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Winter, 2019
Ten minutes before Kazuya’s alarm is meant to ring, a bird starts pecking on his window, the persistent tap-tap-tap ruining Kazuya’s remaining chances of a few minutes of slumber. He doesn’t bother turning to verify; it’s always the same bird that visits them this particular season. So warmly ocher, it’s a sharp contrast to the bleak gray of the Tokyo winter. So little, Kazuya could trap it in the palm of one hand.
Sawamura used to sneak into Kazuya’s room at night, leaving sunflower seeds on the windowsill so the bird would keep coming back the following morning. When he’d gotten caught, he begged Kuramochi to do it instead (and Kuramochi, who would grant Sawamura any favor if he pouted hard enough, had relented).
It’s been weeks since the start of winter, weeks since anyone last left out sunflower seeds, weeks since Kazuya’s last closed his eyes for more than two hours, weeks since Kuramochi last slept in this bed. The bird still arrives every morning without fail, tap-tap-tapping for food, ignoring the empty space on the other side of Kazuya’s pillow.
Does Kuramochi sleep better now, without Kazuya’s weight on his arm? “Don’t know how your head is that heavy when there’s nothing in it,” he’d complain when he woke up, hours before curling his arm under Kazuya’s pillow exactly like the night before.
He cancels his alarm before it can ring. The pecking has stopped. Kazuya’s windowsill is chalk white and bare. He hopes the bird doesn’t come back tomorrow, or the day after that, or ever.
❄
Sawamura ambles into the kitchen like he’s just learned how to walk, sleep still crusting the corners of his eyes, hips bumping into the counter twice. “You didn’t sleep again.” His morning voice, groggy and slow, is still a shout in anyone else’s throat. “The bags under your eyes make you look more like a tanuki!”
Kazuya returns his attention to the pan. He pours out the rest of the batter, letting it spread out until it somehow resembles a circle. “Can’t you wait until after lunch to start yelling?”
“Not when you’re going to sulk the whole morning!” Kazuya can hear his pouting. “And you didn’t leave food out for Pii-chan again,” Sawamura scolds. “I could hear her asking for it!”
“Kuramochi always did it.” Kazuya tries to fake nonchalance, but his voice is rough to his own ears. He clears his throat to soothe it. “I don’t know where you keep the seeds.”
“Oh.” The silence envelops their tiny apartment, mingling with the sweet waft of milk and butter. Sawamura likes his pancakes slightly undercooked, Kazuya remembers. He makes sure he flips the fourth one just as it solidifies, and it isn’t long before he drops it on Sawamura’s plate.
The younger lets out a reluctant protest. “Hey, you don’t have to cook, I—“
“Are you going to cook us breakfast?” Kazuya counters, amused.
“No,” is the reply, and Kazuya chuckles at how instant it is. “But—“
“We have to eat if we’re going to make it through winter training,” Kazuya reminds him. “You almost fainted the first day last year because you ate cup noodles for breakfast.”
“I know that!”
He places the last pancake on top. “Coach wants to see number nine later,” he says, turning off the stove. “I know you’ve been practicing it.” When Sawamura doesn’t answer, Kazuya pivots to look at him, and finds him just a few inches away, reaching for his plate almost cautiously. “Sawamura?”
“You don’t have to pretend you’re fine,” he grumbles. Kazuya’s mouth parts to argue, but Sawamura doesn’t pause. “I’m not… as good as Kuramochi-senpai, but I know you well enough to tell when you’re not okay!”
Kazuya swallows. Sawamura sets his plate on the table, and the sound of ceramic hitting wood only extends Kazuya’s discomfiture. He picks up his own plate, taking a deep breath. “You’ll hurt yourself if you think too hard, Sawamura,” he says shakily. He settles the plate soundlessly on the table. “Remember, when your brain wants to start thinking about something other than baseball, it has to take a few minutes to warm up.” He underlines his teasing with a smirk, and hopes Sawamura buys it, even for a moment.
“You’re such a jerk!” Sawamura whines. “If you’re still like this tomorrow, I’m calling Kuramochi-senpai!”
“Don’t,” Kazuya says, too quickly. It’s like he’s shot ice water straight up an artery; he swears his heart stills, and he forces himself to get the words out: “Don’t bother him.”
“Why not?” Sawamura arches an eyebrow, like he’s challenging Kazuya to articulate the hollow ache in his chest. “It’s been weeks!”
“If Youichi… if Kuramochi,” he corrects himself, “wanted to talk, he would have called.” He levels his gaze against Sawamura’s glare. “You can’t force someone to…” He trails off, taking his first bite of pancake to avoid finishing the sentence. To want to be with you. “He doesn’t want to talk,” he says instead, clenching his jaw. “You should respect that.”
Sawamura gawks at the last words. “Respect that,” he echoes. “Miyuki-senpai, I didn’t even think you knew what that word meant.”
Kazuya scoffs. “Like how you only use formal speech when you’re insulting me?”
“Besides,” Sawamura continues, ignoring him. “I suffered through my first year of university watching you feel sorry for yourself pining over him.” His voice lowers, like it’s still a secret, one Kazuya had drunkenly confessed to him after coming home one night. “And the year after that pretending the walls in this apartment aren’t paper-thin.” He flushes at his own implication, and Kazuya feels an embarrassed heat creeping up his own neck. “After all that, it’s disrespectful to me for you to break up!”
Sawamura’s eyebrows are furrowed. If Kuramochi were there, Kazuya knows he’d tease their kouhai about it until it smoothed.
But he isn’t. “I can’t give you a refund for the time you wasted thinking we were soulmates.”
“Kuramochi-senpai liked you for a really long time.” Sawamura’s voice is as gentle as his nature will allow, and his eyes are wide and innocent as they meet Kazuya’s. “I know because he told me before anyone else,” he adds, his words hinting at his pride. “And with everything else he told me… I know he wouldn’t break up with you if he thought you didn’t want to do it first.”
“What are you talking about?” Kazuya’s breath is a stutter, as he tries to process what Sawamura has just revealed. “In what universe would I want to break up with him?”
The downward curl of Sawamura’s mouth is inexplicably remorseful, and he doesn’t answer Kazuya’s question. “Kuramochi-senpai always calls first, even when he doesn’t think you’re going to answer.” He looks down at the pancakes Kazuya has all but forgotten. “I think you should call him this time.”
“There you go again.” He feels his heartbeat stumble, the longing in his chest building, like it’s preparing for the climax of Sawamura’s pity. “Thinking.”
“Maybe Kuramochi-senpai just wants to feel like you want to be with him as much as he wants to be with you.”
Kazuya doesn’t respond, letting the words sink into him like footprints in the snow. This time, he allows his yearning to flood him in waves, wading through his most recent memories: the warmth of someone else’s body heat while he slept, the tickle of their laugh against his neck, the ghost of their fingertips on his cheekbone, the last feather-light touch on his lips before Kazuya watched him walk away.
“Life isn’t a shoujo manga, Sawamura,” Kazuya finally answers, barely above a whisper. “Things don’t fall back into place just because you think they should.”
“You’re both idiots!” Sawamura cries, huffing through another bite of pancake. “I feel like the senpai here!”
Kazuya blinks at him. “Good senpai help their kouhai with homework and baseball, not spit out unsolicited advice on their relationships and freeload off their cooking.”
Sawamura makes a noise of protest. “Good senpai push their kouhai back into the arms of the only person who can tolerate them for more than five minutes!”
In the face of Sawamura’s persistence, Kazuya recalls how Kuramochi had been just as candid with his own tenderness. Walking from Hosei to Meiji to meet Kazuya just as his class ended, and walking him home even if his own apartment was three train stops away. Leaving sunflower seeds out for the damn bird so it doesn’t wake Kazuya up in the morning, because he knows his boyfriend is a light sleeper. Trailing languid kisses everywhere he can reach, because he loves the sound of Kazuya’s contentment.
Cataloguing the smallest details about everyone close to him, and reminding Kazuya every time he deems it relevant. “Sawamura likes his pancakes burnt,” Kuramochi had said, and the sudden realization that Kazuya had been mistaken that morning, again, frustrates him. “Anything raw, he’ll only pretend to like because he’s trying to be nice.”
In front of him, Sawamura dutifully bites into the last tier of his slightly raw pancakes. When he swallows — almost imperceptibly, if Kazuya hadn’t been looking for it: a wince.
The rush of irritation shocks him, and he snuffs out any remnant thoughts of Kuramochi until his chest is cold with heartache. “I never asked any of you to care.” Kazuya’s voice splinters into sharp edges. “I don’t play baseball to spout bullshit about how my team is family. Not in high school, not now.”
Sawamura gapes at him, like he’s stunned at the cruelty of Kazuya’s honesty. “And you’re surprised he thinks you wanted to break up with him?” he croaks. “You can keep pretending that you don’t need anyone.” It isn’t anger or sadness that Kazuya sees in his stare: it’s sympathy. “But you’re just as lonely as everyone else.”
Summer, 2018
Kuramochi introduces Moriyama Kaori to his two closest friends when they bump into her at a bar, on a summer night in their sophomore year. She’s studying to be a physical therapist, Kuramochi says, and she’d helped him through his daily stretches when he was injured last season.
She is, undeniably, Kuramochi’s dream girl.
It takes one look for Kazuya to know. Her nose is an elegant slope, her eyes two bright pools. Glossed lips part to reveal a gap between her two front teeth that looks almost intentional. Sawamura gasps when she grins, but it’s an awed, wonderstruck sound. Moriyama smiles wider at his reaction, like she’s encouraging his interest.
It takes one minute. She used to be one of Yamamori’s baseball team managers, and conversation is effortless when she knows just what to say to keep it going. She slips into the empty seat when Sawamura starts to ask her about their last Koushien run. Her third favorite team, she admits sheepishly, is Seidou.
It takes one smile. The look on Kuramochi’s face is impossibly fond when Sawamura tints crimson at Moriyama’s praise. When Kuramochi asks if she wants a drink, she only beams, and he leaves his seat without asking for her order. Moriyama bites her lip then, holding back her delight, and Kazuya realizes she’s nervous.
Kazuya likes to think he doesn’t lend himself easily to jealousy. That night, he’s convinced the lump in his throat isn’t anything more than apprehension at this stranger. A month later, after Yama-chan becomes a semi-regular topic of conversation, Kazuya thinks the twinge in his chest every time Kuramochi mentions her is simply mild annoyance.
He never sees them together outside of that same bar, and for once, he’s glad he and Kuramochi don’t go to the same university (but only mildly relieved, because Kazuya is not jealous).
Not even when Kuramochi is an hour late for their weekly movie night in his own apartment, and Kazuya can only assume he’s on another date.
He rifles through the Netflix selection with one hand and fiddles with Kuramochi’s spare key in the other, letting his thumb brush across the rust on the teeth. He wonders, not for the first time, if Yama-chan knows where the key is kept: tucked between soil and ceramic, hiding under the leaves of the plant Haruichi had given Kuramochi for graduation. He wonders, not for the first time, if she and Kuramochi have their own movie nights in this apartment, or if they kiss on the same couch Kazuya falls asleep on when it’s too late to walk home.
He chooses the first movie with a dog on the poster. Kuramochi loves them, even when the dogs inevitably die in the end. Kazuya just likes watching him pretend he isn’t crying.
The sound of a knob turning and the door immediately slamming shut alerts him. When Kazuya cranes his neck to look, Kuramochi is panting against the frame, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt. Kazuya waits for him to catch his breath.
“Coach made me do…” Kuramochi wheezes. “Ten extra baserunning drills.”
“Welcome home.” It’s completely dark in the apartment save for the glare of the TV, and the light from the movie trailer ripples on one side of Kuramochi’s face.
“Wanted to tell you I was going to be late, but my phone died.” Kuramochi’s eyes latch onto his. Kazuya sees the apology before he hears it. “Sorry.”
“Okay,” Kazuya says, turning back to the TV.
“Okay?” Kuramochi echoes, uncertainty leaking into the inflection. The couch isn’t far from the door, and it dips when Kuramochi sinks into it. “Something interesting happen at practice today?”
“Always begging me for team secrets,” Kazuya ripostes, the tsk implied. “Still sore you couldn’t hit off Sawamura last game?”
“You’re so full of shit.” Kuramochi is close enough to elbow him, and he does. “Are you going to tell me what’s wrong or are you going to brood for the next three days?”
A familiar warmth unfurls in Kazuya’s chest. He won’t ever admit it out loud, but it’s when Kuramochi fusses over him that he feels the most wanted. “Worried about me?” He smirks, inching closer, until their thighs touch. “You’re a little to short to be my shoulder to cry on~”
“Nice try, asshole.” Without hesitation, Kuramochi finds his regular spot, tucking his head against Kazuya’s neck. “Relax,” he says, curling into him, and Kazuya would do just that, if it weren’t for the telltale tempo of his heartbeat. “I’m not gonna make you tell me. But you’ll self-destruct from keeping everything in that big head all the time.”
He doesn’t think he’ll ever get desensitized to this routine. It’s even worse tonight; for some reason, all Kazuya can think about is Yama-chan nestling up to Kuramochi just like this, and Kuramochi picking a movie that will make her cry just so he can kiss away the tears on her cheeks. “Doesn’t look like I’m going to blow up tonight,” he breathes.
“Shame.” Kuramochi is already yawning. His hair brushes against Kazuya’s jaw. “You pick a movie yet?” Kazuya nods, knowing Kuramochi will pick up the movement.
“Oh.” Kuramochi lets out a drowsy chuckle when he recognizes what’s on the screen. “Nothing like a dead puppy to lift my spirits.”
“Dead adult dog who lives a full, happy life before getting an incurable disease,” Kazuya corrects, and is rewarded with another laugh. “Besides, you’ll fall asleep halfway through,” he adds, “so you won’t even get to the sad part.” When Kuramochi only hums, Kazuya takes it as permission to press play.
The movie starts out predictably enough, with a young couple looking to adopt. Kazuya can only allot half of his total attention span to them, when the other half sensory overloads at the hint of Kuramochi’s citrus cologne, the weight of his knee over Kazuya’s thigh, and the current running between their pinky fingers, only a breath apart. Kuramochi closes the gap just as Kazuya considers pulling away, tentatively taking Kazuya’s hand in his own. Kazuya feels the warmth in his entire body, like the quiet hum of electricity.
“You finally figured out how to turn the heater,” Kuramochi murmurs, slipping his fingers between Kazuya’s.
“Hm?” Kazuya replies, intelligently.
“You usually run colder. Even the summer.” Kuramochi’s voice is thick. “You’re never this warm.”
He’s right—Kazuya thinks he could be on fire. “That’s how you noticed the heater was on?” he forces out. “This is your apartment.”
“Guess I just noticed you first,” is Kuramochi’s only reply. When he tries to shrug, his shoulder jostles Kazuya’s arm.
Kuramochi, surprisingly, is still awake three-quarters through the film, when the veterinarian, who’d been the maid of honor at the protagonist’s wedding, tearfully reveals that Tadao the dog has two months left to live. He sighs when the camera pans to Tadao: tongue out, tail wagging, and entirely oblivious to his tragic fate. It won’t be long before he starts sniffling and blaming it on Kazuya’s shampoo.
Kazuya stares at their hands, still laced atop his leg. A sliver of doubt makes its way between their palms, and swells.
Kuramochi has always doled out affection in heaps. After years of friendship, Kazuya has learned not to question why he savors the touch so much, but his best friend has a girlfriend now, and Kazuya suspects not even cool, kind Yama-chan would take kindly to… whatever they’re doing.
“We should stop this,” Kazuya says, all in one quick breath.
“It’s almost over,” Kuramochi replies, distantly.
“I mean,” Kazuya starts. “Movie nights… hanging out alone at your apartment.” Ever so slightly, he feels Kuramochi’s hand slacken against his. Kazuya adds “this”, like a period—a full stop.
Slowly, Kuramochi withdraws. Goosebumps form on Kazuya’s arm, instantly cold without Kuramochi’s skin against it. He loosens his grip on Kazuya’s hand, but their fingers remain intertwined. “Oh?” he hums. Kazuya would think he were amused, if it weren’t for the bewildered hurt plastered plain on his face. The folds in Kuramochi’s expressions have always made him an open book. “Wanna tell me why?”
Kazuya avoids meeting Kuramochi’s eyes. “Yama-chan is really nice to me.”
“She’s nice to everyone.” The crease on Kuramochi’s forehead deepens, and his frown curls even lower. “But okay.”
“I just don’t want to offend her.”
Kuramochi clicks his tongue. “You lost me, Miyuki.”
“I wouldn’t want my boyfriend...” He scrambles for a less suggestive word, but nothing turns up. “…cuddling with someone else.”
Kuramochi’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. The corners of his mouth quirk upwards, comprehension dawning on him. Kazuya braces himself for the blow: the you’re right, thanks for understanding, Miyuki, and knows he will miss the weight of Kuramochi’s hand in his.
“Yama-chan,” Kuramochi starts. “Is the girl I introduced to Sawamura. So they could date,” he says, and thinks it’s necessary to add: “Romantically.”
The word leaves Kazuya’s mind wholly, utterly blank. “Oh.”
“Hyaha, I swear, whenever I think you have a brain for anything other than baseball, you go and prove me wrong!” Kuramochi splits his sides laughing, and his mirth shakes the couch under them. “You’re lucky scouts don’t know you can’t think as far as you can throw.” He turns to Kazuya then, just recovering from his amusement, and his eyes are so, so gentle.
It doesn’t help Kazuya’s muddled thoughts. He centers on clarifying the most confusing one: “You’re not together?”
Unhelpfully, Kuramochi doesn’t answer. “Did I say we were together?”
Kazuya opens his mouth, and closes it again. “No.“
“Unlike you, some people use their words.” Kuramochi’s thumb is rubbing the back of Kazuya’s hand again, comforting him through his daze. “But why did you think we were dating?”
He turns his gaze to their joined hands. “You’re different with her. I don’t see you act like that with anyone else.”
The silence that follows is fine, bordering on unpleasant. Kuramochi’s hand stills. “You’re not looking hard enough, then.”
Kazuya’s next breath is long and deep. He steels himself for the blow he’d been preparing for, just repackaged: the there’s someone else, Miyuki. “What?”
When Kazuya looks up, Kuramochi’s eyes hold his in place. “If I told you I met someone, not Yama-chan, but someone I wanted to hold hands with and kiss.” Kuramochi’s voice is firm and crystal clear. “How would you feel?”
Kazuya holds his gaze, and lies through his teeth. “I’d be fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“And you’re being completely honest?” Kuramochi says it like a plea, and Kazuya, even after all this time attempting to ignore his fondness, is still so weak to it.
“I guess,” he replies shakily. “I would have to know who the unlucky person is, so I can warn them first.” He clears his throat. “That you want to hold their hand and kiss them,” he echoes.
“It’s a little too late to warn them,” Kuramochi mutters.
Kazuya’s heart drops to the bottom of his stomach. Against his better judgment, the question comes tumbling out of his mouth. “What are you saying?”
“What I’m saying is,” Kuramochi says, his chest falling when he exhales. “I’m already holding your hand.”
Kazuya’s heart rate climbs at breakneck speed, and all the heat in his body streams to that one hand. Kuramochi is looking at him, expectantly, his jaw slack and lips parted. At that moment, Kazuya recognizes the feeling, not as ugly, bitter jealousy, but as wide-eyed, unguarded desire.
He doesn’t resist it. Trembling, Kazuya brings his fingers to Kuramochi’s cheekbone. Kuramochi’s eyes flutter closed, like a reflex. It’s the last bit of nerve Kazuya needs.
He touches his lips to Kuramochi’s.
The kiss is slow, cautious, and even now, Kazuya is afraid to do anything but meet Kuramochi touch for touch, sigh for sigh. He threads his fingers through Kuramochi’s hair, pulling him closer and marveling at how he melts into the touch. Kuramochi kisses him like he’s making up for lost time, deeply and languidly, each kiss worth a year, a month, a day they’d spent alone together.
He doesn’t know whose gasp he swallows, but it’s like the tiny, innocuous sound flips a switch, and their kisses grow more insistent. The fast, fleeting sensations rip through Kazuya’s neurons, and he clutches Kuramochi’s shirt, his arms, the back of his neck. He doesn’t think, doesn’t hesitate, just lets his hands do what they want for once, and is paid back generously with the smallest, happiest sighs, until they tilt their heads at the exact same time, and their noses smack into each other.
“Fuck, ow.” Kuramochi jerks away, pinching the tip of his nose.
There’s a red spot above his eyebrow where Kazuya’s glasses had pressed against. Without thinking, Kazuya rubs his thumb against it. “Sorry,” he murmurs, repeatedly and in rapid succession, panic rising at having actually injured his best friend while making out with him.
Kuramochi answers his apology with raucous laughter.
“You’re kidding me. It was that easy?” Kuramochi forces out through his cackling. “I should have made Yama-chan come to the bar a long time ago.” He presses another kiss, the tail end of a chuckle, to the corner of Kazuya’s lips.
Kazuya’s mouth quirks up in that same corner, smirk crooked. “Have you been waiting long?”
Kuramochi purses his lips, like he’s considering it, and Kazuya leans over to kiss him again. Kuramochi deflects him. “Nah,” he says, completely deadpan.
Kazuya snorts. “Was it everything you expected?”
A shrug. Kuramochi’s smile is honest and exposed, as vulnerable as the heart on his sleeve. “I never really expected this.”
“How long, then?” Kazuya asks, his grin widening.
Kuramochi punches his arm, without any bite, and huffs. “Longer than you, probably.” Kazuya’s smile falls just a little bit, because he doesn’t like the hesitation in Kuramochi’s voice.
Besides, he’s wrong.
Kazuya doesn’t tell him. Instead, he pokes Kuramochi’s cheek. He’s smiling so much his cheeks hurt. “So competitive~”
And when Kuramochi bends over to kiss him a third time, all Kazuya thinks is I can lose anyone but him.
Winter, 2019
The sunflower seeds on the banister camouflage against the dark-stained wood. Kazuya accidentally knocks a few off the railing when he leans against it; the seeds plummet some feet below, cracking open when they hit concrete.
Hastily, he cups his hands around the rest of the seeds to save them, but he’s thwarted by a whirlwind of chestnut fur, squirming under his arm and springing up to mouth at the kernels. It devours the seeds messily, ignoring the ones that tumble to the floor.
Kazuya only registers the chaos when the dog starts licking his palms. He jerks his hands away, rubbing the sides of his jeans. The dog noses excitedly at his knees, and Kazuya pats its head exactly twice to placate it. “Over there, Hiro,” he says, pointing to the seeds on the floor. Hiro takes one look at the mess—completely ignores it. He nudges Kazuya’s hand eagerly.
“Kazuya?” The voice is croaky, quiet, familiar. “I thought you got shipped off to the MLB!”
A smile tugs at Kazuya’s lips. “It’s two years too early for that, Tanaka-san,” he responds. “There, Hiro,” he tries again, gesturing at the seeds. Hiro snubs his effort, choosing instead to flop on his belly beside Kazuya’s feet.
“Finicky dog won’t eat anything off the floor,” Tanaka-san grumbles. “Youichi-kun spoils him rotten with those seeds.” As if he’d heard him, Hiro turns on his back, staring up at Kazuya delightedly.
“Sounds like him,” Kazuya mutters, voice flat.
“You two should come over for tea later,” Tanaka-san says, walking to his door. Hiro follows at his feet. “I know you young people are always in a hurry, but even world-class baseball players can stop for a chat with their favorite neighbor!” His gloved hand is shaking when he tries to insert the key.
“I…” Kazuya sucks in a breath, realizing just how chilly it is, especially when his palms are damp with slobber. He tucks his hands in the pocket of his hoodie. “We’ll try.”
When Tanaka-san peeks at him from behind his door, it’s with a mischievous glint in his eyes. “I hope it goes well, when you talk to him.” Hiro barks his support. “If I missed seeing you around, I can only imagine how he feels.” Tanaka-san offers a last knowing smile before the door shuts with a soft sound.
Kazuya doesn’t know what he expected to see when he came to Kuramochi’s apartment building. Nothing has been touched in the past month, and the realization brings with it a hollow pang of familiarity. The spare key is still in its pot, barely hidden if someone knew where to look. The fingerprint is still deeply embedded on the paint of Kuramochi’s apartment door, overlooked from last year’s renovation. To Kazuya’s eyes, the only alien features are the sunflower seeds scattered on the floor, unfamiliar and unsettling like specks of fresh ink on aged paper.
“I thought it would follow me.”
Kazuya’s heart leaps up to his throat. He doesn’t trust himself to turn around.
Kuramochi continues, “If I left out sunflower seeds like I did in your apartment, maybe that damn bird would recognize the smell of my hand or something.” He chuckles, with only a hint of mirth. It’s enough to make Kazuya look.
There he is, Kazuya’s favorite person: lopsided grin, sharp eyes. “It didn’t. But Tanaka-san’s dog loves it.”
“It— She still comes over,” Kazuya says, wringing his hands in his hoodie. It’s freezing. “I don’t know where Sawamura keeps the seeds.”
“Top cupboard,” Kuramochi replies easily, pulling out a key in front of his apartment door. “Behind Sawamura’s candy stash.”
“Oh,” is all Kazuya can say. He gnaws on the inside of his cheek, regret tugging at him at not having a plan beyond arriving at Kuramochi’s apartment. He lets out a breath, and it puffs out like wisps of cotton.
“Come in, idiot.” Kuramochi leaves the door open. “It’s the middle of winter. You aren’t even wearing a scarf!”
Kazuya follows him slowly. “I forgot,” he mumbles, closing the door behind him.
“Did you forget where your key is, too?” Kuramochi retorts, rummaging through a small box and taking out random articles. Kazuya detects a hint of amusement in his voice. His key, Kuramochi had said—the pronoun makes Kazuya’s heart flutter in blind, futile hope.
“I wasn’t sure I was still allowed to use it,” he admits.
It’s silent, for a beat. “Don’t be stupid,” Kuramochi says quietly. His hand pulls out something from the box. “Here.” He tosses something purple to Kazuya. It’s his scarf — the one his father had given him for his nineteenth birthday.
Kuramochi starts haphazardly returning the other items in the box, and Kazuya only then recognizes them. The shirt Kazuya let Kuramochi steal from him because it looked better on Kuramochi’s frame. The sweater he thought he’d lost on the subway. His old catching glove. “Are those my things?” Kazuya asks, the words distant and brittle.
“Yeah.” Kuramochi doesn’t meet his eyes, and continues packing. “That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it?”
Kazuya grips his scarf so tightly he thinks it’ll rip. The words he’d rehearsed in his head a few minutes ago turn to dust on his tongue.
“Tell me if I missed anything,” Kuramochi continues. “If I find anything else, I can bring it over.” On top of the pile is Kazuya’s hat. Wedged in a corner is his extra toothbrush. He doesn’t want any of it back. He doesn’t want to go back to his own apartment and give up a box with Kuramochi’s things.
He shrinks into himself, staring blankly at the carton, while Kuramochi jams in a final shirt like he can’t wait to get rid of every trace of him.
“You look like shit.” The words pull Kazuya away from his introspection. When he looks up, Kuramochi is observing him, his mouth a concerned twist.
Now that he’s actually looking at Kuramochi, he can make out the dark circles under his eyes, the furrow in his brows, the lack of product in his hair. “You don’t look too good, either,” Kazuya rasps out.
Kuramochi’s gaze softens. “Look, Sawamura told me you haven’t been sleeping.“ He hesitates, walking a step closer. “You don’t have to feel guilty, okay? Us breaking up wasn’t your fault.”
“What?” Kazuya clutches his scarf with all ten fingers like a lifeline. The thick wool should be enough to warm him, but his hands feel numb.
“I’m your best friend,” Kuramochi says gently, prying the cloth from Kazuya’s hands and pulling it over him, tucking it under his chin and letting it rest on his shoulders. “I should have known you didn’t want to…” He trails off, still unsure, and blinks up at Kazuya, his expression pained, still holding onto the ends of the scarf.
Kazuya stays rooted to the floor, thoughts running in muddled circles. The scarf around his neck is a chokehold, crushing his windpipe and cutting off his oxygen.
When he doesn’t reply, Kuramochi takes a deep breath. “Do you remember when I first kissed you?”
Kazuya nods.
“Did you just let me because you were scared I’d leave you if you didn’t?”
“No,” Kazuya says immediately, his eyebrows bunching together. “Of course not.”
Kuramochi doesn’t hear him. “Because I would have never let it happen, you know that, right?” He shakes his head, almost pleading. “You’re my best friend.”
The words leave his mouth before he can stop them. “Is that why you haven’t called in three weeks?”
The reply is just as instant. “I’m in love with you, Kazuya. You gotta give me some time to get over it.”
Kazuya’s thoughts slow to a silent standstill. “You’re…” The air grows heavier between them, pinning him down. “You’re what?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t call.” Kuramochi sounds so defeated, so far away. His hands drop to his sides. Kazuya hates the heartache in his voice, and hates himself even more for putting it there. “I didn’t think you would want me to.”
He musters every ounce of courage, clinging to his last shred of hope. “I wanted you to call,” he says. “I shouldn’t have made you think I wanted any of it to end. But you’re the idiot, for even thinking that.”
“Kazuya,” Kuramochi exhales, only a half-step away, but still sounding so distant. “Don’t do this.”
“Did I make you happy?” Already, he thinks he’s revealed too much. Kazuya’s breath catches in his throat, and he wills himself to stop thinking—stop caring — about how defenseless he feels.
Kuramochi nods cautiously, like he’s afraid to speak.
“You take care of everyone. You always take care of me,” Kazuya continues. “I never know how to repay that. I don’t think I’ve ever given you enough.”
“Don’t say that,” Kuramochi interrupts. Hurt flashes on his face. “It’s not a transaction.”
Kazuya backtracks, shaking his head. “I didn’t mean it that way,” he stammers, running a hand through his hair. Everything was coming out all wrong. His heart hammers anxiously in his chest. “I’m not good at this.”
Kuramochi’s gaze softens, but his voice is curt. “I don’t need a metaphor. Or an explanation, just,” he looks up at him, unguarded, and always, always trusting. “What do you want from me, Kazuya?”
“I want you to be happy,” he says, and it comes out a little bit like a breath he’d been holding, a lot like giving in. “I want to make you happy.”
His confession ricochets off the walls, and neither of them make another sound. Kazuya tries, one more time. “Will you stay?”
Kuramochi lets out a shaky breath. “Tell me you mean it.”
Kazuya looks down at him, mouth curling up in a hesitant smirk. “If you don’t want me anymore, then this was all just a joke.”
“Asshole,” Kuramochi brings his arms around him, then, crushing him in the warmest, tightest embrace. Kazuya lets his eyes close, lets himself breathe in Kuramochi as he curls his arms around him and threads his fingers into his hair, bringing him closer on reflex. “Of course you make me happy, idiot,” Kuramochi huffs against his shoulder. “I wouldn’t have put up with you for the last five years if you weren’t kinda fun.”
“Kinda fun,” Kazuya echoes, and his laugh is the lightest it’s been in weeks. “Glowing recommendation.”
“Asshole,” Kuramochi repeats. “Thought you were with me just ‘cause it was easier.” The low pitch betrays doubt, and Kazuya vows to himself to never hear it in Kuramochi’s voice again.
Heart filled to the brim, he buries his head in Kuramochi’s shoulder. “You make me happy,” he murmurs into Kuramochi’s shirt. “More than anyone else.”
“What was that again?” Kuramochi teases. Kazuya hears his smile widen, and doesn’t respond, even when Kuramochi pulls away from him to kiss his cheek. “Hyaha, come on, Kazuya, you were doing so well, being straightforward for once!”
He tiptoes to kiss him again, on the forehead. “Whatever. I missed you so much, jerk.”
Kazuya still has a whole nine runs’ worth of promises to declare, but Kuramochi is kissing him, and Kuramochi wants to stay, and Kazuya has all the time in the world to tell him more. So he allows everything unsaid to linger on the bow of his lips, saving them for another hour.
First: tea with Tanaka-san and his energetic, insatiable hellhound. Next: everything else, together.
❄
The bird is there when he wakes up, on the last day of winter.
Sunlight streams through his window. The single streak of gold on the white walls lets him know he’s slept through his alarm (and no one had bothered to wake him). An arm around his waist shifts. Kazuya nestles into its owner, feeling warmer than what’s comfortable, yet not wanting to pull away.
“Go back to sleep,” Kuramochi drawls against his hair. “Sawamura said your coach cancelled practice.”
Outside, the bird happily pecks at her sunflower seeds. She pokes at her breakfast, releasing a little melody of delighted chirps at random intervals. Her pleasure is infectious. Kazuya, ridiculously, feels a smile blossom on his lips.
“You have no idea how much that bird missed you,” he whispers, like the bird will hear his amusement through the glass.
Kuramochi pokes his side. “More than you did?”
“Not even close,” Kazuya says, matter-of-fact. He curls closer, kissing the corner of Kuramochi’s mouth.
Kuramochi clicks his tongue. “Oi, roll over, my arm is killing me.” Still, when Kazuya pulls away, Kuramochi follows right after him.
Content rolls over them, slowly but entirely, like a cloud blocking out the sun. The two words slip off his tongue without him realizing. “Love you.”
“I know,” Kuramochi returns, completely without flourish, somehow without uncertainty.
There’s a tap-tap-tap , from the window, a last gesture of gratitude before the bird flutters away, the only evidence of its visit the dust on the windowsill.