Archive of Our Own

i.

Kei's hand is at the base of his spine. He always starts there, a few moments after he turns the lamp off. Tetsurou's used to the goosebumps he gets in anticipation, which is an irony he'd get into if the lamp wasn't off.

A few moments after Kei turns the lamp off, he always trails the tips of his fingers briefly over Tetsurou's hipbone before splaying his hand on the small of his back. Tetsurou is always warmer than Kei, so the colder the weather gets, the higher the little shock that travels from the point of contact. Sometimes Kei mumbles a sorry and sometimes he puts his other hand there too, laughing when Tetsurou squirms. This time he does neither, only waits for a moment while Tetsurou settles.

When Tetsurou was still a student, he used to rent a studio where the bed was against the wall. Kei would always sleep next to the wall, his back pressed to it deliberately as if to remind himself that he wouldn't fall off. Now they have a king against a midpoint in the wall, so Kei sleeps on the side farthest from the door. It works just fine for Tetsurou, who always has to sleep as close to a door or a window as possible. It doesn't make a world of difference, but it would if he had to see the window from three feet further away.

Kei moves his hand higher, slowly, without breaking contact. Tetsurou lets his eyes close and pretends that the only touch he can sense is Kei's hand. It never takes more than a second to work; now there is only that coolness on his skin, the only pressure the tips of Kei's fingers. Higher, still, so meticulous that it always leaves Tetsurou abashed, conscious.

The first time that he had done this, Tetsurou hadn't quite understood. He'd thought that perhaps Kei just wanted to touch— God knew that Tetsurou himself could never get his fill— and then Kei had murmured here?

Here? Tetsurou had echoed.

Does it hurt? Here?

Tetsurou works ambitious office hours. Lunch is almost always forgotten, dinner is almost always reheated. Coffee is almost always the kind of bitter that leaves his grimacing out of his control, and gone cold, it tastes worse. He loves every minute of it but sometimes forgets to leave his fingers loose, as if they are still poised over a keyboard. Kei's thumb is now on the midpoint of his spine, stroking over there in one self-indulgent movement. Then he's inching it upwards again, and his index comes up to the nape of Tetsurou's neck. He presses the heel of his hand into Tetsurou's shoulder, and pain spikes sharp and quick in a line. Tetsurou tenses for a moment.

Doesn't hurt there, no, Tetsurou had answered, smiling.

When he had figured out what Kei was doing, he hadn't said a single word. Back then guarding his silence was more precaution than understanding, but it never bothered him. Back then Kei used to be shyer, if not slower, about the way his hand moved up the expanse of Tetsurou's back and then down again, gripping lightly over his thighs and hooking behind his knees, bending his legs to feel down his calves. His shyness never meant that he wouldn't do it; Tetsurou doesn't remember a single night without that one focused trail.

When Tetsurou tenses, Kei stops. His hand curls over Tetsurou's shoulder fully, thumb stroking at one end of his collarbone, and Tetsurou keeps his eyes closed, too tired to move. It only takes Kei a moment to understand; he moves his hand down Tetsurou's arm and takes his wrist instead, holds it, briefly.

—

'My supervisor gave me so much grief this morning,' Kei mutters. 'Words would've been had, I swear to God.'

They're on the balcony, sitting on the stools they've dragged outside from the kitchen. Tetsurou's mug is balanced on the parapet while Kei's is between his hands. The steam rising from it disappears before it can fog Kei's glasses, for which Tetsurou is grateful, because he likes seeing the different points of the landscape Kei focuses on when talking about his day. He also likes being done with seeing them as quick as possible so that he can focus on Kei's eyes, and then his lips, if he's telling a funny story and Tetsurou knows he'll let a smile slip despite himself.

The evening is young but the sun is already down; winter has its charms in the streetlights they can just barely see through the fog that clings to their high position. The sweater Kei is wearing is not his own; the shoulders hang off him just enough to make him look like an installation more than an angry PhD student. It makes Tetsurou's heart ache. The delicate position of Kei's glasses on the bridge of his nose; the way his little finger, unsupported while the rest curl around the mug, shakes with fatigue.

Kei doesn't talk a lot when others talk to him. When he talks unprompted, he can go on for longer than he himself probably expects; not acknowledging his audience's laughter with anything more than a little smirk and further talk. He's in one of his moods today, impersonating his poor supervisor who Tetsurou knows for a fact is a sweetheart of an old man, rolling his eyes and huffing at every punchline, pausing only once to blow on his tea.

Tetsurou has been besotted for enough years to let the words wash over him and take in everything together. The steam vanishing into the dark background of the sky in nanoseconds, the colour of Tetsurou's oldest sweater against Kei's pale skin, the quiet sound of Kei's voice.

'And that's why I told him that you aren't listening to me at all right now, are you,' Kei says, raising his eyebrows. 'I knew it.'

'I am absolutely listening. Your supervisor is a very, very, very bad person.'

'This family is falling apart,' Kei says, and he actually holds back his smile for about five seconds after Tetsurou bursts out laughing.

—

'There's a reason mankind invented neck pillows.' Tetsurou snorts. When he turns around, facing the window, the blanket slips halfway off him. Kei huffs and pulls it back on before pressing his hand to Tetsurou's neck again. 'And an even better reason I bought you one.'

'I'm not walking around that way at work,' Tetsurou replies. 'I'd look ridiculous.'

'That ship sailed a while ago. I don't know if you've ever seen your hair in the mirror, but—' —Kei's breath catches when Tetsurou gasps; he's found a particularly painful point— '—but it pretty much takes care of all your looking ridiculous needs—'

'Kei, ow,' he gets out through gritted teeth, and Kei stops, turns one hand over to press the cooler back of it to Tetsurou's neck.

'Sit up straighter, then,' he says softly. He sounds like he's in pain.

—

ii.

Tetsurou works ambitious office hours. Lunch is almost always forgotten.

When he first met Kei, he was twenty one. Fresh out of university, eager to get working before starting his master's, unable to understand why Akaashi's eighteen-year-old reed like roommate wanted to do a double degree and delay stepping into Tetsurou's shiny real world, and then unable to understand why he didn't plan on stepping into the shiny real world at all.

A what? He wants to go into what? Research?

I really have no idea how you can have such a problem with this, Kuroo-san.

But...It's research.

Kei took six months longer than Tetsurou to acknowledge falling in love; Tetsurou had felt that first pang of longing in his chest on when he had first laughed in defeat in the face of Kei's passion for his studies, after a year of debates. It's not just research, it's about this— this— this need to know more. To find more and then tell people about it.

I get it, Tsukki. Really. Look, we have different—

No, Kei said, frowning into his salad, hand curled in a fist on the table. It's...Don't you look at the— when I—

Tsukki, listen to me. You don't need to—

No, Kei said. Please, let me just.

Okay. Okay.

The nineteen-year-old Kei hadn't looked much different from the eighteen-year-old one. Still in his lab coat from that morning's practical, with dark circles under his eyes, looking ready to pass out at any moment. Tetsurou had wanted to reach out and pull him close and call him beautiful, or at least reach out and pull him close. He'd waited instead, for a minute that afternoon and then half a year longer.

Okay, Kei said. I. When I look up at the stars, I have to do something. I can't just leave them there. I have to do something.

Lunch is almost always forgotten, dinner is almost always reheated. Coffee is almost always the kind of bitter that leaves his grimacing out of his control, and gone cold, it tastes worse. He loves it all, just as much as he did on the first day, with the same kind of giddy happiness. On the first day, three years ago, he'd told himself that he would let a month pass and make sure he was working well, and then he would ask Kei if he was up to some apartment hunting.

There has to be a balcony, Kei had said after the first few blinks of shock. His voice was steady but his face pale, nose red, lips trembling.

Of course, Tetsurou had replied, reaching out and pulling him close. Balcony, first priority.

'Why are you already drinking the death concoction?' Sawamura asks, scrunching his nose at Tetsurou's mug. 'It's not even that time of the month yet.'

'I'm working overtime,' he says.

'Working over-overtime, you mean. What's the occasion?'

'Wouldn't you like to know.'

'Asshole.'

On the days when he's running even later than usual, he has to make do with buying flowers from a convenience store instead of rushing to a flowershop about to close down, pleading with the owner to give him five minutes to pick out a bunch. The variety at convenience stores is limited, but he'd never go home empty-handed unless the world was crumbling in some way, so he makes do with slightly drooping roses now and then.

In a way, he understands Kei wanting to do something. But when Tetsurou looks up at the stars, like right now from his car with the roses in the passenger seat, he feels small. And the way in which he feels small relieves him, reminds him that if he got locked into the car by accident, the sky would still be endless above and around him, and night is the natural state of the world.

—

iii.

Tetsurou is currently twenty seven years old. His job is stable and rewarding but his still works overtime, and all their bills are paid right as they arrive. The apartment's nearly been paid off, and he has to fight off a smile while working overtime, and their two families are as much in love with them as they are with each other.

Kei is currently twenty five years old. He is as determined to be an astrophysicist as he was seven years ago, and is heartbreakingly humble in the way he tells Tetsurou the simplest of facts sometimes. It rains acid on Venus. I mean, it rains acid on Venus. He is so beautiful that it hurts to talk about the weather with him, even if it's the weather on Venus.

What he wants to say is, they are old enough. They are still full of youth and Tetsurou thinks that as long as idiots like Bokuto and Sawamura are around, he will never lose that youth, and as long as Kei has those bouncy, bright childhood friends of his, he will never lose his either. And that warms Tetsurou, but outside of it, they are old enough. They are definitely old enough that it's unreasonable to have moments like these at the rate of ten a month.

'We've discussed the winter protocol,' Tetsurou sighs. 'Winter means socks. Socks mean slipping. You won't be able to massage away a fracture, you know.'

'Run better,' Kei says flatly. 'You're not putting on Die Hard again.'

'I very much am.'

'Your only copy is in my hands, unless you have another one hidden in a shoebox somewhere.'

'Tsukki. Winter protocol. Socks. No running. Hand it over.'

It's three in the afternoon and the sun is starting to go down thread by thread. Their nearly-paid-off apartment is large enough that running in it wouldn't make him panic in the least, because the walls are far apart and Kei took literal window counts of all their options before choosing this one. Balcony, first priority. Windows, next priority. Tetsurou might be twenty seven but sometimes the walls close in, and when the walls close in Kei opens the windows.

The sun is starting to go down thread by thread, but it's still light outside and the kitchen window lets that light fall right on Kei, one side of him washed in paler colours than the other one, the box still in his hand. He raises an eyebrow and looks at Tetsurou, shakes the box as if to say well?

'It's Christmas eve. It's the best time to watch Die Hard.'

'So was your birthday, and Bokuto-san's birthday, and your last pay raise.'

'Okay, but Christmas eve is the original best time to watch it. Like the alpha best time.'

Kei looks at him in such an utterly unamused manner that Tetsurou almost reconsiders his pitch. Before he can attempt to add more intelligence to it, however, Kei jerks the hand that's holding the box.

Tetsurou lunges without thinking, going right for the direction of the throw. His socks slip on the wooden floor like he knew they would and he skids and stumbles to a stop near the window, and blinks at the floor.

It takes him only half a second to realise what happened, but Kei is already laughing. He has a variety of laughs but one of Tetsurou's favourites is this one; loud and silly and interrupted by gasps. When Tetsurou glares up at him, he looks every bit as immensely pleased with himself as a twenty-five-year-old shouldn't. The box is still in his hand, and he's using it to cover his mouth as he continues to lean back and laugh, eyes nearly screwed shut, other hand on his hip.

'Oh my God,' he wheezes. 'Oh my God, just like a puppy.'

'Very funny,' Tetsurou says darkly. 'Can I have my goddamn DVD now?'

At that, Kei trails off, straightens up. He's still got a bit of a curl to his lips, but his eyes are bright and focused on Tetsurou, and he clears his throat. Tetsurou stays where he is, lips in a tight line, and waits.

'I didn't,' Kei says in a smaller voice, stepping forward, 'I wasn't going to…'

Tetsurou reaches forward and takes the box from Kei's outstretched hand and walks to the doorway of the kitchen. Once he's at a distance, he turns around and grins widely at Kei, waving and winking. Kei is twenty five years old, but there is always a split-second where he takes things as he sees them.

His timid expression immediately turns into the most vindictive scowl Tetsurou's ever seen, and it's his turn to burst out laughing. 'Every time, you—'

'Run better,' Tetsurou calls over his shoulder as he sprints for the living room.

—

iv.

Before that, they were cooking. Christmas eve means either everyone goes over to Bokuto and Akaashi's, or everyone comes over. This year it's their turn to host, and their turn means that there need to be roughly three dozen types of dessert, according to Kei.

Cooking was mostly Tetsurou reading out from mostly unhelpful food blogs while Kei huffed that he had absolutely no need to listen to what a food blogger had to say about his ratio of strawberries to cream, and Tetsurou honestly doesn't remember any other way of cooking anymore. Whether it's with their friends or family, there is always Kei in one corner, whisking eggs in a bowl or chopping tomatoes half-absently, throwing comments at Bokuto's blade of choice and smiling at shimizu or Sugawara or Yamaguchi. Tetsurou loves all that, he does, but his favourite moments are ones like that one was: the afternoon sun not quite as warm as it used to be on the kitchen floor, and just him and Kei for the preparations until the others would start to show up one by one.

Kei looked a picture, deadpanning his tirade against food bloggers while hulling strawberries mechanically, and Tetsurou thought once to his Christmas raise and took a deep breath and smiled at his phone.

—

There is a perfectly good reason that winter protocol says no quick movements when socks are being worn, and that good reason is that the entire apartment has wooden flooring and Tetsurou is too fast for his own good. The winter protocol was actually put into place exclusively for him, after a memorable occasion upon which he crashed backwards into the balcony door and gave Kei a scare that Kei fondly describes as the biggest heart attack of his life.

Tetsurou is too fast for his own good. Kei remarks about as much, sitting down cross-legged on the living room carpet beside his sprawled form.

'We're still watching Die Hard,' Tetsurou says to Kei's knee. 'I didn't fall over for nothing.'

'I really don't know how to contribute to your embarrassment right now,' Kei replies. 'You do it so well yourself.'

'We're still watching it. It's Christmas. The weather outside is frightful. We have to watch it.'

'The weather is perfectly fine, and if it's just about the song we can put it on the system.'

'It's not just the song, Tsukki. It's the feeling. The concept. The spirit of Christmas.'

'And your adolescent crush on— oh, for God's sake.'

Tetsurou frowns and raises himself up on his elbows, follows Kei's exasperated gaze to the balcony door. It takes him a while to focus beyond the glass, but once he does, he's sitting up fully. They're very small and very few, but they're snowflakes, all right.

'You see this?' Tetsurou says. 'Clearly I am omnipotent.'

'This has got to be the worst coincidence—'

'Omnipotent,' he repeats gravely, and Kei shakes his head, leans forward to take the box from him. 'Put the movie on, loyal subject.'

'Bring the rest of the strawberries over.'

Tetsurou doesn't move immediately; watches as Kei opens the box and pries the disc free from the inner case. Maybe it's the festivities or maybe it's the fall he took, but all of a sudden he is so confusingly touched that Kei's agreeing to the movie. So confusingly grateful, having taken his fall on a carpet that Kei picked out; having Kei sitting cross-legged like this beside him, his head full of stellar dynamics and relativity but with all this affection to spare for Tetsurou; Tetsurou, who pretends to choke when Kei is fixing his tie, and can't shower in cubicles. Tetsurou wants to reach out and pull him close.

'Strawberries,' Kei says, without looking up from the box.

—

He moves his hand higher, slowly, without breaking contact. Tetsurou is wired into agony, breathing in and out too harshly to hide, wincing at every inch of progress. He's long since stopped expecting Kei to speak up at times like these; there is no what did you do or I wish you would just— and Tetsurou would be hurt at the silence if he didn't understand it.

Kei reaches over— hand still on Tetsurou's back— and turns the lamp back on, and pulls open the drawer to get the lotion. Tetsurou shudders at the first cold touch of it, colder than Kei's hands, and Kei doesn't say anything. He's straddling Tetsurou's waist without really straddling it; knees on either side of him, in the perfect position for Tetsurou to wrap his hands around Kei's ankles for support. He's too tired to control his reactions but not tired enough to escape the guilt, especially when he knows that Kei will stop breathing for a second every time that he reaches a spot that makes Tetsurou cry out.

At one point, Kei stills his hands and Tetsurou feels him lean downward, and then he feels Kei's forehead against the nape of his neck. Kei is breathing deeply, slowly, but his exhales are shaky.

Tetsurou's back is on fire, but sound of those exhales is extraordinary too.

—

In the mornings, Kei is much quieter than usual, preferring to go through his routine efficiently and get ready to step out as soon as possible. Tetsurou knows he has the luxury of stretching and yawning and bickering with his colleagues at work, so he takes his time getting out of bed, casually colliding with three different walls on the way to the bathroom. Kei is much quieter than he is during the day, because he is usually doing three and a half things at the same time.

Tetsurou remembers a day back in february, watching him in the mirror as he brushed his teeth with one hand and scrolled through something on his phone with the other. Tetsurou had been bemused as always; having, himself, barely the co-ordination to get a cup of coffee without scalding a hand.

Then Kei froze for a moment, narrowing his eyes, and he put his toothbrush down and brought his phone closer to his face, foam still on his lips. He scrolled up and down, frown smoothening, and then made a triumphant sound that had Tetsurou laughing without even knowing the context.

'What?'

Kei opened his mouth to reply, realised that he hadn't rinsed the toothpaste out, and proceeded to do that first while Tetsurou took the first gulp of his coffee.

'Remember what I was telling you last week?' Kei's voice would normally be a little heavy still, but in that moment it was as alert and sharp as if he'd already had his first coffee. 'About the gravitational waves?'

'I want to say yes,' Tetsurou said slowly, bringing the mug up to his lips again.

'Well, they finally announced it,' Kei said. He reached out for the towel, patted his face with it. 'They proved Einstein right.'

'I'm very happy for Einstein.'

'Einstein doesn't need your approval, but  I'm sure he appreciates it.'

'Very funny. Eggs?'

'Do you have time?'

'All the time in the—'

'Gross. Pancakes?'

'Pancakes.'

Tetsurou remembers finally settling down across from Kei at the breakfast table, a plateful of pancakes ready with honey drizzled over them, a mug of coffee, milk, no sugar. Kei had been glued to his tablet, watching the conference with rapt attention, not acknowledging Tetsurou's presence in the least, and more amusingly, not acknowledging the sweet smell of breakfast. His shirt was still unbuttoned, short hair as messy as short hair could be, still damp from his shower. The skin of his neck, the dip of his collarbones, the way he took his bottom lip into his mouth while concentrating. The frail sleepy sun beginning to come in through the blinds and turning the golden kitchen lights into gentler versions of themselves, and Kei's eyes through it all, a shade of brown that Tetsurou would never believe to be real.

He remembers finally swallowing and exhaling and reaching out to pull the plate towards himself, slicing through the pancakes to start cooling them down.

'Thank you,' Kei had murmured without looking away from his screen.

—

v.

Usually, on the nights when he's running late enough to only find flowers at the convenience store, he comes home to Kei asleep on the couch. It's such a mundane sight and concept that it's the very simplicity of it that makes Tetsurou's throat clench every time without fail. The couch is big enough for him but he still has the habit of curling with his back to its back, old habits. Sometimes Tetsurou wonders if that old habit is for Kei's own benefit, or the silent acknowledgement and brushing off of the fact that Tetsurou would start to panic the moment his back hit a surface and his front was covered too. These are things that don't need to be asked; only appreciated.

Tetsurou has his convenience store roses slung over his shoulder like the people in movies, and he feels like a person in a movie sometimes with his loose tie and rolled up sleeves; in his fast fancy car with a smile on his face, and in love with the prettiest boy in the world.

The sleeves of Kei's sweater have been pulled up to his knuckles by him, Tetsurou sees the dark colour of it stand out against the cream leather of the couch, where Kei's hand is curled into a loose fist right in front of his face. His glasses are on the armrest, not folded, precariously balanced with the kind of confidence that only comes with having lived in a place forever and ever.

Tetsurou has his convenience store roses slung over his shoulder, and he smiles down at Kei's unconscious form before stepping quietly to their little dining room, setting the flowers on the table. They'll survive without a vase for a few hours more if they made it all the way to midnight.

When he joins Kei on the couch, Kei shifts and makes place for him without opening his eyes, and Tetsurou knows through practice that he'll only drift awake once Tetsurou settles in perfectly. And he does just that, aligning his shoulders with Kei's forehead, his legs slipping slowly between Kei's, a hand going to his ribs.

Kei doesn't say anything, even after he arches awake in a slow, delicate motion not so much restricted by their proximity as rearranged. He smells so sweet, so warm. His hand, when it finds its usual way to Tetsurou's waist, isn't as cold as it usually is.

Its slow path upwards is soft, careful if sleepy. Tetsurou wants Kei to ease back into sleep, let his closed eyes stand for something, and he's impatient when he thinks about all the nights that he's been working longer than usual, harder than usual, waiting and wanting and smiling so wide. He's impatient, so he presses closer to Kei and shushes him, and Kei breathes out a laugh and pulls him even closer, secures him from the edge of the couch with his hand in the centre of Tetsurou's back.

—

'Saturn has a lower density than water,' he says, the day before new year's eve. They're packing the ingredients Sugawara commanded them to bring along, wrapping them up and putting them in containers. Kei is standing at the counter while Tetsurou sits at the table, and Tetsurou watches him put away one box. 'So technically, if you had a water body large enough to just, well, hold Saturn, it would float on the water.'

'It would float,' Tetsurou repeats. 'You're telling me that if there was a way to just plonk Saturn into our ocean, it would just...Float.'

'Well, when you put it that way—'

'Just casually bobbing around on earth. Hide your kids, it's on its way.'

There's a long silence, and Tetsurou's preparing himself to have something flung in his direction, but then Kei turns around and just looks at him. There is such a hysterical mix of disgust and amusement on his face that Tetsurou can't even laugh and ruin the moment. Kei continues to stare in utter silence, pursed lips and bright eyes, before finally turning away.

There's a long silence, and then Kei shakes his head and splutters, laughing so hard he can't make a sound.

—

The first time Tetsurou had come home with flowers slung over his shoulder, Kei had asked what the occasion was. Tetsurou had considered answering wittily, coming up with some wisecrack, a crooked grin, some way to charm Kei a little bit more. He hadn't been able to think of anything, only shrugging as he handed them over, rubbing the back of his head with his other hand.

He doesn't recall a day since then when he's voluntarily not brought home flowers. Even when they fight, he silently puts them in one of the vases without showing them to Kei, because one morning of waking up after a fight and seeing Kei tend to the flowers just as carefully as ever was enough to know that should he ever stop, it's going to be more his loss than Kei's.

Kei guards them jealously and without a word. He never reacts to any of them, no matter how big the bouquet or how different the flowers. He accepts them with a soft thank you and makes sure to put them in water before doing anything else, and Tetsurou loves observing that more than anything else. He never actually stopped to find out whether Kei even cares for flowers or not, but then that's how Tetsurou does a lot of things, sometimes. It's nothing new and nothing that Kei doesn't already know.

He guards them jealously and without a word, placing them along windowsills or dividing them for different vases, one for the living room, one for the kitchen, one for the bedroom. He doesn't chide Tetsurou on the late nights when he's already asleep and Tetsurou doesn't put them in water, just does it the next morning, silently.

—

'When we finally kiss goodnight,' he sings in a whisper, forehead pressed to Kei's as he rocks Kei from side to side, 'How  I'll hate going out in the storm.'

Kei is looking right into his eyes even though it's difficult with how close they are, noses bumping now and then, so close that Tetsurou might as well be singing onto Kei's lips. He smiles, and Kei smiles back. 'But if you'll really hold me tight, all the way home,  I'll be warm.'

He knows there are so many things Kei wants to say, something to tease Tetsurou, maybe, a don't be dramatic, it's just snowing, it snows sometimes, you know. He thinks maybe he should spin Kei around so that they can both see the snow that's slowly gathering on their balcony, but the truth is that Kei is looking right into his eyes, and his unreal brown irises are lit up with a joy that could bring Tetsurou to his knees right now. There's a time and place for everything, though, and so he tips Kei backwards a little and continues to sing.

'Oh, the fire is slowly dying—' —there's no fire, Tetsurou— '—and my dear, we're still goodbying.'

Their friends are going to start arriving anytime now, Bokuto banging the door down, Yamaguchi toeing his shoes off and hanging up his coat, Kenma refusing to unwrap his scarf despite the heating. The movie's been paused at the beginning of the credits and the lights are still low, and Tetsurou ate more strawberries than he hulled. The sun itself, or any star, couldn't compare for a moment.

'But as long as you love me so,' he says, and Kei closes his eyes and kisses him.

—

vi.

Overtime pays off. And when he grins so hard he thinks his face will fall off, and tells Sawamura, Sawamura grins wider.

'You bastard,' he says, and Tetsurou laughs and shrugs and tries not to pass out. He's known what ring he wants to get for months, now.

—

N.

Kei first discovered that Tetsurou was a claustrophobe when they were twenty-one and twenty-three, when Tetsurou got his arms and head stuck in a sweater. Tetsurou was twenty-three and should technically have known much better, but he'd called out 'Kei?' in a voice that was panicked despite his effort to keep it casual, and it was enough to get Kei's heart hurting.

Four years from then, right now, Tetsurou is on one knee, looking up at Kei with a smile on his face. He looks like he has been waiting for this since the day he met Kei. His hair is as unkempt as always, even though after this they have to leave for Sugawara-san's country house. Tetsurou is proposing like he does everything else— in a shirt and a tie and uncaring of a single thing, head held high in the love Kei has for him.

Four years from now, back then, it had taken him only a few seconds to drop the dishes and dry his hands, but by the time he sprinted out into the living room, Tetsurou had already been struggling to breathe. Kei's own heart was thudding when he managed to pull the sweater off completely; the sight of Tetsurou's wide, wet eyes giving him goosebumps; Tetsurou's throat working to swallow, over and over again. He was fine, but also not, and all Kei could do was run a hand through his hair and keep his distance.

Tetsurou is proposing like he does everything else, head held high in the love Kei has for him.

Kei looks down at him and thinks that he has to do something. He can't just leave Tetsurou there. He has to do something.

Tetsurou prompts him silently with a slow blink, stars and sky so endless above and around him. Kei has to tell him something about cryovolcanoes, but he thinks he'll say yes first.

—

'Jupiter's been having a storm for nearly two hundred years,' Kei says as he struggles with the vacuum cleaner. Tetsurou doesn't have the remotest idea what he's trying to accomplish with the way he's hauling the machine around, but he'll leave it alone. 'It's called the Great Red Spot.'

'I think I remember reading about that one,' Tetsurou says. Noon is unnaturally sunny, to the point that he has to shade his eyes even from the right side of the balcony door. 'Isn't it really huge, or something?'

'It's bigger than the earth,' Kei replies. He finally manages to do whatever it is that he wanted to, reaching up to swipe the back of his hand over his forehead. Tetsurou knows he's procrastinating on his thesis; that's the only time Kei takes to the kind of spring cleaning that belongs to, well, spring. He's been at it all morning, changing linens that he changed last week, asking Tetsurou about three times an hour what he wants to eat for lunch. 'So yes,  I'd say it's huge.'

When he bends over to pick a console remote off the floor, the sun hits his hair and lights him up, and when he straightens up, the sun hits his ring and lights it up. Tetsurou thinks, swallowing, that sometimes it hurts to talk about the weather with him.

The world unfolds a little more around him, and Kei unfurls in his arms the way star charts remind him of how small he is. Tetsurou reaches out and pulls him close.