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Tsukasa has heard about him, of course, it's his duty as a hall monitor to always keep track of anomalies within the school and although Kamishiro isn't an anomaly, as his classmates call him, he's certainly someone that catches his eyes whenever he sees him pass by. Tsukasa doesn’t normally bother remembering faces of people that aren't important to him, even as his class representative and as a hall monitor, he's seen so many faces and he'll see even more in the future that they'll all blend together at the end of the day.
Kamishiro Rui is a clear exception.
Tsukasa sometimes finds him casually strolling through the halls a few minutes after classes have started and Tsukasa's wrapping up his work; a frequent class skipper, he notes. It's hard not to notice him, long –as long as he can have it by school standards– purple hair with two cyan streaks peeking out from his fringe with a small ponytail on the right side, probably to keep most of his hair out of his own face, a forever disheveled school shirt with his equally disheveled school tie. He's lost count of the amount of times he reminded Kamishiro to please tidy your uniform before going into class. Once he even had to watch another hall monitor confiscate his bag because it seemed to be a bit too heavy for someone who doesn't go to class that often, it turns out the school's code of conduct doesn't have a rule against bringing robots and/or building them inside, they let him go easily after that.
Today, after wrapping up his work, a teacher from another class spoke to him about Kamishiro and gave him an order. That's how he finds himself going up the stairs leading to the mysterious rooftop, the keys to open this door are supposed to be only for the cleaning duty and the director themselves but somehow, as usual, Kamishiro finds a loophole in the system and exploits it to his favor.
He opens the door with the key given to him and finds the boy in question tinkering away with his usual electronics, he doesn't bother looking up. Tsukasa doesn't know if he even heard him come in.
"Kamishiro, I've come to take you to class, one of the teachers wants to speak to you"
With that, finally, Kamishiro looks up at him, a set of tired eyes meeting his own, the interaction doesn't last long enough for Tsukasa to completely study Kamishiro's expression because his gaze goes back to the colorful metallic pieces on his lap as his hands keep working.
"I'm skipping today. Could you tell him to wait for me after school?" His response is lazy, dismissing him completely and Tsukasa feels offended for that very reason. How dare he ignore The Tsukasa Tenma so easily. I'm just doing my duty work! Please cooperate!
"Please do that yourself!" Tsukasa puts his foot down, angrily putting emphasis on his actions so Kamishiro will have no other choice but to look at him "You're really skipping today too? You'll get suspended if you keep going like this!"
Kamishiro looks up at him again, eyebrows slightly raised with surprise. That's new. He chuckles after a while and lowers his head again to keep his work going, these cables are a mess to work with but it'll be done today for sure. This time when he speaks, his voice is softer.
"I don't really care, Tenma-san"
"C'mon, there has to be something that could get you in class today, don't you have something you're striving for?"
Rui stops his tracks for the third time and sighs. He's really persistent. Tenma Tsukasa, he remembers, is just another faceless student to him. Someone that lives just to remind him of the things he's missing in his life, of the friends he should be spending and enjoying his short youth with. But well, he stopped trying to reach out to people when he started clearly seeing that his efforts to open up would not bear fruit. His "friends" will abandon him when they get to know him better. They change their minds once they find out who he really is, they always do.
Even Nene stopped reaching out to him. But he doesn't hold a grudge to her, he doesn't think he ever will.
But Tenma Tsukasa… he really exceeded his expectations, they weren't the most astounding expectations, the bar is in hell, but he exceeded them nonetheless. Most hall monitors, classmates even, tended to ignore him, and when they spoke to him they were clearly nervous or even scared, it showed in their body language when they got too close to him. Rui didn't consider himself as a scary person, he was really just a dude doing his own stuff, but long enough he started believing it that maybe he was a bit scary, elusive, maybe just not fun to be around. He embraced that solitary figure and went on with his life as if it were a one man show, performing on his own with his drones and robots to his audience, a lonely alchemist, as he calls himself.
But he didn't appear to be an odd person to Tenma Tsukasa, this boy his own age spoke to him in the halls like he was just another student breaking the school rules. His voice never wavered when talking to him and his body stood straight the entire time they briefly interacted with one another.
And for the first time in a long, long time. Rui wanted to reach out, to try again.
"Mmhh… there might be something that could convince me not to skip class today"
Tenma's eyes glow with those words, Rui cannot even begin to comprehend why this once faceless student was suddenly so set on helping him. Maybe Tenma was truly the oddest person out of the two.
"As long as I can help!" He says in his earnest.
He leaves his colorful robots to the side and stands up, cleaning his uniform of the leftover cable jackets and dust collected by sitting on the floor. His feet carry him towards the boy that's still standing close to the door. He wants to try something new for a change "Then, I want you to grant me one request"
"O-of course, I'll do my best!" Tsukasa feels his voice waver, but only because, for some reason, Kamishiro is getting close to him. But he regains his composure not long after, keeping eye contact with him as he gets even closer. Why does it feel like he took forever to get here? We weren't even 5 meters apart! He thinks time must slow down when he's with Kamishiro, somehow.
Kamishiro is definitely breaking his personal space now but Tsukasa finds he doesn't bother it as much as he feels it should, it doesn't bother him like when other people do it.
"Just stay in place, this won't take long" Tsukasa actually flinches a bit at that, what does he have in mind for him?
"W-what are you-" but he gets silenced when he sees Kamishiro's hands getting close to his face. He won't do that would he? He'd have to hit him if that's the case. Instinctively closing his eyes, Tsukasa waits for whatever the boy has in store for him. But he opens them in surprise to find that those hands find a place to stay on the top of his head.
Kamishiro is stroking his hair. With both hands even, like he's petting a cat.
Tsukasa stands there in shock for a few seconds before he regains himself again. So this is what he wanted, huh. The touch doesn't feel bad, per say, but beside his bewilderment he somehow gets the feeling that Kamishiro is holding back a bit. He meets his eyes and finds him looking directly at him with a gaze he cannot fully distinguish. Is it boredom? indifference? Tsukasa lowers his gaze again, seemingly to focus on the other's messy uniform but the truth is that he's too nervous to see his expression again when his heart is pounding so hard in his chest like it's about to explode. He can't hear it, can he?
"It's softer than I expected" Tsukasa is about to agree that of course his hair is soft, he takes meticulous care of his appearance but Kamishiro keeps talking before he can utter a response "Your tips, are they dyed?"
"N-no, they're natural, my sister also has them…" Gee, and even if he wanted to speak, his words would come out stumbling and nervous like now. It might be best if he keeps quiet for now and just allows Kamishiro to do his thing.
Kamishiro hums in response and keeps petting. Tsukasa allows his mind to clear up for a moment. Although his heart won't slow down and his face is probably crimson red by now, he can tell for sure that Kamishiro's hands are a bit stiff, like he's afraid to go any further and that fact resonates within Tsukasa.
So he puts a small plan on his head and finds enough courage within himself to carry it out. He's done enough shows to carry out not a perfect performance by any means, but something that hopefully can convey his message clearly to Kamishiro.
Meeting Kamishiro's eyes is the hardest part, his gaze is a bit softer now and that definitely doesn't tug on his heart strings for a brief second. As he looks up at him, he tilts his head to the right, meeting his hand and cuddling up to it. That should do the trick, this is something that heroines from his stories do to make others do whatever the heroine desires! He just has to adapt it to the situation at hand. And just for good measure he flutters his eyelids a bit and musters a small smile. Kamishiro must surely be swooning at him by now.
He sees Kamishiro's expression change just a small bit, his eyelids open a bit more and his eyebrows raise, but it's gone as quick as it came and Tsukasa feels a bit disappointed that his plan didn't work out as he intended.
But as he's about to sigh in defeat, he feels those hands become lighter on his head like they're waking up from a deep slumber and they start tracing every strand carefully and intertwining them between his long fingers, reaching deeper within his locks with enough tenderness that Tsukasa's eyes close before he can take notice of it. He doesn't feel the need to celebrate his acting victory since he's already getting his reward.
He vividly remembers being in the hospital, gently stroking his sister's hair as she went to sleep due to her high fever. She'd say she felt comforted when he did it because it showed her that she wasn't trapped inside those four walls, completely alone. Tsukasa burst into tears immediately after hearing that and it was Saki who had to comfort him instead, a bright smile on her face. But he'd never known it felt like this before, like his worries faded away with every second as his body became lighter.
So this is how it feels like? It's nice.
He lets out a deep sigh, further relaxing into the touch. A few more minutes and he'll surely… surely…
But just as he starts to lose himself ever more, Kamishiro removes his hands from his head.
Tsukasa tilts his head upwards, a surprised expression meeting a bashful one, small flush now adoring his face, he even distances himself from Tsukasa. Why are you feeling shy all of a sudden? I'm the one that should be embarrassed by this! Tsukasa thinks as his own hands go upwards to fix his appearance, his heart hurts a bit knowing that his touch is not the same as Kamishiro's… then–
I don't mind doing this again.
"You won't skip class now, right?" he asks, his head feels lighter and his heart is calm. He hasn't felt this soothed in a long, long time, like waking up from a deep slumber. He couldn't say the same about Kamishiro who looks three seconds away from a heart attack but he guesses that's the Tenma Tsukasa effect.
"... lead the way, Tsukasa-kun"
"Being so casual with me already, Kamishiro? That's quick" he smiles at Kamishiro who realizes that he definitely shouldn't be so casual with him, they're not even friends, but Tsukasa catches his change of expression quickly and reassures him "I don't mind, don't worry! Can I call you by your first name too?"
Kamishiro doesn't recoil this time, his eyes seemed exhausted when he first talked to him, but now Tsukasa can swear he finds a small gleam of hope in them when he relaxes and nods his head.
"Rui" he remembers, tasting the name in his tongue. It feels nice to say it out loud like this "Let's go, then"