Work Text:
“Are you ready to begin, Hasumi-kun?”
Keito nods from where he sits behind the glass, lifting his hands to rest upon the outsides of his headphones, blocking out the world around him. Behind the thin lenses of his glasses, his eyelids gently fall, his lips parting just enough so that he can exhale the slow, steady breath he had taken in a few moments prior. Kuro watches his shoulders relax themselves, and his spine straighten itself out, and the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest as he slips himself into a perfect state of concentration. He’s never shown any sort of hesitation or unpreparation when recording professionally, so much so that Kuro envies that natural-looking calmness of his, for he quickly loses count of his own clumsy mistakes.
Akiomi lowers his hands to the dashboard before him to begin flicking switches and pressing buttons, glancing up at the student briefly for one final check before giving a signal to the other side of the glass. He then flicks one last switch, and a small red light beams to life upon the dashboard.
Kuro and Souma lean in ever so slightly, drawn in by the anticipation of that first note, watching as Keito’s lips tremble with their first movement and wrap themselves around words, his voice beginning to pour through from the three pairs of headphones outside of the booth. Souma’s eyes brighten with delight at the sound, and, in uncoordinated unison, both he and Kuro lift their hands to press the headphones closer against their ears, as if trying to completely absorb the sound emanating from them. Akiomi simply continues with his work upon the dashboard, brows lowered in concentration, every movement of his hands judged entirely by the sound that floods through his headphones.
Keito pours himself entirely into his singing as always, his shoulders rolling downwards and his eyelids fluttering—the fluidity of it makes it seem as though it is the most natural thing in the world for him to do. He was always in this sort of captivating state when he performed, whether it be for an audience of one or one hundred; he pushed himself to his limit each and every time, whether it be a simple practice or a final performance. Keito was the kind of person who could never bring himself to leave something half-finished or sloppily done, and that is why he always worked his hardest, despite his own fatigue or shortcomings. Though that quality was something that constantly brought worry and concern to Kuro, who couldn’t bear the thought of Keito deteriorating his own health for his work, it was also something that he admired most about him, and, more than anything, wanted to protect and cherish.
Souma’s attention is captured further as he nears the chorus of his song, and Keito’s gaze is soft, fixated and yet looking at nothing as he sings, a beautiful light pooling in his irises. But then he looks up, just once, just briefly, and yet in that short moment, his eyes meet with Kuro’s instantaneously, drawn to each other like a pair of magnets pushed within each other’s range.
Kuro’s heart swells with adoration, and he feels the sharp, hardened features of his face soften, his lips pulling into an effortless smile as limerence floods his gaze. Keito’s voice reaching his ears and reverberating within him, and the elegant shape of his eyes, and the sudden quivering of his lip, and the faint, enrapturing blush that suddenly blossoms upon his pale cheeks—everything beautiful and exquisite in the world has suddenly burst free from the confines of Kuro’s chest, and his love overwhelms him all at once.
Keito holds that gaze for too long.
If he had only glanced for a short moment, perhaps he would have been able to scrape by without feeling the full force of the blow, but now he feels it crash into him with a ferocity far greater than he could have anticipated. The love that is held in Kuro’s gaze is too much, too intense, too genuine—Keito’s breath is knocked out of him, and in the next few seconds he makes a hopeless attempt to take it back in, but his perfectly crafted state of concentration has been knocked completely out of balance by the erratic beating of his own heart.
“Hi— ”
Akiomi looks up instantaneously at the broken syllable that falls from Keito’s lips, cut short by a sharp hitch of breath, and Souma tilts his head and narrows his eyes, and Kuro, enamored, watches a dark flush begin to paint Keito’s face as he realizes his mistake and becomes desperate to fix it.
“Hirari— ”
Akiomi sighs and shakes his head as Keito’s eyes widen behind his lenses with his hurried attempt to move past his slip-up. He even tries to skip the word entirely and continue with the rest of the line, but, his cheeks burning with embarrassment, he realizes that he can hardly manage to get his voice past his lips at all. His breath has left him entirely, leaving him winded and stunned; it’s as though some invisible hand had tightened around his neck, only leaving him room to choke out vague and incomplete pieces of his words. Finally, he gives in and lowers his head in defeat as Akiomi flicks the switch and his headphones fall silent. A horribly hot humiliation prickles at the back of his neck, and he chews on his lip, turning his head away from the glass.
“Hasumi-dono always records in one take!” Souma protests with a sudden lurch forwards, as if trying to convince himself that what had just happened was some sort of trick or illusion. “He must be falling ill, Kiryuu-dono! Perhaps he has a fever? I will go and bring him to the infirmary at once!”
“Don’t,” their teacher instructs, stopping Souma in his tracks before he could rush to the door of the recording booth to retrieve Keito. His gaze hadn’t moved even slightly from the dashboard beneath his hands, but the tone of his voice was so authoritative and certain that Souma couldn’t help but return to where he had previously stood, his brows knitting together as he tried to piece together on his own what he had done wrong.
Unbeknownst to Souma, however, Akiomi had already figured out what had interrupted Keito’s recording. He readjusts the controls to prepare for a second take, and, without having to look up or redirect his focus for even a moment, he fixes the issue with a simple request.
“Kiryuu-kun, go and wait outside while we record.”