Work Text:
If you had asked Ryo a year ago what his life might one day look like, his answer would've been that he doesn't think that far ahead. Maybe he would've said that he would be working on whatever case was plaguing him at the time.
Certainly, none of his thoughts factored in living with another man, and certainly not one that a non-zero number of people described as roadkill.
But here he was: standing in his living room, looking at the aforementioned man who was sprawled out, fast asleep, on his couch.
Truthfully, anything Ryo could've said about future plans would've been a non-answer, something polite enough to satisfy someone's curiosity. His life had always been about one thing, and one thing only, and nothing beyond that mattered. The future existed to Ryo in the form of calendar dates for court hearings, client meetings, and the occasional progress on finding out what happened to Mei. He didn't think ahead any further than strictly necessary, and truthfully, he couldn't. What was the point? Everything he ever did was for his singular goal. It didn't matter what happened after.
"Towa?" Ryo squatted down by the couch, observing Towa quietly. His breathing was deep and even... He seemed relaxed enough. On one hand, he wanted to put Towa in bed. On the other, Towa had been awake when Ryo woke up for work this morning. While it was certainly nice to wake up to find Towa making breakfast on a weekday, it typically meant Towa hadn't been able to sleep... which turned out to be the case this time as well.
Towa liked to tease Ryo about how spacey and oblivious he could be, but it wasn't like he never kept track of anything... What did it matter if he forgot to turn off the lights? He had more important things to remember. It wasn't like he couldn't afford the electricity bill.
Ryo looked to the end table when Towa showed no signs of stirring, and spotted his bottle of sleeping pills and a half empty glass of--water? Ryo picked it up, smelled it: definitely water. Not that Towa was typically in the habit of knocking back his medication with alcohol these days... But Ryo didn't want to miss something that told him Towa was doing worse than he seemed.
But no, this was all in the range of normal for him. Ryo wasn't worried--after all, he might be a little oblivious, but he wasn't stupid, nor was he naive. Wounds on someone's heart and mind could only heal so much, and they might rupture again over something seemingly innocuous. Maybe you would know what it was, maybe you wouldn't. Ryo was no stranger to grief and anxiety hitting him like a truck because he saw some little girl with a stuffed bunny, or because he saw cigarette burns on someone... Or sometimes it was nothing at all that kept him up and lead him to spending a night at the office, dense legal documents preferable to thinking about his feelings in any capacity.
He stood up, stretched, and pulled the blanket off the back of the couch and covered Towa with it. If Towa slept better on his couch, so be it.
Never would Ryo have imagined this kind of scene in his future, but he certainly wasn't complaining. Living with Towa inspired some kind of fluttering warmth in his chest: unfamiliar but comfortable. Whatever Towa needed, he wanted to give.
Impulse struck him, and he leaned down, kissing Towa's cheek softly, earning him the faintest half asleep sound in response. Ryo felt a smile tug at his lips.
"Good night, Towa."