masanari | [Futurelandia] The Thanksgiving and Early December Post

[Futurelandia] The Thanksgiving and Early December Post

[ It's been around a month since everything started to change. And frankly, a damn sure more things have changed even in that month. There's simplistic ones, such as Masaomi getting a vasectomy which even if he tried to keep it on the downlow, everyone found out about because of what a whiner he was for his week of medical abstinence and everyone felt after that for how he proceeded to fuck every relevant woman in the house and who would sleep with him out of the house into submission for the next two or three days. Everyone sort of had a rude awakening there.

But then, some changes were bigger and more serious. A new member joined there pack (Veroncia) not all that long ago, and it was much to everyone except some of the adult's surprise. Everyone had to learn their new pecking order and where she fit in with the rest of them. Masaomi and Nariko continued their rituals and continued their seeing other people, to mixed results from both. Audrey was hanging around the house more, though she hadn't had the recommended Talk with Masaomi about joining, despite making this something of a second home for her. And of course, Junko's training continued despite the week long hiatus from it.

Everyone was changing, and everyone was adapting. Yamato even had a sexy car now. And at the culmination of everything, a sort of milestone in the midst of everything, there was Thanksgiving, the lead up to it, and the follow up after it leading into December. A time when a lot of people hung out in one house, and then things got weirdly tense for a variety of reasons. God bess us, every one. ]

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[ By Msaomi's count it should be fifteen, if he's got the count right. Seven between her legs, three on her belly counting the naval one, one in her tongue and four in her ears. Though counting the nipple ones might have made more sense as a set. Same for her ears. Still, he's trying not to snicker.

Nathan, for his part, tries to poker face, but at the same time - watching her switch her dress like that made him squirm. Her breasts... he'd seen- he saw a glimpse of the one on her arm and one on her hips but. ]

How about... nine?

[He's trying not to but he's also doing a bad job and she kind of gives him a teasing, mockingly reproachful sort of look.]

You're getting close, but it's still less than twenty.

[That gives him a better window to guess from! ... When did she get wrapped up in playing this, too?

Sorry Nathan.]

[ What the fuck you two. Nathan squirms again, and he looks at Nariko in a new light. He bites his lip and reaches to take a long sip from his drink, wishing it were alcohol for once, even if he didn't really like getting drunk. More than nine. (NINE? WHERE?) less than twenty-

Might as well guess unlucky - ]

Thirteen.

[ Masaomi's smirk is now wide, like a cheshire cat. He looks even more amused than before at Nariko's reproach, leaning his hand over to tap at the bullseye on her chest. ... That was by far the silliest of the tattoos he'd picked out for her and if you asked him twenty years ago if it'd be his favorite he'd've said fuck no. But it was almost edging towards it now ]

[He's basically just touching the material of her dress and she rolls her eyes but there's a quirk of a grin, there. She knows they must look ridiculous to her sibling but they're maybe not as serious adults as they should be. And - edging? Which one was his favorite, then!? But as far as the guessing game is concerned she does take a bit of the fun out:]

Fifteen.

[So he wasn't very far off! But it also wasn't the unlucky number, either.] Not that a lot of them are immediately visible, of course ...

[ He'd always said it was his name on her forearm, obviously! ... But this one was visible and it was fun, and a little less gaudy. He sometimes considered asking for more from her, like some design around her areolas or more on her stomach than the one which had gotten added years later near her naval, but. ]

But they are all fun.

[ Masaomi chimes that in, pulling his hands back to himself. Nathan though. He just... ]

That's a lot of them! [ . . .hahaha- ] You must have had to hold her hand for them, she barely tolerated her ears being pierced the first time!

[ Let's pretend he can relate and not need to imagine where you put fifteen on her ]

['But' he's not getting anymore tattoos or piercings out of her. It took her most of their first son's life for her to become entirely comfortable with it all and she wasn't going to start that process over again. If he wanted something with more holes in it he can go fuck swiss cheese.]

I almost killed the girl that was doing them! And it took everything in me to avoid crying my eyes out, Nathan! The only reason I wasn't balling is because I was too prideful! [That, and she'd been with Masaomi, she was proving something to him and if she'd appeared as utterly terrified and sad to lose her flawless skin as she'd actually felt he probably wouldn't have let her do it.]

I still can't walk near tattoo ships without feeling an unreasonable amount of pure anger.

I bet. [ That idiot, Nathn can't help but think. ] I never expected you to changes things up for your flawless skin like that. But I guess everyone goes through changes in life.

[ Also excuse you Nariko you got the four extra rings on your vulva of your own volition! ... Probably! ... And okay he did sort of push for the extra tat by her naval, but it completed the set of the bullseye and the little vine-things on her waist, okay. She even liked some of them now, he knows it! And she definitely got her tongue of her own volition.

( has she had the tongue one in at all this trip? ) ]

She did, the near murder was amazing.

[ Masaomi chimes that in, but now a part of him does wonder if he forced her too much back then... but no time to think about it now. Way too late ]

I mean, it was for the sake of proving something invaluable, it was a really high price, but I got our kids out of it, for one thing. [... Really, their presence might be why she was able to come to terms with how she looked now. If she hadn't proved it to Masaomi they might never have ended up getting the house together, which would mean no Junko or Koji. So while there had been pushing she hadn't been forced, and she'd eventually come to terms with the fact that she'd never look the way she wanted to again, or cherish her own body the same way, she didn't feel a need to pretend about it anymore. They were kind of too old for that.]

There you go, I guess! Now you know how many there are.

[Although to be fair her tongue was always her idea and ... She'd had it pierced as a teenager and it had just healed after she took it out upon becoming Alpha.]

'Amazing', though? It's almost as if you like seeing me get violent, Alpha.

[Man this dress is way too tight, augh.]

[ Nathan reads all that in her response and her expression, and he's mildly furious about it, and completely irrationally he thinks about how he he wouldn't have demanded that she mutilate her body in order to prove a point. How could she ever be happy about all that, even if she had accepted it? She never would be able to look the way she wanted and she never would be able to love the way she looked properly and-

It's such a waste. It's a waste. ]

Mmmm, maybe it's a little bit of a guilty fantasy, on my part?

[ Nathan sits here, trying to get some control of his own emotions, watching this... flirting. They had connection, and it was beautiful. But the more he saw, the more he wasn't sure what to feel.

Masaomi's not oblivious to her plight though, and he makes to move a hand so that he can pull aside a strap or unzip something or whatever to let off some pressure. ]

We all have them. [The only hope she has is the zipper at the back and when he reaches for it she moves her hair and lets herself breathe as the pressure is relieved from her chest. ... But she's not entirely ignorant to Nathan's emotions either, and.]

Hey, Masaomi, would you mind getting me a drink from the bar? I think our waitress is really busy!

[It really is a little too hot! But the ulterior motive is to speak with her brother, if even briefly.] I'm sorry.

[She leans over to kiss him sweetly. This wasn't what he planned, she knows that, but she can't help being a little worried now.]

[ ... Kissing him like that. Nathan's pulled out of his reverie, noticing that both her dress is sagging and Masaomi did indeed get up to get his mate a drink. He sets out to do that (and their waitress is busy, she's going to bring their food over soon. But still! Nathan--...

... ]

Why?

[She doesn't answer him right away. The dress is open a bit, sure, but it's not in danger of falling off or even revealing any real part of her body. The zipper goes all the way down to her hips, after all. ... This is a stupid thing to think about when he's so upset.]

Even if I started from the beginning would any of it seem like a good enough reason? [For him, anyway. She shakes her head.] I love him. And when I was pregnant with Yamato I didn't want him to leave. [She can't help thinking back on it, and her smile is oddly nostalgic.]

I didn't want to be alone anymore.

[ ... He's not nearly drunk enough for this. Are they really doing this? Are they really doing this now? He leans forward and even if he's cognizant of Roman and the damage that did ~~though the player might need a reminder but I can wing it~~ he cannot accept this idea she would sacrifice her long term happiness just for - ]

And if he really loved you so much then you wouldn't have needed to ruin your body like that. We both know you don't like it.

[ He, of course, assumes she still doesn't. He puts a hand up to his mouth, it's a bit of an old habit, back from before his asthma was really treated, as if that would somehow make him have more air. He's not in danger now, but it's still what he does when he is being made uncomfortable ]

[In a way she can understand why he might think her too strong or self-assured to go so far for one, or any man. While she'd never really hid Roman from anyone she'd met him after Nathan was already mostly out of her life by then. Of course he'd been invited to their wedding but he hadn't been there to see how quickly Nariko gave up the stability of a normal life for a man that was chaotic at best and manipulative at worst. They'd made a singular world of each other and that might have been romantic if they weren't so terrible for each other. What Nathan would have inevitably seen was how terribly Roman's departure sucked all the confidence out of her. She'd been a wreck, and it wasn't long after that her father died. Becoming Alpha to that pack had given her a sense of purpose, a reason to drag herself back up, but-]

And I think those ideals would apply if he'd loved me back then the way he does now. [She tries to take a gentle breathe, tries not to think all of this is useless.] But we didn't go about it that way. We didn't really trust each other, we weren't equal for a long time, Nathan. I had to prove it to him, but he had to do the same.

[She doesn't like to think of it that way but it was the truth.] It's not ideal, and sometimes I worry about it, but it's still a part of me now.

Edited 2016-01-03 06:36 (UTC)

But he still hasn't married you! He's going around screwing other women even after you gave up so much for him? That's bullshit and you know it! [And she clearly, clearly does if she's giving him an answer like that, if she isn't getting so immediately defensive of her mate in the same way she did her short lived husband back then. She's clearly aware that that idiot has a conditional love for her.

( he doesn't, but Nathan is a flawed person who sees flaws which aren't necessarily there in other people when he jelly ok ok )

Also he just totally ignores that bit about Masaomi having to prove himself too because that's convenient for him -- err. Because that doesn't matter nearly as much as his sister's wellbeing? Yeah, that. ]

Edited 2016-01-03 06:40 (UTC)

Nathan, he's not ever going to marry me. [Man, she had come a long way from being hurt that he would mention almost asking her! Masaomi should be proud of her!] Masaomi thinks that marriage is something that restricts people. To him it's not a celebration or a chance to let anyone who will listen know that we love each other as partners. A lot of pack-minded people are like that.

[She isn't becoming defensive because she's a grown ass woman and whether Nathan likes or agrees with it or not, she belongs with Masaomi. But she also knows he's being petulant, to some degree. Getting angry would only fan his not so proverbial flames.]

Masaomi loves me. He's given me all of him, a beautiful family in both our kids and our pack, stability, and his life. We're married in the ways that count, he's given just as much as I have. And you seem to be forgetting that I sleep with other people, too.

[The trick here being that Nathan, more than anyone, would know how unnatural that was for her. Nariko's devotion was nothing if not utterly riddled with a near insane amount of loyalty, but she had to give the defense a try.]

[ He is being petulant, and he knows on some level it's the same argument they had thirty years ago when they were still under his goddamned mother's thumbs about her and her shitty boyfriends back then and how she didn't pay enough attention to him. He knows that on some level, but he is in severe, severe denial about that, instead in his head framing it to be all about her.

He's never going to marry her? And he cane convince himself like that? Bullshit. Bullshit, if he needed him of all people to help save his relationship. and what's more - ]

Did he force you to start doing that too? Or did you do that in order to make hm feel less guilty about him sleeping around because he's too much of an idiot to just show he "loves" you in any sane way?

[ ... He hasn't sounded this nasty in years, he recognizes. But all the same. ]

[At least if he just came out and said he wanted more attention she could actually accommodate that! But he makes it about something else, and she can't help idly knowing that he probably picked that up from her more than Viktor or Amelia. There's a part of her that wants to snap at his tone and defend Masaomi, but it would be like supplying answers to a pissy twelve year old. She won't do it.]

Why does it upset you so much, Nathan? I'm safe and I'm happy and I'm loved, and since all of those corners are secured you have to be pissed at something else.

[It probably isn't a good idea but she reaches out to touch his face, holding his cheek and stroking idly with her thumb.] Just tell me what it's really about.

[Because it's something, but even now she isn't angry with him, she's worried and she loves him. This is the same way she got him to open up to her as a kid, why fix something that isn't broken? To her knowledge, anyway.]

[ She wants what this is really about? and they the fuck wouldn't it upset him that she's been so abused this whole time, because that's what it is, it's goddamn abuse (no it's not) and... and... and she's touching him and he can see that target and he saw her masturbate and -

She wants to know what it is? Fine, then he'll tell her - ]

I wouldn't have made you give up all that stuff!

[ . . . ]

I know that.

[She doesn't take her hand from his face.]

But you can't love me now that I look like this?

[Now that every part of her was a reminder of being owned by someone else?]

[ She knows? She knows? but if she knows, then why is she- ]

I-if. If you knew, then why were we apart so long? Why didn't you just stay with me...

[ He ignores her point entirely, instead just tearing up, going right back to that teenager who had just more or less raped his sister out of a love that she didn't reciprocate, or at least claimed she didn't, and who was at the end of a nervous breakdown. He happens in an instant. ]

Because I didn't know back then.

[And she didn't love him back then, either. She'd been too much of a mess to really love anyone romantically. You couldn't be in their household and come out of that immediately healthy. The distance, going to college, experiencing things? It'd been great for her and while Nathan was gone she'd met and fallen for Roman once she had some form of balance.]

Come on, deep breathes, you're alright. [Did he still have trouble with his asthma? If he did then the last thing he needed was to freak out here. But at the same time now he knew that things were a little different, right? He knew that she knew, so he didn't have to be as upset.]

Edited 2016-01-03 07:55 (UTC)

[ If Nathan were capable of perfect hindsight and perfect clarity about his own actions, he would know that his own love even apart from the wrongness they both perceived what with it being incest and, well, him getting so forceful that one time was also a twisted love, born out of necessity and jealousy. The need to have something or someone you could project genuine feelings onto without it feeling conflicted, or without the feelings not being welcomed back. With the absence of emotional connection in his own life, it was probably inevitable.

But Nathan doesn't have perfect clarity, and so the love he remembers was a pure one, one which had grown out out of adversity, yes, but it had also been the only great thing in his life during a dark period of it. And with the distance came a nostalgia which only made it seem stronger, more pure. With the distance came the knowledge of how fucked up he was with his kinks and a self-awareness that he didn't commit anywhere else because he needed her. He needed her, and he had ruined her and ... and he thought he would be okay with just being a family again but id he?

Is he really?

Nathaniel was a man who could see the depth and complexity in the world, yes, but he was also a man very prone to seeing things through a lens of right and wrong and that lens only became more narrow and more childish the more he was brought back into that nostalgic, beautiful, awful, terrible, inhumane past that his sister and him shared and right now with so many thoughts echoing around in his head, he can't help but think-

Why did they waste so much time? ]

B-but you know now. You know now-

[ He's not taking her advice, and he does still have issues. He's not had an attack in a long while now, but the inhaler is still in his man-purse thing. But - oh. Okay, he - ]

So now---

[ Now what, what was he even digging at? (he's making such an ass of himself, he knows he is, his breath is getting shorter -) ]

[She hadn't wanted to go about it this way. If it was a discussion they were going to have, if they were going to do it right and from the very beginning then it shouldn't happen in public, surrounded by mostly foreign people. But nothing is ever as organized in life as she'd like it to be, so this is just - well, this is how it happens and now they kind of have to deal with it, except this isn't the time and place. He asks her that question without really answering hers, in the end. He loved her back then but did he, now? When she was with someone, when she had children and a life with another man? Even though she had picked him as one of her starter 'choices' Nariko had always thought Nathan might have a hard time sharing. Not everyone had that in them.

And the other part of it is just ... ]

Now you have a girlfriend. One you've been with for three years.

[And they've been monogamous that whole time, right? So how would she feel about this? It might be disturbing to Irina, and would it really be worth putting in danger if her appearance bothered Nathan so much?]

[ Bordering on a full blown attack as he is, while Nathan might have intended this to come out as a growl, the end result is far more like a wheeze. The dichotomy between how impressive he wants to appear right now and how pathetic he actually looks is really very strong. But the fact of the matter is that her "choices" like that and sharing are both very far from his mind now. Maybe their uncle had a really stiff drink in there after all or he's just lacking oxygen in his brain before what he wheezes out here as both Masaomi is coming back with her drink and the waitress is at the far end of the room with the tray that has their dinners on it - ]

Leave him. I'll dump Irina and we'd be better for each other.

[ Family was most important. He loved family. ... He could be a father for her kids, right? Of course he could, probably a better one than than that guy. (he couldn't, he knows he couldn't in his mind he knows this is wrong, he knows he sounds just like he did when he pouted and tried to demand that she dump her boyfriends when they were preteens or when he held back from an "i told you so" when Roman did his shit and--)

... and the Alpha in the room has politely set Nariko's drink down in front of her before he stands over Nathan and with a pleasant smile on his face asks - ]

You don't have the right to challenge me.

[ ... And Nathn looks up at him, tries to glare-- ... And he needs to scramble for his inhaler because he's just that lame apparently. ]

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Man what a baby

YEP he's lucky that he's loved despite that

you decide if Masomi is back or not to hear this

Mmm. Maybe not just yet though I do kind of want him to overhear

Okay just ping when you think is good

k!

wow I nodded off. But yeah tell me if/when you think is good.

Right about now is good!

Okay this time the drama is mine