Work Text:
Akira invited him to try out a new restaurant. It was nice to be invited out to eat with a friend. He felt lonely sometimes when he tried all these new places by himself, but he convinced himself that it couldn’t be helped since he had to do everything to stay relevant to the public. He had to remain popular and continue going to interviews to praise the SUI or otherwise, the SUI wouldn’t be as lenient on him as they currently were.
At the moment, they haven’t made him run a lot of errands or put him on heavy caseloads, letting him focus more of his attention on public speaking and thus giving him time to secretly looking up more of Shido’s dealings. He managed to find a great deal already and was confident with the amount of evidence he has present that it was enough to convict Shido. However, he was always on a lookout if anything new came in couldn’t hurt him.
Right now was the quiet period where he has some free time and was able to spend it with Akira without feeling like he wanted to run back to the police station to look at old case files for anything related to Shido or go undercover or even risking going Mementos to look around for more clues. That was the reason why he didn’t rejected any of his offers recently.
To be honest, he never saw a point of going to fancy restaurants or paying an absurd amount of money just for the glamourising visual presentation of food. Food was for eating, that was all Akechi sees it as. There was no point on spending a ridiculous amount of money on food when he could buy it for cheap and it tastes similar to each other. Akechi never really craved or was curious on trying anything. Well, the only exception was pancakes, but that was more for nostalgic sake relating to his memories with his mother.
Akira told him to meet up at the Akihabara station.
He was checking on the latest news on his phone as he waited patiently for Akira. It was interesting that Oyamada, Shoichi confessed that he ruined Takemi, Tae’s name by perjuring her for the patient's death. With his sudden change of heart, Akechi deducted that it was another work of the Phantom Thieves. Even though he officially opposes them and their methods, he couldn’t help but to silently cheer them on from the beginning. There were many cases that people would not go to the police for help or were too intimidated to speak up so going to an anonymous group like the Phantom Thieves and asking for their help would be an easier choice.
Akechi was too busy at the time to go to Mementos with them last time so he gave consent that he believes in whatever decision they decided to do with their targets. It’s only been almost two weeks since he joined them and Akechi actually enjoy being with them. Their enthusiasm was contagious that Akechi was able to forget about his mission for a second while being with them. He was afraid to see this all come to an end though. They would never forgive when they find out about his past actions and true intentions are.
“Hey Goro, sorry I’m late. You can smile now that I’m here.” Akira smiled at him as he jogged the last few steps towards him.
Shit, he must looked upset that Akira brought it up as a joke and his cheeks turned slightly pink from hearing his first name by Akira’s lips. Akira asked if he could address him by his given name a few days ago and Akechi agreed, but he was unused to hear it from anyone. This was the first time he heard it in public and all he wanted to do is fiddle with his gloves as he hid behind something in embarrassment. He plastered on a fake smile and said, “you’re late, as always.”
Akira frowned. “Not always! Don’t try to butcher my good name. I was on time two days ago to watch that documentary with you.”
“That was in your room on a Sunday afternoon. If you were late to your own house, that would be another level of tardiness that I am not even sure what it would be called.”
Their little banter made Akechi’s fake smile unconsciously slowly transformed until it look more genuine. Akira smiled a bit wider when he noticed the change. He led the way to a new cafe that had French-Italian fusion food.
“So how did you find out about this place?”
“Ann was curious on the dessert menu but couldn’t make it today with us due to a last minute photoshoot. So we’re testing the waters before recommending it to her.”
“Ha ha. So you want to order only desserts then?” Akechi jokes.
“Sure, we could always take them home if we can’t finish them. You up for the challenge detective?” Akira smirks back.
“I don’t mind, you sure your wallet can take it though? If I remember correctly, you’re working four jobs at the moment. Seems like you should be saving money instead if you need that many part time jobs to pay for your luxurious lifestyle.” His eyebrow raised as he smirked.
“This is why we spend a lot of time in Mementos and negotiate the Shadows for money. For these kind of occasions! I’ve been saving up.” Akira boasted as he gave a big laugh.
“Well then, won’t you be so kind as to buy me a new gun and gear. I have taken a liking to—”
“Oh look at that! The restaurant is up ahead.” Akira yelled over him so he quickly sped up to the place.
Akechi chuckled, looks like he has a limit on how much money he is willing to spend. He let that slide at the moment as Akira opened the door for him.
He thanked him as he walked up to the receptionist and request a table for two.
The receptionist looked at her computer and nodded. She waved a waitress over, gave her two menus, and told her where their table was. The waitress nodded and walked them to their seats.
It was lucky, they had a table close to the window. The view was wonderful to look at in the evening. Even though there were a lot of anime promotions on the buildings, the way the buildings light up colorfully with the advertisements against the darkening evening sky made it look beautiful.
“Please let me know if you have any questions. Can I get you guys something to drink?” The waitress asked.
“Water please.” Akechi said.
“Same.”
“Of course, I’ll be right back.” She says softly as she walked away.
“So Akira, have you tried any Italian or French cuisine before?” Akechi asked as he sifted through the menu.
“Pasta?” Akira smiled while shrugging. “Well my mom made it and put soy sauce and other flavors to make have more of an Asian flavor so I’m not sure if that counts.”
Akechi chuckled. “It doesn’t. I tried some Italian dishes before, although I am curious on veal though since it’s used in many different nationalities dishes. I wonder how different it will taste compared to regular beef or wagyu beef. I think I will be going with veal milanese. Have you narrowed down on what ethnicity of food that you want?”
“Italian. They have a rice dish called risotto. I’m playing it safe.”
“Wanted to try something familiar and foreign at the same time hmm?”
Akira grinned and nodded.
They waited for the waitress to come back so they could place their orders. When she came, she placed their waters on the table before taking out her notepad. She was helpful and patient as they struggled to pronounce the names of the dishes. After that mildly embarrassing moment, they gave her one of the menus and watched her walk away before continuing their discussion.
“So what other dishes has your mother made for you?” Akechi asked curiously.
“Hm, she likes to create fusion food. She enjoys watching the food network to discover new dishes, however, some of the ingredients are hard to obtain in our hometown so she has to substitute some ingredients and alter the flavor of the food to make it fit with our taste buds. So you could say that I never actually had the chance to have official foreign food.”
Akechi smiled. That sounds cute. His mother seems like a nice person. She seems to do small things to show her love to her family.
“Hm, I really liked her omurice, her tonkatsu was always crispy and juicy. I always love her tonkatsu sauce. It was different than the restaurants and better. I still don’t know what she put in her sauce that makes it so good. I like her beef bowl too. I think the beef bowl in Shibuya is better, don’t tell her that, but it’s heavier compare to hers so I go into a food coma after eating it there. I really missed her mapo tofu. I am usually not a fan of really spicy food, but she combines the right amount of spices with sweetness that it compels you to continue eating even though your mouth is on fire. There’s more stuff, but those are the ones I crave from her at the moment.” Akira sighed and gave a bittersweet smile.
Akechi felt his stomach twist in guilt. This was his fault. If it wasn’t for his selfishness, Akira wouldn’t be here at the moment. He would be at home with his parents, enjoying his dinner with them, not here being with Akechi and thinking on past memories when he was close to his parents.
Akechi looked down and fiddled with his napkin, unable to look at Akira and that wistful facial expression that he was making any longer.
“Well, it’s only a few months left until your probation is over right?” Akechi said. “You can tell your mother all about your food cravings when you get back home.”
“Yeah… I’ll be sure to visit everyone during the holidays and breaks though. You better be free Akechi! Even if you aren’t, you are required to reschedule everything so you are free to hang out with us.” He demanded as he pointed his finger at him. At least he was smiling now.
“A—ah, yes.” He stuttered. He wanted to laugh. Akira managed to sound selfish and kind at the same time. Akechi still wasn’t used to Akira wanting his presence around. Even though he knows everything will go to shit later, he couldn’t help but to feel touched by those words.
“Thank you for waiting! I have a veal milanese and mushroom risotto.” She placed the correct dishes on front of them before asking if they will be needing anything else and leaving them to their meal.
They both said “itadakimasu” before digging into their food. The sour taste of the meat immediately hit Akechi in the face. He tried his best to avoid his facial features from scrunching up in displeasure as he continued to eat his meal silently. He thanked the heavens that they had water and took big gulps of it before gathering the guts to return to his meal.
“Hey Akechi, my food tastes…bad.” Akira whispered the last word. “I think they didn’t clean the mushrooms properly, the taste of dirt went into the risotto so it’s hard to eat this dish. How does your dish come out Akechi?”
Akechi tried his best to put on a fake smile as he was eating. It tasted horrible, the cook overcooked the meat. It was dry and hard. Instead of a squirt of lemon, it felt like they poured a cup of lemon juice onto the meat. It tasted so sour. He felt his mouth water, trying to get the taste out of his mouth. The only thing that was redeemable about this dish was the salad. It was almost impossible to make a bad salad in Akechi's opinion...unless it wasn’t washed properly he suppose. He lucked out that the cook washed his salad compared to Akira’s mushrooms. He needed something to get that horrid taste out of his mouth.
“... it's decent” he managed to choke out before he took a long sip of his water.
Akira frowned.
“....you sure? You don't look well.” He said, voice full of concern.
Akechi gave a wide, fake smile. “I'm a bit unused to the flavor, but it's still enjoyable.”
“Well I'm going to order something else. Do you want anything?” He asked as he skimmed through the menu.
“No. This is enough for me.” His fork and knife hesitated for a moment before he digged his fork into the meat and cut a small piece for himself. He mentally sighed before rushing to put it into his mouth and grabbed a huge chunk of salad to cover the awful taste of the veal.
Akira still look unsure but kept silent as he raised his hand for the waiter.
“Hey, excuse me. The food I order is inedible. The taste of dirt is still there from the mushrooms. Can I send this back and order something else?”
“My deepest apologies for this mistake. What do you like to order instead?” The waitress looked apologetic as she picked up the plate.
“I would like to have a Caprese Panini.”
“Alright. Once again, I would like to apologize for this.” The waitress bowed before she quickly left.
“How about you Akechi? Has there been a food that your mother cooked for you that you missed?” Akira picked back up the previous conversation.
Akechi looked away. His mother, eh? Many of Akechi’s memories of her are slowly fading away. He could barely remember the trivial details about her anymore.
“...pancakes.” He whispered.
“Hm, I missed that.” Akira tilted his head curiously.
“Pancakes.” Akechi said in a louder voice.
Akira nodded, probably wanting to know more details.
“We weren’t well off and we had to save every yen so she never able to buy cakes or anything fancy when we want to celebrate something. Instead we would cook pancakes together since the batter can last for years. It was nice, but I never could replicate the taste after she died.”
“Let’s make it together then. We can make it after we finish Sae’s Palace as your initiation party.”
Akechi smiled. “Sure thing leader.”
“Oh, my food is coming. Hopefully nothing goes wrong this time. Cross your fingers Goro.” Akira grinned as he watched the waitress arrive with his food on hand.
As he continued to dig into his food, he convinces himself that he could bare through this. This wasn’t as bad as back then when he struggled to find and get enough food into his body. Shitty food was better than no food at all.
He remember the first time he went home with a foster family. He felt so excited to be leaving the institution. In that place, the children were always crying, it was overcrowded, and the feeling of sadness never fully left the atmosphere. He watched in his car at the institution as it left his view, thinking this was his new chance for a family.
Too bad it didn’t last long.
The family weren’t bad people or anything. It was just that the foster mother never trusted Akechi. She would always look at whatever he was doing, trying to pick at his flaws. Akechi originally thought that she was just curious about him as he was about her, but it slowly became uncomfortable being around her. She would tsked her lips if he dropped something or bumped into something then go to her husband and demand him to disciple Akechi. The husband would just sigh and give Akechi a small lecture before patting him on the head and leaving him alone.
He remembered that they ate dinner early, like around 5pm, and Akechi would wake up feeling hungry in the middle of the night. One night, he wasn’t able to go back to sleep as he felt his stomach grumbling and walked to the kitchen to grab himself something small to keep his stomach quiet.
He remembered his foster mother screaming at him when she caught him looking through the fridge. She yelled at her husband that this was his fault. That if Akechi started stealing something more valuable than food later on, it would be on his head. That they shouldn’t have bothered to try to foster a child, but make one of their own and that Akechi would never be as good compared to having one with their own blood.
Akechi tried to defend himself, that he was just hungry, but she just wasn’t hearing it. Her husband just resignedly accepted her words and they returned to the institution the very next day. She complained to the head of the institution about Akechi and his failures and how he was a thief. One day its food, later, it will change into jewelry and money. It’s inevitable she cried out and how dare he sent a thief into their home, into their lives.
Akechi could do nothing but cry. He sat there in a uncomfortable seat as the husband tried to calm his wife down. No one bothered to comfort him or ask him for his side of the story. When the foster couple left, the headmaster just looked at him in disappointment and told him to play with the other kids as they try to find a room for him.
The rumors spread fast. Akechi the thief. Akechi the spoiled brat. The worst one was the spoiled prince (he never fully liked his nickname by the public, the detective prince. It was too similar to his previous one when the kids wanted to mock him). How he was lucky to get a foster family to take him in and he managed to ruin it.
‘It’s not surprising though since his mother killed herself to get away from him,’ the kids would whispered.
Akechi could only listen to the brutal words from the other kids. What he says didn’t matter. No one ever listened. It felt like he was mute sometimes.
But he learned something from that experience.
He learned that reading and doing things can keep his mind off of food.
So one day Akechi started borrowing books and started reading. He loves the stories with the heroes saving the day and defeating the evil villians. He enjoyed the stories that showed the main character’s good heart and helping everyone around him. He wished he could be like that too. To be useful that someone will need him. That his presence was accepted and not shunned. That someone could love even a child like him. That was all he wanted.
He learned how to adapt. He volunteered to work at the institution. He asked the adults what could he do to help. He put away the toys, cleaned up after the children, anything simple a kid could do. The adults eventually forgot his ‘crime’ and praised him for being a such good boy...and the rest of the kids shunned him for kissing up to the adults. But he didn’t care. He wanted to eat. He knew that they would be more willing to give him extra servings or snacks throughout the day since he was busy helping out around the place.
He never stole or pickpocket ever, even on the days when it felt like his stomach was eating itself. He was frightened that if he ever got caught, that his record would be forever tainted. No one else would bother to even consider to adopt him if he has a bad reputation so he endured the pain from the kids’ words, the hunger, everything, he kept quiet as he walked through the hallways. It might not have been the best way to handle the situation, but he survived.
Akechi didn’t care that the food was bland or if it was burnt, anything he could put in his belly that could prevent his hunger would be worth it. He always finish his food because he never knew if the next caretaker would be as generous.
This mentality never went away, even when he has a job now, can go out, and feed himself three times a day and can venture out to try new things, it never fully disappeared.
So it shouldn’t be very surprising that he got food poisoning the next day.
The food poisoning didn’t happen instantly so he thought nothing of it originally. It appeared the next day when he was about to leave the house to go to the police station for a meeting with Sae.
He thought it was his stomach complaining about his lack of breakfast since he was awake for a few hours now so he grabbed a quick bite to eat with an apple. Big mistake. As Akechi opened the front door while taking a small bite and swallowing the piece, he felt his stomach lurch in disgust and quickly ran back inside to the bathroom to retch it out.
‘ Close call. I barely made it.’ As Akechi let out a sigh of relief.
As he sat on the floor next to the toilet, he shuddered violently. Was it always so cold in his apartment? He waited for a few minutes to see if anything else will come up before deeming it safe to stand up and rinse his mouth with mouthwash. He felt a little woozy from standing up too quickly. It seems that this might more serious than he thought.
Akechi pulled his cellphone from his pocket, feeling guilty, but in the end, decided to text Sae that he wasn’t feeling well and he wasn’t going to be able to go meet up with her today. He glanced at the mirror to see how bad his appearance was and he confirmed that he look paler than normal, maybe even saw a tint of green on his face.
He flushed the toilet and mustered the will to move out of the bathroom, walking towards the kitchen to get some water and keep himself hydrated.
“Hello?” A voice called out from the entrance of the apartment.
Akira? Akechi thought. His mind rewind, trying to remember if Akira wanted to hang out with him today. Nothing came to mind. This must be another one of his surprised visits. It’s nice, but he feels like Akira enjoys coming over when Akechi was feeling under the weather.
“Is everything okay? The door was unlocked and partly opened before I entered. I didn’t have a chance to use any of my lock picking skills.” Akira joked.
Akechi’s mouth twitched. Akira was so cute sometimes. He wants to pet his hair after some of his comments, it looks so fluffy.
Crap. He might actually go through with it at this rate with his mind being stupid. He needs to get Akira out before he does or says something he might regret later down the road.
“I’m in the kitchen getting water Akira. I wish I could spend more time with you but I need to leave soon, I apologize.” He lies. He needed Akira to get out. He was ashamed to let Akira know that he got food poisoning from the place Akira picked and doesn’t want to see a hurt look on his face if he reveals the truth.
“No problem. I wanted to give you tiramisu that I bought from the restaurant we went to yesterday. I swung by early today when I needed to grab something from Akihabara. I did originally said we were going to try some desserts and we never got the chance.”
His stomach lurched.
“Oh, thank you Akira. I’ll take it and save it for later.”
He took the gift from Akira and was about to move to store it in the fridge when Akira asked. “You don’t want to try it now? I was hoping to see if you like it or not. It’s a coffee dessert!” Akira pouted.
“A-ah… why not.” He said hesitantly. Akechi wasn’t sure how to gently say no so he slowly opened the box on the dining table. He could smell a brief scent of coffee. His stomach protested at the smell. Great.
“Let me get two forks then. You should try it too Akira since you are living on top of a coffee shop. Who knows, it might be good enough to convince you into making your own version of the dessert.” He weakly chuckled as he walked grabbed the forks and slowly marched to the dining table to his death.
Akira laughed heartily. “Maybe.”
He passed Akira one of the forks and looked at his newest enemy. It looked simple. There were layers switching from custard to cake topped with cocoa powder and a couple of chocolate flakes.
Akechi prays hard that the dessert will stay down as he said his thanks and lifted his fork to break himself a small piece.
‘The moment of truth .’ He thought as he raised the fork and brought it to his mouth. It tasted divine the moment it hit his tongue. He slowly chewed it nervously before swallowing.
“Not bad.” He said.
“Yeah! Hm, I wonder what kind of coffee they used to make this. I wonder if I should buy another one and quiz Boss.”
They both laughed at that thought.
It hit Akechi like a punch, the desire to throw up.
“Be right back.” He said while trying not to run to the restroom.
He quickly closed the door behind him and turn on the water full blast as he threw up the dessert.
After successfully emptying his stomach, he wonders how long he spent sitting on the restroom floor. He heaved himself up to check himself in the mirror. He quickly brushed his teeth, washed his face, and fixed his hair before heading out again.
“Is everything okay Goro?” Akira asked with concern.
There was a chance that he heard him throwing up, there’s no way he could make a believable lie.
“Ah. I might have caught something.” He lies.
“Could it be the food from yesterday? I did feel a bit sick at nighttime. It might have been from the risotto, but I only ate a small part of it. However, you finished all of your food even though you didn’t look like you really enjoyed it.” Akira frowned.
“...” Akechi was caught off guard. He looked displeased while he was eating? That was not good. He can’t afford to have any cracks in his mask in public. “It was alright. I have no issues with the food.”
Lies. Lies on top of more lies. It’s not a surprise why his mask nose was so long with all of the lies he kept telling people. He wonders if his mask can change to become longer with the amount of lies he dishes out similar to Pinocchio’s nose.
“Hmm, your face never lost its smile while eating your meal, like you were on camera the whole time. You also seemed hesitant to keep digging into your meal and drank a lot of water afterwards to wash away the taste. I think you went through 3 glasses of water during the meal and a few more afterwards.”
“A-ah.” It make sense. If he was smiling all the time, it would look a bit weird. No one smiles the whole time while eating, usually they would at the beginning and put on a face of concentration afterwards. And the water, everything seems obvious now that Akira pointed it out.
“Did you really like your meal? Was there something wrong with it? I would’ve asked the waitress to bring something else.” Akira shot questions rapidly at Akechi.
He stayed silent for a moment, not sure on how to respond. This was the first, someone asking his opinion on his likes and dislikes. Akechi fiddle with his thumbs as he looked at his hands.
“Hey, it's okay to have dislikes. I won't judge you for them. You don't have to pretend to enjoy everything, especially if it gave you a stomach ache afterwards. Please value yourself more.”
“Hey...does that mean that one time I fed you my Volcano Hot Curry, did you really finish it even though you didn’t like it?”
Akechi kept silent and turned away feeling guilty. His first instinct was to joke and say that he enjoyed it, after his tongue died and he couldn’t taste the spices anymore, but it felt like Akira wouldn’t appreciate the joke at the moment.
God, he really ruined the moment didn’t he?
He wanted to lie, but felt it wasn’t fair to Akira. He omitted, told half-truths, and many, many lies to Akira before that he wanted to be truthful for things not related to his mission. It doesn’t seem to be working very well in his opinion. It felt so natural to please people that he was used to lying so they wouldn’t get offended.
Akira looked so guilty when he didn’t responded that he blurted out, “I’m sorry.”
Perhaps it wasn’t the best idea to keep that information to himself, but how would he have been able to address it to Akira? ‘Hey your food made my stomach burn for hours, I couldn’t even go to sleep until 2 in the morning. I didn’t feel like eating anything for dinner after having that for lunch due to the pain.’ That sounded pretty messed up. Akira was just having a fun time with Futaba and Akechi didn’t want to come in and ruin the moment.
So what was the right thing to do?
Akechi turned away in shame. He put them into this spot and made everything all awkward. That’s all he ever does.
He apologizes again more in a quiet, timid voice.
“Hey, hey. It’s alright Goro.” Akira grabbed him by the shoulders and lightly rubbed his shoulder blades with his thumbs.
“I should be the one saying sorry.”
Akechi opened his mouth in protest.
“No, I didn’t notice how uncomfortable you were at the time, that’s my fault. I’ll try to observe more closer next time, but could you also say something if you were uncomfortable with my actions? I think the rest would like the same treatment too. We’re all friends. We don’t want to do anything that makes you feel unease or awkward around us, okay? Let’s pinky promise.” He hooked their pinkies together and smiled.
Akechi’s mouth parted at Akira’s monologue. Friendship. Akira always know the right words to make someone feel better.
“Y-yeah. I promise.” His finger tightened it’s hold on Akira’s.
“As an apology, do you want to make it up with a different type of food? We can go out to wherever you want or I can make something, not spicy, of course!”
“...cake.” he muttered as his face went red.
“Hm?”
“Pancakes.” He repeated himself. “When I feel better, let’s make it together.”
“Sure.”