[LOG] Hirakoba Rin and Kite Eishirou

[legally_blond]

Who: Hirakoba Rin and Kite Eishirou (and Pi-chan)
What: Rin and Kite head to Kite's place to pick up some stuff, odd cuteness. So much gross. Cock(atiel)-blocking.
When: 23/08/18
Where: Kite's parent's place in Okinawa
Rating: PG. OUR FIRST EVER LOG WHERE PANTS STAY ON

Hirakoba stares out the car window at the stretch of apartments they’ve pulled up in front of, looking all the more miserable from the rain drizzling down. At least it had one benefit, in that it’d encourage Kite to actually accept a lift to his parent’s place instead of walking there that he’d originally planned. “I’ll probably be a while,” he says. “I’ll send you a message when we’re done.”

And then he hops out of the car, leaving the door open for Kite to scoot out after him, jogging for the overhang to try avoiding getting his hair and clothes wet as much as possible. He doesn’t have to be here, but, he grins at Kite as he gestures for him to lead the way in, a dumb part of him wants to keep spending time together this trip to keep prodding at the boundaries between them and seeing how far they now go. And it’s just to help Kite sort through a few things, apparently, and doesn’t actually require him to do much besides laze around and watch, really.

Perfect for his lazy, rain-induced sleepy mood right now.

“I don’t think I’ll be much help to you, Eishirou,” he says, just in case Kite has some kind of strange ideas about getting him to do anything. “I’m still rather sore from training yesterday.”

If it weren’t raining, Kite would never have accepted the ride for what would ultimately have been a ten minutes walk at all, but with his jacket still soaked through from his morning run in the rain and his umbrella inconveniently forgotten at his Airbnb room the only other option was risking a chill. This near to the US Open qualifiers that wasn’t a risk he was willing to take.

He thanks the driver as he follows Hirakoba out of the car, a little uneasy with leaving the man behind in his nice car, obviously out of place between the utilitarian little square cars of the building’s inhabitants. Still, he’s long since given up getting Hirakoba to put overmuch thought into appearances, and going by the way the driver immediately sinks into his ereader things like this don’t actually faze the man.

He briskly steps through the rain and motions Hirakoba further along the building to one of the more well-kept looking front doors in the building as he shuffles through his keys for the right one.

“It’s just a few boxes of stuff I need to choose to keep or not, Hirakoba-kun,” he says, somewhat distractedly as he picks the right key out of his collection. “I only asked you to come because I’d promised to spend time with your poor, neglected self, not because I thought you’d be useful.”

He pushes the door open carefully, peeking in to make sure none of his sister’s shoes are out of the shoe rack where they risk getting crushed, then wider once he’s reassured they’re not. Stepping inside he toes off his ankle boots and slips them into one of the higher tiers in the cabinet, one of the few spaces left. His sister’s collection is getting bigger, and he wonders if their parents have already told her to keep some of her shoes in her bedroom the way they used to scold him about it. “Just put yours by the entryway,” he tells Hirakoba. “My sister and I aren’t allowed to leave shoes on the floor, because there will be too many out in no time.”

“Well, you’re soon leaving me alone for Yuujirou,” Hirakoba huffs, frowning a bit as he waits for the door to be opened. “So you have to make it up to me now, before I miss you too much.” Nevermind that he could very easily go along to the US if he had any interest in tennis anymore, especially since it would still fall completely in his university holidays.

Hirakoba follows Kite in curiously, pausing that he has to stop and wait for Kite to move out of the genkan before he can step in, slipping off his shoes and purposely putting them neatly to the side. “I see your sister’s also got a love of shoes,” Hirakoba says, glancing at the shoe rack with some amusement.

He has no idea what he’s meant to expect from Kite’s family home, but he trails behind Kite into the living space and pauses, looking around. It’s… a small space. “Is this like your private sitting room?” he asks, trying to see some sign of Kite in the way the room’s decorated. “Like my grandmother’s got one, where we have our morning greeting, but hers is a bit bigger than this.” He gestures with his hands to try and show the relative size of his grandmother’s private sun room that is really just for the grandchildren and her. There’s closed doors off to the side and Hirakoba eyes them. “Is the rest of the apartment through there?”

“And here I thought I’d been neglecting Kai-kun in favor of you, lately,” Kite says sarcastically as he drops his keys on the key tray by the living room door. “Clearly I must balance my every waking hour between you two now.”

His sister’s shoe collection is a little bit less tasteful than his, largely cutesy flat-heeled boots and beat up runners because their parents won’t allow her to wear heels yet. Still. “She’s learned from the best.”

Walking into the living room is always interesting now, an odd combination of routinely familiar and nostalgic. As promised, there’s a pair of large cardboard boxes stacked up against the windows that he starts making his way over towards until Hirakoba starts narrating his thoughts. Kite twitches, a brief flare of indignation rising up before it strikes him Hirakoba is being utterly genuine. It’s been a long time since he’s actively worried about how his parents’ living situation would look to others, he realises. Long enough that he’d forgotten Hirakoba would never have been here, because at fourteen Kite had been a lot more on his guard to avoid these things.

“You’re lucky my parents aren’t home to hear that, young master” he says, a little waspish regardless. “This is the living room. Beyond the doors are a kitchen and a stairway to my sister’s room and the bathroom. You’ve already seen most of the apartment, sorry to disappoint.”

He can’t even really be that annoyed at Kite spending so much time with Kai, since… it’s Yuujirou, who Hirakoba enjoys hanging out with just as much. And Hirakoba’s never been one to let some sort of relationship get in the way of friendship, and he’d be genuinely annoyed if Kite wasn’t the same way.

The ‘young master’ comment though, does actually annoy him and Hirakoba straightens up, narrowing his eyes at Kite. “I get called ‘Rin’ at home, not ‘young master’,” he says, huffing a little as he moves into the room, sitting awkwardly on the couch as Kite’s words actually sink in. Oh.

And he looks around the room again, this time with a different eye. It’s… probably smaller than his own bedroom at home and certainly his own apartment in Ebisu looks to be better off. “You’re joking with me, right Eishirou?” Hirakoba says, his uncomfortableness with sitting there shown in his posture, with his feet properly on the floor and sitting straight instead of lounging like he normally would. “This isn’t where you grew up.”

Kite frowns when it momentarily looks like Hirakoba is going to actually argue with him on semantics when he physically sees realisation dawn. It’s an odd sight, having the normally extravagant and relaxed Hirakoba coil up like an overwound spring on his parents’ couch, which might look very well kept for an eighteen years old couch, but is clearly an outdated model no matter how great a job his mother did refitting it with a classy looking cream suede.

He leans against the table, which his sister must have forgotten to fold back up against the wall after eating breakfast, and crosses his arms slightly awkwardly. He glances around the room, trying to imagine what someone might see the first time they’re in the room, with the corner his mother uses for her sewing commissions, half-finished custom curtains hanging over the thirty-odd years old Singer, his parents’ lovingly amassed vintage film noir movie posters on the walls, the modern-looking cubic chairs that hide his parents’ futons inside during the day.

He can’t claim he isn’t aware of the size restrictions, or the fraying edges where time has worn down cheap to moderately priced furniture down just a tad faster than they can be replaced. His parents have tried hard over the years to keep things aesthetically pleasing and tidy, but there is only so much they can do to hide the less than ideal state of the building, like the part of the wall that sheds paint like an animal’s fur when the neighbors shower too long. There was a reason he didn’t bring friends, especially not Hirakoba over when he was still living here, after all.

“It fit easier before Towami was born, but yes. Welcome to my home, I suppose. I take it it doesn’t meet your expectations.” It comes out more snidely than he means for it to.

Hirakoba fidgets uncomfortably at the comments from Kite, well aware of what his expression must be as he glances around the room again - it’s so… cramped - and he sighs. “It’s just. It’s not what I expected,” Hirakoba says lamely, crossing his legs and purposely resting back into the couch a bit, trying to look a little bit more relaxed. “It doesn’t fit your image.”

He knows logically that the rest of his friendship circle didn’t exactly grow up in similar houses to what he did. But he just always assumed that Kite’s place was like Kai’s - smaller than Hirakoba’s used to but still comfortable and kind of homey in it’s own way? Like Kai’s with a touch of Chinen’s old feel to the house, with smatterings of Okinawan culture in the corners. But there’s… none of that here and if it wasn’t for the sewing machine in the corner, it wouldn’t feel like Kite at all.

Hirakoba is morbidly curious though, he kind of wants to see the bathroom, and see what sort of cramped bath Kite put up with while growing up. And if this is the living room, how large (or small) is Kite’s childhood bedroom, then? “I’d love a cup of tea before you start sorting things out,” Hirakoba says, pushing himself up suddenly and moving towards the door that apparently leads to the kitchen. “

It’s difficult not to say anything as Kite watches Hirakoba’s discomfort truly settle in, but at the same time he’s not sure what to say. Kite has put a lot of time and effort into not looking the part of a poor kid throughout his teens, much like his parents put a great deal of effort into their own presentation.

But he’s also very different from his parents, having a deep seated appreciation for his roots they’ve never really shared. Being gone from Okinawa as much as he has been has only driven that feeling home more. His parents’ apartment, small in size though it might be, is their love letter to a vintage-inspired western style he’s grown up to love and adapted in much of his own presentation, but it lacks the serene timelessness of the house Hirakoba grew up in, the sense of history unwritten between the relics on the walls.

He wonders, suddenly, if Hirakoba and the others have ever noticed his envy at all. He supposes they mustn’t, not if his parental home catches Hirakoba off guard. “I’m not sure what my image made you expect, but I’ll take that as a compliment.”


He follows Hirakoba into the small kitchen, a little cramped with the both of them in there, and digs around in one of the cupboards to hand Hirakoba a box of tea. “Don’t fill the kettle more than half,” he says when he notices his parents still have the same bleached mustard yellow electric water kettle. “The lid spills a bit when it boils.”

As he says it, a sudden unexpectedly loud whistling noise comes from right above them, and Kite grins a little as he whistles a short tune back. “I’ve been noticed. I’ll be back in a moment.”

Hirakoba runs a hand through his hair, looking at the peeling paint on the wall in one section, the air-conditioning unit that looks like half a century old… and he just feels more awkward as he thinks about the constantly changing paint of his bedroom as his whims changed, and the air-conditioning that he knows his grandfather put a lot of time into getting done, so it could blend into the ceilings of their house as seamlessly as possible. “Just… not this.”

But perhaps it’s because it’s empty of people besides them that it’s a little odder. Maybe if Kite’s parents and sister were here, it’d feel more like somewhere Kite could grow up? All he knows that he feels distinctly uncomfortable in this apartment right now where he’s fairly sure he has more money in his wallet right now than the monthly rent would be.

Hirakoba jumps a bit at the sudden whistling, distracted by the extremely ugly kettle in front of him. “Noticed…?” But before he can get a confirmation, Kite’s gone and Hirakoba’s left alone with a tiny kitchen. Making a cup of tea is a welcome distraction, even if he has to hunt around for a mug and a spoon. None of the mugs match either and he’s stuck staring at the kettle watching it heat up before he grabs another mug to make Kite a cup as well.

He goes on a hunt for the sugar next and emerges partway victorious with a packet of white crystals. That turn out to be salt as he tests them, licking a few crystals off his finger and making him pull a face as he nearly drops the packet. “Eishirou, where’s the sugar?” he calls out, shoving the salt back in the cupboard.

Hirakoba’s admission makes Kite feel almost a little guilty for his snippy initial reaction. At the same time, Hirakoba isn’t a child, and Kite had admonished him for being thoughtless about money countless of times. That he’s never tied those comments to his own situation is... deceptive, perhaps, but shouldn’t have taken away from the message.

It’s a welcome distraction to leave the kitchen and get to the stairs hidden behind the other door in the living room, up to the top floor. His sister’s bedroom door is full of stickers she’d gleefully pasted all over it once it became clear she wouldn’t need to go back to sharing it, and he rolls his eyes at the pink glittery cats while he digs through the small storeroom next to the stairway for some dried treats.

Another impatient whistle comes from the other room, the beginning notes of some pop song he vaguely remembers being popular over the previous winter, and he whistles a catcalling noise back even as he shakes a few treats into his hand and slides the rest of the bag into his pocket.

He opens the door to Pikky hanging upside down in the cage, staring at him for a long frozen second before he puffs up his feathers and races to the bell toy to shake it around maniacally, crowing in glee.

“Yes, yes,” Kite says, laughing at the antics of his bird as he steps over his sister’s teenage mess to open the cage’s door, holding out his arm so Pi-chan can climb up to his shoulder, where the bird proudly fluffs up his crown and exclaims an exuberant ‘Haide!’, before leaning forward to whine for the treats he’s spotted Kite holding.

“Greedy bird” Kite tells his pet fondly as he holds his hand up and lets the bird peck at the grains. He leaves the room with one final glare to the irritating face of Kimijima Ikuto, who just had to be one of his baby sister’s first idol crushes and whose smug know-it-all look gazes out from the inside of the door entirely too innocently for someone Kite recalls as more than happy to throw his own friend under the bus.

When he comes down, Hirakoba seems to have managed everything except finding the sugar. “It’s in the green jar on the countertop. It says sugar on it in English and has a bee on it.”

Hirakoba really does wonder what on earth Kite is doing upstairs - he can hear more whistling and he frowns. At least the mystery’s answered when Kite reappears in the kitchen and he spots… that bloody bird sitting smugly on his shoulder and Hirakoba’s expression sours. He hates that bird.

He does find the mentioned jar though, turning it around to look at the English words on it that he can sound out and oh yes, it does say ‘sugar’. It does just serve as a reminder that Kite is fluent in English and he fluffs up a bit as he finishes putting together his cup of tea. “I can speak multiple languages already, I don’t need to speak English too,” Hirakoba says, even though Kite is undoubtedly about to lecture him about it. At least the kettle’s boiled and he can finish up - and he can find the milk easily enough, pouring it into his own cup only.

“I’ll feed you goya!” pipes out and Hirakoba visibly twitches, closing the fridge door with a little more force than necessary, memories of threats from both Kite and that bird from junior high coming back. “I can’t believe he still remembers that” Hirakoba complains. “Couldn’t you have taught him to say something nicer, Eishirou? Like ‘I love you, Hirakoba-kun’?”

Seeing Pi-chan seems to make Hirakoba grumpier, and it takes Kite a moment to remember his bird didn’t always have the ideal relationship with his team. Pi-chan puffs up on his shoulder when he spots Hirakoba, turning his little head ominously.

“You don’t need to be fluent to recognize the word ‘sugar’,” Kite points out, wondering how lost Hirakoba would have gotten in the kitchen entirely, with his parents’ love for mismatched western knickknacks, the french ‘sel’ and the ‘Gewürze’ on the spice rack. “It’s a useful language to know. Doesn’t your father do a lot of overseas business?”

Then Pi-chan’s scheming turns into a loud call he’ll feed Hirakoba goya, and Kite lets out a barking laugh, handing the bird a treat on principle.

“Haide!” It cheers, as it munches on it, “Higa tuuuu, haide!” Still laughing, Kite leans against the door to pet his bird under the chin feathers, earning himself an appreciative warble. Teaching Pi-chan the school chant as a thank you cheer was the best choice he made raising him.

“He has a good memory,” he says fondly. “He also uses it when my sister is spending too long on her homework and he wants attention, apparently. He can say plenty of nice things though. Pikky, look at me.”

To demonstrate he makes a kissy noise at the bird once he’s sure he’s paying attention. After a second of shuffling from side to side and twisting his head from side to side observe Kite closely he finally responds with a loud “I love you!” in English.

“I’m not allowed to take over his business, and I can hire a translator,” Hirakoba says dismissively, even as he spins the sugar jar around and looks at the words again. He does know his English letters and can sound them out well enough, he just hasn’t cared enough about it to try. “And now I have a fluent speaker on call, it’s even easier.”

He really hates that bird though, but he likes watching how Kite’s expression softens when he looks at it, much more open about his fondness and his stomach does a weird flipflop as he dumps the teabags in the bin. “I hope you don’t make that face at people, Eishirou,” he says, smiling a bit as he picks up the mugs and makes to head back to the living room with them. “You might make multiple people swoon over you.”

Hirakoba puts the cups down carefully on a sad looking coffee table before he sits on the couch again, looking marginally more relaxed than before on it. It’s at least a comfortable couch, better than the ones at his home that look great, but are uncomfortable and bad to slouch on.

“He won’t be able to use his connections to get you foreign clients, though,” Kite points out, though he’s actually not entirely sure whether Hirakoba intends to become the sort of actively working lawyer that even takes clients. “And I have too much of an accent to translate in an official capacity.”

Living in Hawaii had taken care of a lot of his accent and improved his vocabulary a great deal, but Kite is pretty aware he doesn’t sound anywhere near native.

Pi-chan nips at his earlobe to catch his attention for an impromptu warbled series of notes that Kite doesn’t recognize as anything he’s specifically taught him, and then he has to hold back a laugh as he scoldingly tuts at the bird when it tries to lift the sleeve of his shirt to crawl in. It’s distracting enough that he blinks at Hirakoba’s observation somewhat owlishly. “What face?” he asks, poking at Pi-chan’s feet to make him get onto Kite’s hand for easier transport. “I hope you’re not feeling seduced, Hirakoba-kun. There’s a child in the room.”


Pi-chan whistles in agreement, not realising he’s calling himself a child, and Kite wiggles his hand around to distract from his sitting down on the couch, knowing his bird can fuss over sudden height changes. Fortunately, Pi-chan doesn’t notice until they’re already seated, at which point he excitedly runs back up Kite’s arm to pluck at the deep v-neck he’s wearing until Kite gives in and pulls the fabric up enough that his bird can burrow inside and stick his smug face out over the edge of the deepest point of Kite’s neckline.

“Well, I have a few years until I’ll be able to practice, anyway. Plenty of time to learn English,” Hirakoba says dismissively. And besides, he has a feeling that he won’t be dealing with foreign clients if he follows some sort of preset path in life that his grandmother has laid out for him. He’s pretty sure she’s already building connections amongst her circle for him to just slide into when he’s older and Hirakoba just sighs at the thought.

“I’ll show you in a moment,” what sort of face Kite’s making at Pi-chan, so that he can actually understand. “It’s not exactly being seduced….” Hirakoba waits, watching vaguely curiously at the distracting and then Pi-chan hiding in the shirt which is enough to draw out a bit of a laugh out of him. Even if surely the claws are digging into the fabric to keep him there.

Hirakoba shuffles a bit closer to Kite, prodding him in the leg to get his attention. “It’s like this.” And he lets his face relax into something almost tender, with a fond smile as he stares at Kite, certainly in a way that Hirakoba associates with post-sex doziness and petting. And then he abruptly pulls away and curls up on his end of his couch, cradling his cup of tea. “It’s quite a confronting look, coming from you.” It makes him think about soft kisses and hair petting, actually..

“They say learning a language is easiest when you are still young,” Kite says in the tone of voice Towami likes to call his know-it-all voice. Unlike Towami, Hirakoba has no real reason to listen to him though, and he does it more out of habit than any real expectations.

Pi-chan has figured out where his shirt is tight enough to just keep him suspended and fluffs up against his chest to get comfortable, looking entirely too content for a bird. It’s an adorable sight that leaves Kite gooey and entirely unprepared when he looks up to see Hirakoba demonstrate his apparent face while he goofs around with his bird.

Softness isn’t something he sees a lot out of Hirakoba, and if it had been a few weeks earlier he might not have even recognized the expression as such. It makes something twist in his gut, and he has to forcibly remind himself Hirakoba still hasn’t agreed to anything as of yet even as he watches the expression shutter back into something distant while Hirakoba scuttles off to the far end of the couch.

“I do not look like that,” he protests when the flutter in his chest settles back down and he remembers that was meant to be a demonstration. He leans forward to get his cup, apologetically skritching Pi-chan under the chin when the bird titters in irritation at being jostled and tries to sink his talons in Kite’s chest for purchase. “No claws, Pikki.”

It’s worth it, for seeing Kite thrown momentarily off kilter by the expression and Hirakoba smiles smugly at him from his spot on the couch, finally drawing his feet up to curl up properly as he fully starts to relax. “You do,” he says, taking a sip of tea and reaching out with a leg to curl his toes against Kite’s thigh. “It’s kind of sweet, but also not something you want to show other people.”

Especially since Kite has worked quite hard over the years in building up a particular reputation for his personality and… seeing something different to that, well, Hirakoba can personally attest to it being a rather addictive thing. Although he has to remind himself that this is only a temporary thing, this strange pseudo-relationship agreement thing they’re in right now, at least until Kite goes to the US. “Like I said, it might make them swoon and fall in love.”

Having a bird in the shirt seems a bit inconvenient and Hirakoba stares at the fluffy, much too smug looking bird head. “Are you going to be able to sort through the boxes with him there?” Hirakoba asks, nodding at Pi-chan. “He doesn’t look like he’s going to let go of you anytime soon.”

It’s hard to be appropriately annoyed at Hirakoba while Pi-chan is close and feeling cuddly, but that doesn’t stop Kite from glaring at him. “Well excuse me for not being made of stone,” he says, forcing his face into something more neutral now that he’s been made aware of his lapse in relative stoicism.

A little red-faced at the idea that he’d manage seducing people by just playing around with his pet bird, he pointedly focuses his attention on his tea. It’s in one of the more plain mugs his parents own, a pale blue one with strawberries printed around the rim he suspects his sister probably uses the most. “Are you saying you’re having to resist swooning, Hirakoba-kun? It’s okay to let it out, you know, I’ll try not to judge too much.”

After taking a swig of his tea and deciding it’s too warm still to properly enjoy he puts it back down on the table, much to Pi-chan’s dissatisfaction. “He won’t stay there, he has too much energy for that. But even if he wanted to, well. Here, watch.”

Kite cups his hands together in front of his chest. “Pikky,” he calls out, earning himself an upside down look from his chest, followed by a confident ‘haisai!’. Which is adorable, but not quite what he was going for. He calls the bird’s name again, getting another greeting in return. It’s only at the third attempt Pi-chan seems to realize what he wants, and with some wriggling and talons scrabbling where he’d prefer not to have them the bird flies into his hands instead. “Did you want to hold him?”

“Are you saying I am made of stone?” Hirakoba asks, the question coming out a little bit more sharp than he intends and rather at odds with his relaxed posture. The warm beverage is a nice way to get him feeling more settled in the apartment that still throws him off kilter a bit when he glances around it. “I only swoon when you direct it at me, Eishirou. Not when I’m the third party.” He’s joking, but he works quite hard to keep his face straight, sipping at his tea to help hide his smile and stop himself from laughing.

Hirakoba does actually like watching Kite soften when he plays with Pi-chan, a much… almost immature side of him coming out that he hasn’t really seen much in the past few years. The high pitched peeping talking does make him laugh a bit too. Almost enough that he’s tempted to take Kite up on the offer to hold him, even with past experiences with the bird being rather negative. “Maybe,” he says, inching a little closer and moving to hold out a hand.

At least until Pi-chan spots him and gives him a threatening “Goya!” which makes Hirakoba sink back into the couch corner looking grumpy. “I definitely don’t. He hates me.”

“Only sometimes,” Kite says, only half joking. “I meant you saying it was confronting to see me making faces at my bird, though. I got him when I was eight, you know. I’d be more worried if I didn’t play with him anymore just because I’m older now.”

Pi-chan nestles in his hands happily enough to let him peer down at his shirt to check for damage to the fabric or his skin. He thinks there’s some angry red claw marks on his chest, but they’re far enough down it isn’t overly obvious. The fabric has a few tiny holes, but it’s stretchy enough he’s confident he can pull them back out with minor damage. “I’ll be sure to remember that for later,” he says, knowing full well that later might come with a rejection. “I don’t get to see Pi-chan as much as I see you, though. Clearly he’s my main date right now.”

He reaches out to put Pi-chan into Hirakoba’s outstretched hand, only to get a scolding nip at his fingers when he starts laughing again at the semi-threat, accidentally shaking the bird. Pi-chan hops from nesting in his hands to sitting on just his thumb, threatening “I’ll feed you goya!” another two times to show his displeasure.

“He doesn’t hate you,” Kite says, still shaking with laughter. “He says it to strangers. The full version is when he’s startled or annoyed, but just ‘goya’ is basically hello. I think he forgot you were there.”

As if on cue, Pi-chan turns to Hirakoba, gives him a curious once-over before exclaiming “Goo-ya!” again.

“I have treats in my pocket,” Kite offers, an attempt at a peace offer that comes across only partially sincerely in the face of his obvious amusement. “You can try and win him over with one if you want.”

“I suppose since you only see him once in a while, I can accept that” And just be privately glad that the bird isn’t in Tokyo with Kite, since he has a feeling any time he went over to cuddle, it would just result in goya related threats being peeped at him from a corner, which is kind of a terrifying thought.

And maybe it’s worth it to see Kite laughing so freely when normally it’s much more restrained and Hirakoba’s expression softens a little from the grumpiness and sulking. Even if the threats make his eyebrow twitch.

“Fine. Maybe for a little bit, I can try holding him.” Hirakoba puts his cup down first before he scoots a little closer, holding out a hand for Kite to put the bird in. He’s not really a holding animal type, particularly since his pet of choice is just a tank filled with fish, but, it’s fine.

Kite doesn’t like dwelling on having to leave his bird behind again when he has to move on, so he doesn’t respond directly. It’s probably for the best he can’t stay with his parents while he is vacationing in Okinawa, so he doesn’t have the opportunity to get overused to spending time with the bird before leaving. When he’d first gone to America, Pi-chan would apparently sulk for hours, and try and sit on the phone whenever he was out of his cage, waiting for Kite to call and be put on speakerphone.

Kite holds his hand next to Hirakoba’s, shaking his fingers slightly to get Pi-chan to leap off his fingers onto Hirakoba’s. He shifts sideways on the couch, partially to keep an eye on things, partially to be able to pull the bag of treats out of his pocket, huffing out an amused snorting noise when Pi-chan goes completely still at seeing it, before letting out an excited ‘oooooooooh’ that gradually swells louder.

He shakes a treat into his hand, closing it to get it out of sight before holding it out for Hirakoba to take. “Hold it up for him, don’t get too startled if he pecks at it.”

Hirakoba’s fingers twitch at the sudden weight - more than he’d almost expected. He’s not sure what to do so settles for just keeping his hand still, trying not to think too much about the weird feeling of claws on his skin or the softness of the feathers. His expression becomes slightly panicked as Pi-chan suddenly starts whistling for something and he visibly tenses as the bird gets taller in his hand. What the fuck.

It takes him a few moments to realise what it’s all about and he ineffectively nudges Kite with his knee to get him to stop laughing. Hirakoba does as he’s told for once, holding out the treat in his other hand, twitching as Pi-chan jumps onto that one to start pecking off bits of grain.

“I definitely prefer fish,” he says bluntly and he wants to touch the feathers and maybe run a finger down Pi-chan’s back to feel the texture, but he also stares at the claws that are gripping around his thumb and the wings seem to ruffle warningly. “Even if my aquarium here has been protesting how bad my sanshin playing has gotten.”

Kite can tell Hirakoba is uncomfortable, and he’s pretty sure Pi-chan can too. Where the bird is usually mischievous and a little rude, he stays unusually still on Hirakoba’s hand, devouring his seed treat with a definite improvement in tablemanners from his usual self.

Nudging his knee back lightly to not disturb the moment for Hirakoba and Pi-chan, Kite fondly rubs over the cockatiel’s cheek with his pinky finger, earning himself a rewarding clicking noise that sounds suspiciously like the way he unconsciously clicks with his tongue when he’s peeved by something, a noise Pi-chan clearly hasn’t taken the context along with.

“You’re so cute together though,” he says, fondly taking in the picture. “You even match. The two long-haired blondes in my life.” As if to prove his point, Pi-chan turns around to face Hirakoba and puffs up his yellow fringe, preening. The thought that his bird is trying to impress his, well, whatever they could be makes him smile.

“How does a fish express distaste for your sanshin playing?” Kite has seen the fish tanks in both Okinawa and Tokyo, and he’s never particularly gotten the impression the fish respond to much unless they’re actively being startled.

When there’s no claws digging into his hand and Pi-chan does nothing more than just sit there and eat… Hirakoba relaxes a little. Even with Kite petting him, there’s no extra movement.

“Cute.” Hirakoba repeats, raising an eyebrow, sparing Kite half a glance. He finally gives in and carefully pets Pi-chan on the chest with one finger, smiling a little at the preening that follows. “The long-haired blondes that you reserve special swoon-worthy faces for,” he says, laughing a little to himself as he pets Pi-chan again. “Should I be offended that I’m on the same level as a bird?”

Hirakoba sighs. “They’re not coming out to eat properly until I fix up my fingering,” he complains, picking up stray bits of seed that have made their way off his hand. “I’m just out of practice and my grandmother normally plays for them.” And since she usually plays casually every other day, of course she’s better. “It’s possible they’ve also gotten used to a female voice singing at them…”

“Very cute,” Kite confirms, sitting back a little now that it’s obvious the two aren’t going to murder each other. It’s true too, in part because of the slight apprehension the usually overconfident Hirakoba is showing, and Pi-chan’s unusually good behavior in response.

“My favorite blondes. Don’t be offended, Pi-chan is superior to the vast majority of humans out there,” Kite says, laughing again as Pi-chan demonstrates his comedic timing with another proud chirp. “Don’t swoon while you’re holding him, though. He might get jealous and poop on you.”

It’s difficult for Kite to imagine fish caring overmuch about musical nitpicks, but he’s also the first to concede he doesn’t know much about fish. “Do they not come out if they’re hungry? Do they actually need to be sang to to survive?” Pi-chan apparently already raises hell if his sister is too late with feeding times, so a pet with survival skills that poor seems... inconvenient.

“I think you must be the only person besides my grandmother who can get away with calling me ‘cute’,” Hirakoba says, before he turns to Pi-chan and talks quietly to him, in an odd rolling language that lacks the harder consonants of Japanese. It earns him a confused tilt of the head and Pi-chan peeps questioningly at him and responds with a squawk on his own. That perhaps he can concede is cute.

Hirakoba likes to think he’s getting better at petting, stroking a finger finally down Pi-chan’s back and lightly along the tail feathers. That makes the claws shuffle around his hand a bit and Hirakoba twitches. “You’ll have to avoid doing anything swoon-worthy, then,” Hirakoba says, his mind now on the idea of a bird pooing on him. “Avoid looking too in love around me and Pi-chan.”

He has to keep picking up pieces of pecked off seed from his lap and the couch and Hirakoba puts them back on his hand. “If you leave the fish food in there, they’ll eat it eventually. But it’s just easier to sing at them and they all come out for feeding time.” And it’s not that good to just leave food in the tank for judgemental tropical fish. “It’s just a sign that I need to practice more. I haven’t taken lessons since junior high.”

The language of the Hirakoba twins sounds a lot less sinister when it is being spoken to his bird. It’s been a while since Kite has heard it, and he still can’t really make heads or tails of it. “I still can’t believe you can make up an entirely new language, but English is too bothersome,” he says, whistling few notes Pi-chan automatically finishes with the traditional Okinawan festival chants, to keep the bird from getting too confused.

Going by the way Pi-chan seems to be getting ready to preen his feathers, Hirakoba is doing an acceptable job of keeping him entertained. Kite is pretty sure they’re being a little too idle and the cockatiel will fly off any moment to cause a racket hanging off the ceiling light or something equally stupid, but he doesn’t want to disturb the moment to take the bird back. “I’m not in love with my bird, Hirakoba-kun. You’ll just have to try your hardest to avoid swooning at my face. I’m sure you have to resist that all the time, though, so you have plenty of practice.”

“They sound like a selective audience,” Kite notes, trying to recall if he’s ever heard Hirakoba play a sanshin. “Do you have a sanshin in Tokyo, or is your tank over there equally specific with their preferences?”


“It’s not an entirely new language,” Hirakoba says, laughing a bit as Pi-chan talks again. The fact that Kite had taught him that is… testament to how much of a dork Kite actually is. “It’s just some words and a few phrases. Nothing too big.” Born out of sharing a bedroom for a few too many years, always being around each other for most of elementary school and then continuing to sneak into each other’s beds long after they’d been split into separate rooms.

He’s learning that if he makes a soft peeping-esque noise at Pi-chan, he gets taller and his yellow head feathers start to puff up. Hirakoba glances at Kite’s admission that he’s not in love with Pi-chan and smiles a bit. “Good, I’d be rather jealous if you were,” he says before he realises exactly what he’s implying, pausing awkwardly. “You’re not allowed to swoon either, Eishirou. No matter how cute I look.”

“My fish in Tokyo like dance music. Just things with a good beat.” It’s rather nice to just be able to play music on his phone and not have to worry about setting up for a concert every day. The treat’s all gone, so are the little fragments of seed that’ve been pecked up. And Hirakoba panics a little as Pi-chan’s wings start rustling and he holds his hands out to Kite to take it away.

“It’s still enough to have a recognizable conversation with,” Kite argues. “That’s bound to be harder to learn than English.”

“It wouldn’t work out. Pi-chan is a bit small for me.” Hirakoba’s inquisitive tittering at the bird he’d been grumping at earlier makes Kite want to grin again, but the talk of ‘looking in love’ makes him too conscious of the expression on his own face to let himself. “I’ll try and contain myself.”

“Do they have any opinions on sanshin music?” Kite still isn’t sure he understands the extent to which Hirakoba’s fish actually care for music, but it’s not like he’s never made odd concessions for his bird. He lifts a hand to take Pi-chan back, not wanting to make Hirakoba uncomfortable by asking him to hold the cockatiel longer even if it’s a cute sight, but Pi-chan evidently disagrees and takes off, flying onto the corner of the table instead.

“We’re both a little rusty,” Hirakoba confesses - which seems to be a state of a lot of things related to Okinawa with him, actually, now that he thinks about it. “We’ve been having to practise it a bit more lately with our grandmother taking us to a lot of places together.” With brand new matching outfits that Hirakoba loathes. Thankfully with his sister dyeing her hair now, although not to the same blonde he has, his grandmother’s been pestering him less about going back to his natural colour.

“And I imagine you can’t kiss him properly, nor can you cuddle in a bed naked,” he drops his tone almost suggestively, even as he keeps making soft sounds at Pi-chan to watch the way his head tilts and he mimics the sounds back. It seems almost scandalous though, to make mention of those sorts of private things in Kite’s childhood home and Hirakoba has to bite his tongue to stop himself from following up with another comment about how he really would like a kiss now, actually, now that the atmosphere has relaxed and they’re just making soft jabs at each other.

Hirakoba jumps a bit when Pi-chan flies off but he dusts of his hands and reaches for his tea to settle back down, purposely scooting a little bit closer to Kite. “I haven’t been able to bring a sanshin to Tokyo to try it with them. They don’t mind me singing though, perhaps I should try it one day.”

It sounds similar to the way Kite’s Uchinaaguchi is gradually getting less effortless since his old mentor’s passing, so Kite nods in understanding. “You still sound as incomprehensible as ever to me, so if that was the goal, you’ve succeeded.”

“Please don’t scandalise my bird,” he scolds, even though he’s fairly sure that even in just the short few months his sister has been following her idols Pi-chan has probably been exposed to more suggestiveness than in the previous years combined. “He’s just a child on the inside. He doesn’t need to know these things.”

“I’m surprised your grandmother hasn’t insisted, honestly.” He takes a sip of his tea to test whether it’s cooled down enough, and gulps it down when he decides it has. “Made you take a sanshin along to keep your skills sharp, I mean.” Another skill Hirakoba has apparently been letting go to waste.

Putting his mug back down, he sits back for a moment to look around the living room, suddenly oddly aware that with his parents’ plans to move, this might be one of the last times he is in his childhood home. It’s a strange thought, and he has a brief flash of wanting to hold onto the space for memories alone, even though he’s never thought of himself as fond of the place.

Shaking his head, he glances over at the boxes. They’re bigger than he expected when his mother told him there was old stuff of his stored here still, and he wonders if they’ve been taking up a corner of his sister’s room all these years. “I should get started at taking a look at those boxes.”

Hirakoba just shakes his head judgementally at Kite - him and his stupid mothering tendencies that come out at inopportune times. And the judgemental tendencies too, that he can feel coming off as Kite is no doubt thinking about all the things Hirakoba’s let rust away out of sheer lack of practise and effort. He has a feeling that if he pushes it though, it will circle back around to him and his martial arts training, so Hirakoba quickly squashes the topic and ignores the reply.

Besides, it’s not that important when Kite suddenly speaks about getting started on what he came here for and Hirakoba reaches out to grab onto his shirt, eyeballing Pi-chan who’s hanging from the light and watching them upside down. “Since you’re in love and I’m swooning, I think you owe me a kiss before you leave me to sit on the couch by myself,” he says, watching Kite closely as he purposely keeps his tone light and teasing. They’re still letting themselves exist in this strange bubble before Kite heads off to the US, this is fine, right?

Kite blinks in surprise. It isn’t that the topic has been far from his mind at any point in the past week or so, but he’s still continuously caught off guard whenever it manifests outside of the small corner he keeps the fantasy of a positive outcome contained in.

He glances over at Pi-chan, who is looking down at them with interest. He probably wants to know if they’ll get up and play with him soon, or maybe if Kite will give him any more treats, but he still feels a bit awkward talking such subjects in front of his bird.

“Are you actually jealous of Pikky?” He asks, a bit sheepishly as he lets himself be pulled closer instead of pulling away to get around to opening the boxes. “I guess it’s fair enough, since you’re having to share me with another blonde today.”

Hirakoba moves a hand up to Kite’s hair and then pauses as he realises there’s product through it and carefully styled. And he clenches his fingers together, letting his hand fall on the back of Kite’s neck instead. That’s frustrating, it just makes him want to mess it up more, but he respects the importance of hair, just like Kite does with his own… so. Hirakoba sighs and moves closer to press a kiss to his cheek.

“I’m not jealous of a bird,” Hirakoba says firmly, although maybe he is a little with how much it’s made Kite laugh freely and in a genuinely pleasant way, not because he’s being an ass and getting enjoyment out of that. “And you’re the one who doesn’t like to share.”

The way Hirakoba’s hands move, and the purpose they do it with are an odd contrast to the fluttering grip on Kite’s neck and the polite kiss on the cheek, no different from any of the thousands Hirakoba has given before without asking.

He lifts one hand to lightly grab at Hirakoba’s chin, tilting his head so he can at least press their lips together. He really isn’t looking at escalating anything, not with the intensity they sparked between them a few days ago, which is hard to think about without turning red even when Hirakoba isn’t sitting right next to him.

Stomping that thought back into its own little corner, he lets go of Hirakoba’s chin to gently pet some of his fringe out of his face instead. “You’re right, I don’t. Still, there’s no need to be jealous. I don’t need a third blond in my life.”

Feeling a little giddily embarrassed at the admission, he pushes off the couch to pick up the uppermost box and put it on the floor in the middle of the room, figuring the contents are probably safer than the conversation topic at hand.

Hirakoba smiles at the kiss and that’s satisfying enough for now. Especially with not being able to intensify that with not being able to run his hands through Kite’s hair and pull him closer, which would just end up frustrating him. It’s just a reminder of their awkward stance in their friendship right now and Hirakoba settles back on the couch to fix up his fringe and watch Kite.

“What about Tachibana-kun?” Hirakoba asks, pulling his feet up and grabbing his cup of tea to continue drinking. “He’s a blond and he calls you ‘Eishirou’.” Which is something Hirakoba finds… unsettling and odd. “And he thinks you’re cool, which is hilarious.” Nevermind that Hirakoba did at one point consider setting Kite and Tachibana up on a date, which was never going to happen now.

“He’s too nice though,” Hirakoba says, more talking to himself now as he curls up and sips consideringly at the tea. “Too nice and my hair’s better than his.”

Kite is expecting the comeback. He’s known Hirakoba far too long to assume he wouldn’t prod around for some extra ego stroking. Still, Tachibana is an unexpected tangent, and he looks up from opening his box to give Hirakoba an odd look. “What about Tachibana-kun? Clearly his judgement skills are in the right place, but I’m not certain why he’s chosen to be quite so familiar in addressing me either.”

The first thing to catch his eyes in the box is a tangle of medals, mostly martial arts related, with on top of the other the golden medal from the Kyushu regional tennis tournament, which he holds up for Hirakoba to see before he lays it out on the floor next to the row of karate tournament accolades, a fond memory of the path he chose not to walk. “You do have very nice hair, of course. Trying to imagine you with your natural hair color after all these years seems odd.”

He turns to the box again and freezes a second when he notices a familiar bundle of purple and light gray; his old regulars jersey, the final version his team made the Nationals in. Lifting it out gingerly, he holds up the jacket he knows would likely not fit him anymore. Pi-chan flutters from the ceiling light onto the edge of the box, clearly recognizing the jacket. “Higa tuuuuuuuu~, haide!”

“I did for a while seriously consider him as a contender for setting you up on a date,” Hirakoba says, laughing to himself. Tachibana, if he remembers that post correctly, had been one of the people who had wondered why he didn’t just date Kite himself. A slightly awkward realisation now, with their current situation.

He smiles grimly at the medal he’s shown - very fond memories that are soured by the memories of Nationals and then what followed. He doesn’t think he even has his anymore, thrown out with the rest of his tennis things. “I haven’t even really changed the style that much since I dyed it,” Hirakoba says, fiddling with the ends of his hair that hang over his shoulders. “Your hair changed a lot over the years. I like it now though.”

Hirakoba’s smile vanishes when he sees the jersey again and he’s almost glad for Pi-chan’s interruption that makes him laugh. “Pass it here, Eishirou,” he says, pulling off his own light jacket to expose his much disliked upper arms and still bruised forearms. Let me model it for your pleasure.”

“...Did you, now,” Kite asks skeptically, trying to see the logic behind setting him up on a date with Tachibana. He’s not bad looking, Kite supposes, and they do seem to have a number of overlapping interests but... the thought is just a weird one to him all over.

Hirakoba hasn’t been following his tennis career, he suddenly remembers, and he grins as he reaches out to touch his hair, remembering the period of time he’d kept it about shoulder length. “Did you know I actually did dye it blond for a while?” He asks, remembering the blond ponytail he’d sported around the time of his final exams, where he hadn’t had time to keep up with his appearance in between his studies and the junior tennis tournaments the school had been pushing him to enter as a final push before moving into the adult category tournaments.

Kite isn’t sure exactly how he should interpret Hirakoba’s reaction, the brief fluctuation in mood before Pi-chan brings it back up, but he holds the jacket out for Hirakoba. “I’m pretty sure it’ll be big on you,” he warns, though Hirakoba’s own jersey hadn’t exactly been properly sized, to hide his shoulders.

“… I don’t believe you,” Hirakoba says, staring at Kite and trying very hard to imagine him with blond hair. It’s just not an image he can really easily accept, especially since his own interpretation of blond hair is so tied to his own. “Were there not enough blonds in your life or something, at the time to keep you satisfied?”

Since surely it would’ve happened when… they weren’t talking. Or when Kite was overseas and hadn’t been back to Japan in a while.

He hops up to get the jersey, shaking it a little bit before he pulls it on, with much the same flourish that he did every single day while changing into their uniform back in junior high. Especially as the only member of the team that wore his jacket on a daily basis. “Stop bragging about how you were still taller than me now back in junior high,” he says, any sort of complaining tone lost in his distraction as he admires the jersey. It does hang a little differently than his own did, since Kite had cut them all to their own specific measurements, but it brings back nice memories anyway. “I know I haven’t grown.”

“There’s pictures online,” Kite says, trying to recall what tournaments he’d been playing in at the time. Compared to his current schedule, which is calmer than he recalls it ever being despite his school assignments and reading, the blur that was his senior year in high school is difficult to remember specific tournaments in. “Just look for my name, 2015 or something.”

He’s not going to tell Hirakoba he let it go back to his natural black for a while after that because Katarina asked him to. There’s absolutely no reason he can think of to bring her up around Hirakoba. He does recall his old roommate’s advice to never mention exes on a date, which leaves him floundering a moment as he tries to figure out if this could be seen as one.

Not by Hirakoba’s standards, surely?

Then Hirakoba is wearing his old jersey, which hangs off of him just loosely enough it gives an extra illusory layer of youth to him, and Kite blinks. “You really haven’t changed your styling much,” he says with a fond laugh. “I almost feel like I should be telling you to run laps or something. I’m missing the shorts, though.”

He gives Hirakoba a slow, considering look as he wonders if he could convince him to wear an updated version, just to give him a bit of nostalgia to take back to Tokyo with him.

“I’ll have to look it up, then.” So he can laugh at Kite’s bad hair choices because… no matter how many ways he tries to think about it, it’s just not a good look for him. “What prompted it? Just needing a change from the dark hair?”

He returns to the couch, flopping down on it while happily bundled up in the jersey, pulling at the cuffs and appreciating that even back then, Kite’s sewing was… very good. “My hair was longer back then,” he says, trying to think about other changes. “And I had a bit more muscle definition.” Not much else though, really. The way Kite’s jersey is just a bit too big does make him miss his own made-to-size one that had been so comfortable.

“You’ll just have to imagine my bare legs by yourself,” Hirakoba doesn’t think Kite would really appreciate him sitting pantsless on his parent’s couch. “And if you told me to run laps now… I might have bruised knuckles right now, Eishirou, but I’d still punch you.” He flops back to lie on the couch, fiddling with the zip to do it up all the way, tucking his chin into the collar and feeling very warm.

Straightening his glasses, Kite gives a suspicious look at the dubious note in Hirakoba’s voice. It hadn’t been the best look for him, but it also hadn’t looked bad. “I was too busy between school exams and keeping active enough in tournaments to keep my scholarship to do much with my appearance, so I dyed it to keep my hair from being too boring.”

The way the sleeves of his old jersey are slightly longer on Hirakoba’s arms than they were on him adds to the oddly adorable factor Kite doesn’t want to admit to finding charming. Surely there’s something wrong about appreciating allusions to someone’s fourteen years old self even if they’re not actually fourteen, and Kite has been quite naked in bed with the current version.

“You’d refuse, and then I’d threaten to feed you goya until you and Kai-kun gave in and ran... half a lap before slacking off elsewhere,” Kite says, smiling nostalgically, smile widening as he catches sight of the row of black book covers that were hidden below his old jersey. He holds up one of the old club-logbooks, pressed back into perfect flatness over time even though he knows the pages all curled around the edges from the humidity long before they completely filled up. “How many explicit mentions of you two giving me a hard time are in here, you think?”

Hirakoba just looks even more doubtful at the explanation. Kite being boring is just a funny concept, even if Hirakoba’s one of the people that ribs him about it on occasion, mostly when Kite doesn’t give in to his demands. But even with undyed, unstyled hair, truthfully, Kite’s not at all. But, admitting that is just embarrassing so Hirakoba just hums vaguely, not really answering at all.

He laughs and rolls onto his side to watch Kite. “You can’t complain too much about us slacking off,” Hirakoba says with a grin. “It pissed off fatty Saotome too, and I think you got a bit of a kick out of that every single time.” Besides, it wasn’t like Kite hadn’t expected them to slack off. And given that he hadn’t followed them to make them complete the laps just meant that he hadn’t really minded all that much either.

Hirakoba gets momentarily distracted by the rather obvious smile on Kite’s face before he spots what’s causing it and he laughs openly. He remembers those stupid notebooks and how diligently Kite had recorded the club activities in them. “Probably at least one a week,” he says, waving a hand at Kite to toss him one to flip through. “You liked it, don’t even deny it, Eishirou. You’re secretly a masochist.”

“That’s the same year I pierced my ears, too,” Kite muses, feeling at his earlobes. He’s not currently wearing anything in them, having left most of his jewelry in Tokyo so he wouldn’t needlessly need to lug it around.

“That’s true,” he agrees, entertained at the memory of various of his old teammates playing up acts of rebellion (or, on occasion, general stupidity) to draw their coach away from the main practice going on, possibly inadvertently buying Kite the time needed to run things his own way. “I’m sure nobody was sad to see the old man go when they let him go.”

“That sounds generous. Between the occasional fashion faux pas and club-related offenses I’m pretty sure it will be higher.” He briefly flips open one of the notebooks, which seems to be on a week where he was preoccupied with one of Tanishi’s weight loss attempts after splurging, with one mention of Kai showing up late on the Thursday, and then hands it over to Hirakoba, followed by the three other volumes. “And if I’m the masochist, what does that make the pair constantly setting themselves up for punishment?”

There’s also another, much thicker leather-bound tome next to them he realises with some tightness in his throat as the photobook the first and second years on the team put together for him and the others before graduation. On the cover is a group photo, taken shortly before the National tournament, with all 24 members of the tennis club, regulars in the center. It had been, he thinks fondly, a truly excellent year.

“Wow, that was truly a year of rebellion for you,” Hirakoba says, eyeing Kite’s ears. He hasn’t really spent much time noticing the earrings, really. They’re just… part of Kite’s variety of accessories and overall fashion choices. “Are you going to tell me next that you got a nipple piercing as well? A tattoo somewhere? A little goya on your ass?” The last one, obviously not, since Hirakoba’s seen Kite entirely naked, but it’s a funny thought.

It would’ve been better if Saotome had been gotten rid of a lot earlier than after they finished up, but the words just feel bitter in his mouth even as he thinks it and he can’t bring himself to voice that outloud. Besides, thinking about Saotome just makes him annoyed and they’re meant to be reminiscing on the good times. “It’s me openly being a masochist, it’s not a secret,” Hirakoba says, accepting the books and starting to flick through one. “Yuujirou as well. I think we’d have to be, to stick around with you for so long.” He’s teasing as he lands on a page outlining the outcomes of different doubles strategies for him. That had been a shitty week, he remembered that.

“You’re criticising Yuujirou’s clothes here,” Hirakoba says, shaking his head a bit as he flips to the next page. More training regimes that he remembers with phantom aches in his muscles. “Oh, comments about me and Tanishi having a fight.”

Kite snorts. “Yes, because I was a good child who never stepped out of line until I pierced my ears and bleached my hair. I broke loose from my previously perfectly boring, safe existence to rebel. I’m such a cliché.”

Deeper in the box are another team photos, as well as several pairs of shoes he’s quite sure won’t fit anymore. It’s a pity, too, as several of them are quite nice in design. In fact, he recognises one of them as a pair of Timberlands he’d spent a long time saving up his allowance for. “If you’re telling me there’s additional context to my threatening you with vegetables for punishment I need to know about, I may need to kick you out of the house.”

“Ah yes,” Kite remembers quite clearly the kind of squabbles Tanishi and Hirakoba got into. “That both sounds like just about any other week. Anything more specific to help me place it?”

“It’s a good thing you didn’t have bleached hair when you met my grandmother the other week,” he says, laughing at the thought. Mostly because she would have seen it as absolute proof that Kite was a bad influence on him, no matter how much Hirakoba tries to convince her otherwise.

It’s funny reading into the club logbook that had been so meticulously maintained by Kite, as a strange snapshot day by day by whatever he deemed most important to note down. “You wouldn’t,” Hirakoba says, quite unconcerned by with the threat. “It’s raining and you wouldn’t want me to get sick.”

Hirakoba suddenly starts laughing. “I think it’s the week that I had my first few experiments with a guy in the clubroom,” he says. “Your comment about it sounds so clinical. It’s nice to know one of us kept track of things.” Hirakoba puts the book down on his lap and tries to remember. “I think he was the soccer club captain and he kept making eyes at me in PE. He wasn’t interested in the end though.”

“Technically,” Kite says, frowning slightly, “it is? I need to bleach slightly to get the dye for my current color to stick properly.” He assumes Hirakoba’s grandmother probably doesn’t believe the faint purple hue is natural.

“You’re already quite sick in the head if being force fed vegetables is a kink of yours,” And the slight flush covering Kite’s face has nothing to do with his general discomfort with such vulgarity. “I’m sure getting physically sick would only improve your general disposition.”

The next things he finds in the box are his old karate gi and some wooden practice weapons. “I know I said to pick something to help me place the week, but I would actually like to unremember this now. And the fight with Tanishi-kun was because you kept insinuating you had used his shirt to wipe yourself off. You’re actually a terrible person.”

“I’ll feed you goya!” Pi-chan chimes in, largely aimed at Kite jossing the box. The timing still makes him laugh, though, accidentally shaking the box even more and making the bird chirp indignantly and fly off, landing next to one of the shoes he’s placed next to the box instead.

“Be quiet, Eishirou, don’t ruin her delusion,” Hirakoba says, rolling onto his stomach and propping the next logbook up to keep looking through it. “I don’t want her to blame you entirely for the hair dyeing.”

Kite’s endlessly surprising and Hirakoba looks up from a meticulous record of the entire group of regular’s letters-to-Saotome-punishment and laughs a little. “Being force fed goya isn’t a turn on for me, don’t worry,” Hirakoba says, turning over the page. “I don’t like things being put into my mouth in general, for future reference.” He pauses at that and narrows his eyes at Kite. “Actually, I could probably blame you for my dislike of oral, now that I think about it.”

What a funny thought.

Even funnier is the reminder about that particular teasing of Tanishi and Hirakoba smothers a laugh in the logbook. “I never did anything further than kiss people in the clubroom,” Hirakoba says, grinning. “It’s his fault for believing I’d be that awful.” He makes a noise at Pi-chan who looks over at him, tilting his head and Hirakoba gets another “goya!” out of the bird.

“... I just remembered we spoke with Tachibana-kun about your grandmother once. Considering he could be seen as the initial cause of both of us dyeing our hair, she might dislike him even more than I anticipated.”

Kite picks a heavy, dusty aluminum covered jewelry box out of the box next, going silent as he traces his fingers over the lid before he flips it open. Inside is an odd, cobbled together collection of buttons and beads, and the occasional pretty piece of glass or seashells he’d picked up all over the island while chasing down Kai, and kept just in case. “I’ll keep that in mind,” Kite says, too distracted by his own fond memories to be properly scandalised. “And yet you accept food from anyone that offers, these days.”

Pi-chan, apparently on some grand adventure, clambers into the shoe so only his lower half is sticking out, and lets out another muffled titter. “Perhaps Tanishi-kun was merely being too good of faith, taking you at face value. But really, you shouldn’t have been using the club room for such things anyway.”

Hirakoba realises quite suddenly that he doesn’t … want to talk about his grandmother, whose presence, while he loves her dearly, around Kite just reminds him of harsh realities that have no place in this weirdly comfortable and squishy scene. “Let’s stop talking about my obaa,” he says abruptly, coming out harsher than he intends and he cringes a bit. “She’s…” able to be charmed, always going to be an issue, a lovely person… he doesn’t know what he’s meant to finish that sentence with, so he just sighs loudly and leaves it to Kite to fill in the blank.

“I can’t help that I’ve got a weakness for good food,” Hirakoba says, watching Kite’s face as he looks at some sort of treasure box. “Don’t get jealous, Eishirou, as long as there’s no goya in it, I enjoy yours a lot.” And as if hearing the word is enough of a cue, Pi-chan pips in with a “I’ll feed you goya!” that makes Hirakoba snort.

Talking about past flings of his, whether around the school, or in the privacy of the clubroom, or even those that happened more recently, it almost feels weirdly shameful right now coming from Kite and makes him uncomfortable. He just makes a quiet grumbly noise in response before he tucks himself up in the jersey more comfortably. Hirakoba rolls onto his side to show Kite his back and covers his face with the open log book so he can just lie in quiet for a few moments.

“She is,” Kite agrees dryly, fairly certain most of his own endings to that sentence are less flattering than Hirakoba’s are. Still, it’s almost easier agreeing to an unspoken expression than find a word the both of them can agree on.

Fishing another bird treat out of his pocket, Kite attempts to lure Pi-chan out of his old shoe. Not that they’re a size he can wear anymore, and not that being threatened by a shoe with a bird’s tail sticking out isn’t entertaining, but there’s more bird-friendly places to hang around without choking hazards if he decides to pry the sole loose.

“You’re like a stray cat,” he complains. “Feed you once and you will never stop showing up for more, but there’s not an ounce of loyalty. I suppose it does mean you’re actually eating, though, which I’ll take as a minor victory.”

He’s been a bit thrown off by the reminders of the small details of junior high and the tennis club, and the revelations about Kite’s home life, and weird flipflopping feelings in his stomach that he doesn’t want to dwell on. But lying in the quiet helps with refocusing himself and Hirakoba finally rolls back onto his back and closes the log book.

He pushes himself up off the couch and fusses with unzipping the jersey and fixing his hair before he wanders over to where Kite is and sits down behind him. And then drapes himself over Kite’s back, curling his arms around his waist. “If I get fat from eating too much, you won’t find me attractive anymore, and we won’t ever have sex and you’ll be a virgin forever,” Hirakoba tells him matter-of-factly, pressing his face into Kite’s neck and smothering a laugh. “You should worry more about that, than whether or not I’m eating properly.” Especially since he’d managed just fine without Kite actually physically being in Tokyo too to police his meals.

Also in the box is several classical novels Kite remembers reading for class, primarily, and a surprisingly large amount of manga he has no recollection of ever reading. Keeping Kai occupied while he did boring to watch things like sewing had been a full-time chore, once upon a time.

He is picking through an assortment of further miscellaneous notebooks, some of which seem to be schoolwork he’s never tossed for whatever reason, when Hirakoba drapes over him. He’s almost leaning into the touch when Hirakoba starts talking.

There’s a tenuous promise in the blunt declaration Hirakoba intends to be Kite’s first, which is the sole anchoring point that keeps him from just climbing into the now mostly empty box to hide away. Instead he pointedly looks at Pi-chan, who enviably is small enough to fit into a shoe without being overly suspicious about it. “The more weight you gain,” he starts, voice a bit shaky, “the more leverage I get for making you join my training. So maybe you should be more concerned about getting fat than getting rid of me.”

Hirakoba narrows his eyes as Kite speaks and jabs him in the stomach with his fingers, getting up onto his knees to be able to peer around at Kite’s face. “Is that why you insist on feeding me so much?” he asks accusingly, prodding Kite again. “Is it just a ploy to get me to train with you again?” Hirakoba’s 90% sure that Kite’s joking, that making sure he eats proper meals is more just about his mothering tendencies. But, he can still be a little suspicious.

This is an uncomfortable position for it, but Hirakoba can lean over a little more to press a kiss to Kite’s cheek. “You must be in cahoots with my family’s cook. She keeps laying out 13 dish breakfasts every morning and night for me, it’s killing my waistline.” Hirakoba sulks, going back to snuggling up against Kite and pressing his face into the back of Kite’s neck, hugging him around the middle. “And they’re so delicious, I can’t not eat them.”

“Oh no, you’re onto me,” Kite responds monotonously, feeling much more comfortable with the entire situation now that the more dangerous topic has subsided. “I’m feeding you meals with much lower fat and sugar ratios than a cake and coffee diet to get you fat and unattractive so you’ll have to literally fight off the carbs.”

It’s a little odd, sitting on the floor of his parents’ apartment sorting through his childhood memories while Hirakoba presses up against his back, a warm and solid reminder of the present. Leaning back into him, Kite wonders how things would have been if Hirakoba and him hadn’t been physically apart as long as they had been. Going by Hirakoba’s ‘training’ of people, and how easy it’s been to get physically closer, paired with how fickle Hirakoba could be...

“Perhaps she believes you’ll store some of it, like a hamster,” Kite says, trying to focus on shuffling through odds and ends instead of the weird side by side comparison with the past, made worse by his old jacket’s nostalgic purple and white. On cue, Pi-chan lets out a wolf whistle, and Kite colors slightly, feeling almost accused.

“I haven’t actually been having much of the cake part of my diet at the moment,” Hirakoba says, sounding quite mournful about this fact. “I don’t have time to sit and eat cake anymore. And I’m too full after dinner at home to enjoy it.” It’s a depressing state of affairs and Hirakoba just slumps more against Kite and sighs about it. “The cake you bought me was the most recent I’ve eaten.”

It’s hard to keep his hands still, even with how strangely comfortable sitting like this is. Hirakoba shifts his hands down to trace his fingertips along Kite’s thighs, petting the material idly. “You don’t understand. If I don’t eat enough at home for breakfast and dinner, my grandmother gets worried I’m not enjoy the food, so she demands more of my favourites to be made. It’s a neverending cycle of food, Eishirou.” It’s little petty complaints, but Hirakoba doesn’t care.

He laughs at the whistle and looks over just in time to see Pi-chan stick his head up out of the shoe and call at Kite for attention. “Who have you been whistling at, to teach him something like that?” he asks curiously, perking up to try and look at Kite’s face.

“Woe is you,” Kite says with a roll of his eyes. “A whole few days in between eating cake, because you’re too stuffed from eating your favorite foods. I don’t know how you cope.”

Sometimes he really wonders how he found himself getting attached to someone as spoiled and different from him as Hirakoba Rin. Perhaps overexposure followed by fond distance makes sense, as a cause. And he does remember getting cross with Hirakoba quite a few times in school, when too much of the entirely different world Hirakoba was born in seeped into his practice time.

Kite straightens his glasses before he reaches out to scratch Pi-chan under the chin gently, laughing a little at the sight of his bird blissed out, sticking halfway out of a shoe. “Myself, actually. I tried to teach him to give his opinions on outfits I tried on, at some point. I don’t think he ever quite figured out the intended context, though.”

“I’ll just have to spend more time with you for cake eating,” Hirakoba says, quite happily melting against Kite’s back in their current position. “Or I’ll just make it for it when I get back to Tokyo. I’m sure Koichi will join me happily enough.” Having a cake eating companion would be nice, actually.

Hirakoba isn’t really thinking that much when he presses a kiss to the back of Kite’s neck, sighing against the skin and giving another kiss. “You could have just asked your one fashionable friend for his opinion, you know,” Hirakoba says, scraping his teeth much more intentionally this time against a bump of Kite’s spine on his neck. “I wouldn’t have minded, you do it all the time for me now.”

Without the wolf whistle though. But he prefers the clinical and helpful feedback he gets significantly more. It just makes him feel a bit better going out when his outfit’s gotten the Kite stamp of approval.

“Of course that is your solution,” Kite laments, shifting a little in place so he can sit more comfortably now that it doesn’t seem Hirakoba intends to go anywhere anytime soon. “At least you’re currently having no obscene amounts of cake and getting extra exercise. You’re going to return to Tokyo well-fed but fitter than you left.”

Leaning his head back a little, Kite lifts his hand up to brush away the long blond hair tickling against his neck, only to startle when Pi-chan takes that as a cue to leap out of the shoe and fly onto his hand, letting out another slightly clumsy attempt at a wolf whistle. Laughing a little, Kite lifts the hand holding the bird up to his face, so that Pi-chan can lean against his lips for a kiss. “Don’t be jealous, Pikky. And it was honestly more for the novelty value of trying to teach him a trick. He’s a clever bird, he needs the stimulation of learning new things. Also, please. I could always ask Tanishi-kun.”

Hirakoba has commented on enough of his outfits Kite thinks he probably has a better grasp of what Kite’s style is like, but Tanishi has always been more overall insightful than most people give him credit for.

Hirakoba sighs into Kite’s neck. “And then I’ll slide back into normality when I get back to Tokyo, and I’ll have to wait until I’m back home for winter break to be healthy again,” he says, just a little jokingly. “I’ll text you photos of the desserts I eat every day while you’re away.”

He can see the weird softened expression on Kite’s face as he talks to Pi-chan and Hirakoba’s stomach does a strange twist that he deals with by just biting down on Kite’s neck, wrapping his arms around his waist to cling tightly. “Don’t talk about that fatty while you’re making that face,” Hirakoba grumbles, because that’s something more concrete to focus on and more of a logical reason for a reaction to Kite’s facial expression. “I don’t need him swooning over you as well.”

“Do you really intend to ruin your condition just to spite me,” Kite says, though he’s not as alarmed at the thought as he probably should be. “I’ll be right there to tell you when you’re fattening up, I’m sure you realise.”

Pi-chan chirps in offense at the startled hitch of breath that makes Kite’s hand twitch slightly, and he tilts his head to try and get a look at Hirakoba. He joked about his being jealous of Pi-chan before, but the thought of Hirakoba Rin being jealous over him is still a novel thing, something he doesn’t quite know how to place yet. “I trust Tanishi-kun to keep his wits about him. You’re going to scandalise my bird, Hirakoba-kun.”

It’s just routine for them now, for Kite to made a jab about Hirakoba’s figure and Hirakoba to fluff up in response. Even if he knows it’s just ribbing though, he can’t help the indignation that makes him jab Kite in the stupidly well defined stomach of his. “I’m not going to get fat,” Hirakoba says, biting again. “I do watch how much I eat, I’ll have you know.” And as much as Kite did not acknowledge it, he did actually do regular exercise in Tokyo.

He’s still a little fluffy though, and talking about Tanishi isn’t helping at all. Hirakoba frowns and moves, shifting to Kite’s side where he can press a kiss to Kite’s cheek a bit easier. “Good, he needs to learn you’re a horrible person at some point in his life,” Hirakoba says with a bit of a laugh. It feels weird to grab Kite by the chin to turn his head so Hirakoba can kiss him properly, but Kite’s hair is still styled and he doesn’t want to mess it up.

Kite winces slightly at the jab, which is just close enough to his bladder to be uncomfortable. Then Hirakoba bites again, and he has to swallow back a strangled noise in the back of his throat, earning a curious look from his bird. Clearing his throat, he adjusts his glasses and forces himself back into a more normal composure. “You need to balance it more, on top of checking your portion sizes. Facial skin treatments and calorie counting will only save you for so long.”

Pi-chan makes an attempt to hop up his arm towards his shoulder, but Kite shakes his forearm slightly to deter him. The last thing he needs is a curious beak stuck in his private business. “Is this truly how you want him to primarily remember you, Hirakoba-kun? The interloper who defiled Pikky’s human pare-hmph!”

He’s cut off by the kiss, and scrunches up his face a little at the way it knocks his glasses askew, but doesn’t pull away.

Hirakoba grumbles - why are they now talking about his skin as well? It’s just Kite ribbing him at getting wrinkles and getting old, but Hirakoba can’t help but rise to it and it makes him more determined to get Kite to shut up and just kiss him more.

He laughs into the kiss, quite satisfied as he moves his hand to the back of Kite’s neck to pet at the skin there. “It’s nothing he can’t handle,” he says, glancing at Pi-chan as he briefly pulls away. “I’m not threatening to rip off your shirt or pants, or just sticking my hand down them either.” He would, Hirakoba does realise, if he thought he could get away with it in their current setting.

He wants more kisses though, something he’s quite addicted to, especially since… he can essentially get as many as he wants while they’re in Okinawa without having to commit to anything, right? Hirakoba kisses him again, pulling away as he hears a threatening “Goooya!” from somewhere around Kite’s arm and snorts. “I’d say you’re welcome to defile me all you want right now, Eishirou, but…”

Kite leans into the kiss for just long enough that he almost forgets the bird perched on his hand until Pi-chan bites at his finger petulantly.

“We’re in my parents’ living room,” Kite points out, somewhat indignantly. “Don’t even think about it.”

Pi-chan seems more threatened by the lack of attention than specifically offended by the scandal he’s being subjected to, but Kite still reaches out to soothe his bird by rubbing his face. “Really, allow Pikky some of his innocence you menace. I also don’t know when my parents or sister might return, so don’t be crass.”

“You’re right, the living room floor really isn’t comfortable,” Hirakoba agrees, although he’s 100% sure that’s not what Kite’s implying with his refusal. “And the couch isn’t big enough. We can save it for later.” Saying that is just… so absurd that he has to laugh.

“Overly possessive boyfriend slash thing,” Hirakoba says straight back, an automatic response to being called ‘menace’. He reaches out to pet Pi-chan on the head lightly before he pushes himself up off the floor, heading back to the couch to drape and grab his cup of tea again. “Although I suppose that counts more as you mothering him, doesn’t it?”

“We aren’t doing anything weird on my parents’ couch,” Kite warns. Never even mind that his mother has only just worked the new fabric onto it, he’s also just not interested in engaging Hirakoba’s salacious side in the relative lack of privacy in his parental home.

He’s not sure what it means when Hirakoba laughs at his own statement, but he doesn’t protest the ‘later’. Receiving Hirakoba’s affection so freely, even with the uncertainty of the future hanging over it, is intoxicating, and he doesn’t want it to end any faster than Hirakoba seems to.

“That would make me the distant parent who spoils and then leaves again, wouldn’t it?” He asks pensively, watching Pi-chan smugly accepting the petting. Then his back is suddenly cold and light, no dead weight clinging to it, and he kind of misses the closeness already.

With Hirakoba gone, Kite lifts his elbow so that Pi-chan can walk up his arm and sit on his shoulder if he wants to. So naturally, the bird shakes up his feathers and takes off to crawl into another shoe instead. “Traitor,” Kite accuses him. “You only want to sit with me if you have competition, I see how it is.”

“We can always go back to your place after this and continue, then,” Hirakoba says easily enough. And it’s… odd how casually he can suggest something like that. “I’d say we could do it at my place because I have no worries on doing something weird on my parent’s couch, but…” The implications of that hang in the air and just make Hirakoba laugh a bit more.

It’s nice being back on the couch and Hirakoba gets comfortable wrapped up in the jersey again, picking up from where he left off in the log books. “He’s almost as heartless as me,” Hirakoba comments, crossing his legs and watching Kite over the top of the log book. “Perhaps it’s a consequence of spoiling people and then deserting them for a few years.” Hopefully the teasing note to his voice is obvious enough.

“My place it is,” Kite says decisively, not even bothering to suppress a full body shudder at the mental image. “I have a competition in a few days, I don’t need assassins on top of the tournament stress.”

Even though their first suggestive interaction was inside the Hirakoba family home. But Hirakoba’s sister had been the only one home at the time, and it had happened in a private bedroom rather than some shared space with disapproving grandmothers and, well, possibly mothers? Kite is fairly confident Hirakoba’s father thinks well enough of him, but the mother’s opinions are elusive.

“You were heartless long before I left, so that’s clearly not it. Maybe it’s the long blond hair and feather ruff,” Kite deflects, refusing to let his lingering guilt over leaving interfere in the playful, easy mood in the room. “You’re both too vain. Are you saying I should help deflate your self image?”

“I keep telling you, we got rid of the family assassins after the war,” Hirakoba says, smiling. “I’ll try my best to keep her from killing you before the US Open anyway.”

Hirakoba’s automatic response is to say he wasn’t heartless back in Junior High but… no, he definitely was. He certainly left a trail of broken hearted girls who just annoyed him when they wanted to cut into his time with his friends. “I was less heartless back then,” he says, although he doesn’t sound all too sure about that either.

He watches Kite as he purposely preens a little, ruffling a hand through his hair and he snickers as Pi-chan fluffs up as well from his position in a shoe. “No, Eishirou, keep telling me I’m pretty and an attractive model for your clothes,” he says, fluffing a bit at the jersey and tugging on the sleeves again. “My self-image is feeling a bit battered at the moment with the bruises, I need all the compliments I can get. At least the agreement to not hit my face is still in place.”

“For the sake of my continued wellbeing, I choose not to believe that,” Kite says. “Just to make sure.”

He has to give that statement some actual consideration. Hirakoba had been more viciously outgoing back then, less stuck in his outgoing persona, but perhaps also slightly less set in his ways and ruthless in how easily he cast people aside. “You were more honest about it to people’s faces back then,” he concludes after a pause, “but I don’t know if that’s better.” Though in a way, Kite supposes it is. If they’d met for the first time now instead of years ago, he’s not sure Hirakoba would have put up with him.

Snorting, Kite gives a visibly disdainful look in Hirakoba’s direction. “And I’ve already told you those bruises are a silly thing to be self-conscious about. They are proof that you are powerful, and people should respect you, they don’t make you any less attractive.”

Hirakoba rests his chin on his hand as he raises an eyebrow, looking at Kite consideringly. “Does it bother you, lik— not wanting to share someone that’s heartless?” he asks, stumbling a little. “At least you can be satisfied in knowing I’m not likely to spontaneously start caring about random people.”

He frowns a little and self-consciously rubs a hand against his forearm before he tugs down the sleeve again. “No, that’s definitely not sufficient, Eishirou. You need to compliment my appearance, I’m a shallow person that only cares about that.”

“Not really no,” Kite replies dryly, ignoring the off-beat flutter of his heart at the slight misstep, somewhat reassured that he’s not the only one with trouble on how to name what they’re doing. “Clearly I only like you for your body. More importantly, there’s a tiny shred of heart in there, and I’m confident enough it’s pretty fond of me.”

Which isn’t to say that it won’t be difficult if Hirakoba turns him down and he’ll, one way or another, will have to go back to sharing again.

He gets up from his spot on the floor, carefully tidying the last papers and tidbits from the first box into two separate piles, of which to keep and which to get rid of. Then he walks over to Hirakoba and leans down, placing one hand on the back of the couch for balance and grabbing a hold of Hirakoba’s chin with the other, pressing an unusually chaste kiss against his lips. “You’re very pretty, Hirakoba-kun. And you can’t stop me from thinking the bruises make you prettier.”

“I tell you I’m quite fond of you often enough, I’d be worried if you weren’t confident,” Hirakoba says, trying to keep his voice relatively calm. He doesn’t like how he wants to squirm a bit at the rather open agreement from Kite about feelings and the accusation that Hirakoba’s… returning them. But it’s easier to just play off and go along with it.

He tilts his head back and stares at Kite leaning over him, caught between wanting to smile at the kiss and the compliment… and wanting to just frown at the last part. “I keep forgetting you find bruises a turn on,” he says, sighing to himself. “I’m going to end up with bruises all over me if I keep this up.” At least he can poke the marks on Kite’s neck and feel quite good about them, sliding his hand around to the back of Kite’s neck to pull him in for another kiss.

“I think that’s one of the few things against you, Eishirou.” Hirakoba pauses as he thinks about the other things. “And your stupid love of bitter food.”

Kite hums in semi-agreement, though he vividly remembers arguments about not using ‘I love you’ to get people off Hirakoba’s back when they start to have expectations, which makes words a less than stellar gauge on where he stands.

“It’s still not the bruises,” Kite reminds Hirakoba sternly, even as he lets go of his chin to brush his fingertips over the bruise-mottled skin of Hirakoba’s wrist. “It’s knowing the effort you put in while you got them.”

He lets himself be pulled into another kiss, but breaks it before it can drag on too long. Not, he thinks, in his parents’ living room, while family can come home anytime and Pi-chan is watching.

“I make you plenty of other food,” he says. “I’m just keeping myself healthy.”

“That sounds very pretty, Eishirou,” Hirakoba says, sounding openly doubtful as he pushes up the sleeves a bit to show off his forearms again. “I’m pretty sure it’s because you’re a sadist though, who likes bruises.” He’s teasing, petting Kite’s neck with his fingertips and trying not to laugh as he talks.

He could almost forget where they are and pull Kite down on top of him for another cuddling session, but Pi-chan has to make himself known again with a trill and something moving as the bird knocks into it. Hirakoba sighs and drops his hand, letting Kite pull away if he wants. “Go give your bird-child some attention, Eishirou. And finish up so we can go back to your place.”

And he can chase away his poor driver who’s probably still sitting out in the rain.

Kite’s neck is sensitive, and he shudders slightly at the continued feeling of the pads of Hirakoba’s fingertips running across his skin. “I don’t recall you complaining about other bruises,” he accuses. Running a finger over the now slightly faded markings on Hirakoba’s neck he’s been promised a chance to renew before he leaves.

Placing a final close-mouthed kiss against Hirakoba’s lips, Kite pushes himself back up and looks over to where Pi-chan has pushed a bowl with decorative rocks and a small cactus precariously close to the edge of the side table.

“Don’t even think about it,” he tells the bird, who puffs up smugly in response, clearly happy enough to have Kite’s attention on him again. With a sigh, he picks up Pi-chan and unceremoniously dumps him on his shoulder so he can focus on the next box.

“Except that I didn’t have to work hard to actually get these ones,” Hirakoba says, somewhat smugly, tilting his head slightly and trying to ignore how his breath catches from Kite’s touches.

It’d be so easy to just pull Kite back and insist on continuing to kiss but he makes himself get up, picking up his cup of tea. “I’m going to get another cup of tea, then we can go when you’re done,” Hirakoba says, smiling a bit at the oddly cute scene of Kite and Pi-chan. And then he has to go make himself head into the kitchen before he lets himself go and drape over Kite as well.