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Misaki felt her cheeks burning as she realised what she had just admitted to. Damn it, why couldn’t she just learn to think before she spoke for once? She fixed her gaze on her shoelaces so that she wouldn’t have to watch the mocking grin spread across Saruhiko’s lips and braced herself for the acidic sarcasm that was guaranteed to drip from his response.
“N-never mind, forget it. Forget I said anything.” She blurted before he had a chance to speak, then jumped to her feet and made a move to flee to her room, vainly hoping that if she hid from him long enough, Saruhiko wouldn’t remember what she had said. Of course he would remember. She would never live this down.
They hadn’t long moved back in together; it had barely been a month, but already Saruhiko was getting on her nerves. He barely ever lifted his eyes away from that damn laptop. Munakata was working him like a dog, and he barely seemed to have any time to do stuff with her. It pissed her off to no end; what was the point in moving back in together if they never spoke? Of course, they had rationalised the move with bullshit excuses like it meant Misaki was closer to Bar Homra, and they would save money on rent and utilities, but really, she had just missed him, and now having him here physically while his mind was elsewhere was just making her miss him even more. She wondered if this was how Saruhiko had felt when they had joined Homra, and she had barely had time for him.
Evidently Saruhiko had picked up on her bad mood. “What’s got you all in a huff?” It was the first time he had looked up from the screen in almost an hour.
“Nothing.” She had said through gritted teeth.
“Misaki.” His voice was stern.
Right, of course. They were supposed to be communicating. She sighed. “You’re always on that damn laptop. I bet you aren’t getting paid overtime for all the work you’re doing. It’s like you aren’t even here, what’s the point in even moving back in together if we don’t do anything? We barely even talk.”
Now it was Saruhiko’s turn to sigh. “The only reason I’m doing so much work at home is because there’s no point in moving in together if I’m at the office all the time. I’m backed up on paperwork because of the time I spent undercover with the Greens, and from the destruction of the Slate and the loss of Munakata’s powers, but I’m almost finished with it now. Once it’s all done, I’ll be back to my normal hours.”
“Right…” Damn. She had made a fool of herself.
“Why does it bother you so much anyway?”
She sat opposite him on the sofa and pulled her knees up to her chest. “I just… I dunno, is this how you felt when we were in Homra, and I didn’t pay attention to you much?”
“Not really. You were the only person who really cared about me and I felt like you were leaving me behind and finding people you liked better.” His voice was stiff as he spoke, and he had paused in thought before he had said it, but it was coming easier now for Saruhiko to tell her how he was feeling. “It looks like you’re just annoyed that I’m not paying you enough attention.”
“Oi, when you say it like that it makes me sound like an ass.” She protested.
“Well why are you so bugged by it.”
“Because you’re right here but it doesn’t feel like you’re right here at all.” When she started talking, the words wouldn’t stop coming. “And it’s like the biggest fucking tease because I was really looking forward to spending more time with you because even if I didn’t treat you right before you were still my best friend, hell, you were more than my best friend, and I wanted that back. I want to do all the things we used to do together back.” She was yelling by this point. “But I’m not getting that back. All I’m getting back is all these shitty-ass confused feelings that I had when we were younger like the huge lame crush I had on you like an idiot and all that’s coming back up again and I don’t know what to do with myself because it’s like you’re not even here!”
Shit.
And now she was waiting for Saruhiko to laugh at her as she escaped the room.
He didn’t. “Wait,” was all that he said at first. His voice was quieter than Misaki had expected.
She stopped and turned to look at him.
“I thought you liked Mikoto.”
“Well… I mean… I admired him, and he was pretty handsome…” She mumbled in admission. “But it wasn’t like that. I don’t know, maybe I wouldn’t have said no, but I didn’t really think about him in that way. He was just my King, I didn’t like… want in his pants or anything. Even if I did, he was way out of my league.”
“Why do you think he was out of your league?”
“Have you seen me lately? Guys don’t go for girls like me. I’ve got no boobs, I’m basically a thug, I’m scrawny as hell, I’m really pale and not ladylike at all and…”
“Misaki.” Saruhiko cut her off, closing the lid of his laptop and setting it on the coffee table. “Sit down.”
Unsure what else she could do, she nodded and sat down opposite Saruhiko again. He moved to sit beside her.
“You wouldn’t be Misaki if you were ladylike. And you’re not ugly.”
She sniffled quietly, and he clicked his tongue in response. “Jeez, are you crying?” He brushed a tear off her cheek, and she froze at the tender gesture. Saruhiko sighed. “You’re pretty. I’ve always thought you were pretty. And guys don’t care if you don’t have big tits.”
Her cheeks blazed, and she hurriedly changed the subject. “W-were you jealous?”
“Obviously it wasn’t the whole reason I left, we talked about that. But thinking you wanted to screw Mikoto didn’t help the situation.” The idea of her in that sort of relationship with her old King disgusted him; the venom in his voice made that obvious.
She gave a little nod, still refusing to meet his eyes. She had her knees pulled up to her chest again. “Sorry. You can just forget I said anything. It’s not a big deal. I don’t want things to get weird when we just started fixing them and-“
“You’re such an idiot, Misaki.” He interrupted.
She looked up at him in surprise, and the look on his face took her aback. Misaki had never seen that look before; his expression was soft, and he was staring at her with an intensity that made her heart flutter uncomfortably in her chest. God, how embarrassing for her to be thinking in clichés like that. Even so, she couldn’t draw her eyes away from his, no matter how badly she wanted to hide her face in her hands. He was getting closer, turning his body towards her. His arm slid around her waist, his hand rested on the small of her back, and her protest caught in her throat as she felt his breath tickle her lips.
When he kissed her, she grabbed his arms ready to push him away, unable to believe this was anything other than some cruel joke. But when she felt how soft his lips were against her own, how tenderly he held her, Misaki found herself pulling him closer, her arms snaking around his shoulders and her fingers gripping the fabric of his shirt. When Saruhiko finally broke the kiss after what felt like hours, a little reluctant whine escaped her throat involuntarily. He chuckled, and she felt her cheeks flame. Saruhiko pulled her beanie off and gently teased the hairbands out of her hair, letting her pigtails fall loose so he could run his fingers through her auburn locks. The embarrassment finally became too much for her, and she buried her face against his chest.
“I liked you too, when we were younger. I just thought you’d go for Mikoto over me.” Saruhiko admitted.
She shook her head. “Sorry.” They spoke in hushed tones.
“Yeah, me too.”
“What for?”
“Leaving without having told you.”
Gently, Misaki pulled back the collar of his shirt with shaking hands and brushed her lips against the scar that disfigured his old Homra insignia. He looked down at her in shock.
“Misaki, what are you doing..?”
She took a deep breath, her face still pressed close to his collarbone. “I…" The words had come so easily before, but now she couldn’t force them past her lips. “Never mind.”
“Hm?”
“F-forget it.”
“Misaki, tell me.”
“…I love you.” She breathed the words, barely above a whisper. “I just… I didn’t want to say anything, I didn’t want to freak you out and scare you off again when I just got you back… But even if you are in Scepter 4 it doesn’t matter to me, because you’ve always been my best friend even if I don’t show it very well, and I meant it when I said you’re a stand-up guy. You’re loyal and brave and smart and annoyingly handsome even if you don’t take care of yourself like you should and even if we fight and we don’t agree sometimes I can’t freaking help loving you and-”
Saruhiko cupped her jaw and tilted her head up, and whatever she was about to say next died in her throat. “I love you too.”
She stared at him, her mouth open in shock. Saruhiko chuckled at her expression; the sound wasn’t scathing like she expected it to be- it was almost affectionate. They had been fighting for so long that she struggled to get used to the idea that they could be amicable again. Let alone be like this with their arms around each other, so close that she could feel his heartbeat where their bodies pressed together… it was almost unthinkable. But here they were, and she could feel how his hands were cool against her burning face. He was smiling at her like she was the most endearing thing in the world and there was that damn cliché fluttery feeling in her chest again. It had been so long since she had seen a genuine smile on his face that it shocked her every time she saw it, and God, she had missed it.
Misaki couldn’t help herself. She crashed their lips together, clumsy in her inexperience, but she could feel Saruhiko’s lips curl into an even wider grin against her own as she tangled her fingers in his hair. She felt the nervousness that had coiled in her stomach melt at the expression on his face. All the fear of rejection, the fear that all the things they had just begun to rebuild starting to crumble, the fear she would lose him again, push him away again… All of it vanished when she felt the way his arms clutched her body close to his, and how gently he kissed her, and the way he smiled. It seemed like he felt the same way; she felt his body relax against her own, as if the fear that things would slip back to how they used to be was dissolving in him the way it was in her. His hands rested on her hips and he lifted her effortlessly into his lap to pull her small frame tighter against him.
When the kiss finally broke, Misaki looked up at him, eager to see him smiling. She resolved that her goal would be to coax that smile onto his face as often as she could, make up for all the years that she had gone without seeing it. His eyes were creased at the corners, and she realised that she had never noticed how blue they were before. The colour of the sky just after dusk. And he was looking at her like she was the only thing in his world. How embarrassing, that he was making her think like this, like some insipid character in a cheesy romance novel. But being so close to him, feeling the warmth of his body and the tingling on her lips, seeing the way he smiled at her. It made her forget herself. It was just him and her, and none of the crap of the last few years mattered any more because, even if they weren’t the same, even if she was Red and he was Blue, it wasn’t important. Because she loved him.