Chapter Text
~
When Shinji got home, Kaworu was sitting cross-legged on the kitchen table, eating cake batter from the mixing bowl with a wooden spoon. As usual he had on neither shirt nor socks.
“Shinji!” he called happily when he spotted him. “Welcome home!”
Shinji swallowed the lump in his throat. “Hi Kaworu,” he managed, with forced casualness. He struggled out of his jacket, tangling it in his satchel straps and hitting his cello case against the wall for the twentieth time that week. “Crap, sorry…”
Kaworu put his head on one side. “Why are you apologising? I don’t own his house – none of us do. Those are the terms of the rental agreement.”
“Um…” Shinji nearly tripped over his own shoes as he swapped them for slippers. “Just – sorry for the noise? I guess?”
Kaworu waved the spoon dismissively. “Everyone in this house is a music student. Noise is a given.” Then he noticed that batter was dripping onto the table, and swiped it up with a finger. “Oops.”
He put the finger in his mouth and sucked, hollowing his cheeks, and Shinji dropped everything he was carrying.
“Oh dear,” said Kaworu cheerfully, and hopped off the table. “I’ll help!”
“It’s fine!” Shinji blurted, and recoiled from the shirtless guy suddenly crouching beside him. “Don’t worry, I’ve got it!”
“Friends and housemates help each other out,” said Kaworu firmly, and his slender arms and graceful fingers made swift work of collecting Shinji’s books and stationary.
Shinji gulped, watching Kaworu’s shoulders and the muscles in his back work. When Kaworu turned to him and presented the armful of rescued goods he looked away, cheeks blazing. “Thanks,” he muttered.
“Any time.” Kaworu smoothly got to his feet and collected the mixing bowl again. “How was rehearsal?”
Shinji nodded jerkily. “Good.”
He avoided looking at Kaworu as he took his bento to the sink and hand-washed it. This was getting ridiculous -- he should be used to it by now, they’d shared a house for over a year already! Kaworu was just one of those people who didn’t care about wearing clothes at home – Shinji was sure that if Asuka and Ayanami weren’t renting with them Kaworu wouldn’t even bother with pants.
Not that Asuka was happy with the status quo, but she’d given up on scolding Kaworu about it, and resigned to grumbling about “rando sharehouse weirdness, what else do you expect from a web listing…”
Ayanami, of course, was to all appearances unfussed. Shinji knew his oldest friend well enough that he’d expected it, but he and Asuka had still tried to invoke Ayanami’s innocence (she’d never even kissed anybody) to persuade Kaworu to cover up.
It hadn’t worked. Rei had calmly informed them that there was no problem with Nagisa’s state of (un)dress, and Kaworu had offered to kiss her if “innocence” was an undesirable trait.
Asuka had snorted. “Why would you want to kiss a girl?”
“Kissing is fun,” Kaworu explained, like it was obvious and no big deal. “Don’t you agree? That is, if you have kissed anyone.”
“Gyah! Of course I’ve kissed someone, arschloch!”
They’d devolved into arguing in German (well, Asuka abusing, and Kaworu smugly responding), like they had many times over the course of their sharehouse residence.
Shinji supposed he was lucky – as far as meeting a housemate on a social media page and moving in with a complete stranger went, there were much worse possibilities than the semi-nudist smiling at him around a wooden spoon.
“Your next graded performance is next month, yes?” Kaworu asked. He was sitting on the edge of the kitchen table now, swinging his feet.
Shinji forced his attention back to the present, and nodded. “Yeah, I’ll need to practice those transitions a bit more, I think. Um, when’s your next grading, Kaworu?”
“Next week.”
“Oh wow, aren’t you worried?” He knew it was a dumb question, but asked anyway.
Kaworu shrugged one bare shoulder. “Que cera cera. I’ll practice until I’m satisfied, the rest is out of my hands.”
Shinji found himself smiling. “Is this—” gesturing to the mixing bowl, “practicing?”
Kaworu reached behind himself (Shinji hadn’t noticed his violin resting on the tabletop) and plucked an arpeggio without looking. “If food be the music of love, eat on.”
Shinji laughed, and privately squashed down the pang of envy he got so often around his housemate. Kaworu was a really skilled musician, sure, but more than that, he was so confident, so self-assured – not to mention knowledgeable and worldly, having lived and travelled in more countries than Shinji could name, and speaking half a dozen languages, and just generally being everything Shinji wished he was.
…Including experienced. Kaworu brought home a date or hookup just about every month, and the weeks he didn’t it was because he was going to their place. Shinji’s awe at the other guy’s success wasn’t even diminished by the fact that the dates and hookups were with other guys – game was game, after all.
Asuka had called him a manwhore – Kaworu had responded by detailing every step of a health-STD screen until she put her hands over her ears and screeched.
Shinji didn’t exactly have a problem with Kaworu’s … uhhh, ‘sociability’ (it wasn’t really any different to Asuka inviting her friend Hikari over, for example), but he couldn’t really claim he was used to it, any more than he was used to Kaworu’s shirt allergy.
He glanced at Kaworu from the corner of his eye. Right at the join of neck and shoulder there was a telltale dark bruise. Shinji’s jaw clenched. Envious. I’m envious, I wish I could get as much action as he does. That’s why my stomach’s doing that.
Kaworu was saying something. Shinji blinked and shook his head. “Huh?”
Kaworu didn’t look offended. “I said, would you like to go over the theory reading together?”
“Oh – yeah, that’d be great. Thanks!” Shinji smiled – even in the midst of whatever mood or thought he was having, he always found that talking to Kaworu calmed him down, made him happy. It was like the other guy had some kind of superpower that made Shinji’s insecurities – well, maybe not disappear, but stop mattering.
After Shinji had unpacked his satchel, he quickly got some ingredients together for dinner and prepared them. Kaworu offered to help, but he politely declined.
“I want to try this new risotto, but if it goes badly I should be the only one blamed.”
“I’m sure it’ll be delicious,” said Kaworu supportively. “Shinji has such culinary skill, after all.”
Shinji felt his face heating. “That’s not so true…”
Kaworu fixed him with that Look again – the one that said he was seeing right to Shinji’s marrow, who he really was, warts and soul and all. Shinji had been terrified of it – was still terrified, to be honest – but somehow from Kaworu it was also … a bit thrilling?
“You’re rather afraid of praise, aren’t you?” Kaworu observed now. “Even though at the same time you crave it: validation from others to justify, in your mind, your existence. More so than the culturally-mediated script response of denial when complimented, your reflex is to abase yourself, hoping for and formulaically inviting repetition – and therefore confirmation of the praise – but unable to directly ask for or comfortably accept it.”
—Oof. There he went again. “Kaworu…” murmured Shinji. How did Kaworu manage to break him and heal him at the same time? “Are you sure you’re co-majoring in philosophy, not psychology?”
“The one informs the other,” said Kaworu. “Both are motivated by interest in and empathy for the human experience. In this case, yours.”
“Mine?”
“I’m saying I’m interested in you,” said Kaworu, and Shinji nearly fell over.
He didn’t mean it like that he didn’t mean it like that!
Kaworu seemed totally unbothered by Shinji’s shock, just smiling serenely around another spoonful of cake batter.
Shinji’s face had passed combustion point and all he could do was just stare at Kaworu’s violin. How can he just say things like that? So casually? Even now Shinji’s envy wouldn’t let up – compared to himself, a nervous wreck when it came to telling anyone what he thought about them, Kaworu might as well have been a different species.
“It’s all right,” Kaworu said in a reassuring tone. “I understand the interest isn’t mutual.”
“Huh?” Shinji’s head snapped up.
Kaworu’s expression was as placid as ever. He didn’t mean it like that! Shinji thought desperately. He can’t have. Not for me. Not someone like him.
“Th-that’s not true,” he stammered. “I mean, I’m not studying philosophy or anything, but you're a really interesting person, definitely. You’re smart, and sophisticated, and really kind – if anyone’s ‘human experience’ is interesting, it’s yours.”
Kaworu’s smile was warmer than ever. “You say such gentle things to me, Shinji,” he said. “What more could I hope for?”
For just a second Shinji wondered if there was just the tiniest hint of wistfulness in Kaworu’s eyes, but he must’ve been imagining it … right?
The click of the front door lock broke his focus, and Kaworu looked away down the hall with a bright grin as the door opened.
“Guten tag, Fraulein,” he called.
“Guten tag, ausarten,” came Asuka’s contemptuous reply. “Halo, Shinji,” with only slightly less contempt.
“Hi Asuka,” said Shinji wearily, then lightened: “Welcome home, Ayanami,” as orange hair ceded to blue.
“Ikari,” she responded pleasantly. “Nagisa. Are you both well?”
“Exceptionally,” said Kaworu. “How was your day, Miss Bluebell?”
“It was agreeable—”
“It was awesome!” Asuka interrupted. “The music student society decided to use our decor theme for the mid-semester party!”
“That’s great!” Shinji enthused. Since Asuka’s over-workloaded triple-major burnout last year, she’d had to cut back on so many extracurricular activities, and the M.S.S. was one of only a few left.
Asuka skipped down the hall through the kitchen and deposited her instrument in the living area. “You’re both coming, right?” –in a tone of less hospitality and invitation, and more impending threat.
“Of course,” said Shinji.
“Wouldn’t miss it,” added Kaworu. “What is the theme?”
“Robots and mech!” She struck a dramatic pose. “I’m going as Crimson Typhoon!”
Kaworu nodded. “A most apt choice.”
Shinji turned to Ayanami. “Have you decided on a costume yet?”
She nodded.
Shinji waited, but nothing. “...What’s it going to be?”
Ayanami looked at him solemnly. “You have to guess.”
“Guess? Um ... could it be...”
“Not now,” Asuka interrupted. “We’re going to run a raffle – everyone buys a ticket and guesses Rei’s costume, and if anyone gets it right, there’s a prize.”
“What if more then one person guesses correctly?” asked Kaworu.
“Oh, they won’t,” Asuka assured him. “It’s obscure.”
“You know what it is, Asuka?” Shinji asked her.
“Yep!” She produced a folded piece of paper from her pocket. “Going in lock-up for competitional integrity.”
“You didn’t guess it, though,” Kaworu inferred shrewdly, and Asuka scowled at him.
“Well, no, not that it’s anything to do with you.”
She dismissed the guys to loop Ayanami’s arm in one of hers and grab a bag of chips from the top of the fridge. “C’mon, let’s get stuck into this theory reading already!”
Ayanami nodded at Shinji and Kaworu as the girls left, and even as he returned the nod Shinji felt hesitant. He and Kaworu had already planned to do the same work – should he suggest a group study session?
Kaworu caught his eye, and smiled at him again around the cake-battered spoon. Shinji smiled back involuntarily. Well, if Kaworu’s not going to mention it...
He just liked it better when it was just the two of them, anyway.
No need to think about why.
~