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Reki burst through the front door, happily sighing as he dropped his backpack in the hallway and took off his shoes. It had been a long ride back to his house, as they first stopped at the store thinking they needed to pick up ingredients. Fortunately, they ended up not needing to go inside, as Langa assured Reki that he brought everything they needed. Langa trailed in closely behind him, shutting the door before turning back to Reki with a blank face.
“Um, Reki?” Reki turned merrily back to Langa. “I, uh. Kinda forgot the cupcake mix.” The smile vanished, and he deadpanned. “Sorry…”
Nope. No smiles for idiots.
“Langa. Are you serious right now? That’s the whole reason we didn’t go into the store that we were standing right in front of fifteen minutes ago, mind you…is because you were supposed to bring it.” Langa shrugged and gave him an apologetic half-smile. Reki sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose, and exhaled dramatically before bracing his hands on Langa's shoulders (because let’s be honest, how could he ever stay mad at Langa when he shrugs so adorably like that?). “You’re so stupid sometimes. Come on, we’ll make them from scratch, then.” He ruffled his soft blue hair, and when he pulled his hand away, Reki could have sworn he felt himself tingling from the brief touch.
“Sounds good - sorry again.” Reki squinted at him.
Stupid adorable accent. Stupid adorable Langa.
“Alright, help me gather ingredients, will you? I’ll need to look for a recipe. We have flour and cocoa in the cabinet over there, so that’s where you can start.” Reki pointed to one of the shelves above Langa, thankful for his taller friend at the moment. Usually he would just jump up onto the counter to get whatever he needed from the highest shelf, but he thought it might seem a bit juvenile and utilized his friend’s height, instead. He leaned against the counter, swiping through recipes on his phone, and rattled off a couple more items for Langa to find. He found it entertaining watching his bemused best friend wandering through a kitchen that wasn’t his own, making little grimaces and frowns every time he opened an unhelpful cupboard.
Reki stood, noisily drumming his fingers against their work surface, as Langa assembled everything in front of him. He knelt down into the cupboard below, grabbed a cupcake pan and some paper cupcake cups, and set them all on the center island. His sous chef was looking for one final ingredient, and there was only one more cupboard that he hadn’t checked yet. His determined cerulean gaze made a bee-line for the cabinet door that hovered right above Reki’s head. He closed the distance between the two of them, leaned impossibly close to Reki’s body as he stretched up to the top shelf, and grabbed the last tin of baking soda they needed with a sparkling grin. Reki accepted the ingredient, slightly dazed, as Langa stepped back. He accidentally set down the baking soda a bit aggressively near the stove, and he startled himself out of a daydream when he knocked over a small bottle of his mom's teriyaki sauce that sat next to the stovetop.
Demon sauce. Dishonor on you, dishonor on your ancestors…
“It’s fine, we’re fine. It’s fine.” Reki vibrated over to the other side of the counter and started to preheat the oven, silently cursing Langa and the demon sauce bottle for terrorizing him so inconsiderately today. He tossed a mixing bowl onto the countertop, pulled out two aprons, and tossed one over to Langa. He never really understood why people wore them, but Langa always did at his apartment, so Reki supposed that it wouldn’t be too bad to give it a try.
“So first, we'll measure the flour - “ Langa had grabbed the opened bag of flour a little too hard, and a large puff of off-white powder flew up into his face and settled into his hair. It was like a fine, falling snow that settled around his head and shoulders, and the pout beneath it was almost more than Reki's heart could take. Langa’s sulking eyes slid over to Reki, who was now laughing hysterically, and frowned even harder. This made everything twice as funny - watching the skateboarding snow god of S standing here, covered in flour, and pouting like a child was absolutely priceless. Reki quickly pulled out his phone, snapped a photo, and tucked it back into his rear pocket (because nobody would believe him if he ever tried to talk about this without picture proof).
“It’s not funny, Reki. Help me get this stuff off, please?” He tried to wipe his face with the back of his hand, but he just ended up spreading the flour across his face even more. Reki snorted and went to run a clean dish towel under some warm water, stepping over to clean up the helpless, messy boy in front of him. When he reached up to wipe off Langa’s face, his companion turned away and scrunched his nose from the tickling sensation; Reki grabbed his face in his hands to bring it back to center. Slightly surprised blue eyes peered down at him, but the powdery skater remained where he was as Reki carefully (and slightly nervously) wiped away the flour and helped shake out his hair. “Thanks.” A shy, grateful smile spread across his face, revealing those entirely-too-white-and-perfect teeth.
Reki was going to die.
He mixed together some of the ingredients a bit combatively with a wooden spoon. Langa stood a few feet away, arms crossed, watching the redhead take out his frustration on the cupcake mix in quiet. amusement. Reki motioned impatiently to the cupcake pans, but then his gaze softened into more of a silent and gentle, “please?” directed toward Langa. His sous chef brought the pans to him and leaned over slightly to watch as he started to fill the cupcake tins with paper liners. The close proximity was almost allowing Reki to feel the body heat radiating from Langa, so he quirked one eyebrow as he whirled around to face him. He didn’t realize their bodies were so close, and he ended up having to lean back slightly so that he didn’t accidentally kiss him on the lips. His amber eyes went wide for a moment, and Langa seemed equally surprised before he cleared his throat lightly and pulled back.
“I’ll help you with that.” Langa fished out a large spoon from the drawer in front of him and started ladling the cupcake mix into the cups next to Reki. The two worked quickly and efficiently, filling each paper liner to the optimal level to make the perfect size cakes. Langa smiled as they poured the last of the batter into the final cup, and they popped the pans into the oven to bake for the next sixteen to eighteen minutes. Reki had no idea what he was going to do with his hands or his erratic thoughts for that long, so he simply started to scoop up the remaining batter in the bowl with his wooden spoon. “Reki, what are you?...” Reki licked the spoon sloppily, scraped up a bit of chocolate mix on his thumb, and smeared it onto Langa’s cheek.
“Hey bro, there’s something on your face.” He grinned mischievously at the stoic skater in front of him. What he hadn’t planned for was a dramatic response from a usually impassive human - when Langa stepped into his space and gripped onto the spoon with a half-frown, Reki startled and looked wide-eyed to the side.
“You should really mind your manners in the kitchen, you know,” Langa breathed into his ear. It was almost a breathless purr that caressed somewhere deep and slumbering within Reki’s soul. His entire body twitched slightly.
Did the planet’s magnetic poles just switch? Did one of the tectonic plates nearby slip into the ocean of magma in the depths of the earth below and now they are tap dancing on top of each other? Did the migratory pattern of every bird on the planet just suddenly and immediately shift, and his primitive brain is picking up on the subtle changes of said pattern change?
Reki licked the spoon again as he stared directly back into Langa’s eyes, which narrowed indignantly in response. He plucked the spoon from Reki’s hands, dropped it in the discarded mixing bowl, and slowly walked forward until Reki’s feet began moving. In a matter of seconds, he was backed against a wall, still clad in his apron, and sans-spoon (that he could have used to defend himself).
Langa’s expression was steeled and determined, the full power of that icy gaze locked right in on Reki. A flicker of uncertainty passed through like a rippling wave, and Reki knew he had to somehow will his limbs to move, but it proved to be nearly impossible under the weight of Langa’s gaze. He leaned his head forward slightly, blue bangs tickling the side of Reki’s face, before he placed a timid kiss on his ear. Reki heard him take a deep breath in with a slight tremor before he placed another feather-light kiss on Reki’s cheek.
For one thing, he knew it would help to at least stop looking back at Langa like a deer in headlights. His eyes flickered down to lips, back up to blue eyes, and Reki panicked as he felt a small blush starting to creep up his face. It was all Langa needed to smile widely, reach around Reki’s back, and untie the apron on him. With swift, skilled hand movements, he used the apron to tug Reki’s body flush against his own, running one hand down Reki’s side cautiously. It wasn’t difficult to feel those strong, pale fingers knotting the apron strings in his hands, poised and ready to use them to strike at any moment.
Reki was going to extra die.
Langa had a small smear of chocolate on his right cheek. Reki’s eyes flicked over to it, and he knew what his next move had to be.
It’s do or die. Do it for Langa.
He leaned forward, standing up slightly onto his toes, and licked it clean off of his face. He pulled back, stared back up at Langa, and licked his lips.
He was thoroughly enjoying how the snowboarding deity in front of him suddenly looked like he was malfunctioning at a molecular level. After a few moments, however, the sky-blue eyes in front of him darkened into something that resembled more of a summertime blizzard. Langa held tightly to the ties on his apron, looking intensely and questioningly back into Reki’s eyes. Reki stumbled forward slightly, tugged into the last bit of space made by the curve of Langa's spine. His breaths traveled down Reki's neck like a cool arctic breeze, sending a wave of pleasantly-painful pins and needles from his fingertips down through his body.
“Langa - ” He didn’t even have a chance to say what he was about to. His mind went blank, and he completely forgot whatever it was he was about to proclaim.
“Shut up, Reki.” Langa surged forward and locked his lips onto Reki’s, whose eyes flew open in surprise. It didn’t take long, however, for him to melt into the arms of the skater in front of him. Langa reached down and quickly wrapped the loose apron ties around Reki’s wrists, tugging them upward and over his head as he went in for another urgent kiss. Reki settled helplessly against the wall, arms pinned above his head, and whimpered quietly into Langa’s slightly parted mouth. This seemed to urge him on, holding Reki’s hands up with one of his own and allowing the other to crawl up the front of Reki’s shirt. The rough pads of his slender fingers scraped tenderly over all the bits of Reki’s chest that were the most sensitive to touch, and he whimpered again into something that transitioned into a quiet gasp as those secret places were touched and tweaked. Langa chuckled darkly, pushing up a little harder against Reki to suddenly stun him with a really unusual (yet really hot) show of power. Reki was also pretty sure that it wasn't Langa’s phone or wallet that was pressing firmly into his side. “So, that’s what you like?”
Reki couldn’t do anything but nod frantically. Reki couldn’t move. Reki was extra extra going to die, but he never even had the chance to tell his family that all his skateboards could go to Langa and Koyomi, and he never got to tell Langa how beautiful his eyes were, and he never got to tell him how they’re the same color as the September sky on a cool fall morning, and -
“Reki.” Langa lowered his arms back down and set his wrists free again. Reki shook his head lightly back and forth, bringing himself back to the present moment, which still felt absolutely unreal. “You okay?” Reki softly hummed in approval, leaning forward and resting his head on Langa’s shoulder. He felt strong arms encircle him, and he laughed nervously, returning the embrace eagerly. The timer on the oven went off, and they broke apart briefly so Reki could remove the perfect cupcakes from the oven.
“Turn around, I want to try something.” Langa smiled softly down at him, so Reki did as he was asked and felt his shirt get tugged upward, allowing access to his lower back. Reki leaned over the counter and wiggled his hips and jumped slightly, feeling something cold on his back. Langa tried shushing him and soothing him, so he closed his eyes and tried to relax again as he felt strong fingers smooth over his back.
A few minutes later, Reki’s mom and sisters came home. Langa had since stopped giving Reki what felt like a lower back massage, but his shirt was still tucked up so his lumbar area was visible. Koyomi bounded into the kitchen searching for a popsicle when she turned, looked at her brother’s back, and shrieked.
Written across his lower back in chocolate icing was, “Langa was here.”
Reki looked startled and confused after his sister but quickly noticed his reflection on the oven door. His eyes went wide as he started cursing Langa out loud, and he chased after Koyomi through the house so she wouldn’t go tell their mother on him. Langa waited patiently and tried a perfectly baked cupcake as the chaos unfolded before him. He distantly heard Reki’s feet pounding back toward the kitchen before a pair of very irritated, very close-up amber eyes were merely millimeters away from his.
“How could you? Traitor.” Reki grabbed Langa by the collar and pulled him down to his lips again, angry, hungry, and amused all at the same time.
Once one of the twins started asking questions about what they were doing, he quickly shuffled Langa into his room and shut the door behind them. Despite the noise outside, he shoved Langa against the wall and continued his kissing onslaught, tasting the chocolate cupcake mix on his own tongue now that it mingled with Langa’s. They were stupid boys in love, and they aptly kissed each other stupid amidst the chaos in Reki’s house.
Though not likely to admit it in the middle of the mayhem, neither of them would have it any other way.