Unrequited Loves
By Willow Athena
Author's Note: I'm not even going to pretend that this is a one-shot – I've given up, I know I can't write those. This will however be a short (just a few chapters). I'm writing this because I needed a light-hearted break from Supernova, and this story will only be updated if there is interest. I'm really new to this fandom. I encountered Junjou by chance and loved it. Having now watched both seasons, I'm an egoist fan since their first appearance – I wish there was more of this couple in the anime, so here I am fabricating more in fanfiction. Enjoy.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything, especially Junjou Romantica or any of its characters, but the OC is mine.
*Revised Version*
CHAPTER 1 – The Girlfriend
Nowaki finally arrived back home. He had been unexpectedly called back out after breakfast due to the hospital being suspiciously short staffed on the Friday. He had just pulled a double shift and should have refused, but couldn't bring himself to do it, so he had reluctantly left his Hiro-san at the university entrance and went off to attend to the emergency. After half a day, one of the attendings, who was just then sauntering into work, took one look at the resident and kindly ordered Nowaki home for the rest of Friday and Saturday morning as well. Nowaki was incredibly grateful for this sudden streak of luck as Hiroki only had one morning class on Fridays and would no doubt be home by then. At this joyful news Nowaki had already begun contemplating how he was going to seduce Hiroki into afternoon sex.
Nowaki had gotten drenched to the bone due to the sudden storm that had clouded the midday sky as he left the hospital. He had heard superstitious old people, he had given his seat up for on the train, talk about how the storm was a bad omen and foretold of the winds of change sweeping away happiness. Nowaki never believed in things like that; he was mercifully taken in at the orphanage on a similar day, he had been told. Nowaki, ever the optimist, should have stopped to consider that he was also abandoned on the steps of the orphanage on a similar day.
In the entryway, Nowaki brushed what water he could off of himself and then gently opened the inner door of the apartment he shared with his cute Hiro-san.
"Ta…" He was about to say Tadaima and announce that he was back home, but the sight he saw stole his voice away. A vicious crack of lightening and boom of thunder concealed the isolated syllable that had fallen out of his gaping mouth and simultaneously illuminated the scene so he would have no doubt about what he was seeing.
Nowaki saw Hiroki's profile. Hiroki was standing in the lounge, his back against the open plan granite kitchen counter that overlooked the lounge. Nowaki rubbed his eyes thinking he had gone delirious from exhaustion, but the picture did not change. It was his Hiro-san alright, head bent down and arms on the waist of a girl he was kissing. She looked too small and young to be one of his students. Her left hand was securely holding Hiroki's pale blue tie and her right was affectionately knotted in his shaggy brown hair as she stood on her tip toes and leaned into Hiroki and the willing kiss he was giving her, which didn't seem anywhere close to ending even though Nowaki felt like he had been watching them for almost a minute.
Nowaki loudly slammed the door as he stepped in. Hiroki's eyes suddenly shot open. Out of shock, he pushed the girl away, perhaps a little too forcefully. She flew away from him and fell down, her short blue-tartan pleated skirt flew up higher on her knees as she painfully landed on the hardwood floor.
"Stop being so rough, Hiro," she chided as she looked up at him. "I'm not a guy, you can't just fling me around," she added more irritably as she stood up.
"Look, Nowaki, I don't want you to misunderstand, this is not what it looks like…," Hiroki began saying from the spot where he seemed to have been frozen by Nowaki's sudden icy stare, but Hiroki was interrupted and his attempts to pacify his boyfriend were thwarted by her rushing up to Nowaki and offering her hand to him.
"Hi, I'm Hiroki's girlfriend, nice to meet you, Nowaki-kun," she brightly said, offering her hand to Nowaki without an ounce of shame about having been caught kissing HIS boyfriend.
Nowaki was so angry, he didn't know what to do – if she was a guy he would have decked her out cold by now. Nowaki noticed Hiroki flinch when she said 'girlfriend' but he still had not denied it. When Nowaki stood frozen and did not take her offered hand, she withdrew it and took a different approach.
"Usami Hiroshi, I am pleased to make your acquaintance," she respectfully bowed and said in her most practiced and polite voice. Perhaps this guy was just shy and she had scared him, she thought as she straightened up, she knew she could sometimes be a bit jarring.
Usami?
Nowaki looked down at her tiny 5ft tall body and her kind lavender eyes staring up at him. Akihiko's eyes, Nowaki realised, and it made him even angrier. Why was this family always causing trouble in his relationship?
Hiroki returned from the bathroom with some towels. He put his hand on top of her lilac coloured hair, turned her head around, and moved her aside. Without another spoken word, she lifted her little black socked foot and stomped on Hiroki's foot with her heel as hard as she could.
"What the fuck, Hiro!" Hiroki scowled at her.
"I told you to stop fucking pushing me, Hiroki," she huffed as she turned and walked off to take a seat in the lounge, her long layered lilac hair flowing around her like the cape.
Hiroki handed Nowaki a towel to dry off with and bent down to the floor, mopping up the puddle Nowaki's statuesque form had created with another towel. "Trust me, whatever you're thinking, it's wrong. You're going to get sick standing here like that. Take a shower and change and I'll explain," Hiroki offered as he stood up and looked apologetically at Nowaki even though it hurt his face to do it.
Nowaki decided he should give his Hiro-san the benefit of the doubt, I mean it wasn't like he had come in and found him lying naked under a sheet with her. Hiroki had been uncharacteristically understanding about the awkward situation with his senpai that morning, so surely Nowaki owed Hiro-san some maturity in return. Nowaki's anger ebbed, his Hiro-san was right, he should trust that there was some rational explanation for why he suddenly wanted to punch the doll-like Usami in his lounge. Nowaki was about to do what Hiroki had asked and give himself time to cool down while he took a shower, when…
"You still owe me kisses and it's time to pay up, Hi-ro-ki," she shouted in a sing-song voice from the lounge and Nowaki saw Hiroki flinch again. Nowaki forcefully tossed his bag on the ground and angrily stormed past Hiroki to the bathroom. Hiro-san better be able to explain this or somebody was going to be permanently evicted.
Nowaki's shower and change took 5 minutes; he didn't want to give them any more time than was necessary. As he walked down the corridor towards the lounge, in a grey t-shirt and blue jeans, he paused for the briefest second to prepare himself for what he might see. Even if his Hiro-san was being an idiot right now, Nowaki decided he would fight for him, he would not let this Usami-doll have him.
When Nowaki walked into view, he saw Hiroki's almost 6ft tall body towering over the 5ft little girl, whose head was hung low as Hiroki scolded her in an animated hush. Her pale silvery lilac hair fell all around her like a silk curtain obscuring her face so Nowaki could not get a clear look at this entitled child. Just because your surname is Usami, doesn't mean you can have everything you want. Everything the doll wore looked expensive, even though they were all ordinary items Nowaki saw many young girls wearing, perhaps they were expensive, or perhaps it was just the graceful way she carried them. Even with her head contritely bowed as Hiro-san scolded her, she looked like she could break into a pirouette at any moment.
Nowaki cleared his throat. Hiroki looked up at him and the little girl looked away and mopped up her unshed tears with the long sleeves of her back cashmere sweater so Hiroki wouldn't notice them. Without any further admonishment, from Hiroki, the little girl walked up to Nowaki and strained her neck to look up at the giant.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know Hiroki was dating anyone," she calmly said, her polished voice rushing like silk falling down his skin. She sounded older than she looked, perhaps it was her precise articulation of the words that made her seem older, or the clear authoritative tone she said them with, but Nowaki had no doubt that if she said something, she was used to people listening in rapt awe. "He could never afford this place on what he makes, so I thought you were his roommate," she sincerely explained as she looked up at Nowaki, but he could see the words hurt her to say for some reason. "I'm really happy for him," she said as her eyes filled with tears. "I wish we could have met differently. I'm really sorry," she said as Nowaki was the only one to see her tears silently roll down her cheeks as she bowed her head to hide them.
"I'm just going to go," she said as she cautiously put her hand up and stepped back. Nowaki had instinctively taken a step closer, wanting to gather the broken doll up in his arms and comfort her. Nowaki hated seeing anyone in pain, and here was this little doll-like girl crying silently in front of him and trying to hide it form Hiro-san. It was a tragedy he could not endure. Even though she had been crying most of the way through her apology, her voice had not changed from the calm authoritative timbre it had when she started. What kind of child learns to hide their pain so effectively, Nowaki wondered.
"There's a bad storm outside, you can't leave," Nowaki warmly offered and her retreat froze at his tone.
"I'll be fine," she said without turning back, her tiny hands balling up into determined fists.
"That's hardly the point," Hiroki interjected, now that he knew Nowaki wasn't against her staying. Hiroki had wanted her to stay, but after what his boyfriend had come home to, he didn't want to be the one to suggest it. Something important must have brought her here. She never intruded in his life, she rarely called, mostly communicating with him via e-mail, and all since that awful day he wished they could all forget. He would never forget the way she had looked at him, like he had fallen off of the pedestal she had placed him on and shattered her heart. She was a reflection of his pain in that moment and they both struggled to put it behind them. But here she was now, and he had a chance to repair the friendship.
"Thank you both, but I don't want to be any more trouble than I have already been," she calmly said. "I really will be fine," she added in her silky voice as her hand grasped the handle of the inner door of the apartment.
"Stop this!" Hiroki shouted as he pushed the door she had opened shut. He put all his weight against his hand and held it there as she tried to open the door again. "I can't take it when you do that," he gruffly scolded. He hated the excessively polite persona she and Akihiko would adopt when they thought they had done something wrong, like it was a learned reflex from their childhood to distance themselves from the pain of being a disappointment. He wasn't one of her parents, and he couldn't take it when she behaved in this way.
"Do what?" she tonelessly asked without turning around, wanting to hide the evidence of the drying tears on her face even though his broad shoulders were right behind her.
"Don't fuck with me, you know what I'm talking about," he shouted as he spun her around and forced her to face him. She still refused to look up at him but he could see the wetness of her cheeks and jaw even if her fringe covered her left eye and the wet eyelashes of her right eye were downcast. She and Akihiko never let people see them cry, like their tears were evidence of an unnecessary weakness or flaw in their character. A tremendous pain must have caused these tears and Hiroki wasn't about to let her go before uncovering it. Not before wiping them away.
"I always go too far, Hiroki," she whispered. "I always end up hurting someone, and I never want that person to be you," she confessed, her tone so much more tender now. It made Nowaki wonder about what kind of relationship Hiro-san had with this little girl as he walked up behind his boyfriend. "It's the Usami curse, to hurt the ones they love, and I should have known better than to drag you into it again," she said, her soft voice sounding less confident now.
"You will not succeed in taking all the blame and convincing me that I bear no responsibility for our predicament. I proposed it to you, remember," Hiroki conceded and gathered her up in his arms, and to save her pride, he didn't look down at her as she wiped her tears away.
"Actually, you lied about it to our parents and then came to my school, chased away my boyfriend at the time, and begged me to cover for you," she corrected as she pushed him away.
"Maybe we should all go back into the lounge, then someone can explain what's going on to me," Nowaki interrupted from behind his lover. Nowaki was a bit nervous now, he wasn't sure if he wanted to know, but he wasn't going to let this school girl go without telling him everything. Nowaki walked in and they both hesitantly followed like they were being called into the principal's office.
Hiroki and Hiroshi sat on the same black suede couch but on opposite ends, and had the presence of mind to look contrite. "Would you like something to drink?" Nowaki pleasantly asked. Something besides my Hiro-san, I mean, Nowaki darkly added in his head.
"It's been an awful day, I could use a beer, thanks," she replied in polished silk and was captured by Nowaki's beautiful blues. She shyly smiled up at Nowaki who walked over and vaulted the granite kitchen counter instead of walking around.
"Show-off," Hiroki mumbled.
"What was that Hiro-san?" Nowaki called as he opened the fridge.
"I'll also have a beer," Hiroki covered quickly.
Nowaki walked back and handed Hiroki his beer and handed the little Usami a juice box. She looked at it without saying anything for a minute. Hiroki was shaking with restrained laughter beside her, tears forming in his eyes. "Did I stutter Nowaki-kun? B-b-beer…J-j-juice," she condescendingly began, "or are you one of those men who thinks women shouldn't drink?" she sweetly asked, burning with inner fury.
"No, I'm one of those men who thinks children shouldn't drink," Nowaki confidently said as he took a sip of his own beer from the couch across from her and Hiroki. Hiroki burst out laughing and almost spilled some of his open beer.
"How old do you think I am?" she dangerously asked as she stole Hiroki's beer from his hand and took a large sip while tossing him the juice box.
"Too young to be drinking," Nowaki said and looked disapprovingly at Hiroki for not taking the beer away from the young girl.
"Don't look at me, I'm staying out of this," Hiroki laughed as he stabbed the juice box with a straw and took a sip.
"Really, and how old is that?" she challenged, taking a polite sip of Hiroki's beer.
She was tiny. If she didn't have a curve to her hip and perky B-cup sized breasts, he would have said 12, but her anatomy would suggest that she has at least entered puberty, so perhaps 14 at the oldest, but from the way she was talking Nowaki decided to add two years more to that. "Sixteen perhaps," Nowaki answered, "and that's still too young to be drinking, no matter how mature you think you are," Nowaki added with concern.
"Failed," she stated like he had answered incorrectly on a game show. "Maybe you should add a decade onto that," she smugly suggested.
No! She couldn't be 26 years old, he was 26 years old, Nowaki thought. She looked like a child, like an expensive porcelain doll that other children begged their parents to buy them. Her long lilac hair framed a petite perfectly sculpted face and angular jaw…she had no baby fat, he realised, and if he looked at each part in isolation and not as a part of a petite little doll, it was entirely possible. He was always being mistaken for someone older since he was so tall, so he guessed people could assume the reverse of someone so small. His Hiro-san was also often mistaken for someone younger even though he was 29 years, almost 30 soon.
"I'm sorry Usami-san, I didn't mean to offend you," Nowaki apologised. He hadn't meant to stomp all over a tender subject, especially given that he was so tall and now it kind of seemed like he had been bullying her.
"That sounds like you're talking to my father or Haruhiko, you can make it up to me by calling me Hiro, not Hiroshi – I hate my name. I don't know why my father was so insistent about naming his only daughter that," she offered and smiled at him while taking anther polite sip of beer. "I can't take it anymore, this tastes like shit, Hiroki," she said stealing the juice box back and shoving his beer at him.
"You asked for beer," he defended and took a sip of the beer.
"I was just being polite, I didn't want to be difficult and ask for something complicated. Do you have vodka?" she asked as she took a sip from the bendy straw. She really did look like a cute little schoolgirl when she did that, Nowaki thought. "Good vodka," Hiro added.
"You mean expensive vodka," Hiroki corrected. "Yeah, on the top shelf in the kitchen," he replied while smiling. Nowaki watched Hiroki. He had never seen Hiro-san so at ease with someone new, then again, she wasn't new for Hiroki, he realised and decided he wanted to know it all.
"Nevermind," she sighed and put her feet up on Hiroki's lap and he absently began massaging her little black socked feet like it was a long learned habit. Their every interaction made Nowaki more interested in the story behind it. The easy familiarity Hiroki had with the doll made Nowaki feel like he had glimpsed at an unseen side of his Hiro-san, like he was getting a peek at the obsessive child he was before he became so defensive around others.
Nowaki cleared his throat. He felt like they were purposefully avoiding explaining things to him. "Uh…Hiro-san?" Nowaki hesitantly asked, and he saw Hiroshi's perfectly waxed eyebrow rise in question about the nickname. Hiro-san adorably began to blush and rub the back of his neck with his hand.
"She is kind of my girlfriend," Hiroki sheepishly began, while he looked down and nervously rubbed Hiro's socked feet. "My betrothed actually," he added and finally looked up at Nowaki who looked utterly confused.
"It's like being in a relationship, but without all the sex," she clarified. "You're telling it all wrong, Hiroki," she scolded.
"It's nowhere near like being in a relationship," Hiroki angrily countered.
"I love you, you love me, sometimes we hate each other, we don't have sex…you're right, it's like we're already married," she argued, sounding a little annoyed with him.
"My parents don't know I prefer guys," Hiroki simply said, like that explained everything – it didn't. Nowaki had always wondered about Hiroki's parents, but he always tended to avoid the subject or become really defensive and say they don't matter. Nowaki didn't grow up in a conventional family, and Hiro-san was always so secretive and defensive about the topic that Nowaki always felt like he was pushing his lover to the edge when he brought the subject up. Hiro-san rarely went to family functions or special occasions and when he did, he was never gone for long and always came back in a worse mood than when he had left. Now Nowaki at least knew who he was spending his time with at these things. Hiro-san always returned to him and Nowaki was never the type to get jealous over family, and he often encouraged Hiroki to attend Easter lunch or whatever it was. Nowaki believed that family was important, even if Hiroki took it for granted most of the time.
"For an associate professor of literature, your story telling skills are shit. They really will let anyone teach at Mitsuhasi University," she piped up as she straightened to face Nowaki. Hiroki mumbled something incomprehendible under his breath.
"Hiroki was unrequitedly in love with an ass," she began and gave Hiroki a meaningful look about who that ass could be. "Anyway, he was also a little adventurous when he was in university, and I'm pretty sure his parents got a whiff of some rumours that were circulating at the time. You really could have been more discrete, Hiroki," she chided. "I think both our parents were worried about all the time Hiroki and Akihiko spent together at each other's houses. They really were inseparable until Takahiro, and even then they were still close. There was probably pressure on both our families to clear things up, so they called you and Akihiko in didn't they?" she asked, like she didn't already know what had happened.
"Yeah," Hiroki replied and lay his head back on backrest of the couch and pinched the bridge of his nose to lessen the headache that was beginning to take hold.
"Akihiko came right out and said he was gay and that he was moving out because he had had enough of our family's shit, and to leave Hiroki out of it because he was just a friend and then he stormed off, leaving Hiroki alone with those sharks. Then Hiroki came up with the most brilliant plan to explain away all the time he spent with Akihiko, and what was it that you said to them?" The silk of her voice had tied a noose around his neck, and now he was hung and had nowhere to go but to tell Nowaki the truth.
"I told them I had been dating Hiro, and that Akihiko was just covering for us," he confessed, like it was the worst mistake he had ever made. Hiroki often wondered if his life would have been different if he had done exactly what Akihiko had that day, but he could not bring himself to break his mother's heart as she carefully watched him from across the lounge that afternoon. Unlike in the Usami family, Hiroki was an only child and was expected to carry on the Kamijou name and inherit all the wealth that came with it. Hiroki didn't have an older brother to pick up the slack like Akihiko had, all Hiroki and his parents had was him, and at that moment he had been unable to shatter their dreams.
"Why would they believe you were dating Hiro-chan if you were always with Akihiko?" Nowaki asked, trying to steer the conversation away from something Hiroki obviously felt uncomfortable discussing.
"She was like our shadow, wherever we went, she went, it was really annoying actually." Hiroki latched onto the lifesaver Nowaki was throwing him.
"You're annoying," she bickered. "Well, I used to love my brother before I hated him," she added as a justification. She wasn't trailing behind Akihiko, of course, that's just what she used to tell everyone, she was really just helplessly following her heart, even if it got her nowhere.
"So, Hiroki showed up at my high school," she began and looked accusingly at him. "I was sixteen at the time and kissing my boyfriend goodbye, what was his name…Sumi something," she tried to remember.
"Sumi Keiichi," Hiroki offered. "He was the son of the author Sumi-sensei, and looked far too much like Akihiko for you to be dating him. It was too weird," Hiroki added.
"Why was it weird? My brother's an attractive guy, don't you think? Why should I not have looked for those obsessive and attractive qualities in someone else? But to tell you the truth, I kind of felt like he talked about Akihiko far too much – what a blow to my pride that was. Everybody always wanted Akihiko, and was only ever interested in me because I was Akihiko adjacent. I can't believe you remembered him," she questioningly peered at Hiroki.
"He was in my Intro to Japanese Literature class two years ago with Akihiko's boyfriend. He remembered me and asked about you," Hiroki revealed.
"And?"
"I told him you were still unavailable," Hiroki firmly stated.
"Well, with the scene you caused that day, I doubt he would ever forget you," she teased. Hiroki never did things in half measures, and this dramatic intensity had long been present. He loved intensely, he cried intensely, and he above all cared too much no matter how hard he tried to conceal it.
"What happened?" Nowaki asked, at the edge of his seat and having long since consumed his beer in nervous frustration.
"Hiroki, my twenty year old boyfriend from university shows up in Akihiko's expensive red sports car, flings my current boyfriend, Keiichi, off of me, kisses me and says 'We're dating now' and shoves me into the car to explain further. No one at my school ever forgot it, and my dating experience in that high school ended that day." She stared daggers at Hiroki and then smiled and shook her head. Even though it had caused her a lot of trouble, it was an incredibly fond memory for her.
"You should have refused," Hiroki whispered to her. "It was too much to ask of a friend," he gruffly added.
"I could never have refused you, and the offer you made was so enticing, I couldn't say no. But in truth, Nowaki-kun, I had to change schools, I even went overseas so I could date without suspicion, so none of our friends and family would see me with another man," she sweetly revealed.
"And what did he offer you?" Nowaki wearily asked, not really sure if he wanted to know the answer.
"Anything I wanted," she replied while intently inspecting the label on her juice box.
"Anything?" Nowaki repeated to make sure he had heard her right.
"Yes, anything," Hiroki grumpily growled and turned away, resting his chin in the palm of his hand which he leaned on the armrest of the black suede couch.
"And what did you ask for?" Nowaki's voice shook as he questioned her.
"As long as I remained his girlfriend, all I asked for was to be able to truly kiss him and have him kiss me back, like he cared. Hiroki had this problem of not caring when we were younger. I think that I perhaps also wanted his emotions to make up for the discomfort I knew my acquiescence would cause me," she revealed, looking over at Hiroki who was still avoiding both their gazes.
"You should have just refused," Hiroki reiterated. He had been expecting her to ask for more, perhaps limitless sex or eternal servitude or something. She already had enough money, so he knew he would have to do something in return for her, but what she had asked for at the time had seemed so small and meaningless to him that he had jumped at it and agreed.
"I am sorry about this afternoon, Hiroki. I should have given you a chance to refuse before I kissed you. I have never meant for our agreement to ever cause you or your boyfriend any pain. I'm sorry Nowaki-kun, I rarely if ever enforce the agreement, and I promise, the last time I kissed him was a year ago, so that's probably why he hasn't had the opportunity to tell me about his new relationship," she sincerely apologised but Nowaki looked more pissed off now than he had before.
"We've been dating for seven years," Nowaki explained, trying to burn holes into the side of Hiroki's head.
"What?" she screamed and threw a conveniently placed book at Hiroki, from one of his many handy piles scattered around the apartment.
"Ouch!" he yelped and blushed furiously.
"I blatantly asked you if you were dating anyone last year," she shouted and levelled another book in Hiroki's direction.
"He left me without a word and went to America for a year with radio silence," Hiroki shouted back and dodged another book.
"I would never have kissed you if I'd known you were in a relationship," she stated in irritation and folded her arms.
"It has never stopped you before," he countered.
"My brother doesn't count. Nowaki's not one of those guys you were just fucking to pass the time. For God's sake Hiroki, I can tell that you love him – why didn't you just tell me?" she demanded, sounding more hurt than angry by now. "And here I was under the delusion we were close friends."
"Haven't you ever had something so precious, you were afraid to even utter its name in your house, in case it ever got dragged into the cesspool of a family we both have," Hiroki argued back, not immediately recognising the declaration he had just made.
Had his Hiro-san been trying to protect him all along? Nowaki just sat there in stunned silence, not sure what to do and trying to process if he had heard Hiro-san right. Did Hiro-san think of him as someone precious to him? Nowaki heart threatened to burst and kill him right there. He knew that the winds of change didn't necessarily mean bad changes, they could sweep away doubt, tear away armour and breath fresh new life into an old love.
"Hiroki, I'm so happy for you," she sincerely said and scooted over on the couch to hug him. He let her hug him, in fact, he even hugged her back. Hiroki cradled her small body inside his arms – he really had missed her and her unwavering kindness. She had always been too kind, and for this reason alone, she needed protecting.
"Earlier you said that my mother came to see you," Hiroki stated, once she had settled down in the seat next to him and leaned against him. Hiroki was only mildly curious about what his mother could have said to her to bring her all the way here to see him.
"Yeah, you don't want to know," Hiroshi sighed and moved to the couch Nowaki was sitting on.
"Sorry again, you should go and sit next to him. I know I've been unfairly monopolising him since I arrived," she offered, her kind amethyst eyes sparkling at him.
"It's okay, I know what it's like to miss Hiro-san." Nowaki smiled warmly at her.
"Hey, don't offer me up – it's not like we're some old married couple who sits around holding hands," Hiroki protested but Nowaki got up anyway and walked over to him.
"No, but we are like newlyweds, christening every flat surface of our new home," Nowaki suggested as he grabbed Hiroki's chin and caught his lips in an intimate kiss. Hiroki struggled inside the deep kiss but Nowaki pursued him. All Nowaki wanted was a brief kiss to restake his claim on his Hiro-san, and after all the things Hiroki was keeping from him, he owed him.
"Hiroki, are you always that resistant?" she asked when Nowaki had finally released him. She hadn't been able to tear her eyes away from watching them, but at the same time each second stabbed at her heart. She needed to watch this, she had told herself, but no matter how logical she was being and how gleefully erotic the kiss looked, it hurt for a reason she thought she had long conquered.
"Occasionally," Nowaki answered for him.
"Always when someone is watching," Hiroki angrily added.
"Hiroki, I've seen you doing far worse. Why you two couldn't have used Akihiko's old room, I'll never know," she casually added, sounding more hurt than angry at the sudden influx of the memory. How she wished she could forget. How destructive she had become after that, just like she felt now after watching them. At least it wasn't Akihiko anymore.
"I told you, we didn't plan it and you were supposed to be away at boarding school," he justified. "I don't know why you won't just let it go," Hiroki grumpily added, uncomfortable about bringing up the subject in Nowaki's presence. Nowaki had kept his word and never pried into his relationship with Akihiko, and Hiroki who should have volunteered the information anyway had just wanted to forget the whole thing ever happened.
"Because you deserved better than what happened that day," she angrily countered. "On a similar note," she quickly added, seeing Hiroki's discomfort about lingering on the subject. "I usually don't bring boyfriends home, but I naively thought 'what's the harm this once'. Haruhiko is usually the only one at home, and he doesn't care if I sleep around on you," she began.
"Nice to know the older Usami has my back," Hiroki grumbled but was thankful for the change in topic.
"But it turns out, my brother was having a business meeting with your father, and your mother was running unsupervised through my house," she continued.
"Oh, no…," Hiroki gasped.
"She had the courtesy to knock and wait. I thought about pretending I wasn't there, but then she said, 'I heard you giggling Hiro-chan', so I had no choice," she revealed as she took the last sip of her juice box.
"A relationship doesn't have many places to go when you ask you half-naked boyfriend to hide in the closet so your almost mother in law can come in and discuss your long-term boyfriend at length with you while he listens in the dark. So yeah, that's why I came over." She smiled as she finished her story, an inherited characteristic, but both men continued to look at her with concerned expressions.
Hiroki got up and sat down next to her on the smaller couch. "I'm sorry you had to do that," Hiroki whispered as he caressed her cheek, turning her face towards his. She was always too kind to him, and it was probably now killing her to have hurt someone, but she had done it – for him. She was too good of a friend to him.
"I promised, didn't I," she said as she leaned in and pecked him on the lips. She clasped her hand quickly over her mouth. "I'm sorry, I'm really going to stop doing that, but old habits die hard," she apologised to Nowaki who stood up and walked towards them.
"It's okay, you deserved it," Nowaki assured her as he affectionately ran his fingers over her hair. Nowaki noticed the barely visible 2 millimeters of platinum blonde roots as he displaced her coloured lilac hair, she and Akihiko really must look similar for her to go through this much trouble to look different.
"God, he's warm," she sighed and closed her eyes while she leaned into Nowaki's touch. "And excessively handsome," she complimented.
"I know," Hiroki blushed in acknowledgement and then pulled her away from Nowaki and into his arms again. "Don't go getting any strange ideas," Hiroki warned her.
"Who me?" she asked innocently, batting her long lashes and doll-like features at Nowaki over her right shoulder. Nowaki froze, it was probably one of the cutest things Nowaki had ever seen a girl do. She really was like a life size doll, just as he had originally thought. Nowaki wanted to gather her up in his arms and squeeze her tightly, just like Hiro-san was now doing, but Hiroki seemed pretty attached to her.
"It's just an act," Hiroki warned him. "Don't do that to him, he doesn't know how to defend against it," Hiroki complained as he pinned her shoulders to the couch.
"I told you to stop pushing me Kamijou," she said as she tried to knee him in the groin and missed.
"See, this is what she's really like. The devil with the face of an angel," Hiroki teased as he looked up at Nowaki. He shouldn't have taken his eyes off of her. She was so small that she was difficult to keep a hold of and she managed to squirm her legs up and catch him in a head lock between her thighs.
"I could say the same about you, Kamijou. I heard your students call you 'Kamijou the Devil'," she taunted as he tried to wriggle free and hold her skirt down at the same time.
"And pray tell, what do your students call you – Usami-doll?" he bickered right back, knowing exactly which buttons of hers to push.
"Professor Usami," she shouted as she hit him over the head with a book.
"What? You didn't tell me you were promoted," Hiroki said as he stopped struggling and she released him. He sat up and tried to digest the information as he ran his fingers through his ruffled hair.
"Yeah, at the beginning of this year," she casually said as she straightened her skirt. Nowaki looked at Hiroki with concern; he knew Hiroki would not warm to the news that someone younger than him had attained a professorship before him. That's probably why she hadn't told him Nowaki realised, as she quickly added, "It's probably because I'm an Usami. Teito University probably wants to hit father or Haruhiko up for a generous donation sometime soon and this was probably their way of getting some leverage," she softly said, trying to dismiss the achievement. She must know Hiroki really well, Nowaki realised.
"Don't be an idiot, you're brilliant," Hiroki mumbled.
Perhaps this would have pleased any other person, but Hiroshi knew that when it came to any praise Hiroki gave her, it was often followed by…just like Akihiko in Hiroki's mind, and it pissed her off.
"Whatever," she defensively replied.
"Sorry to pry, but what type of work do you do?" Nowaki asked as he walked into the kitchen and started looking around for what he could use for dinner, as they would obviously be having a guest.
"Are you referring to the job I perform, my career, or my occupation?" she asked him to clarify. Yeah, she was definitely one of Hiroki's friends, only an academic would take a simple question like that and debate the complexity of it rather than just simply answering.
"My occupation is that I spend most of my time spending my family's money, like the spoilt little girl they expect me to be, but I like to consider myself a patron of the arts. To their chagrin, I also perform a job, I lecture the advanced classes for first years and second years in my faculty. And I suppose my chosen career is that I am a professor of literature at Teito University, specialising in western literature," she informed Nowaki with a warm smile.
Nowaki wanted to ask how someone so young finishes their doctorate so fast and attains a professorship. Hiro saw Nowaki's questioning expression, and that he was saying nothing and guessed what it could be about. Even though she would have preferred not to discuss it while Hiroki was moping next to her, she supposed the cat was out of the bag in more ways than one. "I began and finished school early and I studied in London a bit, so I completed my theses in less than the allocated time as well as concurrently lecturing at Teito, and I am an Usami, so lots of doors that would have otherwise been closed, were open to me," she explained.
"Don't give him the wrong impression. I read your work a few years ago, it really was brilliant, and you have probably only gotten better at it since then, so don't make it seem like you're talentless and your family pushed you up, it pisses me off," Hiroki sternly said, like he was reprimanding one of his students.
"Fine, but they had some impact, and that can't be denied. You gave it all up, declared that you didn't want their money, paid your own way through school, lived like a pauper in student housing for years, and all so you could follow your passion independently and make it on your own, and I feel like what I have done cannot compare to that, so I don't want you to feel like I have surpassed you because I don't think I ever could. That's just how I feel about things," she sternly said back, using her lecturer voice on him as well.
"Dumbass," Hiroki insulted while turning an interesting shade of red.
"Even now, when I write a journal article or a poem, I always look at it in the end and ask 'What would Hiroki think of this'," she revealed, her voice returning to the silk of familiarity.
"You never send me anything to read," he accused.
"That's because I don't impose on you like Akihiko and consider you my personal editor that I can call up at all hours of the night and day," she irritably replied. Nowaki agreed with that assessment, Akihiko was always calling Hiroki at all hours and begging him for favours. Nowaki understood that they remained best friends and there was nothing he could do about that, but Akihiko could have some consideration, but he didn't – Akihiko still treated Hiroki like he belonged to him.
"I'm glad to do it," Hiroki defended.
"Just because Misaki is not intellectually stimulating, doesn't mean Akihiko can get his thrills from you whenever he wants. You are a treasure he has lost the right to pillage. I hate him! He just continues to be thoughtless and selfish, and you allow it Hiroki," she frustratedly said and hit Hiroki with a cushion. She was almost equally mad at both of them, but it was far easier to just blame it all on her brother.
"He's my best friend, and yes he can be selfish at times, but he is also thoughtful, caring, and kind."
"When it suits him," she countered, and Hiroki couldn't argue with that.
Nowaki agreed with everything she said, but didn't know how to bring it all up without sounding childish and petty to Hiroki. He was glad that there was someone in the Usami family who was looking out for Hiro-san rather than dragging him down. If they had both turned around from their bickering, they would have realised that Nowaki was smiling down at them from the kitchen counter where he was preparing dinner. They looked so adorable as they were caught in a heated debated about some book Nowaki had never hear of…they were so cute. They fought like siblings, Nowaki realised, and was glad Hiroki had one friend who could stand on equal footing with him and call him on his bullshit at times.
She was not just Hiroki's friend, he realised, she was his girlfriend.
Author's Note
I enjoyed writing this. They call Hiroki's character archetype a tsundere which implies that he is initially cold but then warms up as you get to know him. Although the implication is true on the surface, I don't know if Hiroki's complexity can be covered by that one character archetype. Hiroki is really sensitive and warm and caring right from the start, but tries to hide it all because he's been hurt and he has lived a non-linear complicated, messy life that didn't turn out the way he thought he wanted it to– like we all live in reality. I think my purpose in starting this story was to see if anyone else was interested in unpacking Hiroki's complexity.
I also enjoy Nowaki's character – despite the child-like quality of his initial affection for Hiroki, he knew he had to grow up and be Hiroki's equal in some way or they would never last. I like the two different types of intelligence that Nowaki and Hiroki bring to their relationship. As for the OC, if anyone's ever read anything else I've written, you'll know how much I love to play around with OCs. I've never written one like this. I'm trying to write this flawed, doll-like, damaged girl who is always stuck in Akihiko's shadow no matter where she turns. I mean, that's gotta mess you up.
I probably could have worked on this longer, but I let it go where it was cause I wasn't supposed to be obsessive with this story. If there is interest, I may revise it more. I hope you guys enjoyed this anyway, if you did or you didn't feedback would be appreciated in the form of a REVIEW.
~Willow~
