Chapter Text
Yuichi isn’t exactly sure what or why… but he sure as hell knows who, when, and where, and the answers to those questions — respectively — are Leo, always, and everywhere.
He’d first met the slider whilst applying for a job at Señor Hueso’s Run of the Mill pizzeria, and it was all uphill from there.
He’d gotten the job and started working alongside the turtle, both of them as servers, and despite the hours often being unpredictable and occasionally stressful, working with Leo had definitely increased his energy and motive. Plus! Yuichi is sooo good with social situations, so he loves his job! Sure, his first impression on his friends back home had been nothing short of… criminal, but now they’re friends, so tomato tomato.
Their blossoming and thriving friendship — his and Leo’s — had kicked off incredibly, but after a few weeks, the slider’s behavior became… indecipherable. Yeah, that’s the word.
He had this odd habit that only grew with time. It started off with the turtle showing off his nails (claws?) to Yuichi every chance he got. And that’s fine! Leo has nice nails. But that had eventually progressed to sudden bombardments from behind, where the slider would seemingly just appear behind or next to him to gently and repetitively tap Yuichi’s face.
It doesn’t hurt or anything — startling if anything, but that’s fine! He just wishes he knew why Leo does this. He hasn’t seen him do it to anyone else, so, like… did Yuichi do something wrong? The slider doesn’t act angry, but who knows.
He also doesn’t usually do it in front of his brothers, but it definitely gets more obvious around… actually, the rabbit has no idea. Yōkai who get a little too up close and personal, maybe? But that could just be Leo being sweet — he knows that Yuichi is relatively new to the New York facet of the Hidden City, so he could just be looking out.
The rest of the Hamato brothers, however, have more of an… interesting reaction compared to the surrounding yōkai.
The five of them had been watching one of the too-many Jupiter Jim movies after they’d learned about the particular lack of ‘JJ’ in Yuichi’s life. Mikey vehemently calls them films, but that usually leads to a long-winded rant from Donnie on the difference between films and movies, and how only Jupiter Jim’s Whatever’th Trip to Pluto can be considered a film, so they try to keep the discussion in the dojo only.
Regardless, when the cheesy action hero finds out that his father is actually an alien from Mars, Yuichi had gotten maybe a little bit too excited at the plot twist.
“I told you, Leo!” Lunging forward, he grabs the slider’s face in his hands, excitedly (and lightly… No Leos were harmed) slapping his cheeks. “I told you; I called it from the start!”
Silence.
No witty remark or snide comment — just silence punctuated by a few snickers from the three other turtles.
When Yuichi looks back at his friend, he finds that Leo’s face had turned an excited shade of red (or, as close to red as his green skin would allow) with his eyes blown wide.
Mikey coos, snapping the entranced teen out of his temporary trip to the clouds. His blue eyes flick back toward the screen, and he clears his throat, response coming out far more shaky than he’d likely intended. “Hah! Told you you’d like it!”
“Uh, guys?” Yuichi had asked to be cut first for this specific reason, so he’ll be damned if he doesn’t put it to use. With Leo closing, he leaves his brothers open to a lovely round of questioning.
He’d been lucky to catch them all in the same place, seeing that each turtle has such different interests.
Lowering the stopwatch in his hand with a frown, Raph is the first to acknowledge him. “What’s up, big man?”
A deafening crash rings out from the skate ramp, echoing through the room in tandem with a groan. “Raphael, tell me you got my time.”
The snapper’s stare flicks nervously back toward the clock, and he winces, clearly having not gotten Mikey’s time. An audibly-announced ‘eye roll’ draws attention to Donnie. “No, Michael, he did not. HOWEVER, I did.”
“You did?” Enthusiastic, orange eyes practically light up the room, and Donnie hums.
“Well, I would have if you didn’t take down all of my non-invasive cameras.”
“Oh NO you didn’t-”
Raph scoops the box turtle into an Angry Cat Hold, chuckling anxiously. “Ignoring that, why’re ya here, Yuichi?” The chasm in his forehead deepens. “‘S Leo okay?”
“Actually, Leo’s the reason I’m here right now…” He runs a hand over his head, pulling the hair tie out to free his ears. “What’s with the nail-thing?”
“Nail thing?”
“Yeah… you know, when he shows off his nails, or makes them click on stuff around him, or, like, taps them on my face?”
A barked cackle, uncharacteristically loud, escapes Donnie’s beak. “I’m not touching that with a nine-foot pole.”
Mikey coos and Raph sniggers. “Look up fluttering. Tha’s all Raph’s gonna say.”
Back in his apartment, Yuichi gets to work, first searching exactly for ‘fluttering’, which yields no results.
So, switching tactics, he looks up ‘fluttering turtles’ and this… yeah. This.
‘Red-eared slider turtles typically ‘flutter’ their claws around the faces of other turtles, usually either to assert dominance, or as a sign of aggression or fear. This behavior is most often observed as playing a part in courtship rituals.’
Well Leo definitely does not come across as aggressive, so that just leaves… oh. Oh.
Yuichi slams his computer shut in favor of burying his heated and reddening face in his hands.