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Kei could ignore everything else.
The rest of it could all be explained away. The cellphone charger hanging from the wall socket in his living room? No different from the one in his bedroom, even if he never charged his phone out there. The extra toothbrush in his medicine cabinet? Could just be that: an extra toothbrush, never been used and certainly not belonging to somebody in particular. The box of teabags taking up space in his kitchen drawer? Just for special occasions or guests, since Kei much preferred coffee himself.
He could rationalize all of those things, as well as the countless other odds and ends he’d unearthed in his apartment over the last several weeks. He could delude himself into believing that there were good, reasonable explanations for their existence in his life that had absolutely nothing to do with the one person he was trying so desperately to forget.
But that shampoo bottle—that fucking shampoo bottle—was what broke him.
It could not be ignored. It just sat on the ledge of his shower, staring at him. Taunting him, with its forest green bottle and its promises of silky soft strands and calming lavender and jasmine scent. He had the bottle memorized by now, with how many times he’d picked it up and read it over. How many times he’d let its weight sit heavy in his hand, popping open the lid for only a second to breathe in that floral scent. It wasn’t the same as he remembered, though. The scent from the bottle could never compare to the way the scent smelled on Kei’s pillow, on Kei’s shirt, or pressed up against Kei’s nose as a warm head rested on his shoulder.
He should have just chucked it out. He was never going to use it, and clearly—fucking clearly—nobody else was either. No, the only person in Kei’s life who would ever use lavender and jasmine scented shampoo was long, long gone. Out the door. Sayonara, never to be seen again.
But for some reason, Kei couldn’t bring himself to do it. He couldn’t throw out that stupid shampoo bottle, just like he couldn’t bring himself to pick up the phone and call. It didn't matter that he'd spent every waking moment since the fight thinking about calling—when it came down to it, he just couldn't do it.
The most ridiculous part of the whole thing was that now, Kei couldn't even remember what the fight had been about. How it'd started. He knew it was his fault, though, like most things were in the end. He couldn't remember what he'd said, but he remembered the way it made Yamaguchi’s face scrunch up like it always did when he was really hurt. He remembered Yamaguchi starting to shout, and then Kei shouting back. He remembered Yamaguchi finally biting out something with an air of finality (Fine! Have a good life, then!) and storming out of his apartment. Kei remembered throwing himself down on the couch afterwards, rubbing at his forehead and thinking to himself, He'll come back. Tomorrow he'll come back.
He hadn’t.
One day passed. Then two. Then a week. Two weeks. Three. A month. And now, six weeks later, Yamaguchi still hadn't come back. He hadn't called or texted either. Nope, it'd been nothing but radio silence from someone who'd practically been living inside Kei’s skin for the better part of a decade.
Kei realized around day five that Yamaguchi was probably waiting for him to call first. He was waiting for an apology. But Kei was stubborn—always had been—so he hadn't apologized. He hadn't called or texted. He just waited and waited, figuring that at some point Yamaguchi would cave and give in. He'd come crawling back like he always had before and things could go back to normal between them.
But now, Kei was beginning to fear that that was not going to happen. He was beginning to fear that Yamaguchi was in fact not coming back. He was beginning to fear that he'd waited too long to apologize, and that now it was too late. It was never going to go back to normal between them, whatever it was that normal meant.
And Kei was beginning to fear that life without Yamaguchi was not a life he wanted to experience.
Six Months Before
“Tsukki,” Yamaguchi whined, wrapping his arms around Kei’s waist where he stood at the sink. Yamaguchi laid his chin down on Kei’s shoulder, the bone digging into his muscle in a way that was a bit annoying, but Kei was a bit too drunk to care. He was also a bit too drunk to be bothered by Yamaguchi’s touchiness. He always got touchy when he got drunk, and by now, Kei was used to it. And besides, Kei had been finding that it didn’t bother him so much anymore when Yamaguchi touched him. He hated it when anybody else touched him, but with Yamaguchi, it was alright.
“What?”
“Pay attention to me.”
Kei snorted, but didn’t abide. He kept on washing the dishes, because he knew that if he didn’t, it would bug him the next morning. Even drunk, Kei had the sense of mind to be particular.
“I’m busy.”
“Tsukkiiiiiiiiiiiiii.”
“Yamaguchiiiiiiiiiii.”
Yamaguchi giggled at that, his arms tightening even more around Kei’s waist. They’d only just gotten back from the bar a few minutes before where they’d met up with Hinata for what was supposed to be a single drink. Hinata wasn’t around so much anymore since signing on with MSBY, so when he did come around for a visit, he always managed to talk Yamaguchi and Kei into meeting up—Yamaguchi enthusiastically, and Kei begrudgingly. They were supposed to have a drink, maybe two, and then head on their way, but instead, four hours had passed and double-digit drinks had been consumed between the three of them. Kei was drunker than he’d been since college, and so when Yamaguchi followed him home instead of going to his own apartment, Kei hadn’t questioned it. He’d force water down Yamaguchi’s throat (ever the responsible one) before laying him down to crash on the couch like he had a million times before.
Finally, Kei finished with his dishes, placing the final cup into the drainboard.
“You’re finished,” Yamaguchi said. “Now pay attention to me.”
Kei had to disentangle himself from Yamaguchi’s arms in order to spin around to face him, but finally he managed it. Yamaguchi’s cheeks were bright pink, his freckles standing out perfectly against his tan skin. His bottom lip was jutted out in a small pout. It was cute. All at once, Kei became overwhelmingly aware of how aware he was of how cute it was.
“What would you like me to do?” Kei asked. He was going for a teasing tone, but he thought it likely still sounded flat in his voice. Yamaguchi didn’t seem to mind, though.
One corner of Yamaguchi’s lips tugged up into a small smirk. Then he said, “You could kiss me.”
For a moment, Kei’s drunken mind convinced himself that he’d imagined Yamaguchi’s words. There was no way he’d actually just told Kei to kiss him, had he?
“Wh—What?” he stuttered. “Why would I do that?”
“Because you want to,” Yamaguchi said, like it was so, so simple.
And at that moment, Kei realized that it was simple. He realized that he did want to kiss Yamaguchi. He realized that he’d perhaps wanted to kiss Yamaguchi for quite a while, but it took Yamaguchi suggesting it for the thought to fully form.
Yamaguchi’s eyes fluttered closed, his lips slightly parted, and Kei noticed that he had freckles even on his eyelids. Once again, he became painfully aware of how cute he was. Of how much he wanted to kiss him.
So he did.
It was his turn to wrap his arms around Yamaguchi’s waist, tugging him forward until their lips were pressed together. They stayed like that for several seconds—just touching, not moving, barely even kissing—before with a hungry groan, Yamaguchi dug his hands into Kei’s hair and tugged him impossibly closer, opening his lips and licking his tongue into Kei’s mouth.
Then, it was Kei’s turn to let out a hungry groan.
The rest of it was blurry. He spun Yamaguchi around and lifted him to the kitchen counter, stepping between his legs to bring them closer, closer, closer. Yamaguchi kissed Kei like he was trying to devour him, and Kei kissed him back just as ravenously. At some point, they stumbled to Kei’s bedroom, clothes flying all over the place. He laid Yamaguchi down on the bed and pressed into him slowly and carefully, but fucked him hard. Hard enough that there were scratches down his back the next morning, and beautiful, purple bruises decorating Yamaguchi’s hipbones. He came harder than he ever had in his life inside of Yamaguchi, and afterwards, as they laid in his bed, sweaty and breathing heavily, Kei thought to himself, Why haven’t we been doing this the whole time?
The next morning, Kei figured they’d have a conversation about it. After all, Yamaguchi loved to talk. But instead, he’d awoken to Yamaguchi brewing coffee in his kitchen, one of Kei’s Sendai jerseys hanging around his bare thighs. All thoughts of conversation went flying out of Kei’s head at the sight, and before he knew it, he had Yamaguchi bent over the counter while he fucked into him from behind. After they finished that time, Kei figured the conversation would come.
But it didn’t.
It never came.
They continued to fuck—constantly and consistently as much as they possibly could—but they never had a conversation about it. They never discussed what it meant. How it changed things between them.
Kei didn’t mind, really. It wasn’t like things were that different, after all. They were still just best friends, like they’d been forever. But best friends who had sex now. Good sex. Really good sex.
And if it bugged Kei just a tiny little bit that that was all they were… Well, Yamaguchi didn’t need to know that.
Now
So it wasn’t a breakup. It wasn’t a breakup because there wasn’t anything to break up. But it felt like a breakup. It felt worse than a breakup, honestly. If it was a breakup, at least Kei would have a valid excuse for feeling this way. Instead, he felt heart broken and torn up over a person he’d only ever been casually fucking. So what that the person he’d been casually fucking had also been his life-long best friend? It was a hookup situation. Nothing more. Kei should have been fine.
He was decidedly not fine.
Kei became unbearably aware of that fact as he stood in his bathroom for the fifth time that day, that fucking shampoo bottle clutched in his hand so tight he was lucky it didn’t break.
I’m not fine, he thought to himself, squeezing the bottle even tighter. I’m not fine. I’m not fine.
I’m not fucking fine.
Before he could stop himself, Kei was storming out of his bathroom, yanking on his shoes, and running down the stairs of his apartment building, bursting out on the street with the shampoo bottle still clutched in his hand. He took off at a run down the block, hurtling towards the only destination that mattered.
Luckily, Yamaguchi didn’t live all that far away.
When he reached his door, he pounded on it once, twice, three times, before squeezing his empty hand in a fist at his side and waiting. It took nearly a minute before he heard the lock on the door click, and then it was pulled open to reveal Yamaguchi on the other side.
Kei tossed the shampoo bottle right at his chest.
“What the—”
“Here!” he shouted at him.
Yamaguchi leaned down and scrambled for the bottle where it’d landed on the floor at his feet (after bouncing off his chest). He picked it up and held it out in front of his face, eyebrows furrowing together.
“Is this my shampoo?”
“You left it at my apartment.”
Yamaguchi’s look of confusion remained plastered on his face for several more seconds, but then, the confusion gave way into anger. He looked back up to meet Kei’s eyes.
“That’s what you’re doing here? You haven’t spoken to me in six weeks and now you’re here to return my fucking shampoo?” Yamaguchi spat.
“It’s not my fault you left all of your crap at my place!”
“And it’s not my fault you’re a piece of shit!”
Kei couldn’t really argue with that.
“Six weeks, Tsukki,” Yamaguchi repeated. This time, he didn’t sound angry. He just sounded hurt. “Six weeks.”
Kei’s stomach bottomed out, and he resisted the urge to pull Yamaguchi into a hug. He hated hugs, but Yamaguchi loved them. He thought that that might make Yamaguchi feel better, but he also had a feeling it wouldn’t be welcome just then.
Also, he was a little pissed off himself.
“You didn’t call either,” he said. “You’ve been ignoring me too.”
“I was waiting for you to apologize. But you didn’t, so clearly it doesn’t mean that much to you,” Yamaguchi said, his anger clearly rising again. “Clearly, I don’t mean that much to you.”
“That’s not true,” Kei replied, nearly tripping over the words. He felt stupid saying them, but he needed Yamaguchi to hear it. Even if this was over—if they were over—he needed Yamaguchi to know that he did care.
“Really?” Yamaguchi challenged, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “Prove it.”
“How?”
“Apologize.”
It hurt his pride a bit, but finally, Kei said, “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
Oh fuck.
“Um.”
Yamaguchi’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t remember, do you?”
Oh fucking fuck.
“So I guess I was right,” Yamaguchi said, taking Kei’s silence as confirmation. “You don’t care.”
But that wasn’t true. How was Kei supposed to prove to him that that wasn’t true?
Well, maybe there was one way.
Kei shoved him backwards into the apartment, smashing their lips together. There was a part of him that expected Yamaguchi to protest, but he didn’t. He just dropped that fucking shampoo bottle to the floor and wrapped his arms around Kei’s neck, tugging him even closer and kissing him back even harder. Kei kicked the door closed behind him, already walking Yamaguchi back towards the bedroom. He hadn’t gotten laid in six fucking weeks and he suddenly felt like he was going to explode.
“I’m so mad at you,” Yamaguchi hissed, pulling away from his lips for just a second.
“Noted,” Kei replied.
When they reached the bedroom, it was Yamaguchi who pushed Kei down onto the bed, standing over him and looking down.
“I’m so, so mad,” he said.
Kei grew tired of waiting. He reached his hands up and grabbed Yamaguchi’s waist, tugging him down so he was straddling Kei’s hips.
“Be mad down here.”
Yamaguchi brought their lips back together. Their kiss before had been hungry, but this one was furious. Yamaguchi pulled at Kei’s hair hard enough to make him hiss, but he didn’t mind. He liked it, even. He dug his fingers into Yamaguchi’s waist tight, starting to rock him down on top of him, and he couldn’t help but smirk against Yamaguchi’s lips when Yamaguchi let out a small whimper.
Kei barely disconnected their mouths long enough to rip off his own shirt and Yamaguchi’s, but then trailed his lips down the column of Yamaguchi’s throat, across his chest, and right to one of his nipples. He sucked it into his mouth, flicking at it with his tongue in just the way he knew made Yamaguchi go crazy.
“Tsukki,” he gasped.
Yes, yes, yes, Kei thought. Say my name. Say my fucking name.
He would do anything to get Yamaguchi to call him that dumb fucking nickname again.
He switched to the other nipple, mouthing at that one until Yamaguchi was nearly a melted puddle in his lap, squirming around and making wonderful, desperate little noises that were a thousand times better than what Kei had been imagining while getting himself off for the last six weeks.
He switched them around so Yamaguchi had his back pressed to the bed, Kei kneeling between his spread knees. He wanted Yamaguchi out of his pants yesterday. He never wanted to see him in pants again.
Kei wasted no time in yanking both his pants and his boxers down his legs, and Yamaguchi helped him out by kicking them off when they reached his feet.
“Yours too,” Yamaguchi gasped, reaching up to paw at Kei’s waistband. “Take ‘em off too.”
Kei obliged, and once they were both naked, he took hold of Yamaguchi’s ankles, pushing his legs back to expose him further. Yamaguchi took over right away, bringing his own knees back to press against his chest. He was so good. So perfect for Kei.
“Good boy,” Kei couldn’t help from saying, and the way Yamaguchi whimpered at the praise was enough to make his cock get even harder.
Kei reached over him to grab the bottle of lube that he knew lived in the bedside table, but nearly dropped it as he fumbled to get it open.
“Come on,” Yamaguchi whined. “Come on, come on, come on.”
“Hold on a second,” Kei hissed, but finally managed to get the bottle open and some lube poured out onto his fingers. He rubbed them together to warm the liquid up before leaning forward, one hand on one of Yamaguchi’s knees to push it back further, while dropping his now-slick fingers down to press at Yamaguchi’s entrance.
The noise Yamaguchi made as Kei slid in his first finger nearly made him come on the spot. It was so desperate, so filthy, that Kei knew he’d be replaying it in his mind for years to come. He’d never stop thinking about the way Yamaguchi’s lips looked while he moaned, parted and sweet, and the way he started to beg nearly instantly.
“Another,” he said after not even a minute had passed.
“No.”
“Tsukki.”
“It’s been too long. You’ll need more stretching this time,” Kei replied sternly, but right as he said it, a terrible, terrible realization dropped into his mind. “Unless…”
Yamaguchi’s eyebrows drew together. “Unless what?”
Kei bit down on his bottom lip, finger stalling inside Yamaguchi. “Unless you’ve done this with somebody else since.
Yamaguchi didn’t reply for a few moments. His mouth just dropped open in a look of surprise, eyes widening. Finally, he shut his lips before opening them again to say, “I haven’t. Have you?”
“No. Of course not.”
What a stupid question. Of course Kei hadn’t fucked anybody since.
“Okay.” Yamaguchi shifted around for a moment. “Then resume, please.”
The formality of it made Kei snort out a laugh, but then he resumed, starting to pump his finger in and out again. He pointedly avoided Yamaguchi’s prostate, even though he could see Yamaguchi starting to get antsy for it.
“C’mon, Tsukki,” Yamaguchi complained after a couple more minutes had passed. “Another. Please.”
Kei had never been good at saying no when Yamaguchi begged for things.
He slipped in another finger along with the first, but the way Yamaguchi gasped made him pause just as soon as he’d started.
“What?” he asked, starting to draw out his fingers, but Yamaguchi grabbed his wrist to stop him.
“Don’t stop! It’s good. It’s just… tight,” he said finally. “Don’t stop, Tsukki. Please.”
There was that fucking please again. Goddamn.
Kei started to work his fingers in and out again, this time finally brushing up against Yamaguchi’s prostate. He spasmed around him, moaning loudly enough to bug the neighbors, and Kei hit it again and again and again, doing anything he could to chase those noises. Yamaguchi barely noticed when he slipped in a third finger, and only after a few minutes of that did Kei finally decide that Yamaguchi must be ready.
He drew his fingers out, watching the way Yamaguchi’s hole twitched around nothing, wanting to be filled again. Kei wanted to fill him. Kei wanted to keep him full all the time, so he’d never forget him. So he’d never move on. So he could never go anywhere ever again.
By then, Yamaguchi had devolved from the occasional please to full-on pleading.
“Please, Tsukki,” he whined, squirming around on the bed. “Please, please, please. It’s been so long. I need it. I need it, please—”
Kei was just as desperate. He wasted no time in slicking up his cock and guiding it to Yamaguchi’s entrance, experimentally pressing forward against his rim not enough to push inside, but enough to make Yamaguchi whimper and beg some more.
Finally, he pressed his hips forward and sank inside, the feel of Yamaguchi squeezing around him enough to make his vision go momentarily white. Yamaguchi’s hands scrambled onto his back, digging little marks into the skin of his shoulders. The light sting from that brought Kei back to the present, and he kept pushing forward until he was fully buried inside.
His head fell down to rest on Yamaguchi’s sweaty shoulder, and he pressed one gentle kiss there.
“Fuck, Tadashi,” he muttered.
He’d missed this. God, had he missed this. Nothing on Earth could compare to the feeling of fucking Yamaguchi, and he couldn’t believe he’d gone this long without it. He couldn’t believe he’d gone this long without him.
He sort of wanted to cry, but he wasn’t going to.
Yamaguchi began to lightly move his hips.
“Come on, Tsukki,” he said gently. “Fuck me.”
Kei did.
He pulled his hips back and slammed them forward so hard that the sound of slapping skin echoed through the whole room. Yamaguchi yelped, fingers still digging tightly into his back. They both moaned in unison as Kei began to fuck him harder and faster. He didn’t have it in him to hold back, not then.
They continued like that for what could have been a few seconds or a few years, and then before Kei could really register it happening, Yamaguchi shoved him backwards, flipping them around to climb onto his lap. When he sunk back down onto Kei, Kei’s hands shot to his waist, helping him lower and then helping to lift him back up again. They built a rhythm, Yamaguchi frantically bouncing up and down, hands placed on Kei’s chest for leverage.
“You gonna come, Tadashi?” Kei found himself asking. His lips had gotten away from him, but he couldn’t muster the energy to rein himself in. “You gonna come on my cock?”
Yamaguchi nodded, biting down on his lip hard enough that Kei was worried it would split.
“Tsukki,” he gasped. “Tsukki, I’m gonna—”
Kei used one hand to clamp down on Yamaguchi's hip and hold him in place, starting to thrust up into him roughly enough to make Yamaguchi shout. He used the other to stroke Yamaguchi’s cock perfectly in time with his thrusts. It only took a couple frantic strokes and a couple hard thrusts before Yamaguchi was tightening around him like a vice, throwing his head back and letting out a long, stuttered moan as he started to come all over Kei’s stomach and chest.
When he finally finished, Kei tried lifting him just enough to pull out, but Yamaguchi stopped him, pushing his hips down further and starting to grind.
“You have to come,” he said, his voice scratchy. “We’re not stopping until you come.”
Yamaguchi started to roll his hips, and although he must have been sensitive enough that the overstimulation should have been uncomfortable, he started to make little gasping noises of pleasure that pushed Kei closer and closer to the edge. Finally, Yamaguchi dropped his lips down to hover next to Kei’s ear.
“Come, Kei,” he whispered.
Kei came.
Oh, he came.
His soul practically left his body as his cock throbbed inside of Yamaguchi, and an inhuman noise burst free from his lips. Yamaguchi continued moving his hips the whole time, working him through it, waiting until Kei had stopped twitching with aftershocks to pull off and flop down to the bed next to him.
For several minutes, the room was filled with nothing but the smell of sex and the heavy sounds of their breathing. Neither of them spoke. His head should have been clear, but instead, all Kei could focus on was the way Yamaguchi’s arm pressed against his where they were laying, and how he could faintly smell Yamaguchi’s shampoo where it lingered on the pillow. Lavender and jasmine. It smelled like home.
“I think I’m in love with you,” Kei said into the silence. “I think I’ve been in love with you for a very long time.”
Yamaguchi took a sharp inhale. Kei braced for the impact. For him to shout, or cry, or simply say nothing at all. Instead, Yamaguchi rolled onto his side, and Kei turned to look at him. Yamaguchi peered at Kei with big eyes. Then, his lips pulled up into a smirk.
“You’re just now figuring that out?”
So Yamaguchi had known all along. Of course he had. He knew Kei better than Kei knew himself. Always had, really.
Kei rolled on his side to face Yamaguchi fully, wrapping a hand around his hip and tugging him just a bit closer.
“I don’t want to do what we were doing any longer. I want to date you. For real this time,” he said.
Yamaguchi’s smirk turned soft, and he brought a hand up to cup Kei’s face, leaning forward to press a gentle kiss to his lips.
“I want that too,” he whispered. “I’ve wanted that forever.”
“Forever?” Kei raised his eyebrows.
Yamaguchi rolled his eyes. “You’re an idiot, Tsukki.”
Maybe Yamaguchi was onto something. Which brought him to…
“I am sorry, by the way,” Kei said. “Really. Even if I don’t remember what it’s for.”
Faintly, Yamaguchi’s cheeks flushed pink. “Can I confess something to you now?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“I don’t remember either.”
They stared at each other for a moment, and then both broke out into laughter, clutching their sides as they shook on the bed. When they finally stopped, Yamaguchi tugged him forward into another kiss so soft that Kei couldn’t fathom what he’d possibly done to deserve that gentleness.
“I love you too,” Yamaguchi whispered.
They kissed for a bit longer before managing to rouse themselves enough to clean up. When they finally climbed back into bed, Yamaguchi rested his head on Kei’s chest with his hair tickling his nose, and Kei inhaled the scent of lavender and jasmine, this time perfectly mixed with that other special scent that was just Tadashi. Kei drifted off with that scent swimming through his senses.
Faintly, Kei hoped he’d never have to sleep without it again.