Chapter Text
It’s the small things. The little, minute details that make up moments like these, insignificant on the surface but so important to Genma. In this moment, brief though it may be, these things belong to him - the way her eyes light up when she smiles, the curve of her lips over the top of the beer bottle, the almost wild sound of her laughter. In this moment, as her gaze locks with his across the table, his inhibitions lowered by the alcohol and the sound of her laughter echoing in his ears, the rest of the world around him fades out.
All that’s left is her, and suddenly the way she’s watching him makes something in his chest flutter.
“Asuna,” he says, lowering his beer bottle to the table, casting his eyes downward and idly drawing his finger around the rim, unsure what to say next. There are words bubbling up in his throat, burning a hole through his tongue; words he knows he shouldn’t say, words that will turn everything upside down… but before he can stop them, they spill over. “I love you.”
“What?” Every sound at their table stops, every eye turning to him, until Raido recovers from his shock long enough to stammer something about privacy and usher everyone else away, leaving Asuna staring at Genma, wide-eyed and surprised. He keeps his own eyes fixed on the table, lifting the bottle to his lips once more and wishing he could sink through the floor.
It’s unlike him to be so nervous, stomach twisting in knots as he focuses on the bottle in front of him. He has always been confident when it comes to things like this, so sure of himself that the idea of rejection has never really crossed his mind before.
It takes him a moment to realize why it’s so different - it’s different because it matters.
It’s different because it’s Asuna. Beautiful, kind Asuna, who he has loved since he was old enough to understand what love was. Asuna. He’s an idiot.
“Just, uh…” He swallows thickly around the lump that’s formed in his throat, trying, and failing, to fight back the heat rising in his cheeks as embarrassment and shame and overwhelming regret flood his system. “Pretend I didn’t say anything.” This was a mistake.
His empty bottle clinks on the table as he sets it down, a little more forcefully than he ought to, and gets to his feet - he can’t sink through the floor, but he can exit the bar as fast as his legs will carry him.
This was so stupid. Asuna is his best friend, he’s known her since they were children, had grown up with her and watched her grow into the woman he knows today, had held her through every bad thing and every nightmare, promising her everything would be okay… And he had just ruined it. He had just ruined it and he has no one to blame but himself-
A warm hand on his wrist stops him before he makes it two steps from the table, and he turns to see Asuna standing there, finishing off her own beer and setting the empty bottle down before stepping toward him.
“You don’t get to say that and then just walk away,” she says quietly. Her grip on him is loose, yet holds him there as easily as the tightest restraint. He falters, his mind going strangely blank when she gives him a small, tentative smile, hand sliding down to grasp his.
“What else is there to say?” he mumbles, looking everywhere but in her eyes - even as her fingers tangle with his in a silent reassurance, he has never in his life been as afraid of rejection as he is in this moment, terrified that he has just irreparably damaged one of the few good things in his life. He can’t lose her, especially not to his own slightly inebriated idiocy and inability to keep his big mouth shut. He’s ruined this, he’s ruined this, he’s ruined this-
But then she moves closer, her fingertips impossibly gentle on his chin as she tips his head up to look at her, and the look in her warm eyes, the barely concealed amusement beneath overwhelming affection… He forgets how to breathe as she leans in, the hand on his chin shifting to rest on his cheek.
Her breath is warm against his mouth, her eyes like oceans inviting him to drown.
And gods, does he want to drown.
“Genma,” she murmurs, gaze darting down to his mouth for the briefest of seconds before flicking up to meet his once more, pupils dilating slightly. He can’t form words to respond, suddenly hyper-aware of the warmth of her body, her hand tightening on his. The noise in the bar, already faded to nothing but static in the background, disappears entirely as her mouth shifts to his ear to whisper an invitation. “Take me home.”
They aren’t the three words he wants to hear, but he nearly trips over himself in his rush to comply anyway, dropping money on the table with shaking hands. His heartbeat is pulsing violently in his ears as he leads her from the bar, desperately wishing he lived closer, or that he could use the Flying Raijin by himself to get her home faster.
In that moment, it doesn’t matter that she hasn’t directly addressed the words that led them to this point in the first place. She doesn’t need to. He had always been able to read her better than she would have liked, and the slight shift in her expression before she’d whispered in his ear, the look in her eyes…
He had been afraid, but that look had told him everything he needed to know.
She is battling a fear of her own, one that leaves her unable to say it to him, but he knows now, as surely as he knows his own name, that she feels the same.
And however long she needs, he will wait.