Work Text:
He can’t really explain the phenomenon of how they started living together.
Well, that’s a bit too concrete of a description, Atsushi supposes. Akutagawa doesn’t live in his apartment, but he shows up so often that it’s stopped taking Atsushi by surprise when he walks into his home late at night to find a mafioso calmly reading a book on his living room couch.
(The first time, he screams and drops his phone on his foot. Akutagawa threatens to share the memory - excluding some of the details, of course, such as why he’s in the detective’s house in the first place- as blackmail. He never does.)
It’s unsettling, for a while, and Akutagawa never responds to his baffled interrogations with a proper explanation for his strange behavior, so Atsushi just… learns to live with it.
(He locks his door after the first night, but it does nothing to stop the mafia executive from finding an entrance through the second-story window. Atsushi doesn’t bother to find out how.)
It’s definitely an arrangement that takes some getting used to - Atsushi will never really escape the way the hair at the back of his neck stands on its edge when he gets close to his apartment on those certain nights - but he has to admit that having some company is alright sometimes. Even if said company is a stoic and judgemental murderer who seems to live by the twisted motive that ‘ tu casa es mi casa .’
(“That’s not how the saying goes,” Atsushi vehemently objects during one night when Akutagawa barges into his kitchen and eats chips directly taken from his already sparse pantry. Akutagawa just shrugs at him in response.)
Sometimes, Akutagawa is his normal, mean self, on days which Atsushi wonders why had even bothered to come over at all if all he’s planning to do is throw snarky remarks and complaints.
But there’s other days when he’s less insufferable, and Atsushi finds that the frugal expanse of his house feels a little more like home. Like when he comes home rubbing his eyes in the moonlight that pools on the floor through the window slats and there’s a listening ear waiting for him, who knows exactly how to help.
(Oftentimes, it’s food. Atsushi can’t count the number of times that he’s been alerted to the mafioso’s presence by the smell of his cooking wafting out from under the door. He isn’t sure where Akutagawa learned how to do it so well, but he won’t decline the meals that they share late at night to the backdrop of a starlit sky.)
Unfortunately, this isn’t one of those nights. He leaves for the agency early in the morning and doesn’t get back until late, and he can barely unlock the door to his apartment with all his limbs wobbling like they’re about to collapse underneath him.
The door creaks open. He hadn’t bothered to open the windows before he left earlier that day, so the entrance is shrouded in a cloak of darkness before Atsushi staggers his way over to the light switch.
There’s no sign that Akutagawa has been here at all; everything is just as he’d left it, including a messy stack of newspapers on the counter and dirty dishes in the sink. He sighs, resigned, before wondering when the lack of the mafioso’s presence started to become so disappointing.
Akutagawa is always gone before he wakes up, anyhow, and Atsushi actively feels like he could pass out for thirty-six hours straight. It’s not like it matters.
(Once, he had fallen asleep on the couch after bandaging his minor cuts from a battle. He wakes to the golden rays of sun curling through the windows from daybreak over the city, covered in a blanket that he has no recollection of using the night before.
He shrugs it off to fatigue clouding his memory. That’s all.)
Atsushi trails his hand against the wall as he enters the house, stumbling on his own feet in his eagerness to collapse into bed. Just as his hand hovers over the doorknob, though, his stomach protests with a frankly obnoxious grumble.
Atsushi sighs. He can ignore his scrapes and bruises until the next day, but he already knows that once the hunger starts there’s no escaping its clutches.
Maybe he’s just being dramatic, but he thinks that he’d feel a lot less miserable if he came back to a home-cooked meal instead of the cup ramen noodles that have been wasting away in his pantry for weeks and water heating in the microwave because he doesn’t trust himself, in his current state of exhaustion, to handle a stovetop fire.
He doesn’t bother to turn on the overhead light and just stares blankly at the glass of water as it spins endlessly in the yellow glow of the microwave. He can’t stop his eyelids from drooping to the monotonous hum of the device, struggling to stay awake. Curse his traitorous stomach.
He jolts upright as the microwave beeps, startling at the disruption of the quiet of the apartment. He exhales in relief when he recognizes the source of the noise, placing a hand over his chest to calm his racing heart and using the other to cease the insistent dings.
Atsushi nearly burns his hands on the glass taking the container out of the microwave, and then almost does it again when he spills some of the boiling water as he tries to pour it into the styrofoam ramen cup. He rubs his eyes as the whole ordeal is complete, sighing once again into the silent darkness and leaning on the counter behind him to wait for the noodles to cook.
Then there’s footsteps in the hallway from the bedrooms. He can only tell because of his enhanced senses that come naturally with his ability; they’re nearly inaudible, clearly practiced and trained to ensure stealth.
The hair on the back of his neck stands up in apprehension, a clear sign of danger -
But then a familiar silhouette emerges from the darkness and into Atsushi’s amplified night vision, and he’s able to relax.
“Akutagawa,” he greets quietly. “I didn’t know you were here.”
Akutagawa grunts and rubs his eyes. “What time is it?”
It’s only then that Atsushi notices his appearance: hair mussed and sticking up in every possible direction, Rashomon hanging off one shoulder, wrapped in a blanket. One of Atsushi’s blankets, to be precise, the one that he keeps folded at the foot of his futon in case of a chilly night.
“Late,” he replies belatedly, and it should say something about the mafioso’s current state that he doesn’t even attempt a cynical remark.
“Were you- asleep?” Atsushi asks, dumbfounded. It’s the first question that he thinks to ask - not “why are you in my house?” or “how long have you been here?” He just offers a noncommittal hum to Atsushi’s statement, dragging his feet through the kitchenette and coming to a rest by the weretiger’s side.
Atsushi thinks that he would laugh if he could see the expression on his own face right now; he’s certain that his eyebrows are raised high and his mouth is parted slightly in surprise. Akutagawa stares at him, and seeing the befuddled look in his eyes, deigns to respond.
“I was waiting for you, earlier,” he admits, closing his eyes. “But you took so long that I must have fallen asleep.”
The confession does nothing to reduce the emotions that are all jumbling together in Atsushi’s head and heart. Eventually, he just manages a shrug.
“Tough day at work,” he offers with a tired smile. Akutagawa nods. It looks almost subconscious, the way he agrees without understanding any of the details. He gazes around the kitchenette, glazed eyes landing on the single cup of ramen that’s covered as it cooks.
“I was going to go right to bed, but I knew I couldn’t actually fall asleep if I just kept thinking about being hungry,” Atsushi interjects sheepishly. Akutagawa hums again and closes his eyes.
And then- he leans his head onto Atsushi’s shoulder. Atsushi thinks that he just might combust with the confused and conflicting feelings that worm their way into his chest.
“Um, you can go back to sleep, if you want,” he offers softly. Akutagawa waves him off lazily.
“The microwave woke me up.” Atsushi winces apologetically. “I’m already awake, now, so it doesn’t matter,” he claims, but the yawn that punctuates his words is nothing less than incriminating as he turns his face further into Atsushi’s neck. The strands of his hair tickle as they brush against his skin, Atsushi notices belatedly, but he can’t seem to bring himself to mind.
He smiles to himself: fondly, privately.
“Akutagawa,” he says softly, tousling the other’s hair to garner his attention. Akutagawa makes a noise of acknowledgement in the back of his throat. Atsushi repeats his name, to which the mafioso raises his head and meets Atsushi’s eyes with a bleary gaze.
“Sleep,” the weretiger says, more convincingly this time.
After a moment of brief consideration, Akutagawa nods almost imperceptibly and trudges out of the room.
As Atsushi finishes his ramen a few minutes later, he tosses the utensils in the sink and resolves to deal with them later. Walking through the hallway, though, there’s an unmistakable rustle of fabric from the living room; Akutagawa lies on the couch, blanket pulled up to his chin and eyes closed gently in sleep. Atsushi was going to offer to take the couch and let the other man sleep in his bed, but he doesn’t see any point in disturbing him any more and shrugs lightly to himself.
He falls atop the mattress gratefully: for both the comfort that it brings after a long, hard day, and the promise that it holds for another.
Unfortunately, he still has to go to work a few hours later. He drags himself out of bed with the rising sun, getting dressed and nearly forgetting about his guest until he notices that his favorite blanket is missing from the foot of his bed.
Atsushi creeps into the kitchen, forgetting about breakfast entirely when he catches sight of a familiar man asleep and curled up into a ball on his couch, enveloped in a blanket that’s much too large for his frame. Atsushi smiles and scribbles down a note on a piece of paper.
The atmosphere is different this time. He isn’t sure when Akutagawa started feeling comfortable enough to trust in him like this, but a warm feeling bubbles in his chest at the realization. Seeing Akutagawa in the morning glow of the dawn is an unfamiliar sight, face serene and rid of the negative emotions that plague him so often during his waking hours.
(Privately, silently, appreciatively: Atsushi thinks he could get used to this.)
akutagawa~
left to go to work, but i hope you’re sleeping well!! see u later tonight?
- atsushi
p.s. fold the blanket when you're done <3