love is something I deserve (but you, I deserve more)

by lovelavanya (can_i_disappear_please)

Summary:

Kazama just wants Shinchan to take life seriously.

Shinchan just wants Kazama to take him seriously.

It’s really that simple, or is it?

Chapter 1: one

Notes:

Shinchan thinks of his parents by their names sometimes (he doesn't call them by their names, don't worry) so just a reminder, Mitzi is Shinchan's mom and Hiroshi is his dad. Also, I know Shinchan isn't a full name and all that but because I watched a dubbed ver of the cartoon, I've used names as they were said in the show. Don't come at me for any mistakes in honorifics please 😭

This was supposed to be a 10k one-shot, but I've already written almost 13k and have no intentions of stopping anytime soon. So, I did what i do best and decided to divide it.

Masao and Nene are getting married.

Shinchan blows out the smoke he inhaled, feeling the tobacco spread through his lungs as he thinks about exactly what the fuck was going on his life.

Very obviously, Shinchan is the best man. Very not obviously, Ai-chan is the maid of honour.

His childhood friends are getting married to each other. All their families, teachers and people from their shared past are to reunite for this wedding, so Shinchan should be happy, because these kinds of reunions didn't happen very often. The last time they all reunited had to have been when..... Suzuki got married? Shinchan isn't sure.

But fact of the matter is that Shinchan should be happy, and he is, to a good extent, he is, because damnit he might be an asshole through and through but stealing the thunder of his best friend's biggest day to wallow in his misery is not the level he'd stooped to, ever. So yeah, Shinchan is happy, it's just that... that...

"Hey, Shinchan?"

He flicks the cigarette on the ground and stomps on it lightly, before turning around to face his best friend.

"Yeah?"

Masao wrinkles his nose, still not a fan of this habit even though Nene has gone through a million phases of chain smoking while dating him, no thanks to Shinchan's influence.

"You know where Nene is?"

Shinchan scoffs lightly, "Why would I know where that piece of shit is? Last time I checked, she wasn't my responsibility to take care of." When Masao comes forward to hit him on the head, Shinchan knows he deserves it.

"Ow! You're abusive." He whines, "Does Nene know that? Or you only show this side of yourself to me?" He suddenly smirks, leaning forward to crowd Masao's personal space.

Masao, to his credit, doesn't even flinch as he watches Shinchan make fun of himself like it's an everyday thing.

"You know you can still ditch that small packet, no explosion for my ethereal looks, divine personality and obviously, amazing skills in be-- HEY, NENE SAKURADA, SOON-TO-BE-SATO, LEAVE MY FUCKING EAR, YOU CAVEWOMAN!"

"I will," She twists his ear one more time for good measure, "when you stop hitting on my soon-to-be husband," before finally freeing him, with at least a good ten meters or so between him and Masao.

"Jealous bitch." Shinchan mutters, rubbing the angry red organ harshly.

"Clingy asshat." He hears Nene sneer at him before running over to fawn over Masao.

Shinchan just gags at them being all lovey-dovey like he has done these last eight-nine years they've been together. Still, beyond this crassness, Shinchan knows they know that he really is happy they found each other so early in their lives, built a good foundation of friendship before starting a relationship that is now getting converted to marriage.

Marriage.

God, Shinchan wants to cry.

He had been fine this morning. He woke up at around six in the morning, started doing his best manly duties the moment he regained his senses. Today's work involved making sure all the guests, staying in the farmhouse they had rented, had packed and were ready to move to the airport for their flight to the destination of the marriage. It's not Kasukabe.

They had moved into the farmhouse to accommodate all guests coming from all over Japan at one place, before boarding the flight for the wedding together, in order to avoid hassle. A good thinking on Shinchan's part but don't let Ai-chan hear that.

Speaking of whom, "Shinchan! Where are you going? We have a situation to deal with, moron."

Yeah, Shinchan huffs to himself amusedly as he continues walking down the hallway of his floor to get to his room, he took care of every plausible situation they could potentially find themselves in earlier, so Ai-chan is probably being a nuisance as alwa--"Now, Mister." Maybe not, then.

He whirls around, hands stuffed snugly in his pockets as he peers at the haphazard mess of a woman charging towards him. "The faucet in Nene's grandmother's washroom is leaking."

As he just raises a brow in question because that is the situation she couldn't deal with, she continues, "It wasn't a huge thing, and I asked her to move to my room to wash up but then Nene's mother found out about it."

"Oh." Shinchan lets out sympathetically, finally understanding the emergency. "What did you say to her?"

Ai-chan looks at him then, arms crossed over her chest defensively. "What makes you think I said something to make her upset?"

"Well, I know I didn't, so it has to be you or Masao. But I just met Masao a few minutes ago and he seemed pretty chill so I know it's you."

Ai-chan pouts, trudging the last bit of distance between them gracefully. "I said I had it under control and I really did, but then she started ranting about how I want this wedding to be spoiled because I want Masao for myself. You know how she is with words." Shinchan knows, he really does. "I went to defend myself, but with all this stress piling up, I kind of let it slip that she is the one spoiling all the fun here and she..."

"... didn't take it well." Shinchan finishes and winces.

Ai-chan looks close to tears now. Poor girl.

"She's cursing at anyone who dares to come near her now and I'm scared to even be in a ten-meter vicinity of her. But we have a flight to board, and we can't just leave her here," Shinchan snorts lightly, "so please help me."

She's within touching distance now so Shinchan says nothing while putting an arm around her shoulders and brings her close to his chest. She comes willingly, tired out of her mind. And the wedding festivities haven't even started yet.

Ai-chan is a petite little thing, barely reaching his collarbones. Their height difference is cute for bystanders, but Shinchan finds it comical, almost as much as the difference in their bank balances. She is still very much of the entitled girl she used to be when they were younger, still thinks that she is a part of their little Kasukabe Defence Group (even though she never once went on a patrol with them), only, Shinchan sees how much she has grown up. Because he knows the many things she could've said to Nene's mother, not only today, but in all these years of her and Nene becoming best friends, but she hasn't. Not a single wrong thing until today for she, along with everyone, knows how much her mother matters to Nene. And Nene is easily one of the most important people in their lives.

The things we do for that ungrateful woman, Shinchan muses as he walks back the way he came, delicate fingers wrapped around his own tightly as if feeding on his courage.

When they reach the crime scene, things have escalated.

Almost all the guests staying at the farmhouse are here now, watching the drama unfold as Nene's mother and Mitzi argue about something; all the while Masao's mother tries to come between them in order to stop the chaos. But Shinchan knows she is no match for them both, knows he has to take matters into his own hands now. He still sighs though, why did Mitzi have to get involved?

When the fathers, huddled together near the window, spot him entering the room confidently, all of them release a sigh of relief, looking at him as though he is God-sent. Shinchan cherishes the attention, letting it fuel his ever-inflating ego as he moves to stand between the older women arguing as if it's no one's business.

He offhandedly motions Ai-chan to keep guard of the door so at least the bride and groom are not subjected to the scene about to unfold.

"You have an ungrateful son, Mrs Nohara, and I am so glad my Nene got over hi--"

"You're talking as if your daughter is the best of them all, Mrs Sakurada, I am glad my Shinchan never fell for her fak--"

"Ladies," he interrupts gently, standing tall between them. "You're both pretty, calm down."

He winks, deliberately facing Nene's mother and revels in her flustered expression.

Mitzi is trying to peer over his shoulders now, "No, Shinchan, you don't know the things this woman has said about you and--"

"Mom, please." He looks at her pointedly, not letting them see each other again just yet. "It's fine, I don't care. Plus, it's Nene's wedding. Mrs Sakurada was just concerned about her daughter and you happened to catch her at the wrong time." He stares down at Nene's mother, daring her to refuse. "Isn't that right, Mam?"

If there's one thing Shinchan is confident about, it's making people agree with him. He has a way with words and gestures that make it hard for humans to disagree. It took him a long while to master this, but now, as he watches the fight slowly leave Nene's mother as she assesses the damage she has caused, Shinchan thinks all that effort is worth it.

Still, he isn't done yet. "Nene's wedding is by far the most important thing in her life. Think about how my wedding would make you feel, Mom." He forces himself to continue as thoughts about his own wedding threaten to choke him.

"Stressed, right? Of course you'd be angry and concerned at the same time, but you would also consider the fact that I am happy." He peers down at Nene's mother assertively. "Even if not everything goes perfectly, I would be happy marrying the person I love," Mayday, mayday, mayday, "so at least you wouldn't want anything you do to affect my happiness. Would you, Mom?"

Nene's mother has shame written all over her face as Shinchan's words finally pierce through her haze to hurt, but she doesn't say anything as she makes a quick exit.

Guessing that the drama is now over, all the other guests leave too, the parents patting his back sympathetically. Mitzi hugs him tiredly from behind, whispering something about needing to start attending that mediocre-at-best meditation class again, and leaves too. Shinchan wants to joke that the last time she joined that, she ended up hitting the instructor and he would have, if only his mind was in the right place.

My wedding. I am happy. I would be happy marrying the person I love. The person I love. I marry the person I love. My wedding with the person I love. Happy wedding. Love marriage. My happiness. With the person I love. But I love....

Dainty, cold fingers on his cheek, concerned brown eyes looking up at him and a bop on his nose make him focus again. The palm on his cheek spreads, manicured nails now scratching the skin behind his ear. Pressure on his head, guiding him closer to that all-too-familiar small, tired smile. The taste of cherry floods in his mouth as their lips meet. Eyelashes flutter against his cheek. Shinchan closes his eyes too.

And as they embrace each other, not out of love or lust, just plain camaraderie, that they are in this sinking ship together; Shinchan thinks, he wouldn't be this lucky. He wouldn't be lucky enough to marry the person he loves. The more he thinks, the more the thought hurts, the more he buries it deep under the pile of their clothes falling one by one.

"Ai-chan." He breathes against her neck, tears clinging to his lashes but never quite falling anymore. He is tired of crying after the person he loves.

"I know." She whispers, equally broken.

She knows. Shinchan wants to laugh because she knows him so tragically. She has always known what he needs, always been there for him in times he wanted nothing more than to be alone. She offers herself to him so unconditionally; it takes Shinchan's breath away sometimes. God knows how much he wishes he could fall in love with this weird arrangement they have, like those romance novels Nene likes to tell him about. Second chance at love.

But no matter how much he wants that to happen, his heart still refutes so stubbornly, even after years of pining and years of not seeing the person it loves, that Shinchan hurts.

He hurts but Ai-chan is always there for him.

He wonders who she hurts for as he watches her lose herself in that temporary euphoric rush he takes them to. Wonders if she truly understands the amount of pain he feels whenever they do this.

As they come down from the height to their low realities, she settles against his chest, and he feels the dampness of salty tears a moment later, Shinchan thinks maybe, she really does.

---

About two months ago, Masao and Nene had the amazing idea of having a destination wedding, miles away from their town Kasukabe, for reasons even Shinchan doesn't understand. All he knows is that about Masao had asked him to search for pretty places to get hitched in a country he never thought they would even dream about going to.

India.

The reason had been pretty simple: Nene, in her childhood, had always thought of herself as this gorgeous princess who rules the entire world (read: their group of five) with her pretty looks and unbeatable wisdom. This childhood fantasy had vanished somewhere as the lot of them grew up. Nene is now a wonderful kindergarten teacher like Ishizaka mam (although Shinchan has a habit of teasing her that her nature resembles that of Matsuzaka mam more).

Long story short, Masao had always known that deep down Nene still wants to be like the princess she had conjured all her childhood fantasies to be about, and so he wanted them to have a royal-themed wedding. This part was clear to Shinchan. It was adorable, the reasoning, as much as Shinchan wanted to gag about it.

The next part, however, isn't clear to him. During his best manly duty of researching for a destination, he realized pretty quickly that India was fucking expensive. Just where the hell did Masao think he would get enough money to fulfil Nene's long-lost dream? Because as far as Shinchan knows, Masao is still very much a measly corporate worker in the company Hiroshi used to work for, and Nene is still a pre-school teacher. And the option of his best friend miraculously producing some sort of lifetime savings was out of the window because come on, have you seen Nene? That bitch spends like money grows on trees or something.

Shinchan, being the good (amazing) friend he is, asked Masao the same. Only, instead of looking worried about the problem, Masao had grinned smugly (very unusual on his part, it still scares Shinchan sometimes) and said, "You don't have to worry about it. I have it all covered. Just make sure the place is the best we can find, alright?"

Now, as he watches Nene scream in delight as the royal city of Jodhpur comes into their view from the airplane window, he thinks that he did find the best place possible. He feels proud obviously but still stares suspiciously at the back of Masao's head as his best friend hugs an excited Nene, everyone around them cheering for the happy couple. Shinchan has to find out where exactly did he find the money to organize all this.

"You know I'm rich too, right?" Ai-chan asks from beside him, looking down at the city from her perch against the window nonchalantly. "I could've organized this for all you know."

Shinchan laughs, "Yeah, as if Nene wouldn't die before borrowing money from you."

"It's not borrowing if I willingly give it." She shrugs, looking at him finally. "Also, think of it as my wedding gift to them. That makes sense to you?"

He faces her too, studying her expression with cat-like inspection. "Why are you so against me finding out who is it?"

"I'm not against you finding out, I just don't think it's necessary. Masao and Nene are happy; you have a week to explore the various pleasures of us riches, so why do you wanna know, anyway?"

"Love it when you flaunt our financial differences, honey." As she flicks her hair smugly, he chuckles fondly. "No, you're right. I have no reason to investigate." But...

"You're hurt Masao didn't tell you who is it?" Of course, Ai-chan knows him.

He sighs pathetically. "It's not a big deal; I'm still the best man, whatever. But yeah, I feel like if Masao's hiding it from me, it's gotta be something important. Right? He never hides anything from me."

"You don't let him hide anything from you, there's a difference." Ai-chan mutters but Shinchan ignores her. He knows she understood him anyway.

He and Masao have been best friends since the day Shinchan knew what the word meant. They have been inseparable all their lives, so comfortable with each other that even Nene has gotten jealous of their bond at times (resorting to physically hurt Shinchan but whatever). Masao is his through thick and thin kind of friend, one he cherishes the most in this world. Shinchan knows how unbearable he can be sometimes, knows he tends to come off as childish or annoying to most people in his life but Masao, he knows, never once judged him.

They have been through so much together, Shinchan helped Masao confess to Nene, helped pick out the ring to propose, helped organize this whole wedding, so rightfully, he feels hurt by the notion that there's something so important to Masao (because it's money he's talking about) and he was hiding it. It just doesn't sit well with Shinchan, sue him.

"Oh, come on," He hears as fingers caress his forehead to smooth out the stress lines. "Don't sweat it, moron. You and Masao are the most unbearable couple I've ever met, after him and Nene of course. You'll be fine. He'll tell you when he feels like it. Don't overthink."

He sighs again, leaning down to burrow his head in the junction where Ai-chan's neck meets her shoulder as she giggles from the sensation.

He hopes she's right.

---

The moment they land, it's chaos again.

Everyone is in a frenzy to see the city specifically chosen for the wedding, knowing they won't be able to explore it ever again in their lives.

There are about forty people or so, in total. Nene and Masao, their parents, relatives and grandparents; Shinchan's family, Suzuki's family, Ai-chan, and their teachers, that's it.

Shinchan remembers vividly how much Nene wanted to have a big, grand wedding and the fight her and Masao had over this at Shinchan's apartment, only for Masao to pull Nene into a different room and coming back out as if they never fought in the first place. Shinchan is still suspicious as to what exactly Masao had said to her and why did he have to say it in Shinchan's absence only.

Right now, he's at the baggage collection point, alone because Ai-chan is guiding all the guests and the bride and groom towards the bus waiting for them. They're meant to go sight-seeing the Kailana Lake, as it is said to have a sunset to kill for. Their flight was long, landed well into the evening hours so they figured the guests could do with some rejuvenation.

Shinchan and Ai-chan won't be accompanying them today, because they need to tour around the resort they had booked and make arrangements for the first night party. There are also a million things needed to be checked and gone through and Shinchan already feels a familiar fatigue climb its way through his body.

"Shinchan," He hears from a distance as Ishizaka mam calls for him, "I forgot my pink suitcase. It's a small, furry thing. Can you pick it up for me, please?"

"Yeah, sure." He calls out. Almost every guest has collected their bags so he was going to wait for Ai-chan to come anyway, another bag wasn't an issue. He stands there, whistling a random tune as he waits for the bag to come out.

When he sees a spark of pink in the line, he turns towards it, hands reaching out to collect the bag but before it can get to him, a pair of hands interjects its passage and takes it away.

"Hey!" He exclaims at the woman who just took Ishizaka mam's bag. "That's..." He hesitates, glancing around the airport timidly. Technically, it isn't his and he knows he can't say it out loud that it's his because... it's embarrassing. The pink bag really is a small, furry thing and Shinchan would die before owning anything even remotely resembling it.

But as he watches the woman take away his teacher's bag, he knows he can't just let her get away with it. "... mine, mam. Please return it." The woman doesn't even glance at him, already on her merry way towards the exit.

Her blonde hair is long, as is her height as her small heels clack against the tiles of the airport. Shinchan has a sneaking suspicion that she has her earphones on because as he watches the way her head bobs to an unknown rhythm, he feels his irritation spike. He speeds up, chasing after the deaf thief.

"Hey! Hey, you! You're taking my bag, madam! Mam! What the he--"

In hindsight, Shinchan should've known.

The woman is tall, uncommonly so, and so is Shinchan. Her hair, on closer inspection, is not blonde but a scary mix of orange and brown, skin light enough to appear as white. She has on, what Shinchan is sure is a designer dress worth more than his salary. The curls on her forehead remind him scarily of Mitzi. She looks at him with eyes that make him think he's looking at a mirror.

"Himawari." He breathes out, staring in shock at his sister, one he hasn't seen in over five years.

If anything, Himawari looks shocked too, so Shinchan feels a bit better. She hadn't expected to meet him. Though, as soon as this thought occurs to him, he bristles. As if she is in a position to expect anything from him after what happened.

Shinchan gazes at her pensively, trying to make sense of her sudden appearance. He suddenly wishes he had Ai-chan here with him now. She would've known what he needs at this moment because his brain seems to be giving in to the shock he's feeling. He knows she would be here any second; she has to have seated all the guests on the bus by now, so she should be on her way to discuss the proceedings of the wedd--

Wait.

The wedding.

Shinchan feels something in him break as he tries to link Himawari's presence in any way that doesn't lead back to the wedding about to happen in a week, except he is no fool. If he feels hurt by Masao hiding the mysterious source of money for the wedding, he knows even that is forgivable over this betrayal.

Masao knows what Himawari did to Shinchan. Everybody else knows a boiled down version of it but Masao is one of the few people who knows exactly what had happened and still, he invited her to the wedd--

The invites. Suddenly, he finds himself holding onto that like life support.

Shinchan, being the best man and all, had made the entire guest list himself; mailed everyone the invites and no one else had the access to that list. This thought calms him a bit. Yeah, he knows who was and who wasn't invited to the wedding and Himawari hadn't been on the list. Masao was his best friend so surely, he wouldn't go behind Shinchan's back to invite the one person Shinchan never wants to see ever again.

As he convinces himself that maybe she really isn't here for the wedding and Masao hasn't betrayed him, he takes a good look at her finally, older brother instincts clicking in like a long-forgotten habit.

She has grown a lot, appears to be older than he last saw her. She looks so mature as she tries to hide her shock the way Shinchan knows he is too, that it makes Shinchan feel a familiar ache in his chest. The ache that reminds him that he would never get to see how his sister has grown into the beautiful woman that stands in front of him over the last five years.

No matter how much he tries to tell himself that it was her choice, that she had chosen that person over everything, over her own life, Shinchan knows a part of him would still always blame himself for missing out on her little sister's life. If only she hadn't chos--

"Shinchan." She says finally, voice so eerily familiar that Shinchan wants to turn away and hide because it occurs to him suddenly, that if Himawari is here, then surely--

An arm wounds around Himwari's waist, "Hey, honey, is there a problem?"

And Shinchan wants to die.

---

"Here."

A cigarette is thrust into his fingers and he's eternally grateful to his younger self who got Nene into smoking just because he needed a partner.

As he watches Nene light his cigarette before taking a drag of her own, Shinchan thinks that maybe, he messed up.

"I'm sorry." He says without an explanation.

Nene waves him off, not really looking at him.

They are at the resort where the wedding is supposed to happen in six days. Shinchan had looked through thousands of luxury resorts all over India, before settling on a city (Jodhpur) and then looked through a thousand more to decide exactly where they were to stay.

It's a five-star, weddings-only resort, of course, half booked by their party and half booked by some other wedding. As Shinchan peers over the railing of the roof he and Nene are at, he sees a large pool smack in the middle of their residence. There are small lights all around it, decorated in a way that soothes him. The rock structures meant for their stay are vintage, he can feel it in the way they exude royalty. There are different kinds of trees surrounding them, the small lights, like that around the pool, scattered all over those trees.

The sun has long set but there's a warm glow in the sky, Shinchan observes. It is winter but still, he doesn't feel anything as he stands on the roof in nothing but a short-sleeved t-shirt and sweats he has on, all the extra layers he had traveled in from Tokyo deposited on the chair in his room. There's a light breeze and as the warm glow starts disappearing, Shinchan feels slightly cold but that's nothing on the extremities he's seen back in Kasukabe.

When he finally focuses on Nene again, she's already looking at him, expression unreadable.

They don't say anything for a while as darkness grows around them. They light another cigarette each, as Nene finally deems it dark enough for them to start the conversation.

"You'll get cold if you don't wear anything else soon."

Shinchan scoffs, "You don't have to pretend to worry about me. Just say what you want to."

Nene looks at him with the same expression as before. It makes Shinchan squirm.

"It was a mistake." She shoots.

"You don't know that." He fires back.

"Fine, I don't," She concedes, "but it's been five years."

Shinchan just looks at her then, pain etched on his face like the masterstroke of a renowned painting. She must've found something in his expression because she's hugging him then, his face buried in her neck and as Shinchan inhales the familiar cocoa perfume she loves, he feels like he can finally breathe.

"Masao got in touch with them a few months ago." She begins and Shinchan just takes it. "He was in town, wanted to meet up. Said he had regrets for how he left things. I didn't want Masao to go obviously; it was the coward's way out. But then he mentioned Himawari and..." For the first time in a while, Shinchan feels Nene hesitate and he knows why.

"... I just couldn't stop feeling guilty for her, you know. She doesn't deserve this." Shinchan doesn't even have the energy to argue at this point. He has said everything he wanted against them five years ago, so if Nene still thinks this way, there isn't anything he can do now.

"I agreed, but on the condition that I join too. We met up then and it had been a while so there was a lot to catch up. They... Shinchan..." She holds his head between her hands, thumbs caressing his cheeks and Shinchan feels like a small child again. "They've changed a lot. I know you have no reason to trust me or Masao after... whatever happened today but they have. And Himawari..."

Shinchan knows he can't just hear anymore. "She called me a cocksucker today."

Nene stills, and Shinchan feels bad because why is he doing this? It's her wedding, of course she is allowed to invite anyone she wants, it's not like Shinchan has any authority to make decisions here, so really, why is he doing this?

She looks at him again then, the strong, brave Nene who never once backs down from doing the right thing and finally, Shinchan lets himself crumple like a dry leaf.

"Tell me what happened."

---

"Hey, honey, is there a problem?"

Shinchan, in his darkest moments, has thought a lot about how he would meet Kazama Toru again.

Every time he found himself even remotely close to the street where Kazama's house used to be, or their kindergarten, middle school, or high school. Every time he went to Tokyo for work, passed by their university. Most times, he had someone bring him back the moment he went down that road (it was Ai-chan, mostly) but sometimes, there was no one stopping him. His imagination would run wild then, and he would end up gasping for air, wondering exactly where he went wrong with his life.

Still, nothing could have prepared him for the reality. As the arm that wound around his sister's waist leads to the body Shinchan had once wanted to memorize every nook and cranny of, he feels like he's back in that alley behind their university, thinking he must have done something to deserve this torture as memories threaten to choke him right then and there.

"No," Himawari whispers, smile small, but so fake, anyone with eyes can see that. "It's fine. I think I got the wrong bag. Isn't that what you were saying, sir?"

Sir?

Shinchan thinks he really deserves it.

"Yeah." He lets out hesitantly, eyes resolutely on the woman in front of him. Not once does he let them stray to the man he can feel burning a stare in Shinchan's body, the familiarity of it taking Shinchan's breath away. "It's, um, mine."

Himawari snorts indignantly and Shinchan realizes a moment too late that he slipped up.

"Of course," The disgust on her face is so familiar that Shinchan starts finding comfort in it. She thrusts the bag into his unsuspecting hands roughly, barely caring as he tries to grab it.

It's only when large, manly pairs of hands help him that she seems to take notice of his predicament.

Shinchan looks up when he feels a faint touch on his fingers as the bag is deposited safely in his grasp. He looks up to find those onyx-black orbs still looking at him unabashedly and feels like he might not survive long enough to see the end of this.

Up close, Kazama hasn't changed, Shinchan realizes. He hadn't expected him to, to be fair, but still, the fact that the past five years haven't taken a toll on him the way they have on Shinchan and Himawari makes him think that life really is generous to some. He looks at those eyes and thinks about the times they used to have staring competitions and Shinchan would always win, too busy getting lost in those deep eyes to even think about blinking. He eyes trail over the familiar face like a loving caress and Shinchan hates how his heart still hurts like the wound isn't years old already.

It's been five years, damnit.

A slender hand pushes at his shoulders as a reminder and Shinchan lets himself be pushed, too tired to regain his balance. There are arms around his waist then, and a head pops up from under his arm as Ai-chan peers at him.

"Hey, hey, hey," She's worried, he can tell. "Take it easy, Shinchan." She helps him stand up properly and Shinchan looks at her. Tries to find an anchor in those brown eyes in the ocean of black he finds himself drowning in again.

There's a scoff from his left and Shinchan still doesn't turn away from Ai-chan. He doesn't think he can.

"There comes the savior," Himawari is speaking but it doesn't sound like her. When did her voice become so bitter? Where is that sweet, little girl Shinchan used to proudly call his sister?

"Hello, Ai-chan. Or should I say I'm-always-a-replacement-chan."

This is a low blow. Shinchan can see the small traces of hurt in Ai-chan's eyes as he still resolutely keeps his eyes on hers and feels his heart breaking. She doesn't deserve this.

"Let it be, Himawari. Let's go." Always the sound of reason, Shinchan wants to scoff derisively.

He has had enough of this. Ai-chan probably sees the resolve in his eyes and starts shaking her head, mouthing No continuously that Shinchan takes no notice of.

All the hurt, pain, anger worth years come back to him, and he decides, that if they still see him as a nuisance, then he would be the best goddamn nuisance they'll ever meet.

"Yes, Hima--or should I say, mam, let it be. Listen to your husband because that's what you do best anyway." It sets him on fire to say those words, but he licks the flames like a maniac. He is Shinchan Nohara for a reason.

"Shinchan." Kazama says, a warning Shinchan could care less about.

"Kazama." He mocks.

His heart is weeping, and he wishes it to stop it already. 

"Shinchan, please." Ai-chan is behind him now, hands gripping his sides to pull him away. There is a crowd around them now and Shinchan is grateful for her for taking notice, he really is, but he is also not done with the pair in front of him just yet.

Shinchan sees the exact moment Kazama actually registers the presence of Ai-chan so close to him, there's a flicker of pain in those eyes he knows so well, and it fuels him to hurt more.

"Fuck off, Shinchan." Himawari's lips twist and she practically spits out, "I can't believe I grabbed your bag, of all people." She isn't particularly quiet, she knows it too. Shinchan knows that she revels in the way the crowd around him gasps as she says, "You cocksuckers really know how to make people regret, huh?"

Shinchan smiles, a small, cruel thing as he thinks of all the times he fought against bullies back home because they called his sister fat. He mourns, at that moment, for all his efforts were in vain anyway because his sister is long dead for him now.

"Why, why, Himawari, does your husband make you regret a lot?" He tilts his head innocently and revels in the break of her expression.

Another round of gasps occurs around him, only this time, Ai-chan has had enough too, and she's pulling Shinchan away from the scene just as airport officials arrive, asking why the crowd has gathered. He lets himself be pulled, watching that sullen face with black eyes one last time before turning away.

Once he's back in the safety of their rental car, Shinchan breaks, and Ai-chan is there to pick up his pieces.

---

Nene is quiet. Shinchan needs another cigarette.

He nudges at her, looking pointedly at the last cigarette in her hand. She gives it to him without a word and Shinchan thinks he might've broken Masao's fiancée.

"You good?" He presses a palm against her forehead, and she doesn't even flinch. "You know as much as I like you being absolutely stunned by my words, I think that ship sailed a while ago, Nene." He points to the resort below them, "You're about to get married here in six days. To my best friend."

Nene snorts weakly and Shinchan lets himself smile.

It's quiet for a while again, before Nene speaks up.

"I get why you're hurt." Shinchan doesn't like this tone at all. "She is still immature, still doesn't know what to say and what not to. It's not like she's had a lot of support growing up alone these last five years. We all abandoned her when she was nineteen, Shinchan. What were you doing when you were nineteen? Probably blowing off smoke with Kaza--"

At that, even Nene stops. This is uncharted territory, for both of them and Shinchan just wants this conversation to end.

"We didn't abandon her, Nene." He says quietly. "She chose to leave us."

When she goes to protest, Shinchan just shushes her. "I don't care why you invited them, and I won't question you. I know my place and know how much to say and how much not to because I wasn't abandoned at nineteen." He smiles again, "You don't have to worry about me. Just focus on your wedding and you have my word on it, no scenes will be caused from my side."

"Shinchan, you know that's not what I mea--"

"I know, Nene," He looks over at his childhood friend and thinks how far they have come. Thinks how Nene is still defending his sister over him. Thinks that maybe, not everyone around him is as supportive as they were five years ago. Thinks how, sometimes, old wounds do open if not treated the right way. Thinks how sacrifices made for the sake of righteousness don't always heal. Thinks how much he needs Ai-chan at that instant.

"I know."

He turns around, taking his leave and Nene doesn't stop him.

When he passes by the shadow standing guard on the door of the roof, he smirks bitterly.

Love is a crazy, crazy thing. 

---

Notes:

IT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO BE SO ANGSTY TRUST ME!
fun fact: the word doc I'm writing this fic in is saved as "something i deserve" (that's where the title came out to be) bec i've always wanted a good shinchan x kazama ff but just couldn't find it so i decided to write one ;)

idk when i'll update next but it should be soon.

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 2: two

Summary:

Shinchan might not be in the best of his mental state as of late, but he knows the mystery of lingering eyes and warm blushes well enough to know when intrigue turns to desire.

Notes:

it is not what you think it is, trust me *evil laughter*

A lot is going on in this chapter so just two things: there are multi povs and there's a time jump (basically a day jump).

Enjoy reading!!!!!

Himawari might not be the brightest bulb out there, but she knows when she's wanted and when she isn't.

As she looks at her husband sitting beside her in the back seat of the cab, she wishes she had this knowledge five years ago.

"You're staring." Kazama mutters, fingers typing something fast on the phone he's holding like a shield.

"You're my husband." She reminds him, already expecting the flinch that comes with it.

Kazama sighs, and transfers the phone to his other hand as fingers collect both her hands in their grasp. Five years in and Himawari still marvels bitterly how Kazama's one hand can engulf her both. It unsettles her.

"I know." There's a squeeze before the treacherous fingers are leaving and Himawari realises she forgot to cherish their presence this time. She almost moves to grasp them again, just a second longer but then she remembers. Five years.

Himawari knows when she's wanted and when she isn't.

---

"Do you need help putting them up?"

Shinchan gestures to the flower garlands the guy in front of him is clearly struggling immensely to put up. He has been watching the staff member fight a lonely war for the last ten minutes and he just wants to feel useful.

The guy blushes lightly, embarrassed. "No, no, it's fine." He bows deep and Shinchan pities him a bit, feeling grateful for his height now more than ever. "I'll just get the ladder from... there."

There is no ladder there.

Shinchan chuckles lightly as the guy seems to realize the same and holds out a hand for the garlands. He gets to work as soon as he gets them, humming the tune of a love song Nene made him listen to yesterday at the party.

The wedding is in five days and Shinchan thinks he is better. It was still too early for people to be awake and going right now, but Ai-chan had taken him hiking this morning, something about the hill air being good for health and Shinchan was too indebted to her to refuse. He muses that the hill air had actually worked on him though, and he feels better than he did when he went to sleep last night, after the celebratory party.

"Are you..." The staff member behind him speaks, pulling Shinchan out of his reverie. "... Japanese, by any chance?"

"Yeah," It's sudden, to say the least. "I am. How'd you guess?"

"The song..." Staff member trails off and Shinchan is confused.

"What song?"

The guy blushes again, "The one you were humming, my sister likes that stuff."

Well, well, color him surprised. "For real? That's so cool. How old is she, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Uh, nineteen. She's in college."

"Oh."

Right, most nineteen-year-olds tend to be in college. Most nineteen-year-olds tend to experience a lot of their firsts in college. They tend to enjoy their life at this age, with no worry about the future. Fresh out of high school, they tend to be reckless. They tend to be on the path of discovering what they want to do with their lives, and not marry men older than the--

"Shinchan!" Suzuki is calling him. "Man, it's been a while."

He's suddenly engulfed in a bear hug, as he hugs back the big body with equal enthusiasm. Suzuki's family had arrived with the lot of them yesterday, but he and his wife had been at some work conference out of Japan, so their tickets were booked separately. He is released from the bear hug and moves to hug Suzuki's wife, Megumi. She's a naturally warm person, and Shinchan feels himself light up just at the mere sight of another one of his childhood friends and their love.

"I didn't know you guys were coming today. Wasn't your flight tomorrow? It must have been hectic." Shinchan is sure he had booked their flights himself to arrive tomorrow, so their sudden appearance, though appreciated, leaves him unsettled for a second.

Suzuki laughs, "Yeah, we know nobody knows. We wanted to surprise everyone. Ai-chan booked our tickets quite secretly."

Oh?

Oh.

It's not a big deal, Shinchan knows. Ai-chan is as much of an organizer of the wedding as he is, but something inside still him freezes as he watches her hug Suzuki and Megumi. Booked their tickets secretly? Why not just tell Shinchan? Suzuki surprising Nene and Masao made sense, but it's not like he had to surprise Shinchan too.

"He is your childhood friend though; you're closer to him than I am." Ai-chan reasons with him when he asks her. "It makes sense that he wanted to surprise you too."

It does but, "Did he specifically ask you to not tell me too?"

Ai-chan actually looks at him then, the scenery of the city from the window now forgotten.

They are on the tour bus to visit the Mehrangarh Fort, a famous tourist spot in Jodhpur. The entire city is quite rich, in heritage and Masao had looked at him surprised when he announced that they were going to an actual castle today. A certain couple was missing because Shinchan had booked the bus only keeping the guests he knew were coming in mind, but Shinchan tries not to think of them.

"You doubt me."

It's not a question so Shinchan doesn't bother answering her as he watches Suzuki playfully ditch his wife for Nene's favor. Bride privileges have to be a real thing.

Ai-chan doesn't say anything in her defense after that though, and it leaves a sour taste in Shinchan's mouth. Why secretly?

When they finally reach the fort, the tour guide they hire tells them that to reach the actual fort, there is a good, few kilometers long climbing they need to do, and Shinchan feels his legs screaming in protest. The trek in the morning might not have been the best remedy.

He doesn't say anything still, walking behind the lot, keeping a check on all the people who have come to visit from their party. The grandparents opted out of it, so it's just their parents, teachers and them doing the climb.

Shinchan walks with practiced ease, nonchalance bleeding through every step of his and thinks how nice it would be to actually possess this confidence in front of the people it matters. He peers over the mass of people in front of him and sees Ai-chan gossiping giddily with Nene in front of their little group. He feels his heart relax a bit at the sight; at least some friendships aren't being compromised for the sake of this wedding.

A musician is playing an interesting instrument with strings, the melody somber, and his voice heartbreakingly haunting. The tour guide tells them that this is a famous sad song in the Indian film industry (called Bollywood, apparently) and Shinchan makes a mental note to check it out later. They stay there for a few more minutes, the musician playing different assortments of melodies now that he has an audience and Shinchan watches Masao tip him heavily. The money makes his mind run again. Where is it coming from?

They are now viewing the inside of the fort and the Sheesh Palace takes Shinchan's breath away. It's all mirrors, reflecting the light they receive. The design is so intricately detailed, it feels unreal. Because it's still sunny here (this city is called the Sun City for a reason), the mirrors sparkle mysteriously, and Shinchan finds himself lost in the kaleidoscope of lights. Various colors twinkle around him, and he thinks how different the cultures of the two countries are.

He feels a presence beside him then, mature and strong. Not Ai-chan then.

"You good?" Matsuzaka mam is asking him. When he turns to look at her, she's facing the Sheesh Palace.

This floor of the fort also has a spectacular collection of artifacts and a view of the entire Blue City, so it makes sense why it's just him and Matsuzaka mam here. The others are probably learning about the artifacts from the guide or clicking pictures of (read: with) the view.

"Yeah." He mutters, going back to marvel at the mirror reflections.

"I heard Kazama and his wife are here."

He's glad she doesn't say his sister and her husband. It would've hurt more. He still inhales sharply, "Who told you?"

"I saw them in the morning. Their room is opposite mine apparently."

So there is a room separately booked for them. Shinchan looks around and catches Ai-chan's eye for a second. An ache is rising in his chest.

He keeps his eyes locked with hers and says, "Yeah? I wonder how that happened."

Matsuzaka mam follows his line of sight and hums.

When Ai-chan breaks the eye contact, because Nene is shouting something about wanting to buy souvenirs from the shop they passed earlier on the ground floor, he looks at his companion again. This time, she's looking at him too.

"Do you have a problem with them? I can shift their room if you want."

She raises a brow and Shinchan wilts a little. "Can you, now?"

"Fine, I can't," He concedes, "but I can get you a different room."

She waves him off and loops her arm with his as everyone starts moving downstairs. Shinchan lets himself be pulled. "It's fine. I just wanted to know how you're holding up."

Matsuzaka mam is among the people who know the boiled-down version of what went down five years ago. Shinchan finds it funny that even when she doesn't know exactly what happened, she's still concerned enough to comfort him. And then there are Shinchan's supposed best friends.

"I'm holding up okay, I guess." He shrugs, then remembers a little detail from the living arrangements he had made for the guests. "If their room is opposite yours, then did Mom...?"

Matsuzaka mam nods and Shinchan thinks he has had enough already. Why torture him more?

Still, there's a very real fear in him as he dares to ask, "How did she take it?"

There is no hesitation. "She's still here with you, isn't she?" Here with you. Not us.

Matsuzaka mam is one of the first people Shinchan went to when he decided to learn the art of words. He looks at her again now, and thinks his younger self was smarter than the present him.

Shinchan hums, grateful and she leaves him then, returning to her full-time job of pestering the hell out of Ishizaka mam.

He looks at the pair for a second longer than usual. They share an apartment back home, something about saving money and electricity by living together. Shinchan used to find it weird sometimes, considering they are still unmarried. He remembers the time when he and Kazama were in high school and had dared to ask Ishizaka mam why she was still willingly tolerating Matsuzaka mam now that they had different jobs.

There had been no definite answer back then, but now, as Shinchan lets his eyes linger on the hand on the small of Ishizaka mam's back, he thinks he gets it. He knows from experience.

Some questions are better unanswered, anyway.

---

"Are you happy?"

Nene startles a little as she glances at the girl standing hesitantly at her door.

She motions her to come inside, all thoughts of makeup forgotten. When Himawari looks too unsure for Nene's little heart, she takes it upon herself to bring the younger in and settles her on the armchair in her room.

"Are you okay?" She asks, genuinely concerned.

Himawari plays coy, "Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"

Nene looks at her pointedly and she just shrugs. "You didn't answer me. Are you happy?"

Nene takes a good look at her then. She sees how much Himawari has grown, sees that calling her a girl, even in her mind, just doesn't fit. She doesn't see the best friend she had willingly abandoned to do the right thing. Something akin to remorse settles deep in her gut as she thinks of how close they used to be, growing up.

Masao, Kazama, Suzuki, and Shinchan had been her best friends, but only till middle school. When they were separated on the basis of gender in high school, Nene had been all alone. She had Ai-chan of course, but for some reason, Nene had been too insecure to reach out to the popular, rich girl everybody in school seemed to love. It went on for two years before Himawari joined them. Given their shared past, Nene was quick to befriend her, thinking she would take the younger under her wing so she doesn't end up like her. A lonely princess.

Somehow, they had become the best of friends then; something about Himawari's startling maturity for a fourteen-year-old just drew Nene in. Himawari had been there when Masao had confessed to Nene, when she had cried at the loss of a chance with Shinchan. Nene had been there when Himawari had admitted to having a crush on her older brother's best friend after Nene and Masao started dating.

It had been a weird time for all of them. Masao and Nene were in the honeymoon phase of their relationship, fresh out of high school, ditching their friends to see each other. Suzuki had met Megumi in the first week of uni and was having the time of his life with her.

It makes sense now, as she recalls, how Shinchan and Kazama got closer, the most inseparable duo among them all. They had been left behind by their friends. But in hindsight, she thinks with drops of guilt flooding her bloodstream that she should've known how Himawari would take that, knowing she was alone in high school after Nene graduated and was too busy with Masao and hers blooming love. They were supposed to be best friends both ways.

It all adds up, of course, leading to what happened five years ago, but as Nene looks at the skeleton of her (ex) best friend sitting in front of her, she knows she regrets a few things.

"Yes, I am happy. Masao makes me happy." She does not dare move towards Himawari's marriage.

"I'm glad." She is, Nene can tell. "Thank you for inviting us here. I imagine it must have been very... tough."

Tough doesn't even begin to cover it. "Don't worry about it. It's my wedding, I'm the bride; of course, I get to make all the decisions." She says it as a joke of course, but watching the light dim from Himawari's eyes reminds Nene of the younger's wedding and she quickly realizes her mistake.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it lik--"

There's a knock on the door before it is being pushed open, and a smug drawl follows, "Your majesty, your dress is here." Ai-chan.

Nene looks up sharply from where she's kneeling in front of Himawari and feels like a kid caught stealing from the cookie jar. Her maid of honor stares at them openly, a flash of hurt on her face gone as soon as it comes, but Nene sees it obviously.

So does Himawari as she stands up abruptly, muttering something about getting ready while Nene continues staring at the door. The moment Himawari passes Ai-chan, the juxtaposition of her two best friends, from different points in her life, standing by Nene's door flashes the last five years in front of her, completing her trip down the memory lane.

After Himawari and Kazama married and left, everybody was devastated, to say the least. Shinchan didn't talk to anyone for over a month before a cheery, bright Ai-chan was forcing him out of his own apartment. Nene still remembers the shock she felt when a barely alive Shinchan was dumped at her and Masao's apartment door, Ai-chan looking at them pleadingly to take him in. They had, of course, doing everything in their power to bring the old Shinchan back, even when it meant putting their healing on pause.

It took about a year for the three to get him back to normal, Suzuki and Megumi helped as much as they could from their permanent residence in Megumi's hometown. But it wasn't a walk in the park. Especially not for Nene.

She had this unexplainable guilt in her being, that made her think she must be the devil's spawn because here was Shinchan, battling by far a loss bigger than what Nene and the others felt, but she still found herself wanting to contact the reason of his misery time and time again, just to know how Himawari was holding up.

It's all a blur in her mind but sometime during their late night, alcohol-induced conversations, Nene had confided in Ai-chan that while she was angry, hurt even, at Himawari, make no mistake of it, she still found herself wanting to know if the younger was okay. Ai-chan had consoled her then, had said that it was okay to feel that urge to protect because Himawari had been the closest to Nene out of everyone else. They were best friends, so it made sense that she was concerned.

The kindness had reminded Nene of the time Himawari had consoled her in a similar fashion back in high school, and so, when Shinchan had finally managed to bounce back from his near-dead state, Nene had a new name for the word best friend.

"I'm sorry if I interrupted something important." Her maid of honor says, setting up Nene's dress neatly on the bed.

"It's fine. We were just talking."

Ai-chan hums, doesn't say anything as she comes to pick Nene up from where she's still kneeling by the armchair. "You need to talk to Shinchan." Her tone is matter-of-factly but Nene knows she's serious.

She always is when it comes to Shinchan.

"I know." Nene sighs, "But he avoided me all day today. How can I get him to talk to me?"

Ai-chan huffs lightly, opening the door to usher Nene's helpers in, "You're the bride. You have privileges nobody can refuse."

Nene chuckles, looking at her best friend's reflection in the mirror in front of her. She sees the stress line marring Ai-chan's otherwise spotless skin and thinks she genuinely is grateful for her maid of honor, even when she knows the other thinks differently.

"Hey." She says, somber. Ai-chan pauses in her frenzy to settle Nene's makeup troop and looks up at her in the mirror. "Thank you. For coming back."

It's sincere and the smile she receives in return is sincere too.

---

"Can we talk?"

Shinchan looks at his best friend from his perch at the edge of the pool and nods.

Tonight's party is still in full swing, if the music from the lawn behind the resort is anything to go by. Shinchan had been eyeing the pool ever since they arrived, so it made sense that he sneaked out to enjoy some solitude after a particularly taxing day. The pool water was surprisingly warm as he dipped his suffering legs in it about an hour ago.

Masao comes to sit next to him. "Nene wanted to talk to you today. She's pretty upset that you ignored her."

Shinchan just hums, and waits.

"You know she isn't concerned that you wouldn't be able to control yourself now that they are here. She's only worried about you because you are her friend, Shinchan."

"You're my best friend." He points out. "Yet you keep secrets from me. I can be allowed too then, to be petty over this because she's just my friend, Masao."

His best friend winces, rubbing the back of his head. "I knew you wouldn't take it well, so I didn't say anything. But you have to understand," He looks Shinchan in the eyes, "Nene really wanted them to come, if only for Himawari's sake."

Shinchan knows that of course, but that isn't why he's upset, not anymore anyway. "Did you?"

Masao, to his credit, keeps his reaction passive to the sudden question. "No. You're my best friend, Shinchan. I'd never do that to you."

There's truth in those words, he can feel it, but he is still hurt. "I don't know how to face them." He admits reluctantly. "It's like every time I see them, all the time I spent moving on just... vanishes. The wound still feels so fresh, it hurts." He rubs his chest subconsciously.

A head falls on his shoulder then, and arms wound around his waist as Masao pulls him closer. "I get it. You weren't ready to face them just yet. I don't regret inviting them here, but I do regret not telling you. I'm sorry."

Shinchan sighs. The apology was long overdue, but he feels a bit better now that everything is out in the open. Except...

"Why won't you tell me where the money for the wedding came from?"

This time, the reaction isn't passive, and Shinchan thinks life is unfair.

Still, when Masao moves to remove his hold from Shinchan, he grips the arms around his waist tightly, a silent acceptance of the half apology.

They're quiet after that, lost in their own planets of thoughts.

Shinchan thinks back to the time when Masao had started initiating physical contact between them. They hadn't always been overly affectionate, what with society being a little too iffy about two guys embracing, even if it was just platonically. Shinchan didn't mind, he never cared for the so-called rules they had to uphold to live peacefully in their small town, but he knew his friends did. So, for the longest time, it was just him clinging onto whatever part of his friends he could get away with until they felt too fearful of the eyes trailing them and shook him off.

This change, of contact initiation from his friends, particularly Masao, had been around the time his mind fails to remember clearly, when everything around him felt so fragile that Shinchan was scared of his own mobility. The memories are a blur, everything as good as translucent except the betrayal, pain, hurt, and anger he used to feel. Those are still as clear as the night sky he's looking up to, city lights blocking any stars he could have seen.

All he remembers is that after he came out of that pitiful state, Masao was more open to him, letting Shinchan cling to him for as long as he wished. His best friend would sometimes randomly come and hug him when he got too worked up about whatever heated discussion they were having, effectively managing to reduce him to a whining and grumbling mess. The first few times he did it, Shinchan had been so shocked that he couldn't even think about hugging Masao back.

Now, he feels the body next to him relax as if the contact soothes him as much as it does Shinchan.

He looks up at the clear, empty night sky and thinks what a cruelty life is, when losing the meaning of one's entire being is what manages to bridge the societal gaps they suffer with.

---

Kazama stares at the clear, empty night sky from his perch on the table and chair provided in their room, and sighs.

"Are you not coming?" Himawari is all dressed up and ready to join the party down at the lawn, but as Kazama looks at the paperwork on the desk, she gets the hint.

She has been getting good at this, he notices, as he watches her leave. Good for her.

He sighs again and focuses on the account details sprawled out before him. If he gets done with this work by tomorrow afternoon, then he will finally be able to join the soon-to-be-married couple for their engagement ceremony tomorrow night.

It's not exactly a very enticing prospect to look forward to, Kazama knows, but having been cooped up in this room for the last two days to avoid any kind of confrontations has made him humble. He would do anything to interact with anyone who isn't his bitter wife, even when that meant willingly submitting himself to the lion's den he knows will greet him.

A series of knocks on the door makes him lose count of the transactions he's reviewing, and he's frustrated. Himawari wouldn't knock, she knows how much he hates them, so it has to be somebody else. He has a half mind of ignoring them, he will send Himawari to deal with whoever it is later, but as the knocks get louder and louder, he knows there is no escape.

He opens the door roughly and pauses. "What do you want?"

Ai-chan looks at him haughtily, "Talk to Shinchan. Apologize, while you're at it."

Talk? Kazama wants to laugh. "Are you high? Drunk? Want me to get some water for you?"

Her eyes narrow menacingly and Kazama questions his motivations to get out of this room again. "I'm not joking, Kazama. I have risked a lot to get you guys here; don't you dare waste it by rotting in this room for days on end. It's been five years. Grow up."

She's leaving then, as abruptly as she came. Kazama knows asking is wrong, curiosity killed the cat. But he can't help himself when it comes to a certain person. "How has he been?"

He watches her slim back stiffen and thinks there are no winners in life.

"He thinks he's fine. Thinks he has moved on. But he has been managing, at best." She looks at him sharply over her shoulder. "None of us have the courage to tell him that, of course. You both left him to die so the fact that he's here, smiling, is a big thing, don't you think?"

Left him to die. As if Kazama isn't already dead inside.

"Why are you doing this? None of this concerns you."

She turns her head away from him as a scoff, so bitter Kazama can almost taste it, echoes around the empty hallway.

"Ask yourself why you left him five years ago and maybe you'll get it."

Kazama watches her leave and feels himself lose his composure for the first time in five years.

"You're his best friend. You're..." He doesn't let himself say it, hurt by the mere thought of it.

His whisper is drowned out by the music from the party downstairs but the implications ring loudly in his ears.

... in love with him.

---

"Why aren't you dressed yet?"

Shinchan whines as Ai-chan looks at him disapprovingly. "I don't wanna go. I can't feel my legs."

"You're such a kid sometimes." She mutters as she takes out his suit pants and shirt from the closet. "Go shower, Nene is about to get ready. You're lazier than her, I swear to God."

He gasps, immediately sitting up, "Take that back."

"I will, if you prove me wrong. Hurry up. Get in the washroom."

He whines again, dropping back dead on his bed.

"Now, Shinchan."

"You're scary." He mutters as he trudges to the washroom, and takes a quick shower, welcoming the hot water like an old friend.

"When I want to be, of course." The smile she gives him is contradictory, but Shinchan values his life.

She makes him sit on the chair in front of the mirror and starts blow-drying his hair as he finishes his skincare routine. "What time are we leaving for the massage center tomorrow?"

"Grandparents have the first slot at 12. Ours is the last so, I'm guessing, 5 pm?"

"We won't have enough time to prepare for the campfire then."

Ai-chan shrugs as she fixes his tie, "Suzuki and Megumi offered to help. We'll do as much as we can before leaving, they'll take over after that."

Shinchan hums, it makes sense.

"Oh, and before I forget, I gave the wedding dress and suit for dry-cleaning today, make sure to pick them up the day after tomorrow. The groomsmen have to get their fittings done too."

"Nene's mom made you hurry?" He smirks knowingly as she glares at him.

"You shouldn't leave her alone with me. I can handle anything but her." She shudders and Shinchan laughs as they walk down the aisle to the stage set up in the middle of the lawn, "I can't even make sense of half the allegations she throws at me. It's like she doesn't care what she's saying, just has to say it."

"Sounds like someone we love." He points at the window of Nene's room where they can clearly see her arguing with the staff about something. Ai-chan groans and takes off in that direction, leaving Shinchan to help set up the stage.

He spots a familiar face in the helpers and moves towards him. "Amir, hey, what's up?"

Said guy is puzzled as he looks around before he spots Shinchan and blushes. Cute. "Hello, sir. Are you here to help?"

Shinchan nods and Amir hands him the strip lights he was hanging on the curtains decorating the stage. It's a barely lit affair, a special request from Nene to make it look as intimate as possible.

The engagement ceremony, tonight's celebration, is something Shinchan has looked forward to for the last few months of organizing the wedding. He and Ai-chan had divided the workload of planning and Shinchan had been given the responsibility of this. The reasoning had been simple: It was Nene's dream wedding so, of course, the maid of honor would know, better than the best man, exactly how to plan it.

Now, as he looks around to see the guests finally arriving, he feels a bit of pride at the awe in their expressions as they take in the sight of the venue.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Shinchan's voice booms as he speaks into the mic, "I, Shinchan Nohara, the world's best best man,"

"And I, Ai Suotome, the maid of honor,"

"Also the best in the world," Shinchan whispers, earning himself a swat on the arm before he continues, "welcome you all to the most-awaited engagement ceremony of the entire world!"

Clapping ensues around them as the guests giggle over Shinchan's goofiness.

"Ignore him please," Ai-chan mutters, taking over, "we know there's a bit of a delay going on here, so without further ado, please welcome our beloved groom, Masao Sato."

As everyone watches him enter from the narrow passage behind the stage, Shinchan fills in for the background, "Masao is the kindest, purest, most supportive, most adjusting, most comforting, and of course, most adorably adorable soul you can ever meet. His patience should be studied by the greatest of scientists because tolerating Nene is a feat no one has managed to achieve but him."

The laughs around him are familiar, so is Nene's glare from where she's waiting to enter.

Masao's eyes are a bit wet when he reaches the stage, so all is well and good.

"Now, I'd like you all to challenge yourselves a bit and stand up, for it's time to welcome our beautiful bride, Nene Sakurada."

Ai-chan has a smile on her face as she talks about Nene and Shinchan thinks she has the prettiest face he has ever seen.

"Nene is the light to your darkest moments, the sun to everyone's moon. She's a force to reckon with, but if you are someone she cherishes, the world would fall apart, and you will still find her standing by your side. She's a protector, through and through, fighting anyone who dares to even think about bullying our little Masao, because that is her birthright."

Nene is laughing as she enters from the aisle in front of the stage. The guests turn to look at her, and Shinchan thinks how this scene will be repeated just two days from now, only, with Nene clad in a wedding dress. The thought makes him choke a bit.

He watches as Nene smiles at her family, bows a bit for Masao's, waves at Suzuki and Megumi and their teachers. This is all fine to him, but then he catches the split second she looks behind her and waves at the shadows sitting near the darkest ends of the seating arrangements, shadows he hadn't even noticed until now, and feels his happiness drain as though someone has punctured his mind.

A hand on his arm consoles him. He looks towards Ai-chan smiling reassuringly at him.

"It's her wedding." The whisper is a reminder and Shinchan finds himself nodding.

Right.

Shinchan still eyes the open bar longingly. He cannot get through this sober.

---

"Say, Amir," He nudges his companion from where they stand by the open bar, views obscured from the tree that hides them, "Do you like the decorations?"

"Considering I did them, I should of course." He laughs openly, prompting Shinchan to chuckle.

There might or might not be a bit of alcohol in both of their systems.

"No but seriously, do you like how intricately it's planned?"

Amir's head tips to the side as he considers it. "Did you plan it?"

Shinchan beams, "Yes. The entire thing. The flowers at the entrance are Gerberas, they represent friendship. Fitting because Nene and Masao are friends before anything. The red ribbon tying the whole structure there," He stands behind Amir and points over the other's shoulder, breath close to the pierced ear, "is the string of fate, binding them together for eternity. It's a famous Japanese lore."

A treacherous hand lands on Amir's left hip. Shinchan might not be in the best of his mental state as of late, but he knows the mystery of lingering eyes and warm blushes well enough to know when intrigue turns to desire. The signs had been there yesterday as well, when Shinchan had conversed, fully into the pretense of hanging garlands in a place they weren't even supposed to be, to begin with.

There is no protest, so he continues, "If you look over there, from where Masao entered, it's a bit darker, as you can see. That's planned too, for Masao told me that he was in a dark place when he confessed to Nene, who would then become the light of his life as they meet in the center." His hold on the hip tightens and Shinchan feels Amir stiffen. No protests still.

"Tell me, Amir," His voice drops a few octaves lower, as he resists the urge to nibble on the ear directly in front of him, "do you like the planning now?"

Shinchan is aware that they are still out in the open and anyone can catch them the moment they decide to make a trip to the open bar. It's a tricky game he's playing here but instead of deterring him, the knowledge only fuels his desire, his want as he watches his potential companion for the night take the hints he's throwing like the best pitcher in the entire world. He'll let Amir hit a homerun if that means Shinchan can score tonight.

He is desperate for it, that he can admit. It's been a while since he's had a masculine hand caress him the way Ai-chan does. Shinchan is proud of who he is, but he knows not to step over the fine line between being proud and being insufferable. The stolen moments he manages to get are only when he's visiting Tokyo for work, for the people in the big city tend to be more open. Ai-chan is there with him to keep the pretenses of course, but sometimes, Shinchan finds himself longing for the freedom to hold the hand he deserves out in public. But beggars can't be choosers, so he takes what he can get.

But this want, need even, that consumes his entire being isn't for that fact alone. Amir is appealing, very much so in the way he differs Shinchan's usual preference or applicable choice in a male partner, but Shinchan knows that's not it either.

It's the fire he feels, as he watches Himawari dance peacefully in the arms Shinchan spent more than half his life trying to feel around him, the arms that belong to the person he spent his entire life trying to move on from. That fire burns his rationality, prompts him to hunt for a weakness in the seemingly perfect pair. A small voice, suspiciously sounding like Ai-chan, pleads him to take notice of the happily engaged couple tonight is centered around, and Shinchan is fueled to find the next best alternative then. Intimacy, with a man.

He can feel the flush that spreads on the entirety of Amir's neck, warm against his own skin. The body never lies.

"I... don't know, sir" The alcohol might be helping with his courage as Shinchan feels a hand atop his own on the tortured hip, "you might be needed here sometime soon again," and there's a slight shove on his hand, enough to be felt but not enough to remove it completely.

Excuses.

Shinchan would usually back off at this point; any kind of uncertainty is still uncertainty and Shinchan doesn't dabble in that, not anymore. But the shove is what tells him that he's almost there. A few more runs and he'll score. And if Shinchan prides himself in doing one thing correctly, it's not giving up until he absolutely has to.

"That's a pity." He licks the shell of the ear and revels in the shudder he gets as a reward.

"But what if I say that nobody will even notice we're gone, not unless you want to scream it for them, hm?"

"S-sir," The tremors are real, as Shinchan wraps his arms around the very enticing waist, and pulls the warm body flush against his front, "Are y-yo," he starts kissing Amir's neck like a kitten savoring the first lick of its milk, "-mm-u s-sure?"

Yes.

"I've never been surer of anything more," He continues marking the column of Amir's neck with his kisses, the teeth grazing lightly meant to tease. "Are you sure, though?"

There's still a slight, barely there hesitation and Shinchan has the ultimate cure for it. A bite on the junction where his neck and shoulders meet, and Amir is bucking his hips in the air, finally losing to the fight against pleasure, "Yes! Y-yes, I'm sur- oh god, y-yes, ye--"

"Shinchan," Ice cold water is dumped on him with that single word. His own name. "A word?"

It's sudden and unwanted, the voice that interrupts them. It startles Shinchan so much that he ends up leaping away from Amir and falls on his ass. He wants to glare and curse at the intruder because now his pants are dirty, it pains him a lot as he stands with Amir's help and his chances of hooking up are completely ruined, and he would, if only his brain would work like that of a normal being's.

What does he want? Why is he talking to me? Is this a game? A prank? Did Nene put him up to it? Did Masao? Where is Himawari? Does she know? Did she send him? Why would she do that? What if he came on his own accord? Why would he do that? Is he here for revenge? Is he going to tell everyone? Will he use it against me? How did he even find me? Was he searching for me? Why?

"Shinchan," The voice is gentle now, and Shinchan hates the warm blanket it wraps him in. "Are you okay?"

The question brings him back to the unbearable reality of his life and he looks around to find that Amir is gone now, leaving him defenseless to the man in front of him.

Shinchan makes to leave from the side of the intruder, still not brave enough to look him in the eye. It's pathetic, he thinks, how Kazama can still possess the courage and right to come talk to Shinchan, ask him for a word, like the last five years haven't passed, like all is well between them when Shinchan can't even make a single second eye contact with him without hearing the sound of his own heart breaking into pieces all over again.

The whisper of "Please, listen," doesn't do it.

The sidestep meant to hinder his path, which Shinchan, in turn, side steps doesn't do it.

A warm hand on his suddenly cold wrist, stopping his exit, does it. Makes him lose it all.

"Don't you dare touch me."

But also, makes him do the one thing he wasn't supposed to. Look Kazama in the eye. The regrets anger leaves one with.

Kazama's hand has now left him and Shinchan wants to hightail out of this weird situation he finds himself in, wants to look for Amir to maybe reconsider the possibilities of their night together, wants to do anything but be captive of those black eyes he knows so well, ones that hurt him every time they look at him. Ones that will surely be the death of him.

A look is all it takes for Kazama to win all over again, and Shinchan to feel the loss of his soul akin to what he did, five years ago. 

---

Notes:

I'm sorry for the cliffhanger 😭

If the writing of this chapter seems rushed, that's because it is. I wanna get this fic out of my system so that i can focus on my other works again, but it's so hard 😭😭😭

the total chapter count might increase, so like beware
will update when i can

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 3: three

Summary:

Shinchan might exhaust every letter of the alphabet, forming all imaginable words around it to convey what he feels for Kazama and still his feelings will be left unexplained because nothing in this world can account for the way his heart beats for the man in front of him.

Notes:

I wish I could say this is meant in a happy way but 13k words in, y'all should know better. It's never what it looks like.

Total chapter count increased, as predicted, because I can't stop punishing these people for some reason.

I just want to remind everyone before going into this chapter that all my characters here are flawed af. Nothing they do is meant to be nice and good because they are as real as I could make them.
So just, bear with me, okay?

Seven years ago

"You need to leave."

Kazama frowns, looking over to his best friend busy cleaning up the mess they made in the last hour or so they had been here.

Here, meaning the small, unoccupied but extremely useful university dorm room Kazama had gotten them this year. Every year, the room allocated is different (this time it's the fifth-floor balcony one with a nice view of the campus), but the purpose remains the same. Or at least it has for the past two years, anyway.

His best friend has an apartment just outside the campus, which is where he and Kazama crash often times than not. Their friends pretty much like to do the same though, because, well, his best friend is the most nonchalant person Kazama knows and boundaries is not a word in his faulty dictionary. But Kazama's has it underlined and bold and hence, this dorm is just an extra room for them to use if they want to be away from the stress of humans (and their existence) for a while.

"Why?"

"I have someone coming over in about..." His best friend trails off, glancing at his phone to confirm, "... twenty minutes."

"Oh? Why do I need to leave, then?"

The sly smirk is all the answer he needs. Oh.

Sometimes, instead of an alone time apart from the mortal beings they (unwillingly) associate themselves with, Kazama and his best friend use this dorm for some... let's just say superior(ly pleasurable) meetups with the same mortals. Considering the fact that they (almost) live together in the apartment his best friend rents, privacy is never a given and hence, they both came up with this plan.

Kazama doesn't need to force the grimace that takes over his face.

"Who's the unlucky girl?"

"Who says it's a girl?" His best friend is a menace, but Kazama knows him well enough to know when he's bluffing.

"It's always a girl. Who is it?" He asks, impatient for some reason.

His best friend just shakes his head, makes a zipping motion in front of his mouth and resumes making the room look remotely presentable.

Kazama knows the rules. Knows that this room is multi-purpose, no matter how much he tries to avoid that fact. Knows his best friend has tendencies he usually just ignores for the sake of his sanity. Knows it all but... still...

It's annoying, bratty and hence, utterly unacceptable, because come on, this is Kazama's dorm, for fuck's sake. He worked his ass off last year, like he does every time, to have been offered the room so if anything, his best friend should be the one leaving. He rents an entire apartment, outside of campus, much more ludicrous than this dorm where the girls have a high chance of getting turned off by the notion of his best friend being a nerd (Kazama knows from experience).

And of course, there's the obvious fact that Kazama is the one who wanted to be away from the human population for a while, which is why they were here in the first place, so it's not like his best friend can't take this... whatever this is, to his own goddamn apartment because he doesn't have boundary issues, after all--

It's ridiculous, this line of thinking. It never leads to anything good, Kazama knows. And yet, he finds himself doing this every time the promiscuity of his best friend is thrust upon his face. Even the being-out-there thing isn't a bad one because they're only nineteen, for heaven's sake, so if anything, this is what is expected of them. Not spending the entire year studying like breathing to ensure you have a room all to yourself where you and your best friend can hang out without interruptions (if you have your way).

Kazama forces himself to let go of the unnecessary anger. "Whatever. How long would she be here for?"

A laugh, one of Kazama's favorites, echoes around the empty except for furniture room.

"How long do you think?"

This is easy. "Oh, two minutes then. I'll just wait outside." Banter has only been fun for him if it's with his best friend.

"You know I'm better than that, dude."

He grimaces again, because ew, though it's not as effortless as before and Kazama hates that.

"I don't know shit about you like that, weirdo."

His best friend looks at him then, done dumping pizza boxes, soda bottles and some randomly scattered shit in the dustbin near the bed. His gaze is intense, suddenly too serious for this conversation. Kazama thinks one of the most important people in his life is bipolar.

"Do you want to?"

Yes.

Kazama decides he hates his best friend, then.

He hates how deeply the other knows him. Hates how he sleeps with almost anyone who shows interest, but makes Kazama lie about the number of people he has brought here. Hates how he never lets Kazama bring anyone here anyway because this place and the apartment they (almost) share is a sanctuary for Kazama, too important to let the scent of other mortals pollute them. 

Hates how he isn't even aware that he does that, because it's all in Kazama's head. 

Hates how clingy he is, because it makes Kazama feel a bit too special for his liking. Hates how he is the most beautifully annoying person Kazama has ever met. Hates how he makes Kazama's heart race like a fucking marathon champ whenever their eyes meet, whenever an arm is slung casually around his shoulders. Hates how he makes Kazama lose almost every staring competition they have because who has such enticingly intense eyes that Kazama can't even look at them for a proper second before wanting to burst into flames of... want.

But mostly, Kazama hates how his best friend never thinks before speaking, breaking his little unaware heart every time he says shit he doesn't mean.

He shakes his head still, used to it like he's used to ignoring every little thing he feels for his best friend.

"No, thanks. Don't have time for your jokes." But if you actually mean it then yes, please.

His best friend just snorts. Kazama just leaves.

---

The silence is too loud.

Shinchan is the kind of person who thinks that absence of words is the signal of a storm brewing, ready to destroy everything he holds dear. Life hasn't given him a lot of chances to think otherwise either; every good thing or person he has had to lose till now have been a victim of this theory of his, so he has every right to be wary. Nene had been uncharacteristically quite before telling him that she broke his favorite Action Kamen figurine; Suzuki had been uncomfortably silent before telling them he was to leave Kasukabe forever to settle with his future wife Megumi; Mitzi had been scarily quite before relaying the news of Shinchan's beloved grandfather's death, and Himawari had been--

Ah, never mind.

Point of the matter is that Shinchan doesn't like silences, and anyone who knows him, knows it too. It's part of why they tolerate him being as chatty as humanly possible in order to avoid the lull in the conversation where someone might take a chance tell him something completely and utterly unalterable about his life. So yeah, it's common knowledge, but maybe not common enough for the nuisance in front of him.

He still resolutely looks out of the glass he's facing, the place of this... confrontation (?) putting him at some ease.

The room is familiar and comfortable, so at least Shinchan is not worried about some vile wife barging in here to demand him out of his own room. Had they gone to Kazama's, like the fucker had proposed, Shinchan might just have been a ball of anxiety at this point. Not that he isn't right now, but there's still a semblance of control he'd very much like to maintain until the end of this, which just couldn't come sooner.

A movement in the corner of his eye, and he naively shifts his focus to the other man in the room. When will he learn?

He watches as Kazama pours himself a glass of water and goes back to sit on the armchair near the bed, far away from where Shinchan's now leaning against the sliding doors leading to his balcony. The glass is emptied in seconds, yet he still watches. Their eyes meet, yet he still watches.

There's something awfully familiar about finding himself inside four walls with Kazama again, that Shinchan notices it right away. It explains why he's able to maintain the eye contact that seems to stretch time, why he's still here waiting for Kazama to say something, anything, and why he's still hoping, for fuck's sake. The lack of the usual tension in his body was expected, but indiscernible all the same for a third eye. Sure, the atmosphere is electric; each breath dancing on a barbed wire, playing with the static current flowing through the room. There's tension everywhere between the two people, as there should be considering they're sharing a small space after five goddamn years, but inside his body, Shinchan is not tensed. And he hates the false sense of comfort it brings.

"I..."

He stays silent, letting this play out however it will because it's not like he's here on his free will.

The engagement ceremony downstairs is still going on and he thinks this isn't how he wanted to disappear tonight.

"I... how are you?"

Shinchan just continues staring.

"Actually," Sheepish expression, "how have you been these last... five years?" Hands scratching the back of his head. 

Shinchan doesn't say anything. More nervousness ensues. "Nene is getting married," Wow, breaking news, "so you must be very happy, right?"

Five years later and Kazama's lack of finesse in small talk is still the same. It makes Shinchan want to laugh, albeit genuinely. 

"Are you... not gonna say anything?" Busted. 

Shinchan sees the exact moment Kazama sees right through him and his plan and the other is frustrated like it's no one's business. 

He decides to humor him then. 

"We're here to talk, right?"

He shrugs.

"So, you're really not gonna say a word?" Another shrug, followed by a sigh.

"You have to understand, this is hard for me."

Shinchan raises a brow, the gall this pathetic excuse of a human has, but still stays silent.

Kazama looks at him then, really looks at him and Shinchan sees it. The pleading eyes his worst nightmares are made of.

He hates this fact, would rather forget about it altogether than anything, but it still remains that Shinchan knows his ex-best friend in a way that he doesn't even know himself. It was bound to happen, he knows, considering the interest (which borderlines obsession) he had in Kazama back when they actually used to be the best of friends. Theirs was a bond of fewer words and more expressions; less telling and more understanding.

Shinchan knows his ex-best friend still remembers how well he is versed in all things Kazama because the sorrowful eyes displayed as the saddest piece of art are a living proof of it. The other man is fishing, for an opening, for a direction or for any which way to diffuse the tension palpitating in the room and he wants Shinchan to quit whatever game he's playing, staying silent when he can barely contain the words almost bubbling out of him. It's all in those eyes he knows to read so well.

Five years ago, Shinchan would have done it. Stop playing that is, because if Kazama doesn't want it, it's over.

Today, he doesn't even know if he's the one playing or being played.

Evidently, Kazama is frustrated. "Why... why did you even come if you didn't want to?"

As if he had a choice. As if he ever has a choice when it comes to this one person. Kazama asks, no, demands him something and the only option Shinchan sees is combining the highest peak of heaven with the lowest lows of hell to give him whatever he wants. Nothing more and certainly nothing less.

"It's not going to lead anywhere, anyway. Not if you can't say even a single word to me--"

Single word? Shinchan has walls inside him covered with the millions of letters, coherent and incoherent all alike, he wants to give to Kazama. He might exhaust every letter of the alphabet, forming all imaginable words around it to convey what he feels for Kazama and still his feelings will be left unexplained because nothing in this world can account for the way his heart beats for the man in front of him. A single word is like a grain of salt in the biggest of the oceans.

"--so, we're just wasting each other's time here." Kazama pauses and gets up from his perch on the armchair.

"We're here to talk, right?"

Repetition, as if talking to a child. Shinchan bristles.

"Are we?" He can't help it. He's frustrated, angry and so, so confused, it's hard to hide his bratty, defensive side. "Am I? Because as far as I know, I never agreed to any of this."

The sigh he gets is suffering. Shinchan wants to end Kazama's life. "Didn't you? How are we in your room then?"

"Because you ambushed me!"

"I saved you." He corrects and Shinchan can only stare.

"What?"

It's like Kazama is at a loss of words, gaping his mouth like a fish as words don't seem to form, at least not recognizable enough for Shinchan to comprehend.

"You were... with him..." He still looks around, as if there is someone other than them in this room and Shinchan feels he's transferred six years back in time, "...like that... out in the open, I had to do something."

"The only thing you were to do was dance with your delightful wife, Kazama." It's harsh, and so is the way it's received. The flinch hurts Shinchan of course, but some twisted part of him thinks his ex-best friend deserves it.

"Himawari has nothing to do with this."

Shinchan pouts, "Oh, but doesn't she?" He doesn't know what's happening, or why he's doing whatever he is, but Kazama is in pain and five years are too long. "I thought everything has something to with her. Masao and Nene getting together, you and her getting together, getting married," The hurt, absent till this instant, is reviving again and Shinchan hates it, "then coming back after five years, again because of her, like nothing has changed, like you didn't just up and leave one fine morning with no information whatsoever. It's all around her, isn't it? And of course, if she is the earth to everyone's moon, then you're her su--"

There's a hand pushing him back against the sliding doors and Shinchan wonders if he's dreaming.

The eyes boring into his are intense. Black orbs positively glowing, their darkness accentuating all fleeting emotions, the beauty of it all takes his breath away. Kazama is breathing heavily, grip tight on his collar, and a revelation makes its way into Shinchan's mind, one he seemingly forgot these past five years.

Kazama is deadly for Shinchan.

It is common knowledge, just like him hating silences is. When they were younger, Shinchan used to think it was poetic. The almighty Achilles had Patroclus; Alexander, the great conqueror, had Hephaestion; and mere mortal Shinchan had Kazama. The bonds shared by these lords in the greatest of lores are said to be sacred, something humans aren't supposed to feel and experience because they were way beyond the capacity of emotions one could endure.

But Shinchan had felt it.

In the way his eyes had an uncharacteristic tendency to look for Kazama wherever he went; in the way his heart would burst when they looked at each other, gaze saying words none of them could even think about uttering; in the way he knew Kazama was his forever the moment he had seen the other for the first time in kindergarten; in the way he was completely, utterly, hopelessly, yet unabashedly devoted to Kazama, like there was no other purpose of Shinchan except loving this kind soul.

There had always been something so eternally soothing about the power Kazama had over him, the power Shinchan had given him unknowingly, the power he had never abused, that Shinchan knew decidedly, back then, that theirs was a bond meant to be.

Younger him thought it was everything, present him thinks it's painful.

Because Kazama has proven to him now, the hardest way possible, that in the end, everyone is a transient. The lores might sing praises about the lords, their power, their influence, their impermanence but they can't hide the truth of even these immortals becoming captive of mortality when it comes to the sickest of all curses in this universe, love.

After all, Patroclus left Achilles, Hephaestion left Alexander and Kazama left Shinchan.

"You say one more word about her and I forget the past we share."

It's agonizing but it's love. It's unwanted but it's still fucking there, breathing down Shinchan's neck as he thinks how easy it is for Kazama to give this ultimatum to him. They were childhood friends before anything; Himawari was his wife for only five years.

"Naïve of you to think I haven't already forgotten."

It's untrue, just like his confidence as he pushes back the body on him and moves towards the door.

But isn't that what they all say, fake it till you make it?

---

Himawari isn't a sad person, per se.

But as she watches her husband follow her brother to what she can only assume is the latter's room, she thinks she has every right and reason to be.

The very first day she met Kazama had been through Shinchan, of course. Kindergarten friends came by to see his younger sister and she babbled her way to the most handsome one of the lot. The first few times Kazama played with her, she had been too star-struck to complain and whine the way she usually did with Mitzi or Shinchan. Only three years old, and she knew who her heart would belong to in the future.

"Hey."

Soft tones reach her ear, and she looks towards the woman approaching her. Elegance flowing through her entire body, the woman is as beautiful as one can get. It's frustrating, how much poise and confidence this woman has, so unlike the crude and conniving ways she tends to use her brain in.

Himawari wants to leave now; this confrontation needs to happen never if she has her way, but the other person doesn't seem to share her sentiments. By the looks of it, they are clearly on the other end of the spectrum.

"Not gonna go after them?"

She wants to, because God knows what her husband might end up spilling out when left alone in a four walls vicinity with Shinchan. Himawari left her entire life and everyone she had known to be her family for this interaction to never happen again, and maybe now she should really decide to follow wherever the duo went instead of chatting up with this intruder, but... but...

"Tired, finally?"

Yes, so much. "No," She still scorns, trying to move away in vain from this interaction she knows is bound to happen, "You might corner me all you want, Ai-chan, but I will never fall for your schemes."

The elder tips her head to the side as she assesses her. "I didn't do anything this time; you have to trust me."

Himawari has to scoff now, "Trust you when I know for a fact you're half the reason we're here, when I know you wanted this," she points in the general direction of where the two men disappeared, "to happen ever since you came back into our lives."

"Our?" She has every right to question but it still hurts.

"Their. Their lives." Himawari corrects.

Ai-chan is still analyzing her, brown eyes looking for any fault, any weakness they can find to taper off the confidence and high Himawari has been running on for the last five years. It makes her want to squirm.

She, instead, chooses a distraction. "Why are you doing this?"

A question arises in the assessing eyes. "What am I doing?"

"This." She gestures to herself and the lawn around them bustling with festivities as people continue enjoying themselves without knowing what is going on behind tonight's party.

Himawari has a humor so broken, she wants to laugh at the carelessness of it all because no one will know what happened, where the two men went, or what she and Ai-chan are talking about. The only thing they'd know though, would probably be the awareness of how bad the combo of these three things is.

Ai-chan shrugs, delicate hands brushing back the hair on her shoulders. "I'm not doing anything. Everything happening here was going to happen someday." There's eye contact and Himawari knows Ai-chan knows she knows it too.

Because in the last five years, Himawari has seen a lot.

Some might say that marrying the guy you've liked ever since you knew what that word meant is nice, dreamy, and straight out of a romance novel. Himawari can even think of a title, Marrying my brother's best friend. When the said guy turns out to have one of the richest families in your town, and the most beautiful face you have ever seen, there's literally nothing that can go wrong moving forward. She agrees.

In theory, it all sounds so fantastical, like the most alluring illusion a teenager can come up with in their daydreams and nineteen-year-old Himawari had similar views. Daydreaming about what would it be like to marry Kazama, what would they say for their vows, what would it be like to call him her husband, what would they talk about, what would she say to make him realize she is his forever, and stuff like that. It was all imagination and free and beautiful.

Himawari thinks life is a cruel joke because as she looks again towards the direction her husband vanished off to, she realizes that reality is anything but.

Calling Kazama her husband feels like eating chalk, the vows they said consisted of only the mandatory church ones, void of any truth or love whatsoever. Generally, they don't talk, preferring silence over the battle of words they find themselves in whenever an attempt at a conversation is made. And the thing she had said to make Kazama realize, albeit bitterly, angrily and unwillingly, that she has to be his forever, keeps her awake on nights her husband chooses to spend in his office.

"You're twenty-four, right?"

This is sudden. "Yes."

The older hums, "Still young enough to study."

A raised brow. An answer to the unasked question, "Nene told me you wanted to become a police officer." Analysis begins again, "You ever think about that now?"

The flinch that comes with this new direction of the conversation is expected by them both, of course, but that doesn't mean Himawari can't hate it any less.

"You ever think about minding your own business?"

"Why do you do this?"

"Do what?"

"Shut down, whenever someone tries to break in."

Ai-chan has that look again and Himawari wonders what goes on in that pretty head of hers.

For as long as she can remember, Ai-chan has been a distant memory for her. She used to come by and play with her brother's little Kasukabe Defense Group when they were younger, and Himawari has been told that her three-year-old self had a strange affinity towards this particular girl in the group. She doesn't remember it, but a lot of people have said so. The only people Himawari liked in that group of five (six) were Kazama, for obvious reasons, and Ai-chan, for reasons she has never had a chance to revisit because when Himawari had started growing a conscience, Ai-chan moved back to Tokyo with her family. Nene then filled the space of affection she left behind in Himawari and everything was good again.

Until Himawari moved away, and Ai-chan came back.

"Why do you have to break in if you know you don't have the keys?"

Ai-chan laughs suddenly, a melodic sound fluttering Himawari's ears as she marvels quite bitterly that God really did take his sweet time making this graceful woman in front of her.

"Where do I sign up for the keys then?"

---

Six years ago

"You've been quiet lately."

Kazama raises a brow in question as his flatmate-slash-best friend looks at him quite intently.

"I'm always quiet."

It's true. If it's not for his brain having a lack of topics to talk about with the general crowd of students around them, Kazama prefers to stay silent in order to let his ever-growing social anxiety take a break. After all, it's not like he has to talk very often when his best friend talks enough for them both.

"No, not with me."

This is true too. While his best friend does enough talking outside for the world to not bother Kazama to do so, inside the little flat they're residing in for the last year of their undergrad, Kazama makes up for his daily dose of average words per day spoken by him. The limit is too high for him to achieve if he were to do so out in public, so his best friend becomes a martyr for him (fitting, considering he is the one who set this limit).

"I'm just tired."

This is false. As fake as it can get and if the narrowed eyes pointed his way are anything to go by, his best friend knows that too.

"But I saw you talking to Masao the other day."

"He wanted me to explain derivatives for his financial modeling class."

"I've asked you to explain that to me at least three times in the last week."

A careless shrug. "I didn't have time then. I'm tired and busy." As if to prove the point, Kazama gets up from his chair, collecting the leftovers from his plate in the only Tupperware they own. Their dinner table is a cozy little thing for two and he bumps into his best friend on his way to the sink.

"Move. I need to wash these before I leave."

"You spend all your free time after classes at the library." He's still accusing as he reluctantly moves aside to give Kazama space to move freely in the kitchenette attached to their living room.

"I need to study."

"You can study at home too."

Home. Kazama feels tingles run through his body as the word registers in his mind. "I can't. You have friends over all the time and," He turns around, leaning against the sink to look at his best friend pointedly, "I need silence to study."

"I'll start hanging out with them somewhere else then."

"Still can't. I need people around me being focused on their shit to be serious about mine."

"Study with me. I can focus too."

He sighs, exasperated. "You and I both know how long your attention span is. You'll end up distracting me if I study with you." He turns back to finish the dishes as his best friend comes beside him to dry them. "We've tried this a million times to know it won't work."

His flatmate is silent for a while as they work with practiced ease to clean up the mess they made while having dinner. Kazama is looking at the clock in the living room while drying his hands when the other guy speaks again.

"What time will you be back?"

"It'll be late." His answer is short and crisp and everything his best friend gets riled up from.

There's a measured breath as Kazama goes to his room to pack the books scattered. "I know it will be late, Kazama. You're leaving at ten in the fucking night to study, of course, it'll be late. I asked what time you would be back, so I don't end up losing my sleep waiting up for you."

"Then don't wait up. I have a couple of things planned that I need to finish helping Kkura with before I can start studying my own material."

"Kkura? You're past first names now?"

Kazama can't believe this man. "Yes, your honor. Teaching the same student for months on end does that to you. Also, she practically asks us to call her by her name every time we meet her so it's not like I took some liberties on my own here."

"Her asking doesn't mean we have to call her by her name. You barely say my sister's name without honorifics, and she has been in your life longer than Kkrua, Kazama."

He whirls around, hands flailing wildly in the air. "That's because Himawari-chan is younger than us! Sakura is our batch mate!"

"What are you getting so defensive about? Are you hiding something?"

Kazama looks at his best friend incredulously and resorts to take a deep breath, before promptly leaving his room.

"Don't pick fights with me if you're bored; because it's exam time and I'm already stressed as it is." Heavy footsteps follow him as he moves towards the door to their small apartment, checking for his wallet and keys.

"It's exam time for me too, Kazama. Yet I'm here talking to you, right? That's all I'm asking. I'm sorry for accusing but please come back home when you're done teaching Sakura-chan and we'll study together, and I promise I'll concentrate and--"

Kazama lets an ill-timed snort slip.

It rings loudly in their small apartment as he pulls his coat from their coat hanger by the door and finally faces Shinchan.

It's metaphoric, he thinks, the way he is all dressed up with a hand on the door handle, ready to open any minute while Shinchan stands in front of him on the welcome door mat they had bought on a whim, in his white tee and loose sweats looking all sorts of comfortable and warm. Hurt is swirling in his orbs, of course, becoming apparent to Kazama as he remembers his sudden burst of comic timing.

There's something akin to fear forming a pit in his stomach though and he knows he has to make his escape in the next five minutes or so.

A brief silence. His best friend's eyes are positively smoldering. "What's so funny about any of this, Toru?" Shit.

It's like he has a death wish or something, or maybe he really is tired because Kazama knows himself enough to know that nothing that comes out of his mouth next would even see the light of the day had he been functioning like a normal being. "Nothing. It's just cute how you think you can compare your exam stress to mine. We're like worlds apart, Shinchan."

Not the best way to say but it's true.

A sneer finds his way to Shinchan's face and Kazama thinks he's done for. "So, we're worlds apart now. What's next? Tomorrow you'll say we're not best friends anymore. The next day we're just friends and after that? Nothing more than two people living together to save money. Is that how it's gonna go now, Kazama? That's what your Kkura tells you to say, right? In all that borrowed time you're spending with her when you're supposed to be home with me--"

"You're blowing things out of proportion, Shinchan. And keep Kkura out of whatever it is you're thinking, she said nothing of this sort to me and you know it."

It's apparently the wrong thing to say as Shinchan loses his last straw right before Kazama's eyes.

"Oh, I know alright. I know you can defend everyone in this world, talk to anyone you want, and teach whoever wants you to but just can't have a single meal at home anymore without me having to force you to. I know you can stay out for hours on end and come back so late in the night that even I fall asleep waiting up for you all night long. I know if I ask you to teach me one thing from our same syllabus, you'll keep putting me off but if Masao or your Kkura asks, you'll teach them in a heartbeat." He's breathing heavily by this point and Kazama starts to feel bad.

"And when I ask you if you're okay, if we're okay, for nothing about you feels like you're just stressed out for your exams because I know you and care about you, you give me excuses." Shinchan scoffs bitterly but the hurt in his voice is hard to miss. Especially for Kazama who's an expert in all things Shinchan. "Excuses, Kazama. I thought we were past that. I thought we were past this whole not-communicating-how-we-feel thing. I thought you trusted me enough to tell me what is wrong. We've been best friends all our lives, for fuck's sake. But lately it feels like... like..." His voice cracks and he runs a wild hand to tame his wild hair as sorrow overshadows the beauty of Shinchan's face. "...it hurts but it feels like... you're avoiding me."

Sad, soulful eyes pin him in his place and Kazama forgets to breathe.

"Are you?"

---

Shinchan is brave.

He is, he knows that. It's not a thing he thinks, not a thing he needs reassurance for, not a thing he doubts. There have been plenty of instances in his life which tried to make him feel otherwise, and he still has a billion fears he doesn't think he can ever overcome but Shinchan is brave in the sense that many people around him have a hard time being. A finger jabbing his skull, and a mocking smirk is all he needs for you to understand.

So yeah, Shinchan is brave and as he shakes off the hand holding his wrist for the second time tonight, his faith in his strength is reaffirmed.

"If you have a hearing problem, get it checked," Twisting the hold restricting his exit twice now, he shoves Kazama against the sliding door he had been pinned on earlier and presses his forearm a bit too strongly against his neck, "but I said don't you dare touch me. And I meant it."

A biting smirk because of course, "Your actions speak otherwise, Shinchan."

He still smiles sweetly, pushing against the body held by him more, and repeats, "If you have a hearing problem, Kazama, then get it checked. Old age can do that to you."

Kazama scoffs, face turning red bit by bit as Shinchan refuses to let him breathe normally, "I'm literally the same age as you. Or perhaps did you forget that?" He pouts, "You sure old age isn't affecting your memory?"

Shinchan hates and loves the way Kazama is still the only one who can stand against him in both, a battle of words and a battle of strength as his struggles against his hold just don't cease. It's refreshing and yet, just like old times.

The reminder of old times brings back harsh memories and Shinchan looks for the perfect one to attack this cocky son of a bitch in front of him.

"My memory works pretty well. Though I'd be happy to let you check. Hm... let's see... You became my friend when we were five years old, best friend when were seven. We went to the same kindergarten, same primary, middle, and high school. We shared an apartment back when we were in the same university, the one where you gave me your first blowjob, where you got fucked for the first time," He marvels in the flush rising in Kazama's eyes, "by me, of course."

There's a pause as Shinchan leans impossibly close to practically thrust his face into Kazama's, "And then you went on to fuck my sister with my cum still sliding out of your hole," It's disgusting but so is the person in front of him, "in the same flat. On the same day."

It's embarrassing and humiliating, sure but all of this is just upper-surface stuff. Shinchan knows his ex-best friend enough to know that none of this is hurting Kazama. And that just doesn't sit well with the bitterness Shinchan finds himself drowning in.

He needs to find a memory so deep and unalterable that Kazama would hurt irreparably, in a way that might come close to what Shinchan went through five years ago, and still, Shinchan knows, he would hurt alongside this man in front of him. Suicidal as he is, he wants, no, needs Kazama to burn, to be reduced to nothing but a skeleton of what he used to be.

When Shinchan finally finds one such instance, it must have been apparent to his opponent, one who knows him as deeply as Shinchan knows him.

For a second, he feels it's unfair because what he's about to say now would've worked better if Kazama didn't see it coming from a thousand miles away. His ex-best friend knows him so well, that there's no way he doesn't already know what Shinchan is going to say next.

"You know, thinking about that day, I just remembered something. The memory is a bit blurry around the edges though. Think you can help me?" He tilts his head innocently.

"I remember coming back home, finding you with Himawari. Then I remember you saying it was a mistake, you didn't want any of this to happen. Hm, after that, I remember forgiving you? Can't remember why though," He does remember why, can never forget even if he wants to, "and then... like three weeks later? Was it three weeks?"

He looks at Kazama as if he's genuinely curious, "Tell me, was it three weeks later? Because the time's all meshed up, but I remember Himawari barging into our flat and saying something along the lines of..."

But as the struggles stop instantly and Kazama's face drains of all the color it had acquired due to lack of oxygen as Shinchan finally lets himself go in this encounter completely, he thinks this is better. Still unfair yes, but all the better. Knowing what's coming next but not doing anything to stop it, not because you don't want to, but because you can't.

Kazama can't stop Shinchan, not even if he tries his level best because Shinchan is brave, and he is not.

The memory he chose is pretty much all the proof they need for this fact.

"... being pregnant with your child. Do I remember that correctly, Kazama Toru?"

If Kazama wants to talk, they'll talk all right. Shinchan is done holding back. 

---

Notes:

another cliffhanger but at least the story's moving forward now!!!! i didn't know how much I needed these two pairs to interact for that to happen.
Also, we're entering flashback era, baby!!!!

do lemme know your thoughts on that achilles analogy while you're at it!!!

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 4: four

Summary:

His best friend is brave, in a sense that Kazama can’t ever be, because nothing of these gossip and rumors and truths even grazes him; he’s so damn untouchable and confident that while Kazama punishes himself by hearing and seeing more, Shinchan just does more.

Notes:

i don't think I'm even reminding myself that this was supposed to be 10k oneshot at this point. I just write and edit and write and edit and write and edit with no intention of stopping.

what is wrong with me?

Six years ago (contd.)

The silence in their small living room is so taut that Kazama can probably play out a sound from the almost visible lines of tension covering the entirety of the room.

He chooses, instead, to focus on his phone, clutched way too tightly for the processors of the tiny device to breathe properly. But Kazama doesn’t care at this point, not when the pretense of sending a text to his student for the night, who is probably waiting for him now at the college library, and telling her that he won’t be able to, or more like can’t, make it for their session is what is keeping the confrontation he can literally feel about to happen any minute now at bay and he will take anything over that.

Shinchan’s eyes are hot on him, posture the epitome of laziness and a bit of arrogance as he sits on the couch in front of Kazama, legs spread enough to exude dominance but not enough to appear wanton. As he forces himself to stare at Sakura’s very quick and very feminine reply -- a sad, pouty selfie with the caption Get well soon, Zama! Lemme know if you need anything! -- to his abrupt and typical I’m feeling a bit under the weather cancelation, his mind wanders, wondering what it would feel like to sit on or kneel between the parted legs on display in front of him. He knows himself enough to know he wouldn’t mind either of the scenarios.

A voice in his head, sounding suspiciously like his conscience, chastises him, because while Shinchan is sitting in front of him, hurt by the mere implication and question of whether Kazama was actually avoiding him these last few weeks, Kazama’s twisted and depraved mind is imagining things, sexual things when he has no right to. God knows if Shinchan even got the whiff of where his mind is wandering, he’d be disgusted and running off to the hills, or anywhere far, far away from Kazama.

But still, as he braves a glance at those deep, deceptively so, black eyes, and sees the barely contained anger and hostility, both trying to break free fueled by the hurt and disappointment his actions have made the other feel, he can’t help but notice how restrained and strangely held back, Shinchan is around him.

Kazama is no fool, he has fully functioning ears and eyes and he hears and sees things, unnecessary but true things about his best friend because university gossip just can’t be stopped. No matter how loyal the person is. He knows, has known for a long while, that Shinchan is very out there in their life of college experiences; everybody wants him, and he wants everybody. Girls want to fuck him, get in his bed and become his forever while boys envy him, want to be his friend for his association means a lot and some even want to fuck him, though none is bold enough to say it out loud in public. Kazama knows. Kazama is one of them.

But that fact aside, there are other things as well, things people like to brag about after a particularly rough night Shinchan spends outside of their apartment, when masochist Kazama is left wondering and guessing exactly what kind of gossip he’s going to hear about his only and best friend come morning. These people are girls, of course, because Shinchan is straight alike a fucking pole, Kazama reminds himself, and they talk. These girls, they talk and spread and brag and Kazama hears and sees and hates. But mostly, he wonders, imagines and then hates more.

He hears that Shinchan is said to be very experimental. His best friend is into every girl who wants him, and everything they want him to do to them, because again, Kazama hears, and he has heard a lot about the sex life, more like the other life Shinchan lives, apart from being Kazama’s one and only. He has heard about the clubs and parties, the drugs and smokes, the games and sex; wild, untamable but so fucking erotic sex that even hearing about it makes Kazama hard. He drowns himself in a fit of self-loathing after that, of course, but it happens.

His best friend is brave, in a sense that Kazama can’t ever be, because nothing of these gossip and rumors and truths even grazes him; he’s so damn untouchable and confident that while Kazama punishes himself by hearing and seeing more, Shinchan just does more.

And now, looking at those orbs alike an ocean dead set on drowning him as he reminds himself that he had meant to glance not stare, Kazama knows he really needs to do something about it.

“What are you staring at?” Accusing, his tone doesn’t sit well with Kazama because of how unfair the question is.

Shinchan’s eyes haven’t left him since he had made the silent trip from the door of their apartment to his room to change into comfortable clothes again about fifteen minutes ago, and then his best friend has the audacity to accuse Kazama of glancing at him for the first time in those same fifteen minutes. His decision to stay back was simple and easy because as cowardly as Kazama is, even he knows that nothing would ever come before Shinchan’s hurt for him, not even he himself.

Still, there’s something so addictive about having Shinchan’s entire attention on him though, as if he is the only person worthy enough to experience the expanse of it, all at once. It’s soothing and deceiving because while rumor has it that Shinchan is the king of one-night stands, he is still the most eligible bachelor their side of Tokyo has. The only people he is loyal to, ones that get to see him for more than a few hours in the dead of the night, are Kazama, Masao, Nene, Suzuki and Megumi.

These people have a special place in his heart, Kazama knows, because for them, Shinchan lives a completely contrasting life, one the college people never get a whiff of. It’s like there’s two of him, living two entirely different lives. One who snorts lines of drugs Kazama doesn’t even know the name of, the other who smokes with Nene more as a means to calm her down than any real intention of getting high. One who doesn’t speak more than two words to anyone as he loses himself in the neon lights of whatever clubs he goes to, the other who just can’t stop teasing and talking to Masao about whatever it is his mind decides to torture the other with at that instant.

One who stalks around the clubs of Tokyo to find the most suitable prey for the night, and the other who wakes up Kazama by emptying a bottle of cold water on his head and grants him breakfast on bed as a mediocre apology.

Given how much the span of his attention resembles that of a child for anyone other than the people he knows since childhood, his best friend never lets it shift from Kazama, ever.

And Kazama knows, this attention makes him feel a certain deceiving way and now he is decidedly stalling in his quest of a meaningful reply to the offending question, partially for the sake of having those eyes on him for a bit longer. It’s pathetic but so is he.

He clicks his phone shut, throws it away on the couch aimlessly as he finally letting the poor device breathe and struggles to do the same himself when Shinchan pins him with a raised brow.

He deflects, because he is not brave, “Do you know how much staying back tonight is costing me?”

A careless shrug, “You don’t care about money.”

“I don’t,” He really doesn’t, his family is loaded, has always been, “but I care about impression.”

“Sakura-chan loves you.” There’s a weird tone in his voice and Kazama hates how important and stupid it makes him feel, all at once. “I’m sure she probably asked you rest and reschedule whenever you feel better, Zama.”

Kazama flinches, “How do you know?”

A raised brow again, “I wasn’t supposed to?”

“No, not really.” He’s getting impatient but talking to an angry Shinchan does that to him. “It’s my personal matter. Tell me how’d you know the nickname, Shinchan?”

Shinchan’s lips twist and the face he makes isn’t ugly, per se for Kazama doesn’t think he can ever associate that word with his best friend, but the way it makes him feel is.

“You dropped your phone in my lap while talking to your dearest Kkura, Zama. I have eyes. I see.”

He realizes in a second that Shinchan is true, he did carelessly drop his phone near the other’s lap on the couch, and he’s scrambling for it in the next. Shinchan is faster though.

He tosses the phone further into the couch where Kazama can’t reach without practically draping himself over Shinchan and captures the wrists that come forward to grab the offending device. Kazama is effectively caught now, bent at the base of his spine as he glares at his suddenly too close for comfort best friend and fights back.

“Let me go.” He tries to free himself from the hold. It’s dark and possessive and tight, just the like the eyes of the ma—no, boy in front of him. Sometimes, his best friend’s actions make it difficult for Kazama to put him the in the same age category as his own. “Shinchan, what are you doing?”

He tilts his head, looking at Kazama as the latter still fruitlessly tugs at his wrists to get them to be free, and something about that gaze tells him to stop, because the promise in those fucking eyes is not pretty but all kinds of dangerous and minacious. Kazama holds his ground though, he’s never a wimp in front of his best friend, not if he hasn’t done anything wrong.

“Do you like her?” The complete disregard of his predicament is so... so... Shinchan that Kazama wants to free his hands and hit that beautiful fucking face and then kiss it better (in his dreams, of course).

“What’s it to you? Also, let me fucking go.” He still struggles, still growls because being shy under Shinchan’s scrutiny has never worked for him and wouldn’t miraculously now.

Head cocks to the other side, “What if I don’t?”

“I’ll fucking punch you, I swear to fucking God, you fucking punk--”

“That’s a lot of fucks being given,” A smirk, a fucking smirk, taunts him as he is being released from the suffocating grip and closeness. “Are you mad that I made you miss your daily fuck sessions?”

Kazama bristles, he has every right to. “I go there to tutor her. When will you understand that?”

“When you sound convincing enough.”

“I am telling you the truth,” Fight long forgotten, Kazama makes the mistake of looking in those eyes he knows so well and lets himself be sincere for the first time in a while, “I’m not fucking her, Shinchan. She’s just my classmate, is all.”

“Then you must like her.”

What is wrong with this boy? “How did you even reach to that conclusion?”

“You willingly spend time with her, even on days you don’t have to tutor her.”

“Well, that’s because she is my friend, Shinchan and she pays me to spend time with her otherwise.” The moment the words leave him, he knows how wrong they sound. Of course, Shinchan doesn’t let him backtrack.

“So what, since I’m your best friend,” He makes it sound so wrong, Kazama wonders how well Shinchan knows the art of words, “I have to pay you double than her for you stay at your own home now?”

The fact that this counterargument even leaves his mouth is infuriating enough. “You are in no position to pay me when you literally live off of my money, asshole.”

It’s true. And as his best friend’s composure finally breaks, giving way to that unadulterated hurt it has been harboring since the beginning of this biting encounter, Kazama feels like he can breathe again.

Many, or rather thirteen, if he wants to be precise, years ago, Shinchan and Kazama were on the verge of being separated.

It had been the summer before they were to join their primary school, ready to leave behind the kindergarten days and Kazama was switching schools.

He was smart, had always been, courtesy of his genetic code and affordability of tutor fees for being born as a Toru and had made it into the new and prestigious primary academy all the way towards the end of their small town Kasukabe, one said to be affiliated with a renowned university in Tokyo. They wanted to reach the talents of all the small towns near their main campus to recruit them for their courses of undergrad from as early as primary school.

They were to open new branches of middle and high schools in the towns neighboring Tokyo, like they had opened the primary school in Kasukabe, and students in these schools could only be granted an admission through a vicious and extremely hard entrance exam, compulsory to be given thrice in their entire school life. Once to get into the primary, twice for the middle and third time for their high school, before they’d be allowed to join the uni in Tokyo for whatever course they wanted to pursue.

It was a scheme basically meant to lure in all the rich kids of small town families to get into their prestigious college, because it was expensive as fuck, with the guarantee of an academically prosperous future and Kazama’s family had fallen right into it.

They had encouraged him, a one-month-to-seven year old, day and night, to study his current textbooks as hard as he could, had gotten multiple tutors for different subjects, just so he could get into that primary academy. Kazama had been frustrated, rightfully so, because summers were meant for him to be playing and patrolling with his Kasukabe Defense Group, like all the others prior to it and this exam wasn’t allowing him to do so.

He had whined and complained to his compassionate four friends about it, and they had agreed to support him the only way they could. By studying and appearing for the exam with him, in order to help him feel like he wasn’t alone in this.

The day the results came out, Kazama’s family had been ecstatic, and Shinchan’s had been gloomy.

Because for some reason, some very wild and unknown reason, Shinchan, who had made fun of him for studying so hard for an entrance exam, who had only come to those group study sessions of five to have the snacks and lemonade Kazama’s mother lovingly had their cook make for the dedicated kids, who hadn’t once opened a textbook in those same sessions, had gotten into the academy, along with Kazama and his family wasn’t as well off as the latter’s.

It had suddenly dawned on Kazama that evening, as Shinchan was retelling what had happened in his house prior to his announcement that he had gotten into the best but very expensive primary academy any town around theirs had, that he and Shinchan might get separated pretty soon. Because if his family couldn’t afford that new school, there was no way that the two friends could meet in between the school year because the public academy Shinchan would now have to go to was in the opposite direction was Kazama’s and the only time they could meet uninterrupted would be somewhere around this time next summer. A year they would have to spend apart and Kazama didn’t like it one bit.

He had ran home then, bawling his eyes out in his mother’s bosom that he didn’t want to lose any of his current friends who hadn’t gotten in because who knew what kinds of people he would meet at the new, potentially scary place he was to go come fall and so, as a solution, he wanted Shinchan, who had gotten in, to go with him and be with him at the new, potentially scary place come fall.

Kazama had thrown an actual fit over it, didn’t talk to his parents for weeks after they scolded him that even though they had money, he couldn’t buy Shinchan’s will to go to that prestigious academy with him, couldn’t buy his family’s agreement with the promise of a better future for their kid, and yeah, those arguments sounded weak to even a finally-seven year old Kazama’s ears.

A week later, summer was ending, and Shinchan had a trust fund set up in the same bank as Kazama’s.

Ever since then, they were best friends, and Shinchan was living off of Kazama’s (parents’) money.

A bitter and extremely pointed scoff brings him back to the moment in their small, by choice, apartment’s living room as Shinchan finally deems the conversation worthy enough to stand up for it.

“Now we’re counting money. This is so fun. What’s next? Measuring our dicks?”

He makes a very serious and very condescending motion of his hands reaching for his non-existent zipper and Kazama doesn’t know what takes over him to press his hands, willingly, at the other’s crotch to stop that strangely appalling movement. Shinchan’s hand below his and the soft material of the sweatpants he has on are the only barriers preventing a direct contact and Kazama forces his mind to think of a reply soon enough to not seem suspicious of the traitorous thoughts he is now consumed with.

“What has gotten into you today?” He hears himself ask and thinks he’s more curious than hurt to hear the answer, “You’re not listening to me at all.”

“You’re talking to me normally after a month, let me adjust to the sound of your voice again, sweetheart.” Kazama flinches, from the rude endearment or the truth of that sentence, he doesn’t know.

He is glancing up at his best friend then and he’s thinking suddenly whether all of this is worth it.

Shinchan now knows Kazama has been avoiding him for the past few weeks, which have turned into a month because of course Kazama wasn’t paying attention, too busy to not be in the same room as his best friend any which way to care about how long this has been going on for. Shinchan also knows Kazama as a subject well enough, in general, to know that nothing he does is without a reason, no matter how small or unnecessary it might be, there’s always a reason and for him to willingly go out of his way to ignore the other so much so that he notices, is enough of an incentive for Shinchan to prod, Kazama knows this.

And when Shinchan prods, Kazama can never lie. It’s his damnation, his Achilles heel.

He’s still looking at Shinchan now and he thinks it’s only moments away, the array of questions pointed at him which will make him lose his all, everything that has been bubbling inside of him for the last few week--month, whatever and he doesn’t want it to come out, not really, because when, no, if it does, Kazama will lose everything he holds dear and he doesn’t want that. Never wants that, and yes, all of this is so worth it again for him, if it helps Kazama maintain the fragile, little thing he likes to call his reality.

Removing his hands from the precarious position, he turns on his heels and does what he knows best then.

He fucking runs.

---

A month ago

The parties held just before the exam season are the fucking best, if Kazama is being honest.

There’s something so liberating about them, like you know this is the last of fun you’ll experience before it’s going to be all lines and texts and barely visible fonts of a hundred year old damned philosophy for the next month or so. Making the best of such parties is the goal, more like the incessant need, as he passes the threshold of whatever sorority house his best friend has dragged him to now and he plans to fucking act on it.

A promise of alcohol and good company had been made though, around an hour ago as Shinchan had begged a falsely strict Kazama that this will the last party, I swear, and that (the) alcohol is gonna be cheap but fucking worth it and also everyone’s coming, I asked Megumi to bring Suzuki as well, and so his pretense had fallen and Kazama now looks at his grinning best friend pointedly, asks him to make good on his promises through his eyes.

Message is received in the way the other’s light up, pointing discreetly at something behind his back. Kazama turns, naively so because it’s Shinchan and he should’ve known but he still turns and sees the disturbing sight of Masao and Nene making out in the far corner of the dance floor and Megumi occupying the lap of a slightly tipsy Suzuki as they giggle at something only they can hear and understand.

He doesn’t know what is worse, the fact that Shinchan has managed to deceive him again, after fifteen years of them knowing each other or that this is his last party of the semester and he’d be stuck being a dead weight on Shinchan’s side again, watching him hunt for his potential partner for the night.

The latter hurts of course, because it’s one thing to hear about it and an entirely different one to see it with his own two eyes but Kazama is twenty and he is also tired of feeling hurt by his best friend’s rash and impulsive decisions.

“Hey, Kazama.”

He still turns, again naively so because again it’s Shinchan and again he should’ve known, but as he looks at the delicate and beautiful and awfully familiar girl next to his best friend, looking so natural with him in the way Kazama has always just imagined himself to look, he thinks he needs something stronger than the slightly mixed coke sloshing around in his unattended cup.

“You remember Ai-chan?”

Of course, he remembers Ai-chan. 

Ai-chan who is rich, like Kazama is, who still has a down-to-earth air around her, like Kazama does, who looks at Shinchan with a special smile, like what Kazama imagines his to be when looking at the dork, who then smiles at him, differently but politely, like he does while shaking her bony and so fucking soft hand. 

Kazama thinks that is where the similarities end though. 

Because Ai-chan is also someone Shinchan knew in his childhood, unlike Kazama who he knows since his childhood. 

Ai-chan is standing prettily next to his best friend, unlike Kazama who is pouring whatever hard liquor he can put his hands on in the tiny kitchen of the sorority house. Ai-chan is laughing at something Shinchan says and patting her hand against his chest as consolation, unlike Kazama who doesn’t stop glaring at the pretty pair of them from even the brink of his glass as he drowns his… whatever cup he is on. Ai-chan is a girl who Shinchan takes with him upstairs to the rooms designed for what is natural between a young boy and a young girl, unlike Kazama who is a boy imagining lewd things about his best friend as he walks to their shared home alone, bitterly.

Ai-chan is the one who gets the rumor mill talking whether the most eligible bachelor of their college is finally taken, unlike Kazama who hears and sees and hates and still suffers.

---

“So... Kazama...”

Shinchan says as they sit facing each other on the carpeted floor of Kazama’s room, working some equations of statistics together, two days after the fateful night of you remember Ai-chan?, after everybody started hogging Kazama to ask whether his best friend really was off the market. Kazama would and wouldn’t like to know it, all the same.

He hums in response of the uncharacteristic hesitance, still focused on the numerical he’s been working on for the past ten minutes.

“You remember...” No, he doesn’t want to remember anything or anyone again “... Ai-chan, from the other night?”

He hums again, eyes briefly glancing up to meet his best friend's to get him to continue, before he’s breaking the contact, more for his sake than the suddenly uninteresting sheet of numbers before him.

“Well... she... and I... and then I thought...” Kazama actually stops writing now, concerned, but still doesn’t look up. “I’ve been with her for the past two days,” is what makes sense to him finally.

“Oh.” He pauses, asks his brain to please think again. “Great.” comes out then.

“Yeah... I mean no, that’s not what I meant.” Shinchan is frustrated now, stats forgotten and Kazama is annoyed, more than anything.

“What did you mean, then?” Patience bleeds through his voice, patience he doesn’t feel, but patience he knows his best friend needs at that moment.

“I meant, we’ve been talking and,” Kazama’s eyes are finally on him again and Shinchan exhales as he speaks, “I think I like someone.”

His eyebrows are high now, Kazama knows, and he should probably stop, for his best friend is staring at him openly, gauzing his reaction but he doesn’t care, cannot care because Shinchan thinks he likes someone and in no universe can that person be Kazama, but in every universe that person can be Ai-chan.

“Is it her?” 

His voice is steady, his response is well timed, and it feels like he is fine, like he is just a guy best friend listening to his guy best friend talk about this person, no, girl he thinks he likes. He is just that and not the heartbroken boy who looks at the person he has loved since forever and wonders if it’s really fucking pathetic that his heart wants, fucking wishes, his name to fall from his best friend’s lips next.

Shinchan’s gaze is piercing, assessing, for what Kazama doesn’t understand, but he holds it as well as he can, as strongly as he can because he cannot break, not here, not now, not in front of Shinchan because he knows his best friend wouldn’t stop until Kazama ends up spilling everything that’s upsetting him and that is, quite literally, the last thing he wants because Shinchan thinks he likes someone. And that someone isn’t Kazama, he’s sure of it.

The silence around them stretches, lingers and dances on Kazama’s nerves. Shinchan is still looking at him, their study material all but forgotten, as it sits all spread out between them and suddenly Kazama is dropping his gaze, not brave enough to continue as he focuses on other things around him.

Has Shinchan’s knee always been touching his as they sit tilted towards each other, have their shoulders been brushing all this time? Have Shinchan’s fingers ever made their way towards Kazama’s chin so delicately before, has he ever pressed them there to get him to look at him again? Has Kazama ever agreed readily to such a touch before, has he ever wanted it to last for so long that it is etched and tattooed on his skin permanently? Have Shinchan’s eyes always spoken of promises he cannot fulfil in reality, has Kazama always fallen for them, nonetheless?

Has Shinchan ever dropped his eyes from Kazama’s eyes to his lips in such an innocent way that he feels like a teenager all over again, has Kazama felt this exhilarated of someone simply looking at him before?

“It’s...” Those eyes, those fucking eyes are looking at him so delicately as if his best friend thinks Kazama might break if he looks at him rudely right now, in their shared apartment, in the privacy of Kazama’s bedroom, in the moment Kazama knows finally that the most eligible bachelor of their side of Tokyo is going to be a taken boy soon, and he thinks Shinchan is partially right in thinking so. He will break soon, but not if Shinchan looks at him rudely, no. He’ll break if Shinchan keeps looking at him like it’s him, like the person is Kazama fucking Toru but Kazama fucking Toru knows it’s not.

“... not her.” He seems to settle for, digits still holding Kazama’s face close to him and the latter sees the truth in the black orbs.

The relief is expected, but certainly not lasting. Because if it would’ve been her, would’ve been Ai-chan, someone Kazama knows as well, then it would’ve been easier for him to see where he lacks apart from not being a girl, of course, see where he wasn’t enough as a person in Shinchan’s life and most of all, he would’ve expected that. He was ready for it. An easier pill to swallow. 

But now, it’s not her, not someone Kazama knows, and it’s someone entirely new, someone only Shinchan knows out of the two of them and that just doesn’t sit well with him.

He hesitates, he doesn’t know why for it’s not like he has anything to lose now, but he hesitates and asks, “Who... who is it, then?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

When questioning eyes point his way, Shinchan simply shrugs. Kazama thinks this isn’t the time to be teasing.

“Why doesn’t it matter, Shinchan?” He twists in the hold of the digits still holding his chin and faces his best friend fully, all of their limbs aligned perfectly. They’re close, exceptionally so, though they don’t touch each other anywhere except the hand on his chin but Kazama doesn’t ponder over it much, because it’s winters and Shinchan is warm, is always warm and Kazama is a sucker for all things hot.

His best friend shakes his head, frustrated, “It just doesn’t. You don’t... know...” His hand drops, taking away their only source of contact, and his head hangs between his shoulders, dejected.

Oh, Kazama thinks, he doesn’t know this girl Shinchan likes. Of course he doesn’t.

He hums, “So what’s the matter then?” His voice is still so unaffected that Kazama starts to doubt whether he is alive or not because nothing in the chaos his mind is at that instant should be able to make him still seem normal now.

Shinchan looks up slightly, “What matter?”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you’re my best friend.”

Kazama hates how his best friend never thinks before speaking. He also hates how his heart still has the strength to break some more.

His traitorous eyes roam over the face still so close to his, the face that Kazama can never forget even if he forces himself to and marvel the detailing of it. Shinchan has the most beautiful face Kazama has ever seen.

Kazama sighs, and shifts, rather forcefully, away from the warm eyes and warm body and warm promises and warm hopes and spits out a cold, “Have you fucked her yet?”

Shinchan is hurt, it’s obvious, but Kazama is too, and he is nothing if not imperfectly in sync with his morals. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” He’s standing up now, dusting his pants and bending down to pack up his stats study material from the floor. God knows Kazama can’t even think in this room now without his mind wandering to the fact that Shinchan actually likes a girl now, a girl he has no idea of, so studying here is completely out of question. “Have you hooked up with her? Is that how you know you like her?”

“What the fuck?”

“What?” Kazama stands up straight, backpack acquired and swings it on his shoulders as he levels his best friend with a deceptively innocent gaze, “Isn’t that how you form bonds? Was she at the party two days ago? Or is she Ai-chan’s friend?” He pauses, and decides to hurt more, “If so, then does she know you slept with Ai-chan before meeting her? God, Shinchan, I don’t think you want her to see you as a slut.”

A hand forces his its way onto his collar and the suddenness of it makes Kazama dwindle as he loses his balance for a second before he’s being tugged close to his best friend as he practically growls, “Is that what you think of me?”

Kazama knows he should say no, because truth be told, he doesn’t think of his best friend that way. 

Sure, Shinchan’s promiscuity is detrimental for his mental, emotional, psychological and even physical health but Kazama knows well enough that all of that is his doing. Had he not been pathetically in love with his best friend for all the time he's known what that word means, or had he had the courage and strength to move on from the said person, none of what Shinchan does now, at the ripe age of twenty, would’ve affected him. It’s only because he is a coward himself, a selfish, hypocritical coward, that he can’t get over the fact that Shinchan does not have to have him in his life to live normally, that Shinchan does not need Kazama like Kazama needs Shinchan, as simple as that. The love aspect is secondary here because their emotional maturities are so different for Kazama to even think about that right now.

So yeah, Kazama knows he should say no but he is heartbroken and on a mission to hurt because Shinchan thinks he likes someone, the name of the girl is unknown to him and his best friend thinks it just doesn’t matter. Well, it doesn’t matter to Kazama too then.

“Yes.” He hisses before he’s freeing himself of the surprisingly soft hold and leaving the room.

He promises himself to move on, to leave this all behind because the reality of his one-sided love is becoming a bit too clear for his comfort now.

He promises yet he knows how much of a coward he really is.

---

Notes:

slightly shorter chapter, more of a filler and bg for the ultimate suspense (hehe)

a double update might, or might not be on the table, let's see. till then, let's suffer with these cuties!!!

also, i was reading a pretty morally grey taekook ff while writing this chapter so if the style of it is kinda different from the rest, blame it on that ff.

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 5: five

Summary:

“I used to know you better than she did.” He whispers, better anyone in this world did, he wants to add and shout it out for Shinchan to listen and grieve the way Kazama has done for so long now, and then maybe forgive him for destroying the best thing that ever happened to him, for letting his immaturity ruin every good in his life.

Notes:

talked about a double update, ended up uploading after a month... I'M JUST A GIRL 🎀😭

Five years ago (the beginning)

"Hey, you good?"

Kazama startles, almost drops the TV remote he was trying to fix for the past fifteen minutes and turns to face the intruder.

His face immediately molds into a scowl and the intruder laughs a melodic sound, unfazed. "Chill dude, I'm just asking."

He ignores her for the favor of repairing the poor device again and she gets the hint, moving towards the kitchenette to pour herself some water.

A loud banging comes from the front door along with the shouts of We brought the vodka! and both the people in the living room-attached-kitchenette pointedly ignore them.

"Christ, you guys." Shinchan comes out from his bedroom, freshly showered, drying off his hair in the typical advertisement style he had seen a Calvin Klein model do recently and glares at the two occupants of the room closest to the entrance. "What's so important that you couldn't even open the door?"

Kazama holds up the remote and Ai-chan holds up the glass. Shinchan doesn't look any less annoyed.

"Fuckers." He whispers under his breath, but Kazama hears it, considering he's closer to the door Shinchan is now opening, welcoming the troop of four-five of their closest friends and friends' friends.

Masao enters first, two beer cases balanced precariously in his unreliable arms. No one moves to help him still and he grumbles all the way from the door to the kitchenette where he finally deposits them in the safety of the fridge. Ai-chan makes fun of him, he laughs and goes on to say something in his defense, but it gets cut short as his girlfriend shoots him a sharp glare from where she has deposited herself on the couch in the living room after having hugged a moody Kazama, and Masao hurriedly takes his place next to her. 

Megumi and Suzuki come in with bags of snacks and pizza boxes that Ai-chan had gotten delivered a few minutes ago and everybody thanks them for their kind service while Masao complains that no one was grateful for him bringing the bigger necessity of the night, which is alcohol. 

Nene consoles him, lets him sneak in a kiss as everyone else just groans, used to their lovesickness.

Kazama greets everyone, talks to them while practically sitting on the packed game console near the fireplace.

"How's the packing coming?" Megumi is asking him.

He shrugs, a noncommittal sound escaping him, "It's fine. I almost completed mine two days ago and the movers took most of my stuff today, so I'll probably be done by tomorrow."

Suzuki takes part in their conversation, "And what about him?"

"Him?"

"Shinchan."

Kazama pauses, lets his lungs breathe the air suddenly required for he feels weirdly breathless now and looks in the direction of the said person.

He's busy in the kitchenette with Ai-chan, both of them playing around while emptying all the snacks packets into bowls and pairing the seasonings of the pizzas with their respective boxes for their friends' respective taste buds.

At the exact moment Kazama looks at him, Shinchan's laughing and nudging a clingy Ai-chan off of him as Nene comes over to scold them to hurry before the food gets cold and the party spirit starts to wear off.

Kazama thinks the party spirit never even breathed in him to ever even wear off. 

Tonight is their farewell party.

Shinchan and Kazama, after three years of unofficially living together and two years of officially living together, are finally moving out of their shared apartment.

And the best part? They're moving into different apartments at different sides of Tokyo as they start their different jobs the Monday after this month ends. 

"I don't know." He really doesn't, "Ai-chan helped him with the most of it during exams so I couldn't really see."

Megumi has an understanding expression and Suzuki looks at him like he wants to say something, something that gives Kazama the feeling that it isn't exactly a lighthearted and party worthy conversation but more of a numerous drinks down and bro-motions conversation and he knows that both of them are too sober to have that right now.

He interrupts the moment Suzuki goes to open his mouth, "Where's the vodka you guys were shouting about?"

"So, you heard us banging the door for ten minutes straight," Nene comes over to scold them next, "but didn't bother letting us in?"

He shrugs, nonchalance bleeding through his movement, "Well, I was busy."

"Busy doing what?"

"Busy repairing an ancient remote." Ai-chan calls out as she and Shinchan finally bring the food and bottles of beer from the kitchenette. And deposit the stuff on the floor because Kazama packed up the dinner table for two they used to own with his stuff which got moved just this morning.

He pointedly looks at Masao getting scolded as Nene's last target for now and defends himself, "A decade isn't ancient."

"It is, if we're talking about appliances." This voice isn't the sweet, soft and girlishly mature one he was expecting but he isn't surprised, not really. 

Shinchan has a habit of speaking on behalf of the people he cares about and Kazama had been one of those people for the longest time, until he wasn't.  

After walking out of (euphemism for running away from) that confrontation a year ago, when Shinchan had correctly deduced that Kazama was, in fact, avoiding him because of a conversation they had a month prior to the same, nothing really changed, not majorly at least. 

On the outside, he and Shinchan are still the inseparable duo, still living together in the very same apartment they are now standing together in for the last time tonight, and they're still called best friends, for the sake of old times.

But if you were to ask Kazama, he'd say his entire life, as he knew it to be, changed.

Insider talks, but the alignment of Ai-chan's reintroduction in their lives with Kazama and Shinchan's fallout was so intricately right that gradually, every story, character, detail, everything Kazama had once attributed to being privy to only his and Shinchan's bond was being shared with Ai-chan as well.

Shinchan wasn't alone in his quests to the late-night clubs and parties anymore, because someone better than socially anxious Kazama was keeping him company. The latter was expected to just let it happen, to let their inseparable duo become a trio and he would have, if he had a backbone that is.

Unfortunately for (only) him though, he didn't and ultimately, Ai-chan took his place in Shinchan's life for the word best friend and Kazama realized that all these past fifteen-sixteen years of him and Shinchan being best friends, he had been nothing but a place holder.  

Just a place holder waiting for the place's right owner to come and dethrone him. For Ai-chan, on top of that. Kazama wonders bitterly that if she hadn't left back when they were growing up, Kazama would never have been Shinchan's even place holder best friend. 

It broke him, more than the truth of Shinchan actually liking someone else did, but then again, that was his fault too.

For the past few months specifically, Kazama and Shinchan were only roommates who were friends for they had to be at least cordial with each other to continue living together because their lease was supposed to go up by the end of their fourth year or last year of uni and it would have been too much of a hassle for the both of them to look for a new one before that. 

And they had managed this act of being best friends, but still not quite, pretty fairly too, if he was being honest. Being practically joined to the hip since you were five does that you, he guesses.

Kazama spent most of his time in the college library and Suzuki and Megumi's residence in the latter's hometown as much as he could, only coming back to his apartment if it was very and undeniably necessary. Shinchan, in turn, never left the apartment for more than was required and Ai-chan started doing what Kazama had been doing for the three unofficial years of him living with Shinchan.

Long story short, they grew apart, Kazama blames himself for it but still never has the guts to apologize or rectify where he went wrong. And Shinchan just doesn't care anymore, in Kazama's opinion.

Leaving the conversation he knows wouldn't ever be fruitful to indulge in, he looks at the pair in front of him and repeats, "The vodka?"

"Himawari is bringing it."

What the fuck? Apparently, Shinchan thinks so too, if his outraged yell is anything to go by.

"Why is my baby sister bringing vodka for seven twenty-one-year-olds?"

Nene is answering then, "Because her boyfriend has connections." She goes on to shrug as if that's enough of an explanation.

"And why is she joining the said twenty-one-year-olds for a grownup only party?" Kazama questions.

Another development in the last year is Himawari's inclusion in their group of six-seven similar aged people. She is an incoming third year in the course Nene's graduated from last year and given the suspiciously close bond the girls share, the nineteen-year-old was a welcome surprise in their group along with long lost Ai-chan.

Ai-chan scoffs from where she has her head pillowed on Shinchan's lap while lying on the floor and he tries not to wince at the pain the sight still brings, a year later, "She's nineteen, you guys, not a kid. Stop treating her like one."

"She's still not legally allowed to drink, so technically, she shouldn't be here." Kazama points out correctly and Suzuki laughs from somewhere behind him.

"Kazama dear," Ai-chan's voice is as sweet as it is fake, "her bringing vodka doesn't mean she's gonna drink any. Seven twenty-one-year-olds," pointedly looks at him and Shinchan, "are here to take care of that, right?"

Shinchan whines, "It's my farewell party. Why should I be babysitting her?"

"Aw, honey," Nene coos with mock love, "Why don't the couples take care of the baby, and you two highlights of the night do whatever you guys want?"

Shinchan readily agrees, alike the kid he is, and no one really asks Kazama what his say is, so he lets it go. Unnecessary opinions are already present in abundance.

For example, "But what about me then?"

"What about you?" Suzuki asks as Ai-chan pouts pathetically. Can people not take a joke these days without getting serious, Kazama wonders.

"I neither belong to the couple category, nor is this my farewell party. What should I do then?"

Just leave and never come back, he wants to say but what comes out is somehow even worse, "Who says you have to do something? It's not like you're invited here to begin with."

Tense silence follows his not so successful attempt at controlling his tongue around the one person he just can't stop getting irritated by. He can't really find it in himself to care, though. 

Kazama expected this, a year of pretending to be your almost-ex best friend's best friend in front of your other close friends while the said ex-best friend's current best friend just looks at you as if she thinks you don't even deserve to be there in this group has made him aware of what type of reactions his actions will bring if, say, he sometimes forgets that he is not rash alike Shinchan for not putting a filter over the words following through his mouth. Like right now.

As expected, Megumi is busy removing a non-existent lint from the couch she is half seated on, Suzuki is looking at Kazama disapprovingly as though it was his deliberate intention to let his mouth run loose like that. Nene has her eyes flitting between the pair of Shinchan and Kazama, both seated against the opposite walls on either side of the couch, one with his head down, uncaring and the other playing with the hair atop the head rested on his knee. Masao, Kazama guesses, is doing the same with Shinchan what Suzuki is with him and Ai-chan... well, she certainly doesn't look happy as she whispers something into Shinchan's ears as the other bends his neck to listen to her.

It's all known and Shinchan, Kazama notes, has always noted with an unaccounted amount of hurt, never looks at him whenever he lets something of this sort, something of the insulting and bitter and cowardly sort slip from his tongue and he gets it, he really does because who would want to look at someone you have spent more than half your life knowing and still not being able to guess what vile things might escape their mouth next? Who would want to look at someone you used to know better than your own person not until a year ago and admit that fact that you don't know them like that, not anymore, reason why not mattering in the moment?

But the thing is that Kazama knows this, notices the lack of acknowledgement of his rash actions from his almost ex-best friend, because he is always looking at him. Even now, as he first assesses his other friends, then moves to see what Ai-chan is doing, Kazama knows his eyes will stick on Shinchan in the end and they won't move away for a long time because Shinchan never looks his way in times like these anyway so it's all pathetic and faulty anyway. Kazama catches himself the moment he's about to look towards his almost ex-best friend again, because at one point he ought to stop, none of this is healthy for him and he knows this too but then when he spots the said guy, Shinchan is--

Oh.

There's this small part inside of Kazama, so small that sometimes he forgets it's living there, in him, and he doesn't have to trouble himself with it that much on a regular basis. 

The part remains quiet most of the time, has learned to remain quiet after the years it has spent screaming inside of him, screaming with no luck whatsoever, and ultimately, losing all of its voice, its cadence and its vigor for grabbing and keeping his attention, over time. 

The gradual decline of the pain the existence of this part inside of him brings should be something Kazama ought to be concerned about, and he used to be, a few months after The Confrontation (as he calls it), he used to be, but now, as he stares back at the gaze he once felt completely and utterly unarmed in front of, that small part just throbs lightly inside of him, a barely there presence and Kazama isn't concerned anymore, not one bit.

Shinchan is looking at him. From across the room, one hand still playing with Ai-chan hair as she keeps muttering something in his ear, the other laid silently on the ground next to his knee, fist clenched but attack nowhere in sight.

A year ago, he would have said something. This, Kazama is extremely sure of.

Today, Shinchan just looks at him like Kazama is nothing but a pathetic human hiding behind his hundreds of covers and aliases and Kazama thinks he isn't that far from the truth, as is expected of him.

The door of the apartment opens at that instant, and everyone looks the other way, happy for a distraction from the tense scene, happy to see the baby of their group as she brings the promised vodka, but Kazama keeps his eyes on Shinchan, his ex-best friend not backing down for a second either.

"That was totally uncalled for."

Kazama lets his ears savor the sound of the voice addressing him willingly after what seems like an eternity and thinks there might be some life left in him after all.

"That was the truth." He corrects, not giving up his stance at all.

"I invited her."

He scoffs, sound partially drowned out by the commotion near their front door, "It's our farewell, not your farewell."

"You know her as much as I do."

Kazama raises a brow at the audacity and Shinchan corrects, "Fine, you used to know her as much as I did."

"I used to know you better than she did." He whispers, better anyone in this world did, he wants to add and shout it out for the man in front of him to listen and grieve the way Kazama has done for so long now, and then maybe forgive him for destroying the best thing ever happened to him, for letting his immaturity ruin every good in his life.

Before Shinchan can react to his confession though, a tall figure is hugging Kazama from behind, feminine hands squeezing his waist tightly.

"Kazama." Himawari whispers in the blades of his shoulders and Kazama feels a little faint when Shinchan's dark irises lose their focus from him and intensify on the arms around him.

"Shinchan!" Ai-chan calls out from where she has gone into the kitchenette again, "Help me with the drinks, moron."

For the first time in probably his entire life, Kazama wants Shinchan to listen to Ai-chan and go to her, help her out or whatever. Because while having the possessive attention of the male in front of him is euphoric and rush-inducing, he is very well aware of and acquainted with the fact that it is equally addictive as well. If Shinchan keeps looking at Himawari as though he thinks the wrong Nohara is clinging to Kazama now, the latter doesn't think he could handle that for too long.

"Himawari..." He hesitates for a second, looks into the eyes of his almost ex-best friend again, sees the challenge there, "...-chan, hello," and foolishly refuses it.

If Shinchan's small, barely there grin is victorious, Kazama just attributes it to that small part inside of him, so small he forgets it lives there, but one always thrumming whenever his almost ex-best friend is around.

---

"... being pregnant with your child. Do I remember that correctly, Kazama Toru?"

Kazama isn't breathing anymore, Shinchan is sure of this fact.

Standing this close to this ex-best friend, he thinks and makes himself believe that this is what he wanted when he chose this specific memory to torment this coward in front of him. And to some extent, he does feel a weird satisfaction as he watches and feels the arrogant soul leave Kazama's body as he slacks against Shinchan's hold, it being the only thing holding him up. 

Shinchan promptly removes the hold. Kazama drops alike a sack of potatoes. 

Looking at this pathetic state, Shinchan is reminded of the day he referred to, the day they all found out how Kazama had slept with Shinchan's little sister and gotten her pregnant, right under everybody's nose. Right under his nose.

He had been heartbroken, of course. Who hurt him more wasn't really clear to him at that point because while he wanted to blame his best friend for everything, Shinchan had eyes. He had seen how much of a goner his little sister was for the love of his life, and it should have been concerning to him, but Himawari was just a kid. At least she was supposed to be. Just nineteen and scheming this much to what? Rope Kazama into some kind of forced marriage situation? His baby sister wouldn't do that. His Himawari wouldn't. 

But more than anything, there was this increasingly apparent sense of betrayal and unaccounted anger that had filled him, for nothing was making sense anymore and the person he thought he loved, the first person to matter to him even after they had slept together, had backstabbed him so badly and stealthily, that Shinchan had felt as though nothing in this world he knew was real anymore. 

In this haze surrounding him, there were things he had done he wasn't proud of. Accusations, based entirely on his mind's will to have a truth, any truth, which didn't make him feel bad about... everything. The way he had tried to reason with his friends, his family, even Himawari, that maybe, there was a mistake, maybe she had slept with someone after Kazama and this wasn't his kid, maybe, she was getting mixed up between some disease and taking it as pregnancy, or maybe, the test kit was faulty.   

A truth was all he needed to believe in because two of the closest people in his life had paired up against him to give him the biggest heartbreak of his life. A truth for which he had gone as far as to call his sister a female version of him, a slut who just wanted to bag Kazama for life through this lie and Himawari had rightfully slapped him for it. 

Shinchan isn't proud of anything he had done back then, to defend this son of a bitch he loved so much, but he had done a lot, and he knows, deep down, he knows that had Kazama not shown his true colors then, not shown who the real him really was, Shinchan would have continued doing all that. Continued protecting this weak man till date, years going by without any care. 

"Why are you bringing that up?" Kazama's voice is weak, so is his gaze. Shinchan feels proud. "Why... now?"

"You wanted to talk. This is talking."

"I just wanted to apologize," There's some sincerity in that confession, sincerity Shinchan refuses to believe in, even for a second. "I just wanted to make things--"

"--right?" The audacity, he takes a deep breath, the fucking audacity, "What will you even make right, Kazama? What is there to make right anyway? What are you sorry for?"

"Everything," Kazama is frantic, trying to cut across the wall Shinchan has secured around him, "everything that happened five years ago. I just... want to apologize." He reiterates, insists. 

"Everything? You wanna apologize for everything that happened five years ago?" He scoffs, "You do realize that in order to do that you'd have to actually accept the little fact that you slept with me, right? That you let me fuck you and liked it. That you confessed to liking me mere moments before we had sex and mere moments after you were getting into bed with my sister. Can you?" He shouts, begs, "Accept that?!" 

His voice isn't in his control anymore, the volume of it matching that of the speakers working overtime in the lawn where Nene and Masao are still busy celebrating their engagement ceremony and fuck, what is Shinchan doing here? Playing the blame game with a person who, until today morning, he wanted nothing to do with? What is wrong with him? 

Kazama stays silent for a while after that, just looking at Shinchan. The latter fears he has gone too far. There's one thing as provoking the animal, an entirely different one to full-on attack it. Shinchan knows bringing up the pregnancy was nothing compared to this, because at least that was something Kazama had owned up to. Owned up to sleeping with Himawari and taking the child's responsibility. Stepping up to marry her and whisk her away from her entire family in exchange. 

But sleeping with Shinchan? Nobody knew that except the two of them. Not even their closest friends. 

The day it happened, Shinchan wanted to shout it out for the entire world to hear that his best friend, the only boy he could ever love, liked him back and that they were going to be together for the rest of their life. He had been so, so ecstatic about finally bringing himself to even consider the possibility of a future together, one he had never allowed himself to imagine even in his darkest moments, that it was the biggest mistake he could have committed at that point of time. 

And now, Kazama has a light in his eyes, one that hadn't been there earlier and for the first time in his life, Shinchan fears this man in front of him. 

"You're right," Kazma's shaking his head, slowly standing up with control over his body still a bit wobbly, "You're absolutely right. I can't do this." 

There's a bit of a panic in his voice, "I thought I could and then she... she said I had to, and I know I should but...", which makes Shinchan think that maybe something is wrong but before he can comment on it, Kazama is already halfway through the room to get to the door. "... I can't. I need to leave."

Kazama was running away from their confrontation. Again. Shinchan feels as though he's transported six years back in time. 

"Are you fucking kidding me?" He roars, barely stopping himself from running after the coward. "You did all of this just to back off? What the fuck?"

Kazama is distraught when he turns back at the sound of his yell, body shaking alike a leaf, "You don't understand! I can't do this, Shinchan. I can't."

"Why?" He's unwillingly closing the distance between them, "Why can't you now, when only minutes ago you were so dead set on getting me to talk to you? I'm doing it now, so go ahead."

"I can't," The other man keeps repeating it, eyes flitting between the door and Shinchan. "I really can't. I--"

Shinchan closes a hand around the other's neck for the second time tonight, pushing him against the wall behind him, "If you say I can't one more time, I swear to fucking God, Kazama I will--"

The door is opening then, and Shinchan barely has the time to register who it is, but when the intruder speaks as soon as they take in the current situation of the room, Shinchan has a pretty good idea of who it is.

"Get your hands off my husband right this instant, Shinchan." Fucking hell. 

---

Five years ago (the conflict)

Kazama is hiding. 

He is hiding inside his (for one last night) room in the apartment he and Shinchan have now spent five goddamn years in, just to get away from the party organized by their friends for their farewell. He is not proud of it, but it is, what it is. 

The walls, the study table, the closet and all other places in the room one could attach the various kinds of decorations on are bare, said things packed and gone with most of his stuff this morning. No bedsheets or comforter cover his precious bed, one he had spent so much of his time in, and nothing about the room he is sitting in now seems like the one he spent five fucking years in. 

It's funny, it's cruel but it's happening so Kazama shuts his whines and explores the strange vulnerability of his (almost old) room for the last time, vulnerability from having been exposed with nothing alike Kazama covering it anymore. 

The door isn't exactly locked, he didn't want others to think he was actually hiding from them (even though he was), so he is still a little surprised when a series of knocks bring him out of his trip down the memory lane and make him look back to where the intruder is standing. 

"Can I come in?"

Kazama huffs unwillingly, unprompted and gestures for Shinchan to enter with a flick of his wrist.

He wants to wonder and ponder in detail as to why his almost ex-best friend his here, alone in his almost-old room on their last night in the same apartment, after having spent the entirety of the last year avoiding each other every chance they got. He wants to, but then Shinchan is talking to him, the door behind him locked securely and suddenly, nothing else matters to Kazama anymore.

"How... how are you?"

He is startled, but tries not to show it on his face, "I'm good. How are you?"

Shinchan shrugs carelessly, hesitating a bit near the door, probably wondering where to sit before he's making up his stubborn mind and coming to sit in front of Kazama, their knees almost touching, the closeness of it all baffling the latter to his core. 

It's been a while since he has had this close of a contact with Shinchan and Kazama almost flinches, uncharacteristically (not really), when the other man starts speaking next. 

"Why are you here?" He asks, tipping his head to the side in the way Kazama knows he does almost unconsciously.

"This is my room." He replies, a bit amused.

"Not anymore."

A sudden laugh forces its way through his throat and Kazama swallows it at the last second though a few chuckles slip past his lips. He licks them, looking at the other boy more seriously.

"I'm aware of that fact, which is why I came to bid... a farewell to this room."

"Why?"

That's a weird question, he thinks and says so to Shinchan. The latter shrugs, "Don't see what the problem is."

Kazama hums, even more amused. It's like he's in an alternate world right now for none of this feels real to him. 

After avoiding each other for the past year, he kind of forgot how it felt to humor Shinchan whenever he used to get like... he is right now. A bit lost, a bit confused but a whole lot of stubborn with his questions which leave one with no way but to answer them. A kid he is, through and through. 

Kazama loves him for it. 

And yet, sitting across this boy, talking comfortably after so long and probably the last time for who knows how long, he thinks he shouldn't. Shouldn't love him, not when they are just pretending right now. Pretending that the last year didn't happen, that their other close friends aren't out there in the living room probably wondering where the highlights of the night went. 

Pretending they're not on borrowed time, hiding together in the safety of this room Kazama has lost so much in. His youth, his life, his best friend, his love, and himself.

"I spent almost five years of my life in this room." He begins, trying to gather his thoughts, "Five years of transitioning from a teenager to an adult, of dreaming to actually moving forward to live that dream. Five years of seeing you all, my closest friends, in a new, more mature light. Five years of happy memories that I will always carry with me." He pauses, letting a soft smile take over his face as he gazes at Shinchan, "Five years to bearing your messy and untidy ass."

"Hey!" The other exclaims, affronted.  

"I'm just joking." Yet, he laughs and Shinchan scowls. Kazama laughs some more before continuing, "Five years of living with you, in a shared space. Appreciating you more and more with each day." He feels brave in that instance, probably the first time in his life and takes Shinchan's hands in his. They are slightly bigger than his and Kazama wonders how it would feel to actually hold them as if they were his to hold. 

Lucid dreams.  

When Shinchan squeezes his hands in lieu of affirming his likeness for the hold, Kazama makes a decision.

"Shinchan... I..." He's about to say it then, say everything that has been on his mind for the last year. About how sorry he is, how he didn't mean to drive Shinchan away the way he did, how he doesn't really hate Ai-chan unlike everyone around them likes to believe, how he regrets every single thing that had left his mouth that fateful day a year ago, how he hates himself so much for being such a coward every time something doesn't go his way that even Shinchan had enough of his shit, and simply, how he just wants his best friend back, beyond everything.

"What is it?"

Shinchan's voice is soft, encouraging and Kazama resists the urge to melt. Looking up in the eyes he has printed at the back of his own, he finds a confidence that has never been there in himself, for a moment there, and thinks maybe he should do it. Confess everything and come clean and maybe then, Shinchan would consider being his friend again. His best friend again and--

A glass breaks somewhere outside in the apartment and that moment is broken.

"Nothing," He tries to laugh it off, diverting the topic, "I was just saying that apart from the last year, all my memories in this room have been amazing and this is the reason I wanted to say goodbye to it from the last time."

"Why not the last year?"

Kazama shoots him a look, "You're kidding, right?"

"No." he says, confident. "I'm not."

What the fuck?

"Are you okay, Shinchan?" He asks, genuinely concerned, "Are you drunk? High? Did you smoke with Nene again?"

"I'm fine." His eyes do seem fine, but his actions don't. "I was drunk a while ago but it's all wearing off now. It's fine."

"Oh, okay."

"So, answer my question then. Why not the last year?"

"Why are you doing this?" Kazama is confused beyond reason. "Are you seriously okay? I'm getting a bit scared here, Shinchan, do you want me to call Ai-chan or--"

"Just answer the question, damnit!"

Kazama flinches, almost losing the grip his hands are still in and thinks his alternate world of dreaming is now broken. He's back to his lowly reality. 

"I don't know what you want me to say." He answers truthfully, "Do you not remember what happened a year ago, in this room?" The moment the words leave his mouth, Kazama knows they're the right ones when Shinchan's eyes sparkle with victory. 

Something feels off. 

"What happened?" The grip on his hands tightens a tiny bit, not noticeable yet but Kazama feels it, "A year ago, in this room, what happened?"

"What?" Realization is slow to Kazama, but is this why Shinchan's here?

His almost ex-best friend looks him in the eye, and he forgets to breathe again. "Tell me what happened here a year ago, Kazama." Voice firm, the dominance is so palpable that Kazama resists the urge to scoot backwards and away from the demanding personality. 

"Nothing happened." He says, though no conviction is present in those words.

Shinchan scoffs, removes the warm hold on his hands and moves to cage Kazama between his arms on the ground on either side of his waist. Kazama chastises his brain when a variety of thoughts start flitting through his mind at the position they are in, all the while leaning back in order to avoid having Shinchan too close for his brain to not function properly.  

"That's not what you were saying a second ago." Shinchan whispers, biceps flexing with the weight of his body as he hovers over Kazama with a predator's stance.

"I don't understand." Surprisingly, his voice is soft, steady and if he feels a little faint from their proximity, it doesn't reflect.

"I think it's a pretty simple question, Kazama." He frowns, mockingly, "Are you sure you're okay? You seem to be having a problem in comprehending my questions tonight."

"I am a bit drunk." He admits. 

"Drunk enough to make mistakes?" There's hope hidden there in that question and Kazama shivers. 

He tries to hold his ground, "What does that mean?", and fails miserably when Shinchan smirks. 

"A year ago, Kazama, in this room, what happened?"

He hesitates, but it looks like Shinchan isn't backing off anytime soon. "We... had a fight."

"About?"

"Something I said."

"What did you say?"

"Why are you doing this?" He asks again, fearful of his life at this point. 

Shinchan takes mercy on him and leans back a bit but the cage of arms around him stays intact. "I just want you to answer my questions. Please, just trust me."

Okay, Kazama thinks, okay, that he can do.

"I called you a..." When Shinchan encourages him, he finishes his sentences reluctantly, "... slut."

"And did you mean it?"

"... No."

"Did you apologize to me after that?"

"... No."

"Did I give you chance to?"

"... Yes."

"Why didn't you then?"

Because I'm a coward. "Because you made me miss my tutor session."

"With Kkura?" A year later, and Kazama still flinches.

"With Sakura-chan, yes."

His deliberate use of the honorific grants him a raised brow but sadly, no mercy from the interrogation. 

"So, if I give you another chance tonight, to make things right, will you take it?"

Yes. "Why would you?"

Shinchan sighs, exasperated, "Because I want to, Kazama. I want us to put all of this behind us and go back to the way we were."

Something is definitely wrong now. 

This entire interaction had been only weird up until this point and Kazama had ignored it, happy to have a normal conversation with Shinchan after so long, but this is bad. Because if Kazama knows anything about Shinchan, with utmost confidence, it's that he is the kind of person to take a grudge to his grave if he thinks the apology given to him is not good enough. 

There's just no way Shinchan is willing to break that rule for Kazama, no matter how close they might have been. 

"Shinchan," He begins, uncertainty filling his mind, "Are you--"

The other takes that moment to decide he has had enough and starts leaning into Kazama aggressively, making the latter fall back onto the ground so as to not bump into Shinchan. The moment his head touches the ground, Shinchan repositions his arms. Kazama realizes a second too late there are hands on either side of his face now and his almost ex-best friend and him are in a very precarious position. 

If someone were to come to check up on them right at this instant, the scene they would see would surely be traumatisi-- Wait. Shinchan locked the door, Kazama remembers vividly. 

He is extremely concerned now as he puts his hands on the other's shoulder in a comforting gesture. "Shinchan, please, if something's wrong, you know you can tell m--?"  

"Stop talking." Shinchan growls, and leans even closer, making the tips of their noses touch. 

He has a sudden realization then. 

Up close, Shinchan is as beautiful as anything Kazama has ever seen. 

His eyes are the most wonderful shade of brown. Kazama had noticed, documented and analyzed for the entirety of their fifteen-sixteen years of being joined to the hip that when these eyes darken, they're black and intense, all kinds of dangerous but when they brighten, they are golden and lively, just like the human they are assigned to. His nose is cute, in the sense of a quality Kazama doesn't think his mind can associate with any other body part of Shinchan. 

There are slight freckles dusted all over his handsome face and Kazama tries not to count them all at once. His forehead has an odd pimple or two almost on the verge of bursting, all angry red and painful to look at. Kazama pathetically thinks that he should give Shinchan his pimple removing cream tomorrow. 

He lets his eyes trail more, to the forbidden area he has never allowed himself to venture in and they finally, finally get stuck on the lips Shinchan wets the moment his eyes find them. They're glistening now, looking so dangerously tempting and alluring that Kazama struggles to make his brain think straight. 

"What... what are you doing?" His voice is barely a whisper, lips feeling the breath of the other due to their proximity. 

"Giving you a chance to apologize." What?

His face must have screamed it out loud because Shinchan is answering then, unprompted, "I have been curious about a few things lately and I was hoping you could help me with them."

"What..." his voice cracks and he clears his throat embarrassingly, "What things?"

"Sex. With a guy."

Oh. 

Oh.

"I thought about hooking up with a random stranger, just to satisfy the curiosity, but I can't have word going out about this, you know." The way he says it makes it sound so simple and yet Kazama's heart is beating way too loudly for it to be anything but. "So, I thought, if you're up for it, why don't we experiment amongst ourselves? No rumors will be flying around then, and the curiosity will be satisfied too."

Nothing about this encounter is making sense to Kazama anymore, not with Shinchan's face so close to him, their breaths mingling together as he breathes the air Shinchan allows him to. There's a small, hidden smell on Shinchan's breath, akin to what Kazama knows is on his as well and he's concerned again. 

"You're drunk." He says, more out of a necessity to convince himself than accuse Shinchan, but the latter takes it the wrong way. 

"Enough to make mistakes, yes." A smirk forms on his face and Kazama thinks Shinchan is hauntingly beautiful in this instant. 

"Is this..." He swallows pathetically, "Is this a mistake?"

"Yes," Shinchan purrs, bending his arms more to get impossibly close to Kazama. Their hips slot together and Kazama feels Shinchan, feels him grow harder by the second and thinks Shinchan can feel him too, in this proximity, so lying is out of the door at this point, "the biggest mistake I'll ever make. The biggest mistake you'll ever make."

Kazama whimpers, more out of hurt than anything, but the roll of the other's hips against his might have something to do with it too. "I don't... I don't think I can... I don't--"

His words are broken by a broken moan as Shinchan takes that very instant to nip lightly on his Adams apple and Kazama struggles to make sense of his surroundings. 

"Your body disagrees." Shinchan tips his head to the side, making their lips brush lightly. Kazama shivers, "No one will know, it's just us here, Kazama. Can you? Make this mistake? For me?"

Kazama would be a fool to say no. He knows that. This is his entire life's fantasy wrapped in a pretty bow and served on a silver platter for him. Shinchan is curious, and came to Kazama, of all people, to satisfy this urge, this curiosity inside of him and Kazama feels as though he has hit a jackpot, one he didn't think he would ever, in his life. This is what he's wanted for the longest time, a night with Shinchan where there's no barrier between them, where it's just the two of them, and Shinchan has said that this will be his apology, his way out from the fight that ruined everything for Kazama, so what more could he possibly want?

Shinchan sleeps with him, and they're friends again, come morning. That's it, that's the deal. 

Then why does his heart feel so heavy?

"I... you're lying." he whispers, glancing up at Shinchan's eyes, eager for some, any truth. "We can't move past this, ever, you have to know that Shinchan--"

Shinchan sighs, breath blowing all over Kazama's face and eases up a little to look him in the eye, "Okay, fine. Maybe I am lying, Kazama. Maybe we can't be friends right away after this, but sometime down the line? Sure, why not." A predatory smile crosses his face, "Tell you what, let's make a deal."

There's a very real fear in him when he asks, "A deal?"

"Yeah. I lied to you so now you're unsure." At his hesitant nod, Shinchan continues, "Tell me a lie, one I will believe, and then we're even."

"If we're even, then what?"

A hand brushes some hair off his face and a palm fits itself on his cheek, the warmth of it making him lean into the hold. Kazama flutters his eyes close "Then, we'll make the biggest mistake of our lives. Together"

A lie. What could Kazama possibly lie about that Shinchan wouldn't find the truth about? 

"Come on, Toru," Shinchan leans back into his space, "Give me a lie. I wanna kiss you." The sudden admission makes him open his eyes, and there's truth in the black eyes that stare back at him, threatening to drown his reality. 

"I... I like you."

A small intake of breath follows, and Shinchan eyes widen. Before he can say anything though, Kazama is sliding his hands from the other's shoulders to his face, cupping it, and whispering, "That was the lie, now kiss me."

A slight hesitance before lips are attacking his, a second later, and Kazama wonders just how stupid he can be. 

---

Notes:

I genuinely don't know what i just did here, but for some reason it made sense so i did it.

Also, only 2 chapters left, how does it feel y'all?????

The back story is almost complete, and trust me, everything will make sense. Just, bear with me. 😭😭😭

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 6: hear me out, please

I'm writing this because I find myself in the midst of a great dilemma I can't possibly overcome myself-- JK

so I'll delete this once I actually post the update i.e. chapter six. and ik i promised the update in a couple of days but, here's the thing:

I have a 10k long (unfinished) chapter in my hand, and Idk what to do with it, bec there's this like one particular "thing" I wanna address in this chapter and that "thing" alone has me like writing 6K+ words solely based on it (and it's not even finished yet). Then there's this another "thing" I wanted to complete in this chapter, which is kinda sorta a long overdue atp AND the main point of all this is that I cannot move the story fwd without completing both these "things" in this chapter and this chapter alone.

which now brings me to my next secondary point of what would i like this chapter's ideal length to be. Bec personally, I hate reading chapters with more than 6-7k words, it gets kinda confusing after a point and i just need that click to the next chapter even if the next one is like a direct continuation of the previous one. IDC. and ik, ik, one could be thinking, yk lavanya, this is a non issue bec you could always cut the chapter to two, to which i would reply, what an odd thing to sa-- actually, to that, I'll say, I TRIED, i tried to cut it into two because at 10k, the chapter is still unfinished anyway so winding it up in about 12-13k would give me plenty of space to sort the parts into at least 6k a part each. BUT, for that to happen, I'll have to do exactly two things:

1) write another 2-3 (or possibly more) k worth of angst for these cuties who have done nothing, i repeat NOTHING to deserve the way i treat them (ALSO TRUST ME WHEN I SAY THAT I AM EXHAUSTED OMG)

2) symmetrically divide two parts from the multiple sub-parts my chapter is already cut into (like the flashbacks, diff povs and stuff). 

the angst, I can still do that in like this week--literally wrote the 10k in the last week so you get the drift--but the second one is a bit, uh, problematic atm bec, have I mentioned that the only way i can think of dividing this chapter into two logical and not too complex parts is by having the first one of about max to max 4k and the rest of the dump in the next part? WHICH BRINGS ME BACK TO SQUARE ONE OF NOT WANTING TO HAVE TOO MUCH STUFF IN ONE CHAPTER (/PART, SAME THING). 

I can always have three parts worth min 4k each BUT I HAVE A RULE FOR EVERY FIC I WRITE, which is kinda simple that every chapter has to be in a decent range of words (for this, it is 5.8-7.5k each, an avg of about 6k or so) and the 4k wouldn't do. could always add more words because it's only a couple thousand (hahahaha), but i need to conserve all the energy I can to write the next chapters, yk? 

Anyway, I just wanted to rant about this whole thing here, bec recently I've seen a lot of people noticing this fic and appreciating it, so idk, I just wanted to let you all know that I am working towards finishing this fic as soon but also as neatly and carefully as I can. so yeah. 

love, lavanya <3

Chapter 7: six

Summary:

"This isn't a prank!" She shouts then, voice all shrilly and... and... manic. "We will get married, and you will claim this child as yours and we will live happily ever after. Do you hear me, Kazama? We will live together. Happily. Ever. After!"

Notes:

look who's back hehe

(beware, this chapter isn't my best so idek what's going on here TvT)

Himawari was three years old when she started having a recurring dream.

The TV show she had seen before going to sleep the first night was something about a princess being married off to a new kingdom to strengthen their business relations--marriage of convenience, as old Himawari would realize later in her life--but all the three year old girl could understand were the pretty visuals and the princess lifestyle of that daily soap her mother had made her watch right before bedtime and her subconscious had retained most of the said graceful aesthetic.

The recurring dream always started out pretty sane, just her being busy puttering about her dream castle, thinking of what she should tell the butler to tell the chef to cook for dinner in her dream night, if her father-in-law had been given his nightly dose of medicine at the specified time, or did her mother-in-law need Himawari's famous--and quite special--foot massage for her tender ankles, or if her husband had said something about being late tonight or not and--was that a spider web in that dark corner of her ballroom ceiling? The cleaners were going to be hearing from her butler very, very soon.

Everything around her was coated in shades of sometimes pink, sometimes yellow, and Himawari couldn't be happier. She was a princess through and through, with only one aim in life: to make a comfortable home for her family, and future generations. And she would do anything, go to any extreme boundaries to achieve that, just like the daily soap princess had vowed to, on her wedding day.

But then, three-year-old Himawari met five-year-old Ai-chan.

Ai-chan was, and perhaps will always be, a princess, in the true essence of the word.

Himawari still remembers her mother recalling how baby Himawari was gazing out of their backyard door the first time Ai-chan had visited Shinchan at their house, and the big, long luxury car she had arrived in, the butler she was accompanied by, who had refused to leave her side like a loyal bodyguard. Her straight, black hair; her round, pretty eyes; her chic overalls of maroon blazer and skirt; and her charming yet sly grin.

Everything about her screamed grace and perfect and Himawari remembers thinking, wow.

All afternoon, babbling Himawari had done nothing but try to match Ai-chan's mannerisms, the way she talked, walked, laughed--with a light, graceful hand on Shinchan's arm as though Himawari's brother was oh so funny--and just generally held herself in. This was, after all, Himawari's first encounter with a real-life princess and nothing could change her three-year-old mind that Ai-chan was better than any princess she had seen on TV.

That night, when Himawari had her recurring dream, everything was the same--her mother-in-law had, in fact, been in great need of her special foot massage, the cleaners did hear from her butler about the cobweb near the ancestral artefacts display in their museum--but then, for the first time, Himawari realized they had a guest over in their castle.

A princess from the neighboring, and a lot wealthier, kingdom, who was the only princess to ever have rejected a request for a marriage of convenience, and that too the one Himawari was now in; the princess her husband had claimed was too petty and fake to be his bride anyway.

Himawari had always agreed, her husband was the best and treated her like a true princess and any girl who had rejected him was a bitch--even though Himawari was secretly glad that the princess had rejected him because now he was hers--but then, princess Himawari met her. The princess who preached that marriage of convenience was the last thing a princess of her station, or any station for that matter, deserved. The princess who had very strong opinions about love, justice and equality and how princesses like Himawari were wasting away their life trapped in this loveless marriage no one but their patriarchal families cared about.

Princess Himawari met Princess Ai-chan in her dream that night, and nothing was the same again.

---

"Get your hands off my husband right this instant, Shinchan."

Kazama flinches, closing his eyes at once at the sound of his wife's order and wishes all the heavenly powers above to relieve him of his misery already. The night is done for him now.

"Himawari." He warns lightly--or tries to anyway because the hand around his throat isn't letting him breathe properly--begging her mentally to not say anything further.

Her eyes turn to him, defiant and... hurt, for some reason and Kazama thinks he is too tired for this. He pleads her through his eyes in turn.

Please, just go, I've got this. Please.

Yeah, you sure as hell got this. Kazama can practically feel the eye roll. I can totally see that. He's literally choking you and you're just hanging ther--her eyes widen--wait, are you actually enjoying thi--

"No, no, by all means," Shinchan scoffs, interrupting their telepathic conversation, breath hitting Kazama's face, "be my fucking guest, Mrs. Himawari Toru." The disgust, God, that disgust has Kazama's stomach coiling tight, "I've been meaning to talk to you anyways. A bit overdue, don't you think?"

He releases his captive from the chokehold and Kazama is gasping now, coughing a bit too violently to be okay, but neither of the siblings seem to take his plight into consideration.

Fitting, he muses pathetically, after five fucking years, so goddamn fitting.

"Trust me, Shinchan, you'd rather die than want to know what I think about you or your..." Her deliberate trail off coupled with the slightly arched eyebrow is cruel, offensively so. The Shinchan Kazama knew five years ago would've jumped her, in that instant, he is sure but the Shinchan in front of them just tilts his head, unaffected.

"Is that the only way you can insult me? Really?" He huffs, mocking, "And you were supposed to be a Nohara. Ha, what a joke. Mom would be really disappointed in you, Himawari." He pauses, considering, "Oh wait, she already is." His eyes move to Kazama, and he makes a show of thinking deeply, "I wonder why though. Have you done anything to make her feel like not having daughter like you would've been a blessing rather than raising you to be this," He gestures his hands towards her, "ungrateful, gold digger bitch? I don't think I can recall anything like that, can you?"

Himawari is quiet, undoubtedly struck. Kazama winces mentally; this is a low, low blow and Shinchan really isn't aiming to miss.

She looks at him then, suddenly, and Kazama is hit with the realization that she expects him to defend her. To say something on her behalf, to stand beside her and just do something, anything because this is the one and possibly only instance Himawari doesn't have a defense for. Not even after five goddamn years.

Kazama wants to laugh deliriously, because while he may be getting decently good at defending his wife's honor in the past few years--and getting used to calling her his wife--this is way, way too much expectation from him.

Mitzi Nohara has never once been discussed in the Toru household in the past five years. Not after the stunt she had pulled at Himawari and Kazama's wedding.

It wasn't for the lack of trying, though. Kazama cannot even remember the number of times he has tried to talk his parents into forgiving the grieving woman and make amends with the Noharas, specially Mitzi, because sure, they didn't participate at all in the wedding preparations; were rude to anyone who so much as hinted at being happy for the marriage of their nineteen year old, almost visibly pregnant daughter; called Kazama a "lying, deceiving cunt" who knew nothing but to take advantage of her kids and wished that he rot in the darkest corner of hell with no scope of salvation while objecting to the union of their--and Kazama quotes--pedophilic marriage, they were still his in-laws.

They'd been almost at the edge of calling police to the ceremony, and would have called, had Kazama's parents not had enough and have security throw them out forcefully, but not before getting Himawari to confirm that nothing happening at that venue was against her will. Kazama has tried a lot since then, but his parents have always been too prideful for their own good and even he admits that Mitzi Nohara had taken it way too far that night to have anyone ever come back unscathed from it.

"Wait, did I hit a nerve, sweetheart?" Shinchan is still talking, "Is Mom your kryptonite? All those years of literally living in her shadow and I never could have guessed." His tone is bitter and Kazama feels something akin to pity for his wife. "Or is it Dad?" He snaps his fingers and suddenly points at her, looking straight into her eyes, "You know that painting you drew once? The one we had framed on the living room mantel?"

At first Himawari doesn't respond, slowly drawing herself in as though making her body as small as possible while standing. Kazama feels that faintly familiar urge to protect, to stand in front of her and make sure she's okay because she doesn't look like she is, but he is sagged against the wall, drained of any energy himself, and honestly, he is just as tired as he is sure anyone who could see him now would say he is.

This is what they knew would happen, a month ago, when they had finalized to come to Masao and Nene's wedding. Himawari, to her credit, had been in a good percentage denial still, trying her best to convince Kazama, to talk him out of his frenzy of making amends the right way, but deep down, even she knew that five years is a long time.

For Kazama, it was one thing, losing his found family for the sake of his real one but for Himawari, it was losing her entire family, found and real, at once, just to go to one that didn't really respect her as much.

So he knew that for all her denial, the day they would have to actually go and board the flight, Himawari would come. She is strong like that.

He tries to catch her eye still, wishing he can at least give her some mental support because all he sees in that instant is that nineteen year old girl who had come to him for help, five years ago, and if Kazama had promised her one thing truly from their otherwise far from true wedding vows, it was to protect Himawari with everything he has.

When she looks his way finally, he nods at her weakly. You can do this, he tries to convey, this is it. This is what we came for. Her eyes lock in his and he sees her breathe deeply, trying to control her mind. Kazama mentally prepares himself for the battle he knows is about to happen in front of him now, because while Shinchan has all the attacks of the world on his side, Himawari's defense is something even Kazama's mom hasn't managed to break through, even after five years of damage.

She nods then; she remembers the painting. Hell, even Kazama remembers the crooked, barely balancing on the edge of being called ugly or genius painting that the Noharas had proudly put on the mantel just above the TV because Himawari had drawn it, a painting of her, her parents and her brother, all looking like jagged versions of themselves. When Kazama had first seen it, he thought it was satirical to even put it on display, but Shinchan had threatened bodily harm if he so much as uttered a single word against the painting his baby sister had drawn so dearly.

She looks at Shinchan when there's no counter response a few seconds later but the older is busy looking somewhere else. When Kazama follows Himawari's line of sight, he finds that Shinchan is looking at him now. Locked in, like Himawari had been not moments ago, and Kazama thinks, a bullet to the heart must, has to, hurt less.

For the eyes, he realizes, are trying to talk to him. 

This was their thing, he remembers. Years of living in each other's pockets make you well versed enough to take one look at your best friend and know what he's about to say or do next. They've had conversations in the middle of their actual conversations, just talking through their eyes. There's a surreal moment when Kazama makes the startling but perhaps expected revelation that he cannot understand what those onyx orbs are trying to say to him. That he isn't as well versed as he used to be in the language of Shinchan's eyes.

When a hand touches his arm, he looks at his wife again. She is closer to him now, standing next to his crumpled form, the picture of bravery and strength, both things Kazama knows he can never be. He takes a moment to admit that he and Himawari understand each other's mannerisms now.

Shinchan, in that moment, looks more like a cornered animal than the wild one he had been seconds ago, and Kazama, despite himself, feels sad and miserable for the man in front of them.

His heart doesn't care for the fact that Shinchan had resorted to physical violence just minutes ago and would've likely done some serious harm had Himawari not interrupted at the right moment, or the fact that Shinchan is still looking at Kazama as though he has betrayed him again in this instant, even while doing nothing of that sort. All his stupid, stupid, stupid heart cares for is the fact that Shinchan was ready to listen to his answers then, before Himawari had interrupted and that even now, Shinchan must've trusted him in some sense to be hurt again from his unintended betrayals.

Kazama thinks his heart can go fuck itself.

"I remember the painting." Himawari breaks the tense silence.

Shinchan shakes himself out of whatever stupor he had been in and focuses again. "Do you know where it is now?"

She simply shakes her head. Shinchan smirks. Kazama holds his breath.

"Dad burnt it. The moment he came back from your..." His deliberate trail off coupled with the slightly arched eyebrow is cruel, offensively so. Kazama hates this petty repetition.

"Oh yeah?" Himawari's response is steady, if an unusual second or so late. "You must have been ecstatic. Always wanted your Action Kamen painting up there anyway, didn't you? Oh wait," She pauses, "You weren't even there to witness it." She chuckles, mockingly, "Fled out of town because you were too chickenshit to be a man and face your failure, right?"

Kazama winces out loud this time, and Himawari cuts him a sharp look.

Shinchan laughs, "Failure? More like my victory. I was getting rid of two lying assholes, what more could I possibly want?"

"Him." Himawari points to Kazama simply and this time, Kazama is the one glaring at her.

"What the fuck?" He manages to say before he's coughing again, but it seems his defense isn't really necessary.

Shinchan is already talking over him, "Him? Him? Why would I want him?" He huffs, disbelievingly. "Like I've heard too much money gets to one's head, but this is low, sister, even for you."

"Is it really though, brother? Is it? Can you really look me in the eyes and say that you didn't want him, all those years ago? That you don't want him now, right now, in this room?"

There's no response for a second too long and Himawari seizes the chance. "See? You cannot even defend yourself, you sick fuck. How low can you go, Shinchan? Just exactly how low?"

Shinchan, it seems isn't really looking at Himawari. All Kazama can see him doing is shaking his head repeatedly as though that would make Himawari's voice go away. It wouldn't, Kazama knows from experience.

"You're pathetic, you realize that, right? This is, by far, the most pathetic thing you've done and trust me, that list is really, really, really fucking long."

Kazama has to stop this now. Himawari is going too far and they-- God, they had discussed this. He had made Himawari promise that they wouldn't speak a word about this particular issue, and Himawari had agreed because why would they want more drama associated with them when it wasn't even necessary? No one knows about him and Shinchan anyways except their friends who know better than to bring this up in any circumstance. 

And why is Himawari acting like Shinchan is the one with an unrequited longing when it has always been the other way round?

But no matter how hard he tries, his legs aren't helping, they're still too weak to hold his weight and Himawari is an inch too far from Kazama suddenly that he cannot even leverage her to get up and he is so frustrated that tears threaten to fall from the edge of his eyelids, and--can Himawari stop? Please?

For all their telepathy as a married couple these past five years, she doesn't.

"Like wanting a guy? I can--actually, you know what? Being a guy and wanting another guy? Even that I cannot understand but wanting your best friend, who trusts you with his world, in that sick way of yours? That's completely beyond me, Shincha--"

"I don't want him, Himawari."

The volume of the voice isn't exactly loud, they're barely audible as it is, but for some reason, Kazama hears them perfectly. As does Himawari, if her silence after is anything to go by.

"I don't want him now, didn't want him all those years ago. He..." Kazama has a weird urge to stop his struggle to stand up and look towards the source of this voice and he stupidly does. He doesn't exactly like the sight that greets him.

Shinchan is looking straight at him, haunted, broken and every imaginable emotion Kazama's worst nightmare consists of--and have they managed to travel back in time? To that fateful night five years ago again? Kazama would very much like to be transported back to his cursed reality because this is somehow even worse and deep down, he knows it isn't about to improve anytime soon.

"He was--is a mistake. Will always," Kazama blinks and he's still here. "Always be a mistake."

Himawari doesn't say anything for a second, lets them two keep gazing at each other before uttering a single, soft, "Why?"

And the dam breaks.

"Because he lied to me, fucking lied to me about so many things, so many things he could've told me the truth about instead; fucked you, my baby sister, behind my back, got you pregnant, threatened to either let us marry you to him or he wouldn't pay child support, called the police on my parents, and I would want this motherfucker?! You've got to be kidding."

Kazama isn't sure if he's breathing anymore.

Shinchan keeps on talking, because he is Shinchan and that's what he does, but his voice is drowned by the blanket of haziness Kazama finds himself draped in. All his focus is on the rigorous effort it is taking him to stop these tiny droplets of water from falling from his eyes as he just looks at the man in front of him listlessly. You knew he feels this way, his hindbrain supplies helpfully, you knew he would never accept or own up to his promises of that night. He was losing, and winning you was the only way he could revive. It meant nothing for him, nothing, nothing, noth--

Nothing, indeed.

Himawari's chuckle is as cold as her words, "You don't get to do this, you know. Not when you wanted him enough to call me, your baby sister, a slut. You wanted him enough to blame everything on me to make him innocent, wanted him enough to--"

But, his heart argues, he sounded so solemn that night. He looked so true that night. It couldn't all have been a lie, right? Kazama finds himself agreeing. My Shinchan wouldn't do that, not to me. My Shinchan wouldn't make fake promises so I'll believe him, only to leave me stranded. He cared about me, maybe didn't love me, but I was his best friend and my Shinchan--

Your Shinchan was about to fuck what's-his-name tonight when he promised that sleeping with you was only to satisfy his curiosity.

That shuts up his heart and Kazama is left shouting and screaming into the silence that remains for someone, anyone to come up and defend his love, his youth and all his trust that Shinchan didn't exactly hate him enough to do this to him. That Shinchan at least respected him as a human being enough to not do this to him.

"--sideline me to get to him. What does that say about your want, huh, Shinchan? This is why you wanted him all those years ago and want him now, even today, because you're pathetic like that." She is practically shouting; everything, Kazama thinks, she couldn't say all those years ago, "You know he can never be yours and you still want him, would steal him from anyone who actually deserves him because you're selfish like that. Just like how I'm sure your Action Kamen painting is up on the living room mantel right now, even though I haven't been to that house in years."

Himawari is breathing heavily now, forefinger raised and pointed towards Shinchan when Kazama feels a presence next to them.

He looks up to meet the eyes of the last person he wants to see right now.

Fitting, he still thinks pathetically, after five fucking years, so goddamn fitting.

---

Five years ago (the conflict contd.)

The glass had been a mistake. Himawari can attest to that.

It had just been too much for her vodka filled mind to see her brother be almost on the edge of kissing her crush, the love of her life, just like that in front of her that the glass of water she was bringing for the said love just... slipped from her hands.

The rest of it, though? Not a mistake, not at all.

Kazama's soft moan echoes from inside his room and Himawari starts, bringing herself back to the present. According to her calculations, research, and limited experience in this department, she thinks he ought to be somewhere near his climax, and Shinchan's answering groan confirms her suspicions.

It's awkward and disgusting, listening in on her brother having sex with the one and only man she has ever truly wanted, and Himawari wishes human ears had sound filtering as a service they could provide because she would very much like to cleanse the sound her brother makes while coming, off her soul.

But then again, she could've just not listened in on Shinchan and Kazama having sex, right? In the middle of the night, sitting right outside Kazama's old room in the apartment she loathes with every fiber of her being?

Wrong.

See, Himawari isn't blind. And certainly not when she's drunk.

When Kazama had blearily left the gathering of seven to reminisce over his memories "one last time in my room", Himawari had let it slide. It was a very Kazama Toru thing of him to do and it just made sense that he would want to spend some of his last hours in this apartment in nostalgia over his almost-old room.

But then Shinchan following him a few minutes later, with a flimsy excuse of using the restroom when it was clear as day as to where he really was going? Himawari couldn't turn a blind eye to that. A very Shinchan Nohara thing of him to do and this time, it wasn't the same comforting thought. She felt threatened, more than anything. Especially when everyone around her seemed almost happy with the idea of the two almost ex-best friends finally making up after almost a year.

Himawari disagrees, thank you very much.

"Kazama--shit, you're so--fuck--so good for me." She hears her brother's barely coherent speech. Kazama whimpers pathetically and Himawari gags as the tell-tale sign of Shinchan's climax echoes around her.

Initially, she just wanted to confirm her theory. That maybe, her brother might have eyes on the one person she wished the entire universe he didn't have an eye on.

Himawari knows it's a bit far-fetched, because really, Kazama is Shinchan's friend first and Himawari's anything second, but her brother had so many options to choose from! He had Masao, Suzuki, all those boys who have approached Himawari during her nineteen years on this planet with the hopes of getting close to her brother through her. He has so many girls and boys and people after him and yet, he had to go for the one Himawari wanted? Wasn't there supposed to be a brother-sister code or something?

Regardless, Himawari's suspicions were confirmed the moment she had excused herself from the gathering of Shinchan's friends when they all made a hurried plan to get out of the apartment to get some fresh air--aka leave the two almost ex-best friends alone. It was disgusting.

The way Kazama had been talking about his past with Shinchan, all the things and people and instances he would miss, made Himawari want to cry because come on, not one mention of her? Sure, Himawari hated the very sight of this apartment both her brother and Kazama seemed so very fond of but still, had she not joined their little group in this apartment too? Had her inclusion not been that big of a deal for Kazama?

It all just didn't make sense to Himawari, in all honesty. She has wanted Kazama ever since she could barely even understand what the word actually meant. One look at his charming five-year-old face and babbling infant Himawari was hooked. He was all she could ever think about, the only person she wanted to spend her entire life with. The times he used to ignore her presence in favor of spending all his time at her house solely with her brother hurt her tremendously, but she never lost hope. The hope that one day, Kazama would know her as deeply as he knows Shinchan and he would realize Himawari is all he has ever wanted too.

After all, he has to have a wife at some point in his life, right?

Again, and Himawari glares at the door of the room now devoid of any sounds bitterly, wrong.

Kazama actually likes Shinchan, in the way he is only supposed to like someone like Himawari. He had admitted it moments before the unmistakable sound of kissing had emerged from the now peaceful room and it was just... wrong. And pathetic but so wrong.

Long story short, in Himawari's defense of everything she did when Kazama finally sneaked out of his old room, it was to protect him from doing anything wrong. Anything that wasn't in line with what society had planned for him. With what Himawari had planned for him.

Because she knows Shinchan and she knows how he doesn't care what people think about him. Her brother just doesn't care. She knows he would pursue Kazama quite easily into some sick sort of relationship the moment he wakes up and knows that this is her last chance.

After all, Kazama must have felt the same, as though he were committing a mistake, if he was sneaking out of the room like a thief, right?

Right.

---

"Hey."

Kazama starts, almost jumping out of his skin as he glances around frantically to spot the source of the soft, barely audible voice that just addressed him.

He finds it soon enough. Sitting with her back against the wall just beside his (almost-old) room, looking up at him with an undecipherable look, sits Himawari. She has her knees drawn up to her chin, arms going around the knees, looking so fragile that Kazama feels a bolt of protection spread through him.

As he squints down at her to get used to the darkness around him, he spots some more details of her environment. A bout of something held in a handkerchief in her hands, her hair a bit askew as though she messed it all up unknowingly, her eyes wide open, solely trained on Kazama as though she cannot see anything beyond him. Kazama shakes the weird thought, Himawari is just being... really cryptic right now.

The hallway is dark, so is the living room Kazama can see from here. There's just some faint light coming from the window at the beginning of the hallway and the door behind Kazama which is slightly ajar, casting some deep shadows around where Kazama notices Himawari is sitting. He frowns, noticing the sudden quietness of this apartment. Either all his guests have slept or Kazama's in for a prank.

He frowns some more at the latter prospect before realizing Himawari might still be waiting for a reply.

"H-hey, Himawari-chan." He's confused, to say the least, but something about the way Himawari just sits there, motionless, eyes unblinking, concerns him. "Are you okay? Where's everyone?"

"They left. I waited."

Sitting there all drawn up, Kazama's heart sinks a little because not only does Himawari look so... so small in comparison to him hovering over her, but there's also this eerie feeling all over him as though something is about to happen. Something not exactly... good.

"Oh yeah?" Kazama shifts his weight from one leg to the other, sighing quietly as the movement eases some of his pain down there. He almost blushes when he remembers the reason for the same. "For what?"

Himawari sits up a little then, causing the handkerchief in her hands to crinkle and with some more lighting on her being now, Kazama can clearly spot the blood on the white cloth, along with wet streaks of what could only be tears on Himawari's face.

"For you."

Kazama gasps, too distracted by her haphazard appearance to register what she said, "What? For--Himawari-chan! You've got blood on your hands. What happened?"

He rushes towards the younger, helping her get up with an arm around her shoulders and the other cradling her injured hands. Looking inside the fold of the handkerchief, he finds pieces of broken glass, some even red around the edges where he guesses Himawari might have cut herself from.

Himawari doesn't reply, and Kazama doesn't prod for one, too busy fretting. "That's a lot of blood; how are you so calm about it? How long have you been sitting here for? Come on, I'll clean this in the kitchen."

He tries to lead her towards the kitchen to get a good look at the wound but Himawari resists. He tries again, looking down to where Himawari's feet are to ensure that she doesn't have a leg injury she cannot move because of but finds nothing. When he looks up again, frowning, she's not looking at him.

Her eyes are fixated somewhere behind him, and it takes Kazama a moment to remember.

The door.

When he does, he turns immediately, wide eyes searching for any sign that Himawari could possibly spot to guess what happened in the past hour or so in that room from the slightly ajar door but lets out a sigh of relief, masked by a cough, when he sees none.

Turning back towards the younger, he sees her looking at him with the same unreadable soft look she wore earlier.

Shaking off the eeriness of this whole situation, he starts to lead her towards the kitchen again, "Come on, now. We really need to get this cleaned up and then you can tell me how this happened."

She doesn't resist again, but mutters something that sounds suspiciously like "Why do you wanna help?" to Kazama.

"What do you mean why do I wanna help? You're my friend, of course I wanna help."

Himawari scoffs lightly, "Am I? Your friend? Really?"

"Of course!" He removes the hand cradling hers to grope around for the light switch in the kitchen before turning the main light on. The sudden brightness makes him flinch before he gets accustomed to it, leading Himawari to lean against the counter. "What makes you doubt that?"

She remains silent and he stops for a second, again, gazing down at her to see what's wrong. Himawari just keeps looking at him and Kazama suddenly has a half mind of snapping at her to stop looking at him as though he... as though she... Kazama can't even bring himself to complete the sentence without sounding like a pervert in his own head.

"Well?" He asks, as a means to get her to respond and a means to keep the conversation going because God knows what things his mind might conjure up in the silence Himawari is dead set on putting them in.

He goes to extract himself from her because he also needs a wet towel to clean up her wounds and a couple bandages to not let it get infected, but at the slightest movement from his side, Himawari just drops the contents in her hands and hugs Kazama unceremoniously, slender yet toned arms going tight around his waist, face buried in his chest.

Kazama just stands there for a second, arms in the air as though he is surrendering to some police who would arrest him for getting hugged by his (maybe not so much now) ex-best friend's sister.

When he regains his ability to think, because there's nothing wrong with Himawari hugging him, she is seemingly having a rough night and Kazama is the only soul in this house awake and alert enough to comfort her, he doesn't exactly hug her back, just lets his arms loose around her shoulders.

Although it is common knowledge that the Nohara family has been blessed by the Gods of the height department to give them all such unusual heights, Kazama is still struck with exactly how tall Himawari is when he stands there, holding her lightly.

"Hey," He whispers, "You're okay, Himawari. I'm here. Tell me, what's up?"

A pregnant pause and then, "I'm pregnant."

Oh.

Oh.

Himawari, Shinchan's little sister, who also happens to be only nineteen years of age, is pregnant.

For some reason, it doesn't hit him yet, so he asks stupidly:

"Have you told anyone else yet?"

"No."

And Kazama is the first one to know. Oh.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Two seconds pass in silence.

Then, Himawari looks up at him, he looks down at her and they just... burst out laughing.

"Why are we so awkward?" She squeaks out a bit too loudly and Kazama is shushing her then, afraid their voices will wake Shinchan up.

And then, it hits him.

"Oh my God, you're pregnant," He looks at her incredulously, and she's giggling at him now, from where she is perched on the countertop slab near the sink. "You're only nineteen and you're actually pregnant."

"Uh-huh. Affirmative, officer."

Kazama lets out a shocked huff at her sudden nonchalance, "Wha--How did it happen, Himawari? What?"

She looks at him for a moment, considering, before, "I don't think I need to explain to you how exactly it happened. But if you really wanna know, then, you know, girl meets boy. Girl likes boy enough to let him get between her legs and stick his--"

"Okay, please stop!" He can't believe it but he's laughing at this girl's antics. She's crazy, he deduces, just like her brother. Runs in the family, Kazama supposes.

He still can't believe this, though. "You're actually pregnant? Like, you know, missed your period, took the test and it turned--"

"Red, yes, God, Kazama, you're such a weird person." She's giggling fondly though, so Kazama lets it slide.

His eyes take that slight lull in the conversation to spot the red near the counter she must've used to jump up to her perch. He signals her to pause for a second and goes in search of the wet towels, antiseptic and bandages he keeps under the sink before taking both her hands in one of his and cleaning the wounds under the steady tap water.

"How'd this happen?" he asks, wincing when she does.

"Which one are you referring to? The hands or the pregnancy again?"

An unwanted snort slips, "The hands for now."

"I was carrying a glass and it slipped. Started collecting the pieces and it sliced my skin."

"That sounds like it could be a lyric." He teases her and she laughs again. He's patching up the said cuts on her hands, when he asks again, "And the pregnancy? How long have you known?"

"Just took the test today."

Damn, Kazama thinks, and she still came here, celebrating with the lot of them. And--wait.

"Oh I completely forgot to ask, who's is it?"

"Hm?" The moment he's done bandaging, she hops off the counter again and putters about the kitchen idly.

"Who is the father?"

"You are."

"Oh, I don't think I know--what?!"

Time, for a second there, stops from Kazama. He's whirling around to look at Himawari before he can comprehend he is, and he's holding her from her shoulders, again before he can realise he is but he thinks a reaction like this is warranted because what does Himawari mean this child is his?

"What the fuck?"

Kazama's gay, for fuck's sake, he has never gone further than first base with a girl because for all his pining and self-loathing, he knows how it feels to look at someone you like and realise nothing you can do would ever make them want you the way you want them to want you and so, Kazama just sticks to his own hand-- or had stuck to his own hand, until... until tonight.

He's still trying to remember a drunken night when he could've possibly committed this gory crime, but nothing that matches the timeline of her pregnancy comes to his mind; it had been exam month until literally last week and then packing for the big move had taken most of his time and energy, so any drinks before tonight were an obvious no and--

Someone's laughing.

Himawari's laughing.

Everything tracks suddenly and--Oh God, Kazama is an idiot.

"You're a menace, I thought you should know." is all he manages minutes later when Himawari is done laughing at his face, gasping for air to utter just how naive and gullible Kazama is and blah, blah, blah, Kazama knows, okay? He knows this was a really good prank and a really idiotic reaction from his side.

"And you're gullible, but you already know that."

"No thanks to you," He mutters snidely as he goes around her to step away from the kitchen because for some reason, it's extremely hot inside and the prank really wasn't funny. Plus the eerie feeling from earlier is coming back in full force and Kazama suddenly regrets leaving the safe haven that is his room to get some water because he could've been sleeping peacefully in Shinchan's arms, right now, instead of letting a nineteen year old girl make fun of him.

She stops him when he's almost at the door, a small tap on his shoulder.

"Hey, I'm sorry. I didn't think you'd take it seriously."

Kazam holds in a sigh of resignation. Himawari is, after all, only nineteen. Everything is funny to her, so he cannot really blame her.

"It's cool, I'm overreacting, don't mind me." He turns back around to face her and she's holding a glass of water for him.

Small mercies of life, he muses as a means to calm himself and accepts the apology token. He steps aside when Himawari goes around him, this time and locks the door to the kitchen. "For privacy," she explains and Kazama has the weird urge to ask if she, too, knows that there's someone else in the apartment with them.

He doesn't because that would cause unnecessary questions that he'd rather not answer and perches on the countertop himself. Himawari hops and sits next to him, legs dangling off the edge alike a child.

"So what's the plan now? How're you gonna tell your family? Tell Shinchan?"

Himawari shrugs, "I don't know. I'll probably just tell them everything as it is and pray they don't throw me out or something."

"They won't," Kazama is sure. The Noharas are a caring bunch like that and he knows that their Himawari can do no wrong in their eyes, "But Shinchan might kill the father so, you know, just tell him to beware, whoever he is."

Himawari giggles lightly, and Kazama glares at her in warning. She makes a zip up motion across her mouth and that's that. They move forward.

"Thought of any names yet? Bet Nene will have like an entire fucking list to choose from once you tell her."

Kazama chuckles, already imagining the chaos their friend group will be in once they all get to know about this pregnancy. He can practically see how spoiled the child would be, growing up with its numerous aunts and uncles at its beck and call.

"How are you so sure that I'm keeping it?"

That... is something Kazama hadn't even considered was an option. "You're not?"

"I'm not sure. But it could be anything. Everything's all up in the air, you know."

Actually, Kazama doesn't know, not at all, he wants to point out, because he isn't a pregnant teen joking and making light of the life of an actual individual growing inside him but keeps his mouth shut. Arguing will not lead them anywhere, anyways.

"What's everything?" He asks instead.

Himawari takes a second to ponder. "I don't know. Telling Mom and Dad, telling Shinchan, Nene, and you know, just everyone. I have a future I could be compromising, you know, so I can't just keep it without thinking it all through. Mom and Dad would want me to keep it, I know, but it's my body. I get to have a say, right?"

"Please keep the child."

Kazama doesn't know what prompts him to say this, but he does, and it takes him a moment to realize what he said. When he does though, he cannot find it in himself to take it back.

For as long as Kazama can remember, he has wanted his own children, someone he can raise and spoil with everything he has, but most importantly, let them live any which way they want to in this world dead set on giving people a certain frame of life to live in. He wouldn't care if his children would break the mold and reform one of their own wishing because God knows how much Kazama wants to break the mold his parents have set for him and live his life.

His parents, they're rich, they're composed and they're meticulous to the T. But they're not adjusting, not accommodative and not flexible enough in their views to accept him, Kazama knows.

Mom will never look at him the same if he tells her he likes boys, or worse yet, one boy in particular because: How can you say that when the Mitsui's daughter is to be betrothed to you in a couple of weeks, Kazama? Where are your values? Where are your etiquettes? Dad will never support him when he says he wants to start a business of his own, rather than managing the one his dad has created after years of hard work. Good boys of mannered households don't talk like that, my boy. It is about time you grow up.

"Why?"

"Because..." He pauses, gathering his thoughts, "Don't get me wrong, I respect your decision if you, you know, don't want to keep it. Actually, you know what? This isn't even about me, so I don't know why I'm saying this. Don't listen to me, Himawari-chan, this is nothing--"

"Kazama," She whispers, a gentle hand on his arm, "Why?"

He sighs, "My parents, they're..." He hesitates again, for a second, but then remembers how he is the only one to know about the whole pregnancy situation. Himawari must trust him a lot, right? "... rich, influential and important, as you already know. They've always been good to me, of course, never had me ask for anything they thought I might need, but sometimes, I can't help but wonder if it's because I never really..." He inhales deeply, looking into the eyes of Himawari as he speaks through his exhale, "asked them for something that I really wanted."

The moment he admits this, it's like a door opens inside of his mind, pouring examples upon examples to make Himawari understand.

"Like, there was this Moe-P showcase I wanted to go to once, and you know, my parents don't really know about my--uh, obsession with her." There's a blush high on his cheeks he's sure but he plods forwards, "They had gifted me the tickets to an Action Kamen showcase the month before this--the one you know Shinchan really wanted to go to--because it was, you know, Action Kamen." It suited them that their child was into that sort of cartoon.

"But I was only like, eight or nine then, and so I just asked for the Moe-P showcase tickets just next month, after saving up for them for like six months before that because it was in Tokyo, and they," There's a faint pain in his chest still, more than a decade later, as he recalls this memory, "they tore apart my entire room, Himawari, throwing out every Moe-P merchandise I owned. It was... It was..." heartbreaking, to see his own parents look down at him in disgust as though they couldn't recognize their own flesh and blood.

He cannot say that, of course, not with memories upon memories threatening to clog his throat and wet his eyes. Looking into the brown orbs glinting with his, he realizes Himawari understands still, without him having to complete his predicament. Good.

"So, that's why I've always loved the idea of having my own--uh--kids someday." He turns sheepish in an instant when Himawari smirks at him lightly, "I know, I know, it's not gonna happen for a good few years, but the idea of you not keeping it just... doesn't sit well with me."

It feels a bit nice though, Kazama has to admit, to let it out in the open for once. His parents aren't cruel, or bad, like he's sure innumerable children out there suffer because of, but they aren't exactly... loving either. His mother is, sometimes these days, when he expresses a barely there interest in one of the girls she brings to him for a betrothal consideration, but his father? Sometimes, Kazama thinks his Dad fears showing any human emotion to his own child in the belief that he'll turn out... not quite as rigid and conservative as he is.

Himawari respects his time to sort his mind, and now eager to change the subject, Kazama says the first thing that comes to his mind.

"You'll be a good mother." He ends up blurting out. He is surprised to know he actually means it.

Himawari, for all her mischiefs and rowdiness, possesses a deep, true and almost sufferable, Kazama is sure, side of empathy that he has rarely seen in anyone around him. It's different from the big heart energy Shinchan carries with him, but kind of similar, in a way. She knows things from things, even at such tender age; Kazama has quite literally lost count of the number of times Nene has raved about how mature Himawari is and how she and Masao could only come together as a couple because the younger had helped her sort her mind about everything.

She is an empath, but she is also loud. About everything that's wrong in the society around them, about how ignorant people are these days, trying to live in their temporary bliss, about how nothing about the judiciary really works in a legitimate way anymore and about how the people in authority don't really understand the authority they're fighting for, come every election year. Kazama thinks she is meant for great things in life and actually has the support it requires to achieve them.

When Himawari is silent for a second too long, Kazama turns to her to see that she's gazing silently at him. Her eyes are... wet, too but she isn't crying yet.

"Did I say something wrong?"

She shakes her head silently, sniffing in an effort to not let the tears fall. Kazama smiles despite himself.

"You really will be a good mom. It's like you don't even have to venture outside to look for instances that support, you know. Mrs. Nohara is an ideal example of rough girl gone soft for her kids."

"Yeah?" Her tone is nonchalant but her eyes are seeking approval.

Kazama knows this much, he can confirm, "Yeah." He says softly.

In that moment, he realises one odd thing, one he hadn't understood all night tonight.

Kazama, in a weird yet... fulfilling way, is happy.

Right now, in this kitchen, sitting with Himawari, saying out loud every flaw he thinks his life has had thus far and glowing in the afterglow of his and Shinchan's intimacy, he really is happy. It's a feeling he doesn't know how to comprehend, how to identify and just, how to deal with. The last time Kazama had been happy, in the true essence of the word, must've been when he was a child; when liking Moe-P wasn't something that made his mother weep with the loss of a very much still alive and sane Kazama, when liking anyone except Moe-P wasn't an issue in his mind, when Shinchan was his best friend and Kazama felt as though he could conquer the world with just the right amount of power his hands were always hungry for.

Everything was as it seemed, and people weren't dangerous. They weren't even afraid of him, back then, just blissfully indifferent and twenty-one-year-old Kazama knows he'd take that indifference over the fear or hatred any day. Face value was the only value words were meant to be taken in, and ambiguity wasn't a thing in his world.

Today, though, nothing is the same as it was the last time he had been truly happy, but Kazama cannot deny that this is somehow better. 

Knowing how flawed the world can be, how bad things can go here, or that Kazama can survive not being Shinchan's best friend, that he can learn to live with this deep yearning in his bones for the only person who has bothered to know him truly if it means the person will stay, and how strong a nineteen year old girl, like the one sitting in front of him, can be if the time calls for it, makes it all the more special, to be this happy for some unfathomable reason, and Kazama sighs deeply, happy to just exist and be happy again, after so lon--

"Marry me."

Time, for a second again, stops and Kazama thinks he really shouldn't have gotten up for that glass of water. Life amenities aren't worth heart attacks, not at the ripe age of twenty-one.

He's thankful that at least this time, he is looking at the prankster right in her eyes. Himawari really is good at this because there is no hint of mischief in there that might clue Kazama in about the fact that this is, undoubtedly, another prank.

He chuckles weakly, when she doesn't reply, "Fool me once, shame on you but fool me twice? I refuse to be shamed, Himawari-chan. Absolutely not."

"I mean it. Marry me, Kazama. I..." She looks up at him from her lashes, eyes still damp but earnest--Oh God, Himawari means it. "I need you."

"What?"

She nods hurriedly, "Everything is sorted, isn't it? You get to have the kid you've always wanted, and I get to have the stability me and my child needs. It's like a match made in heaven."

He's hopping off the countertop before he can register, putting some much-needed space between them. "What the fuck are you on about, Himawari-chan? Can you hear yourself?"

"My hearing is fine, Kazama," She snaps, jumping off the countertop too, "I'm telling you about the one solution I can see out of this situation that ends with me keeping the baby and you having the family you've always dreamt of having-- Don't look at me like I'm a lunatic, you know what I'm saying is true."

"Wha-what even? You're not right about whatever it is you think you are right about, Himawari-chan. This is possibly the worst thing you've said in your entire life and, how could you even think about this? You're my best friend's baby sister, for fuck's sake!"

"Ex-best friend, Kazama, and do you really think Shinchan would care? Don't you think he'd be happier to know I'm being married to someone he actually knows and trusts? That the child I'm carrying is yours and you'll keep me happy no matter what?"

"Whoa whoa, Himawari, stop this. Please. This prank is going way too far now, and you need to stop, like right now."

"This isn't a prank!" She shouts then, voice all shrilly and... and... manic. "We will get married, and you will claim this child as yours and we will live happily ever after. Do you hear me, Kazama? We will live together. Happily. Ever. After!"

A heavy feeling settles in Kazama's chest as he watches Himawari's mind work, undoubtedly creating potential happy ending scenarios which could possibly aid her in her quest of convincing Kazama to actually marry her and raise a child together when all Kazama can think about is that if Himawari keeps up the shouting, then Shinchan is going to wake up.

"Hey, hey, hey, Himawari-chan, there's absolutely no reason for you to shout, okay? I'm here and you're here and we'll talk this out. Like adults, hm? Why don't you take a moment, and I'll get you a glass of water and then we will have a nice, civil conversation--"

"I know what you did tonight."

It's like the words don't even register in his brain for the first five seconds, and present Kazama thinks the world would've been so much better if they never had registered. Ever. 

But they do, and Kazama is left looking at Himawari with his eyes wide, mouth hanging, unable to form a single, coherent thought because Himawari knows. She knows what he did tonight--and how?

"W-what?"

He feels, more than seeing, the way this nineteen-year-old girl in front of him transforms in that second. She was trying for him, he realizes, all this while, engaging with his attempts to diffuse the situation and come up with a better "solution" as she called it, for her pregnancy rather than being called the father of this baby he didn't even know existed until an hour ago. She was giving him time to think of as many way outs, he can before she drops this ultimate barrier, removing all his hopes of escaping. 

"Shinchan fucked you, right? I know all about it." She grimaces, the only sign of her humanity Kazama can see really. "Heard all of it, from start to finish. Enjoyed a lot, didn't you?"

All Kazama can do is stand there, just exist. That's proving to be a tedious task too, with the embarrassment, humiliation and most of all, anger running through him at lightning speed. 

"So, no, Kazama, I don't want to have a nice, civil conversation like adults with you. I'm gonna tell you what's about to happen and you'll just do that."

"Why?"

"Because you're not ready to lose your family just yet, are you?" Her smile is saccharine, as sweet as they come. "Not ready for anyone to know how much you like Shinchan bossing you around or you wouldn't look so ashamed." She's practically in his face as she whispers, "I know you, Kazama. Better than anyone in this world can. I've been watching you from the sidelines all my life and I'll be damned if I let my idiot of a brother ruin your life just for his passing infatuation. You don't deserve it, Zama."

Tears are falling freely from his eyes, throat all clogged up because he realizes the truth in her statements. He isn't ready for the world to know. Whatever happened in the confines of his room has to be the most exquisite experience of his life, but heaven forbid if someone even hints about it in public, all Kazama knows about his life will be destroyed in a millisecond. 

"But I love him." He pleads to some, any remaining remotely human part in her. "I can't--can't live without him." 

"And that's why, you'll marry me." Her tone is dripping with satisfaction as Kazama's legs give out, just like his remaining hope. He drops to his knees, forehead resting against the countertop in front of him. He's too hot yet the cold of marble does nothing to soothe him. 

"His baby sister will be with the one person he trusts his world with, and you'll get to have him in your life, despite everything." She crouches in front of him, hands cradling his face as she gets impossibly close to him. 

"Kazama, I love you." She's so sincere about it, Kazama wants to scream. "I will never let anything ruin your world. Just trust me and you'll be fine." She winks, "We'll be fine."

His tear-filled gaze can see the mascara smudged around her eyes, haphazardly washed as though she didn't care it was getting messed up. Kazama wonders if this was when she heard him and Shinchan fuck. The thought makes him rush to the sink and empty the cursed glass of water he'd come out to drink in the first place tonight. 

When he sobers a little, more aware of his surroundings, he looks at her with a black stare and manages a simple, "I hate you, Himawari. With every fiber of my being."

Stepping into her personal space, he spits out, "And if it weren't for this child inside you right now, heaven forbid I'd have done something bad. But if you think everything's gonna happen just the way you want and I'll just play along, you don't really know me that well, honey."

He's exiting the kitchen then, "Although,Shinchan knows I'd never go down without a fight," leaving behind a slightly stunned Himawari he could care less about. 

Deep down, Kazama knows his fate is decided now. He has to do what Himawari's asking of him because there's no one except Shinchan who can help him out of this and Kazama cannot, in his human conscience, pit the two siblings against each other, willingly.

But that doesn't mean he can't make Himawari lose everything she's known to be hers.

After all, that's what she's asking him to do. Right?

Right.

---

Notes:

The ending, as y'all can see, is rushed af, but the thing is that I wrote majority of this chapter when I uploaded the last one and the predicament thing. But it's been getting delayed all this while because I couldn't find a place where I could end it like peacefully yk?

But tonight, I thought fuck it we post raw (there's no editing, no proofreading here and I'm half asleep as I type all this out TvT)

So yeah, here's the almost end of the backstory, lord knows how I'm gonna take the main story fwd tho lol

love lavanya <3