Chapter Text
Aiko double checked her handbag to be sure that everything was still in there. She smiled in relief when she saw that the gift was still where she had put it. This evening was the first big thing she had planned, so she couldn’t help but feel nervous.
An excited smile formed on her lips when the bell rang. She went over to answer it. When all the newcomer did was stare at her speechlessly, she gently stroked their cheek. “Should I just expect you to stare at me whenever we go out? It’s becoming a common occurrence.”
“I’m sorry. You look… You look really beautiful.”
Her smile became happier. “Thank you. As do you, actually. Should’ve figured that you’d look good in fancy clothes but funnily enough, the thought never crossed my mind.” She closed the door behind her, took Bandō’s hand and started walking.
He smiled at her. “Thank you.”
She grinned at him and kissed his cheek. “Happy birthday.”
“It’s already off to a great start.”
She chuckled. “What are you talking about? It’s already five.”
“You still texted me a happy birthday, said that you had something planned and want to spend my birthday with me. Couldn’t ask for anything more.”
“Of course. You’re…” She stopped talking when something came to mind. “Wait, did we become that when we said it or is that something else? Should I ask now, or would it be weird?” she said under her breath.
“Aiko?”
“Ah, um… Time for a possibly dumb question.”
“What?”
She opened and closed her mouth before asking in the smallest voice possible, “Would you consider us boyfriend and girlfriend? Like we never really made it official. And I mean like, I understand. All things considered, we really haven’t been going out that long, but we did say that we love each other so um…”
He stared at her speechlessly. In his mind they were. They were boyfriend and girlfriend. But somehow, he had never thought of bringing it up. He had just started calling her that after their confession. “Yeah,” was all he could say.
She happily nodded. “Okay. Just wanted to be sure that we were on the same page. Would be pretty embarrassing if we weren’t.” She awkwardly smiled at the ground. “So, what I was going to say was. Of course I’m doing all of that. You’re my boyfriend.”
A bright blush sprang on his cheeks. He was so caught off guard by the way in which she had said it that he couldn’t think of anything to say in return. So, all he could do was look at the ground embarrassed. “Still, thank you.”
She giggled. “Nothing.”
As they were making their way to the place she had picked out, Aiko’s eyes were moving from her boyfriend to the ground to everywhere around her. Is it possible that he’s not used to it? None of the guys seem to be the type to be especially kind towards him. Not in that way at least that they’d go out of their way to say kind stuff to him. Kyashi is but I guess it’s not something that would happen often. Damn. Now I want to give him a hug.
Bandō placed his hand on her head. “Hey, you okay?”
She quickly nodded. “Thinking about a character that I just now realised really deserves so much love. And I think those around him might not have been giving him all the love he deserves.”
“That sucks. Hopefully, he’ll find someone.”
She nodded with a slight smile. “I feel like he has. But compared to how long he’s been alive, the time they’ve known each other really hasn’t been that long. Just a few months, you know, so um … it’s difficult.”
“Does he have a lot of years ahead of him?”
A soft smile formed on her lips. “Probably yeah. If he doesn’t do anything dumb like get in some kind of accident.”
“See you’re dealing with another dumbass then.”
“Yeah. What can I say? I love me a dumbass.” She held his hand in both of hers and grinned up at him. “But you’re definitely my favourite.”
“Really? Because I don’t think I’ve done that much dumb stuff.”
She chuckled and shook her head. “It doesn’t have to do with the amount. Damn. How do I explain it?” She smiled up at him gently. “You’re just my favourite person out there, so that’s why you’re also my favourite kind of dumbass.”
Within seconds, he had his arms wrapped around her, holding her in a tight hug. “Thank you.”
She gently rubbed his back. “Nothing.”
The rest of the walk, he didn’t look much at her since he didn’t want her to see just how much the words were getting to him. Sure, it was in a good way. They made him happy. They made him feel good. But that didn’t change the fact that he wasn’t used to something like that. However, when he started recognising where they were, he looked up. “Huh?”
Aiko smiled up at him. “Recognise where we are? We’re almost there.” She smiled at him knowingly before leading him to a restaurant. “What d’you say? Aren’t I an amazing girlfriend?” she asked in a slightly playful tone.
“Yeah. You are,” he said seriously.
She blinked at how it had been said. She had just wanted to say something silly, but he had agreed within seconds. She smiled before going inside and told one of the waiters she had a reservation.
“You reserved a place here?” Bandō asked surprised.
“’Course. It’d be pretty sucky if we came all the way here and there was no place to sit. It’s your big day so you deserve to enjoy it.” She smiled at him one last time before sitting down.
“Yeah. But um… I don’t mind.” He grabbed his head. “No. That’s not what I meant. Thank you. I really appreciate it.”
She reached over and gently stroked his cheek. “It’s what you deserve, so don’t worry about it.”
He felt like melting at the touch. Luckily, he still had enough sense in him to pick up his menu and look through it.
Aiko thought as she looked through her own menu, It’s like so much is foreign to him. It’s so weird. He’s so amazing. How hasn’t he been with anyone decent until now? She bit the inside of her lip in thought. “Maybe a strange question…”
He looked up at her.
“How successful was your dating life before you met me? Like um … did you go out with anyone else or have feelings for anyone or something?”
He looked down in serious thought. “I tried and failed. Once unpopular, always unpopular.”
“Strange. You’re good looking and strong and are smart at what you do, plus you’re kind-hearted and are willing to do stuff for others. I don’t understand…” She looked down sadly. “No. I do. It’s because you’re also quite quiet.”
“I guess. But that’s all in the past now.” He smiled jovially. “Doesn’t matter because I have the best-looking girlfriend out there. Most beautiful.”
A broad smile spread across her lips as she looked at him fondly. “Thank you.”
After they had ordered their food and their drinks had arrived, Aiko thought it would be an appropriate time to give him her gift. She picked up her handbag and held onto the present. “I also got something for you.”
“Hm?” He slowly put his glass down. He couldn’t think of anything more to say or do so just stared at her, waiting for her to do something.
She looked down and presented him with something small and wrapped up. She wouldn’t directly look at him. Buying presents wasn’t her strong suit. Not unless she knew exactly what to get the recipient. What she was giving him now was a combination of an almost endless internet search and her thinking by herself. She wanted it to be perfect and felt it was fitting for him but she was still scared it wasn’t enough.
Bandō slowly unwrapped the present. It felt like a book, so he wondered what it could be. When he saw what it was, he came to an entire standstill.
“Um… Bandō?” Aiko asked unsurely when she saw the absolute lack of response.
He managed to shake his head. Something was building in his mind that he didn’t want to pay any attention to. It was far too early for that anyway. “Thank you. I really like it,” he finally managed to say. He composed himself by taking in a deep breath and put his present, a day-planner, to the side. He looked from his girlfriend to the table. His hands were clasped. “You can call me by my first name if you want. If you want.”
She giggled. “You said it twice. Thank you. Saburōta’s such a beautiful name.” She smiled at him teasingly. “It’s so nice and can be shortened to such a cute nickname, San-chan.”
His face flushed red. There was so much about her that he still had to get used to and her playful side was the most difficult one of them all. It just sprung up out of nowhere. First an annoyed smile, then a fond smile formed on his lips. She’s really amazing. ’Course I love her, ’course I want to spend the rest of my life with her. He smiled at her with the fullest of love. I don’t mind what happens in the future, as long as she’s a part of it. I’ll deal with anything that comes our way.
Aiko was starting to get embarrassed by the gaze she was being met with. She opened and closed her mouth in an attempt to say something, but no words came out. So instead, she shyly smiled at the table and picked up her glass. “Has he always called you that?”
He rested his head on his fist. “Yeah. Ever since we were kids.”
She let out a soft chuckle. “Cute. And what did baby Saburōta think about that?”
He looked down in thought. “He didn’t mind. But as time went on, he got more annoyed.”
“Because his pettiness was starting to show,” she said in a soft voice.
He sighed. “Yeah.”
She smiled at him intrigued. “Do you still hold any petty feelings towards anyone?”
“No.”
Her smile broadened slightly. “So, everyone’s off the hook in your book?” She chuckled slightly at her own word play.
“No.” The look in his eyes became serious. He looked away from her since he didn’t want to startle her with it. “There’s still someone but I don’t hate him for any kind of petty reasons.”
She blinked surprised. “Hate?” she said in a small voice. She could hear how serious he was about it, how much he meant those words. “Who?”
He clenched his teeth. “Daiki,” he said in a low voice.
Her body shook from the surprise, the shock at hearing something like that. Even she didn’t hate Daiki. Sure, he had hurt her emotionally and mentally, she would continue being afraid of him, but her feelings had never turned into full on hate. She held her hand to her face, hiding her mouth, which was twitching, wanting to smile but also not. “You actually … hate him?” she was finally able to say.
Anger flared in his eyes. Though only for a second. “Yes. Even if I don’t know what happened, I know what I saw that day. I know I saw a creep desperately trying to talk to you while you clearly wanted nothing to do with him. I saw someone who wouldn’t listen to anything you had to say, someone who had no respect for you whatsoever. Those are more than enough reasons to hate him.”
Happy. She was feeling truly happy. For someone to care so much about her that they would hate someone who had hurt her. She could feel tears forming in her eyes.
Not a second later, Bandō was out of his chair and was crouching down beside her, so he was at the same eye-height. He gently rubbed her shoulder.
“You’re… You’re such a dumbass.”
He gave her a gentle smile. “It’s one of those things that will never change.”
She let out a weak chuckle. “Yeah. Which is alright.” She lightly ruffled his hair. “You’re still smart in other areas. And even if you were the dumbest in all areas, you’re still an amazing person, so that would hardly matter.”
“Thank you.” He reached into his pocket and took out a tissue. “Here.”
“Thank you,” she said as she accepted the tissue. With it she dried her tears and blew her nose. She rubbed any remaining tears away with the back of her hand. “Sorry about that. Um… I’m an emotional mess, so yeah.”
“You feel things differently than me, that doesn’t make you an emotional mess.” He stopped talking when the waiter arrived with their food. After he had left, he continued, “There’s nothing wrong with crying easily or at the wrong moment or something. They’re your feelings. And crying’s good, right? Kyashi sent a whole post at some point about how crying actually helps regulate emotions.”
She smiled softly. “Really?”
“Yeah. So, there’s nothing wrong with what happened. At all.”
She nodded with a slight smile before starting her meal. He’s so chill about everything. It’s amazing. He’s had his whole life to become like this, after all. And amazing people around him. I’m happy for him. I’m glad he got a good life. She looked down regrettably. Even if not all of it was good. “It’s good food. I’m not surprised this is your favourite restaurant.”
“Glad you like it. It is. How did you know?”
She smiled guiltily. “Might have asked around.”
“Huh?” Did any of his friends know this was his favourite place? He had only ever come here with his family. Shōhei would make sense. But even when it came down to him, he wasn’t sure how he could know. “Who?”
She could feel her face burning up as she averted her gaze to the side. “Kyashi … helped me with … contacting your family. She did most of the interacting. We didn’t talk about my relationship with you. I just said we were close and that that I wanted to surprise you for your birthday. Then they brought up this place, so yeah…”
His mouth hung open as he stared at her. How was it possible for someone to be so amazing and thoughtful in so many ways? She had gone out of her way to contact someone she didn’t know to help surprise him. Even if it had been with outside help, it was still amazing. He held his hand against his forehead and let out a broken chuckle.
“Saburōta?”
“You know, you didn’t have to do all that for me, right? Any old restaurant would have been fine. As long as it was with you. You’re what’s making this day special. I um…” He stopped talking when he felt a wetness on his cheeks. He felt it and was surprised to see there were actual tears streaming down his face.
“Oh,” came out in a small voice before she left her chair to hug him. Her right hand gently stroked his head while her left hand held onto him.
“See? Crying’s normal,” he said, even though his mind was swirling. How could something like that happen? This had never happened before. Never. But then again, all the things that were happening concerning Aiko were new.
She nodded her head. After a bit, she let go and sat down again. She quickly blinked away the tears that had formed in her eyes. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah,” he said, even though he wasn’t entirely sure.
A pained smile flickered on her lips. “Of course you don’t know. But I guess um … that you were experiencing too many emotions for your body to properly deal with it. It was like ‘enough is enough’ and made you cry. Like that post probably said, it’s handy that way.”
“Yeah. I should look at it again. It’s been ages since I’ve read it.”
“Do you know why she sent it?”
“She thought it was cool. She likes sharing random things she finds out. Or she tells them to us, or we have to find out via text.”
She let out a small chuckle. “Sounds like fun.”
“You think?”
She nodded. “To have the ability to share whatever you find on the internet with your friends and those closest to you. No matter what. That must be so nice,” she said, with a hint of wistfulness to her voice.
“Yeah. Guess. So, you can always share anything you want with me.”
She nodded with a slight smile, unsure whether she would. It was a nice thing, and she did want that, but even with him she didn’t feel there yet. Even when it came down to Zuri, there were certain things she didn’t want to share. Even if his reaction was as calm as always, she still wasn’t sure. She let out a slight sigh. I’m thinking about too much too early. It’s going well. Just think about it like that.
The rest of the meal, the pair talked about all kinds of things. The more they talked, the more enjoyable it became.
“Okay, question,” Aiko said with a slight playful smile. “So, you’ve said you haven’t done that much dumb stuff, implying that you have in fact done dumb things. Which is yeah, human. Who doesn’t do dumb stuff every so often? But I’m curious, what’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever done?”
A thought crossed his mind. But instead of saying anything, he looked at his dessert plate. “Can’t think of anything.”
She smiled at him gently. “Cool.” She cocked her head. “I… I once went to a party with Zuri and got pretty drunk. It’s not dumb in the general way, but I’m not exactly proud of it.”
He looked up at her surprised. “You got drunk?”
She chuckled. “First and only time, don’t worry. And it’s not like I was totally not with it by the end. I was like just a bit tipsy, couldn’t walk in a straight line to save my life. Luckily, I had my saviour there or who knows what would have happened.”
“Yeah.” He had no problems imagining what could have happened. And he was so, so glad that none of it had. She didn’t deserve anything bad after all.
After everything had been eaten, Aiko asked for the bill. She saw Bandō opening his mouth and shook her head. “It’d be wrong for you to pay anything. It’s fine. It’s my treat.”
He wanted to argue against her. It was like she was showering him in kindness, and he was giving her nothing in return. Small bits here and there maybe, but not enough.
After the waiter had left, she looked at him compassionately. “You okay?”
“You’re really amazing, you know that.”
“Thank you,” she said with a fond smile.
“But am I doing enough? Because it’s like you’re doing so much more than me.”
“Ah,” she said in realisation. Dammit. ’Course I ended up forgetting that EFJs love doing stuff for people. It makes them happy. And I’m not giving him a chance here. She took in a deep breath and held her hands together. “You are. You being you is more than enough. What you do makes me happy. The things we talk about, what you say, everything. It just makes me so happy. And because of that I want to do this for you. I want to show my appreciation in some way because I’m not always the best in um … expressing myself. So, it ended up like this. Because you deserve the best birthday and I wanted it to be celebrated properly.”
He looked down in serious thought. “Thank you,” was all he could think of saying in the end.
She smiled at him. “Want to go somewhere or shall we just relax here for a bit more?”
“Could we go to my place?”
“’Course. Anything you want, birthday boy,” she said with a bright smile. She put on her coat and was by his side within seconds, with her hand in his. She gently stroked his hair. “How did you usually celebrate birthdays? When you were part of HOMRA and after that?”
“We usually just had a cake and some drinks. And then we would do whatever the lucky one wanted. After that…” — he sighed — “I dunno. Everyone wishes me a happy birthday, but we’ve got such busy lives it’s difficult to celebrate properly.”
She nodded. “I see.” She blinked when she realised something. “You had a cake for dessert but is that enough?”
“Yes,” he said with a smile.
She nodded. “Okay. Next year… Next year, I’ll see.”
He was surprised to hear her already talking about next year. That meant that she too wanted this relationship to last. He smiled at her affectionately. “Hey, Aiko,” he started.
“Hm?” she looked up at him.
“When it comes down to personality types and relationships, are there some that are better at long term relationships than others?”
She chuckled. “Better might not be the right word, but yeah. So like SP types, they take things one day at a time. So Yata and me are the biggest victims of that, but Kyashi’s good at keeping up which is nice. Because of that, they’re not always good at being in long-term relationships, because that’s more than one day at a time thing. A relationship takes dedication and all other kinds of stuff.” She let out a soft laugh. “But, and I really like that thing about my type, the ISFP does want a lifelong relationship. The only SP type that does. So, I um … yeah… that’s nice. The other types are also generally better at it and take their commitments seriously. But you can’t really say too much about it since we know someone who is both an ESFP and in in a long-term relationship, to quote Hinata “One day to be married”.” She smiled at the ground awkwardly.
This was good. This was good. It indicated that she wanted the same thing as him. A proper, long-term relationship. The happiness that he was feeling escaped through a broad smile. “It really is a handy mechanism.”
She chuckled. “My thoughts exactly.”
Eventually, they made it to his apartment. Aiko smiled at the fact that it was still as clean as ever. So much better in real life. She took her shoes off and entered. She smiled at her boyfriend. “So, now that we’re here, what you wanna do?”
Instead of saying anything, he brought her into a tight hug.
She kissed his cheek. “You’re so cute.” She ran her fingers through his hair. “Hope I didn’t go too far in anything. I’m not always great at understanding people.”
He shook his head. “Everything was perfect. Absolutely perfect.”
She smiled gently. “Glad to hear that.” A blush formed on her cheeks as an idea came to mind. “You know, we could um … we could, you know, like possibly continue this somewhere more comfortable. If you want. Like not to say that this isn’t comfortable. This isn’t bad, it’s just ah…”
He removed himself from the hug and looked at her confused. “What?”
She could feel her face burning up from embarrassment. She covered it with her hands. “Cuddle, you know,” she said in the quietest voice possible. “What we sometimes do on the sofa. It’s a different level of closeness than a hug, I think. Um…” The prospect in itself wasn’t that embarrassing, they had done it before after all. Just talking about it was. Bringing up that she actually felt like cuddling with him.
He looked at her surprised. He indeed wanted to; it just hadn’t come to mind with his need to hold her the moment they had entered the apartment. And she was being so cute about it. He gently stroked her cheek and kissed it. “Okay. Where would you like to continue?”
The word entered her mouth, but she couldn’t bring herself to say it. This was a good relationship. A good relationship. Where the guy loved and respected her. One where he was considerate towards her needs. She took one of his hands in hers. “Bed,” she said, barely louder than a whisper.
He gently rubbed the back of her head. “You sure? You seem nervous.”
“Emotions. I am. It’s just this is new, and I love being close to you. This…” She held up his hand. “Just feeling this gives me a sense of security but putting that kind of stuff into words is really difficult. So, you know, it’s fine. I want this.” She smiled up at him tenderly. “I want to give the birthday boy the best birthday cuddles he deserves. In his bed.”
He touched her head with his free hand. “Thank you,” he said while turning in the direction of his room.
She smiled at him. “Nothing. You know, since I’ve never been there before, now I’m also curious to see how orderly that is. Keeping the main rooms clean, as much as I suck at it, not always difficult. Keeping the bedroom clean, on the other hand, is a challenge and a half.”
He opened the door. “Judge for yourself.”
She shook her head with a smile — a mixture of disbelief and affection. Of course it looks perfect. Her eyes moved to the man standing beside her. Everything about him is. Perfectly flawed. Just the way I like it. Her smile became more excited. “Let’s get to it then. The night has just begun, and we still have some hours left of your birthday.”
The look he gave her was one of pure love. He didn’t say anything as he went towards his bed alongside her before bringing her close to her, glad to have someone like her by his side.