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“Here, wear this.” He said, tossing his helmet to Kaidou. He caught it anything but gracefully, but Aren will give him the mercy of pretending he didn’t see, instead watching him closely as he turned it around in his hands.
“Thanks—” Kaidou cut himself off as he saw what was painted on the side of the helmet. His eyes lit up immediately, and Aren felt his heart melt just a little more. Kaidou scoffed in amazement and turned the side towards him. “Did you seriously paint this!? It looks awesome!”
Aren had taken upon himself to skilfully write Jet Black Wings on the left face of his helmet. Painted in red and ‘jet’ black, Kaidou’s favourite colours. He had meant for it to be a birthday gift, but Aren was apparently losing his careful self-control. Seeing his excitement was worth it, and also contagious. He savoured Kaidou’s sparkly eyes scan the artwork.
“This is so cool, Kuboyasu. You’re so cool! How are you so good at everything?” Kaidou praised, before clearing his throat, slightly red. “I mean, obviously not as good as the Jet Black Wings, but still. That’s a high standard.”
He felt himself flush. Aren still wasn’t used to this whole ‘being complimented for anything other than his physical attributes and kill count’ thing. Especially from Kaidou, despite how often it happened. Though, he supposes that’s hypocritical of him when he likes to celebrate every Kaidou-accomplishment in his head. (Even if that’s lifting more than two bags).
“Let’s go for our ride now, yeah?” He diverted the topic instead, rubbing the back of his neck, which was warmer than usual. Kaidou nodded and secured the helmet on his head, clipping it under his chin. Some of his hair still poked out from underneath, contrasting against the almost-black violet. He’s about to mount the bike, when Kaidou points at him accusingly.
“Hey, where’s yours?”
“Where’s what?” Aren asks blankly, raising an eyebrow at him.
“Your helmet, idiot.” Kaidou shakes his head like a disapproving mother. It’s working.
“Oh, uh.” He isn’t sure how to tell him that he is wearing his helmet. And that he doesn’t have any spare ones since he usually uses something until it’s weathered down to pieces. “I think my dad has one lying around somewhere, I’ll go check.” Aren lied instead, embarrassed in his own lack of planning. He quickly dashes out from the garage, straight to his parents room.
They had to have kept some sort of extra helmets around, hadn’t they? He won’t dare touch their personal ones, for obvious reasons. Aren rummaged around through piles of messy, unfolded clothes and questionably bloody keepsakes before brushing his fingers against something metal. Jackpot.
He lifts up his newfound safety gear in triumph, far too early.
… It’s Doraemon.
The huge image of the blue cat beaming at him is plastered right at the front of the helmet. A smaller print of Nobita is on the side, the same side where he etched The Jet Black Wings on Kaidou’s. And to top it off, the helmet has cat ears.
Cat ears. The worst part is that Aren can clearly see that it fits his head, it’s roughly the same weight and size as his original one. He glances around, as though someone will pop out from behind his shoulder and ask what the hell he was doing.
Now, it’s not like Aren was being held at gunpoint to wear this childish helmet. He could simply go back to Kaidou and tell him he couldn’t find anything. But first of all, lying was objectively bad, and he promised to himself to do the opposite of that from here on. Second, Kaidou would probably turn down the motorcycle ride if he wasn’t wearing a helmet. Hell, he had brought knee and elbow pads. (Courtesy of his mother, apparently. Aren hasn’t met her yet and is frankly terrified to). And something in him felt utterly devastated at not being able to give Kaidou his first motorcycle ride. His grip tightens.
Wear the damn helmet, Kuboyasu. You’re a man, aren’t you?
He doesn’t remember his gut sounding so condescending, however it is right. He shouldn’t be making such a big deal out of something so minuscule. Therefore he takes a deep breath in and shoves the helmet on. It’s slightly too small for him, but nothing unbearable. Aren catches sight of himself in a nearby mirror, and he looks absolutely ridiculous. Could he chop the cat ears off?
He sighs and goes back to Kaidou, his line of sight somehow managing to see every reflective surface on the way. Kaidou is sitting on a large toolbox, fiddling with some piece of purple scrap fabric in his hands. He looks up at the sound of Aren entering, and is visibly startled. It’s either because of the fact he is wearing a children’s Doraemon helmet, or the extremely pissed expression on his face. As Kaidou tries to stifle his laugh, Aren begrudgingly accepts that it’s the former.
“Ready to go?” He asks, attempting to avoid the unavoidable. Kaidou stares at him for another second before bursting into laughter.
“Is… is that Doraemon!?” He snickers, covering his mouth with the back of his hand, though his shoulders are still shaking. There goes Aren’s chance at playing it nonchalant. His face instantly flames with embarrassment and he crosses his arms to retain some sort of dignity. Kaidou laughing at him doesn’t evoke as much anger as it usually would when someone made fun of him, Aren feels more bashful than anything. Kaidou coughs at his lack of response and composes himself.
“I mean, the Jet Black Wings respects your concern for safety, Kuboyasu.” Says the one with the protection pads. Aren doesn’t say that out loud though. Instead he sighs and rubs the side of the helmet. He mounts the bike and gestures for Kaidou to sit on the back, who scurries over buzzing with so much excitement that Aren’s annoyance dissipated immediately. Right, that was the whole reason he was going through with this.
“Hold onto the back.” He pauses. “Or me.” To his mild disappointment he hears Kaidou’s hands grip the tail of the motorcycle.
“Go super fast!” Kaidou urges as Aren starts up the engine. He can’t help but smirk at his request.
“Really? I dunno man, even some of my old friends asked me to slow down sometimes.” They slowly begin to roll out from the garage.
“I can handle it!” He assures indignantly. “You know, my main vehicle as the—!”
Kaidou cuts himself off with a yell as Aren suddenly began zooming down the pathway. His arms instinctively switch to wrap around Aren’s waist and almost squeeze all the breath out of him as he clung on for dear life. Aren wants to laugh but also feels a tiny bit bad. Okay, this might have been slight revenge for laughing at the Doraemon helmet earlier. On the plus side, Kaidou is really warm compared to the wind whipping against his eyes and so his face pressed into Aren’s back isn’t the worst feeling in the world.
He gradually slowed down, until the flowers and trees were simple blurs instead of flashes of colour. However, Kaidou didn’t seem to notice that they had slowed at all, his eyes screwed shut. Aren stops near an empty park, and tries getting off, but Kaidou is practically glued onto him.
“Kaidou? Kaidou, we’re not moving.” He said. Kaidou blinks and lifts up his head, registering that the world isn’t spinning anymore. He springs off the bike and nervously brushes himself down while Aren watches in vague amusement.
“I—I knew that.” He stutters, taking off the helmet and placing it carefully on the grass.
“You could’ve just asked me to slow down, y’know.”
“I didn’t need to! I was just…” He trails off. Then Kaidou’s eyes suddenly go wide and he spins around, promptly throwing up.
“Oh shit—” Aren takes a step forward but Kaidou holds up a bandaged hand. The sound of him retching continues for a few more awkward seconds. Aren looks around, wondering if he should run into a nearby convienence store and buy a plastic bag, or mints, or something. He feels a bit useless and even more guilty. He’s standing in a stupid cat helmet as his friend is suffering! He sticks a hand in his pocket and finds a singular crumpled tissue. Better than nothing.
“Hey um, does this help?” He asks, holding it out towards him. Kaidou doesn’t fully turn around, but he gratefully accepts the tissue. He quickly wipes his mouth and throws it in the bin, leaving them both now awkwardly facing each other. What do you say when someone vomits in front of you?
“That was my fault,” Kaidou starts, laughing nervously, “shouldn’t have told you to do that when I know I have motion sickness.” Aren stares at him blankly. What’s motion sickness? Kaidou clears his throat.
“I was cursed with this disease when I transformed into this mortal body— it makes it more difficult for me to have fast getaways from the Dark Reunion when they inevitably chase me down for information—,”
“Do you want to get some water?” Aren interrupted, partly because he knew once Kaidou got on this train of thought it rarely stopped, but also because he must be dehydrated from puking his guts out and rambling was surely not helping. He sticks a thumb behind him. “There’s a store down the road.” Kaidou gives him an indiscernible look. Is Aren losing his edge?
“…Okay.”
* * *
The sliding store door dings as they step into the building. It’s so brightly white in here that Aren may actually need glasses. Luckily the helmet visor is shielding his eyes. There’s ramen, snacks, pre-made sushi, and JUMP magazines on the shelves, but that’s not what they’re here for. Aren grabs a bottle of water before Kaidou gets the chance and makes his way to the till.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Kaidou questions him as they wait behind a lady in line. Aren raises an eyebrow at him.
“What does it look like I’m doing? Buying you water, obviously. It’s only 100 yen.”
Old Aren would’ve said, ‘It’s only 100 yen, buy it your damn self!’, but he’s a changed man now. It wouldn’t be very gentlemanly of him. (He ignores why he feels the need to be gentlemanly for Kaidou when he usually would have mooched off his old friends). Kaidou gives him another look and it disturbs Aren that he can’t figure out what it means. Kaidou would give him a lot of those in the future, and he’ll be rolling them around in his head for a while.
The cashier rings him up, and he makes a split-second glance at the pack of cigarettes behind her before reprimanding himself. Bad Aren!
“Doraemon fan, sir?” She giggled as she handed over his change, and he wonders why he’s still wearing the stupid helmet.
He passes the water to Kaidou as they exit, who pops the cap and takes a gracious swig.
“Thanks, I feel a lot better.” Kaidou thanked him and Aren feels a sense of achievement. The wind is picking up, and his hair is being ruffled about. He pushes up his glasses and gives him a half-smile.
“Hey runt! Is that you?” Both of their expressions immediately drop as they hear a deep voice behind them. They turn around to find Nendou merrily traipsing towards them, Saiki reluctantly at his side, as always. He catches Saiki shooting a questioning look at his choice of headgear, but he luckily doesn’t mention it. Aren might have imploded.
“Nendou!? What are you doing here!?” Kaidou shouted, and just like that, the peaceful atmosphere from earlier had shattered.
“The ramen shop was closed, so me and pal decided to buy some instant ramen!” Nendou explained. The impassive look on Saiki’s face was enough to tell Aren that this was clearly a one-sided idea, and he wonders how Nendou managed to drag him along.
“We’re getting dessert too.” Nendou continued, and Saiki’s eyes sparkle for a moment. Well, that explains it. A large hand lands itself on top of Kaidou’s hair, messing it up even more.
“Would you stop that!” He snapped, swatting Nendou’s hand away. Nendou laughed and sniffed the air, wrinkling his nose.
“Fine fine. But why do you smell like that? You smell like the floor of Koriki Number Two’s cage!” Funnily enough, Kuboyasu could only now smell the distinct scent of vomit that was emitting from Kaidou when Nendou pointed it out.
“How dare you!?” Kaidou shrieked, and began unsuccessfully punching Nendou. Saiki is standing next to Kuboyasu as they watch the chaos unfold, and he shoots Kuboyasu a side-eye that seems to convey, ‘Really? This is who you like to hang out with?’ To which he squints back, ‘I could say the same about you.’
Saiki shrugs and goes into the convienence store, leaving him alone with the unintelligible screaming. It was incredible how fast Kaidou could go from somewhat calm and endearing to yipping at Nendou like a feral chihuahua.
However, it’s never a boring (or illegal) day with him, and Aren will stand by that. So despite everything, he gives a fond grin at the scene in front of him, and goes back to his motorcycle, trusting that Kaidou would follow soon enough.