Archive of Our Own

One day of Hiyori not pestering him was, well, not normal, but happened often enough that Shin just texted him asking him if he was okay. Not getting a response was weird, since usually Hiyori got back to him within seconds about how he was just fine and a little busy so no need to worry—although that response did always make Shin worry anyways. Two days was odd, especially with Hiyori’s continued radio silence, but three was downright alarming.

And that was why Shin was standing in front of the door to Hiyori’s apartment, holding the spare key he’d been given last year. Honestly, he wasn’t really sure what he was doing here, since it wasn’t like he knew what the problem was or if Hiyori was even here—there’d been a couple times when Shin had shown up here on days when Hiyori hadn’t talked to him, and his friend just flat out hadn’t been home at all. But he’d always been back to his usual self the day after, so this was…definitely unusual.

It wasn’t exactly that he was worried about Hiyori, since he could certainly take care of himself better than Shin could. It wasn’t exactly that he missed Hiyori, since it was honestly a bit of a relief to not have his phone going off constantly with his texts. But maybe Shin had still checked his phone, just out of habit, no other reason, and maybe he’d felt a little disappointed when he saw Hiyori still hadn’t said anything, and maybe—maybe—he’d felt a little bit lonely without him.

Either way, here he was, standing outside Hiyori’s apartment door. All he had to do was turn the key and walk in, and if he hesitated much longer someone was going to call the cops on him, so Shin took a deep breath and…went inside.

Inside was…dark. And quiet. Shin was used to this apartment being bright and full of Hiyori’s relentless energy, and it honestly felt a little eerie without it. “Hiyori…?”

No response, but Shin’s voice hadn’t carried very far. He swallowed nervously, and finally deigned to step in farther than the entryway—and found that the apartment was way messier than he could ever remember it being. Normally, Hiyori kept everything neat and tidy, but there were papers haphazardly strewn around the floor, as if someone had been sitting there trying to look over all of them at once, there were snack wrappers and empty soda bottles shoved around, and there was at least one half-eaten convenience store bento that Shin had to step over as he made his way towards Hiyori’s room. The closer he came to the door, the clearer he could hear the harsh, electronic sounds of Hiyori’s preferred coding music, so at least that meant he was here.

The music was clearly audible even through the door, and Shin’s hand went to the doorknob, hesitated, and he tried knocking instead. Nothing. The music was probably too loud to hear anything over, or maybe Hiyori was just so focused on whatever he was working on he didn’t notice. Shin took a deep breath, put his hand on the doorknob again, and then the door got ripped open from the other side and Hiyori lifted him into the air before he could even process what was going on. “Shin! You’re just in time!”

Shin grabbed onto his friend mostly on instinct—his feet were not touching the ground right now—and Hiyori hugged him so tightly it hurt, laughing brightly. “Ahaha! Did you miss me that much? You’re so sweet!”

There was…something strange about Hiyori’s tone of voice. He was almost always bright and cheerful, but his voice was a little bit wild and off-kilter, like someone had dialed him up a few notches, and it was…honestly, it was a little bit scary. It reminded Shin a bit of how he’d felt about Hiyori all the way back when their friendship had first begun. “Wh-what’s got you so excited, Hiyori?”

“I just finished a biiiig project!” They were spinning around now, and that just made Shin cling to Hiyori even tighter. He did not want to fall. “Just as you came in! You really have excellent timing, and that means that you get to be my reward for finishing it up!”

“Wha–” Shin jerked back, as much as he could, at least—Hiyori still had him in a vice grip, but at least now he could get a proper look at Hiyori’s face. His hair was down, green waves over his shoulders, and his eyes were way too bright for comfort, the same way his voice was. “I only came over because I didn’t hear from you for three days! I’m not–”

“Aw, were you lonely without me? Well, don’t you fret! I’m not going anywhere now!” The spinning finally stopped, and Hiyori set Shin down, a little roughly. He staggered back a few steps, feeling dizzy, but Hiyori didn’t seem affected in the slightest. He just kept chattering on and on about nothing, and Shin took a moment to try and collect himself—Hiyori’s music was still playing loudly, the man himself was almost incoherent, and how he was acting was even weirder than he normally was. This whole setup sucked. “Hey, Shin, are you listening to me? Come on, look at me!”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m listening,” Shin lied. “Are you…okay? How long were you working on that?”

“Since I woke up a few days ago! I had a deadline I forgot about, so I needed to push through to finish it!” Hiyori skipped—skipped—back over to his computer desk and finally hit pause on the music, and now it was blessedly quiet. “What about you? How are you, Shin?”

Shin ignored him. “Have you…slept in the last few days?”

“Nope,” Hiyori chirped happily, and Shin felt all his worries getting progressively worse. No wonder he was acting so weird. At least he knew Hiyori had been eating based off the mess outside, but he’d really never seen his friend such a wreck before—despite how erratic and eccentric he seemed, he tended to at least keep himself and the space around him neat and tidy. It really must’ve been something important, maybe. “Hey, Shin—”

He was used to Hiyori being a little clingy, but this was getting ridiculous. “Hiyori, you need to sleep. Right now.”

He grabbed Hiyori’s wrist and started dragging him over to the bed in the corner, and luckily Hiyori trailed along after him. “But you just got here! I want to spend more time with you!”

“You can do that after you’ve rested, okay?” Hiyori could be…disarmingly candid sometimes, and Shin never knew what to make of it when he was. It was embarrassing, mostly. “You’re acting like a little kid. Come on, you need to–”

Shin tugged a little harder on Hiyori’s wrist, and then several things happened in really short order. Shin had been expecting a little more resistance from Hiyori, but Hiyori was so tired he just stumbled forward. The lack of resistance caught Shin off balance, and he stumbled backwards, his legs smacking against Hiyori’s bedframe and—

And now they were both collapsed on Hiyori’s bed, Shin getting smushed by how heavy he was. Hiyori was taller and stronger than him, but he’d never realized how much heavier Hiyori would be than him, and getting caught underneath him like this sucked. “Hey, Hiyori, get off—”

He turned his head to see if Hiyori was just grinning at him, but…he wasn’t. Hiyori had fallen asleep as soon as he’d become horizontal, apparently, his eyes closed, his breathing even, his face…peaceful, as he let it rest on Shin’s chest. He really had been completely exhausted. Of course he was, that was exactly why Shin had been trying to get him to sleep, but…he hadn’t exactly been expecting…this.

Shin sighed. He couldn’t go waking him back up like this, even if he was pinned to his bed right now. Besides, it wasn’t often that his friend looked so…at peace. Hiyori was always moving, always talking, always had some bright idea or some too-cheery comment to make, and while Shin didn’t mind it as much now as he had a few years ago, it was still nice to see him calm and relaxed like this.

He ended up just laying there for a while, letting Hiyori rest on him, until Shin realized he couldn’t dig his phone out of his pocket because of the angle he’d gotten stuck at. Hiyori was a pain even in his sleep. What a talent. Really, he would’ve been fine being Hiyori’s pillow if he’d had something to do, and…and he wasn’t going to think too deeply into what that meant.

It took a while to pull himself out from underneath his friend, partially because of how heavy he was, and partially because Shin didn’t want to wake him up by moving too much too fast, but eventually he had himself out, all of Hiyori’s limbs on the bed, and his head on a pillow softer than Shin’s bony ribcage. Hiyori was still fast asleep, and…honestly, Shin wasn’t sure what to do now.

It was still the middle of the day, and sunlight was streaming into the room through the open windows until Shin decided it would probably be a good idea to close the blinds for Hiyori’s sake. He didn’t really know if Hiyori was a light sleeper or not, since he’d actually never seen his friend sleep before; Shin always fell asleep before him and woke up after him, and it wasn’t like they slept in the same room or anything when he stayed over here. It was kind of…odd, reflecting on how he didn’t know something so simple and basic about Hiyori even after years of having been so close with him.

Shin flicked out the lights next, and…then stared at Hiyori’s computer. It was still on, the screen bright in the darkness, and while common sense and basic decency told him to not go digging through his friend’s work projects, he was honestly extremely curious about them. He’d never had much of a chance to look through Hiyori’s computers before, since Hiyori never left his apartment for very long, but who could blame him for wanting to know more about him? Hiyori was…

…Hiyori was a lot of things. Scary, sometimes. Blunt and straightforward. Childish and cheerful. Amazingly talented and brilliantly smart. Shin wanted to know more about him. He really didn’t know much about his personal life at all—where had he grown up? Where were his parents? How was he supporting this nice apartment of his? What kind of job was he actually working? He always had so many questions, but Hiyori had always been just evasive enough to answer them without actually telling him any of the details. Maybe Shin shouldn’t have been trying to pry into stuff his friend clearly didn’t want to talk about, but who wouldn’t look at Hiyori Sou and end up fascinated by him?

He sat himself down in Hiyori’s silly egg chair—it was comfortable, he did have that to say for Hiyori’s taste—and started up the screen. Both of them knew all of each other’s passwords, that was just a given with how much time they’d spent together in this room, and Shin typed in Hiyori’s. His desktop popped up, the background yet another picture of Shin’s smiling face, and then a file opened in front of him, presumably what Hiyori had been working on. Shin glanced over the lines of code and…made a face at it.

Hiyori’s poor state was showing in his work. It was riddled with basic spelling and syntax errors, and after he scrolled up a bit to look through more of it, he was pretty sure about half of these commands didn’t actually connect to anything. Hiyori had spent all that effort trying to put this together for his deadline, and he hadn’t even managed to actually put together something that could work at all. Even Shin could tell that, and he wasn’t anywhere near as good at parsing how coding worked as Hiyori himself was.

He’d learned pretty much everything he knew about programming from Hiyori himself, so he could at least understand the logic behind how Hiyori’s code worked. There was a specific kind of flair to them that Shin had more-or-less started to mimic without meaning to, but that was an inevitability when his teacher had such a distinctive style—and Hiyori had teased him relentlessly about it when he’d realized how similar their code had become. It was embarrassing, honestly, but Shin wasn’t about to change the only way he knew how to compose things just because his friend loved to bully him, and it made it easier for Hiyori to explain things to him when he had questions about how things worked. It was only natural that they’d end up similar, right?

Shin hesitantly placed his fingers on the keyboard. If he could go over the entire code and figure out what it was supposed to do and how it was supposed to do it, he could fix this up for Hiyori before he woke up. Hiyori’d be so impressed with him for fixing his mistakes like that. He’d get to show off, and Hiyori would give him praise that didn’t sound totally overblown and disingenuous for once, and…and he wasn’t sure what the hell he was fantasizing about right now. Fantasizing about his best friend praising him? What the hell was his problem? Shin shook his head and was about to take himself to the top of the code to try and figure out what this routine was supposed to do until he noticed in the bottom corner line 367,893.

Nope. Hiyori was going to have to deal with this himself when he woke up. Shin was not messing with that.

…It really would’ve been nice to do something like that for Hiyori, though.

Shin sighed and pulled himself out of the chair. At the very least, he could neaten up Hiyori’s apartment for him a little bit while he slept, so that he wasn’t waking up to the mess it was now.

There were energy drink cans scattered around Hiyori’s side of the desk, and Shin started gathering them up in his arms—they were all the same brand, same flavor, and he hadn’t realized that Hiyori had such a specific favorite energy drink, or that he liked them at all. It felt just a little bit…uncomfortable that he didn’t know such a basic, simple thing about him.

Shin piled the cans in Hiyori’s chair for the time being as he looked around for any other pieces of trash he could take out, illuminated by Hiyori’s desktop screen. There were a few more empty snack bags, a few energy bar wrappers, and a…little tiny glass vial that had a bit of red liquid pooling at the bottom. Shin picked it up and looked at the label on it, which read ASU-NARO - Movit #8 - Test Sample.

He dropped it into a snack bag, crumpled it up, and then shoved that into a can. Not his problem. Not his problem. Where the hell had Hiyori even gotten something like that? Why was he taking it? A test sample? That didn’t sound good at all. He wasn’t going to suddenly die in his sleep or something, was he?

Shin stepped out into the main room again, delicately stepping over the mess on the floor out there, and moving into the eerily neat kitchen so he could pull out a trash bag from under the sink. He knew where pretty much everything in this apartment was, since Hiyori was a creature of habit, and liked keeping everything in its exact place where he always knew where it was. It had been kind of annoying at the beginning, since Shin was…admittedly more of a slob, but he’d adapted easily enough. It might be a problem if they ever ended up actually living together, though…not that that was, you know, something Shin thought about often. Sure, they did already spend days and even weeks at a time together here, and Hiyori had rearranged his room to give Shin his own section of the space, bought a heater for him, offered him gifts and things that Shin could never possibly repay and…and…

Shin made a face at nothing. If he was going to think about this, he would’ve rather done it while Hiyori was awake and present enough to be serious about it. Not that Shin was thinking about it.

He moved back into Hiyori’s room, and his friend was still dead asleep. Shin shoved all the cans and trash into the same bag, and…and it wasn’t often at all that he got to be alone in Hiyori’s home. It was a bit empty without his friend’s constant, boundless energy filling up the whole entire space.

Shin looked over Hiyori’s desk again, at the things that he normally kept neatly in their proper places. A flash drive that Shin was unfortunately aware contained nothing but pictures of himself had gotten unplugged and replaced by a new one, one he didn’t recognize. Hiyori’s pad of paper had gotten the last few pieces messily ripped off, and those pages had just been crumpled up and shoved into one corner instead of going into the trash can by his feet. His favorite pen—or at least, the only one Shin had ever seen on his desk—was normally kept carefully capped and in a nice-looking pen holder when it wasn’t being used, but now it sat uncapped and off to one side of the papers, so Shin ferreted out the cap and put it where it was supposed to go. Next was…

…Hiyori had moved a few of the pictures he displayed, and Shin could feel something in his chest tightening. Of course he knew about the pictures of him that Hiyori displayed, they were kinda hard to miss, but normally they were kept on a shelf up above the monitors. Right now, two of them—the ones where Shin had been smiling the brightest—were set up on either side of his monitor. Shin felt his stomach flip over inside him, and he gingerly picked up one of them.

Hiyori had taken this picture late one night when Shin was walking home with him, when Hiyori had told some stupid joke and Shin had been laughing his head off about it, and before he’d even realized it, Hiyori’s phone had been in his hand and he’d snapped a picture of Shin’s smiling face. He’d been embarrassed and a little bit upset at the time, but Shin could still remember the way that Hiyori had smiled at his phone at the time, at the moment he’d captured forever.

Shin stared at his own face. It wasn’t like…there was anything particularly spectacular or interesting about him, but he’d never seen Hiyori take pictures of anything else. Sometimes, if they were walking around the city together, Shin would point out a bit of scenery that he thought looked nice, and Hiyori would insist that Shin be part of the photograph’s composition, so he always obliged. It was kind of annoying, kind of weird, and kind of…something else.

He didn’t understand why Hiyori took so many pictures of him. Wouldn’t he ever get bored of staring at someone like Shin?

Shin sighed, and stretched up as high as he could to put the picture frames back where they normally went. Why was he getting all bent out of shape because of a few pictures? It wasn’t like this was out of the ordinary. Hiyori had been taking pictures of him for years. A constant record of his emotions, as long as the two were side by side, and…why did he display them like this? What was so special about Shin’s smile that he’d wanted to stare at it while he’d been working? Shin couldn’t think of anything.

…Well, Hiyori was always staring at him anyways, so maybe it wasn’t anything special at all. He was just overing thinking things, that’s all.

Shin glanced over at Hiyori’s bed, and he was still asleep—of course he was, it hadn’t even been an hour since he’d passed out. He’d never seen his friend so…defenseless before. It was kind of odd seeing him that way. Maybe that was a strange thing to think.

Hiyori was someone who seemed to always be so in control of everything, no matter what it was. He knew exactly what to say and how to say it to get the exact responses he wanted out of Shin—usually just to tease and embarrass him, but sometimes Hiyori would somehow give him gifts and things Shin had wanted before Shin could even mention he wanted them. He was amazingly smart, and it seemed like he knew everything, not just about coding and computers but really just about anything that Shin could think of to ask him, and even if he was sometimes a little mean about it, he’d still always answer Shin’s questions as best he could. He was…someone that Shin idolized, not that he ever wanted Hiyori to know that, since he would’ve never heard the end of it if he ever did.

Shin stepped over to his bed again. A few small rays of light were scattered over Hiyori’s face. He had long eyelashes. He looked like some kind of sculpture in a museum, one that was carved from marble at the careful hands of a master, smoothed to perfection, and Shin wanted to reach out and touch him, just to be sure he actually was…real.

Hiyori really did seem to be too good to be true sometimes. He was everything Shin wanted to be, despite his eccentricities and mean streak. But he was kind as well, in a lot of ways that Shin wanted to be, too.

He stretched his fingers out, and then hesitated a few moments too long. This was…weird. This was weird as hell. Why was he acting like this? He wasn’t going to touch his friend’s sleeping face. He was not.

Shin pulled out his phone instead. Hiyori hated having his picture taken, one of the few things he’d actually get angry at Shin about if he tried, but right now Hiyori was asleep and there was nothing to stop Shin from taking a picture of him the same way that Hiyori took tons of pictures of him. He held his phone up, staring at Hiyori’s sleeping face through the viewfinder, at the way wisps of green hair framed his cheeks, at…

God dammit. He was not taking pictures of his friend in his sleep. That was even weirder than touching him.

Shin shoved his phone back in his pocket, ignoring the part of himself that was saying he should’ve preserved this moment forever the way Hiyori loved to do to him, and forced himself to turn away from him. It was, shamefully, a somewhat gargantuan effort.

He took himself out of Hiyori’s room and threw himself on the couch. This was where Shin normally slept whenever he stayed over at Hiyori’s, and it was a comfortable place to ruminate on what the hell was wrong with him. Was he just thinking about these sorts of things because he didn’t have Hiyori’s energy and constant comments and teasing to distract him? Where had all of these feelings come from? It was the fact that they didn’t feel unfamiliar that was somehow the most confusing part of them. Maybe they’d just never been so…overt before. They were uncomfortable. He hated them. He hated that he wanted Hiyori to look at him and praise him, to take pictures together with him, to live together. Someone like Hiyori, someone as amazing as him, would never…do any of those things. It tasted so bitter Shin wanted to go cough up all of these wretched feelings in the bathroom so they’d be out of him forever.

Hiyori would probably laugh at him if he ever expressed any of this. That was just the kind of person he was. He hardly ever took anything seriously, and the rare occasions when he did were always kind of unnerving, and Shin wasn’t sure which was worse—the idea of Hiyori laughing him off, or Hiyori taking him seriously. It was awful thinking about either outcome.

Shin’s heart was pounding unpleasantly. His breathing was getting stuck in his chest. He didn’t want to think about this. He wanted to get back to cleaning Hiyori’s stupid apartment, something he had absolutely no ulterior motives for. It was just something he wanted to do for a friend, as a friend. That was all. There wasn’t anything more to it.

…Hiyori definitely would’ve laughed at him if he saw him like this. Something about that thought was comforting, although Shin couldn’t quite place why.

Shin pushed himself back up, took a deep breath, and started cleaning up the rest of the apartment. He didn’t touch the papers, since that was probably even more sensitive than the code, but he cleaned everything else up and threw out the half-eaten food. It was fine. He was so fine.

A few hours passed, and Hiyori was still asleep. Shin had put his blanket over him since it just didn’t seem right to leave Hiyori out in the open like that and he wasn’t sure where any others were. It was a simple brown blanket Hiyori had bought for him a few years ago, back when he’d first started spending time at Hiyori’s place, because he kept it so cold and Shin was already freezing all the time so Hiyori split the difference by getting Shin a blanket. It was nice, warm, lightweight, and Shin spent a lot of time in this place with it wrapped around his shoulders.

Hiyori had shifted a little in his sleep when Shin draped it over him. He knew that Hiyori didn’t like the heat at all, always griping and running a bunch of fans during the summer, so maybe what was perfect for Shin was too much for him…but he didn’t wake up. Shin wondered what he was dreaming about.

He lingered for another few moments before forcing himself back out to the couch. Waiting for him, exactly where he’d left it, was Hiyori’s phone.

There was a weight on Shin’s shoulders, a pressure that he couldn’t ignore anymore. He’d known Hiyori for years and still knew hardly anything about him, not really. The things he knew were superficial and stupid, and his knowledge of Hiyori’s life outside this apartment was a vast, gaping void. Hiyori was probably his closest friend, and Shin felt like he knew nothing about him at all. Neatening up his apartment had just made that more and more clear to him.

Something inside his gut was twisting up into knots as he tapped in the code for Hiyori’s phone—0402, which was either a coincidence or some kind of weird mind game with Shin—and now Hiyori’s home screen was open in front of him. His background was a different picture of Shin from the last time he’d done this; this one was one Hiyori had actually bothered to ask Shin for before taking it, and he’d given a big smile and a peace sign. Shin had never gone too deep into Hiyori’s phone before, just to look things up when Hiyori asked or delete a few of the more embarrassing pictures that’d been taken of him, but he was changing that now. It was a scary prospect, digging too far into Hiyori’s business, but Shin couldn’t stand not knowing anything about him anymore.

First was checking his contacts. There were…not actually that many. Emiri, Gashu, Michiru…someone whose name was saved as “Meister”...and of course, Shin. No indication of his parents’ numbers, unless he was in the habit of referring to them by first name. Weird. Hiyori apparently hadn’t even checked any of his messages since he started his stupid coding bender, since there were still five unread texts from Shin, so he went into the rest of his messaging history.

Hiyori and Gashu didn’t talk often, judging by their texts, which were mostly severe messages from Gashu telling Hiyori that his assistance wasn’t needed on Project Ranger, whatever that was, and Hiyori telling Gashu that the only thing impressive about him was his mustache. Michiru…sent the most hesitant texts Shin had ever seen in his life, and Hiyori apparently loved taunting her by replying to her within moments and spamming her with replies until she was overwhelmed. Typical of him. He had the most normal conversations with Emiri, but even those were mostly just her griping about him not getting reports in on time and him firing back about how he was busy doing research with Shin, whatever that meant. As for Meister…those were just texts telling him when projects were due. Shin scrolled all the way to the top of their short message history, and Hiyori hadn’t replied to a single one.

Next was checking his email app, but that was about as fruitful as his texts. Nothing of value at all, not even inane stuff like online purchase receipts or anything. It was like Hiyori only existed for whatever his job was and…to be Shin’s friend.

Shin checked his notes app—he actually used it for shopping lists instead of anything interesting—call history—he had a consistent habit of ignoring Emiri’s calls that came several in a row, but there was no real info other than that—and saved pictures—which were nothing but his photos of Shin. It really was as if Hiyori’s life had only started when Shin had first met him.

His stomach was tying itself in knots. This…wasn’t what he’d been expecting to find. Shin wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting to find, but it sure wasn’t this. It felt like the walls of the apartment were closing in on him. This was creepy, wasn’t it? This felt like a scenario pulled straight from some cheap horror flick, except it was Shin’s unmistakable reality.

Uncertain scenarios and desperate attempts to explain this in a way that didn’t sound like his life was some sort of psychological horror film were swirling through Shin’s head when he felt something touching his shoulder. Shin yelped and jerked away and looked up to see…Hiyori, of course. He was staring at him blankly with those turquoise eyes that seemed even more unnerving than they usually were.

Several thoughts passed through Shin’s head at once. First was the fact that Hiyori had not been asleep for nearly long enough to recover from his days-long coding bender. Second was the fact that he was still holding Hiyori’s phone. And third was the fact that Hiyori didn’t seem surprised at all to see him doing this.

“U-um, I—” Words started tumbling out of Shin’s mouth before he could really even think them through, trying to come up with some sort of excuse. “I was just—”

Hiyori’s eyes went from Shin’s down to the phone, at the screen that was still open to his collection of Shin photos, and then back up to Shin, and he grinned. “Find anything interesting?”

“I–I was just deleting some pictures you took I don’t like,” Shin lied, and Hiyori smiled at him the way he always did when he could tell Shin was lying. “You need to stop taking pictures of me when I’m working, got it? I look awful.”

“Aww, but that’s not true! You always look so cute, Shin!” Hiyori plopped himself down on the couch next to Shin, and lazily plucked his phone out of Shin’s hands. He didn’t even bother to check if Shin had gone through anything or messed with things, just tucking it into the pocket of the clothes he still hadn’t changed out of yet. “Thanks for cleaning things up for me, Shin.”

Shin…kind of hated how Hiyori never pushed the issue when he lied about things. “O-of course. I mean…what else was I supposed to do?”

“Mm, well, you could’ve just left it for me to deal with!” Hiyori yawned and then leaned his head against Shin’s shoulder. “I’d’ve gotten to it eventually…at some point…”

He trailed off to nothing, and Shin glanced over at him—he’d closed his eyes again, trying to fall asleep right here on Shin’s shoulder. If he wasn’t really awake yet, why had he bothered coming out here? It was like he had some kind of supernatural sense for when Shin was doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing. Or maybe he’d just been checking to see if Shin was still here—he did say he wanted to spend some time with him before passing out earlier…

Shin sighed, and then shook Hiyori just a little bit. “Hey, don’t fall asleep again yet. You need to get back to bed, and not sleep on me.”

Hiyori grumbled something Shin couldn’t quite catch, and then he latched onto Shin’s arm. “You seem like you’d be comfortable, Shin…”

Shin’s face immediately caught on fire, and he almost shoved Hiyori off of him for that one. “What the hell are you talking about? I’m like, skin and bones. Wouldn’t you be—”

His mouth had gone faster than his brain had, and he’d almost said something he shouldn’t have. It did, at least, get Hiyori off his shoulder, but now he was grinning at him with that knowing look he sometimes had—as if he knew more about Shin than Shin did. It was always uncomfortable being hit with that expression. It…was always uncomfortable, being stared at by Hiyori, with the way it felt like Hiyori was somehow looking inside of him. It always made Shin feel oddly self-conscious, as if he were being assessed somehow.

“A-anyways, you have not been asleep long enough. You said you were up for days, weren’t you?” Shin stood up quickly, trying to get away from that self-conscious feeling, and Hiyori flopped down on the couch where he’d been sitting. “You need to shower and change into something else and go back to sleep. Maybe eat something…”

“Ahaha, what are you, my mom?” Hiyori stretched, looking remarkably like a cat, all the way down to the satisfied-sounding noise he made that Shin pretended he hadn’t heard. “I’ll be fine! I never sleep for very long anyways. You don’t need to worry about me, Shin.”

“Obviously I do! You can’t just shrug off something like—”

Click. Hiyori’s phone was out of his pocket and taking a picture of Shin before he could realize it. Heat rushed to his face and he made a grab for Hiyori’s phone, but Hiyori of course just laughed and rolled over, burying his phone under his chest.

“What was that for?! I’m worried about you, you idiot!” Shin knew full well he wasn’t ever going to win a competition of strength against Hiyori—or anyone else, for that matter—but he still tried to go for his stupid phone anyways. “Can’t you at least try to take this seriously?”

“I am taking it seriously!” Hiyori’s voice was muffled against the couch cushions, but it couldn’t disguise the laughter that was barely being restrained. “That’s why I wanted a picture of you being worried about me, so I’ll never forget about it!”

The gears of Shin’s mind ground to a halt, and his brain cycled through a few possible responses—slapping him for lying to him, asking him if he really meant that, wrapping his arms around him and trapping him until he fessed up to whatever the real truth was. In the end he just mumbled, “...I hate when you say things like that.”

“Is that right?” Hiyori didn’t believe him. Shin didn’t believe himself, either. “I’ll stop saying them, then.”

Something in Shin’s chest twinged painfully at the idea of never again hearing Hiyori say he wanted to remember him. “Do whatever you want.”

“Really? Then I’ll keep saying them!”

Shin hated the messed up, twisted up emotions that were coiling inside of him, ones that were still at the forefront of his mind. Hiyori’s boundless energy hadn’t chased them away the way it normally did, and he kind of resented that. Hiyori rolled over and gazed up at Shin—he looked tired. There were dark circles under his eyes, and he wasn’t nearly as energetic as he normally was. He hadn’t even tied his hair back yet. He needed to take better care of himself.

“Ah… Don’t look so down about it…” Hiyori reached up with one hand, petting Shin’s hair like he was a cat or something. To his shame, Shin leaned into it, just a little bit. “Here, how about this? I’ll give you some cash for food, and while you’re out I’ll shower and change, okay? That’ll make you happy, won’t it?”

“...I’m not happy having to take care of an idiot who should’ve known better in the first place, just so you know.”

Hiyori smiled up at him, so the real meaning behind the words had clearly gotten through.

As promised, Hiyori passed his wallet to Shin, and Shin took off down the street to the convenience store on the corner. The sun was setting and it was starting to get a bit chilly out as the lights of the city started flickering on around him—even at night, this city seemed to radiate life, and Shin was grateful for it.

He pulled his jacket a little bit tighter around himself, shoulders hunched forward as he walked. This was a nice part of town. He’d wondered before how Hiyori could afford to live here all on his own when the two of them were barely adults, and he hadn’t gotten any more insight into that after going through his phone. He’d…well, all his thoughts about it really had all just flown out of his head as soon as Hiyori had touched his shoulder, between how worried he’d been how little sleep his friend had gotten and the way that Hiyori just always seemed to fill up the whole room, even when he was dead tired like that. At least he hadn’t been as overwhelming as he had when Shin had first shown up.

…The contents of Hiyori’s phone, or maybe more accurately the lack of contents, was still weighing on him, though. The chilly evening air was making it feel more ominous than it probably was. Hadn’t Hiyori told him before that he’d always had difficulty making friends or keeping acquaintances? There had to be some sort of normal, mundane explanation for things.

Hiyori was…just a normal person. He was weird, yeah, overwhelming and pushy, a little creepy sometimes, and he could be pretty annoying when he wanted to be, always needling Shin and having the time of his life when he got flustered or uncomfortable. But he was amazing, too, in so many ways Shin could’ve finished the walk to the corner, grabbed their food, and gotten back in the time it took to list them all. Mostly, it seemed like he was everything Shin wanted to be.

So maybe that was why he’d felt so rattled at the complete lack of…life he’d found in Hiyori’s phone. Shin had never considered for even a moment that Hiyori’d still be as much of a loner as the two of them had been back in high school, not when he was clearly so successful in whatever his job was, that was all. It wasn’t anything big, was it? It was normal. It was fine. It wasn’t like suspecting Hiyori was going to do anything but cut Shin off from the only relationship he’d managed to maintain for more than a year.

Shin shoved his hands in his pockets. He wasn’t going to think about this anymore. It wasn’t much, but he knew more about his friend now. That had to be worth something, didn’t it?

He picked up food and drinks from the convenience store, trying really hard to contemplate what would be the healthiest option to get for Hiyori even though it wasn’t like conbini bentos were going to be amazing or anything. As long as it wasn’t expired was really all that mattered. Shin got something warm for himself, and glanced through the drinks, trying to decide what would be best to pick for Hiyori. The same kind of energy drink he’d been subsisting on for the past few days was on one shelf—it was one of those super-sweet ones that tasted more like candy than anything else—and Shin did consider picking it up for a moment before remembering that he was trying to get Hiyori back to sleep, and he ended up grabbing a soda that was probably about the same flavor. This…would be fine. This would be fine.

Shin had never really seen Hiyori get the same thing twice in a row, ever. Even after he worked his way through the menu of the family restaurant they often stopped by, he’d just started working his way through it again, this time in a different order. The fact that someone like Hiyori got all the same of a particular kind of energy drink meant something important, didn’t it?

…He was overthinking things again. Why did he even care this much over something this small? Shin shoved those thoughts to the side of his mind and paid for their food with his own money instead of Hiyori’s.

When he got back, the smell of soap and shampoo hit him as soon as he opened the door. Hiyori sitting on the couch waiting for him and the rest of the room, the stuff that Shin hadn’t touched, was neatened up to the same level that Shin had gotten used to seeing in this place. Hiyori’s hair was wet, he had a towel around his neck, and he’d actually changed into something more comfortable than the button-down shirt and formal pants he seemed to prefer, a plain and basic T-shirt and shorts that Shin felt like he’d never seen before. He wasn’t going to worry about that, though. “I’m back. Hope I got stuff you like.”

“I think anything you could give me is fine, Shin!” That wasn’t a compliment, but Hiyori’s smile was so bright that he decided to…take the comment in the spirit it was made in, whatever that was. Shin passed his food and drink over to him, and Hiyori’s smile widened. “Oh, but I do like these, so well done!”

Shin rolled his eyes and sat down next to him. They ate together like this pretty often, although usually it was punctuated by them both being on their computers, still working or talking excitedly about whatever project they were working on or about some game they were both playing together. It felt…different, not having that.

Hiyori yawned again. “Well, luckily for you, showering didn’t wake me up at all… I could push through it, but I feel like you’d get mad at me.”

“Of course I would. If you don’t sleep properly, you’ll keel over and die.” Shin sipped his soup, his tone not nearly as harsh as his words.

“I could never do that to you! Then you’d be all alone without me, and that’d be just too sad.” Hiyori leaned against Shin’s shoulder again, and he stiffened up just a little. A sleepy Hiyori was…dangerous. “You’re so delicate, it’d just be cruel to leave you on your own for long…”

“I am literally sitting right next to you, you know,” Shin grumbled, and Hiyori laughed. It…was nicer than he ever planned on admitting to hear that Hiyori didn’t want to leave him alone, though.

It had always felt like Shin was just one screwup away from shattering his friendship with Hiyori, like there was some sort of thin line he had to traverse so that he didn’t go and lose the attention of a guy who should’ve been aiming way higher than a scrawny wimp with middling grades and only a few friends from middle school who had, predictably, all moved on without him in a few months. But Hiyori had never seemed to mind any of that. Even when Shin did screw up, Hiyori would always laugh and make fun of him for it, and then he’d hold his hand out and help Shin up and show him how to do it right this time. Even just today, he’d caught Shin snooping through his phone and lying to him about it, and…

He didn’t know what to make of it. If it’d been the reverse, Shin would’ve flipped out about it, but Hiyori didn’t care at all what Shin did, or what he looked at, or what he didn’t do. Any normal person would, but…

Well, but those standards only applied to ordinary, regular people, and Hiyori was anything but that. Shin, on the other hand, was painfully boring, and he knew it.

Hiyori knocked his head against Shin’s lightly, just enough to shake him out of those thoughts. “You still seem down, Shin! Did something happen? Are you okay?”

“I-I’m fine,” Shin lied, and he was glad he couldn’t see the expression on Hiyori’s face right now. “Just…thinking about how glad I am that you're okay.”

“Heehee, of course! It’ll take more than that to take me out, you know! Hmm, maybe a big drill or something…electricity…Russian roulette…?” Hiyori yawned again. Was he even going to be able to finish his food? “Mm, but I didn’t expect that you’d be worried about me. I would’ve figured you’d be grateful to get a break from me for a while, so imagine my surprise when I find out you tried to check up on me every day! You’re so kind, Shin…”

…A sleepy Hiyori really was dangerous. Shin wasn’t even going to respond to that one. What could he possibly say? “Just finish eating and go to bed already.”

“Okay!”

Hiyori sat up again, and Shin missed the warmth almost immediately. They didn’t really talk about much else as they finished, although Shin gave Hiyori a few updates about what he’d missed during the days where he’d been totally cut off from the outside world, but nothing was really all that important. He just wanted to hear Hiyori hum and nod when he told him something, even if he didn’t actually respond.

All of Shin’s worries felt so far away right now. His suspicions of Hiyori over nothing and the complicated emotions that had been constricting his chest had been wiped away, replaced by thinking about how Hiyori was the only person who ever called him kind.

Hiyori really was…amazing. More amazing than Shin could ever be. But he wanted to be someone who Hiyori would think was amazing, too.

…As if that’d ever happen.

Hiyori finished his food faster than Shin had expected, and as soon as he was done he flopped over onto Shin again, almost making him spill hot soup all over his face. His head was now laying directly in Shin’s lap, and he was grinning up at him with some sort of devious look that Shin absolutely did not ever want directed at him ever again, especially not from this angle. “Hey, Shin. Want to sleep with me tonight?”

Shin blanked out as if his power cord had been pulled.

“You left your blanket on my bed, you know…” Hiyori’s cyan eyes were on his. Shin’s heart was pounding. His breathing was shallow. He felt like a mouse staring down a snake. There was no way this was happening. That wasn’t a normal thing to ask your friend, was it? Were they close enough for that to be okay? Did Hiyori— “We can always just keep it there.”

Shin’s throat was dry. No words were forming in his mind, and he wouldn’t have been able to voice them even if he could. Was he happy? Scared? Upset? Was he special to Hiyori? Special enough to ask him that? Was Hiyori special to him? How was he supposed to know?

The silence stretched for a long moment until Hiyori started cracking up, shattering whatever spell he’d just cast over Shin’s brain. “I’m kidding! You should see the look on your face right now! Come on,” he said, reaching up and patting Shin’s cheek with one hand, “I just thought it’d take your mind off things a little bit.”

Shin still felt like his brain was buffering, and then he shoved Hiyori off his lap and onto the floor. “You’re the worst.”

“What, did you want to?! In that case we—”

Shin shoved his pillow in Hiyori’s face and started smothering him with it, while Hiyori laughed brightly and pretended to fight back. Their fake little fight didn’t last long—even Hiyori only playing around was more force than Shin could actually deal with, and sometimes the look in his eyes and the pressure behind his fingertips was a little too real for comfort—and Hiyori ended it by squeezing his wrist just hard enough that Shin jerked away a little too forcefully, as if he were actually in danger, and that ruined the entire mood.

But Hiyori clearly didn't think so, since he was still watching Shin with a smile on his face. It was an expression of…fascination, maybe. The way someone would look at a particularly rare insect before pinning it into a specimen case. Or maybe he was just reading too deep into it. It was taking Shin an oddly long time to avert his own eyes.

…Well, not that it mattered much. Hiyori went about everything the completely wrong way, but here Shin was, still happy he got to be with him.

With that spell broken, Hiyori yawned a third time, and flopped backwards onto the floor. “Alright, that finished wearing me back out! Thanks for the food, Shin!”

“You know I didn’t make that.”

“You still went out and got it for me!”

“And you really don’t need to thank someone for doing the bare minimum, got it?”

"Are you really sure you of all people should be saying that?" Hiyori was teasing him again, a mischievous grin splitting his face in half. "We met because you lost a fight with a vending machine, remember?"

Of course Shin remembered. It had been a hot, humid summer day, the kind that was absolutely miserable if you weren't spending it directly in front of a big box fan, and he'd been seriously considering kicking the vending machine in front of him that had just eaten his change instead of giving him the damn drink it was supposed to. It was so hot and there was sweat rolling down his face and he was so tired of this stupid machine that didn't even work right when a cold drink got pressed to the back of his neck. Shin yelped and jerked away, looking straight up into the brightest blue eyes he'd ever seen.

There were a lot of things about high school Shin didn't remember, or chose not to remember, but he didn't think he could forget that moment even if he tried. All it took was one stranger with one drink and a too-wide smile to match his too-bright eyes to wipe away all the trouble of that awful day. A beam of sunshine through the clouds. Shin had been chasing that light ever since.

“Heehee… Oh, Shin.” Hiyori sat up and grinned at him. “Your bare minimum and someone else’s bare minimum might be very different, did you know that?”

He did know. He knew it better than most people, probably. For Shin, that single moment, that bare minimum of kindness, had made his life so much more worth living. He didn't know what he'd do without it, if it were ever gone. If Hiyori were ever…

Shin beat those thoughts away. Hiyori was here. Hiyori would always understand, and Hiyori would always be kind to him. He'd stayed for this long, hadn't he?

He shivered, and Hiyori's long, spidery fingers gently brushed against his arm, just close enough to touch but not firm enough for it to feel like it meant anything. His hand was warm. Hiyori always saw him, always noticed him, and always…did something. Shin's heart felt like it was crumbling away, just a bit, but that would be fine if it could be replaced with Hiyori's warmth.

Perhaps Hiyori saw the look in his eyes, and that was why he pulled his hand away, stood up, and spun on his heel towards his bedroom door. “Come get your blanket! I’ll even let you run the heater tonight, since the weather’s starting to get colder.”

“...Thanks.”

Shin followed after him, and Hiyori’s room was somehow already spic and span again, even though he couldn’t possibly have been gone long enough for him to shower, change, and clean his whole damn apartment up unless he was some kind of superhuman. Shin had neatened things up, but not that much. It was kind of creepy. There wasn’t even any dust anymore. Shin hoped he never saw Hiyori’s apartment messy ever again.

Had anything he’d done for Hiyori today even mattered? Hiyori was perfectly capable of taking care of himself, more than Shin could ever do for him. It was Hiyori who was always doing the most in their friendship, while Shin offered…he didn’t have anything to offer at all, not to someone like Hiyori Sou. The fact that the two of them were still friends was entirely because Hiyori was taking pity on him. He was only going to get to be here as long as Hiyori let him be. That felt so abundantly, painfully clear right now, as Shin looked at how Hiyori had taken what Shin had already done and improved on it to such a point it was like Shin hadn’t even done anything at all. It was almost sickening to think about. Something vile was curling in the pit of his stomach.

Hiyori passed him his blanket, and Shin…hesitated for a moment before he took it. Maybe he did want to take that offer to sleep next to him and try to convince himself that the space between them—the lack of space between them—was special. He saw the look Hiyori had on his face for that brief moment, and it was what made him snatch the blanket away from him and force himself back outside to the couch. He was not letting those awful, greedy feelings come back, not when he was about to go to sleep. He wanted to go back to pretending he didn’t need Hiyori to be ever-present in his life. Wasn’t it a good thing if Shin was as central to his life as Hiyori was to his?

Hiyori’s voice called after him. “Goodnight, Shin.”

Shin took a deep breath, taking a moment to squish down his fears. He didn’t need to worry. He just needed to trust Hiyori. Having faith in him hadn’t led him wrong in all the years they’d known each other. He just needed to keep believing in him.

If it wasn’t for Hiyori, Shin would’ve been alone. If it wasn’t for Hiyori, he’d probably have never heard someone compliment him or praise him at all. If it wasn’t for Hiyori, he wouldn’t know all the things he did about coding, or about so many other things, either. If it wasn’t for Hiyori, Shin wouldn’t have nearly as much in his life as he did now. It was all thanks to him.

He didn’t need to worry.

“G’night, Hiyori.”