Work Text:
Saichi was reading on his bed when he heard a knock from the front door. It was already past 10 p.m. The hair on the back of his neck stood up instantly. The only visitor he had these days was Ogata, and Ogata never knocked anymore. Taking a deep breath, Saichi placed the book on his nightstand and crept toward the door, snatching a cooking knife from the kitchenette on the way there. He knew he was being paranoid, but it just couldn’t be helped. It was in his nature to be so.
He looked through the peephole and was alarmed when there was a big Caucasian guy standing on the other side. He was quite sure he didn’t know any foreigners, and certainly had never given any stranger his home address. (Except Ogata, but that was highly debatable.)
Saichi peeked again and this time the guy was looking directly back at him through the peephole. That made him let out a surprise yelp, and he was sure the tall man standing just outside his door heard it too. Fuck. Now Saichi couldn’t pretend he wasn’t home.
The stranger knocked again, more insistent this time. He said something that Saichi didn’t understand, and when Saichi still hadn’t opened the door, the guy started banging on it with his fist.
Now, that was just annoying. Maybe he really needed to use the bathroom but still that didn’t give him the right to be a prick on a Wednesday night. He should know to be polite if he was going to ask someone anything. Plus, he shouldn’t be going around disturbing people just before bedtime. Saichi was not the only one living on this floor and he knew for a fact that the lady that just moved in next door had an early morning tomorrow. Enough was enough.
He unlocked the door and intended to open it only slightly to see what the guy actually needed from him, but as soon as the door was opened, the big guy pushed in with his whole body and really, really tried to get inside. It wasn’t every day some rando tried to forcefully get into your room so Saichi sort of panicked and slammed the door shut—or tried to. The man already had one leg inside and the rest of him was about to follow. He should have installed a security chain, Saichi thought with a wince as the man finally shoved himself inside. Saichi thought about the knife in his right hand. He really didn’t want to go to the police.
“What do you want?” Saichi pointed the knife at him. He kind of wished Ogata wasn’t on his stupid business trip right now.
He was tall and had wild brown hair and what seemed like a week old stubble. All in all, he looked quite intimidating and really out of place in Saichi’s small room. The guy looked Saichi up and down, and tried to look over his shoulders into the room. He seemed like he was looking for something. He might be assessing Saichi’s possessions and deciding which ones of his furniture to take when—if—he overpowered Saichi. If that was the case, if Saichi was really being robbed, then Saichi felt a little sorry for him. He didn’t really have much worth stealing anyway. Maybe the iPad Ogata left on the coffee table. But that was really it.
This man certainly didn’t pay Saichi, or the kitchen knife he was holding, any attention. He attempted to walk around Saichi and further into the room, but then Saichi waved the knife dangerously close to his face and that seemed to make him stop. He finally turned his attention back to Saichi, blue eyes piercing under the dim light of Saichi’s room.
“Get out,” Saichi said, trying his best to stay calm. He didn’t want to cause any ruckus and risk getting reported by the neighbors. He liked this apartment. It was not very big but everything worked fine. There was no leakage, no mold, and the rent was reasonably cheap. It was perfect. He’d hate to have to find somewhere else to live.
The guy probably didn’t care about all that.
He snatched Saichi’s wrist and tackled him onto the floor. The impact knocked the air right out of him, his head bouncing against the edge of the coffee table. The edge of his vision was graying and his grip on the knife loosened. The intruder banged Saichi’s arm against the coffee table, sending the knife clattering away somewhere. Saichi grunted and chose that moment to sock him in the neck then jumped on top of the other man’s back. His knee on one arm, he twisted the man’s other arm back, not enough to break it but enough to make it hurt.
“What do you- do you want? Who- ugh, who,” Saichi slurred, shaking his head in an attempt to dispel the dizziness in his head.
When the man’s muscles shifted under his legs, Saichi immediately put more pressure onto his knee and his arms. The stranger yelled, but Saichi didn’t let go. Not until the man continued in his heavily accented Japanese, “Ogata! Where!”
Saichi blinked. “Ogata? He’s not here.”
Saichi wasn’t sure if the other man understood him, but he let up the pressure a bit, and the man seemed to stop struggling. He craned his head back to look at Saichi. “Ogata is not here? This is Ogata’s home.”
For some inexplicable reason, the word ‘home’ made Saichi blush. Maybe it was the concussion. Saichi did feel a little faint. “No, no, no. Ogata doesn’t live here.”
The guy’s brows knitted together. “He came here many times.”
Saichi shook his head, but maybe he shouldn’t have done that because now the dizziness was worse. “No- Yes. Okay. But he doesn’t live here.”
The other man continued to frown up at him.
Saichi groaned, and tried to find an explanation that would satisfy him. “Ogata and I, we, uh,” he sweated. The room became a bit suffocating. The walls were closing in on him. Saichi racked his brain for something. “We’re, uh, friends,” he settled lamely.
“Friends?” The other man repeated. Did he understand that word? Saichi hoped. Because he couldn’t think of another simple word that would properly explain their relationship.
“Uh huh.”
The guy nodded a little to himself. “Where is Ogata?”
Saichi wanted to pass out. He didn’t have the energy for this. “You need to get out. Ogata is not here. Once he’s back, I’ll tell him you want to see him. Okay?”
He frowned again. Maybe Saichi spoke too fast. As he was about to repeat himself, the guy buckled his hips suddenly and that took Saichi off guard. It sent him tumbling backward onto the floor. The abrupt movement sent a sharp pain into his brain. Ow, fuck.
The guy appeared in Saichi’s line of sight. He seemed to be saying something, but everything sounded muted and his vision was swimming. Saichi realized belatedly that he was lying on his back on the floor. It was getting harder and harder to think.
Okay. Maybe he did have a concussion after all.
***
Saichi woke up once around noon. He knew because the light outside was bright and piercing. He took the pain meds someone put into his hands and coughed when the water he tried to drink went down the wrong way, spilling the rest onto himself. His head throbbed heavily and everything was too much.
He fell asleep again after that.
***
Saichi slept on and off all through the night. Every time he stirred, there was a fresh, cool washcloth on the side of his face where the ache was worst. He didn’t remember going to the bathroom, but he must have gone at some point, otherwise he’d be lying in a pool of his own piss by the end of the day.
Saichi blinked awake the next day. His head still hurt but it was already much better. His thoughts were clear now and he was able to sit up on his own without feeling like puking. The curtains were drawn so the room was dark, but he could still hear the sound of busy traffic outside. He looked to his nightstand and found his phone charging, the battery already full. He didn’t remember waking up and plugging it in. Saichi realized he couldn’t remember a lot of things. Maybe that should alarm him, maybe it would. Saichi’s brain was just slowly starting to come online.
The sound of someone walking outside his bedroom drew his attention, and at first Saichi thought it was Ogata. But at the thought of Ogata, the memories from two nights ago came flooding back and Saichi sat up straighter, muscles tensed. Oh, shit. Was that guy still here?
As if having heard Saichi’s silent question, his bedroom door opened, and the intruder peeked his head in. “You are awake,” he said, his accent thick and foreign in Saichi’s ears.
When he noticed how Saichi was just staring up at him without saying anything, he came in with a fresh washcloth that Saichi had never seen before. He looked down at the white washcloth that fell limply onto his lap. He also didn’t remember having a washcloth this clean. Or new. “Did you buy this?” he asked the man.
The stranger came to kneel next to Saichi’s bed. “You did not have much. So yes.” He handed him the new one and Saichi automatically took it. “Put it on your head,” the man supplied, after seeing how Saichi was just looking at it dumbly.
Saichi did as he said and sighed at the cool sensation on his aching head. “So you understand Japanese?”
The man nodded. “A little. My name is Vasliy. I am from Russia.”
“Vasily,” Saichi tasted the syllables on his tongue. “My name is Sugimoto. Nice to meet you, Vasily.”
Vasily gave him a small smile. “Nice to meet you, Sugimoto.”
Saichi pushed the cloth against the side of his head and winced slightly. Vasily didn’t seem like he wanted to hurt Saichi, at least not intentionally, seeing how he was the one taking care of Saichi when he was out. “So what do you want with Ogata? Did he owe you money or something?”
Vasily’s blue eyes widened at Ogata’s name. His reaction made him seem a bit… young. Saichi wasn’t good at guessing a westerner’ age, but he had a feeling Vasily was younger than him. “When will Ogata come back?”
“I don’t know. What day is it today? Maybe a few more days,” Saichi told him.
Vasily’s intense eyes were on him as the man nodded eagerly. “Good. I will wait for him here.”
“Wait.” Saichi couldn’t follow his train of thought. “Don’t you have anywhere else to be?”
The bigger man shook his head. “I can work from here.”
And with that, he stood up, and left the room.
Saichi called in sick at work and spent the day reading and napping. Vasily would check in on him every two hours or so and around one in the afternoon, brought him a bowl of fried rice. It was not the best fried rice he’d had, but Saichi finished it anyway. He guessed he was quite hungry after a lot of sleeping and lying in bed all day.
In the evening, his bedroom was beginning to feel really stuffy so he got out of bed, took a cold shower, and walked out just to find Vasily at the coffee table, intently writing something onto an iPad. When Saichi got closer, he noticed that the man was actually drawing on his own massive iPad Pro, and that he was working on a picture of two absolutely adorable Shiba Inus.
Saichi all but melted when he saw it.
“They’re so cute,” he cooed.
“How are you feeling?” Vasily looked up at him.
“Better. I’m going out for a walk,” Saichi told him.
“I will go with you.”
Saichi knew he shouldn’t be too trusting, but the way this huge guy was just drawing two Shiba Inus while Saichi was sleeping the day away did something to his brain. Or maybe it was just the concussion talking, but he said, “You can just stay here drawing.”
Vasily shook his head. “I will go with you. We will eat dinner.”
“Oh. Dinner. Right.” That worked too, he guessed.
***
They ended up at a ramen shop not far from Saichi’s apartment. He came here a lot with Ogata when none of them were in the mood to cook. When they entered, the owner greeted them, and smiled when she spotted Saichi. She was an old lady who was always kind to Saichi and often gave him leftovers as freebies. He stayed until closing time and helped her clean and put things away sometimes when the part-timers weren’t there.
“Evening, Saichi-kun.”
“Evening, Susupo-san.”
They sat at the counter and each ordered an extra large bowl of tonkotsu ramen. Vasily seemed to be enjoying it a lot and since he kept eating and nodding the whole time.
When they were done, Vasily paid for the both of them, insisting that this was his apology for Saichi’s injury. The owner smiled warmly at them and asked about ‘the guy Saichi-kun always came here with.’
“Oh, him? He's working today, Susupo-san.”
“Mmm.” The owner seemed to be thinking. “You two didn’t break up, did you?”
Saichi felt blood rushing to his face. “No! I mean- we’re not-”
“That’s good.” Susupo-san nodded to herself. “Bring him with you next time, Saichi-kun.”
Saichi wanted to explain, but he didn’t know what exactly. “Okay, Susupo-san.”
Vasily looked at him curiously on the way home.
***
Saichi sat on the couch, watching the Russian finish up the Shiba Inus. Vasily told him he worked as an illustrator for children’s books. The story he was working on was about two Shiba Inus who met at a dog park and didn’t like each other at first. However, after learning more about one another as the story progressed, they eventually became best friends, and the story concluded with a happy ending.
Saichi liked it despite how naive that sounded.
He watched Vasily work, and felt his body slide down the couch, little by little. He told himself to go sleep in his own bed, but his eyelids felt heavy, and another man’s presence was quiet and comforting.
***
Saichi woke up feeling refreshed and well-rested. The headache was gone, and he didn’t feel any lingering dizziness. He shook his head. Everything felt fine. Time to go back to work.
When he exited his bedroom, he found Vasily snoring quietly on the couch, his iPad charging on the floor. Saichi crouched down next to him, wondering how he got to this point in his life where there was a strange Russian man sleeping soundly in his living room. His sleeping face was peaceful without the usual tense line of his brows. As if sensing Saichi’s observation though, his brows knitted together a little, and Saichi couldn’t help but reach out and massage that stiffness away.
And then there was the sound of a key unlocking his front door. A few seconds later, Ogata walked in.
The exact same moment Vasily stirred and caught Saichi’s wrist before he pulled completely away.
“I’m back…” Ogata looked at them, dropping the small bag in his hand, his eyes sliding over the way Vasily is holding Saichi’s hand. “Seems I’m interrupting something,” he said, then turned back toward the front door, not caring to pick up the paper bag from the floor.
“Wait.” Saichi stood up and followed him. “Hey, hold on.”
Ogata stopped, and suddenly whirled around to face Saichi. His eyes landed on Vasily, who had already fully woken up and followed them to the door. “Ogata!” he said excitedly. “Let’s go to the shooting range-”
“Who the fuck are you?” In a blink of an eye, Ogata pushed past Saichi and got all up in Vasily’s face. It would have been sort of funny, with how much shorter Ogata was between the two of them, if he hadn’t looked like he was going to bite Vasily’s head off.
Vasily blinked down at him, bemused at first at his aggression, but then something seemed to click inside his head. He put up his hands and stepped back. “Sugimoto is not cheating on you.”
Saichi spluttered as Ogata just said, “I didn’t say that.”
Vasily tilted his head. “But you are jealous.”
Saichi looked at him. “You are?”
“I’m not,” Ogata deadpanned.
Sachi was incredibly annoyed with him right now for some reason. “Then why are you so angry? I, we, didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Oh, so now it’s a ‘we’?” Ogata did that thing with his facial expression where it stayed expressionless but somehow was capable of making Saichi feel guilty and stupid.
“This is so stupid,” Saichi told him. “You need to go cool your head.”
Ogata scoffed, “A minute ago you were begging me not to leave and now you are telling me to fuck off. You need to make up your mind.”
Saichi had a feeling there was an underlying meaning in Ogata’s words, but he was angry and it was getting harder to control himself. “How about you go-”
“Both of you need to calm down,” Vasily interrupted.
“I am calm,” Ogata said, his voice dripping with venom.
“Shut up,” Saichi said, not really sure who he was directing it to.
Vasily exhaled heavily. He then walked to the front door, taking his iPad with him, and Saichi thought he was going to leave, but then the Russian proceeded to sit down in front of the door. Facing them, he propped up the iPad on his knees and started drawing. “You two should make up. Our rematch at the shooting range can come later.”
Saichi stared, embarrassed and a bit confused. Did Vasily force his way in here because he only wanted to have a rematch with Ogata? “Wasn’t that a little extreme?”
Ogata huffed, ignoring him, then snickered. He gripped Sachi’s arm. “Why don’t we do what he suggested?”
“Huh? Have a rematch?”
But then Saichi knew what Ogata was going to do, could read it in the lines of his movements. Still, he didn’t stop Ogata when the man pulled him down for a kiss.
The kiss was rough and possessive and maybe a little desperate. Saichi whimpered when Ogata sucked on his bottom lip and bit it. Maybe Saichi was desperate, too. He didn’t like how shocked Ogata had looked when he first walked in before schooling his face into a mask of nonchalance. Didn’t like it when Ogata had insisted he wasn’t jealous, like he didn’t care at all if Saichi was with someone else.
Saichi might cry if Ogata was with someone else.
And then he realized that, oh, he might be really, really fond of this mean asshole.
Ogata seemed to notice that something was off, because Saichi stopped responding to his kiss. He pulled back a little, examining Saichi’s face.
“You’re such an asshole,” Saichi told him, feeling quite emotional.
Ogata glared, opening his mouth to probably call Saichi stupid or useless or something. But then Saichi’s mouth was on him, shutting him up. Ogata grumbled in his throat but still went along with the kiss.
When Saichi broke off the kiss, he held Ogata close by his lapels, and hid his face in Ogata’s neck. One of Ogata’s hands was on his neck, rubbing soothingly, the other resting on his waist. Saichi couldn’t believe his bad luck. There were literally millions of people and he had to fall for this psychopath.
“Ugh,” he groaned. “I can’t believe this.”
“Hmm. Are you ready to apologize?”
“Wha- Huh?” Saichi looked up at him. “I’m not apologizing. What is your problem?”
Ogata’s jaw tightened. “Alright, be that way.” He tried to dislodge Saichi’s hands from his coat, but Saichi held on tighter.
“No, listen to me. Hey!” Saichi shook him, getting the other man to look him in the eyes again. “Listen, um, I…”
“Speak up, would you?”
“I like you!”
Ogata blinked.
Saichi’s whole face was burning.
And then Ogata said, perfectly unaffected, “I thought we had already established that.”
Saichi really, really wanted to hit him. “No, you, listen to me,” he struggled. “I… like you, okay? Like, um, I like you. I like you.”
Ogata’s expression was blank, but then he said, “Ah,” and smirked irritatingly. “You mean, you’re in love with me.”
Saichi gaped at him. “I- I- I-”
“So that’s why you wanted me to be jealous.”
Saichi wanted to disappear. Ogata was a giant asshole. A really awful one.
“You’re awful.”
“Mmm. You like it though.”
Saichi looked away. The room was getting really hot. “I need some fresh air,” he told the other man, trying to get some distance between them. Ogata was having none of that.
“I think what you need is a reward,” Ogata said, and pushed him down onto the couch.
Wait. “You haven’t- haven’t-”
“You want me to say it back?” Ogata asked from above him, shrugging off his coat and loosening his tie. “I like you. There. Satisfied?”
Saichi covered his face with his hands. “You’re unbelievable.”
There was a sound of a belt clinking, and the couch sank down further under their combined weight. Ogata’s hot breath was on the back of his hands. “I’ll make sure you believe it by the end of the day.”
Saichi thought about work, and Vasily, who was probably still in the room somewhere since he didn’t hear him leaving through the front door, and then Ogata’s tongue was on his nipple and all his remaining coherent thoughts disappeared completely.
Saichi couldn’t believe his luck at all.