Disclaimer (that everyone already knows): I don't own Kuroko no Basket
Note: this is for the Kiaka week under the prompt Firsts
Akashi does not like his ex-teammate who had decided to pop into Kyoto every weekend to get extra tuition from Akashi in hopes of getting a scholarship to study overseas after being inspired by his older sister who had done exactly that. He was not at all cute, being overly tall and having an extremely annoying habit of whining every time Akashi refuses any of his unreasonable demands (Midorima reckons should be called indirect orders by now because Akashi indulges them almost every time). Akashi's tendency to feel the strange need for more physical contact whenever he was around was merely because Kise was ten times clingier to everyone else from Teiko, Midorima included, that it feels strange since he doesn't do it as much to Akashi. And the strange ache was merely curiosity to know whether perhaps it was because of fear that Kise was always less clingy around him. Not that he minded, of course. He didn't like physical contact. Any notion otherwise was ridiculous and laughable.
Honestly, Akashi would have liked to believe all of these for as long as he could and cling onto these denials, pretending that his feelings (his father would be utterly disappointed to find out how affected he was) didn't exist. Except within two hours, he realised that there was an awful flaw to this plan and it was that if he were to lie to himself, he was likely to be horribly unprepared when questioned about his feelings and if he were to fail to perform, would be terrible (while it was not good to have these feelings, it would be considerably worse to have his father know about them). So instead of wasting his time denying them, he might as well prepare for when people questioned him about it to make pretending a much easier task.
It was a cringe-worthy experience to be honest. Akashi had to sit down and imagine any and every scenario of anybody and everybody he knows asking him about his relationship with Kise and whether he liked him or not beginning with the person most likely to ask tactlessly (Murasakibara) to the person who was most unlikely to ask (Nebuya with his extremely poor brain capacity that beat Aomine's for last place). For the first few times, it was appalling to find that he could not prevent himself from turning a horrid shade of red but he consoled himself that this was merely a practise and it was exactly why he needed to practise. Once he had mastered it, he even went on to practise the imaginary scenarios where a teacher, a stranger, his father's business partners or anybody at all were to ask him such a question, just in case because one can never be too sure. He even practised it if Kise were to ask him such a question because Kise was a tease and there was no knowing what he would do.
There was indeed no knowing what Kise will do because Akashi was not sure what had happened that has him here, standing frozen in his spot at the corner of a basketball court in Kyoto where he had just been playing one-on-one with Kise. In all fairness, Kise hadn't been asking a very strange question. His question had simply been "Will you go out with me, Akashichi?" A very simple question with a very simple yes or no answer (which we all know is yes, though one would have thought otherwise). The flaw, you see, in Akashi's brilliant plan of denying his affections was that Akashi had never even imagined that Kise would like him back. It was a small mistake to make, one that many would make in all honesty, with how Kise was clearly less clingier to Akashi (indicating that he was clearly less fond of Akashi apparently). To add on, Kise loved to be praised, to be seen, to be recognised and Akashi is unbelievably poor at and, in fact, not at all fond of giving recognition and praises of any sort.
But it was this mistake he made that made him forgo practising how to answer the question of "Will you go out with me?" which was precisely why Akashi was here blushing fiercely and unable to form a coherent sentence of any sort.
When he finally nodded, it was no surprise that Kise squealed (Kise claimed that it was not a squeal, it was a manly yell of joy or something like that) with delight and tackled Akashi, wrapping his arms around him. He had rambled on and on about how he was so sure that Akashi would reject him and how he could now cling onto Akashi whenever he liked and Akashi couldn't punish him (so it was fear that made him less clingy) because they were now dating (he doesn't know how he ought to feel about that because he had nodded out of instinct after having imagined this scenario occuring in an alternate universe and timeline so many times). That was the first time that Kise had successfully made Akashi blush (this is technically speaking, of course, although if you count the number of times Akashi has blushed because of Kise but not in the vicinity of Kise, the number would have increased greatly). Kuroko also thinks that this is an appropriate place to state that this is also the first time they had hugged.
Couples do couple-y things, as Akashi already knows. And Kise, being an overly affectionate cheesy pie, would definitely want to do couple-y things. He has already been amazingly thoughtful, considering the fact that one would expect to him to pounce on and kiss Akashi the moment Akashi had agreed to go out with him, but Akashi knows Kise has a limit so sooner or later, he is bound to ask Akashi if he could hold his hand.
In an effort as to not embarrass himself a second time, Akashi decides that he'll practise it and this time, he will get it correct. He imagines the thousands of ways in which Kise might ambush him with this question, even going to the extent of checking pick-up lines, just in case Kise would use them because he couldn't rule out that possibilities. After practising endlessly and ensuring that he would absolutely not be embarrassed, he was left a disgusting blushing mess when Kise grabbed his hand in a haunted house without a warning. It was not Kise's fault, Akashi was aware. Kise was, after all, just frightened. At least, he had thought at that time, it was dark in the haunted house and he could calm himself down in the time that it took before they reached the exit. But he had barely had time to think "oh no" before they were out of the haunted house as they were metres from the exit at the point when Kise had deemed appropriate to grab Akashi's hand.
It was embarrassing to know that he had been unable to react properly to Kise's question of "Akashichi, are you blushing?!" and his stammering reply of "no" merely incited a laugh from Kise as he ruffled Akashi's hair unfairly happy about the fact that he had made Akashi blush again (Aomine thinks this is absurd even if it is the first time that they are holding hands but Murasakibara said that Aomine has no rights to say anything because Aomine blushes when Kuroko pats his head or do something just as insignificant).
Very well, Akashi had thought, if Kise was going by surprises as well, Akashi would just have to prepare doubly as much but he would make sure that he does not get embarrassed this time. Akashi had imagined the many ways Kise could possibly ask to kiss him, the many ways Kise could possibly kiss him, the many ways that Kise could possibly accidentally kiss him and he was so, so sure that he had everything covered this time. So when Kise asked if he could kiss Akashi, Akashi perfected his act and despite the butterflies in his stomach, he did not blush one bit. He had simply nodded and tilted his head upwards in anticipation, only to be mercilessly lifted off the ground. In an attempt to secure himself in the air, his arms had instinctively wrapped around the Kise's neck as Kise kissed him which led to a rather cutesy position that Akashi had never thought he would be in. Needless to say, he blushed.
He had been utterly silent for about two minutes after the whole catastrophe (Kise would like to clarify that it was a catastrophe in Akashi's eye only because he thought it went perfectly and Takao would like to mention that he is surprised that Kise is still alive after that incident) during which he felt utterly strange with the warm fuzzy feeling he was having almost as though he was melting. When he finally stammered out a "let me down" to Kise, Kise happily set Akashi down, only to have Akashi wobble unsteadily (which Akashi claims that is entirely due to the fact that Kise set Akashi down too suddenly and not at all because of the fuzzy feeling but Midorima believes otherwise) and Kise grabbed Akashi's shoulder in an attempt to steady him.
Afterwards (Murasakibara's proclaimed favourite part of the story), Kise had apparently thought Akashi was too cute and decided that it was a good time to kiss Akashi again because he had asked if he could kiss Akashi, not if he could kiss Akashi just once, which means he had permission for more than one kiss (but Kuroko would like you to know that this was Kise which means that no matter what Akashi had said, it would have made no difference if he wanted to do it). The point was that Kise had kissed Akashi again and Akashi's blush returned at full bloom and he was so embarrassed he would have liked to disappear. He was eternally grateful that this occurred in Kise's apartment and not anywhere else where he could have possibly be seen by anyone else. Aomine has to add that it is amazing that Kise could get Akashi to progress so quickly to get both the first and second kiss in one day because they all knew how conservative their team captain and vice were.
In the end, Akashi decided that if he were to prevent such unforeseen circumstances from occurring, it would be best to take charge himself and go ahead and do it first so that Kise could not embarrass him, intentionally or not. In this case, 'it' was to offer moving in together. Meticulously, he studied their relationship, the ideal time, the ideal location and even the horoscope for the ideal situation to suggest moving together, only to be left wondering how such a simple task could feel like it was the hardest thing he had to do (this is because it was, of course, as we all know just how emotionally incompetent Akashi is). All his calculations boiled down to the day of the anniversary when Kise first asked him out.
They had been in Kise's bedroom in his apartment and Kise was sitting on the bed playing video games. Akashi had been lying behind Kise pretending to read a book while dwelling on how he should go about this. After hours of tireless practise on top of all the deduction for the ideal situation which had been hard enough on its own, Akashi hadn't expected the real deal to be this much harder. Unfortunately, deduction has not made the fear of rejection any less and practise never required Akashi to summon up as much courage. His grip on the book was so tight his hand was rather pale while his face was an interesting shade of red as he attempted to summon up the courage to present the request. It was a pity no one else was watching or it would have been amusing to see how Akashi slowly lowered the book on to the bed, as though to put it down, leaning forward slightly while taking a deep breath, as if preparing to ask the question, only to quickly snatch up the book with his cheek deepening in colour.
After thirty minutes of procrastination which was not quite Akashi's style, he had finally gathered enough courage and calm himself down enough to crawl over to where Kise was when he cleared the current level. Taking a deep breath, he shoved a piece of paper which he had scribbled on into Kise's hands and retreated quickly beneath the blanket. Akashi was torn between wishing he had never done it and wishing he had done it better. How could he have done it better though? It had taken him all his courage and willpower to do as much. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he realised that this was the biggest step in his life that he had to make by himself. But that was no excuse to make it so sloppy. He should have worked harder on this, shouldn't he. Would Kise mind, he had worried. Kise was always the romantic one wanting to do all the unbelievable unnecessary cheesy acts but what he had done was such a pathetic attempt and perhaps he should have tried harder but wasn't it too late to retract now? Part of him (a really big part) just wanted to jump out of the window and escape before Kise reacted.
His thoughts were ultimately interrupted as Kise crawled under the blanket and peppered an entirely embarrassed Akashi with kisses happily muttering yes with every breath that he took. In all truthfulness, it did absolutely nothing to help Akashi with the embarrassment but he couldn't find it in himself to dislike the feeling too much with Kise and his joyful mood hovering above him anyway. (And that was Akashi's first move that pushed forward their relationship.)