Chapter Text
1.
Taki was going to throw up. He’s finally got the hottest guy in his year, clearly interested enough in him to come to the dorm that he shared with two other people, and he was going to throw up.
Taki may not be experienced, but even he knew sneaking someone into your room after curfew when you’re both buzzed didn’t exactly scream platonic bro time. However, for a moment, the possibility of anything happening between them tonight seemed just as terrifying as nothing happening. He could feel his blood pressure rising, and his head was pounding. His nerves were getting the best of him, and he knew he had to put an end to it. He was not going to let his stupid brain fuck this opportunity up for him.
But before the voice in his head that sounded eerily similar to his Yudai hyung could give him a pep talk, Niki turned around to face him, probably done examining the room and psychoanalyzing him based on his taste in plushies. "So... nice room,” he said. Just to be nice, Taki assumed. One of his roommates, Jo, was a pretty tidy guy who kept to himself most of the time. Except when he didn’t. Every once in awhile, they would find whatever fucked-up experiment he’s working on for the month casually left around in the room, and it would always leave them with a mild form of trauma. And his other roommate was the devil reincarnate Hirota Maki, aka the other Riki; most days he would sneak into the room after the curfew, knock out several things on his way, then make himself an abomination of a sandwich at fuckass o’clock, and 8 times out of 10 he would forget to clean up after himself. Taki hated to admit it, but he was pretty much the same in the messiness department. So, no, there was nothing nice about their room. It was like the poster child of messy boy rooms.
Still, he was raised with manners, so he said, "Uh, thanks,” with a nervous laugh. God, could he get any more awkward? “You’re lucky my roommate's not here, by the way—the annoying one, not the alien-ish one.” Now, why did he say that? He had no idea. See, the thing about Taki was that he was allergic to silences.
Despite his brain’s attempts to sabotage him, Niki chuckled lightly. “Maki-kun, right? What do you have against him anyway? From what I’ve seen, he’s pretty chill.” “That’s probably because you don’t have to sleep with him every night.” Niki shot him a mischievous look. “Oh god, not like that—no. Uh, no.” He was laughing now; he had a fond look in his eyes, like he found Taki cute or whatever. Taki mentally gave himself a high-five. Getting laid wasn’t going to be so hard after all.
It turns out he spoke too soon.
He had Niki close—so close, his hands were on Taki’s waist. Taki’s heart was pounding, and his ears were ringing. He used up, like, 75% of his courage to ask Niki to come over; now he was using the remaining 25% to put his hands on Niki’s shoulders. Niki’s face was inching closer to Taki’s, but then, all of a sudden, Niki jumped back, blocking his ears. ‘’What the—What's that noise?!’’ What. ''Wha-wait, you hear that too?’’ Oh. He could’ve sworn the alarm bells were just in his head.
Of course, the one time he felt mentally strong enough to even attempt to get dicked down, some idiot would activate the smoke detectors. It was only a matter of time before their RA came to inspect the rooms. His night was positively ruined. And naturally, his fucknut of a roommate chose this moment to join them—through the window, you know, as one does.
Hirota Riki lifted himself up and ungracefully rolled into the room. Taki could’ve helped him, but, well, it wasn’t his business. He didn’t tell Maki to drink until he was piss drunk and use the least safe option to enter their room. ‘’No fucking way...'' he heard Niki whisper. Which was a totally valid reaction. Maki finally got up and straightened his clothes; his eyes were unfocused, and his hair was a mess. Taki hated him for still looking better than he did on an average day. ‘’Hey, dude, uh, Nishimura Riki, right?’’ Niki gave him an upward nod. Taki would bet all his fortune of seventy-five dollars that he used 100% of his brain to remember that; he had a proud smile on his face, the one that made Taki understand why so many people likened him to a golden retriever. ‘’And Taki... you’re here too.’’ It was his room too; of course he would be here. God, what an asshole. He didn’t even question the blaring alarm sound, which was still going off in the back. There weren’t even that many rooms in the residence; finding the source shouldn’t have taken this long.
Speaking of, someone started knocking on the door, and if Taki had to take a wild guess, he would say it was their RA. Once again, he was filled with terror. He needed to hide Niki quickly.
He approached Niki with the cutest, softest voice he could muster. ‘’Heyy, Niki-kun, don’t take this the wrong way, but uh, you need to hide, like right now.’’ Maki made a gagging sound. Yeah, fuck you too. He still wanted to have a chance with Niki after this hellish night; sue him.
‘’Taki? Jo? Are you guys there? ’’ God, why did these things always happen to him? ‘’Yudai hyung, I’m changing; don’t come in, please!’’ He said in a high-pitched voice. Maki rolled his eyes at him. ‘’Really? That’s the best you could come up with?’’ ‘’What? Maki, is that you? I can’t hear you; it’s loud as fuck out here.’’ Maki made an offended sound at the accusation, but nonetheless, he pulled Niki by the elbow and took him towards Taki’s bed, careful to avoid Jo’s because God knows what type of man-made horrors laid under there. Meanwhile, Taki took off his hoodie and gave himself a disheveled look. The RA was still pounding on the door. ‘’Guys, I’m coming in.’’ Taki turned to look at Maki, trying to fit Niki’s huge frame under his bed, and did the first thing that came to his mind. Which was to rush over to Maki and pull him towards the door to kind of use him as a human shield.
That didn’t really work out, though. Of course it didn’t, because Taki's got two left feet. He tripped over the hoodie he just threw on the floor and fell down on his back, pulling Maki down with him.
Honestly, Taki wasn’t surprised that he was clumsy enough to trip on a piece of clothing, but he expected better from Maki. Seriously, what's the point of being a gym rat if you don’t even have the core strength to resist a guy who gets manhandled by people shorter than him on a daily basis? And because the universe hated Taki, there was no other explanation at this point really, before Maki’s drunk ass could lift himself up, the RA barged into their room. ‘’What the hell are you guys do–’’ He made eye contact with Taki, and Taki just stayed put; he didn’t even try to free himself from under Maki. He just laid there, wishing he was just caught with Niki instead. Yeah, he would probably get a warning or even get kicked out, but at least then people would know he was hooking up with someone hot. Now he was going to be known as the horny loser who was desperate enough to try to get it on with his roommate.
When Maki realized the knocking stopped, he immediately got up, but Maki being Maki, he made no attempt to assist Taki, truly an angel.
Yudai was now looking between his Riki and the other Riki. It was obvious he was not happy. He had the pout™. Him and Taki look uncannily similar when they do that face, Maki thought; it must be the nonexistent genes.
“So, care to explain what you guys were doing?'’ Silence. ‘’No?’’ Maki prayed to whatever god was out there to just kill him. He didn’t risk taking a look at Taki, but he was probably in worse condition. Yudai didn’t really look like he was enjoying this either; he looked really close to tears, actually. And he didn’t even want to think about the poor Riki under the bed. What a shit show.
Maki was surely going to come back to his moment and regret his silence, but right now he didn’t have the time to feel sorry for himself or anyone else, for that matter. He was more than a little tipsy; he hadn’t had a single bite in hours, and he needed to pee, like, urgently. So excuse his brain for being a little slow to come up with a lie.
“For god’s sake, we were just making out. It’s not that serious.” Taki finally blurted out. Thank God for his inability to handle silences.
Except that it may not have been the right thing to say because now Yudai looked downright insulted. “Oh, it’s not serious? So are you guys, like,'' He looked like he was searching for the right word. “Experimenting or something?” He asked while looking Maki directly in the eyes. Wow, he really was pretty. But also? He made him feel like prey, so, not cool. “Uh, no, sir—I mean, Yudai hyung.’’
He was going to regret this. ‘’I was looking for a more suitable time to bring this up, but um, I was about to ask him exactly that, actually.” Taki was going to kill him. “Taki, I know you said to wait, but I don’t think I can wait anymore.’’ He gave a dramatic pause. ‘’I want us to be... exclusive.” Okay, now he was overdoing it. But fuck it, go big or go home, right? He held Taki’s hands in his: “Please accept my love and be my boyfriend!"
Good news: the RA looked like he’d rather be literally anywhere else. Good, they shouldn’t be suffering alone.
Bad news: Taki was taking too long to answer. He was looking at him with his annoyingly pretty eyes wide. He looked like his brain was fried, and it was getting kind of embarrassing for Maki.
So, he gave Taki a sharp look and squeezed his hands. Don’t fuck this up.
Finally, his brain caught up with the situation, and he said, “Uh, yeah. Sure, I’ll be your boyfriend. Yes.” What.
“O-kay, that was really touching, guys, but um... I need to go check the other rooms now. So… Riki? Not you, Taki, the other Riki. See you around, and Don’t. have sex in the dorms, please.” There was no way this was actually happening. “And Taki? We’ll talk about this later.” Maki was still in shock; he didn’t even have a sarcastic remark. “Yes, hyung.” They both said it at the same time. Disgusting.
Yudai just looked at them weirdly and forced a smile, which they returned with equal enthusiasm, and with that, he closed the door and left. “What the fuck—” Before he could finish his sentence, Nishimura Riki crawled out under the bed. God, he almost forgot about him. He dusted himself off while they both cringed, neither of them remembered the last time that place was cleaned.
“Niki, I’m so sorry you had to go through all that I really–” Riki waved his hand around with an easy-going smile. “No, it’s fine; don't worry about it. I’m just surprised.” Then he turned to Maki and said, “I didn’t know you two were seeing each other like that, my bad dude. Happy for you two, though.” And because he really was nice like that, he dabbed Maki up, gave Taki a slightly awkward side hug, and left.
What a fucking shit show.