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The night air washes over Giyuu’s face like a blanket of silk when he steps outside. It’s a welcoming chill after the clammy warmth of the room he just left, stewing with sweat and brimming with bodies.
The door creaks shut behind him. The booming music inside the club dulls to a steady thump, and Giyuu sighs as the throbbing headache in his skull starts to ease instantly.
He still has his drink in hand, ice cold against his fingertips. It’s his second of the night, right after that disgusting glass of craft beer he ordered on impulse after the guy in front of him asked for one and he didn’t know what else to say when the bartender looked to him next. He downed that one in under a minute after discovering how awful it tasted, unwilling to let it go to waste after how much it cost him and unwilling to let it settle in his mouth long enough for him to throw up.
This one’s a fruity cocktail, something the bartender whipped up for him in sympathy after seeing his reaction to the beer. Personally, Giyuu thinks he went a little over the top—it’s in a much fancier glass, topped with something sweet and sparkly around the rim, and it’s bright fucking pink. But there are far less people out here than there were inside the club, so Giyuu doesn’t feel too bad about having it with him.
Now that he’s outside, he’s not sure where to go. After some loitering, he wanders across the street to the food truck parked on the other side, where he finds an empty table to stand at while he wallows away in misery.
So much for having fun. He was supposed to come here with his sister, who insisted he get out of the house and have some fun while he was in town.
Unfortunately, something came up on her end just as they finished getting ready, but she somehow managed to convince Giyuu to leave without her. He would’ve preferred to stay home, but he always had trouble saying no to her, so they settled on a compromise. He agreed to go out, by himself, for at least an hour. After that, if he really couldn’t stand it, he could head home and spend the rest of the night lounging in bed like he planned to do in the first place.
And now—Giyuu checks his phone—it’s been exactly thirty-eight minutes. He has twenty-two more minutes to kill before he can call a taxi, and a half-finished cocktail to try and finish in that time. He stares mournfully at the pinks and purples of his drink, mixing the colors together with his straw and listening to the ice clink against the sides of the glass.
The back door of the club opens again, and the squeak of its hinges prompts Giyuu to glance up from his drink. He expects to see a group of rowdy drunks, or a couple searching for a private place to hook up. Maybe even someone just like him, looking to get away from the chaos inside.
Who he doesn’t expect to see is his ex from high school. Giyuu knows it’s him the moment he catches a glimpse of stark-white hair, the shadow of his scars visible even across the street.
Oh, no. No no no no no.
This is exactly what Giyuu was afraid of. He wouldn’t have cared if he ran into anyone else from his old school, but Sanemi Shinazugawa is a different story. Already Giyuu can sense his heart starting to beat a little faster, the space between his fingers growing damp with sweat.
But it’s too late to leave without drawing attention, so Giyuu just lowers his head and prays that Sanemi doesn’t notice him.
“Giyuu?”
Fuck.
Maybe he can still get out of this. Giyuu ignores the call of his name, pretending to fiddle with his phone even as he hears footsteps approaching his table.
“Oi, Giyuu. I’m talking to you.”
Never mind. Giyuu has no choice but to lift his head, barely restraining the urge to jump back when he sees how close Sanemi is. He’s on the other side of the table, leaning against it as he sets his own drink down beside Giyuu’s. He looks annoyed, the ridges of his scars stretched tight across the skin of his forehead.
Giyuu hates that he still finds him as attractive as he did three years ago.
“Oh, hi. I didn’t hear you,” he lies, and that seems to push Sanemi from annoyed to pissed off. His frown morphs into a scowl, deepening the indents of his scars even further until they split across his face like cracked glass.
“Don’t pull that shit with me,” he glowers. “What are you doing here? I thought you left this place for good.”
“I did,” Giyuu says, perhaps a little too quickly. “My sister’s still here, though. I’m just visiting.”
Sanemi grunts, then grabs his drink and downs almost half of it in one go. Giyuu watches him from the corner of his eye, fidgeting with his own glass.
“Must be nice, moving to a new city all by yourself,” Sanemi muses, but there’s nothing pleasant about his tone. “Find yourself a nice boyfriend to settle down with yet?”
A familiar sting prickles at Giyuu’s chest, right above his heart. That’s definitely one thing he hasn’t missed about Sanemi—the snark, the backhanded compliments, the poison bite to his voice. He’s still an asshole after all.
Giyuu tries not to rise to the bait, but the smug look on Sanemi’s face goads him on.
“No,” he says, snappier than he means to be. “I’m too busy for a relationship.”
Sanemi laughs, and it sounds just as mean as Giyuu remembers. “That’s ironic. Considering all you wanted in high school was a relationship.”
The sting sharpens, so piercing that Giyuu has to fight to hide his flinch. Three years apart and Sanemi still manages to worm his way under his skin with only a few words.
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we aren’t in high school anymore.”
It will always be a sore spot—him and Sanemi and high school.
They never dated, not really. Sanemi was their class delinquent, always in a foul mood, always stuck in after-school detention for fights he always claimed weren’t his fault. The type of boy Giyuu knew he should avoid, the type he found himself drawn to anyway.
Giyuu, on the other hand, was about as ordinary as they came. He never missed a day of school, he managed decent grades, and he was even a member of the junior varsity tennis team. Being with Sanemi gave him a sense of exhilaration he lacked in all other aspects of his life, even when he knew it was unhealthy.
It was their little secret. They snuck around together, finding pockets of time before and after school to fool around, stealing small moments of intimacy that would leave Giyuu walking on clouds for the rest of the day. Everything about it was exciting and fun and good—until it wasn’t.
Eventually they reached a divide in the roads, where Giyuu thought he was in love and Sanemi couldn’t have cared less. Giyuu made them into something they weren’t, and sometimes he could trick himself into thinking they were dating, that he was special, that Sanemi felt something for him too. But deep inside he knew that was never the case, because if they weren’t behind closed doors then Sanemi never looked at him twice or acknowledged that anything existed between them at all.
The end to their story was a bitter one. Shortly after graduation, Giyuu received an offer for a promising job out of town. Everyone else in his life encouraged him to take it, but the only opinion that really mattered to him was Sanemi’s.
Even now, Giyuu has no idea what his eighteen-year-old self wanted to hear from Sanemi. Maybe a congratulations, or a hug, or a plea to stay. Maybe he wanted a grand declaration of love, a dramatic confession where Sanemi finally told him how much he cared for him and how much he wanted them to be together.
He didn’t get any of that. When he told Sanemi the news, there were no congratulations, no hugs, no confessions at all. Without looking at him, Sanemi simply told him to do whatever he wanted. That he didn’t care, that he didn’t give a fuck where Giyuu went.
Without saying goodbye, Giyuu left town the very next week.
Years later, it seems like that resentment hasn’t quite disappeared. Suppressed, sure, but still there.
“No, we aren’t,” Sanemi murmurs, echoing Giyuu’s sentiment from earlier, and takes a long sip of his drink.
Giyuu shifts his weight from one foot to the other, drums his fingers against the side of his glass. The neon lighting from the food truck casts everything around them in a warm blue hue, emitting a low buzz that drones in and out with the muted bass of the music from the club.
If Giyuu lets his thoughts run astray, it wouldn’t be hard to conjure up a scenario where they’re on a date now. And to the average onlooker, maybe that’s exactly what it looks like—that they got dressed up together, went to the club together, danced together, drank together, and now they’re about to go home together. Maybe, in another universe, they could’ve…
Giyuu shifts again, uneasy. He pinches his straw between his fingers, refusing to lift his head and meet Sanemi’s eye when his heart feels a little too raw.
Back in high school, the closest thing to a date they’d ever been on was at an old arcade on the other side of town. They’d gone as part of a larger group, some event organized by the school for a purpose Giyuu can’t remember. All he knows is it was during their summer break, on either a Saturday or a Sunday, and it was late at night.
He’d stumbled upon Sanemi near the pinball machines. Giyuu approached him cautiously, without saying anything, half-expecting Sanemi to roll his eyes and tell him to fuck off. Instead, Sanemi looked at him once, nodded to the machine next to him, and went back to his game. By the end of their third joint round, the tension between them had eased enough for Giyuu to feel comfortable enough following Sanemi to the next row of machines once he’d grown bored.
They sifted through the entire arcade just like that, though always at an appropriate distance apart so no one would think they were actually together. Sanemi only had a handful of change to spend for the evening, which was probably meant to be saved for food, but he’d used it on more tokens to keep up with Giyuu.
Unfortunately, neither of them were much good at arcade games, so they each ended up with only a few pitiful rolls of tickets. They had limited options when it came to choosing their prizes, but that didn’t stop Giyuu from agonizing over several small, cheap items that caught his interest. He ended up with a tiny coin purse, which he definitely didn’t need but would be cute enough to entertain him for a few days.
Giyuu had no idea what Sanemi spent his tickets on until they were outside, sipping on milkshakes Giyuu bought with the last of his money. Knowing Sanemi would be too proud to ask for something, even as his stomach rumbled every time someone passed by with food, Giyuu asked for two different flavors on purpose and handed one off to Sanemi with the excuse that they screwed up his order and made him an extra.
Only when Giyuu finished half his milkshake did Sanemi reach into his pocket for his prize, holding it out to Giyuu with one word: Here.
It was a keychain, decorated with a couple of tacky charms and a rubber figurine somewhat resembling a cartoon duck, and from an objective point of view it was ugly. There was no justification for the stupidly big smile it put on Giyuu’s face, which he tried to hide behind the lid of his milkshake even when the blush on his cheeks gave him away.
But it wasn’t the keychain itself that made Giyuu so happy. It was the fact that Sanemi gave it to him as a gift, that he thought of Giyuu when he made the choice to buy it.
To this day, Giyuu still has that keychain clipped to the front of his favorite bag. He doesn’t know why he hasn’t thrown it away yet; every time he goes to get rid of it, something about the chipped yellow paint of the duck-not-duck makes him stop. Giyuu blames it on the nostalgia, those long lost memories of being a teenager and those giddy feelings of having a crush. Not because he’s still attached to Sanemi, obviously. Nothing like that.
Giyuu taps at his phone to check the time again. He’s past the hour mark; he could call for his ride anytime now, then text Tsutako to tell her he’s on his way home.
“You look different.”
Giyuu stiffens. He glances down at his outfit, a small bud of insecurity cropping up beneath his skin.
This definitely isn’t something he would normally wear, but after endless weeks of binding his chest and wearing the same three suits to work, he wanted something different. Something that would make him feel pretty again, a fraction of the confident person he wanted to be.
Tonight, he opted for a short summer dress, a forgotten piece he found stuffed in the bottom drawer of his old dresser and miraculously still fit him after three years. Under it he wore a thin long-sleeve shirt and matching tights, because even in the warmer seasons it was always chilly after the sun went down. On his feet were a pair of tall black boots, which gave him a slight boost to his height, though he still found himself looking up to talk to Sanemi.
He also chose to leave his hair down instead of tying it back. There was a time when he hated his long hair, since it always blew in his face whenever it was windy and always made him look a little too feminine, but other times he loved it too much to go through with cutting it short.
Now, as Giyuu tugs at his dress to cover more of his thighs and pushes his hair over his shoulders, Sanemi must notice his discomfort. Clearing his throat, he adds, “In a good way, is what I mean. You look good.”
Giyuu pauses. He toys with the hem of his dress one more time before he lets it go, even as he feels it ride up his thigh immediately.
“Thanks,” he mutters. Try as he might, he can’t ignore Sanemi’s wandering eye, drifting past the table to stare right at the curve of his ass below his dress.
That look sets Giyuu’s heart pounding a little faster, the heat in his face intensifying from more than just the alcohol in his system.
Sanemi picks up his drink, swirling the last of it around in the bottom of the glass. Then he holds it out to Giyuu, the ghost of a smirk lifting the corner of his mouth.
“Want the last sip?”
Giyuu eyes the amber liquid swirling in the depths, lighter where the ice cubes have melted away. He takes the glass from Sanemi’s outstretched hand, ignoring him even as that smirk widens into a grin.
Sanemi watches as he brings the drink up to his lips, maintaining eye contact up until the moment he tips his head back and lets the first drop coat his tongue. He only manages about half a mouthful before he has to stop, abruptly setting the cup down and covering his mouth as he coughs, unprepared for the bite of the whiskey.
“Ugh,” Giyuu croaks out, coughing again, and pushes the drink back to Sanemi. “Tastes like… like licorice. How do you drink this shit?”
Sanemi laughs, picking the lemon rind out of the glass before he tilts the rest into his open mouth, polishing off what Giyuu couldn’t finish. Then he pops the rind between his teeth, chewing down like it’s nothing, still grinning. Giyuu finds himself stuck on the shape of that grin molded around the fruit, the slight sheen of his lips under the street lights.
Giyuu swallows. The burn in his throat travels lower, sneaking past his stomach to gather between his legs as a pool of heat instead. He has to look away when Sanemi licks his lips, a flash of tongue curling around the edge of the lemon slice and the sharp points of his canines. Still, the image remains glued to the backs of his eyelids, along with the faint memory of how that same tongue used to feel on his—
“What’s on your mind?”
Giyuu startles, feeling his face flush hot like he was just caught red-handed daydreaming about Sanemi’s fucking tongue.
“Huh?”
“I can tell you’re thinking about something,” Sanemi says plainly. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” Giyuu lies.
Sanemi opens his mouth again, no doubt to call him out on his bullshit, when the door across the street bangs open.
This time, it is a group of rowdy drunks. They spill into the street hooting and hollering, waving empty bottles of beer in the air as they stumble towards the food truck.
Put off by the commotion, Giyuu wrinkles his nose and backs away from the table, more than happy to ditch his drink so he can leave as fast as possible.
“You bailing on me?” Sanemi calls after him.
Giyuu pauses. It might just be his imagination, maybe even a bit of wistful thinking, but Sanemi almost sounds… disappointed.
“No, I…” He hesitates. Fuck. “Just finding a quieter place.”
“Shit, why didn’t you say so?” Sanemi jogs to catch up with him, then a little bit ahead to flash him another one of his stupid grins. “I’d love to have some alone time with you, sweetheart.”
Giyuu rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t tell Sanemi to fuck off. Really, he should. He should tell Sanemi to fuck off, and he should call that cab. Because this Sanemi, standing in front of him with that slanted grin and those smoky eyes, is dangerous. He’s drunk and that means he’s flirty, ready to pounce at the first sign of weakness.
The worst part, though, is that it’s working on Giyuu. He doesn’t know if it’s because he’s also tipsy or because it’s been too long since he last got laid or because he misses Sanemi more than he’d like to admit.
Giyuu doesn’t want to think about that last option. No, he doesn’t want to think at all. Just do.
There’s a small park just down the street from the club. Without saying a word, that’s where they both agree to go. The paths are quiet, empty, the silence disturbed only by the rustling of leaves in the treetops and the crackling of their shoes over the gravel.
Only a few minutes in, Sanemi shoulders him off the main trail and into a clearing separate from the rest of the park, sheltered by some scraggly bushes. He has Giyuu up against a tree in an instant, leaning close enough for his lips to graze Giyuu’s chin, then lower to mouth at the bend of his neck. At the same time, his hand slips past the short hem of Giyuu’s dress to push his legs apart just a little, just enough for him to ghost his fingers along the seam of his tights.
“Ah, Sanemi—”
Sanemi rumbles out a growl into his neck when Giyuu makes a grab for his wrist, alarmed at the idea of letting Sanemi touch him like this in such an open space. Even so, he throws his head back for Sanemi to bite at the skin of his throat and grinds down on his hand with a gasp, feeling himself already starting to dampen in his underwear.
“Oh, fuck.”
“There you go,” Sanemi rasps out, holding Giyuu’s hips to the tree to stop him from bucking. “Let’s have some fun while you’re in town, yeah?”
Sanemi strokes two fingers up his pussy through the thin fabric of his tights and easily finds his clit, pressing down on it relentlessly even after Giyuu’s thighs snap shut around his hand.
It’s been too long since someone touched him like this. So bold, so sure, every move designed to tear him down.
Sanemi plays with him until Giyuu has all but soaked through both layers of his clothes, squirming with each pass of Sanemi’s fingers over his cunt. His legs feel so weak he doesn’t think he’d be able to stand up on his own, relying on the trunk behind him and Sanemi’s knee between his to keep him upright.
Just when Giyuu thinks he might come like this, with only a few teasing touches over his clothes and a few bruises sucked into his neck, Sanemi stops. He leaves Giyuu frustrated and panting, slumped against the tree, his orgasm fizzling into nothing as Sanemi pulls his hand out from between his legs.
The next second, he’s kneeling down. Giyuu makes a confused noise, craning his head forward just in time to watch Sanemi grip the nylon of his tights into a fist and tear them in half right over his crotch. The sound of the material ripping is enough to make Giyuu’s legs buckle, the breeze of cool air on the bare skin of his inner thighs sending a shiver up his spine.
“Sanemi, what are you—”
Ignoring him, Sanemi hooks one of Giyuu’s legs over his shoulder, flips the bottom of his dress up, and leans in until he’s close enough for Giyuu to feel the warmth of his breath.
Then he slips Giyuu’s ruined panties to the side and seals his mouth over his cunt. Just that raw contact is nearly enough to make Giyuu come on the spot, his whole body going tight, way more sensitive than he wants to let on.
Sanemi wastes no time sliding his tongue between Giyuu’s folds, lapping up the wetness of his cunt with a throaty moan. Giyuu echoes him, rolling his hips down on Sanemi’s face as he drags his tongue in a messy line up to his clit. He eats Giyuu out like a man starved, like he’ll die without it, eyes lidded every time he looks up to make sure Giyuu’s watching.
It doesn’t take much at all. One more flick of Sanemi’s tongue against his clit and Giyuu’s coming hard, slapping both hands over his mouth to smother the noise he makes. He writhes when Sanemi licks at him again, lingering over his hole as it pulses with every wave of his orgasm.
Giyuu would be embarrassed about coming so fast if not for how dazed it leaves him feeling. His head swims in the clouds, bones melted to jelly. He’s so out of it that he doesn’t notice Sanemi grabbing him by the waist, pulling him down, flipping him onto his back.
When Giyuu blinks his eyes open, he’s looking up at the sky, the faint glimmers of the stars peeking through the leaves above. He’s painfully aware of his own breathing, strained and stunted like he just ran a marathon.
Then Sanemi leans over him, blocking out the sky and forcing Giyuu’s attention back to him. His mouth is wet, shining from his lips all the way down to his chin, and it takes a minute of staring for Giyuu to realize that’s from him. Embarrassment blots his cheeks red, even redder when Sanemi dips down to kiss him, wet and messy, and shares the taste of himself mixed with the spiced tang of whiskey.
Still, Giyuu spreads his legs obediently for Sanemi to settle between them, biting down hard on the inside of his cheek when Sanemi’s hips press into his ass. He can feel the hard line of Sanemi’s cock through his pants, hot and heavy where it rests against the inside of his thigh.
Then he adjusts, bringing the bulge of his dick in contact with the bare folds of Giyuu’s cunt, and thrusts against him like he would if he were actually inside. He does it again, then again, dropping his head with a guttural noise as he ruts his cock into Giyuu like an animal.
As filthy as it is, all Giyuu does is open his legs wider and roll his own hips up to increase the friction. His pussy clenches in earnest, almost wistful, aching with the need for something to fill the emptiness inside.
“Fuck, you really want it, don’t you.” Sanemi pulls back, lets his eyes roam all over Giyuu’s body like it belongs to him. His tousled hair, his kiss-swollen lips, his dress pushed up to his stomach. “Is this what you were thinking about, back at the truck? Spreading your legs for me again?”
Giyuu doesn’t say it out loud, but the look on his face must give him away because he hears Sanemi’s breath catch. Then he’s sitting up to unbuckle his pants, leaving his belt to hang around his hips as he reaches in to pull his cock out. Giyuu almost sighs out loud when he sees it—long, thick, so hard it curves up to his stomach—and he instinctively tilts his hips up, offering himself shamelessly as he stares up at Sanemi with pleading eyes.
“Look at you,” Sanemi hisses, one hand wrapping around the base of his dick and squeezing lightly. He shuffles closer, jerking himself off once before he slots his cock up to Giyuu’s cunt. “You want this?”
With Sanemi’s dick sliding over his folds, Giyuu can’t think clearly enough to answer Sanemi’s question out loud. He makes a garbled noise and nods mindlessly, hoping Sanemi will just get the hint and fuck him.
Sanemi nudges his legs apart a little more, spitting onto his cock to lube it up the best he can, and lines up. He doesn’t bother warning Giyuu when he forces his way through, fucking the entirety of his dick into Giyuu’s cunt with a single thrust.
Giyuu nearly screams. He can’t remember the last time someone fucked him, let alone someone who could match Sanemi’s size. The stretch makes him clamp up, tears already stinging at the corners of his eyes, clinging so tight to the base of Sanemi’s dick it can’t be comfortable for him either.
But screaming would get them caught, so Giyuu tries to divert the urge by biting into his lip hard enough to draw blood and digging his fingers into the grass sharp enough to rip it up by the roots.
Sanemi groans, rocks into him deeper. Giyuu answers him with a whimper, trembling around the girth of his cock, throbbing with the burn of accepting something so big so fast.
“You’re so—fuckin’—tight,” Sanemi pants from above, sweat already gathering at his browline. “Feels just like the first time.”
The mention of their first time together jolts through Giyuu like a physical shock. He’d rather not think about it, especially not now, but the memory resurfaces before he can shove it back down.
It happened on homecoming night, senior year. He’d waited an entire month for Sanemi to ask him to the dance, hoping that this would finally be the year he’d get to go with a date instead of his small group of friends, but to no avail. That night, he still couldn’t stop himself from sneaking looks across the floor to where Sanemi stood in the far corner of the room, still hoping in all his naivety that he would ask him for at least one dance.
An hour passed, then another, and when Giyuu stepped outside for a breath of fresh air it took only seconds for Sanemi to find him alone. He never said a word—didn’t have to. Just took Giyuu by the hand and led him around the gym, down to the empty field, under the bleachers.
Part of Giyuu worried what would happen if someone found them, but because Sanemi’s hand was warm in his and being with him made Giyuu’s heart pound faster than anything else, he kept his mouth shut and followed blindly. It was dark, but if he closes his eyes he can still see the rows of steel seats looming above his head, the faded yard lines beneath his feet. He can still feel the artificial grass poking his back, sliding through his hands.
The grass is softer tonight, almost like a plush blanket if Giyuu tries to forget that they’re doing this outside. It tickles his shoulders when Sanemi shifts him up the ground with his first thrust, wringing an audible sob from his heaving chest. It’s barely anything—Sanemi pulls out only an inch or two before working his way back in, and still it feels like Giyuu’s being split in half. His legs go limp when Sanemi bottoms out again, the length of his cock sliding so deep it hurts.
“I—fuck, please—I, nnh, I can’t—” Giyuu twitches, spasming, feeling the first of his tears trickle down his temple.
He’s already sore, battered and bruised, and Sanemi’s only just getting started. There’s no way he’ll be able to survive an entire round, not when he’s hanging on by a thread after the first few seconds.
“Does it hurt?” Sanemi whispers, feathering his lips over Giyuu’s cheek.
“Mmn,” Giyuu tries to nod, but his mind goes a little foggy every time Sanemi delivers one of those mini-thrusts, nudging shallowly into his pussy.
“You like it when it hurts,” Sanemi says, sneering a little, and Giyuu clenches down reflexively. “I remember. You always came faster when I was rough with you.”
That’s right, Giyuu thinks to himself, drowsy. Even though his hips are starting to cramp from how tense he is and he stings between his legs whenever Sanemi buries himself inside, he’s still wet. Still dripping, slicking down his thighs whenever Sanemi draws his cock out a little, making a mess of the ground beneath his hips.
“You like it when you know we could get caught,” Sanemi goes on, and fuck—it’s always dangerous when he gets on a tangent, running his mouth the more that Giyuu reacts to his words. “The men in the city aren’t doing it for you, are they. They don’t know how to fuck you.”
“Sanemi,” Giyuu feels his mouth gape, his throat bob, “please.”
“Don’t whine,” Sanemi shushes him, bends down to kiss him again. Giyuu grips at the front of his shirt, a small moan falling from his tongue, eyes fluttering when Sanemi pulls away. “Just stay quiet and let me do the rest, okay?”
He’s starting to speed up, spiraling out of the steady rhythm he’d set before as he fucks into Giyuu faster, harder. It’s too much too soon, leaving Giyuu flinching away from the pain of the stretch and towards the pleasure of the fullness inside him, caught between two extremes.
Even Sanemi doesn’t seem to be aware of his own pace, muffling his moans into Giyuu’s neck as he pounds away at his cunt, racing ahead in his rush to get himself off. The erratic slap-slap-slap of their skin fills the air, louder than anything else in their vicinity, along with the slick sounds of Giyuu’s pussy leaking all over Sanemi’s cock as it drags through his folds.
Giyuu recognized that Sanemi had grown the moment he stepped out of the club, but now, pressed so close, it’s all he can think about. He’s filled out since high school, solid muscle packed under the skin where he used to be more lanky than built, shoulders so broad that when Giyuu clutches at them he feels small in a way he didn’t before.
There’s more power behind his thrusts, more confidence, his experience clear in the way he tilts his hips to angle his cock to the spot that makes Giyuu choke on his moans. Giyuu is left scrambling to hold on, lagging several steps behind, just as inexperienced as he was three years ago under the bleachers. Back then, though, he wasn’t alone; Sanemi had also fumbled, unsure of what he was doing, but any of that hesitation is gone now.
It feels good—too good—and that small, ugly voice in the back of Giyuu’s head points out exactly why Sanemi’s technique has improved so much. Because while Giyuu was gone, too busy with work to even think about sleeping around, Sanemi was here, doing just that.
Giyuu shouldn’t care. He shouldn’t. And yet he can feel a seed of jealousy growing inside him, nourished by the liquid desire in his veins, feeding into a selfish urge to keep Sanemi to himself.
Giyuu squanders the feeling before it can get the best of him. He can’t regress to his old habits, not after all the progress he’s made. He won’t let one night with Sanemi ruin that.
One night. Just one night can’t change anything.
Like before, it doesn’t take long for Giyuu to come. One second he’s trying to hold it at bay and the next he’s falling over the edge, helpless, his moan cutting off into a squeak when Sanemi hides his mouth under a sweaty palm. He fucks Giyuu right through his orgasm, swearing between his teeth when he squeezes down on his cock.
“Giyuu,” Sanemi husks, his voice breaking, and hearing him say his name like that makes Giyuu’s stomach flip. “I’m coming, fuck. Can I—”
Giyuu’s nodding before Sanemi can finish asking the question, locking his legs behind his back to keep him right where he is as he starts to come.
Giyuu closes his eyes when the first wave hits, shuddering as the feeling of hot come spreading deep inside him melts away all the tension in his body. He keeps both arms around Sanemi’s shoulders as he rides it out, holding him close so the warmth doesn’t fade too soon.
It was supposed to end there. One bad decision that Giyuu could sweep under the rug, hidden away with the rest of the moments he stole with Sanemi, so he could finally get on with his life.
It wasn’t that easy. It was never easy with Sanemi, who lowered his mouth to his ear and told him in that low, sex-scratched voice of his that he wanted more. That he missed Giyuu, that he couldn’t get enough. And Giyuu, just as naive and stupid as he was three years ago, let Sanemi scoop him up and take him to the nearest motel, where they stayed until morning.
From there, Giyuu’s memory started to lapse. He can only recall the rest of the night in flashes, bits and pieces that he wishes he could forget.
Sanemi bending him over the edge of the bed. Fucking him rough, rougher than he did in the park, holding him down by the neck when he got too loud. Flipping him over once his legs gave out, pulling him on his lap to slide into him again. Pushing him through his third, fourth, fifth orgasm, so far gone he couldn’t uncross his eyes anymore and couldn’t seem to remember how to say anything other than Sanemi’s name.
The only times Sanemi stopped were when he came, buried so deep Giyuu swore he could feel him in his stomach. As much as Giyuu wished he’d stay there, keeping them locked together forever, Sanemi was never still for long. And when Giyuu tried to close his legs around his waist, desperate for a whisper of an embrace, Sanemi just pinned them down and went right back to it.
The vulnerability of being trapped there, unable to move, brought a twinge of panic to Giyuu’s chest—but because it had been three years since someone fucked him this well, he let it happen. He let Sanemi do whatever he wanted, let him lick the tears off his cheeks and lay his claim on every inch of his body. He let Sanemi take and take and take until there was nothing left for him to give.
On and on they went until they couldn’t anymore, until they had cycled through every position possible and the sheets were ruined beyond repair. The sky had begun to lighten by the time they fell asleep, the faint chirping of morning birds following Giyuu into his dreams.
And when he woke up, of course, Sanemi was gone.
“Giyuu Tomioka?”
Giyuu startles from his half-snooze, quickly sitting up in his seat at the call of his name. Once he rubs the blurriness from his eyes, he sees a woman standing in front of him, clipboard in hand, and finally remembers where he is.
“Yes?”
“We’re ready for you. Please come with me.”
After he gathers his things, Giyuu follows the woman past the check-in desk to a small office tucked around the corner. She gestures for him to take a seat.
“The nurse will be in with your results shortly.”
He nods, and she leaves him alone in the room.
Sighing, Giyuu checks his watch. He didn’t anticipate having to wait so long for his appointment, and now he only has twenty minutes left before his lunch break ends.
The only reason he’s here is because his work said it was mandatory. Apparently there’s been a virus of some sort going around the office, highly contagious, and they want everyone tested in an effort to keep it contained. Giyuu hasn’t been feeling sick lately, so he hopes this whole ordeal will be over in a minute tops and he’ll be back at his desk with time to spare.
He perks up at the sound of the door opening behind him, eager to get this over with.
The nurse greets him warmly, then takes a seat across from him and runs through a typical list of questions—does he smoke, is he taking any medications, what are his allergies—before she tells him he doesn’t have the bug.
Just when Giyuu starts to get up, thinking he’s free to go, she keeps talking.
“Other than that, everything looks fine, health-wise. Your labs show that your hCG levels are a little high, but they should settle as you enter your second trimester. As for everything else—”
“What?”
The nurse looks up. “Is there something wrong?”
“Second trimester of what?”
She blinks at him, clearly puzzled. After a slight delay, she says, “Of pregnancy.
“I’m sorry,” Giyuu blurts. “You must have the wrong person.”
The nurse glances down again, flips through the chart in her lap. “No, these are your results. Giyuu Tomioka? Date of birth February 8, 1987?”
Giyuu wishes he could say no, that isn’t him. But it is. He bites down on his lip, hard. False positives are possible, right? Rare, but possible. Surely the test is wrong, and surely he can’t be…
“Yes, that’s me, but—but that’s impossible, I—”
Haven’t slept with anyone in forever, is what he means to say. Until he realizes that isn’t exactly true, because the last time he had sex was a little less than three months ago. Not just any sex, either—it was multiple rounds of unprotected sex, and it was with Sanemi. Sanemi, his ex, who has never expressed any interest in him other than a fleeting moment of pleasure, a warm body to spend the night with.
Giyuu can’t think of a worse outcome.
“No, this can’t—can we redo the test? This has to be a mistake, there’s no—”
The nurse frowns at him. She steeples her fingers together above her lap, right over his test results.
“Were you unaware of your pregnancy?”
Giyuu’s mouth clicks shut. Just hearing the word makes him feel nauseous, a tingling that travels through his ear and down his spine to settle at the bottom of his stomach. Suddenly, he has the urge to throw up.
“I see,” the nurse says, reading his answer in his silence. “Congratulations, then. Would you like to schedule an appointment with one of our OB-GYN doctors? Even if your tests show that you and the baby are both healthy, it would still be beneficial for you to—”
“No,” Giyuu interrupts. “I mean. I, uh. I just need some time.”
The nurse nods. “Of course. Would you like a copy of this?” She holds the file out to him, but Giyuu can hardly stand to look at it.
“No, thanks.”
“Okay.” She straightens the pile of papers in front of her, then slips them back into her folder. “That’s all for today then, Giyuu. Please call if you need anything.”
Giyuu’s pretty sure she says something else on their way out, but he doesn’t hear any of it. He rushes back to the office with only five minutes left on his lunch break, diving right back into his work with an empty stomach and a scattered mind. He tries to focus, he really does, but he barely finishes a single task before six o’clock rolls around and it’s time for him to head out.
On his way home, Giyuu stops by the pharmacy just below his apartment. There, he nearly clears out the rack of pregnancy tests in aisle two and deliberately avoids the judgemental stare of the cashier as she rings him up. Then he hurries home, hiding the plastic bag under his coat like it’s a taboo, and locks himself in his bathroom.
Giyuu knows blood tests are more accurate than take-home urine kits, but he needs to see it for himself. He goes through so many tests that he loses count, pacing back and forth over the floor of his bathroom as he waits for the results.
Positive after positive after positive. Each time Giyuu picks up one of those sticks he hopes to see something different, something that will prove this is all just a bad dream.
He’s aware that he’s being delusional, but he can’t bring himself to stop checking. In the end, when he picks up the last test and sees those two lines staring back at him once again, Giyuu knows he can’t deny it any longer.
How did he miss it? He should have noticed. The clues should’ve been there, glaringly obvious, and he should’ve been prepared.
But his periods have always been infrequent, irregular, so he never thought twice when he went a full month without a cycle. Or another. And another. With how busy he is, it’s easy to lose track of things like that.
He should’ve paid more attention. Should’ve been more careful. Should’ve realized the pill he took every day wouldn’t be enough, not this time, even though it had never failed him before.
Giyuu spends an hour working up the courage to stand in front of the mirror, and another staring at the reflection of himself and his bare stomach. Even now, he can’t really see anything—maybe there’s a slight swell, but only when he turns a certain way and presses down just above his belly. And that could easily be a sign of bloating, not—not pregnancy.
Twelve weeks and he had no fucking idea.
The panic that’s been welling up inside him all day finally bursts. His chest starts to constrict, and it’s getting harder to breathe, and—
He can’t believe this is happening to him. There’s no way. No way.
He has to tell someone. Someone, anyone, because he doesn’t know what to do and he feels like he’s suffocating, drowning, and right now he can only think of one person.
Stumbling out of the bathroom, Giyuu grabs his jacket from where he discarded it on his bed and rifles through it until his phone falls from one of the pockets. His fingers are shaking as he swipes it open, and it takes him a few tries to locate the right app.
Giyuu taps through his contacts, frantic, scrolling from top to bottom so quickly that the names start to blur on the screen. He keeps trying even when he knows he won’t find the one he’s looking for, as if going through the list enough times will somehow make it appear out of thin air.
“Fuck fuck fuck fuck,” Giyuu hisses under his breath, cursing his past self for deleting Sanemi’s number off his phone several years ago, back when he thought it meant taking the first step in moving on.
Just when he’s about to throw his phone across the room, a lightbulb in the very recesses of his head flickers on. Scrambling up from the floor, Giyuu makes a beeline for his closet and digs past all his clothes to reach the boxes shoved in the very back. He peels them open one by one until he finds his old yearbooks, then flips through those until he finds the one from junior year.
Giyuu takes a deep breath. If his memory is correct, then…
There. On the very last page, amongst all the other messy scribbles of his classmates’ names and quirky catchphrases that have no meaning today, are seven numbers. And just below it—Sanemi Shinazugawa. Year ‘05. Call me.
Giyuu’s stomach twists. He doesn’t know why, but he still remembers that moment like it just happened yesterday.
He was wandering around the gymnasium, yearbook clutched to his chest, when he nearly bumped into Sanemi. It wasn’t the first time they’d seen each other, but it was the first time they’d been so close. Close enough that Giyuu had to tilt his head up a little to look Sanemi in the eye, close enough for his face to go beet red when he realized Sanemi was staring right back at him.
But all he did was hold his hand out for Giyuu’s yearbook and his pen. Then he opened it to the last page, clicked the pen, and scrawled something down. Giyuu didn’t have a chance to see what he wrote before Sanemi closed the book and handed it back to him, and he hadn’t dared to open it again until he was alone. That very night, sitting on the edge of his bed and still in his school uniform, he called. Sanemi picked up on the second ring.
Now, in the present, Giyuu isn’t sure if that will happen again.
He slowly punches those seven numbers into his phone, checking the sequence twice to make sure he has it right. Then, as if in a trance, he lets his thumb hit the call button.
Giyuu sits in front of his closet, his old yearbook in his lap and his phone pressed to his ear, for what seems like hours. He listens to the monotonous thrum as it rings, over and over again, vibrating lightly against the side of his face.
Oh god, he hasn’t even planned out what he’s going to say. How should he start? Should he tell Sanemi over the phone, or ask him if they can meet in person? Or—
“The person you are trying to reach is unable to take your call at the moment,” the automated voice at the other end tells him. “Please try again later, or leave a message at the tone.”
Or nothing. Giyuu doesn’t know whether to be disappointed or relieved, but he doesn’t put the phone down right away. He should leave a message, right? Just so Sanemi doesn’t see a missed call from his old high school flame with zero context, just so Giyuu doesn’t look like a complete fool. Or he could try calling again later, but in the chance that Sanemi doesn’t answer that one either, then he’ll have two missed calls from his old high school flame, and that would just look desperate. And pathetic. And—
The tone goes off. Time’s up.
“Um—hi. It’s Giyuu. From, uh, from high school.” Giyuu cringes, wavering between the urge to hang up and his moral conscience telling him to go on. “Sorry, I know this is really… random, and out of the blue, but I—there’s something I need to tell you. If you could call me back whenever you get this, that would… that’d be great.”
He hesitates. Wishes he had a rewind button, a pause button, anything that would give him some time to organize his thoughts and his words in a more coherent way. But this—the message that he’s already halfway through—this is it.
“Not that you have to. It’s just… Never mind. Bye.”
Giyuu tears the phone away from his ear, hands clammy, trembling all over as he ends the call. He really should’ve planned that better. Wrote a script, prepared some notecards, anything besides whatever the hell he just said.
No matter. It’s done. All he can do now is wait for Sanemi to call him back. And if he doesn’t, Giyuu can at least live with the consolation that he tried. He tried, and if Sanemi still wants nothing to do with him, then…
He can live with that, too.
Giyuu drops his phone to the floor, numb all over, and watches the screen fade to black.
“You’re kidding me.”
Giyuu glares at the notification on his phone, wishing he could will away the message currently lit up on the screen.
Unfortunately, the door to his office is open, and one of his coworkers just happens to be passing by.
“Is something wrong, Giyuu?”
Giyuu’s head snaps up. Shinobu stares back at him, a pile of colorful folders stacked in her arms.
“Oh, um… No, everything’s fine. Just have to head out a little early.” Giyuu shoves his phone into his pocket, then stands up from his desk and starts packing his belongings away. He has a meeting in an hour, but there’s nothing he can do about that now. “Could you let Himejima know I’ll get my report to him first thing tomorrow?”
“Already done,” Shinobu hums, then blinks at him sympathetically. “Did your nanny cancel on you again?”
Giyuu winces. He should know by now that nothing slips past Shinobu. “Yeah.”
“Oh, no. That’s the second time this week.”
“I know,” Giyuu sighs. The first time was yesterday, but he was able to get Tsutako to swing by the daycare for him without a fuss. She’s never once turned him down or complained about the inconvenience, but Giyuu can’t bring himself to ask her twice in a row.
Sighing again, Giyuu zips his bag up, flicks the lights off, and locks his office behind him. Shinobu walks with him down the hall to the elevators, arriving just as one stops at their floor. Giyuu steps inside as the doors slide open, then hits the button for the first floor.
“Have a good night, Giyuu. Say hello to Giichi for me, okay?”
Giyuu nods. Shinobu waves him off with a small smile, the butterfly clip in her hair twinkling in the light, and Giyuu does his best to offer one in return.
Once he’s in his car, Giyuu fiddles with his GPS until he gets the right address punched in. He feels like not knowing exactly where his kid goes to preschool probably makes him a bad dad, but he’s always been horrible with directions and he hasn’t taken this route often enough to memorize it, so he figures he should cut himself some slack.
Giyuu likes to think he’s done his best over the last four years, but as a single parent working full-time and sometimes over-time, it gets difficult. He’s fortunate enough to be able to afford a nanny, who picks Giichi up and drops him off and looks after him when Giyuu’s out of town, but it’s just not the same.
He can’t deny the ache in his chest when he comes home after a string of late nights and sees Giichi curled up on the couch, struggling to stay awake because he refused to go to bed without seeing Giyuu first. Or when Giichi sneaks into his office to ask if they can play, and Giyuu has to tell him with a heavy heart that he needs to work.
To make matters worse, his nanny has been slacking off lately. She calls in sick more often, usually on short notice, leaving Giyuu scrambling for a last-minute babysitter. Even so, Giyuu can’t exactly fire her—he needs the help, and finding a suitable replacement in the midst of everything else he has to do is more of a hassle than it’s worth—but he has a feeling she’s going to quit soon anyway.
Not for the first time in his life, Giyuu wonders if everything would be easier if Giichi had a normal family. Two loving parents, happily married, living out in the suburbs in a two-story house with a white-picket fence and a puppy to match. He wonders if he could’ve given Giichi just that, if only he’d tried a little harder to reconnect with Sanemi four years ago when he first found out he was happening.
Giyuu never got a call back. The first week after he left that voicemail for Sanemi, he checked his phone obsessively, anticipating the moment it would light up with those seven numbers he had all but memorized. The second week, he stopped hovering over his phone every waking minute. By the end of the fourth week, he began to resign himself to the fact that Sanemi was never going to call.
And he was okay with that. It wasn’t like Sanemi would want to be involved, anyway. Saddled with a kid he never asked for, bound to a partner he never loved. The last thing Giyuu wanted to do was force him back into the role he despised when he was just a kid himself, burdened with the responsibility of raising all his siblings just because he happened to be the oldest.
In the end, Giyuu did it alone. He had other people, of course—even when he lived miles away from home, his sister called him every day and made sure to visit as often as she could. The few friends he had popped in to check on him whenever they could, bringing with them armfuls of gifts and goodies to see him through the toughest days.
Mostly, Giyuu expected physical side effects to hit him the hardest. The nausea, the vomiting, the fatigue, the changes to his body. For him, though, the emotional turmoil was far worse. He cried, he raged, he went from happy to sad to angry in the blink of an eye and he had no one to take it out on but himself. He still went to work every day, sometimes more than he knew he should. Even when everyone told him to slow down, to take it easy, he never did.
There were people around him, but in his heart he knew he was alone. Because when it finally happened he was the one to drive himself to the hospital, and when it was over he was the one to drive himself back home with a new baby in the backseat.
Everything passed in a blur. He was meant to call Tsutako the second it began so she could make it there in time to be with him, but in the stress of the moment he completely forgot. It wasn’t until hours later, sitting upright in the bed with a baby in his arms and watching as the delivery nurse left his room, that the silence closed in around him and he realized he was well and truly on his own.
By the time he finally called his sister, he had already been discharged from the hospital. Prior to that call, he’d only ever seen Tsutako lose her temper twice: once when they were just kids and Giyuu decided to explore the forest behind their grandparents’ house without telling her, and another when Giyuu had his one-night stand with Sanemi, forgot he left his phone on silent, and Tsutako called him a total of forty-seven times before she concluded he was dead in a ditch somewhere. None of those moments could compare to her reaction when Giyuu told her he’d had the baby without her and was now on his way home.
She gave him an earful over the phone, then promptly hung up, drove all the way over to his place, and gave him another earful in person. She stayed with him for a month after that, even when he reminded her that he was on leave from work now and could manage things just fine. Still, she stayed, and even if he never said it out loud Giyuu knew that she knew he needed her there.
Maybe that was when he first began to feel the pull to return home. It was stupid, anyway, the reason why he moved in the first place. Giyuu told himself it was for a change of scenery, but deep down he knew it was because he was hurt. Still young, still resentful, he wanted to put as much distance between him and Sanemi as he possibly could. Even when he knew it didn’t really matter and Sanemi wouldn’t give two shits about where he ended up, he did it anyway. He made the move a few cities away, threw himself into his work, and thought he’d never look back.
Nearly eight years and one kid later, the heartbreak was gone. When Giyuu’s sister suggested he move back to town, closer to where she was, the idea became too tempting to resist. As much as he liked to deny it, he missed home, and Giichi was growing up—acting out, demanding more attention, proving to be more of a handful than Giyuu could manage alone. Tsutako never missed an opportunity to tell him how much she wished she could spend more time with her nephew, how great it would be if they lived close enough for her to visit whenever she could.
Soon enough, Giyuu caved. He found an apartment at a reasonable distance from his sister, his work, and the daycare he chose for Giichi. Since then, things have been better—Tsutako has stayed true to her word, swooping in to save the day whenever his nanny flakes out, and even Giichi seems happier. He liked his old daycare well enough, but every day it was clear that he’d rather be with Giyuu than go to school. Now he jumps to tell Giyuu everything that happened in the classroom and on the playground, much more talkative than he was before, even pouting when he has to stay home for the holidays.
With the move back home, Giyuu had some lingering concerns about running into… certain people, but their town is big enough and Giyuu simply avoids going to bars and clubs and anything in between. It isn’t much of a loss, anyway; he outgrew that phase long ago, since having a kid meant he’d have to get used to a rather unadventurous lifestyle.
Now all his days consist of waking up before dawn, driving to work, working, driving back home, tending to Giichi, and crawling into bed by nine. And with the way things are going now, it seems he’ll soon have to factor in transporting Giichi to and from daycare too.
Lost in his thoughts, Giyuu almost misses it when the GPS tells him he’s nearing his destination. The lack of cars in the parking lot must mean he’s early, but since he’s not quite sure what the pickup protocol is like here he just finds a spot close to the entrance of the building and lets himself in.
Ashamedly, Giyuu can count the number of times he’s been here on one hand. The first was when he enrolled Giichi, and the few instances after that were for parent-teacher conferences, though he’s since passed that job off to Tsutako after realizing they just reiterate what he already knows about his son. She always fills him in anyway, eager to boast about all the great things the teachers are saying about Giichi, how bright and smart and well-behaved he is in the classroom.
“Here for early pickup?” the lady at the front desk asks the second Giyuu comes through the entrance, startling him briefly.
“Oh, um. Yeah.”
“Name?”
Once Giyuu gives her his information, she tells him Giichi’s homeroom number and gives him a vague set of directions that he forgets almost instantaneously.
From the office, the main hallway branches off into three different corridors, so Giyuu just chooses one and hopes for the best. There are small cubbies lining both sides of the hall, some empty and some overflowing with bags and coats and half-finished art projects.
Giyuu clears about three-quarters of the hall when he hears the pitter-patter of footsteps behind him, fast and light. He turns around just in time to see Giichi’s face, a huge smile stretching his round cheeks, his blue eyes wide with excitement. Just seeing him lifts all the week’s stress from Giyuu’s shoulders, at least temporarily.
“Dad! Dad! It’s me!”
“I know it’s you,” Giyuu laughs, glancing down the hall. He must’ve passed Giichi’s homeroom without knowing, and Giichi must’ve seen him and ran out to catch up with him.
Giichi flings his arms around his legs, hopping up and down until Giyuu gets the hint and bends down to pick him up. The second their faces are at the same height, Giichi clings to his neck instead, squishing their cheeks together in the process. He’s warm, his hands a little sticky where he pats at Giyuu’s neck, and he smells faintly of grass and wood chips. They must’ve had recess outside today.
“Dad! Dad!” Giichi continues to chant, his little feet kicking into the space under Giyuu’s ribs. One is softer than the other; he must be missing a shoe. “Guess what I found today!”
Giyuu hums, adjusting the cradle of his arms to keep Giichi from falling with how vigorously he’s moving around. “What did you find?”
“Guess!”
“Oi, Giichi! You forgot your—”
Just like that, all the warmth in Giyuu’s body evaporates into ice. He goes deathly still, his heartbeat cranking to a stop in his ears, too afraid to turn his head and see if that voice belongs to who he thinks it is.
Unfortunately, Giichi doesn’t let him. He starts straining in Giyuu’s arms, reaching around him for whatever it is he forgot, and Giyuu has no choice but to let him down.
When he stands up again, he comes face-to-face with none other than Sanemi Shinazugawa.
Except… It doesn’t look like him. Not by a long shot. His basic features are still the same—he’s still got the short white hair, the rough scars on his face and his hands, the distinctive hue of his eyes.
It’s everything else that throws Giyuu off. He’s wearing a baggy hoodie and a half-undone apron covered in paint stains, with a nametag in the shape of a stag beetle pasted to the front. Holding his hair away from his face are several pastel-colored clips, all bug-themed—Giyuu spots a ladybug, a caterpillar, and a dragonfly before Giichi tugs at his arm and diverts his attention. He has his backpack now, the biggest pocket unzipped as he shows Giyuu the various drawings and crafts he made today, along with an assortment of random objects he found on the playground.
“Giyuu?”
Sanemi looks just as surprised to see him as Giyuu is. Giyuu can feel his mouth opening and closing, but no sound escapes. He can’t seem to remember how to speak.
“Dad!” Giichi exclaims, and Giyuu feels his face burn bright red. Giichi bounces on the balls of his feet, lifting an arm to point right at Sanemi. “That’s Sammy! He let me wear his nametag today.”
“Sammy?”
Sammy? That’s who Giichi has been referring to this whole time?
Giyuu’s eyes flash to Sanemi’s badge again, the six bolded letters that spell out his name. Sa—ne—mi. Giichi’s always had trouble pronouncing the ne syllable, which means he’s really just saying Sa-mi, which is why Giyuu’s been mishearing it as Sammy every time Giichi talks about him.
Sanemi is Giichi’s favorite preschool teacher. Sanemi bandages his cuts and bruises whenever he takes a fall on the pavement outside. Sanemi is the one who’s been waiting with Giichi far past the last bell whenever his nanny or Tsutako happens to be running late, the one who’s been sending Giichi home with more snacks in his lunchbox than Giyuu remembers packing for him.
“Yeah, I know,” Sanemi says, laughing a little, completely unaware of the mental breakdown Giyuu is having right in front of him. “I’ve been trying to teach him how to say it the right way, but I think Sa-mi is pretty great already. You’re almost there, right, Giichi?”
“Yeah!”
Sanemi laughs again, the sort of carefree sound Giyuu thought he’d never hear from him. Then he clears his throat, redirecting his eyes to Giyuu again, and another wave of panic engulfs him.
“So. He’s yours, then?” Giyuu feels the ground drop out from under his feet. “Sorry, it’s just—I thought he was your sister’s kid this whole time.”
It should click any moment now. Any moment now, Sanemi will look at him, at Giichi, at him again, and connect the dots. He’ll realize that Giichi is exactly four years old, and remember that the last time he and Giyuu slept together was four years and nine months ago, and—
But the accusation never comes. Sanemi just crouches down, gestures for Giichi to hold his sock-clad foot out, and slips his missing shoe back on. He squints up at Giyuu as he starts tying the laces, more curious than suspicious. Giyuu can’t stop looking at the stupid clips in his hair, how out of place they look next to such a harsh face.
It’s gentler now, though. More at peace. Giyuu wonders what changed since high school, when he can only remember that same face twisted in scowls and bitter storms.
“I had no idea you were back in town.”
“Yeah, I—” Giyuu’s voice comes out all crackly, betraying his secret, and he has to clear his throat before going on. “I requested a transfer a while ago, just to be closer to home.”
“Ah.” Sanemi looks down as he finishes tightening the knot. He taps Giichi’s leg to let him know he’s done, then stands back up. “All good, buddy. Don’t run off like that next time, even if you see your dad, okay?”
“Okay!” Giichi chirps, hugging Giyuu’s legs again now that he’s free. Both of his hands clutch at one of Giyuu’s, a habit that Giyuu made sure to ingrain in him since he could walk, always paranoid he’d lose him in a crowd.
Sanemi smiles down at Giichi, a small, fond thing that even he doesn’t seem to be aware of.
“So, are you—do you work here now?”
Sanemi shifts his gaze to Giyuu again. “Yeah. It’s been about… three years, I think?”
Just then, the tone of a bell chimes out above them. Moments later, dozens of kids start to stream from the rooms lining the halls, all carrying with them their backpacks, jackets, and lunchboxes. A few of them flock to Sanemi’s side, pulling at the hem of his apron as they all try to speak over each other.
“Hey, I gotta go help these guys find their way home now, but—”
Giyuu clutches tighter at Giichi’s hands, his chest stiff with anticipation.
“—you’ll be here tomorrow, right? For the dropoff?”
Giyuu hesitates. Will he be here? He probably shouldn’t, just in case he runs into Sanemi again and accidentally does something to give himself away, but…
Before he can give Sanemi a definitive answer, the kids vying for his attention have already dragged him halfway down the hall. And Giichi’s tugging at Giyuu’s hand too, impatient to leave the building now that it’s starting to get crowded.
In a daze, Giyuu lets Giichi lead him to the exit and out into the parking lot. Giichi skips his way to the car, still babbling on about all the fun things he did and saw at school today, either oblivious or indifferent to the fact that Giyuu doesn’t seem to be fully hearing what he’s saying.
On autopilot, Giyuu helps Giichi into his booster seat and buckles him in. Then he rounds the car and slides in behind the wheel, breathing a sigh of relief once he shuts the door behind him.
Sanemi. Sometime in the last few years, Sanemi somehow found himself a job at the same daycare that Giyuu happened to choose for his kid. Their kid.
This is a nightmare. Of all the possible ways Giyuu’s secret could come out, this might be the worst. It’s a miracle Sanemi hasn’t figured it out yet, but he will. Sooner or later, he’ll know he’s a father, and Giyuu will have to deal with the fallout.
It’s not like he can just pull Giichi out of this daycare. Applying to different schools, especially at this time of the year, would be a headache. And Giichi loves this place; it would be heartless to transfer him now.
And Sanemi, an evil voice in the back of Giyuu’s head reminds him. And he loves Sanemi.
“Dad?” Giichi pipes up from the back, saving Giyuu from his doomsday thoughts. He can see Giichi’s eyes peering up at him from the rearview mirror, wide and hopeful. “Can we get ice cream?”
Sighing, Giyuu grabs his keys to start the car.
“Sure, Giichi,” he says. “Let’s get you some ice cream.”