A/N: note to self: do not let your otp consume your life. otherwise you will write overly detailed, stupid fluffy smut about them and then torture yourself forever.

Hiyori sees her life in two colors: the gnawing, rainless gray of forgetting, and the hot, pure blue of sudden recollection. The times when she forgets eat away at something inside her, chewing a hole in the center of her chest. She lives for days, feeling it grow under her skin…but all she knows is that it has been there before, that sometimes it opens up wide like a hideous mouth, taunting her with…what? What can't she remember?

She never really gets used to it.

Sitting alone in the library, Hiyori recognizes its fluttering itch again, teasing her past the point of sanity with something very important, very familiar. Something she promised never to forget.

Half-memories flit like ghosts between the pauses in her concentration, and her eyes can't focus on the complicated text in front of her. She sighs, slamming the dog-eared pages shut and shoving the book at arm's length across the flat surface. She shifts uneasily, uncrossing her legs and setting an elbow on the dull wooden desk. With her cheek resting on the knuckles of one fist, Hiyori's attention drifts across the large room, where rows of tall shelves stretch to the opposite wall, and mislaid books scatter the floor in the gaps between them. Dust motes twirl in a slab of chilly afternoon sunlight dropped across the room by the high windows. And there is something winking on the ground: an ember of bronze that strikes her eye vividly in the midst of the grayscale surroundings.

Hiyori stands to collect her bag from the seat next to her, and drops the heavy textbook into it. She decides to pick up something from the bakery on her way home, and reaching into her purse, she searches for the correct amount of money…because whatever she gets, she has to buy three. She walks past the bright, small, winking thing on her way to the exit door, and glances down at it. It's probably a pen someone dropped in the mid-day rush.

It's a five-yen coin.

"Oh!"

She doesn't smell him, but she remembers his smell, and the threads at the edges of the hole in her chest reach for each other, struggling to close the gap. Her cry of surprise draws attention from the few other students working in the library. Hiyori belatedly notices their concerned gazes through her agony of confusion, and weaves her way more quickly through the dusty stacks, leaving the five-yen coin where it lies, glinting.

Everything she passes on her walk home screams an echo of him, and even her heart pumps a two-syllable name that thuds over the noises of traffic, over the chatter of a faceless crowd, over the wind that scuds yesterday's snow over the tops of her boots. She doesn't remember to stop at the bakery.

Her forgotten errand comes suddenly to mind when she arrives home to a cold apartment. She sets her bag down on the kitchen table and begins a half-hearted search of the cupboards for anything edible, unearthing nothing but a half-empty box of cookies and a stray clothespin. She considers: since there's nothing here to eat, she might as well go to…ah…

There it is again: the blankness rippling across stretches of her memory, stealing names out of her mouth. The words she needs flicker at the edges of the emptiness, almost brushing across her tongue, but dancing away again, mocking.

Hiyori breathes out, stops biting her lip in the anxiety of something missing—something is always missing. Maybe it was right of her parents to worry that she is spending too much time alone; maybe this is what happens when she exists in isolation, with only dusty textbooks and empty cupboards for company.

She should at least call Ami or Yama; she says their names out loud, quietly, and with urgent relief, as if to remind herself she still can.

Hiyori walks aimlessly through her apartment, past the living room, bathroom, into her small bedroom, nibbling one of the stale cookies. There is a second set of footsteps she can almost hear—another person spends a lot of his time in these rooms. She hasn't been alone here always. Has she?

Immediately, the loud, strange silence is too big. Invisible, empty eyes stare at her from the blank walls and every hair on Hiyori's neck stands up. Her fingers shake as she sits down at the end of her bed, pulling out her phone and tapping through the contacts for someone to call. A little, nasty voice wriggles out from the hole in her chest: "Still alone. Always alone. Always forgetting."

The other end of the line trills, and her restless fingers twirl the fringe of the scarf she forgot to take off, sloughing melting snow onto the bedspread.

*Hello?*

"Hi, Ami?"

*Hiyori?! You haven't called in weeks!*

"I—I know. I'm sorry, university is so busy for me now."

*You work way too hard. Take a break sometime, and you can meet up with me and Yama! She misses you too—although not as much as that boyfriend of hers…*

A droplet of the melted snow slides over Hiyori's fingernail and drops onto her skirt.

"That would be great."

*Speaking of which: you must have met a handsome medical student by now, Hiyori.*

Her stomach does a funny flip, and words spring to the front of her mouth:

"Actually, I do—"

Hiyori's assertion dies on her lips. With no idea how to explain her conviction that there is someone—someone very special—she leaves Ami hanging in bewildered silence.

*Hiyori?*

She backtracks hastily.

"Well, you know. None of them are buff enough for me anyway."

Ami's exasperated "tch" makes Hiyori smile, even though her thoughts whirl around the point of vortex—the pieces missing from her conversation. Her friends never did understand her Tono obsession.

*Hopeless as always—*

A distant voice on the other end of the line swallows up the rest of Ami's response, and Hiyori waits for her to return to their conversation. The big, angry emptiness has receded a bit—but not enough, and she can't silence the internal, nasty little voice. It keeps buzzing its vicious song in her ear.

Ami responds to the other person, and her voice is distracted, ever so slightly guilty.

*Hiyori, uh…I'd love to talk to you some more, but I really have to be somewhere in ten minutes! Can we meet up sometime? Maybe next week?*

"Oh. Of course, Ami. Sorry!"

*It's no problem. I'll call you and we can set up something with Yama.*

"Sounds good."

*Bye bye!*

"Bye."

Ami's end of the line clicks, loud and final, and Hiyori reaches over to set the phone on her nightstand. Cold seeps out from the hole in her chest, and she wonders if she has always been so solitary. It seems like she would have noticed it before now.

"Always alone. Forgetting your friends. Letting them forget you, move on from you. Disappearing. Always alone."

Hiyori slides her legs up onto the bed, curling her arms around her knees and pushing her face against them. The apartment drops in temperature, and her anxiety pitches upward.

Who does she talk to at times like this? Or has it always been the same—trying only to exist outside of the encroaching silence that pushes inward, closing up her throat. Shaking her head, she does her best to ignore the vacuum clawing its way open, wider and wider on top of her lungs until it's hard to breathe.

Without moving off the bed, she kicks her boots to the ground, the muted thump as they drop swallowed by the quiet and oncoming dark. As she leans back onto the mattress, Hiyori pulls a pillow to her chest. She breathes: long, slow, deep, and…maybe her brain invents it out of necessity, or maybe a memory of a memory surfaces, and…she smells it. The subtle, somewhat spicy, achingly familiar scent that she can almost put a name to.

Hiyori's eyelids drop; she stops thinking about the chilliness and lack of food in her apartment, all the studying she still has to do—the enormous blank spot where all her happiest memories should be. Evening creeps up the walls, and she drifts to sleep.

When she wakes up, disoriented and mouth sticky, the inky blackness of the room drops like a curtain over her eyes. Somehow, it has gotten even colder, and she uncurls herself stiffly from around the pillow, groaning softly at the crick in her neck. The red numbers from the bedside clock blink next to her bed; she slept for over two hours. Disgusted with the waste of her evening, Hiyori gropes blindly for the switch of the small bedside lamp.

Before she finds it, awareness of another presence in the room drops like a bucket of ice over her shoulders. Suppressing a scream, Hiyori lunges for the lamp switch. Yellow light washes over the room, and she launches herself off the bed and away from the other, her back pressed against the wall and arms raised, swinging protectively at chest height.

The intruder stands, frozen, between the wide window, now halfway open, and the bed. He wears a black and white-trimmed tracksuit, boots, and a faded, torn-up scarf tied loosely around his neck. Hiyori's eyes travel upwards from his unusual attire and land on a face—a bit too perfect to pass for human, with such blue, blue eyes. Her own narrow in recognition, and she scolds:

"Yato! You can't just invite yourself into my room to watch me sleep! Don't you see any problems with that?!"

Hiyori clenches her fists, slowly lowering her arms, and the intruder she calls "Yato" lifts one eyebrow questioningly. Then, her jaw drops.

"Oh."

It's the same sensation as when she saw the five-yen coin in the library, that of the threads in her chest reaching together, re-knotting and stitching themselves over the wound. For a moment, she can't speak, and one of her hands hovers over her heart, right where the hollowness is healing.

"Yato."

He takes a tentative step forward—she isn't quite as intimidating as her martial arts idol, but he doesn't want to take any chances—and before he can say anything, she flings herself at him. He staggers backward when she collides heavily against him; her arms wrap so desperately tight around his ribcage. She presses her face against his chest, and her head tucks perfectly, naturally, under his chin.

Memories filter back to her, at first like grainy photographs, then gradually taking on more life and color and movement. Bishamon, Daikoku, Kofuku. Yukine.

Yato.

"What the hell did you do that for?" she whispers, her eyes roughly on a level with his zipper. She can't believe she lived like that for days.

Yato's arms, which he flung out to keep his balance steady, wrap around her. His smell, strong and so much better than any memory she has of it, becomes a part of her. His voice betrays immeasurable relief—though a seed of guilt is there too—:

"Sorry. That took a while, didn't it?"

Her chin against his chest bobs up and down forcefully. He knows she's trying so hard to be angrier with him, and he's glad she can't quite manage it.

"How much did you forget?" he asks softly, seriously.

"A lot," she responds; the tiny crack in her voice spears through him.

"Is it…coming back?"

"Yes," she says quickly—too quickly—now worrying he's going to turn this into a guilt trip for himself. She loosens her grip on him, just a little bit, so she can look into his eyes properly. "Not all at once, but it's returning. Little snippets of it keep…oh!…"

Hiyori blushes impressively, as one of the "snippets" from several weeks ago replays in her mind in rich, devastating detail.

Yato finally grins, catlike.

"Good memories?"

She groans, hiding her brilliant face against his tracksuit.

"Well, some are certainly…wow. Wow."

He can't suppress the smirk covering his face, but it doesn't make up for the fact that he let her forget him, again. And from the looks of it, she hadn't enjoyed it any more than he had. When he slipped in through her window (unlocked, not like the front door), he saw her asleep, but not peaceful. A fitful tremor passed through her hands, which clutched the pillow to her chest, and her forehead was wrinkled, straining even in sleep to recapture the parts of her memory that were always escaping.

He refuses to entertain the possibility that someday, her best memories of him might vanish forever.

Hiyori doesn't expect his silence, so she glances up at him again, the stain of self-consciousness on her cheeks fading slowly.

"Is everything okay?" she asks, apprehensive.

"Definitely."

Yato says it with conviction. Because it is okay. Worlds better than okay.

Hiyori accepts it, and focuses her energy on remembering how it's always been this good, how his presence lights a candle inside her that beckons, strong and comforting. It takes a while for that candle to begin to falter, flickering unsteadily until it gutters out—but when it burns new, that's probably the best.

Yato's hands, which rest one on top of the other against the small of her back, move so that one is on each side of her waist. She leans marginally away from him so he can dip his head towards hers. Hiyori's eyes drift closed as he brushes his lips barely over her mouth, an invisible echo of a kiss that skitters little chills down her neck and spine.

"Yes, everything is okay now," he breathes, when his lips stall at the corner of her mouth. Hiyori doesn't think he meant for her to hear him, but it's hard to avoid when every one of her senses is attuned to him, re-memorizing him. Her fingers tighten their grip on his shirt, and he rests his forehead very softly against hers.

The center drops right out of her stomach when she opens her eyes again and sees both of his, millimeters away, and too, too blue. Her heart rate hiccups, her balance becomes as stable as water.

"Hiyori," he says; she feels the ghost of her name across her skin. The tip of his nose trails underneath her right eye as he kisses her cheek, and then at once moves on to the other one, leaving a warm, invisible spot where he marks her with his lips. Next, she feels his breath at her hairline, and he drops a kiss there, too, right in the center of her forehead. Hiyori inhales, deep, shuddering, and the corners of her lips turn up when he leaves two more slow, light kisses, one on each of her closed eyelids.

She loosens her fists against Yato's back, and brings her hands around to the front of his jersey, climbing up from his waist to his chest, so her fingers tease the very edge of the scarf around his neck. He pauses, his breath whispering against the skin above her eyebrow.

"I remember…something like this," she murmurs, heat rushing to her cheeks as his thumbs tap quietly against her ribs.

"Really?" he asks, a layer of happy surprise coloring his tone. "So, what happens next?"

She shivers, but not from the temperature of the room. Once she tries to catch up with her memories, they tumble farther out of reach. It's even more difficult, too, when he pulls her closer, pressing himself to her, stomach to stomach, and when his open lips glide from in front of her ear to just below her earlobe, his cheek level with her jawline.

"Hmm…I'm sure it'll come back to me," she hedges, and Yato chuckles, smiling into her skin. He lifts his head again to look at her, and strokes tiny circles over her ribs with his thumbs. His eyes fix purposefully on her parted lips, and tingling warmth spreads across her cheeks again; his eager gaze awakens something deeper, greedier. Leaning in, he closes the last millimeter between their mouths, sealing his lips over hers and swallowing the breathless noise released through her teeth.

His hands press hot on either side of her waist, and she locks her fingers into his clothes; if either of them lets go, she might melt into a boneless heap on the floor. The sweet tentativeness of his touch gives way to hungry need, and his tongue flicks against her lips until she opens for him. Against her waist, one of his hands grips her shirt desperately, and the other travels farther around her back, open palm pressed against her spine and up, up to the base of her neck where it buries in her loose, tangled hair.

Hiyori's hands are trapped between their bodies, palms flat against Yato's jersey, but even as her thoughts are set adrift in the mind-numbing heat of his kisses she manages to tug feebly at the zipper. He smiles against her lips, blissfully amused at her impatient, half-struggling movements. His hand on her waist loosens, and she makes enough space between them to pull his zipper down all the way. He doesn't release her mouth, using his teeth to gently catch her full lower lip, and the little gasp he drags from her etches itself into his memory.

Once his jersey is unzipped, Hiyori starts sliding it off his shoulders, and she runs into trouble here because his hands are still on her, one sifting through her hair, the other pressed flat against her spine. He helps her, shrugging quickly out of the sleeves and letting both it and his ragged scarf drop to the floor before he touches her again, eagerly, starvingly, like she'll disappear any second.

Yato lets her recover for two seconds, long enough for him to hear the frantic stutter of her pulse close to the skin and her breath: short and quick. He feels his own mirrored response. With Hiyori, he can nearly see himself as human: his heart races the same way hers does, his breathing trips over itself when she skates her hands searchingly under his white shirt, every inch of his body that touches hers is set on fire. A god should not be so fragile, so susceptible to the same wants and hungers as humans are. But he is.

Hiyori's hands—still very cold from the chill of the room—pause on top of his skin.

"I really don't want to forget this, too," she whispers. Her uncertainty flutters in the small spaces between them. She can't think about what it will be like when the grim hole opens inside her again, when her entire heart will scream incompleteness. The edges of the wound will creep outwards until there's a raw, aching spot where her life should be.

It isn't the language of a wish. He can't take five yen from her and promise to protect her memories forever. The two of them dance a dangerous, vulnerable waltz between the Near Shore and the Far—it's already incredible that Hiyori has managed to remember as much as she has, and for as long. But Yato plays a game with himself, and for the few things she does forget, he creates new memories with her: better, richer. Ones that sink so deeply into her soul that she'd have to forget her own identity to lose them altogether.

"Our fates are forever intertwined, remember?" he says, winding his long fingers through the hair that falls over her shoulder. "It takes a lot more than a lapse of memory to undo that kind of a knot."

Her eyes search him, and she can see that he means it—that it would devastate him as much as it would her if, through some awful necessity, he cut his ties to her and gave her the terrible gift of a normal, human existence.

Because he's trying to reassure her, and he's not sure if it's working, she decides to tease:

"Still, it would be nice if there was something worth remembering. Maybe I just forget because our time together has been so boring."

Hiyori giggles at Yato's expression of exaggerated offense, right before he tugs her close and seals his lips over hers, cutting off her laughter. He claims her mouth—possessive, "mine,"—and in a few seconds she loses track of what was so funny. His hands trap her face as they break apart again, and his cheeks are endearingly flushed, eyes slightly hazy.

"I dare you to forget that."

He tips her head back, gently, firmly, and sucks hard at the dip of her jawline beneath her ear—"or that,"—at the pulse point that jumps unevenly under his lips—"or that,"—at the junction of her neck and shoulder, one of his hands pushing aside her scarf and dropping it to the floor next to his jersey—"or that."

She struggles to keep her breathing regular and her knees strong, but the only thing holding her upright is the electric current flaring between Yato's lips and her skin. He must realize this, because he nudges her backwards, towards the foot of her small bed, and guides her down to sit on the edge with the slight pressure of his wrist on her shoulder. As he kneels in front of her, his other hand searches near her waist, below the open winter jacket she never took off, beneath the thinner shirt under it. He kisses his way from the top of her shoulder to her collarbone, pushing the thick jacket down farther on her arms. She withdraws her hands from him and lets him remove it completely; buries her nose in his hair and inhales, steadying.

"Still bored?" he queries, his face hidden against her.

"Uh…" Hiyori loses concentration, running her hands through his hair. He smells too nice for her to think straight.

"Good." And he licks her collarbone, sending a streak of white fire plummeting deep, tingling below her stomach. With her sitting on the edge of the bed, and him on his knees in front of her, they are so perfectly aligned—face-to-face, hip-to-hip. Unhesitatingly, she wraps one leg around his waist. Yato's breathing stutters as she molds herself to him, and when she slides her hips purposefully against his, she feels the immediate, thrilling convulsion of his body against hers. She grins mischievously at the top of his head, pleased with her effect on him.

Distracted, he lets his lips come away from her skin and surveys the damp, scorching mark left there. He's unblushingly triumphant to see the vivid evidence of his touch on her. Then, she does that little roll again, sinking her fingers deeper into his hair as he takes both his hands off her and places them on the mattress, one on either side of her hips. Hiyori notices that even though his head rests gently against her shoulder, his knuckles are straining, bone white. She hitches her right leg over his hip, her ankle and heel curling around the back of his leg. Tentative, experimental, she mimics the position with her other leg, and is met with a satisfying growl from the god in her arms.

Yato's hands dig into the thin bedspread; he wants to draw this out, to give her a million freshly minted memories, but it's made difficult when she's already pinpointed his weakness. Then, she wriggles, less-than-innocently pressing her curves against his chest, arching against him, stoking the deeper heat that sparkles between them, and that is absolutely the last he can take.

Hiyori gasps when he picks her up, her center of balance shifting against him as he grips behind her knees. He stands up carefully, keeping her tucked close to him as he sets one knee on the edge of the bed. Then, suddenly, smoothly, she's lying back on the mattress and his face is above her, less than a whisper of distance between them.

Yato is a god of calamity, has carved with unstoppable strokes a path of bloodshed through the centuries, but his hands tremble when Hiyori reaches out for them. She sets them against her ribs, fingertips nearly brushing the sides of her curves, and pulls him down toward her for a kiss: deep, and drugging. His hesitation doesn't last long, and she makes a soft noise when he palms one breast through her thin shirt. He squeezes slightly harder, thumb catching over her nipple, which begins to harden under his attentions. She sighs, and her fingers rake through the soft, shorter hairs at the nape of his neck. She never unlocks her legs from around him, using her leverage to arch up against his body, pushing his entire hand close to her breast.

When he rips away from her mouth, her small whine of loss becomes a breathy moan, because he's sliding his other hand beneath her shirt, electrifying the nerves of her bare skin. The fabric creates an uncomfortable ridge under her upper back, and bunches beneath where he cups his hand against her chest, so Hiyori guides his fingers away from her. She shimmies out of the long-sleeved T-shirt to toss it aside, and hears his breath catch.

She thinks she's correct, but just to make sure:

"You've seen me…before now. Haven't you?"

Yato's gaze sweeps over her skin, and again she shivers.

"Yes."

With two fingers, he slides one of her bra straps farther down on her arm, and kisses her shoulder lightly.

"But I never really remember how beautiful you are."

Hiyori doesn't roll her eyes at how cheesy he is—partly because it's the most perfect thing she's ever heard, and partly because he's so busy appreciating her silently with his hands and lips. There's still too much clothing between them, so her hands seek out the edge of his shirt and tug it clumsily over his back. She grumbles when Yato grins amusedly at her failure to lift it higher than his ribcage, and instead pulls it over his own head with ease. Pleased, she notices his laughter dies suddenly when her insatiable fingers search out the planes of his exposed stomach, making his muscles quiver tight beneath the skin.

The room used to seem cold, but now all Hiyori can feel is the fire licking inside her veins and deep below the pit of her stomach. He is touching her too fast, too much, and at the same time too slow and not enough—not nearly enough. She can't make her fingers work quickly enough to help him rid her of her thick skirt and the winter tights under it, which slip to the floor alongside both pairs of their boots.

Yato sets one hand low on her hip, the other pulling her slightly off the mattress, up towards him. With a fluid movement, he unhooks the back of her bra—using only one hand—and even through the haze of anticipation, her eyebrows pull together.

Yato pauses, concerned that she might be rethinking this, that she might need more time to remember what "they" are.

"You've had practice," she says hoarsely. It's dragged out of her; she's reluctant to air her small worries.

For half a second, he doesn't understand. Then—

"Oh, Hiyori." His comical, catlike grin makes her groan internally. "On you, of course."

The mixture of adoration and exasperation in his tone floods her cheeks, once again, with uncomfortable warmth.

"I knew that!"

She squeezes her eyes shut, and wishes her memories would cooperate with her for once. Being with him is familiar, home, but at the same time the details squirm resolutely out of her grasp.

Yato stops grinning, kisses her once—chastely, for insurance—and waits for her blessing to continue. It's one of his many self-imposed restrictions: whatever happens, and how quickly it happens, is entirely up to her.

Still, he feels light-headed as she carefully slips the bra off herself, leaving her almost completely bare in the yellow dimness of the room. She has yet to overcome her brief embarrassment—her face is so perfectly rosy, and he can't speak or breathe. Four fingers of his left hand still rest under her shoulder blade, and if he moves his thumb, he can trace the sensitive outline of her breast until goose bumps raise across her skin, until she releases one of those quiet noises that makes it hard—very, very hard—for him to be slow.

He strokes, barely there along the side of the soft swell. She reaches up towards him to ground herself, and her hands clutch his shoulders, nails digging in as he swirls feathery patterns into her skin. He lowers his head to drop damp, rousing kisses beneath her left collarbone, and moves down to the shallow valley between her breasts. Even though she twists her torso, trying to direct his attention to her nipples, he keeps evading where she needs his touch most.

The ache spurred by his teasing becomes unbearable, but Hiyori knows he just wants to accommodate her—so she gives him a signal that's impossible to ignore. Her fingers drift innocently down from his shoulders, following the long curve of his spine, and against the waistband of his tracksuit. Then, without warning, she bends her elbow, aiming farther down over the front fabric of his pants. Yato chokes out a gasp when she cups him firmly through the material, and his hands clench, twitching. He lifts his head to look at her, and her lips are bruised, her eyes focused and filled with need. Looking at her makes his world spin—although that might also be caused by her unrelenting grip on his arousal.

She squeezes, once, and he bucks against her, a growl ripping from his throat.

"Hiyori…ah…wait—wait—"

She obliges, withdrawing her hand and tapping a delicate rhythm against his waistband as he struggles to quiet his breathing. Then, to her delight, he lowers his head again, taking the point of her breast in his mouth and rolling her nipple under his tongue. She makes a keening sort of gasp, her head dropping back and neck arching against the bed, while the thumb of his other hand hooks beneath her underwear, sliding them off her entirely.

She wants more—so he'll give her more. While he kneads the firm flesh of one peak in his hand, sucking and teasing the other, his other hand climbs the inside of her thigh. He feels the ribbons of tension that course through her, echoed in the small gasps tumbling from her lips. When he reaches her center, running a finger over, against, around the nub at the top, she utters a short, strangled cry that shoots straight to his groin. He pushes in, slowly, listening through the thundering in his ears for any sign that she wants him to stop. He doesn't hear it.

Hiyori doesn't have the benefit of remembering what she likes, but luckily, Yato does. Her legs shake as he presses at a perfect angle, working gently around her most sensitive point, and deep in her core, until she has to nearly bite her lip bloody to keep quiet. Her fingers fist against the bed, nails digging in painfully as he keeps his rhythm steady, twisting his finger against something magical inside her, that curls up, up, up and outward until she sees white, and the liquid fire building below her stomach shoots to the end of every nerve.

She returns to earth slowly, head spinning. When she opens her eyes, she is transfixed by the burning blue stare less than two inches from her face. The strain and intensity in his face begins to reawaken the quick, quivering feeling inside her. He's so close to her, and his beautiful smell trickles into all the little cracks that opened up while she was forgetting him.

Breathless, she reaches her hand up and strokes the side of his face, drifting her thumb across a perfect cheekbone, fingertips brushing through the long bangs that swing down towards her. Yato exhales slightly, eyes closing as he lets his face rest against her hand. Some of his built-up tension siphons away, but the rest stays coiled up in him like a spring.

Quickly, her other hand finds him again, reaching beneath his pants and closing directly around him. Yato's eyes fly open, and she smiles up at him, victorious. Then again, she could be laughing right in his face, and he would still think her expression reflected the stars. She gives two long, smooth strokes, leaving his arms weak and his hips thrusting shallowly into her hand. He attempts to say something, but she catches him off guard with her entire hand tightening around his length. His head falls forward, and he releases a groan that muffles low against the side of her neck. Hiyori's hand fists deep in his hair, holding his face against her neck as she strokes, long and languorous, with the other. The heavy, agitated rhythm of his breathing affects her, and she notices the molten, swelling feeling growing again below her stomach.

He catches her wrist after just a few more pumps, and his fingers are trembling, tension wound to the near-limit. He quickly rids himself of his clothes and returns to balance close above her, his forearms on either side of her head—nothing but air and heat between their bodies. Hiyori takes a deep breath, and, reaching, finds him again, guiding him to her entrance without unlocking her eyes from his. She counts, inhaling deeply, the seconds it takes for all of him to join her, and she isn't surprised at how comfortable it is; they were always meant to fit together.

Yato doesn't move at first, drawing a full, steadying breath into his lungs, but the smell and sensation of her drives all else from his mind. She adjusts to him, tipping her pelvis up marginally, and he sinks deeper. He clutches one of her hips, so hard it will probably bruise, drawing out slowly, achingly—and then drives in all at once, tearing an ecstatic cry from her lips that she can't hear through the crazed, electric pump of her blood.

He sets a rhythm of long, smooth thrusts, and she squeezes her eyes closed and arches her neck, baring a smooth expanse of skin for him to drag over with lips and teeth. He builds up speed, quickening, gripping her and raising her lower body up to meet his. Her gasps and cries unspool in the air around him, and the ones that sound like his name twist the cord of tension that is already perilously close to snapping. She is wrapped so tight around him, legs locked fast around his body, her fingernails clawing down his back. He's strangled by her warmth, and softness, and revels in the scream of rapture that precedes her climax. He loses sight of himself; everything drowned out by the roaring white that pours through his body and extinguishes everything in his mind but Hiyori.

She holds him when he collapses against her. She knows she's seen what he's like before now, but even so it throws her like a punch: the ecstasy of a god isn't something easily forgotten. His warm weight drapes over her body as he rides the wake of his expenditure. She runs her hands from his back, over his loose shoulders and into his hair, massaging. He stirs after a few seconds, shifting himself off her, and pulls her towards him, rolling until they lie tangled, face-to-face. Yato's eyes flutter open, his expression lazily euphoric.

For a time, she lets the comfortable silence expand between them. Then, she whispers:

"I remember now: I said I wanted to stay with you forever."

His eyes shoot wide open, boring into hers. Hiyori's are honest—wide, unshuttered windows.

"Forever is a long time," he says, even though his soul joyfully chants: she remembers. She remembers.

She doesn't blink, but her lips tip up when she responds:

"I know. I'm counting on it."

He doesn't say anything to that, and Hiyori doesn't know what to do with the look he's giving her: something between outright shock and utter worship. This he should already know: that she passed the point of doubt a very long time ago.

Before too much time passes, before she can blush at her unabashed response, Yato's stomach growls loudly. She's also stopped wondering about how a god, of all things, could ever get hungry. He hears it too, and adopts an expression of intense suffering. The next thing he says makes Hiyori hide her face in her hands and groan.

"Do you have any food here?"