Work Text:
Laios sat kneeling on the top bunk of his bed, stroking his chin and humming in deep consideration as he tried to decide which of his stuffed animals he should bring down to the bottom bunk with him for the night. It was a very serious matter, indeed. Ideally, of course, he would be able to cuddle all of them while he slept, but he found that it wasn't really feasible in practice. If he brought too many of them, odds were that a majority of them would end up falling off the bed during the night anyway. Laios always felt a little bad as he picked them up off the floor, especially those that ended up rolling under the bed and ended up covered in dust, which, on top of everything else, made him sneeze uncontrollably. Now, of course, he also had Kabru's body to account for, too. One could say that he didn't need a plushie at all, now that he had another person to sleep with, but those were not the same thing at all. It would be like saying that he didn't need a pillow anymore. He needed at least one plushie, the only question was which one he should choose.
His taste in stuffed animals, much like his taste in everything else, was very particular. The weird, super-deformed pink and purple abominations that plagued toy stores as of late and didn't resemble any real or fantastical animal that he was aware of, he found totally off-putting. On the other hand, had a special affinity for realistic plushies, ones that resembled the animal as closely as possible – accounting for scale, obviously. A truly one-to-one plush toy of, say, an elephant, would be really damn cool, but it also definitely wouldn't fit in his room, unless it was specifically a baby elephant, maybe, and even that would be cutting it dangerously close. Not to mention that he'd never be able to afford it anyway. And so, Laios would happily settle for a plush that was a foot tall, and looked enough like an elephant would if it shrank to that size, all while being really nice to the touch. He dreamed of one day being able to afford one of those interactive toys that could move and make noises, and some of them could even drink water and have it come out the other end. Obviously he wouldn't be able to bring it to bed with him for fear of accidentally breaking it in his sleep, but that was barely a downside. It would be a cool thing just to have in his house.
He once brought up the idea of splicing some of his plushies together to create cool chimeras, but Marcille scolded him for wanting to 'hurt' his plushies, and Falin offered to sew him something from scratch instead, which turned out to be a much better idea in the long run. Falin was crazy good at sewing, Laios thought. It was one of the skills she picked up from Chilchuck. She could make just about anything out of rags and scraps of clothes that Laios'd grown out of. He asked her to teach him, but, either because she didn't explain things very well, or because he was too clumsy to follow her instructions correctly, he found the tutorial pretty hard to follow. One time he watched Chilchuck fix up his jacket and tried to copy him, which helped a little bit. Laios never quite mastered the skill like he wanted to, but he'd at least been able to utilise it in the creation of his fursuit. He kept Falin's plushies in an honorary spot where they would be safe. Whenever he found himself missing her more than usual, he would pick one up and hold it for a little while.
“Is everything all right?” Kabru's voice came from the bottom bunk, a little concerned, a little impatient, but mostly just curious. Kabru brought some of Laios' books to bed and passed the time by flipping through them while he waited for Laios to come down and join him. Maybe he ran out of books already, Laios thought. “Are you having trouble making up your mind?”
“Yeah, a little bit,” Laios murmured, knitting his eyebrows in deep focus. Suddenly an idea occurred to him, and he leaned slightly over the edge of the bed in an attempt to look down at Kabru. “Hey, maybe you could help me decide! Which one do you like?” he shouted.
“Hm?” Kabru raised his eyebrows as he looked up towards the top bunk. He was lying on his back with his back propped upon a pillow, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers, with a tower of books on the nightstand beside him and an open one in his lap. From this distance and angle, Laios couldn't tell which one it was. “You're going to leave the decision up to me? That is a big responsibility,” Kabru hummed, idly stroking his bottom lip with his index finger. “What are the options?”
“Oh boy! There's a lot of them!” Laios exclaimed, putting his hands together. “Let's see... We've got a wolf, a tiger, a lion, an elephant, a cow, a sheep, a fox, a raccoon, a sea turtle, a frog, a bunch of dinosaurs, some Pokemon, but I don't know how familiar you are with their names, so...”
When Laios paused to take a breath, Kabru immediately seized the opportunity to make his choice. “Bring me the wolf! I want to see just how closely it resembles you,” he added fondly.
“All right!” Laios chirped, leaning over the edge of the bed to give Kabru a thumbs-up. He carefully fished the wolf out of the pile of plushies and hugged it close to his chest. The wolf plushie was one of his absolute favourites. Obviously, his collection wouldn't feel complete without his favourite animal, so Laios scoured a bunch of toy stores and thrift shops looking for the perfect one. It took way more time than he expected. As it turned out, it was surprisingly hard to find one that actually looked like a wolf, and not a husky or a malamute. For such a popular animal, he would expect people to know what it actually looked like. Evidently not, though. Eventually, he stumbled upon this perfect specimen, which he had to dig out of a random toy basket in a second-hand store. He named it Anowtrid, in honour of one of his childhood dogs, and loved it dearly ever since.
He should be coming down, now that he had what he came here for, but instead he found himself staring absentmindedly at the wall, deep in thought. “You know,” he said, to himself as much as Kabru, clutching the wolf in his arms, “when it was decided that I was going to move in with Shuro, and I found out that I'd be getting a bunk bed, I was really excited. I mean, obviously! Bunk beds are awesome! But there's really no point to them if you're the only one using the bed, right?” he mused, stroking the wolf's back as he spoke. “The way I imagined it, I would take the top bunk and Shuro would take the bottom one, or the other way around, it doesn't really matter,” he went on, “and we would talk until we both fell asleep. Yeah, yeah, Shuro was gonna have his own bedroom, but I didn't really think too hard about that. It just made sense in my head, you know?” He rubbed his cheek against the wolf's head. “I asked if he'd want to sleep over in my room a couple times, but he never took me up on that. I figured that he was probably pulling all-nighters studying or something. Eventually I stopped asking, but I always hoped that it would work out one day. Obviously, it never did. I have no idea why I thought that it would.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “I was used to sharing a room with someone, since Falin and I had to do that for a while. I figured having a roommate would be similar. That's my bad, I guess. It's not his fault at all. Anyway, I got used to it after a while, and it was fine, I thought,” he went on, “but now that you're here with me, and we're talking and sharing a bed and stuff, I guess it's really catching up to me how lonely I've been until now.”
Kabru responded after a moment, perhaps to make sure that Laios was done talking. “It's perfectly understandable that a prolonged sense of loneliness would take its toll on your emotional and mental health. Humans are social animals, we require interaction to function properly. In that context, I don't think your expectations were all that unreasonable,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “Toshiro simply has different social needs from you. From what I've observed, he is quite introverted. It's not your fault any more than it is his. You're mismatched, is all.”
“Maybe he just doesn't like me,” Laios said defiantly, burying his face in the wolf's fur.
“I sincerely doubt that,” Kabru said firmly, shaking his head, and added in a softer voice: “It's extremely hard to dislike you, especially once one gets to know you a little better.”
“Is that so...” Laios knitted his eyebrow and bit the inside of his cheek. “Doesn't seem that hard to me. Most people got the hang of it pretty quickly.”
Kabru pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers and heaved a sigh. “Did it ever occur to you,” he asked patiently, “that you might be misjudging the degree to which most people dislike you? To be clear, I'm not really talking about bullies here. Some of them, I imagine, may have personally disliked you. Some may have picked on you not out of personal dislike, but because you happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and made for an easy target for their cruelty. There are plenty of cruel people out there, and it breaks my heart to know that you've been victimised by them. However, I don't think they are representative of how the average person would feel about you. Even less so when it comes to how your friends feel.”
Laios crinkled his eyebrows. “How would you know that?”
“Well, because I talked to them, for one,” Kabru said simply, cocking his head. “Not all of them, surely, but at least two of them. I went out for coffee with Marcille, remember. It was quite informative. I got to make small talk with Toshiro a handful of times when you were in the bathroom, as well. All of those interactions were rather short, admittedly, but they still provided some valuable insight into these people's relationship with you. On top of that, there was that time we went to the mall with Marcille and your sister, which gave me the opportunity to observe their behaviour towards you. I trust that I don't need to tell you how much your sister loves and admires you. Just like you, she's very earnest and emotionally honest. However,” he added, furrowing his brow, “I suppose I can't fault you for struggling with people like Marcille and Toshiro. They're not nearly as open about their feelings, which I imagine must be quite confusing for you. They both care deeply about you in their own ways, though. Unfortunately, I can't do anything to prove that to you, so I'm afraid that you will have to take me at my word. Or not, I suppose.”
“Hm...” Laios considered that for a moment, pursing his lips. Kabru's words were actually pretty reassuring. After all, he was much better at reading people than Laios was, so he probably knew what he was talking about. There were presumably a lot of things Kabru immediately picked up on that would totally fly over Laios' head. Obviously, it was possible that Kabru was just trying to make him feel better – it wasn't as if Laios was going to check if he was telling the truth – but Laios was inclined to believe him. “All right, I believe you.” He hesitated for a moment, furrowing his brow. “Why wouldn't they tell me that, though? Why did they tell you instead?”
“Well, some people struggle to communicate directly, especially when it comes to their feelings,” Kabru explained patiently. “There are many possible reasons for that. In Japanese society, for instance, people typically rely on implication and coded speech to convey certain ideas, feelings and sentiments that it would be considered rude to acknowledge directly. So long as both parties exist within a cultural context where these things are broadly understood, it's not a problem, of course, but it might easily become one if the other party does not have the necessary information to decode the message, so to say.” Laios' eyes grew wide. Ohh. Kabru went on: “Sometimes it's simply a matter of temperament. People who perceive emotional openness and sincerity as something embarrassing and uncouth might prefer to express their feelings towards someone in a veiled, often ironic way so as to give themselves plausible deniability. Or, it might simply be fear of punishment for expressing the wrong feeling towards the wrong person in the wrong way. As I said, there are a lot of reasons why one might struggle with telling others how they feel about them.” He furrowed his brow. “It doesn't come naturally to me, either, as you know.”
“Well, yeah, but you figured it out, right?”Laios pointed out cheerfully, snapping his fingers. “Sure, it took you a while, but you managed to tell me how you felt! That's something, right?” He paused. “Then again, I guess you didn't really have a choice, huh?” he mused, scratching his cheek. “There's no way in hell I would've figured it out otherwise, after all. I kind of forced your hand there.”
“Haha...” Kabru sighed softly, covering his mouth with his hand. “...You did, a little bit. Honestly, though, I'm actually very grateful for that. Really, I am,” he insisted, putting up his hands. “That's exactly what I needed to get my priorities in order and consider the matter as seriously as I should have from the very beginning. Once it became clear that my usual methods of seduction were not going to work on you, and that I would have to explicitly tell you how I felt in order to get through to you, I only had one real choice to make.” He wagged his index finger. “I could either give up right then and there, or bite the bullet and confess as soon as possible. Obviously, I went with the latter option, and I don't regret it at all. Honestly, compared to the unnecessary stress from before, stress, mind you, that was entirely a result of my own actions, the confession itself was surprisingly painless. Perhaps because I already knew that you returned my feelings.”
“It was that obvious, huh?” Laios mumbled, cupping his warm cheek with his hand. Kabru really was too good at reading people – or Laios was much worse at hiding things than he thought. In hindsight, it was a little embarrassing that he ever believed that just because he chose not to acknowledge his feelings for Kabru, nobody was ever going to notice that he had them, so long as Laios himself didn't say anything. On the contrary, Kabru's feelings towards him were a total mystery until the moment he confessed. Well, that wasn't entirely true either. Laios definitely noticed some things that seemed kind of suggestive, but he always dismissed them as misunderstandings on his part. At the time, he believed that he was being respectful, but he would have saved Kabru a lot of trouble if he trusted his gut from the beginning. At least they were even in that regard. Besides, everything turned out for the best in the end. “Wow. Well, if you think it was worth it, then I guess that's good,” he said, nodding his head. “Although... Honestly, I still don't really understand why you went out of your way to get together with me. I swear I'm not trying to be self-deprecating or something!” he added quickly, glancing over the edge. “I guess I just want to know why you like me so much. It's not like I did anything to earn that.”
Kabru's lips curled into a smile. “Well, if you really want to know,” he said in a playful tone, patting the mattress beside him, “I'm afraid that you will have to get down here first. I miss you, baby. If we're going to continue this conversation, I want to be able to see your face while we talk.”
“A-ah...” Laios blinked, his face growing warmer. Baby... “A-all right, I'm coming,” he said, tucking the wolf plushie into his boxer shorts, and wiped his hands on his boxer shorts. Now that his hands were free and dry, he could safely hold on to the bedfame, glancing back over his shoulder as he carefully scooted towards the ladder and stuck out his leg to feel around with his foot. Once he found his footing, the rest of the process was pretty intuitive. He quickly went down the ladder and threw himself towards the bottom bunk without ever touching the floor, landing precisely in Kabru's outstretched arms, which immediately closed around him in a tight embrace, drawing a gasp out of him. The book was no longer there – Kabru must have added it back to the pile. This reminded Laios of the plush wolf, and he quickly pulled it out of his boxers and put it next to the pillow before carefully writing his arms around Kabru's waist.
“Here we are. That's much better, isn't it?” Kabru hummed softly, running his fingers through Laios' hair. Laios gave a nod, rubbing his cheek against Kabru's chest. Kabru pressed a kiss to his temple and rested his cheek atop Laios' head. “Well then, what was it that you wanted to know? Why did I go out of my way to date you? Why do I like you as much as I do?” he mused, scratching behind Laios' ear. “Hah! I couldn't come up with a more difficult question than this if I tried. Not, mind you,” he added quickly, “because I don't have an answer, or anything like that. On the contrary, I have so much to say on the matter that I don't even know where to start, nor am I sure that I will be able to convey everything in a satisfactory manner. Well, I suppose I might as well start talking and see where that takes me,” he said, picking at his lips as he spoke.
“Mmm...?” Laios blinked slowly, looking up at him.
Kabru took a deep breath. “Why do I like you? To put it simply, everything about you is extremely attractive to me. In terms of physical appeal, I've told you many times just how handsome I find you, but it bears repeating for the sake of making my point. You're the cutest boy I've ever seen. I mean it. I especially love your eyes – they're strikingly beautiful – but of course I'm quite fond of your lips as well. To be honest, I would be perfectly happy to see your face when I wake up every morning for the rest of my life.” His hand slowly moved down Laios' back. “As for the rest of your body, I simply can't wait to explore it. I want to know what makes you tick, what makes you squirm, what makes you come,” he went on excitedly, groping around Laios' body.
Laios shuddered with pleasure and anticipation, his eyes rolling back in his skull. He would let Kabru do whatever he wanted to his body, if it only made him happy.
“Ahaha... Well, it's not just your body, of course,” Kabru chuckled, speaking directly into Laios' ear, blowing warm air inside his ear canal with every word. “Your personality is just as delightful. You're worth so much more than you give yourself credit for. Despite everything you've been through, you're very considerate, compassionate, thoughtful and sweet. Your passion is inspiring, your thirst for knowledge admirable, and your independence enviable. You've got a beautiful mind, too. I hope that I can truly understand it one day. I could listen to you for hours, both because I find everything you say deeply fascinating, and also because your voice is the most pleasing sound I've ever heard.” The corner of Kabru's mouth twitched. “For various reasons, I usually do not trust people easily, but I latched on to you basically from the moment we became acquainted. I get the feeling that I might cave and tell you my entire life's story within the next two months. Things, you understand, that even my closest friends of many years don't know.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “There's a part of my brain that has been warning me to cut my losses and retreat while I still can every time I got closer to you. It's going off right now, in fact. I've been trying to drown it out by talking, which, as you can imagine, is only making it worse. Despite my better judgement, I've elected to ignore these warnings, and I've gotten away with it so far, which is actually quite thrilling.” He cupped Laios' cheek and tilted his head back to look into his eyes. “Why did I go out of my way to pursue you? Because I like you very much. Because my life is better for having met you. Because I want to stay by your side for the rest of my life. Do you understand?”
Mildly light-headed, thoroughly overwhelmed, and barely conscious, Laios' brain struggled to process Kabru's speech while his eyes struggled to stay open and focused on his face. It felt as if a thick fog had begun to settle on top of his brain, turning everything into a kind of blurry mush. He heard every word that Kabru said, but he didn't really register any of them. He did, however, get a pretty good sense of what Kabru was trying to convey, which was probably good enough for now. Laios smiled weakly, nodded, licked Kabru's mouth, and promptly collapsed on top of him, instantly losing consciousness.