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Mushrooms and tomatoes. Yesterday, when Gon made breakfast, he put mushrooms and tomatoes in Mito’s omelette.
The tomato is squishy but firm, and heavier than it looked. Kalluto slices through the outer layer cleanly, and then it squirts.
Kalluto grimaces. They don’t squirt when Gon cuts them.
He finishes the cut before licking the juice off his thumb. Maybe if he pulls the knife towards himself instead of cutting straight down, it won’t pop. His next cut is optimal.
There are still chunks of mushroom in the fridge from last night’s supper—a pot of things Gon found outside all boiled together.
Kalluto wonders whether mushrooms can spoil. He closes his eyes and sniffs them.
They seem fine? Good enough, at least.
He watches the sizzling egg with hawkish intensity.
How cooked are omelettes supposed to be?
Less cooked than that.
Oh shit.
Kalluto opens a window and takes the battery out of the smoke detector before it can sound the alarm.
Killua makes it seem easy. Killua makes everything seem easy.
He slices through the second tomato with the same confidence he has towards flesh. Not a drop lands on his skin.
If he has a cube, sweet and gushy, as a reward for himself, well, no one will be any the wiser.
This time, the omelette is perfect. Gently folded, fluffy, and colourfully chunked with tomatoes and mushrooms.
He makes another and places them on the table with fresh orange juice.
His confetti still plays him Mito’s quiet snores, but she and Killua should be up soon enough. He releases the ability.
His jacket—jackets, like a lot of things right now, are new for him—has big pockets he can hide his hands in to shield them from the snappy morning. The clouds hang like inverted mountains, and fog rises from the ocean in puffs like breath.
Kalluto finds Gon on his walk to the library. He sits on one of half a dozen massive concrete blocks, lined up along the edge of the beach.
“What are these for?” he asks, hopping onto the one beside Gon. His own private kingdom.
Gon spooks, and turns to him with a soft smile. “Oh. Hey, Kalluto.” He spares a glance at his watch.
Kalluto does the same.
He has time.
“Do ships use them, or…”
“Honestly, I don’t know,” says Gon, supporting his weight on palms spread wide. His hair is tousled, and his jacket is half-unzipped. “I’ve never really thought about it. Mito’s the one to ask.”
Kalluto nods sagely. Mito is usually the one to ask. Even Killua thinks so.
They sit in amicable silence for a few minutes, Kalluto kicking his legs and Gon breathing with a steady rhythm that must be intentional.
Gon suits the oceanside. His rough edges make sense here, lock with the environment like he was built to match the surf and gulls.
There are circles under his eyes, and a weariness to the way he’s rolling his lips. He’s still wearing his pajama bottoms, ones from the matching set Alluka insisted on everyone wearing for a “slumber party”.
They had sundaes and played truth or dare. It devolved into Killua and Gon brawling in the space between the couch and the wall, and then Gon holding a towel to Killua’s nose and apologizing between giggles as sincere as his regret.
“Thank you,” says Kalluto.
Gon raises an eyebrow. Kalluto fists the fabric on the inside of his pockets.
“You make my brother really happy,” he says, determined to push through the thought. “He deserves to be happy. So thank you.”
Gon doesn’t answer for a moment, and Kalluto worries that he’s said something he shouldn’t have, breezed beyond a line in the sand he didn’t stop to check for. He risks a glance up.
There’s something kind in Gon’s eyes, in the lift at the corners of his mouth. Kalluto’s anxiety melts away.
“It means a lot to hear you say that,” says Gon. He turns back to the ocean, his shoulders a little lighter.
Kalluto smiles shyly.
“Are you happy?” asks Gon.
“I think so.”
At that Gon really smiles, broad and energetic and infectious. “Good. You deserve to be happy too.”
Kalluto laughs.
His watch beeps.
Both of them groan.
“I have to get going,” says Kalluto.
Gon runs his hands through his hair, somehow making the tangled mess worse. He sighs, his shoulders dropping hard. “Yeah, me too.”
They hop down and meet in the middle, headed opposite directions. Gon pats his head automatically, his eyes and attention already drifting up towards the house.
“Do you tell them about this sort of stuff?” he asks.
About Killua waking up himself and the rest of the house at three in the morning? About Kalluto watching with transfixed fear, wishing Alluka were there to show him what to do instead of off training?
“No,” says Kalluto. He shrugs a shoulder. “Besides, they never really ask anything. I think it’s more a reminder.”
A reminder they aren’t off the hook yet. Too many resources were dumped into the three of them to have no heir to show for it.
Gon nods solemnly. He gives Kalluto’s shoulder one last reassuring pat. “Okay.”
“Later,” says Kalluto, drifting out of the touch.
He stops after a few steps when he doesn’t hear the crunch of Gon’s boots.
Gon’s still watching when Kalluto turns.
“We’re all really proud of you.”
Kalluto swallows down something slippery. He kicks his toe on the gravel. “You’re worse than Killua,” he says, eyes on Gon’s shoes.
Gon laughs. He waves lightly, walking away backwards. “See you.”
“Yeah, see you.”
Kalluto makes sense under stained glass and marble arches, but he’s trying to make Whale Island work.
It isn’t going so bad.