Cheap Perfume
By Aja
DISCLAIMER: Gravitation and its characters belong to Maki Murakami and not me. I just keep borrowing them. This ONE-SHOT is rated R and not intended for immature readers. Mature readers, enjoy!
To my beta readers, Bakayaro_onna and Pato-san: THANK YOU! ^_^
***
The smell hit Eiri before he even heard Shuichi come in through the door. It was a nose-tickling, neck-ruffling scent of cheap perfume. Eiri wrinkled his nose and pushed back from his computer. His chair rolled over the floor with a soft clatter just as the front door burst open and Shu yelled, “I’m home!” Eiri came to the study doorway and clapped his hand over his nose as the full impact of the smell was realized. Eiri choked uncontrollably and his eyes watered from the thick, but invisible, wafting stench clinging to Shuichi.
“I know,” Shu said miserably. “No one would stand near me on the subway, either. I’m going to wash!” Shu dropped his bag and started stripping his clothes off as he headed directly toward the bathroom. Meanwhile, Eiri gasped a breath and hurried to open the balcony doors. The fact that it was late February and the temperature was only about 35 degrees [1] outside made no difference at all. The fumes had to go! On the balcony, Eiri took a deep breath of cold air and let it sweep through the apartment in an attempt to dispel the putrid cloud of perfume Shuichi had brought home with him.
What in the world had happened? Why had Shuichi been doused with that evil-smelling stuff? It was a horrid, flowery scent gone very, very bad. Eiri wiped his eyes and braved the hallway. First, he propped the living room door open, then the apartment’s front door, trying to air the place out. The rooms became very cold almost instantaneously, but the scent persisted. What was this shit and why wouldn’t it go away? Wasn’t perfume supposed to dissipate quickly? He went into the bathroom to get some answers.
Opening the bathroom door filled the hall with a fresh dose of noxious vapors. Eiri gagged on the smell. “Shuichi! What the hell happened?” He yelled, accusingly, over the sound of the shower.
“Well, after Bad Luck finished for the day, Hiro said he had to leave because he had a dentist appointment, but I still had to talk to Suguru about the latest song we’re working on. The—“
Eiri coughed and distastefully picked up Shuichi’s stinking clothing. “The short version!”
“Um, okay . . . A girl dumped perfume on me.”
Eiri sighed. “That much, I figured out on my own!”
“Eiri~!”
“Nevermind! I’m putting these clothes in the washer.”
“Okay. Hey! Don’t turn it on ‘til I’m done in here, okay?” Shu called.
“Idiot,” Eiri muttered. He coughed a little more as he held Shu’s clothes away from his body at arm’s reach— as if that was going to do any good, Eiri thought to himself. His eyes were tearing again. How was such a stench created? Did people actually believe this smelled good? Were there some insane people who were *attracted* to such a scent? Perhaps olfactory-deprived assholes somewhere made the stuff and stored it in giant barrels to age it, and ferment it, like brandy. With an inarticulate snarl of disgust, Eiri dropped the offensive clothing into the washer and closed the lid.
The house had gone from sort-of chilly to utterly frigid in the past few minutes as February winds blew through the apartment. Eiri went into the bedroom and put on a sweater. Then, he grabbed Shuichi’s robe and took it to the bathroom. The kid was shutting the shower off when Eiri opened the door.
“Shit! Why is it so cold in here, Eiri? Haven’t you had the heater on today?”
“It’s all your fault,” Eiri told him. “I had to open the doors to air the house out, so quit whining. Dry off and put this on.” Eiri held the kid’s robe out to him as he stepped out of the shower. “Wait a minute!” Eiri withdrew the robe, pulling it away from Shuichi’s grasp and he stepped closer to sniff his lover. “Get back in the shower! You still stink!”
Shu snatched his robe out of Eiri’s hand and sneezed. “I already washed my hair twice! I’ve soaped all over, too. I’m clean!”
Eiri crossed his arms over his chest and glared at his lover. “I don’t care. You’re not coming any closer to me until that rancid scent is gone!”
“Eiri,” Shu whined, as he pulled on his robe. “It isn’t my fault! It’s those stupid door people!” Eiri raised one eyebrow, silently asking for explanation. Shu huffed. He put his towel over his hair, bent over, and rubbed vigorously, while he talked. Eiri leaned against the bathroom doorway, keeping the door open to let the late February breeze try to clear the air in the bathroom, too. “The back door was being worked on, ‘cuz the new security door panels were having some bugs and so they were all blocked off,” Shu related. He picked up his head and frowned at Eiri. “They even had the elevator consoles torn apart, so people couldn’t ride down to the parking garage. The only way out of the NG Building was by the main doors, where all the fans are staked out.“ Shu hung his towel up.
“So what’s the problem? Weren’t you wearing a hat and glasses or something?”
“Eiri, I’m freezing! Have a little pity and shut the door!”
“No,” Eiri said, refusing Shuichi. “That perfume is revolting and the damned doors are staying open until that disgusting shit has been completely exorcised from this house!”
Shu sneezed again. “Then I’m getting dressed before I catch a cold!”
“Good choice,” Eiri told him, acerbically. Shu gave him a dirty look and muttered something derogatory as he passed into the hall. Eiri propped the bathroom door open because it seemed as if the nasty scent trail had already permeated the tiles in the bathroom. Maybe it was time to set Shu to the task of bleaching every corner of the room?
Letting cold air in wasn’t accomplishing much other than bringing the indoor temperature down to outdoor temperature. The whole house stank. Marvelous, Eiri thought sarcastically. What stupid cow would have dumped perfume on Shuichi— and why? Shuichi’s natural body scent smelled so good all by itself; why did some bitch have to go and pollute that? Eiri found himself severely annoyed with all feminine kind who used scented chemicals in make-up compounds, skin lotions, scented soaps, and cursed nostril-burning perfumes. (The fact he used cologne, he considered to be completely immaterial.)
In a few minutes, Shuichi came out of the bedroom wearing jeans, a white t-shirt, an orange sweatshirt, thick brown socks, and a fleece cap with rounded ears sewn on it. Eiri couldn’t tell what sort of ears they were supposed to be, because the cap was blue. The kid still smelled like he’d been liberally dunked in cheap perfume. Perhaps the scent was a little less-strong, but it was definitely detectable and it still wafted in the air behind Shuichi as he moved.
“How long are we going to leave all the doors open, Eiri? The neighbors are going to start complaining when icicles form in the hallway!”
“Forget it. Tell me what happened after you went out the main doors at NG.”
Shu sighed. “I’m hungry. If you’re gonna make me cold, I need fuel.” Shuichi headed for the kitchen and Eiri followed him, trying to avoid Shu’s direct path so he could keep out of range of the perfume’s evil spoor. Eiri knew the singer couldn’t resist an invitation to talk, so he waited.
Shu took a plate from the cupboard and started gathering food for sandwich-making. He laid two pieces of bread on the plate and began speaking. “Everybody thought the goon squad should stay back because if Suguru and I were escorted out, the fangirls would know something was up. Lots of people were coming and going anyway— even the people with cars had to go out the front of the building and walk around it to get down to the parking garage— so we just put on our disguises and walked out. Then one of those stupid door guys— the ones working on the security panel things— he goes running up to the door and says, ‘Shindou-san, before you go, can I get your autograph?’” Shu thumped a block of cheese onto the countertop with more force than necessary.
Eiri had to admit the door guy had made an incredibly bone-headed move. Those fangirls could be like a raging pack of cannibalistic carnivores. Shu haphazardly sliced cheese off the block for his sandwich. “Stop that,” Eiri told him. He walked to Shuichi and took the knife away from the kid. “Can’t you cut a straight line down the cheese? And stand over there, where I don’t have to smell you as much. Ug, that stuff is worse than rotted flowers.”
Shu stepped away. Petulantly, he said, “Who cares if the cheese is cut straight or not? It’s just cheese.” Eiri gave him a dirty look. With a bounce, Shu pushed himself up to sit on the countertop, content to let Eiri fix his sandwich.
“So you were mobbed?” Eiri asked.
“Not quite,” Shu said. “One of the goons pounced on the door guy. I thought Mishima-san was going to tear his arms and legs off! The goon squad came pouring out of the building and surrounded me. Suguru got away. That snot sneaked away; unrecognized, in the mess,” Shu grumbled.
“So, if you were surrounded by bodyguards, how did a girl get close enough to dump perfume on you?” Eiri asked.
“She didn’t, exactly. She used the little glass bottle like a bomb. She yelled something about ‘marking her territory’ and she threw it. One of the guards tried to block it and the bottle shattered. I was hit the worst, but Nozara-san and Kajiyama-san were splashed pretty badly, too.”
Eiri grunted, to acknowledge he was listening. He idly wondered if the two guardsmen were married and what their wives would think when they walked into their respective homes. Eiri wrapped up the cheese and put it away, along with the lunchmeat, pickles, and mayonnaise. He handed Shuichi the plate with its completed sandwich. “So how did you get away?”
Shu accepted the plate with one hand, took a bite of sandwich with the other, and shook his head. Talking around the food in his mouth, he said, “I didn’t. K and most of the goons walked me to the train station and held the fans back at the entrance while Harada-san escorted me down to board the train.”
Eiri nodded. “Why didn’t someone drive you home? Or call me?”
“Well, K drove his motorcycle today and he figured we’d really be mobbed if we tried to get away on that. We could have taken the Bad Luck van, but K thought—“
Eiri waved him off. “Forget it. It will take you days to give excuses for the entire goon squad.” It all made sense. Shu shrugged and watched Eiri while he ate. The question now was: how to get rid of the lingering perfume stench? No pipsqueak fangirl was going to get away with marking *his* territory, Eiri thought. “You know, for skunks, you’re supposed to wash with tomato juice. Do we have any?” Eiri looked in the refrigerator and then started checking the cupboards.
“Tomato juice?” Shu echoed. “I think we have some canned stewed tomatoes, but . . . Eiri, you’re not serious, are you?”
“Of course I am.” Eiri grinned at his lover, evilly. “If I have to, I’ll tie you up and scrub you until that shit comes off your skin,” Eiri told him.
“Uh, Eiri . . . “ Shu’s voice shook with uncertainly, “That’s not necessary . . . “
“Mmm. Not yet,” Eiri admitted. The cupboard yielded a large can of stewed tomatoes. “Look what I found,” he said, showing Shuichi the can. Shu looked scared. “Don’t look at me like that! Finish your sandwich and you can go wash again with this.” Eiri tipped the can side to side, showing it off.
“Uh . . . you’re not kidding, are you?”
“Of course not! Either that perfume goes or you do! I want that stinky crap off of you and if tomato juice works for skunks, it should work for this fetid miasma! I’m not going to allow you to trail this putrescence all over the house tonight. It’s bad enough as it is. Who knows how long it will take to get rid of the stench. If you’d rather, I can kick you out and you can go visit Hiro and stink up—“
Shu sighed. “Alright! I’ll give it a try,” Shu said. “Can we at lease shut the front door while I’m in the bathroom?”
Eiri shrugged, to show he was willing to compromise. “I guess so.” The kitchen smelled bad, now, too. Eiri was going to be pissed if the whole house had to be doused with bleach to get rid of this horrid effluvium. Eiri didn’t really like the smell of bleach, either, but it was better than that of cheap perfume.
Eiri closed the front door while Shuichi undressed in the bathroom. The author was fairly certain the bathroom tiles were closer to freezing and forming icicles than the hall had been. Still, once Shu was naked, Eiri made him sit on the wash stool. Eiri had already opened the can of tomatoes and now he rolled his sleeves up and prepared to work them into his lover’s hair, in hopes the tomato juice would magically dissolve the odoriferous perfume.
Shuichi bitched and moaned about how gross the mushy tomatoes felt in his hair and on his body and how silly he felt being washed with them. Eiri threw the limp, used tomatoes into the sink and doused Shuichi with the rest of the tomato juice in the can for good measure. Then, Shu showered again.
Even after all that, the rancid fragrance *still* clung to the kid! It was weaker, but it hadn’t gone away. Disgusted, Eiri picked up the used tomatoes from the sink, slapped them into the can, and took them to the kitchen to be thrown out while Shuichi dried and dressed again.
The kid came pattering into the kitchen just as Eiri finished cleaning up the mess. “Eiri, what am I gonna do? I can’t go around smelling like this forever. And you won’t even let me touch you, because I stink!” Shuichi wailed and sank down onto the floor, dismayed and depressed.
“Shut up. We just need to find a stronger scent . . .”
“Eiri, if we used your cologne or something, I’d just smell like this nasty stuff and your cologne. A stronger smell won’t work.”
“I don’t want you smelling like me,” Eiri told him, disdainfully. “I think bleach might do the trick, but it can also hurt your skin if the concentration is too high.” Shuichi moaned. “Relax,” Eiri told him. “I don’t want you smelling like bleach, either. We need you to . . . Of course!” Eiri said in sudden realization. He marched over to Shuichi and pulled him up by his sweater. “Come with me.”
Shuichi stood and let Eiri pull him into the bedroom. “Eiri? What’s in here that would . . . “ The author grinned at Shuichi and started stripping his clothes off. “Oh,” Shu said.
“Well? What are you waiting for?” Eiri prompted. “Take your clothes off.”
“Why do you want to have sex now? I’m too cold and . . . uh . . . I thought you wouldn’t touch me bec— “
“Idiot. Come to bed. I’ll warm you up,” Eiri told him. Naked, he climbed under the bed covers. “We need a scent that will overpower the chemicals of the perfume,” Eiri said. “So let’s do it.”
“Oh,” Shu said, with more enthusiasm. He flung his clothes off and hopped into bed. “Do you really think sex will get rid of the perfume?”
“Yes, and I think we’ll have a better chance if we can make you sweat,” Eiri answered with a grin. He hooked his hand around Shuichi’s ribs and pulled him close for a kiss. It didn’t take much for Shu’s eagerness to show, physically. It was ridiculously easy to get the kid aroused.
When Shuichi drew back, his movement exacerbated the air currents and Eiri breathed shallowly to avoid inhaling any more perfume. Shuichi searched Eiri’s face. “Um, do you mean I get to do you?”
Eiri smirked. “No. I want you to impale yourself on me. I’ll hold still and let you do the work. How does that sound?” In response, Shu straddled him and attacked his mouth, kissing him so vigorously Eiri had to push the kid away to catch his breath. “Get the lube, Bratt,” he ordered.
Shu reached over him and fumbled around in the bedside table until he located the lube. While the singer was stretching his reach, Eiri took the opportunity to run his hands over Shuichi’s body. He kept his hands away from the kid’s groin, so he didn’t over-stimulate Shu and make him cum too soon. Nasty eddies of perfumed air drifted around Eiri and he held his breath until Shu settled back. Shuichi presented the lube to Eiri with both hands and a bright, eager expression. Eiri took it and ordered his lover to turn around.
“You mean, face your feet?” Shu asked. The kid moved around so he straddled Eiri in the opposite direction. “Like this?”
“I’m not moving, remember? If I’m going to prepare your body, you’ll need to move so I can reach. Now bend over,” Eiri told him, knowingly.
Shu went down on all fours, putting his face in Eiri’s groin and his rear in the air by Eiri’s face. “Like this?” Shu purred, rubbing his mouth and nose over Eiri’s cock and balls.
“Yeah,” Eiri said. For a moment, he closed his eyes; just savoring Shuichi’s attentions. When he opened his eyes, he was enticed by his lover’s cute, rounded ass, wiggling in front of his face. Shuichi took Eiri’s cock into his mouth, surprising the writer and causing him to gasp once. Eiri spread lube on the fingers of his left hand and reached for Shu’s ass.
Shuichi’s loud gasp combined with a moan and broke the kid’s mouth suction on Eiri’s penis. The singer laid his cheek over Eiri’s penis and made small panting noises as Eiri probed his lover’s bottom and worked his fingers into the kid. “Eiri!” Shu said. With his right hand, the writer reached around Shu’s leg to touch his penis. The kid was hard and more-than-ready. When Eiri wrapped his fingers around the singer’s erection, it was enough to send him over the edge of pleasure and into orgasm.
Eiri figured Shu would cum quickly the first time and he was satisfied; however, he did not let Shuichi know that. He ran one hand over Shu’s back, as if checking for dust. “This is unacceptable, Bratt. You’re not sweaty at all! You’ll have to try harder than this.”
Shu sat up and twisted around to look at Eiri. He yelled, defensively, “You said you would let me do the work, too, but you didn’t! You haven’t cum yet, either! I can keep going!” Shuichi looked at his lover with determination as he turned again to face the writer. Eiri adjusted himself on the bed pillows so that he was sitting up a little. When he was settled, Shuichi reached behind himself, grasped Eiri’s penis firmly, and placed the tip against his entrance. Slowly, Shu pressed himself back down onto Eiri’s cock.
The kid felt lusciously tight and slick around Eiri’s penis. “Harder,” he said to Shu. “Pump your body against me. Pound us into the bed,” Eiri whispered. Shu grinned devilishly. He leaned over, kissed Eiri’s nose, and took a deep breath before forcing the writer’s cock to plunge inside of him as far and as fast as he could go. Eiri controlled himself, trying to hold back his orgasm as long as he could. His purpose was to make Shu sweat as well as to prolong the ‘completed’ feeling of great sex for himself. It was all working. Eiri was gratified by Shuichi’s bouncing obedience as the kid pounded Eiri between his small body and the mattress, making his balls slap against Shu’s cute ass.
The writer felt his orgasm creep closer and he reached out, seizing Shuichi’s penis in a warm, vice-like grip. Shu moaned from deep in his throat, projecting the noise from his diaphragm. The muscles of the kid’s butt clenched around Eiri’s cock as Shuichi came a second time. The reaction of Shu’s body sent Eiri crashing through an orgasm, too. Replete, Shu let his head drop backward off his shoulders and he sighed deeply. Eiri hooked Shu’s arms with his fingers and pulled his lover to him, holding the kid tightly to his body. “That’s a better smell,” Eiri said. He put his face into Shuichi’s neck and inhaled: the scents of sweat and semen cleared the memory of cheap perfume from his mind.
Shu giggled. “I’m cured! *Now* can we shut the damned doors and turn on the heater?”
“Alright, Bratt, but only if that malodorous vapor is totally gone,” Eiri reminded him.
Shu rolled his eyes and extracted himself from Eiri’s body. Then the kid leaned over him for another kiss. He lingered, sucking on Eiri’s lower lip. When he pulled back, Shuichi smiled brightly. “I love you, Eiri, but you can be such a b—“
Eiri covered his lover’s mouth with his fingers; a glance warned Shuichi not to finish his statement unfavorably. “Shut up. I know it,” Eiri said.
“Okay,” Shu agreed. The kid lay over him like a blanket. The singer’s arms came around Eiri’s body, folding up along the writer’s sides, with small hands tucked under his shoulders. Shu snuggled his head against Eiri’s chest, shifting until he was comfortable. Eiri laid a hand over Shuichi’s pink hair and smiled. He thought he should get up soon and close the windows; but he had no intention of moving.
It was said, “Half an hour in a spring evening is worth a thousand gold pieces,” but really, Eiri felt that way about a lot of moments spent with Shuichi. Maybe more appropriate was the saying, “All things are like Saiou's horse.” [2] Who would have guessed being doused by foul-smelling liquid would turn out so well?
***
[1] 1 degree C.
[2] Japanese proverbs. "ningen banji saiou-ga-uma" means "All things are like Saiou's horse." This refers to an old Chinese story about a man named Saiou whose horse broke his leg -- making everyone say how unfortunate he was. Because he had no horse, though, he didn't have to go off to battle to be killed, so this was a good thing. The moral of the story is; when something good or bad happens, no one can say for sure if it is truly a good or bad thing in the end.
***
In all honesty: the way to get rid of noxious perfume is to “rub lemon rind on the skin to dilute extra-powerful perfume. Its natural oils neutralize odors, reducing potency in seconds.” ;D Isn’t that funny??
