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Really, if Tōru had been paying any attention at all, he would've seen this coming.
It's an exceptionally unremarkable day, as far as being Prime Minister goes: he's sequestered away in his little suburban office in his electorate during a week when he's not required in the capital, catching up on the day-to-day reports which have piled up during a recent trip. It's a balmy spring day. Pollen hangs heavy in the air outside, the cicadas nearly loud enough to drown out the crowd at the front of the building.
"About that," Makki ventures.
Ugh. "Can't we just ignore them?" It's standard protocol to pretend he's not in.
"As much as I love being your hashtag-representation photogenic trans assistant, there's too many cameras out there for just little old me."
Oh, so it's that kind of gathering. "Housing, right? Why all the attention? The indigenous protestors occupying that land have been there for years."
Makki grimaces. "You're about to get to this one, actually." They gesture at a folder two down in the stack. "While you were away, the investors called the police in to enforce their ownership, then a bunch of minor celebrities showed up and it got too big for the cops to evict."
"Ah. And the people here..."
"Walked for two hours to get here, yeah."
Tōru can feel a headache coming on. This sort of thing always reminds him of his university council president days, butting up against idealists. He's always had a larger goal that they don't seem to see.
"Well, let me just freshen up, then! You can give me the quick run-down."
This is Tōru's second mistake: opting to head out to greet the marchers where the cameras can see it, rather than inviting a small group back in to talk in private.
It's better optics, or it's supposed to be. Tōru's tired of the crowd-dispersing options that give people more chances to call him wishy-washy. He's hoping he can pull off a miracle today; nothing gets on his nerves more than being called a coward, except feeling obliged to compromise his ten-year plan for something ridiculous.
Except that he steps outside, and before he can say anything, an alarmingly familiar figure sways in his peripheral vision. In the heat, it looks like they're about to pass out.
"Refreshing-kun!" he calls, almost on instinct, taking a step closer. Sugawara straightens, regaining their grip on their cane. The skinhead punk with an arm around their shoulders shoots him a glare.
"Ah, Prime Minister. Fancy seeing you here." At least a dozen cameras pan over to catch Suga's coy smile, their operators bewildered.
"It's been a while," Tōru acknowledges, pulling graciousness back across his demeanour. "But we can catch up another time, I'm sure." He turns back to the elders who he presumes are leading this group with his warmest smile. This is still plenty salvageable. He's got the softest public image of any head of state to date. This'll help.
As it turns out, his soft reputation does not help. Even Makki, swinging on one of Tōru's visitor chairs, is at a loss for words.
"Of all the ways to end up in a sex scandal, Oikawa!" Mattsun looks like he's about to combust.
"I know."
"You hardly said anything to them!"
"I know."
Makki settles all four legs of their chair back on the ground with a thump. "You know, I was trying to figure out how to make an appropriately saucy joke, but they're all right there in the tabloid headlines."
"What I don't understand is why," Mattsun groans.
It's obvious, really. "Why not? The right-wing papers have been barely restraining themselves from homophobic slurs since before I won the election; now they've got footage of me with a prostitute who's significantly more gay-looking than I am, where I'm calling them a pet name and worrying after them like we go way back. Which we do, which also doesn't help."
Mattsun sighs, shooting Tōru an apologetic look. "You were friends with this Sugawara-san at university?"
"Well... not exactly. We were butting heads in this exact way already, shockingly enough. I didn't know that Suga had dropped out, though. Figured they'd become a teacher like they planned." Yesterday's headache twinges with guilt. In hindsight, his successor on the student council was, to put it lightly, more bigoted than principled.
"I'm going to call them," Tōru decides.
"What?"
"I should probably apologize." Hanamaki opens their mouth. "I know what you're about to say. It wasn't my fault, but I'm still a public figure, and they're not."
"Fair enough," Makki murmurs. They've been uncharacteristically quiet all day, reviewing media coverage without their usual commentary, and Tōru makes a note to send them home early, too. "We can offer some support from this office, if they need anything?"
"It'd be good to lay down the line we'll give the media," Mattsun notes.
"Later. I'll see how they're feeling first." Plan in place, he's feeling a little better.
Suga, perhaps predictably, doesn't have a landline. Tōru finds himself staring down the cellphone number Matsukawa had gotten him, and hesitates. Picks up his cellphone.
Sugawara-san, Oikawa here. I'm so sorry. Do you have time to talk soon?
He gets a reply nearly immediately. Just Suga's still fine :) Now's good for me if it is for you.
There's nothing for it but to hit call. It rings once, then connects.
"Okay, first of all. Is this just me and you? No bugs? No staff? No cops?"
Tōru blinks. "Just the two of us. I've sent my staff home for the day, my driver won't be here for a while yet. This is my personal number, so please don't spread it."
Suga cackles, bright and ugly. "You met me in that context, and you're trusting me with both your number and the knowledge that you're alone and probably in your office right now? I'm touched."
Tōru has to fight off the wave of annoyance, but he finds that what's under it is just bone-tired honesty. "Well, yes. It's the least I can do, really. I called to apologize, you know."
"I figured." Suga's voice gentles to the teacherly tones Tōru remembers them using, walking Kageyama through statistics in the common room years prior. "You don't need to, you know. It would've been less trouble for us both if I wasn't so open about being a sex worker. How are you holding up?"
"Me?"
"Humor me."
Tōru sighs. "I'm... the media's always vicious, and social media even more so, but I'm worried about my PA, right now."
"The one with the pink hair?"
"Yeah. They're trans, too, and it can't be fun monitoring that stuff right now. I told them to take the week off, but I have a feeling they're not going to do that."
Suga chuckles. "I certainly wouldn't. And thank you, by the way! I've gotten quite a few enquiries, even if it's not generally ideal that they know my full name and face."
"Yikes. I'm sorry."
"No, no, I was making a joke. Poorly executed, I know, but you know me, right? I'm not one to be bothered by these things."
"I don't know that I ever knew you," Tōru says. Some of the rawness of this whole situation is cutting too close to home, but he's not sure what. "Don't take that the wrong way. I just mean. If you were bothered, then, or now, I wouldn't know. You probably know more or less exactly how things have been for me since I graduated, and I have no idea what's happened for you."
Suga's quiet for a moment. "Well, now you do, a little. My arrest record, my university transcripts, whatever else the people on Facebook who knew us both at school are saying. You must've known, making the plans you were making even then, that you'd be leaving all of us behind."
"Not Tobio-chan," Tōru mutters, and Suga chuckles.
"Not Kageyama," they agree easily. "But you know what I mean. What's happened for me is homelessness, moving in with my boyfriend way too early, joining that one brothel in town that takes trans people to pay the rent, getting gay married — thanks for supporting that, by the way — and dropping out of university after I stopped caring enough about it to fight for it. What's happened for you is, what, are you still sticking to the ten-year plan you pinned to your office wall back then?"
"I called to apologize," Tōru says.
"What for? Are you going to put a cap on student fees? Fund more disability services?"
"Sugawara, please."
"I'm sorry," Suga says, quiet and sincere. "I'm sorry it has to be like this. But, well. We know each other well enough to know that it was going to be like this, I guess. I'm not... of all the things I'd want from you, an apology for recognizing me was never one of them. But thank you for checking in. I've got people I love supporting me, I'm on a fixed-term lease my landlord can't break because of this, and I can get our press people to run my press release by you first if your team has a damage control plan we should fit into."
"Pretty sure all your press releases to date have been trash talking me."
"Pretty sure the press didn't think you were secretly a communist transsexual by association with me the last time we sent one out," Suga says lightly. "You can be one of us for a little while."
"That's quite an olive branch," Tōru murmurs, brittle with candour. "Thank you. I'll get Mattsun to reach out."
"I'll let Ennoshita know." A long pause. "Hey. Just, you know. Between two people who know what it's like to be hated. Get some rest, if you can?"
"No promises there, but I'll do my best."
"Good. And, well, if you actually want a sugar baby, I've been told I'm good with my m—"
"Goodnight, Sugawara."
It sounds like they're smiling. "Night, Oikawa."
Sugawara doesn't stop plaguing Tōru's thoughts for a while. Things die down quickly enough once every exasperated professor who's ever had trouble with either of them has weighed in to confirm they were both public figures and nothing more, but that phone call isn't the kind of conversation one easily forgets.
Tōru never receives another text, not even when he sees Suga railing against a new policy on Twitter; he never reaches out, either, even if his domestic terrorism briefings include a slight silver-haired figure among the photographs of the radical left.
He catches Hanamaki in a quiet moment, a few months later.
"Social media giving you grief?"
Makki smiles, but it's a little wan. "There's still some far-right blogs obsessed with what they're calling 'Rentboygate'. I was just wondering... do you know how Sugawara-san is doing?"
"We don't exactly stay in touch, you know."
"Right. Don't worry about it."
He doesn't.