Air Conditioner

Disclaimer: Don't own

The sweat is pouring off of Midorima like he's a melting ice cube, except he's not getting any smaller and the sweat is giving no signs of slowing down. It drips from his forehead down onto his nose, between the top of his glasses and his skin, and it itches so much. Even in the dark, windows open and fan blasting, there's no way to escape the heat and humidity. It's felt like it's going to rain every day for the past week and a half, but the skies have been mostly clear and the water seeps into the air until it's oversaturated and no one can move.

There's no comfortable sleep position tonight; the sweat pools around him and he feels like he might drown so he's sitting up on the futon, legs spread out and back against the wall. He doesn't want to move but knows he should take off his glasses because he's slowly but surely getting there, to where he can drift off. Once he's out, he'll sleep like he's in a coma—at least, that was how Kise put it the first time he woke up next to Midorima and flipped the fuck out and almost called 911.

Speaking of Kise, he's sitting up, too, forced to comply with Midorima's whims once again (although it's too hot for him to complain as much as he usually does). His hair is stuck to his face in the humidity, and if possible he's sweating even more than Midorima is. He threads his hand through Midorima's; they're both sticky and wet and hot and kind of gross, and they make that weird suction-y sound when they move against one another. It's really too hot for this. Midorima can't say the words out loud because sweat will fall into his mouth and his tongue is heavy against his teeth, so he shifts closer to Kise instead.

He picks up his glasses and places them on the small table next to the futon, from where he can pick them up in the morning. But it's already morning; the digital alarm clock that Kise bought at the drugstore illuminates their faces in the dark, neon green numerals showing 2:04, and damn it, he's been trying to go to sleep for over an hour. He sits perfectly still, not even twitching or swatting away the fly that lazily buzzes around the room and finally out the open door, breathing as shallowly as possible.

Kise's head falls onto his shoulder; his breathing deepens and his grip slackens around Midorima's hand. Instinctively, Midorima almost shoves him off, but no. The less he moves, the easier he sleeps and somehow, even though it's hotter and sweatier and more slippery like this it's easier for him to stop thinking and to fall asleep himself.

He wakes up crankier than usual, but still in time to catch Oha-Asa on TV. Kise trails behind him like a confused puppy into the kitchen. The signal is kind of fuzzy, but they can understand the words so they just sit, staring at the TV while the sun through the windows heats up their bodies further. Cancer is sixth today; Gemini is seventh. Midorima's lucky item is contact lenses (he knew there was a good reason he kept a couple of pairs around. Kise's is a sweat sock, and even though he pretends he doesn't believe in luck he's not exactly discreet as he opens the sock drawer and grabs one. Midorima showers first, because he's actually got work today, and the cool water feels like bliss on his skin. He doesn't want to get out but knows that he can't be running late and has to stick to schedule, so he doesn't spend a second longer in there than usual.

He picks up a piece of toast back in the kitchen, where Kise is digging through the drawers and cabinets. "I'm going to fix the air conditioner today!" he says, voice muffled because his head's under the sink.

Midorima sighs. "Ryouta, please call a repairman if you need—"

"I can do it myself!" Kise's face has reappeared from under the sink; he's clutching a wrench and a couple of screwdrivers.

Well, he does have his lucky item, and it would be cheaper to do it himself than to hire a mechanic. But Kise has never been the mechanical type (he can't even change the smoke detector without Midorima's help), so Midorima can only hope that Kise doesn't end up blowing up the house, and that he knows where the instruction manual is, because he really has to get to work.

When Midorima comes home, Kise is sitting at the kitchen table looking exhausted and it's still ridiculously hot. Kise has a nasty-looking bruise on his right forearm and one of the screwdrivers is bent into almost a right angle.

"I called a mechanic, but they weren't available until tomorrow." Kise says, rubbing his arm where the bruise is. "And I hit my arm on the outside of the system."

Midorima raises an eyebrow.

Kise holds out his arm. "Will you kiss it so it gets better?"

"No way."

"How mean, Shintarou!" Kise whines, but then Midorima leans in and kisses him on the mouth.

Midorima pulls away. "We have bruise ointment in the cabinet in the second-floor bathroom. What did you do with the instruction manual?"

"The instruction manual to what?"

Midorima sighs. "The air conditioner. Please tell me you did read it?"

Kise shakes his head. "I didn't know there was one…"

"So you just went on the roof and messed around with it?"

"Yes…?"

Midorima feels like banging his head repeatedly on the table. Why the hell would there not be an instruction manual to the air conditioning unit, of all things? Why the hell would Kise just take a bunch of tools up and mess around without even looking for an instruction manual? Oh, right, because he's Kise. Midorima picks up the tools and then walks to the hall closet in search of the elusive instructions.

"Oh!" Kise calls after him. "Kagamicchi called. I knew you wouldn't feel like going out, so I invited them over."

Midorima racks his brain, trying to remember this morning's Oha-Asa. Was he really not ranked last today? "You're making dinner," he grumbles as he pulls out the instructions from a box on the floor of the closet.

He spends half an hour undoing all the shit Kise did, which has not been enough to completely wreck the AC unit. It's almost a miracle, because the thing is incredibly cranky and even when it's working there's always something wrong. They had wondered why the house was so cheap when they bought it but decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth. Unfortunately, the constant short-circuiting and questionable HVAC system are the answer to the price question. Getting the place rewired and installing new heating and air conditioning units seems like more trouble than it's worth, though they often talk about doing it and probably have enough money for it. That option starts to look more and more attractive to Midorima, however, now that he's up on the baking black roof and dealing with the hot metal box.

He methodically checks every page in the manual, and finally finds a combination of levers that are in the wrong place. He fixes those, and flicks the "on" switch, but immediately turns it back off when the thing starts vibrating way more than it should, almost leaping off the surface of the roof. Shit. There must be a screw loose.

"Yo! Midorima!" He walks to the edge of the roof and looks down, and sure enough Kagami and Aomine are at the open door. Kise is half in the house and half out, and then he pokes his head up and even though he's two floors down and Midorima's glasses are dirty he can totally tell Kise has that stupid cheeky grin on his face. He has to try very hard not to throw the bent screwdriver at Kise's face. Actually, the only thing that's keeping him from doing that right now is the fact that he needs that particular screwdriver, and he doesn't want to have to go down and then back up again. So, instead, he searches the giant tank for loose screws, and finally there's one on the bottom that's almost all the way off. He takes the bent screwdriver and twists it until it will go no further, and then stands up and flicks the "on" switch. The machine buzzes to life, humming and vibrating and hissing in the usual way, and Midorima instinctively backs away.

Seven seconds later, it shuts off.

"Hey!" Kise calls from out below. "All the power's gone out!"

And the fragile system is overloaded again. Midorima sighs and climbs back through the window.

Apparently, Kise had left the washing machine, television, and dishwasher on and had neglected to inform Midorima of all this. Aomine finds the whole situation hilarious, probably because he lives in a nice modern apartment where you can run the washer, dryer, dishwasher, air conditioner, and three televisions without straining the circuitry at all. At least he and Kagami are willing (albeit with some reluctance on Kagami's part) to help go down to the basement and fuck around with the cantankerous fuse box. Kise carries the flashlight and the volt meter, and Midorima's got the tools in case there are a couple of screws loose down there.

Midorima opens the metal box and peers inside, looking at the labels (even though this is a semi-regular occurrence, it's a different set of switches each time. He holds out his hand for the volt meter and turns it on. While he's messing with this, Kise is playing with the flashlight. He holds it under his face and grins, and Midorima tries not to roll his eyes (and totally fails, not that anyone is looking at him).

Even though Kagami knows it's Kise, he's still scared and stumbles back into Midorima, pitching him face-first into the fuse box. Midorima's about to yell at both Kise and Kagami, when the light above them flickers on. Apparently, the awkward face-jostle is what did the trick.

They trudge back upstairs, and when they get there it's already a couple of degrees cooler from the now-working AC.

Kagami and Midorima fix up a marinade for the salmon steaks that Kise set out to defrost earlier in the day while Aomine and Kise goof off. Midorima's actually grown to kind of like Kagami—he almost has to, given that Kise and Aomine are best friends again. The steaks don't take too long to grill, and it's cooled off outside somewhat so they eat on lawn chairs in the driveway, talking and laughing, and it's almost nice (not that Midorima will ever say anything to that effect).

Kise gets tired very easily, and he crawls onto Midorima's lap and practically drapes himself over him.

"What have you done today? I should be the one who's half-asleep" Midorima murmurs, half-grumbling, into his ear, and Kise give a lazy half-shrug in reply. Midorima is quite tired, to be frank, but he's self-conscious enough and awake enough to not just collapse.

Kagami is totally embarrassed by all of this happening right in front of his eyes, and Midorima smirks. Even now, that guy blushes at the drop of a hat. He mutters something about how they really should be going and grabs Aomine by the hand. Kagami thanks Midorima and Kise for the dinner, and Kise gives a drowsy nod and buries his face in Midorima's half-open shirt. Midorima quickly presses his lips to Kise's forehead, and when he looks up Aomine and Kagami are already gone.

The fire on the grill is on its last embers, trails of smoke drifting through the summer air. Midorima drops Kise into one of the lawn chairs, jolting him awake. They take the chairs and plates inside, and load but do not run the dishwasher. The inside is really quite cool and dry now.

Kise sleeps with his arms and one leg wrapped around Midorima, who has been asleep on his back since he first touched the futon. He doesn't usually move around in his sleep, but tonight his hand intertwines itself with Kise's.