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It was their second year of highschool, packed with a lot more responsibilities than their first.
Hirose, personally, liked it that way. He was forced out of his laid back nature and pulled into a school life where he was always busy. Student council, debate club, health ambassador for their class… Hirose would barely have any time to himself, and when he did, he would spend it with his best friend, Nakamura Okuto.
Who was currently unavailable any time Hirose wanted to hang out.
“Okutooo…” Hirose complained, burying his head in his hands on his friend's desk. “Why won’t you hang out with meeeee?”
Nakamura gave him a fond smile, one that Hirose had seen enough times to get used to. Contrary to what Hirose first thought when they met, Nakamura was a very kind person and also amazingly easy to talk to. Even though they had only known each other for barely over a year, his and Nakamura’s text threads were longer than his with any other person.
“I can’t, sorry Aiki. I’ve just been busy.” he had the decency to look apologetic, but that look faded into a laugh when Hirose puffed his cheeks out and scowled.
“Don’t ‘Aiki’ me when I haven’t seen you outside of school once since the school year started a whole two weeks ago!” Hirose had planned so many fun activities for them to do in their free time. Their summer had been busy since Hirose was stuck visiting his grandparents in Chichibu for the first two weeks and Nakamura was busy with his summer job at the local aquarium as a new dolphin trainer. They had barely enough time together to go buy ice cream!
Hirose had been so excited to spend time with his best friend because he had discovered so much during summer break and they had only talked about it through text. He wanted to hear about Nakamura’s fascination with the record player he had gotten and he wanted to talk about the thrifted clothes he had bought in Chichibu.
But, so far, he hadn’t gotten a chance, because Nakamura was so dang busy!
“We shared schedule ideas at the start of the year, Okuto, so why are you so much busier than what you said?!” Hirose complained.
Takeuchi was even more annoying now since he had started going out with Hamaoka, and Mukai was always playing basketball with the guys from other classes. Hirose was lonely! And it wasn’t like he wanted more friends when he already had all he could ask for from Nakamura!
Except for time, apparently…
Nakamura rubbed the nape of his neck.
“Well, I did tell you I would be joining some clubs and trying to do more with my time.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t expect to be ignored.” Hirose said bitterly.
“I’m not ignoring you,” Nakamura insisted, his cheeks flushing. His face did that often; turning the prettiest shade of peach Hirose had ever seen, comparable only to that sunset back during their trip to Yokohama.
Hirose brightened slightly. He could use Yokohama!
“Well,” Hirose leaned back, crossing his arms. “If you can’t find it in yourself to give me enough time as you did in Yokohama, when we weren’t even best friends, when you didn’t even think we were friends, then I suppose I’ll have to step back, won’t I?”
Hirose sniffed, feeling proud as Nakamura’s face dropped. Nakamura had a sore spot for Yokohama because Hirose had felt offended that Nakamura didn’t consider Hirose a friend even when Hirose ditched his friends to spend time with Nakamura. Technically Nakamura wasn’t sure if Hirose considered them friends, but Hirose thought it was obvious that they were friends, so he felt a little betrayed. He moved on fast, but he made sure to mention it just enough that he could use it to win some arguments.
He might’ve felt bad for saying something like that back in their first year, sure, but he had always been a bit selfish with the things he cherished, and Nakamura signed up for this when they exchanged numbers, so Hirose felt nothing as he gave a pointed look to his friend, who looked close to begging for forgiveness. Hirose smiled sweetly; he had Nakamura right where he wanted him.
Nakamura gave Hirose a pout. “You don’t have to do that…” he mumbled.
“What? I couldn’t hear you.” Hirose said, a smile still on his face.
Nakamura sighed, resigning himself to Hirose’s whims. “What do you want, Aiki, and what do I have to do to make you happy?”
Hirose clapped his hands together excitedly.
“Full schedule, from your phone. In my hand, please.” he held out his hand with the most innocent look he could muster.
Nakamura had never been strong in the resistance department, which was evident as he almost immediately handed it over. He knew how protective Hirose could be, and going against that was not something he wanted to do in the first month of school, or ever.
Nakamura had Hirose’s fingerprint in his phone, as did Hirose for him, so Hirose just opened the phone and found his schedule easily.
Everything was the same as Hirose’s except the piano practices he had started in the summer, time for studying and art, and…
“Archery?” Hirose squeaked.
Nakamura looked embarrassed. “It looked cool, so I tried out for fun. I didn’t tell you because I wasn’t sure I would make it in, but it turns out I’m good at it..?”
Hirose tried to calm down. He was going to say something collected, maybe a congratulations for his friend, or a nice plan so they could hang out, or–
“You replaced me in favor of hurling a bunch of pointy sticks at colored hay?!” Hirose said, ever eloquent.
“What? No! I didn’t replace you.”
“You did! And now you’ll never have time for me and you’ll go on to winning championships and you’ll make cooler, more talented friends and you’ll switch to an archery academy and you’ll leave me stuck here as a boring student who can’t even pass math without your help and I’ll never get–”
Nakamura interrupted him.
“Aiki,” he said softly. Hirose paused, frowning as he put a hand over his heart. It was going fast enough that Hirose could feel it in his neck.
Nakamura waited patiently for Hirose to steady his breathing. Hirose did that sometimes; he’d panic easily and think everything was going to come undone.
“Sorry, I just…”
Nakamura nodded, waiting for him to go on. Hirose looked down at his hands, and to Nakamura’s hand that was fiddling with his pencil. He had been doing his English homework right before Hirose captured his attention. He had stopped everything to listen to Hirose, which obviously meant something. Hirose sighed.
“I like Takeuchi and Mukai, they’re good friends, but they both have something or someone that’s more important than me. I can deal with that with them, but you’re my best friend, Okuto, and if I have to be second place for you… I just don’t think I can do that.”
Nakamura nodded, his ears reddening. Hirose wondered why he was embarrassed when Hirose was the one saying how important Nakamura was to him. Unless... he wasn’t as important to Nakamura as Nakamura was to him.
Hirose stowed his worrying thoughts away as Nakamura opened his mouth to speak, then closed it only to open it again, more confident now.
“You aren’t second, Aiki. You’ll never be second. Not to me.” Nakamura said, holding Hirose’s eyes with his own. Hirose felt like Nakamura had confessed something important but all he could think about was that Nakamura was looking very intensely at Hirose.
He really, really liked it.
Nakamura softened, twiddling his fingers on the desk. “I don’t think there’s anything that could ever take your place.” he whispered, averting his gaze shyly.
Again, Hirose felt like he had missed some big connotation, but he moved on from the both pleasant and disturbing feeling that was clouding up his head and stomach.
“Then why are you never free?”
“I just… I don’t know, Aiki. We’re both busy, and you know, I came out to the class last week and it was hard and I’m pretty sure I cried and I sort of wanted to distract myself from all that, right?”
Hirose nodded. Their class was mostly the same besides a couple of new students and Mukai who had been switched to a different class, but he was still there when Nakamura came out. Hirose found out over the summer on a call when Nakamura mentioned a male actor they both really liked being one of his first crushes.
The class had been supportive of Nakamura, and the confession even prompted another girl to admit that she liked both girls and boys, and then Kawamura admitted to being newly lesbian as well. Still though, it had been overwhelming for Nakamura who was so used to hiding it, and he had gone into a short three day slump of avoiding eye contact with any of their classmates until multiple students sought him out to congratulate him on coming out and to offer support.
“And archery… does that?”
“Yeah,” Nakamura smiled, looking wistful. “It feels like I’m in control of my body, and I like it because I’m basically never in control.”
“You’re getting better.” Hirose insisted.
“Thanks,” Nakamura said, smiling shyly. “I’m sorry I don’t have a lot of time.”
“I’m free this afternoon?” Hirose offered as a truce. He did have student council matters but he could do those really fast and be done, and he would, because it was Nakamura.
“I have practice.” Nakamura apologized.
Hirose groaned and banged his head on the desk. Nakamura gasped softly and rubbed Hirose’s head.
“You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“Would you skip practice to take care of me?”
Hirose looked up pleadingly, and he knew that Nakamura would say yes if the coloring on his cheeks and the hesitation in his eyes said anything.
“Y-you’re not hurt,” Nakamura stuttered, looking out of the window.
“I could be.” Hirose said.
“I don’t want you to be.”
“Then hang out with me.”
“Are you threatening to get hurt if I don’t make time for you?” Nakamura raised an eyebrow.
Hirose rested his head on his propped up fists.
“Maybe,” he said, drawing out the first syllable with a smirk.
Nakamura tapped him lightly on the head with his notebook.
“Dumb,” he said, but he didn’t mean it.
Hirose breathed through his nose. It was nice talking like this, but he wanted to ramble with Nakamura on Nakamura’s bed, throwing popcorn into each other’s mouths and dissing on a terrible movie they had decided to watch just to hate on it.
“Can I come?” Hirose said, trying the most recent solution that came to his mind.
“Come where? To my practice?” Nakamura asked, covering the left side of his face with his hand as light streamed in when the sun peaked out of the clouds.
“Yeah, can I come watch? I can do homework or something, and even bring my student council stuff to go over while I wait.” Hirose proposed.
“Does that count as hanging out? You’ll just be watching me, and occasionally talking when we switch positions.”
“It’ll have to work. We can walk home together, to your house or mine.” They both knew Hirose preferred Nakamura’s house, though. “It could be a routine, and we could hang out, have dinner together, and go over homework after.”
It wasn’t what they usually did, or what they were used to from the year before, but Hirose liked the idea more and more as it stayed in his mind.
Nakamura thought about it.
“Sure,” he said. “That could work.”
Hirose smiled.
“Yay,” he said softly, waving his fists as well as he could with his head still resting on them.
Nakamura laughed.
“I’m excited to see you shoot.” Hirose said, because he really was.
BONUS:
Hirose took off his shoes as he entered his house, making a beeline straight for his room (not after wishing his parents a good night, since Saho was working overtime) and flopping on his bed.
He stared up at the white, boring ceiling, his arms and legs positioned in a way that made him look like a starfish.
He thought about Nakamura, whose practice he had attended hours ago. It had finished smoothly and they had gone to Nakamura’s house for dinner and studying, a couple of hours taking space between Hirose watching the practice and him in his bed now.
Hirose groaned, his face heating up until it felt scorched.
He was not prepared to watch his best friend (questionable and debatable, after that practice) shoot an arrow like a literal god.
Hirose glared at the ceiling, trying to project the utter blessing of the mental image he had gotten of Nakamura, standing in plain black pants and a button up white shirt that stretched when he angled his arms to get the shot. He tried to sear the image of the fabric bending as Nakamura pulled the string back, his shirt riding up just a little bit, enough for Hirose to sneak a look at Nakamura’s pale stomach, and the look of proud satisfaction that Nakamura got when he hit the center, turning to give Hirose an excited, albeit smug, smile.
Hirose’s heart flared when he thought of what Nakamura would look like in a traditional kyudogi, which he would have to wear at some point for competitions.
Would he wear it with the shirt underneath, or shirtless like he had seen some competitors do the one time he watched archery on his television?
Hirose flipped himself over.
Either he was a teenage hormonal mess, or he had just realized that he was in love with his best friend.
...It explained a lot.