Work Text:
With senior year comes a newfound sense of rebellion. The thirst to do something wild and crazy, like they do in the movies, without worrying about the consequences because for once they’re free.
They’re free. From entrance exams and volleyball practice. From stressing over what’s next, what’s in their future, what more can they do — all of them going to sleep at night with smiles on their faces and acceptance letters under their pillows, assured that they aren’t going to end up as the family failures and be mocked for the rest of their lives. At least not yet.
Their teachers have lightened up the load as well. The closer they draw to graduation, the more lenient they become and Tooru is happy to report that tonight might have been the first night since he started his elementary education that he didn’t have hours of homework to keep him busy until the sweet release of death.
In fact, the only one still trying to push for them to learn is their English teacher. Unsurprising (given her history) but even she’s eased up. Assigned them to read two poems, neither of which any of her students have actually read because why do today why you can do right before class tomorrow?
Instead, Tooru finds himself enjoying a self-care day with Iwa, both treating themselves to icy cold sodas after a pick-up game with Makki and Mattsun at the park, followed by steamed buns and ice cream topped with mochi and a whole lot of raucous laughter.
All in all, it’s a fantastic evening and when they get back to their street, Tooru squeezes his best-friend-boyfriend’s hand. Turns towards to his house with a smile on his face and lumbers inside to fall face first onto his bed, body already settling into a well earned food-coma.
That was all nearly seven hours ago, however. It’s currently three a.m. according to the digital clock on Tooru’s nightstand and he’s wide awake with the inexplicable urge to go do something insane, though he’s unsure what.
Stealing a stop sign is out of question. It’s too much effort to unscrew the rusty little screws and he knows he’s going to get bored after the first few are out — if he even makes it that far in the first place. On the all-encompassing list of super sexy crimes, stealing traffic signs is right next to pilfering gumballs from the pharmacy in terms of clout.
The next idea is breaking into someone’s house but he quickly vetoes that one as well. There are too many intricacies that go into that plan, including finding a house that is, one, abandoned since he doesn’t want to actually run into anyone on this rendezvous and, two, trespassable in a way that doesn’t involve the cops being called.
He’s already applied for his passport and any discrepancy in less than exemplary behavior could cause a delay or overall cancelation in its issuance and he cannot let that happen. Not after how hard he’s worked to get to this point.
And besides, breaking into a house by yourself is, as previously mentioned, lame, which he is not, and so he quickly moves onto the next item on his list: foraging through his parents’ liquor cabinet. A brilliant idea if only his parents could be normal and have some liquor for him to steal. But, no, ten months ago, his mom decided to put them all on a new love-yourself diet (popularized by some KPop idol who also has a few soju promotions under her belt, so who really knows what’s true) and emptied all of her husband’s bottles along with Tooru’s dreams to be a teenage miscreant down the drain.
He huffs under his breath as he rolls over onto his side and watches the numbers on the clock change. Iwa’s parents have some liquor that they keep for when guests come over and he’s sure that they wouldn’t mind him sneaking some. Though, Iwa might. And, then, there’s that whole clause about how doing this kinda shit by yourself is lame. He needs to make sure that there is some record of this event for posterity, which now means he needs a partner in crime and the first person that comes to mind is Iwa.
Iwa. Iwa. Iwa!
As always, his beloved best friend comes in clutch and, suddenly, he knows exactly what he’s going to do.
The Iwaizumis don’t have any rocks in their garden. Iwa’s mom had them all removed when she renovated the area with strict instructions to ensure that not even a single blade of grass was out of place.
Rocks, both artificial and real, are apparently no longer in fashion, and were immediately replaced with fake grass that Iwa’s puppy has peed on far too many times, much to the agony of his mother.
Lucky for Tooru, however, his own mother holds no such perceptions and there is a plethora of smooth rocks outside their house for him to choose from.
He shovels handful after handful of the pebbles into a plastic Lawson’s bag before trotting across the street, a bluetooth speaker tucked under his arm.
Iwa’s parents aren’t home. They’re visiting his grandparents in Tokyo and so he feels confident in his plan as he sneaks in through the back gate lugging his wares alongside.
He sets them down on an overturned plastic garden chair, chunks of the legs chewed out from when Iwa’s puppy was teething, and pulls his phone out of his back pocket. There’s approximately twenty minutes of battery left on the darn thing, but he figures it will be enough and sets about pairing the device to the speaker.
The speaker trills as it powers on before turning off and Tooru huffs under his breath in annoyance.
“Fucking piece of garbage,” he grumbles, smacking the pill against his leg as the bluetooth refuses to connect, dying whale sounds blaring from the mesh, and wondering if he should run back to his house to grab his guitar.
That idea evaporates just as quickly as it manifests and he returns to beating the speaker against his knee, turning his phone on and off and considering chucking it into the sun.
Playing the guitar would be a great solution. A romantic one. But he only knows one song and he highly doubts that “Highway to Hell” is what Iwa wants to be roused out of a deep slumber with.
That is, if Iwa even wants to be roused out of his slumber at all. There is a tiny voice in the back of his mind, warning him to think of the consequences to his actions, but before he can overthink it, he tosses the speaker to the side and holds up his phone. Selects the curated serenading playlist that some sad fool thankfully thought to put together on Spotify, turns the device so that its God-given built-in speaker is pointed at Iwa’s window, and maximizes the volume.
No, this is going to be good. This is going to make a wonderful memory that they’re going to laugh about in the future. He just knows it.
He clears his throat before tugging the plastic bag open and wrapping his fingers around the first stone. And then, without any more consideration as to what exactly he’s doing, he reels his arm back, wrist bent slightly outward, and aims for the dead center of Iwa’s window.
The first toss is a bit off target and he huffs before picking up a few more stones in his palm, pushing the first between his fingers and trying again.
This time is a bit better, though it falls a little short, bounces off the edge of the balcony, and he rolls his shoulders, prepared to stick the landing on the third.
And stick it does. The rock flies right through Iwa’s curtains — a surprise to Tooru since he thought the window would be closed. But, it’s a warm evening and he knows his boyfriend tends to run a higher temperature than most and so, he doesn’t give it much thought.
Instead, he lets another rock fly through the curtains and then another, cheering when he hears the muted clatter against the wooden flooring.
Five more rocks in and the lights turn on and that’s when Tooru puts the next step of his plan into action. Namely, the soliloquizing part.
As part of their last unit, their English teacher had them watch some boring-ass classic play that put a good majority of the class into a coma induced by proxy. Tooru still has no idea what has been going on for the good part of the last month, has slept through more lectures than he would like to admit, but he was awake for one particular scene. The one that Sensei stressed is known as one of the most romantic pieces of dialogue in all of English literary history.
And it is that very dialogue that he quickly pulls up on his phone’s cracked screen, hoping that the remaining four percent of battery he has will soldier through until he’s done.
“But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east and Iwa-chan is the sun!” He picks up another rock as he sees a large shadow lethargically approach the balcony, the fat yellow daisies on the curtains Iwa’s mom picked out for him dancing in the evening breeze, and cheers internally. This is romantic. This is so romantic. He’s a genius. “Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moo—”
Before he can finish, however, Iwa jerks the curtains open with the force of Moses parting the sea, behavior completely unexpected of someone being serenaded, his excited teacup Pomeranian yapping at his side. And that’s when Tooru pales.
Because Iwa’s hair is sticking up in all directions, like it always does when he’s having a particularly good sleep. His face is just as scrunchy as it was when they parted ways after the game. And his forehead is bleeding.
Fuck.
“I,” Iwa starts before Tooru can thoroughly process what he’s seeing given that mortal injury was not part of his master plan to sweep Iwa off his feet. He gapes as Iwa swings a leg over the railing and then the other. Toes along the rickety wooden edge barefoot like he’s a motherfucking gorilla about to break free of his zoo prison and not a healthy eighteen year old male with a flourishing future ahead of him. “Am going to. Kick. Your. Ass.”
Tooru sees his life flash before his eyes and he watches in horror as Iwa slides down the banister on the side of his house with practiced ease, treating the tottering rusted pipes of a house that’s been in his family for five generations like playground equipment rather than a death sentence, before lunging for Tooru, murder apparent in his eyes.
“Iwa-chan, no!” Tooru screeches at the tops of his lungs, making sure to use the tips they were given at the last Stranger Danger assembly they attended in middle school (“Be fearless. Do not hesitate. Let the assailant know that you are willing to fight back!” their creepy instructor, who was probably a pedophile himself, had told them). The sound is loud. Shrill. Echoes through the silence of their neighborhood, and then, just to make a point, Tooru screams once more uncaring about who can hear and how it’s nearly four in the middle of the goddamn night.
“Come here!” Iwa yells, swiping for his boyfriend and making a frustrated noise when Tooru dances out of reach with the lithe and dainty footwork of someone who wasn’t just roused from a deep sleep and nearly bludgeoned to death in the process. “I’m gonna make you regret being born!”
Tooru’s dropped his phone in their struggle and the cheesy music has stopped playing. In its place, an ad for the local crematorium’s services blares through the speaker, inviting the listener to move fast, spots are quickly filling up! and Tooru briefly wonders about the odds.
He quickly backpedals as Iwa takes a menacing step forward and then another and because he has no sense of self-preservation when it comes to his best friend or a filter for that matter, he yells, “I was just trying to be romantic!”
“Romantic, my ass. Are you fucking kidding me?” Iwa bellows, lunging forward to wrestle the other into a headlock. “You’re insane. What the hell is your problem?”
The lights of the neighboring houses are starting to flicker on but the pair heeds them no mind. Instead, Tooru grabs at Iwa’s forearm. Starts to tug and pull at it as he flails in his hold but Iwa’s grip is lock-tight.
On any other occasion, Tooru would be impressed. Even compliment his boyfriend for his brute strength and stroke a flirtatious finger down his bicep. But right now, all he can think of is how he has plans. Plans that don’t involve his picture being hung over an altar and his prostrate mother weeping about how he was too young.
He still has some overconfident motherfuckers to put in their place and he refuses to go out without seeing them grovel at his feet.
And so, with the familiarity that can only come with being best friends for so long and the decision to put himself first, he opens his mouth as wide as he can in an act of self defense.
Before he can slam it shut, however, Iwa releases him. Grabs him again so that his wrists are cinched behind his tailbone and backs him up against the sidewall of his house with a grumble.
“Biting me? Really?” Iwa asks, and despite the fact that he’s out of breath, he’s starting to sound slightly less annoyed. “You haven’t been able to pull that one over me since we were seven, stupid.”
“Oh, Iwa-chan remembers all the times I’ve bitten him, does he? I can’t believe it took you that long to—” Tooru snarks with a huff, turning look at his boyfriend and throw some more choice words at him, only to feel his voice die down in his throat.
Goddammit.
The moon is shining down on them. On Iwa in particular. Bathing him in its luminescence and despite the fact that he’s still emanating the energy of an enraged chimpanzee who only got one banana instead of two during snack time, Tooru has never seen him look more handsome.
It’s a cliché thing to do, obviously. Comparing one’s beloved to the moon is a tale as old as time, and Iwa is far shot from the sweet and dainty maidens said odes were written about. In fact, Tooru’s pretty sure Shakespeare would ugly cry if he knew how thoroughly and absolutely Tooru was bastardizing his works. Using his well-thought out words to serenade a person who is, essentially, a Neanderthal with the knowledge to operate a motorized vehicle and all the lyrics to Girls’ Generation’s latest solo (though, it’ll be a cold day in Hell before said Neanderthal actually admits the latter).
Despite all that, Tooru is still rapidly approaching the conclusion that the poets of the past knew what was up. Because, even though Iwa is wearing faded Spiderman pajamas, has a bleeding forehead that is starting to look more concerning by the second, and is squinting at Tooru without his contacts in, Tooru can only think of how beautiful his best friend is. Bathed in the same light that Romeo famously compared Juliet’s beauty to. The same light Shakespeare sat under when he wrote that god-forsaken sappy crap.
Oh, God. He is, objectively, so whipped. There is no going back from this.
Clearly, Iwa has come to a similar conclusion because slowly, his grip starts to loosen and he steps back from the other. Rubs a tired hand over his face.
“Didn’t think your threats through, did you, Iwa-chan?” Tooru taunts, immediately jumping in now that his life is no longer in peril. He rubs a hand over his tender wrist and grins at Iwa who stares back at him in disbelief. “Go on, then. End me. You wouldn’t last one day without me.”
“Oikawa,” Iwa finally says after minutes of silence pass between them. He runs his fingers back through his hair, the spiky locks sticking up endearingly. “I’ve said this a thousand times before and I’m sure you know it yourself, but I’m going to say it one more time and hope that you get the memo: there is something very wrong with you.”
He says it in the tone of an exasperated parent. One who just needs a drink and ten minutes of silence and Tooru wrinkles his nose before replying, “I kiss Iwa-chan in my free time. Of course there’s something wrong with me.”
He sticks out his tongue to fortify his statement, only to squawk loudly when Iwa grabs him by the scruff of his shirt. Tugs him forward and wraps an arm around his waist, the other curling in his hair before pushing their mouths together.
Kissing Iwa was both a learning curve and not when they first started doing it. Because as much as it took for Tooru to realize that he could do this now, freely demand the kisses he so desperately dreamed about prior to them getting together, he had also learned that kissing Iwa was just another facet of life that he was already innately familiar with.
Iwa kisses like he does everything else. Wholeheartedly and without any restraint. He throws his entire self into it, and the evidence is more than prevalent by the way Tooru’s legs are shaking when he finally pulls away, a streak of blood sliding down the side of his face and they should probably take a look at that.
“Next time,” he says, poking Tooru in the forehead. “Can you please tell me before you decide to pull this shit?”
“But that would mess-up the element of surprise.” Tooru wrinkles his nose, though he leans into the other’s weight. Tugs off his shirt and hands it to Iwa to press to his cut before kissing his jaw once again. “Admit it. You’ve dreamt of being serenaded like a beautiful maiden at least once. I know I have.”
“I know you have,” Iwa grumbles and before Tooru can delve deeper, he holds up a hand. “I know everything about you, Oikawa. All the stupid fantasies you have. Just — next time you want to reenact something like this at the crack of Satan’s ass, can I be the one who throws the rocks? My mom only has one kid. I need to stay alive.”
He cracks a smile which elicits a snort from Tooru and then the two are collapsing onto the dewy fake grass in a fit of giggles, the sound echoing through the empty streets. A few minutes later, one of their neighbors, an annoyed looking pre-teen who definitely stayed up all night gaming, cracks open the window and squintly glares at them.
“Can y’all go do that shit where no one else can see you?”
“Aw, did your girlfriend cheat on you again, Minato-kun?” Tooru asks, taking Iwa’s hand and allowing his best friend to jerk him to his feet before dusting off his knees. “You can come over and talk to us about your feelings, you know. It’s not good to keep all that frustration pent up in your tiny little body. We’ll help you out.”
Minato looks horrified at the offer and slams the window shut with a loud yell. “She didn’t cheat on me! We’re taking a break!”
The force is enough to causes the wall to slightly tremble and as more of the surrounding houses’ lights start to turn on, Iwa leads Tooru back to the patio door. “Can you not patronize the neighbors?”
“He should know better than to interrupt when the adults are talking,” Tooru replies, leaning over to grab his phone from where it’s glitching on the concrete. The screen has switched back to Spotify, “Sweet Home Alabama” blaring from the speakers, and he’s forced to power the entire device off when it refuses to pause.
He steps inside first, whips around and rests his forearms on Iwa’s shoulders and leans in close enough that their noses are brushing. “So were you surprised?”
Iwa scoffs. Presses his palm to Tooru’s forehead and shoves him away. The steady trickle of blood has split into three rivers now and as he walks into the kitchen to look for the first-aid kit, Tooru bounding behind, he says, “Surprised is definitely an understatement. Let’s never do this again.”