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Taki knows he can be forgetful, sometimes. He misplaces his wallet often and constantly has to ask Harua what his astrological sign is, even though it should be easy to remember. Sometimes he enters a room and finds that he doesn’t know what he came there for, and his object permanence isn’t the best.
But he’s pretty sure he would have remembered something like this.
“Uh. What?”
He’s not sure he’s heard right. He was initially caught off guard by Yuma’s question—why did you introduce me as just your best friend?—because he doesn’t know what else he was supposed to introduce him as. But when he asks for clarification, Yuma only repeats himself.
“Your boyfriend? Duh.”
He says it like it should be obvious, like it’s something Taki is supposed to already know and not something he found out about two seconds ago. He stares back at Yuma, mouth gaping open like a cartoon character, as he tries to process what the hell he is talking about.
“Is this a prank? Are you pranking me?” he asks. Last time he checked, Yuma was not his boyfriend. Close friend and roommate and questionable crush, maybe, but not boyfriend. Again, he’s pretty sure he would remember something like establishing an official relationship with someone. Especially when Taki has never dated before, and especially especially when that someone is Yuma.
But the look Yuma gives him in response only makes him even more confused, because Yuma is not laughing. If anything, he looks almost wounded, like Taki is the one pulling a prank and he’s accidentally crossed the line between playful and hurtful.
“Stop messing around,” Yuma says with a huff. He pushes on Taki’s shoulder with a touch more force than usual. “I was already kind of pissed at you and now you’re making it worse.”
Taki flounders. Yuma sounds so sincere that it has him wracking his brain for anything he might have missed, or misinterpreted, or maybe even repressed for one reason or another.
He comes up blank. Taki gulps, desperately attempting to swallow down the panic that now rises in his chest. He doesn’t want Yuma to be pissed at him!
“Ahh, okay, um, I’m sorry?” he squeaks. “I’ll…I’ll tell them next time we talk? I really didn’t mean to upset you.”
Yuma seems to soften at this, and Taki feels his heart flutter.
“Fine, whatever,” Yuma says with a sigh. He stands up from where they are sitting side by side on the couch and turns to retreat to his room. “You coming to bed, or what?”
Right…bed. The bed that they share, because they are boyfriends. Question mark? They have their own rooms, but Taki has been sleeping in Yuma’s pretty consistently for the past few months. His own loft bed is often difficult to get in and out of, and he likes to cuddle. Yuma lets him. (Sometimes, he even reciprocates!) Taki didn’t think it was anything other than platonic, but maybe he’s just stupid.
“Uh, yeah. I’ll be right there,” he says.
***
Right. So. That’s how Taki found out he is apparently Nakakita Yuma’s boyfriend, and literally nobody told him until now.
“Did you know I have a boyfriend?” he asks out of nowhere, too shy to look up from his meal to address his friend directly.
Harua nearly chokes on his drink. “What the hell are you talking about?” He looks at Taki like there’s no way he’s actually dating someone, which like, rude! But also, he kinda gets it.
“Yuma,” Taki says with a sigh. “Apparently we’ve been dating for…I don’t know how long, actually. I would ask him but I have a feeling he’ll get offended. Fuck. What do I do about that? I don’t even know what our anniversary is!”
“Wait, wait. Back up. You confessed to Yuma?”
All of Taki’s friends know about his big, embarrassing crush on Yuma. It’s kind of hard to miss. Taki had thought he was doing an okay job of hiding his feelings from Yuma himself, but apparently he was wrong.
“No? Well, I don’t think so. I’m not really sure what happened.”
Harua stares, deadpan. “You have to give me more than that, Taki. Come on.”
Taki lets out another heaving sigh. He doesn’t even know where to begin.
“We met Yudai and Fuma for lunch the other day,” he starts. “They haven’t had a chance to meet Yuma yet. It was just a casual thing, I thought—but then when we got home, Yuma asked me why I didn’t introduce him as my boyfriend.”
“Huh?”
“I don’t know! I was so confused, I asked him if he was joking, but he looked at me like I had just killed his entire family. I think he really believes we’re dating. Are we dating?”
“How should I know?”
Taki was sort of under the impression that Harua knows everything. Apparently he was wrong.
“You’re my best friend!” he says. “And I always vent to you about my Yuma feelings. I thought maybe I told you.”
Harua shrugs and chews at the end of his straw, contemplating. “Well, you didn’t. This is the first I’m hearing of any sort of reciprocation.”
Taki’s heart sinks a little in his chest. A part of him had hoped that Harua would have all the answers. The fact that he doesn’t is just…suspicious. Isn’t he supposed to be Taki’s best friend? He’s friends with Yuma, too! He should know these things.
“I feel like I missed something really important,” Taki sighs.
Harua snorts. “Yeah, no shit.”
“…are you sure I didn’t say anything about it?”
Harua sighs and reaches across the table between them to place his hands over Taki’s own. He hadn’t even realized they were shaking until the weight of Harua’s fingers over his caused them to still.
“Taki, if you didn’t even tell your brother you were dating someone, why would you tell me?” he asks. “You tell Yudai everything. There has to be a reason you didn’t remember.”
Harua…has a point. Unfortunately, Taki has no idea what that point means in the grand scheme of things.
“I don’t know?” he frowns. “I mean, Yudai is definitely going to make a huge deal over it. Maybe that’s why I didn’t mention it.”
It sort of makes sense in Taki’s brain—avoiding his older brother’s teasing would be a logical reason to hide his first boyfriend. Maybe he was trying to avoid it so hard that he even convinced himself they’re just friends. That could happen, right? Like some twisted version of denial. He’s liked Yuma for a long time, after all. Maybe this is his brain’s way of trying to protect him from future heartbreak.
“You realize you sound insane, right?” Harua says, narrowing his eyes with concern. Oh. He must have said that last bit out loud, then. “Like, this is insane.”
“Thanks,” Taki says. “I feel insane.”
“I think you are, actually.”
“You said that already.”
At that moment, the waiter comes by their table to drop off the check, and Harua and Taki shift gears into arguing over who is going to pay the bill. Taki’s too busy trying to physically pry the card from Harua’s hands to worry about this whole Yuma thing. He’ll figure it out later.
***
By the end of the week, Taki has just sort of accepted that he was wrong. It’s not an uncommon thing, after all. He’s wrong about stuff all the time.
So he figures it’s the truth: he and Yuma are dating. He must have forgotten the exact moment their dynamic shifted, which is kind of a bummer, but it’s fine. It’s whatever. It’s not a big deal.
There has been one question on his mind, however.
“So…”
“So?”
“If you’re my boyfriend, why haven’t we uh—why haven’t we kissed?”
For a split second Taki worries that maybe they have kissed, and he just forgot about that, too. But no—there’s no way he wouldn’t remember something like that. Not when he’s imagined how it might go a hundred different times.
Yuma grins at him, his snaggletooth peaking out and turning the smile more mischievous. If Taki didn’t know better, he’d say his cheeks are dusted a little more pink than usual, but maybe it’s just the harsh apartment lighting. “I know you’re inexperienced so I’ve been waiting for you to make the first move,” Yuma says. “But if you want to kiss me so badly, baby, all you have to do is ask~”
Taki’s entire face flushes red with heat. Baby? That’s certainly new. Yuma is going to be the death of him, he swears.
Flustered, Taki shakes his head vigorously, his shaggy bangs flopping messily over his eyes. “That’s not it at all!” he protests. Yuma raises an inquisitive brow. “I mean—I don’t not want to kiss you, but it’s not like I’m desperate for it or something—”
Yuma interrupts him with a bright peel of laughter. “Cute. Come over here,” he giggles, patting the couch cushion next to him. Taki approaches slowly, with all the confidence of a spooked deer. His heart is pounding furiously in his chest. He’s a big fat liar. He is desperate for it, and he knows it’s written all over his face.
Taki is sure to leave a little space between them when he finally takes his seat, but Yuma immediately closes it by scooting as close as he possibly can. The side of Taki’s thigh burns where Yuma’s jeans press against his own. Everything else burns where Yuma’s gaze sears into him, warm and wanting.
“Well?” he grumbles, embarrassed and impatient. Yuma laughs again, his breath tickling Taki’s jaw where he leans in close, and Taki feels his insides twist with anticipation.
The kiss starts soft. It’s a weird sensation, one Taki has never experienced before, but it’s not bad. It’s quite nice, actually. Yuma holds his chin in place as he slides their lips together, and Taki squeezes his eyes shut, unsure how to respond. When Yuma starts to deepen the kiss, Taki does his best to mimic his movements, but it’s awkward. Fumbling. Yuma seems not to mind, though, so he soldiers on.
Taki has no idea what to do with his hands while they kiss. Yuma coaxes his lips open and he lets out an involuntary whine, which has Yuma huffing in amusement in return. His snaggletooth catches on the skin of Taki’s bottom lip and suddenly everything becomes startlingly real.
Like…holy shit. Yuma is kissing him. He’s kissing Yuma. Yuma’s tongue is in his mouth, and he tastes like cherries.
Taki presses closer, returning the kiss with a new vigor. It’s still awkward and a little sloppy, but it’s Yuma, and that’s all that matters. Taki clings to the fabric of Yuma’s shirt with shaky hands. He wishes he didn’t have to breathe so they could do this forever.
Alas, Taki is not some kind of immortal eldritch being, and so they eventually part.
“Woah.”
“Yeah…woah.”
Yuma looks just as dazed as Taki feels. It’s this realization that gives him the confidence to charge forward and ask:
“Can we…do that again?”
The response is immediate.
“Fuck yeah,” Yuma agrees enthusiastically, and leans back in.
***
Well, Taki is glad he at least got to make out with Yuma once over the course of his life, because he’s pretty sure this is where he dies.
He doesn’t usually remember his dreams. If anything, he’ll wake with a vague sense of dread at forgetting a math test or something, but it usually fades before he can fully grasp onto it. It’s never anything deep, and on most mornings, Taki wakes feeling perfectly refreshed and ready to start the day.
Today, he is anything but refreshed.
Instead, he’s flushed and sweaty. And uncomfortably hard. And snuggled up against Yuma’s back, arms slung over his waist and legs tangled together under the sheets. The third thing almost guarantees that Yuma is aware of the first two—there’s almost no way he wouldn’t be. Unless he’s the world’s deepest sleeper, which Taki knows that he isn’t. One time he pulled an involuntary all-nighter because the stray cats outside their apartment complex decided to hold a fight club or something.
Plus, Taki had jolted awake violently enough that if Yuma wasn’t already conscious, he certainly is now.
Yuma stirs slightly, and Taki is torn between freezing in place and running as far away as he possibly can. His stupid boner is aching and pressed right up against the back of Yuma’s thigh. Taki is afraid that moving will only make it more obvious, but at the same time… if he doesn’t get out of this situation soon…
He doesn’t even want to think about what sort of mortifying events might unfold. So he quickly detaches himself from Yuma and rolls off of the bed, hitting the ground with a dull thump. He groans. Thank god they weren’t sleeping in the loft bed. Taki’s pride is already bruised enough; he doesn’t need a bruised body, too.
“Taki…?”
Yuma’s voice is gravelly with sleep, which isn’t helping with the boner problem; and he’s looking around for Taki all dishevelled and soft, which is actively making the problem worse. His face breaks into a devastatingly fond smile as he finally locates Taki’s sprawled figure on the floor.
“You good?” he laughs.
Taki is not good. In fact, he is very bad, but he does not want Yuma to know this. So he stays quiet. He tries to become one with the carpet. Maybe if he’s still enough, Yuma will think he’s dead?
“Yah, Takayama Riki! I know you can hear me!”
Okay, fine. Apparently not.
Yuma swings his legs off the edge of the bed and extends his foot to poke Taki in the side. Taki can’t help but squirm at the contact; he’s always been particularly ticklish on his sides. Yuma knows this and often exploits it for evil.
“Stop, stop!” Taki protests, swatting playfully at Yuma’s ankle.
Yuma laughs and nudges harder, attempting to get Taki to roll over from his stomach to his back. He manages to succeed, but at great cost to Taki’s dignity—because as his position shifts, the friction of his lower half against the floor causes him to let out an involuntary sound that can only be described as a moan.
They both freeze. Taki is absolutely fucking mortified. He stares up at Yuma with wide eyes, too scared to speak. Yuma’s whole face has flushed cherry red, and he seems to be trying very hard to avoid staring at Taki’s crotch, which like. God. He’s wearing his stupid Winnie the Pooh boxer shorts, the ones that unfortunately leave little to the imagination if you’re looking in the right places.
Yuma’s usual carefree charm seems to have left him for the moment as the awkward silence stretches between them. His tongue darts out to wet his bottom lip, and something in Taki breaks. He stands up and abruptly begins to flee.
“Dibs on first shower,” he nearly shouts, tumbling over both his words and his feet. He slams the bathroom door shut behind him and turns the faucet to cold. It’s going to be a long day.
***
Taki tries to call his brother as often as he can. Once a week, at the very least, though even that hardly feels like enough. Taki would call him every night if he could, but Yudai is exceptionally busy these days. He’s off being a real adult with a full time job and a partner he plans to marry and other grown-up, time-consuming things. Taki is incredibly happy for him, of course! But he misses the days when they used to stay up late chatting about everything from what they ate for breakfast that morning to whether or not aliens exist.
Nobody really gets Taki like Yudai does. He’s the only person he can talk to for hours on end without feeling insecure, annoying, or burdensome. Other people often make Taki feel like he’s too much—like the things he wants to discuss are frivolous or not worth their time. He knows deep down that this isn’t true, but…it's the objective truth that there are certain conversations others just don’t understand. With Yudai, Taki doesn’t have to think too hard about what he’s saying or how he’s presenting himself. He can just be.
There is, however, one thing Taki has never talked with Yudai about: sex.
At least not at length. Of course there were brief acknowledgments akin to “the talk” when Taki was first going through puberty, but Yudai was off at college then. He was hardly around enough for them to really get into it, and Taki was always way too embarrassed to bring it up, anyway. His parents and his health teacher made sure he understood the important clinical pieces, and that was that. Taki didn’t date anyone in high school, and he’s not the hookup type. There has never really been a need for more practical knowledge—until now.
“So…like…how old were you when you lost your virginity?”
The question comes out of nowhere, tumbling from Taki’s lips haphazardly and with exactly zero preamble. They’d been talking about dog breeds before this. Taki really doesn’t know his brain got here.
Yudai, bless his soul, only lets out a shocked laugh. “What?” he asks. Taki can’t see his face over the phone but he can imagine his expression perfectly: eyes wide, brows raised, mouth gaping like a fish. “What does this have to do with boston terriers?”
Taki can feel the heat flooding his cheeks and crawling up to the tips of his ears. “Nothing,” he coughs. “I was just wondering, that’s all.”
Yudai pauses. There’s no judgment in his tone—there never is—but Taki feels his heart rate pick up anyway.
“How do you know I’m not still a virgin?” Yudai asks.
“Hyung, come on,” Taki whines. “You’ve been dating Fuma-hyung for like eight years.”
“So?” Taki can practically hear the cheeky smile in his voice. “That doesn’t guarantee that we’ve had sex. Ace people exist, you know.”
“I know that! That’s not—” Taki huffs. He’s fairly certain from the way his brother openly drools over Fuma’s muscles that he does not fall under that category. “Can you just answer my question, please?”
“Hm.” Yudai laughs again, but hums in dissent. “I was seventeen, I think? Why?”
Taki is twenty. He had his first kiss mere days ago, with Yuma.
“Wait—” Yudai gasps, connecting the dots before Taki can formulate a response. “Did you sleep with someone? Who was it? Did you use protection? Oh my god, my little baby is all grown up—”
Taki really should have seen this coming. He rushes to interrupt before Yudai can craft an entire narrative in his head.
“Stop, no!” he squeaks, “I didn’t sleep with anybody. We haven’t done that yet.”
“Yet?” Yudai lets out another overly dramatic gasp. “Hang on…we? Who is we?!”
Shit. This is not going how Taki planned.
“Well…” he trails off, sheepish.
“Is it Yuma? It’s Yuma, isn’t it? I knew that boy looked at you with a little too much yearning to be just a friend.”
“I—huh?”
“Am I right? Tell me I’m right.”
Taki is flabbergasted. Yudai has only met Yuma the one time, and while Taki does talk about him a decent amount, he didn’t realize he was being so…obvious. Though if he’s reading into his brother's words correctly, it’s not Taki’s feelings that Yudai had picked up on, but Yuma’s.
Yuma’s feelings… Feelings that Taki had been completely oblivious to until last week. Feelings that have yet to be defined clearly. Feelings he still isn’t quite convinced are real.
“What do you mean…?” Taki asks, biting at his bottom lip. It’s an old anxious habit, one that often leaves his lips chapped and cracked. Yuma had commented on it after that first time they kissed, which was extremely embarrassing, but he insisted it was cute. Still, Taki didn’t miss the tube of chapstick that mysteriously appeared next to his toothbrush the next day.
“What do you mean, what do I mean?” Yudai scoffs. “Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed how he looks at you. Even Fuma picked up on it; when we got home after lunch he asked if the two of you were dating.”
Taki gulps. Oh.
“Um…”
“So? Are you dating?”
Taki hesitates. “I mean…yeah?”
For the briefest moment, he considers telling Yudai everything. But he isn’t in the mood to be lectured, so he swallows down the added ‘apparently?’ that sits in his throat.
As expected, Yudai’s reaction is explosive.
“WAHOOOOO! I KNEW IT!”
Taki has to pull the phone away from his ear to avoid bursting an eardrum. He’s glad this is just a voice call and not a video call, because he’s certain he’s blushing all the way down to his toes.
But Yudai is not done celebrating. “Tell me everything! Since when? Who confessed first? Have you guys kissed? Is he a good kisser? Do you love him? Is he your boyfriend?”
The amount of questions is overwhelming, and Taki does not know how to answer any of them. So he doesn’t. Instead, he hides his face in his hands and whines into the receiver, “Hyung, please help me.”
Yudai instantly snaps into protective big brother mode.
“Help you with what, my darling mochi cake?”
Taki takes a deep breath. Well, here goes nothing.
“I um…had a dream. The other day. About him and…me,” he starts, cringing at the memory. “...And I woke up hard and he definitely noticed and it was extremely embarrassing and I don’t know what to do.” The last part spills out in a disorganized jumble, words slurred together with little to no breathing space between them. Taki isn’t even sure he remembers how to breathe. He’s certainly not doing it right now.
Yudai is quiet for a moment as he formulates his response. He doesn’t laugh at him, which Taki half expected, though he really shouldn’t have. Yudai can always tell whether a situation warrants laughter or not.
“You’re embarrassed because you had a sex dream about your boyfriend?” he asks. Again, there’s no judgment in his voice, only a genuine curiosity. Taki wants to die a little bit.
“Yeah…” he says. “Like I said, we haven’t slept together yet. I don’t even know how to bring it up. I think I made things really awkward.”
The vibes around the apartment have been mostly normal since The Incident, but there’s an unmistakable tension in the air that wasn’t there before. Taki can’t ignore it, and it’s driving him crazy to pretend it doesn’t exist. Unfortunately, Yuma does not seem inclined to address it himself, which has left him with little choice but to say something himself.
He just has no idea what he’s supposed to even say.
“Oh, baby,” Yudai coos. “A little awkwardness is okay. It’s bound to be uncomfortable when you’re navigating firsts together like this. Have you guys talked about it at all? Or fooled around or anything?”
Taki’s blush deepens. “No,” he says. “We just made out a few times. But I know that he’s, um, more experienced than me. Not that it really matters, I guess.”
“It doesn’t matter much, but it’s okay to feel some type of way about it,” Yudai says. “If you feel like you’re ready to take the next step, you should just tell him. Honesty is important in any relationship; especially a sexual one.”
A sexual relationship. With Yuma, his roommate. His friend. The guy he’s been crushing on for years at this point. His supposed boyfriend.
Taki still doesn’t know how they got here. He cannot believe this conversation is real.
“I know, but like…how?” he asks. “Every time he smiles at me I can feel all of my brain cells melting into a stupid pile of mush.”
“Cuuute,” Yudai teases.
Taki huffs. “Hyung, please.”
“Just tell him directly, babe. Or wait until things heat up next and ask him if he wants to go further. Who knows, maybe it’ll happen naturally!”
“That sounds terrifying.”
“Well, the alternative is talking about it like a big boy. Or dying untouched and forever hiding your morning wood. Your choice.”
“I never want to hear you say the words ‘morning wood’ again,” Taki splutters. His face must be impossibly red at this point—he’s grateful that Yuma isn’t home to witness it. Or to overhear this conversation, for that matter. There’d be no coming back from that, that’s for sure.
“Anyway, when you eventually do it, don’t forget to be safe, okay? Just because you can’t get pregnant—”
Nope. Taki has limits. There’s only so much embarrassment he can take.
“BYE,” he shouts, interrupting Yudai before he can say anything worse. This time Yudai does laugh at him, but Taki has already hung up and flung his phone across the room, so he doesn’t hear it.
He knows his brother well enough that the sound haunts him for the rest of the day, anyway.
***
Taki does not want to die untouched and stuck popping spontaneous boners like a fourteen year old for the rest of his life. He also doesn’t want to leave things up to chance, because he doesn’t exactly have the best track record when it comes to being put on the spot, so he decides to just suck it up and “be a big boy.” Yudai better be proud; turns out this shit is not easy.
It takes him an entire week to work up the nerve. When he finally gets the words out, it’s at a completely random and slightly inconvenient time: right as Yuma walks through the front door, returning from work.
He should give him time to settle in before starting a conversation. He should at the very least say hi or welcome home, but Taki knows that if he doesn’t do this now, he never will. So he barrels forward.
“Do you want to have sex with me?”
Yuma is crouched by the front door, untying his shoes, when the sudden proposition causes him to wobble off balance. He falls on his ass with a squeak, and it’s so cute that if Taki didn’t feel like he was about to have a heart attack, he would have teased him for it.
But now is not the time for teasing. Yuma seems to realize this as well. He stares up at Taki from the floor, eyes wide and ears burning red.
“What?”
When Taki practiced this in the mirror—in the employee bathroom at his part-time barista job, because he couldn’t risk Yuma overhearing him—he’d been cool and suave. Now, standing stiffly in the mudroom like some kind of sleep paralysis demon, he feels anything but.
“I mean, not like, right this second!” he flounders. “Just like, eventually!” Yuma continues to wordlessly stare at him, his usual teasing quips nowhere to be found. He’s still sitting on the floor, one shoe tossed to the side while the other sits firmly on his left foot.
Taki kind of feels like throwing up. He starts to ramble out of sheer nervousness.
“Boyfriends…uh, sleep together…right?” he says, as if he needs to justify himself. “And since we’re boyfriends, I just thought– maybe we could– well, you know. Only if you want to, though! We don’t have to! We don’t even have to date anymore if you’re bored of me; actually, maybe we should just break up—”
“Taki—”
“Wait, no, I didn’t mean that. Sorry. I’m just kind of nervous. I’ve never had sex with someone before. But I want it to be you,” Taki admits, his voice hurried and shaky. He hardly even pauses to take a breath. “My first time, I mean,” he continues, “I trust you, and I like you a lot, and you’re like super fucking hot—”
“Taki, oh my god. Wait. Stop.”
Suddenly, Yuma is standing in front of him. Taki didn’t even notice he had gotten up from his place on the floor; he was too busy word-vomiting all over the place to process any visual information.
Now, visuals are all he’s processing. Yuma’s whole face has flushed red at this point, and his hands have moved to rest on Taki’s shoulders. His hair looks windswept and messy, like he’d run his hands through it one too many times. Taki wants to run his hands through it, too. He doesn’t—though it’s a close thing.
Yuma’s mouth is still parted in surprise as he stares at Taki with an expression that he can’t quite read. He looks embarrassed, sure, but he also looks…guilty? Immediately, Taki assumes that Yuma doesn’t want to take that step with him and starts mentally preparing himself for heartbreak.
“It’s fine, we don’t have to—”
“Shut up, will you?” Yuma interrupts him. He gently shakes Taki’s shoulders before letting his hands fall back to his sides. Taki silently mourns the warmth. “Just stop for a second. I…I have to tell you something.”
Taki shuts up.
Yuma takes a deep breath and casts his eyes down at the ground. It’s quiet for a solid five seconds before he finally speaks.
“We’re not actually dating,” he says. “I was…I was messing with you. I didn’t think you’d go along with it, but then you did, and…” Yuma sighs, heavy. “Look, I’m sorry. Please don’t say things like ‘I want it to be you’ because that makes me feel like I manipulated you into sleeping with me, which is just gross—”
Taki frowns. “But I do want it to be you,” he says. His brain is still processing the first part of Yuma’s admission, but this much he knows for sure. He’s always wanted it to be Yuma. That hasn’t changed, and probably won’t any time soon.
“Did you even hear me?” Yuma says with a huff. He crosses his arms, frustrated. “I just said I made it all up. I lied to you, Taki.”
Taki thinks about this statement and all its implications for approximately five seconds. Everything clicks into place.
“...oh. Well, that makes a lot of sense,” he says with a small nod.
Yuma looks at him like he’s crazy. And maybe he is, because his first instinct isn’t to be angry with Yuma. Instead, he feels light and giddy. Hopeful.
“Aren’t you mad?” Yuma asks, perplexed. He’s stepped a little bit away from Taki now, as if he’s afraid to get too close. He looks like a spooked cat. Taki’s heart squeezes in his chest.
“Why would I be mad?” he says with a shrug. “You didn’t do it with malicious intent, right?”
Yuma shuffles uncomfortably. “No, I—” he starts. “I actually thought you’d call me out on my bullshit right away, and then maybe I’d be able to move on. You were supposed to reject me. It was supposed to help me get over you, not fall even harder.”
Taki can’t help it—he laughs. He steps closer to Yuma again, closing the distance between them, and reaches for his hands.
He feels so happy he could die.
“You are so fucking cute,” Taki says, grin stupidly wide. “I can’t believe you like me so much that you thought you had to trick me into dating you. Wow. That’s so embarrassing for you, actually.”
Yuma bristles. “Shut up,” he says. He narrows his eyes at Taki, still wary, but doesn’t pull away from his touch. “Did you seriously think you forgot we were dating?”
Taki shrugs. “More like I thought I got isekai-d into an alternate universe where you like me back.”
“You’re unbelievable,” Yuma grumbles. “You don’t need to go to an alternate universe for that to be true. Dumbass.”
“I’m the dumbass? You’re the one who couldn’t just ask me out like a normal person,” Taki snorts. “And obviously I know that now. But I really thought I didn’t stand a chance. You’ve dated so many cool guys in the past. I never thought you’d go for me.”
“Well, think again,” Yuma huffs. “…Nico says I like you so much it makes me look stupid.”
“Nico would be correct,” Taki says.
“Hey!” Yuma tries to detach their hands, but Taki only tightens his grip.
“It’s okay,” he says with a grin. “I like stupid. Clearly.” He gives Yuma’s hands a gentle squeeze, then swings their arms back and forth between them.
“I do too,” Yuma says. His body language has finally relaxed as he seems to have accepted that Taki isn’t angry with him. “Clearly.”
They stand there, grinning at each other like fools, until Taki remembers that Yuma still has one shoe on. He had barely walked through the door when Taki pounced, after all. Whoops.
“So we’re still boyfriends, right?” he asks, releasing Yuma’s hands so that they can slowly transition to the living room.
Yuma kicks off his remaining shoe and follows Taki into the next room. “I told you, we weren’t really dating,” he says as Taki moves to the couch. “But I’d like to be now, if you want.”
Taki pats the cushion next to him, and Yuma takes a seat. There’s no space between them—Taki supposes there hasn’t been in a long time. He takes Yuma’s hand in his again and threads their fingers together.
“I mean, we basically were,” he says, shrugging. “It wasn’t a lie for me, remember? So you’ve functionally been my boyfriend for at least two weeks now. You can’t take that back.”
“Are you trying to gaslight me, now?” Yuma laughs.
“No, I’m trying to say that your dumb plan worked,” Taki laughs back. “You’re stuck with me now, whether you like it or not.”
“Of course I like it,” Yuma says, rolling his eyes. “I like you.”
Taki is certain he’s never been happier in his entire life. Who knew being tricked into a relationship would actually be kind of awesome?
“I like you, too,” he says.
“Good.”
“Good.”
A comfortable silence falls between them. Taki plays with Yuma’s hand in his lap, and Yuma nuzzles against him like an affectionate cat.
Then Taki remembers something. He clears his throat.
“You didn’t answer my question earlier,” he points out.
Yuma lifts his head from where it’s resting on Taki’s shoulder. “What question?”
Taki figures he doesn’t have anything to lose, at this point. He may as well ask again. He swallows down the last bits of doubt lingering in his throat and takes a deep breath.
“Do you want to have sex with me?”
The response isn’t immediate this time, but once Yuma has determined that Taki is being serious, he gives him a small, shy nod. Taki returns it with an equally shy grin.
“Really?” he asks, just to be sure.
“Fuck yeah,” Yuma agrees, laughing, and leans in.