Work Text:
Doppo can feel his legs trembling slightly as he stares at the men in front of him. The audience around him roars with unrivalled energy, the battle between Yokohama and Shinjuku only growing more powerful.
He watches in horror as the attack Samatoki aims at Hifumi results in a direct hit, his teammate going tumbling to the ground, unmoving. Doppo wants to run over and pick him up, but his legs won’t steady themselves, and all he can do is stare at Hifumi’s motionless form as the large countdown above them reaches zero. The crowd grows louder.
Izanami Hifumi, defeated!
Doppo is shaken from his reverie as the train jolts sharply, his trembling hands gripping the assistant bar with surprising force. If not for how packed the train currently is, he’s sure everyone would be staring at him after what he assumes was a very visible freakout. The screeching crowd still lingering in his head ebbs away and is soon replaced by the sound of the train carriage vibrating against the rails.
It’s been months since the last Division Rap Battle, and while it feels as if everyone around him has moved past it, the entire experience has left Doppo with even more anxiety than before. None of them were so badly injured that they couldn’t recover, and they came out of the battle as champions, but he can’t shake the pure panic he felt when Hifumi was knocked unconscious.
And that’s all it had been - unconsciousness - but the way he looked that day… it could have been something worse.
Doppo hates that thought the most.
The train slows to a halt at his stop and he squeezes through the horde of passengers, feeling a lot less like a canned sardine as he walks upstairs. Even with all the distractions of his mind, he’d managed to get everything done today, and luckily, his co-workers have been giving him a lot less of their own work lately, most likely because of his heavily televised victory.
The streets are bustling tonight, like every night. Doppo keeps his eyes downcast as he walks home, wanting nothing more than to be inside and out of this damn chokehold of a tie. It’s not quite half past six yet, so Hifumi should have a little over an hour before he has to get ready to leave for work. It’s not long enough, not nearly as much time as Doppo wants to spend with him, but sometimes it’s all they have.
He breathes a sigh of relief once he’s inside the apartment building, making a beeline for the elevators and wondering what Hifumi has cooked for dinner. Briefly, he thinks of the possibility of one day having to come home to an empty apartment, one not shared with anyone, but he pushes that into the recesses of his mind before it twists his stomach any more.
Hifumi is fine. Hifumi recovered. Hifumi is alive.
He slides his keycard into the door of his and Hifumi’s apartment, slipping out of his shoes before the door has even closed behind him. “I’m home,” he calls, and inwardly pleads for a response.
“Welcome home!” comes Hifumi’s cheerful reply, along with the tantalising smell of whatever he’s currently cooking in the kitchen. Doppo feels his anxiety ease slightly, just at the sound of his voice. Hifumi is fine.
“How was your day? You worked hard to be able to come home earlier, Doppochin~” Hifumi’s expression is bright as he grins proudly at Doppo, already setting the table with a wide variety of restaurant quality dishes. “I even bought cake today for dessert!”
Doppo watches in amusement as Hifumi putters around the kitchen, preparing and working on so much at once. “Today was alright, it has been kind of nice having less to do with everyone treating me so well at the office lately, but I doubt it will last long. I’ll be back to working overtime soon, I bet… there’s no real end to that.”
“Well, for now, it’s the weekend!” Hifumi cheers, throwing a hand up as his eyes crinkle happily. “You don’t have to go into the office, do you? Not for very long I hope.”
“We’ll see. I’m gonna go wash up. Thanks for all this, Hifumi.”
“Anything for my best friend, you know that! Go wash your hands and we can eat.”
Loosening his tie as he walks into the bedroom, Doppo throws it onto the bed unceremoniously and slips out of his suit jacket, hanging it up in the cupboard. Everything looks immaculate, he thinks briefly, Hifumi must have cleaned a lot today .
As he makes his way to the bathroom he glances at Hifumi, who’s currently smiling and humming as he dishes up the rest of the food. It’s amazing how just looking at Hifumi’s cheerful expression is enough to put him more at ease, but just as he’s revelling in that fact the image he’d been trying so hard to forget hits him like a tonne of bricks.
He’s not looking at Hifumi’s smile anymore; he’s looking at his expression as the excruciating pain from Samatoki’s barrage of hits seeps out of him, and his eyelids flutter closed. All Doppo can hear is a horrendous cacophony of cheers and screams from the spectators around him, his best friend now lying motionless on the stage floor.
“Doppo?”
He hadn’t realised his anxiety attack had been so obvious, or lasted as long as it seems to have, but the next thing he knows he’s opening his eyes and Hifumi’s face is close enough that he can see every hint of concern lacing his usually relaxed demeanour. Doppo knows he’s not wearing his tie anymore, but the feeling of suffocating is still there, pressing down on him.
Eventually, as Hifumi stares quietly at him and squeezes his hand, the attack fades and his breathing evens out. “I’m fine,” he lies, ducking his head in embarrassment, unable to stare back at Hifumi’s unwavering gaze. “Just- just work stuff.”
Hifumi hums loudly, pulling away. He lets go of Doppo’s hand - something Doppo wishes he hadn’t - and smiles gently. “Well, that’s okay. Go wash up before everything gets cold~”
They sit down across from each other at the table, Doppo staring in wonder at all the different dishes Hifumi prepared. How he manages to prepare all this so masterfully, he’ll never understand. “Thanks for the food,” he chimes with a small smile, grabbing his chopsticks.
As is usually the case at dinner, Hifumi talks animatedly about anything and everything that he hasn’t had the chance to tell Doppo since their last chat (usually the night before). He tells him about the episode of the drama he’s addicted to that plays every day at 2 in the afternoon; he tells him about the nice elderly lady at the patisserie who always gives him extra cake whenever he buys any; he tells him about the friendly rivalry he has with the other hosts at his club, and how Hifumi always wins their bets on who can earn the most in one night.
Doppo feels much more relaxed as he listens to Hifumi talk, revelling in the taste of all the food and nodding along to all of his best friend’s stories. After their championship win at the Division Rap Battle, their lives have changed in a lot of ways; but here, in this moment, everything feels the same as it always has, and it’s nice.
“So,” Hifumi’s expression suddenly changes, going from playful to concerned. “Are you going to tell me the truth about all these new freakouts you’re having?”
Doppo’s hand stills. He sighs and sets his chopsticks down. “I told you, it’s just work.”
Hifumi chuckles slightly, winking. “You can’t fool me, Doppochin~ I know what your work freakouts are like better than anyone, and these are different.”
They’ve never talked about anything to do with the battle beyond their victory and that it was a difficult fight, and Doppo wonders briefly if Hifumi will get mad at him for freaking out so much over something that’s long since resolved. He’s not sure if he can pinpoint Hifumi’s reaction on this, but he knows he can’t get out of this conversation without being honest.
“The Division Rap Battles…” Doppo starts, and feels his heart begin to race with anxiety. He watches with uncertainty as Hifumi puts down his own chopsticks and sits up in his seat, giving Doppo his full attention. “I know they’re over for now, and we won, but…”
Hifumi nods gently, urging Doppo to go on.
“But… we almost died out there Hifumi, you almost died, a-and I can’t stop reliving that, that moment where you dro-dropped,” he wants to grab his glass of water, throat feeling dry, but his hands are shaking too much that he doesn’t trust himself to not spill it. “I-I don’t know if you’ve seen the footage but, but you… y-your… y-your eyes closed a-and your whole body stopped m-moving and, fuck, H-Hifumi I really thought I’d lost you!”
Hifumi wordlessly gets up from his seat, and dread settles in Doppo’s stomach. This is it, this is where he tells me I’m being a ridiculous idiot, that he’s fine and I should stop treating him like a kid or something, that I’ve always bothered him and he doesn’t want to be around me anymore--
With a few quick strides Hifumi stands beside Doppo’s seat, crouching down ever so slightly and pressing a kiss to his forehead, hands gently resting on the sides of Doppo’s face. Doppo feels his face heat up, not unused to the feeling of being kissed by Hifumi, but this feels… different.
“I have seen the footage,” Hifumi says, pulling away. “It was… a little confronting, seeing myself lying there when I can’t remember a thing. I kept watching, though, I watched you take down Samatoki’s teammates, and then I watched you fall to the ground, almost lifeless. Trust me, Doppo, I know what it feels like… but we both came out of that fine, didn’t we?”
“B-But,” Doppo stutters, “the Division Rap Battles are ongoing, w-we’ll have to do that again and again,” his hands shake more, wondering how many times it will be until Hifumi doesn’t get back up.
“And we’ll get through it again and again, do you really think there’s a division alive in this world that could separate me from you?” Hifumi asks, thumbs gently stroking the sides of Doppo’s face. He looks so serious, Doppo can’t help but to hang onto every word that he’s saying, his eyes becoming watery.
Hifumi kisses him for real this time, gentle and patient. He grabs one of Doppo’s hands again and Doppo squeezes it in return, his own reciprocation turning needy, and he grabs at Hifumi’s shirt and pulls him closer. Hifumi breaks the kiss after a few minutes, pecking Doppo’s lips again before he stands up straight. “Sorry, give me a minute.”
Doppo watches quizzically as Hifumi unearths his phone from his pocket, dialling a number quickly. “Hello? Yes, it’s your number one host~ listen, I know it’s last minute but something has come up and I can’t work tonight. -- Huh? Come on, don’t be pouty~ look at it this way, one of the other guys can win that bet now, hm? -- Yes, I know our regulars will miss me, but we both know absence makes the heart grow fonder~ they’ll pay triple what they usually do the next time they visit, trust me. -- Yeah, yeah~ see you tomorrow night then!”
“Hifumi, are you sure?” Doppo asks nervously once Hifumi disconnects the call. “Won’t they be really mad at you for not working? Fridays are usually your busiest night, too… my boss would kill me if I ever took the day off so close to starting hours…”
“They’ll be fine~ I have someone more important to take care of right now, someone more important than any of my customers or co-workers alike, and now we have the night off together!”
Doppo smiles softly, immensely grateful for everything that Hifumi is. He rotates on his seat so that he’s facing the table again. “We should finish dinner first.”
“Oh, yeah! I got distracted with dessert I guess,” Hifumi winks playfully, bouncing over to his seat and picking up his chopsticks once more. “Hey, Doppochin, tomorrow let’s go and see Jakurai, okay? We can talk about these newfound anxieties and work on them as a team.”
Doppo nods, smiling. “Yeah, okay.”