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Akira hadn’t gotten up all day. Sure it was a Saturday and he could be meeting up with his friends and levelling up some confidants- I mean spending some quality time with his pals with absolutely no ulterior motive, he decided to stay in his dusty attic under the covers.
Damn you Akechi. Since the group had pulled off the high-risk plan of basically letting the bastard detective prince kill Akira, he’d had to stay on the down-low which meant not leaving LeBlanc.
He was surviving by watching the same DVDs over and over and playing niche indie games on a crappy looking 90’s style console which often crashed every time he was near a save point. But he couldn’t complain, it was something to do.
Shit, he missed people.
He missed being squashed on the Tokyo trains every morning or fighting for a seat with Morgana digging his claws into his shoulder. Sometimes he’d hear the other kids talk about the Phantom Thieves and about how cool they were.
Even Futaba and Morgana were getting sick of having him around. Last week Morgana jumped out a window when Akira tried to talk to him. And that was when he realised that god, he needed to get out.
He sent a text to the group chat.
‘What’s everyone up to?’
[Makoto:] We’re in class Akira, midterms are coming up.
Haru added in too quickly. She must be bored.
[Haru:] I’m in social studies, speak to you later!
Just to add insult to injury, Yusuke added on that he was also busy, getting Akira's hopes up only to plough them into the ground.
[Yusuke:] I would greatly like that, however, my sensei is taking the class out for an observation of people watching in Shibuya, I must focus.
Oh goddddd, he was so bored even Yusuke’s painting thing sounded interesting. He was losing his mind and it’d only been 4 days. He slumped back on his bed back first, staring up at his phone. Surely he could pop into the convenience store just for a minute or two, make boring conversation with the person at the counter. Any face-to-face interaction would do at this point.
Leaving LeBlanc was a weird feeling. He hadn’t seen the weather in so long that it felt foreign on his skin. How many degrees had it dropped since he was last out? Felt like he’d missed the beginning of Winter with everything being frosted over. It wasn't snow, however, just a little bit of frost. In Tokyo snow was a nonexistent meteorological feature, unlike his hometown which was often covered by a few inches of the stuff by November.
Dipping into the store, he was greeted by a familiar gush of warm air from the large heaters that had been placed at the entrance. He glanced over. There were new employees at the counter which were weird as they stood there with bored expressions lounging around in the watermelon coloured uniform. Not like he could particularly blame them though because it was always empty except for the occasional old person.
Akira kept his head down low. He looked awful, like death itself with large bags under his eyes and a pale face. He hadn't shaved in just over a week so the stumble on his chin made him look a little bit like a young dad struggling to cope and running on 3 puny hours of sleep.
He strolled through the aisles to try and look busy. The employees were giving him evils with their eyes which he felt burned into the back of his head as he wandered haphazardly. Not being able to go out had taken a toll on him. This pointless convenience store trip was the highlight of his week. No, month. He picked a random set of instant ramens from a shelf and headed over to the checkout where he slid them over to be scanned with a huff. "Is this everythin-" The employee took one look at him and stopped in the middle of his rehearsed sentence to gasp in horror, "Jeez... you have a rough night there, buddy?" He probably thought he was hungover. Akira just nodded along awkwardly to what the guy was saying, he didn't want to make a fuss.
It wasn't all bad, after 10 minutes of basic small talk, the man had felt so sorry for him he'd given him a huge discount on his shopping and a genuinely sincere smile as he left. But hey, free stuff.
Ding! He unlocked LeBlanc. It was really too strange to see the café without anyone in it and still after living there for months, he couldn't get used to it. It looked... abandoned and dusty. Sometimes Akira would bring down a pillow and a few blankets sleep in the booths for a little bit of a change of scenery. All sorts of things happened in LeBlanc when Sojiro had left for the day, all sorts.
Akira had learnt early on that he didn't really have any of the basics he was used to. The toilet was the cafe's downstairs public one, the shower didn't exist and his bed was simply a mattress on top of a few old food crates. Plus, the public baths cost money and that, he was slowly running out of. He had worked out that if he took one bath a week, he could afford the occasional film or video game to keep his boredom at bay.
He trudged upstairs, legs lingering on every step. It was unhealthy to go from doing a truckload of cardio a day to doing none at all and his body wasn't coping with the change. Going to Mementos to finish off some of the requests would be a decent idea but with everybody's schedules and exams approaching, it felt sort of wrong to call everyone together just because he was wallowing and wanted a bit of a train.
Flop.
He got to his bed with an exhausted pounce, turned on his phone and saw that the group chat was still pretty dead but he had a few messages from Ryuji. His heart did a little skip. Ryuji was always trying to come and see him and skive off school but he had Makoto breathing down his neck badgering on at him to start studying early this year so his grades didn't take a bellyflop off a high cliff like they had every other year. Apparently, if he failed one more subject then he could have to retake the year so it was kind of extremely important he was studying, despite how that sucked.
He opened the messages. In typical Ryuji fashion, there were a lot of them and they hardly made any sense.
[Ryu♡]: Dude shitn hell u like nuggets?
[Ryu♡]: okk update u better like em
[Ryu♡]: every1s givin me looks man
[Ryu♡]: b @ leblanc in 5
[Ryu♡]: dude im outside
In a way, the story these messages showed was majestic, in another, Akira genuinely had no idea what they meant, the only thing he understood was that Ryuji, his secret boyfriend for the last couple of blissful months, was outside. He sprang up with exuberance and scampered down the stairs, nearly tripping but regaining himself. With a jolt, he swung open the door so hard that it shook on its hinges making him panic. Sojiro would kill him if he broke the door.
Ryuji was stood there with two large bags in his hands which were bursting at the seams. A stench wafted through the doorway and hit Akira’s nostrils, making his face recoil with a gag reflex. “Ryuji... what the hell is in that bag?”
The faux blonde was hopping up and down in a large puffy coat which was of course, obnoxiously coloured with a bright eyesore of a red. It was so Ryuji. The colours did make his eyes bleed but Akira had to admit that anything the other threw on instantly looked good on him. The cold breath twinkled on Ryuji’s breath, panting and heavy. “Lemme in already! Effin’ freezin out here.”
Akira realised he’d been staring. “Sorry, I’m super out of it.”
”Dude, I can tell.” As a Ryuji shuffled into the cafe, he dumped the bags on a nearby table and Akira watched as grease seeped out from the edges of the plastic, creating a sweat pool. “Get your ass over here! I gotta surprise for ya.”
”I’m pretty sure I don’t want it. It’s leaking.” He raised an eyebrow but warily approached anyway.
Ryuji’s smile was enough to lure him over. “It ain’t leakin’!” He exclaimed, then saw the puddle and picked it up in a hurry, “It's still gonna be proper nice!”
”That’s...” Akira blinked, “Food? We’re going to eat that?”
The blonde nodded and Akira felt his stomach churn. He had never had food poisoning before but was pretty convinced that after this, he'd be throwing up within the hour. Anyway, he threw on a fake smile and went to the small kitchen area to get some plates, gulping as he told Ryuji to bring the food upstairs.
He cautiously wandered up the stairs and a smile took over his face as he saw Ryuji sitting on the floor on top of a traditional plaid picnic blanket with the bags all laid out, starting to unload them one by one.
Akira chirped up, "Are we having a picnic?"
"Sorta. Just turn off the light will'ya?"
Flick, he did what he was told. The lights were off and they were graced with only the light from Akira's un-curtained room which nicely reflected on Ryuji's face so delicately, it made Akira's heart do a little backflip and dance about. "This is pretty ominous you know? Ryuji Sakamoto, man of mystery."
He could see the blonde crack a smile and sat down next to him on the blanket, cuddling into his shoulder, "I do appreciate this, really I do but what's in the bag?" Ryuji warmed to the gesture as he'd done the last hundred times they'd done it, allowing Akira to find safety in the crook of his shoulder, arm on his back. "McDonalds."
Akira burst out with a shocked laugh, "This is all McDonalds? How much did you buy?!"
"Fuckin', I don't know like 7000 yen's worth? A shit tonne, 'much as I could carry."
He whistled sarcastically at the sheer amount of food and the challenge they had ahead. Being the leader of the phantom thieves, he had conquered the Big Bang Burger's challenge with resilience and pace but now he was in an entirely different ballgame. Ryuji took a few items out of the bag at first; Big Mac, Coke and a 20 chicken nugget share box, explaining them all one at a time as if this was an auction house, "Big Mac's a classic, coke 'cause we'll be proper thirsty. Nuggets are like a go-to mcdo experience, 'wonder why they call it a share box..." He stared at the box as if interrogating it, staring down at the labels then up at Akira with a revelation, "You think they call'it that to guilt-trip people?! Like 'effin, ain't that the point of Mcdonalds, to eat shitty food and know you're doin' it? No one on earth goes to that place and contemplates gettin' a salad."
He nodded, melodramatically staring down at a box of large fries, "Mcdonald's really is the most delicious place for the scum of the earth to gorge themselves, a place where no one gets judged, truly a paradise."
"Y-Yeah, took the words right outta my mouth..." Ryuji added on unconvincingly and picking up a burger from a stray box, taking a gigantic mouthful. Akira tried to resist to make a comment and failed, allowing the ever so horny words escape his mouth, "You can sure fit a lot of things in your mouth, maybe you could..." He very obviously indicated down and Ryuji went a dyed deep red as if all the blood had rushed to his head.
Akira smirked at the reaction, reaching his hand into the bag for another piece from the absolute moutain of fast food, pulling out an iconic red box. "I haven't had a happy meal since I was like 5..."
"Nostalgic, I bet. I got you one 'cause you were lookin' sad... and it's a happy meal and-"
His expression melted, "Aw, you got me a happy meal b-because I was sad?" He broke into a soft smile, "Oh 'Yuji..."
The blonde pushed him playfully off his shoulder with embarrassment, rocking a bit, "That's the point of a happy meal, ain't it? To made ya happy...?" He noticed Akira's smirk, "Oh shut up, that's what my mom told me, and get that smirk off your face, it's not... like a big romantic gesture or anythin'." Akira brightened up and leaned in even closer to Ryuji. "What would people do if they knew you were this sweet? Your tough guy act would be over."
"'Eff you man! And it's not an act!"
"Is too."
"I ain't arguing with you." Ryuji groaned, sinking down deeper into the blankets. Akira retorted stubbornly, "That's because you know I'm right." Ryuji let him take the win, he knew from many throwaway comments that had turned into full-on arguments over petty trivia that his boyfriend was extremely stubborn and wouldn't ever admit to being wrong unless there was concrete proof that he couldn't deny. "Yeah, yeah, you're right."
Akira grinned, dipping into the bag for a couple of rapidly melting McFlurrys, handing one over to Ryuji. "And... by the way, thanks for this. Seriously I- didn't expect it. Though, it's so you. Like, it's ridiculous and obscene and there's no way we're going to be able to eat all this... but I love you for it."
The blonde had already started shoving ice-cream into his face and didn't catch a single word, looking up with an expression that perfectly encapsulated the word, 'huh'. Akira laughed. Yeah, that was about right. "I said I love you, you moron."
Red spread across Ryuji's cheeks, mid-ice-cream. No matter how many times he heard it, it still made his heart race. "Love you too, man."