Disclaimer: Digimon is not my property. Lemon. Yaoi. Taito.

Cool, Calm, and Collected

Yamato knew enough about Taichi than to show him outright, like, Hey Taichi, I got my nipples pierced. Wanna see? No, that wasn't going to happen because:

Number One: Taichi would touch them, immediately, because that was the goggle head's learning style. Touching. Poking. God forbid, pinching.

Number Two: If he touched them—and he would definitely touch them, if he didn't skip straight to the pinching—then that would send the wrong signals to Yamato's overcooked brain, keeping him up even later at night, writing even more pathetic song lyrics and causing even more angry cursing when he touched himself and saw only golden fucking Taichi, no matter how hard he tried not to.

Number Three: Wait. Fuck. God, did he just admit that? No, he did not. Yamato still remembered how it felt to be lonely in those long, dull years between the divorce and Taichi. He would never risk losing his best friend. Over what? Some clandestine nipple pinching? No way. Not after the summer he'd had.

There. Three perfectly good reasons not to tell Taichi about his pierced nipples, Yamato thought with satisfaction, expertly ignoring the voice in his head that wanted to hear more about this pinching business. Yamato tsked at himself under his breath as he fixed his hair in the bathroom mirror with slender, slightly shaking fingers. It'd been two endless months since Taichi left for vacation with his family. No reason to ruin their reunion by blurting out secrets left and right.

No reason to tremble either, God, Yama, it's just Taichi. Yamato knew he'd get his ear talked off anyway—talked off with every last possible mundane detail of the trip, like whether or not Taichi had gotten sand down his swim trunks and how much, not that Yamato thought about what was going on in Taichi's trunks but, that was just a random example, it wasn't that…no, there was nothing to read into there. Just aperfectly random example of a typical conversation with Taichi: funny and weird but so, so pointless.

No, Yamato wouldn't get a chance to talk at all. He wouldn't even get a word in. Not that he ever had much to say to begin with. Anyway, the whole pierced nipples issue wouldn't come up. He didn't want it to.

Satisfied with his hair for the moment, Yamato trailed his hand down his chest to pinch his nipple, now stuck through with a silvery barbell, and let out a happy, scandalized little hum. Taichi would be rougher, he thought. Or gentler. He couldn't decide.

Two months earlier…

Yamato stood, sleep-mussed and grumpy, in the doorway of the apartment he "shared" with his "father." He'd been living alone for a month or three with no end in sight. His dad had left in the night on a long-term assignment, forgetting to tell Yamato, who'd woken up the next morning, looked around, and sighed. It had been his birthday. Probably. In any case, there had been significant emotional scarring.

"Just had to say goodbye," Taichi said, shifting his weight where he stood in the hall. He couldn't hold still. Not good can't hold still, like Taichi's-so-excited-cause-he-saw-a-big-lizard-sitting-on-a-rock-on-the-way-over, but bad can't hold still, like Taichi's-terribly-depressed-and-is-afraid-of-what-will-happen-if-he-stops-moving-so-he's-gonna-do-handstand-pushups-in-your-living-room-until-he-breaks-something. There was a subtle difference.

Taichi swayed and frowned and picked at something on the wall and looked at Yamato, then looked away and frowned again and said, "The place we're staying is like, right on the beach but you can't bring phones, or sunscreen with chemicals in it, or like, bug spray that works. My mom's gone granola now, you know, all-natural, organic, tofu, vegan, yoga, rice cake…" Taichi trailed off, looking pale and shaken at the prospect, "So. I won't get to hear your v—um, so we can't talk. You know, while I'm gone."

Yamato knew. Taichi'd told him this before, in ominous tones, as if two months apart was some big deal. Still, Taichi had come to say goodbye, which was more than Yamato could expect from his own father, so he was determined behave himself and keep the attitude to a minimum. He stifled a yawn and sleepily followed Taichi's gaze down to the floor, where Taichi was toeing the weather strip with his sneaker. It was a terrifically stylish sneaker: fresh out the box and blue and hot orange and white and black with stripes and checks and logos. Yamato had to hand it to him—Taichi's sneaker game was always on point.

"Nice kicks," Yamato said, sticking out his bare foot to knock against Taichi's. Then a couple strange things happened all at once.

For example, Taichi kissed him.

Then, there was a clatter and a wheeze behind Yamato's back, and the window unit—the only one supplying clean, frosty air to the cramped apartment—broke.

Yamato, who had just opened his mouth to protest (which Taichi, whose mouth was pressed against Yamato's mouth at that moment, completely misinterpreted), and who had just got his hands on Taichi's shoulders to violently push him away, turned to look.

Taichi was powerful in his way, or whatever. Great at breaking things from any distance. He could've done it from there. Or, at least, in that fuzzy instant, it felt right to blame him.

"What'd you do that for?" Yamato asked, or, embarrassingly, whispered, because when he turned back around he realized he was still hanging onto Taichi's shoulders, and now their mouths were nearly where they were before, except now Taichi's hands were on his back, very low. It took a few seconds, but Yamato remembered to push him.

Taichi let go with a grin, grinning even though Yamato hadn't kissed him back, or asked to be kissed in the first place, or looked particularly kissable, considering it was noon, so he'd just woken up. His hair wasn't fixed. Yamato hadn't even shut his eyes for the kiss. You had to shut your eyes for a kiss to count. "Stop smiling at me," Yamato said.

Taichi didn't stop. Typical.

"What's wrong with you?" Yamato asked.

"I dunno," Taichi shrugged, still smiling, "The usual, I guess."

Then he'd shook his head in his affable way, like Yama-you're-crazy, even though Taichi was the crazy one, kissing him like that when his hair wasn't even fixed.

And then he'd left.

Next up: Part Two

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