Chapter Text
It’s pleasantly warm out, and the weather is making Miku feel a bit sleepy; she would be totally passed out on this cafe table right now if it weren’t for Vivid BAD SQUAD’s loud singing from just outside. Well, Akito’s loud singing, anyway. Miku thought An was loud at first, but Akito has absolutely no volume control.
Not that their singing is a bad thing. They sound great-- they’ve only been a team for a little over a month, but they’ve improved a lot since they first performed together, and they’ll only get better from here.
Miku’s excited to see her friends grow and change, but for now, she just wants to sleep.
“Miku! Wake up! Miku-chan! Miku-kun! Miku-nyan!”
The universe is an expert in comedic timing, Miku thinks grumpily. “What’s up, Rin?” She lifts her head to face her. “Did you just call me Miku-nyan?”
“Why are you inside?” Rin notably ignores Miku’s second question. “We’re all singing with VBS out there; why don’t you join us? We sound great! Did you hear us?”
“I heard you. You sounded amazing,” Miku says. “But I’m tired.”
“Aw, man.” Rin pats Miku’s head with uncharacteristic gentleness. “Alright. Sleep well! Join us after your nap, ’kay?”
“‘Kay,” Miku mumbles in agreement, setting her head back down on the table. “See you later.”
“Later!”
Rin leaves, and in the brief silence between songs, Miku finds herself drifting off to sleep.
. . .
“Miku-sa-- oh.”
Miku is, quite unfortunately, a very light sleeper, so even though Touya’s voice is always very soft and quiet, it wakes her up immediately. “Huh?”
“I apologize for waking you,” Touya says quickly. “I didn’t realize you were asleep. I can leave if you’d like to continue resting.”
“Nah, it’s okay,” she says, sitting up and stretching. A glance of the pink sunset through the cafe window-- and the ache in her neck-- tells her it’s been at least an hour since she started napping. Rin must have told everyone not to come in because she was sleeping. Aww. “Do you need something?”
Touya glances back and forth, like he’s making sure no one is listening. Oh, this might be interesting, actually. “Well . . . I’ve come to realize something quite important, and I’m not sure who to tell.”
“You can’t tell Akito?” They tell each other everything. Well, mostly everything. If they told each other everything, there wouldn’t have been that whole soap opera where Akito ran all the way to Ken’s cafe and heartfeltly shouted some sort of emotional speech at Touya while on the verge of tears. And all that other angsty teenage guy stuff, or whatever. (It was only a few weeks ago, but Miku can’t remember all the details now.)
“Well.” Touya clears his throat. Shifts awkwardly. Tucks that one lock of hair behind his ear, the one that’s longer than the rest of his hair for some reason. (Maybe his barber was distracted.) “I . . . no, I can’t exactly tell Akito about this.”
And then Miku knows just what he’s about to say-- she’s been waiting for this ever since they first met-- but she decides to let him finish. “Then what is it?”
“Um.” Touya looks away, then looks back at Miku, fiddling with one of the many straps hanging from one of his many belts. Kids these days and their impractical layers. “I’m not very experienced in this field, but I’m almost entirely sure I may have developed romantic feelings for him?”
Called it. Well, she called it forever ago, but she never really expected Touya to come out and say it. Ha-- come out. That’s practically what he’s doing. “Ah. You have bad taste in men.”
“Akito is an amazing person,” Touya argues. “He’s my best friend in the world and I trust him more than anyone. I can’t imagine a life where I’m not standing by his side.”
Miku always forgets just how sappy Touya can be when he has something important to say. “Alright, I get it, I was just joking. Sorry.”
“Oh.” Touya seems to relax a little. “Anyway, I . . . was wondering if I could perhaps get some advice? Not just on how to confess, but how to-- how to process? All of this. And to figure out if he feels this way as well.”
“Look, man, I have no idea how love works,” Miku says, kicking her feet up on the table. “But if you really don’t have anyone else to tell . . .” She doesn’t know much about Touya’s family, but she knows they’re not people he’d want to talk to about anything, much less something this important to him. And An and Kohane . . . well, they seem like good options, but Touya’s not very close to them, so he might’ve opted for who he presumes is The Mighty All-Knowing Hatsune Miku. Unfortunately, said Hatsune Miku is just a regular old teenager like him who, yes, does tend to wear impractical amounts of layers sometimes. “I guess I could try to help.”
Touya brightens. Barely. All of his facial expressions are a semitone above blank stares. “Really?”
“Really,” she says. “Although I don’t know him half as well as you do. You’ve been his best friend for two years, and I’ve barely been his acquaintance for a month.”
“That’s okay,” Touya says, sitting down across from Miku at the table. “I just need . . . general advice. I can barely understand any kind of feelings normally, but romantic feelings are a whole other story.”
“Well,” Miku says, trying to take this seriously. Touya doesn’t start conversations much, let alone ask people for advice, so she really wants to try her best to help him out. “About him liking you back-- I haven’t seen you two interact a whole lot, but it seems to me like he’s much touchier with you than with the girls.”
And by much touchier, she means much touchier . There was that one time when Akito hugged Touya backstage, of course. And the many times he’s ruffled Touya’s hair. And the time when they hugged in the cafe when they thought no one was looking. And the way they always link arms when they’re walking together. And the time when they hugged after practice. And the way Akito will put his arm around Touya’s shoulders whenever they’re sitting together. And that one other time when they hugged. (Miku’s starting to get a vague idea that Akito likes hugs?)
Touya considers this. “I believe that’s because he doesn’t open up to people easily, and he’s not very close with them yet. I’m sure he’d act the same way with them if they were all best friends.”
Miku’s no idiot; she’s seen the way Akito looks at Touya as if he hung all the stars in the sky. Well, actually, that might not be the most admirable thing to Akito. The way he looks at Touya as if he invented pancakes. Yeah, that’s more like him. “Hmm.”
“Do you disagree?” Touya asks, looking skeptical but also hopeful. Well, that’s how Miku imagines he feels. His tone of voice and facial expression haven’t changed at all over the course of the conversation.
“Well . . .” Miku likes to stay in the cafe sometimes and watch Vivid BAD SQUAD hanging out without joining in. She wants to learn more about the people who created her world with their feelings, and every interaction feels like remembering something about an old friend. So, among many other quiet observations, she’s noticed the way Akito lingers a bit too long when he touches Touya, and how he’ll stare at Touya when the latter isn’t paying attention. Akito blushes very easily, she realized early on, but he blushes the most when he’s with Touya. It’s obvious he’s got it bad for his partner. She’s known that the whole time.
Touya’s crush on Akito, however, is a bit more subtle, and it took Miku longer to realize he returned the feelings. He doesn’t show his emotions on his face, or with physical affection like Akito does, but through words. While he’s not a chatty person by any means and stays so quiet most of the time that Miku tends to forget he’s there with the rest of VBS, Touya could talk about Akito for hours . Heck, she found out for sure he likes Akito when he was talking about him one time. In great length and detail. And Miku was trying her very best to pay attention, but thankfully Akito cut him off before she lost her mind.
It wasn’t all bad, though. That might’ve been the happiest she’s ever seen Touya. His eyes seemed to sparkle as he rambled about small details about his partner that most people wouldn’t think to notice, let alone tell someone else about.
“I think there’s definitely a difference,” she finally says. “Although, I mean, it’s not like you two ever hug or anything.”
“We do,” Touya says, smiling a little. “Akito gives great hugs. I didn’t really like being touched at first, but now I love it when it’s him.”
“I . . .” The poor guy still doesn’t get sarcasm. “Cool. Have you ever seen him hug someone else?”
Touya thinks for a moment. “I don’t believe so.”
“Then there’s your first sign.”
“Really?” He seems to relax a little. “Is there anything else?”
Miku has to think really hard. There’s all the evidence in the world that Akito has a crush on Touya. But what’s the best way to explain it?
“Oi, Touya. What’s takin’ so long?”
Touya whirls around to see Akito in the cafe doorway. Miku doesn’t miss the way Touya absolutely lights up at the sight of him. “Oh-- I’m sorry. I said you didn’t have to wait for me.”
“But I did anyway,” Akito says. “I wanted to walk halfway home together. I can wait longer if you’re not done talkin’ to Miku.”
“No, it’s alright.” Touya stands up and bows to Miku, a silent thank you, let’s continue this conversation later, and walks over to Akito, who dips his head in a casual bow to Miku and links their arms together as they walk off.
“Ah, young love,” the voice of MEIKO says, startling Miku. She whirls around to see MEIKO standing behind the counter. “Since when have you been there?!”
“A while. I was just quiet. And I didn’t want to disturb you and Touya’s conversation.” MEIKO smiles warmly. “I appreciate you trying to help him out.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not very good at it,” Miku says with a yawn. “Hopefully he’ll be able to figure out most of it on his own.”
“If it’s those two? Even if they do figure it out, they’ll never tell each other.” MEIKO grins. “You might have to give one of them the little push he needs.”
“Ugh, no. I love them and they’re great, but I’d really rather not get caught up in their weird teenage dude romance thing. Too much testosterone and angst for me.” She stands up. “I’m gonna make some coffee.”
As she whips up her drink, she thinks about everything that just happened. Even though she’s romantically clueless, it means a lot that Touya would come to her. And she really does want to help, if it’ll make both boys happy.
She supposes she’ll just have to see how their story plays out.
Touya talks to her about Akito a few times over the next month or so, but Miku’s not sure what she’s supposed to do about it. She listens to him and tries to provide advice, but ultimately, it becomes clear neither of them are going to take any initiative on getting into a relationship, so she decides to brainstorm some ideas in some dusty old coffee-stained notebook she found in her room. Yes, she does have the notes app on her phone, but in movies they always write their plans on paper, so she thinks she’ll have more success this way.
She’s just writing down ‘Step 1: Get Akito to admit he likes Touya’ when she sees the flash outside of someone entering the SEKAI, and peeks outside to see who it is. It’s pretty late, after all. Rin and Len (and probably KAITO, who goes to bed at 8 p.m.) went to sleep hours ago, and the others probably have as well at this point.
The mysterious visitor is Akito. Instead of coming to the cafe like Miku expected, he starts walking off into a random alley. What is he doing? It’s dark out. He’ll get eaten by Calne Ca if he goes the wrong way!
(No, really. MEIKO says she’s sweet and friendly, but Miku’s still pretty sure she eats people.)
Miku throws her jacket on and hustles outside to follow him. Hopefully she can get him to come inside before they get eaten, but that guy is more stubborn than she is, which is . . . really saying something.
“Akito!” she whisper-yells. “Akito, what are you doing?!”
Akito whirls around, startled, making a really funny squeak that Miku would totally tease him about if she weren’t so worried. “Miku?”
“You need to come inside,” she says. “If you don’t know exactly where you’re going out here, you’ll meet some, uh, interesting characters.” She links her arm with his. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Um,” Akito says, clearly completely confused, but he follows her back to the cafe.
“What on earth are you doing out here?” she asks. “Why were you heading out into the streets?”
“I just . . . wanted to take a walk and think about some things.” His voice wavers, and he clears his throat.
“Are you okay?” she asks, letting go of his arm to open the cafe door and let him inside. “I thought your problem was resolved earlier.”
Apparently, some young adult singer trash-talked Akito and his friends, and Akito has been overworking himself like crazy for the last few weeks. Miku’s been really worried, but Touya and the others came to the rescue today, and she thought Akito’s troubles were over.
“I’m fine,” Akito says sharply.
Right. This’ll be a little difficult if Akito refuses to talk about his feelings like always.
Well . . . there is the option of bribery.
Miku goes to the dessert case and gets him a slice of cheesecake, then sets it in front of him. “Here.”
“It’s almost midnight,” Akito says, but immediately starts wolfing it down anyway.
“Now talk. What’s wrong?” Miku asks, sitting across from him.
“I just . . .” Akito sighs heavily. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Matters to me. The SEKAI has been a little funky since the whole Arata thing started, so I think you should tell me. Plus, I gave you dessert.”
“Fine,” Akito mumbles through a mouthful of cheesecake. He swallows, then says, “I’ve gotten so used to practicing like crazy and goin’ to bed really late the last few weeks, so I feel super restless now. I can’t sleep, and I didn’t want to go out running in my pajamas, so I came here to jog a bit.” He stares at his already almost-finished dessert-- dude?? “I’m grateful for everything my friends said today, and Touya’s words especially hit me hard. But . . . I feel like it’s gonna be kinda difficult to get out of this mindset, y’know?”
She does know. In fact, she’s pretty sure all of her negative qualities come from Akito. Except for the one that makes KAITO scared of her cooking. What’s up with that?
“So Touya told you to rely on him more, huh?” Miku asks, propping her chin in her hand.
He sets down his fork. “Yeah. And . . . I wanna do that. I seriously do. I just don’t really know how yet.”
“That’s okay. You’re a smart guy; I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” Miku glances at his almost-empty plate. “Did you eat dinner?”
Akito sheepishly avoids eye contact. “Uh. I was too busy.”
“Well, that’s the first thing you should change. You can’t think or sing on an empty stomach. Want me to make you a sandwich?”
“No,” Akito says quickly, and there’s something like fear in his eyes. “I’m good. Thank you.”
Why does no one like her sandwiches??? “Well then, you better eat something filling when you go home, ’kay?”
“Okay,” he mumbles, shoveling another huge bite of cheesecake into his mouth. He’s eating it so fast Miku’s getting worried he’s going to choke.
“Are you doing okay besides all that?” Miku asks. “Like, are you feeling better than you have since the whole Arata thing started?”
“Yeah.” Akito smiles a little. “I guess I didn’t really realize how much my team cares about me. I don’t deserve them. Especially Touya.”
“You do deserve them,” Miku says. “Jeez. Is it gonna take a whole year for you to realize that? A very long year that feels like three?”
Akito shrugs.
“I’m starting to think you’d sooner die and get reincarnated as a white knight in a fantasy world than realize your friends love you.”
“Oddly specific.”
She ignores him. “Oh yeah-- Touya.” Maybe this doesn’t have anything to do with what they were talking about, but Miku hasn’t forgotten about her mission to get the guys to tell each other how they feel. Might as well accomplish Step 1 right here and now. “You love him, don’t you?”
Akito immediately turns bright red, then glances both ways, like he’s making sure no one’s listening.
“Everyone’s asleep,” Miku says. “Especially KAITO.”
“Why especially?” He finishes the last bite of cheesecake and pushes his plate to the side.
“Because he goes to bed earlier than the twins. He’s like a grandpa-- or a seven-year-old. Anyway, you were saying?”
“I don’t,” Akito says, fidgeting with his hands, which are shaking all of a sudden. Oh-- Miku didn’t realize he would get that flustered. She almost feels a little bad. “Well-- yeah, I love him, but not like that .”
That’s BS. “Are you sure? You can tell me. I’m here to help.”
“I’m sure,” Akito says. His hands really are very shaky. Miku takes one of them to calm him down.
“I promise, it’s not a bad thing,” Miku says. “In fact, everyone else who’s ever met you can probably tell you like him. Admitting it might make you feel better.”
“I . . .” Akito swallows hard. “I dunno.”
“How does spending time with Touya make you feel?” Jeez, she sounds like a therapist. Maybe that’s what she is at this point. She was destined to become the therapist of a bunch of messed-up kids her age when, hell, she’s almost as messed up herself.
“Warm,” Akito says, blushing again. “And safe. He’s kinda always been my safe person, I guess? Jeez, that sounds sappy and stupid, I . . .”
It’s true; Miku rarely ever sees one of them without the other. She knows Akito doesn’t have any other friends, and he never mentions his family, so Touya must really be the only person he trusts fully. “And why do you hug him all the time and not the others?”
“Hey, it’s not all the time, ” he says, defensive, then thinks about this. “Okay, yeah, maybe it is. It’s just ’cause I’m not close with the girls yet. I’m not really a hugger, either. I just wanna make sure Touya feels comfortable and loved, ’cause of everything he’s been through.”
Oh, Akito, and his constant need to act tough even when he doesn’t need to. “Hmm.”
“I’m sure he never really gets hugs from anyone else except maybe his freak sorta-brother sometimes. So I’m giving him the human contact he needs. Yeah.”
She has no idea what on earth a freak sorta-brother is. Sounds interesting. She’ll have to ask Touya. “Suuure. Ever gotten butterflies in your stomach around him? Gotten really blushy and heart-race-y?”
“Leave me alone,” he mumbles, picking at the black polish on his thumbnail. “’S just . . . my hormones actin’ up or somethin’. I’m not gay.”
Miku has to try really hard not to laugh. “Yep. Definitely. Have you ever had crushes on anyone before?”
“I mean . . . not really. Unless you count . . . like, there was this one girl” -- he turns very very red -- “from an-- from an idol group.”
“Ooh,” Miku says. She wasn’t expecting that. “Bi, then, maybe? Spill the tea.”
“There’s no tea to spill. There was a girl. From an idol group. That’s all you get to know.” He clears his throat and turns away. “And I don’t want a label. Not yet, anyway. Not until I figure things out.”
“Fair enough. So do you like Touya or not?”
“Ugh, now my stomach hurts,” Akito grumbles.
“’Cause you didn’t eat anything for hours and then shoveled a whole slice of cheesecake into your body in like three seconds. Let this be a lesson.” Akito does look a little green, but it’s almost certainly because of the Touya thing, not the cheesecake. “By the way, I’m not as dumb as you think I am. You might feel sick, but you only brought it up to avoid my question. I said, do you like Touya or not?”
Akito refuses to meet her gaze, and there’s a very, very (very) (Miku could sing the entirety of Melt in the time it takes before he responds) long pause before he speaks again.
“. . . Yeah,” he says in the quietest voice she’s ever heard him use. “I think I like him.”
Finally. “Cool.”
“That’s it?” Akito finally looks up in surprise. “I guess I was expecting you to go on some whole rant about me needing to finally tell him and how I’m an idiot and stuff.”
“You’re not an idiot, Akito,” Miku says. Actually, he sort of is. But she’s not about to say that. “Anyway, it was always pretty obvious you fell in love with him.”
“N--”
“‘Fell’ might not be a strong enough phrase. You tumbled down fifteen flights of stairs.”
“That’s not tr--”
“Tripped off the edge of the Grand Canyon.”
“Miku, I swear to--”
“Nosedived out of a plane without a parachute only to fall into the ocean and plummet all the way down to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.”
“Akito!” Touya’s voice calls, startling Miku.
Akito clasps his hands together and looks up at the ceiling like he’s thanking God for the interruption, then turns around to see what’s going on. Touya’s standing at the door, red-faced and breathing heavily, like he just ran a marathon. Or two yards. Touya isn’t much of an athlete.
“Touya? What are you doing here?” Akito asks.
This feels like deja vu, Miku thinks.
“I’m so glad you’re alright,” Touya says breathlessly. “I texted you to say goodnight, and you didn’t respond. I figured you just didn’t see it, but I called you to make sure you were alright-- because you always answer calls-- and you didn’t pick up. So even though I assumed you were just getting the rest you deserve, I ran to your house just to make sure, since I was a bit worried. And Ena-san said you weren’t there, so . . .”
“Oh, crap,” Akito says. “It’s gonna startle her pretty bad if I just spawn in my bedroom. Hopefully she’ll just think I came in through the window or something, although that makes it seem like I was doing something suspicious.” He shakes his head. “Anyway, I’m sorry you had to do all that. I must’ve been so distracted I didn’t notice my phone vibrating.”
“Distracted by what?” Touya asks, sitting down next to him.
“I was just thinkin’ about some stuff,” Akito says. “I went for a walk out here to clear my head, but Miku said there are dangerous people in the SEKAI at night.”
“No, seriously,” Miku tells them. “There’s a freak of nature that sorta looks like me who lives out there, and I’m pretty sure she eats people.”
“Oh,” Touya says. “She sounds pleasant.”
“Right? We’ve got some other great folks out there too, like this sorta deranged clown guy and one who’s basically gender envy as a person and some dude who isn’t even a Virtual Singer. His name is Giga. I think he just sorta showed up one day. He’s our biggest fan. Yours, too!”
“Giga? Like, the one who wrote BRING IT ON and stuff?” Akito asks. “Huh? How is he--”
“Anyway.” Touya turns back to Akito. “Are you sure you’re alright?” He slides his hand over to Akito’s and holds it tight, twining their fingers together-- aww-- and Akito’s expression is unreadable for a second before tears start forming in his eyes.
“Akito?!” Touya asks, alarmed, and Akito immediately wipes the tears away with his sleeve and looks away.
“Akito,” Miku says, not knowing what to do. She thought he was okay. Is he just-- just touch-starved or something? Or sleep-deprived, or food-deprived . . . yeah, it’s probably all of those.
“I really don’t deserve you,” Akito mumbles, untangling his fingers from Touya’s with some effort. “Sorry-- can you stand up so I can get out? I should . . . probably get back home.”
Surprisingly, Touya complies with this request, but as soon as Akito stands up, Touya wraps him in a tight hug.
Akito is startled for a second, but then he returns the hug and starts silently crying into Touya’s shoulder.
They stand there for quite a while without saying anything, and after a moment, Miku stands up and heads to her room to get ready for bed, because all of her worries are gone. Now she knows Akito’s going to be okay.
When she gets to her room, she pulls her notebook out again.
Step 1: Get Akito to admit he likes Touya
Step one complete. Now she just has to get them both to admit it to each other.
Ugh.
This one might take a while.