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"I don't..." Akira frowns at the little parcel in his hand. It's beautifully wrapped, a folded paper box tied with green ribbon, his name and a smiley face inked in with sharpie. He rattles it slightly and hears the chocolates inside, no doubt small hazlenut-filled balls just like he saw Kindaichi hand out to everyone else on the team and half the people in their class. Something ugly and hot settles in Akira's gut. "I don't want these."
Kindaichi tilts his head, obviously confused. "You don't..." They then light up with realisation. "Don't worry, my mother did most of the actual cooking." He laughs and rubs the back of his head. "I stirred the chocolate and... watched over the oven while they cooked. I guess." His grin is rueful. "I wasn't sure I was gonna give any this year, you know, 'cause high school and all. But she came home with all the stuff, so I couldn't say no. It's kind of a family tradition at this point."
Kindaichi laughs self-conciously before turning and making for the school gates. Practice only finished twenty or so minutes ago but already Kindaichi and Akira the only ones visible on the campus. Everyone else was probably eager to get away from the unusually frigid evening, back into the warmth of indoors.
Akira follows Kindaichi after some hesitation, eyes still glued to the small gift resting on his palm. It feels way heavier than it should.
To be fair, it's only been a a few months since Akira figured out his own feelings for Kindaichi Yuutarou. It wasn't a big deal or anything. He was doing his homework when he found yet another place where Kindaichi had hastily scrawled an explanation to a maths problem when the teacher wasn't looking for Akira's benefit, and it just sort of clicked. Like, oh... it's you. Of course it is. Quiet and simple and soft. No big deal.
His sister told him it was much the same when she fell for her girlfriend all those years ago in high school, too. It's some sort of Kunimi curse. He has a lineage of cold-hearted analysts who liken love to flicking on a switch. Akira wouldn't say he fits into that exactly — but he does recognise that most of the time there's not much point in getting overly worked up over things that don't matter or don't require it, so he can understand why his laziness could come across as distance.
Maybe that's why Kindaichi hasn't noticed anything.
"You coming?"
Akira glances up. Kindaichi's waiting for him, hands stuffed into pockets, striking a tall figure against the waning February sunlight. He looks good. (These sorts of thoughts, Akira isn't quite as used to.)
"Yeah."
They walk in silence for a few minutes, out the school gates and along the road they share every day. Kindaichi rolls his shoulders before he starts rambling. This, too, is routine.
"It was sort of embarrassing giving them out, especially to the girls..." Kindaichi rolls his eyes, glancing across to Akira with a knowing look. "Sato-kun gave me so much slack as well, all this stuff about how Valentine's Day is supposed to be for the girls, about how I should wait until White Day, and yeah, whatever, he's right, but I'm hardly gonna stop just because of that. It's my mother after all, she was looking forward to it. No big deal, anyway. It's just obligation chocolate, right?"
So off-handedly kind. Akira's hand tightens on the little parcel. "Obligation chocolate," he echoes.
"Mmm!" Kindaichi burrows into his scarf, nose already pink against the cold. His cheeks go red so easily. Akira hides his smirk. It doesn't suit his stern appearance at all. But his attention is once again drawn to the one and only friendship chocolates Kindaich gave to him without so much as a blink, paper smooth against the pads of his fingers.
Akira repeats, "I don't want it."
He suddenly thrusts the parcel back to Kindaichi, but he accidentally does it too hard and what was meant to be a gentle nudge to the ribs ends up forcing the breath out of him in a quick shocked splutter. Kindaichi looks back at Akira with wide watering eyes, clutching at his waist where there could very well turn into a bruise. So maybe he punched him a little harder than he should have...
"Sorry," Akira says unapologetically. He holds out the parcel again. "But I don't want this, so take it back."
"I can't take it back, Kunimi... It's obligation chocolate."
"Okay, well, I'm giving you back obligation chocolate. Here." He insistently waves it in front of Kindaichi's face.
"Just take the chocolate like everyone else, would you?" Kindaichi mutters, batting Akira's hand away with a poorly concealed smirk. "It's not like you to turn down sweets."
"You'll probably poison me."
"I told you, I didn't cook it," he whines, falling back into step with Akria. "No-one would let me."
"I'm not surprised."
"I think you're spending too much time around the upperclassman, you're starting to sound like Iwaizumi-senpai to Oikawa-senpai..."
"Wouldn't that be you? They're so stupidly fond of you and all."
When Kindaichi visibly perks up at the thought — "You think so?" — Akira doesn't bother hide his laugh.
"Yeah, for sure. You're their favourite."
At this, Kindaichi shakes his head, humming, but he doesn't say anything more. He's so obviously pleased, so obviously flattered and quite clearly doubtful, too. The overall effect is just endearing; a subtle pink to his cheeks, barely perceptible through the natural flush from the cold.
The gravel of the pavement cracks under their heels. It's a colder evening than either of them were expecting and Akira has to suppress a shiver, ears painfully cold. At this rate, the train station can't come fast enough. But it turns out they're more than ten minutes early, just like they always are, bad weather or no. Once they're both standing on the platform waiting for the train that takes them both home, houses in the same direction, Akira tries for a final time.
"I don't want this," he says seriously, holding out the inoffensive chocolates. "I appreciate it, but no. Thanks."
"Why?" There's a distinct whine to Kindaichi's voice again, and the weirdest part of it all is that Akira thinks it's cute. "Just take them, would you? You weren't so stubborn about it last year."
"Last year, things were different."
Kindaichi huffs, purposefully ignoring the hint. He knows Akira likes to drop loose threads like that and has a habit of refusing to help tie them back in. "Just take the chocolates."
"No."
"Just take them!"
"No. Take them back."
They're both smiling — Kindaichi's a fully-blown grin, Akira's quieter but definitely there, too. Kindaichi pulls a hand from his pocket to snatch the packet from Akira's fingers, bringing it close to his face and examining it himself.
"You have no idea how long it took me to tie all those dumb ribbons," he mutters half-heartedly.
Akira just huffs in amusement, turning back for the platform. Weirdly, his fingers, previously so weighed down by chocolates that wouldn't tell him the pretty lies he half-wanted them to, feel empty. And colder for it.
"Are you sure you don't want to eat them?" Kindaichi mumbles hopefully. "I swear they're not half-bad."
Akira shakes his head. "They're Valentine's chocolates," he offers by way of explanation.
"Yeah... So?"
"Obligation Valentine's chocolates." He sniffs as if the notion offends him. He wonders if Kindaichi will pick up on it... He wonders what it would be like if he did.
But of course, he doesn't, because he's Kindaichi, and he's observant about all the wrong things, kind in a careless, throwaway way, and at the end of the day if Akira didn't find obliviousness adorable, didn't think dense boys held their own kind of charm, he definitely wouldn't have developed feelings like this for his best friend of all people. They have time. They're only sixteen. He takes a deep breath of the crisp early spring air, and lets the cold prick at his throat. Akira revels in the quiet sting of it.
"I know what the problem is," Kindaichi offers six minutes later, talking around the chocolate he's chewing. He hands one to Akira silently, who happily wolfs it down. "You didn't get any romantic chocolates, did you?"
Only two. "Of course not," Akira lies smoothly. Kindaichi might get hurt if he tells him he did, and as funny as it would be, it would probably just bum Akira out too, so better safe than sorry.
"You can pretend, if you like." Kindaichi is grinning at him, too wide to be teasing, and—
Akira starts, his heart squeezing. Why did his breath just catch in his throat?
He likes the way Kindaichi's ears go pink at the tips.
"You can pretend they're romantic. If it makes you feel better." And he means it. Kindaichi means it. Another squeeze in his chest, unbearable and wonderful.
Akira ducks his head away in time to hide his smile. Because they have time.
"Thanks, Kindaichi."
The train arrives two minutes late. They board it, and off it runs into the crisp February evening.