Archive: NO.
Notes: Also posted on LJ. InuKai :D Set in the same university, future sort of place as "Small Things". This is more 'slice of life' rather than really plot-driven but I really like the way it turned out. Reviews would be appreciated. Enjoy!
Just One of Those Days
By Miki
Inui took a long look at Kaidou's arms, wrapped around his knees as he hunched over another textbook. He glanced at Kaidou's hair and noted its unusual messiness, as though he'd forgotten to brush it that morning, and then he noted the fact that Kaidou's shirt was on inside out. His tip of his nose was pink and the box of tissues beside him seemed to be half empty when Inui was quite sure it had been approximately 89 full when he'd left to go to university in the morning.
"Kaidou, I'm home," he announced, somewhat belatedly.
Kaidou looked up at him, sniffling a little. "Welcome home," he said.
Inui dropped his bag down next to the sofa, taking off his glasses and wiping them against his shirt. They were a little dirty from walking home in the rain. The raindrops had dried against them, leaving them decorated with streaks of water marks, much like the windscreen of a car.
"How was uni?" Kaidou asked, reaching for a tissue.
Inui shook his head. "It was fine," he answered, trying to be as brief as possible. For a moment he almost wanted to tell Kaidou about how annoying his lecture had been; how his professor had harped on for nearly an hour, rehashing useless information which was about as necessary as explaining the basic principles of velocity and inertia to an air force pilot. He wanted to tell Kaidou how he'd rather have stayed at home and actually had breakfast with him instead, or how his classmates had fallen asleep by the time the professor had actually reached the useful part of his monologue and Inui had felt obliged to lend them his notes, watching as they photocopied six copies before handing them back to him with a wave, a thank you and a promise of shouting him coffee in a few days' time.
"Inui?" Kaidou asked, placing his hand over Inui's where he was still rubbing his glasses on his shirt.
He stopped the movement of his hands, a little surprised at how annoyed he was still feeling about the morning.
"Ah… It's nothing," he explained quickly, before Kaidou started quizzing him.
He put his glasses down on the coffee table in front of the sofa and sat back down properly, pulling Kaidou against him, between his legs so that he could feel Kaidou's back against his chest.
"Have you already eaten lunch?"
Kaidou gave a quick nod.
"Ah, okay then," Inui replied, a little disappointed.
He wondered if it wasn't more than a little selfish to expect Kaidou to wait for him, especially when he was already an hour later than he'd meant to be home.
Kaidou's skin felt hot; his cheeks warmer than usual when Inui tilted his head to kiss him, and his hands almost sticky with sweat.
"Kaidou, you're sick," he murmured, brushing aside a strand of Kaidou's hair.
Kaidou tensed slightly, a look of defiance settling on his face after the surprise had worn off. "I'm not," he insisted gruffly.
He wasn't sick; there was no way you'd call this being sick. This was just a runny nose and a bit of a headache. It was nothing big and it wasn't anything to be concerned about. Inui was just being a worrywart, he thought. Not that he really minded.
He looked away from Inui, not wanting to let him see what he was feeling. He didn't feel one hundred percent; that was true… but had had work to do. He had to study for tests and he didn't have time to be sick. Focusing on it wasn't going to help him at all and he knew Inui's sympathy would just encourage him to do so.
He got up from the sofa, leaving Inui with his arms awkwardly at his sides.
"I made tea just before. Do you want any?"
Inui nodded and Kaidou walked briskly to the kitchen.
There were a few sounds of cupboard doors opening and closing and of the teapot and the teacups chinking against each other on the kitchen bench top, and then Kaidou returned, setting the tray down on the coffee table.
"Are you sure you shouldn't take a break?" Inui questioned after Kaidou had poured their tea and returned to his previous spot between Inui's legs.
Neither of them made a fuss of the fact that he so willingly let Inui hold him, but neither of them really needed to. Inui knew he was being granted a privilege; he knew Kaidou disliked being touched and he remembered how Kaidou had always flinched when he'd first started touching him at training when they'd been at Seigaku. Accidentally or deliberately, every touch seemed somehow surprising and unsettling to Kaidou, as though he didn't want to feel other people's skin against his own.
Kaidou's back curved slightly now as he hunched forwards. It wasn't enough to pull him from Inui's embrace though, and Inui leant forwards a little too, tilting his head to the side and pressing his cheek against the back of Kaidou's head.
"You don't have to," he said, "but you don't seem… quite yourself. Don't push yourself before next week, Kaidou."
"I'm not pushing myself."
Kaidou closed his eyes, feeling both irritation and affection in his chest. He needed to hear the words from Inui but they reminded him exactly why he couldn't afford to be complacent right now. He had no time to be sick; no time to be slack in training and no time to drop his studying and just lie around waiting for his head to clear and his cold to go away.
Sometimes, he would admit he was pushing himself. He wouldn't admit it aloud and he wouldn't admit it to Inui, but those days he found himself exhausted to the point that he collapsed against the sofa when he came home, forgetting to lock the door properly and not bothering to stop to take off his shoes, he wondered if the only person who truly understood how he felt was Inui.
Inui, in a lot of ways, wasn't just someone who told him to push his limits, but he was also someone who controlled how far Kaidou pushed himself; asked him to count the number of kilometres he ran and the number of weights he lifted. He calculated Kaidou's fitness and he knew how much Kaidou needed to do to step up to the next level, but he always knew when Kaidou needed to step back and he knew exactly how to stop Kaidou from pushing himself too hard to the point of breaking.
It probably wasn't an easy thing to do, Kaidou thought.
He knew he could be stubborn and he knew sometimes he didn't listen to Inui. Sometimes – just sometimes, when he was angry or frustrated, felt lost or behind or just needed to know he was going somewhere with his training and with his life – he disobeyed Inui's advice. He'd run for two hours instead of one in the morning or he'd do twice the number of bench presses that Inui recommended.
Somehow though, he knew when he returned home that Inui knew.
Inui might have been the constant in his life but their relationship wasn't static.
Perhaps it was something like the concept of dynamic equilibrium. Inui had explained that to him once and Kaidou was sure he'd learnt it during high school, yet it was Inui's explanation that stuck with him rather than his teacher's. Most of what Inui said tended to stick with Kaidou whether he realised it or not, and the fact that Inui had demonstrated using copious amounts of ice cubes and then hot water and had ended up accidentally flooding Kaidou's mother's kitchen hadn't exactly gone unnoticed either.
Kaidou leaned back a little, causing Inui behind him to do the same. He felt the brush of Inui's hand in his hair again and closed his eyes, wondering if it was too indulgent to spend time like this.
The gap between him and Inui had closed some time during high school. He'd been too absorbed in playing tennis and discovering goukons, girls and something of an almost-friendship with Momoshiro at the time – which just happened to be responsible for his simultaneous discovery of goukons and girls and the strange happenings on the insides of karaoke rooms – so it wasn't until later when he'd been looking for accommodation for university that Inui had offered to share his apartment and Kaidou had realised he was offering not as a senpai, but as a close friend who was asking for more.
When Inui had found Kaidou completely bewildered, almost frustrated to the point of tears over revision for his first university exam, that was the point Kaidou had really felt things had changed between them.
If Kaidou was the one who pushed himself to extremes, then Inui was the one who pulled him back in. He was the one who waited up until the small hours of the morning for Kaidou to finish his homework and get into bed, and he was the one who remembered to stuff an umbrella into Kaidou's satchel even if Kaidou insisted there was no chance in hell that it would rain when the sun was shining so brightly, too intent on getting his day underway to bother with petty things like umbrellas and raincoats.
Kaidou sniffled a little, trying to reach out for the box of tissues.
Inui noticed his movement and managed to grab a tissue between the tips of his fingers, handing it to Kaidou.
It was a bit pathetic, trying to blow his nose and not make it sound awful when he was lying against Inui. He wondered if Inui was grossed out. The answer though was 'apparently not', since Inui just murmured an "I told you so" against Kaidou's ear as his hands migrated south. He settled for holding Kaidou around his waist as Kaidou sat still and tried not to feel indignant.
He crossed his arms, not having grown out of that habit, and closed his eyes, wriggling back to get a little more comfortable against Inui.
When he opened his eyes, he was alone in the bed, tucked in with the sheets and blankets up to his chin. His clothes sat folded on the desk in the corner of the room and a mug of lukewarm milk sat by his bedside table.
The first thing he thought of was his textbook; the one he'd been partway through when Inui had come home.
A glance at his clock showed it was nearly five in the afternoon and he jerked, hurriedly sitting up and nearly swinging his legs out of the bed when he noticed his book was on the floor beside the bed.
He reached down and picked it up, opening it where Inui had placed a shiny, red tab at the side.
Inui would probably have already gone back to university for his afternoon classes, Kaidou knew, but he should be back within ten minutes or so, if he was on time today. His nose still felt runny and his head felt hazy, as though he was tuned into the static on a television.
He pulled his knees up to his chest and sat back against the headboard, listening to the traffic outside and imagining Inui walking home in the evening rush. He imagined Inui opening the door, his eyes looking around the apartment for Kaidou as he stepped on his shoes to get them off without having to undo the laces. He'd be tired too, though he didn't often talk about why, and he'd probably walk over and droop against Kaidou, as though he really thought Kaidou wanted to have to stand still and have a grown adult lean against him for ten whole minutes.
Kaidou closed his textbook at the sound of the door opening.
He swung his legs out of the bed and hurriedly pulled on his slippers, ignoring the slight dizziness in his head and only pausing momentarily for it to pass.
He walked out of the bedroom, just in time to see Inui close the door behind him and then kick off his shoes at the entrance, looking around for Kaidou.
Inui didn't speak as he walked across to Kaidou. He checked Kaidou's forehead with the back of his hand and then leaned against him, hugging him as though in relief.
Kaidou wondered if sometimes he couldn't be the one to pull Inui back in, and he found himself returning Inui's hug more so than usual. That was, until Inui interrupted with a frown and declared, "You're still sick, Kaidou."
"Am not."
.fin.