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They were tired. That was the only reason this was happening.
Goro wasn’t even sure what the argument had been at first. They’d been texting about something inconsequential, Akira had taken offense at his wording, and before he knew it they were bickering back and forth with increasingly hostile wording and less coherent spelling. And finally Akira, who Goro knew for a fact was running on three hours of sleep and two thermoses of coffee, just texted bluntly,
[go fuck yourself, crow]
And in a spectacular burst of tiredness and frustration, Goro texted back without thinking,
[fuck me yourself, you coward]
Exactly two seconds after hitting ‘send’, he felt like a lead weight dropped into his stomach. Why had he said that? What was he thinking? He wasn’t, that was the problem. He’d gotten baited into bickering with Akira and had gotten entirely too carried away. Now he’d said something unfathomably stupid and who knew what the consequences were going to be?
There was no response for at least five minutes, and despite his prior exhaustion, Goro found himself wide-awake and keeping a wary eye on his phone as he dressed for bed. There was no telling what Akira’s response would be. Unless he’d fallen asleep. Maybe he’d fallen asleep. That would be for the best. But as Goro returned from brushing his teeth, the phone buzzed ominously on the desktop, and when he opened the text it just said,
[I’m on the train. Ten minutes.]
Goro set the phone down, staring blankly at the wall. Akira had to be joking. This was a prank. He was waiting for some sort of incensed reply or deflection, after which he’d admit he wasn’t actually on the way and chide Goro for taking a joke so seriously. Clearly the ideal response here was to not say anything; it would seem as though he had made the comment offhandedly and then fallen asleep, unconcerned what Akira’s reaction would be. He could settle in with his book, and then tomorrow when everyone could think rationally again he would apologize for ‘missing’ the text and explain that he’d been attempting to imitate the Thieves’ usual casual sarcasm.
Twenty minutes later, his ongoing reread of the Featherman: From the Ashes light novel adaptation was interrupted in the middle of Feather Shoebill’s first real fight by a knock at his apartment door. Goro swallowed hard, glancing at his phone, and set the book aside. Maybe a neighbor needed something. It wasn’t good to assume.
But a glance through the peephole confirmed that his worst nightmare was standing outside his door, and when he opened it, Akira flashed him a crooked smile.
“It took longer to walk here from the station than I thought,” he said, and despite his lighthearted tone, there was something hungry in his dark eyes.
Goro sincerely regretted the one single time he had allowed Akira to come over and study in his living room. It had given Akira his address. In fact, he regretted several things in his life right now that had apparently all culminated in this moment, where he was mechanically stepping aside to let Akira in because it would be rude not to. “I didn’t think you were actually coming.”
Akira huffed a laugh as Goro closed the door behind him and followed him into the living room. “You were pretty specific in your text.”
“I was being sarcastic,” Goro replied automatically, standing firm in the face of Akira’s eyes as they dragged over his faded Featherman Victory T-shirt and soft grey lounge pants.
“You’re never sarcastic over text like that,” Akira said. “Passive-aggressive, yes, but not sarcastic.” He tossed himself onto Goro’s couch as if he lived there, and Goro entertained a sudden urge to upend the entire couch so it landed on top of him and crushed him.
“There’s a first time for everything,” he felt himself say, wondering how much force it would take to lift the couch with Akira on it.
Akira’s gaze dragged down the length of his body again, and this time, it provoked a shiver.
“There is,” the thief murmured, and sat up to pat the seat on the couch beside him. “At least indulge me with your company, since I came all the way here.”
There it was: a possible angle of attack. Goro took a seat, a safe amount of distance between them, and said, not without an edge in his voice, “Yes, you did. You came all the way here on the assumption that I actually wanted you to fuck me. I think that says more about you than me.”
Akira smiled lazily. “Maybe I just think you’re more honest when you’re tired and irritated.”
“Maybe you’re a presumptuous asshole to think that you would be the one fucking me.”
In a split-second, Akira lunged, pressing Goro back into the couch. His weight settled heavily on the detective’s thighs, and Goro realized with alarm that his wrists were solidly pinned over his head. “...that’s the version of you that I like,” Akira said quietly, leaning over him to look him directly in the eyes.
“The version of me calling you an insufferable bastard?” Goro spat, tugging against the hold on his wrists, but Akira’s grip was iron.
“The version of you that’s not censoring yourself.” Akira leaned even closer, so his breath brushed Goro’s lips as he spoke. “You’re always denying yourself. Not saying what you think, not asking for what you want, and when someone’s willing to give it to you, you pull away.”
“Excuse me?” It took a moment to process what Akira was saying. “Is this some kind of prank?” Goro demanded. “What are you trying to accomplish? Getting me to agree and then laughing in my face for ‘falling for it’? This is a lot of effort for a joke, Kurusu. Just shut up!”
“There you are,” Akira said with a dark chuckle. “The real you. Not that fake-pretty face you put on, not the lies you keep telling me. This isn’t a joke, Goro.”
Goro just stared at him, struggling to figure out what to say. It certainly didn’t help that the closest he’d ever come to actual sex with someone were awkward come-ons and thinly-veiled propositions. And then there was Akira, suggesting sex so casually that it implied he had plenty of experience. It was infuriating.
The thief shifted enough to transfer Goro’s wrists to one hand, running the other down his chest over his T-shirt. “You’re so tense; let me unwind you a little. I won’t do anything you don’t like.”
“I don’t like this,” Goro snarled, and Akira just smiled.
“Liar.” He rocked his hips shallowly against Goro’s, provoking a startled gasp. “Stop lying to me.”
There was something about the way Akira said it that made it feel like it was about so much more than just whether or not he was going to get to sleep with the Detective Prince. Goro did his best not to flinch, because there was no way that Akira could know how much he was lying about. But it didn’t matter, because a moment later, Akira’s lips were crushed against his, prying his mouth open with shamefully little effort. Involuntarily he arched into the thief’s hand as it pushed his shirt up, moaning softly at the taste of coffee that seemed to linger in Akira’s kisses.
It would be so easy to give up, to just drink in what Akira was offering and drown in his warmth. But Goro was nothing if not stubborn, and he wasn’t going to make this easy for Akira. So at the first opportunity, he bit down on Akira’s lip. Akira let out a satisfying hiss, pulling back and dragging Goro with him by his arms until they were both sitting up. For a breathless second they stared at each other, and then Akira released his wrists to grab his face and pull him in for another kiss, leaving Goro free to fist his hands in Akira’s shirt and hang on for dear life.
When Akira let him breathe again, he panted for air, leaning his forehead on Akira’s shoulder, and the thief pressed a kiss to his temple.
“So am I allowed in your room, or am I taking you apart on this couch?” he teased.
“Still presumptuous,” Goro grumbled.
“I’m in your lap, honey, I can feel how hard you are.”
Goro scowled, shoving Akira off and getting to his feet. When Akira didn’t move, staring up at him with confusion, he growled, “Are you coming, or are you just going to sit there like an idiot?”
Akira raised an eyebrow. “Oh, finally admitting the truth, huh?”
Goro didn’t dignify that with a response, leading the way to his room with measured steps. This was fine. At the very least, he could assume Akira was enough of a do-gooder that he would get some pleasure out of this. Akira wouldn’t be cruel to someone that didn’t know what they were doing. If Goro was willing to admit that he had no experience. But Akira would probably know. Somehow Akira always knew.
They’d barely made it into the bedroom before Akira pushed him back onto the bed, straddling his hips again. “Isn’t it nice to finally let yourself feel something real?” he said, pulling Goro’s shirt back up and wrestling it over his head. “Isn’t it nice to not be faking some mask, and letting yourself have what you want for once?”
There was a hitch in Akira’s voice, and Goro stared him at him, searching his face with wide, startled eyes. Behind the smug expression, there was frustration, certainly, but also anger, and...hesitation?
“...hypocrite,” Goro murmured.
Akira froze, one hand pinning Goro’s shoulders and one in midair after tossing Goro’s shirt to the floor. “What?”
“Hypocrite,” Goro accused, louder, sensing a weakness and pressing. He was right; that was why Akira looked so surprised. He had to be. “You keep telling me to stop lying, how much you like it when I don’t pretend, and you’re pretending right now!”
“Pretending what? ” Akira retorted, leaning over him to put their faces inches apart. “What could I possibly be pretending? If you think I don’t want to sleep with you, you’re sadly mistaken. Sorry that I’m not so above the rest of your fans.”
“Not that,” Goro insisted. “This, you’re not like this, this...” He slammed his hands helplessly against the bed, trying to figure out what he was saying. “Aggressive. Throwing someone down? That’s not you. Coming all the way to my apartment acting like you’re going to force yourself on me or something? What the hell, Akira? You want me to stop lying, so you do the same! What are you really here for?!”
Akira ducked his head so that Goro couldn’t see his face, but in the silence that filled his room after the question, a drop fell from hidden eyes and splattered against Goro’s chest. More drops followed, and Akira shuddered out a ragged breath. “I didn’t know what else to do.”
Taken aback by the tears, Goro just stared at him. “What does that mean?”
Akira laughed bitterly, his voice choked. “In case you hadn’t noticed, I like you, you asshole. I just want to help you, but you won’t let me! Nothing gets through to you! Being nice hasn’t worked, trying to make you feel like part of the team hasn’t worked, so I figured why not try being forceful? Maybe that would finally get through your thick head so you would tell me what’s wrong. But you just keep lying, and I don’t understand how you do it. Maybe Makoto’s right; maybe it’s just a waste of time because you like being like this.”
Goro could practically hear the alarm bells going off all around him, a frantic warning that something was about to go catastrophically wrong. But he reached up on instinct and coaxed Akira down to lie half on top of him, flagging erections forgotten as the thief shivered and smeared tears against his bare shoulder.
“Kurusu, I don’t know what you think I’m like, but I know you’re exhausted. Have you gotten more than six hours of sleep in the past two days? We can talk about this in the morni—”
“I know about the plan to kill me.”
Goro felt his blood go cold. Akira didn’t move other than the occasional hitched breath, aborted sobs muffled against Goro’s chest, and the detective tried to wrap his mind around all the implications of the confession. If Akira knew, if they all knew… How much of everything was a lie? And if it wasn’t a lie, why…?
“You...know,” he said slowly. “You know what I’m going to do, and you still...welcomed me into your group? You still wanted to sleep with me? ”
“I don’t know why you’re going to do it,” Akira mumbled. “I didn’t think it was because you hated me. I hadn’t done anything to you, and you wouldn’t have kept coming by for chess if I was that bad. So I… I thought it was something else. I thought if you felt welcomed, you’d trust us enough to ask for help. But you never did. Maybe you really do hate me enough to kill me. I don’t know anymore.”
Goro swallowed hard. “It’s not your job to save everyone. Were you just trying to ‘help’ me to save your own skin?”
“No, you asshole. I told you, I like you. For some reason.”
Akira’s voice was petulant, and for the first time, Goro felt like he wasn’t looking at the leader of the Phantom Thieves. He was just looking at another boy, who was seeming more and more like he was as damaged as Goro. How many pieces of himself had he given away, trying to help make everyone else better? It was ridiculous. Other people weren’t worth that. He wasn’t worth that.
But as always, Akira managed to worm his way into Goro’s thoughts. He’d caused doubts already, and now those doubts multiplied a hundredfold at the realization that Akira had known all along what he was, and had been kind to him anyway. This stupid boy was weeping over his future murderer, distraught that he couldn’t figure out how to help.
...wasn’t that all he’d ever really wanted? Someone to care?
Goro sighed, pushing Akira off of him and watching him sniffle pathetically. “There’s only one thing for it, then,” he said. “You’ll have to stay here tonight. You’re obviously too exhausted and overwrought to go home at this point. There’s sweatpants and t-shirts in the bottom drawer; change clothes and come back to bed.”
Akira stared at him blankly, like he’d suddenly ceased being able to speak Japanese, and Goro raised an eyebrow. “Would you rather I frame it as though I’m taking you hostage? For goodness sakes. Put on some pajamas so we can sleep, you insufferable annoyance. And…” He hesitated, then continued, “And in the morning, I’ll explain why, if you explain how you found out. We’ve both been hiding too much.”
It was only later, with Akira plastered to his side like the world’s clingiest personal space heater and wearing one of Goro’s old t-shirts, that Goro allowed himself to contemplate what had just happened. Had he honestly snowballed his entire plan out of control with an impulsive text to a boy with even worse impulse control? Why.
Maybe...things would be okay. Maybe Akira would understand. And maybe if he knew, they could find a way to fix this so he didn’t have to shoot him.
God, if he could be so lucky.