Work Text:
Akira had never thought of himself as someone who gets lost in the tiniest details. Big and medium sized details? Sure. Small details? Plenty. He’d gone on enough tangents about how pretty Yusuke’s hair is in the glow of sunset or how Yusuke’s eyes twinkle like the stars in the planetarium whenever he gets a flash of inspiration that Morgana decided to set up—and now gleefully enforced—a system where every time Akira waxed poetic like some “lovesick fool” he had to put money in the money cat piggy bank that now acted as Morgana’s snack funds. Something that had worked far more in Morgana’s favor than Akira’s (or his wallet’s), since Akira just couldn’t seem to shut up about the object of his affections and had become painfully aware of just how much he couldn’t shut up.
The point is, he maybe sometimes got caught up in the smaller details, and that was fine. As long as he continued to ignore the constant drain on his wallet. But as he sat across from Yusuke in one of Leblanc’s booths, staring at the other’s eyelashes of all things, he couldn’t help but feel that he had reached a new level of lovesick foolishness that surely no one had ever reached before. Because who even becomes so entranced by another person’s eyelashes that they sit and just stare at said eyelashes for a good ten minutes (maybe more—he’s been too busy staring to check the time, after all) instead of studying for finals like they were supposed to be doing? The answer was, apparently, Akira.
In his defence, Yusuke did have very pretty eyelashes. It was just a totally objective fact. Even Ann had said something to that effect, stating how unfair it was for Yusuke to have such long and dark lashes without needing even a little bit of mascara. Akira hadn’t paid much attention to Yusuke’s lashes at the time, not having caught on to his own feelings yet at the time, but now he realized how right Ann had been. It really wasn’t fair that Yusuke had such nice, distracting eyelashes. Akira felt a sudden urge to reach out and brush his finger across the tips of them, to watch how they fluttered as Yusuke blinked in surprise. Instead, he kept his hands curled into fists, his chin resting on them to prevent himself from trying.
He wondered, briefly, what Yusuke’s lashes would look like with mascara. Would they be prettier? Akira wasn’t sure that would even be possible, but now he was curious to see. Maybe he could convince Yusuke to try it sometime. Y’know, for science. Though Yusuke would probably take that seriously, and wonder what that could even prove, scientifically, before declining. No, if Akira wanted to have the chance for this to work, he’d have to say it was for art, instead. Makeup could be considered a form of art, couldn’t it? He’d seen enough videos of people treating it as such to make a convincing argument in front of Yusuke, at least. He’d just have to figure out a reason to bring it up sometime. Maybe convince Ann to go along with it for extra support. Though if he did ask for her help, she’d probably tease him relentlessly for how ridiculous he was acting over a crush he still couldn’t bring himself to act on, even if she would eventually agree. She’d probably rope him into having his makeup done as well, which he wasn’t necessarily opposed to, but it was certainly a lot of effort to go through just to sate his curiosity about how Yusuke would look in mascara.
Would it be worth it? Akira considered it for a moment before deciding that it probably would. Another sign that he was reaching new levels of hopeless, maybe. He’d have to tell her no lip gloss, though. The last time Ann had gotten him to try some out, he hated it. Too sticky and gross feeling, even if it did make his lips look nicer. He’d be willing to try lipstick, though, even if he wasn’t sure it would feel much better. Maybe it would look nicer than lip gloss. It would probably look nice on Yusuke. Probably even nicer a little smudged—say, from someone rubbing their thumb across his bottom lip, or maybe even kissing him breathless. Or that someone leaving kiss marks all across his face, or—
Akira bit down on the inside of his lip, trying to force himself to keep his poker face up as Yusuke suddenly looked up from his notes and noticed Akira staring.
“Something the matter?” Yusuke asked.
Akira wanted to shake his head and say no. He could have redirected Yusuke’s attention by asking him if he wanted some more coffee or snacks before running away from the situation, however briefly, under the pretext of needing something to eat. Instead, his brain betrayed him, and before he realized what was coming out of his mouth, he said, “You have really pretty eyelashes.”
Smooth. Real smooth. Was it too late to run away? As much as he wanted to, his body seemed to have frozen in place, like a deer caught in the headlights too stupid to get out of dodge. He could only stay that way as Yusuke seemed to pause, taken aback by the sudden declaration, before leaning across the table with a furrowed brow and staring Akira down in turn. Akira unconsciously held his breath as Yusuke’s face came a few inches from his own. The sudden proximity had his heart going into overdrive, but on the bright side Yusuke’s eyelashes seemed even prettier up close.
He felt both a wave of relief and a twinge of disappointment as Yusuke sat back a moment later, looking far more collected than Akira felt.
“Yours are quite nice as well.”
“Um… thanks?” Akira said, face feeling strangely warm. He hoped he wasn’t blushing. If he was, Yusuke didn’t seem to notice, giving Akira a brief smile before turning his attention back to his notes. Akira forced himself to look down at his own notebook, but his mind was still focused on what had just happened.
Yusuke thought his eyelashes looked nice? Even though he probably didn’t mean it in the way that Akira did, it made Akira feel a bit giddy all the same. Unless he did mean it the same way, but Akira was not going to try to dissect that moment for some sort of clue of what it really meant lest he talk himself in circles until he convinced himself it couldn’t mean anything. He’d probably just wait until later to talk with Morgana about the whole thing and have his cat help him analyze later. Morgana certainly wouldn’t mind the extra snack money. For now, he took one last glance up at Yusuke (trying not to look too closely at his eyelashes) and tried to finally focus on studying again.