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“Just because I had, what,” biting his lip, Hizashi clenches his fist against his chest to steady himself, “Good intentions? Love? You think that’s enough to trump hurting you? For you to forgive me? Intention never matters! You taught me that!”
Throwing it back against Shouta is a low blow, but even a gust of wind is enough to set Hizashi off.
Radio-silence. Typical.
Even the crickets aren’t chirping.
What does that say about him?
Hizashi scrapes his palms down his face, brushing against his mustache before tugging; light, because he doesn’t want to ruin Present Mic, not one to grow facial hair at the same bullet pace as Shouta’s stubble does, but just hard enough to make sure he doesn’t float away.
Floating away does sound real appealing right now, though. He could go for miles.
Maybe the sky could do with another friend; not that he would know, but it does look lonely without the clouds sometimes.
“Mic.”
Hizashi turns his head up, vision blurry.
“Yamada,” Shouta amends, usual pout quelled down by something even Hizashi can’t pinpoint.
There’s a pregnant pause. “Hizashi.”
He shudders out a scoff. Unable to help himself, Hizashi does not bite his tongue. “Are you just goin’ to keep going down the whole list? Next you’re going to tell me my middle name’s next on the chopping block.”
Shouta stills. “You don’t have a middle name.”
Then he groans, covering his mouth.
“That’s not the point,” he ticks out, glaring at him with the same vigour he offers his students.
The effort not to burst out into laughter is tumultuous.
"It could be," Hizashi prompts. Throwing out a hand, he gestures wildly to the sky, jazz hands in wait. "Just imagine it. The scope, the melodrama. If my adoring listeners thought I did, they'd be talking about it for weeks on end! I'd probably have to ask my team to do some crazy PR!"
No, they wouldn't.
“You had good intentions,” Shouta interjects, breaking through the illusion that their usual bit and routine could still exist by ignoring him. Hizashi frowns at the refusal to play along. “You still do.”
Why? Why?
“What good does that do?” he questions.
A small child lingers behind his words, surely, from how egregiously childish his request must seem.
“I still hurt you,” Hizashi says, voice small.
Shouta steps forward.
Despite heroics instilling in his nerves the need to defend at even the slightest of movement, even more years of parading and waltzing around in Shouta’s personal space have taught Hizashi’s body not to react as fast as it usually would.
Not as fast is an understatement. Hizashi flinches back, tugging his hand back to his side.
He ignores the look of hurt Shouta flashes him.
If he were truly affected, he’d be stepping away right now. For his own good.
“Yes,” and Hizashi tries to push back the simultaneous grief and thrill of success that rushes through him at finally having his words sink in. “You did hurt me. That’s true.”
Another step forward. “Doesn’t mean I won’t forgive you.”
Launching himself off the nearest podium right now seems ideal.
“You really shouldn’t, listener,” he huffs.
Seldom does he get anything but a warm welcome when Present Mic’s on stage, so, naturally, this is his Hail Mary.
Last-ditch efforts are not Present Mic’s scene, so of course Shouta persists.
“I really should,” he counters. “You’ve never been anything but well-meaning, Hizashi. It’s not like you to be petty like this.”
Hizashi barks out a laugh.
“Now, that’s dead wrong,” he chuckles out. “Everyone who knows me well enough would disagree with you, yo, and you’re supposed to be the one that knows me best. Pettiness is my middle name.”
“I thought we’d established you don’t have a middle name,” Shouta mutters, but the look of discontent blaring in his features like alarm bells is enough to send his voice dropping another octave.
With how much of a baritone Shouta’s voice is already, Hizashi wouldn’t have thought it probable; but of course. Even in his worst moments, Shouta manages to be a marvel anyway.
“You’re petty enough,” he assents, and to that Hizashi can agree wholeheartedly, sated as he is , “Especially with the stunt you pulled earlier.”
He winces at the reminder.
“But not like this,” Shouta finishes. “Not to this level.”
“I got in your way,” he insists, fists clenching at his sides. “I defended you when you clearly didn’t want me to! I-- I pushed and prodded ‘cause I wanted to, you know, feel like I was doing something for you.”
Another step.
Two.
Three.
Within a matter of seconds, Hizashi finds himself backed into a corner. It's only through good grace that it’s not a literal corner. Just a wall.
Something gets pushed into his hands. “Read this.”
Reluctantly, green eyes peer from where he’d been looking past Shouta to glare down at his fate.
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO: ROMANTIC HOAX, OR GOODWILL?
Hizashi bites his lip. “See,” he says, legs numb with Shouta pressing his own thigh against him. It must show in his voice, if his boyfriend propping up his now free hands to steady him by his shoulders is any indication. “Failure.”
He gawks when Shouta frees up a hand to pinch at his cheek.
“Ow!” It hadn’t hurt, not really, but the sentiment’s not lost on him. He squirms uneasily. “What was that for?”
“You’re not a dumb blonde,” Shouta comments dryly, “So don’t act it. I won't buy what you're selling.”
Another pinch. Hizashi doesn’t react.
“Read it again.”
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO: ROMANTIC HOAX, OR GOODWILL?
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO: ROMANTIC HOAX?
“Are you upset they mentioned romance? Granted, I’m usually in those types of scandals anyhow,” Hizashi can't help slipping into something casual, normalcy lingering at his periphery, “But ‘hoax’ is definitely a new one. The media’s gettin’ crafty.”
Another pinch is code for a buzzer ringing wrong.
Grumbling, he tries again.
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO
That can’t be it.
PRESENT MIC DEFENDS UNDERGROUND HERO
Underground hero?
Underground hero...
Mouth dropping open, a realization washes over him.
“Underground hero,” he says, quiet. Eyes racing over the rest of the article, scanning the text in a blur, they widen. “They didn’t mention Eraserhead.”
If walls could talk, they’d complain about Shouta’s smirk too. Even as focused on the paper as he is, forced against the wall like this, his super-hearing is enough to hear such an endearing expression.
"Bingo,” the other drawls out, languidly. “My cover hasn’t been blown.”
Hizashi’s still staring after it.
“As grandiose and loud-mouthed as you’d like Mic to be,” his boyfriend continues, “Even he listens enough to know what I’m like. And, even if he had blown it, it wouldn't make much of a difference."
It’s only through Shouta’s instinct that Hizashi manages not to pitch forward as the feeling in his legs gives way to static, caught by his underarms just before he kisses the ground.
The newspaper does not have the same luck.
Uncaring, they both cast it aside anyway, its purpose served.
He wheezes in relief.
“Holy shit,” he mutters, dropping the curse in English. Shouta grunts, still holding him.
Hizashi knows it’s not for a lack of strength, or from strain; Shouta could lift him without a second thought, over a decade of experience being on Shouta’s back as he did a three-fingered push-up a testament.
“I did something right, for once.”
He looks up just in time to gleam one of Shouta's rare smiles. "You usually do."
His boyfriend not protesting when Hizashi winds his arms around him and tackles him into a hug makes him think that maybe, just maybe, that could be true.
Shouta holding on just as tightly is enough of a sonnet to be convincing.