Work Text:
“I don’t know what I should do.”
The words left his mouth before he could think them through. It happened to him often lately, especially when Shuu was close. Like he was now, calmly sitting on the other side of the huge table in the Fujiwara family’s house and cutting a cooked carrot in half.
“My sister insists that I should apply to some university in Tokyo too, but it’s over three hours away from home,” Ryouhei continued, tearing his meat into pieces with a fork. “Besides… Well, it’s Tokyo. Tokyo. You know what I mean.”
He took a deep breath and finally stopped torturing the meat, resting his fork on the edge of his plate. Shuu nodded in response.
“I don’t even know what I want to study. Or if I even want to study more after high school at all. I’ve just been thinking about it a lot because everyone in the club is planning something, and I started talking about it out loud, and she took it all so seriously.”
After another deep breath, he grabbed his fork and plunged it into the piece of roast with even more brutality than before. Shuu's eyebrows rose.
“Besides, it's stupid that we have to decide everything now. I don't even know what I want to eat for dinner tomorrow, let alone what I want to do after high school.” He slowly lifted his fork and brought it down quickly, jabbing it right into the middle of the roast. “This dinner is also stupid. I know I promised we'd eat out tomorrow, but I still haven't planned anything. I'm sorry, Shuu. All these decisions are stupid. Someone smarter should make them for me. I'm too dumb for all of this.”
Finally, he tore his eyes away from the plate and looked up at Shuu. He blinked slowly.
“You know what...”
Shuu's mouth opened at the same moment, but instead of his voice, a loud splat broke the silence. The roast held on the fork fell a few inches down, straight onto the plate. The sauce splattered across the table and the nearest wall, leaving a brown, speckled trail.
Shuu's gaze moved down to the dirty tablecloth. Ryouhei's heart leaped into his throat.
Oh great. This was the first time he had eaten a real dinner with Shuu at his house, something more than the snacks he had brought as gifts before, and he had already ruined everything. He had stained the tablecloth, the wall, and his shirt. Out of the three, the last was probably the cheapest to clean. The wall probably needed repainting, and the tablecloth… Gods, he hoped it wasn't an antique. Could tablecloths even be antiques? Or, as his sister had called them, vintage? Or something like that? Even if they normally weren't, the Fujiwara family definitely had an antique tablecloth. Everything in this house seemed older and worth more than anything in their entire city. If they made Ryouhei pay for cleaning, he would have to take out a loan. He would never pay it off otherwise. No more plans for university. He'll have to work for the minimum wage for the rest of his life to pay off the debt he's incurred because of his own disgustingly stupid-
Something delicately brushed his cheek, making him choke in surprise.
“Mr. Toujou?”
The man working for the Fujiwara family was always ready to help, probably because it was in his contract. Besides, he had a very warm personality. That was the only reason Ryouhei thought about him first.
But it wasn't Mr. Toujou.
A strange grimace appeared on Shuu's face as he leaned over him. There was no trace of Mr. Toujou nearby; he wasn't standing next to him, behind Shuu, or even behind the ficus tree by the window. At what point did he leave? When they sat down to dinner, he was still there and-
The soft handkerchief disappeared. Shuu's cold hands replaced it. Ryouhei winced, his body shivered.
“You have sauce all over your face,” Shuu explained in a low voice.
Oh yeah. The sauce and the roast. And the mess Ryouhei had made. Lately, that was all he had been good at - ruining everything.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered under his breath, and the guilt grew stronger. “For the tablecloth and the wall. And for the roast. And for talking so much. Even now I can’t shut up. Really–”
Another painful grimace crossed Shuu’s face. Ryouhei stopped for a moment, and his mouth closed, then opened slowly, like a fish’s.
“Because–”
He didn’t know what he was supposed to say anymore. The grimace on Shuu’s face deepened, and Ryouhei couldn’t concentrate.
Did something hurt Shuu? Was he angry at him? He was probably tired of listening to this mindless chatter, to Ryouhei's dumb issues.
“I really– Because you know–”
“I’m sorry.”
Shuu’s voice was choked when he interrupted Ryouhei. It sounded so strange that, at first, Ryouhei thought someone else had spoken.
And he was apologizing? For what? He had the patience of a saint, he had suffered so much listening to Ryouhei's childish complaints.
He wanted to ask what was going on, but Shuu got ahead of him, speaking first.
“I didn’t know you felt so much pressure. I didn’t want to add to your problems when I mentioned university last week.”
Oh. Yeah, right. They had talked about university stuff last week. But this was different. Shuu hadn’t pressed, hadn’t suggested anything, had simply asked if Ryouhei decided anything. He didn’t even remember what he’d said back then, but it had progressed to the point where they’d started joking about going to classes and the library and the pool together and staying the night to study and watch movies together, and Ryouhei had almost burned with embarrassment when Shuu had commented that it sounded a bit like a home date.
It had been different back then.
“You’re not the one who’s stressing me out,” he answered quietly, staring into Shuu’s face incredulously. Wasn’t that clear? Shuu had never stressed him out. Everything was easy with Shuu. “If you were stressing me out, I’d say something… I guess. Maybe not. I don’t know. It’s probably not even possible for you to be stressing me out. I've never thought about it before.”
Shuu's face did something strange. The grimace of pain disappeared, but there was still a shadow lurking in his eyes.
Ryouhei was unable to stop talking again.
“I mean... you know, sometimes I get stressed when I think about you, but it's not really related to things like college and the future. It's more like 'I hope Shuu likes the movie I chose' or 'I wonder if he'll like this new flavor of Coke because I've already bought five bottles'. It's more like... nothing serious, right?” As he was asking this question, he frowned and tilted his head to look at his face from below. His forehead got closer to Shuu's stomach. He could feel his warmth.
Slowly, Shuu also took a step towards him. Ryouhei's cheek pressed against his body. Something under his ear began to rumble loudly. If it wasn't beating so fast, he would have thought it was Shuu's heart. But Shuu probably didn't have such serious heart problems.
“I don’t know what to do when you’re so stressed out,” Shuu explained in a half-whisper just when Ryouhei thought he’d never speak. “I wish I could help somehow. I have no idea how.”
His chest rose and fell slowly, and Ryouhei had the answer on the tip of his tongue. The reassurance that Shuu was doing enough. That being so close helped. His smile alone helped.
Somehow, though, he couldn’t bring himself to speak. Something was still rumbling by his ear, and his whole body was growing pleasantly warm.
“Hmm,” he mumbled instead, and without thinking, turned his face. His nose pressed against the warm stomach. Shuu's body froze.
It was either a few seconds or a few hours before either of them moved again. Shuu’s fingers began to comb through Ryouhei’s hair. Timidly, gently, a little clumsily.
“I feel better now,” Ryouhei finally managed to whisper. He made no effort to move away.