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Moonlight slips in through parted curtains, gleaming down onto Momota just barely. He hardly pays mind to it this time around, eyes set on something else instead of the stars.
Typically, he would find himself leaning on the apartment balcony, looking up at the clouded sky and reminiscing on old memories of his childhood. He’s used to the foamy city view of the stars by now, though it certainly never softened the blow. Perhaps one day he could bring Oma home to see his grandparents, and they could climb onto the farmhouse roof and stargaze together.
It’s well past midnight right now, knowing fully that if he were caught awake Kokichi would spew his typical; “Momota-chan is up past his bedtime, and he isn’t fun to mess around with when he acts like a zombie. Now get to bed, or I’ll have my subordinates send you to the shadow realm,” or anything else of the sorts.
Falling asleep on the couch wouldn’t be good. It wouldn’t get him a talking to, but his back would hurt like hell in the morning. He readjusts his position and pulls the blanket over his legs. It’s a stupid looking one, full of wacky patterns and different hues of purple ranging from a neon to an almost black. The blanket is old as hell, having been a valentines gift back when they were both still in highschool.
He scrolls through the phone aimlessly, not quite paying attention to most of it. It’s mostly just a few of his friend’s posts of how they’ve been doing. He admits that he hasn’t seen quite a few of them in ages. He’s surprised on how caught up he’s been; he thought he would have been told about Rantaro and Tsumugi being engaged by now. He doubts he’s missed a text or something, right? Kokichi was good friends with Rantaro, did he know?
Whatever. He makes a mental note to text them congratulations later, and closes out of the app. Maybe some music would help him fall asleep. At this rate he would be falling asleep halfway though the day tomorrow.
Music seems like it would help. He hadn’t been one to fall asleep easily with background noise, but it more so a last resort at this point. Maybe he could find something. Brown noise or whatever may help. Or maybe some of that classical music stuff that Kaede had mentioned once or twice before.
Opening Spotify, he finds himself questioning if it’s even going to work. Falling asleep to the hoots of owls and the chirps of crickets was far different than sounds of waves or straight… whatever the hell brown noise was designed to be.
Just as he moves his fingers to the search bar, his eye catches on the most recently played song. It certainly isn’t his, he knows that for sure. He hardly listened to music. Not quite his thing. He had shared a headphone with a few of his friends before, though none of the songs had really stuck.
Kokichi did have access the account, so most of the music on here he listened to. Though, he can’t quite see Kokichi listening to anything but pure chaos incarnate. Momota certainly didn’t trust him with the car aux, that’s for sure.
“I’m Gonna Be A Star” certainly isn’t a title that he’s heard of before. Kokichi didn’t seem like the type to listen to stuff like that. Yet again, Kaito had never heard his partner’s music. He didn’t trust that Kokichi wouldn’t blast some weird shit or obnoxiously loud noises just to fuck with him. So there was a completely real possibility that Oma actually did enjoy the song and hadn’t just listened to it for shits and giggles alone.
Curiosity consumes him, and he clicks the song; pressing play after questioning if it’s really worth it or not.
Christ almighty.
It’s fucking K-pop.
And it’s actually good?
He can’t help but sit in silence as the song plays through his earbuds, actually sounding like half decent music. Never would he have thought that he would be sitting in his living room, on a work night, listening to k-pop.
Blinking once or twice, Momota has to process everything. Oma Kokichi listened to K-pop. And the music wasn’t even half bad to add to the matter.
Only few people in his life had listened to the genre. Out of all of them, he thought Maki listening to K-pop would be the most surprising. But Kokichi? Listening to K-pop? He feels someone’s just clubbed him across the back of the head.
Had Kokichi brought it up before? On a date or something? In casual banter or conversation? Talking to any of their former highschool classmates? Kaito’s brain wouldn’t have just glossed over something like that, right?
The song seems to be coming to a close, Kaito realizing that his brain had filtered out most of it. He had been so caught up in his own thoughts that he had only listened to the first half of it or so.
Would it be bad if he listened to it again? Just out of curiosity, of course. It’s wasn’t like he actually enjoyed this crap. No, it wasn’t even that good. He had heard better. Better music, not better K-pop. He didn’t like that kind of shit. That was just weird. Not to mention he was a dude, and K-pop was certainly more girly than anything. Maybe it would be okay if it was some kind of boy group, but this wasn’t. This was a girl group.
He reluctantly clicks the back button, trying to actually listen to the music this time around. He listens, trying to ignore the thoughts that told him this was stupid and too girly for his taste. He probably would have gotten though the entire song this time if his headphones hadn’t been yanked out of his ears, eyes covered by a set of hands.
“Very funny Kokichi,” he deadpans, “but give me my headphones back.”
Kokichi gives a childish smirk and removes his hands from Kaito’s face, instead holding the headphones high above his head. The song faintly plays through them, not having disconnected just yet.
“Momota-chan abandoned me! I woke up because of the super scary monster in our closet! And when I turned to my beloved paladin to ask him to vanquish it, I realized he was gone!” Oma places his hand on his forehead, pretending to be some kind of melodramatic damsel in distress.
With a scoff, Kaito removes the blanket and stands up, snatching his headphones out of Kokichi’s hands. “I was going to come back to bed, but couldn’t sleep. And since you’re the lightest sleeper I’ve ever met, I didn’t want to wake you.” He replies, placing one of the headphones back in his ears. Thankfully, the song hadn’t ended yet.
Clearly, his reason seems to be deemed as an excuse by the other. Kokichi seems to be aggravated, crossing his arms.
“What a hypocrite! Mr. ‘let-your-burdens-be-my-burdens’ refuses to let his own boyfriend help him fall asleep! I’m so hurt. I sentence you to a good nights rest!” Kokichi proclaims, switching from emotion to emotion like clockwork.
Kaito knows that he can’t really wriggle himself out of this one. Kokichi is just going to pester him until he drops from exhaustion. Or, he’ll go on “strike” and refuse to go to bed himself. Kaito doesn’t find either of the outcomes all that appealing.
The song comes to an end, and Kaito is tempted to replay it again. He turns on his phone, pressing the back button reluctantly and turning down his volume, praying that Oma wouldn’t hear it. Being mocked wouldn’t help him out at the moment. Especially for what he was listening to.
“Music? I thought you didn’t listen to music.” Kokichi raises a brow, pointing out the obvious. Kaito grumbles, not in the mood to be questioned at the moment.
“Yeah, music. Last resort. Couldn’t sleep.” He keeps it brief, putting his phone and other headphone in his hoodie pocket. “Would listen to a documentary, but would probably get too caught up in at and wouldn’t fall asleep.”
Speculation seems to be forming in the prankster’s mind. Kaito can’t blame him, considering how may times Kaito had mentioned how he preferred to fall asleep in silence. Usually the only noise was the feint sounds that came from Oma’s headphones every now and then.
“So- watcha listening to?” Oma questions, grinning and attempting to grab the headphone out of Kaito’s ear. Kaito swerves out of the way the best he can, though Kokichi has always been far more agile than him. It isn’t long before the headphone is yanked out of Kaito’s ear and Kokichi is putting it in his.
Mouth agape, Kokcihi appears to be trying not to laugh. Kaito can’t help but bite his lip, grabbing his phone from his pocket and hastily pausing the song in shame.
“Momota-chan listens to K-pop? And this junk nonetheless!” Kokichi cackles, holding his stomach for exaggeration. Kaito can’t help but get agitated, snatching the headphone out of Kokichi’s ear. “You listen to this crap, not me! I just clicked the most recently played song.”
Kokichi’s laughter falters, face becoming grim. “But it wasn’t me. I may listen to K-pop, but I don’t listen to that. I didn’t tell you this when we moved in, but there were stories of the old owners being chased out by a-“
Kaito covers his ears, looking away and refusing to read the other’s lips. “Shithead!” He snaps. “I’m not in the mood for any of your weird fake stories about ghosts. Ghosts aren’t even real anyway- wait, you really do listen to K-pop?” Kaito stops, curiously present in his tone.
If they weren’t currently on a topic that intrigued Oma far more, then the conversation would most likely have spiraled into a debate about poltergeists and spirts. But now the only thing that seemed to intrigue Kokichi was the song that Kaito had been listening to.
“Obviously! I’m not uncultured like you, Momota-chan! But I don’t listen to this trash either. I’m telling you, it was the monster in the closet! And he’s still there! I need you to chase him away and rid us of this foul keyboard smashing worthy song!” Kokichi demands, pulling Kaito’s arm and failing due to the considerable mass difference.
Kaito shakes of Kokichi’s arm, trying to process the information. It wasn’t all that unexpected, really. He was know for doing all sorts of outlandish things in their teen years. Wearing Halloween worthy costumes to class and the dreadful April fools pranks spoke for themselves. So Kokichi listening to more girly music didn’t seem all that taboo in Kaito’s mind.
So why did he feel this way? Feel so… weird. So judged. The laughter from moments earlier leaving spit in his stomach. It wasn’t like he actually enjoyed K-pop. He had just listened to one song and thought that it was a little catchy. Nothing more than that.
Momota had never had anything against what society considered more “girly.” His favorite color was purple for Christ’s sake. But indulging in anything else made him feel so… ick. That was the best way to describe it. Maybe even bittersweet. Other men doing that kind of stuff was no problem to him. It wasn’t like he was going to mock someone for cross-dressing. But the idea of him doing that stuff was so weird and unfathomable to him.
Kokichi’s probably notice his bittersweet expression by now. He hasn’t bothered to hide it, though even if he had Kaito knows that Kokichi would have noticed it anyway.
“Does Momota-chan enjoy this garbage?” Kokichi raises a brow, voice lighthearted. Kaito frowns, annoyed but knowing his lie would be picked through like a vulture to a carcass.
“So what if I do? You listen to this crap, don’t you? The song was the most recently played one. I just clicked it out of curiosity.” Kaito admits, shame bubbling up from his core. He knows that Kokichi won’t judge him; he had admitted to listening to it himself. Regardless, he can’t help but feel so ashamed and gross.
He knows it’s bad when Kokichi climbs on the couch and pulls him down forcefully, knocking him off of his feet and forcing him to sit down.
The mask that Kokichi holds high doesn’t clearly break, though it still seems to soften. “Why does Momota-chan refuse to admit it?” Kokichi asks, almost too open for Kaito’s liking. He hadn’t seen Kokichi this open with him too many times before. It just seemed so jarring.
Kaito offers no reply. He sits in silence as his leg bounces up and down. He has no idea what to say.
“Kaito?”
He looks at Kokichi.
“You do know that it’s alright to like things that are seen as ‘girly,’ right?” Kokichi questions, eyes clouded with speculation.
Rambling about his entire childhood would be no good. He doubted that Kokichi wanted to hear any of it. He could ramble on about his grandparents words about ridged gender roles and how he would find a woman one day who he would provide for.
Oh, how that had gone downhill.
“I didn’t grown up like you, Kokichi. I grew up with my grandparents. You’ve heard the saying, ‘they’re from a different generation, their viewpoint is dated,’ or whatever the hell that excuse is” Kaito explains, trying his hardest not to overshare as tears prick at his eyes.
Moments pass by in silence. They two sit together on the couch, moonlight still peeking in from the window. Neither says anything as time uncomfortably ticks by.
“Well, then they’re just outdated bags of bone!” Kokichi declares, sticking out his tongue and crossing his arms like a child. Kaito blinks in surprise, the shift in tone being surprising, though not out of character for Oma.
“If you’re going to get into K-pop, at least listen to some of TWICE’s good songs. Your taste is the worst, seriously.” Kokichi scoffs.
“The song is good and you know it!” Kaito snaps, squinting his eyes. He finds the fact that he’s able to talk about it odd. Though, he owed it to Kokichi. The carefree personality of the other fueling Kaito’s confidence.
Kokichi quickly snatches the headphones and Kaito’s own phone out of the hoodie pocket. “Your taste is serious BORING! B-O-R-I-N-G! And to think that I live with you.” Kokichi fake sniffles.
Kaito can only roll his eyes at the childishness. “If that song is so bad, then what’s your favorite?” Kaito asks, not entirely sure that Kokichi’s preference would be even better.
“TT! Or maybe, that’s a lie! The lyrics as too sweet for me. And I live off a sugar rush!” Kokichi states, a coy smirk present. Kaito’s lived with Kokichi long enough to know that it’s a lie. The song Kokichi plays being titled “FAKE AND TRUE” being evident of that.
Kokichi pulls the colorfully purple blanket onto the two and shoves one of the headphones into Kaito’s ear. Kaito can only let out a breathy laugh as the song plays, it clearly leaning more heavily towards J-pop than anything else, with brief English lyrics being mixed in.
“You should have paid more attention in language class.” Kaito comments.
“Jackass!”
Kaito doesn’t snap back, rather mumbling a few teasing words back that are hardly audible.
Momota has to admit, falling asleep to music isn’t that bad after all.