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Tokyo was biting cold in the midst of winter, heavy snow falling from the sky and stacking up before doors and windows. The wind that accompanied it blew forcefully on the frozen glass, making the panes shift and shake with movement, and made an eerie whistling tune as it went. Tree branches shook and their leaves were forced off until they were spindly and dark and thin, ugly things that casted distorted shadows in the moonlight. Even the house shook with low bangs and booms as drafts of air filled all the gaps and holes in the building, forcing the house to make creaks and groans as it settled once again.
The room was pitch dark. The electricity had been cut a few minutes ago due to the horrid weather and it was impossible to tell when it would be back on. The heater didn't work either, doing nothing when Yuuta turned the switch back and forth, looking for heat. Instead they both laid in ghostly blackness, a room so dark they could see nothing but the outline of random shapes and figures in the shadows.
"Are you scared?" Toge was clutching Yuuta's hand tight underneath their mound of blankets, hand sweaty and warm and trembling just a bit. Yuuta didn't know if the slight tremor was attributed to fear of the night and the movie and the sounds, or if it was just the effect of a chilling cold night full of shivers. "It's okay if you're scared."
"Okaka." I'm not scared.
Toge's voice trembled a bit, voice wavering with something farther away from the sound of chattering teeth.
"You're trembling," Yuuta continued. Smiled as he heard Toge huff with annoyance.
"Mentaiko." Fuck you.
The room lapsed into silence once again. Floorboards creaked in the kitchen like someone walking, windows shuttering with every breath the wind decided to take and spew out. The snow sounded more like rain now, or maybe it had turned into hail with how freezing it was outside, light white dots turning into something much bigger and harder. It sure sounded like it with the way it pelted on the glass and the doors, made the sound resonate throughout the house like someone was knocking.
Yuuta feels his own hand slick with sweat, mixing with Toge's own. Fuck.
"Tuna?" Are you scared?
Yuuta's cheeks color and he shakes his head in the dark before he realizes that Toge can't see him like this, can probably only feel the movement of him shaking. "No, of course not." He amends. Congratulates himself on speaking without a single stutter.
When Toge shifts the bed feels like liquid, permeable and this close to something they could both fall through. It's precariously set up and the headboard bumps against the wall too loud when the mattress moves, makes so much noise when Yuuta turns his body to try and match Toge's position. It's hard because Yuuta can't see him, can't see anything besides dark shadowy figures that look like they're moving, but he tries. Runs his hand down where Toge is supposed to be and feels his body position and matches him, spooning him now. It's so cold; Toge jerks when the point of Yuuta's nose rubs against the back of his neck and Yuuta struggles to avoid the smaller man's feet because Toge refuses to put on socks.
"Katsuobushi." Toge says when he's finally comfortable, closing his eyes and trying to focus less on the fact that he can't see and more on the feeling of Yuuta behind him. Don't lie.
Yuuta says nothing, but they both tense when the window makes a loud knocking noise as wind slams into it. The weather is so bad, disastrously bad, and the power is still out. It's the worst scene, the worst situation to be in, truly. Couldn't a masked murderer break into their home right now? One of the big and scary ones, with muscles bigger than Yuuta's own and an axe to kill them with. It would be so easy, and it sounded like someone had found their way in already with the way the floors and walls creaked to the beat of footsteps, the way the broken window a few rooms down kept banging and banging and banging.
"We probably shouldn't have watched that movie." Yuuta blurts.
It was labeled as a murder mystery but was significantly more murder than mystery. The setting was too close to their circumstances now, an elderly couple trapped in their house during a snowstorm. The power had went out and like Toge and Yuuta, the couple were trapped in darkness, unable to do much but wait for the lights to turn back on. Someone had been outside waiting for them though, a giant, bulky axed murderer with a crazy look in his eye. He had slain them in cold blood as the storm raged on outside, had left their bodies to freeze in the snow and rot with the wet. He left and had never been found, and then the movie ended.
The film hadn't been scary then. Toge had remarked that the blood looked fake, too watery and the color of ketchup, and Yuuta had laughed and agreed because the acting wasn't so good either. The old man seemed way too willing to die and the old lady hadn't been scared enough, pleading to the axe murderer for her life with a voice too high.
Then the power had gone out and the snow had started to darken into something sinister and demanding and both of them began to realize how similar the events were becoming. And here they were, the both of them holding onto each other tight as they cowered in fear under their mount of blankets, blaming it on the cold.
"Shake." Yeah, you're right.
Toge snuggles further into Yuuta after that, sharing the little warmth that radiated from him. The storm may have been bustling and tearing up the world outside, but they were safe here and they were fine. It was a dumb movie that had too many unbelieveable scenes, and everything up until now had just be strange coincidence, no matter how off-put it at all seemed. The power would come back on and the storm would eventually stop, and they could forget about ever having watched that movie.
They just had to wait it out.
But for now, well. If either of them clutches the other just a little bit more (sweaty hands grasping other fingers in a slick steady slide) when the wind starts howling and the storm picks up once again, neither of them say a word.
(They hold onto each other tighter, instead.)