Chapter Text
Kojiro doesn’t normally push this hard. In fact sometimes he thinks that their relationship works so well because he is so careful never to cross over the line. But this time he messed up, he’s not sure when the argument shifted, when it went from careful teasing to dangerous territory, nor is he sure exactly what it was he said that caused first the hurt and then the fury on Kaoru’s face. They don’t normally fight like this at S. S is neutral territory, S is when they have their public faces on, when they are Joe and Cherry Blossom, not ‘Jiro and ‘Ru. It’s masks and competition, not sitting practically on top of each other on one of their couches, commenting on the terrible reality tv show neither of them can admit to being obsessed with.
It’s when there is a girl pressed to his side instead of Kaoru’s sharp elbows resting on him, leaning against him but also taking some of his weight. Kaoru has always been so much stronger than he looks.
“I’m leaving,” Kaoru says, voice thin.
“Wait!” Kojiro begins to say, reaching towards him.
Kaoru practically hisses at him, and when Kojiro opens his mouth to apologize, to somehow fix it all, Kaoru snarls and yells. His mask covers most of his face, but Kojiro can see the danger in his golden eyes, if he pushes more now Kaoru will not forgive him. So Kojiro stands there, like an idiot, at the top of the course, watching that swishing beautiful ponytail fade into the dark of the night. His date of the night presses closer to him, offering comfort and pouting when he pushes her away.
He leaves S shortly after and somehow stumbles through the next few days of his week.
He isn’t sure exactly what sets Kaoru off and it makes him feel like a gangly teen all over, watching Adam break his heart slowly and then realizing he isn’t the person to put it back together. Kojiro isn’t sure of much right now, except that he is drunk, on a ‘date’ and hopelessly in love with his best friend who currently isn’t talking to him.
It had been three days since their fight. The longest they ever went without talking was five days, when Kaoru stayed up for three days straight working on Carla only to pass out from exhaustion and sickness for the next several. Kojiro had showed up to make sure he wasn’t dead and found him passed out with a fever.
The girl he’s with giggles, pulling him out of his mind. He can’t remember her name Hani or had it been Hamari. They had met at a bar a few hours ago. Either way she’s looking at him like she just asked a question, and is gesturing to some small shop. He smiles and nods, trying not to think about how her eyes are just a few shades too dark to be considered golden, and then trying not to think about why his dates these days share similar features.
Haruko pulls him into the building, some fortune teller's shop or something, her hand gripping him tightly. Too tight, everyone seems to think that just because he’s big that must mean they can be much more rough with him. That somehow his muscles protect him from feeling the pain. Kojiro blinks at the interior, wondering for a second if he is drunker than he thought. The inside of the shop smells strongly of incense, the walls were covered with tapestries of thick purple material and strange symbols. There was a beaded curtain to the back. A thin black cat stands on the counter blinking at him as the girl walks away from his arm cooing at some small crystal.
“Hello there.” Kojiro finds himself saying, offering out his hand gently to the cat, who looks at him with disdain, before beginning to clean itself. Kojiro sighs, even the cat wants nothing to do with him. “Sorry, you must get tired of all these strangers trying to pet you all day huh? They don’t even buy you a drink first. Or try to get to know you.” Kojiro laughs slightly to himself, both because he is joking with a cat, and because he knows just how true that statement is. Even now with Hitome, he knows she just thinks he’s hot. She doesn’t know anything about him, and he doesn’t know anything about her either. They are using each other.
“Well most people do at least. I bet your person knows you better than that.” he sighs heavily, suddenly wanting nothing more than to be home, alone, or with Kaoru. He feels drained, older than his twenty five years. The cat stops licking its paw and looks up at him with alarmingly bright purple eyes.
It yawns, before trotting up to him, and pushing its head into his hand once, before hitting him in the face with its tail and leaping through the beaded curtain. Kojiro pouts, feeling more confused than he normally does with Kaoru. The cat is moodier than even you, Ru, he thinks. He sits there for a moment hearing movement somewhere off to his left as his date talks at him.
There's an indignant meow a few seconds later, as the cat pokes its head back out and looks at him. He looks back. It meows again and walks back through the curtain with exaggerated slowness.
Kojiro laughs, glancing around, feeling sheepish about going into the backroom, as though he wasn’t at an illegal skateboard race a few nights ago. “Are you showing me where your food is? Because somehow I don’t think your human would like that.”
The cat pauses and looks at him one more time.
“Fine, fine. You are lucky I am a big softy.” He says and pushes back the curtain, to find an even more mystifying room. There is a small table, candles set up in some odd pattern, and two chairs. In one sits a woman, her age indiscernible. Her eyes clear and sharp as she looks at him like a beast staring down its prey, and Kojiro feels himself shift slightly on his feet. She seems to be studying a layer of him that most people don’t see. He is used to people looking at him like that but somehow he gets the impression this woman isn’t looking for companionship. Normally he isn’t prey but an equal participant in a carefully constructed game.
“Hello.” He says awkwardly, looking for the cat, “I think your cat wanted to use me for treats.”
She raises an eyebrow at him, “Kuro does not use people for treats.” Her voice is strong and forceful, the kind of voice that could silence an entire high school class room with a single word. “Sit.”
He obeys, feeling like a child about to be yelled at for a bad report card.
“Hand.” She says, holding her own out across the table.
“Um.”
She stares him down, unblinking, “Kuro brought you back here. You clearly need help, hopeless fool. Hand now.”
He gives her his hand, palm up. She leans over tugging at the skin of his palm, poking it like a kid might poke a frog with a stick.
“Hmm. Idiot.”
“Hey now!” Kojiro starts, trying to pull his hand back, only to have it held in an iron grip. “We just met, that seems a bit rude.”
She glances up at him with a look of pity. And he stopped trying to pull his hand back.
“You hurt someone recently. You want to fix it. But you are stupid.” She looked at him for confirmation, and he nodded slightly. “Good. That is the first step. And this” she pulled something out from under the table and plunked it in front of him, “is the second.”
A tiny ceramic cat sat in front of him.
Kojiro looked down at the figurine for a moment, confused. The alcohol was starting to wear off. “I’m sorry, how will this help?”
“Hold it and think of him.” She said, releasing his hand and standing up from the table. Against his better judgment Kojiro finds himself doing just that. He thinks of Kaoru, his face when Kojiro does something especially stupid, his eyes when he laughs, the way he struts into his restaurant knowing Kojiro will never deny him anything in the world. He thinks of his sharp tongue and clever hands, building Carla from nothing and coding her himself, and he thinks of the man who has never once taken good care of himself in his life. I never wanted to hurt him. I don’t even know what I did. He thinks, followed by a God, I love him so much.
Kojiro closes his hand tightly around the cat figure and then the world begins to go dark.
Kojiro wakes up slowly, shivering slightly in the cold of the early morning. He blinks as the world shifts in front of him, his vision blurring, as the wind shoves him. This wouldn’t be the first time he has gone out drinking and passed out somewhere, but it would be the first time in a long time. He shivers again, his headaching.
Something is off. His hands, his feet, his entire body aches, and the world seems different.
It takes him a while to realize, as he continues to lay on the pavement, that the world is much too big right now. The patio he is passed out in front of looks like it is built for a giant. Kojiro lets out an alarmed squeak, only to find that something is also wrong with his voice. Instead of its usual low sound it comes out soft and shaky. He tries again, only to find the noise repeated, louder this time, more like a yowl than words. He shivers again, looking around for his jacket, as a soft patter of rain begins to fall.
And that is when Kojiro really begins to panic. Because he has certainly woken up after a long night and not known where he is. He has certainly woken up feeling this miserable and awful before, and he has certainly woken up not knowing where his clothes are.
But he has never woken up and wondered why he had four fur covered legs instead of two human ones. He has never looked down after a long night of fun and seen a fluffy looking tail. He yowls again this time with more force and fear, rushing up the patio and to the door of the traditional style house he finds himself in front of. Screaming his little kitty head off.
He hears someone’s footsteps approaching the door, and has to have a quick argument with himself about if he wants to stay out in the rain, or have to figure out how to be a house cat really quick before the door opens, and the universe seems to have made the choice for him already.
Kaoru’s grumpy ‘I am not a morning person’ face greets him back, staring down at his pathetic cat self with contempt. His pink hair is a mess around his face, and he looks terrible, like he has been crying, or not sleeping for days. Kojiro doesn’t hesitate. He sprints full force into the house and dives under Kaoru’s covers.
At least I’m home.