by Z. Allora
“But what about you?”
“I really like watching you… come.” Sage did. Seeing Daiki fall apart in his arms was nothing short of magical.
Daiki writhed next to him as Sage stroked him to a quick orgasm.
“Sage,” Daiki gasped as he came. He bit his lips as if he could stop the whimpering of release escaping from his sexy mouth.
When Daiki stopped shivering, Sage used Daiki’s T-shirt to clean the sticky off them.
Gesturing toward Sage’s problem area, Daiki said, “Don’t you want me to try to—”
Fix my broken dick? “Nah, I’m good.”
Daiki sighed but stopped with the fruitless suggestions, allowing Sage to pull him into his arms and absorb how good he felt there.
Daiki’s eyes started to blink as he tried to stay awake.
Sage combed his fingers through Daiki’s hair in a slow, steady rake that had Daiki yawning and then snoring in short order. He kept playing with the strands of Daiki’s hair.
Five hundred wasn’t a lot of people; after all, with any luck, Kashi-sei would be playing much bigger events.
He placed a hand over his chest. Wow, his heart was beating fast. How silly! His anxiety had dissipated while loving Daiki but now emerged stronger than ever. Sliding out of bed on max stealth, Sage made it all the way to the door.
“Sage?” Daiki sat upright in bed.
“Yeah?” Sage’s hand froze on the door handle.
He turned. Daiki’s covers pooled around his waist, his swollen mouth making him look all kinds of delicious.
“You’d tell me if there was something wrong between us… that if I wasn’t making you happy, you’d say?” The words were said with a cautious calm, but Sage couldn’t miss the worry that rendered each word rough with fear.
He rushed back to the bed and sat next to Daiki. Wrapping him in his arms, Sage said, “You are one of the few things that is holding me together. It’s true I’m stressed, but I swear it has nothing to do with you or us. We’re okay… right?”
Daiki seemed to hesitate for a long time as he stared at Sage. Finally he said, “On my end.”
Sage needed to get himself together; otherwise he ran the risk of losing Daiki. “This show is really eating my brain. I’m sorry.”
Daiki sighed. “Just tell me if I can do anything.”
“I will.” Sage wished he could lie down next to Daiki and sleep, but that wouldn’t be happening. “I’m going to go to the music room for a while.”
Nodding, Daiki grabbed his sketch pad off the nightstand. “I’ll be here.”
Sage wanted to stay with Daiki, but the worry drove him out. He made his way through the dark apartment to the music room. He flicked on the lights—too bright—then dimmed them and trudged over to his drums. He sat and twirled his sticks.
None of the usual calm found him as he spun the wood between his fingers.
How was he going to manage stepping out onto a stage in front of so many people? What had he been thinking? Maybe he should find another drummer to— No!
This was his dream. He wanted to do this… if only performing wasn’t involved. He couldn’t tell anyone else because it was crazy, right? One would think someone starting a band that wanted to give visibility and a voice to those who are different would have thought it through to the getting-on-stage part.
THE REST of the band was already on stage and in place doing sound check. Sage sucked on a peppermint Daiki had given him the last time he’d left the bathroom. The gesture removed any hope that Daiki didn’t know any food Sage had ingested in the last year had left his system. He’d brush his teeth after sound check.
Ichika, Haru’s girlfriend, gave him a worried smile and a thumbs-up.
I can do this.
He nodded to her and tried to smile at Daiki like he hadn’t just puked.
When that didn’t quite work, he forced himself to step onto the stage. The too-bright room was loud, and their sound echoed. The studios he recorded in were contained and his drumbeat clear. How would the distortion affect their music? Okay, not at all, but this felt terribly wrong.
Then again, this room would be filled with people and all their noise. Even the most crowded studio control rooms had no more than five or six people. Oh God, how would he ever play?
“You okay?” Wayuu asked what the others were wondering, if their expressions were anything to go by.
Sage focused on breathing and tried to come up with the right answer. He took a couple more steps toward his drums, but his heart felt like a warning beat.
Stalking over to him, Wayuu was bigger than life on stage. He loomed over Sage and fussed with his shirt.
“What are you doing?” Sage stared down at how his T-shirt was now tucked in at the front and draped over his ass in the back.
As Wayuu rolled the sleeves of Sage’s T-shirt, he said, “That’s a french tuck.”
Haru snorted. “Where did you learn about that?”
Wayuu pressed the now pristinely styled sleeves onto Sage’s arms and gave him a smile. “The question is, how didn’t any of you learn this?”
“’Cause I’m a musician, not a fashion model.” Haru guided Sage over to his drums and gave him a bit of a push toward the chair.
Sage made his way behind his drums without falling, so he’d put that in the win column. Damn, he could see the entire venue… and it was a huge space.
Zen grinned. “Let’s do the first song. Count us in, Sage.”
The request should be simple, only Sage was having problems moving his hands.
“Sage?” Wayuu’s concern cut through the anxiety.
“I’m good.” What was the first song? “Um, ‘I’m All Tied Up For You’?”
Zen nodded and made some adjustments on his mic. “Check. Check.”
“I’m All Tied Up For You” was the song they were pairing with their BDSM photo shoot.
Wait, how did the song go?
Sage raised his sticks and tapped them together. Their beat was off, or rather he was, but he dragged himself through the song, avoiding the stares from his bandmates.
As he left the stage, Sage stumbled into Daiki’s arms.
“Are you okay?” Daiki brushed the hair out of his eyes. He removed the band holding Sage’s hair, finger-combed the wayward locks with gentle strokes, and reattached the band.
“Thanks. Much better.” Sage dry heaved.
Daiki couldn’t act unconcerned because his eyes had become cartoon circles. “I’ll get you something to settle your stomach in a minute. First, let me hold you a bit longer.”
Sage nodded because what could he say? Leaning into Daiki for a moment allowed Sage to absorb the warmth, but he failed to find any steadiness within himself.
Ichika held out a plastic bag to him. “Just in case.”
Sage wanted to refuse but couldn’t, so he nabbed the bag and thrust it into his pocket. “Thanks.”
She backed away, probably to find Haru.
All too soon Daiki left for the Family Mart around the corner.
What could Sage do?
There would be no settling his stomach. He gripped his drumsticks tighter, hoping to stop his hands from shaking. His heart felt like it might beat out of his chest… and then he’d bleed out from not having a heart.
How can I go out on stage?
He wiped a hand over his forehead and then pulled at his T-shirt. “Why isn’t the air turned on?”
Haru glanced up from his guitar. “It’s freezing in here.”
There was no way Sage could do this. He needed to put a stop to this.
It was only another thirty minutes until they needed to be onstage, but Sage couldn’t hold the insanity in any longer.
“I can’t do this.” Sage stated a fact.
“Do what?” Zen asked.
Sage grabbed his stomach and tried to catch his breath.
“Clarify.” Haru put a hand on Sage’s shoulder.
“I’m not feeling well.” Understatemen
t of the year, but no sense adding drama. He could barely breathe.
Zen put a wrist to Sage’s forehead. “You feel warm and clammy. Did you eat something bad?”
Could he pass this off as food poisoning? “I—”
“I heard you getting sick in the bathroom.” Haru shrugged, and Wayuu nodded.
Great, everyone heard him puking his guts out. Sage popped another antacid, but he worried his body would rebel against even that. “We can’t cancel.”
“Okay, but you look terrible, so let’s think.” Zen started pacing. “I can synthesize the drums through my keyboard. I can keep the beat simple.”
That shouldn’t have hurt Sage, but it felt like a drumstick was driven into his heart. Of course Zen could, but he asked, “You sure?”
Zen put his hands on his hips. “Yup, fancy keyboard. We’ve got this, Sage.”
Sage hoped that would be the case. “I’m really sorry.”
He couldn’t stay there another minute and burst out the back door and into the night.
Gasping for air, he inhaled. He exhaled. Ahhhh.
It felt like the first time air had filled his lungs and didn’t have to push past dread and terror since Zen had scheduled the show.
Trudging to the front of the building while he practiced breathing brought him the reality. People had lined up around the block to see the show. Well, probably to see two used-to-be idols on one stage. Sage hurried away from the venue.
He should probably go back to the apartment, but instead he sidled into the first bar he came across.
After finding a quiet corner at the end of the bar, he ordered shots and kept flagging the bartender for more.
How cliché am I? Sitting at a bar getting plastered.
He rolled his drumsticks back and forth between two of his empty shot glasses.
The bartender had gotten into the bad habit of stealing the empty glasses, so Sage kept his fingers inside these two. Ha, he showed him who got to keep his shot glasses as drumstick stoppers.
These pieces of wood always brought him pleasure and peace, but for the last few weeks they’d brought nothing but anxiety and a limp dick.
Sage spun his phone in a circle. He’d powered it off. What a loser move.
He slammed back another shot. Kanpai!
Where was Daiki? He wanted Daiki. Right here and right—wow, he really did, but not just for some barroom sex, which, if it wasn’t on the list, they could add it… but Daiki would know what to do.
Daiki was smart, kind, and everything lovely in the world.
How did he turn his phone back on?
The glass clunked against it.
Step one, take fingers out of shot glasses.
The device was slippery. He should cover it in sticky plastic. Oops! His cell clattered to the floor.
“That’s bad.” He laughed because he needed to slide off the stool and get his phone before someone stepped on it, but he didn’t quite know how. The room seemed a bit off-kilter, but if his cell was crushed, how would he ever see Daiki again?
Oh no!
“Here. Let me help you.” Daiki handed him the phone and stopped Sage from hitting the floor.
Happiness surged through him. “You. You appeared like an angel.”
“This is yours. You’re done drinking.” The bartender handed Sage back his credit card.
“Well done, sober self.” Sage grinned, or at least he thought his mouth was in the right position. “Thanks.”
Was he slurring?
He turned to see Daiki’s concerned smile—yeah, he was slurring. “Don’t want to go back to the apartment, Daiki.”
“I know of a place nearby.”
“Lead on.” Sage threw an arm around Daiki, and things started to feel okay again.
Chapter 15
“ARGH! DAIKI… we’ve walked forever.” Sage exhaled loudly in Daiki’s ear for the seventh time in the past thirty seconds.
“Careful, Sage.” Daiki steered his rather drunken boyfriend around some debris caused by the area construction.
“Yes, Sensei.” Sage sounded beleaguered but willing to continue to march across Japan the long way if Daiki asked.
Daiki bit back a smile. A drunk Sage was an adorable Sage… but then again so was a sober Sage. “We’re almost there.”
He had guided Sage up the incline, past the various hotels, and now they were on the other side. Less construction meant fewer ditches for Sage to fall into.
Sage’s head popped off Daiki’s shoulder. He stopped and looked around. A moment of clarity could be read in his expression. “Wait, is this Love Hill? Are you taking me to a no-tell motel?”
“What’s that?”
All of Sage’s usual cool escaped with his snort. “Isn’t this where people come to do the naughty?”
“The naughty?” Somehow Sage had morphed into one of Daiki’s adolescent characters, which didn’t bode well for informed consent to do anything at a hotel other than sleep.
“You know… I haven’t been, shall we say, in the mood with the stress of the…. How did I not know I had stage flight?” Sage had stopped slurring, but now he wasn’t using the right words.
“You mean stage fright?”
“No. I mean I saw the stage and fled.” Sage laughed. “It’s bad, but I’m so glad I’m not on that stage right now.”
Daiki didn’t want to ask more, but he hoped Sage would fill in the blanks.
“On my YouTube channel, I have lots of views, but it’s only after I have time for edits, and then I can shoot again and again as often as I need.”
Lines that Sage had slashed onto his storyboard hadn’t made sense, but now the lines were forming a picture so Daiki understood the truth. “And there are no redos on the stage.”
Sage stared at him. “Exactly. You screw up on stage and you can’t go edit that out. Your mistake will live forever. To be mocked and made fun of on a loop and in memes by all the haters.”
“Mm.” Daiki nodded. “I’d find it terrifying if someone were to see my first storyboards.”
“Yeah?”
“Most definitely.” At Daiki’s urging, they began walking again. Sage wasn’t staggering as much, but he wasn’t walking a straight line either.
“Here we are.” Daiki maneuvered him into the private, dimly lit lobby of a hotel. He tapped on the screen of an automated check-in machine a few times, and a key card dropped out.
Sage air-drummed but then turned and became distracted by the drinks and food laid out on a table. He grabbed a tray and slid a number of complimentary Saran-covered dishes of sandwiches, cakes, puddings, and candies onto it, along with a teapot, cups, and tea.
“You must be hungry.” Daiki grabbed a couple of bottles of cold water. He was delighted, since Sage hadn’t been eating much and what he had hadn’t stayed in him long.
On the way to the elevator, Sage ate several cookies and stuffed one into Daiki’s mouth. They got off on the second floor and entered their room.
The windowless room was tinted the color of pink sorbet, and the thick bedding had dark magenta roses on it. The matching canopy and the fluffy pillows called to mind a princess bed of eighth-grader fantasies.
“So do you come here a lot?” Sage’s arched eyebrow suggested irritated jealousy.
The heater kicked on, humming and breaking into the silence. After Daiki swallowed the cookie, he said, “I’ve never come here.”
“Yet… but you will. I’d better put this down… unless you’d like me to hold it?”
Daiki forced himself not to remember the details of that wild morning when he’d simply acted on his instincts. No, this was a time to use his brain. He smiled and said, “You can set it down.”
Setting the tray on the bed, Sage gave him a saucy wink. He appeared somewhat steadier on his feet.
Sage lunged toward Daiki and latched on to his neck in the most delicious way.
Good as his mouth felt, Daiki gently pushed him back. “You’re drunk and hungry.”
“Why do you feel stupid?”
He groaned. “How could I not know I’d freak out about going on stage?”
Daiki froze the image into his mind’s storyboard. Sage—eyes huge and head shaking—sitting in the middle of a big pink bed with frilly pillows behind him.
He sat beside Sage on the bed and squeezed his shoulder. “You never had the experience, so it’s not surprising that you didn’t know your reaction to it.”
“I guess.” Sage pulled the band from his hair, letting the bleached-blond waves free. “So how do you know about this place?”
Daiki’s face heated. Why should he be embarrassed? Coming to a love hotel alone… “I needed to do research for a story. I reserved a room nearby, but this hotel looked nicer.”
“Who did you come here with?” Sage picked nonexistent lint off the bedding.
“No one.” Daiki’s voice squeaked like he was lying, but it was actually surprise at the jealousy reappearing in Sage’s tone.
“Really?”
Daiki didn’t respond other than to tilt his head. Just him and his right hand… and a few drawings.
“Right. Sorry. Um, good.” Sage did a quick roll with more coordination than Daiki expected him to have and put Daiki on his back with Sage straddling his middle.
“What are you doing?” Daiki’s hands were being held pinned above his head in a very interesting way.
“I know we’ve not been together much lately, but I hope I still remember how to put the moves on you.” Sage gave him a smirk that could have made every uke in Daiki’s head squee, and then he shifted his butt right over Daiki’s—
With care Daiki pushed Sage over to the other side of the bed and sat upright.
Sage scrunched up his nose. “Isn’t that why you brought me here?”
Shaking his head, Daiki reminded him, “You said you didn’t want to go to the apartment.”
“Oh, well, right, but we can still—”
