Work Text:
Floreamus una
“Let us bloom together”
True love is not about staying the same – it's about growing side by side, through every season of life.
Spring wind gently storms through the ajar window. The weather’s sunny enough for all the bathroom’s small lights to stay off as Hitoya fixes his hair for what feels like the millionth time in a few minutes and looks into the mirror to see a sight of the man he was four years before.
After all, it’s been since then that Jyushi hadn’t invited him to a concert, or more like they last went to one together, because Jyushi hardly ever shared his passions unprompted: whether it was because Hitoya would try to understand him better or because some coincidence would collide with his interests, Jyushi always needed a push to come forward about what he was most willing to discuss for hours, and by discuss he’d (accidentally) mean stealing the show until his onlooker would, hopefully for him, ask questions.
Category which was narrowed down to Hitoya and at most, if anything, Amanda.
It had gotten to a point where the lawyer was almost convinced Jyushi grew content with the way he learnt to embrace what he liked with no fear of judgement to the extent of finding himself comfortable enjoying them solo, in the now safe bubble he’d always blown around him and that he was slowly accepting others into, though Jyushi would still eventually barge into his office and try to find a way to bring up worthless drama about celebrities he didn’t even know personally while he was working, all through metaphors too eccentric for Hitoya to break down like he would operate through a case.
Deep down, Hitoya wished he had the guts — perhaps it was self-esteem, dignity, but he hardly can tell the difference — to sweep all his pivotal paperwork aside and settle for one more day out with him just like when they’d first met, but like the great lawyer he is, there’s always been an excuse he could make up or get to for him not to.
One of his go-to alibis was that, indeed, he didn’t want to creep him out— which has always been a lame justification given how Jyushi would refer to him with every honorific his elevated language skills could think of. And while he sure did and does still believe being addressed as a god of any sort is far too extreme, the shame he felt at the thought of dropping his strict pretense and asking him if he wanted to take a day off to do what he most liked had always been paired to a degree of gratitude.
Something he’d constantly fail to have Jyushi realize is how, since stepping back from what would’ve been his final pedestal forever, he’s always pushed through everything life tried to block his path or slow him down with relying on no one but himself, save for Hitoya taking legal action against the only immovable boulder on his way. It was never Jyushi who had to be grateful for his doing, rather the opposite.
For a man who has to find as many words as possible for a living, there’s still none he can weave a sentence with so that Jyushi could understand how prideful he is of the strength he took care of within himself like one would with a plant that takes its time to bloom. Hoping Jyushi could read how much he truly cared for him through his possibly not that obvious sarcasm in scolding him was much easier.
Laying down his small grease bucket on the sink, Hitoya gives one more glance at the mirror and behind him is his last ever sight of the person he helped Jyushi to plant a seed of in his own tiny garden and who’s now flourished into someone he’s only yet to comprehend the full potential of.
There’s two things Hitoya hates: one, even the slightest wind blow ruining his hairdo, two, how he still can’t wrap his head around the reason why Jyushi can’t grasp his own worth after all this time.
It’s not like he hasn’t at all, but Hitoya knows there is much more to what he believes is Jyushi’s consideration of himself that it’s just upsetting for him to simply stand by, unable to say or do anything truly meaningful about it. His job was the first thing to teach him how some questions may be meant to stay unanswered, and that’s okay. He loathes that saying more than anything else, but he’s come to terms with it in the long run.
Before he knows it, he’s once again lost himself in that thought spiral so hard that time feels as if it has flown away and he’s at the concert hall already, a black sheep amidst a flock of people he could guess were just slightly over half his age and, most importantly, all dressed in a way that made him stand out as ridiculously as he could.
Hitoya can’t quite lie to himself, maybe he does care about that a bit, but it would also be fiction for him to place that as his biggest worry at the moment, so he forces himself to push it away as he makes his way through the crowd and enters the venue, all while luckily able to find a good spot. Or perhaps it was his height freeing him from the trouble of not having a good stage view. That’s one thing he could beat every single one of those youngsters at.
Only one person stands taller than him, and that’s who he’s most waiting for. Outside of his law duties, Hitoya’s always been fine with waiting. He could’ve waited decades for Jyushi, as long as he found his own way to pursue his true self and display it to the world no longer with mortification, but with honor and fulfillment.
And when he sees Jyushi’s silhouette through the smoke clouding the stage, Hitoya believes he’s found at least the starting point to his answer.