5+1, Romance, Slow Burn, Drama, Friends to Lovers, Brief Mention of Biphobia
Summary: Five times that Keiji Akaashi went to Onigiri Miya and sought comfort from Osamu, and the one time he finally expressed how much it meant to him.
Hello, all! Here is my story for the @osaakabigbang! Had some ups and downs writing this one, but I think it turned out to be an emotional story we can all relate to in some form or another. Be sure to check out my partner Seb’s wonderful art as well!
The first time Keiji went to Onigiri Miya alone, the sky had opened up to weep for him. Rain poured down torrentially in thick sheets that seemed like curtains of glass beads against the backdrop of the gloomy night. Yet the air was warm with the summer heat, so much so that mist swirled around Keiji’s feet as he limped down the sidewalk. The rubber foot of his crutch squeaked each time it rubbed against the slick concrete. The universe had decided to spare him insult to injury, keeping him from slipping and falling into the puddling water though it was nearly a statistical given.
The rain thrummed like a war drum against the wooden slats that roofed the onigiri shop. Yet for how ominous it sounded, the air vibrating, Keiji was warmed by the sight of it. It felt like the stifling heat of the summer night shifted to something warmer, something cozier. So the tiny smile that appeared on Keiji’s lips was genuine as he hobbled up to the front door and began to wrestle it. He’d only had the crutch for half the day, so navigating things like doors was still an art he had yet to master.
“Whoa, Keiji! Let me help you.” Osamu hopped over the counter and rushed to the front door as soon as Keiji’s rain-soaked, haggard form wiggled halfway through the entrance. Though frustration burned in the pit of Keiji’s belly, he also couldn’t help breathing a sigh of relief when the weight of the glass door was pushed off his shoulder. As he held the door open for him, Osamu placed a light hand on the small of his back, helping him cross the threshold.
Keiji wanted to snap at him like he had everyone else who had suddenly begun treating him like a porcelain doll. He’d torn all the ligaments in his knee, not broken every bone in his leg or something, yet the barb sizzled out on his tongue as soon as he looked at Osamu. He, at least, didn’t seem like he was pitying him. What swam in his dusky-brown eyes was concern. It was different enough, at least, for the anger to melt out of Keiji’s body. Or maybe he was just tired.
“So it’s true,” Osamu breathed as Keiji limped into the restaurant. Keiji could feel his gaze burning through the thick brace around his knees, even through the layer of cold water that insulated him. It took Osamu a minute to register the water that puddled behind Keiji, but when he did, he sucked a breath in through his teeth. “Shit, Kei, let me—let me see if I have a spare uniform or something around for you.”
“Not much point,” Keiji huffed, now at the bar. He gripped the ceramic tight while he balanced on his one good leg, hopping in a circle so he could situate himself in front of the stool. Thank God they weren’t those super-tall ones; he could have taken a booth, but trying to wrangle himself out of one would have been a chore. He sank down onto the stool with a sigh, and his leg muscles rejoiced at finally being free of his weight. “I’ll just have to hike back out to flag the taxi home.”
“Like hell,” Osamu growled before disappearing into the break room. Keiji heard him banging around in there, and he soon came striding back out with a black uniform in his hand. “If it’s still raining when you leave, I’m taking you home myself.”
Keiji frowned as Osamu plopped the uniform down on the counter.
“Please don’t make me strip in the middle of your restaurant.”
“Why not? I flipped the sign to ‘CLOSED’ when you came in, and the windows are tinted since it faces the east.”
Keiji knew that Osamu would yank his clothes off himself if he had to, so he relented. With Osamu’s help, he peeled the rain-soaked clothes from his body. Loathe as he was to admit it, it did feel much better to be in dry clothes. Misery loves company, as they said, and Osamu was hell-bent on removing as much misery as he could from Keiji’s equation. To that end, he was now hustling and bustling behind the counter, ingredients sizzling on his griddle while the rice cooker ticked down to a fresh batch.
“So,” Osamu said. “Atsumu said the injury was bad, but he didn’t tell me the details. Said that I should ask you.”
“Awfully sensitive for Atsumu,” Keiji sniffed. He played with the thin corner of a napkin that was sticking up from one of the silver dispensers as he watched Osamu work. “Yeah, it’s bad. They can repair it in theory, but my volleyball days are done.”
Osamu stopped to look over his shoulder. Ugh, there was that look. That heartbroken look that made Keiji’s heart twist in his chest. He immediately averted his gaze, focusing instead on the fingerprint smudges on the shiny aluminum napkin dispenser.
“Can you not look at me like that? Fuck, I’m not dying.”
“Keiji, I know that, I just—”
“Just what?” Keiji snapped back. When his eye flickered back to Osamu, they were hardened with fury. “Just what, Osamu? Just wondering what I’m going to do now? Wondering how it would feel to have the rug yanked out from under your feet? Wondering if I’m resentful, or jealous, or replaying the moment over and over again in my head to figure how the fuck I could have avoided destroying what could have been my professional career?”
He didn’t mean for Osamu to be the target of his anger, but he just couldn’t take it anymore. If one more person gave him that look, he was going to go insane. He didn’t want everything to think he was fragile. He didn’t want himself to think he was fragile.
But he felt fragile, and that’s why he slammed his forehead down against the counter to hide the tears burning in his eyes. He clenched his fists so tight he felt like he would snap all those tendons, too; but what did it matter? Keiji was done.
Both of Osamu’s hands cupped his balled fists, and despite himself, Keiji slowly relaxed.
“I’m sorry,” Osamu murmured. Keiji didn’t get angry this time because he knew it wasn’t the same apology that he’d heard over and over again since the doctors told him that he would be lucky if he ever walked again. “I’m just worried about you, that’s all.”
“I know,” Keiji exhaled. He rested his cheek against the counter, watching his warm breath fog against its smooth surface. He knew that everyone was just worried about him. And while it made him happy, it made him so, so sad, too. The tears leaked out of his eyes to puddle under his skin. “I’m worried, too. I’m worried that I won’t bounce back from this.”
“You will,” Osamu assured him. Everyone had been saying stuff like that lately, but it only sounded true now that it left Osamu’s lips. When he felt the warmth of Osamu’s hands leave his, he looked up. The man had walked back to the grill and was now molding the warm rice balls into shape. “You’re still working on your degree, right? Atsumu told me that you had been going back and forth about whether you wanted to go on to play professional or go into the literature field… It sucks, not having a real choice, but maybe this is the sign you’ve been looking for.”
“God has a real fuckin’ twisted sense of humor, then,” Keiji gruffed. He pulled his head up to rest his cheek in his hand, using his other to smear the tears off his face.
“Yeah, sometimes things don’t work out exactly the way we want them to,” Osamu nodded. He walked back to the counter and set a plate of kombu onigiri in front of him. “Sometimes you feel like giving up, especially when you feel like the path you wanted to take suddenly isn’t anything but a gaping abyss anymore… And when that happens, you just have to look at the paths you still have and keep moving forward.”
“How is it that you’re so wise and your brother’s such a dumbass?” Keiji smirked, then picked up the rice ball to take a bite. Fuck, nothing lifted his mood more than Osamu’s godly onigiri.
Osamu gave him a lopsided smirk. “Unfortunately for Atsumu, I got the brains and the devilish good looks.”
Keiji barked out a laugh.
“Keep moving forward, huh?” he hummed, tilting his head as he regarded the rice ball. He smiled, then took another bite of it. Well, he still had one good leg. He would move slowly, but he could still move forward.
It was raining again the second time that Keiji Akaashi went to Onigiri Miya. It wasn’t like the first, though; where the first night the clouds had unleashed their torrent, this time, the rain fell in silence. It was more depressing, in a way. The raindrops were thin, ghost-like as they misted over Keiji’s skin. There weren’t slick puddles on the concrete—not that it mattered, since it had been some time since he’d needed the crutches—but rather just a slight darkening of the stone to indicate it was even wet at all. The clouds were still thick and oppressively gray when Keiji looked up at the sky. Like his melancholy mood had been personified, the heavy dark clouds hung over his head to weep where he wouldn’t.
“Hey, we’re just about to clo—” Osamu began to call when Keiji opened the door. His words stopped short, though, replaced with a soft gasp of his name. Keiji wore a crooked smile as he walked into the restaurant. The last time Osamu had seen him in person, Keiji had been bungling into the restaurant, unable to even get through the door by himself. Now, the only evidence of his injury was a slight limp.
“Evening, ‘Samu.” Keiji’s tone was pleasant; the random onlooker wouldn’t be able to tell that anything was amiss. But Osamu Miya was no random onlooker. He immediately pierced through Keiji’s smile, eyes zeroing in on the slight quiver of his lips and the wateriness of his eyes and the tension in his muscles. Osamu narrowed his eyes, then turned back to the grill.
“Take a seat. I’ll make you a fresh batch.”
Keiji released an audible sigh of relief when he sank down onto the stool. Though his injury had healed well, there was still a lot of pain in his knee with the damp or with overuse—both of which he was subject to today. He idly rubbed at his knee, frowning slightly at the rainwater moving over his chilly skin. He half expected Osamu to turn around and ask if he wanted a spare uniform again; he didn’t, though, probably because Keiji didn’t look quite like a bedraggled wet puppy this time.
The silence of the rain had settled within the restaurant, too. Despite the pop of the oil and the scraping of Osamu’s kitchen tools, it was like those ambient sounds existed on another plane from the two of them. The rain was so soft that it didn’t even make noise as it pattered against the windows.
“So… it’s been a while,” Osamu’s breathy comment finally pierced the veil of quietude.
“Six months.”
“Ya look well.”
“Compared to last time you saw me, I’m sure,” Keiji joked. Did he change napkin brands? he wondered as he fiddled with the corner of the one sticking up from the dispenser. The fingerprint smudges on its shiny silver surface had changed, too. Yet the smell of cooking kelp clouding the air and the surety of Osamu moving around behind the counter hadn’t changed, and the familiarity assuaged Keiji somewhat. For too long, he’d felt trapped in a never-ending maelstrom of change; it was nice to have something stagnant for once.
“Atsumu told me that you graduate soon.”
“That’s right.”
“He also mentioned that you were on the hunt for a job for writing positions.”
Osamu peeked over his shoulder as he said it, and he didn’t miss the way that Keiji’s face scrunched up in distaste. Sometimes it really felt like Osamu was everything Atsumu wasn’t; where Atsumu didn’t care to pry—or didn’t even notice—Osamu had a poignant way of getting right to the heart of the matter while looking totally inconspicuous. But the smirk curling on his lips betrayed that he knew exactly what he was doing, and the glitter in his dark eyes told Keiji that he wasn’t going to be leaving here without giving the restaurant owner the answers he sought.
What made you turn back up here, after all this time?
“I am. ‘S not going well, though,” Keiji relented. Osamu clicked his tongue sympathetically. He continued to watch Keiji as he shaped the rice balls; muscle memory had long since taken over, a far cry from the practiced way he’d shape them when they were in high school, piling in the Miya’s living room for rowdy sleepovers. Osamu had always made onigiri then, too, and when the boys annoyingly wheedled “Whyyyyy?” he would wink and say, “‘Cuz it’s Kei’s favorite.”
Keiji had blushed then, and he blushed now thinking about it. Some things changed, but some things never did.
“Wanna talk about it?” Osamu asked, and both his question and the clatter of the plate on the counter snapped Keiji out of his thoughts.
Keiji blinked, taking a moment to register the kind face of Osamu hovering in front of him. He leaned over the counter, attention focused solely on him, and that brought the heat rushing back to Keiji’s face. Keiji tried to hide it by shoving the onigiri in his face, but sticky rice sticking all over his cheeks wasn’t really a great alternative.
“I got rejected from a job I really wanted. A columnist for this really prominent sports magazine.” He released a heavy sigh; it felt like voicing his dejections aloud released a heavy tension from within him, like a balloon nearly full to bursting finally allowed to spill the air trapped within it and deflate. “And it isn’t just that one… I’ve gotten rejection after rejection. I really need a job before graduation, but I’m starting to think that I’m not cut out for it.”
Keiji looked sourly down at his destroyed knee. As if it sensed his displeasure, the muscles spasmed, making him hiss in pain. He rubbed at it, trying to soothe the irritated tissue, before grumbling, “And if I’m not, it isn’t like I have something to fall back on.”
“Listen, you’re not going to have to fall back on anything,” Osamu huffed, crossing his arms against the counter. “So what if you’ve gotten rejected? That’s not a reflection of your talent.”
“It’s not?” Keiji asked doubtfully, pausing in the middle of chewing his rice ball. He had been under the impression that if you were good at what you do, you got a job.
“Listen, it’s the entertainment field,” Osamu said. “It’s one of the most competitive fields out there! You have to just keep trying and trying until you get your foot in the door, and then you’re off and running.”
“Osamu, you run an onigiri shop,” Keiji couldn’t help but laugh. “What do you know about the entertainment business?”
“Well, Atsumu dated some P.R. agent lady for a couple of weeks, and she always said stuff like that,” Osamu shrugged with an impish smile.
Keiji just laughed again and shook his head. It sounded like total bullshit, but hey… He was kind of willing to believe it. It was much better than wallowing in his own self-pity like he had been doing for the last couple of days. After shoving the last bit of onigiri in his mouth, he held his hand out for Osamu to fist-bump.
“You’ve got this. And be sure you come back and tell me all about your new job when you get it, ya hear?” Osamu smirked, straightening up and tossing a dish towel over his shoulder. “If you come back here after six months, I’m just gonna kick yer ass.”
“I didn’t realize you enjoy the pleasure of my company that much.”
“Better you than my brother. He walks in here like he owns the place.”
Their laughter bounced around the empty shop, drowning out the dreary echo of the rain still falling outside.
Osamu clicked his tongue when he came out of the break room to see Keiji slumped over the counter, forehead pressed against the cool ceramic and his hair slightly sweaty from the intense heat boiling outside. He’d taken off his suit jacket and slung it haphazardly over the back of the barstool, and the sleeves of his dress shirt were rolled up to his elbows, sweat-sheened skin greedily soaking up the chill of the rumbling air conditioner. Keiji heard the cook’s footsteps approach, but rather than come to him, they walked around the bar and stopped in the kitchen to be replaced by the banging of kitchen utensils and the fwooosh of the gas stove igniting.
“So I take it that your first major editing job didn’t go so well, huh?” Osamu said over the sizzle of the meat simmering in the skillet. Osamu no longer bothered with pretense when he saw Keiji moping; he just got right to the heart of things, offering himself up to be the shoulder that Keiji cried on without any ado.
Keiji finally lifted his head only to flop his cheek down into his hand with an aggravated groan.
“That’s an understatement. It was awful. I was reamed by my boss in a staff meeting in front of everyone!” he growled. “I thought the coach’s scoldings were tough, but this guy makes him look like a wet kitten!”
“That bad, huh?” Osamu chuckled. He glanced over his shoulder as he quickly squirted sauce over the strips of beef. He’d gotten quite good at cooking while carrying a conversation with Keiji.
“Yeah. It was totally embarrassing. No one made eye contact with me for the rest of the day.”
“Sounds like they didn’t wanna catch your stupid,” Osamu joked. He ducked as Keiji grabbed one of the laminated menus and chucked it at him; it made a wobbling sound as it collided with the backsplash. Still chuckling, Osamu tossed it aside before getting back to stirring the meat around. “Oh, come on, I’m just trying to lighten the mood.”
“Well, stop it. I think the mood is perfectly heavy for someone in my situation,” Keiji grumbled back. He leaned back on the barstool and crossed his arms, but Osamu just raised an eyebrow at him. Keiji’s frown began to wobble, and it wasn’t long before it morphed into a teensy smile. “They didn’t wanna catch my stupid, huh?”
“Yeah, and I don’t want to catch it either, so you make sure you stay on that side of the bar.” Osamu nodded and pointed the business end of the spatula at him. Keiji just snorted and shook his head. Osamu turned off the stove and left the meat there to sit for a minute while he walked over to the rice cooker. As he began shaping the rice balls, he asked, “So what are you gonna do?”
“What else can I do? My boss told me to redo it and have it done by tomorrow morning.”
“And yet you’re here instead of at home working?” Osamu asked, looking over his shoulder to smirk at him with an arched eyebrow.
“Well, I couldn’t deprive you of the pleasure of my company,” Keiji retorted.
Osamu rolled his eyes as he slid him the plate of onigiri, and Keiji wasted no time in digging in. Osamu crossed his arms to lean on the counter, watching with soft eyes.
“Are you sure you’re not just abusing me for my food? You know, when do you ever sit there and listen to my problems?” Osamu challenged.
Keiji let out a sputtering sound as he nearly sucked a strip of beef down the wrong pipe. He gaped at Osamu with wide eyes and his mouth hanging open dropping rice and seared beef back onto the plate. Holy crap, had he been selfish this entire time? He surely didn’t come in to bitch about his life that often, did he? It was just… Osamu was just so easy to talk to; he just found himself coming here without even thinking about it. Holy shit, was he a bad friend?
As soon as he started to speak, Osamu shoved a napkin into his mouth.
“Relax, I was just kidding,” he purred. Keiji just blinked, the napkin hanging out of his mouth and growing soft where it rested over his tongue. “I don’t mind that you come in here to talk about your problems. I like to listen, and… I like to think that I help.”
Keiji slowly pulled the napkin out of his mouth. He tried to ignore the little wet bits sticking to his tongue and instead stammered, “Y-you do.”
Osamu smiled. And it wasn’t a smile that Keiji had ever really seen before. It was—he didn’t really know how to describe it. It was more than sweet, it was more than soft, it was more, and it was doing things to his heart that had never happened with Osamu before. It thumped against his ribcage, pound-pound-pounding while a blush began to creep up from the base of his neck.
“You do,” he whispered without really thinking about it, and somehow that smile got even softer and even sweeter. It felt like they were just cotton candy, melting everywhere in this insane summer heat, and Keiji lovedit.
“Well, I’m glad. So you come in here and talk to me anytime you want to, got it?” Osamu said, reaching out to flick a piece of sweaty hair that had fallen into Keiji’s face. “Anytime.”
“R-right,” Keiji nodded. And when Osamu turned around, he gulped, and it had nothing to do with the bits of rice still in his mouth.
It was raining again—torrential, like the first time that Keiji had come here by himself. Now he came here all the time—sun, rain, sleet, snow. It had become his home away from home, it seemed, the one other place in the world where he could lower all his walls and feel truly at peace. Yet now, he could not bring himself to go inside. It no longer felt like a home. It felt foreign, just like everything else; Keiji was a man lost, wandering through a fog with no place to rest.
He hovered in front of the door. A thin layer of mist had made its home on the glass, preventing him from seeing inside. Part of him wanted to reach out and draw patterns in it—a smiley face, a flower, a ladybug. He wasn’t quite sure why. Maybe it was because he didn’t feel at home in his own skin right now, and all that nervous energy had to get out somehow. He didn’t, though. Instead, he stared, and the rain poured down on him all the while.
Keiji just blinked when there was a small click, and the door swung open to reveal a very perturbed Osamu.
“Keiji? What…what are you doing just standing in the rain?” It had been over a year now, but Osamu still looked down at his knee. It was early autumn, so the chill hadn’t quite set in yet; even the rain was warm. Keiji wore athletic shorts, and the pale pink of the scars adorning his leg seemed to shine brighter in the gloom of the evening. But it wasn’t that, and Osamu probably figured that, so he looked back up at Keiji with concern.
“I, um. I came to talk.” Even Keiji’s voice didn’t sound like his own. It was like he was in his own head, trapped in a bubble and screaming to get out while his body was on autopilot. But at the same time, he was buried deep down inside of himself, curled up into a ball and not wanting to see the light of day ever again.
Osamu blinked at him. It seemed to take him a moment to realize what Keiji had just said. When he did, he stammered, “Yeah, yeah,” and stepped aside. Keiji’s body was stiff and robotic as he crossed the threshold, and instead of heading to the counter, he just stood there in the lobby, puddling water.
Osamu locked the door behind them and flipped the sign to “Closed.” He rushed off toward the back of the store. Change of clothes, Keiji thought dimly, and it made a ghost of a smile appear on his lips. It faded by the time Osamu came back with a spare uniform. He put it in Keiji’s hands, and Keiji just held them, not moving at all.
“Kei…what is it? What happened?” Osamu asked quietly.
Keiji wasn’t sure what it was, but it seemed to flip a switch in him. He suddenly regained control of his body as the reality of the situation hit him. With a dry, humorless laugh, he raked his fingers through his wet hair and gave Osamu the most pitiful, heartbroken smile ever.
“She broke up with me.”
Osamu’s eyelashes fluttered, and he straightened up. Soft “Oh’s” repeatedly left his lips, but it seemed to take him a few seconds to realize what he was even saying them for. In the meantime, Keiji stripped out of his wet clothes, tossing them into a pile on the floor with repeated wet slaps. Just as he was pulling the shirt down over his head, Osamu finally seemed to find his words again.
“Broke up with you? Why? I thought you guys were getting serious.”
They had been, or so Keiji had thought. After all, who wouldn’t think a relationship was getting serious after six months? But time couldn’t fix some things, and another dry laugh left his coarse throat as he realized that. He walked past Osamu towards the bar, motioning for him to follow. Just because some things changed didn’t mean everything had to.
Osamu obediently followed, walking around the bar and clumsily grabbing his cooking supplies. Keiji patiently waited for him to get settled, fiddling with the napkins in the dispenser. He’s changed brands again.
After the smell of cooking rice filled the air, Keiji finally spoke again.
“She broke up with me because I told her I was bi.”
“Shewhat?” Osamu barked, whipping around. He was still holding his spatula, and it flung a piece of salmon that had been on it clear across the room. They both turned to look at the wall against which it had splattered. The half-cooked fish down the wall until it hit the floor with a wet plop; then, they turned their gazes back to one another. Osamu slowly breathed in, then let the breath out of his nose. “She did what?”
“Apparently, it makes her ‘uncomfortable.’ She ‘can’t trust me.’”
Osamu nodded, his lips pinching together. He continued to nod as he turned around and began looking over his cooking supplies. Suddenly, he picked up his skillet and said, “Sorry, Kei, I’m afraid I forgot. My skillet has a date with your ex-girlfriend’s face, and we can’t miss that.”
“Thanks, dude, but I’m not in the mood for jokes,” Keiji chuckled weakly.
Osamu gave him a stony stare. “Who said I was kidding?”
Keiji held out his hands in a placating gesture as he said, “Look, it’s not that big of a deal.”
“Itis a big deal!” Osamu snapped. He slammed the skillet down on the counter, and Keiji jumped at the bang that resounded through the room. “That is the shittiest reason to break up with someone ever! And I’m twins with Atsumu, he is the king of shitty excuses to break up.” With a growl, he whipped around to angrily begin stirring the fish around in the pan. “I always had a bad feeling about that bitch.”
“You did?”
Osamu’s entire body stiffened. After freezing for a second, he slowly began stirring the fish again. It was several seconds before he mumbled, “Yeah, I did.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
Osamu still wouldn’t look at him. There was another period of silence filled only by snaps and pops of oil.
“I just… didn’t think it was my place.”
“Or you didn’t think I would listen to you?” Keiji challenged. He expected Osamu to get defensive, but he just offered a half-hearted shrug. Keiji exhaled deeply through his nose and ran his hand through his hair again. Osamu fell quiet again, now shaping the rice balls. “Well… it’s not like it matters, man. It’s not your fault she’s a bitch.”
“Yeah, but I could’ve…” Osamu trailed off, and he stopped in the middle of molding the rice ball.
For a second, Keiji considered hopping over the counter. He’d been the one who’d come for comfort, but Osamu just looked so sad, standing there with his shoulders sagged and his head hung. However, just as Keiji was moving to get up, Osamu suddenly laughed.
“Yeah, you’re right. What am I getting all moody for? That’s your job.” He quickly finished making the rice ball and plopped it on a plate, then turned around to slide it over to Keiji. He leaned against the counter like he always did, arms crossed, but Keiji couldn’t help but notice a stiffness in him that had never been there before.
He stared suspiciously at Osamu as he brought the rice ball to his mouth.
“Seriously, though, fuck that girl,” Osamu huffed. “You’re way better off without her. Any girl—or guy—would be lucky to have you. If she can’t see that, then it’s her loss.”
“Yeah…” Keiji sighed. As good as Osamu’s cooking was, it looked like his stomach still hadn’t come back yet. He set the rice ball back down, and Osamu raised an eyebrow. “I guess it just threw me off guard. Everything had been going so well, and… I thought she might be the one. She could have rejected me for a million different things, but that? Something I can’t change? Something that shouldn’t even be a problem? It just… it just hurt.”
As he laid his head down on the counter with a sigh, Osamu looked at him with sad eyes. He reached out for Keiji’s head, but hesitated. When Keiji didn’t move, just slowly turned his gaze upon him, he swallowed and slowly rested his hand atop Keiji’s head. He began to gently move his hand back and forth, and Keiji couldn’t help but let his eyes flutter shut. It felt good. Too good.
“I’m sorry, Kei. I really am. I… I hate seeing you hurt like this. Always have.”
“But you let me come back here every time,” Keiji said, cracking an eye open to look at him.
And Osamu gave him that soft, sweet smile that sent his heart fluttering in his chest. “Yeah. Guess I caught your stupid after all, huh?”
“Guess so,” Keiji chuckled, and his eyes fell shut again. “You can keep it. And take the rest of it, too. I don’t need to be falling in love with any more bitchy girls.”
The snow drifted down from the cloud-choked sky. The little flurries caught in Keiji’s hair and deposited on the thick down of his coat as he trudged along the sidewalk. He kept his mittened hands buried in his pockets and his scarf pulled up over his nose, but there was a chill still, a chill that seeped down to his bones. No amount of layers could protect him from it, because this empty cold wasn’t from the winter weather.
Things had been going well. Extraordinarily so, even. He’d evacuated the dating scene for a while to sort out his feelings and identity; it had been a hard few months, but he’d finally escaped that fog to find himself in a clear landscape, at peace with himself. His stubborn tenacity at work had also begun to pay off. Despite the embarrassment of being berated by his boss, he had forced himself to carefully consider the offered criticisms, and his writing had thus grown. Now he was routinely praised at the weekly meetings, and he had even earned himself a pay raise.
Keiji was in a good place in life. He had a steady and well-paying career, a nice apartment, a nice life. After all the trials and turmoils that had driven him to Osamu over this past year and a half, he’d finally landed at that desperately-sought tranquility. Yet it was beginning to feel… hollow. Like there was something at the core of his life that was sorely missing. A festering wound that had grown in the background of all his other bumps and bruises that now left him cold, on the cusp of freezing in this stagnation.
Onigiri Miya was warm.
Keiji released an audible sigh as the heat flooded his chilled skin, diving down to his freezing marrow to slowly bring life back to his frozen body. He just stood there in the entryway for a second to soak up the warmth. When Osamu came out from the back room, he found Keiji idling there with a dreamy expression on his face, all lidded eyes and dopey smile.
“Cold out there,” Osamu remarked with an amused smirk. “I was hoping you’d stop by today. I honestly don’t want to get out in it just yet.”
“Can’t blame you.” Like Osamu’s voice was the key to bringing his frozen body back to life, Keiji finally stirred. He wiggled out of his snow-dusted jacket as he walked toward the bar. He threw it over the one next to him, then exhaled heavily while he pulled himself up into the stool. All his joints ached from the cold, but especially his knee, which he rubbed languidly while he watched Osamu walk to the stove.
Even with the heat of the stove slowly rolling over him, Keiji could feel the chill still, deep inside of him.
“So… things have been going well for you lately,” Osamu commented. Keiji hid a smile behind a hand. Even though they had been talking like this for well over a year, Osamu still had that knack for seeming totally nonchalant while directly challenging Keiji to get whatever it was off his chest.
“Yeah, they have,” Keiji agreed. While his one hand still cupped his cheek, fingers extending slightly to cover his lips, his other began to tap a rhythm against the bar. The unspoken buthung heavy in the air, like the cloud of heat slowly enveloping the restaurant and misting up the windows. “I just feel like… I’m missing something. Is that strange?”
“I don’t think so,” Osamu answered, looking over his shoulder at him. “I feel like that sometimes, too.”
“You do?” Keiji asked with raised eyebrows.
“Sure I do,” Osamu said with a nod, then went back to his grill. Keiji watched the subtle motions of his muscles as he stirred the sizzling ingredients around. “After a while, the good feeling that comes from your accomplishments fades. You realize that they’re less special… when you have no one to share them with.”
Keiji’s eyes widened. Osamu continued to face away from him, just silently sliding the simmering meat around the skillet. Something else hung in the air now, heavy over their heads. Or maybe it had been there the whole time, since the first time that Keiji had wandered in during that stormy night. It had been small at first, and it had grown slowly over time, nurtured by these conversations both big and small. All the things left unspoken had coalesced into this looming cloud. All Keiji had to do now was reach out and touch it, let it finally burst to fall down upon them in a warm relieving shower.
Maybe he’d been afraid to do so before. Held back by all the uncertainties, the “what if’s.” But if time had proven anything, it was that he always found his way back here to Onigiri Miya… to Osamu. There was no one else he would rather share it all with—the ups, the downs, the good, the bad, the insignificant, the life-changing.
When Osamu set the plate of rice balls in front of him, Keiji finally recognized them for what they’d been the entire time.
“Thank you, Osamu.”
The snow had stopped by the time they walked outside. A chill still hung in the air, but it didn’t bother the two of them. They were still engulfed in that little bubble of warmth, but it was only just, making them stand a little closer to keep from accidentally venturing back into the cold. So close that the fabric of their jackets brushed, so close that the fog of their breaths mingled together when they turned toward one another to talk.
“Hey, wanna go for a walk around town?” Keiji offered.
“In this weather?” Osamu said with a quirk of his brow, and Keiji nodded. Normally, this is where they parted ways. But there was still that matter of the things left unspoken, and Keiji was determined not to shy away this time. Osamu relented with a nod, and they set off down the ice-slicked, snow-encrusted sidewalk.
They walked in silence for quite a while. Maybe they didn’t quite know what to say, or perhaps it was strangely comfortable in a way, basking in the cloud of familiarity. Eventually, they found themselves at the town plaza. They sat down on a bench in front of a fountain, which was trying its best to trickle water despite the icicles hanging from most of its surface.
“Why the change of venue?” Osamu asked no sooner than they’d gotten themselves comfortable on the bench. Keiji smirked at him, and found his expression mirrored by mischievousness. “Oh, come on. You wouldn’t ask to go for a walk unless you had more to talk about.”
“You know me too well,” Keiji chuckled. He looked away from Osamu, out at the expanse of snow and gray stone. One would expect it to seem dreary, but it didn’t to Keiji. Then again, nothing really seemed dreary when he was with Osamu.
“I wanted to thank you. You’ve helped me a lot, you know,” Keiji said, looking back to the man beside him. Osamu’s eyes widened, like he hadn’t been expecting thistype of conversation. Keiji leaned back against the bench and stretched his arm around the back so his fingers were just barely brushing up against the back of Osamu’s shoulder. “Seems like your rice balls are the cure for my stupid.”
Osamu snorted with laughter. After a moment of chuckling, he grinned, “No, I don’t think anything can cure that. But I tried my best.”
“You’re right,” Keiji murmured. Osamu looked inquisitively at him, then dropped his gaze to Keiji’s body as he scooted a little closer. The heat around them was growing stifling; it was boiling with anticipation. “I’ve still been a little stupid. Stupid for waiting until now to do this.”
Maybe Osamu had been expecting it just a little, because he didn’t so much as gasp when Keiji swooped in to smother Osamu’s lips with his own. Instead, he melted into him. He pressed against Keiji like he was trying to mold himself into him, blur their borders until neither of them was sure where one ended and the other began. That cloud that had been growing silently all this time finally burst, and it burst in a fury, an explosion of sparks and warmth that lit Keiji up from the inside out with fireworks. In that kiss, Keiji told Osamu all the things he never had, and Osamu did the same.
“Yeah. You should have done that sooner,” Osamu said breathlessly when Keiji finally pulled back.
“And why didn’t you?” Keiji challenged with a playful smirk. As a blush rushed up from his neck, further pinkening his wind-bitten cheeks, Osamu looked down at his lap.
“I guess I didn’t want to ruin it… Didn’t want to make it awkward. I would’ve hated it if you stopped coming around…” Osamu looked bitter as he said it. Looking back, Osamu had probably noticed that cloud far sooner than Keiji did, but he had been too overwhelmed by the pressure of it to do anything. So he just suffered in silence, easing Keiji’s pain in an effort to numb himself at the same time.
“Sorry,” Keiji chuckled, a bit ruefully. “Guess you really didcatch my stupid, huh?” Osamu huffed indignantly at that, his expression growing a little pouty. All it took was for Keiji to laugh for him to smile again, however. Keiji leaned forward to press his forehead to Osamu’s, and Osamu’s gaze flickered up to meet his. “But you don’t have to worry about me going anywhere. I abuse you for your food. Can’t get rid of me now.”
“Pssh,” Osamu snickered. “I’ll burn your rice next time.”
“Aw, come on. That’s a little uncalled for, don’t you think?” Keiji pouted. Osamu responded by reaching up to pinch it between his thumb and index finger. Keiji recoiled at the biting cold, but Osamu didn’t let go, making his lip stretch slightly. “Oshamuuuu…”
“Hmm… If you kiss me again, maybe I’ll forget to burn the rice,” Osamu said with a twinkle in his eye. Keiji chuckled and leaned in. Osamu released his lip so Keiji could kiss him again, soft and sweet this time. And Osamu welcomed him, just like he had welcomed him all the times before. But Keiji didn’t need healing or comfort. He’d already gotten it. Now, he just needed to keep moving forward with Osamu at his side and to make sure that he didn’t leave anything unspoken along the way.
