Work Text:
All preparations complete. The table in their kitchen covered by newspapers to prevent splatters. All needed supplies spread out in the middle so they both could grab what they wanted as they needed it.
Paint of every color of the rainbow. Brushes big and small. Paper towels to clean up their messes and a plastic cup full of water to change their colors.
Michael’s favorite wine, of course, and plastic wine glasses that wouldn’t break when one of them inevitably bumped it and knocked it over on the floor.
Oh, and the canvas, still wrapped up in it’s plastic wrapper, straight from the store.
Michael was in the other room, changing into a shirt that he wouldn’t mind getting messy and dramatically sighing every few moments about having to do this.
I know its too cold to actually go out, but can’t we just do something normal like ordering out and watching a movie?
Yes, Yoichi said, they could absolutely do that. But, he also wanted to try this. Just for fun . It didn’t matter if it came out like shit and they never let it see the light of day by hanging it in the darkest corner of their house. It was different. Something neither of them had really tried before. Neither of them were artists, not like some of their friends, but that didn’t matter. What mattered was doing something where they could spend time together during their bi-weekly date night.
Every other week, for as long as they had lived together, they had promised each other they would do something out of their ordinary. Something that actually felt like a date and not just two roomates going to dinner together. They were busy frequently, usually together but sometimes not, but the only way they could make them feel like partners, boyfriends, soulmates was to carve out a little bit of time where they could just focus on each other.
Not life.
Not football.
Just Yoichi and Michael.
Though, even Yoichi was wondering if this was a poor choice of activity for the evening.
Normally, for their date nights, Michael set up reservations for some nice restaurant, one of the many around Munich that they both had never gone to. They would try new food, have some nice drinks that cost way too much and they would try to recreate at home later, before making their way home to spend the rest of the night alone together.
But today, their designated night out, wasn’t quite right for that. They had known for days that it was going to be windy, stormy, and the nice outdoor restaurant that they had been planning for canceled their reservation a couple days in advance. A disappointment sure, but they’d have other chances to go out and try it another time. A night like this called for a change of pace, because it was a change of pace for them. Time to pull out the at home date nights that they had considered before, but never got around to because it wasn’t the right time. Or it was too nice out and neither of them wanted to stay home. Or a multitude of other reasons that gave them excuses to not do what they planned to do, even if they really wanted to try.
Well, Yoichi wanted to try. Michael was pretty content with the setup they already had. Dinner and drinks, movies at home or in a theater. Cuddles on the couch that turned into more than cuddles. It was all well and good, but Yoichi was ready to finally try this project that Bachira had suggested, letting him know that even Rin had managed to participate in their date night activity. Yoichi purchased all of the supplies online the next day, and they had been sitting sadly in a box in the entryway closet for way too long.
Michael rolled his eyes when he saw the box when he woke up that morning for their shared day off.
But he didn’t say no, he wouldn’t do it. He just complained, nervous to try something he knew he wouldn’t be good at because that was Michael. Not wanting to try anything if he knew he wouldn’t be good at it right off the bat. But Yoichi knew he would be shit at it as well, and just thought it might be fun to see what kind of monstrosity they could make together.
Michael meandered into the kitchen finally, an old black t-shirt that appeared a size too small. Or maybe it was Yoichi’s to punish him for making him do this. It was probably that, and luckily, it wasn’t an important or irreplaceable shirt, and it formed nicely to Michael’s skin, so that wasn’t a bad outcome either. He was fully comfortable, no shoes, sweatpants, and his hair pulled back into a low bun. He observed Yoichi’s hard work, and immediately reached for the bottle of wine, uncorked and ready for him, to pour two glasses of red. He looked over the paint colors as he sipped, contemplating their lackluster creative process before taking a seat, the two chairs that normally sat across from each other moved to one side so they could easily pass the canvas back and forth.
“Well? What do we do?”
Yoichi sat down as well, Michael’s free hand quickly finding his thigh under the table. Yoichi half-heartedly wondered if there would even be any progress made on this painting before Michael distracted him, but his hand simply sat there, possessive and bold, but did not wander or squeeze. Michael was behaving himself for now, and the hand was simply a warning that if he got bored then well… Michael had other activities in mind.
Yoichi grabbed the canvas, and unwrapped it, pulling it to his side of the table so he could start. He explained the process, and Michael nodded, indicating he understood. It was pretty simple, passing the canvas back and forth as they added more and more to it, stopping when they were satisfied. You couldn’t control what your partner added, just like they couldn’t control your own hand, and at the end, a certainly “unique” painting would emerge that would hopefully look a little bit better than his childhood art projects from elementary school.
Michael leaned back in his chair, content to look over Yoichi as he worked, hopefully enjoying his time as he sipped and observed. If he knew this had any chance of going well, Yoichi may have been a bit nervous to have Michael watching him so closely, but he knew there was no hope as soon as he touched the paintbrush to the canvas.
A messy green splotch, what was meant to be grass, as grass was as good of a base as any to start when he didn’t know what Michael was going to do next. Michael snorted, a half laugh as Yoichi cursed under his breath, asserting that he meant to do that as he turned the grass splotch into something that could be interpreted as a bush. Maybe? Because what else was fluffy and green like that?
The timer on Yoichi’s phone went off, signaling the end of his turn. He passed the canvas to Michael, before resetting the timer for another ten minutes. He wouldn’t start it until Michael put brush to canvas. Michael had his hand on his chin, contemplating Yoichi’s start to their masterpiece before picking up a color, a dark, deep blue, and squirting it not on the palette he had purchased specifically for this, but in the middle of the canvas. Yoichi wanted to complain, but that was the whole point of this.
After spreading the dark blue paint around, a thin layer that covered the top half of the canvas, Michael nodded, passing the painting back to Yoichi even though his time wasn’t finished yet.
“It’s night now,” Michael explained, quite pleased with himself despite his complaints from earlier. Michael grabbed his glass again, holding it below his nose and Yoichi inspected his work and decided what to do next. Maybe another attempt at the grass? Because Michael had painted over the entire canvas and it would take at least a couple minutes to dry before either of them could paint over it? It was really the only thing he could think to do for the time being, so a couple of swipes of green paint, and the painting was passed back to Michael, all intents of trying to make the grass look pretty out the window. It was simply abstract now.
As abstract as the creepy eyes Michael painted next on top of his bush, making it look like a wild animal with glowing golden eyes were peering out of the bush. Sort of. The eyes were a bit lopsided, and it looked like whatever animal or creature owned them had a disease, but it worked.
Just like the splotchy white moon painted over the still wet dark blue sort of worked.
And the bright red flowers added to the grass by Michael sort of worked (even if they were barely flowers and just little red dots spattered through the grass like blood… but oh maybe that was what Michael was going for? Maybe?
Maybe…
They finished their first glasses of wine and Michael poured their second, teasing Yoichi about his pink, alcohol flushed cheeks before nearly leaning back too far in his chair, flailing his legs as he tipped back forward and bumped the table. Yoichi managed to grab the bottle before it tipped over and spilled all over the table and floor, laughing at Michael’s now similarly flushed face, embarrassed for nearly wrecking himself on the tile floor. Michael shoved the canvas towards Yoichi, indicating it was his turn.
Yoichi added diamond shaped stars in the sky, picking out a light silver color to contrast with the bright white moon. But it didn’t really contrast, because Yoichi realized that maybe he didn’t know what contrast meant. But it looked fine, probably the best of anything he had painted that day, and nodded with satisfaction as he handed the canvas back to Michael, who promptly picked up his brush and began adding stars of his own, little dots of gold, as Michael seemed keen on doing anything that was a simple dot, rather than something with more detail.
Yoichi knew there was a problem the moment Michael grabbed a slightly larger brush, dipping it in his puddle of gold paint. He had a look in his eyes, a mischievous grin popping on his lips as he set his wine glass on Yoichi’s side of the table, moving it out of the way as he raised his arm up, brush so full it was nearly dripping on the table.
And then with a flick of his wrist, gold splattered across the canvas, in big, spltochy spots that were definitely not the delicate little drips he was probably looking for.
“ Michael ,” Yoichi scolded, looking at the paint now splattered across the newspaper and the wall behind the table. Michael plopped the paint brush in the cup of water, shrugging his shoulders.
“Oops.”
“Yeah, oops ,” Yoichi sighed, reaching for the canvas as Michael picked up his wine glass. “I think we’re done.”
“Good. I was running out of ideas anyway.”
“As if you had one to start?”
“Shh, shh, Yoichi,” Michael soothed, condescending as he held up a finger to Yoichi’s lips, before gesturing to their painting. “I think I did a good job.”
“Sure,” Yoichi responded, rolling his eyes as he picked the painting up, a large blob of gold paint rolling down the canvas. It wasn’t so bad though, definitely a good representation of them as a couple, weirdly enough. He scanned over the painting, eyeing all of the things they had done together before his eyes settled on the “stars” Michael had dotted onto the canvas before he decided to go modern art all over their kitchen. “Michael… what is that?”
Michael leaned over, looking at the spot on the canvas that Yoichi was pointing at. He laughed, snorting into his glass of wine as he leaned back in his chair.
“Do you really need an anatomy lesson right now? Haven’t you had mine in your face enough to be able to identify it on sight?”
For added effect, he grabbed the front of his sweatpants, squeezing himself firmly before letting go, tipping the last of the wine bottle into his glass. Yoichi could only roll his eyes as he sat the painting down, sighing at his boyfriend.
“Maybe it’s a little too small for me to recognize.”
“Awe, should I paint it bigger?” Michael smirked, grabbing his paint brush once more before Yoichi held a hand up, standing from the table to snatch away the plastic paint pallets to dump into the sink, likely to be forgotten until they realized they needed to clean them tomorrow.
“No, I mean. Yours. Bit smaller than the artpiece, don’t you think?”
Michael gasped, his jaw dropping open as Yoichi pushed his chair in, grabbing his wine glass and rushing out of the kitchen, leaving Michael to clean up the mess he made of the wall all by himself.
It would only take a moment. Maybe a bit of elbow grease if it started to dry already. Michael was already grumbling at Yoichi’s comment, mumbling under his breath so loudly that Yoichi could hear it from the next room over, about how he would show Yoichi small, big, whatever it took. A sensitive man with a sensitive pride, maybe a painting activity like this had been the perfect opportunity to bring out a softer side of his partner.
Probably not though. It was still fun while it lasted. He just knew the moment Michael was done cleaning his mess, he would be on his way to make a different kind of mess with Yoichi.