Chapter Text
It started, as all unbelievable and shocking days do, as a completely normal day.
Shu had gotten to the office a little early, so he decided to treat himself to a coffee from the shop down the street before clocking in. He was also feeling particularly productive for some reason, so he cleared out a bunch of tasks that he had been meaning to get to. Even though working in IT could be pretty unpredictable, nothing out of the ordinary had happened all day, and Shu’s mood was good.
And just as Shu thought about what he should have for dinner, he heard a set of footsteps heading towards the IT department. A gentle knock on the wall got his attention and he looked up, already smiling.
But before he could even get a word out, the sight of the person standing in front of him made Shu freeze up. A man with blonde hair and broad shoulders stood a few feet away, staring back at Shu with wide lavender eyes.
A man that Shu was all too familiar with.
“Shu?” the man said. “Shu Yamino?”
Shu gave an uneasy laugh, forcing a smile. “Yes, that’s me.”
“Woah, what!” the man said, grinning widely as he walked up to Shu. “No way, that’s crazy! I didn’t know you worked here! It’s Luca! Luca Kaneshiro—from high school? Do you remember me?”
Unfortunately, it was kind of hard for Shu not to remember Luca. Not only did Shu and Luca share quite a few mutual friends in high school, but Luca was also the star athlete of their school’s track team and their senior prom king. He was good-looking, undoubtedly popular, and had the stereotypically haughty attitude to back it up. But despite his boyish nature, he also had fantastic grades—a real honor student. Everyone knew Luca Kaneshiro.
Back then, Shu absolutely could not stand him.
Aside from being the most obnoxious jock Shu had ever had the displeasure of knowing, for some reason Luca had made it his personal mission to make sure Shu knew that he was absolutely insufferable. Aside from committing the cardinal sin of being a jock, Luca was incredibly loud and boisterous, creating a scene wherever he went. He had a raucous laugh that Shu could always hear ringing through the classroom or down the halls—one that had an interesting dual effect of bringing people joy while also pissing off whoever the laugh was directed towards.
And, for whatever reason, a good amount of those times, Shu was the unlucky recipient of Luca’s mocking laughter. Ever since Shu had cursed out Luca and his friends during P.E. class in middle school, Luca had decided that he wanted to spend his high school career trying to get any sort of reaction out of Shu, enough to the point that he had once landed Shu in detention. Ever since then, Shu had decided, with firm resolve, that he couldn’t stand Luca Kaneshiro.
“How long has it been?” Luca continued, still grinning. “Like… ten years since we graduated?”
Shu laughed awkwardly. “Yeah, I guess so.”
Even now, Shu felt an instinctive annoyance at seeing Luca, even though the man hadn’t done anything wrong yet.
Shu took a good look at the man in front of him, sizing him up. For the most part, Luca was still recognizable from his teenage self—same soft-looking blonde hair, bright lavender eyes, and boyish grin. He still carried himself with the straight posture of a seasoned athlete and his hip leaned against the desk as he talked to Shu.
That said, there were a lot of things about Luca that had changed. He had already been, admittedly, pretty good-looking when they were both in high school, but somehow he had gotten even more attractive in the ten years since Shu had last seen him. He had grown into his face, soft features now more angular and symmetrical. Luca had also grown his hair out a little and tied it into a little sidetaill. His shoulders were broader and even under his button-up shirt—Shu had to quickly look away from the way it was a snug fit around his chest—Shu could see the markings of a tattoo curling around his neck and forearms where his sleeves had been rolled up to his elbows. He had even gotten taller.
Shu couldn’t help but feel wronged. Not fair, how did this guy get even hotter ?! Couldn’t Shu get some sort of karmic compensation for having to deal with him for four years of his precious high school life?!
Shu swallowed down his apprehension and gave Luca a polite smile. The faster this interaction ended, the better.
“Can I help you with something?” Shu asked.
“Oh, right!” Luca said. He straightened up. “My manager sent me over to pick up my laptop? It’s my first day.”
First day, huh? Shu didn’t remember seeing Luca’s name when he was setting up Luca’s laptop, but he went over to the IT closet to sort through the new laptops. Sure enough, on a shiny new system written on a pastel purple post-it note: ’Luca Kaneshiro - Engineering’ alongside a temporary password. Aster must have set this one up, Shu realized. Unfortunately for Shu, though, Aster had called out sick this morning, which meant that Shu would be in charge of onboarding Luca onto his new system.
Professional. Shu reminded himself in his mind. Keep it professional.
Shu walked out to see Luca looking at him with big, eager eyes. He felt a little self-conscious as he sat down in his desk chair and booted up Luca’s laptop.
“If you want to come over here…” Shu said without looking up. He set the post-it on his desk and typed in the temporary password that Aster had set up. “We’ll need to set up everything before you can start using it. So if you want to go ahead and enter your new password…”
“Oh, wait, sorry—where?”
Shu looked over to see Luca still standing a few feet away from him. Raising an eyebrow, Shu motioned with his hand for Luca to come over. “You can pull over that chair if you want,” he said, nodding at Aster’s empty seat next to him.
“Oh, okay,” Luca said. “‘Scuse me…”
Shu looked away politely as Luca started to go through the last bit of the new user flow.
“I-Is it all good now?”
Shu looked up to see Luca looking at him with uncertainty.
“Let me take a look,” Shu said. He slid closer to Luca to get a better look at the laptop and leaned slightly into Luca’s bubble. “Excuse me.”
“Y-yeah!” Luca stammered from next to him, his posture going stiff as he looked away from Shu quickly, as if there was something on Shu’s face that Luca shouldn’t be seeing.
This gave him pause. Shu wasn’t used to Luca being so… reserved. All throughout high school, Luca was an obnoxious show-off who was overly touchy-feely. Shu could still remember all of the times Luca would nudge him with his elbow or kick Shu’s feet under a table to get his attention. Luca even threw an arm around Shu’s shoulder from time to time, knocking the air out of him with the impact, as if they were actually friends. So, yeah, it was kind of weird to see Luca getting so bashful over something like being in close proximity.
“I think you should be all good,” Shu said, doing the final checks. He slid back in his chair as Luca gathered his belongings. “And if you’re missing anything that you need, you can just come back to the IT department. I think Aster will be here tomorrow, too, so he should be able to help.”
“Thanks, Shu!” Luca said, holding his laptop under his arm.
“No problem,” Shu replied. He paused before adding, “Welcome to the company.”
With that, Luca practically beamed at him. With a reaction like that, Shu would have thought Luca just watched him put the moon in the sky.
“Yeah, yeah!! Thanks!” he said enthusiastically. With his free hand, Luca scratched the back of his neck. “Maybe, we can get lunch some time later? Catch up on stuff?”
Shu’s smile twitched slightly. Oh god, hanging out with Luca Kaneshiro in a public restaurant? That sounded like a recipe for disaster. What if he caused a ruckus?
There was a part of him who wanted to flat out refuse—a younger, more annoyed part of him who remembered rolling his eyes as he watched Luca launch a fidget spinner into the classroom ceiling tiles in sophomore year.
However, Shu was older now, and much less blunt, so he just waved at Luca. “Maybe. I don’t know, I can get kind of busy.”
At that, Luca seemed to almost visibly deflate, and Shu instantly felt guilty. It seemed that Luca’s habit of wearing his heart on his sleeve hadn’t really changed even after all these years.
“O-oh, okay! No worries,” Luca stammered. “See you around, Shu.”
Finally, Luca left the IT department and Shu let out a relieved breath he didn’t realize he was holding in. He slumped in his chair and rubbed the bridge of his nose, taking a moment to gather himself before getting back to work.
Shu finished off the day with his mind in a haze. He didn’t see Luca for the rest of the day, which counted as a win in his book. He packed up as soon as it was time for him to clock out and was careful to make sure he didn’t run into Luca on the way.
Shu didn’t really relax until he got back to his apartment. He let out a deep sigh, throwing his bag down before flopping down on his couch. What a day.
Of course, after thinking that, his phone began to ring as if on cue. Shu squinted down, thinking very hard if he actually wanted to talk to anyone right now, before finally picking up.
“Hey,” his brother’s face popped up on the screen. Mysta switched the camera to show a moldy loaf of bread. “Do you think if I just cut out the green parts that this will be safe to eat?”
“That’s, like, ninety-percent green,” Shu answered. “What would you be eating?”
“I dunno,” Mysta said. “Crusts? Actually, ew. Nevermind, you’re right.”
“If you need me to buy you food, I’ll do it,” Shu said.
“What? No!! Bro, I’m fine,” Mysta insisted. “Like, it’s not like I’m dead or anything.”
“I don’t think I should waiting for after you die,” Shu said.
“Whatever, dude,” Mysta laughed. The camera swatted back to Mysta’s face. “Anyway, what’s up with you?”
Shu let out a sigh. “You’ll never guess who I saw today at work.”
“Who?”
“Luca Kaneshiro,” Shu said. “You remember right? From high school? Isn’t that crazy?”
There was a long silence from the other end of the call and, for a moment, Shu thought that the call had dropped. However, when he looked down at his phone, he could see Mysta’s eyes darting nervously.
Shu narrowed his eyes. “Mysta?”
“Uh, sorry! Yeah, that’s,” Mysta spluttered. “Yeah that’s crazy , bro! Whaaaat…”
“Mysta,” Shu repeated, eyes narrowing. “Did you know?”
“Okay, okay, wait—you can’t be mad—”
“I can’t promise that.”
“ Listen ,” Mysta said insistently, “ listen, okay, you know how I'm still friends with Luca, right?”
Shu, in fact, did not know that. He knew that Mysta and Luca were friends when they were all in high school, sure, but Mysta had never really brought Luca up after they graduated—probably because he knew Shu didn’t really like him. In fact, they had gotten into a few petty arguments when they were younger when Mystsa insisted that Luca was ‘not that bad.’
But for the sake of the conversation, Shu just nodded. “Sure.”
“Well, he mentioned that he got a new job a few weeks ago when we were getting lunch together,” Mysta said. “And, I mean—okay, he did mention that it was your company, but what are the odds! You don’t even work in the same department!”
“And you didn’t even think to warn me?” Shu asked.
“No! Why would I? I didn’t think you guys would actually meet ,” Mysta said. “Besides, you don’t even like the guy—why would you care?”
“Well, I mean, maybe you should have warned me before I had a surprise encounter with my high school nemesis!”
Mysta visibly rolled his eyes. “Bro, he’s not your nemesis. You just don’t like jocks.”
“I mean, it doesn’t help that he’s a jock,” Shu said. “Besides, he's so annoying! He would not leave me alone for four years!”
“Gee, I wonder why,” Mysta muttered under his breath.
Shu wasn’t really sure what that was supposed to mean. “What?”
“Nothing,” Mysta said smoothly. “You were the only person who thought he was annoying, okay? I mean, yeah, he kind of got into trouble a lot, but he’s super chill with everyone. He was, like, super popular, bro.”
Shu pouted. “I don’t even get why he was so popular,” he complained. “What—just because he’s some track star? Who’s kind of good-looking? Having big muscles and being super hot doesn’t give you a license to be obnoxious.”
“Is he ‘kind of good-looking’ or ‘super hot’, be consistent,” Mysta said.
“Whatever, you know what I mean,” Shu rolled his eyes.
“So, what, did you actually see him or something?”
“Yeah, I was the person who had to get him set up and everything,” Shu answered. He paused for a moment. “Hey, did Luca get, like, quieter or something?”
Mysta frowned. “Not really.”
“Oh, huh, weird.”
“Wait, why?” Mysta asked. Shu watched as he straightened up a little, eyebrows knit in concern. “You can’t just ask something like that and then not explain.”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Shu said. “He just… seemed really shy when we were talking? Like he was scared of talking to me or something. It was just weird because he used to be right up in my ear all the time.”
“Oh, I mean, it’s not like he’s still that loud, but he’s still pretty friendly. Y’know, like a dog,” Mysta mused. “Maybe he’s scared of you.”
Shu’s eyes widened. “Me?! Why would he be scared of me?! ”
Mysta gave him a deadpan expression, and even over the video call, Shu could feel the full weight of his disbelief. “Dude, I mean, it’s not like it was a secret that you hated his ass,” Mysta said. “Maybe he thinks you’re going to, I dunno, cancel him on Slack or something.”
Shu had to snort at that one. “Cancel him? On Slack? ” he asked. “What would I even cancel him for?”
“Dude, I dunno! You’re the one who hates him.”
“I don’t hate him!” Shu tried to argue.
“Coulda fooled me,” Mysta responded with a shrug.
Shu frowned, almost ready to argue the point with Mysta. Shu actually didn’t hate Luca. At least, not anymore. Sure, they didn’t get along when they were younger and Shu wouldn’t go as far as saying he liked Luca, but hate was a really strong word. It had been ten years already—Shu could barely remember a lot of his grievances against Luca other than the fact that he was generally obnoxious. Also, they were teenagers, and as much as Luca was kind of annoying, Shu admittedly was also not the nicest person either when he was a teenager.
And, in Luca’s defense, it wasn’t as if Shu gave him the warmest welcome that day either.
Throughout the rest of his call with Mysta, Shu was only about half present, his mind wandering back to his interactions with Luca earlier. Perhaps he had been a little too quick to judge Luca after all this time. They had so many mutual friends in common after all—still did even to this day. Honestly, if things were a little different, they could have probably been friends to some extent.
After Shu had hung up his call with Mysta, he resolved to treat Luca a little more kindly. Maybe he’d even take Luca up on that lunch invitation. Shu went back into office the next day with just that intention in mind. It was a big office, but he was in IT, so it should be easy enough to encounter Luca one way or another.
…Or so he thought. Weirdly enough, now that Shu was purposely seeking out Luca, Luca seemed to make himself scarce. And it wasn’t even that he didn’t see Luca at all. Every time he ran into Luca or tried to speak to him, the man would get pulled away to some other business or have some sort of excuse to leave before Shu could get a word out. If Shu didn’t know any better, he’d think that Luca was doing it on purpose.
At first, it had been pretty inconspicuous, so Shu hadn’t really thought about it. Luca would walk out of a room just when Shu was walking in, or Luca would exchange a quick greeting with Shu, but before Shu could say any more, he would suddenly run into another coworker with a quick, “Sorry, gotta go!”
Shu was chalking it mostly up to unfortunate coincidences all week, but on Friday morning, Shu walked into the office to see, out of the corner of his eye, Luca walking in through another entrance, freezing, and then immediately turning around.
So… maybe he was doing it on purpose.
By the end of the week, Shu was starting to feel a little confused and, honestly, annoyed. Luca was the one who invited Shu out for lunch, why was he avoiding him all of a sudden? Sure, Shu wasn’t really the friendliest when he started talking to Luca again, but he didn’t think he was cold , or anything.
It got especially annoying on Friday, when Luca had peeked into the IT department a few times today holding a keyboard, before promptly leaving.
“Hey, Luca,” Shu greeted. Luca jumped like a startled rabbit. “Is… there something I could help you with? You’ve been popping in all day.”
“N-no, it’s okay!” Luca stammered. “I was just checking if Aster was in.”
Shu frowned. When did Luca get so close to Aster?
“Aster just stepped out for a late lunch,” Shu said, his eyes falling to the keyboard in Luca’s hands. “Are you sure you don’t need help?”
Luca scratched the back of his neck. “Uh… I mean… My keyboard suddenly stopped working this morning. It can’t hold a charge or anything, but I don’t want to bother you.”
“No, I mean, that’s literally my job, so…” Shu said. He extended his hand for the keyboard. “Do you still want a wireless one?”
“Yeah, if that’s okay,” Luca said. He handed Shu the keyboard, still keeping a slight distance that wouldn’t have been noticeable if he wasn’t so awkward about it.
“I told you, it’s no big deal,” Shu said, turning the keyboard over in his hands. It was an older model, so that was probably why it suddenly just died. He could take a look at it later though and see if it’s salvageable. “Let me grab you a new one, you got a Macbook, right?”
Luca seemed to brighten a little bit. “Yeah! Thanks, Shu!”
Now that Shu had Luca somewhat captive, he had half a mind to confront Luca and ask him why he was avoiding Shu like the plague. However, the way Luca was watching him gave him pause. It still weirded Shu out a little to see Luca so… hesitant.
Maybe he should ask Mysta about it later? Whatever, that was a problem for future Shu. It’s been a long week.
Shu walked over to the IT storage closet, which—okay, he and Aster had a lot of organizing to do. Things were stacked precariously like Jenga blocks, different devices in labeled sections that they definitely shouldn’t be, and what looked like an abandoned phone case? He made a mental note to get to that at some point soon, but not today.
Unfortunately for Shu, their habit of procrastinating on getting the IT closet sorted was currently to his detriment. Shu could see a keyboard balanced precariously on top of a stack of boxes, just out of his reach, step ladder nowhere to be found.
Shu did a little hop, wondering if he could reach the keyboard without knocking over the boxes. When the shelves shook slightly on landing, he winced.
“Hey, are you okay in there?” Luca called out.
“Yeah! Yeah, I’m fine,” Shu said. He stepped out of the closet, trying to see if Aster had left the stepladder somewhere outside, but to no avail.
“D’you… Do you want me to help you reach something?” Luca asked.
Shu felt a little embarrassed, but grimaced. “Uh… Yeah, that’d probably be better than whatever I’m trying to do.” He motioned for Luca to follow him into the cramped little closet.
Luca stepped into Shu’s bubble. It was the closest they had been all week. “Where is it?”
Shu pointed at the box right over his reach. “Right over there. Top box. It’s a little… uh… Like there’s a lot of boxes that might fall—”
“Oh! Okay, I see it!” Luca said.
“Okay, let me just—” Shu turned around, but before he could get out of the way, Luca had reached over.
It was at that moment that it crossed Shu’s mind exactly how much Luca had changed in the past ten years. His chest, visibly muscular even under his shirt, was barely an inch away from Shu’s face and he could smell Luca’s cologne—subtle but almost alluring. Shu felt his heartbeat speed up, thundering violently as he stared at Luca’s shirt button struggling to hold on for dear life.
It had also occurred to Shu just how small the closet was.
Another memory crossed Shu’s mind—one that he had completely forgotten for years until now—that was eerily similar. Instead of the IT closet though, they were in a library, stuck in between the narrow space between two bookshelves.
Luca wasn’t as broad back then, but he was still taller than Shu, even if only slightly. He grinned down at Shu, smugness etched across every feature of his face as he held a book that they were both fighting for over Shu’s head, just out of reach.
“Sorry, Shubert,” Luca had teased, giggling like he was barely able to control his laughter. “You’re just too short.”
And that had really pissed Shu off, because he knew that Luca probably didn’t really need that book, he was just there to get a rise out of Shu. Also, Shu wasn’t even that much shorter than Luca! It was a few inches at most! And you know what, Shu didn’t even want that book that bad anyway, but now that Luca was making fun of him—
“Shu?” Luca called. “Shu, are you okay?”
Shu blinked and the memory of a sixteen-year-old Luca Kaneshiro was replaced with the current one standing in front of him, but instead of smiling, his lips were curled into a frown and his eyebrows were knit in concern.
“What?” Shu asked, although it came out unintentionally snappy.
“Sorry, I, uh,” Luca waved the keyboard in his hand. “I got the keyboard.”
“Oh,” Shu blinked. He softened his tone before continuing. “Right. Sorry, I got distracted.”
“Okay, well then,” Luca’s eyes darted to the side. “I-I mean… Thanks for the help.”
He could see the signs—the same signals he had been seeing all week. Luca was going to try to run away again.
As Luca started to move, Shu reached out to grab Luca by the wrist before he could leave. Luca looked down at Shu with wide eyes.
“Shu?”
“Why are you avoiding me?”
Even in the dimly-lit closet, with them standing so close together, Shu could see the shell of Luca’s ear turn red. His lips quirked, as if twisting between a smile and a frown.
“Uh, well,” Luca stammered. “I-I guess I should just say this now.”
Shu was determined to get at least some sort of answer. He was prepared for Luca to say something—anything. Maybe he was mad at Shu for the way their reunion went. Maybe he just wanted to keep things professional, or maybe he wanted to act like they didn’t know each other. All of it was fine, honestly. Shu just wanted answers at this point.
He watched as Luca hesitated, opening and closing his mouth like a fish. After what felt like one of the longest silences of his life, Shu was about to give up entirely.
Shu sighed. “Luca—”
“I’m sorry for landing you in detention when we were fifteen!” Luca blurted out. He spoke so quickly that it took a moment to decipher exactly what Luca said. As Shu paused to remember exactly what Luca was apologizing for, Luca continued. “And also for that time I pushed you in the pool at Pomu’s homecoming afterparty… And honestly, for just being… I dunno… kind of a dick when we were in high school.” He pulled his wrist out of Shu’s grasp and scratched the back of his neck. “I know you didn’t really like me back then, so I didn’t really want to bother you at work.”
Shu blinked owlishly. Huh, this… Wasn’t exactly what he was expecting. He didn’t even realize that Luca was aware of all of that. Aside from the fact that Luca was always bothering him, Shu always thought he was just another NPC in the glorious life of Luca Kaneshiro. Just one disdainful person amongst the sea of admirers.
And the thing is, Shu didn’t even really want Luca to apologize or anything. Yeah, Luca was a brat back then, but so was Shu. And, to be honest, Shu didn’t even remember how Luca got him into detention other than the fact that it happened. Heck, he didn’t even remember the pool incident at all outside of a vague memory of being drunk and Uki patting his hair dry with a towel, aggressively muttering, “Dry your hair, bitch, you’re going to catch a cold .”
Luca, a whole twenty-eight years old now, suddenly looked smaller than Shu had ever seen him in the years that they had known each other, looking down at his shoes. Shu had never known Luca to look so apologetic.
He had changed. There was no doubt about it now. Luca was no longer the same person that Shu knew ten years ago, and just as importantly, Shu was definitely not the same person he was ten years ago either. For some reason, that realization made Shu curious to know what type of person this Luca was.
“I don’t forgive you,” Shu said.
Luca looked up, not really looking surprised or angry. In fact, his expression didn’t really change much at all. “Yeah, I know—I can stay out of your way—”
“Woah, woah, woah, hold on,” Shu interrupted him. “I’m not done. I don’t forgive you… But… ”
Luca perked up a little at that. “‘But’...?” he echoed.
“ But …” Shu smiled. “If you let me take you out for lunch next week, we can leave all of that in the past.”
“W-wait, what?” Luca asked, eyes wide.
“Well, I mean, unless you don’t want to have lunch anymore,” Shu said. “No pressure.”
“No! No, I still want to have lunch,” Luca said quickly. “B-but, shouldn’t I be treating you? ”
“Nah, it’s fine! Think of it as like a… Congrats on your first day at a new job lunch,” Shu said. He brushed a strand of his hair between his fingers, feeling a little shy. “Besides, I… want to say sorry, too. I don’t think I was the… nicest person when we met because I was kind of surprised. I don’t really think that’s fair.”
“Wait, Shu, you don’t have to apologize.”
“I want to,” Shu insisted. “Look, honestly? High school was a long time ago and… I was kind of salty back then.”
Luca rubbed his neck. “I… wouldn’t really say that.”
Shu laughed. “See? You agree!”
“No!!” Luca argued, although a laugh passed his lips as well.
“Besides, starting at a new job can be rough,” Shu said. “It’s always nice to have a friend around.”
“Friends?” Luca echoed Shu again. His eyes were still wide, as if he was still in disbelief about what Shu was saying. To be honest, if Shu were eighteen years old, he would probably not believe what he was saying either.
But Shu wasn’t eighteen anymore, and the Shu of today wanted to give Luca another chance.
“Yeah, friends!” Shu grinned at him.
“Okay,” Luca said, hesitantly at first. Then, he smiled. “Yeah, friends!”
The smile Luca gave him was the most genuine one Shu had seen from him all week, stretching to his dimpled cheeks—a smile so bright that Shu thought that it could light up this dingy little closet without a problem. Shu felt like he was basking in the sun and all of its warmth.
Huh , Shu thought to himself. Maybe there are some things that will never change.