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This isn’t where either of them thought they’d be in their 40s.
Kuroo stands on Daichi’s dimly lit porch, staring at the doorbell for what seems like hours. He can’t bring himself to press the button, no, because that means he’s accepting whatever he can call this mortifying situation that his family decided to push him into.
It’s not his fault he’s approaching his mid-forties and hasn’t gotten married yet. He’s tried, he’s failed, and he hasn’t found the right person yet — and that’s okay with him. Or, at least that’s what he convinced himself of. He’s happy on his own, content to focus on his career and spend time with his friends, learning more about himself every year. Pressure to get married and settle down never faded, his family pushing and pushing for him to find someone soon. The implication that he has to be married to be worth anything never sat well with him anyways, and he’s grown quite familiar with brushing off the set-ups and scolding year after year when he didn’t bring anyone home.
But now that he’s standing here, outside Daichi’s door because he’s too nervous to ring the bell and start this fake date he unwillingly agreed to…it’s overwhelming. It’s what their families suggested, since they were always together anyways.
Not that Kuroo has never looked at Daichi in this light, of course, they’ve had their moments. But they both acknowledged that they didn’t want to mess up their friendship, never letting it get past being a moment.
Over more than twenty years they’ve spent together, and tonight is their first /real/ date.
Kuroo steps forward to ring the doorbell.
***
Hoping his house doesn’t look like he intentionally deep-cleaned it before Kuroo arrived, Daichi finishes his kitchen prep when he hears the doorbell ring. /Shit/, he’s early, Daichi thinks.
Tonight wasn’t meant to be this complicated. They’ve made dinner together and gotten drunk on his couch for years now, this isn’t any different.
Except…it is. Daichi wishes his family would just let him be. He’s successful in his career and even recently bought a house that he’s been working on renovating for the last few months. Every spare second he got was spent on repairs, painting, decorating–anything to keep his hands busy and his mind from roaming too far away. He thought after he adopted Nana, his sweet rescue husky constantly curled up and napping on her designated corner of the couch, that maybe just maybe they would ease up on him. A dog is apparently no match for a partner and child of his own, though.
How Daichi was going to reign in his suppressed feelings for Kuroo from his whole life on this fake date they promised they’d try is beyond him.
Daichi opens the door, immediately smiling at the mess of Kuroo’s body language in front of him right now. “I guess you’re feeling the same about this as I am.”
Kuroo covers his eyes, groaning. “Shit, is it /that/ obvious?”
“Mmm, relax. It’s just like any other night.” Daichi nods towards the kitchen. “C’mon in, I’m almost done with dinner.”
The tension in Kuroo’s shoulders smoothes out a bit, Daichi holding out a hand to take his coat and restraining himself from smiling at the way Kuroo’s cheeks redden. Why, /why/ does everything have to feel so much more intimate right now?
Quickly hanging it in his closet, he leads Kuroo through the familiar hallway of framed memories, most containing the two of them along with some other friends they stayed in touch with throughout the years. He gestures towards a bar stool, Kuroo taking a seat and immediately spinning in a few circles like he always does.
Daichi disappears to his living room briefly and returns to throw a deep red scarf directly at Kuroo’s face. “You left this here last time.”
Kuroo laughs, folding it neatly before sliding it down the countertop for later. “Ah…that’s where it’s been. Thank you.”
“I’m sure you would have been back for it again anyways.” Daichi looks down at the stove, at the dinner he spent way too long thinking about over the last week to make sure it was good for Kuroo. “Beer?”
“Sure.” Kuroo twirls around, eyeing the living room. “Where’s Nana?”
“Hmm?” Daichi peeks around him and chuckles. “Oh, she’s over there. I think she wiggled her way under your blanket again.
“A thief! I guess I’ll allow it, but that better mean she cuddles with me tonight.”
Daichi hums, and they both fall quiet after that. Kuroo, while he knows it’s a fake date, is still visibly nervous in a way. They’ve never put that name to their time together, even as a joke, and Daichi is equally aware of that fact. They’re both on edge for no good reason.
“Here, one sec,” Daichi starts, reaching above his bookshelf in the hallway to switch on his speakers. He pulls out his phone, scrolling to find the “keep me calm” playlist that Kuroo never asks for but always appreciates in these times where Daichi knows him better than himself.
Daichi would never admit it, but he made it special for Kuroo. Now that he’s thinking about it, he’s caught himself turning it on when he’s home alone, seeking to fill the unknown Kuroo-shaped void in his heart without even realizing that was the reason.
For now, it’s mostly just for background noise, and it looks like Kuroo appreciates that. Their comfortable silence afterwards while Daichi plates dinner and Kuroo watches intently is soothing for the both of them.
Dinner is filled with comfortable conversation, and even Nana wakes up to come lay at Kuroo’s heels for company (and attention). Daichi spots her rolling over onto her back while Kuroo runs his foot over her belly, just the way she always likes. Spoiled girl, he thinks.
They talk a bit about work, how the renovations are going, really anything to keep the topic away from their purpose for tonight. The truth they’ve both been avoiding. After they’ve finished, Daichi sets his chopsticks down and takes in this moment.
Kuroo sitting across from him at the dinner table he helped Daichi make — “help” may be a stretch of a word, Kuroo really just handed him one piece of wood before running around to play with Nana — Kuroo in most of the hung-up frames with him, Kuroo’s blanket that he eventually stopped taking home since he always brought it with him when he visited…Daichi realizes in this very moment that Kuroo is already ingrained in his life. Not a single spot in Daichi’s house is left untouched by Kuroo’s influence. There’s no mystery, he’s /been/ here. They’ve been together this whole time and he hadn’t opened his eyes to accept it in that light yet.
As the next song played softly on the speakers, Kuroo finally looked up at Daichi, noticing he’d been staring this whole time.
“What is it, Dai?”
“Tetsurou…” he starts, but why is he hesitating? There’s no one here, no one but them. It’s their moment, and Daichi wants to show him that.
“Dance with me, Tetsu.”
It looks like Kuroo forgets how to breathe, and blink, too. He doesn’t say anything for a while.
Daichi stands, offering his hand to the still-dumbfounded Kuroo whose mouth can’t seem to close as he studies Daichi’s expression, trying to figure out if this is a joke or not.
“Dance?” he whispers, his voice sweet, hopeful almost, but mostly full of nerves. “I thought…this was just like any other night?”
“What if it wasn’t?” Confidence overtakes him as his mind grinds to process the wave of emotions rolling through him. The music in the background only amplifies his feelings. “What if we gave it a shot?”
Kuroo shakes his head, still not taking Daichi’s proffered hand, trying and trying and trying to push down his thoughts, Daichi can see it. “We’re doing this for our families,” he protests, “there’s nothing else. We need to just get it over with so they can leave us alone. Sa’amura, I thought we agreed on this.”
♫ ~ It's funny how you always remember ~ ♫
“Tetsurou, who are you trying to impress?” Daichi asks, kneeling beside Kuroo’s chair, wary of Nana’s tail, though she moves to the couch again at the intrusion. “We’ve always been there for each other. /Always/, Tetsu. Can we really keep saying we’re doing this just for our family?”
♫ ~ And we've both done it all a hundred times before ~ ♫
Slowly, slowly, Kuroo’s eyes trail from Daichi’s gaze down to his hand, reaching out, fingers barely dancing on Daichi’s fingertips, sparks igniting in his chest.
♫ ~ It's funny how I still forgot. It would be a hundred times easier ~ ♫
“We’ve danced along this line for years now,” Daichi’s breath hitches, waiting for Kuroo to meet him halfway, “isn’t it time to finally give in?”
“Sa’amura…you really mean it?” Finally, his fingertips make a home on Daichi’s palm, giving his silent permission for Daichi to take his hand, pull him up out of his seat.
♫ ~ If we were young again ~ ♫
Daichi leads him into the living room, making sure his grip on Kuroo’s hand transfers everything going on in his head, all the tender emotions he’s been holding back his whole life, all the moments they could have had, everything. He wants Kuroo to have it all.
♫ ~ But as it is. And it is ~ ♫
“Is it wrong?” he asks Kuroo, his hand finding its spot on Kuroo’s waist with ease, pulling him close. “To want this? To want…each other?”
♫ ~ We're just two slow dancers, last ones out ~ ♫
Moments from their past flood his mind — the high school dances, college party nights, weddings — all the highs and all the lows, they were all spent /together/. What fools they were to not have seen it years earlier.
♫ ~ We're two slow dancers, last ones out ~ ♫
Kuroo is taller than Daichi, he always has been, a fact that doesn’t change how Daichi tenderly holds Kuroo’s hand in his own, swaying him back and forth to the tune in the background like he’s the most delicate thing Daichi’s ever laid his hands on.
♫ ~ And the ground has been slowly pulling us back down. You see it on both our skin ~ ♫
“It’s not wrong, Dai, but I don’t know what to think,” Kuroo starts, head resting against Daichi’s shoulder, and Daichi has never felt more at home than in this moment. He lets Daichi guide him, giving into the sway of the whimsical song still buzzing in their ears.
♫ ~ We get a few years and then it wants us back ~ ♫
“Did you play this song on purpose?” he continues. “You remember when we added it to this playlist? You were showing me how to dance for Suga’s wedding like ten years ago.”
♫ ~ It would be a hundred times easier ~ ♫
Daichi tightened the hand on the edge of Kuroo’s shirt. “Of course I do. It’s the first time we danced together. Well, like that at least.”
“I miss that night…” And for good reason, Daichi thinks. If ever they were going to get together before now, it would have been that night, energized by alcohol and their teasing friends, they ended up unintentionally sharing a hotel room together, though nothing happened.
Kuroo wasn’t ready, that time, and neither was Daichi.
♫ ~ If we were young again ~ ♫
“You know,” Daichi leans against Kuroo, bumping their heads together, “the song has a point. If we were young again, there’s so much we would have done differently.”
♫ ~ But as it is, And it is ~ ♫
Daichi feels the purr from Kuroo’s chest in agreement. “Can we start over? Forget about our families, forget all the stupid excuses we gave ourselves, and each other, and just start from here.”
♫ ~ To think that we could stay the same ~ ♫
“I’d like that, Tetsu. We can’t stay the same anymore, we need to figure this out.”
♫ ~ To think that we could stay the same ~ ♫
“What should we tell our family?”
“It’s none of their business. We come first, we can decide what to do and then talk to them after.”
“I can’t believe we didn’t do this sooner.”
♫ ~ But we're two slow dancers, last ones out ~ ♫
“You can be pretty stubborn, Tetsu.”
Kuroo playfully steps on Daichi’s foot, his “oof” likely bringing Kuroo too much joy. “Hey, I’m not the only one to blame here, Sa’amura. You could have made a move, too.”
♫ ~ We're two slow dancers, last ones out ~ ♫
Daichi pauses their dancing, wrapping his arms around Kuroo properly, like he should have done years ago. “I’m glad I did now.”
They’ve spent practically their whole lives together and they never thought, even for one second, that maybe…just maybe…the right person has been in front of them all along.
♫ ~ Two slow dancers, last ones out ~ ♫
It’s all about the moments ;; I don’t think this came out how I wanted but it is what it is, just know that they’re in love.