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An really thought wearing her hair up on this trip would help.
It's a lost cause now, really. At least that's what An is thinking when she practically starts clawing at the door of her and Kohane’s tent, desperately trying to find the zipper so she could crawl out and bask in her last moments on this planet.
“Shit!” She hisses. She really doesn’t want to pester Kohane with this—plus, she looked really cute when she was sleeping and who was An to destroy that!? “Come on, come on…”
An is going to die. She is going to die all because she’s too scared to deal with the tick that’s crawling up her neck. She had just felt it there while trying to fall asleep and now she could sense its ugly little legs planting themselves in her skin. She had tried pulling it off by herself but the sensation of touching it…and how it was practically suctioned onto her made her feel nauseous.
She hears a subtle clink of metal against her nails and quickly zips the tent doors open, darting out of the tent. Though, she puts a little too much power into this, propelling herself forward and launching out of the tent. She lands face first on the grass. It was cold, and a little moist from the dew that was forming on it.
“Ughhh…” She groans into the literal grass. This wasn’t the particular deathbed she was hoping for. But at least the nighttime breeze feels crisp against her skin.
Well, this was it. She was going to get whatever disease ticks gave you and she was going to die. Her teammates would wake up and see her limp body lying by the campfire sticks and they were going to be scarred for the rest of their lives. God, it really was selfish of her to choose to die this way.
All ‘cause she was scared of a fucking bug. How pathetic is that?
Suddenly, there’s a burning sensation on the back of her neck. “Shiraishi!? Are you hurt?”
“Touya!?” She flips over onto her back and has to cover her eyes from the flashlight Touya’s holding. “What’re you doing out here!?”
“I could say the same to you.”
She can hear him turning the knob on his flashlight to change the light’s intensity so she’s not afraid of going blind anymore. She can hardly see Touya out here, so thank god for the flashlight.
His face looks the same as it always does—or, she would say that, but now there’s something different in his gaze. His brows are furrowed as he stares down at her, and An’s shock from seeing such a definitive expression on his face almost makes her forget that there’s a tick about to kill her. It was like seeing him beam over cutting a pepper earlier that day… seeing him with an expression like that—being able to read him—it gave her a warm tingly feeling in her chest.
“Are you star gazing?” Touya asks.
“No, Touya. I’m dying.” His eyes widen so she backs it up with, “There’s a—there’s a tick on my neck and it’s not getting off of me.”
“That’s no good. You’ll get Lyme Disease if you don’t take it off. Quick, Shiraishi, before it bites you!”
She blinks and he’s only a few inches away from her face. She thinks she’s hallucinating the proximity, but now he’s crouched down on top of her and she can feel his breathing on her skin, so in no way is this a hallucination. An can hardly process what’s happening before she’s suddenly sweating in all of her camping jackets, praying to whatever god there was that Touya couldn’t see her disheveled look. As if him walking out and seeing her on the grass wasn’t embarrassing enough. “Lime disease!? Who names a disease after a fruit!?” She manages to choke out.
Touya’s gaze isn’t on her eyes anymore, it’s dead set focused on her neck, he’s angled the flashlight on her jawline too. He’s got the kind of look in his eyes she’s seen him get when playing arcade claw machines, so sagaciously focused on what he’s doing. “It’s not ‘lime’,” Touya chuckles, breaking his serious look with a more fond one. His laughter is so pure An feels like crying. Like, she could get Lyme Disease or whatever it is, die, and not be so upset about it. “It’s ‘lyme’. It’s a funny case of homophones.” And now she can’t remember what a homophone is. Or her name.
“Touya…w-what are you doing?”
“Trying to find the tick.” His hand slips on the back of her neck, and he slightly lifts her head up to get a better angle of her neck. She tries to hold back a gasp. Admittedly, it’s way better than feeling grass, so she’s not all too upset about it. Plus, Touya’s grasp is warm from the gloves he’s wearing although he’s absolutely merciless in the way his fingers trail up and down her neck. He’s still trying to find this stupid bug. If the tick doesn’t kill her, Touya definitely will. “If you get bitten…”
“I’ll die!?”
“You won’t die.” Touya says, sounding the strangest bit amused. He had never seen her be a complete and utter loser and she was honestly hoping he thought this was all because of the tick. Because if that wasn’t the case, he’d know she was losing her mind because of how ruthless he is in how his face comes even closer to her neck to try and spot the tick. “But it can potentially cause paralysis depending on where it bites, you’ll feel fatigued. Fevers…headaches…”
He pauses trying to think of more effects, but An promptly cuts him off, “This sounds worse than dying!”
“Exactly.” He exhales in concentration, shifting the hand on her nape higher up to where he’s touching the little baby hairs that escape the clutches of her ponytail. It’s such a weird sensation that washes heat anew onto An’s cheeks in a way she didn’t think was possible for Touya to do. “Apologies for taking so long. It’s shocking how small ticks can be.”
“Take your time.” An lets out a shaky breath. Would it be stupid to think he’s purposely dragging this on!? But then again, someone as astute as Touya wouldn’t do that, right…? Right!? “Pesky little guys, aren’t they?”
It’s only been a minute or two, but it feels like it’s been hours. How does he seem so unphased by all of this!? She wishes she could read his mind, just a little bit. To see what he’s thinking…to know how he’s feeling. She’s got to work harder to understand him.
“Oh, definitely.” He gasps, “I think I found it!”
“You did!?” She feels as if the sun has just risen even though it’s probably midnight.
“Oh, it’s not. I mistook it for one of your freckles.” She sees his shoulders slump. “I’ll find it, I promise you. I learnt today that I can cut peppers, I can practically do anything now, Shiraishi.”
“I trust you.”
“I’m glad that you do. I really am.” He turns the flashlight’s intensity up and squints at her open neck, akin to a vampire ready to bite. “Ah, look. I’ve finally found it. It looks like a deer tick. It crawled up behind your ear, which is why I couldn’t find it originally.”
“It’s there!? Touya, take it out, please! Take it out!”
“Stay still, Shiraishi.” An feels a gentle tugging at the bottom of her ear “Let me know if I’m hurting you, please. It’s got a tight grip.”
“Touya, I’m gonna be completely honest. I don’t care what you do as long as you get the tick out. If it were Akito doing this, he probably would have ripped my ear off by now and I would’ve thanked him.”
“But if your ear got ripped off it would be harder to sing. You’re a key asset to Vivid BAD SQUAD, that would be horrible.”
“But the tick would be off me.”
Touya doesn’t seem amused by her reasoning, “I never expected you to be afraid of bugs.”
An almost chokes out the grass she probably swallowed earlier. “I’m not scared of them…I’m just…heavily disturbed by them.” She doesn’t like lying, but it’s the least she can do to preserve what's left of her grass-stained dignity.
“I see.” He murmurs, and An wonders if he’s able to see through the lie. It’s something close to a whisper but it sounds like he’s speaking through a megaphone with how close he is to her ear. “You always seemed like someone who’s so utterly confident, it’s not something I thought I’d see in you.”
Well, this is embarrassing. She can’t wait to scream into her sleeping bag.
Touya keeps tugging at the bug and a panic crashes over An because what if she’s already been bitten!?
He makes an incoherent sound, “Ugh… we didn’t bring tweezers with us, did we?”
“No. We brought tongs, though. Wanna give that a try?”
Touya’s grip on her nape tightens, “I’ve almost got it out. It has its teeth in you.”
“Ew! Touya, I’ll throw up!”
“Apologies. I’ll stop narrating everything.” A brief moment of silence passes and An is lying there thinking she liked it when Toya was talking much better. She enjoys his voice, but now can only listen to his huffs and hope the tick is almost out. There’s an abrupt snapping sound, “There we go.”
“It’s off?”
“Yes.”
“Oh my god, Thank you so much!” She springs out of position (almost bashing her head with Touya’s).
Once she’s on her feet, she rubs her fingers along the side of her neck, just in case there’s any more bugs crawling on it. Instead, all she feels is…a strange sensation in her stomach as she massages her neck up and down, where Touya had just been touching her. It’s like the contents of her stomach had been emptied and all that was left inside of it was swarming butterflies and suddenly her heartbeat is a lot louder than all the crickets out here at the campsite.
Touya’s still crouched down on the ground, An observes, but she immediately has to look away because she’s feeling even more embarrassed now.
“Look at him go…” Touya says admiringly as the tick crawls up and down his index finger. An thinks it’s illegal to look at a bug with so much wonder in your eyes.
“Kill it!” An cries, flicking it off of him and proceeding to stomp in the grass where it landed. She makes sure to twist her—wait a minute, she forgot to put her shoes on before running out here. Now there’s dead bug guts and mud on her sock. Great. At least it’s dead.
Touya looks up at her, confused. “Shiraishi, you’re not wearing shoes?”
“I wasn’t thinking, okay?” She groans, “Jeez, I’m really making a fool out of myself, aren’t I?”
“It’s okay. I can lend you a pair of my socks.” He quickly stands up and rubs some grass on his knees.
“Touya, I have my own back in the tent. I can just change into those.”
Touya walks over to his and Akito’s tent, slowly opening the door so as to not wake the other boy. She knows Touya hears her because he pauses in steps for just a few moments, but he seems to ignore her statement entirely because he still motions for An to follow him into his tent.
Enveloped by the warmth of the tent, An sees that there’s a dimly lit LED camp lantern in the corner by Touya’s sleeping bag with a book open nearby. He was still reading out here!? But that’s besides the point because the most she’s taken out of this is that Akito’s a really ugly sleeper. There’s drool running down his cheeks and he’s snoring loud enough to start an earthquake. How did Touya sleep next to him!? Then again, maybe he never did in the first place because he was so quick to find her outside.
Touya scrambles over to his bag and starts searching for a pair of socks. It doesn’t take him long before he pulls out two dark blue socks with little cat heads embroidered into it. They look like long socks that’ll go half way up her calf.
“These are cute.” She says as he places them into her hands.
The tip of Touya’s ears are dusted with pink and An would be lying if she wasn’t the slightest bit charmed by it. She smiles at him, ignoring that weird feeling in her stomach again. What was up with that?
He doesn’t necessarily reply to that, opting to stare at her again. An nervously giggles and takes her muddy socks off and decides right there that she’ll kill herself if Akito wakes up to this.
Touya’s socks feel soft, and they’re really thick too so she won’t have to worry about being cold now. Not like she could be cold since her face still feels like she’s been sunbathing for hours. She wonders if he’s ever worn them before but chides herself for thinking of such a stupid thought or even caring for that matter. She quickly slides the cat socks on.
Akito shifts in his sleep, so the two of them take that as a queue to leave as fast as they can. She leaves the tent a little more gracefully this time, successfully not eating a yummy entrée of grass.
She sighs out of relief, trying to collect her thoughts but she’s only gotten more confused about everything, so she decides to concentrate on trying not to die instead.
“That was a good experience.” Touya says. He’s literally just standing there but it looks like he’s bathing in the moonlight up above them.
An tries not to laugh, “…You can not be serious right now.” He was practically on top of her, trying to find a bug earlier. An doesn’t think it gets worse than that.
“No, I really am. I’m glad we got to do that and that I got to help you. What is this if not the true camping experience you speak of?” She watches the corners of his mouth lift into a smile that wouldn’t have been visible had she not been so adamant in watching his every movement. “It’s not often it’s just the two of us spending time together.”
“You seem keen on changing that.” An smirks and elbows him softly in his side.
“I am.” He nods, completely serious. “So please, come to me if you need help. You don’t need to lay in the grass awaiting your death all alone. We’re a team now, don’t forget that.”
“I’ll… remember that. Thank you for this, Touya. Especially with that tick.”
“No. Thank you, Shiraishi. For letting me experience this with you. It means more than I think you realize.”
“Getting soft on me, Touya?”
“I find it hard not to…” He eventually says.
The two of them splutter out a series of ‘good night’s and ‘thank you’s and after that, An stumbles back into her and Kohane’s tent, questioning everything that just happened and how her perception of Touya feels like it’s been flipped upside down.
She sits down on her sleeping bag and then looks down at her socks. The stupid fucking cat socks. Her stomach does a summersault and it feels like all her organs are being rearranged as graphic as it sounds.
She still feels a lingering warmth on her nape from where his hand once rested and decides she likes that much better than the pillow her head now lays on.