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Yuuta looks out at the wreckage before him, wiping the sweat from his brow as he does so. The air hangs heavy with regret and defeat. There are scattered pieces of furniture everywhere. Next to a large red stain on the carpet, Toge is crumpled into a pitiful, sweaty heap.
“It’s over,” Yuuta sighs. “There’s just no way we can win this.”
Toge moans from his spot on the floor, and Yuuta kneels next to him, carefully moving his boyfriend’s bangs away from his face. “This is just too far outside of the scope of what a special grade can handle,” he says solemnly.
Two shaky hands lift into the air to sign. “I can’t believe you were bested by furniture assembly.”
“You can’t even get the juice stain out of the rug,” Yuuta shoots back.
“The only reason there’s a stain in the first place is because your table fell apart.”
“It’s hard!”
“There are instructions.”
“They don’t make any sense!”
“They have pictures.”
This isn’t an argument he’s going to win, so Yuuta abandons it entirely. “I’m not built for this. I wasn’t meant to make it to adulthood,” he declares, flopping onto his back next to Toge. “I don’t even know who to call about the AC being broken.”
“Okaka,” Toge mumbles as he smacks Yuuta’s chest halfheartedly. He stays silent for a few beats. “...takana?”
“I guess it would be the landlord. At the very least, he can probably tell me who to call if it’s not him.” Yuuta sighs and props himself up on an elbow. “I wasn’t kidding earlier. I’m tapping out. I’m done for the night. Do you want to go get dinner or something? If I don’t get out of this apartment, I think I’m going to die.”
Suddenly, it’s like Yuuta has given Toge a shot of straight adrenaline. He shoots up into a sitting position, his eyes wide and a grin on his face, like he’s just been dying for Yuuta to suggest they go out. “Shake! Tsuna mayo!”
That’s when the warning bells go off in Yuuta’s mind.
Toge loves going on dates, but he rarely likes to plan them. He’s the type of person to drag someone out on the town to see where the wind takes them. For some reason, knowing that Toge has an actual plan for the evening sends shivers down Yuuta’s spine. It’s reminiscent of their highschool days, which aren’t that far behind them, when Toge would coerce Yuuta into helping him with pranks against their classmates. Whatever Toge has in store, it isn’t going to be good for Yuuta.
“Of course,” Yuuta says with a smile anyway, unable to help but give into Toge’s every whim. “Whatever you want to do, I’m okay with. Just let me shower first, yeah?”
Toge grins back at him. The pieces of his hair that aren’t matted to his sweaty forehead are sticking up at odd angles, he still has juice on his pants, and he smells like carpet cleaner. When he leans down, Yuuta’s eyes flutter shut, and he feels Toge huff out a small laugh as they kiss.
Yuuta would follow him anywhere.
— — —
Yuuta really needs to reconsider his “follow Toge anywhere” policy.
“Toge, we cannot do this.”
Toge looks up at him, blinking innocently with his hand outstretched for the knob of the bakery’s door. Yuuta grabs him and drags until they’re out of view of the window. “I’m serious, Toge. What if we get arrested or something?”
“No one is going to arrest us for pretending to be engaged.”
“They could try!”
Toge scoffs, but he looks a little forlorn as he gazes at the advertisement for free wedding cake samples, and Yuuta can feel his resolve begin to crumble. He probably is being a little dramatic, right? It’s not like the bakery has any way of validating their engagement claims. Even if they do, the worst they could be accused of is petty theft, at which point Yuuta can just pay them for the samples.
Besides. Toge isn’t the only one in the relationship with a sweet tooth.
“Fine,” Yuuta says, caving almost immediately. “But I want you to know that I’m morally opposed to this.”
“What a sad life to live, being morally opposed to cake.”
Yuuta splutters. “That’s not what I– Toge!”
Toge ignores him with a giggle as he pulls open the door and skips inside, already looking all the part of a future newlywed walking on air. Yuuta takes a deep breath and follows him in.
Then, he takes another deep breath, because holy shit.
The smell of baked goods hits him immediately, and Yuuta feels his face light up with a small smile at the scent. It smells so good. Toge is already across the room, admiring the rows of neatly arranged cookies and cupcakes, but Yuuta can tell by the smile on his face that he agrees. To use Nobara’s words, the vibes are immaculate. It’s a pretty small building, but that only adds to the cozy atmosphere. Yuuta can definitely see himself sitting in here with a book and a cup of coffee, if he was the type of person to spend time reading. There doesn’t seem to be a particular theme to the decorations; they’re fairly eclectic, as if the owners had just bought whatever they thought was cute here and there at random, with no regard for how it would look with the decorations they already owned.
Suddenly, the smile drops from Yuuta’s face, and he feels the familiar feeling of anxiety simmering under his skin as he realizes that this isn’t even a corporation they’re stealing from. This is a small business. This is locally owned.
“Oh, hello!” A voice chimes from the back, causing Yuuta to jump out of his skin. An elderly woman walks out from behind a curtain, carrying a tray of small cake slices, and the mounting horror that Yuuta feels cements him into place. “You must be the Okkotsu couple, right? I’m Gertrude. It’s so lovely to meet you!”
“You made us an appointment?” Yuuta asks. Even to him, it sounds a little strangled.
“Well it would have been rude to just walk in without one,” Toge signs. Yuuta feels his eye twitch.
“Come, come!” Gertrude calls, waving them over to a table in the middle of the room. “Have a seat! Get comfortable! Would you two like some tea?”
Toge nods eagerly.
“No thank you,” Yuuta chokes out, his voice a little higher than usual.
As she gets up and slowly ambles to the back, Yuuta looks at Toge.
“We have to buy so many cookies,” he signs, not wanting Gertrude to hear him. Toge blinks at him. “Toge, I mean it. So. Many. Cookies.”
Toge nods at him, but Yuuta can tell it’s absentmindedly by the way his eyes are already wandering over to the array of cake sitting in front of them. Yuuta has to admit—they look delicious. Even from where he’s sitting, he can tell that each slice is delicate and moist. They must have taken ages to make. The guilt twists in his stomach. As if he can sense it, Toge reaches up and pats Yuuta on the arm.
“Aren’t you two just the cutest?”
Yuuta looks up as Gertrude carefully sets down a tray. Despite Yuuta’s declination, three teacups sit next to the beautifully painted pot. “Please, help yourself,” she says, gesturing towards it.
“I’m sorry,” Yuuta says. “I mean—thank you! Thank you is what I meant to say.”
Even with Yuuta being as painfully off-putting as possible, Gertrude laughs. “Don’t you worry! There’s always one, and when I spoke to Toge, I knew it wasn’t going to be him.”
Toge snorts, and Yuuta feels his face heat up. He doesn’t know how, but he’s pretty sure this sweet old lady just roasted him.
“One of—one of what?”
Locking eyes with Toge and winking, Gertrude uses one hand to wave away Yuuta’s concerns as her other covers her mouth conspiratorially. Yuuta has no idea how Toge always manages to bend people to his will even without his cursed speech, but it would be genuinely impressive if not for the fact that Yuuta feels like he’s going to melt into his chair.
“She means that there’s always a really nervous person in a couple planning a wedding,” Toge signs, taking pity on Yuuta. Then he turns towards their sweet, oblivious hostess. “Being nervous is just his default state, even outside of wedding planning.”
Yuuta is so surprised at how easily Toge manages to slide into his role of a fiance that it doesn’t even register that Gertrude knows JSL. But the shock must show on his face, because she laughs at him again.
He has a feeling she’s going to be doing that a lot today.
“Oh, you don’t have to be so shocked! My husband started losing his hearing years before he should have!”
“Right…” Yuuta says awkwardly, sitting uncomfortably in the realization that he and Toge weren’t going to be able to talk in secret anymore. As nice as it is for Toge to be able to freely communicate without Yuuta having to act as translator, he was kind of banking on their “Secret Code” of sorts to be able to keep their stories straight. Now he feels like he’s treading water in the middle of the ocean. At night. And there are sharks. Glass sharks that can’t even be seen in the water. And—
“Please, help yourself!” Gertrude says, nudging the tray towards Toge. He’s quick to oblige, reaching for a light green slice first. He uses a small fork to pop a bite into his mouth, and as his eyes light up, he uses the same fork to offer a bite to Yuuta, who opens his mouth on pure instinct.
As soon as his mouth closes around the fork, he feels a little bit better.
The cake is so good that it actively eases his anxiety. It’s like an emotional support cake. How can anyone be worried about anything when they’re eating cake this delicious?
“Holy crap,” Yuuta says before he catches himself. “Ah—sorry, I mean, uh, holy cow?”
“I think I’m old enough to hear a curse word or two, sweetie,” she says with a wink before turning to Toge. “What do you think? Our matcha flavor is fairly popular.”
With his hands still full, all Toge can do is nod eagerly with a grin.
“It’s really good,” Yuuta fills in for him. “Toge likes matcha flavored things. He drinks a lot of tea.”
“He should try this one then,” she says, pointing to a slice on the far right. “It’s earl grey. And you should try this lemon one! It goes nicely with the matcha if you’re looking to do multiple tiers on your cake.”
“Oh, I don’t know how many tiers we’ll need,” Yuuta says as he reaches for the soft yellow slice. It’s impossible to say no to Gertrude. After all, cake tasting is why they’re there. “I don’t think it’s going to be a very big wedding. Neither one of us are really into huge crowds or anything.” He takes a bite of the cake. It’s better than the matcha. He likes the citrus, soft enough to not be sour, but strong enough to be noticeable. He offers a forkful to Toge, who offers him a bite of the earl grey at the same time. Toge is smiling at him as they feed each other, his eyes crinkling a little at the corners like they always do.
Gertrude is smiling softly at them. Yuuta wonders if all old people get sentimental when they see younger people in love, or if Gertrude is just the type of person who loves love. He wonders if he’ll smile at young couples like that when he’s old, assuming he lives long enough to get there. For now, he lets himself be carried through the evening until all of the cake has been eaten. He can feel his social battery drain with each slice, but Toge is there to take over the small talk every so often, and it offers Yuuta just enough time to recharge a bit before he takes back the reins.
Toge and Yuuta remain seated and discuss cake flavors as Gertrude clears away the empty trays. He could pretend that it’s because they’re trying to keep up appearances, but Yuuta is genuinely just that shocked at how delicious it all had been. Predictably, Toge’s favorite is the matcha. Yuuta is partial to the vanilla—”It’s not that basic, Toge,” he whines—but he would gladly eat any of them again. He would even pay for them.
God, he wants to pay for them.
“Well, what do we think?” Gertrude asks as she returns to her seat.
“They were all so good,” Yuuta says, desperate to at least pay this poor old woman he’s swindling in compliments, if nothing else. “I don’t know how anyone is supposed to choose between any of them.”
This brings a bright smile to her face. “I’m so glad to hear you say that. You know, my husband is the one who does most of the baking, and it always makes me so happy to see others enjoying his work.”
“Toge does all of the cooking and baking at our place, too,” Yuuta says. That one isn’t a lie; it’s technically true, even if they’ve only been living together for two days now. He doesn’t anticipate that changing anytime soon, especially if their experience in the dorms was anything to go by.
“You know, what a lot of people do is base their cake flavors around their wedding’s theme,” Gertrude says. “For instance, the last couple we served had a beach wedding, so they chose fruity flavors. How fun! What kind of venue is your wedding going to be held in?”
For some reason, Yuuta doesn’t hesitate.
“A garden,” he answers. “Our highschool—that’s where we met—has a really nice garden that Toge takes really good care of. It’s basically his garden, and it’s really beautiful.”
Gertrude clasps her hands together in excitement. “Garden weddings are so lovely! The matcha and floral flavors would pair wonderfully with that. Of course, the flavor of the cake doesn’t have to dictate the design of it, either! Have you thought of a color scheme?”
“Lavender and navy,” Yuuta answers immediately. “Toge likes when I wear navy, and lavender goes really well with his eyes.”
“And the centerpieces?”
“Something with bell flowers, I think. They’re the first flowers I ever helped Toge plant. I almost killed them,” Yuuta says, laughing a little at the memory, “but he managed to save them. They’re still thriving in the garden, three or four years later. I don’t know how he does it. He—”
Yuuta cuts himself off when he feels Toge staring at him. When he looks over, Toge’s face is bright red.
Gertrude croons. “You two are absolutely smitten with each other! It’s adorable.”
Yuuta can feel the heat creeping up the back of his neck. He was suddenly very aware of how quickly he had answered Gertrude’s questions, especially because he had never really considered having a wedding before.
“It’s a little odd, though. I would have expected you to be the one to propose, not Toge.”
Yuuta tears his gaze away from his flustered boyfriend to look at Gertrude. “He told you he proposed?”
She shakes her head. “No, but I can tell. You’re the one wearing the ring, after all.”
He can’t help it. He looks down at the ring on his hand, the silver band that still shines thanks to the way Toge cleans it every so often. The small gem on it catches the light every time Yuuta moves his hand. It’s a beautiful ring.
But it’s not Toge’s.
At least Gertrude is right about one thing. Of the two of them, Yuuta is the one more likely to propose. Toge always likes to leave major relationship decisions up to Yuuta. Of the two of them, Yuuta needs to think things over longer. It’s his anxiety, he thinks. Or maybe it’s just his general relationship trauma. And maybe it’s because of that trauma that he’s never considered proposing to Toge. Every time he thinks of his future, Toge is there, but he’s always there as Yuuta’s boyfriend. Partner, if Yuuta wants to be a little more serious about it. Husband has never crossed Yuuta’s mind. The idea of Toge wanting to be bound to Yuuta so permanently never occurred to him; at least if they’re dating, he has an easy out, if he would ever want it.
Suddenly, he thinks that Toge wouldn’t want a way out, even if it was offered to him.
He thinks that Toge would marry him, if he asked.
He thinks that he wants to marry Toge.
He thinks that he’s going to cry.
Toge looks alarmed, fretting around for one of the spare napkins that Gertrude had offered him before that never got used. Instead of taking the napkin, Yuuta takes Toge’s hands, and softly kisses his knuckles.
“I’m just so glad I get to spend the rest of my life with you,” he says.
It’s not a proposal by any means, and Yuuta does plan on doing a proper one. But Toge’s face is bright red anyway, and he looks like he might start crying soon, too. Yuuta laughs.
When they leave a few minutes later, Toge is still too embarrassed to make eye contact, and Yuuta is holding a bag with fifty cookies in it.
— — —
Yuuta flops onto the couch, and Toge follows quickly after, landing in Yuuta’s arms. Luckily, the couch doesn’t fall apart, and neither does the coffee table when Yuuta puts his feet on it. He presses a kiss to the top of Toge’s head, and then one to his temple, and then one to his forehead. He’s about to move on to Toge’s cheeks when Toge looks up at him, his mouth very obviously full.
Yuuta blinks at him.
Toge swallows, and instead of kissing Yuuta, he blows his breath in his face. Yuuta crinkles his nose, but he recognizes the smell immediately.
“You have to stop eating our wedding cake.”
“We paid for it this time!”
“I know, but we’re going to run out if you keep eating it like this.”
Toge pouts. “It’s literally made to be eaten . You would derive this wonderful cake of its sole purpose in life? You would allow it to wander through this world, empty and devoid of—”
“Okay, I’m not doing this,” Yuuta says. He captures Toge’s lips in a kiss, and it proves to be an effective way to shut him up. His hands drop onto his lap, his made up platform for Cake Rights immediately forgotten. Yuuta pulls away. “I guess we could always buy more, but I’m worried Gertrude is going to judge us if we keep buying wedding cakes like this.”
“Okaka,” Toge argues half-heartedly, too busy in his attempts to get his kiss back to care about Gertrude’s opinion of him. He makes a valid point, though—they are giving her more business, so she’s probably glad they keep buying wedding cakes.
“That’s fair,” Yuuta concedes. Instead of kissing Toge again, he pulls him tightly against his chest. Toge sighs in annoyance, but Yuuta can hear the smile in it, so he knows Toge isn’t actually upset. “I’m really glad I have such a smart husband,” Yuuta hums.
“Shake,” Toge agrees. Yuuta can feel Toge’s hands moving behind his back to absentmindedly twist the ring on his finger around the way he does every time he’s reminded that they’re actually married now. Every time he sees Toge fiddle with it, Yuuta can’t help but smile, a warm feeling flooding his chest.
“If only you were smart enough to figure out how to get juice stains out of a carpet.”
“Okaka!”