Work Text:
If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing it well.
If a date’s worth going—and when it comes to Akira, it always is—then it’s worth planning it down to the minute; so worth, in fact, that there is no way Goro won’t come out as the superior planner. The 24th of December might be disgustingly cliché—and to his seven-year-younger self, it would have been—but the high expectations and overbooked venues only act as just another challenge to prove he’s the best at this.
And to give back to Akira even a fraction of what Goro receives, but that is beside the point.
“If only they would fucking let me go,” Goro grumbles, eyes boring holes into the fingerprints-stained screen of his work laptop where the toggle box in the last row of today’s to-do-list is still left unchecked because someone from those stragglers they call their production division failed to upload the revised software again and Goro’s supervisor won’t allow him to clock out unless he’s double, no, triple-checked that this update went through or else Japan’s entire informatic infrastructure will implode.
‘Is everything going smoothly, Takada-san?’ he types into the work chat. If his laptop had a soul, it would beg for his life now, as Goro smashes the keys like they’re worthless Shadows—oh, what he wouldn’t do to have some goo to stab at the moment.
Exhaling a strained sigh, he checks his watch: a quarter past eight. He booked a sukiyaki restaurant in Shibuya at eight thirty feeling optimistic that he would even have time to change clothes. With a tight jaw, he draws out his phone and dials the number.
“Hello? Yes, I would like to move a reservation…” He glances at the chat. Takada’s typing bubble appears on the screen. “Yes, I understand. How late…?” Takada’s stupid bubble disappears. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Actually, can you confirm you’ll be open until midnight? Perfect. We’ll just queue. Yes. Thank you.”
His work laptop pings. ‘Update online in 2 minutes,’ says Takada, with the worst fucking timing ever.
“Finally,” seethes Goro, who just gave up the possibility of surprising Akira with a trip to his favourite gin bar because now they will have to wait in line for one hour in the best scenario, and by the time they will be done with dinner, the place will already be overcrowded and most likely out of the best stuff.
Another ping advertises Takada’s biggest achievement of the day—disproving he’s a complete failure—and a third one is a system notification that the update is ready to be officially shipped to the client. Goro attaches the completed job number to the email he’d already pre-written, informs his supervisor that he’s done, and slams the laptop shut.
He rushes out of the elevator before the ding has even stopped echoing in the deserted entry to his damn company building and shoves his badge against the reader. Gripping his phone with one hand, he lets Akira know he’s on his way.
“Hey there, Goro,” comes Akira’s voice, hoarse from the cold and the tiniest bit muffled by a heavy burgundy scarf coiling around his neck. Goro starts.
“What are you doing here?”
“You said you were almost done forty minutes ago, so I thought to meet you halfway.”
You sentimental fool. It mixes on his tongue with ‘I’m sorry,’ and ‘I had to cancel our reservation,’ in a rather bitter cocktail.
“You’ll get sick,” is all he utters. Akira does that embarrassingly endearing thing where he lowers his head and scratches at the crown of his hair, where Goro spots beads of melted flakes. “Snow?”
“A white Christmas!” Akira grins. He takes some steps back, out of the portion of the building shielding them from the elements, and more white dusts the tip of his nose and his too-thick lashes. Most of it adds to the thick layer coating the sidewalk. He beckons Goro to meet him, and when Goro does, Akira takes him by the hand—his are not as cold as they should be in this weather. “I, uh, actually phoned that fancy sukiyaki place to let them know we’d be having difficulty arriving on time due to the snow, but they just said you’d already called them?”
Goro stretches a sour smile. “Sorry about that.”
“It’s fine,” Akira shrugs. “We can go there on New Year’s Eve. But…” He lets go of Goro’s hands and begins quickly scrolling on his phone. “There’s actually a sushi place nearby I’d meant to check. It’s a chain, but the store in Roppongi opened not long ago, so I bet the sets are extra good right now.”
“My, look at you go,” he huffs out, “to think I used to be the foodie. Some thief you are.”
“A fake foodie, so it doesn’t count,” Akira fires back without even detaching his eyes from the screen. “Here, I put it on the map. 7 minutes on foot.” He offers his hand again, gaze charged with expectation. “Shall we?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer, and Goro lets himself be dragged around for exactly—and Akira should commend him, really—five whopping seconds before he yanks his wrist free and opens his umbrella so there’s at least some chance they won’t wake up with a fever tomorrow.
They exit into the main avenue, Tokyo Tower blurred by the flurry coming down, peeking out between skyscrapers from the base of this gentle slope once-Edo residents dubbed ‘hill.’
Squished under the umbrella, Akira leads them into a straight line, even though Goro can’t stop wondering how far they are from some secluded alley, the kind that calls to Akira like he belongs there. And he does, this damn boy who could worm his way into a dull side street even in the heart of Tokyo’s ever-overworking district. God, he’s getting all sentimental again.
They reach a pedestrian crossing in front of an ivy-covered wall. Goro barely has time to ask himself if that's place before Akira promptly turns left into an alley wide enough for one car that runs along the side of an office building like many others. Past a raised flower bed and a concrete wall, a more traditional array of wood panels introduces passersby to a glass sliding door that would be very easy to miss if one didn’t know to search for it.
“There,” says Akira as he leaves the umbrella’s cover and saunters towards the entry.
“How did you even find this?”
“A guy at a part-time job abandoned ship to come here. I hope he’s not working today, though.”
Goro follows him through the threshold. A blade of warm air welcomes him to a restaurant the size of a dining room, with a cornered counter with fifteen seats at most and two men working silently behind it. Soft LED lights warm the lacquered wood; they reflect on a series of glass panels between the seats and the chefs, showing off today’s fresh fish.
A waiter greets them and leads them to the only two seats available near the wall farthest from the entry. As Goro hangs his corporate-appropriate backpack under the counter and sheds his trench, Akira slides a menu his way with the biggest grin. His eyes lock on the photos… and especially the too-cheap-to-be-true price.
2,300 yen for a fifteen-piece set?!
“The promo’s still running,” Akira whispers with the devil’s smile. “They’ll have dinner sets at lunch prices for a little while.” He pours Goro a glass of green tea and raises it in a toast. “To our date that I just saved.”
Squinting at him, Goro sits. “Don’t act like you won anything.”
“Don’t act like this wasn’t a competition in your brain.”
“Fine,” Goro says, and he sips on scalding green tea, “then I’m paying.”
“With your awesome junior salary?”
“Which still beats your several minimum wage salaries, last I checked.” He takes another sip and, before Akira can retort anything else, he inches closer to his ear. “Besides, differently from this restaurant, I accept other forms of payment, too.”
He doesn’t manage to make Akira sputter, but Akira does cough heavily, which leaves Goro to enjoy the tiny starters one of the chefs is offering them with the undisputable, objective knowledge that he’s won.