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Yuma is really good at keeping secrets. He’s also excellent at telling his friends what they need to hear. This, though, is less important right now. When Kei had come to him during their trip to Wasaga Beach, Yuma had known, instinctively, that he had wanted to talk about something very important. From the way he was acting so unlike himself, shifty and fidgety, Yuma had decided to forego the teases he usually let loose whenever the others came to him for help and led Kei to a secluded part of the promenade.
Ice cream dripping down their wrists onto the concrete, Yuma watched Kei go through the same routine he went through every time they had a performance. Air in through the mouth for five, hold for eight, and out through the nose for another five. Repeat, repeat, repeat until he felt sufficiently settled.
“How did you know you wanted to be more than friends with Jo?” he asks, voice low but clear.
“You mean like best friends?”, Yuma questions in confusion. Nonetheless, choosing to continue without waiting for an answer, “I don’t know. We never really talked about it, but for me, it was when I realized I wanted him to be the first person to know all of my news, good or bad. When I would say goodbye to everyone, and head home with Maki, wishing to spend more time doing anything, whatever, with him."
Yuma isn’t sure why saying this makes him feel awkward and unsettled, like he’s revealing something that is only meant for him and JoJo and nobody else. Not even their mutual friends. He doesn’t get a chance to explore this feeling because Kei starts nodding from his place at Yuma’s left, his eyes lit up in understanding. He also has a big smile on his face, blinding in its hopefulness and a far cry from the discomfort that was twisting around his mouth just minutes ago. “Thank you for making things clearer for me. Come on. I’ll buy you a new one since that one”, he says, motioning to the sticky goopy mess on the concrete that was previously Yuma’s raspberry cheesecake ice cream, “went to waste because of me."
Yuma is tempted to ask Kei why he needed to speak with him about this, but he knows that part of the reason why Kei came to him in the first place is because he knows that Yuma will never pry for more information than he’s been given. He resolves himself to the knowledge that he might never find out, while ignoring the inexplicable feeling that he will be made privy to the information, and soon, and hurries after Kei and his freakishly long legs.
The next morning, Yuma wakes up at 6 am, like he always does, freshens up and heads out to the balcony to stretch. Going through his routine here, with the prettiest view of the water and the sound of the gulls in the background, is infinitely better than doing it in the middle of a busy city. He spends well over 30 minutes going through his yoga routine and doesn’t realize how much time it’s been until he hears the shorebirds and waders moving in for their meal. Around 7:30 am, he’s freshly showered and dressed to lounge, so he grabs his phone, the volume of Detective Conan he’d borrowed from Taki and heads downstairs.
While his first cup of tea steeps, orange vanilla, he gets started on breakfast. Usually, he does the prep work for breakfast and Fuma is the one that cooks it. However, they’re going into the city to see a show late in the afternoon, so they’d all decided to do a heavy lunch before that as well.
Having decided on a fruit salad with yoghurt, he gets to work. He’s slicing and layering the fruit in an alternating pattern of mango-kiwi-strawberry-grape-mango-kiwi-straw… only pausing to change the song that's playing in his headphones and to take pictures of the birds for his mum.
Fruit salad done and centred on the patio table, he puts the yoghurt in separate bowls. Not forgetting to put the Greek stuff, that Harua and Kei swear by, in bowls for them as well.
He’s leaning over the counter, seven chapters into his book and sipping on his third cup of tea, this one a special blend called Para-Nice, when he hears a stampede of elephants thundering down the hallway and heading towards him. Taki and Maki come crashing into the kitchen, Taki just barely missing the edge of the marble countertops. He doesn’t seem to notice, though, because he’s still arguing with Maki about whether they both played fair in their race to the kitchen. Harua walks into the kitchen behind them, at a more sedate pace, his face already buried in his phone, and expertly manoeuvres around the tangled heap of limbs on the floor. He heads directly to the patio table, where he seats on the cushion placed directly in front of his bowl.
Yuma put all of their food in the same bowl and even arranged them differently, just to make sure Harua would have to look up from his phone and say something before breakfast. [The rest of them have an agreement to mix things up once in a while whenever they all eat together, just to catch Harua unawares at least once. In the seven months since they’ve started it, no one has succeeded. Taki has been very vocal and staunch in his belief that Harua is actually fae and is using his magic to discern the truth each time-everyone else thinks he’s lost his marbles, but they humour him anyway].
Yuma hears Nicholas before he sees him, and when he rounds the doorway he's walking backwards with a finger pointed at whoever is in front of him while Euijoo tries, and fails, to lower it. The rest of them make their way outside and Yuma shows Kei which of the bowls has his yoghurt. Fuma settles in beside him, which isn’t unusual but it seems more intentional this time.
Breakfast starts off without a hitch. About halfway through, Kei starts fidgeting and this immediately draws everyone’s attention because Koga Yudai does not fidget. Calmly, Fuma interlaces his left hand with Kei’s right and raises them above the table. Seven pairs of eyes follow their hands intently.
“Kei and I are dating”, he announces, voice steady in that solemn way of his, with the biggest smile Yuma has ever seen on his face.
The silence lasts for approximately three seconds before everyone starts screaming and scrambling across the table to congratulate them. Kei’s ears are redder than the time he accidentally slipped during a performance, and Fuma cups them so gently while he asks them to calm down. When everyone is settled back into their seats and back to eating, Euijoo sets his spoon down and looks up.
“Congratulations on the baby”, he says, eyes shining with sincerity and lips trying, and failing, to force down a smile.
Everyone bursts out laughing once again, Fuma chokes on a piece of watermelon, and Kei ends up on the floor in tears.
Lunch ends up taking longer than they’d anticipated, what with Kei, their food captain, going on strike halfway through collecting their orders. Although they ended up running all the way to the theatre, split into mini-groups of twos and three, they manage to make it with time to spare, even though they’re all panting heavily and heaving pathetically at their arrival. Well not all, Kei and Fuma, perfect as they are, get there before everyone else and are handing their tickets to the usher when the rest of them arrive. Taki, who accompanied them, is hunched over the counter making noises that can only be described as pained, while Kei pats his back rhythmically.
The show is wonderful, as always, but Yuma has seen OVO enough times that he can wander off mentally and not feel like he’s missed anything important. He finds himself thinking about breakfast, thinking about Kei and Fuma’s revelation, and about the conversation he had with Kei the night before.
Jo shifts in his seat beside Yuma and when they make eye contact, his smile drops as though sensing that something is wrong with Yuma just from a glance. Yuma steadfastly ignores the way this thought makes him feel, as he does with everything Jo related. By his side, Jo has an eyebrow raised, his lips quirked in concern. So Yuma sends him a small smile, making sure to let his snaggletooth show in that way that makes the others coo over him, as he nods in assurance.
Walking back to the restaurant, where they had parked their cars, Yuma ends up beside Jo. His gaze piercing in its intensity, while Yuma pretends he cannot fell it.
Jo nudges him with his shoulder, and Yuma pretends to stumble away. Jo grabs his hand and pulls on it to right him. He tugs Yuma closer, so their shoulders brush while they walk.
Yuma is used to the flutter that rises in his stomach when Jo does this, when he thumbs across the back of Yuma’s hand. It’s why he doesn’t even register it, until he feels a featherlight swipe across his inner wrist. He startles, left hand jerking in Jo’s grasp. His sudden movement prompts Jo to tighten his hold and tuck their hands in the pocket of his cardigan, effectively immobilizing Yuma. Before Yuma can process this sequence of events, Jo starts talking.
“So, what did you think about breakfast?”
“Huh…breakfast?” Yuma asks distractedly. “I think I did a good job. Didn’t you?”
“No, not that. Although you did do a fantastic job, I meant Kei and Fuma’s announcement.”
“Oh…that.”
“Yeah, that” Jo says, voice radiating a fondness that Yuma adamantly refuses to analyze. “What did you think?”
“I thought it was really cute? I never noticed the both of them getting closer in that way, so it was a little surprising I guess. But I thought about it for like three extra seconds, and it all made sense. I guess I never realized it because they’re the oldest, but even amongst the nine of us, they’ve always had such an untouchable bond. So yeah, it seems like a natural progression of their relationship, and I’m really happy they figured it out.”
Jo mumbles something beside him, but Yuma trips over a crack in the sidewalk, so his words get lost in the sound of Yuma’s shoes hitting the concrete as he tries to right himself.
“Sorry, could you say that again?” he asks while turning to Jo. At his side, Jo is speeding up and the back of his neck is red. Not the red that takes over his ears when he’s feeling extra shy or bashful, but the redness that appears when he’s embarrassed and ready to withdraw back into the known comfort and safety of his solitude.
Yuma can’t have that. Not now, when it feels like he’s missed something really important, and he won’t have another opportunity to earn it back. He tugs on their joined hands, pulling Jo to a stop. Once again side by side, he slips his hand out of Jo’s and cups his face. Distantly, while turning his face so they’re looking at each other right in the eyes, Yuma can’t help but notice how small Jo’s face is. Especially in comparison to his hands. Despite the inherent embarrassment of doing something so intimate in the middle of a sidewalk, Jo nuzzles his face deeper into Yuma’s palm, his left hand coming up to push Yuma’s right deeper into his skin.
Like this, he looks like a meerkat or perhaps a ferret, However, Yuma cannot get distracted by how adorable he finds him or how much he wants to hold him right now.
“Repeat what you said. Yeah?” Yuma coaxes, voice deceptively airy in the way it gets when he’s trying to persuade the others to go along with one of his harebrained schemes.
“And us? Does dating also seem like a natural progression of our relationship?” Jo asks. “That’s what I asked before.”
Yuma is dumbstruck. Honestly, out of everything he imagined Jo saying, this wasn’t one of them, His lips open and close without his input, multiple “Oh’s” tumbling out of their depths in quick succession.
“Because I’d like that. I’d like that very much.” Jo continues, eyes unwavering in the intensity he regards Yuma with.
Yuma doesn’t know what to say in response.
Luckily for him, he doesn’t have to say anything because Taki starts yelling for them from across the street. Yuma removes his hand from Jo’s face, and drags him in the direction of the others, ignoring the looks they receive from their friends when they approach them.
Back at the cottage, Yuma still feels unmoored from earlier events. He’s replaying what Jo said to him over and again in his mind, trying to figure out what he could’ve possibly meant by it, when Fuma and Taki burst into his room. Their eyes shining with unasked questions as they sit on the mattress in front of him, backs against the headboard.
“I don’t want to talk about it.” he says, without giving either of them a chance to speak.
Fuma nods at him, understanding in his every move. He settles deeper into the pillows, his switch out with Sword and Shield loading on its screen. He does this sometimes. Keeps himself busy, but close to Yuma so that when he’s done with his latest overthinking spiral, he can share the conclusions he’s reached immediately.
Taki, on the other hand, ignores Yuma’s words entirely. He does this too; blows right past Yuma's hesitance to talk about his problems because he knows that if someone doesn't, Yuma will stay in his head agonizing and pouring over every single thought.
“What happened today? After the show? With you and Jo? Did you guys argue?” he’s in such a hurry to get all of his words out that the syllables don’t come out right, sounds missing from every other word.
“Taki”, Fuma calls out, voice stern and eyes shining with the warmth that never leaves them even when he’s scolding them. He pries Taki’s hands away from where they’d been fisted in Yuma’s collar, and pulls him back to lean against the headboard.
With the both of them staring at him intently, Taki with his big brown eyes that are always shining like they’re close to tears and Fuma in the black frames that swallow his face and make him look even softer than usual, Yuma never stood a chance.
So he tells them. It’s a short story, he doesn’t need many words to tell them that his best friend of six years might’ve...kind of...definitely hinted at having a crush on him.
“I told him that we would talk when we got back…” his voice trails off.
“But you’ve hiding in here like a coward” Taki says matter-of-factly.
“Taki”, Fuma says once more, voice still as stern and eyes still as warm as before.
“Sorry.” he doesn’t sound the least bit apologetic. “But you have to admit that he’s being cowardly. He’s been infatuated with Jo since they were 18. It’s been three years, surely you understand why I think that he’s being a bit silly by refusing to talk to Jo.” Taki says, nonplussed by the menacing glances Yuma shoots him from across the bed.
“I don’t want to hear that from you, of all people.” Yuma says testily, feeling a little, okay a lot, called out.
“Huh” Taki echoes distractedly, looking up from where he was occupied with the bunnies on the blanket. “What do you mean by that?”
“He’s talking about whatever you have going on with Harua and Maki.”
“I can’t lie, I’m very confused right now. What do I have to do with Harua and Maki’s relationship?” With his head tilted in confusion like this, he looks every bit the puppy Kei calls him.
“They’ve been trying to get into your pants for months now. Less than an hour ago, Maki had both of his hands shoved up the rips in your jeans while Harua held you in his lap.” Fuma says, trying not to laugh.
“That’s normal for us though.” Taki says exasperatedly.
“That’s not all. On the beach yesterday, Harua spent the entire time feeding you ice cream, playing with your hair and cooing while you progressively got pinker and squirmier.” Yuma says, feeling less awkward now that the attention is completely off him.
“Oh…that” Taki says dumbly.
“Yeah, that. What’s going on there?”
“I don’t know.” Taki says, shrugging. “Like, I told you guys how they both asked me to stay while they confessed their feelings for each other, right? Well after that, they said a bunch of other stuff that I didn’t hear because I got distracted, but then Maki kissed me. Really light, but before I could even react, he kissed Harua too. So I figured it was just for reassurance or something.”
“Oh, reassurance huh. Is that why Harua crowds you under the stands of our schools pool and kisses you senseless while my brother”, Yuma shudders, “keeps watch?”
“I don’t know. Anyway, it’s just a friend thing. Friends kiss each other all the time, right? So it’s not weird.”
“So that means if I were to kiss you right now, you wouldn’t so much as bat an eye?” Yuma questions while knowing, fully well, the answer he will receive. Exactly as he had predicted, Taki rears back, face twisted in disgust as he fervently denies it.
Despite the ridiculousness of the situation, Yuma bursts into laughter, feeling lighter than he did just minutes ago. Across from his, Fuma runs a soothing hand through Taki’s dyed blue hair, cooing at him from where he’s buried his entire face in his shirt,
“No. Wait. We’re getting distracted.” Taki says as he emerges from his refuge. The prior redness is completely gone from his face, and in its place is a serious expression.
“Did you get over your feelings for him?”
“What? No!” He doesn’t even need to ask who Taki is referring to.
“Okay, you still have feelings for Jo. Then what’s the problem?” Fuma probes. “Because the way we see it, and from what you told us, he seems to feel the same.”
“I don’t know.” Yuma mutters as he refuses to meet their eyes.
“Are you scared?” he feels his eyes dart up to lock onto Taki’s before his brain can even process the movement.
“I’m not saying this to shame you, or make you feel bad, but remember your high school graduation? When you said you would give him your second button in the classroom where you first met, and then you decided not to because it “made no sense for one graduate to give another one his button”? Because I do. I remember how excited you were to finally do it, only to chicken out later.”
“I just don’t want to lose Jojo as a friend. I would rather live with the what-if’s of how we could’ve been a couple rather than be the cause of our friendship possibly falling apart.”
“I understand that it’s scary. And I know that the potential bad seems to outweigh the potential good. And while I would never force you to do something so difficult and vulnerable, I still think you should talk to Jo. You don’t have to confess to him or anything like that, but he’s been worried because you’ve been sequestered in this room for a while now.” Fuma responds.
It takes a bit for him to find his words, but when he does, he asks them to give him some space to think.
Fuma ruffles his hair as they head to the door, and Taki presses a kiss to his cheek, whispering an affectionate “You’ve got this, we believe in you” into his right ear.
To be truthful, Yuma doesn’t know what he needs to ponder on. He’s been well aware of how he feels about Jo for years, and their conversation today made it seem clear that, true to his suspicions, Jo might feel the same. And despite his fear, all he needs to do is take the plunge.
Mind made up, he stands up and heads for the door. Outside the room he shares with Harua, voices float down the hallway to greet him. Maki and Nicholas are arguing about the fairness of using Luigi in a friendly game, while Kei loudly eggs Maki on. Steady streams of “Exactly” and “Put that fraud in his rightful place, Maki” tumble out from his lips.
All of a sudden, there’s a loud thud that is immediately followed by deathly silence. Then everyone bursts into shocked laughter, Euijoo the loudest of them-the way he gets when Nicholas does something particularly cute, and he can’t pretend to be immune to it. Harua’s voice, angel that he is, asking “Nico, are you okay?” rings over the sound of the rest of them gasping for air.
Standing in front of Jo’s door, Yuma quickly raps his knuckles three times against the hardwood before he loses his courage and retreats.
Almost instantly, it swings open. Jo’s chest is heaving like he’d run to get the door.
“Hi”, he says simply.
Yuma can’t help but smile. Perhaps, he thinks unbidden, even if things don’t go they way he’d like them to during their conversation, there might still be hope for them to remain friends.
“Hey Jojo. Can I come in?”
In lieu of a verbal response, Jo opens the door wider and steps back deeper into the bedroom.
Yuma crosses soundlessly over the frame as well. The door closing behind him is deafening, as though proclaiming his fate like some herald of death.
“I’m sorry for hiding like that after we got back” he starts. “I had a lot to think about, but it was still an incredibly cowardly thing for me to do. I’m sorry, please forgive me.”
“Why are you here now?” Jo asks- not meanly, just careful. Curious.
“I just wanted to let you know how I feel about you. I’ve been in love with you since we were 19, but I was so taken off guard when you suddenly said that on the road that I didn’t know how to react. Obviously, I didn’t plan to tell you in a place where you might’ve felt cornered, but I really wanted you to know."
“I have you beat by at least a year and a half.” Jo says, a tiny smug smile on his face.
“Huh? What do you mean by that Jojo?” Yuma asks, confusion lacing his words.
“Do you remember that time I was out of school with the flu for two weeks? You came over every day with notes and my homework from classes you weren’t even taking. You took a booster shot just so my mum would let you in to see me, and you hate needles. Yuma, you drive me to and from my art classes on the weekend even when you’re sore from pilates just because you didn’t want me taking the bus. How could I not love you? In what world would it be possible for a person to be the recipient of your care, affection and trust and not fall irrevocably in love with you?” Jo finishes, cheeks pink like he can’t believe the extent of his outburst.
“Did you know that in the 12th grade, I asked my mum how teenagers usually confessed back home? I wanted to give you my second button at graduation, but I chickened out.”
“I know. I found the notebook with your plan amongst my things while I was cleaning out my locker.”
Yuma can feel his ears catch fire. “This is so humiliating, oh my god.”
“If it helps, I thought it was really cute, and I was really sad you never followed through with it.”
Before he can fully comprehend what he’s doing, Yuma pulls his flannel taut and rips out the second button.
Taking Jo’s hand in his, he flips it over and lays a kiss on his palm. Dropping the button in the centre and clasping Jo’s fingers over it, he says “Asakura Jo, I have been in love with you since I was 19. Though I have grown and matured as a person, my feelings for you have never changed- only deepened. Would you do me the honour of going out on a date with me?”.
“Only a date?”
“Well, several if I have my way. And then I plan to woo you into becoming my boyfriend if you’ll have me, as well."
“You silly boy. Was there ever a doubt that I would choose you?” Jo says as he tugs Yuma closer to place a kiss on his cheek, both their faces flushed in happiness.
“Do you think it’s happening right now?” Fuma seems to be asking Taki with his eyes.
“Yes.” Taki responds. “I think they figured it out.”