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Pressure.
There’s pressure, dipping the mattress on either side of his body. Soft breaths ruffle the baby hairs that always fall out of the shitty bun he puts his hair in to sleep, interspersed with little huffs of laughter. His bed frame creaks in protest to the added weight of a second person.
So goes the awakening of one Geto Suguru at who-fucking-knows o’ clock. Maybe at night. Probably in the morning.
He breathes out, slow and deep, as the familiar weight of the second person settles fully over his back, covering him like a very squirmy weighted blanket.
Lips press close to his ear with another soft giggle.
“Suguru,” Satoru whispers in his ear, elongating the vowel at the end of his name. Long fingers tangle themselves in his hair and tug lightly. “Suguru, wake up. Wake up, please?”
Suguru’s already up, but the added incentive of Satoru asking him is enough to pull him fully from the dredge of sleep. He cracks one eye open, glancing around his dark room and catching a little bit of blue and white in his peripheral.
“Mm,” he hums, shifting around until he’s on his back. Satoru shifts with him, straddling his hips and leaning down to tuck his head into the crook of Suguru’s neck. His skin is cool against Suguru’s, too warm from being under his comforter. He frees one hand from the confines of his bedding to pet Satoru’s hair.
“You up, Suguru?” Satoru asks, lips brushing Suguru’s skin.
“Mm. Don’ know.”
“Wake up, then,” Satoru says, rocking side to side and pulling Suguru with him. “C’mon, please.”
“I’m up.”
Satoru’s head perks up, dislodging Suguru’s lazy fingers. He smiles at Suguru, cupping his face in both hands and bumping their noses. “There you are.”
Suguru scrunches his nose, bumping it with Satoru’s again and turning his head to search through the mess of bedding for his phone. He comes up empty.
“What time is it, ‘toru?” he asks, letting his eyes fall shut again. Satoru’s hands roam, brushing stray hairs back and trailing down to tug his face back in Satoru’s direction.
“Uh, it’s like three.”
“In the PM?”
“In the AM.”
Suguru snorts, head falling back to the side. “Then I’m going back to sleep.” But of course, going back to sleep means Satoru goes back to his own room and he loses Satoru’s hands all over him and Satoru’s weight in his lap and all of that great stuff he was probably dreaming about before he woke up. He considers for a moment. “Wanna sleep in here with me?”
“No. Wait, yes. I do, but, like, later. I don’t wanna go to sleep right now,” Satoru says, leaning down again to blow cool air against the shell of Suguru’s ear. He can feel the muscles in Satoru’s thighs tense against Suguru’s hips as he stretches them to lean over Suguru, and honestly, that is just… pretty great. Suguru would probably be happy if he died right now. “I’ve spent, like, the last three hours of my life studying for my calculus midterm Monday. I’m hungry, Suguru, I wanna go get something to eat.”
There’s food in the kitchen. There’s so much food in the kitchen. Suguru went grocery shopping yesterday. But Satoru wants to go get something, so the food in the kitchen is moot.
“Is anywhere even open at three in the morning?” Suguru asks, freeing both arms from the comforter and stretching them. He rests his hands on Satoru’s hips, feeling for the little dimples in his back through his thin t-shirt. And yeah, this crosses about every appropriate-touches-for-best-friends line ever drawn with finality, but Suguru’s never really thought those applied to them. Satoru draws their line, and he’s arching back into Suguru’s touch, so whatever. It works for them. It’s not like they go this far in public or anything.
(Kento would likely beg to differ. Yuki would definitely beg to differ. Shoko would tell him to shut the fuck up if all he’s going to do is lie.)
“Convenience store?” Satoru offers, sitting up and squeezing Suguru’s hands with his own. “There’s one a few blocks over. Just want something sweet, I don’t need a meal.”
Suguru blinks his eyes open, watching through a dim haze as Satoru rocks, left, right, left, smiling down at Suguru with teeth like he already knows he’s secured a yes.
And he has, because it’s Satoru and Suguru is weak, but whatever.
“Do you wanna go put some pants on first?” he says instead of a direct yes to save at least a little face. He busies himself with studying the tiny white briefs Satoru wears. He wonders where exactly Satoru draws their line, because sure, he’s been naked in front of Suguru plenty of times before (the memory alone is kind of mouth-watering, but— lines, Suguru, boundaries, he usually tells himself so he doesn’t dwell on it any further) and rocking back and forth on his lap in underwear is probably not crossing as many lines as that, but it’s still pretty far, you know?
Whatever. Satoru’s comfortable, and Suguru’s chest kind of feels like it’s being flash-flooded with warmth, but it’s good warmth. The warmth he only feels with Satoru, so really, the best warmth.
“I’ll just borrow some of yours,” Satoru says, tugging Suguru by the arms to sit him up.
“Get off my lap, then, I gotta brush my teeth.”
Satoru hops off his lap and beelines it for his dresser, rooting through carefully organized drawers for his favorite pair of Suguru’s sweatpants. Suguru lets his eyes dwell on that little fold of skin where his thigh meets his ass far longer than a best friend should and gets out of bed to brush his teeth and wash his face.
Satoru’s already waiting in the genkan by the time Suguru’s made himself vaguely palatable to the outside world.
“Finally,” Satoru says as Suguru roots around his crowded countertop for his wallet and apartment key. Satoru keeps his key on his own key ring, but he forgets to take it with him at the best of times. Better safe than sorry. Satoru nods his head at the floor of the entryway. “Got your shoes ready for you.”
Suguru looks down and sure enough, his slides are lined up neatly for him to step into. That’s sweet. So so sweet. Suguru gets this really weird, all-encompassing urge to hug Satoru and pepper his face with kisses and all that really sappy shit. But it’s just shoes, so he bites his tongue and uses Satoru’s shoulder for support. The urge rises again at about double strength when Satoru tilts his head to nip at Suguru’s knuckle with his teeth and grin.
He steps into his slides with his socked feet, glancing up just so he can catch the way Satoru’s nose scrunches up and his mouth forms around something along the lines of old geezer, socks and sandals, hey grandpa what was it like to live through the Meiji Restoration inquiring minds want to know. Suguru doesn’t catch what exactly he says. His chest is so warm and so full, the feeling almost climbing up his throat.
“Shut up, let’s go,” he manages to say through the cottonmouth.
He walks in mostly silence, content to let Satoru rant about every random thing that flits through his pretty head. He stares at the wild gesticulations of Satoru’s hands while he regales Suguru with the escapades of his least favorite classmate (Zenin Something-or-Other— Suguru remembers his name on a good day, but really the only thing worth remembering about him is that Satoru hates him), watches his lips hitch up in that little grin when Satoru suggests some incomprehensible act of mischief against Shoko when they all meet for brunch here in about… five and a half hours. That urge from earlier almost ebbs and flows, but it never quite returns to baseline. He wants to kiss Satoru a moderate amount, it plateaus until Satoru pulls out his next endearing trick, and then he wants to kiss Satoru just a bit more. So on and so forth and what have you.
He doesn’t realize Satoru’s asking him a question he wants an answer other than “hm?” or “yeah?” to unto Satoru’s moving closer, closer and tugging Suguru’s bangs.
“Hm?” Suguru asks, blinking out of his admiring. He thinks some part of his brain is still in bed back home, and whatever’s left of it is being held hostage by the way Satoru twirls the loose hair around his fingers and pulls lightly, letting go to dip down and rub at the nape of Suguru’s neck.
“I said, are you sleepy?”
Suguru shrugs, leaning back into Satoru’s gentle hand. Their walking has paused. “I guess.”
“I guess that’s my fault, dragging you out of bed so early,” Satoru says, a little sheepishly. “I could’ve gone myself, I just didn’t really want to.”
“I don’t mind, Satoru. I’m glad you woke me up.”
Satoru’s nails scratch gently down his neck and the junction of his shoulder. Suguru thinks this wave of the urge is tall enough to swallow Mt. Fuji.
“Why?”
“I like being with you.”
“Even when it’s, like, three thirty in the morning and we have brunch with Shoko at nine?”
“I’m still with you, aren’t I?” Suguru reaches for Satoru’s arm, rubs at the jut of his wrist.
Satoru just stares at him for a few moments, pretty eyes searching Suguru’s face. He lets go of Suguru’s neck, and that kind of makes Suguru feel like he’s missing a limb or something. He links their pinkies together, though, to guide Suguru the rest of the way to a convenience store he's been to about a million times since he moved into their apartment. The flush on Satoru’s face is so pretty, pink cheeks stark against the white of his hair.
Voicing that thought probably doesn’t cross any lines, and he’s still a bit too sleepy for pretenses. Not like it’s anything he hasn’t said before.
“You’re so beautiful, ‘toru,” he says with a sigh.
“Shut up,” Satoru says, cheeks getting a little pinker. He tugs the rest of Suguru’s hand to entwine with his own. “You’re sweet. Thank you. Or whatever.”
“So pretty.”
“You must be exhausted. Tired out of your mind, if you will. When did you go to bed?”
“Oh, dude, I have no fucking idea. Midnight?”
“Checks out.”
“Have you slept at all?
“Hell no. I feel like I’m about to drop any second.”
“I’ll catch you.”
“You’re, like, loopy, Suguru, you really gotta start going to bed earlier.” He squeezes Suguru’s hand a little tighter, shaking his head. “You’re so fucking sweet.”
Suguru doesn’t respond verbally, opting to map out the contours of Satoru’s hand with his thumb. It’s probably his favorite hand in the entire world— fits perfectly in his own, soft and familiar and gentle and all that great stuff. Satoru keeps on talking, something about calling me beautiful, god, just look in a mirror. Suguru watches the back of his head, listens to the sound of his voice without really understanding what he’s saying.
They approach the konbini, Satoru still leading. He doesn’t break their hands apart, even when the cashier gives them a funny look as they walk in.
“You can get whatever you want,” Suguru says. “I’ll pay.”
Like hell you will, he can almost hear his bank account screaming, but then Satoru’s eyes do that shimmery light-up thing they always do when Suguru makes him happy, and you can’t really put a price on something that beautiful, so whatever.
Satoru skips-walks through the aisles, piling Suguru’s arms high with all kinds of sugary shit (though, probably less than Satoru would’ve gotten if he was paying for it himself. So so sweet.). They briefly scuffle over the coffee custard bread. You’re gonna keep me up all night with that caffeine, Suguru argues, and Satoru defends with its barely any caffeine, come on at least you’ll be up with me, right baby? and a smile, which disarms Suguru with a pathetic quickness. The line is… somewhere, like, way out in fucking Narnia. He’s probably going to dream about Satoru calling him baby for the rest of his life. He’s probably going to slip up and call him baby right back the next time he opens his mouth.
Satoru hangs off his back while he pays, confused looks from the tired cashier be damned. There’s a constant, giddy mumble of thank you thank you thank you in his ear as he brings about his own financial ruin in the form of cream bread and mochi.
“Thank you, baby,” Satoru says when they leave, leaning down to smack a kiss on Suguru’s cheek. He takes the bag from Suguru’s hand easily and rummages through it.
Suguru’s floating. He can feel the smile on his own face, the burning at the exact point Satoru’s lips touched his cheek. He follows Satoru over to the park by their apartment— the one that’s tucked away from the street. There’s usually some old guy with a yakitori stand who sets up shop by the bench and the odd runner or two, but now, there’s no one here but them.
This is probably as close to perfect as Suguru’s life is ever going to get.
Satoru rips the plastic off of some strawberry cream daifuku, stuffing the trash into the pocket of Suguru’s pants. He shifts the konbini bag over to the arm furthest from Suguru, holding the daifuku with his teeth. That scene from Lady and the Tramp starts to play in his mind, but instead of two dogs with a noodle, it’s him and Satoru with daifuku and the kiss after is one hundred percent intentional.
Lines, Suguru, boundaries, appearances, what the fuck ever.
And then Satoru’s hand is warm in his again, and the warmth in his chest is kind of starting to take up the space he needs to breathe.
Satoru holds his hand loosely, turning around in slow circles like they’re slow dancing when they walk. Suguru twirls him, until they’re only holding on by the tips of their fingers and Satoru’s arm is bent so far back from trying not to let go, it almost looks painful.
Satoru dizzies himself eventually, shaking his head and letting go of Suguru’s hand again. He doesn’t really get the chance to die inside over it, because then Satoru’s hand is skating over his back, tucking itself in between Suguru’s waist and his elbow and just… holding.
Suguru’s hand wraps around Satoru in turn, supporting each other like Suguru always sees those sweet old people who’ve been together for the better part of their lives do. God, he hopes he and Satoru are still doing this here in about fifty years. Blessing enough that they can do it now, but he’s got the image of it in his mind and now he can’t let it go. Both of them, wrinkled and gray-haired (or probably still white, in Satoru’s case), reminiscing like oh, honey, remember when we used to walk this park in our twenties? My footwear matches my age now and ambling along just like they are now, like they’ll fall if they don’t have the other to hold them up.
Suguru has this kind of realization, as they walk together, hips bumping with every step— he’s in love with Satoru.
It’s kind of like that feeling you get when you remember that you’re breathing— it comes to you, natural, easy, and then suddenly you’re just aware of it. Like, oh, yeah, I’m breathing, the miracle of life. How didn’t I realize I was doing this before?
But it’s more like oh, yeah, I’m in love with my best friend, the light of my life, probably, like, the best thing that’s ever happened to me. How fucking stupid do I have to be to let one second of this pass me by?
Satoru finally bites off his piece of daifuku. He’s got powder all over his lips when he jokingly asks Suguru, “How are you feeling on this lovely morning, dear? You’re walking slow. Sciatica acting up again? Or is it your geriatric ass shoes?”
Suguru thinks there might be, like, tears in his eyes or something. He swallows around the lump in his throat as they round the corner of the sidewalk. I love you so much it actually kind of hurts, I really must be God’s favorite or I wouldn’t be walking with you like this right now bubble up from the warmth in his chest.
“I’m so happy.”
Satoru’s smile falls a little bit when he studies Suguru’s face. “You look, like, five seconds away from bursting into tears. Are you sure you’re happy?”
“I just really want a piece of that daifuku,” he says quickly. Satoru looks at him in thinly veiled suspicion. “Like, so much. I want a piece of that daifuku so badly I could cry.”
Satoru laughs, all bubbly and sweet and Suguru’s heart starts beating double time. Satoru takes the daifuku between his teeth again and offers it to Suguru. Their lips brush when Suguru takes a bite, and then his fingers start tingling and he’s actually having to make a conscious effort not to cry.
“You can’t lie worth a shit,” Satoru tells him.
“This daifuku is better than anything I’ve ever tasted before,” Suguru says, sniffling. “Orgasmic. I’m in heaven.”
And he really is.
It occurs to him when he’s sitting on his bed, watching Satoru strip in preparation for his before-bed shower, that he should probably say something about the whole, like, first and only love thing. Best friends don’t keep secrets from each other, you know.
“I love you,” he says as Satoru’s shimmying out of Suguru’s sweatpants. The words are enough to make him stop, pants around his ankles, and just look at Suguru. His cheeks quickly flush pink in the dim light from the lamp on the bedside table. He’s got this little frown on his face, but his eyes are doing that shimmery light-up thing again.
“I love you too,” Satoru answers immediately. He shucks off his too-big shirt next.
“I mean, like, in love. Like I’m in love with you. Like there’s never going to be anyone else, because I love you so much and I’m genuinely never going to be able to love someone like this again.”
Satoru sighs softly into the shirt, pulling it the rest of the way off. His entire body is steadily growing pinker. Suguru’s feeling pretty warm himself.
“I mean, ditto,” Satoru says. “Like, double it all, return to sender.”
Suguru’s heart thuds steadily in his too-small chest. “You too?”
Satoru frowns a little harder, but it’s not, like, an angry frown. He just looks a little confused. He’s so adorable, it’s making Suguru emotional again.
“I thought it was a given. Obviously, you’re like, my one and only, love you more than life itself, all of that. I didn’t think I had to say it.”
“It would be nice. To say it. Or hear it.”
Satoru picks up his discarded clothes and tosses them into Suguru’s hamper, gripping the edge of it for a moment as he takes a few deep breaths.
“Okay,” Satoru says.
He turns and stalks over to Suguru with a purpose, climbing into his lap and dipping his head down for a lingering kiss.
Suguru gets his hands on the bare skin of Satoru’s hips, grabbing more of his ass than is most likely appropriate for a best friend to do, but he thinks they’re probably past that now. And again, Satoru is pushing his hips back, beckoning Suguru to grip harder, so whatever.
“Love you, mm,” Suguru manages to slur into the kiss. Satoru’s tongue swipes at his lips, his teeth. “Fuck, mm, love you, ‘toru.”
Satoru breaks away, leaving sloppy, open-mouth kisses all over Suguru’s face.
“Love you too, S’guru, love you so much.” He pulls back, gently tugging Suguru’s hair so he’ll look up. He smiles down at him, bumping their noses together. “My sweet Suguru. I love you. Obviously.”
Suguru thumbs at the hem of Satoru’s stupid tighty-whities. He kind of feels like he’s dying, in like, the best possible way.
Satoru climbs off of his lap with one last kiss, Suguru lifting off the bed in his attempts to keep him from pulling away. He roots through Suguru’s drawers again for pajamas, tossing his picks on Suguru’s bed before he starts tugging his underwear down.
“Say we wanted to get, like, married, in the near future,” Suguru says, brain-to-mouth filter effectively melted. It’s probably kind of weird, the progression from I love you to please marry me in five minutes tops, but whatever. It works for them. And as for the influence Satoru’s nudity may have had on that progression, well, Suguru’s not taking any further questions at this time.
“How near?”
“The immediate future.”
“Courthouse is closed on weekends, I think. Opens at nine Monday.”
“It’s not too soon?”
“You’re stuck with me for life either way.” Satoru says like it’s a fact. It absolutely is. He shrugs. “Marriage or no marriage. Monday’s fine by me.”
“We can go pick out rings after brunch.”
“Ooh, but don’t tell Shoko anything. I want to surprise everyone. Honeymoon?”
“I’ve got a few days off to burn. We can go to Kyoto or something.”
Satoru hums, considering. “You think my grade will survive if I skip that calculus midterm?”
“Of course. You’re so smart, sweetheart,” Suguru says.
Satoru leans down again to kiss him softly.
“I don’t really care either way,” he says, lips brushing Suguru’s cheek. He feels up Suguru’s arms, and Suguru is abruptly reminded that he’s stark fucking naked. Satoru leans back, gives him a wicked little grin. “Want to shower with me?”
Suguru attempts to swallow, but doesn’t quite manage it. He settles for clearing his throat and scooting back on his bed to strip his own clothes off.
They end up late to brunch. Satoru needed a power nap after their shower, and then they both fell asleep and woke up about fifteen minutes before they were supposed to be at a cafe twenty minutes away by car.
Shoko takes one look at both of them, rolls her eyes, and spends the rest of their meal shutting down every single excuse the two of them can cook up.
Satoru keeps on asking her if she can keep a secret, to which she always replies I don’t know, can you read a clock? and showing her rings on his phone and shit, which is definitely giving their plans away, but Suguru honestly couldn’t care less.
He plays with Satoru’s bare ring finger, watching him and Shoko argue back and forth over gemstone settings and metal alloys and ring sizes and shit. Satoru reaches back over at some point and links their hands together without looking, squeezes once, twice.
Suguru remembers, oh, yeah, I’m, like, in love with my best friend.