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When Goro had come up the whole “infiltrate the Phantom Thieves by befriending their leader” plan, he had thought it would be difficult.
He had expected backlash, had expected to need to weasel himself into a group of people who hated him.
What he hadn't expected, he had to freely admit, was the difficulty he currently found himself presented with.
“Uhm,” he told the courier, who was grinning at him with a knowing glint in his eyes. “There must be a misunderstanding.”
“Nope,” the man told him, the grin only widening, revealing a missing tooth and a frankly inappropriate amount of gloating. “This form here clearly states to deliver to one Akechi Goro and I know from TV that that's you.”
“Of course that is me,” Goro hissed, then quickly reined in his anger and put on his sweetest smile, ignoring the way his hands trembled as he quickly folded them behind his back. “My apologies – this is merely unexpected. A fan must've found out my address... Surely you understand my concern?”
“Not my problem,” the courier told him with a shrug. “I'm just here to do my job. Please sign here?”
Goro stared at the man in disbelief, a second away from telling this guy where he could shove his “delivery”.
Instead, he cursed the need to uphold his public image and forced himself to another shaky smile as he signed the form that was being held out to him.
And that was how he found himself standing in a corridor full of a dozen blooming bouquets in various colours, overwhelmed and unsure what to do with all these... flowers.
“There wasn't even a note with it,” he told Akira over coffee in Leblanc, having ranted about the sudden flower attack for several minutes now.
Akira was an attentive listener, always seeming interested no matter what he had to say – something that was new for Goro from people of his age.
He was good company, all things considered. He was understanding when Goro was busy, easily followed all his suggestions and was happy to avoid places too crowded to spare Goro the frustration of being overrun by fans. He always listened to him, always seemed to understand. Never judged him for his odd bouts of oversharing that sometimes just came over him when he was around Akira. Never said a rude word about him, to his friends or to him, even when Goro knew for a fact that the rest of his little group hated him. He made good coffee, brought him gifts when he was feeling down, talking about “cheering him up” as if he somehow sensed his low moods, he was clever and witty and could keep up with every challenge Goro threw at him – and if he couldn't, well, then he worked hard to improve and do it anyway.
They seemed to oddly fit together like two puzzle pieces that seemed to have no obvious connection and yet were made for each other, one black, one white. It shouldn't work, but the seam always had to be somewhere.
It hadn't been difficult to befriend Akira Kurusu, actually. Not in the slightest.
What was difficult was not to get lost in the lie of it all.
“So you have no idea who sent all these flowers to you?” Akira asked, eyebrows raised.
Goro sighed heavily.
“No. I think it might be a fan. But someone having found out my address is a concerning thought, to say the least.”
The last thing he needed was some overly eager stalker following his every move.
“Hm,” Akira said.
“Hm?” Goro repeated, then took another sip from the excellent coffee in front of him, feeling the heat spread through his body and relax him considerably.
“Well, I don't know about that theory,” Akira said after a little pause for thinking.
He appreciated that about him, actually – that he thought before he spoke, at least with Goro. Knew he couldn't half-ass a conversation with him.
He appreciated quite a lot about Akira.
“I feel like a fan going through the trouble of sending you so many flowers would want to make themselves known. Leave a confession along with it at the very least.”
That made... sense, Goro supposed. Whenever he'd received fanmail, it had contained hopeful scribbled return addresses, phone numbers and names framed by hearts.
Someone going through these lengths to get his attention only to then not make use of their opportunity when they had it...? Improbable.
“Then I don't know who else would possibly send me flowers,” he told Akira, feeling stumped. “I don't give my address to a lot of people. And none of them who do know it would be likely to send me anything, let alone a dozen bouquets.”
Akira shrugged.
“Maybe a friend who just wanted to make you happy, you know? With no strings attached, no attention on them. Kind of sweet.”
Unimpressed, Goro gave him a dry stare and Akira grinned in response – another thing he liked about him.
Whenever Goro slipped out of his role into something sharper, something with harder edges, he didn't recoil, seemed to instead revel in it, greeted it with open arms and judgement-free lack of comment.
He was pretty unique, this one.
“Maybe,” Goro mumbled, not particularly motivated to humiliate himself by bringing up the fact that he had no friends.
Akira smiled at him, the grey eyes behind his glasses glittering. “Did you at least like them?”
Did he? He'd been so busy trying to find out who they were from and what to do with them, he'd barely paid any attention to that simple question. Had dumped them all in a corner of his kitchen (he didn't really use it, anyway) and tried to forget about them – with little success.
“I don't really know what to do with them,” he admitted and Akira shook his head with a fond smile.
“You set them up in places where they look nice and enjoy the view,” he finally told him with a shrug. “They're just decoration, but they remind you that someone cared enough to pick them out for you. And they smell nice. Extra bonus.”
They had smelled nice, Goro thought. And some of them had been quite pretty, now that he considered it. Especially the blue, tiny ones stuck together to a beautiful bouquet that looked like ocean water sprinkled over juicy green.
“I suppose they weren't that bad,” he finally conceded and thought, for a short second, his heart beating wildly, that not even a whole ocean of flowers could keep up with the beauty of the beaming smile Akira Kurusu's was currently giving him.
The next time Goro and Akira met up, they did so in a little café in Kichijoji. Akira had agreed to try out any new establishment Goro dragged him to and sat down and ordered with incredible patience, always finding something he was interested in that somehow seemed to compliment Goro's own orders.
He also always grimaced at whichever coffee he got served, clearly utterly spoiled by Leblanc's quality (and Goro couldn't blame him). It was weirdly endearing.
He was fairly sure that he shouldn't find him endearing.
“How are your flowers?” he asked him between bites of his cake. “Have you found some spots for them?”
Goro had, actually. He'd spent the entire evening after returning from Leblanc standing in his apartment as if he was seeing it for the very first time, trying to scout out places that looked better with a little colour in them and had discovered that pretty all of them would.
“I think I like flowers,” he told Akira earnestly. “They did look pretty.”
“Did?” Akira asked, eyebrows raised. “Did they already wither?”
“Regrettably, yes,” Goro sighed. “It didn't take long for them to get brown and lose petals.”
It had stressed him out, a little. He'd spent hours with his gaze distractedly going back to the flowers which were still looking fine, trying to find the first threatening signs of decay.
Akira still looked at him with a light frown on his face.
“That's fast – did you put them into water?”
“Water?” Goro asked.
Akira stared at him.
“Well, uhh... Flowers need water, it keeps them fresh a little longer. I'm sure you know that.”
He had seen people do that but hadn't thought he needed to bother, in all honesty.
“Well, yes, but I wasn't really prepared for a dozen flower arrangements, you know? I don't own a single vase, let alone twelve.”
Akira nodded, taking another bite of his cherry cake. It looked good, the way the dark red of the cherries coloured his lips, painted them darker than they already were.
For the fraction of a moment, Goro found himself battling the ridiculous urge to kiss him, to suck at his lips until he could taste the cherries himself.
He cleared his throat, chasing away the thought before it could take root.
“Maybe I should get one,” he muttered thoughtfully. At Akira's inquiring gaze, he added, “A vase. I could maybe get a bouquet of my own once in a while. Liven up my place a little.”
Akira smiled at him.
“I think that is a great idea.”
The very next day, Akira texted him to ask for another meeting, which was a first. Usually, Goro was the one initiating all their contact, having long gotten used to the fact that he was shoving himself onto acquaintances, had to to not be forgotten, tossed aside.
But it surprised him very little that Akira was different from what was usual in this aspect as well.
Akira, for some reason, insisted to meet him at his apartment, something that Goro thought was a horrendous idea, a really, really bad idea, some invisible line he shouldn't let get crossed but couldn't find a single argument against and so instead of a resounding “no”, he texted Akira his address.
Akira came by that same evening, out of breath, his face flushed and several bags dangling from his arms.
“Hey,” he greeted him and carefully set them to the floor of his hallway. Goro could hear it clinking gently whenever he did. “I brought you some vases.”
“You- what?” spluttered Goro.
Akira grinned, looking relieved now that he was finally free from what had to be, Goro realised with a quick scan of the bags, several kilogram of weight he had carried through the city for him.
“Well, you're a celebrity,” he told him with a light-hearted nudge of his elbow. “You'll get more flowers as the years go by. You gotta be prepared.”
“Tell me you didn't go out and buy me a dozen vases,” Goro pleaded incredulously, but Akira shook his head.
“Nah, I work part-time in a flower shop, remember? These were kind of standing in the back of the storage, we haven't used them in ages, so I asked my boss if I could have them. She seemed confused about what I wanted with so many vases, but didn't mind.”
Of course she was confused, Goro thought with light hysteria. This was ridiculous. No one needed this many vases.
It was... thoughtful. Downright sweet. But ridiculous.
Still.
“Well, I- Thank you,” he brought out, feeling overwhelmed. “I certainly appreciate it, even if...” He swallowed down a complicated mix of emotions he better shouldn't look at too closely. “Even if you may have gone a little overboard.”
“Aw, don't say that, Akechi-kun,” Akira replied with a little wink and a glint in his eyes that Goro had by now learned meant he had mischief in mind. “You never know – your secret admirer could send you fresh flowers at any time.”
The next delivery came exactly two days later. It was the same delivery guy, too – He stood there, with all these flowers draped around him, grinning that unnerving grin the second the door opened.
“Akechi Goro?” he asked, even though they had already established that he knew the answer. “Got a delivery for you.”
“Yes,” Goro replied, keeping his tone dry as he was in no mood to entertain this man any longer. “I can see that.”
He opened his door and let him carry the flowers inside, handful after handful of bouquets, intentionally not signing the delivery confirmation until he'd brought all of them inside.
One had to learn from their mistakes, after all.
The man was still grinning when he stepped back out however, clearly drawing plenty of amusement from Goro's unfortunate situation.
“You must've really stolen some girl's heart, kid.”
“You don't happen to know who ordered these, I assume?” Goro asked stiffly.
“Sorry,” the delivery man said with a shrug. “Even if I was allowed to tell you – I just get the orders on paper and load them in. No clue.”
Goro let out a regretful breath.
“Well. Thank you anyway. Have a nice day.”
And choke on your goddamn grin, he thought in quiet to himself.
“Until next time, then,” the man chuckled.
And if Goro slammed the door shut a little too forceful – well that could've just been the wind.
They were pretty, though, Goro determined after a quick look around his hallway, the usual bare, bleak atmosphere looking like a bucket of paint had exploded all over it.
There were more of the blue ones he'd liked and a few red ones that looked like wildflowers, even a few roses this time. He'd read somewhere that roses represented declarations of love.
Urgh. Presumptuous.
Beautiful, though.
And they did smell good, Goro thought to himself as he remembered Akira's words and stepped closer to them, taking a deep breath and inhaling their sweetness.
He supposed there was no harm in setting them up, if he already had them – At least Akira's vases would find their use after all.
He didn't even notice that he was humming a cheerful little Featherman tune as he started filling all the vases with water and setting them up in the spots he had already scouted for them the last time – Making sure to put the prettiest bouquets onto the best visible places and smiling all throughout his work.
Goro went to Leblanc the very next day, carefully handing Akira one of the reddest roses he had found in the bunch and watched the boy blush delightfully.
“Oh. Uhm. Th- thank you.”
This was odd – usually Akira matched him with so much self-confidence, it was bordering on cocky.
He appreciated that about him too – the way he had never been scared, never been shy about Goro's status and instead talked to him like he would with every other boy his age, easily and relaxed, not afraid to tease him. Though he had to say, he appreciated the light red blush spreading on his cheeks too, liked the way it seemed to soften up his entire face while giving it colour.
“It's a thank you,” Goro told him as he swung onto his usual seat before the counter. “For all the vases – it turns out I needed them after all.”
“Got fresh flowers again, did you?” Akira grinned, while putting his rose into a high glass and filled it with water. He set it down on the counter, looking at it with a weirdly warm gleam in his eyes.
Goro remembered that roses were famous to declare one's love with, but quickly pushed down that thought again. A gift among friends – a quick show of appreciation. Nothing more.
Akira would get that.
Goro hummed.
“It looks like they're not letting off anytime soon,” he finally said and he hadn't meant to sound so happy about it, but he supposed it was out there now and something told him that Akira would've known anyway.
The next delivery came just when Goro's last flower had started withering – whoever sent him those flowers certainly knew how to time their deliveries, had to have at least so much basic knowledge about flowers to know when to send fresh ones.
Sadly, they seemed oblivious to the fact that Goro would also like a fresh delivery driver.
“Goro Akechi?” the familiar voice asked with downright laughter caught in it. “There's a-”
“Yes,” Goro cut him off sharply. “I know that there is a delivery for me, I can see you and I can see the hordes of flowers behind you. Please, just get them in.”
He held open the door and the man got to work with the occasional snort escaping him.
“You sending them to yourself or something? This is not normal, you know?”
“I'm most certainly not,” Goro spluttered, face reddening. “How on Earth would you get to that ridiculous accusation?”
“Well I talked to the boss,” the man replied, finally having carried in the last of the order and standing in front of Goro again, scratching his head. “And she said she never took any such order. Sounds suspicious to me.”
Goro frowned.
“Just how many people work in your store?” he asked the man in his most authoritative detective tone and watched him flinch back visibly in surprise.
“Well, just us three – the boss, the part-timer and me, you see?”
“I see,” Goro replied, not seeing anything but blooming confusion. “Thank you very much.”
And he slammed the door shut in front of the man.
“You've been in a better mood these past weeks,” Sae-san told him at work. “Did something good happen?”
It was nice she asked, Goro supposed. She was still leaning over her papers, barely looking up from them but it was always like that with her. Work came first and everything else? Well, it would have to be done in the few moments in between.
A part of Goro was almost relieved that he was about to put the Phantom Thieves onto her tracks – Maybe a change of heart would be good for her. At the very least targeting her was what kept her out of Shido's increasingly bloody plans that he had somehow gotten himself entangled in.
For now.
“Someone keeps on sending me flowers,” he told her and when she actually was stunned enough to do look up, he added with a little smile, “anonymously.”
Even the pen she was continuously scribbling with had halted.
“Huh,” she finally said.
“What?”
“Well it's just... anonymous flowers, huh?”
Goro fidgeted with his gloves, then lifted his chin a little, looking at her in the way that he always did when he needed to remind himself that he didn't get to be childish, didn't get to be insecure around adults expecting him to be one of them.
“Yes. What about it?”
“Well, they usually mean someone's in love with you. Especially roses. Did you get roses?”
Goro swallowed.
His newest delivery had entailed more roses than the other two combined, white ones, red ones, he'd even found a bouquet of black ones, but a little bit of research and closer inspection had shown that they had been merely sprayed with paint.
Still.
They looked lovely.
Unique.
“No one's in love with me,” he evaded the question expertly, having learned to do so subtly in countless interviews. “It's probably just a fan.”
“Well, if you're sure,” Sae replied with audible doubt in her voice. “It might be someone from your school, though. A friend maybe? Might be worth investigating, if you know which of them know your address.”
No one. No one knew his address. Shido did and Goro had killed people he thought were more likely to send him flowers than his fucked up father was. Sae did, but she clearly was not in the pool of suspects, either. Akira did, of course, but he had sent it to him himself, after the first delivery had already occurred.
No one else knew his address, unless they had stalked him or used other means to find it out.
Now that he thought about it, thoughts unclouded from the sweet, calming smell of the flowers currently crowding his apartment – it was odd.
Instead of going straight back home after work, he went to Shibuya instead, his hand clenching around the handle of his silver case as he walked through the underground mall to the flower store he had gotten his deliveries from.
Rafflesia, said the sign. It was tiny, really, barely more than a big booth, with flowers everywhere and in the middle of it....
In the middle of it sat Akira in a green apron, binding some flower stems together with green plastic tape.
“Oh,” Akira greeted him as he looked up and saw Goro, surprise spreading on his face before it turned into open joy.
Another thing about Akira Goro had learned to appreciate as soon as he'd accepted it as real (which had taken a while) – Akira seemed to genuinely not hate him.
“Hey! Did you want to place an order?”
“No,” Goro said as he stepped closer, leaning against the counter while taking a look around. “I came to try and find out who keeps on sending me flowers. I didn't know this was the flower shop you worked at.”
Akira grinned at him, before lowering his head again, getting back to work as he talked. Goro watched his skilled fingers carefully handling the flower stems as he wrapped them together to beautiful mixes of colours.
Of course he would be unfairly talented in this aspect of his life, too.
(That was something he didn't appreciate about Akira in the slightest – how easy it all came to him, how everything he touched seemed to just fall into his lap, ready and willing and fall into place for him without the slightest hint of effort, all while Goro had to fight and claw his way through this world since the day he was born.)
“Small world, huh?”
“Certainly,” Goro huffed. “You wouldn't happen to know anything about these deliveries, would you? Since you seem to be the person wrapping them up.”
Akira's steel-grey eyes flickered up to him shortly before they were focused on his work again.
“Seven bouquets of roses, including one of black ones. Two bouquets of our bluest forget-me-nots, two Red Asters mixed with white daisies and some lilies,” he recited flawlessly, then looked up to him again with a half-smile. “Did you like them?”
Goro found himself unable to speak for a while.
“Th- that's what they're called then? The blue ones?”
“Forget-Me-Nots,” Akira nodded. “They symbolise sincere love, true friendship and... well. The wish to be remembered.” He grinned. “I read a book on flower meanings.”
Goro swallowed.
“I- I did like them,” he finally said. “I'm just confused as to who sent them. Were you the one to take the order?”
“Nah, sorry,” Akira told him with a shrug. “Most of the time, I just put together the bouquets from the instructions I get.”
“I see.”
There were only three people working in this shop, none of which wanted to have taken the order, which meant that one of them was lying.
Goro was beginning to get a very good idea of which one it was.
He had his mouth already opened, ready to call Akira out on it, but a numb feeling spread in his chest as he watched him sit there, still completely engrossed in his delicate work, looking like he couldn't harm a single fly.
What was the point, he thought, to tell him now when next week he was about to blackmail himself onto his team to... to...
It didn't really matter, he realised. It didn't really matter because the deliveries were coming to a rapid halt soon enough, anyway.
“Well – I'll leave you to it,” he told Akira, trying to think through the numbness spreading in his entire body, turning his thoughts sticky like glue.
He turned around and fled before Akira could say another word.
Goro had expected Akira to stop seeing him privately after going through with his blackmail plan.
He'd expected to go back to spending his evenings alone in his apartment, doing work while staring at empty vases.
But it still hit him harder than he had thought, those first few days.
He was kneeling in front of his table, staring at the empty shelves and wondered how he could have gotten used to colour and life in his apartment so quickly. Everything seemed to look so much bleaker than even before.
There were still brown rose petals lying on the floor that he hadn't been able to bring himself to throw out.
The last evidence of someone's affection towards him before he had stumped it out and left it to die.
And soon all proof of it would bleed out on the floor of an interrogation room, for no one but Goro to see.
He sighed.
Fucking Akira Kurusu had to go and make him appreciate him and now here he sat, regret pooling in the pit of his stomach.
His dark thoughts were interrupted by a ring of the bell, making him flinch and throw down his pen.
Who the hell...?
When he opened the door, he stared right into the eyes that had haunted his thoughts just moments before, gleaming and alive and not holding any of the scorn he was expecting to find the next time he dared to look at them.
“What-”
Goro's mouth fell open as he looked at the countless flowers standing all over the hallway, waiting to be let in.
“It's a special delivery,” Akira told him with a beaming smile. “I thought I'd bring it to you personally to make sure it got here okay.”
Goro had to try and get words out three times before he finally succeeded, watching Akira watch him with amused patience as he opened and shut his mouth like a fish on land.
“Special how?” he finally croaked out and Akira held out his hand, handing him a card.
“It came with a note.”
Goro looked down at the card offered – Black and red spiralling pattern all over the back, a familiar logo plastered in the middle.
“A Calling Card?” he asked, outrage colouring his tone and Akira giggled.
“Just a postcard from the official Phantom Thieves merch line,” he told him with a wink. “Not the real thing.”
Goro took the card, feeling overwhelmed as he read all the words without taking in their meaning, then re-read.
Flowers for my favourite detective,
as a welcome to the team ;)
- Joker
“Th- that's me, in case that wasn't clear,” Akira added almost shyly. “Joker.”
He knew that, of course. He'd have known that even if he hadn't spied on the Phantom Thieves in the Metaverse. Had known Akira was the one to send him these flowers for a while now, had compartmentalised that knowledge carefully into the “over and dealt with” drawer of his brain ever since the festival invite.
And now here he was, mind drawing a blank on what to say, how to react, and Goro said the first thing that came to him, acting on complete instinct, unable to filter his words.
“You absolute piece of shit.”
It only took a second for his own words to catch up with Goro but by then it was already too late to take them back, to pull his mask back into place, so he simply stared at Akira, who looked as stunned as he felt for a moment and then... simply laughed.
“Yeah well,” he finally grinned at Goro. “Takes one to know one.”
Goro's mind still being so utterly wiped blank helped, as he stepped forwards and finally decided to show Akira his appreciation. With a swift grab of his collar, he pulled him towards him and kissed him hard enough to bruise – A little clumsy maybe, he'd never done any of this, but Akira certainly didn't complain.
He didn't complain when he was being pressed against Goro's door frame, either, kissing him back with all he had, hands wrapping around his waist and Goro slowly, absent-mindedly, let his own hands sink from his collar as well and used them to pull that heated body closer against him instead, a hand to the back of his head, finally sinking into that black hair of his, finding out just how much softer it was than he had always imagined, the other on the small of his back and he could get used to this, actually, to Akira against him, spilling sweet sounds into his mouth for Goro to swallow freely.
Akira only started complaining when they stumbled backwards and hit one of the bags full of flowers, tearing himself away from his lips long enough to whisper “Hey, careful, they're expensive.”
Goro laughed breathlessly, stealing himself another quick kiss, before slowly untangling from Akira, feeling dazed and giddy and thrilled.
“We should probably take them inside before someone sees.”
Akira just grinned and gripped two of the bags and together, they carried them all inside with ease. Akira watched him set them all up, giving them fresh water, lovingly arranging them in their vases, a fond little smile on his lips whenever Goro dared a glance at him.
“How did you get my address anyway?” he finally asked, needing to talk about something to keep him from crashing into Akira again and trying to taste that smile for himself.
Akira shrugged.
“Futaba.”
“Futaba?”
“You'll know soon enough. She's uhm... good at finding out all kinds of stuff.”
He looked sad for a moment, thoughts going somewhere Goro couldn't follow, dulling the glint in his eyes.
He couldn't have that – the burden he carried was heavy enough for two, he didn't want to watch Akira carrying similar weight.
“Think I should set up some of these in my bedroom?” he asked him and Akira, sharp, smart, beautiful, attentive Akira, lit up like a lightbulb, beaming at him.
“I think that's a brilliant idea.”
“You probably know all the best spots, maybe you could...”
But Akira was already moving, turning around to walk backwards, a grin flashing at Goro even as he ran straight against a wall.
“Well – what are you waiting for?”
What indeed.
As the years went by, Akira made sure there were always blooming flowers in their home. More often than not, he returned home from grocery shopping with several bouquets of them to set up.
He also made sure they had food in their home, cooked their dinners and forced Goro into making friends with his friends (which actually wasn't half as bad as he had expected going into it).
In return, Goro kept the apartment clean, made their breakfast the way Akira had taught him (he was always the first one up) and kept their fat, creepy talking cat happy with take-out sushi, ignoring Akira's constant claims that he was “buying Mona's love” by spoiling him (it was working).
Akira had been incredibly good at figuring out his favourite flowers quickly and efficiently, without even having to ask.
So it came to very little surprise that the day he asked Goro to marry him, he'd done so with all of them around, hundreds of carefully, beautifully arranged flowers all around their living room as he knelt before him, looking as gorgeous as he had that very first day, so entirely oblivious to the fact that he was making every single flower in his vicinity pale in comparison.