Love From the Sidelines

by panaracosm

Summary:

Nirei and Suo's story, as seen from the perspective of others.

Chapter 1: Sakura Haruka

Everybody adores Nirei, from the soft way Kiryuu helps him touch up his roots, to the way Tsugeura listens to him ramble on and on about his new analysis. Even down to Sakura allowing himself to be taken care of by the blonde male, which was difficult at first and still is at times.

Yet nobody adored Nirei quite like Suo had, Sakura noticed. He wasn't that dumb to not notice Suo’s blatant favoritism, whether or not he wanted to acknowledge it wasn’t any of his business, but it was getting confusing if the two of them were friends or something more.

Sakura sighed, eyeing the burgundy-haired male who appeared to be resting against his desk. His expression gave nothing away, but being around him for so long, Sakura could tell his stiff posture was out of pure boredom.

The split-haired male didn’t blame him; the classroom felt awfully quiet without Nirei’s constant chatter. The male had gone ‘under the weather’, if his groveling was anything to note, a few days ago, despite his best efforts to hide it.

Sakura hesitantly fidgeted with his phone, no good-morning messages or check-ins confirmed he was dead to the world currently. Sakura glanced up, his eyes gazing around the classroom as it landed on Suo, a curious tilt to his head, noticing that the one-eyed male was finally smiling ever so slightly.

Sakura’s eyes gazed down at his hands, the male’s phone was in his hands, slowly typing away as his flimsy phone charm dangled a few centimeters above the desk. Sakura squinted at it— wasn’t that the one Nirei looked at a week ago?

Before he could say anything, Suo’s phone was put down as Sakura glanced back up, noticing Suo’s eye was on him as the male stood up. It caught the attention of numerous individuals as Tsugeura approached him, his loud voice catching the attention of others as Sakura grimaced slightly, watching Suo barely get up before swiftly avoiding the other male’s touch.

“Ayeee Suo! You’ve been looking down all day, c’mon, I’m about to go make rounds around the town, you wanna come with?” Tsugeura laughed, Suo’s avoidance going under his radar as the one-eyed male grumbled, his hands going to rest behind his back as he shook his head.

“I’ll pass Tsugeura.” Sakura’s eyes narrowed at that, a small huh coming out of him before he could stop as he started walking over.

“Oh! Sakura-kun, I’m sure he’d love to join you Tsugeura.” He bitterly smiled, an arm going out to gesture at the shorter male as Sakura huffed, “Yeah sure, whatever, what are you skipping for Suo?”

Tsugeura opened his mouth to talk before he was cut off by Suo as the burgundy haired male shrugged, politely walking past Sakura as he smiled. “I trust our captain has it under control, I’m..a little occupied with important matters.”

Sakura stammered, his face flushing at the easy trust Suo pushed out onto him as he crossed his arms, waving him off, a whatever coming out as Kiryu seemed to be talking to Tsugeura now, easily taking the attention away from Suo as he seemed to just strut out of the room.

Sakura tilted his head with a confused look, a small jump reminiscent of a cat leaving him as Tsugeura excitedly dragged him and Kiryu out shortly after, the pink haired male easily accepted being dragged out whilst small protests left Sakura’s mouth, his eyes barely caught on the back of Suo’s head as he frowned, watching the tall male’s tassel earring move with his steps as he got more distant.

“..I’m suspicious.” Kiryu said that as soon as their feet hit the floor again, his words were more directed to Sakura as he spoke, though. The heterochromia male turned to him with a curious gaze as Kiryu cleared his throat, “Suo-chan isn’t busy right?”

“Uhh no..” Sakura said bashfully, rubbing the back of his head, he sighs a bit with a head shake though, “I doubt it, I mean he's been so down lately though..so..” The male blushed, watching the two people beside him turn to listen to him with knowing gazes, he turned his head down more at their gazes, covering his mouth slightly.

“So..I guess it's fine for him to skip patrol for a day..it's not like we’re gonna die without him..” Sakura stammered out his pace, getting a little faster as Tsugeura’s oh! could be heard, Kiryu fondly chuckled, shaking his head at the male's shyness as Sakura started rushing out excuses.

“Hurry up! We have more ground to cover with Suo gone.” He grumbled out, shoving his hands into his pocket, Sakura quickly turned out the gates of Bofurin.

“Yes captain!” The two chorused behind him, Sakura puffed, his cheeks dimming down to a light pink, despite his words, he slowed down enough to join the two as they comfortably patrolled the streets.

“Oh Kiryu-san!” An older voice called out, it snapped the attention of the three of them as Sakura saw Kiryu giving a small wave to the lady at the shop, one glance up, it was a simple food stall.

Sakura looked around, as Kiryu went up to chat with her, he tried to see if there was any trouble, given that there seemed to be a mess of boxes in the front of her store. He frowned slightly, however, before he could talk, the lady seemed to smile at him with a small wave of her hand.

“Oh, please don’t mind the mess, a handsome young man came around earlier to help out– aish, what would we do without you Bofurin kids?” She chuckled a bit, shaking her head as she waved the three inside.

“Please come in! I apologize, I wasn’t able to properly thank him, but you three are from Bofurin, so if it isn’t too much trouble, I’d be happy to treat you all to a meal.” She moved around her restaurant, her steps light as she patted down her apron. Her name tag shone under the fluorescent lighting as Sakura slightly squinted to read it.

Kiryu stepped in before he could say anything, though, as the pink-haired male smiled at her, “Thank you, Mrs. Shinozaki, but we’d have to pass...” The disappointment was clear on the older lady’s face as she frowned at his words. Kiryu offered a small bow in apology before the lady huffed a bit, shaking her head.

“At least let me give you boys something to go! You need to keep eating healthy meals if you’re going to fight.” An unexpected hand latched onto Sakura as he flailed a bit, “Huh–” the male wasn’t able to process being dragged to sit at a table, rubbing his shoulder, he saw Kiryu and Tsugeura sitting down next to him, Tsugeura loudly laughing as multiple thanks came out from the two.

“T-thanks.” Sakura pushed out, sinking into the chair a bit as he watched the lady move to a more secluded area to prepare their meals. His eyes flickered up to the menu before a sudden realization hit him.

“Aren’t we the only ones patrolling this area?” He glanced towards the other two, and Tsugeura’s busy chatter paused as Kiryu gazed up from his phone. Sakura sat up a bit, his eyes glancing between the two as he thought for a second, his eyes shutting a bit in thought before Kiryu spoke up.

“We should be, the first years are the only ones out patrolling at the moment.” He said, waving his phone around, “Tsubaki-chan confirmed that we’re the only ones in this area at least.” He hummed, going back to play on his phone.

“Why, though, Sakura-kun?” Tsugeura leaned forward a bit, his head tilted as Sakura frowned a bit.

“Nothing. It’s just somebody helped Mrs. Shinozaki, right? It wasn’t one of us.” He trailed off, his voice dropping a bit as he whispered, Kiryu nodding in agreement as Tsugeura seemed more confused.

“Ohh!” The male snapped his fingers as he realized what the two were trying to say. Kiryu shook his head in exasperation as Sakura nodded. “You don’t think Suo’s tryna one-up us and go out patrolling on his own?” The male exclaimed, his hand reaching towards his chin as he spoke, in careful contemplation.

Sakura observed him for a second before glancing down at his phone, “I don’t know... his behavior was kinda off today.” He sighed a bit, a permanent frown seemed to rest on his face, before Kiryu interjected.

“I doubt it.” His words caused both males to look towards him as Kiryu calmly rested his phone for a second, “Suo-chan wouldn’t ignore the other areas we helped today already,” Sakura watched him place a finger on his lip as the pink haired male paused his talking, silence taking over the table before his words came out again.

“I think he probably–”

“Alright! Here you guys go.” The older lady came stumbling back out, Tsugeura immediately stood up to try and help as she waved him off with a firm head shake, “Sit back down, sit!” She ushered him as neat to go bags were placed on the table, Sakura looked back at the food as a warm aroma came out. More thanks were mumbled out as the older lady only fondly patted their heads.

Sakura flushed a bit as her wrinkly hand came into view, helping her to stand more properly, she smiled towards the split-haired male. “Aish, this old lady’s back is getting worse.” She joked around, using the table as a better support as Kiryu grabbed the bags, small thanks coming out once again.

As they waved their goodbyes, Sakura hesitated briefly, his hands wrapped around one of the bags, before he paused at the door. “Mrs Shinozaki?” He said, his voice in a seemingly gentle tone as the older lady turned to him, “Um...the person who helped you earlier...” He gestured with his free hand as the lady’s eyes lit up a bit.

“Oh yes! Wait here, you just reminded me, I presumed it was him who dropped something earlier while trying to help out.” Her pace picked up a bit as she held a charm in her hand. Sakura’s head tilted as she grabbed his hand, placing the item into his hand. She tightened her grip slightly as she shook his free hand a bit.

“He seemed to be in a hurry, but he had an eyepatch on?” She murmured, her words confirming Sakura’s thoughts as he frowned a bit more, “Please, if you do manage to see him around, let him know next time the meal is on me.” She let go of Sakura’s hand, allowing the split haired male to glance down at his palm as he saw the flimsy charm in his hand, the string holding it together had broken off but besides that it was still in a good enough condition.

Sakura jumped a bit, his train of thought being broken off as Kiryu’s voice registered in his ears, “We will! Thank you, Mrs. Shinozaki.”

“And for the food!” Tsugeura grinned, giving a cheeky wave as the older lady fondly laughed at him, her hands going up to wave as Sakura was dragged out of the doorway by Kiryu, the older lady shutting the door as he stared at it for a brief second.
“It was Suo.” Sakura finally said, turning around to face Tsugeura since Kiryu stood next to him already. Tsugeura scratched the back of his head as Sakura started walking, tucking the charm into his pockets, he frowned a bit. “Why was he out here, though, and he ordered food?” He mumbled out loud, his free hand reaching for his phone as he squinted slightly.

Tsugeura seemed to be thinking as Sakura sent a message to Suo, his typing incredibly slow due to only having one hand available, ‘Where r u’ The message read, a few slow minutes passed by before Sakura sat down on the sidewalk, footsteps ceased as he assumed Tsugeura and Kiryu just joined him in sitting. His message wasn’t even left on read like it normally was– it was left on delivered.

Sakura set the bag down beside him, his eyebrows coming together in frustration before a calm voice spoke out, “Sakura-chan, why don’t we go to Nirei-chan’s place?” Kiryu said, while it sounded like a suggestion, it seemed to be more of a demand as Sakura paused, pocketing his phone.

The male hesitated, but the patrol was practically wrapped up, and Nirei hadn’t messaged him yet either. Sakura rested his head on his palm as he sighed a bit, “We should! Nirei-kun would probably love the company!” Tsugeura nodded enthusiastically, Sakura glanced over at him, feeling a hand on his shoulder as he looked over to Kiryu now.

“If you want to, I mean, he’d probably appreciate company while he’s sick.” Sakura thought for a moment, they did come over– while uninvited, it was slightly nice that he was concerned about Sakura, the split-haired male exhaled slowly before nodding. It wasn’t any of his concern if Suo decided to get food before disappearing off the planet.

“So was that a yes?” Tsugeura glanced over, his face popping up in Sakura’s peripheral vision as the male violently blushed, in a panic, he stood up, waving Tsugeura off. The other two looked slightly stunned at his behavior before smiling at him. “Yeah.. we can go see him, there’s so much food, anyways, he probably hasn’t eaten anything.” Sakura stammered; his excuses sounded weak even to his ears.

He was a little concerned for the short male; it was one thing for him to not come to Bofurin, but to just not message at all was unusual for Nirei, who randomly called Sakura once in the dead of night for ‘company’. Sakura rubbed the back of his neck, already starting to walk off in the general direction of Nirei’s house.

The small rustle of bags alerted him that the other males were following him, light quips falling on deaf ears, though as Sakura glanced up at the sky, the sun was bound to set in a few hours. His hands rustled into his pocket, grabbing out the charm as he examined it for a bit. The design was simplistic. Regardless, it still screamed ‘Nirei’ to the split-haired male as a small smile made its way to his face, the string being kept together with his fingers as he pinched at the material to view the dangling charm. Thinking back to the festival, Sakura sighed a bit, a small head shake as he pocketed the charm once more.

It was probably around that time that Nirei fell ill, while Sakura was spending time with Togame, he wasn’t sure what happened with the blonde male, just that he was shivering despite the warm weather. His face lit up remembering that Suo was holding the blonde, the one-eyed male’s yukata, damp from the incident.

Sakura fiercely shook his head, trying to shake the memory out as he walked, shoving his hands in his pocket he let one free to knock on the door of Nirei’s home. He positioned himself to the side a bit, allowing Tsugeura and Kiryu to walk forward more.

The door slowly creaked open, and a smaller lady with brown hair peeked out as her eyes lit up, recognizing Sakura. “Oh Sakura!” She opened the door wider, her hair was slightly messy as she urged them inside, “Akihiko didn’t tell me you guys were coming.” She laughed slightly, a smaller kid clinging to her leg as they looked up with a pout.

Sakura waved a bit shyly as he took off his shoes, stepping inside. The clicks of others indicated that they were also taking off their footwear as Sakura glanced inside the house, a small mess of toys was organized into one area, besides that, nothing much had changed since his last visit, as he glanced up.

“Hello, Mrs. Nirei.” The two males besides him said in sync, Tsugeura appeared nosy as he glanced around Sakura, taking in Nirei’s childhood home as Sakura put his shoes down, his eyes widened at a familiar set, before he could talk, though Nirei’s mother seemed to confirm his suspicions with a small laugh.

“Akihiko’s upstairs with Suo-san already,” She calmly said, picking up the child clinging to her. She lightly bumped his nose with her face as she smiled, looking back at the three males. She tilted her head slightly, “It’s so nice that my Akihiko has such reliable friends.”

Sakura flushed at her words, his ears staining a dark pink as he rubbed the back of his head. Sakura cleared his throat, nodding his head before speaking, “Suo is here?” The questioning tone made Nirei’s mother look back at him, her own freckled face a clear blueprint of the blonde as she nodded.

“Suo came here a bit earlier with some soup.” She put her child down, allowing the small kid to walk back to his toys as small grumbles left their mouth, tiny fists glancing back up at the split-haired male with narrow eyes, that kid scares Sakura a little.

“He was a bit earlier today than usual, but Akihiko seemed to be expecting him. I put him back in his room, though, since he shouldn’t really be walking around right now..” She trailed off a bit, her eyes turning serious as she looked at the boys, “You’re welcome to join them, but don’t let Akihiko out of bed! That troublemaker..” She shook her head fondly before eyeing the bags Tsugeura and Kiryu were carrying, her hands stretched out to take them.

Sakura watched as the two males insisted on bringing them inside themselves, their footsteps slowly padding on the wooden flooring as Sakura gazed up the stairs, his hand rested on one of the walls as he followed behind the three people, voices could be heard coming from inside the kitchen as Nirei’s mother slid the door open.

A taller male glanced up, and Sakura noticed his calloused hands before glancing up to see his face, Nirei’s father. The male gave a small handshake to Tsugeura as the orange-haired male placed the bags down. Kiryu was given a small pat on the back as Nirei’s father let out a deep chuckle, his eyes looking up towards Sakura with a small smile.

“Sakura-san,” He waved at the boy. Sakura scratched behind his ear a bit as he let his head down gently in acknowledgement before picking it back up. “Mr. Nirei.” His voice came out steadier as he spoke, glancing around the room, he noticed a to-go bag similar to the restaurant they had just at already in the trash.

Nirei’s mother pranced around a bit, patting the bags down as she looked at the boys, “I’ll warm this up for everybody, please feel free to go upstairs and say hi to Akihiko, Sakura-san can lead you boys there.” Her hands were neatly folded together as she smiled at them, Sakura nodded lightly. The others seemed to wave their goodbyes and thank yous to Nirei’s parents as Sakura left the room, a small click of the door confirmed they were right behind him.

Kiryu’s voice broke him out of his confusion as the male adjusted his jacket, “So! We know where Suo-chan was.” He smiled, his pace easily matching up with Sakura’s as the split-haired male huffed.

“He could’ve read my messages.” Their footsteps were louder now as they approached the stairs, and hushed conversation could be heard coming from behind the door as a voice unmistakably belonging to Nirei could be heard.

Kiryu only laughed at that, Sakura flushed a bit at his admission before shaking his head, an incoherent grumble to the others coming out, before Sakura could raise his hand to knock, Tsugeura opened the doors at a rapid pace as he walked inside.

“Nirei-kun!!!” The male proudly exclaimed, Sakura glanced inside, his face immediately flushing at the intimate act the two were in– Suo was feeding Nirei. Sakura stammered, his hand going up to point at the two as he could hear yet another exasperated sigh coming from the pink-haired male.

Glancing at Suo, the one-eyed male seemed to be slightly stunned at the sudden entrance, his eye flickering between the three before landing on Sakura. Sakura stumbled slightly before rushing back outside, dragging the two with him at an impressive strength.

With trembling hands, he shut the door, and a loud slam could be heard as silence took over everybody. Sakura shut his eyes, the image was already cemented into his mind, though, as soon as he opened them, Kiryu seemed to be looking at him with a confused expression.

His face flushed a bright red as he opened the door again, this time the bowl was on the side and Suo was standing up, his jacket taken off to reveal his changshan, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, as the male waved to them. His wave skipped over Tsugeura.

Nirei seemed to adjust himself once the door opened, shifting his body to face them as he waved, his face was flushed a bit pink, whether that was from Suo or from his sickness, Sakura couldn’t tell, as his own face lit up again, looking between the two.

“Sorry–” Nirei coughed gently, shaking his hand in front of himself, “I didn’t realize you guys were here!” He said, Sakura watched as he attempted to stand, but Suo was already pushing him to sit back down. The split-haired male watched as the taller one rested his hand carefully on Nirei’s back, kneeling to reach his height.

Sakura couldn’t watch this anymore; he felt like he was going to go into a cardiac arrest if he had to watch these two interact anymore. Thankfully for him, Kiryu spoke up, sliding up his jacket, he watched the male carefully adjust it as he glanced at Nirei.

“We wanted to drop by to see how you were doing,” He said. Sakura looked a bit stunned as Kiryu pointed to him, watching Nirei’s eyes snap to Sakura, the split-haired male blushed even more. “Sakura-chan wanted to make sure everything was okay...” He trailed off a bit, and Sakura barked out a reply before he could stop himself.

“Clearly, everything looks fine.” He watched as Nirei turned a bright pink, this time it seemed to be out of pure fluster as he shook his head, Suo shutting his one eye out of amusement at the scenario they’re in as the blonde adjusted the clip holding his hair back, “No! I mean– yes, things are fine, but it’s nice seeing you all!”

Sakura watched the two for a second, Tsugeura attempted to approach before Suo every so unsubtly waved the orange haired male off, his expression unamused as he patted Nirei’s head before standing up, Nirei, seemingly oblivious to the burgundy male’s interjection, kept rambling on, adjusting the large dorky shirt on him as he leaned forward.

“I just wasn’t expecting you guys!” He scratched his face shyly, his blush lightening up a bit as Sakura huffed out again.

Suo patted Nirei’s back, the gesture small but noticeable to Sakura as the split-haired male finally calmed down a bit, his face was still slightly ignited unfortunately, but he pulled himself together enough to sigh.

“It’s um..nice knowing you’re okay though,” Sakura said slowly, pulling his jacket over himself a bit more as he rubbed the back of his neck, looking back up, Nirei was smiling at him, the blonde’s voice, despite sounding nasally, still was full of warmth.

“Thank you, Sakura-san, Kiryu-san, and Tsugeura-san! I’ll be back in two days, I think..but um it was nice seeing you guys visit..” He fidgeted with his hands slightly. Sakura watched Suo sit back down on the chair across from him, no words left the burgundy male, but Sakura could tell– as he stared at Nirei, it was nothing short of adoration.

With that, Sakura coughed a bit, clearing his throat. He looked back outside, “We’ll get going now, uhm, get better soon, Nirei, I need my vice captain.” He stammered, pulling his ear gently. Nirei glanced at him with stunned eyes before nodding, his hair bouncing up and down with his movement as he smiled at Sakura.

“I will, Sakura-san!” The male laughed, his movement bringing a small smile to Sakura’s face as the three of them waved their goodbyes to Nirei and Suo, Sakura handed the charm back watching Suo’s eye glitter in appreciation, briefly before shutting the door, Sakura watched with a small gaze as Suo wrapped his jacket around Nirei, slowly pushing the male to rest again.

Sakura only shook his head, fully shutting the door as Tsugeura and Kiryu walked in front of him. The split-haired male bit down a smile as he descended the stairs. Before he left, he looked back up again, hearing muffled laughter coming from upstairs.

Sakura took his time putting on his shoes, his worries from earlier now gone as he watched Tsugeura and Kiryu talk to Nirei’s parents, saying their goodbyes to them whilst Sakura glanced at the young child playing with a toy train.

“Thank you for having us!” The two males waved, and Sakura slowly waved as well, a smile coming to Nirei’s parents' faces as they stood at the door, watching the three males exit their homes. Sakura slowed his pace a bit, and the sun was now setting.

“2,000 yen, they’re dating already,” Kiryu said calmly, his jacket falling a bit again as he pulled out his phone to take a picture of the sunset. Sakura stammered out an incoherent response as Tsugeura’s loud laughter could be heard throughout the block.

Notes:

this is so nerve-wrecking to post lol ;;
normally, I consume media, but I thought I'd give it a try and post something as somebody who has been through multiple fandoms, I love the dynamic of Suo and Nirei and find it criminally underrated at the moment.

I apologize for any mischaracterization or improper use of honorifics. Please let me know!

thank you for reading to the end of chapter 1 and giving this work a shot !!

MY TWITTER (for updates !! or listen to my ranting) :
panaracosm

Chapter 2: Kiryu Mitsuki

Kiryu wasn’t a stranger to weird looks; the stares he received from the street didn’t lessen the sentiment that he was considered an anomaly to others, with his bright pink hair and piercings.

A sign of ‘rebellion”, to be fair, Kiryu did consider that a part of it was originally out of spite against his father. People wouldn’t exactly be wrong to call it a rebellion of sorts.

“Nirei-chan, you have to stop moving,” the male politely chided. Using his elbows, he adjusted Nirei’s body to face forward as he touched up his roots, a concentrated look on his face, where the blonde male pouted, wearing one of his old ratty t-shirts, which was already stained with previous bleach, as he wiggled around a bit.

Kiryu adjusted his sleeves again, pulling one hand free from his glove whilst doing so. He turned around, making sure to position his body so he could still see Nirei’s movement in the mirror as he looked through the conditioners.

Kiryu voiced it aloud before, he was grateful to the smaller male for being so willing to be a guinea pig to his dying sessions— the praise from the blonde haired male and his thankfulness turned this into daily sessions, while Kiryu still got his hair dyed at a salon he was happy to help Nirei with his rowdy hair.

The pink-haired male glanced back, lightly bonking Nirei on the head as he moved towards his phone again, “Ow! Kiryu-san!” Nirei whined, his hands instinctively reaching up to prod at the foil whilst he pouted.

“I told you Nirei-chan, don’t move for a bit, we'll rinse it off in a second.” He said with a fond sigh, taking the last glove remaining off as he patted the area he had hit.

“…but my messages…” The blonde-haired male poked a tongue on his cheek as he shook his head, the foil wrapped around the sections of his hair shook with him. Kiryu pinched his cheek as he grabbed Nirei’s phone, an amused expression on his eyes at Nirei’s eyes widening almost comically.

“Wait Kiryu-san!!” The smaller male reached out, his hand barely missing his phone as Kiryu stepped out of the way, pocketing the device with a small wave of his finger.

Nirei’s pout nearly made him give it back, but he only shook his head, “It won’t be long, just a quick rinse and then toner.” His eyes made a pointed look to remind Nirei, the boy sunk in the seat a bit, remembering just how bad their first dye job was due to forgetting that step.

Kiryu watched as the other one shuddered a bit, nodding his head in reluctant agreement as he sat back down. He eyed the conditioners he placed down earlier, reaching for them before he looked back to Nirei, “Oh yeah, which one did you wanna use, by the way? I bought a different brand because I heard this one smells better.”

He watched as Nirei eyed the two, his gaze flickering in thought before looking back at Kiryu, as he gestured to the new brand. Kiryu nodded his approval, uncapping the bottle to let Nirei smell it.

Nirei leaned forward, his head dipping down a bit as his nose scrunched at the light smell. Kiryu observed his eyes blinking in content, though once he held the conditioner back to him, allowing Kiryu to cap the bottle.

“That one smells nice.” The freckled male crossed his legs on the chair, watching Kiryu’s hand move to check on his hair. “Which brand is that?”

Kiryu secured the foil again, glancing at the conditioner bottle, he clipped the sections together. “Shu Uemura? Yubi blonde, if it doesn’t work out well, we can always just switch back to the other brand, though.” He said softly, his hand pulling out his phone as he started a timer for 10 minutes.

Kiryu watched as Nirei’s eyes followed his movement, a small chuckle coming out of the male standing at the urgency to be on his device. He fished out Nirei’s device, a small smile on his lips at the sparkle in his eyes.

“Your phone is beeping a lot, Nirei-chan, who’s even messaging you right now?” His eyes briefly crinkled as he chuckled, watching the other male’s face flush, amused him as Nirei reached out for his phone.

For the slightest second before the screen went dark again, Kiryu could see at least five messages coming from somebody. He wasn’t able to pick out the name, though, before Nirei laid the phone flat, showing his popcorn case as he shook his head.

“It’s probably Suo-san,” Kiryu paused his movement, his eyes widening a bit in confusion as Nirei kept on talking, Suo? The one who leaves group chats on read, multiple people on delivered— Kiryu at this point has given up on messaging him for some things! He won’t even pick up calls unless you schedule an appointment with him.

It was a little funny watching Suo make Tsugeura schedule an appointment for a phone call, Kiryu’s 90% sure that was only because it was Tsugeura, though. The 10% is still undetermined since he had an actual schedule for it.

The pink-haired male watched as Nirei flipped his phone over, his screen lighting up as he unlocked it. Kiryu stared at his messages, a bit stunned as Nirei confirmed for him that it was Suo who had been messaging for the last five minutes, and they weren’t short texts either.

“The favoritism.” He mumbled under his breath with a small shake of his head. Nirei paused his typing to glance up at the male.

“I’m sorry, Kiryu-san, did you say something?” He tilted his head, the bubbling messages coming from his screen briefly distracted Kiryu again as he only smiled at Nirei.

“No, I’m sorry, it was something silly I remembered just now.” Nirei seemed to be satisfied with that answer as he turned to his phone, “Oh! Kiryu-san, are you okay with taking a picture?” The male gestured after a brief period of silence.

Kiryu glanced up, his eyes looking at Nirei, and the camera app was already open. He nodded his head to showcase his approval as he smiled to the camera, a hand easily wrapping around Nirei’s shoulder when he moved closer.

“Tada! Okay, thank you!” He grinned towards the pink-haired male. Kiryu only nodded once he stood back up, pacing out the room for a brief second to grab some new gloves.

A loud ringing sound sounded shortly after Kiryu got back inside, his alarm reminding him to check the foil. As he regloved himself, Kiryu lightly tapped on his phone to stop the alarm.

Nirei put his phone down, his hands neatly folded, to let Kiryu work as a comfortable silence overtook the two. Kiryu gently adjusted the foil, rising with Nirei as he gestured him to the bathtub, he grabbed the small stool as he cuffed his pants, raising them to try and avoid getting water on them.

A loud ringing sounded, it startled the both of them as they jolted up, Kiryu let go of the shower head slowly stepping out of the tub, Nirei was about to stand and follow but Kiryu patted the top of his head as a way of telling him to stay put on the stool, reluctantly he walked over to the sink.

Glancing at the caller, the male scoffed a bit, “Wow, Nirei-chan, I think you have an admirer.” The mentioned male perked up at that, his head peeking past the curtains with a curious gaze. Kiryu watched his face morph with laughter as Nirei waved him over.

With ease, Kiryu handed him the phone, stepping back into the tub. Suo’s voice could be heard filtering through Nirei’s phone automatically; a rather ugly perspective of his face being shown as Nirei waved to him, small giggles coming out from the blonde as Suo adjusted his phone.

“Hello Nirei-kun, Kiryu-kun.” His tone was more clipped, saying Kiryu’s name, the male in question rolled his eyes as he was out of view, “Hello Suo-chan!” His voice sounded more friendly than the other's, setting the shower head down; he started the water as he unraveled the foil on Nirei’s head.

A small squeak sounded from the blonde as he angled his camera up; in this perspective, Kiryu could see Suo better; the eyepatched male seemed curious at what was going on. His face moved closer to the screen on autopilot as Kiryu bit back a laugh at the slightest frown appearing on Suo’s normally collected face.

“Why’d you move the camera? What’s going on?” His questions came out almost whiny; there was still the collected tone behind it, but Kiryu could only click his tongue at the desperation oozing through it. One glance at Nirei, and he knew the male couldn’t tell that the burgundy-haired male was down bad for him.

“My hair is all funky right now, Suo-san!” Nirei frowned, while Suo only got a view of the ceiling, he could still hear the laughter erupting from Kiryu, his frown becoming more prominent in the pierced male’s view as he ruffled Nirei’s hair.

“It can’t be that bad, Nirei-kun, I can’t see you.” He pointed out, adjusting his camera as he seemed to realize he was at a bad angle. Kiryu watched the male lean back a bit more naturally, the camera no longer shoved in his forehead, he grabbed the phone though, making sure Nirei was out of view as he set it on the bathtub’s edge to avoid any water damage.

Kiryu slightly adjusted the water temperature as he listened to Nirei talk, “It’s uneven— and Suo-san, I offered for you to join us…” Kiryu perked up at that, now that was unexpected news, as he couldn’t resist asking the question filtered out of his mouth with little to no hesitation, “Is your hair dyed too, Suo-chan?”

Silence took over the call, minus the sound of water running, as Nirei paused, and Suo could be heard shuffling through the other end. “So—“

Kiryu shut his mouth as Suo cut him off, the male’s tone chipped away more at his calm facade. Kiryu giggled upon hearing his words, softly guiding Nirei’s head down to wash at it as he handed him the shower head.

“Wouldn’t you like to know Kiryu-kun?” Suo huffed out, the sound of water might’ve intrigued him, as now the only view he could get was of the tiled wall to the bathtub. “Dying hair is a valuable skill to learn.”

Kiryu rolled his eyes again. At Suo’s lame excuse, he lathered his hands in conditioner as he softly worked his way through Nirei’s roots, gently prodding at the hair to make sure each section was evenly conditioned.

“Mhm!” Nirei’s enthusiasm cut through. The water was a bit cold, but he still washed it over Kiryu’s hands, making sure the conditioner got off before handing him the shower head again. It was a system the two were used to, “Sorry, Suo-san! Maybe next time we’ll invite you…”

Kiryu took this as an opportunity for a little petty revenge. He shook his hand free of water as he laid the shower head against the tub, allowing the water to run free. he grabbed the phone and pointed it at himself.

“Nope!” He said, popping the p as he looked past the phone to Nirei, “Exclusive to people who dye their hair, sorry Suo-chan.” Even his sorry was mocking to the ears as Suo briefly stared at the phone. His one eye shut as he smiled; yet Kiryu could almost see the veins popping out of his forehead.

“I’m sure Nirei-kun is fine with me being there?” Kiryu took a glance towards Nirei, the water dripping down his forehead in a slow motion as the blonde looked conflicted on who to side with, “I-I mean Kiryu-san doesn’t dye—“ Kiryu raised an eyebrow towards Nirei, a playful wink at the other male made Nirei pout before nodding in understanding.

“Sorry, Suo-san! Exclusive hangouts..” It was worth seeing Suo’s eye widen in surprise, a rare look that Kiryu relished in for a few seconds before putting the phone back down.

“We’ll all see each other tomorrow, though!” Nirei happily pointed out, he shuffled a bit to move his head down as Kiryu grabbed hold of the shower head again. Water dripped down Nirei’s head, the conditioner smoothly rinsing out. Kiryu gently pulled at the hair to make sure no remnants of conditioner were left, and he grabbed a towel to pat on Nirei’s head.

As he leant over to turn the faucet off, he watched Nirei slowly adjust the towel to cover his hair better, now properly grabbing his phone to angle it towards himself. “Okay, Suo-san!! We’ll see you tomorrow at Furin!” Nirei waved, and he turned the camera to face Kiryu as the pink-haired male gave a small peace sign, waving it around to signal his goodbyes.

Suo blankly looked at the camera before saying his goodbyes with a rather neutral expression. Kiryu could smell the male’s poorly conceited jealousy from over here. “Goodbye, Nirei-kun! Kiryu-kun.” He had to fight back another eye roll; this favoritism issue was getting out of hand.

At the ring of the FaceTime being ended, Kiryu stood back up, extending a hand out to help Nirei out of the tub. He didn’t blame Suo for his favoritism; he supposed it was hard to dislike Nirei after all, when one of the male’s charms was his curiosity.

Kiryu gently guided the male back in front of the sink, watching Nirei sit down as he went back through the products looking for the toner. “I feel like we should go for a softer blonde next time.” He suggested, clipping up Nirei’s hair, the male glanced up at him with a small head tilt.

“Would it look better? I think it’ll clash too much with my eyebrows unless we dye it too, Kiryu-san..” At Nirei’s words, Kiryu moved his bangs out of the way, frowning and shaking his head. “Maybe an experiment for another time, blonde eyebrows are kinda tough to pull off. Trust me.” He said, a small shiver, remembering his previous attempts, it was a phase he was going through.

Nirei seemed curious, though, as his mouth formed a small ‘o’ shape, Kiryu flicked his forehead gently, causing his hands to fly up to it with a small ouch. “Don’t think about it, Nirei-chan. You can’t add that to your notebook.” Kiryu scolded, he could hear the embarrassment lingering in his tone; seeing Nirei frown made him a little worried, but he simply patted the male's head again.

“But yes, a softer blonde might look nicer, we don’t have to experiment now, though the blonde you normally go for is plenty nice.” He snapped the gloves back on, mixing the toner in a small bowl on the side as he began running the brush through Nirei’s hair. Nirei slowed down his talking, his movement more still as he allowed Kiryu to work. A soft hum came from him still as Kiryu moved along.

“Alright, let that rest and then one final rinse if you like how it turns out.” He smiled, shrugging the gloves off after he smoothed the toner into his bleached hair, the orange strands being smothered in purple. “I think that should be the appropriate amount, though..let's wait like 15 minutes this time.” Kiryu adjusted Nirei’s bangs, clipping them to the side.

“Do you want any snacks, Nirei-chan?” Nirei peeked up at that, his hair swishing to the side in a light moment as he seemed to consider Kiryu’s words. “I’m okay, Kiryu-san!” The male smiled, Kiryu nodded at his response, stepping outside of the bathroom briefly to go find something to eat his hand hesitated on the door knob as he shouted lightly.

“Let me know if you need anything, I’ll be back in 5!” Kiryu walked around the room, rummaging through his bag. he pulled out an assortment of sweets as he sat down on a nearby chair. Pulling out his phone, Kiryu pushed back his pink hair out of his eyes as he sat back a bit.

With his device in his hand, he typed away, pulling out a piece of chocolate to eat. His fingers paused on the matching blocks game he was playing, a curious glance up confirmed Nirei was still left to his own devices in the bathroom as Kiryu opened up his messages app.

Scrolling through a long list of contacts, he finally placed a finger on Suo’s contact; the ID was very short, a simple ‘Suo-chan’ with a cat emoticon following his name. Kiryu grinned a bit before clicking on the messages. It has been a while since he messaged Suo, and their responses were very brief. Kiryu was the last one to message in their chat, asking where Suo had gone.

As he placed the half-eaten chocolate piece back down, his eyes glinted with mischief. The large delivered icon gleamed back almost in challenge. Kiryu happily skipped back up, pushing his phone back in his pocket. “Nirei-chan, can I come in?” Kiryu knocked gently against the door, his eyes flickered down to the shadows underneath, watching it move around, before a voice sounded back to him.

“Oh! Give me a second, Kiryu-san,” The sound of running water was evident as Kiryu stood outside, one hand scratching at his eyebrow, piercing with a contemplative hum piercing. “Take your time, I’m just checking in on the toner.” Kiryu points out, messing with the tips of his hair, he waits for the soft click of the door to sound, a sign that Nirei was unlocking the door before stepping in as he prodded at the male's hair upon his arrival.

“It actually might be fine now if you wanna rinse it?” He pinched the hair between his fingers, twirling it around slightly as he tilted his head to look at it closer. “If we leave it on anymore, your hair is gonna die.” A small joke to lighten the mood, watching Nirei’s face wither caused him to backtrack, though, as he walked with the male to the tub again.

“Kidding! Mostly,” Kiryu shrugged, the stool from earlier being grabbed and placed back in the tub. Once Nirei sat down, Kiryu twisted the faucet head, water quickly pouring out at a fast pace again as he tested it.

Brushing his fingers through Nirei’s roots, he slowly lowered the male’s head to avoid water getting on his clothes. Simultaneously, he grabbed the shower head, letting go of Nirei’s hair to twist at the faucet head, switching where the water was coming out. “Let me know if it’s too cold, Nirei-chan.”

He gently reminded the male, lowering the shower head to wet the hair again. The slightest flinch came from Nirei at the temperature, his body readapting to the chill; Kiryu tapped his shoulder to get the male to hold onto the shower head as he began lathering his fingers with the conditioner from earlier.

The light smell of peonies invaded the bathroom once Kiryu began slowly rubbing the conditioner into the male’s hair. A stream of water was the only noise occupying them before Nirei began speaking, “Does it look okay?”.

Kiryu took a peek at his hair; compared to the rest, it was slightly lighter, but it was practically unnoticeable, so Kiryu nodded. “Yeah, it looks fine. Super cute Nirei-chan! Blonde suits you.” The male smiled, grabbing the shower head back from the male’s smaller hands, starting the rinse process again as Nirei’s small nod of appreciation was noticed.

As he bent forward to stop the flow of water, Nirei kept his head down, allowing water to drip at a fast pace before slowing down gradually. Kiryu hung the shower head back up, stretching his back as he stood, a small pop sounding with a yawn as he shook his head.

“Oh, hold on, let me grab your towel.” Kiryu hummed, turning around and grabbing the yellow towel that was hanging off a hook. “Also, if you like the conditioner feel free to take it, just remember to bring it over next time we dye your hair.”

“Thank you, Kiryu-san.” Nirei softly said, his eyes crinkling into a smile. Kiryu couldn’t help but shut his own eyes into a smile at that, a ‘no worries’ slipping out before he stepped back to give the blonde some space.

“I mean it! You’re helping so much, and this takes a lot of time out of your day..since you get your hair done at a salon and all that.” Nirei pointed out, drying his hair with the towel as he spoke. Kiryu only tilted his head with a small laugh.

“It’s no worries, Nirei-chan, I’m happy to help, plus we get to chat more outside of Furin.” Kiryu helped the other boy up, a chorus of thanks being chanted from Nirei before the blonde laid the towel to rest around his neck. He watched as Nirei rubbed the back of his neck, the boy's shirt slightly damp at the collar despite his best efforts to keep it dry.

“Oh, right, before you go, are you okay with taking a picture?” Kiryu questioned, his eyes flickering down to his phone and back up to the male. Nirei seemed to smile at that, though, as he nodded, giving a small thumbs up.

“Yeah, of course! Wait, let me dry my hair a bit better first.” He shuffled the towel over his head again. Kiryu pulled his phone out in the meantime, already pulling out his camera app, he snapped a quick picture of Nirei drying his hair.

A smirk on his lips as he opened up his messages, scrolling through again before he tapped on the one with Suo. Kiryu opened up his albums, the image he took earlier was a clear picture of Nirei messing with the towel, his face slightly hidden behind the towel due to drying his hair, but it was obvious who it was.

Kiryu clicked on the photo, sending it to Suo. He began typing a message before Nirei’s voice brought him back to where he was. “Okay, Kiryu-san! Let's take the photo.” Kiryu glanced up, seeing Nirei shuffling closer to where he was standing as the male adjusted himself.

Kiryu looked down before switching out of his messages to the camera app he lowered himself down a bit to position his face next to Nirei as he snapped the picture. “Thanks, Nirei-chan!” The male smiled, waving his hand with his phone once Nirei nodded enthusiastically towards him.

“Of course! Send me the picture later, I’m gonna head out soon.” His eyes trailed behind Kiryu once he finished talking. Kiryu stepped out of the way, allowing Nirei to leave the bathroom, the conditioner bottle in his hand. He looked towards his phone again, opening the messages app, finishing his message, and sending another photo.

A glance towards the usual ‘delivered’ icon left him in shock as instead a ‘Read’ icon was now there, Kiryu examined the empty bathroom, hearing Nirei humming in the other room he sent another quick message, watching the three bubbles pop up before a thumbs up emoji was reacted on his latest message.

‘Isn’t Nirei-chan cute?’ Kiryu rolled his eyes. the simple reaction wasn’t enough to confirm his suspicions about Suo’s feelings towards the other male, but how quickly he read Kiryu’s messages... well, that spoke otherwise.

He’s probably a little bit jealous if Kiryu had to guess, “Ah, I’m off now, Kiryu-san! Thank you again for the conditioner and help!” Nirei’s voice sounded from the other room. Kiryu peeked out, waving his goodbyes to Nirei.

“No worries, Nirei-chan! I’ll see you at Furin tomorrow!” He waved using both hands, a light-hearted smile on his face, hearing the door click. He put his hands down, brushing his hair back, finally getting rid of the barrette holding his hair together. Kiryu looked towards the shut door, a small smile on his face as he pulled out his phone to play a few games before heading to bed.

- - - + - - -

Short footsteps sounded through the halls. Kiryu adjusted his jacket as he tugged at the collar of his outfit. The sun had risen a short while ago, his phone reading 8:24 AM, still early into the day, but he was running a tiny bit late to ‘class’. He was busy helping out an elderly man with his groceries earlier, rendering him around 20 minutes later than normal, scratching the back of his head as he slipped through the doors.

Kiryu gave a small wave to the others, shuffling to the back of the classroom. He felt a piercing glare on him when he pulled out his phone, a small shiver running down his body as he glanced back up.

His eyes darted around the room before landing on Suo, the male in question was occasionally nodding to Sakura’s words, the captain rambling on about something. Kiryu squinted at Suo, watching him just barely hide his stare-down at Kiryu when Sakura turned. A loud crash broke the staring contest, Kiryu whipped his head over to the source, even Tsugeura seemed to pause mid pull-up as he glanced towards the door.

“Sorry! Sorry!” Kiryu watched Nirei immediately stand up, dusting his pants off as he bowed. The others lightly laughed at his entrance, patting him on the back as he strolled down the aisle. A light flush remained on his cheeks from his unexpected trip, yet Kiryu could only see the hand reaching out to pull Nirei down to his seat, lightly rubbing his shoulder.

Kiryu gazed for no longer than a second before he looked back up, watching Nirei animatedly explain his predicament to Sakura. He couldn’t stop his eyes from analyzing the sight before him. It didn’t feel like a stretch to describe the way Suo looked at Nirei speaking, his eyes inexplicably soft on the blonde male.

Kiryu smiled, about to turn back down to his game before Suo’s words caused an eyeroll. “Nirei-kun, your hair looks a bit lighter on top, Kiryu-kun didn’t do a very good job, hm..” His tone was kept neutral, if anything a small smile on his face as an apology for cutting Nirei off. Yet Kiryu could tell there was a heavy jealous undertone with the male’s words.

“E-eh is it lighter on top???” Nirei’s panicked tone caused him to dip his head down as if he could see the hair himself. Kiryu watched Sakura glance at it, the split-haired male scoffing at Suo’s words.

“I didn’t even notice ‘'til you said something, Suo,” Sakura said. Kiryu wanted to stick his tongue out at his small victory over the other male, but Suo seemed to just click his tongue at Sakura’s words.

“My my, Sakura-kun, I think your eyes are getting worse.” An arm wrapped around Nirei’s shoulder, an intimate gesture that caused Sakura’s eyes to avert and his face to flush. What a dirty cheater, Kiryu stared, his eyes narrowing.

“It still looks nice though, Nirei-kun. It smells nice as well.” The blonde tilted his body to face Suo, a relieved sigh leaving his face as Kiryu saw Suo make brief eye contact with him, a smirk lying on his lips while Kiryu scowled. What a nasty guy to get on the bad side of.

He sighed, shaking his head while the trio seemed to get into a different conversation about the fragrant smell emitting from the now fully blonde hair once Nirei was reassured that it was fine, Kiryu looked back down at his screen, seeing the large ‘game over!” flashing at him.

His frown seemed to get deeper as he immediately went to message Suo, his calm demeanor lost as the streak he held in the game was now broken.

‘You need to get yourself together, Suo-chan! Jealousy is ugly~’ He angrily tapped at the keyboard on his phone, his eyes glancing up occasionally to sneer at the burgundy-haired male. Once he hit send, he felt a wave of satisfaction run over him, hearing the ding of Suo’s phone.

The second Nirei and Sakura seemed to be busy talking to each other, Kiryu watched Suo briefly turn around to scan the male, making a show of pulling his phone out, which he never did in front of others before tucking it back in, smiling.

One confirmation, looking back down at his phone confirmed that he was left on ‘delivered’ again, he could feel the headache starting to form as he typed another message out, this time, it caused something to hit his forehead square in the center as others turned to him at the noise he let out.

‘I hope you know I’m the reason his hair smells like that btw.’

Notes:

tadaaa !! i cut out like 2k words from this to move it to a different chapter because the scenes were a little funky all put together

besides that, kiryu’s perspective was so fun to write and jealous suo was veryy interesting to dabble in.

is his hair dyed?? hmmm we’ll never know..

thank you for reading until the end of chapter 2, hope you guys enjoyed !!

EXTRA NOTES:
chapter 3 may take a bit longer to get out compared to the first two since i’m working out the kinks of how to write this character..

honestlyy my editor is calling me a little insane because i wrote this hella fast while whisking away at a different fic so hi bee if you see this love you thanks for editing my work ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡

its another long fic but i’m planning to publish it after chapter 3 is released for this work just to see if people are interested in the concept (aka its been rotting at my brain since i started writing chapter two for this fic lol) ! i wanna give both works my proper attention and my editor did point out that it’ll take longer for chapters to get out if i write like this so we’ll see how it works out!!

my twitter (for updates / rants !!):
panaracosm

Chapter 3: Sugishita Kyotaro

Notes:

my twitter (for updates / rants !!):
panaracosm

* this chapter was not beta read

Water trickled on the plants, Sugishita adjusted his watering can to give more attention to the neglected areas. His eyebrows furrowed together in concentration; the tomatoes had to look good this harvest.

He crouched down, setting the watering can down with him to pick at the leaves. They looked fine, but upon closer inspection, he probably had to spray a repellent sometime soon; the bugs were gnawing on it again.

He huffed, standing back up and looming over the plants as if it would scare the bugs away. Walking around the garden beds to move on to the next area, a slight flutter of wind brushed past him, and he hunched over, hands tight on the watering can.

“. . .” Sugishita made a noise, an unsatisfied rumble in the back of his throat. The vegetables here looked rather sad; a few were wilting for unknown reasons, and yesterday there was hardly any improvement either.

If Sugishita recalled correctly, it had been like this all week; no amount of water or sunlight helped it. He’d wanted to research what it needed, but most of the searches sent him back to the same spot. It was disappointing, but it couldn’t be helped.

He sighed, a pensive look on his face, before going to take care of the next plants. If that bundle wanted to die, it wasn’t worth spending extra time trying to care for it if it meant neglecting the other plants.

Sugishita pushed his hair back, a frown on his lips when he moved on to the next garden bed. He continued his task silently, a look of determination to let the plants showing signs of success harvest properly, Umemiya would be satisfied with this.

A loud bang caught his attention, dragging his eyes off the plants to look at who had intruded on the roof. Bouncy yellow hair met his eyes. The small male was panting, holding his knees before he picked himself up again to slowly walk towards the garden bed. He looked disheveled.

“Sorry Sugishita-san!! Agh, you didn’t do a lot without me, did you?” The blonde asked, Sugishita tilted his head upwards, standing up a bit straighter, his eyes lingered on the new bandages fitting the male’s face. He didn’t ask questions, but he shook his head. Nirei, the blonde, seemed to be getting a lot more injuries lately.

Upon further inspection, which was more squinting on Sugishita’s part while Nirei blurted out apologies and put on gloves to take care of the plants with Sugishita, his fingers were laced with bandages as well. Sugishita pursed his lips to one side. It was concerning that somebody who didn’t fight was getting injured that much.

“Why are you late?” Sugishita muttered out, he accepted the gloves Nirei handed him, watching the male immediately set to patting the dry soil down, further picking at some leaves. “It’s already…” He glanced towards the clock, “ten in the morning.”

Nirei looked up, a tint of red on his cheeks when he freed one hand from a glove to rub the back of his neck, “Oh, I overslept. It’s so embarrassing I haven’t done that since I was a kid.” His words jumbled together at the speed he was talking. Sugishita looked towards the plant, his scowl fading away when he set his gloves down.

It was quiet for a while after, just the noises of rustling and the occasional noise popping out of Nirei, but the silence didn’t last for long, though. “Oh, the shungiku still aren’t good…” Sugishita grumbled, looking to the side in disdain due to the poor condition of the plant.

“It’s okay, Sugishita-san! Maybe they’re just going through a rough patch.” Nirei happily exclaimed, his joy made Sugishita soften a bit, but he was still irritated, a plant that typically thrived under any circumstance going through a rough patch under his care was annoying to say the least.

He mumbled his agreements regardless of the hesitation he felt, looking back up when he heard Nirei humming towards the plant; soft encouragement to grow faster and not die on them. His eyes lingered on the bandages covering his cheek.

“Did you hurt yourself?” Sugishita pointed towards Nirei’s cheek, his grip on the watering can loosening to gesture towards the other individual. He watched Nirei immediately reach up to touch his face, soiled hands on the clean bandage. Sugishita frowned more, watching him shake his head frantically.

“No, I didn’t! Um…it was from an accident, earlier, yesterday, maybe the day before.” His small laugh bundled with his anxious ramble didn’t help Sugishita at all. Normally, the taller male wouldn’t care about something like this, but if Nirei had gone out of his way to lie and try to hide it. There was some concern that raised his suspicions; the blonde had practically always worn bandages on his face for the last few months or so.

Sugishita didn’t budge, though, his eyes focused on Nirei with an intensity that caused the smaller one to look away, patting down frantically at the plants. “Okay.” He simply said, dropping the conversation. He tightened his grip on the watering can, trudging along to another garden bed to continue his task.

Footsteps scurried near him; his vision was a bit obscured by his hair, but he paid no mind to Nirei working next to him. “Bugs,” He said. Nirei glanced up from where he was crouching, shifting his head in confusion. “There might be bugs there.”

“Bugs?” He watched Nirei look back down, making sure the blonde wasn’t messing up any of the plants after hearing that, “We should buy a repellent then…maybe that’s what's messing up the shungiku!” His small gasp of revelation caused Sugishita to think, glancing back towards the clock to see that 20 minutes had passed by.

“Let’s go.” He settled on standing up and grabbing the back of Nirei’s jacket to drag him up. The male made a small squeak in surprise at being dragged up.

“W-wait, I can’t, Sugishita-san!” His stutter left Sugishita confused, letting go of his hold on Nirei while the male picked himself up, readjusting and scratching his neck in a sorrowful manner. “Sorry, I have plans later on...”

Sugishita squinted at the smaller one, his eyes narrowing with each small movement, “I can buy it myself, though! Um, later.” He unconsciously scratched at his bandage when he said that, picking at the ones on his hands. The movement didn’t go unnoticed.

A thought passed by Sugishita when that happened. After the fight against KEEL, he had been appearing more busted up than usual. Had Nirei been getting picked on by other people for not fighting as well?

It was a fleeting thought, yet it still plagued his mind when he saw Nirei adjust his sleeves down again, covering his hands.

“Anyways, I think you handled mostly everything up here! We should head down soon, it’s bright.” Nirei whined, making a mock cover for his face with his hands. Sugishita nodded, placing down his watering can to tidy up the place before he wandered back downstairs.

“You can go first, I’m gonna talk to Umemiya-san.” He murmured, already walking off before Nirei could respond. It seemed the male heard him, though if his loud “Okay Sugishita-san!” was anything to go by.

Sugishita trudged over, keeping his pace even with each step he took. Nirei was practically vibrating near him. The blonde opened the stairwell to go back down, waving goodbye to Sugishita. Sugishita waved in response before the door was properly shut, a softer click this time in comparison to his entrance.

“Sugishita! Hey!!” Umemiya’s voice boomed on the rooftop, the white-haired male retracted his attention from the four kings who were in an easy conversation amongst themselves, eyes drawn up to glance towards Sugishita with small smiles.

“I’m done watering.” He announced, eyes dragging on everybody before settling on Umemiya, the leader seemed to beam even more at that.

“Oh, thank you, Sugishita! You’re a lot of help.” Umemiya gave a thumbs up, his other hand reaching to pat Sugishita’s arm. Sugishita lowered his head more as a way of saying thank you to the other male.

“Was Nirei up here with you?” Tsubaki’s deeper voice cut in. The male was fiddling with his hair, a curious gaze in his eyes, when Sugishita looked over to him.

Another nod to satisfy his question, Tsubaki seemed to smile at that. “Wow! I didn’t know you and Nirei were close.” Sugishita shrugged; he wouldn’t consider them close. The blonde was just a really curious person. He’d consider Nirei tolerable; the short male was respectful, and while he was pushy for information, it didn’t exactly bother him.

Unexpectedly, he blurted out his worries, “He’s okay. I don’t know, he gets injured a lot.” Umemiya turned his head up at that, looking at Tsubaki in confusion when the male gave a knowing hum.

“That’s true! Nirei does seem to be getting hurt more frequently.” Sugishita withered a bit at that, his posture slouching down more when Umemiya laughed, making him look up.

“Is it worrying you?” He considered the male’s words. Sugishita wasn’t sure if he was worried for the boy; it was more upsetting to think that the male was getting picked on than anything.

“I guess..” He murmured, a scowl coming back on his face when he kept thinking about it. “He doesn’t fight so.” Sugishita tilted his head, his hair moving in sync with the movement, unsure of how to phrase his words.

“So are you trying to protect him?” Tsubaki’s tease caused him to reel back, his eyes sharpening in response. The king threw his head back in a laugh, seeing Sugishita’s reaction. Seeing Umemiya smile at the tease made him grumble.

“Isn’t that already Suo’s job?” Hiragi said, breaking his conversation with Mizuki to pipe in. A thoughtful hum came from Tsubaki before they nodded. Sugishita shifted where he stood; it felt like he was in the middle of their gossip time.

“Anyways, Sugishita.” Umemiya caught his attention, dragging his eyes back to the white-haired male. “Don’t worry too much about it, just talk to Nirei about it, yeah?” He gave a reassuring thumbs up, Sugishita looked back and forth before mumbling his agreement.

He bowed in respect before turning and leaving. A loud “You got this, Sugishita!” came from behind him. He slouched even more, hurrying his pace to get out of there. It was embarrassing to think about, but he had no clue how to approach the small blonde and ask him what’s going on.

He scratched his palm, opening the door to walk back down. He didn’t feel close enough to ask Nirei about his injuries; it felt like he was prying into his personal space, and that was awkward.

When he thinks about it, Nirei does constantly seek out personal information from people or find it himself…somehow, so maybe it wouldn’t be too bad to just go up and ask the blonde. He doesn’t seem like he’s hiding the injuries either, so other people had to have noticed. His face hardened when he walked to the first-year floor.

At the same time, he’d rather ask Nirei about it than ask one of the other four close to him. It was a headache to try to make out Sakura’s words. Kiryuu was okay, but Sugishita didn’t feel like sitting through that…Tsugeura wasn’t even an option...and Suo.

He froze behind the door, hearing loud chatter. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt like it’d be dangerous to try and ask Suo. Memories of him flipping out at the KEEL fight guaranteed that if he heard about Nirei possibly being picked on by others, it’d just end bloody. He scratched his head. It was weird that the one-eyed guy wasn’t doing anything, though. Nirei was constantly around him and Sakura, so he had to have seen the plaster of bandages on his face.

Grumbling to himself, he slid open the door, and bodies shifted to face the noise before they resumed their conversations upon seeing who it was. Sugishita trudged over to his seat, eyeing the blonde who was now happily talking to the captain and co-vice captain.

Absentmindedly, he gazed down to where Nirei’s hands rested, a slender, bigger hand was on his, it was flicking over where the bandages were in a circular motion.

“What are you looking at?” Sugishita scowled, looking up at Sakura now, where the male was giving him pointed looks, his voice was a snap back to reality, though. He was staring a bit too long, given that Suo seemed to be looking at him curiously, his previous motions stopping to retract his hand back to himself.

“Sakura-san!” Nirei frowned, his smacks on him were a light-hearted warning at the tone of aggression he had. “Be nice! Hi Sugishita-san!” Nirei scolded, turning back to Sugishita and waving towards the man.

“Hi.” He murmured, mustering up his courage to ask about why Nirei was busted up that badly, but it was quickly taken away when Sakura snarked out another comment.

“He’s looking at you all funny.” The split-haired male squinted at Sugishita. Sugishita threw his own look towards Sakura, anger bubbling up; it was cut short when Suo, a voice of reason, spoke.

“Nire-kun was upstairs with him earlier, Sakura-kun, and we are the loudest people here.” His response was curt, hands folding neatly in front of him to look over at Sugishita with a small smile. Sugishita turned away and slumped down on his desk. He could talk to Nirei later when he wasn’t surrounded by those two.

He positioned his hands underneath to cushion his head, turning his head to look outside the window while the three behind him continued to talk. He wouldn’t say he intended to eavesdrop, but they were being overly loud, Sugishita was tempted to punch the male until he said something of interest.

“...actually, Nirei, you do look like you have five new bandages.” The tone was sharp, an undertone of wanting to know what had happened was clearly there, along with shuffling. There was that anxious laughter again from the blonde. Sugishita opened his eyes, yet didn’t turn around.

“I tripped yesterday! Wait, no, no, I tripped this morning getting to Furin, that’s why I was late.” Nirei’s ramble made Sugishita’s eyebrows furrow together even more; his excuses were beyond pitiful, and honestly, he wasn’t prepared to hear the next words come out. He wanted to slam his head against his desk.

“Oh. Okay, yeah, that makes sense...tripping…again...” Sakura exclaimed, the bandages were on his face for crying out loud, and there were far too many for this to be a simple fall. Sugishita groaned just thinking about it, asking the others was definitely out of the question if this is how Nirei would react; if he’s lying to Sakura, there’s a high chance he wouldn’t tell Sugishita the truth.

He slowly exhaled; the conversation behind him was drifting elsewhere. His mind was still occupied figuring out the cause behind Nirei’s skittish behavior and the reason he was hiding it; it wasn’t bothering him that much, though. The male would tell the others if something was truly wrong, right?

- - - - - -

It was bothering him beyond belief, which is why he’s chalked it up to the fact that it was inevitable he’d pull something stupid like this. Sugishita ducked behind a wall, chest heaving when a cat pawed at his ankle, he stared it down. The cat stared back, one final meow of dominance before it pranced away.

“Oh, a cat!! Hi, kitty.” There was a cooing noise. Sugishita hesitantly peeked his head out from behind the wall, eyes only watching Nirei slightly kneel to pet the cat who was tormenting him earlier; the cat was now unmistakably calm, loud purrs vibrating through its tiny body. Sugishita couldn’t find it in himself to curse the cat, but it was trying to ruin his stealth mission.

In theory, he didn’t expect to be trailing the blonde around town because he had attempted to go to sleep after unintentionally eavesdropping on the trio’s conversation, but he hadn’t been able to sleep; there was a loud ping from Nirei’s phone that caused the blonde to scramble up and make up a lot of excuses nearly tripping over himself ‘again’ to leave.

He wasn’t the only one puzzled, yet nobody did anything but laugh a bit and say “Classic Nirei!” Sugishita scowled. That was his last straw. The lame excuses he could maybe tolerate another six or so of them, but everybody brushing this off for some reason didn’t sit right with him.

Sugishita grabbed a random newspaper, practically smothering his face in it when Nirei suddenly looked around. He could faintly hear his heart rate picking up when somebody tapped on his shoulder, whipping his head around, narrowly dodging Sugishita’s hair flying at them.

“Excuse me, sir, are you buying that?”

Blinking down, Sugishita realized he had a death grip on the newspaper as he slowly folded it back up, shaking his head. The stall’s owner seemed to laugh nervously at that, nodding their head while looking up at him.

“Okay…can I have it back..?” Sugishita looked at them for a second, about to hand it back, his eyes darting to where Nirei was standing. The blonde was nowhere to be seen. In a panic, he practically threw the newspaper back at the person. A startled noise left them just as Sugishita began walking to see where the male had gone.

His eyes darted across different shops; they were in a section of the town Sugishita didn’t frequent. He swiveled his head, lingering no longer than a few seconds on unfamiliar attire until he recognized Furin’s jacket.

He slowed his pace, an attempt to blend into the crowd was made, but it was awkward given his height as he slouched down more. Nirei was walking into a store; Sugishita glanced up. It was a jewelry store? His nose scrunched in confusion, but he continued his stride, just stopping short of the store.

It was rather empty and bleak, the furniture inside was minimalistic to a tea, and it didn’t look like someplace Nirei would frequent given his rather abstract fashion. Sugishita scratched the back of his head. Aside from the store being a very traditional front, there wasn’t anything exactly wrong.

“Nirei-chan!!” A male hopped out from the back of the store, excitedly waving their hands to the blonde. Sugishita squinted, taking in the appearance of the guy who was rather ordinary, perhaps a young adult, given that he seemed to be the only person running the store.

“Oh, Takeo-san, hi! Is Yaeko-san not here today?” Sugishita watched Nirei look around. The man was nervously drumming his fingers around the desk.

“Nope! We’re getting closer to the due date, so I told her to stay home for today.”

“Ohh! That makes sense.” Nirei nodded, his hands stilled against the glass countertop while the male, Takeo, moved about, grabbing something from the counter. Sugishita tensed. This is when he had to make a move. Just as he was about to go in, his hand stopped on the doorknob, and he turned around.

“Where is Suo today, by the way?” The conversation was muffled, almost like Takeo had intentionally been quiet. Sugishita watched the way Nirei’s ears flushed.

“Oh, um, we’re meeting later…I didn’t want him to know about this since it was a gift.” He murmured, his hands moved to grab the thing Takeo pulled out.

“Young love! So cute, I still remember the days me and Yaeko gave each other stuff.” Sugishita stiffened even more, his mouth dropping in surprise at the words that just came out, young love?

“No-no, no it’s not like that, Takeo-san!!” Nirei’s loud outburst caused the man to laugh even more, “Suo-san’s just– agh, he’s really helpful, and amazing, but um..it’s…” Sugishita couldn’t catch the last part, Nirei’s voice got quieter to the point where it wouldn't slip by the tiny crack in between the door.

“I’m just teasing,” The man reached out to pat Nirei’s head, ringing up the item. Nirei was still a bright red despite the male’s reassurance, and Sugishita loosened his grip on the nearby pillar. He only relaxed a bit, shoulders slumping with his movement as he backed away from the door.

“Nirei-chan, I’m cheering you on though!” The male called out, a loud laugh rang through the otherwise empty store, with Nirei sputtering out his small disdain towards the adult.

Sugishita quickly stepped away from the door, his hands shoved back into his pockets while he pulled his phone out, looking at the time. Umemiya was partially right; maybe Sugishita had nothing to worry about, but this was one incident to go off of, he’d have to see more.

A strong force suddenly pushed him down to the ground. Passersby gasped, but none of them bothered to stop. Sugishita was about to grumble when he saw his phone a few meters away from him before recognizing the voice.

“Oh my!! I am so, so sorry, mister, there was a rock-eurgh and I didn’t see you!!” It was a bit high, clearly flustered, but Sugishita remained on the ground even as the person picked themselves up. It was Nirei, undeniably him, from the way the blonde flailed about before picking himself up, Sugishita wanted to dig a hole into the ground and live there. There was no way the blonde wouldn’t be able to recognize him.

“Did I knock you out? Oh goodness, I think I just killed somebody. Wait, where’s my phone? Oh my goodness.” He blabbered about, “I need to call 119– oh, but I’d be in trouble if you died. I mean, I don’t think I’m heavy enough to knock somebody out. Hello, mister, how much do you weigh?? Wait, maybe you have some medical thing though agh, please wake up!!”

Nirei shook his body, and Sugishita grumbled out a response, ceasing his motion. Finally shifting his head back to look at Nirei, the blonde’s eyes widened in recognition, clicking in after his panic.

“Eh?! Sugishita-san??” Sugishita watched the teenager’s face whiten, hands immediately trying to help him up while he flipped over to sit up.

“Hi.” He said, moving his hair about as he reached behind him to grab his phone.

“W-what are you doing out here— better yet, are you okay? I thought I killed somebody, Sugishita-san!!” The male whacked his shoulder, a light-hearted whack not meant to inflict more damage, but Sugishita grunted regardless. It was a bit embarrassing to be caught in the act, so he shook his head, standing up to dust himself off.

“I’m fine. I was—“

“Oh! Were you buying the bug repellent?” Nirei tilted his head. The male gave a perfect cover-up to Sugishita’s actions, so all he did was nod. Nirei seemed to be satisfied with this, the way he beamed up at Sugishita before grabbing his wrist to pull them off to the side more.

Sugishita stiffened. Maybe it wasn’t the best cover-up since he didn’t have his wallet or any possessions besides his phone on him. He was planning to beat some people up today, so it didn’t make sense to carry extra items.

“I’m surprised you came out here, though! There’s a little corner store near Pothos that sells stuff like that.” Nirei shoved his phone in Sugishita’s face, showcasing the address.

“It’s pretty early too, you typically leave Furin on time?” Sugishita shut his eyes, briefly pausing before turning to Nirei, holding on to his shoulders.

“I was following you.” Sugishita spat out, a few people whipped their heads around in surprise; some people began walking faster, avoiding the two.

“I mean. Not like that, but, uh.” He let go, rubbing the back of his head while Nirei blinked up at him. The blonde seemed to be processing what was said while he stood there. Sugishita slouched even more when Nirei gasped.

“Oh, you mean–”

“Since you left.”

“Oh.”

It was silent for a bit. Sugishita could feel shame crawling up on him when Nirei was looking around, possibly to see if there was anybody else.

“Um…why, though, Sugishita-san?” Nirei looked up at him, and Sugishita shrugged. He pointed towards Nirei’s bandages while the other male lifted his free hand to touch his face.
“I thought you were in trouble.” Sugishita murmured, his eyes flickering down to the hand littered in plasters as well, “I mean, you’re…covered in…bruises?”

His tone lingered on the confused side, unsure if that’s what the dressings were covering, but he looked back to Nirei’s eyes, realizing the male was now flushed and shaking those same hands. His bag containing his purchase was securely tied around one of his wrists, moving along with his hand.

“Ah, no-no that’s not the case!” The blonde stammered, slowly dragging his hands back down. “I swear I would’ve told somebody if that was the case.”

Sugishita squinted at him, it seemed to cause the male to retract and laugh nervously.

“Eventually! Tell somebody, but Sugishita-san, that's not the case at all…” Nirei looked back down, and the two of them began walking again while Nirei slowly exhaled, looking up to Sugishita.

“I didn’t want to tell anybody because, um, Suo-san is the one doing me a favor.”

Sugishita felt even more confused, “He’s doing you a favor by beating you?” The male scowled; the fact that Suo, somebody who was supposedly close to Nirei, inflicted these wounds on him confirmed that might’ve been the reason why Nirei was silent.

“No! He’s not– Sugishita-san, you’re very blunt.” Nirei scolded, but Sugishita could already see the gears turning in his head to write that down later.

“He’s helping me train? I don’t wanna drag anybody down, so um…yeah!” Sugishita stared, Nirei looked away.

“He’s…really cool. I wanna be able to stand up there with him and Sakura-san soon.” Nirei murmured. There was that anxious laughter again. Sugishita should be upset at the mention of Sakura’s name being associated with Umemiya’s title, but he just sighed.

“...They need you more than you think. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

“Eh? What was that, Sugishita-san?” The tone was softer, one of curiosity that caused Sugishita to reel back a bit, pushing his words out louder.

“They…need you so…don’t be too hard on yourself.” Footsteps slowly ceased, Sugishita could feel embarrassment crawling up on him, and chose to ignore it in favor of the blonde’s squeak.

“Wow! You sounded a lot like Sakura-san there, Sugishita-san!” Sugishita felt a vein burst in his neck. Hastily, he turned to frown at Nirei, making sure the blonde could feel his disappointment with those words.

To his dismay, Nirei just laughed and kept on moving, not wanting to be left behind. Sugishita begrudgingly followed along.
- - - - - -

His hand reached out to open the door of the corner store, the small jingle of a bell announced their arrival. The cashier raised their head from where their phone was loudly blasting a video, giving a small hello to them.

He let Nirei walk ahead, watching the male hurry along to the back of the store as if he knew this place like the back of his hand. The aroma of the store was rather warm, passing by a couple, the stink of cologne made Sugishita waver before continuing his pace, Nirei pausing his chatter to find what they came here for.

“I’m not too sure if they have this brand in stock, I heard it was good for plants though.” Nirei handed his phone over behind him, allowing Sugishita to view the bug repellent he wanted to buy.

Sugishita grabbed the phone, simultaneously nodding in approval. It was a good brand; Nirei must’ve done some research before this when he noticed the shungiku. The thought was a bit touching, especially since Sugishita had been frustrated over it for the past week.

A notification rang through. Sugishita was gonna hand the phone back, but looking up, Nirei was already scouring through the shelves to find the repellent. He swiped up to avoid prying into the male’s business, crouching down near him to begin looking as well.

A few minutes passed by, and they found nothing. Nirei stood up first, Sugishita turned to look up at the other male, who was moving around, a small pout was present on his face.

“I guess they didn’t have it in stock…hm…” Nirei shuffled next to him, his head turning around twice before finally settling on Sugishita again.

“It’s fine! Where’s my phone? We can look at where to go another time.” Nirei held his hand out, Sugishita shifted before standing up to hand the device over. His eyes peeked at the numerous notifications that rang through once it was in Nirei’s hands again.

It was silent again, a brief period of typing before Sugishita turned away to give the other some privacy as he looked towards the cashier. His eyes flicked up towards the clock; it was nearing the time ‘school’ would be out, he wasn’t exactly surprised that a lot of time had passed.

The area Nirei originally went to for the gift was far from Furin; it was typically patrolled by the third years, if Sugishita recalled correctly. He sighed, twisting his body back around to face Nirei, who let out a small ‘oh!’

“Wow, Sugishita-san. They don’t have this brand in stock anywhere near us.” Nirei tilted his head, “We might be better off ordering it…oh! The time!” Sugishita watched the male scramble through apps before opening his messages again.

“Sugishita-san– give me a second, I’ll be back!” Nirei practically ran out the door, his phone faintly displaying a caller ID with a heart next to the name. If Sugishita saw correctly, he could barely see it, though before the phone was pressed to the blonde’s ear, frantic sorry’s coming out.

“. . .” Sugishita sighed, crouching down again to grab a random brand before standing back up and going to the cashier. The man in front of him seemed unbothered, video loudly playing on his phone still while he lounged around on his chair. Sugishita grumbled. The person looked up, briefly the two made eye contact before the guy immediately stood up, coughing and rubbing his snack crumbs off of himself.

“Uh…your total is..940 yen…” Sugishita shoved one hand into his pocket. His eyes snapped to his hands, fingers scrunching in his empty pocket.

The cashier looked nervous. A few seconds passed by before Sugishita slowly brought his hand back out; it was empty. He shoved his hand into another pocket, and it was empty again. They both stared at each other for even longer. Sugishita scowled, the cashier looked away.

“...Dude, I can’t like…give this to you for free.” Sugishita furrowed his eyebrows, ignoring the cashier's words before a realization hit him. He didn’t have any money on him. He came completely penniless.

A crawl of shame rose; he was about to take the product back before the cashier seemed to rest their hands on it; Sugishita looked up, his eyes narrowing.

“You’re not like…trying to steal right now, right?” Sugishita’s mouth dropped at that, an undignified noise leaving him when he shook his head; he could feel a headache starting to form at the video still loudly blasting through his phone.

“No.” Sugishita deadpanned, his hand gripping the object with less force than usual, “I don’t have money.”

“You don’t have money, but you tried to buy this? You sound like a scam artist, dude.”

Sugishita tightened his hold, the worker standing before him seemed to pale at the difference in strength as they grabbed onto it with another hand.

“I’m…not scamming you.”

“You don’t have money!”
Sugishita growled, neither person tugged on the object, but he was getting tempted to. He just wanted to put the product back on the shelf where he found it.

There was a small ring at the front, causing both males to look up at the door. Sugishita relaxed his hold slightly upon realizing it was Nirei, and trailing behind him was…Suo?

Bewildered, Sugishita let go of the object before Nirei came prancing up behind him, wallet in his hand. An unanswered question stood at the back of his head while Nirei was apologizing to the underpaid worker: why was Suo here?

“Oh, oh, and these gummies too! Suo-san, you like these, right?” Nirei whipped his head around, already pulling out his money while Suo stood beside him. Sugishita blinked twice. He looked at the worker, who looked back at him, equally confused.

“Sure, Nire-kun, whatever you’d like.” Sugishita looked over at Suo, the male looked a bit disheveled as if he sprinted or something, which seemed a tad bit absurd. Sugishita fidgeted where he stood watching Suo easily take his wallet out and hand the amount needed to the cashier while Nirei talked excitedly to the overwhelmed male, his wallet abandoned in his hand.

“You guys are Bofurin kids, right? It’s on the house.” Sugishita clenched his fist, staring at the side of the cashier’s head where he stood.

“Ah, no, no, we insist! Wait, Suo-san, I'll pay!” Nirei swatted the burgundy male’s hand away, seemingly finally realizing Suo was attempting to pay before him, as the taller one just smiled down at Nirei.

“Hm, okay Nire-kun.” Suo took his hand back, neatly folding his money back into his wallet as he turned to look at Sugishita. Sugishita withered slightly under his gaze as he shuffled farther away.

“Sugishita-kun, you’re not wearing your uniform?” Suo tilted his head, Sugishita looked down at his attire. He absentmindedly unclenched his fists at the question as he shook his head.

“I guess that makes sense. You wouldn’t want Nire-kun to discover you were following him after all.” Sugishita tensed, looking to his side where Suo stood, the taller one was still looking ahead while Nirei happily finished his transaction, his hands animatedly moving around.

“..What.” Sugishita forced out, Suo turned to look at him, and a false smile was on his face while he tilted his head to mimic a sense of warmth.

“You were with him earlier, hm? He sounded really happy.” Suo folded his hands behind him, Sugishita shuffled farther away, blinking slowly. This was getting creepy; if he didn’t know better, it was almost like Suo was trying to fight him.

“I guess that’s why he didn’t answer my messages…how interesting. I wonder what you two were doing.”

Suo paused his movement, his eye shut in a smile before turning back around and walking near Nirei. He helped grab the bag out of the male’s hand while Sugishita staggered behind, his eyes darting between the two.

Sugishita wasn’t blind to cues, but for a split second, it was as if Suo was being territorial, like an animal, maybe the male had some strange personality Sugishita wasn’t aware of.

The bell rang again, Sugishita looked behind him to see the cashier was back to watching his loud movie…video thing. He wasn’t going to come back to this store anytime soon, at least until he needs more bug repellent again.

“Sugishita-san! Here you go! Suo-san and I need to head off, but um, I assume you’re going back to Furin?” Nirei looked behind him, easily grabbing an object out of the bag to hand to him.

“..Yeah. Need to get my jacket.” He murmured, accepting the spray as he eyed the bag in Nirei’s hand and the one in Suo’s before pointing to Nirei’s.

“Your gift.”

“A gift?” Suo tilted his head, Sugishita blinked, and he swore Nirei’s face lit up two shades brighter when he turned back around, nervously laughing again.

Sugishita continued walking away, leaving the two behind in their bliss as he could faintly hear them talking to each other. It feels like they’ve gotten a lot closer recently. He couldn’t put his mind on it, but it almost seemed like they were…together. Which is silly, so Sugishita ruled that out. Of course, they had to have gotten more friendly in the time they’ve been together.

“...for me….get…..bracelets?”

Sugishita turned around briefly, watching Suo slip something on his wrist as he picked up pieces of what the burgundy-haired male said. It was something that caused Nirei to flail around and laugh again.

That seemed to put Suo in a better mood, though, given that when he turned around and made eye contact with Sugishita again, it wasn’t to give him a stink eye but rather to smile at the male. Sugishita didn’t feel a hint of malice behind it, whether or not Suo was good at masking that didn’t concern him.

He supposed he was happy for the two and whatever weird thing they had going on. Sugishita wasn’t going to try to pry into Nirei’s life anymore; if the male needed help, he knew how to ask for it, hopefully.

- - - - - -

* BONUS SCENE *

“Oh Sugishita! Hey, I forgot to ask, did you ever find out what was going on with Nirei?” Tsubaki adjusted their hair, they looked towards Sugishita for a response as they eyed him watering the tomatoes.

Sugishita blanked. He lifted his watering can so as not to drench the produce before gazing towards where the three sat talking to Umemiya. He tightened his grip before looking back at Tsubaki and nodding.

“He’s fine,” Sugishita confirmed, going back to his duty of watering the plants.

“...Did you have something to do with it?” Sugishita tensed, his scowl returning at Tsubaki’s teasing words as the male just laughed, patting Sugishita’s back a bit.

“I’m kidding! Kidding! Wow, Sugishita, you got a mean glare.” Tsubaki smiled down at the male, Sugishita looked at them to see where they were looking before realizing Tsubaki was turned to Umemiya again.

Unconsciously, his eyes lingered on Nirei and Suo. This time, a flash of red appeared on Suo’s wrist only to be covered again. Sugishita squinted as a tiny charm was dangling from his bracelet, the only evidence of there being something. He wasn’t huge on fashion, but looking at Nirei’s wrists, it was easier to identify that the blonde had on a matching yellow bracelet since his sleeves were pulled up.

It seemed exclusive to the two of them as well, as Sakura’s wrists were bare. Why would the two get exclusive bracelets, though? Maybe Suo got them as a thank you to Nirei for the gift. Sugishita frowned at the idea. It doesn’t seem like Suo would do that. When Tsugeura came back with souvenirs, Suo didn’t even say thanks.

Maybe the bracelets came in a matching set when Nirei got them, but Suo’s looked like it was custom-made, though since Nirei’s didn’t have a charm. This was hurting his head to try to decipher.

“The Shungiku look a lot better this week, Sugishita! You have a really good green thumb.” Sugishita snapped his attention off of the four, looking back to Tsubaki, who was examining the plants as he huffed his thanks out.

Well, it wasn’t his place to be concerned about them, he supposed, and whatever weird thing they have going on. Sugishita had to make sure not to let Umemiya down and complete this harvest; the tomatoes also looked nice this year.

Notes:

hii!! It's been a bit since I updated I apologize, my updating is going to start being pretty inconsistent for now since my beta reader is out of commission for a bit..

but ITS OUT !! Writing Sugishita's perspective was such a huge challenge and I was dying a lot T-T (rewrote this like 5 times and lost one of the final drafts...)

Two more chapters to goo!!

Thank you so much for reading chapter 3 and for being patient with updates! (also your guys' comments literallyy make my day thank you so much T-T)

* yeah suo IS a loser and did sprint to him when Nirei answered his call.