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The first time he meets Akaashi, Akaashi is on his knees.
“Oya?” Bokuto says.
Konoha, who is standing beside him, gives him a look. “This guy’s been outside for two days. He requested an audience with you.”
Bokuto perches on top of the table and twirls his club around his hand. He looks at the boy, who is kneeling a good distance away with both Sarukui’s and Konoha’s guns trained on him. Bokuto cocks his head to the side. So?
The boy puts both palms on the hard cold floor and bows. “Please let me follow you, Bokuto-san.”
Bokuto blinks. He hears Konoha sigh next to him, and distantly registers Sarukui mutter an exasperated did we let an idiot enter our building again.
Bokuto barks a laugh. Well, this is exciting! “You,” he jumps down from the table and walks towards the boy, “hey, look at me. What’s your name?”
The boy straightens up, still kneeling, and looks up at him. He looks so serious, so collected, that Bokuto wants to hit the stoicism away. His fingers holding the club itch.
“Akaashi Keiji.”
“Akashi,” Bokuto says, and sees Akashi opening his mouth to say something, but continues anyway. “Now I get that Fukurodani’s the strongest group in Tokyo—” he says, vaguely ignoring Konoha’s don’t keep saying that you conceited owl “—but why involve yourself in something like this?” He takes the club and pushes against Akashi’s shoulder, its nails no doubt painfully digging into Akashi’s skin. “Do you not understand the danger you’re in?”
“Because you saved my life before,” Akashi says, his face like still water. “I want to repay you.”
Bokuto blinks again.
Konoha turns to him. “Did you?”
“Huh,” Bokuto says. “Did I?”
.
Apparently he did. Bokuto doesn’t remember the incident. It was supposedly seven years ago, and supposedly it was Nohebi that attacked Akashi’s family, and Fukurodani – led by someone else at the time – came just in time for Akashi to live. Akashi was twelve then. Apparently Bokuto, who was thirteen, was the one who found him and killed the man who was about to slash his throat.
I really don’t remember any of it, Bokuto thinks as he heads towards the range.
He’s running down the halls when his eyes catch sight of someone sitting on the ground in one of the smaller rooms, with a book in hand.
“Hey hey hey, Akashi!” He waves and slows to a stop in the room. Akashi looks up at him.
(The second time he sees Akaashi, Akaashi is already a member of Fukurodani.)
“Bokuto-san,” he says with a small bow.
“What are you doing here? Can you help me with some sparring practices? Everyone seems to have left the building and Konoha told me to go away because he’s dealing with some ‘personal stuff’. What even is that? He wouldn’t tell me! Anyway, can you? I can beg if you want, but that'd be unbecoming of me as your boss. But can you?”
He sees Akashi’s mouth turn upwards into a small smile, so quick that Bokuto would have missed it if he hasn’t been looking the whole time.
“Of course. You are a star after all.” He gets up. “It’s Akaashi.”
Bokuto is in the middle of a triumphant cheer with both hands in the air when he stops and says, “Huh?”
“My name is Akaashi.” There is a surprising mix of amusement and displease in his usually emotionless eyes. “Not Akashi.”
“Oh. Akaashi.” It’s not quite what Bokuto meant though; the ‘huh’ was more of an oh right I realize it’s Akaashi oops but what did you mean by star? But when Bokuto says his name correctly, Akaashi looks so childishly happy that Bokuto forgets about it.
.
He quickly warms up to Akaashi. Akaashi is smart, a quick learner, and very patient. Konoha says that Akaashi seems to be the only person who is able to deal with Bokuto’s chaotic mood swings. It’s impressive, he smirks, given that he’s only a year younger than you, Bokuto.
“Why do you rarely practice with guns?” Akaashi asks him one day, a few months into joining Fukurodani.
Bokuto has been asked this question many times. He always gives the same simple answer: “Because I love using my club.”
But it’s not just that. He likes the smell of iron. He likes the smell of blood. He loves being able to use his arms, his strength, his whole body; and to hear something crack when the club collides with something or someone gives him the same exhiliration he feels when he’s on the brink of death. It makes him feel invincible, impenetrable, immortal, and at the same time reminds him that if he can do this to someone then someone else can do the same to him.
Akaashi, on the other hand, mainly practices with guns. His ability to wield a knife is impressive, but it seems he avoids the usage of anything other than guns as much as possible. His aiming is pinpoint nevertheless, so there isn’t anything to complain about.
.
The first time Bokuto and Akaashi have a match with each other, hand-to-hand combat, Konoha is there with a medical kit and a phone. Just in case I have to call Sugawara, he grumbles; Bokuto and Washio laugh.
Bokuto wins. But Akaashi’s face when he nearly lands a hit on Bokuto’s head towards the end, all determination and composure and danger, makes Bokuto so thrilled, so exhilirated, that he asks to spar again for twenty-three more consecutive times.
(He wins all twenty-three of them.)
.
The first time Bokuto realizes that he cares quite a bit about Akaashi is while they are walking down the streets of Tokyo.
Well, a little bit outside of Tokyo. There is this stand that sells the most delicious sandwiches, and Bokuto has been craving it for days. Days. He has been whining about needing to eat it so much that Akaashi relents; so now they, much to Konoha’s dismay and with Washio driving, make the 13 km trip to a sandwich stand.
Washio parks the car down the street and the three of them walk a few blocks up to the stand. Bokuto is practically prancing with excitement.
“Eh?” he says, when Akaashi orders five sandwiches. “Are you that hungry? I only need two.”
“Oh,” Akaashi says, and turns to the seller. “Six sandwiches then, please.”
Bokuto tilts his head at Washio, who merely shrugs in return.
Akaashi holds on to three of the sandwiches for himself as they walk back to the car afterwards. As Washio opens the driver’s door and puts his half-eaten sandwich into the cup holder, Akaashi says please wait and half-jogs a few meters down the street.
Bokuto stares in wonder as Akaashi slows to a stop in front of a little girl leaning against the wall, clothes ragged and hair ruffled and body smeared in dirt. She’s so thin, Bokuto thinks, and she can't be more than ten. Akaashi kneels next to her, says something that Bokuto can’t hear, and—much to Bokuto’s surprise—hands her all three sandwiches.
“He’s too soft,” Washio sighs. “It’ll get him killed someday.”
Bokuto keeps staring as Akaashi touches her hand, says something more, and runs his way back to the car. Bokuto doesn’t think the girl even responded to him. She looks haggard, empty, way too weak. It is only when they get in the car and Bokuto looks through the front mirror that he sees her take a bite of the first sandwich.
“Isn’t three excessive?” Washio asks.
“No,” Akaashi says what Bokuto expected him to and slumps down on the backseat.
.
Akaashi has become more talkative lately, more expressive. The first few months that he’s a member, he is hard to read and kinda difficult to talk to and just so reserved it was a bit frustrating. But as the days pile on, he starts to visibly relax around everyone. Bokuto notices that the introversion and politeness gradually fade away: Akaashi would snark out a comment when Bokuto is getting a little too recklessly ahead of himself, would voice out his opinion and give a disdainful look if he disagrees with someone, and to Bokuto’s delight would participate in his pranks on Konoha and Komi.
It’s kinda like he made friends for the first time, Bokuto thinks, and didn’t know how to before.
.
The first time that they are in real danger together—one where Bokuto is not 99.9% sure they will all come out alive—is when someone plants a bomb in the bar they frequent.
Bokuto should’ve known. You seem to have a sixth sense for danger, Konoha always says. He senses that something is slightly off, but he is already slightly intoxicated, and the bar owners are acting completely normal, and Konoha and Shirofuku and Akaashi are there with him
(and maybe he is hoping that he and Akaashi can get drunk together and then maybe, just maaaaybe)
and he feels safe, so he decides that there is no need to be alarmed. The four of them are sitting at a booth—Bokuto playfully and Konoha seriously arguing about what they should do about the offer of alliance with Nekoma, Shirofuku laughing and drinking way too much for her own sobriety, and Akaashi eyeing everything with caution despite the cold drink in his hand—when the sound explodes in their ears.
He will have to think about this later, but his first instinct is to jump over Akaashi. Bokuto first smells smoke and iron, then understands that the latter is blood, and then feels nauseating panic when the thought of the other three not making it crosses his mind, and finally he feels the pain.
It isn’t too bad; he has felt worse before. The pain is coming from his shoulder—no, where his back meets his left shoulder (thank god thank god it’s not my dominant arm thank god)—and he tries to move it. Yes. Yes, it’s painful, but he can move it. Best not to though, he thinks, wincing.
He turns his head to look at Akaashi, who is lying on his back on the booth cushion with Bokuto on top of him.
Akaashi looks like his whole world is ending, all panic and shock and desperation. Bokuto’s stomach twists, well, to be honest, pleasantly.
“Bokuto-san, you’re hurt,” Akaashi says, trembling, his eyes wide. He looks like he isn’t able to get up but he doesn’t look injured.
“Are you hurt?” Bokuto asks. Jesus, there is so much smoke—
“N-no, ah,” Akaashi says, and then lifts his hand and touches Bokuto’s head. When he retracts, it’s covered in blood. “Oh god.”
“Oops,” is all Bokuto can think of saying. My head then too, I guess, oops. He climbs off of Akaashi, glances over at Konoha and Shirofuku, sees that they are injured but both very much alive, dimly hears Akaashi repeating his name like an echo, and passes out.
.
After that incident, Akaashi always gets in a bad mood whenever Bokuto goes somewhere without him, so Bokuto brings him everywhere. Not that he minds, really. At all.
“Did you realize,” Konoha says to him while he is bedridden for a few days, “that Shirofuku also sat next to you, but you dove for Akaashi instead?”
“Well,” Bokuto says, insanely thinking that his nose has somehow grown longer, which might be the workings of the opioids he was given, “I thought you might have been able to save her.”
“Hm,” is all Konoha says, hiding a smile behind his hand. Bokuto feels strangely attacked.
.
Bokuto’s able to gauge Akaashi’s expressions now: he can tell that Akaashi is agitated by the slight furrow of his brows, or hungry by the falter in his step, or happy by the bright glint in his eyes. Akaashi’s not hard to read at all, he realizes; he is an open book as long as you pay close attention.
“I think he’s replaced me as your right hand man,” Konoha remarks, two years after Akaashi joined Fukurodani. He doesn’t look bothered; just entertained.
“Hey hey hey, don’t look so down!” Bokuto says despite that and lightly whacks Konoha on the back with his club. That earns two whole days of Konoha vocally fuming at him.
.
Bokuto likes violence and Bokuto likes girls. He grew up in a world of blood and power and he knows not much else. He grew to like strong women, confident women, smart women, and it’s the reason why Shirofuku and Suzumeda are members of Fukurodani. Although sometimes he likes submissive women too, and during these times there are places he can go to for them.
Bokuto likes violence and Bokuto likes girls, so he doesn’t completely understand why sometimes, when he sees Akaashi laughing, he would feel such intense longing.
(Shirofuku also sat next to you, but you dove for Akaashi instead.)
He doesn’t completely understand why, but Bokuto’s not a total idiot. He can hazard a guess.
And then there is one particularly time that he will look back and think is ridiculous but remembers it forever anyway: when he walks in on Akaashi sleeping in June. Akaashi is laying on the sofa, his eyes closed and a book on his chest. It is so quiet that all he can hear is the wind blowing gently on the curtains as specks of golden dust drift slowly, slowly in the air through the few rays of sunlight spilling through the window. Everything is so still and so serene and so peaceful that Bokuto wants to burst out crying, because time stops moving for him in that moment and he does not believe he deserves it.
.
The first time Bokuto says the wrong name, he feels horrible.
It’s not one of those cases where he mispronounces a name or forgets a name; that he never feels horrible about. This time, he is completely aware of who he is with.
She’s not a prostitute; just a nice girl with a penchant for adrenaline rushes that he’s met a couple times before at a bar and they’ve been meeting up frequently the past week. She’s lying on his desk now, with her back to him, and Bokuto just kind of zones out. No one’s in the building now – everyone has gone out either to dinner or home – and Bokuto thought it would be exciting to bring her here and have some fun.
He closes his eyes and idly thinks of how silky her hair is between his fingers, how smooth her skin is, how nice this feels. He thinks he will do this again.
Until the name, slipping through his lips, starts with an A and ends with a shi, and the girl freezes under him as cold heavy rocks settle at the bottom of his stomach.
“That’s so funny,” she says, and he never sees her again.
.
There have been too many sudden disappearances, too many civilian casualties caused by Nohebi lately, so Fukurodani agrees to side with Nekoma.
They manage to catch three of Nohebi’s men one night—Bokuto, Kuroo, and their right hand men. Bokuto wanted to beat them until they tell him what Nohebi’s leader, Suguru, has been up to lately, and even after they confessed (“He is trying to get his hands on the Ornament!”), Bokuto still wants to club all of them on the head and finish them in one go.
But Akaashi places a hand on his chest and says his name, and Bokuto pouts but subsides.
When he retreats to the corner, where Kuroo and Kenma are standing, Kuroo offers him a cigarette and says, “He seems to have mellowed you out.”
“He has not!” he says indignantly.
Kuroo looks at him for five long seconds and laughs.
“What!” he says, kicking Kuroo’s leg. “What’s so funny?”
Kuroo keeps on laughing for another ten seconds, then gasps for breath, and then tells him, “I like Akaashi.”
Bokuto catches Kenma giving Kuroo an annoyed glance. “Hey,” Bokuto says, feeling a little hot, “as much as we are allies, he’s one of my men.”
Kuroo grins at him, a little deviously. “Don’t worry,” he says, in a tone that Bokuto thinks is as ingenuine as lies go. “I’m just saying he’s a very efficient man. Look at him.”
Bokuto frowns, but turns his head. Akaashi has tied up all three men and leaned them against the brick wall. Admist their muffled, pleading yells behind the gags, Akaashi purses his lips, and Bokuto can see an apology in his frown. All too suddenly the night air feels very cold and the moon shines a little too bright, and Bokuto can’t avert his gaze. Akaashi stands, silhouetted, and pulls the trigger thrice. Bokuto doesn’t feel like he can breathe. All he wants to do is walk over and throw the gun away from Akaashi’s hand and yell at him to leave this city, leave this country, and never be associated with this world again, because Akaashi is still just a boy.
.
He sometimes dreams of Akaashi.
The majority of the dreams consist of both of them conquering the world together. Nohebi – those bastards – would be taken down and disbanded. Fukurodani would rise up the ranks as the most powerful gang in the Shinseikai family - the largest criminal organization in all of Japan - and everyone would know Bokuto’s name!
Once in a while, the dreams are entirely inappropriate, and Bokuto wakes up with a bit of a problem, so he tries not to think about it.
The rest of the dreams however, occuring rarely and randomly, are the ones that leave Bokuto waking up with an achingly staggering amount of sadness. In these dreams, he and Akaashi are ten and nine, childhood neighbours living in the countryside with green and blue and gold all around them, and the years pass by and they go to school together and have lunch with their friends together and stress over math homework together and play in a volleyball club together and, in the afternoons, go for bike rides through the fields during warm summer days, the wind whistling past their faces.
Those are the dreams he hates the most.
.
His relationship with Kuroo morphs from allies to friends in the span of a month. It’s hard to fully trust people, especially considering who they are and what they do, but it’s easy with Kuroo. The guy is infuriating and a bit of a sadist, and he’s always accompanied by Kenma, who more often than not is playing some kind of game, but Bokuto thinks that out of everyone he’s ever encountered in his life, Kuroo is the person he gets along with the quickest.
He almost tells Kuroo about his little obsession with Akaashi one evening when they are walking together, but when he thinks about the teeny tiny possibility that other people might know what his weakness is and who they can consequently hurt, he decides not to. Someday, maybe.
.
The first time Akaashi is shot, Bokuto feels like the ground under him has given up.
Bokuto knew the bullet was aimed at himself. There wasn’t enough time to fully dodge, so he was just gonna move to the right so that it lands at his shoulder instead, but before he can act upon it, Akaashi is in front of him.
No! he wants to shouts, but the shock from the sound of the bullet being fired fills him with so much dread that his heart lodges in his throat.
When Akaashi crumbles to the ground and a pool of blood forms around him, Bokuto feels his knees giving out. He faintly registers Konoha shouting and other guns being fired, and either Washio or Sarukui are running in front of him, but all he can really see is Akaashi covered in red.
Bokuto likes the smell of blood, but for the first time, he is so horribly terrified of it that he wants to run to the nearest dump and just retch and retch and retch and retch and retch and
“AKAASHI!” he hears himself screaming. “Akaashi, Akaashi,” he says, like a prayer, shakily turning him over. There is blood everywhere, oh god, there is so much blood, it’s all pouring out from his stomach. Akaashi’s eyes are fluttering, and his gaze falls on Bokuto for a second before Bokuto can see that he has lost consciousness. “Jesus fuck, Akaashi—”
“Get him somewhere safe, boss!” he hears Konoha yelling. His survival instinct kicks in, and Bokuto holds Akaashi as carefully as possible and runs.
.
The first time Akaashi meets Bokuto, everything is falling apart.
There are bad men outside. They already killed dad, and mom is lying on the ground beside him, and there is a bad man in front of him now. He sees Akaashi, grins, pulls out the biggest knife Akaashi has ever seen in his twelve years of life, and lunges for him.
Akaashi closes his eyes. When he opens them a moment later, his mom is in front of him. She makes a painful noise and falls, the thud sounding so incredibly heavy that his legs stop functioning.
The man huffs a laugh, half-frustrated and half-amused, and advances towards him. Akaashi doesn’t know what to do or how to move or what to say, and desperately thinks that maybe twelve years is enough of a life to live, maybe that’s long enough for him and he doesn’t need any more than that to experience anything worthwhile—
There is a cracking sound and the man stumbles to the floor. Behind him is a boy that can’t be much older than Akaashi, with spiky black and white hair and a shirt with a yellow star on it. He’s holding a club, Akaashi notices, stained with red.
The man gets back on his feet, but before he can lunge at the other boy in a fit of rage, the boy pulls out a gun and shoots him twice in the chest.
Akaashi stares. “A star,” he mumbles inanely.
The boy notices Akaashi and blinks. Then the curious face turns into a half-scowl and half-pout. “I’m only using a gun because I wouldn’t be able to kill him with my bare hands. If you say anything to anyone, I’m gonna come back and beat your ass!”
When the boy runs away to join the rest of his group, Akaashi says something that rhymes with Uurghnkh and collapses. It is roughly an hour later that he registers what has happened and wails in grief.
.
Six months later, Akaashi finds himself starving on the street. They took away his family, and his aunt who moved in treated him with burn marks and dirt food and deep cuts and strange men. As he ran away from home, Akaashi swore to himself that he would rather die on the sidewalk than live with her.
Well, he thinks now, the hunger so immense that it clenches into knots in his stomach, guess I made my choice.
He is about to close his eyes and go to sleep when the smell of meat strikes him, cruel and inviting. His mouth waters.
“Hey, kid,” comes an older man’s voice. Akaashi looks up to see a man with blonde hair styled back with a headband and a cigarette in his mouth. “You need to eat. Here.”
Akaashi feels something fall on his lap. The smell is so much stronger now, but he is too exhausted to make any big grateful movements. He gingerly opens the warm paper bag to find three pork buns inside, steamed and untouched. They are in his mouth so quickly that Akaashi barely registers himself moving, and when he looks up after devouring the first bun to profusely thank his saviour, the man has already left.
.
He’s able to distribute the food and find the resolve to steal a few chickens and bread.
When Akaashi has found the strength to work, he begs to be a bus boy in a restaurant and his quiet politeness earns him another job as a helper at a construction site. He saves up enough money to find the smallest, most dilapidated apartment on the outskirts of Tokyo. Sometimes he gets into fights with other boys, but the wounds always heal.
He survives like that for the next six years.
.
The second time Akaashi sees Bokuto is when he just turns nineteen.
He is carrying a heavy box of fresh food for the restaurant when a black car pulls up in front of him and somebody climbs out.
The years have given the boy more muscle, more of a jawline, more of an energetic but solid edge in his walk, and a lot of height, but it is unmistakably the one Akaashi catches himself thinking about when he misses his family.
His eyes are golden, he notes.
The spiky-haired boy shouts something at the driver, who mutters in return, and then laughs as he saunters his way through the doors of a building.
Akaashi hears something metal fall behind him, and he whips back to find another boy bending over to pick up a worn-out rod.
“It’s the star,” Akaashi blurts out.
The boy blinks. “The what? The guy who just entered?” He looks… boisterous, Akaashi thinks; this guy who looks about Akaashi’s age seems like someone who would war-cry himself into a building on fire as a dare.
Akaashi nods. “I owe him my life.”
Now the face morphs into pure surprise. “You owe Bokuto Koutarou your life?” Then he throws his head back and laughs. “Well, this is a bizarre day. What even happened?”
Akaashi tells him, and the boy falls quiet. After a while of talking, he explains to Akaashi that Bokuto is dangerous, is completely unhinged, because he’s only become Fukurodani’s leader for a year now and already there have been almost double the number of attacks caused by his gang, man, I heard he loves blood so much he has a room painted in it, and even though Karasuno isn’t targeted we’d like to have some control over this much violence, and that’s part of the reason why I’m here spying on him, well kinda, but anyway don’t go finding him, you’ll get yourself…
Akaashi dimly drowns the rest of Tanaka’s words out. The next day he requests an audience with Fukurodani’s leader.
.
Akaashi is beaten so badly that he almost regrets his decision, but then the beating stops, and one of the guys says um I think he might pass out if we continue.
Akaashi drifts off. When he opens his eyes again, he’s lying on something soft with his entire body aching.
“Sorry about that. Requirement, sorta,” says Konoha beside him, squeezing hot water out of a towel and gently placing it on Akaashi’s arm, which stings a surprising amount. “I know it’s real nasty, but we needed to see how serious you were. We’ve had a few people pretend to join to spy on us or bring us down or some shit, but when we start hurting them they balk out, those cowards. Not that we won’t have any brave infiltrators. It’s just, there is no place for them here if they can crumble so easily, and we’ll at least be able to filter out the weak ones, I guess. There have been too many of them lately. Either way, there's sake, so that will help. You're going to be in the probationary period for a few months before you can exchange sake with Bokuto.”
Akaashi is about to go to sleep again, but then sees a man with silver hair burst into the room and shout, “If you can just stop beating up your newcomers, I wouldn’t be so overworked! Not only am I taking care of my men, but also Fukurodani’s?!”
Behind him is Sarukui, who is panting and shooting Konoha a look of apology.
“S-Sugawara!” Konoha yelps.
“I swear to god!” Sugawara angrily stomps over to Akaashi and starts taking things out of his medical kit. He glares at Konoha, who (Akaashi notes with bemusement) looks like he’s forgotten how to activate his fight or flight response. “Look at this poor boy! When I’m done with him I’m going to skin you. If you don’t stop hurting these poor kids, I’ll beat you half to death. Do you want me and my men to beat you half to death?”
“No, sir, no!”
“Good!” Sugawara turns to Akaashi and beams the most angelic smile. “I’m sorry about this. I’ll take care of your wounds. Make sure to get a lot of sleep and food, and ask me any questions you want. And please call me Suga.”
Akaashi wants to laugh, but it’s a little too painful for that.
.
Akaashi is able to spend more time with Bokuto after that. He is honestly not entirely sure what drew him to the point of joining an organized crime syndicate just to be around Bokuto. Maybe he wants to be as strong and reckless as that boy in the star shirt seven years ago. Maybe there is nothing to lose. Maybe he doesn’t have anyone else that he cares more for in the past few lonely years. Maybe seeing his family killed before his eyes left him with a sense that he hasn’t lived since. Or maybe he’s just attracted to Bokuto.
In any case, none of that matters. He goes through gun training with Sarukui and hand-to-hand combat training with Washio. After a few weeks, he starts to accompany them places. After a few months, he starts joining their outings for extortion and debt collection and dealings and mostly hunting down Nohebi’s leader. It seems that Nohebi is trying to expand and find something called the Ornament, although no one knows exactly what that is.
.
The first time Akaashi’s heart skips a beat, Tokyo is covered in snow.
Bokuto is in a dejected mood today because it’s too cold out. He’s been complaining all night about how his ears are so frozen he can’t quite feel them, but it would look fashionably awful, awful I tell you, Akaashi, no one will look at me and think I’m the boss of the most powerful gang in Tokyo if he wears earmuffs. Akaashi will have to come up with a way to convince him otherwise later, but leaves it be for now.
They’ve captured two of Nohebi’s men, but during a moment of distraction, one of them lunges at Komi.
It is too quick for Akaashi to react, but when he processes what’s happening, Bokuto has hammered onto the man’s outstretched hand with his club. There is a sickening crack, and the man falls onto snow, whimpering and holding an unnaturally bent arm.
Bokuto, who was looking like all he wanted to do is go home and hide under a blanket, is now looking like he has the whole world behind him cheering him on. Akaashi watches, unblinking, as Bokuto lands other bone-chilling sound across the man’s other arm. Definitely dislocated now, if he’s lucky. There is also blood, dripping onto the white, cold snow.
“Nobody touches my men,” says Bokuto, and steps forward to raise his club one more time. There is fire in his eyes, glee, and Akaashi notes with distant fear that Bokuto is grinning despite the anger evident in his voice. His heart skips a beat. There is no doubt in his mind that Bokuto would charge through hell for every single one of his men, and succeed in doing so. Akaashi wishes that he could’ve done the same for his family and promises that he will become strong enough to do the same for Bokuto.
.
A year into joining Fukurodani, Akaashi thinks he has all of Bokuto’s weaknesses noted down. They have spent so much time together that Bokuto would ask Akaashi to come with him everywhere except for when he visits brothels, because I trust you. He has learned what to say and how to deal with Bokuto’s low points, even when he doesn’t understand almost all of the reasons why he gets into a foul mood.
“You’re getting really good at this,” Sarukui tells him one day with a proud smile. “No one has ever been able to deal with his mood swings before.”
“Yes please replace me as his right hand, I can’t do it anymore,” Konoha begs.
Komi laughs. “You know,” he says, placing a hand on Akaashi’s shoulder. “I think Bokuto’s also changed a bit. Before he would always do everything without thinking. He was also, well, a little sadistic too, maybe twisted. But ever since you joined he’s gradually, hmmmmm, I don’t know how to put this.”
“He’s gotten softer,” Konoha agrees. “He doesn’t look like he was raised by Fukurodani’s previous leader anymore.”
Akaashi understands a little bit of what they mean. Bokuto doesn’t use his club that much anymore. But Bokuto will always be Bokuto, Akaashi thinks. He will always be the person who will do everything he can to protect the people closest to him; a boss everyone respects; a man who wears his heart on his sleeve and does nothing to hide his thoughts. And when he breaks into his wider, more genuine smiles – the ones full of happiness that happens after Akaashi has cracked a joke or when they manage to play a successful prank on Konoha or Komi – Akaashi feels more or less like he’s bathed in sunlight.
.
The first time Akaashi got jealous to the point of not thinking clearly, he was fourteen and, while walking back to his apartment, he peaked into a home to see a family of four having dinner together.
There was a moment when he wanted to kill everyone at the dining table and leave the young son to feel all the crippling loneliness that he’s felt, but the moment passed and Akaashi hated himself for a very long time afterwards. He decided then that jealousy is a useless emotion, as is self-pity, so he locked them both away.
The second time Akaashi gets jealous, he’s walking down the halls of an otherwise empty Fukurodani building. Everyone has either gone home or to dinner, so Akaashi thinks he can maybe borrow a book in the library for tonight.
Then he hears a girl’s moan, and his whole body turns cold when he quietly peers into Bokuto’s office. They are there: Bokuto standing and a familiar girl (ah right he’s seen her before at a few bars, the name’s something like Hana) on the desk. Both of them have pants and a skirt on, respectively, but otherwise they’re unclothed, and it’s glaringly obvious they’re not unexposed below.
The coldness turns into heat, and Akaashi flushes. It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve seen him without his shirt on, he frantically thinks, but never in this manner. The heat then quickly morphs into white-hot envy, and Akaashi wants to be her, wants to be her so badly that for a split second he thinks of pulling out his gun and shooting her in the head.
The split second passes though, as all things do, and he hates himself again. He will never be Bokuto’s, and Bokuto will surely not be his. He can’t let these emotions cloud his judgement and taint his actions; there are more important things in life than the desires for affection.
As Akaashi walks away, he misses hearing Bokuto say his name and an entirely hurt but almost amused that’s so funny.
.
They are walking down the halls one morning, chatting about maybe investing money into the cozy little bar at the end of the neighbouring street, when Bokuto, out of zeal and eagerness, wraps an arm around Akaashi and pulls him in for a side hug.
Akaashi feels his body heat up and internally freaks out. It’s not because of fear, or embarrassment, or shame, or—
“Akaashi?” says Bokuto, releasing him. No it’s fine, you can keep doing that. Akaashi looks up, surprised to see Bokuto looking half-confused and half-disappointed. And maybe a little… flushed?
“You’re red,” Bokuto says. “Um.”
“I’m sorry,” Akaashi says, glad to find his voice not breaking. “It’s just been a while since I’ve been hugged.” Which is a lie, because Konoha and Komi have been doing it a lot lately.
“Oh. Well. Well then,” is all Akaashi hears before he finds himself tackled into a bone-crushing hug.
.
Akaashi would die for him.
That is why, when the bullet comes, he thinks of all the possibilities of what he can do, and goes for the one that ensures absolutely no injuries to the boy in the star shirt.
.
When Akaashi wakes up, there is a dull pain in the left side of his stomach. His mouth tastes weird under the oxygen mask, and the ceiling is so bright that for a moment it gives him a light headache.
Akaashi has been to the hospital once, when his mother broke her leg from a careless incident involving swings, so he’s able to recognize where he is. Suga is sitting beside him with Konoha standing right behind.
“Good morning Akaashi,” says Suga, smiling, “or well, it’s 3 PM now, but. We’re in the hospital. You’re badly injured and you’ve been asleep for a day, so don’t move too much, but you’re going to be okay.”
Akaashi gives the slightest nod. It’s pretty hard to move anyway.
“You idiot,” comes Bokuto’s voice. Akaashi jumps a little and turns his head, reprimanding himself for not realizing there has been someone on the right side of the bed.
Bokuto is standing and glaring at him with so much anger that Akaashi doesn’t quite understand what he has done to be on the receiving end of this. Bokuto also kind of looks like he might cry, so Akaashi tries to apologize, but what comes out of his throat is a hngkm.
“You idiot,” Bokuto says, louder this time, and raises his fist like he’s going to punch him. Thank god we’re in the hospital, Akaashi thinks gratefully, or else his club would’ve been in his hand.
No one in the room expects Bokuto to hit him though, so no one reacts.
“Idiot,” Bokuto repeats, all furious. “Idiot! YOU IDIOT!”
“Can you say that again, I didn’t quite catch it,” says Konoha, but he looks terrified when Bokuto shoots him a glare. Akaashi wants to laugh.
“Would you like us to give you guys a moment, Bokuto?” asks Suga.
“No,” Bokuto seethes, and storms out of the room.
Suga turns and smiles cheerfully at Akaashi. “He looked relieved, didn’t he?”
.
Bokuto soon regrets his decision to leave, so he comes back the same day and says I was just worried, which is undoubtedly the understatement of the year because never in his life has he been so anxious.
“It’s okay,” Akaashi says, smiling, and Bokuto has the urge to yell at him all over again.
.
It takes a couple weeks for Akaashi to be released from the hospital, and another month to fully recover. The bullet went through the far left side of his stomach, so it misses all the abdominal organs. Bokuto was so terrified that night when he ran in the hospital with Akaashi in his arms, screaming for help, someone please please help.
As Akaashi was whipped into emergency surgery, Bokuto had looked up chances of survival from gunshot wounds to the stomach. If it had hit his spine, he would die. If it had hit a mesenteric artery, he would die. If it had hit his spleen or liver, he would die slowly, but still die. If it had hit his intestines, there is a high chance he would die from gastrointestinal perforation. If it had caused peritonitis or leaking intestinal fluids…
When the doctor came out of surgery, Bokuto was sitting on the floor in a corner of the waiting room, his arms wrapped around his knees in an almost fetal-like position. He didn’t even have the energy to stand up; the spiral into endless harrowing possibilities had already gone too deep.
When the doctor confirmed that Akaashi would be fine, that it’s lucky the bullet did not puncture any important parts, Bokuto was so relieved he started laughing. Then he went into the washroom and vomited his dinner out. Then the next emotion is anger: angry at Akaashi, half for not thinking about himself in dangerous circumstances, and half for putting Bokuto through all that emotional turmoil and be fucking unconscious while it happened.
(The first time Bokuto realizes he’s in love, he’s puking down the toilet of a hospital’s washroom.)
.
When Akaashi is fully recovered, he immediately comes to work with Konoha and Komi and Sarukui. They cheer and clap him on the back and chastise him for stressing them out, and Akaashi feels it all as affection. It’s been a long time. He’s happy to be back.
Later that day, Bokuto calls him into his office.
When Akaashi enters, the sound of rain through the windows drowns out the apprehension in his head. Bokuto is eating a protein bar and sitting on his desk in a posture that indicates he is neither his usual energetic self nor in dejection mode.
That’s good, I guess, Akaashi thinks. “Bokuto-san,” he says.
“Akaaashiiii,” Bokuto drawls out. “Did you know I have a favourite kind of protein bar? I’ve eaten it before, but I didn’t take a mental note of what it looks like or how it’s called or what exactly it tastes like even, and then I ran out of it one day and now I don’t know where to find them. It’s lost. Gone. Forever. And I think back and go, ‘oh well that was very stupid of me’. You know what I mean?”
“Er,” Akaashi says.
“What I mean, is that there was something I could do about it, but I didn’t because it was easy not to, and now it’s too late. Do you see where I’m going with this?” Akaashi stares blankly, and Bokuto lets out a heavy sigh. “I’m trying to make a point. It’s like the situation with you. I should’ve brought you out of Fukurodani early on. Or never have let you join altogether—see, like if I’ve never tasted it I wouldn’t know how good it is and I wouldn’t be so miserable now. And you wouldn’t have been in danger. If I never let you in, you wouldn’t have almost died.”
“Are you comparing me to a protein bar?”
Bokuto puts both hands on his hips and pouts. “You’re not listening to what I’m telling you.”
“I am listening to you,” Akaashi says, holding back laughter. “Are you listening to yourself?”
Bokuto gives up. “The whole point of this is that I don’t want you to be in danger.”
“I know,” Akaashi says softly.
The mood has lifted a bit. Akaashi has been very uncertain around Bokuto these days, after the injury happened; sometimes it looks like Bokuto wants to both hug him for a thousand years and strangle him at the same time, and Akaashi is pretty much confused. But the inane babbling just now is comforting. He feels like they’ve gone back to being friends, partners, someone they can each rely on, something much more precious than leader and right hand man.
“Come here,” Bokuto orders.
Akaashi steps forward until he’s standing half a foot away.
“Show me your wound.”
“It’s a scar now,” Akaashi corrects, and lifts up his shirt.
What used to be a hole in his stomach is now new skin, the edges pulling inward. It itches a little, but not too much.
“It’s so ugly,” Bokuto comments.
Akaashi’s mouth twitches. “Thanks, I made it myself.”
Bokuto lets out a surprised laugh. Then he does the last thing Akaashi thinks he would do and presses his lips to the scar.
“Blarggh,” Akaashi yelps. Don’t react don’t react don’t react don’t react don’t react—
“You know,” says Bokuto, looking up at Akaashi’s face and covering the scar with his right hand, “I’ve always wanted to be as kind as you are.”
“I think you’ve got,” Akaashi attempts because he’s uncomfortable, “uh, chocolate on your face. On the right.”
Bokuto impatiently wipes it away and smiles. “You might be the kindest person I know, Akaashi. I want to be someone who is as kind as you, but I can’t. I can’t be a good person. Not really. If I am, we all die.”
It sounds like an apology, which annoys the heck out of Akaashi. He understands what Bokuto means, but does this man not remember when he held Komi until he stopped crying in grievance of his mother’s death? Or how he always refrains from eating Konoha’s favourite food and lets him eat it, even though it’s also Bokuto’s favourite food? Or how sometimes, after a bad fight, he orders Suga to tend to everyone else’s injuries before his own? The way people express cruelty is more or less the same, but the way people show kindness is all so different, and to hell with it if Bokuto thinks his kindness is more undeserving than Akaashi’s.
(The first time Akaashi realizes he’s in love, he’s so frustrated he wants to yank all of Bokuto’s hair out of his head.)
Akaashi is about to verbally repeat everything that’s on his mind, but he looks at Bokuto, who is half-child and half-danger and all brave, and makes a mental note to say all of that later. He instead grabs Bokuto by the front of his shirt and leans in.
.
The first time they kiss, the rain falls long and heavy outside. Somewhere in the heart of Tokyo, a boy named Hinata accidentally crashes into Kageyama after years of not seeing each other; somewhere else, Daichi plants a tentative kiss on Suga’s forehead while the latter pretends to be asleep; nearby, Nishinoya is vehemently convincing Tsukishima to teach him how to beat Asahi at chess while Yamaguchi laughs in the corner; further on the outskirts of the city, Oikawa and Ushijima are holding each other at gunpoint; and deep in a filthy, muddy alleyway, Suguru shoots a man from Shiratorizawa in the head for refusing to tell him where the Ornament is.
The first time they kiss, Bokuto and Akaashi are grinning so hard they feel like they can just die right then and there will be peace, because no matter how everyone’s lives unfold, and no matter what other people may say, they are the protagonists of the world.
.