Chapter Text
This wasn’t the first time Rui’s parents tried to help push the shut-in out of his comfortable bubble. Being shunned as a freak and a weirdo by his peers for being too… out of the box? Probably not the right term a so-called sane person would use. Not when your school’s theater club kicked you out for wanting to dangle your fellow classmates from the ceiling for their play. Or have them submerged underwater. Or use a real flamethrower for more realism.
Rui’s dreams of directing amazing shows that could bring smiles and wonder to anyone who witnessed them, his dreams of shooting for the moon were already crushed before they could truly begin.
He hardly ever went to his middle school anymore, wanting to avoid the constant whispers and mockery from his fellow classmates, only coming in for mandatory tests. He was barely passing his classes at this point, which might have been why his parents thought getting him a tutor would help?
The tutor was going to be here any moment now, the purple haired boy groaned at the thought. He was tinkering with a gadget of his at his desk, a drone capable of lifting light weight objects despite having such a small body. If he couldn’t get real people to act out his ideas, he’ll just build robots to do it instead.
He could hear the faint sound of the doorbell ringing through the walls of the garage, or rather his room to be exact. Not so faint however was the unnecessarily loud voice of the person at the door. Rui couldn’t clearly make out what was being said, but even through the thick concrete walls he could still hear a rather obnoxious laugh.
Laying his head into his arms, Rui let out a sign and closed his eyes. He was already feeling the beginnings of a headache even before he’s seen this tutor of his. He could hear shuffling from the other side of the garage door, the only entryways to his room were from the outside of the house.
There was a knock on the door beside the garage door, Rui shut his eyes tighter and tried to ignore them. It didn't take long for the knocking to get more intense along with a booming voice, “RUI KAMISHIRO!! ALLOW ME ENTRY SO THAT I MAY TUTOR YOU!”
The knocking and yelling would not cease and Rui had had enough, begrudgingly getting up to open the door. What greeted him on the other side of the door was another boy who was shorter than himself, head topped with blonde hair. Judging by the school uniform the other was wearing, he must be a high schooler, a first year if he had to guess. The other boy’s previous frown from his frustration of being ignored flipped into a beaming smile, “There you are, Kamishiro! I was getting worried and was about to fetch your mother for assistance!” His voice was still rather loud even while being face to face with the person he was talking to, but that was the least of Rui’s concerns at the moment.
Rui’s eyes were still trailing up and down the other boy’s figure, and that smile on the smaller boy's face made him feel a fleeting sense of butterflies tickling his stomach. Despite the other’s loud disposition, he was… rather charming. The cardigan he adorned was rather ill fitted, being overly sized for his small body. It was rather precious to say the least. Upon looking at the older boy’s hair once more, Rui noticed the ends faded to a peach color. He pondered a bit if the other dyed the tips of his hair, or if they were natural like Rui’s clashing cyan streaks in his mop top. Rui’s gaze wandered some more till the two locked eyes with each other, he noticed the other boy had yellow eyes like himself. But yet the other boy’s eyes were very different, so much more welcoming and warm. It was as if he was staring into a beautiful sunset with how lovely of a shade of amber they were, in contrast to his own cold gold irises.
The blonde boy’s smile turned into a pout, getting a bit peeved that the other wasn’t responding but yet staring at him right in the eyes. He began to wave a hand in front of Rui’s face saying, “Earth to Kamishiroooo, are you in there?”
That snapped Rui out of his trance, now feeling a little embarrassed that he had been staring at the other for so long. He hoped his long bangs were covering where his eyes were looking, he really didn’t need another person telling him how much of a weirdo he was.
“Come in,” The inventor said, quickly turning around to not see what the other boy’s expression was, missing the light blush that had painted the blonde’s cheeks.
Barely a few steps into Rui’s room and the other boy was already yelling again, “WHY IS YOUR ROOM SUCH A MESS! THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE,” The blonde boy drops his school bag and pulls out some rubber gloves and a couple of face masks from inside it. Those… aren’t really things a normal student would be carrying in their bag… right? Next thing Rui knew a pair of gloves were dangling in front of his face, the shorter boy already adorned with a face mask with a handkerchief sitting atop of his head that was then neatly tied under his chin, “We’re going to clean this place up! This is not a healthy space to be living in, let alone learning in!”
Rui had really let the place go admittingly. Copious amounts of different items were scattered across his floor. Nut and bolts, dishes, clothes, deflated balloons, a few books, the list goes on. The utter shock and disbelief in the shorter boy's amber eyes was quite amusing though, Rui couldn’t help but let a giggle slide past his lips.
The other boy’s eyes narrowed, “What’s so funny? I’m trying to help you!”
It’s because you’re really cute. “It’s because it’s rather peculiar that you would go out of your way to do this much when your obligations are to merely teach me, dear senpai.” Rui couldn’t help but try to tease the other boy a bit, finding his reactions already quite adorable.
A splash of pink colored the other boy’s cheeks, his eyebrows coming together in frustration. The boy took Rui’s hands into his own, forcibly pushing the gloves into the other’s while awkwardly muttering, “Tsukasa. Tsukasa Tenma is my name,” Once said gloves were fully on Rui's hands, the other quickly moved away, already starting to pick up things on the floor.
“Fufufu, alright Tenma-senpai.”
It was shocking how easily Rui was opening up to Tenma. Somehow this boy was able to break down the walls Rui had built up oh so easily. He was still extremely loud, but yet it somehow felt endearing. Tenma would yell at him over and over about how dirty everything was, Rui would simply giggle in return and the other would get flustered yet again.
As they were cleaning the room, the other boy would occasionally ask Rui about the various gadgets and robots he came across with seemingly genuine curiosity. Every time Rui felt his heart swell in his chest more and more. It was an unfamiliar feeling for him, the feeling of someone actually wanting to get to know him and talk to him about his unique hobbies.
“And what about this one over here, what does it do?” Tenma was over at Rui’s desk, wiping down the dust that had been gathering for months when he spotted the drone Rui had been working on earlier.
“Go ahead and push the button on top. Fufu, you’ll see,” he replied back, turning his attention away from the large bookshelf where he was putting away the remaining of his misplaced books. Rui really wanted to see what the other’s reaction would be to his drone.
Doing as instructed, the blonde boy pushed down on the top of the drone’s head and the inner machinery started whirring into action. The drone lifted itself up into the air with ease, and Tenma’s face lit up with amazement. A hatch opened up on the underbody of the flying robot, revealing a clamp that it used to hold objects with. Tenma was still in blissful astonishment that he hardly noticed the drone making a straight beeline towards his head. The boy let out a fearful yelp as the robot clung onto his handkerchief, sliding it off of his head.
“HEY GIVE IT BACK!” Temna yelled at the contraption, desperately jumping up and down to try to get a hold of his beloved handkerchief. The drone was easily able to fly high enough out of the shorter boy’s reach, waving the cloth back and forth in front of him, only to move back up into the air when the boy tried to reach for it again. Temna interpreted that as the robot mocking him, stomping his feet and clenching his fists in aggravation.
Rui was about to bust a lung, trying so hard to hold back from laughing at the sight before him. He was not expecting the AI he programmed into the machinery to do this per se, but it was an interesting development. He’ll have to make a note of it for future reference.
As adorable as Rui found the older one to be in this predicament, his cheeks puffed out in anger, face red from exertion, he knew he needed to put an end to the cycle eventually. He made his way over to his desk, fetching a remote in one of his drawers. With the simple push of a button, the drone’s power was shut off and it succumbed to gravity, crashing down onto the couch that was below it, providing a cushioned landing.
Tenma hurried over to the robot to grab his handkerchief, worried it’ll spring back to life at any moment. “So is its purpose to steal things?!” The boy exclaimed, his tone still laced with irritation.
“Fufufu, oh no my dear senpai, I would not stoop so low as to program a drone to commit theft. Please have a bit more faith in me,” Rui playfully replied back to the other, noticing the red in his face fading back to pink.
“Stop calling me your dear senpai!! Tsukasa is fine!”
“Oh my, we’re already on a first name basis? Aren’t we moving along a bit too fast, Tsukasa-senpai?”
“No senpai!! Just Tsukasa is fine!!”
“Hmmm… How about Tsukasa-kun~?”
“AAAH FINE!” The blonde eventually gave up, going back to wiping down the desk, be it in a frustrated manner.
By the time the boys had finished cleaning Rui’s room, it was well past the time Tsukasa was supposed to be tutoring the other. To say the older boy had a panic attack when he noticed the time would have been an understatement, frantically digging his phone out and hestily dialing who knows what.
“Saki!! How are you doing? Feel any better? ... Good, I’m glad to hear it! ... Huh, the tutoring job? I-I’ll talk about it when I visit tomorrow. … Would you like me to bring you some chips? … Pizza flavored? Of course, leave it to me! … Just don’t push yourself ok? I’ll talk to you later!” Tsukasa happily sighed in relief as he hung up the phone, but then recoiled in embarrassment when he remembered he was still in front of his kohai.
Rui continued to stare at him with curiosity. Just who was that? Someone important to Tsukasa no doubt. Rui felt like he opened up a lot about himself today, but he barely knew anything about the boy in front of him, other than that he was a worrywort who got flustered easily.
Tsukasa felt the other’s gaze intensely on him yet again, so he quickly recollected himself to try to avoid any more teasing from the other, “I’m sorry we couldn’t even go over anything today, Rui. I’ll tell your parents they don’t need to pay me for today since we didn’t do any studying.”
Rui blinked back into reality when he noticed the other was heading towards the door, “Oh, no need for that. You still did a lot of work today, Tsukasa-kun. Be it more housekeeping than tutoring…” he started to trail off, seeing the other boy rushing to get out the door. He felt a sharp pain in his chest, a familiar sense of dread enveloping his mind. Did he go too far again? Was he scaring away yet another person because of how much of a freak he was? Rui hung his head in shame, eyes boring holes into the ground below him.
When Tsukasa looked back at the purple haired boy after opening the door, he was quite taken aback by the sight. Why was the other looking… so upset? But then Tsukasa realized he hadn’t even given Rui a proper goodbye yet. He quickly turned around and patted the younger boy's head fondly. He was thankful for the slight elevation in the flooring by the door, or else he might not have been able to reach the top of the taller boy’s head.
Rui’s negative thoughts subsided when he felt the other boy’s touch, who was gently petting his hair to help sooth the other’s troubled mind. He could feel all his worries melt away so easily with each caring stroke. It felt almost familial, like Tsukasa was already very accustomed to comforting others. Rui resisted the urge to lean into the blonde’s hand more as he continued his brushing. But he chose to keep his face to the ground, fearful of how his expression might look at that moment.
“I’ll see you in two days, alright? I’m supposed to be tutoring you every Tuesday and Thursday. Don’t let this place become a dumpster again or you’ll be in big trouble mister, you hear me?” Tsukasa jokingly threatened, a warm dazzling smile spreading across his face.
The petting had come to a halt, but Rui could still feel the other’s hand resting atop of his head. He finally decided to lift his gaze to look at the other, and to say the sight he saw wasn’t positively breathtaking would be a complete lie. A brilliant beaming grin that could illuminate even the darkest corners of his mind. The light of the sun setting in the distance of the opened doorway behind the boy, giving him an almost ethereal glow. If Rui cheeks weren't already flushed from the blonde’s touches a moment ago, they most certainly would be now.
Tsukasa tilted his head to the side, the younger was once again not speaking. He really gets lost in his own thoughts doesn’t he? He gave a few more firm pats on top of Rui’s head in an attempt to wake the boy up before finally pulling his hand away.
Everything that had happened in the past few minutes finally fully processed in the inventor’s mind. It was a crazy and wild roller coaster of emotions he was struggling to comprehend. But he inevitably felt immense embarrassment for staring at the boy yet again, “R-right. See you in a few days, Tsukasa-kun,” Rui eventually managed to mumble out, locking eyes with the other before looking away.
The blonde let out a relieved sigh, “I should get going, a star like myself needs to get plenty of beauty sleep. Goodbye Rui, take care!” He enthusiastically boasted, waving to the other while fully making his way out the door.
The soft click of the latch echoed through Rui’s room, and now he was finally by himself once again. But, he didn’t feel any sense of loneliness or dread like he usually would. No, instead he felt a pure sense of happiness and warmth in his chest. This was one of the most enjoyable days Rui has had in quite a long time, despite the slight humiliation he felt here and there.
A star, he recalled the shorter boy saying before he left. He wasn’t sure what the boy was implying when he referred to himself as such, but he would definitely agree that Tsukasa was very much a star. Shining so brightly, able to make him feel like a blanket of warmth surrounded him. Truly this boy was something special.
Rui should really thank his parents the next time he runs into them, for hiring this adorable oddball of a tutor to help him.