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Shisui walks into his kitchen at 5 AM in the morning, hunting for a glass of water and some aspirin after pulling an all-nighter just to finish a damned essay. He almost dies of a heart attack in the process. He might also shriek like a goat, but he will deny that with a fervor for the rest of his days from then on.
Because… what he fuck?
And “what the fuck!” he screams (it comes out more like that embarrassing goat shriek), body jerking backwards the moment he steps into the kitchen and sees the dark shape of a figure right beside the table.
His heart literally leaves his body for a hot second and he staggers backwards, bumping into the wall, not even feeling the way his head just slams into it hard enough to give himself a concussion, while his hand is frantically and blindly fumbling for the light-switch behind his back.
Through sheer luck he hits the switch and the ancient LED tubes flicker on to life, bright white light flooding the room like some divine grace coming to his salvation.
Now that he can actually see that the dark figure is not some goddamned demon lurking in the shadows and thirsting for his blood, but rather a normal, flesh-and-blood man sitting in the dark at his kitchen table, Shisui wheezes in relief, sucking in deep, avid breaths, and sags against the wall like a soggy macaroni, his knees weak and almost giving way under him after just experiencing the wildest scare of his life.
But, the next second, the notion that a man – who is neither of his supposedly out-for-the-weekend roommates – is just casually standing in his college apartment’s kitchen kicks in full force, sending a brand-new jolt of panic right through the middle of his spine. His heart plunges right in a delightful pace of 200 bpm and he straightens up as if electrocuted.
Flight or fight, but for Shisui it goes something along the lines of ‘freeze and stare wide-eyed at the threat until you either die or get killed’.
A flurry of images of a thousand possible ways to how he will be murdered in the next fifteen seconds pop up into his mind and remind him that he is about to become a Buzzfeed Unsolved himself. Watch one too many and suddenly you’re going to be on the next episode?
How peachy.
Fifteen seconds pass and, surprisingly, he does not get murdered. Instead, he continues to stare and get stared back at by a pair of – he only now notices – the most beautiful coal black eyes he has ever seen. In fact, the other man(?) or young adult more likely, probably around his own age if Shisui were to take a guess, is one overall gorgeous person, with elegant features and long, black hair tied in a low ponytail that looks very, very soft (and oh, the temptation Shisui feels to card his fingers through the silky locks, if only just to confirm it for himself).
He feels his heart speed up for a whole other reason now.
No—focus, Shisui!
“Hello,” the other says flatly, completely unbothered by the situation he was caught in, as if breaking into someone’s apartment at some ungodly hour of the night is as normal as updating your Instagram story.
“Hello?” Shisui parrots, his voice higher in pitch than what should be considered dignified, so he quickly clears his throat in a futile attempt to rescue even an ounce of his dignity, while also trying and successfully failing at regulating his erratic breaths and the wild thumping of his heart.
His brain, which has been slowly frying over the past eight hours while trying to spew out a ten-page paper on the history of torture devices (don’t ask), can’t quite comprehend the picture painted by the boy in front of him.
Perhaps the adrenaline rush that left him more dizzy than anything else isn’t really helping with that either.
“Wh-what the fuck, man?” he swallows down around his tightened throat, brows slowly furrowing in confusion when his eyes fall onto the other’s hand – which is holding a half-eaten dango stick (again, what the fuck?) – then back to the young man’s face, noticing the slight roll of his jaw as if he is chewing on something, and then back to the table where lies an open casserole with more of the dessert. Shisui’s own casserole that he bought earlier in the evening and was planning on savoring as a reward after submitting the damned essay, he realizes.
As it quickly becomes obvious that he – most likely – isn’t about to face impending death, the shock of finding the other in his kitchen begins to thaw. His eyes narrow and, as the other boy eats another dumpling from the skewer, a spark of irritation ignites his blood.
“Hey! That’s my dango!” he accuses, straightening up against the wall, but not yet darning to approach the other male. He could be anything from a psycho killer to some kid on drugs, and Shisui is trying to be strategic.
The young man has the audacity to raise an eyebrow and pin Shisui under a scrutinizing gaze, looking him up and down with intense black eyes and leaving trails of fire on his skin. Is the heater turned all the way up?, Shisui thinks, alarmed, feeling himself flush hotly before the other’s eyes. He really hopes this is not some deeply buried and repressed kink he only now discovers—to be stripped naked by the eyes of a gorgeous stranger who broke into his apartment and is eating his dango (apparently?) while somehow still giving the impression that he is silently judging him.
“Oh? This is yours?” the other says, a pink tongue darting out and licking absently over two rosy, very alluring lips. Shisui’s eyes automatically follow the gesture, impure thoughts that he immediately shuns away threatening to invade his mind. He still blames it on the paper screwing his brains over.
Focus. He shakes his head in bewilderment, trying to see the situation objectively, and his eyes go wide, blinking rapidly as he registers what the guy’s just said.
Is he fucking serious?
“Yes,” he says pointedly, trying to regain his composure enough to kick the other out (into his bed, preferably — no!) or as he should, maybe, call the cops. “Whose could it even be?!”
“…No one's?”
“No one’s?” Shisui breathes out, incredulous laughter pealing from his lips.
“I merely found it on the table.”
“Exactly! On the table. In my apartment! Which you broke into! In the middle of the night!” he calls out in exasperation and stresses his sentiment by gesturing chaotically.
The other nods minutely, as if in complete agreement with each of Shisui’s words.
“…In my defense, no one who plans on eating their dango would leave it on the table uncovered and then go to sleep.”
“Hey, I wasn’t sleeping. And still—what the fuck, man? I mean, I don’t even know who you are or what you’re doing here. Fuck. I should probably call the cops,” his rambling transforms into a mutter and then, “You’re lucky you’re cute.”
It’s only too late when his brain catches up with the bullshit his mouth’s just spewed, eyes widening and a blush reddening his face. But hey, at least the other looks just as flustered as Shisui feels!
A very long and possibly very awkward moment passes in which they only stare silently at each other. The spell is finally (unfortunately) broken when the other boy clears his throat and bends over to pick up a bag from the tiled floor. Shisui continues to stare dumbly as the guy grabs two more dango sticks from the table and begins to step towards him, something that causes his heart to beat rapidly once again in anticipation, body tensing, but the other just brushes past him, into the living room, then out towards the front door.
“Hey!” Shisui calls after him, body jerking in motion and following on the guy’s tail. “Who are you? What were you doing in my apartment?”
In the frame of the open front door, white artificial light encasing him from behind, the other pauses and turns back towards Shisui. The blush is still dusting his cheeks, betraying the otherwise deadpan expression of his.
“My name is Itachi. Sorry for disturbing you, and thanks for the dango... See you around, Shisui.”
And just like that, he is gone, disappearing into the hallway of the building and leaving behind a dumbstruck Shisui.
Does he know my name...?
Long story short, Shisui doesn’t call the cops, after all, but he spends the rest of the night tossing and turning in his bed, the image of the other young man like a sticky parasite in his head, unable to shake it off no matter how hard he tries. And he also just now reads an hours-old message from Kakashi, one of his flat mates, saying that his friend Itachi will drop by to pick up some books they need for a project together.
What he definitely does not do, is follow Kakashi around for the next couple of weeks just so he could meet Itachi. Definitely. Not.
But it all works out in the end, when Shisui invites Itachi out for dango and green tea. And an indefinite number of time after that as well.
Shisui learns that Itachi really just loves dango.
And his bratty little brother, Sasuke.
And Shisui really hopes to make the list someday, too.
FIN