Chapter Text
You could call this melting.
A palm underneath you, as long as you are tall. Firm flesh warm under your body, pulsing with every slight twitch of a hand. Heat searing through your skin, your veins, down to your core, enough to heat the cold, stiff thing you call your heart.
You could call this comfort.
Because that’s what it is, isn’t it? A distraction, a warm place to curl up, a body—hand wrapping around you and telling you everything is going to be alright. You can relax, melt into the single, massive appendage of Ren Amamiya. What's holding you back? It should be easy.
Goro Akechi calls this endurance.
This palm won’t throw him off. This voice won’t tell him he’s unwanted. These fingers won’t crush his bones into a fine paste. Ren’s hand lays perfectly still on his desk, while the boy himself hunches over his phone. He’s fine, he’s safe. Nothing will harm him, here.
Every second that passes is another second Goro want to fling himself off Ren’s hand, to take a match and gasoline and burn Ren’s skin to a crisp.
He shifts, in no way wanting to bare his back towards Amamiya, but wondering if his discomfort is from the position of his spine. He shifts again. Results inconclusive. Goro folds his legs under him, straightens his back—
Ren’s fingers twitch. Goro freezes, body half lifted off the palm. The position makes Amamiya's gaze snap over to Goro. Goro forces himself to relax under the weight of gunpowder-dark eyes, each one bigger than his head.
Ren assesses Goro’s position, his half-assed comfort, and says, voice like the rumble of a volcano, “We don’t have to do this.”
Goro sits up. Roots his hands flat against Ren’s palm from where they’re itching to clutch his arms. “It’s fine. You said it yourself: I could use some time to unwind. Maybe become more comfortable with you, while we’re at it.”
Ren doesn’t respond. He’s listening, of course he is, but not even an eyebrow is raised in acknowledgement. Goro cranes his head back to meet Ren’s looming stare, the silence in a face so—far from him. He smiles wide, hoping Ren’s too big to see the way it strains. “It’s just a little difficult on my back. that’s all.”
For how colossal Ren’s face is, it’s surprisingly difficult to read. Goro doesn’t know what the slight narrow of his eyes mean, the way lashes as long as his hand half-droop over massive eyes. Ren asks, “Are you relaxed?”
It’s a yes or no question. It’s simple, Goro can see it. He meets Ren eye to eye, angles himself in just the right way in his palm, and answers in perfect, clear confidence. That’s all there is to it.
The back of Goro's neck prickles. He tears his eyes away from Ren’s own. His gaze lands on Ren’s thumb, a meter to the right of Goro's body. He knows the digit is over half as long as he is tall, if cared enough to compare them. He swallows, feeling the giant’s eyes latch onto the tiny movement.
Goro says, quieter than he intends, “It’s different.”
He feels Ren’s gaze move off him—how useful this skill would be with other people of his size, to know if he's being watched. How unfair for it to manifest with Ren, of all people. Goro runs his thumb against the leather of his glove.
He doesn’t shy away, doesn’t hunch into himself, doesn’t cover his face and beg for his life to be spared like he’s seen so many do. Goro sits, straight as a wire. His fingers dig into the thick flesh of Ren’s palm. His gaze is drawn elsewhere in this massive, massive attic. To anyone watching, he doesn’t care about the presence of the giant in front of him.
He feels Ren’s gaze return to him. He doesn’t meet those eyes, only sits and wonders, randomly, if the accessibility rope Ren attached has fell. He can’t help but remember how it looked between Ren’s fingers, how what filled up Goro’s hands looked barely thicker than a piece of string, compared to him.
Ren makes up his mind. The table rumbles, faintly, as he sets down his phone. He uses his thumb to crack a knuckle, the sound a distant firework to Goro. He says, voice completely steady, “I'm not going to—“
“Hurt me, I know.” Goro must meet Ren’s gaze, this time. Not back down from that massive stare. Ren won’t hurt him. He knows this; he does. He does. There’s nothing he would gain, no reason Goro's given him. Unlike Goro, he doesn’t take pleasure from inflicting pain. Goro plasters his smile back onto his face. “I'm okay. I apologize for the awkwardness.”
Massive eyes bore into him. It takes every bit of Goro's power to do—nothing, because he’s perfectly fine, perfectly calm. Not at all against the idea of laying on some attic trash’s palm, in a room that stretches for miles.
Goro has never felt so fucking small.
Finally, Ren responds, voice soft but still, still reverberating through Goro, “Alright.”
Those eyes—like steel, like a knife, like the distant gleam of an executioner’s blade—make one last run over him. It’s a miracle, that Ren swings his gaze away when he does. Because Ren adjusts, not jostling Goro nor the table, simply bringing his body forward. It’s a miracle, because for an instant, a giant shadow envelops Goro, sending the air around him plummeting. Because, for a second, a single finger nearly as long as Goro is tall brushes against his back, and—
Goro isn’t able to stifle a full-body flinch.
He looks away, when the weight of Ren’s gaze returns. He breathes out. Hopes that the seams of his gloves won’t burst with how hard he’s clutching them.
He doesn’t meet Ren’s gaze for the rest of the night.