Work Text:
I dip a glass in a bath-tub,
drink dirty water.
Soaping together—that
is sacred to me. Washing mouths together.
You can fuck
anyone—but with whom can you sit in water?
And the cuddling up
before sleep!—and back-scratching
in the morning. My back, not yours!
—Ilya Kaminsky, "After Bombardment, Sonya" (excerpt)
Keiji is not perfect. He has his own foibles, a whole lot of it that Osamu is well aware of, that doesn’t distinguish him too far off from other human beings. It’s just that more often than Osamu could admit of thinking, Keiji forgets that he is.
He forgets that it’s perfectly human of him to have spilled his third cup of black coffee on the manuscripts he is yet to proofread, and it’s perfectly human of him to have shrieked so audibly that Osamu almost dunks his own head into the toilet from rattling out the shower in haste to find out about what danger the love of his life could be under, and it’s perfectly human of him to have some misplaced anger over it that he starts blaming people who weren’t even at fault.
“Who even fucking writes their manuscripts on paper these days. It’s 20-fucking-20,” Keiji would mutter to himself after telling Osamu that he was fine and he had just been scorched by the heat, but not at what happened to his work.
“Well, there are those people.” Osamu would walk towards him and snake his hands over the rough of Keiji’s shoulders to let him know there is something warm he could always turn to, something much better he could have other than bitter dark water if he wanted his heart rate going before the afternoon. “Like how you’re still using one of those CD players that even my grandfather doesn’t remember anymore.”
Keiji whirls his office chair around to face Osamu and gapes his mouth at him in pure disgust that Osamu almost snorts. “That’s different. I have a reason.”
And he does, that being, from what Osamu could recall: I want to have the songs with me, like, more than just listening to them. I want to feel like I have them. And Osamu remembers almost purring when he had heard it.
“You do.” Osamu crouches down to his level, leans his palms against the armchair, and lets a grin slowly begin from the corner of his lips. “Just like that guy who writes on paper, baby. Maybe he also just wants his words with him, even the drafts. Come on, I wasn’t done showering yet ‘cause you scared the shit out of me. Let’s cool you down and join me.”
“But the—”
“We’re just going to let them dry, I’ll help you out with the reading later.” Osamu slips Keiji’s glasses off before he could protest again and presses his lips against him so hard, he feels Keiji’s breath hitch for a moment before inhaling into the kiss.
That leads to: Keiji’s eyes looking graciously heavy after he pulls away, Keiji obediently following him into the bathroom with their hands linked as Osamu leads, Keiji placing a kiss against the swell below Osamu’s nape under the running water when he has his back turned from him because that’s how he says his thanks sometimes, while you’re preoccupied and distracted and hopes it would be subtle enough that you go on doing what you had been. But Osamu had never been too engrossed on something else when Keiji was in the same space, so he had grown accustomed to this pattern, this steady discovery of some pieces of Keiji he occasionally picks up and grows fond of.
Osamu knows he could just scrape the whole package out if he wanted to, could just sit Keiji down and nitpick all the miniature extensions of himself so far-fetched to what he superficially is and ask him to lay them all down en masse, but he also knows it doesn’t work like that, especially not for Keiji, who is all but an assortment of gradation for him.
He’s not one for confrontations, absolutely detests them, and he never had to tell Osamu this because it was evident from how he would always lock himself up in their bedroom alone after a colleague would meet him for “constructive criticism” on his work performance, that ends up involving personal interests after all. Osamu is relieved he rarely gets those invitations now, but he remembers how unsettling those days would be for Keiji, even if his appearance would pass off to be a complete clone that of yesterday’s, it was in when he would move the clutter of his desk to the floor instead of in front of him, because anything he finds visually polluting a few inches away from his face would overwhelm him more, that even the glass of water could be 50 meters away from his plate, and so in these kinds of days, Osamu would not touch him too much, he would kiss the corner of his mouth or the inside of his wrist only when Keiji’s arm would be laid out near him, instead of clinging unto him, especially when they go to bed, he makes sure a pillow is in between them so he doesn’t reach for Keiji unconsciously and suffocate the little hours of sleep he could designate for a wider room to breathe.
And in the morning, when Osamu had properly substituted the ill-fated, almost disfigured pillow as his lover for a night, he would wake up to Keiji staring at him, something heavy on his lids that coos him awfully a lot more in the haze of having just woken up, when there seems to be a screen that blurs his sight for a little, and he can think of it as clouds thinning around him because having Keiji look at him this way devastatingly completes the ensemble.
There he goes again, saying his thanks a few moments before Osamu opens his eyes like he knows the exact instant when Osamu will wake.
They look at each for quite a while more, because Osamu had just been gathering himself to sobering from both the drag of sleep and Keiji. Oh, Keiji, who’s looking at him like he had done the absolute most for him when he was just loving him.
“I’ll do something for you today.” Are the first words that come out of Keiji’s mouth because he thinks “good morning” wouldn’t suffice to the weight he feels in his chest right now. He reaches out to tug at Osamu’s ears softly like he always does in an attempt to wake him up.
“You already did.” And Keiji narrows his eyes a little. “I wake up next to you.”
Keiji bites his lip to suppress a grin, though it doesn’t entirely help. He pulls the pillow between them and throws it someplace else in the bed, and Osamu takes that as a plead to touch him now, so he does. He takes him in his arms in the place of stretching his limbs in the morning, and Keiji sinks himself into the hollow of Osamu’s chest formed in the angle. An exchange of sighs.
“When I wake up next to you, you do so much for me,” Osamu whispers against Keiji’s hair again.
Keiji only pulls him closer, he slides a hand inside Osamu’s shirt, leaving a phantom of scratches all over the expanse of his back, just to let him know he hears it. “Let’s go out today. My treat.”
Osamu parts from his warm residence on top of Keiji’s head to look at him. “I told you, you don’t have to.”
“Yeah, well, there’s another occasion.”
“What occasion?”
“I love you.”
Osamu could only hold his stare for so long before he rolls Keiji on his back and engulfs him in another squeeze that makes Keiji laugh while he dramatically whines loudly to express his being swooned.
And they did, as Keiji insisted, go out together; to the theater—though Keiji thinks he paid to risk getting caught for public indecency with his boyfriend for the last 40 minutes of the film than for watching it because Osamu kept digging his fingers against Keiji’s thigh so keenly that it wasn’t enough to just purse his lips so tight to keep himself from releasing an audible whimper. It only took surrendering to reliving as horny touch-starved teenagers left alone in a row of seats in a dark corner; two fingers in Keiji’s mouth to suck while the owner of them also did his own share of sucking… to subdue a portion of something pent up between them since the morning—and ate strawberry cheesecake bingsu, and to a bookstore where they separated the moment they came in to search for their respective books (Keiji buys Osamu a cookbook and smiles when he sees it’s solely for desserts, because Keiji told him a few minutes ago that he’d like to try more desserts after how good the bingsu they had was, so he steals a chaste kiss to Osamu’s cheek while they were waiting in line, and Osamu blushes because he knows he’s been caught.)
These kinds of days are simple, and Keiji knows he has to stop thinking like they’re something to be earned, whether or not it’s from having been upset the night before or getting a promotion, he wants to grow out of the habit of working for his good days, wants to get rid of the room in the pit of his stomach merely for the reminder of the balance of things he had been accustomed to, that when he’s in the high of spirits, it glares at him, rings at his ears so painfully to halt before he gets too happy and the price to pay for it gets even higher. For once he wants to feel the kind of joy that wastes his fears of losing it, unlike when he would allow himself to wallow in the dark, or at least remain below amenity, just so he doesn’t take up too much of the slice meant for him. Maybe he could have it for other days he thinks he deserves it most.
But he’s no longer alone now. To carry the same means of trying to preserve happiness for himself feels like he was insisting Osamu not to touch the slice he was supposed to eat, leaving it to spoil. It felt like it was so selfish of him to hesitate when Osamu was so certain. Sometimes, he felt like he was both too much and too little for him. He was so used to his loneliness that it occurred to him it could have been a part of him all along, something he’s made of and maybe everything he extends contains the same substance, everything he gives to the world is meant to drain whatever it was that filled it and acknowledge something hollow exists in you all this time.
Sometimes he wondered if Osamu ever felt it, when he’s cautious of becoming too brimming for Keiji, he wonders if he constrains himself too much because he thinks Keiji might break if he touches him too deep, wary of opening a door into a room he might not have been welcomed to. And he feels like he’s making Osamu walk on eggshells, making this harder than it should be for him.
But then Osamu, with his big hands that just might be as big as his heart, is so kind to him, sometimes he gets an overbearing thought he just laughs off; that every person Osamu treats as kindly as he had already fallen in love with him. He doesn’t understand it sometimes, the intricacy that is a person in love. He sees how exasperatingly Osamu bickers with Atsumu when they’re together, how a bag of chips could be enough reason to begin an international conflict should the two govern their separate nations. Osamu loses his temper over burnt rice (maybe just on days he’s too tired and had met some trouble at a branch of Onigiri Miya), his jaw clenches when somebody accidentally bumps his shoulder in the subway, and once or twice yelled back at a customer who was being unreasonably rude to one of his staffs.
But to Keiji, who had spilled so many different kinds of drinks on his work so many times Osamu could make a menu out of it, he gently peels each page away from each other so as not to tear them and lay all (43 pages) of them across the floor and dry them individually with a hairdryer. To Keiji, who had broken that expensive, pretty, hand-painted porcelain bowl from China where Osamu only eats on occasionally because it’s his favorite, told him to make up for it by hugging him from the back the entire time he makes dinner.
“How can you be so patient with me?” Keiji had asked once, when he was staring at Osamu’s back as he opens the window in their kitchen and snatched everything away from the pot in the stove that had been burnt to its severity because Keiji had fallen asleep on the table and left the fire on before he could put the water in, to make ramen at 3 in the morning, as he chased his last deadline.
Osamu was about done collecting 6 different kitchen mittens stacked over each other to avoid getting burnt in removing the bedraggled pot, whose supposed stainless steel appearance only remains at the edges of its opening, before he stops himself in hearing Keiji’s question, stays absolutely still for what Keiij thought was a million years, and Keiji’s eyes are almost about to water, he can feel the gloss that’s beginning to blur his sight because he’s so tired and his deadline’s in 30 minutes and Osamu might not let him in the kitchen ever again and he won’t turn around and maybe he’s had enough—
“Do you think I shouldn’t be?”
“What?”
Osamu finally turns around, both his hands, still covered in three layers of kitchen mittens each, are placed in either side of his waist. “Do you think I shouldn’t be patient with you, Keiji?”
Keiji doesn’t know what face he’s making, he’s only looking from the point of Osamu’s chest because he feels pathetic, like he has to be taken care of all the time, and Osamu’s not supposed to be someone who fixes him, but it feels like he has to because of the way Keiji is when things like this happen.
“I… don’t know,” Keiji stifles a groan on his throat, it comes out cracked instead. This is it, he thinks. Maybe Osamu could finally feel the weight of it all, the both little and too much load that is Akaashi Keiji.
“Can I touch you?”
Keiji flinches as he looks up to him, and he forgets he had been latching at the flush of tears in his eyes, so they finally slither down his cheeks once he blinked. He looks at Osamu, whose gaze feels pained. So Keiji stops fidgeting with his fingers, and timidly opens his palms up, more for Osamu than the ceiling above them.
At that, he gets enveloped by Osamu’s body, he feels the mittens around his neck and he almost wants to cry at how it pillows him and it feels ridiculous to want to. Keiji lets his arms rest against Osamu’s back, fisting the fabric of his shirt and breathing him in though the space he’s left within the crook of his neck doesn’t supply much air.
“You act like you’re the only one who makes stupid mistakes here.” Osamu’s voice resonates against his shoulder, and he sighs before speaking again. “You act like you need to be good at this.”
Osamu shifts to set him at his level to see but doesn’t pull away from the grip he has around Keiji’s neck. “Do I make you feel like it’s a competition?”
“No, Osamu… no.” Keiji stresses on his words because he doesn’t have much of himself right now to convince Osamu otherwise, that no, he doesn’t stretch on Keiji’s limits but smooths them instead, and he’s afraid of how happy Osamu makes him because that means he could be taken away from him. Like all the other things that had made him too happy before.
“Then, baby...” Osamu sighs, for the hundredth time this morning, Keiji thinks. He closed his eyes and sunk his forehead against Keiji’s, and he could see the bags under his eyes, it’s almost 4 a.m. after all. “Just let yourself happen. Let all these things happen if they have to. Why would you even think I would lose it over pots? Or pans? Or porcelain bowls? Why would you even ask how I’m so patient with you? They’re pots and pans and porcelain bowls, baby. You’re… not. You aren’t something that gets destroyed and just replaced, Keiji. You build yourself up again no matter how many times you’re devastated. I’m not patient with you, I love you. That’s everything I do. You ruin the kitchen, and I love you. You buy me books, and I love you. You wake up next to me, and I love you. You think you upset me sometimes? Yes, I’m upset, and I love you. Do you understand?”
Keiji hadn’t noticed when he started to cry, but it feels nice like this. He shuts his eyes and lets the mittens that had risen to sandwich his entire face soak his tears, and laughs as he does so, and lets a wave of silence settle between them again. He keeps crying, and Osamu loves him.
Keiji doesn’t want to feel lonely anymore, because Osamu makes him feel so full. More than the food, and the love, he admits to himself. Osamu makes him feel whole, but not in how the two of them are pieces, it’s how both of them are their own, and when Osamu is confined in the solace that is entirely his, Keiji is comforted at the kind of tenderness they had built their world upon, where now, the balance of things isn’t coupled with altering his desires into rubble, but having somebody else be a person with him, and remind him it’s something that human beings simply do, desire—that is.
So, Keiji learns, bit by bit, in simple days and maybe much more in bad ones, when Osamu is… himself, and Keiji loves him. He’s himself when he comes home looking like the daylights had been punched out of him and his jacket doesn’t seem to fit him the same way it did when he left the apartment this morning. He’s himself when he throws his keys on the couch instead of flinging it in the key holder beside the door, and he finds Keiji’s eyes drought in worry, waiting for him to explain what problem there is.
Osamu is met with Keiji dashing towards him before he could move from his spot. Keiji tries not to madly fidget in front of him as not to further what stress he is under. Osamu’s eyebrows are limping and it’s almost crooking his eyes. A surge of pain crosses his chest briefly.
“The branch in Kōbe. The first one, the biggest.” Osamu tells him, the bump on his throat looks like it’s throbbing. Keiji waits for him to finish. “Robbed. Nobody’s hurt but, God, Keiji. It was a month’s worth.”
And for a second, Keiji didn’t seem to know what to tell him. He visits all three of the branches he’s built for the past year and a half now, every month. A day in a week designated for a city where Onigiri Miya can be bought. A fourth one he had been wanting to plan this week. And in Kōbe, he had built it first, met the real matters of starting small to rising into a name that was well-bought enough to be called known in the region. And Keiji falters for a little while, but then he remembers, Osamu in his state right now, is still himself, and he should know better than to separate Osamu into parts when he’s a whole in himself.
Osamu’s drooping like he’s about to turn into a puddle on the floor, so Keiji grounds him before it happens. He slips Osamu’s jacket off and throws it absentmindedly where his keys are, and he laces their fingers together.
“You need a bath before I kiss you.”
Osamu chuckles. “Didn’t we first make out in my shop’s cramped restroom after a full day shift?”
“I’ve raised my standards now.”
Now it’s Keiji’s turn to pull him into the bathroom, fill the tub, and strip in front of him as his back is turned like in the indie movies they like. For a while, they shift their limbs here and there, because between a cheap generic bathtub acquired 45% less than how much it originally was and two grown men stretching at 6 foot and beyond, only the latter is left with most options, so they do, with giggles toppling from each other that exhausts the awkwardness that should be there, some crisp screeches of skin against the acrylic, and the rise and fall of their breaths as the water gushes at the brim.
Osamu cushions his back against Keiji’s chest, letting himself glide a little lower so Keiji can follow the angle less straining for the both of them, and Keiji grants the last setup of their position by bending his knees so Osamu could rest his arms on top of them.
And like a pattern, they sigh, with Osamu loosening his breath a little longer than Keiji’s, because he carries much more of it at the moment, and Keiji loves him.
“Tomorrow?” Keiji leans his head harder against Osamu’s, just enough to share the tension that expels from him, thinking if Osamu had more life pressed against him, all of what dulls it currently could come out faster. He closes his eyes and hopes Osamu does as well.
“Hmm,” Osamu’s voice doesn’t sound like he’s thinking. More of filling the space than looking for answers in it, Keiji thinks. “Tomorrow.”
Then they will talk about it tomorrow, and leave the night to let Osamu wander around the space he has to himself, because while they’re two people who barely fit in this tub, tangled and compressed around water, Keiji is one person, and Osamu is another.
And Keiji is over the assent of himself in thinking that loneliness is a part of him when he had mistaken it for the fear of forfeiting his solitude instead. Keiji had always found love too compact, too intrusive to what he is, being so protective over the makeup of himself, and he thinks it would be a chore for anybody to maneuver around the walls he had built up when everything was so simple all along because Osamu isn’t made of concrete and sharp edges that have no trajectory to turn to corners. Osamu is tender, and he flows through the passages in a steady stream. Keiji finds that water softens the wood of his walls, warmth makes it easier, it bends easily without danger of splitting, and sometimes it can seep through the cracks when it’s welcomed.
Because Osamu, with his shoulders so wide it finds the shallow descents across Keiji’s collarbones as they rest against each other, and the world he had made so much wider for Keiji like he owns it, lets himself happen along with each other, and he’s brought to a reminder that he’s not the only one whose solitude is a precise possession, belonging only to themself. Osamu also has his solitude to protect, and it occurred to Keiji that they also protect each other’s solitudes, in these little ways that they discover among themselves, whether it’s both or one of them.
Osamu grazes both of Keiji’s knuckles and gathers their fingertips together until it entwines. Keiji lets Osamu pull his hands from each side of the tub and wraps himself around it so tight that Keiji sits up a little higher. Osamu tugs him even closer until he’s nearly blanketing him around his arms, and Keiji feels Osamu’s cheeks against his swell a little. He’s smiling.