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The sigh that escaped his mouth as he headed to the backroom of the shop after finishing his shift made him realise just how tired he was. It had only been a five-hour shift as opposed to his usual eight-hour ones, however, recently he'd had practically no time to do...well anything.
He was in work for eight almost every morning to unload the deliveries, opened the shop at nine and dealt with problematic customers for eight hours with barely an hour for a lunch break.
It was the same monotonous routine and it was clearly beginning to weigh down on him.
Only, it wasn't as if he could walk out tomorrow and still expect to afford to live, after all, once they had returned from Heavenly Host he had barely graduated high school, only just scraping D's in his subjects.
He supposed, at least he graduated, not that it was much help to him seeing as most jobs required much higher grades.
And so, he was stuck in this depressing, repetitive job, cycling through all the same things just on different days and had been since he had started high school.
At least in high school, he'd had some friends, now he was lucky to talk to one person on a regular basis and that person was his sister, he had simply started working too much and at such awkward times to keep in contact with his old friends. Well, that and the fact he had come to an uncomfortable realisation towards the end of high school and wasn't sure how to go about telling anyone about it, but he tried his utmost to forget that.
Regardless, he grabbed his jacket and bag, slinging it over his shoulder as he locked up the backrooms and set the alarms before leaving through the front door, flicking the lights off and sliding the shutter down, locking that too. The shelter surrounding the small corner shop provided protection from the rain which was now coming down in sheets and he sighed once more, thoroughly convinced that the world must have some vendetta against him.
His tiny, overpriced apartment was a couple of blocks away and to make it even better, he hadn't even brought an actual coat, instead grabbing a hoodie which was the furthest thing from waterproof.
He supposed there was nothing to be done about it now, knowing that he would have to have a shower when he got back and decided not to bother with the hood.
He got enough questionable looks as it was, after all, he worked a minimum wage job and lived in a fairly rough area of town, he was even followed by his label of 'delinquent' at times.
With his head ducked to try and keep the rain out of his eyes, he began walking home, trying to ignore the cold of the rain sliding down his back only, by doing this, he failed to notice the taller male walking towards him, only narrowly avoiding him as he noticed at last minute.
"Sorry," Yoshiki grunted out, squinting against the rain to look up at the person who he had nearly run into "I wasn't looking where I was-"
"Yoshiki?" He was interrupted by the strangers, or apparently not-strangers questioning voice
It was hard to see with how heavily the rain was coming down however he blinked a couple of times, feeling recognition hit him like a punch to the stomach. Of fucking course
"Satoshi?"
It just had to be Satoshi...
"It's been so long,"
There was a reason for that.
Satoshi gave a lopsided grin and Yoshiki noticed that he too was not dressed appropriately for the current weather, with what looked to be a thin shirt and jeans. He seemed to notice Yoshiki's questioning gaze, glancing down where Yoshiki was looking and giving a sheepish laugh
"The weather forecast said it wouldn't rain today. Then I missed my bus..."
"Oh? You're still bad at being on time?" Yoshiki couldn't help the teasing (Flirtacious, his brain helpfully interjected) remark as he took in just how much Satoshi had changed over the years they hadn't seen each other.
The most obvious but also shocking change being that Yoshiki now had to tilt his head up to look at Satoshi. Only when he did so, it was painfully obvious that one thing most definitely hadn't changed.
His damn feelings...
"I suppose so," Satoshi laughed, his voice changing to a more melancholy tone "You know we've all missed you,"
"Sorry," Yoshiki meant it. He wanted to keep in contact but it was so hard when they all had their own separate lives. Not only that but everyone else had made new friends and had family to spend time with whilst Yoshiki, well he had become a bit of a recluse if he was honest with himself. "I can't even say I have an excuse really,"
"Other than you're anti-social?"
"Oh, you're giving me an excuse right now," Yoshiki shook his head with a sigh, grimacing at how wet his clothes were getting, as nice as it was to see Satoshi again after so long "You're a brat,"
"Hey, you should respect your elders,"
"You're like five months older," Yoshiki countered, remembering just how easy things were between them. It had never been like this with anyone else. "And like I said a brat. If you want you can come round until the rain stops?"
"I would be honoured," Satoshi gave an impish grin, making a grand gesture as he pretended to bow "Lead the way,"
He did, pretending to ignore the way his heart lurched painfully into his throat as they began walking, focussing on the feeling of a raindrop rolling down his back to distract him instead.
He supposed he should probably address the elephant in the room, or he supposed, the giraffe in the street, turning to look at Satoshi and almost forgetting to look upwards as well as to his side.
"So," His voice was teasing again, a common tone between the two of them ever since their first meeting "I suppose I can't make jokes about you being shorter than me now?"
"Oh how the tables have turned,"
The rain didn't seem anywhere near as cold and miserable with Satoshi by his side and Yoshiki found he almost didn't want it to stop raining as it would mean Satoshi would leave to catch his bus home. He shook the thoughts from his head however, knowing they would lead him nowhere good as they reached his apartment block pretty quickly.
He groaned in frustration when he found that the door for the main entrance was stuck once again, a now common occurrence which the landlord refused to fix, holding his key in the lock and stepping back slightly to slam his shoulder into the door.
It gave way after a couple of shoves and Yoshiki grunted at the impact, holding the door open for Satoshi to enter, disbelief filling him as he saw that Satoshi had to duck his head slightly in order to not smack his head, before letting it slam closed once more, giving it a quick kick for good measure.
"Aggressive much?" Satoshi joked as they headed for the stairs.
"You're one to talk, you're like a damn noodle,"
"You're just jealous,"
"Yeah, yeah," Yoshiki brushed off, stabbing the key into the lock of his apartment and turning it, this door, thankfully opening normally.
Satoshi, unfortunately, forgot to duck his head down this time and Yoshiki turned just in time to hear the dull thud and see Satoshi reaching up to rub his head with a grumble.
"Not used to your growth spurt yet?" Yoshiki laughed, leading Satoshi through the apartment whilst shedding his now thoroughly soaked hoodie, slinging it over one arm.
"Shut up," Satoshi grumbled, a pout forming on his face "You're just annoyed that you haven't grown since the end of high school,"
He was just annoyed that he had to be attracted to the person he had the least chance of ever being with.
Changing the subject, Yoshiki threw his hoodie into the basket beside the washing machine, turning to Satoshi once more
"You can go for a shower if you want, otherwise you might get sick,"
"Ah...Uh, thanks," Satoshi fumbled over his words and followed Yoshiki as he showed the way to the bathroom, grabbing a towel for him out of the cupboard.
"I'll get you a change of clothes so yours can dry," Yoshiki added "Oh, and you might need to adjust the height of the shower, not all of us are ten feet tall,"
Satoshi nodded once more with another of those damn lopsided smiles and Yoshiki felt something uncomfortable stirring inside him, forcing a smile of his own before leaving the bathroom, letting the door click closed behind him.
He moved onto grabbing Satoshi some clothes, hearing the shower starting up and moving to place them outside the bathroom door and calling out
"There are some dry clothes outside the door,"
Satoshi replied with a muffled hum and Yoshiki decided he could wait to shower, heading back into his room to strip off his wet clothes in exchange for something dry and much more comfortable before returning to the living room and flopping down onto the sofa with a sigh, leaning his head against the back of the sofa, staring at the ceiling.
After all these years, and he was still crushing on his best friend.
He was honestly hopeless...
He let his eyes slip closed, his earlier exhaustion returning with vengeance, so much so that he didn't even hear the shower cutting off or the bathroom door opening. Even Satoshi's footsteps went unnoticed, well, that was until he decided to sit beside Yoshiki, faking a yawn and wrapping an arm around Yoshiki's shoulders, startling him out of whatever daze he was in.
"Nice of you to join me," Satoshi grinned, it faltering slightly as Yoshiki tried to wriggle out of his grasp.
"Sorry, I'm just tired from work," And from hiding my feelings from you...
"I get it," Satoshi spoke wistfully "You're still working a lot then?"
Yoshiki hummed, standing up and stretching his arms above his head, finally noticing that the clothes he had given Satoshi were slightly too small and being unable to hold back a laugh.
"Why are you laughing at me?" Satoshi pouted "You don't think it's a good look?"
"How on earth did you end up growing so much?"
"Maybe you just stopped growing," Satoshi argued, leaning forwards and resting his chin on his hands "You know I'm going to have to insist on hanging out more often. I've missed you,"
"I've missed you too," Although Yoshiki knew he had completely different emotions behind his words, he figured it wouldn't hurt to express it. "It's just hard...To fit things in..."
"I know," Satoshi sighed, also standing up, Yoshiki's hoodie riding up even more. "I...Yoshiki," He grabbed Yoshiki's attention, the latter turning to him in confusion.
Satoshi took this moment to lean down, face inches apart from Yoshiki's to give him the opportunity to pull away if he so wished.
Of course, he didn't.
Why would he?
And so, when Satoshi moved forwards to press their lips together, Yoshiki only took moments to collect himself before kissing back, mouths moving in unison.
When they finally pulled away, Satoshi spoke, voice full of seriousness
"I mean it...I've missed you," A grin slipped onto Satoshi's face as he dramatically rolled his neck in a circle "But damn, you really haven't grown,"
"Okay, now you're pushing your luck," Yoshiki grumbled "I...Didn't think you felt the same,"
"Of course you didn't because I hid it as much as I could," Satoshi reached out to take Yoshiki's hand "I didn't think you felt the same so I hid it, then when you disappeared completely I tried to work out why. I got my hopes up that this could be why but I wasn't confident enough to act on it,"
"All that extra height but you've not got any extra brain cells," Yoshiki reached out to flick Satoshi's forehead "But I guess you were right. It's part of the reason I stopped talking to you all,"
"I have plenty of extra brain cells, thank you very much," Satoshi protested "I just hit my head at times so I get confused,"
"I think confused is an understatement," Yoshiki grinned "But now that we're at this point," He paused for effect, "Do you want to stay the night?"
Satoshi's smile was ridiculously wide as he nodded.
Although it was just a small change in routine, it was a break from the same monotonous routine that Yoshiki was used to.
And he felt his earlier frustration melting away as he collapsed back onto the sofa alongside Satoshi and his seemingly neverending limbs.
Maybe he could continue with his boring job if he gets to spend time with Satoshi once more.