Chapter Text
It’s just another day.
Kaidou gets up at 5, and goes for a run. It’s July, and properly hot even early in the morning. The streets don’t know his footprints very well yet, but they’re learning.
He runs by a park. There’s a big Akita, with a bright gold collar. It’s always a good day when he starts by seeing a dog.
Back home, the futon is aired out, fluffy, and dry. There’s a fancy barometer with floating balls of liquid near the window that Kaidou doesn’t really understand, but that tells, apparently, when it’s going to rain. He doesn’t really have to understand how it works, as long as he knows how to read it.
He scrubs the bathroom floor under Emily’s litterbox, until it smells as fresh and clean in there as it does in the kitchen, where he’s certain anyone could eat off the floors, and no one would want to, just in case Inui spilled some juice on it. After cleaning, he showers, and uses Inui’s shampoo. It’s not that good for his hair type, but he likes the smell clinging to him all day.
Inui is awake, typing at his laptop in the living room by the time he’s dressed and ready in his freshly-ironed suit. He looks Kaidou up and down, raising his eyebrows. “85.54% chance that you’ll get the job, looking like that.”
Kaidou lets out a hiss, but bends when Inui crooks a finger, and gets a kiss for doing so. There are other tennis clubs in Tokyo, and when he isn’t so curled up around his hurt and shame, he’d found that several of them were eager to talk to him on reputation alone, even before hearing about some of his references in the pro circuit. “Not my looks they want me for. I’ll be home before you.”
“We can go on a run. By the way, those came for you.” There’s a suspect glint in Inui’s eye, that Kaidou follows to a small bunch of flowers, tucked haphazardly into a beaker of water. There’s a note.
Good for you. Don’t come back. - Noguchi
“Anything important?”
Kaidou’s mouth tugs at the edges, and he says in all honesty, “No one that matters anymore. You got your lunch?”
“All packed. It looks delicious, thank you.”
His phone buzzes.
Hiyoshi (July 13, 6:52): double date tonight?
“You wanna go out with Hiyoshi and Okabe tonight?”
Inui wavers, obviously wanting to say no, but not wanting to be rude. “Ah...fine.”
Kaidou snorts. “I won’t let Hiyoshi tell that story again.”
“It was a very hot grill. And it wasn’t funny.”
Kaidou (July 13, 6:53): Sure. but shut the fuck up about yakiniku.
Hiyoshi (July 13, 6:54): lol
Kaidou packs his own lunch, a multi-tiered bento tied with a furoshiki that matches his bandana. “I’m off.”
“Take care of yourself.”
Kaidou pauses at the door, to look back over his shoulder. Inui is watching him, eyes soft behind his glasses. “Yeah. I think...I am.”