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“You know,” Suguru says, watching as the screen is filled up with flames after Chell misses the portal again. “I have a degree.” Satoru scoffs, adjusting the mic on his headset. “Yeah. In literature.”
Suguru gives him a look. “Literature is a perfectly respectable degree,” he says, watching as Satoru glares at him sarcastically “I could have gotten a job. An English professor. An editor. I don’t know, something.”
“And get paid nothing?”
“Better than working with you,” Suguru shoots back, his hands back on the keyboard as he focuses on trying to beat the same part of Portal for the third time. “You love me,” Satoru says, smiling.
The man doesn’t dignify that with a response, opting instead to stare directly into the camera with his usual long-suffering eyes. “I don't see why you’re having a hard time,” Satoru says. “If you’re struggling now, how’re you even gonna kill GLaDOS?”
Immediately, Satoru is struck on the head with a pencil that had been laying near Suguru. “Hey!” He complains, just as Suguru flips him off. “Don’t spoil the game, asshole.”
Satoru frowns. “It’s been out since 2007. It’s your own fault if you don’t know how the game goes.” Satoru flicks his eyes to the screen, watching a two dollar donation flicker in with the message ’you just spoiled it for me :(‘ written on it. He laughs, rolling his chair to bump next to Suguru’s, knocking them both a bit to the left.
In retaliation, Suguru kicks Satoru in the leg, off screen. “Sorry, but if you joined the stream knowing we would be playing Portal and assumed there’d be no spoilers, then either you’ve never watched us or you think too highly of Satoru.”
“I’m not that bad.”
Suguru chuckles, looking at the chat. “Thank you all for understanding what I have to put up with,” he says, as he finally manages to progress further into the game. “What do I do here?” he asks when he’s stuck in a new room, pinching his eyes.
“Did you know a lot of people think you fake that?” Satoru says, opening a cabinet under his desk where there’s a small pile of candy and a large pile of discarded candy wrappers.
“Fake what?”
“You know,” Satoru waves a hand as he reaches for a strawberry-flavored hard candy. “Not knowing how to play any video games. They think there's no way someone could be so stupid.” Suguru chuckles and elbows him. “I’m serious!!”
“Well, you know that I’m quite bad.” Suguru admits. At this point, it would be hard to deny his failures, at least with Satoru. “And that’s all that matters.”
At that, Satoru practically beams. “Suguruuu! You admit that my opinion matters above all else?” Suguru, in the game, manages to die immediately upon hearing that. He sighs, using his thumb and index to rub at his eyes.
“That is not what I said and you know it.”
Satoru, as he does often, chooses to ignore him. “People say a lot of stuff,” he says, beginning to spin in his chair.
After smashing his keyboard in annoyance when he (unsurprisingly) manages to die again, Suguru looks up at Satoru. “Yes, that’s what people usually do. And quit the spinning, you’re going to end up breaking a bone.”
Being the mature adult that he is, Satoru sticks his tongue out. “I really do hate you,” Suguru deadpans.
“Aren’t you going to ask me what they say?”
“This feels like a set up.”
“They say we’re in love.”
Suguru freezes, and they both stare at each other. Satoru has his eyes, warm and bright blue, set directly on Suguru, unflinching. Suguru tilts his head as if to tease.
Then they both burst into a fit of laughter.
“If I were in love with you, I’d have wasted my whole life.”
Satoru gasps, offended. “You know you’d be lucky if I ever loved you. I’m gorgeous—“ It takes all Suguru’s whole concentration not to scoff too loudly. “You know you love me,” Satoru says. “I’d be an amazing boyfriend.”
“You’re an egomaniac,” Suguru manages to keep his tone even, though he feels his heart beating in his ears. Odd, he thinks. The joke isn’t even that funny. “When was the last time you even made me dinner?” he teases.
There’s a moment of hesitation, where Satoru seems to be trying to remember. When he falls short, he turns to Suguru and puts a hand on his shoulder, fluttering his eyes. “I could make you something tonight,” he says.
You don’t even know how to cook, Suguru’s about to say when a fifteen dollar donation rolls in, a loud chime sparking from their computer. “Oh, hello, Sukuna,” Suguru says with a feigned smile. Satoru scowls, neither of them having read the message yet.
‘Stop flirting and get back to the game, dumbasses.’
Suguru whines, putting his head in his hands. “But the game is so–” he begins, but is cut off by Satoru, whose hand springs to Suguru’s mouth. “Don’t you dare insult Portal on stream.” Suguru put his hands up in surrender.
Carefully, as if treading lightly on an animal, Satoru’s hand retreats. “Fine, I just suck at it.”
“You know what else you could–”
“And,” Suguru continues, resisting the urge to hit Satoru, “we’ve been at it for hours. I’m sure the chat would rather see something else by now, right?”
They both stare at the computer monitor, where Twitch is open. A stream of messages pops up. Suguru cringes as a resounding ‘NO’ is reached. “Come on, there has to be something else,” Suguru complains.
“Big baby,” Satoru chimes. “Okaaay well, since this is our streaming platform, we get to choose what we play! And since Suguru doesn’t wanna keep playing Portal, why doesn’t he give a few suggestions?”
They ignore the chat, which continues to, in essence, say no.
Suguru hums. “You always make me try games you know I won’t do well at, why don’t I return the favor?”
“You play shit off camera?” Satoru asks, an eyebrow up in silent judgment.
Suguru huffs, “No, of course not. You know this. I could make you read–”
As soon as the words are out of his mouth, they are immediately thrown back in. “No, you are not turning my stream–”
“I thought it was our–”
“--into storytime,” Satoru finishes. Suguru gives him a look, the kind he always gives whenever Satoru is being an asshole. It's a look he’s so accustomed to giving that it’s almost become his default. Satoru stares back, and it isn’t until another chirp comes from their computer that they both back down.
“Damn, how rich are you, Sukuna?” Satoru mutters with a frown as Suguru thanks him for his returning flow of cash. “It’s like you’re single-handedly funding all our streams.”
“You ought to be more grateful, Satoru.”
“Why? He seems like an asshole–”
Finally, Suguru does hit Satoru. Slaps him right on the face, not hard enough for it to actually hurt. Before Satoru can complain, Suguru continues. “Well, the chat seems dead. Still plenty of viewers though–”
“It’s dead cause you aren’t doing anything, Suguru.”
“Why don’t we do a Q&A?”
And just like that, the chat comes alive. Rows and rows of questions spawning in, mostly misspelled and half thought-out. “Oh, now you’re okay with putting a pause on Portal?” Suguru teases. Satoru makes a small noise, but seems content with the engagement coming in.
“Do I get to choose the questions?” Satoru asks, his mind already coming up with the answer before Suguru responds. Still, Suguru blinks at him. “Why would you? I’m the one who even thought to do a Q&A.”
“Becaause..” he starts, trying to think of a reason. Suguru rolls his eyes. “You were being an asshole. And that means I get to choose.”
Suguru sighs, but gives in easily. He’s never liked looking through the chat for questions anyway, he’s always found it overwhelming. There was something about Satoru. He always seemed to have an easy time with it. It was as if he could simply stare for a few seconds and comprehend every string of messages, as if he had some keen sense that Suguru would never possess. That or he was just chronically online enough to know how to read the right messages as they fell.
“Alright, first question! Suguru, how many tattoos do you have?”
Suguru raises an eyebrow. “That was not on there,” he says confidently. “Oh but it was!” Satoru says, and waits for Suguru to answer. The man simply gawks at him, unimpressed. “I suppose since he’s too shy to say..hmm I think it was four?”
“Five,” Suguru corrects, without even thinking.
Satoru takes a second. “When’d you get the fifth?”
He had gotten it years ago, a naval one that his cousin did for him when they were bored and it was too hot outside to go find something to do. Suguru waves a hand, “It’s not visible. No one’s ever really seen it.”
“No one?”
“No one. Well, except Hiroto, but he doesn’t count.”
“Can I?” Satoru asks, perhaps a bit too enthusiastically. Suguru hums thoughtfully. “I’ll think about it.”
Satoru beams, and something warm grows in Suguru’s chest. “What's the next question?” Suguru asks, ignoring the way his head felt light with making his friend happy.
“Ooh that's a good one! How’d we start streaming?”
“Well,” Suguru reminices. “I had the horrible luck of being Satoru’s roommate in college. He was annoying. Seriously, the worst! He never did his chores, the ones we agreed on, he’d stay up late and he wouldn’t use his headphones so I’d stay up hearing physics videos–oh and that too, he never turned in his work on time so everything was always last minute with him–”
“I don’t think this is necessary to answer the question,” Satoru complains.
“It’s necessary for my sanity, Toru. No one understands how horrible you are.”
“I am a delight,” he counters.
“Please never say that again,” Suguru says. “So, my point. Satoru was horrible, but unfortunately, I also had a horrible judge of character and thought he was interesting enough to talk to.”
“Weird way to say you thought I was cool–” “I did not. Matter of fact, I thought you were a nerd,” he continues, taking in with a grin the way Satoru’s face practically falls in annoyance. Cute, the thought is gone the second it comes. “But I also thought you’d be fun to talk to,” he admits. “If I had known what kind of path talking to you would lead me down, I never would have played Digimon with you.”
It takes Suguru a second to realize that Satoru is smiling. Something soft and genuine—almost thoughtful. The kind that only ever comes up when it’s late and their apartment smells like sleep, Satoru drunk on exhaustion but too stubborn to go to bed. For a second, Suguru thinks he’s going to say something heartfelt. “How’d you manage to suck at Digimon?” he says, and the moment is over.
“Shut up,” Suguru whines. “We streamed Digimon for a bit,” he explains to the chat, and doesn’t miss the way that Satoru winces. “It did not go well. Our friend, Shoko, you guys know her I’m guessing?”
The chat erupts. “Yep, okay, you definitely know her. She gave us a few tips.”
“We should stream with her sometime,” Satoru muses, and Suguru nods. Satoru continues to read the chat. “My turn to take one, right? Ooh! Favorite game. I think mines…well, call me sentimental, but Digimon! It makes me think of you,” he says, voice sickeningly sick. Suguru snorts. “And you, Suguru?”
“Probably same here.”
“Hey, no fair! You have to choose a different one.”
That earns the white haired man a forehead flick. “You act like a child,” Suguru says, and pauses. “I’m not sure. Maybe..what's that one people have been recommending me?”
Satoru glares. “Seriously? Not even one that you’ve played?”
Suguru shrugs. “I’ve only ever played your games. This one sounds quite nice. Literature club something, I think. I was surprised any of our fanbase would enjoy and recommend a game centered on literature, but I’m excited to play it nonetheless.”
Silence hangs between them for a second, and Suguru wonders briefly if he’s managed to say something wrong. “Do you mean Doki Doki Literature Club..?” Satoru asks. Suguru nods, the look on his face something between excitement and trust.
It causes Satoru to burst into laughter.
“Nooo…Sugu–that’s not–love, that’s not what the game is about.”
Suguru hardly notices the nickname. Well, maybe hardly is pushing it, but he doesn’t think much of it, finding it easy to smile fondly as the chat goes off. Satoru stares at the chat, and then at Suguru. “What, did I say something?”
He shrugs simply. “Nothing. Is the game not about literature? That sounds misleading.”
“That’s because you’re the only person in the world who actually wants the game to be about literature,” Satoru mocks. “Hold on, I think I played it a few years back. I can pull it up.”
That’s how they end up opening the game, Suguru playing for hours, at first confused as to Satoru’s reaction, and later horrified. (“This is pushing it a bit far don’t you think? Aren’t they Highschoolers? What even is this fanbase..”) It’s only until hours later, when it’s dark outside and the viewership numbers have dwindled down to only a few hundred thousand, that he closes the game. Suguru yawns. “Toru,” he mumbles. No response.
“Toru,” he repeats, and finds that the boy is asleep next to him. Suguru chuckles softly. He looks back up at the computer. He’s never really figured out how to turn off the camera, but it's as good a time as ever. “Alright, well,” he says to the few remaining in the stream. “We’ll pick this up in the next stream. It’s late now and I believe we have to be up early tomorrow. That and Satoru is a child who can’t handle staying up past his bedtime,” he jokes, knowing full well that Satoru will watch the stream back for the parts that he was asleep for.
Then, he ends the stream.
Turning his back to the monitor, Suguru sighs as he watches his best friend snore lightly in his chair. “Hey, wake up, dumbass,” Suguru whispers . Satoru grumbles something unintelligible, before reaching up to grab at Suguru. He slaps the hand away and it lulls back into the chair. “I know you’re comfortable but your spine is really going to regret it if you sleep here.”
As if purposefully trying to disobey him, Satoru falls back asleep. “Hey. Hey” Suguru tries, before groaning. “You aren’t even conscious right now, are you?” Satoru, in his sleep, hums. “It’s like you're an asshole even when you’re asleep.”
After chuckling to himself, he leans forward and places a gentle kiss on his friend's forehead, greeted by soft white hair. “You’re seriously gonna regret this in the morning, I hope you know that. But I’m too tired to carry you like I did last time, and you’ll bitch at me if I wake you up. You really are hard to bargain with, you know that?”
Suguru ruffles his unconscious friend's hair, letting his hands linger for a second too long. “I’ll go get you a blanket,” he mutters, only half annoyed. He leaves the room, and goes to he and Satoru’s shared room. Off of Satoru’s bed, he picks up a blanket, and returns back to where Satoru is sleeping.
As he approaches the sleeping man, he hears a chime from the computer. When he looks up, he’s hit with a sudden realization.
He had not ended the stream.
Oh fuck, Suguru thinks.
“Oh fuck,” Suguru says. His face is dusted incredibly pink, and he can't help but feel as if he has just sucked a lemon. “Hahaaaa..” he wheezes, not really laughing.
What he had just done with Satoru was normal to him. They had both been affectionate since college, and it never been anything more than a platonic (and more often than not, teasing) gesture. But he was certain the internet wasn’t going to think of it that way. After all, people say a lot of things.
“Nothing ever happened here, okay?” Suguru says, going back to the computer and desperately searching for the actual way to turn the stream off.
A swarm of messages come in, mostly laughing at him. ‘I knew you swung that way’, says Sukuna. Suddenly, Suguru finds himself agreeing with Satoru. He flips the camera off, before saying. “That was directed specifically to Sukuna. But all of you can go die, thanks,”only half joking,
The stream is off (properly, this time) and Suguru sighs.
Satoru will definitely see the footage tomorrow. Maybe he’ll be kind enough to spare Suguru the embarrassment.
–
Satoru is absolutely not kind enough to spare Suguru the embarrassment. He does, however, wait until they’re streaming. You know. So he could be publicly humiliated.
“Sooo..” Satoru says, the moment the stream turns on. “Didn’t know you swung that way, hm Suguru?”
Suguru covers his face with his hands. “I don’t. Go fuck yourself.” “Based on what everyone on twitters saying, you’ve been taking care of that for me” Satoru is promptly bombarded by pillows. “I’m just joking, man!” Satoru smiles. “You’re my best friend, and I know we aren’t really ever that vulnerable with each other on camera. It was totally platonic and everyones just blowing it out of proportion,” Satoru explains, uncharacteristically calmly.
The dark haired man blinks at him. “I know?” Suguru says, confused as to why exactly Satoru is explaining something so obvious to Suguru. Satoru gives him an exasperated look. “Yes, but the chat doesn’t.” “Oh.”
They’re silent for a moment as Satoru loads up Doki Doki again. “Do you agree with me that Sukuna’s an asshole now?”
“Yes,” Suguru agrees immediately, partly because it's true and partly because it’s a welcome change in subject.
–
The stream went by with virtually no awkwardness, aside from a donation or two that was a bit too generous to ignore but a bit too presumptuous to acknowledge. When they close the stream, Suguru feels much more calm about the whole incident.
“Hey, Suguru?”
Suguru hums, taking off his headset as Satoru fidgets with the strings of his hoodie. “Yeah?”
He hesitates. “You know you can tell me anything, right?”
Suguru pauses, staring back at his friend. “Of course. You’re my best friend.” Satoru lets out a weak smile. “Same goes for you, I hope you know.”
“Yeah, of course. Just wanted to make sure.”
Suguru nods, standing up to stretch his body. Streaming is an easy job. Compared to other jobs, it's maybe an incredibly easy job, and yet it still manages to leave a strain on Suguru’s body any time that he sits still for too long. “Is this about yesterday?” he asks.
Satoru hesitates before shrugging. “No. Yes. Sort of.”
At that, Suguru freezes. “You alright? If I made you uncomfortable–”
“No, nothing like that. I thought it was sweet, actually–”
“You what?” Suguru slips out, because of all the words that he had thought Satoru would use, sweet was not one of them. “It’s nothing, Suguru. I just wanted to make sure you knew I’d still love you no matter what.”
There's a second of hesitation, before Suguru, with pink cheeks speaks. “Are you trying to ask me if I'm gay?”
“No! But like–I’m just saying, if you were–”
“Oh my god.”
“Just know I’ll support you no matter what.”
Suguru takes in a sharp inhale, pinching at his forehead. “Thanks, Satoru. I appreciate it,” he says, and he does mean it. He had always assumed that Satoru would be in his corner no matter what—they were too close to let anything small or stupid break them apart–and too codependent for anything major to make a difference. Still, it's nice to have it spoken. “The same goes for you,” he says.
“Really?” Satoru asks, as if he even has to. “Of course. Always.”
A comfortable silence rolls between them.
Between Suguru and Satoru, peace was a rare feeling. Not that Suguru minded, but it was always going to be chaos and excitement and adrenaline—heart beating in his chest and throat scratchy from laughing, when it came to Satoru. When streaming, it was almost always a mess full of screaming or insults, where even the quiet moments weren’t safe from their banter. It was all glazed with performatives, but there was still a large part that was true behind it all, and their dynamic stayed similar off screen. And Suguru does love it. He loves the chaos, but he loves the peace even more.
“We should go get breakfast,” Suguru says, when enough time has passed. “We can go somewhere sweet. I heard a new crepe place opened recently.”
Satoru hums. “Careful, Suguru. Gonna make people think we’re dating.” Despite himself, Suguru feels himself flush a little. Too soon,he thinks, but doesnt say. “Fuck off.”
“I’m just joking, obviously. I could never say no to crepes!”
Suguru snorts. “Cool. I’ll go get dressed.” He’s technically already dressed, but he hardly considers a hoodie to be appropriate for going out. Satoru doesn’t seem to care, and is already headed to the car. “Oh! And, Suguru?”
Suguru looks up from the door and hums in response.
“I’m bisexual.”
He then goes out the door and takes the car.
–
When Suguru makes it to the crepe place, having taken the bus, Satoru is already sitting at a table, waiting. He trudges his way to the table and takes his seat across from Satoru. “You wanna talk about it?” Suguru asks, trying to treat the matter with some amount of delicacy.
Satoru looks up. “Talk about what?” Suguru blinks at him.
“You know. That you’re bi,” he says, his voice hushed.
His friend is still looking at the menu. “I don’t see what there is to say about it. I like girls. I like guys. Not much to it. You said you didn’t care, right?”
Suguru sighs. Maybe he’s curious. Maybe he’s just confused. Whatever it is, he wants to know more. “Yeah you’re right. I guess I was just wondering, like, how long have you known?” Satoru thinks about it for a second, putting the menu down on the table. “I figured it out recently.”
“Oh?”
“Yep.”
“That’s all you’re gonna tell me?”
“Yep,” Satoru says, popping the p. Suguru sighs. For all of his extravagance, Satoru liked to keep quiet about his personal life. They each had their secrets, though they were far and few between, and some things are just personal, he supposes. “Yeah okay, I guess that makes sense.” Satoru smiles. “Curious?”
Suguru chuckles, taking a look at his own menu. “Of course. You’re my best friend and that’s a pretty big part of life, you know? You said you found out recently so I probably knew you when you were figuring it all out. I just wanna make sure I didn’t, like, accidentally do anything wrong so you wouldn’t feel comfortable talking to me about it or something.” It’s true, but there’s something more. Something he can’t quite understand, much less explain.
Satoru smiles, “Nah. You’re a good person. Always have been.” Suguru doesn’t respond, mostly because he doesn’t know how to.
They end up ordering the sweetest things on the menu. When Suguru can’t finish his, he gives them to Satoru.
–
“This was a horrible idea,” Suguru says, watching as Satoru googles “butter replacement for baking”. Satoru shushes him. “Do we have applesauce?”
Suguru gives him a long, pained look. “Why the hell would we have applesauce and not butter?”
“Don’t ask why, my friend. Ask only if.”
With a very displeased face, Suguru goes to the fridge and discovers that, yes. There is applesauce. “God I hate you so much.”
“That’s not what you said last night,” Satoru jokes, and is promptly hit in the face by a (sealed) packet of applesauce.
Satoru has, for whatever reason, decided that it would be funny–or perhaps at least entertaining, to fan the flames that followed from what Suguru likes to refer to as the ‘Satoru Sleep Incident’. (Satoru has insisted it be referred to as the ‘Suguru Sleep Incident’, to no avail.)
Suguru wants to admit that it’s funny, but for whatever reason, any time it’s brought up, he feels like he’s going into cardiac arrest. He wants to find it funny, because it should be. But for reasons unknown to even himself, he can’t. So, instead, Suguru has resorted to throwing various objects at Satoru whenever he brings it up, and if no object is available, Suguru is not above throwing a punch.
The oven is preheating, and the batter is looking. Well. “I don’t think it's meant to be that thick,” Suguru points out. “Or that clumpy..” he adds, a look of disgust on his face. “Are we going to have to eat this?”
“Of course Suguru! It’s your birthday, you deserve an amazing, homemade, and stunning cake.”
“Right,” he says.. “I think this cake is only gonna check one of those boxes, Toru.”
The camera is set up so that it can still be able to watch them bake, but the computer, with the stream and the chat, is off elsewhere. Suguru is sure the audience may have some interesting commentary, but he also, maybe, likes to pretend that there is no stream. That they’re baking just because they can, and just because Satoru wants to give Suguru a good birthday gift.
This is close enough.
“Be grateful, young man,” Satoru says. “It’s not every day you turn fifty seven.”
He turns to the camera. “For the record, I am not turning fifty seven.”
“I don’t think you need to tell them, you look plenty young.”
“Oh, so you think I look young? What does that mean?” he asks, trying to tease in the way that Satoru does to him. Maybe he can manage to fluster his friend and not the other way around.
He doesn’t expect Satoru to smile, an honest tint in his eyes. “It means I think you look beautiful.”
Suguru chokes on his words. He tries his best to avoid the camera, and avoid the way that Satoru is looking at him. It takes an embarrassingly long time for him to speak, and when he does, his throat feels achingly dry. “This is why people think we’re in love.”
Satoru laughs, and the moment is over just as quickly.
If Suguru forces a few glances over every now and again and catches himself flushing, then that's nobody's business but his own.
(..And maybe the few million people watching).
–
In the end, the cake tastes even worse than it looks.
“It's a brick,” Suguru says.
“A brick with a good personality,” Satoru argues.
“No, the applesauce ruins the flavor,” he responds. He’s trying his best to look disappointed, or upset, but it doesn’t take long before he’s laughing. “Toru, I told you this wouldn’t go well–” he says between wheezes.
Satoru giggles as well, and Suguru refuses the urge to think of it as adorable. “Fuck off, you helped bake too!”
“Barely,” Suguru argues. “My sister could’ve done better–” “I wanna see you try, asshole.”
“Sure,” he says. “For your birthday, I bet you I can do a better job at making a cake.”
Satoru hesitates. “It has to be from scratch.” Suguru snorts. “I’m not a cheater. Of course it’ll be from scratch–”
“You’re the one who suggested we use a cake mix for this!”
“Yeah, because it’s you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?!”
“Okay, well, chat, it’s been great streaming for you today,” Suguru says, ignoring Satoru’s protests. “Thank you all for the kind birthday wishes. Much kinder than Satoru could ever dream to be. We’ll see you all tomorrow,” he says. “Satoru? Any parting words?”
Satoru huffs. “Never forget that Suguru is an asshole. Never.”
At that, Suguru snorts. “And Satoru is a child. Goodbye, everyone.”
They turn the camera off, and Suguru goes to the computer. He ends the stream. (He also double checks that he ended the stream, nearly goes back to the kitchen, before deciding that it would be best to triple check he ended the stream,)
Satoru is waiting in the kitchen, his phone in his hand as he scrolls through his messages. “Yo, how come so many people are coming to me to wish you a happy birthday? I never get these many people wishing me a happy birthday,” he complains. Suguru snorts.
“You definitely get more birthday wishes than me.” “Fans don’t count, they don’t really know us.”
Suguru hums and looks at the atrocity of a cake that stands on their kitchen counter. “Are we really going to have to eat that?”
Resting his arms on the counter, Satoru pouts. “What’s wrong with my baking?”
Without even thinking, Suguru supplies: “Everything.”
“Wow, okay. First of all, rude,” Satoru says, grabbing the cake by the plate. “Second of all, no. This thing is a disgrace to the culinary world.” Suguru snorts. “Even I can admit that I made..perhaps a few mistakes.”
Suguru puts a hand to his mouth, faux surprise laced on his face. “The great Satoru, admitting he’s made a mistake?”
Satoru rolls his eyes and throws the cake away. “Yeah, yeah. Consider your birthday wish granted.” Suguru chuckles. “But, believe it or not, I predicted this!” Satoru says with a smile.
“I wonder how. Perhaps you’ve tried baking in the past and managed to feed not only me, but also Nanami, salt cookies?”
He’s met only with a middle finger as Satoru takes a step outside. By the door, he yells out, “Fine, be that way!”
When he returns a few seconds later, he’s holding a box. “I know you don’t even like cake that much. I wanted to give it a shot cause I thought you’d get a kick out of watching me fail,” he says, and Suguru can’t help but smile because he was right. And more than that, because he had thought about it, and was willing to throw his dignity out for the sake of making Suguru happy. “You like cheesecake, though, right? The one on 2nd street?”
Suguru blinks up at him. “Yeah,” he says. He’s only ever mentioned it a handful of times, and hadn’t thought anyone would remember. “It’s pretty expensive, though.” he adds skeptically, as Satoru puts the box down on the counter.
“It was on sale,” Satoru mutters, but if the way he’s avoiding eye contact is any sign, he’s lying.
Suguru softens, a smile finding a way on his face easily. “Satoru, you really didn’t have to.”
Satoru is still not looking at him. “Well, I’m having some too.” “Obviously,” Suguru agrees.
“As for your gift,” Satoru starts, finally looking up. “I did get you something. I promise you that. It’s on its way, but it won’t be here until a few days from now.” His tone seems to be saying ‘I hope that’s okay’. Suguru’s smile only grows fonder.
“That’s alright, thank you, Satoru. I really do appreciate it.”
Satoru smiles, and Suguru can’t help but think it’s quite beautiful, actually.
–
Suguru has a problem. Well, really he has a few. His declining mental state, for one, his student loan debts, for another. But his main problem, or at least, the one that is currently beating him over the head, involves a white haired man.
Actually, that’s too broad. There is a large array of Satoru-based problems in Suguru’s life, but somehow, this one takes the applesauce-flavored cake.
He can not seem to stop staring at Satoru.
It’s something small, really. Nothing that should be bothering him. But it’s been a day since the Suguru-birthday-cake-stream, and somehow, Suguru has started to stare. Satoru hasn’t noticed, or if he has, he has stayed entirely silent about it. But it bothers Suguru.
It bothers him mostly because it feels almost instinctual. He’s begun to wonder if he’s always done this, and simply has never noticed. That must be it, because no one seems to say anything. Not Satoru, with his perceptive eyes, not anyone in the chat, who seems to constantly be looking for funny things to nit-pick, not even Sukuna has teased him about it. So had he always stared?
It doesn’t really matter, Suguru thinks to himself as he struggles, controller in hand, Satoru next to him with a concentrated look on his face. It takes him until his team loses again to realize that he had been staring. “Overwatch isn’t even that hard, Suguru!” Satoru complains as the screen informs them of their loss.
“The whole premise of our stream is that I don’t know how to do jackshit, Toru. Why are you even surprised at this point?” Suguru deadpans, and Satoru snorts.
“Of course you’re playing Genji again,” Satoru says as they load in again. “Genji’s cool,” Suguru defends, a frown on his face.
Satoru snorts. “I’m not attacking you. I’m just saying it doesn’t surprise me.”
Before Suguru can try to defend himself again by saying that he isn’t that predictable, Satoru leans and rests his head on Suguru’s shoulder. The game is going to start in a few seconds. Suguru wants to say something, his tongue caught in his throat–but the game starts, and he decides it can wait until later.
Suguru makes a point not to look at Satoru for the whole round, not even a glance as Satoru makes fun of his playstyle. When the round is over, Satoru turns off the TV and puts his controller down, burying his head in Suguru’s neck.
“What’re you doing, Satoru?” he asks immediately, feeling as puffs of breath reach on his neck, ignoring the way his face is flushing.
“I’m tired,” Satoru says, yawning, as if on cue. “And you’re warm.”
Suguru frowns. “We’re on the couch. If you’re tired, go to bed.”
Satoru lets out a noise in complaint, and it's so close to his skin that Suguru can feel it vibrate. “I don't wannaaa..” he draws out, just to be annoying. Suguru huffs. “You know, if we were streaming, I’m willing to bet the chat would be accusing us of dating .”
“Is that why your heart is beating so fast?”
Suguru freezes, trying his best not to let the fear on his face show. Wait. Why is he afraid? It’s just Satoru. “Is it?” he asks, but his voice is strained.
“Yeah,” Satoru says. “‘S nice, though.”
He is given no further warning before Satoru promptly passes out on his shoulder.
“Toru? Toru–not again, man.”
Suguru, who had previously been sitting up straight against the couch, realizes that this position may last a while longer than he had originally anticipated, and sighs. Might as well get comfortable.
He shifts on his side, going to lie down so his back is straight, and takes Satoru down with him. The couch has never been a fun place to sleep, but goddamnit, he’s going to reduce the pain by at least some percent.
As he lies down, he realizes he’s staring again. There isn’t much he can do to stop it, at this point, since they’re practically laying on each other, but the fact remains. Satoru lays his head on Sugurus chest, right by his neck.
It takes a minute before his own breathing settles into rhythmic huffs. Sleep settles in his eyes, his hand resting on Satoru’s hair. The last thing he thinks before falling into a peaceful, dreamless sleep, is: he’s beautiful.
-
With the morning, comes a new thought. One thought, echoing in his head, knocking down any other thought so that only it ricochets in his body.
Fuck.
Because falling asleep with a friend is one thing. Falling asleep while playing with said friend's hair is another. Falling asleep while playing with said friends' hair and admiring their beauty, after spending a whole day (and very possibly much longer) staring at them, after having kissed them (even if only on the forehead), and having an entire audience thinking they were secretly in love, was a whole fucking other thing.
And the worst part of it all?
Suguru is a morning person. Satoru is not.
Which means that he can’t even have the luxury of worrying about this in the privacy of his own room, but rather, with the cause of said worry lying on top of him. Kill me, he thinks to no one in particular. “Hey, Toru,” Suguru says, trying to speak in his normal tone. His voice is scratchy with morning haze, but it's good enough. Loud enough that Satoru groans in complaint and digs his face deeper into Suguru.
Seriously. Kill me.
“Satoru, wake up.”
When he doesn’t, Suguru wriggles his palm under Satoru’s face so he can push the man off. Satoru rolls off the couch ungracefully, and lands on the floor with a blanket wrapped around him. “You’re a bitch in the mornings, has anyone told you that?” he complains, and Suguru snorts.
“Says you.”
“What happened yesterday?” Satoru asks, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “I remember playing Overwatch..” he says, trailing off.
Suguru sighs. “You decided to be an asshole and slept on me. I know how you get when I wake you,” he says, signaling to the current Satoru who is pouting on the floor, wrapped like a burrito. “..so I decided it was better to just sleep on the couch.”
Satoru hums, nodding. “What time is it?”
Taking out his phone from his pocket (something that he finds a lot easier when there isn’t another person on him, go figure), he says: “eight thirty-two.” Satoru nods.
“I haveee…less than two hours then” he says, drawing it out as if the math is difficult to do. “Satoru. You were a physics major. Please tell me you know how to subtract.”
From the floor, Satoru snorts. “Alright, well I need to get up now.”
Suguru gives him an odd look. “Now? When you just woke up and still have two hours?”
Satoru shrugs. “Yeah. Why?”
“You never get up early if you can help it, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you get prepared for something two hours in advance. You’d show up to your own wedding fifteen minutes late, if you ever found some bastard desperate enough to marry you.”
The white haired boy winces, perhaps at Suguru’s analysis, more likely at the insult. “I’m a catch, fuck you. And this is important, and I do put effort in for the important things.”
Suguru smiles, remembering his birthday. “Yeah, I know. So what is it? A date or something?”
“I told you I had a gift for you.”
Suguru pauses. What is that supposed to mean? “Do I need to get dressed..?” Satoru thinks about it for a second, and shrugs. “I mean I guess I’d recommend it. You’re not going out of the apartment, though.”
Right. “Okay. Tell me when you’re on the way back home, I guess,” Suguru decides. Satoru nods, and goes to the restroom, probably to take a shower. Suguru holds his breath and lies on the couch, back pressed flat against the cushion. Right, so the key is not to panic.
Suguru takes a deep breath in. It smells like Satoru.
Okay, sure, fine, fuck that plan anyway–it is perfectly reasonable to panic.
Is it normal to cuddle with friends? He knows people who do that, and that had never bothered them, and it had never been anything but platonic, so why would it be different with him and Satoru? Except, those friends were always physically affectionate with other people, too, and the idea of being that close with another friend that isn’t Satoru does not appeal to Suguru in the slightest.
And what was with the staring, really? He knows Satoru is attractive, everyone does. It's practically a fact of life, right? So there's nothing wrong with staring, really, it's just natural. Except he knows other people who are attractive and he never really stared at them. Okay. Sure, fine, maybe it’s just a Satoru thing.
Many things are Just Satoru things. Like, that specific shade of blue. The calm, light blue that his eyes were, vibrant at certain parts where it feels somehow just like summer, but not in the trapping, hot way– rather, in the peaceful evenings spent with friends, laughing and loving and living. That color of blue is a just Satoru thing. A beautiful color. Probably Suguru’s favorite, if he’s being honest.
Okay so maybe now’s not the time for honesty. There are other Satoru things. Like being a dick and being annoying and never doing things on time and being considerate and thinking incredibly hard about the sort of stuff his friends like, and smiling and laughing in a way that’s just so freeing for some reason, so nice that it makes it feel like Suguru’s entire chest has been lifted.
Fuck. Right. Okay.
“Suguruu!” Satoru calls out. “I’m on my way out, I’ll text you when I’m on my way home!” he says, and Suguru says nothing. Partly because he doesn’t trust himself to say anything. Mostly because he doesn’t trust himself to say anything.
And Satoru is dressed well, and Satoru never dresses well. And he’s doing it for Suguru. Whatever that may mean.
The second that he hears (he doesn’t want to look, not when he’s in this state and Satoru is looking nice for once) Satoru leave the apartment, Suguru doesn’t hesitate to bury his face in a pillow. Maybe he screams, maybe he doesn’t. He can’t quite be sure.
It’s alright. It’s okay, Satoru will support us no matter what, he thinks to himself, because of course that would be one of his concerns at a time like this.
So maybe Sukuna was right. God, isn’t that a sentence. Maybe Sukuna was right, and he has, just a teensy, tiny, barely even detectable crush.
Suguru breathes, hard and sharp, into the pillow. He’ll be fine. He can ignore it. It’s just Satoru, anyway, it's his best friend. It’ll go away soon.
–
When Satoru texts that he’s on his way back, nearly two hours later, Suguru has–at the very least–calmed down. He continues to feel dizzy in the head and a bit light at his feet, sort of like he came to a realization that he was never meant to make, but that was alright.
He’s calm enough to get up and go to his room, pick out a pair of clothes that look just slightly above his average, and go back to the kitchen. He realizes Satoru hasn’t had breakfast yet. It’s probably the polite thing to do—to make him something, especially since he’s already going so far out of his way to do something for Suguru (though what the gift is is seriously beyond him).
So, Suguru makes his way to the pantry, looks through their ingredients, and decides he’ll make pancakes. There’s no butter, still, but he can simply use oil on the pan. Much better than applesauce, he thinks to himself as he sets the stove on medium and begins to cook.
Despite all his teasing, Suguru is only moderately better than Satoru at making food. Practically raising his two younger sisters, since his parents were often busy with work, he learned how to cook the basics when he was little, but never went too far into it. Mimiko liked to cook, and she would often, once she was old enough, take over making any food in the household. She was still a child, so Suguru would help her, but it relieved him from the need to cook too often.
But some amount of cooking experience still bests none at all, and thankfully for himself, it did cover pancakes.
Suguru is almost done cooking all the pancakes when he hears the door unlock. “Satoru,” Suguru calls out, “I’m making pancakes. Do you want any?” he asks, as if he hadn’t already made the others food.
“Of course–” he says, but it sounds strained, like he’s attempting to hush something. “Can you make a bit more than you usually would?”
Suguru blinks. “Are you really that hungry? You can take mine, if you’d like,” he suggests. “No, you need to eat, too. Just make a bit more.”
“Sure,” Suguru says, already gathering the ingredients again.
“Brother, can you make mine with blueberries?” a small voice yells from the door.
“They taste better with chocolate, Nanako..”
Suguru freezes where he stands. “Well shit,” Satoru says, and Suguru hardly processes it as the girls whisper to each other about how they were supposed to keep it a surprise. Mimiko whispers a quiet ‘sorry, Mr Satoru,’, followed by quiet assurances and jokes, and it's nearly enough to make Suguru cry.
He approaches them, and sees that they had been hiding behind Satoru, trying their best to stay hidden to make up for ruining the surprise. “Mimiko? Nanako?” He asks quietly, and they emerge from behind Satoru. Satoru is smiling, but stays behind.
“I thought you two were in school right now,” he says, crouching down so he’s closer to their eye level.
“We were! But Mr Satoru asked mom if we could come see you and she just couldn’t say no!” Nanako says with a smile, Mimiko nodding along. “Mr Satoru must be really good at convincing people,” she agrees.
“He is,” Suguru grins, something wild and soft, pulling both of them in for a hug. “How long are you here for?”
“Uhmm…” Mimiko thinks, before Satoru interrupts.
“I bought their tickets to leave in three days. So they don’t miss too much school, you know? But if you want them to stay longer, I can always–”
“No, it’s okay. Thank you, Satoru,” he says. He isn’t sure if a thank you quite conveys the array of emotions he’s feeling, but it’ll have to do. “Thank you,” he repeats, a bit quieter.
Satoru smiles, watching as the girls talk to their older brother with excitement about their school and their classes and friends. Suguru had had these sorts of conversations with them, but only ever on the phone. It’s been over two years since the last time he’s seen them in person. “Of course,” Satoru says, so quietly that Suguru may or may not have heard it, and he meant it as a guarantee.
Any time.
–
“How did you convince my mom?” Suguru asks once the girls are asleep on the couch, and they’re hanging out in Satoru’s room, each doing their own thing on their phones.
Satoru shrugs. “She always liked me.”
“No she didn’t.”
Satoru cringes. “Wow, okay. I guess you’ll never know, then.”
Suguru thinks for a moment, wondering what could ever possibly convince her to let her two children escape school to visit her other, less promising child in a whole other country. “Did you bribe her?” he asks.
The second of hesitance is enough to prove Suguru right. “Would you be mad if I said that I did?” Satoru asks, his tone laced with insecurity. Suguru huffs. It’s not a good look on him.
“Honestly, no. I’m sure mom appreciated the extra money and I’m just glad to have some more time with Nanako and Mimiko. It’s been so long since I’ve been able to hug them.” When Suguru looks up from his phone to look at Satoru, he sees the boy smiling.
That smile is something pure. Something that says: I’m just glad you’re happy, I’m glad I got to give you this. It makes him feel, suddenly, as if he's the only person in the world, and Satoru is holding him up like Atlas. Suguru gives a smile of his own, genuine and true, yet, somehow, in comparison, he feels it falls flat.
He reaches his hand out, and it lands somewhere on Satoru’s knee. “Seriously, Satoru. Thank you. This is the best gift I could have asked for,” he says, and Satoru looks away.
“I’m glad you’re happy,” he says, and even Suguru can see that his ears are pink.
–
The next morning, Suguru is both delighted and horrified to learn that Nanako and Mimiko both not only know about the stream, but also watch it.
“You say a lot of bad words, Sugu,” Nanako says. “And very mean things about Mr Satoru,” she adds. Suguru feels his face burn up at that. “How come you get to swear and be mean and we don’t?”
Satoru looks at him as if he had, himself, gotten some kind of beautiful present. He’s holding his mouth closed and obviously trying not to laugh. “Well,” Suguru says, trying desperately to look less embarrassed than he feels. “It’s part of my job, and Satoru can be very mean, too.”
“So we can be mean to Mr Satoru?” Mimiko asks.
At first, Suguru wants to say no, of course not, but the way that Satoru is laughing now stops him. “Yes, as mean as you want.”
Nanako frowns. “But mom said not to be mean to people we love,” she says, looking up at him with puppy eyes.
“Huh?” he says, dumbly, and Satoru, for whatever reason, does not seem to find that funny. He’s stopped laughing. “Yeah!” Nanako says. “Yuji–you remember Yuji, right brother?”
Suguru nods, wondering where this is headed. “Your pink-haired friend, right?” Mimiko nods. “Yea! Yuji–he kept getting his hair pulled at the playground–”
“How would that even work, doesn’t he have short hair?” Satoru cuts in, suddenly involved in the conversation. Mimiko shrugs. “Doesn’t mean he can’t get his hair pulled.”
Satoru frowns and, to demonstrate the point, Suguru grabs a chunk of white hair and (a bit too gently) tugs it down. “See?” Suguru says.
“There it is again! Mom said that if someone really does love someone, they should say nice things and never ever pull their hair!”
Suguru feels his whole face go pink as he lets his hand go. “I’m not–Satoru–he’s just..”. He looks at Satoru for help, but oddly enough, he seems to be just as quiet. Once Suguru gives up on his sentence, Satoru finally speaks.
“Suguru loves me but not like that. So it’s okay for him to be mean to me,” he says, very purposefully not looking Suguru in the eyes. Mimiko looks confused for a minute, her head turned to the side as she gives Nanako a very quick, very unsure look.
“But..” Mimiko starts, “Sugu kissed Mr Satoru, and when we showed mom–
“You showed mom?” Suguru says with more than a bit of despair.
“She said it was the most in love she’d ever—”
“Alright, that’s enough of that,” Suguru says, wishing with all his power that some God is listening and willing to smite him where he stands. He risks a glance at Satoru, mostly to survey the damages that had undoubtedly been done, and is surprised to see that Satoru isn’t disgusted. He doesn’t find it amusing or weird or concerning. He just seems..stunned. Dozey, in a way that he can almost describe, if he himself is feeling wishful, as hopeful. “We can talk about this another day. Weren’t you two supposed to be asleep? It was three in the morning.”
Satoru, snapped out of his daze, chuckles. “That's central time. It was only like, five in the afternoon for them.”
“So you can do math,” Suguru deadpans, recalling the other morning.
Satoru cackles, free and unrestricted, and Suguru finds himself smiling. The girls stare between them, their confusion only growing. When Satoru finally stops laughing, he’s smiling too. “Have you two ever had crepes?” he asks the twins, and they shake their heads.
“Well,” Satoru says, looking back at Suguru. “Mr Satoru’s about to become their favorite brother, I think”.
–
Silently, Suguru wonders how it’s possible to be so loud in a place so calm.
Satoru is laughing loudly at all the stories the twins tell him, and Suguru can’t help but smile even as they tell him ones Suguru has already heard before. “Seriously?” Satoru says, egging them on to continue until the girls cheeks are pink from laughing at their own tales.
It’s, in all honesty, too much for Suguru to handle in one afternoon. But it’s also not at all enough, because he knows that they’ll both be gone soon enough. “So he’s not even interested, and they still come up to him?” Satoru asks, as if he didn’t know damn well that elementary school drama means nothing.
“Yes! But it’s okay, because Yuji has an older brother, and he’s gonna come to school one day and scare off all the other kids!”
Suguru snorts. “Must be one scary older brother,” he says. Mimiko nods. “He even scared you, Sugu!”
There’s a moment of silence shared between Suguru and Satoru in which they both wordlessly wonder; what the hell is she talking about. “I don’t think I’ve ever met him, Mimiko,” Suguru says gently.
Nanako frowns. “But he talks to you all the time! He’s the one who got us to start watching your stream..” she says.
In the end, it’s Satoru who asks first. “What’s his name, kiddo?”
Mimiko shouts out, “Oh I know! I know, he’s Sukuna! He looks just like Yuji, but he’s scary and old!”
Satoru looks at the girls, at their naive, happy faces—and then at Suguru, as a revelation seems to spark in the man's mind.
“If I ever meet that bastard, I’m splitting his head in half with a meat cleaver,” Suguru mutters, just loud enough for Satoru to hear. He spits some of his water out on accident, and laughs. “It can’t be that bad,” Satoru tries to comfort.
“Sukuna also got mom to start watching!”
“Nevermind,” Satoru says, going to pat his friend, who has already surrendered himself to the table, on the shoulders. “I’m going to die in this crepe shop,” Suguru says. “And I’ll meet Sukuna in hell.”
The food arrives shortly after, and Suguru is forced to prop himself up. “It’s okay, brother! Mom likes watching you! She says it feels like you’re there with her. And she likes Mr Satoru, too.”
Satoru smiles around a mouthful of chocolate and strawberry stuffed crepes. “She does?” he asks, hope in his voice. “Suguru, you lied to me!”
Suguru laughs, but is genuinely surprised. The first time he had ever brought home Satoru, when they were in college, his mom seemed to dislike him. Not enough for her to outright tell him to stay away from Satoru, but enough for it to feel very implied.
“Mhm,” Mimiko says. “She says she’s glad to see you acting like yourself again,” she says. “I don’t really know what she means..but I’m happy too! Sugu is the best, and if Mr Satoru makes you happy, then Mr Satoru is the best, too!”
And suddenly, Satoru is smiling, and he’s giving the twins some of his own crepes for them to try because they want to try all the flavors, and Suguru realizes he feels at home. He feels like himself, and it’s an odd thing, when you’ve felt like someone else, to realize you’re at home. Maybe he’s been at home for a while.
It comes with a sense of clarity, this time. It doesn’t rush or crash or burn. It comes as he’s being forced to try some of Satoru’s overpriced, oversugared desert.
So, he thinks. This is love.
–
It only really hits him that night, as he’s trying to fall asleep and he can hear Satoru try to sneak the girls some candy ‘without Suguru noticing’.
And somehow, it makes sense. How could it not?
He has half the sleep-deprived mind to storm out and declare his new discovery, but he thinks better of it. Despite everything, Satoru is his best friend. Putting this on him like this, without thinking about it for a while, without thinking about it hard and being sure of it–and being sure that it won’t scare Satoru off, would be reckless. Risky in a way that Suguru is not willing to risk.
It’s as he thinks this that Satoru sneaks into his room. “Heeey..” he says quietly, and Suguru props up gently. “The girls aren’t allergic to any food, are they? I tried asking them but they don’t know and I just wanna make sure.”
Something warm crowds in Suguru’s chest. It’s a familiar feeling. How did he never realize soonee? “No. No food allergies. What’re you giving them?” he asks, a smile forming. Satoru scratches the back of his head. “Oh, now? Nothing!”
“You’re a horrible liar.”
“Fuck off,” he whines. “It’s just–I want them to try all the classic American candies before they go. Like, did you know there’s no starbursts or nerds or snickers in Japan?”
Suguru snorts, “Yes, we both lived in Japan, dumbass,” he tries for sarcastic, and is appalled to find it comes out rather fondly. “You could have told me from the start. I want to hear their opinions too, you know?”
And that’s how they both end up in their own kitchen, a bowl of mixed American candy that makes it look like a Halloween party that came way too early. The general consensus, as they all find out rather quickly, is that the candy is far too sweet.
“These taste like they could kill me..” Mimiko says. “I like the yellow ones,” Nanako says. “But I think if I eat any more, I’m gonna be sick.”
Suguru laughs as Satoru looks near offended. “The sweetness is the best part,” he argues. “It makes you feel so alive!”
“That sounds like drugs,” Suguru says, and is backed by two small, nodding heads.
“Well, I'm an addict then,” Satoru decides. Mimiko frowns. “That’s not a good thing,” she says, so serious that it makes both the adults break down in fits of laughter.
When they’re done, Suguru breathes out a content sigh. “I think it’s time for bed now, Nanako, Mimiko.”
“I don’t wanna sleep on the couch again,” Mimiko whines. “I’ll take the couch then,” Suguru immediately offers. His little sisters can sleep in his bed. It was the sort of arrangement they had when they lived back with their parents, where there was only so much space. Suguru’s fine with sleeping anywhere.
Satoru frowns. “That’s some bull–” he cuts himself off. “You deserve better than that,” he corrects himself, finding the strength in himself to smile at the girls. “Suguru can just sleep with me.”
Suguru raises an eyebrow at the phrasing, to which Satoru shoots back a quiet look that Suguru knows well enough means ‘seriously, man?’, but he doesn’t fight back.
“Okay,” Mimiko says. “Good night big brothers!” Nanako nods, and repeats, “Good night big brothers,” but she seems to be a bit more tired.
“Sleep well,” Suguru says, watching as the girls make their way to his room.
Satoru watches with him, and once they’re gone, he looks at Suguru. “For the record, I didn’t mean it like that, and if you want I can still go take the couch.” Suguru snorts. “I know. And don’t stress it, neither of us need to take the couch.”
“Oh thank god,” Satoru says, his head hanging down. “I hate sleeping on couches.” Satoru makes his way to his own room, expecting Suguru to follow, and he can’t help but think, as he follows. Why’d you offer, then?
–
It’s a lot like college, is what Suguru discovers as he sits on the edge of the bed. Neither of them are asleep yet, not quite wanting to succumb to the unconscious, but neither of them are really speaking. It’s nice, anyway. Like a reminder. He isn’t sure what the reminder is, but it feels like he needed it.
“They’re good kids,” Satoru finally says when he turns his phone off. Suguru is messing with his own hair when he hears it, and he smiles. He takes off his hair tie. “Yeah. They are.”
Satoru yawns, stretching his arms up. “We should sleep,” he says, because, truthfully, Suguru was only barely exaggerating when he said that Satoru had a bedtime. “We should,” Suguru agrees.
Suguru slips into bed, and watches as Satoru looks up and down at his long hair. “You never wear it down anymore,” he says, quietly. “It looks nice. I mean, it looks nice either way but..”
Slowly, Satoru’s hand creeps its way into Suguru’s hair. “It’s my favorite like this.” Suguru smiles, ignoring the flush that’s surely rising on his face, and puts his own hand on top of Satoru’s. “I can wear it like this more often, if you want.”
Satoru frowns. “No. Not on stream.”
“Why not?” Suguru asks, confused.
Maybe, if it were daytime, Satoru would’ve hesitated. Maybe he wouldn’t have said anything at all. But a tired Satoru is, more often than not, an honest Satoru. “I like that it’s something only I get to see,” he says, and it’s quiet.
“I love you,” Suguru says, before he can even think about it. Satoru smiles, and before Suguru can even get a chance to worry about it, he says, “Love you too.”
It’s easy to sleep, after that.
–
It’s been two days since they last streamed, which, really, isn’t a lot.
And yet.
“No, Mimiko, Nanako, you can’t be on stream,” Suguru tries to explain as the girls stand disobediently in the room where they record. “Why not?” they demand.
Suguru sighs. “The internet is a big, scary place. Satoru and I are adults. We can handle it–”
“We can handle it too!” Nanako says. “Yeah, don’t baby us!” Mimiko agrees.
Satoru gives them a stern look. “Your mom will be watching, and if you get on stream with us, she’ll be very angry with Big Brother Suguru and Satoru. You don’t wanna get us in trouble, do you?” He tries, and watches as they consider it and finally nod among themselves.
They both leave the room, under the agreement that they’ll go out in the city after the fact. “Thank you,” Suguru says, a sigh of relief escaping him as they set up the stream. “I don’t know how to say no to them, sometimes.”
Satoru smiles. “I know, you big pushover.”
“I’ll show you pushover–” he says, gearing up to throw something at him just as Satoru manages to turn the stream on. “Hey guys–” he starts, and is interrupted by a notebook, hitting him square in the side of the face.
Suguru winces. “That one may have hit a bit too hard,” he says as Satoru gets up. “Ya think?” Satoru bites back, his middle finger up before he is.
“Heeey guys..” Suguru starts, a lot more sheepishly than his counterpart. “Sorry for the sudden absence, we saw all your concerns–”
“And frankly think they’re bullshit.”
“Satoru,” Suguru warns. “What? It’s true. Y'all can chill out, we just took a quick break. Two days. Seriously, we didn’t get killed by the mafia or whatever you seem to think happened.”
Both their faces fall at a donation from Sukuna. ‘Most of us thought you guys just eloped tbh’, it reads. It’s a twenty dollar donation. Suguru isn’t sure whether to cuss him out or thank him. “Thank you for the twenty dollars,” he decides on, before continuing. “But fuck you, man. You seriously showed the streams to my mother?” he says.
“Hi, Ms. Geto, if you’re watching!” Satoru says happily. “Your three kids are all perfectly safe and happy,” he adds. Suguru cringes. “That makes it sound like you kidnapped them, Toru. And I wouldn’t describe myself as ‘safe and happy’ with you.”
Satoru frowns. “Well your mom seems to think–”
“And I think we should start the stream off with some..minecraft! Yeah, that works right?” Suguru says, rushing to cut his friend off. Satoru laughs, and tells the chat they’ll find out what Suguru’s mom thinks about their stream some other day.
“I’d rather we stop talking about my mom now, thanks” Suguru says, as they end up deciding on starting Deltarune. Suguru’s run of Undertale (for which he had decided, for some reason unknown to even god himself, to do a genocide run) did surprisingly well, they were hoping for a spin off just as well received.
It’s as the game starts to download, since Satoru himself hasn’t attempted it yet, that there’s a knock at the studio door. “I’ll go get it,” Satoru says. Suguru nods, but the second that Satoru has his back turned, Suguru shifts his gaze back at his friend.
He’s standing by the door, half creaked open, crouched down just enough so that he’s facing one of the girls. He speaks quietly, and smiles as he makes sure that he shields their faces from the camera. Suguru looks back to the stream, and his feelings must show on his face, because the chat is going insane, and Sukuna has sent another donation.
‘Ha. Gay.’
Suguru sighs wistfully, but can not find it in himself to disagree. “I’m so fucked,” he says quietly, and the chat explodes. “You all better not tell him I ever admitted it,” Suguru whispers.
When Satoru returns, the chat is still booming, and Satoru winces. “What did you do to get them all so worked up, Sugu?” As if a new nickname would make it better, Suguru thinks.
“Not sure. I think they just saw Nanako and Mimiko,” he lies.
“Oh,” Satoru says. “They’re not our kids or anything. They’re just Sugu’s younger siblings,” he explains.
And the crowd, once again, goes wild.
–
“When are you getting married?” Nanako asks, the day they’re set to leave, when Satoru is out buying some food. “How do you mean?” Suguru responds in turn.
Nanako frowns. “You and big brother Satoru. Mom said that when two people love each other, they get married. So why aren’t you?”
Suguru bites the inside of his lip. “Well, he doesn’t know I love him.” Not in that way, at least.
Mimiko is putting her shoes on, swinging her small backpack on her shoulders. “Why not?”
“I haven’t told him,” Suguru says honestly, putting a hand to the back of his neck. “I’m not sure he loves me back.”
The girls stare at each other, and then at him. “That’s silly. Of course he does.”
Suguru tries not to let the conversation linger in his head for any longer than it has to. But it repeats any time that he’s silent. Of course he does. And wouldn’t that be perfect?
–
When they’re at the airport, he hugs the twins tightly, and sees as they also hug Satoru. It feels nice. Like they’re a family. Maybe they are. “I’ll visit soon,” Suguru promises.
Mimiko and Nanako nod. “Bring Mr Satoru,” Nanako says, as Mimiko says, “Please tell him.” Satoru chuckles and ruffles both their hairs, leaving them with a bit of candy because it wouldn’t be a proper Satoru goodbye if he didn’t.
Suguru watches as they leave, a half frown on his face. “They’ll be alright,” Satoru says immediately, putting a hand on Suguru’s shoulder. “They’re pretty smart,” he says.
Suguru can’t help but agree.
On their way out, Suguru is quiet, and Satoru sneaks quick glances at Suguru. “Hey, man, you alright? You’re not usually so..” he signals vaguely at Suguru. “Do I need to slap you or something?”
“I’m alright,” Suguru says, and he believes himself. “I just didn’t realize how much I missed those two,” he finishes. Satoru hums. “We can go visit when it’s summer. A whole week, maybe more, if you want,” Satoru says.
“A whole week?”
“Yeah. Hell, we can make it two. They’ll be out of school, and we can say hi to Yuji, and you can sucker punch Sukuna if you see him.” Suguru chuckles. “And we’ll put up a notice, yeah? I’m sure everyone will be fine without us for two weeks.”
Suguru smiles. “Yeah. That sounds good to me,” he says, and it all makes too much sense. Satoru and summer and family, a love that must have grown inside him for months, maybe years. It was hard to recognize, but now that he’s seen it, it sticks out as if there were no other way this could have gone.
“I love you,” Suguru says, and this time he can’t blame it on the sleepiness.
“Love you too,” Satoru says, and Suguru doesn’t ask for clarification. That can come later. Maybe, for now, this is enough.
–
“Oh fuck no,” Sukuna says, sitting next to his younger brother, his noodles growing cold. Yuji frowns.
“That’s not a nice word,” Yuji says.
Sukuna waves it off. “Yeah, yeah. You’re sure that’s what Nanako and Mimiko said?” he asks, his anger only growing worse as Yuji nods. “He doesn’t think. That Satoru. That Satoru. The one that’s so stupidly in love that he cried over how pretty Suguru was six months ago, that he practically admitted it, loves him?” Sukuna asks again, grabbing Yuji by the shoulders.
Yuji, to his credit, seems entirely unfazed as he nods again. “I can’t take this anymore,” Sukuna complains, throwing his head back and palming at his face. “How can they be so stupid?”
“I want them to be happy too,” Yuji says with a frown. “Nana and Mimi seemed very sad that Suguru was sad.”
Sukuna sighs. “Of course they did,” he mumbles. “And all because their communication is horrible.” In all transparency, he should’ve seen it coming, considering how poorly they did at Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. That had been one of his favorite streams, a year ago.
Now though, Sukuna thinks, it just represents everything they’re doing wrong. “I’ll fix it,” Sukuna says to Yuji. “Really? How? Mimi said that Suguru hates you.”
Sukuna smiles. It’s always good to have a reputation. “Don’t worry. It isn’t Suguru I’m gonna talk to.”
–
The next time that they’re streaming, it’s pretty slow. Suguru is quietly picking at his lip while trying to figure out a puzzle, and Satoru is reading out things from the chat just to hear Suguru laugh quietly at them. It’s honestly quite peaceful.
And then Sukuna donates nearly a hundred dollars.
Satoru’s jaw drops, and he has the base intelligence to read the message to himself before saying it aloud.
‘Hey, asshole. DM me. It’s important. Don’t tell Suguru.’
Satoru hesitates, and is opening and closing his mouth before another donation comes in, just as much money.
‘I’m only doing this for Yuji, respond, fucker.’
At that Satoru silently brings out his phone, giving a small word of encouragement as Suguru beats the level he was stuck on, and types in Sukuna’s information.
Where’d you get all the money?
Mind your business. Y’all are getting unbearable, and Yuji looks like a fuckin kicked puppy.
attachment: video
I don’t really give a shit what happens between you two. But sort this out, for fucks sake.
Satoru scoffs at Sukuna’s choice of words but opens the video attachment anyway, expecting some sort of prank or silly clip that he’s seen a million times.
What he doesn’t expect to see is Suguru looking back at Satoru, when he had gone and talked to Nanako and Mimiko, as if he had hung the stars. That, in and of itself, wasn’t enough to draw any conclusions, but it did make his heart skip a beat or two.
What he expects even less is for Suguru to look back at the camera, a..look on his face, and for him to sigh wistfully. He reads Sukuna’s donation which, yeah, typical, and expects Suguru to brush it off. Instead, he says nothing to Sukuna. Looking almost as if he’s agreeing. “I’m so fucked,” he says. “You all better not tell him I ever admitted it.”
And seriously, what’s that about?
–
“Hey, Suguru,” Satoru starts, once they’re done streaming. Suguru hums in the way he does when he’s waiting for Satoru to continue, cleaning up neatly for the next day. “What, exactly, did you admit on stream a few days ago?”
At that, Suguru freezes. He clears his throat. “Sorry?” he says, rubbing at the back of his neck. Satoru frowns.
“Don’t play dumb, it’s not like you. I’m talking about when I went to see Nanako and Mimiko and you apparently ‘admitted’ something,” Satoru says, air quotes hanging in the air. “What was it?”
Suguru taps his fingers on the desk, staring at the keyboard in front of him. “Did you–um-see the clip?”
“Yeah, that’s why I’m asking.”
He doesn’t sound cold. Doesn’t sound angry. He sounds confused, more than anything, and maybe a little sad. Suguru pushes past the initial cold gut reaction he had. “If you saw it, you should know. I’m going to bed–” Suguru says, trying to make his way to the door without bumping into Satoru.
Satoru grabs him by the wrist. Not tightly. Suguru can still back away, if he wants to. And god, does he want to. He wants to keep walking and get to his room, and he wants to shut the door and never let anyone in for the rest of his life.
But Satoru is looking at him and he looks nearly like he’s pleading. And Satoru never pleads. “What do you think I admitted?” Suguru tries to see if maybe he got lucky.
“I don’t know,” Satoru says, letting go of Suguru’s wrist now that he’s sure that they were having the conversation. “That’s why I’m asking.”
Suguru breathes, deep. “Look, it’s..look. I don’t–” he stutters, trying to find the right way to say it just in case. Of course he does, echoes in his head, but not loud enough.
“Hey,” Satoru says. “No matter what, I’ve still got you, and you’ve still got me, yeah?”
Suguru nods. Of course he does.
“I think–” there’s too many ways to say it. I love you more than you realize, maybe. If he were normal, maybe he’d stay with something direct. I love you, more and more and more. Instead, he says, “I think you’re what home is, to me.”
Satoru blinks at him. “Huh?”
“I didn’t–I’ve been home in so many places. Back in Japan, with my parents, and Nanako and Mimiko, and in college, and now, but I don’t–it doesn’t feel like home unless it's you. Home is a light blue summer,” he says, and he’s holding his own arms as he says it. “And,” finally, he decides, he has dug his own grave deep enough. “I think I love you. Not just in the way I always have.”
Once he’s done, it doesn’t feel better. It doesn’t feel like a weight lifting off his chest, or like spilling it all out has somehow saved him from the feeling. Rather, it feels like the waiting room between heaven and hell. His sins on display for judgment day.
Without warning, Satoru wraps his arms around the other, pulling him deeply into a hug. “Until I die,” Satoru starts, “You’ll always have somewhere with me,” he says. It sounds like a promise.
Suguru grabs onto Satoru. “So you–”
“Yes. Of course. I love you more than you can ever imagine.”
They stay like that, for long enough that they forget there was ever anything more or anything less. It takes them minutes before they pull away. When they do, it’s Satoru who speaks first. “You did remember to end the stream this time, right?”
“Fuck off, that was one time.”
Satoru laughs, and it sounds whole. “You’re gonna hate it when you find out who finally got me to ask you.”
Suguru finds that he could not care less.