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It’s not like Takao often sources his information from occult websites (although he does it often just to spite Midorima), but when he googles his symptoms up, they were all he could find.
Symptoms? Well, Kazunari Takao has something special to share. It’s not that he’s part of a strong basketball team, or the fact that he can predict the weather three hours prior, or that the reason why he passed his finals last year was thanks to Midorima’s pencil, but that when he goes to sleep, he doesn’t really sleep.
✂
Today, Kazunari Takao is a reporter. The camera sits heavy and unfamiliar in his palms, and someone elbows him in the sides. “Oi, Kazunari,” the guy whispers, and Takao turns to see Kise Ryouta, decked in sunglasses and a black trench coat. “Why are you spacing out for? Take some damn shots, you idiot. This is a big scoop.”
“I—” don’t know how to work this thing, he wants to reply, but he subconsciously lifts the camera up and starts taking photos of the scene. Now that he focuses through his lenses, he can see what’s going on in front of them (outside the bush they’re hiding in). “S–Shin-chan?” He squeaks unintentionally, lowering his camera as he watches Midorima strum a guitar on a park bench, eyes closed in concentration and lips pursed in content, humming to a tune.
“You friends with him or somethin’, Kazunari?” Kise asks, eyes bright with curiosity. You bet, Takao thinks with a long internal sigh. “Interesting, isn’t it? You should thank me for dragging you out for this, man. Midorima Shintaro and Kuroko Tetsuya’s unrevealed collaboration! This smells like headlines!”
“Uh – yeah, thanks, Kise,” Takao manages, fumbling with his camera before he resumes taking photos. Midorima looks like the Midorima he knows – Takao knows. He’s had many of these, too many, where people he know turn into people he don’t, where things he never used to do become things he was proficient at, where he is Kazunari Takao and not at the same time.
Midorima smiles – Takao loses grip of his camera for a bit, and takes a late shot when his smile is just fading away. It aches a little when Takao looks at the photo in the gallery later because he knows that when he wakes up, he would wish he could keep the photo with him.
(A pity he never did get to keep it. A pity he never got to keep the things he’d gotten in his dreams, the people he’d loved in his dreams—)
✂
“Takao.”
Harsh, bright lights jolt him awake as he peels off the towel over his eyes and sits up on the bench in the gym. Midorima hands him a bottle of cold water from beside, and he takes it gratefully, taking huge gulps before he lets out a loud sigh. “Fell asleep, didn’t I,” he says.
“When do you not,” comes Midorima’s curt reply.
“Don’t be so mean, Shin-chan~ I dreamt of you this time, you know,” Takao replies airily, setting the bottle beside him. It's not a complete lie, but Takao practically dreams about Midorima in every other dream.
Midorima pushes up his glasses and slaps a towel on Takao’s head. “I’m not interested in what your dreams portray me to be, idiot. Now come practice before captain kills us all.”
Takao chuckles behind the towel, closing his eyes to imagine how Midorima would look like – not in a dream but in real life, with a genuine, content smile on his face. Midorima shoots him an angry glare from the court and Takao pretends to fall asleep again, back flush against the cool bench.
It would probably be nice.
✂
Google tells him that he has the ability to travel to parallel universes where Kazunari Takao exists, not as him, but as another him. Despite Midorima’s frequent accusations, Takao isn’t actually an idiot, but it took him quite a while to understand what the website was talking about. He’s skeptical about the whole ‘travelling’ thing, since he doesn’t know if he really does appear in another world or if he’s just dreaming, but if this explanation was real, it would serve to explain how Takao falls asleep and wakes up as a Takao that isn’t him.
He turns his laptop off, and throws himself on his bed, burying his face into a pillow. He knows the number of nights he’d spent without sleep – trying to avoid falling into the world of another Takao, trying to avoid the feeling of waking up feeling strangely disoriented and lost, and when Takao blinks, he falls asleep.
✂
Today, Kazunari Takao is a florist.
He looks down and sees a bunch of neatly primmed roses in his hands. He wonders if this customer will get mad if they don't get their roses soon, because he doesn't know what to do with this.
There isn’t really a pattern to his dreams, really: one day he could be a good ol’ farmer working hard under the sun to put food on the table, and tomorrow he could be a paid assassin to get a job done, revolver friendly and familiar in his hands, and in the next he might just be a firefighter who managed to pull a cat out of a burning tree. However, no matter how his dreams change, there’s always this one thing that stays constant.
The bell attached to the glass doors ring, pleasing to his ears and Takao stills in mild shock (he should’ve gotten used to it, but heck) when he sees Midorima strolling in, glasses and taped fingers and all. “Excuse me,” Midorima says, walking to the counter, where Takao is sitting at, “sorry, but do you have cacti here? The rounded, stubby ones.”
“Um,” Takao says, because he’s just been here for like three seconds and he has no idea what the store has. But because he’s Takao and here’s Midorima, he grins. “I don’t think we do, sir. Sorry.”
“Is that so?”
“Well…” Takao shifts his gaze to the bunch of roses in his hands, “not many people raise cacti for personal interest, so we don’t have a habit of importing cacti for sale, you see, sir. What is the plant for, though? I could recommend you another kind, if you’d like,” Takao replies easily, and contemplates about being a salesman in the future if the basketball thing doesn’t work out.
“It’s… um…” Takao watches in amusement as Midorima fumbles for a way to say that it’s his lucky item for the day, perhaps, but he doesn’t say anything. “I’m buying it for a close friend. He’s an asshole, you see, and I told him that I would shove a cactus up his ass if he annoys me another time.”
Takao has a cold chill running down his back. Something in him tells him that the friend may be him. Not him, technically, but, yeah. Him.
“Well – a pity we don’t have them here then, mm? I – uh, hope you find a cactus soon then, sir!”
Midorima’s halfway out of the door when he says that, but Takao can see him nodding and muttering an half-hearted thanks when the door closes with a soft tinkle of the bells.
✂
Later, Takao wakes up with a start. If he concentrates hard enough, he thinks he can smell roses in the gaps between his fingers.
✂
When they’re playing Seirin, Takao finds out that Midorima is fiercely competitive. The wooden raccoon in the changing room couldn’t hold a candle to the determination he’s feeling from beside him, to the point that he would have believed it if someone told him that the determination came off Midorima in waves. Radiation, maybe. He would have believed it.
Midorima doesn’t speak to anyone during the break, mumbling to himself about fate and destiny and doing everything that he can, what’s new. Sometimes, Takao wonders if Lady Luck laughs at Midorima for doing all these nonsense when it probably doesn’t even work, but when they’re on the court and Midorima makes his insane long shots, Takao doubts himself a little. Just a little. Not that he’s ever going to tell Midorima that, though.
Kuroko Tetsuya walks over with a hint of a smile clinging to the corner of his lips after the game ends. Midorima pretends he isn’t interested, like he always does, but Kuroko probably can see through the act too. “You were amazing today, Midorima-kun. I hope we can play again soon. Kagami-kun sends his regards, too.”
Maybe it’s because they’ve known each other since a long time ago, but Kuroko knows that he doesn’t have to wait for the answer that won’t come because he just walks away right after. Takao watches as Kuroko rejoins the Seirin group and they leave the stadium together.
If Takao was famous and an interview asked him for his favorite pastime, he probably won’t answer in this fashion, but what gets him thinking and wasting his precious time by thinking is how the hell he can get Midorima to be fixated on something else that isn’t defeating his old teammates. But, he won’t admit that he wants Midorima to be fixated on him. Not to national television, not to Midorima Shintaro.
Not to himself, either.
✂
Today, Kazunari Takao is a doctor.
Frankly, he’s always seen this job as one fitting for someone like Midorima, or maybe Akashi, so he’s pretty shocked to find himself stirring awake on a swivelling office chair with a clean white lab coat on him.
Well, might as well enjoy this, right? It’s not everyday that he gets to become a doctor like this—
“Dr. Kazunari! The casualties are here! Please come down to A&E now!” The intercom buzzes from the telephone on his desk and he takes a moment to absorb the fact that he may kill someone or cause them to die indirectly because he’s not a doctor, damn it. He’s a high school student who plays basketball. But, well, he finds that things always work out in his dreams. It’ll be like he was born to cut open hearts or something. It surprises him sometimes, and it’s one of the reasons why he chose to believe the occult websites instead of dismissing all of these experiences as simple dreams.
He remembers being a farmer – cursing at the overhead sun glaring down on his sweaty figure as he pops seeds into fertile soil and wonders how on earth he knows how to properly stuff a scarecrow and prepare a chicken for dinner. He remembers flying a plane – a big airbus with the dashboard that looked familiar in video simulation games but utterly foreign up close, but he manages to fly a few thousand miles out of America, so he figures it probably won’t be a problem to operate on a few people this time, or something.
Takao reaches the A&E area after stumbling into a rushing nurse and asking for directions, and he helps a few soldiers bandage and clean up their wounds after he reports his attendance. Aomine Daiki runs into the room with several packets of IV drips in his arms. “Oi, Sakurai,” he yells, “get me some more stands for the drips!”
“Y-yes!” Sakurai yells back, running out of the room and Takao is mildly amused by the resemblance in real life. Although, real life Aomine would be too brash and careless for a nurse. Sakurai fits the bill just nice, though.
After they manage to deal with the current injuries, Hyuuga Junpei ushers them out of the room and sighs. Takao gets reminded of the one time he was in a world where Hyuuga was his butler, and he’d made him scrub his feet, and Takao suddenly thinks this is pretty funny, but the atmosphere is too grave for him to let out even a single chuckle. “War is coming. Casualties will only increase,” he says, gazing out of the glass doors. “But let’s have faith in the soldiers.”
There’s a loud blast of horns from outside. Curious, they walk out of the hospital to look. The soldiers are doing a ceremonial parade around the area after the first attack, it seems, and all of them are mounted on horses, faces grim but evidently victorious.
Takao watches the flying flag and realizes that the one beside the flag is Midorima. He’s leading the troop, Takao notes in shock, and Izuki Shun and Akashi Seijuro are riding beside him silently, faces sullen and melancholy. The generals.
“We can't predict what will happen next,” Hyuuga says with a frown, eyes locked on the fleet of horses without a rider on them and Aomine sighs. “Be alert and on your guard, okay?”
They nod, silent.
✂
The loud echo of the firing of the cannon signals that another attack has ended. Takao countdowns to the moment where he’ll be summoned down and when it does come, he rushes down in a heartbeat. He doesn’t know if it’s instinct, or if the Takao here is pretty strict towards himself, but he feels obliged to do his job to the best of his abilities. Or maybe because he’s just waiting to meet Midorima? Well, he muses, but a general probably wouldn’t be here—
—right? On a stretcher is Midorima Shintaro, overseeing general and the tactical advisor of the war. His head is almost entirely covered in blood and his hands are shaking and his lips are so pale Takao wants to fall onto the floor. The green strands of his hair are tainted by a sickly red and his left hand is marred with cuts, not perfect like Takao remembers. The stench of dried, cracking blood on Midorima’s armor tells Takao that it’s horrible – Midorima is, and Takao wants to blink and wake up.
But his doctor instincts take over instead. Aomine and Sakurai place Midorima’s stretcher on a vacant bed and walk out to receive the next casualties. From the corner of his eye, Takao can see Murasakibara Atsushi, body charred beyond recognition save for his bright purple hair. With teary eyes, Sakurai silently pulls the cover over his body. Takao mildly wonders how this boy managed to muster his guts to become a medical staff.
“General,” Takao whispers, and Midorima lets out a shaky breath.
“Don’t save me, doctor,” Midorima replies, refusing to look at anyone as Hyuuga attaches the drip to his arm. “My time is up. There is no point in avoiding what fate has prepared for me. Extending the date of my death may only result in more agony and suffering, for not only me but everyone else.”
Sounds like you, alright, Takao thinks, and Hyuuga walks away silently.
The room is silent when the machine attached to Midorima announces that his heart has stopped beating, filling the space with a morbid sound of death.
✂
Takao wakes up panting, heart pumping and hands shaking as he picks up his phone and calls Midorima in a daze. It’s probably 3AM, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. Midorima had better be alive – he can’t take his chances, right? His mom had told him before – if you die in a dream, you die in real life. He hopes it doesn’t apply if you aren’t the protagonist of the dream.
“What do you want, Takao.”
Takao lets out a shaky exhale and thinks that he has never been so happy about Midorima being mad at him before. “Hi, Shin-chan.”
“Takao. It is 3AM. Some of us need this thing called sleep.”
“I—I’m sorry, I think I butt-dialled you by mistake because I was sleeping on my phone, haha. You can… go back to sleep now?”
Midorima grunts, but says nothing else before he hangs up.
Later, Takao daydreams about a falling kingdom and its fallen generals and falls asleep to a dreamless slumber.
✂
Today, Takao is late for school. His mom yells at him from the kitchen: something along the lines of rebellious children and how if you don't eat breakfast you’ll become wrinkly at the age of 50 when he says that he’s running late and won’t be having breakfast, so he shoves one piece of bread into his mouth just to appease her and dashes out of the house.
It’s Physics class, and the teacher is probably talking about something like projectile motion, because he can see the parabolic path on the board, but he isn’t listening – more like he can’t. All he can think about is the sight of Midorima dying in front of his eyes, hands cold and lips pale and trembling, and all he can hear is the deadly sound of the machine, beeping with the straight green line on the display. Takao isn’t a real doctor, but he’s watched enough shows to know what that meant. Death, huh?
Before he knows it, his hands are shaking, and his pen is slightly wet from his grip from all the nervous sweating he’s doing. He knows they’re all not real, Midorima is still alive and kicking just behind his seat, but he also knows that that wasn’t a dream. It really happened in reality, just not in his reality. Somewhere in another world, Midorima has died, and Takao has watched him die without really knowing what kind of a person he was.
All along, he’s been having happy dreams about himself and the people he knows and it’s like he’s living a life parallel to his own, and it’s only until the dream last night that he realizes that it isn’t the case. Many different things happen to the many different Takaos he has been before – maybe today the doctor Takao had been fired for not being able to save a life; maybe today the farmer Takao is enjoying an abundant harvest due to sudden rainfall, and maybe today the paparazzi Takao finally got a big scoop regarding Kuroko Tetsuya’s dating scandal. All he got to experience was an extreme incident – one that simply happened to involve Midorima.
Surprising? After some internal reasoning, it shouldn’t really be, but Takao still can’t find it in him to slow down his heartbeat as the teacher drones on about displacement and acceleration.
“Takao,” Midorima says, over his bento.
They’re spending their lunch hour on the rooftop again – because Midorima had prepared a bento, they don’t need to join in the unnecessary queuing in the cafeteria for food because Midorima always makes too much food.
(Or maybe because Takao has always bugged him for food that he found it too annoying and began to prepare Takao’s share, he doesn’t know.)
Midorima doesn’t always prepare bentos, though. He does it when there are exams coming up, and he needs the silence at the roof or when he’s sick of the food at the cafeteria. The bentos make today feel pretty special. There’s a pleasant moment of silence before Takao realizes that he still hasn’t answered Midorima. “Oh. Yes?”
“You’ve been acting all weird today, and you called me last night – what’s going on?”
“I –” I dreamt of you dying? Like, you died in my dream and I watched you take your last breath? That my heart still hurts when I think of the scene, even though you’re just right here? “Uh,” he says instead, “nothing much. Bad dreams last night. I’ll get over them pretty soon,” Takao murmurs, “hey, but Shin-chan, are you possibly worried about me? Aww, that is so sweet of you, Shin-chan. I thought if I died, you probably won’t come to my funeral, you know. Aww.”
Midorima lets out an exasperated sigh and pushes his glasses up with his right hand. “Pretend I never said that, then,” he says, but the tips of his ears are flushed red.
Takao could make fun of Midorima, but he pretends he doesn’t see instead. He leans over to grab a piece of egg sushi from Midorima’s bento and eats it in a bite, ignoring Midorima’s splutters and protests because he feels pretty happy today.
They lapse into a comfortable silence as they eat and it’s Midorima that breaks the silence. “The next time you have a bad dream,” he starts, “and you actually call me for no reason, you don’t have to lie, you know? Last night, you sounded like you just strangled a cat and were confused whether you needed to call the police to turn yourself in or not. You can just tell me that you had a nightmare – actually, I already could guess before you explained. Besides, Scorpios are ranked the last today, so there's nothing much you can do.”
“Then, Shin-chan, what’s my lucky item today? It helps, right?”
Midorima doesn’t look at him, but passes him an untouched bento box and pushes his glasses up. “Bento.”
Takao chuckles and tackles Midorima, who’s currently facing somewhere that is not Takao and Takao ends up giving him a backhug instead. “Thank you,” he whispers into Midorima’s back, cheeks pleasantly warm.
✂
Today, Kazunari Takao wakes up in a café. The café has a really cute and interesting interior that makes the whole café look like a miniature version of a real café – like those models you find in Barbie sets or in a dollhouse. The tables are a sweet shade of creamy pink and the chairs are wooden and spherical with a nice fluffy cushion to sit on. The walls are painted a soft, sky blue and the floors are wooden panes with a nice layer of gloss over them. Takao wonders who owns this place because it’s decorated so prettily. The air is faintly tinged with the smell of roasted coffee beans and cream and vanilla and Takao has only been here for about a minute and he’s already in love.
“Taka-chin. Could you pass me the coffee beans please,” Takao hears, and he turns to meet the chest of Murasakibara’s. God, no matter how many times he’s been through this, this person is a giant –
Takao probably looks stunned and stupid while lost in his internal monologue because Murasakibara’s eyebrows go up before he points at the bag of beans by Takao’s feet, leaning against the cashier counter. “Oh,” Takao says, lamely, as he hauls the bag up and passes it to the purple-haired boy from across the kitchen counter. “Thanks, Taka-chin,” Murasakibara hums before disappearing into the kitchen.
Taka-chin, huh, Takao thinks, but he’s been in so many of these parallel universes and it’s the first time that someone has the same naming habits as the person he knows in his world. Confusing much.
“Takao,” Akashi says, brows furrowed in confusion as he holds up a cup of hot latte. “Tetsuya once told me that you are great at latte art. A child just requested for me to draw her a Doraemon on her latte, but I can’t manage it. Could you teach me how to?”
How can anyone say no to you, Takao thinks weakly, and this Takao here knows nothing about latte art and coffee in general but he finds himself nodding anyway.
In the end, out of desperation, Takao beckons Kise over to take over the job and he runs away before Akashi can bother him some more. The end product looks decent, although the two boys have spent too much time trying to figure out how many whiskers does Doraemon have, and the kid ends up pouting in impatience when the latte is finally done. Kise pets her hair with an apologetic smile and Akashi offers her a free donut (on his paycheck, of course, he insists) before she finally caves in and beams happily at her table full of sweets.
“Oi, Takao!”
“What now,” Takao murmurs to himself, and he sees Kagami walking to him, a dark-green apron across his waist and all that jazz. He’s holding clean empty glasses in his arms, so Takao presumes he’s a barista here.
“Can you do me a favor and give me an advanced pay for this month?” Kagami asks, setting the clean glasses on the counter absentmindedly as he tugs the apron off himself.
I—I’m the boss here?!
“Wh—what do you need the money for?” Takao replies, a little taken aback by the question. Wow, so this café is his? Sweet, no wonder it looks so pleasing, ah, Takao of this world, you have great taste. Like me – but you are me, so I suppose…
“Um,” Kagami starts, idle hand scratching at the back of his head, “it’s my stepsister’s birthday pretty soon, Alex, you know? The girl that always comes to harass me every now and then. I want to buy her a necklace, but I’m still short of a bit… if I could get the pay first, I can buy it already! Please, Takao, I’ll take over the shifts that Aomine skips. Without pay. Please,” he whines.
Takao laughs, a nervous and strangled noise from the back of his throat because he has no idea how the business runs and what kind of reply he should give. Before he can say anything, though, Midorima appears and roughly shoves a check in Kagami’s face. “Tell her happy birthday from all of us here too.”
“Thanks, Midorima! You’re the best! By the way, your lucky item today looks good!” Kagami says, pointing at the scarf with rubber ducky prints on it. He lets out a loud whoop, kissing the piece of paper before dashing out of the store. Kuroko stares at his leaving figure from the cashier counter warily.
“Kagami-kun is slacking again,” Kuroko says, marker squeaky against the plastic cup as he jots down the orders for the takeout. “Takao-kun, can’t you say no sometimes. I’m busy enough here and he runs away and I have to take over his job inside, too.”
“But he makes good frappes,” Kise tries, and Kuroko shoots him a dirty glare. “S—sorry, Kurokocchi! Don’t get mad! It’s normal to be excited about someone’s birthday, you know? Like that year when I bought you a—”
“Please shut up, Kise-kun. If you were more efficient, I would not need to help out in the kitchen. By the way, you have three orders waiting.”
“Oh my god, Kurokocchi,” Kise whines before dashing back into the kitchen.
“Takao.”
It’s such a familiar voice. Takao looks back to see Midorima with a beret on his head, and the lucky scarf around his neck and resists the urge to laugh. “I’m back. I just ordered another batch of coffee beans and vanilla extract because the Christmas menu used up a lot of vanilla—”
“You’ve worked hard,” Takao says subconsciously and Midorima looks up. Takao blushes at that, and he has no idea what he’s doing and what he’s saying. “I – I mean, yeah! Great job! It’s nice to see the café bustling and warm, haha… By the way, nice scarf! Where did you get it from? Peculiar.”
There’s a short moment of silence but it doesn’t last because Midorima tugs him into his arms, heartbeat loud against Takao’s ear. “You’re why this all happened, you know. You and your stupid idea of opening a café and inviting all of them to work for us, you and your stupid Christmas menu and the abundance of vanilla because you agreed to pamper Kuroko this time round – and you tell me good job? By the way, you gave this to me for my birthday two years ago. Did you forget? Idiot.”
Takao’s heart is beating very, very fast in his chest. He won’t deny that he has felt this feeling before, in real life, but it seems to be very intensified in this dream. What is this feeling? Is it—
“Is it love?” Midorima murmurs, resting his chin on his fist as Takao pulls away.
“Yes,” Takao replies, a cheeky grin on his face. “You love me, Shin-chan.”
He doesn’t expect Midorima to say it back, but he does, and the scene fades away and when Takao regains clarity of mind, he’s staring at his ceiling on an empty and cold bed.
✂
It would be a lie to say otherwise when Midorima claims that Takao has been “out of sorts” these days. It’s absolutely right, because all Takao can think of is the damned café, him being the owner, and Midorima helping him run it, long evenings with two cups of cappuccino as they watch the sunset when the rest leave.
And the frustrating thing? He can’t tell Midorima about this. Shit, he might be shameless, but he can’t risk being beaten up by Midorima because of his incessant daydreaming. He’d experienced it once, so he won’t have it again.
“Takao,” Midorima says, when they’re walking to their next class, and Takao turns to see Midorima hand him a can of iced coffee. “You look like you need it.”
“Thanks,” Takao just says, and bites the urge to reply that he didn’t stay up all night so he doesn’t actually need the coffee. He just pops the can open, and gulps the coffee down before they reach the classroom.
Midorima takes the seat in front of him.
An hour later, Midorima’s notes are filled with neatly-labelled annotations and detailed diagrams and Takao’s head is full of Midorima.
✂
Today, Kazunari Takao wakes up as a basketball player. He hears snoring, and his back aches a little when he turns, and he’s surprised to feel wood under the layer of futon he’s sleeping on. He opens his eyes, and bites back a gasp when he sees Midorima’s face. What the hell?
The sunlight filtering in through the curtains make Midorima look like he’s glowing, and Takao reaches out to poke a finger at Midorima’s cheek. He holds his breath for a bit, reveling in the fact that it’s another dream and the real Midorima he knows won’t know about this, but he’s forced out of his trance when he hears a loud snore from behind him. Miyaji? He stills for a moment, then realizes that this isn’t a dream.
Oh, right. He’s at Shutoku’s annual training camp, and it’s the morning of the second day, after he had fallen asleep after the insane training regimen. If this isn’t a dream, then…
“Good morning, Takao,” he hears Midorima say, and gulps uneasily.
“G–Good morning, Shin-chan, haha… did you sleep well? I sure did, haha…”
Midorima stares at him with his steely green eyes but says nothing in return. Takao still thinks Midorima looks weird without glasses, but he sure isn’t going to share the dream where he made Midorima cry when he was helping him put on his contacts for Midorima’s pursuit of his dream of being a pilot. He lets out a shaky chuckle and Midorima narrows his eyes warily.
“Did you have a weird dream again? You sure sound like you do,” Midorima mumbles before reaching out to grab his glasses from his side. He puts them on but huffs because it looks like it’s uncomfortable to lay on his side with glasses on, so he turns to lay on his back instead.
“Do I? I slept fine, though,” Takao replies, and a finger jabs him in the temple as he finishes. “What—”
“Payback,” Midorima answers crisply.
“You missed, Shin-chan.”
Midorima has the decency to look a little flustered, and he clears his throat. “Whatever,” he says, but he yanks Takao to him and places a soft kiss on his cheek. “Didn’t miss now, did I?”
Before Takao can generate a reply in his head (he’s pretty sure his brain is all mushed up and dysfunctional), the door rattles with a loud knock. “Oi, you idiots! Get up, it’s six! We’re going for a run before practice! Get down in ten minutes or I will double your training today!”
Miyaji’s eyelids fly open as he jumps out of bed and into the shower.
“Ugh. Coward,” Kimura says with a big yawn, but he leaves the room too.
Takao is a little thankful for the interruption, or he'd still be blushing like a thirteen year old schoolgirl.
“Good morning,” Midorima says again, before grabbing a towel and leaving the room.
Takao spaces out a little, and thinks about what just happened, aside from the fact that if he doesn’t get ready in five minutes he’ll be having a hell of a time today. Did Midorima… really… he touches his cheek a little, and pinches it, only to let out a yelp and rub his cheek in pain. “Not a dream, huh,” he mutters.
He remembers the time he had fallen in love with a boy aspiring to be a pilot, but can’t put on contacts by himself for the life of him, and he remembers falling in love with a boy who heals common cold and fever but not heartache. He knows they’re all Midorima, and he’s still Takao, but he also knows that the Midorima he knows is the Midorima he loves the most.
“What a tsundere,” he concludes, letting out a grunt as he stands up to get ready for the day. He thinks of ways to embarrass Midorima while he’s waiting for Miyaji to be done, and smiles to himself.
fin.