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The last thing Aki wanted to do before he died was go fishing.
It may have been a silly request, but it was what he wanted. To sit back and relax at a quiet lake, tangling lines out from the depths of his bag and throwing fish into a bucket of ice - just him, his fishing pole, and the quiet tug of the water beneath his feet.
He hadn't been fishing since he was young - before Taiyo got sick, when his dad would load up the family truck with their supplies and a packed lunch for the three of them. He'd wake him and Taiyo up at the crack of dawn, when it was still dark and misty out.
They'd dress together in the dark, their dad slapping hats on the two of them and helping them into their mucking boots. Popping them in the backseats of the truck, their dad would squish them between the cooler and the lunch bag.
Taiyo loved digging through the mud for worms while Aki did his duty as a big brother and skewered them on the hook for him. They never caught anything, maybe they were too young, too impatient. Their dad could sit for hours, with a cracked can of beer in one hand and his pole in the other, but by midday Aki and Taiyo were busy chasing each other around the lake rather than trying to catch any fish.
Though Aki never caught anything, he looked forward to those days. He loved them more than anything, and he hated the day that became the last fishing trip - when they packed their things and Taiyo fell asleep on the ride home. When Aki asked if they could come back tomorrow, his dad stayed quiet for a long time, and all he could hear was the busted thrum of the old stereo.
Maybe some other time, buddy, his dad finally said. They rolled down the tracks back to their house, bumping over the stones and dirt.
Some other time turned into weeks, then months. Then Aki was twelve and they hadn't gone for three years, because Taiyo needed so much care.
So, Aki wants to go fishing. Sue him, he wants that childish feeling of joy back.
"—Are we there yet?" Angel interrupts. He's wearing a tan bucket hat that was clearly child sized and a pair of jean overalls he suspects are Power's, if the bagginess around Angel's chest was anything to go by, and a startlingly bright yellow pair of galoshes. It’s rare to see him dressed in anything that wasn't issued by Public Safety.
Aki had leant him a shirt before they left, an old ratty t-shirt he didn't mind getting dirty, that engulfed Angel with its size. Even when they rolled it up and secured it with a hair tie, it still overwhelmed Angel.
"We're here," Aki says, beginning to unload the supplies onto the ground.
The area they pick isn’t half bad - a marshy climb down towards a quiet little creek and pond with grass that poke up to Angel's waist. Angel fussed over setting a towel down for their supplies on the rocky shore, while Aki breathed in the crisp air of the summer day.
It’s gorgeous. The sun shimmers off the water, a full, glowing heat above their heads with endless blue around it - not a cloud in sight.
Sure, maybe it isn't the most ideal location, and Aki isn't even sure there’s any fish worth catching here, but to him it's perfect.
Angel slumps down amongst the rocky shore, staring out into the murky water. Though far from the crystalline lakes Aki went fishing in as a kid, the creek sits comfortably quiet, and that matters more than anything else. "Are there even fish here?"
"Not sure," Aki admits. "But it's worth a try."
He passes a fishing rod over to Angel, taking care with the line. It wobbles in Angel's uncertain hands, easily dwarfing him in height.
"Wha–" Angel starts. The rod bends towards the water as he frowns at the weight of it. "I thought you were fishing."
"I am," Aki tells him. He pops the tab for the worms. "I was just getting you started."
Angel wrinkles his nose. "And I was just going to be here for morale support. Last day on Earth and all."
Aki smiles, holding the can of worms out to Angel. "And I want to spend it fishing with you."
Angel sighs, then digs his finger into the soft dirt. Pinching a fat, wiggling worm between his forefinger and thumb, Angel holds it out from his body like it were about to lash out and bite him.
Like the natural that he apparently is, Angel skewers the worm onto the hook with barely a blink, then looks up at Aki. "Okay, now what?"
"Now you cast it out."
"Yeah, but how?" Angel asks.
"I thought you were 'from the country'? Weren't you born fishing?"
"Devils aren't born, dumbass," Angel says, without any bite. He says this as if it's common knowledge - Aki supposes it is. Angel just seems so human-like in his day-to-day life that it slipped Aki’s mind that Angel hadn't been born and raised by a loving family, but rather, simply popped into existence on a sandy beach line one random Tuesday.
"You've seriously never fished?"
Angel shakes his head once more in confirmation.
"Okay," Aki says. If this were anyone else he'd stand behind them, wrap his hands around theirs, and guide them through the motions, showing the most efficient way to cast the line without pulling a muscle. But Angel, even with Aki's shirt on over the overalls, still has exposed skin that's far too close for comfort, pale bony fingers wrapping around the plastic wood.
It's then that Aki realizes they should've gone fishing on a boat or at a dock, where Angel could simply drop the line in the water, sit back against his grandiose wings, and sunbathe the day away without any prospects of Aki needing to wrap his hands around his.
Aki pulls out his own fishing rod, realizing a demonstration might be the best way to go about it, readying the line and bobber.
"Watch," Aki says, and surprisingly Angel turns his attention to him, bright eyes glimmering in the sunshine cascading through the clouds overhead.
"First, slack your line a little," Aki explains before he shows Angel, releasing the tension from the line until it hangs off the end of the rod by a few centimeters. Angel follows his lead without much fumbling.
"Then, one hand here, other down here," He says, sliding his left hand down to the bottom of the rod. "And then you just…. flick it out."
He sends his line out into the water without an audible splash, and a moment later, Angel's follows, bobbing alongside his.
Aki sighs, leaning back while he lets the quiet serene atmosphere wash over him.
Beside him, Angel sighs. "Now what?"
"We sit and wait," Ak replies.
"Boring," Angel says. Squatting down on the sand, Angel flops down onto his bottom, pulling his legs to his chest and holding the pole between his thighs. His wings expand behind him, allowing him to sit back, reclined against the downy feathers.
"Why did you come if you didn't want to fish?"
"I'm a devil, I'm meant to be selfish, don't you agree?"
"I suppose so."
The quiet stretches on for ages. Suddenly, Aki hates the tucked-away creek that they chose. He'd do anything to be surrounded by the bustle of others at the beach or along a lakeside while they sat on a pier, dipping their toes in the water while watching boaters and swimmers alike.
"It's your last day alive, and you wanted to go fishing by yourself," Angel says, somberly. "Not with Denji, or Power, or me." There's a bit of a shake to Angel's hands as he tightens them around the pole. "I don't want to watch another person I love die, but I can't stand being excluded on your last day."
Aki’s never seen Angel cry. He tends to be quiet and keeps his emotions to himself, bottled up tight and neat, never allowing someone to see any vulnerability from him. Now, however, fat tears track down Angel's face in between silent sobs.
"Angel—"
"I'm okay," Angel says, quickly. His cheeks are red and his eyes are puffy with uncried tears. "I'll be okay."
A heartbeat passes, then: "Sorry that I'm crying. You're the one that's dying."
Aki can't help the laugh that bubbles up from his chest. The situation is so absurd, like they were talking about Aki going on a weekend trip. "It's okay."
It doesn't feel okay, now that they've opened the floodgates of it. It's an uncomfortable silence, only broken by the shrill calls of birds in the trees and Angel's deafening tears. Aki wishes he could take it away, make Angel feel better, but there's nothing he can do.
This is the end. There's nothing else that can be done before Aki dies, no matter how healthy and fine he feels at this moment. He doesn't know how it'll happen, when Curse finally gobbles his soul whole, severing him from the rest of the life he should have lived.
Aki had spent the last week with the ones he loved - taken Denji and Power to hot pot while they squabbled over their seats and ate all the meat from the soup; gone to a cafe with Kobeni and watched her stammer through her order of a cappuccino and honey toast, something so thoroughly Kobeni that it made him laugh when she blushed dark pink after he ordered an espresso and nothing else.
He’d thought, stupidly, that the restaurant he took Angel to was enough. A placeholder for saying goodbye as they used up the last of Aki's funds he hadn't sequestered aside for Denji and Power, slurping noodles out of broth as they sat across from each other in companionable silence.
Afterwards, they went for a walk down the boardwalk by the beach and held hands through the skin of leather gloves. It was a nice day, and Aki tried not to let it bother him that he couldn't hold Angel the way he wanted to on their last day together.
Anticipating fishing by himself, Aki packed a lunch for one. He figured if he was lucky enough, he could just keel over and die on the rocky shore - it would be cumbersome to annoy those he loved with another round of goodbyes.
Aki told Angel that he wanted to spend the day fishing with him, when they stopped at the lake, but it was a bit of a lie. Angel hadn't been factored into this equation, and Aki hadn't even felt bad about leaving Angel behind until he turned on the waterworks.
Angel’s fishing pole rests between his soft thighs until it begins to stiffen where the line pulls tight.
"Reel it in!" Aki tells him, as Angel sits up and tries to grab onto the reel. It flails in his hand as he tries to find a good hold on it. With his strength, Angel yanks the rod back effortlessly, cranking the reel until the line tightens and begins to travel back towards them. Aki's surprised that he managed to hook anything, let alone bring it to shore.
"Wait—" Angel says, and his hand slips from the crank. The line slackens as the reel spins out of control – until it stops, like it had never happened at all. "Oh."
Aki's own fishing pole remains calm and unbothered in his hands. "Hey, it's okay."
"I wanted to catch a fish," Angel whines. His voice is soft, always so soft, like a fuzzy blanket, despite the fact that his eyes are shiny, brimming with uncried tears and mouth turned down into an unpleasant frown.
"We can try again," Aki tells him. "We've got all day."
There's a pause, like a spider dangling from its silver web, broken only by a sigh that shudders through Angel's body. "Yeah, I guess we do."
Their bobbers float along the lake in tandem, broken only by the water washing up onto the shore. Aki clears his throat, then breaches the silence. "What do you like to watch?" He asks.
Angel glances at him. "Why do you care?"
"I'm making conversation!"
Angel glances down shyly, mumbling a barely decipherable answer. It sounds something like Tokyo Love Story, which Aki has seen only in passing while Power flipped through channels during dinner.
Aki makes a noise of agreement in the back of his throat.
"What do you watch?" Angel asks. "The news?"
"I don't really watch television," Aki admits. "Power and Denji use it mostly." He leaves out the fact that when he does watch tv, it is the news.
"So, if you don't watch tv, what do you do for fun?" Angel shoves his hands down into the bulky pockets of his overalls and peers curiously at him through his sweaty, matted hair. Between Angel’s knobby knees, the fishing pole sways unsteadily, until he thinks better of it and grabs it.
Work, Aki thinks. But he doesn't work anymore, won't ever have to get dressed in the morning again, "Read, sometimes."
"What do you read?"
Aki feels his cheeks grow hot. "The paper, mostly."
"So old," Angel laughs.
"Can you even read?"
"Sure," Angel replies. "There's a ton of books in my housing unit."
"I wasn't aware devils knew how to read." Aki replies. Now that he thinks about it, he barely knows anything about Angel. "How did you learn to read kanji?"
"Huh? Why would I need to know how to read kanji to read books?"
"Well, how else would you read them? Are they picture books?" It seems fitting he supposes - devils weren't exactly known for their intellectual prowess.
If anything though, Angel seems more confused. "I just eat the paper, why would I need to know kanji?"
"Why—" Aki starts, then stops, trying to squash a laugh that bubbles in his throat at the absurdity of Angel ripping out sheets of a book and munching on them like an after-school snack. "Why would you eat the books?"
"I thought that's what they were for!" He pauses. "One of them has pictures of cakes on the front."
A cookbook, Aki's mind unhelpfully supplies. Angel is eating cookbooks. The thought of it alone is silly - the reality of it is even sillier.
A devil who eats paper, and a human on the last strings of his life. "What a pair we make," Aki laughs. It should feel bitter, but it doesn't. He's never been happier in his entire life than right now, sitting beside Angel in his stupid outfit that looks like he got dressed in the dark, laughing at the mental image of him eating paper and watching Tokyo Love Story.
Angel cracks a small smile. "I guess it's kinda funny."
"A little," Aki says. It's hard to think that this is how he gets to die, sitting side-by-side with his love instead of being killed by a devil on the clock. "Remember when we got together?"
"Do you remember?" Angel asks. "You were so drunk, Denji had to carry you home."
"Not my finest moment," Aki admits, thinking back to when, a few weeks ago, Division Four hosted his going-away party. Everyone insisted on buying him a drink. Within an hour, Aki was more than a little tipsy, and a few more drinks after that, he'd gotten the liquid courage he needed to finally look Angel in the eye and tell him how he felt.
Aki wanted to kiss Angel. Rake his own fingers through Angel’s fiery hair. Slot their fingers together and hold Angel's small, cold hand in his own. Aki was drunk enough that he'd stupidly forgotten about Angel's powers.
"It was raining," Angel says thoughtfully. "I was the only devil on duty that day, and Kobeni wrote down the wrong address. I almost didn't want to come. I was totally soaked."
Aki remembered that - he wasn’t that drunk when Angel had arrived, nearly an hour after everyone else. His hair was wet and stringy like spaghetti. His already-too-big suit was weighed down with water and when he shed the jacket, Aki wanted to bury his face against Angel's chest and keep him warm where goosebumps rippled across his chilled skin.
Everything after that was a bit foggy - Angel came, sat beside him, and ordered food. When Kishibe offered him a drink Angel wrinkled his nose in response.
Adorable. Aki wanted to kiss Angel right there and do so much more - it was only right to want to seek comfort before death, right?
He lost count of how many drinks he had - they just kept getting placed in front of him, and he drank them down like a man dying of thirst. Angel sat next to him, radiant and gorgeous, a smile broke out across his face with teeth glimmering like pearls as he engaged in conversation with Power.
“Kiss me.” Aki said, point-blank words fired like a bullet aimed squarely at Angel, who blinks up at him, confused.
“Why?” Angel asked, tilting his head to the side. It’s a stupid request, because they both know the faintest brush of lips would leave Aki with less time than either could handle.
Aki can’t keep his head up, and it falls onto Angel’s shoulder. Despite Angel’s slender frame, he's as solid as marble. He's cool to the touch; it feels amazing against Aki’s flushed cheeks.
Angel looks torn - like he wants to give in and kiss Aki too, between bites of dinner, like they were a normal couple. Instead, Angel shakes his head.
“'Wanna.” Aki says, then he tries to push his forehead into Angel’s neck which Angel only just swerves away from at the last second.
"That was so dumb of me," Aki admits. It's a foggy, stupid memory. He'd been thoroughly embarrassed the following day, nursing a pounding migraine and cramping stomach from all the alcohol.
Aki remembers being surprised when Angel knocked on his apartment door, a sharp sound stabbing straight into Aki's cranium, and demanded a date from Aki then and there before he ever tried to kiss him again.
Aki liked that about Angel - maybe it was his devil instincts, but he was never scared to stand up for what he wanted. He made Aki buy him ice cream as they walked down the rain-slicked boardwalks together, the wind whipping around them while Aki's head thrummed with pain.
Aki never kissed him, still hasn't. He wishes he could, one last memory to remember Angel in golden light, but he couldn't imagine putting that on Angel's conscience.
Between them, Angel's bobber dips in the creek.
"I think a fish is nibbling," Aki says.
Sure enough, the wire pulls taut but this time, Angel is ready for it, digging the heels of his feet down into the gritty sand and immediately wrapping his lithe fingers around the reel.
Angel yanks it like he's tugging on a rope, a lack of finesse as expected of a devil. Aki is surprised the line doesn't snap with the way that Angel reels and pulls - and even more pleasantly surprised when the fish rolls up on shore.
It's not very big, only about the width of his hand. It flops along the rocks while Angel screeches, picking it up gingerly with his forefinger and thumb.
"Toss it in the bucket," Aki tells him. He opens the container, filled with ice, and lets Angel throw his prize in before sealing it shut again.
The intense moment washes away as Angel preps his line again.
"Tonight," Angel starts, slipping the worm on the hook. "I want fish stew. What about tomorrow?"
Aki swallows the feeling down, of no tomorrows, of no promises, looking at the big blood-red eyes of the one he loves. He places his hand on the denim of Angel's overalls, right above his knee. "Whatever you want."