"Going anywhere fast?"

Blinking at me like that, he looks so cute it's hard to believe we're in a sleazy place like this, about to engage in a sleazy thing like that. "Nope," he replies steadily, a smile making its way over his cherry red lips like light springtime warmth seeping into my bones. "Ready to get it over with?"

I'll never tire of how to the point he can be. It's a refreshing change from all the ones before him, eager to dally around and try to screw with me. I appreciate that he's willing to accommodate me, take care of me rather than indulge me in a merry chase that would end up in more of a nowhere than this tiny bar set off the main road. "As ready as you are," I say, "and you seem ready."

"I am." He takes my hand, his small fingers giving mine a squeeze that says, "Let's go," without him having to utter another word. We weave in and out of the crowd, ducking here and swerving there to avoid the dancers, the lovers, the drunks. I've never seen this many people in this bar, not in all the times I've been here - and I've been here a lot, becoming a regular patron not long after I discovered the place and proved to the bartender that I'm good for a few expensive drinks. They like me for it, the revenue I bring them. Tonight's no exception. No doubt they're secretly glad I've dragged a date along with me.

As close to a date as I get these days. I squeeze his hand back and his lips part in another rewarding smile, sweet sugar to my hungry eyes. Then we're at the door to the bathroom and I don't say anything. He doesn't say anything. We stand for a few minutes, looking into each other's eyes. I am the first one to blink, surprising myself. I've always won staring contests in the past.

He takes the lead, pushing open the door with a practically inaudible creak that disappears into the overpowering beat of the dance music that thrums through the building and into my body. Where the bar is dark, a heady mingling of smells, the bathrooms are brightly lit. It's like walking out of a movie theater into the afternoon sunlight and my eyes blink rapidfire, unaccustomed to the brilliant fluorescent bulbs reflected on the gleaming tile.

"Okay," he says. He didn't need to say it. I know it and he knows it. We're going into one of those stalls, locking the door, and that'll be that. Right? Right.

Standing in the cramped bathroom stall with him, though, I start having second thoughts.

His eyes are luminous, glittering with outer and inner light and bright with what I assume is anticipation. In the darkness of the bar, they looked indigo, consuming light with the powerful ease of a black hole, gleaming only when the lights of the dance floor hit them just right. The light here turns them closer to lavender, two spots of color in his white face, contrasting with the splash of red that is his pretty mouth, silky smooth like a brand new rose petal. I kiss him slowly, tasting the lipstick and swiping at it with my tongue. I feel like wiping it all off, swallowing it like his eyes swallowed the light, but I pull back and he giggles. The urge passes when he says, "You've got lipstick all over your mouth." Stuff tastes Godawful. I'm smarter not to do that. "That's okay, though." He beams at me, lips with their now-smeared lipstick parting to show a flick of crimson on his teeth. Seems I wasn't the only one getting his lipstick in my mouth. "What?"

"I got some on your teeth," I chuckle. He pretends to glare at me. He's no good at it and I laugh louder, unable to control myself. Here I'm trying to screw this guy and I'm laughing at him, giving him the impression that I'm mocking him.

"So get it back off," he orders. He's no good at being bossy, either; it comes out more like a petulant child trying to put his foot down and get what he wants. Spoiled.

I kiss him again, more fiercely this time, driving my tongue into his mouth so he gives a tiny squeak of shock before kissing me back. I'm lucky to be with somebody so cute, this alluring stranger I'd never've had a chance with in the real world. Welcome to the bar scene, I guess. His tongue starts to work against mine and bingo! we're really going.

I think, maybe, I'm not going to be able to let this go once I get to it. I think I might have to ask him to let me take him home with me, he's that cute. Step into my laboratory, my specimen; I'm intrigued more than I've ever been with a bar pick-up date. If you call it a date, which I wouldn't. Wouldn't but for my temptation to stop this now and offer him a way out. "Do you really want to have sex with a stranger in a bathroom?" I could ask.

My mouth stays pressed to his, hot and sweet, like the soft hands he's wrapping around my biceps, giving my muscles a squeeze as though appraising me. As we stop to breathe, I read his thought in his eyes. You'll do.

"Do you -"

He looks up at me through the fringe of his eyelashes, strangely dark for a redhead. The gesture is just plain shy, making me wonder what I've unwittingly gotten myself into. I mean, shit, I don't know how old he is. I don't know his name. I don't know jack about him but that he's adorable and he tantalizes me, driving me to a giddy, almost idiotic flighty sensation. I think I'm experiencing my first ever population of stomach butterflies.

"Do I what?" he prompts finally.

"I was thinking," I begin. A lot of other people'd smirk and comment on how revolutionary that is. They would warn me not to hurt myself or kill off my last remaining brain cells. Jerks. Affectionately, I grin at the memories. My grin slips off my face, though, and I get serious to finish the question. "D'you wanna go somewhere else?"

Those glowing eyes sparkle all the more and his smile broadens. The lipstick on his teeth is gone, long since in one of our stomachs. "You mean out to a different bar, or do you mean somewhere more private, like, say, your home?"

"I was thinking my apartment, but I'll get the hint if you're not into that." Boy, would I. What a spectacular welcome to the scene that would be. Pick up the hottest piece of ass this side of the world, get him into a position that could be called willingly vulnerable, and then blow it on trying to move things too far too fast. Great. I almost flinch, waiting for the refusal and the harsh words.

A thing of the past. I thought I'd gotten away from being degraded every other sentence. Huh.

"I have the hint that you're interested in something more than a bar bathroom quickie," he states the obvious. "And to be honest, I couldn't agree with you more. Do you have a car?"

I can't help the grin that plasters itself all over my face, slapped on there involuntarily and lighting me up. "Come with me."

I hear the music and smell the sweat, the booze, the perfume and cologne and the musk of sex. I hear girls tittering and husky male voices, the clink of glasses against he bar. It doesn't matter. None of it could be more important than him, walking at my side with our hands linked tightly. The night is cold, but that doesn't detract from anything. I open the door for him once we're standing outside my car in the garage a block away. "Thank you," he smiles, climbing in. Even that is graceful. To think he could've been with any other eligible man in the bar, and he picked me. He's going home with me, staying with me for the night, maybe. Maybe more than that, if Lady Luck has a real crush on me.

"What's your name?" he asks me. I look over at him and see his eyes indigo as I turn the key in the ignition.

"Sanosuke," I reply, "but you don't have to call me that. Just Sano."

"Nice to meet you, Sano," he says amiably, "I'm Kenshin."

Seems she has more than an ordinary crush on me.

The darkness of the apartment is perfect for dropping my keys carelessly on the couch and kissing him lightly on the forehead without a word between us. Neither of us talks, our breathing filling the silence on the quick walk to the bedroom. It's a small room and I feel a flash of shame bringing him here to my clean, but unmade, bed. There's a pile of dirty clothes in the hamper and my punching bag - ugly thing, dammit, but it's useful on those pissed off days - makes for a hulking shadow in the corner.

"I'm glad you brought me here," he - Kenshin - murmurs, wrapping his slight arms around me to give me a kiss. As close to chaste as we're gonna get tonight, I bet. I return the kiss, deepening it. Our tongues clash, hands scraping against clothes in search of skin. Under the bitter lipstick, he tastes sweet, his small tongue slick on mine, teasing the roof of my mouth and moaning when I do the same to him, pulling his tongue into my mouth to suck on it lightly. "Really glad," he adds, gasping for breath when we pull apart. I flick out my tongue to break the thin thread of saliva hanging between our mouths and he stifles a giggle.

Kenshin peels off my shirt and I peel off his, both of us looking the other over. Not like fresh meat, not like a predator studies its prey. I relax, comfortable with the way his eyes rove down my bare chest to my crotch. Hello to you, too. He grins, seeing my reaction to his kisses, his presence, his gaze. Taking the shirts, broadening that tiny, naughty grin, he tosses our clothes into my hamper as we take them off. I know from then on that we'll be fine.

Finally naked, I lift him and lay him back on the messy sheets of my bed, crawling over him on all fours. Our foreheads are touching, the light sweat on our skin making us seem to stick that way for a minute. I break the contact and kiss him again, lighter kisses that I draw out one by one until we're in another lip lock. I try not to laugh into Kenshin's mouth when his fingertips trace tickling lines on my lower back, trailing down so he can take hold of my ass. Sure doesn't waste any time, does he.

"Hold on," I mutter. I plant a quick kiss on his cheek and lean over. I pat around on the floor underneath the edge of my bed, soon finding the cool plastic of the tube I'm searching for, right next to a luckily-positioned, never-been-used box of condoms. It's convenient to have the stuff lying around; never know when you'll need it, see? I waggle the tube at him and he smiles, his teeth visible in the faint light shining in the window from the street below.

Neither of us is a virgin. Thank God. I squeeze plenty of lube onto my fingers, just in case he's a tight one. He looks tight. Little ass, thin hips... He's tight, yeah, unbelievably tight. But he's nice and willing and everything, down to the last breathy moan he tries to choke back as I push my middle finger in, goes without a hitch.

So it's no surprise that when I'm really inside him, buried to the hilt between those pale white, perfect thighs, his cries are perfect. Faint at first, they rise to fever pitch along with my arousal. Our bodies are synchronized flawlessly, my rhythm meeting his and collaborating to compose the right song. It's perfect, all of it. He's perfect.

His scream as my world goes white is perfect.

His breathing beside me later as I drift awake and teeter weirdly on the edge of sleep, is even. And it's perfect.

Sunlight, bright as his smile, warms me into waking up. I glare at the light for a minute, my eyes unable to take it after all that prowling around in the dark last night. The space next to me in bed is empty and for a few minutes, I'm filled with rushing panic, the drum of my heartbeat in my ears, causing an aching in the veins of my throat.

The sound of the shower in the bathroom brings me back to reality and I let out a sigh. I'm stupid to think Kenshin would up and leave like that. He isn't the kind of guy who'd do that to me. I can tell. One night and I know with some crazy, almost dreamlike intuition tells me I know him. It whispers something else, too. I don't trust that whisper yet. I have to give it time.

I get up and toss on some loose pajama pants, a kinda raggedy pair that I haven't worn in months. I haven't needed to. I'm not so modest when I don't have company. Screwy word to use, considering what Kenshin and I did last night; I shrug it off and go to toss together some breakfast, making a pot of coffee. He comes into the room, bearing the wet heat of the shower with him, his red hair dark down his back and leaving damp spots on the t-shirt he's wearing. "I'm sorry," Kenshin says. He's noticed the same thing. "I didn't think I should put on my clothes from last night, and I took the liberty of borrowing one of your shirts. Is it all right?"

"More'n all right," I say. "Do you want breakfast?"

I have my heart in my throat. He's going to say no. He's going to say, "The sex was great, but I just want to wash my clothes and be on my way." He's going to turn me down and leave me alone like a jilted admirer, isn't he?

"Thanks!" he beams.

He's not?

"If you don't mind, of course," he adds tactfully. Kenshin is one for being polite, and while I have no problem with that, it's strange to me to have somebody talking to me like I deserve their good manners.

"No problem. It's already done." I point to the coffee pot and then to the toaster. I shop for one person - not a picky eater - and I wonder if he'll hold it against me that I only had the ingredients for toast and cereal. Damn my rice steamer for being broken.

"Thanks," he says again. He puts two pieces of toast on a plate for me, two on a plate for him, and digs in my fridge like he's been here for years along with me. "Do you want marmalade?" he asks, his head still turned away from me. His voice is muffled and the question sounds funny; I force myself not to laugh. I can't let him think I'm making fun of him.

"Sure." I didn't know I had marmalade.

He slathers a thick coating of marmalade over all four slices of toast and puts my plate in front of me, standing beside me and awaiting the verdict. It's cute, picturing this happening every morning. Cute to imagine him playing housewife like this even if he's obviously a man. I can testify on that. "'S good," I tell him with my mouth full.

He bursts out laughing. Between giggles, he mock scolds me, "Don't talk with your mouth full, Sano."

My name in his voice is sweeter than the heavy marmalade on my toast. Mouth emptied, I smile. Big and goofy, but I could care less how stupid I look when I smile like that. I want to smile because he's smiling and I'm feeling the best I have in ages.

"Yes, ma'am," I snicker.

Kenshin puts his plate down and grabs the dishtowel from the counter to whip it at me. It doesn't hurt; it's shocking, though, so I let out a confused noise close to a yell. He laughs again. His laugh is pretty - no, beautiful. Fitting. When he sits down across from me, his violet eyes are sparkling, reflecting the sunlight, channeling its cheerfulness with his own. I love that. I love how happy he is, how cute he is, how he's willing to stay here with me, some bum he met in a bar and followed home. I love that he let me have sex with him, that he'll help make breakfast, even something as simple as toast.

How is it possible to really love someone no more than twelve hours after you've met them?

I can see it in his eyes that he's wondering the same thing. Neither of us address it. We don't have to.

As Kenshin is washing our dishes in the sink, idly scrubbing at a sticky fleck of marmalade with his thumb, he asks me, "What day is it today?"

"Uhh, April something-or-other," I answer. Real smart. I lean over and look at the calendar hanging across the room. "April thirtieth. Why?"

There's complete quiet for a minute, his thumb stopping. His body's all tensed and I stand up, pulling him away from the still-running water and drying his hands for him, then wrapping my arms around his waist from behind. "Why?" I ask again, since he hasn't answered me yet.

"Sano, I'm going to sound forward, and I apologize for that," he says, little pink tongue sliding out to wet darker pink lips. "It's stupid."

"What is? Tell me!" I insist. I rock him back and forth slightly, keeping my grip on him nice and tight, holding onto the warm springtime light that seems tangible in his body.

"The lease on my apartment ends in a month," Kenshin says. His words are slow. He's tasting them as he says them, getting a good sense for the thoughts in his mind. I know the feeling. My mind is at top speed, not slowing down no matter how I try to think logically and draw a normal conclusion from what he's told me. "Do you feel it?" He places his hands over mine, warm and pale and seeming to shine with the sunlight that touches them, reflecting the light.

I feel it. I feel the light in him, the light that he reflects and I absorb. I feel the strange love I've felt from the second, last night in that sterile white bathroom stall, that I wasn't going to be able to let him go, not then, not this morning, not ever. I feel this inexplicable desire to look into his eyes and watch the light play across his beautiful violet irises. I feel overwhelmed and funny and I can't describe it, but I know we've met each other before and I want to grasp that thought so it won't run away from me.

"Yeah," I say, taking hold of his hands. "It doesn't make any sense."

"It doesn't have to." Kenshin beams at me, a source of light all on his own. I grin back, basking in the combined rays of the morning sun and his happiness coursing through him and into me. I've caught the bug and I want to keep it with me forever, a firefly that isn't going to go out with the end of this summer, or even next summer. I want to keep a strong, tight hold on the light and never, ever let it go.

Boxes clutter my living room by the end of the week and we both know he's home.