Chapter Text
Age 6 – Hajime
Hajime had never liked bath time.
He didn’t like having to sit still while his mum scrubbed away the day’s adventures that he had collected on his skin in dirt and mud when he and his best friend Tooru Oikawa explored the forest that started at the end of their backyards, or fought Alien’s and monsters next to the creek near Toou’s house.
His mother would tsk as he fought to escape the towel in her hands and evenings would often end in her chasing a naked Hajime around the house until his dad stopped cooking dinner or cleaning the dishes to help her corner Hajime and drag him kicking into the warm bathtub.
It seemed like a waste of time to him — he was only going to get dirty again tomorrow.
But his parents disagreed. They didn’t understand what it was like being six.
The first time he slept over at Tooru’s house, his mother knelt down outside the Oikawa’s door and grabbed Hajime’s arm to turn him to face her, looking Hajime very seriously in the eyes.
“Hajime. You have to be good for Oikawa-san okay?”
“‘course Mama,” Hajime said and tried to pull his arm out of her grip, but she just tightened her hold.
“No Hajime, listen. I mean it. Bath time as well. You can’t go making a fuss about taking a bath here like you do at home okay? Oikawa-san is not Mama or Papa, she shouldn’t be chasing you around the house to get you in the bath.
“If I find out that you were naughty you will not be allowed to sleep over Tooru’s house again okay?”
Hajime didn’t answer at first. He thought this was being really unfair, bath time was stupid.
“Hajime. Okay?”
“Okay, Mama.”
His mother did not look completely convinced, but she gave his arm a small squeeze before standing up and pushing the doorbell.
There was the faint sound of stomping and cry that sounds suspiciously like Tooru’s name before the door swung open and a flushed Tooru Oikawa looked out over the landing.
His hair was mussed and he was wearing his favourite yellow jumper with an alien head on the sleeve.
“Hajime-chan! You’re here!”
Tooru reached out his arm and Hajime wasted no time escaping from his mother with his best friend, barrelling past Oikawa’s own mother as she came down the hallway to greet them.
“Tooru!”
“Hajime!”
Both mothers let out twin expressions of surprise and annoyance at the boys, but they had already shot out to the backyard. Tooru’s Dad had just finished building a treehouse in the big tree by the fence of Tooru’s yard and the boys had plans to make it their home base — they just needed to go and get it ready for all of the missions they would be going on.
They raced down the slope of Tooru’s yard to the base of the tree, Hajime winning by a hair and earning the right to be the first into the treehouse.
It wasn’t very big or very high off the ground, and there was a large branch the cut through the middle of the floor to the roof, but it was the coolest place Hajime had ever seen.
“This is way better than our old base by the creek!”
“I know right,” Tooru was grinning as he pulled himself through the hole in the floor that served as a door. “And it won’t flood every time it rains!”
Hajime nodded and spun to look around. The walls of the treehouse weren’t too much taller than he was and the roof was slanted around the branches and trunk of the tree. It would probably leek when it rained, but Tooru was right, no more flooding.
Turning to look back at his friend he grinned.
“So where do we start?”
The boys played in the treehouse, running backwards and forwards to their old base by the small creek until Tooru’s mum called them inside for dinner.
They raced back to the house and were about to clear the back door when Tooru’s dad stopped them on the welcome mat.
“Jeez, you two! Did you leave any dirt outside?” he exclaimed as he watched mud drip from the arm his son had thrown around his friend’s shoulder. The shout drew the attention of both Tooru’s mother and sister and his mum sighed before saying the worst words ever:
“You’re going to need a bath first.”
Tooru’s sister turned and disappeared down the hall, presumably to get the bath ready. Tooru’s mum just handed the boys a cloth and told them to wipe off as much of the mud as possible before coming inside.
Hajime wanted to complain, but his mother’s voice sounded in his ears threatening to never let him stay over at Tooru’s house again. Instead, Hajime just pouted as he flicked some dirt of his shoulder and poked Tooru in the side.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“Stupid. This is all your fault!”
Tooru just widened his eyes. “Is not! You’re the one who pushed me into a puddle first!”
“Only cause you were being a dummy!”
“I— I was not being a dummy! You’re the dummy Hajime!”
Hajime just stuck his tongue out and went back to wiping off the mud. Tooru looked at his friend in confusion. Normally a comment like that would earn him a punch or a shove from the other boy, but Hajime just looked away.
Gently, Tooru reached out to touch Hajime’s arm.
“What’s wrong?”
Hajime huffed. Nothing was wrong. Tooru didn’t know what he was talking about. He turned to glare at his friend, but Tooru was looking at him with such a sincere expression that Hajime couldn’t help but tell him the truth.
“I don’t like bath time,” he muttered.
This surprised Tooru. Hajime was usually the logical and sound one of the two of them. And logically you have to take baths to get clean. And being clean is great.
“What? Why not?”
Hajime kicked at the dirt beneath their feet.
“They’re dumb and boring. All your gonna do is get dirty again.”
“Whaaaaaat? Bath time isn’t boring!” Tooru grabbed at Hajime now and shook him a little.
“Yes, they are! All you do is sit in the water and do nothing and then you’re skin gets all wrinkly and gross and—”
“No.” Tooru interrupted. “Bath time is fun! Here I’ll prove it.”
He slipped his hand down Hajime’s arm and dragged the other boy by his wrist to the bathroom. They still weren’t really clean enough to be inside and Tooru’s mum yelled at them a little for tracking dirt into the house. Tooru shouted back that they were going to have a bath and it was fine (Hajime wondered how he knew that since Tooru wouldn’t be the one cleaning up the mess) before pushing Hajime into the bathroom and closing the door behind them.
The Oikawa’s had a nice bathroom and a big bathtub that was built into the floor and wall. The bath was already filled with warm water thanks to Tooru’s older sister and a bucket of toys sat by the edge.
There were no toys in Hajime’s bathroom.
Tooru pulled off his shirt and pushed down his pants, leaving his clothing in a muddy pile on the floor before hopping naked over to the bathtub.
At his young age, he didn’t know that nakedness was something to be worried or embarrassed about, so Hajime watched as his friend dipped a toe in and sighed, before submerging himself in the water.
Tooru turned back around to Hajime who was still standing by the closed door looking at the bath unsure.
“C’mon Hajime! It feels really good.” Tooru slapped the water gently with his hands in emphasis.
Slowly, Hajime shrugged out of his own muddy clothes and followed Tooru into the tub, his friend moving over to make room for him.
The water was warm, and it stung the small cuts he had gathered from playing that day.
Once he was submerged Tooru smiled and splashed him with water.
“Hey!” Hajime said and returned the gesture, Tooru laughing as he brought his hands up to shield his face.
“Ahhh! Haji— I’m sorry!”
Hajime just splashed him again and they both laughed. Once they had calmed down, Tooru smile slipped at he looked at Hajime seriously.
“Okay, Hajime. Pirates or mermaids?”
“What?”
“Do you want to play pirates or mermaids?”
“Oh— ah I dunno. What do you want to do?”
Tooru thought about it for a moment, his face screwing up slightly in the way it did when he was thinking. Hajime liked that face, he thought it was funny.
“Hmmmmm. I played pirates last night, so I think mermaids would be fun tonight.” He looked back at Hajime. “Ahh Hajime, but you’re too ugly to be a mermaid!”
“Hey!” he moved closer to Tooru and smacked a hand against his wet skin.
“Haha! Okay, sorry! How about Hajime you be the pirate and I’ll be the mermaid and we’re working together to find the lost treasure?”
It sounded like a good plan to Hajime.
“Lost treasure? Like what?”
“Hmmm,” Tooru leant over the edge of the bathtub and pulled out a couple of rubber ducks and a toy giant lizard — Godzilla. He dumped the ducks into the bath and placed Godzilla on the shelf built into the wall where the soap and shampoo were kept.
“Okay, we have to fight the evil ducks to rescue the Godzilla statue for their evil base.”
“Ducks aren’t evil stupid.”
“In this world they are.” Tooru grabbed a duck and pretended to peck Hajime with it.
“Oh no! Hajime the ducks are coming from you!”
“Ah! Tooru, wha—” Hajime batted his friends arm away, but he was laughing. Picking up a duck of his own he lunged for Tooru in the bath, water sloshing up and over the edge.
“You won’t get me you dumb ducks! I am the great Pirate Hajime!”
“And I am the mermaid prince Tooru!”
Both boys laughed and splashed around in the bath for a long time until Tooru’s mum came to see what was happening to cause so much noise. She found both boys laughing; fighting with ducks, soap and her new pink loafer. She chided them gently and told them to hurry up before their dinner gets cold, before laying a couple of towels down on the wet floor.
Hajime and Tooru grinned at each other as they dried off and got into warm pyjamas.
Maybe bath time wasn’t so bad after all.
They had a lot of baths together after that, as children often do, laughing, fighting and splashing around. Their mothers got frustrated with the amount of mess they often made, but if both boys got clean and made little fuss about it — especially Hajime — then they decided it wasn’t too bad after all.
Age 13 — Tooru
It was Friday night and Hajime was staying over again. That wasn’t strange, as Tooru and Hajime often stayed over at each other’s houses on the weekend, swapping between the two depending on the night.
Tooru was lounging on his bed reading a manga and humming softly to himself, while Hajime was next to him on the floor, throwing a volleyball up and catching it as he lay back on his futon.
They had started playing volleyball a couple of years back, and what had started as a simple game of passes to one another had transformed into an intense and consuming love for the sport. They practiced and played together any chance they could and had joined their Junior High Volleyball team on the first day of school.
The beat of Hajime’s volleyball seemed to match Tooru’s humming.
It was nice. Relaxing.
Of course, it couldn’t last, as Tooru’s mum called out to them from downstairs.
“Tooru! Hajime! Bath’s ready!”
Tooru froze, staring unseeing at the page of his manga. Hajime was quiet too for a moment before he sighed and got up from his spot by Tooru’s bed.
Bath time was almost synonymous with challenge time between the two of them now, after years of playing and mucking around.
“C’mon Oikawa.” He nudged Tooru with his foot and Tooru let him push him onto his side. He stared up at Hajime, the best pout he could muster on his face.
“Don’t wanna,” the whine in his voice was a practiced weapon, sure to fire Hajime up. Hajime’s hands twitched slightly, but otherwise, he ignored the whine and just nudged Tooru again.
“C’mon Tooru. You stink,”
“Do not.”
“Do too.”
“Do not.”
“Do too.”
“Do no—” Hajime tackled him, wrestling the manga out of his hands and pinning them both by Tooru’s side as he straddled his hips with his thighs.
“Surrender,” Hajime said. Tooru squirmed a little underneath him, trying to escape, but Hajime was bigger and stronger than he was at the moment and once he had Tooru pinned there was no escaping.
Still, giving up wasn’t in Tooru’s nature.
“Never!” He bucked his hips up and tried to dislodge Hajime from his position on top. It worked… sort of.
Hajime lost his balance and tipped off the side of the bed but instead of falling off Tooru, he latched onto him with his arms and legs to try and remain upright and ended up pulling Tooru off the bed with him. They landed with a loud thump on the floor.
“Ow! Iwa-chan—”
They were pressed almost chest to chest and Tooru could feel the hard muscles Hajime had already begun to build beneath him. The feel of Hajime so close made his stomach do a little flip and he wondered if he was going to be sick all over his best friend. Hajime would hate that.
“Urgh! You’re so heavy.” Hajime pushed against Tooru, forcing the other boy to roll off his chest and onto the floor. “Get off.”
“Boys!” Tooru’s mum called again. While she was a kind woman, Oikawa-san was not known for her patience — a trait she had passed along to both her daughter and son — and the boys could already hear the irritation in the rise of her voice.
Tooru sighed and pushed himself up off the floor.
“Jeez Iwa-chan, stop messing around. It’s bath time.”
Hajime just glared at his friend before following him into a standing position and grabbing his towel off Tooru’s desk. Tooru did the same and turned to walk out the door. He should have known better than to turn his back on Hajime.
A sharp sting sliced across his backside and he yelped as he jumped forward out his bedroom door into the hallway. Turning with fear in his eyes, he saw Hajime winding his towel up in preparation to whip Tooru again.
“Noooooo!” Tooru sprinted down the hallway, the thumps of Hajime’s steps not far behind him.
Reaching the bathroom, he launched inside and slammed the door shut, creating a safe barrier between him and Hajime.
Hajime pounded on the door.
“Tooru!”
“Nope. No way Iwa-chan. I’m not letting you in here.”
“C’mon! Don’t be such a little shit!” Hajime’s voice was loud, but he lowered it over the final word — shit coming out as an angry whisper so that Tooru’s mother didn’t hear.
“Nope. Na na nana na. I can’t hear you!”
“You’re a child!”
“You’re a brute”
“Ghyahh!”
Tooru could almost see the exasperation on Hajime’s face and how he would throw his hands up in defeat. He heard footsteps stomped away as the other side of the door went quiet.
Plucking up some courage, he opened the door a crack to stick his head out into the hallway. Hajime was nowhere to be seen.
He must have gone back to my room to wait for me to be done. The idea filled Tooru with a strange mix of relief and disappointment he didn’t quite understand and he thought on it as he moved away from the door and stripped off, easing himself slowly into the bath.
He and Hajime didn’t always take baths together, but they did more often than not when they had sleepovers because it was normally more fun. But lately, seeing Hajime get undressed and feeling his bare legs rest against his own in the bathtub — now that there was less room in the tub with them being so much bigger — Tooru had begun to feel weird. Like maybe they were getting too old to be sharing a bathtub. Like maybe he shouldn’t be allowed to be looking at Hajime naked every weekend, just like how he wasn’t allowed to look at girls naked or in their underwear. He wasn’t quite sure why looking at Hajime was apparently okay and looking at girls was bad, Tooru felt just as weird about both of them.
But Hajime and he had been taking baths together since they were six, it would be weird to stop now.
The bathroom door opening interrupted his thoughts and made him gasp in shock, his hands coming up to shield his chest and groin. Hajime sauntered in wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist and huffed a laugh at Tooru’s surprise.
“What’re you looking so shocked for?” he said slipping the towel off and hanging on the wall-hook next to Tooru’s. “Who else would it be but me?”
Tooru tried very hard not to look, but his eyes seemed to have a mind of their own (or maybe he didn’t have as much self-control as he thought) as they travelled from Hajime’s face down his neck, past tan shoulders to a toned chest and abdomen, where muscles were already evident under his skin. They traced lower and lower, edging towards his hip bones before Hajime coughed. Tooru’s eyes flicked back up to his friend and found him regarding Tooru with curiosity.
“What are you looking at?”
Tooru felt his cheeks flood with heat and began wondering if maybe the bath was too warm.
“Nothing really?” his voice sounded weak even to his own ears, and he felt like he was asking Hajime rather than answering his question. Hajime just looked at him confused.
Tooru hummed as his brain scrambled for something to say.
“You have bigger muscles than me. You’ve pretty much got a six-pack already!”
Hajime just rolled his eyes and walked towards the bath.
“That’s cause I work hard stupid.”
Tooru said nothing and kept his eyes firmly on the bathwater as Hajime shoved him over to make room next to him.
His friend groaned slightly as he got in.
“Man, it’s so hot!”
Now that Hajime’s lower half was safely submerged beneath the murky, soapy water, Tooru felt safe lifting his eyes to look at his friend again.
“Obviously Iwa-chan, I’m here.”
Hajime growled slightly and lightly cuffed Tooru on the back of his head. Tooru felt the awkwardness of earlier fade away and as the boys joked and messed around he was almost able to ignore the firm press of Hajime’s leg against his and the feeling he got looking at Hajime naked earlier.
Later that night, as he lay awake listening to Hajime breathing, those thoughts were harder to ignore. And Tooru found his mind wandering again and again to the image of Hajime earlier getting ready for the bath, of him afterwards flushed from the heat and glistening with water. He thought of Hajime hands and the way he manhandled Tooru like it was nothing. The more he thought about his friend, who was sleeping innocently next to him, the more uncomfortable he got in his pants. The area between his legs feeling hot and itchy.
He knew what it meant.
Slipping out of bed, he tiptoed past Hajime and out of his bedroom, locking himself in the bathroom. Sitting down on the toilet, he pushed his pants to his ankles and let his hand wander between his legs — trying desperately to keep his mind blank. But as he felt the release happen and the pressure ease, it was an image of Hajime that filled his mind’s eye.
Tooru cleaned up and crept guiltily back to bed. Although much more comfortable, the shame of what he had done and who he had done it too would not leave him alone and he cried himself to sleep.
The next day at Hajime’s place when Hajime’s mum called for bath time, Tooru looked at his friend and told him to go first.
“We’re getting a little too old to be taking baths together, don’t you think Iwa-chan?”
Hajime just regarded his friend with a blank face. Tooru looked terrible with bags under his eyes and he had been acting weird ever since their bath the night before. Hajime guessed that this was the reason why.
“Okay.” He grabbed his towel. “I’ll go first then.”
Tooru just hummed in agreement and went back to the manga he was reading. Shrugging it off, Hajime left the room and went to enjoy his bath alone.
Age 16 – Hajime
The call came late at night after Hajime had already fallen asleep. He groaned as he rolled over and winced at the light of his phone, not bothering to look at the name as he pressed the receive button.
There was only one person who called him this late at night.
“Whasgoinon?” he slurred into the receiver.
“Iwa-chan, um, I—” the tone of Tooru’s voice knocked whatever exhaustion he had away.
“What happened? Where are you?”
“I’m ah, I’m at the gym.”
“The gym?” Hajime was confused for a second before he realised what Tooru meant. “You mean the school gym? What the fuck Tooru! What time is it?”
Hajime pushed his covers off and launched himself out of bed, not even noticing as he slipped and called Tooru by his first name.
“It’s a little after midnight, but it’s fine Hajime, I’m fine,”
“You don’t sound fine!” Hajime was moving around the room in a flurry, briefly taking the phone off his ear to push his head through a shirt.
“I just- I just fell, and it’s not bad, but I don’t think I should walk home.”
Hajime was racing down the stairs of his house now.
“Dammit Oikawa.”
His parent left the keys to their car in a bowl on the kitchen counter and he grabbed them as he raced to the genkan, shoving feet into shoes before he walked out the door.
“Okay, I’m on my way now. Stay put.”
“Thank you, Hajime.”
Hajime hung up and started the car, reversing as carefully as he could out of the driveway.
Legally, he wasn’t allowed to drive yet, but the school wasn’t far and his Dad had taught him the basics during a trip they had taken in the summer before school started.
The drive to Aoba Johsai was painfully slow, but Hajime wasn’t confident enough in his abilities to drive any faster. At least the roads were empty.
He parked as close to the gym as he could and raced to the front doors.
He found Tooru sitting outside the closed gym doors on the front steps. His right leg was stretched out in front of him and he was pushing gingerly against his knee. He stopped when he heard Hajime coming.
“What happened?” Hajime knelt down beside his friend and took over the analysis of his knee, bushing figures gently along Tooru’s skin. He felt Tooru shiver slightly.
“I was practising my serves, but I was too tired and stuffed the landing on my last one. I ended up falling onto the ground and landed on this knee wrong.”
The knee did look red and a little swollen.
“Does it hurt?”
“Only a little. I can still walk — I was able to tidy up the gym — but I didn’t think it was a good idea to push it and walk home.”
“Damn straight! It wasn’t a good idea to push it before that! What were you thinking Tooru? You—”
Tooru grabbed the side of Hajime’s face and turned him so they were looking eye-to-eye.
“I know Hajime.” The look in Tooru’s eyes was pained and miserable. “I know.”
Hajime leant his forehead against Tooru’s and closed his eyes. It was quiet but for the soft sound of their breathing and the painful slam of Hajime’s heart against his ribs. He had been so scared.
“You have to be more careful. It doesn’t sound like it’s too serious this time, but next time—”
“I know. I’m sorry. It was dumb.”
“It was.”
“I know.”
Hajime opened his eyes. Tooru was not normally this accepting. He was strong and stubborn, and while Hajime may find that annoying sometimes, this soft-spoken and accepting Tooru scared him.
“You’re accepting this way to easy,” he said.
“I’ve been stuck here for the last hour thinking about what I have done, what it would have meant if I had hurt it worse.”
“And?”
“You’re right. It could have been a lot worse. If it had been worse, I wouldn’t be able to play volleyball anymore.” Tooru sighed, leaning back from Hajime, and turned his face up to the moon in the sky above. “I don’t ever want that to happen.”
Hajime looked at his friend — the tired lines around his eyes, the way the moonlight made his brown hair shine silver and his eyelashes cast long shadows across his cheeks.
“Good.”
Tooru opened his eyes and looked down his nose to Hajime, but didn’t turn his face away from the sky.
“Good?”
“Yeah. Good. Cause there is no way I am watching you destroy any chance you have for your future.”
A smile tugged at Tooru’s mouth and Hajime felt his own mouth ached to follow the motion, but he hid it behind his frown.
“C’mon Shittykawa. Let’s take you to the doctors,” He grasped Tooru’s arm to help pull him to his feet, but Tooru didn’t budge.
“No, please not the doctors?”
“What? Dude you just hurt—”
“I know.” Tooru interrupted, and using Hajime has a stabiliser he pushed himself to his feet. He teetered a little but seemed to be standing strong. “But as you’ve said, it doesn’t seem to be that bad, and I’m tired.”
Hajime looked at his friend unsure.
“Please Hajime, I’m so tired. Can you please just take me home? I promise I’ll go to the doctors tomorrow.”
Tooru looked sincere and after staring each other down for a moment, Hajime relented.
“Okay. But you have to go tomorrow Tooru.”
“I will.”
Can you walk to the car?”
Tooru said he could, but Hajime still insisted on putting his friend's arm around his shoulder and placing his hand on Tooru’s waist to support him.
The car ride back to Hajime’s was quiet, both boys lost in their thoughts. Only when Hajime pulled slowly into his driveway did he realise he had taken Tooru back to his home rather than the Oikawa’s.
“You alright to stay over tonight?” he asked. He didn’t want to, but if Tooru asked he would drive him down the street to his house.
“Yeah.”
Hajime stifled a sigh of relief at the answer. At least this way he could keep an eye on Tooru.
Turning the car off he quickly walked around to the passenger side to help Tooru out, but his friend just battered his hand away.
“I told you I’m okay Iwa-chan. I can walk.”
Hajime ignored him and slipped his hand back into place around Tooru’s waist. Tooru didn’t shrug him off.
They entered the house as quietly as they could and made their way upstairs to Hajime’s room.
Hajime deposited Tooru on his bed and felt the other boy’s eyes on him as he moved about his room, pulling out Tooru’s futon — it was meant to be the guest futon, but really Tooru used it the most — and grabbing him a spare towel.
He threw the last item at his friend, telling him to go and have a bath while he set everything up.
“You stink worse than dog shit right now,”
“Gah! Do not, Iwa-chan! Take it back!”
“No. Now go shower.”
Tooru stood up and walked to the door. Hajime watched him from the corner of his eye and was satisfied to see that there was barely any limp in his step. His injury really wasn’t too severe.
Opening the door, Tooru stood in the doorway and moment and looked back at Hajime.
“Will you come with me?”
The question was spoken in a whisper, and there was fear in Tooru’s eyes as he waited for Hajime’s response.
Hajime just nodded.
“Of course. I’ll grab my towel and be there in a moment.”
Tooru smiled slightly at that and exited the room. Hajime listened to his steps fade away and felt the air in his lungs leave him in a shaky breath.
His heart was racing, and he couldn’t quite understand it. He and Tooru used to have baths together all the time.
He waited until he heard the bathroom door close before standing up and grabbing his own towel. He paused at the door, debating getting undressed.
For some reason, he couldn’t get his heart to calm down. It’s not like he and Tooru had never shared a bath before and even after they stopped doing that, the showers after morning practice weren’t exactly private, so this shouldn’t be any different. It shouldn’t be… but it was.
Unsure where that train of thought was going to take him, Hajime tried to push it from his mind — focusing instead on keeping his footsteps quiet as he walked down the hallway to the bathroom.
He kept his clothes on, but brought his towel.
Oikawa had already drawn the bath and was sitting in the tub when he got there, and Hajime caught the back end of a wince as he closed the bathroom door behind him.
His heart was still beating erratically at the thought of his best friend naked in the bathtub, but he pushed those feeling aside at the sight of Tooru in pain. Tooru came first. He always did.
Hajime crossed the small room in three quick steps and was kneeling down by the side of the tub in an instant.
“Are you okay?”
Tooru smiled at him weakly.
“I think so. The water feels good and I added some Epson salts for muscle tension.”
Hajime hummed and sat back on his feet, calmer now he knew that Tooru was okay.
“So,” Tooru began. His voice held the carefully calm quality Hajime knew he put on whenever he was nervous. “Are you going to get in?”
Hajime couldn’t stop a surprised blush warming his face as he looked at his friend.
“I— Ah—” Hajime stammered and looked to the wall of the bathroom away from Tooru. It dawned on him then that he was kneeling next to the bath where Tooru was sitting potentially naked.
The thought made his stomach tighten and Hajime had to swallow thickly before he could get his voice working enough to answer properly.
“I— No.” He tried to keep his voice even, but it sounded strained even to his ears.
“Oh.” Tooru reply was quiet and a quick glance at his friend told Hajime Tooru was trying extremely hard not to show that he was embarrassed or upset by focusing intently on his hands beneath the bathwater.
Hajime reached out and lay a hand softly on Tooru’s shoulder.
“Hey. There’s not enough room for us both.” He said. “We’re not kids anymore, and I don’t want to risk hurting you by knocking into your knee or something.”
Tooru didn’t look back at Hajime, but he sighed in acquiescence and relaxed back further in the bath, resting his head back and closing his eyes.
They stayed like that for a while, occasionally speaking, but mostly just enjoying each other’s company while Tooru soaked off the pain and sweat of the evening — letting the warm water and Hajime’s presence soothe his frayed nerves.
Hajime spent the time watching his friend, the way the light played with the shadows on Tooru’s face, the long pane of his neck and the reliable strength in his shoulders and chest. He tried desperately not to let his eyes wander too far south of that chest, and every time he felt himself slipping he forced himself to look away or back up to Tooru’s face to make sure his friend hadn’t caught him.
Hajime wouldn’t mind if the desire to look was innocent curiosity. Tooru was his best friend, and he supposed it was normal to want to compare what they both had. But he suspected that his curiosity stemmed from a different place. A place he had pushed down within himself to avoid dealing with. A problem he wasn’t ready to face.
Eventually, the bathwater got too cold for Tooru to enjoy anymore and Hajime left the bathroom so his friend could get out and change into the pair of Hajime’s sweatpants he had brought with him.
As Hajime waited on his bed for his friend, he contemplated the hidden place within himself he had been avoiding for so long. Hajime wasn’t stupid, he knew what having a crush felt like and he wasn’t about to delude himself into thinking that the increased heart rate and funny stomach flips were anything other than that.
So, what did that mean?
Did he like Tooru? Love Tooru?
Yes, whispered that hidden place and Hajime ran his hand over his face, leaning back into his pillow.
“How the fuck?” He said out loud, as if some greater deity might hear him and answer his question.
There were no answers from any gods, but Tooru picked that exact moment to walk into Hajime’s room and responded to his friend.
“How the fuck what, Iwa-chan?”
Hajime turned his head so he was facing the other boy and surveyed Tooru who was standing next to his futon. He was wearing an old shirt of Hajime’s as well as the sweatpants and had his towel twisted around his head to dry his hair.
He looked ridiculous, and yet not?
How am I in love with this guy? Hajime thought, but it was half-hearted. If he honest about it, of course he was in love with Tooru. No one else was more important to him. No one else made him laugh harder, smile more and work to be the best version of himself.
“Iwa-chan?” Tooru fidgeted under Hajime’s gaze, pulling the towel off his head. Hajime decided not to answer his friend’s question.
“It’s nothing. Turn the light of Shittykawa.”
Tooru huffed at the nickname but didn’t complain as he did as he was asked.
Hajime waited for the sound of Tooru slipping into his futon, but it never came. Instead, he felt his mattress dip down and the shifting of his covers as Tooru slipped into bed beside him.
On a normal night, he might have complained and tried to kick Tooru out. But between Tooru’s injury and the sudden realisation of his own feelings, there was nothing he wanted more than his best friend by his side — his presence reassuring and comforting.
As such, he rolled over onto his side so he was facing Tooru, and wrapped an arm around his new bed mate. Tooru sighed and snuggled in.
“I turned the alarm off for morning training,” Hajime whispered into Tooru’s hair.
“Thank you,” came a quiet reply, hot air pushing against Hajime’s thin nightshirt.
They said nothing more and Hajime listened as Tooru’s breathing got slower and steadier, and the faint twitching of his body gave way to the peaceful stillness of sleep.
As he lay there with his body pressed against Tooru’s, memories surfaced of sitting side by side with Tooru in the warm bath, their smaller legs tangled or knocking together as they wrestled or goofed around. And when that stopped, a warm body pressed against him at night as they talked and laughed into the early hours of the morning and fell asleep wrapped around each other.
In the recess of his mind, Hajime had always known that was not quite normal. He had known that he and Tooru were close even by best friend standards, and their devotion to each other had surpassed that of any other close friends they observed in the past.
Reflecting on it now, Hajime couldn’t believe it took him this long to figure it out. But what now?
Did he tell Tooru? Did he risk getting rejected and ruining their friendship? Did he distance himself and try to get over it?
A part of him wanted to wake Tooru up and ask him, because he was always the one Hajime had turned to in the past when he needed advice or faced a problem he couldn’t solve. But Tooru was his problem now.
He looked down at his friend, squinting in the dim light of his bedroom to see Tooru’s face relaxed in sleep. His heart skipped a beat and he felt the desire to pull Tooru tighter against him.
But he fought it. It would be wrong until he found out how Tooru felt. Even sleeping like this now might be wrong, but Hajime couldn’t bring himself to pull away.
Tooru huffed in his sleep and Hajime smiled at him through the darkness.
What now indeed.
*****
Tooru went home in the morning after Hajime’s mum had woken them up an hour before they needed to be at school. If she was surprised to see Tooru in Hajime’s bed she didn’t show it, but Hajime explained the situation to her anyway before he threw on his uniform and walked with Tooru to his house five doors down.
Tooru huffed that he didn’t need a babysitter and Hajime shot back that if that was the case, they wouldn’t be in the situation they found themselves in now. Tooru shut up after that.
Hajime left Tooru in the care of his parents and went to school determined that he wouldn’t spend the whole day thinking about his friend.
He failed.
He jumped at every text and tapped his foot through every class while he waited for news of Tooru’s knee. It didn’t help that Tooru felt the need to send an endless stream of messages to Hajime throughout the waiting period on absolutely nothing important whatsoever.
[9:17 am] From Shittykawa
Iwa-chan ̴ I boorrreeed
Iwa-chan don’t ignore meee
You’re in Sayaka Sensei’s class right now, right?
How’s my favourite potato teacher going?
Say hi to potato-chan for me!
[9:54 am] From Shittykawa
Iwa-chan, day-time TV is so dramatic!
This lady just kissed her brother! Gross!
Apparently they are in love…
Still not cool though.
[10:03 am] From Shittykawa
Turns out it was her best friend, not her brother.
I feel better about supporting them now.
Go hero-chan! Get your man.
[10:10 am] From Shittykawa
OMG. The love rival has just entered.
No! Hero-chan! Jawline-chan loves you not Big-boobs-san!
[10:21 am] From Shittykawa
Jawline-chan is confused. He loves Hero-chan but he really wants to bone Big-boobs-san.
Is it bad I kind of want to support Big-boobs-san? She’s mean, but like also really cool and sophisticated? She’s an amazing plastic surgeon.
[10:29 am]
HOLY SHIT
JAWLINE-CHAN JUST MURDERED HERO-CHAN IN HER SLEEP!
HOW COuld you Jawline-chan?
You were supposed to love her!
Honestly, Hero-chan and Big-boobs-san should have just ditched Murder-san and gotten together themselves.
Hajime looked at the last message and felt his breath catch in his throat. Is Tooru okay with same-sex couples? They had never spoken about it before. He snuck a quick response to Tooru about blowing up his phone while he was in class, between his Maths and Japanese Lit classes, but couldn’t gather the courage to ask the question.
Tooru finally texted with news of his knee just before lunch with the added confirmation that he was heading back to school for their afternoon classes, and Hajime felt tension he didn’t realise he was holding ease out of his shoulders as he read the message.
[11:41 am] From Shittykawa
Iwa-chan! Good news! It’s not bad, I just twisted it when I landed wrong last night. The doctor said that if I take it easy for the next coupleog weeks, and manage swelling and inflammation, I should be good as new.
[11:42 am] To Shittykawa
That’s good. You better do what your doctor said, or I’ll hit you.
[11:42 am] From Shittykawa
Mean Iwa-chan! I’m injured you know
When Tooru arrived at school and threw himself over Hajime already complaining loudly about missing his gruff face while they were separated that morning, Hajime allowed himself a brief moment of weakness and tightened his arms around hid friend slightly before shoving him off.
If Tooru, or their other close friends Hanamaki and Mastukawa noticed that pause, they didn’t say anything.
Things between Tooru and Hajime changed after that. Hajime wasn’t sure if it was the tensions of Tooru’s accident, the awkwardness of the bath situation or the realisation and acceptance of his feelings for Tooru, but something, almost indiscernibly, between them shifted.
They became more tactile, almost without even noticing until Hanamaki pointed it out a week after the accident when Tooru was once again draped over Hajime during their lunch break.
Hajime tried to ignore the burning of his neck at this observation, especially as he had actually been trying to pull back from touching Tooru as much, agonising over the ethics of letting yourself touch and enjoy being touched by a friend who doesn’t know your feelings.
“Aw Makki! Are you jealous? Don’t worry, there’s enough of Oikawa-san to go around.”
“Pfft. As if Oikawa, save it for your boyfriend.”
Tooru had just spluttered in response, but he let go of Hajime and returned to eating his lunch. Hajime tried to ignore how cold he felt once Tooru pulled away.
It seemed that as hard as Hajime was trying to pull back from touching Tooru, Tooru was trying just as hard to touch Hajime. It started with casually with the brush of a hand between his shoulders or lingering for a moment too long on his arm, but a fortnight after the accident Tooru was looping their arms together while they walked home from school in the evenings chatting happily about the observations he had made from his place on the sideline during training, and laying his head down on Hajime’s lap when they watched a movie on the weekend.
It was during one such movie night that everything came to head.
They were watching an old favourite of theirs, a late 90’s action movie based in a futuristic Japan. Tooru had taken up most of the space on the couch, but Hajime couldn’t bring himself to care with Tooru’s head pillowed on his lap and his fingers combing through the soft curls in Tooru’s hair.
Tooru had demanded a head scratch at the beginning of the movie and Hajime, who was becoming weaker and weaker to Tooru’s demands if it meant he got to be closer to the young man who had stolen his heart, did not say no.
Hajime wasn’t really paying attention to the movie, and he suspected Tooru wasn’t either, so he felt no guilt about asking the question he had been stuck on since Hanamaki first brought it up.
“Do you think we touch too much?”
He felt Tooru stiffen in his lap, before slowly relaxing — as if he had to force himself to.
“No.” Came a quiet response. “Do you?”
Hajime remained silent for a moment. Tooru and he had always been so close, but now that he knew his feelings for his friend, he wasn’t so sure.
“I don’t know. We’ve always been like this, but I guess it can seem weird from the outside, right?”
Tooru lifted himself out of Hajime’s lap and twisted himself around to face his friend. At this angle their faces were close and if Hajime moved just a couple of centimetres forward he could kiss him.
He tried not to let his eyes flick to Tooru’s lips at that thought.
“Does it bother you?”
Hajime could feel the warmth of Tooru’s breath on his chin, and at the sound of Tooru’s voice, his stupid eyes betrayed him and flicked down to watch Tooru’s mouth as he spoke — the faint peak of his tongue as he wet his lips.
Involuntarily he began to lean forward into Tooru, his body once again betraying him. It was doing that a lot around Tooru lately.
“No,” he whispered his answer and he heard Tooru’s breath hitch. His answer and Tooru’s reaction surprised him and he realised just how close they had become on the couch.
He leant back abruptly and stood up, Tooru falling off him and almost landing face-first into the couch cushion he had just vacated.
Hajime coughed and then spluttered out a weak excuse for the bathroom, before disappearing down Tooru’s hallway.
He didn’t look behind him to see his friend reaction, but if he had he would have seen the confusion and hurt on Tooru’s face as he watched Hajime retreat, followed by determination when he turned the TV off and followed his friend down the hall.
Hajime shut himself in the bathroom and leant his head against the door.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
He had almost kissed Tooru. He had almost kissed his best friend. His probably very straight best friend. What was he thinking?
But hadn’t Tooru leant in too? He didn’t pull away when they got closer, did he? Did he want to kiss Hajime too?
But no. Tooru’s always been like that, hasn’t he? He’s always been up in Hajime’s personal space, never respecting the boundaries Hajime has tried to beat into him.
But that’s weird too right? Was Tooru like that with his other friends? He asked if Hajime minded touching him so much, but did Tooru mind? Did Tooru like touching Hajime?
His thoughts were spinning, question after unanswered question pushing itself into his head and not moving. He was so focused on his internal turmoil he almost missed the soft tap on the bathroom door.
“Hajime?” Tooru’s voice was soft, probably not wanting to disturb his parents who were already in bed asleep. “Hajime, let me in. I know you’re not actually using the toilet.”
“You don’t know that,” Hajime responded. But he opened the door, moving backwards when Tooru entered until his legs bumped against the bathtub he and Tooru had shared so many times in their life.
Tooru shut the door behind him but didn’t move any further into the room. He surveyed the space, eyes moving over the bathtub to the collection of cosmetics and products he used every day before finally resting on Hajime. Hajime returned his stare, nervous about what the determination he saw there meant.
“You know this is where I first realised I liked you.”
Hajime stilled, the words taking a moment to sink in. What?
“What?” he repeated the question out loud, his voice coming out cracked and a little broken.
Tooru just sighed and leaned against the door.
“I like you.”
“Like, like as in more than a friend?”
“Yes.”
Hajime’s legs chose then to give out on him and he slid down to the floor, back resting against the tub. He didn’t take his eyes off Tooru though, and his mind spun as it tried to catch-up.
“You like me. Since— since when?”
Tooru sighed again and walked over to join Hajime by the tub. He sat down close to him, but not touching, like he understood that Hajime needed a moment to collect himself. He probably did. When it came to Hajime, Tooru always knew.
“For ages,” Tooru said in answer to Hajime’s question. “When we were younger and used to take baths together, I realised that I liked you, that that like was different to what I felt for other people. That’s why I asked to take baths alone. I wanted to look and touch you and I knew that I shouldn’t, that it was wrong.”
“When we stopped having bath— But we were thirteen!”
“Yeah?”
“You’ve liked me for that long?”
“Yeah.”
Hajime stayed silent, his thoughts on thirteen-year-old Tooru figuring this out on his own and making the decision to separate himself from Hajime in that way.
Tooru hadn’t finished talking.
“I’ve like you forever Hajime. I don’t think there was ever a time when I didn’t. It just changed and grew and as we did.”
Hajime turned to look at his friend, his best friend, who had been with him through all the challenges he had faced so far, and just as when he came to recognise that his feelings for Tooru were inevitable, he realised Tooru’s feelings for him were the same way. They have always loved each other, it made sense really that they ended up like this.
“I love you too,” he said finally.
Tooru smiled and tentatively reached out a hand to cup Hajime’s face with his hand.
“I know,” was his response and Hajime would have rebutted with a snide comment, but Tooru closed the distance between them and pressed his mouth against Hajime’s.
Finally. That hidden little place inside Hajime sighed and he closed his eyes.
Tooru’s lips were soft, and with his face pressed so closely to Hajime’s he could smell the clean scent of his soap mixed with a warm tanginess that was pure Tooru.
Hesitantly, he brought his hand up to the back of Tooru’s head and pressed his friend more firmly against him — deepening the kiss.
This was apparently the right thing to do, as Tooru hummed before opening his mouth against Hajime’s and running his tongue against the line of Hajime’s lips.
At that, Hajime pushed aside all reservations and opened his mouth to Tooru, revelling in the feeling of Tooru entering his mouth as he explored Tooru’s in return.
They stayed like that for what felt ages, mouths connected, bodies pressed firmly against each other as their hands ran over their bodies — grabbing and pulling, stroking and caressing. And when they finally broke apart, it was to move to Tooru’s bed, where they continued to talk and kiss and explore exactly what this new development between them was.