Chapter Text
The walk to Sakura’s was dead silent. Sakura led the way, Suo in the middle, and Nirei at the back (making sure that Suo didn’t try to slip away).
Suo wasn’t smiling anymore. As they walked, he gave up on trying to persuade his friends that he was fine. It was obvious that they weren’t going to drop this. He kept his hands clasped behind him, but was careful not to dig his nails into his hand when his eye socket ached, knowing that Nirei would be watching his every move. He didn’t want to give Nirei anything more to worry about.
As they approached Sakura’s place, a strange feeling started to grow in Suo’s stomach. It felt like someone had punched him, but then kept digging their fist into his insides, pushing deeper and deeper. Suo wanted to fold over. Clutch his stomach and his head and just fall to the ground. He wanted to go to his own house. He wanted to run away from his friends. They were never supposed to see him like this. Suo was the person who was never hit, who was always fine. He never needed someone to look after him or take care of him. If he let his weakness show now, how would he be treated later? He would be forced to see the pity stain his friends’ faces as he explained why he had been acting strangely all day. The pity would then morph into uncertainty. Uncertain if they could trust Suo anymore once they learn that one rainy day could throw him off so drastically. And if Suo was so frail that rain and wind could impair him, why would they want him to stay a vice? Why would they want him to stay a member of Bofurin?
If Suo wasn’t so well-trained on his breathing, he would’ve been hyperventilating for the last five minutes it took to walk to Sakura’s place.
Sakura pushed his door open. It was unlocked, of course. Nirei practically herded Suo inside, still scared that he would try to slip away at the last second.
Wordlessly, Suo was practically pushed onto a cushion by Nirei. It was a cushion with a color similar to his eye: brown with a subtle mix of red. Kiryu had bought personalized cushions for all of the boys that usually gathered at Sakura’s, so no one would be stuck sitting on the floor during one of their hangouts.
Nirei settled onto his own cushion beside Suo, colored golden and speckled with little white flowers. They sat together in a tense silence as they waited for Sakura to join them. The captain had gone to the bathroom to grab his medkit. Once he got it, he returned to his vices and sat on his assigned cushion, decorated simply with a black and white checkered pattern.
Sakura placed the medkit on the small table in front of him, then turned to Suo. He gestured stiffly for Suo to come closer; his cushion was too far for Sakura to be able to help with the cut on his face. Instead of moving closer, Suo reached for the medkit himself. Sakura moved it farther away from him, making sure he couldn’t reach it.
Suo gave him a look. Sakura maintained eye contact.
“Sakura-kun,” Suo said, “I can take care of myself.”
“Not right now,” Sakura said. “Now scoot over here so I can clean your face before you get an infection.”
Reluctantly, Suo moved closer. Sakura reached out and grabbed him by the jaw. He pulled Suo’s face closer.
Suo winced at the hold as a nervous smile slipped onto his face. “Sakura-kun,” he said, “I think you’re supposed to treat patients with more care than this.”
“Shut up,” Sakura snapped, but loosened his hold on Suo’s face slightly. “Stay still. Stop talking.”
Suo kept his mouth shut. Sakura got busy cleaning his cheek.
It wasn’t often that Suo had people taking care of him. The gentle action reminded Suo of his older brothers. He could feel his face start to heat up at the old memory of his child-self being taken care of, and how similar the situation was now. But these weren’t his brothers, they were his friends.
Suo knew that family took care of each other, but he was shocked by how far his friends would go for him. They wouldn’t even let him clean his own scratch. Doubtless, Suo would always help his friends with anything they needed, but he was surprised to find that he, in turn, would be cared for in the same way. Especially with how small the wound was.
“Are you blushing?” Sakura asked. His hand had frozen when he pulled the now-bloodstained cloth away from Suo’s cheek.
“If my cheek is still red,” Suo answered smoothly, “that just means you haven’t done a good job cleaning the blood off of it.”
“Then why is your left cheek red, too?” Nirei asked.
Suo didn’t have an answer for that.
“Wow, Sakura-san!” Nirei said. “You made Suo-san blush!”
Suo couldn’t deny it now. “Of course he did. He’s taking care of me so well.”
Sakura’s face exploded in red. He leaned away from Suo, letting go of his face and diverted his eyes. “You were just complaining about how I wasn’t doing a good job at cleaning your face,” he spat.
Suo laughed as Sakura rummaged around in the medkit.
“It may shock you, Sakura-kun,” he said, “but I’m not always the most truthful person.”
Sakura decided to ignore him, knowing that conversations with Suo never went in his favor. He pulled out a small tube of ointment and a cotton swab. He squeezed some of the ointment onto the cotton swab and went back to holding Suo’s face. He was mildly pleased to see that Suo’s cheeks were still dusted with color. It made him feel better about the redness of his own face.
Nirei looked between the two of them. He leaned back with a smirk. “I think this is the most I’ve seen either of you blush.”
“Shut up, Nirei!” Sakura shouted, turning to glare at the blond. He made sure to keep his hands gentle as they tended to his injured vice.
Suo just sighed, a sad smile on his lips. “This whole day has been a mess.” The words slipped out before he could hold them back.
Sakura and Nirei’s attention snapped to Suo in an instant. Something about his voice had sounded so vulnerable that it gave them whiplash. Neither had even heard their friend sound like that before.
Suo quickly realized what he’d said and how his voice had sounded. “Bleeding and blushing,” he said with a shrug. “Messy day.”
“That’s not what you meant,” Nirei said, strangely serious.
Sakura stood up to throw away the used cotton swab. Nirei replaced him, sitting next to Suo. He reached into the medkit and fished out a bandage. Nirei motioned for Suo to come closer. Without meeting Nirei’s eyes, Suo leaned towards him.
“Your day didn’t just get messy at the bridge,” Nirei said, placing the bandage on Suo’s cheek with the utmost care, smoothing it out before pulling away. “Sakura-san and I have noticed all day. You’ve been acting weird since the morning.”
Nirei moved back to his cushion, letting Sakura sit back down between them. Sakura closed the medkit and pushed it to the middle of the table, out of the way. Then he faced Suo, his attention lasered on his taller vice.
“Talk,” he ordered. Nirei peered over his shoulder, also watching Suo.
“I’m not sure what you want me to say,” Suo said. He was hoping that if he kept avoiding the conversation, his friends would get annoyed, give up, and leave him alone.
“Fine,” Nirei said, “I’ll start.” He pulled out his notebook and flipped to a certain page.
Suo watched him with a mix of intrigue and dread. He hadn’t accounted for Nirei’s note-taking. On the average day, Nirei was constantly jotting down data regarding what he noticed about the people around him, no matter how minor the detail. Suo didn’t know why he thought he wouldn’t be included in his friend’s notebook.
“During the walk to Furin,” Nirei said, scanning his notebook, “you barely talked to us or teased me or Sakura-san. At Furin, you looked more annoyed by Tsugeura’s loud voice and Umemiya-san’s loud announcement. And you looked tense all day, like something was causing you pain. When we were assigned to the patrol, I could practically feel your want to punch Umemiya-san and Hiragi-san in the faces.”
Suo frowned. He thought he had done a good job hiding his bloodlust during that moment. Apparently not.
“And throughout the whole patrol, you’ve looked miserable,” Nirei continued. “I know it’s something to do with your eye. There were multiple times that I saw you go to fix your hair, but actually you were pressing your hand to your eye for a second, stopping before we noticed…” He looked up at Suo. “I noticed.”
“I did, too,” said Sakura. “You’re not as sneaky as you think.”
“Which is good,” Nirei said, closing his notebook and tucking it away again. “I don’t want you to be sneaky when you’re in pain. You should tell us.”
“Yeah, what was all that crap about leaning on the people around me?” Sakura asked. “But here you are trying to handle whatever the fuck has been happening to you all day all on your own!”
There was a small pause. “What has been happening to you all day?” Nirei asked, concern choking his voice.
Suo fought for his face to remain neutral. How easy it would be to admit everything to his friends. He could finally tell them about the pain that had followed him around all day… but then what? How would they react? How would they treat him? Would they think him a burden for feeling pain this easily? Would his title as a vice captain be taken from him? Would they try to stop him from fighting? Scared that he would get hurt too easily?
As his mind spiraled, Suo kept his head down, staring absentmindedly at his clenched hands in his lap. He could feel his nails digging into his palms, but compared to the pulsing pain he had felt all day, the sharp bite was nothing.
Nirei, always observant, reached across Sakura to hold Suo’s hands, straightening his fingers so they couldn’t cause him more pain.
“You can tell us anything, Suo-san,” Nirei said. “We want to help you. Please confide in us.”
Sakura looked away from his vices’ hands, blush dusting his face. “We care about you, y’know,” he muttered.
Suo blinked. He knew that they cared about him. They always made it clear. But to hear it said so blatantly by Sakura, Suo couldn’t help but pause. Their captain still struggled to put his affection into his words most times, so hearing his kind words directed at Suo made something in his chest burn. And it made him want to spill everything.
“It’s… my eye,” Suo said, still looking down at his hands, enclosed by Nirei’s. He laughed strangely. “Although, you both know that by now. Apparently I haven’t been very good at hiding my discomfort today.”
“Did something happen?” Nirei asked.
“Did you get in a fight and not tell us?” Sakura asked.
“Nothing so grand,” said Suo, shaking his head carefully. “It’s the rain.”
“The rain?” Sakura parroted. “What did the rain do?”
“Well, not just the rain, I suppose,” Suo said. “The change of the barometric pressure affects me when it rains. It makes my eye sore.”
“This happens every time it rains?” Nirei asked, looking crestfallen. “How haven’t we noticed?” His hands squeezed around Suo’s.
Seeing his friend’s guilt, Suo was quick to clarify. “It’s not this bad every time! Today was just worse because it started before I woke up. Since I woke up to the peak of it, I couldn’t gradually get used to the pain, like I usually do. Before school, I did everything that I could to make the pain subside, but nothing worked.”
“Were you ever going to tell us?” Sakura asked.
“It was just one day,” Suo said, trying to brush it off.
Sakura glared at him. “No, it’s not. You just said that you get used to the pain every time it rains. And if there’s another day like today, you’re gonna be in worse pain again.”
“It’s okay, Sakura-kun,” said Suo, attempting a reassuring smile. “I’ve lived with this most of my life. I’ve gotten used to the pain. Today was just… not the best for me.”
“If we had known, we could’ve kept you from having to stay outside longer,” Nirei said. “Kihachi-san from Class 2-1 didn’t go out today because of his old knee injury. If Umemiya-san knew about your eye, he wouldn’t have made us cover for their group.”
“It’s okay,” Suo said. “I won’t be a burden because of my eye.”
Nirei withdrew his hands like Suo’s had burned him. His spine snapped up rigidly, while his face crinkled with distress. Sakura gave Suo a narrowed-eyed look.
“Suo, what the fuck?”
Suo just stared back at Sakura, not knowing what to say.
“A burden because of your eye?” Sakura spat. “You can’t be serious. No one thinks you’re a burden. You’re in the top five of our class. You’re my vice captain. Feeling some pain isn’t going to make anyone look down on you.”
“You’re allowed to take a day off if you need to,” Nirei said, seriously. “You don’t have to push yourself and make yourself uncomfortable.”
“It hasn’t been this bad in a while,” Suo reasoned, trying to keep his head level among his friends’ fretting.
“Doesn’t matter,” said Sakura.
“If you’re feeling any level of pain,” Nirei said, “we care. Even if it’s not too bad, we want to be able to help you when you’re feeling discomfort.”
“It’s really not that bad,” Suo said, trying to make his friends feel better. “I can handle pain.”
Sakura rolled his eyes. “You really are stupid.”
“You don’t have to handle pain, Suo-san!” Nirei scolded. “You’re allowed to take a break when you’re in pain.”
“But that makes me weak,” said Suo.
“I’m gonna punch him.”
Nirei grabbed Sakura before he could follow through on the threat, hooking his arms under the captain’s.
“Suo-san, basically everyone in our class has had to sit out a few days at some point because they got their asses kicked,” Nirei said, looking at him from over Sakura’s shoulder. “You don’t have to hide your pain because you think it’s a weakness. I guarantee, if we told the others about your eye, no one would think that you’re any less strong because of it.”
“Don’t tell them!” Suo yelped, scooting back, away from them.
Sakura and Nirei froze. Suo sounded desperate or… frightened? He never sounded like that.
“Suo–”
“Don’t tell anyone about this!” Suo pleaded the demand. “They’ll use it against me! Someone will–”
“Suo, we won’t!” Sakura shouted, his voice overpowered Suo’s as he shrugged out of Nirei’s hold. Suo snapped his mouth shut. “If you don’t want us to, we won’t. I get it. You didn’t even want us to know about it in the first place. We’re not gonna go blabbing your secrets.”
“But it would be fine,” Nirei stressed. “They wouldn’t–”
“No,” said Sakura.
“Not yet,” said Suo. “Please, not yet.”
Nirei was disappointed that more people wouldn’t know about Suo’s pain, to be able to know when and how to help him, but he held some hope that Suo seemed to be thinking about maybe telling more people in the future. Nirei hoped that that future was soon. If another day like this happened while Suo wasn’t around Sakura or himself, Nirei feared that Suo would be pushed into doing something regrettable while clouded by his pain.
“Okay, I get it,” Nirei said.
Suo seemed to calm down a little. His posture was still a bit rigid, but he wasn’t positioned away from his friends anymore.
Bummed that Suo wasn’t allowing himself to let more people help him, Nirei sighed. He wanted to do something more to help his friend, but he didn’t want to go against Suo’s request to stay quiet about the whole incident – especially since Sakura was agreeing with Suo. If he couldn’t get others to help Suo, he would have to do it himself.
“Does anything make it feel better?” Nirei asked.
Suo gave him a questioning look.
“For the pain,” Nirei explained. “Like is there something that you do that works to make the pain get better? You said something about already trying to make it better before school, but maybe there’s something that Sakura-san and I can do for you now, something that you can’t do yourself.”
Suo’s eye widened. Nirei really wanted to help him, it seemed. Looking at Sakura, Suo knew that it was the same with the class captain. Both of his friends were staring at him, waiting to be told what to do to help him.
“Um, tea,” Suo blurted the first remedy that came to mind.
Sakura frowned. “I don’t have any tea.”
Nirei shot to his feet. “I’ll go get some! There’s a teashop not far from here!”
Before Nirei could run for the door, Sakura stood and grabbed him by the back of his shirt. It was like he was scruffing an overeager puppy. Nirei looked back, confused.
“You didn’t even ask what kind he wants,” Sakura said.
Suo could’ve poked some fun at Sakura caring so much about him, but he wasn’t in the mood. He was a bit drained from the whole day. Even though he barely had to talk about his eye with his friends, it was still leaving him a bit confused. They didn’t care– Well, they did, but not in an overbearing way. Why had he been overthinking the conversation with them? Did he really think Sakura and Nirei would treat him badly about his eye? Suo had no idea why he’d been so stressed out about allowing them to care for him.
“White tea,” Suo told Nirei. “It’s good for healing. At least, that’s what they say.”
Nirei nodded and slipped from Sakura’s grip. He grabbed an umbrella on the way out, in case it started raining again. Once Nirei was out the door, Sakura sat back down. There was a blanket of silence covering the room.
“Listen,” Sakura broke the silence after a few moments, “I get the whole not wanting to be seen as weak thing, but you should’ve at least mentioned that something was wrong.” He hesitated, clearly struggling with his words. “As the class captain, I should be able to tell when something is wrong with my classmates. It kinda sucks to think about how much pain you’ve been in all day, and I haven’t done anything to help fix it.”
“You can’t fix it, Sakura-kun,” Suo said. “You can’t control the weather.”
“I could’ve pushed against Umemiya assigning us this patrol. I wouldn’t need to tell him the details. I could just tell him to shove it and not ask any questions. He’d probably let us go home like normal and assign some other group to cover the patrol. It didn’t have to be us if we weren’t all a hundred percent today.”
“You can’t blame yourself, Sakura-kun,” assured Suo. “It’s on me. I should’ve checked the weather last night before going to bed. I could’ve set an alarm to wake up before the weather changed. I could’ve gotten used to the pain before it ruined my day.”
“That’s so many extra steps,” Sakura said, narrowing his eyes. “That’s so much to do when you could just stay home and say that you’re having a bad day.”
Suo shook his head, then winced at the ache it created. “I had to be there for the class. I can’t abandon my title as vice captain.”
“You wouldn’t be abandoning shit,” Sakura snapped. He groaned and scratched the back of his head. “You’re impossible to reason with, y’know that?”
Suo grinned. “So I’ve been told.”
Sakura rolled his eyes and leaned back so that he was propping himself up with his hands behind him. He looked toward the sliding door and saw that the sky was still covered in a thick layer of clouds. They weren’t too dark, but they weren’t going away anytime soon either.
“Is there anything else that helps?” Sakura asked. “Besides tea.”
Suo opened his mouth, ready to respond, but stopped himself. An image flashed in his mind. His head lay in his brother’s lap as his brother ran his fingers through Suo’s hair, applying the correct amount of pressure to relieve the headache that accompanied the phantom pain. Suo didn’t dare bring this up. He didn’t want Sakura to feel uncomfortable with it or make fun of Suo’s childish solution.
“Spit it out,” Sakura demanded. “I can see your gears turning. Just tell me what it is.”
“It’s lame.”
“Who cares?”
Suo glanced at him. “You don’t like lame people.”
“I can make an exception.”
“What a big word,” Suo chided.
“Really?” Sakura snapped. “You’re gonna make fun of me while I’m trying to help you?”
Suo shut his mouth and lowered his gaze. Why did he do that? He’d already accepted Nirei’s help with the tea, so why was he still pushing Sakura away?
“I’m sorry,” Suo said meekly. “You don’t have to do anymore than you’ve already done for me.”
Sakura glared at him. “Come on, Suo. Let me do something. Nirei’s getting you tea. It’ll look bad if he comes back and I’m still just sitting here. He’ll slap me for not doing more for you.”
Suo chuckled. “Nirei-kun wouldn’t slap you.”
“Yes, he would,” Sakura said. “If I did nothing to help you, he’d be pissed.”
“You already let me come over and cleaned my wound for me.”
“That’s not enough.”
“I think it’s plenty.”
“Suo,” Sakura said, grabbing his shoulders and carefully maneuvering him so that he was facing Sakura. “I don’t care how lame your request is. Tell me what to do for you.”
Suo bit the inside of his cheek. He’d already revealed his eye’s phantom pain to his friends, what’s a little more?
“I get headaches, too,” Suo admitted. “It only happens on the worst days, like today.”
“What helps?” Sakura asked, cutting to the chase.
“A massage,” Suo said, looking away with a blush.
Sakura hesitated. This day was going down in history with how many times Sakura had seen his taller vice with colored cheeks.
“Do I just need to rub your head?” Sakura asked. “What’s so lame about that?”
Suo still wouldn’t look at him. “It works best when I’m lying down. When my brothers helped me, I would put my head in their laps.” His ears were burning.
“Lying down,” Sakura muttered, looking around. He grabbed Suo and pulled him up.
“Gentle,” Suo reminded as he stood and winced.
“Shit, sorry.” Sakura frowned. He wasn’t used to Suo being so fragile. He was more careful with his movements as he brought Suo over to his futon. Sakura sat down with his back against the wall, so that the futon was in front of him. He looked up at Suo and patted his lap.
Suo was frozen. Sakura was being so normal about this. Sure, he was blushing, but that was pretty normal for him.
“Come on,” Sakura said, getting nervous. He felt like he was messing something up as Suo just stared at him. “You said that it’s better to lie down, right? I don’t want you just lying on the floor while you’re already in pain.”
“How thoughtful,” Suo mused, but his normal taunting tone was hardly present.
He lowered himself carefully onto the futon. He scooted closer to Sakura until his head rested perfectly on his crossed legs. He looked up at Sakura and his breath caught. Sakura was looking down at him, looking so troubled.
“What’s wrong, Sakura-kun?”
“You look so vulnerable.”
Suo immediately tensed up. He was about to sit up, but Sakura brought his hand to Suo’s reddish-brown hair and pressed his fingers into his head with the perfect amount of pressure.
“It’s not bad,” Sakura assured, feeling how Suo had tensed. “I wish you would let us see this side of you more often. You don’t always have to be the one who’s unaffected by everything.”
Suo’s eye slipped closed as Sakura continued moving his fingers through his hair.
“At least with me and Nirei,” Sakura said, his voice had turned gentle, “you should show us your true feelings more often.”
Suo hummed. He didn’t know how to respond to that. With Sakura’s help, the headache that had been ever present, but ignored, was starting to fade away. His eye socket still hurt, but the mellowing of pain in his skull was making Suo feel more relaxed than he had the entire day.
Sakura could feel as Suo practically melted from his massage. His eye was closed and the corners of his lips were tilted up in a soft smile. Sakura had to look away. Suo looked so peaceful, it felt wrong for Sakura to ogle at him.
After a while, a thought came to Sakura. He was worried that Suo had actually fallen asleep, so when he spoke, he spoke softly.
“Hey, uh, Suo?”
“Hm?” Suo was awake, but his hum sounded dreamy, like he could fall asleep at any second.
Sakura didn’t want to bother him while he was finally content, but if he didn’t say something, it was going to bother him.
“Those guys we ran into at the bridge,” Sakura said, “the ones that were messing with the cat…” He hesitated. Suo’s body had tensed slightly at the mention of the men.
“What about them?” he asked. His eye remained closed, but the corners of his mouth were ticked down.
“You kinda went crazy on them,” Sakura said. “Was it because you were in pain?”
Suo sighed. He could tell that Sakura was genuinely curious, not trying to get a rise out of him or anything.
“The pain was part of it,” Suo admitted. “Everything that had happened today piled up at that moment and I snapped. And… the cat.”
Sakura thought back. “It was like you.”
“Fucked up,” Suo said, remembering the mens’ words.
Sakura’s hand paused on Suo’s head. “They were a bunch of assholes.”
“Doesn’t mean they were wrong.”
“Suo.”
“It’s okay, Sakura-kun,” said Suo. “I know that I’m damaged. Them pointing it out doesn’t mean anything.”
Sakura frowned. “You’re such a hypocrite. Always telling me to not hate on myself, but then you do the exact same thing to yourself.”
“It’s different,” Suo said. “You hate yourself because everyone who you grew up around hated you. You didn’t know any better. I hate myself because I’m ruined. I’m not whole like everyone else. It’s simple. We’re not the same.”
Sakura bit his lip until it bled. His eyes were burning. He couldn’t handle the way that Suo was talking about himself, but he didn’t know what to say to make Suo understand the pain his words were causing Sakura to feel.
“You’re not–” Sakura’s voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “You’re not ruined.”
Suo opened his eye and looked up at Sakura. His eyebrows furrowed as his gaze zeroed in on his red stained lip.
“You’re bleeding.” He tried to sit up, but Sakura held his shoulders down.
“Don’t get up,” Sakura said. “It’s fine.”
Suo looked at Sakura’s eyes and paused when he saw the unshed tears.
“Sakura-kun, I didn’t mean to make you cry,” Suo said, his chest feeling tight. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that about you.”
Sakura couldn’t believe it. Everything Suo had said, and he still thought that Sakura was on the verge of tears just because he had said that Sakura hated himself.
“You’re so dumb,” Sakura said. “I’m not mad ’cause of what you said about me. I know that I hate myself because other people taught me to. I’m pissed because you hate yourself just because you’re you! That’s fucked up.” He scrubbed at his eyes with his sleeve.
“Hey, you’re going to hurt yourself.” Suo reached up and grabbed Sakura’s arm.
“We like you,” Sakura blurted. “Me and Nirei. The whole class. All of Bofurin! We like you. We don’t just have you around because you’re strong or smart or whatever. We have you around because we like you. You should like yourself, too. You’re not ruined and you’re not a burden because of what happened to your eye. Who cares if you’re not whole like everyone else? I look like half of two people got squished together. You don’t give a shit about how I look, so why do you care so much about your own looks?”
Sakura was breathing heavily after his rant. Suo was frozen, still looking up at him.
Finally, he said, “Sakura-kun, not everyone is like the members of Bofurin. Not everyone is as nice to me about how I look as you and the rest of the class. You all know that I’m a strong fighter, so you know that I’m not useless. To a random person on the street, I look like a hindrance. I look like I’ll slow people down, or that others will have to worry about me constantly. I don’t want that.” He paused, looking away. “I wanted to kill those guys for messing with the cat. I don’t know if animals feel the same as us, but the thought that the cat was in pain because of the weather, like me, and it was getting harassed by a bunch of bullies, I just– I snapped.”
“Did people use to pick on you while you were in pain?” Sakura asked.
Suo’s eye widened with shock, but he quickly recovered with a forced smile. “Ah, what does it matter? The past is just that. No use worrying about it in the present.”
Sakura frowned at him. He put his hand back to work, rubbing Suo’s head, hoping that he would be able to see his face relax again. He regretted bringing up the men on the bridge and the cat. He wanted Suo to look peaceful again, he wanted him to be comfortable and relaxed in his lap again.
“Fine,” Sakura said, “we don’t have to talk about this anymore.”
Suo closed his eye again.
“Is this helping at all?” Sakura asked, meaning his hand in Suo’s hair.
Suo nodded, smiling. “Immensely. I didn’t even need to tell you what amount of pressure to use. You’re a natural.”
Sakura was glad that he could help in this small way at least. He felt a weight lift off his shoulders as Suo’s smile came back. Sakura didn’t know that Suo’s genuine smile could look so gorgeous. Sakura had never gotten to take such a close look at Suo for so long.
There were a few times Suo would shift his head, guiding Sakura’s hand where to massage, but beside those moments, Suo remained still. Eventually, he stopped moving his head and his breath evened out. It took Sakura a while to realize that the eyepatched boy had fallen asleep.
Sakura started to stress. He made sure to keep his hand moving and to keep the pressure consistent. He didn’t want to wake Suo up somehow. He felt like he shouldn’t even breathe.
As Sakura continued to stress out over his own movements, the door to his apartment slammed open.
Nirei’s excited voice came next. “I got the–”
“Zip it!” Sakura snapped in a whisper.
Nirei rounded the corner and froze.
“Is he asleep?” he asked in a hushed voice.
Sakura nodded, making sure to keep his hand moving and the pattern of the massage unchanged.
Nirei joined them on the floor. He had a to-go cup and a small package. Sakura gave the package a questioning glance.
“Red plums,” Nirei whispered. “I figured he could use something to eat, too. They’re supposed to go well with white tea. And look!” Nirei opened the package and pulled out one of the plums, holding it next to Suo’s head. “They’re basically the same color as Suo-san’s hair.”
“Cute,” Sakura said without thinking.
“Aw, Sakura-kun thinks I’m cute?” Suo asked, opening his eye.
Sakura jolted. “You’re awake?!”
“I have been since Nirei-kun kicked the door in.”
“Sorry,” Nirei apologized, scratching his neck, then glared at Sakura. “Why didn’t you text me? I would’ve come in quietly.”
“My phone’s all the way over there!” Sakura exclaimed, pointing at the table with the hand he wasn’t using to massage Suo’s head. “Did you want me to get up and grab it while Suo was asleep?”
“You should’ve brought it with you when you moved to the futon!” Nirei scolded.
“I didn’t know he was going to fall asleep!” Sakura said in his defense. “I thought I was just gonna massage him until you got back so he could stop having a headache!”
“He has a headache?” Nieri asked, lowering his voice. He looked down at Suo who was wincing. “If he has a headache, stop screaming while he’s lying on you.”
Sakura’s mouth opened as he glared at Nirei. He was about to yell at the blond boy some more, but stopped himself, looking down at Suo’s pained face.
“Sorry,” Sakura whispered, looking away. His hand was still massaging his vice’s head.
Suo chuckled, only wincing slightly.
“Well, since you’re awake…” Nirei held up the cup and the plum. “Drink and eat.”
“You’re like a mother,” Suo chided. He sat up and Sakura’s hand fell away from his head.
“Shush,” Nirei scolded. He handed the cup over to Suo.
Suo let the warmth of the heated paperboard cup seep into his hands. He took a sip of the tea and sighed gratefully.
Nirei held out a plum to him, too. “You should also eat something.”
“Right,” Suo said, taking it from Nirei. “The fruit that matches me.” He held it in front of his stick-on eyepatch. “Does it suit me?”
“You better eat it,” Nirei said, sounding as threatening as he could.
“You really are a mom,” Sakura muttered.
“You know I’m on a diet, Nirei-kun,” said Suo, passing over Sakura’s comment. He moved to put the fruit down, but Nirei grabbed his wrist, raising it back up to Suo’s mouth.
“Eat,” Nirei demanded. He actually looked mad.
Suo took a bite out of the fruit. It was a mix of tartness and sweetness. It tasted really good. His friends watched as he ate the whole fruit, careful to mind the pit. Once he finished it, Nirei took the pit from him and wrapped it in a napkin. Sakura handed him another plum.
Suo could feel his face getting warm again. He huffed a sigh. He was getting as bad as Sakura.
The cycle kept repeating. By the time he was done with his tea, Suo had eaten three small plums. Nirei held the three pits in a napkin, keeping the sticky juice away from Sakura’s futon.
“Are you feeling better?” Sakura asked as he took the empty cup from Suo.
Suo nodded and was shocked to realize that his head didn’t pound with pain as it moved. The massage and the tea and the care must’ve healed him, at least a little bit.
There was a rumble from the window. Sakura glared at the darkening sky. Nirei pulled his phone out and looked at the weather. He frowned.
“It’s supposed to rain again tonight,” he said.
Suo rubbed his hands over his face. “Yay.”
Sakura looked at him, thinking. It took only a second for him to make up his mind.
“Nirei,” he said, “text Umemiya, tell him that the three of us won’t be at school tomorrow.”
Suo’s head snapped up. “No. If I stay home, I can’t make you two stay with me. I can’t take away the captain and the other vice from the class.”
“It’s fine,” Nirei said, already typing out the message. “Our class doesn’t have any patrols tomorrow anyway. I’ll text Kiryu-san, Tsugeura-san, and Sugishita-san to let them know that they’re in charge tomorrow. If they need any more help for some reason, they can ask Hiragi-san.”
“Sounds good,” Sakura said.
Nirei’s phone buzzed immediately. “Umemiya-san says we’re good. Kiryu-san and Tsugeura-san gave thumbs up. Sugishita-san read the message.”
“Great,” said Sakura. “So tomorrow will be a day full of taking care of Suo and making him feel comfortable.”
“That’s right,” Nirei said, nodding enthusiastically. “It’ll be a day full of tea, fruits, warm compresses, dim lighting, and head massages.” He had clearly done some extra research on pain reducing methods on his way to get the tea and plums.
Sakura and Nirei grinned at each other proudly. They clasped hands like they had done something worthy of a celebration.
“You two are impossible,” Suo sighed, shaking his head. He dropped his face into his hands so that his friends couldn’t see his relieved and genuine smile.