It Was You for Minni!
Title: It Was You
Recipient: Minni
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: None really??
Summary: Each time, it's a little more frustrating.
Notes: The prompt you gave inspired me, because it fit for these two so well!!
The first time Chitose brings it up, they’re thirteen years old, and overconfident. They’re fresh off a national doubles tournament win, and Chitose thinks he’s smart.
“Are you never going to cut your hair?”
Chitose’s fingers thread long and deft through Tachibana’s hair, working the dye in to the root. “Hmm? You don’t like my hair, Kippei?”
“I didn’t say that.” Tachibana closes his eyes, trying to sit as still as possible so the bleach doesn’t hit too much of his skin or leak onto his clothes. “It’s just been the same as long as I’ve known you. Doesn’t it get hot in the summer? It looks hot.”
“You think I’m hot?”
Tachibana opens one eye, squint-glaring up at Chitose’s innocent smile. His vice-captain doesn’t blink, just drags his nails over Tachibana’s scalp a little, making him shiver.
“Stop it, that feels weird.” Good, but weird. He’s pretty sure that Chitose spends more time massaging his scalp than is entirely necessary for the dye to take. Chitose has always thought he was a lot smarter than everyone around him, and Tachibana doesn’t mind letting him think that. It makes it easier to tell his mood, when he works in flippant, snippy little comments he doesn’t think anyone else will notice. Of course, Chitose is smarter than most people around him, which makes the arrogance both more and less forgivable at the same time.
“Ah, it’s starting to tingle.”
Tachibana doesn’t even blink his eyes open this time. “I told you to wear gloves. Not my fault you never listen.”
“You don’t have gloves, Kippei.”
“It was your idea to dye my hair. You seriously forget them every month.”
There’s a slight noise of friction, and Chitose confesses behind him, “I kind of like the burning. That’s probably weird...Nana says I have a mind that’s been reincarnated too many times.”
“You believe in that?”
“I believe I’ve known you before.”
The words aren’t that strange--but in Chitose’s certain, glinting voice, they sound sure enough to give Tachibana pause. “Yeah?”
“Lean your head back.”
That’s a different tone of voice. It covers what sounds like a strained secret, and Tachibana complies. “So, who was I, in your past life?”
Chitose laughs. It isn’t a nice laugh. “If you don’t know, I can’t tell you. Close your eyes, Kippei, or I’m going to bleach them.”
Tachibana closes his eyes on that smiling face and its secrets for two years.
~
The second time Chitose mentions it, they’re fifteen, and uncertain. Tachibana still isn’t quite sure who the enigmatic, half-blind, knowledge-seeker before him is anymore.
“Can I sleep on your floor tonight?”
Tachibana has never heard anyone ask such a question so cheerfully. He closes his slack jaw, looking at Chitose’s soaking wet form in the doorway of his family’s house in Tokyo, not sure what to do with this information. “Um...sure. I mean, you don’t have to sleep on the floor, we’ve got plenty of room.”
“Ehh, really? I don’t want to be a bother. Is your family home?”
“Not exactly, but--”
“Tachibana-san! Ishida ate all the eel, should we go get more from the store?”
“I said I was sorry! I thought there was another bag!”
“Tachibana-san, tell Kamio to leave An-chan alone, he’s bothering her again!”
“If he was bothering me, I’d tell him to leave me alone myself, Mori!”
Chitose blanches, even visible under a dark summer’s bronzing and his rain-induced pallor. “Your team is over?”
“Well. Yeah.” Tachibana isn’t sure who he’s more fiercely protective of, Chitose, or his team. What’s important is that they don’t mix too much, not after the way Chitose’s team had destroyed them at Nationals.
Chitose doesn’t look like a National Semifinalist now. He looks cheerfully rotten, insouciant, and like he stumbled out of bed and just happened to land in Tokyo. “Why do you need to stay on my floor, anyway?”
“Secret.” Chitose laughs. “I like to keep you guessing, Kippei.”
“You that hard up for entertainment?”
“You’d be surprised at how much fun I have entertaining myself around you.” The words almost sound wistful, and Tachibana lets them be. It will make Chitose feel better, to think he’d gotten one past him. Maybe that’s the relationship they’re building now--one where Chitose thinks to himself, and Tachibana busies himself with guessing what’s going on under that kinky hair.
He frowns, then asks, “Were you chasing cats? In the rain?”
Chitose’s smile is huge and false, and his eyes light up with secret amusement that tells Tachibana he’d guessed wrong. “Nice guess, you’re right! Ah, I wouldn’t want to intrude, though--”
Tachibana grabs him by the wide-necked shirt and drags him inside. A few hours later, when his team is gone and Chitose is on a futon on his floor, he lays awake, trying to think of what his old friend is hiding.
“Kippei.”
Tachibana considers grunting, but pretends to be asleep instead. It might be the right choice, if he wants a response. Chitose is funny like that.
“It’ll work this time. It’ll have to.”
Tachibana keeps his breathing regular and shallow, not twitching in the slightest.
Chitose shifts, and sighs to himself. “I hope I’m not just crazy.”
Tachibana hopes so, too.
~
(Tachibana remembers years later that he’s forgotten one. They were six years old, and wise for their years. They sat, telling ghost stories in a big climbing tree outside Chitose’s grandmother’s house at the outskirts of Kumamoto. Chitose had turned his head quickly at a sound, then turned back to grab Tachibana’s shirt. “Just don’t fall out,” he’d said, eyes wide and intent. “I don’t want to watch you die again.” That had been surprisingly easy to block out, when the words had shaken Tachibana down to his very core.)
~
When Tachibana works up the courage to stick his tongue down Chitose’s throat, they’d seventeen, and stupid. He grabs at Chitose like he has something to prove, slams him up against a wall like they’re old enemies instead of friends, grinds against him like they’re lovers instead of anything else. Chitose is oddly, pleasantly pliant beneath his fingers, throwing himself into the embrace with limp, noodly enthusiasm. “Finally,” he murmurs against Tachibana’s lips.
Tachibana punches him in the shoulder, barely breaking the kiss to do so. “You could have done it your damn self years ago,” he growls.
“Well, yeah. But that’s not how this works.” The enigma on Chitose’s face makes Tachibana grind his teeth. “It had to be this way.”
Tachibana is smarter than he lets on--at least, smarter than he lets on to Chitose, who would start requiring him to put a lot of thought into everything he does. “This is about who we used to be, right?”
“Hmm? Oh. That.” Chitose’s face lights up as if he’s discovered something hilarious, and he shakes his head. “I don’t think it matters anymore.”
“I really hate you sometimes.” Tachibana looks around, then steals another kiss. It’s enough for now, before they both leave for gods-know-where, him pursuing a pro career, Chitose flitting off to what’s probably the first of many universities. “You’ve been hinting at this shit our whole lives.”
Chitose’s eyes go wide, startled. “You remember all of that?”
“Sure. So, what’s the big--”
Chitose puts a finger to his lips. “If you don’t know, I can’t tell you.”
“Even now?”
“Yeah.”
“Forever, then?”
Chitose’s eyes glint. “That depends on you, Kippei.”
Tachibana only wishes he knew how.
~
They’re twenty-five when Tachibana recognizes him. Chitose’s arms are looped around his neck, and their eyes meet for a brief second, a pause in the steady rhythm of their movements, a slow thrusting that makes both of them groan. “Oh,” he says, startled at how calm he is. “It’s you.”
Chitose’s eyes lid, and his lips curve into a slow smile, at odds with the way he rises and falls. “You know, Kippei,” he breathes, “you’re smarter than you look.”
Recipient: Minni
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: None really??
Summary: Each time, it's a little more frustrating.
Notes: The prompt you gave inspired me, because it fit for these two so well!!
The first time Chitose brings it up, they’re thirteen years old, and overconfident. They’re fresh off a national doubles tournament win, and Chitose thinks he’s smart.
“Are you never going to cut your hair?”
Chitose’s fingers thread long and deft through Tachibana’s hair, working the dye in to the root. “Hmm? You don’t like my hair, Kippei?”
“I didn’t say that.” Tachibana closes his eyes, trying to sit as still as possible so the bleach doesn’t hit too much of his skin or leak onto his clothes. “It’s just been the same as long as I’ve known you. Doesn’t it get hot in the summer? It looks hot.”
“You think I’m hot?”
Tachibana opens one eye, squint-glaring up at Chitose’s innocent smile. His vice-captain doesn’t blink, just drags his nails over Tachibana’s scalp a little, making him shiver.
“Stop it, that feels weird.” Good, but weird. He’s pretty sure that Chitose spends more time massaging his scalp than is entirely necessary for the dye to take. Chitose has always thought he was a lot smarter than everyone around him, and Tachibana doesn’t mind letting him think that. It makes it easier to tell his mood, when he works in flippant, snippy little comments he doesn’t think anyone else will notice. Of course, Chitose is smarter than most people around him, which makes the arrogance both more and less forgivable at the same time.
“Ah, it’s starting to tingle.”
Tachibana doesn’t even blink his eyes open this time. “I told you to wear gloves. Not my fault you never listen.”
“You don’t have gloves, Kippei.”
“It was your idea to dye my hair. You seriously forget them every month.”
There’s a slight noise of friction, and Chitose confesses behind him, “I kind of like the burning. That’s probably weird...Nana says I have a mind that’s been reincarnated too many times.”
“You believe in that?”
“I believe I’ve known you before.”
The words aren’t that strange--but in Chitose’s certain, glinting voice, they sound sure enough to give Tachibana pause. “Yeah?”
“Lean your head back.”
That’s a different tone of voice. It covers what sounds like a strained secret, and Tachibana complies. “So, who was I, in your past life?”
Chitose laughs. It isn’t a nice laugh. “If you don’t know, I can’t tell you. Close your eyes, Kippei, or I’m going to bleach them.”
Tachibana closes his eyes on that smiling face and its secrets for two years.
~
The second time Chitose mentions it, they’re fifteen, and uncertain. Tachibana still isn’t quite sure who the enigmatic, half-blind, knowledge-seeker before him is anymore.
“Can I sleep on your floor tonight?”
Tachibana has never heard anyone ask such a question so cheerfully. He closes his slack jaw, looking at Chitose’s soaking wet form in the doorway of his family’s house in Tokyo, not sure what to do with this information. “Um...sure. I mean, you don’t have to sleep on the floor, we’ve got plenty of room.”
“Ehh, really? I don’t want to be a bother. Is your family home?”
“Not exactly, but--”
“Tachibana-san! Ishida ate all the eel, should we go get more from the store?”
“I said I was sorry! I thought there was another bag!”
“Tachibana-san, tell Kamio to leave An-chan alone, he’s bothering her again!”
“If he was bothering me, I’d tell him to leave me alone myself, Mori!”
Chitose blanches, even visible under a dark summer’s bronzing and his rain-induced pallor. “Your team is over?”
“Well. Yeah.” Tachibana isn’t sure who he’s more fiercely protective of, Chitose, or his team. What’s important is that they don’t mix too much, not after the way Chitose’s team had destroyed them at Nationals.
Chitose doesn’t look like a National Semifinalist now. He looks cheerfully rotten, insouciant, and like he stumbled out of bed and just happened to land in Tokyo. “Why do you need to stay on my floor, anyway?”
“Secret.” Chitose laughs. “I like to keep you guessing, Kippei.”
“You that hard up for entertainment?”
“You’d be surprised at how much fun I have entertaining myself around you.” The words almost sound wistful, and Tachibana lets them be. It will make Chitose feel better, to think he’d gotten one past him. Maybe that’s the relationship they’re building now--one where Chitose thinks to himself, and Tachibana busies himself with guessing what’s going on under that kinky hair.
He frowns, then asks, “Were you chasing cats? In the rain?”
Chitose’s smile is huge and false, and his eyes light up with secret amusement that tells Tachibana he’d guessed wrong. “Nice guess, you’re right! Ah, I wouldn’t want to intrude, though--”
Tachibana grabs him by the wide-necked shirt and drags him inside. A few hours later, when his team is gone and Chitose is on a futon on his floor, he lays awake, trying to think of what his old friend is hiding.
“Kippei.”
Tachibana considers grunting, but pretends to be asleep instead. It might be the right choice, if he wants a response. Chitose is funny like that.
“It’ll work this time. It’ll have to.”
Tachibana keeps his breathing regular and shallow, not twitching in the slightest.
Chitose shifts, and sighs to himself. “I hope I’m not just crazy.”
Tachibana hopes so, too.
~
(Tachibana remembers years later that he’s forgotten one. They were six years old, and wise for their years. They sat, telling ghost stories in a big climbing tree outside Chitose’s grandmother’s house at the outskirts of Kumamoto. Chitose had turned his head quickly at a sound, then turned back to grab Tachibana’s shirt. “Just don’t fall out,” he’d said, eyes wide and intent. “I don’t want to watch you die again.” That had been surprisingly easy to block out, when the words had shaken Tachibana down to his very core.)
~
When Tachibana works up the courage to stick his tongue down Chitose’s throat, they’d seventeen, and stupid. He grabs at Chitose like he has something to prove, slams him up against a wall like they’re old enemies instead of friends, grinds against him like they’re lovers instead of anything else. Chitose is oddly, pleasantly pliant beneath his fingers, throwing himself into the embrace with limp, noodly enthusiasm. “Finally,” he murmurs against Tachibana’s lips.
Tachibana punches him in the shoulder, barely breaking the kiss to do so. “You could have done it your damn self years ago,” he growls.
“Well, yeah. But that’s not how this works.” The enigma on Chitose’s face makes Tachibana grind his teeth. “It had to be this way.”
Tachibana is smarter than he lets on--at least, smarter than he lets on to Chitose, who would start requiring him to put a lot of thought into everything he does. “This is about who we used to be, right?”
“Hmm? Oh. That.” Chitose’s face lights up as if he’s discovered something hilarious, and he shakes his head. “I don’t think it matters anymore.”
“I really hate you sometimes.” Tachibana looks around, then steals another kiss. It’s enough for now, before they both leave for gods-know-where, him pursuing a pro career, Chitose flitting off to what’s probably the first of many universities. “You’ve been hinting at this shit our whole lives.”
Chitose’s eyes go wide, startled. “You remember all of that?”
“Sure. So, what’s the big--”
Chitose puts a finger to his lips. “If you don’t know, I can’t tell you.”
“Even now?”
“Yeah.”
“Forever, then?”
Chitose’s eyes glint. “That depends on you, Kippei.”
Tachibana only wishes he knew how.
~
They’re twenty-five when Tachibana recognizes him. Chitose’s arms are looped around his neck, and their eyes meet for a brief second, a pause in the steady rhythm of their movements, a slow thrusting that makes both of them groan. “Oh,” he says, startled at how calm he is. “It’s you.”
Chitose’s eyes lid, and his lips curve into a slow smile, at odds with the way he rises and falls. “You know, Kippei,” he breathes, “you’re smarter than you look.”