I had a craving for fluffy AlaKou AU shenanigans, so I wrote this. Please forgive any errors!
Disclaimer: I do not own Magi.
Clusters of crystals danced through the air, catching glimpses of the hazy sunlight on their gradual descent to the ground. The holidays were in full swing throughout the city, all the streetlamps covered in tinsel and ornaments cluttering the shop windows were hard to miss. But the weather is absolutely horrid and the only thing keeping Aladdin's fingers warm are the two steaming cups of coffee in his grasp, which are steadily losing their heat. He's bundled up in a large coat and he'd placed a beanie on his head as an extra precaution before leaving his apartment, but his attire does little to keep him from shivering in his spot outside of the college.
The fact that Kougyoku is running late— twenty seven minutes late, if he was counting the minutes correctly in his head— is what's keeping Aladdin standing outside in the cold, watching his breath puff into steamy clouds in front of his face while trying to ignore the curious gaze of the barista at the coffee kiosk that's still open at the street corner.
He takes a sip from the cup in his right hand and grimaces— it's undoubtedly Kougyoku's. He then takes a sip from the one in his left hand, frowning because the taste of those four packets of sugar she loves so much still lingers on his tongue.
Just as he's beginning to grow anxious that something has happened to Kougyoku, and his loyalty for his friend— the girl he'd had a crush on for roughly three years now, actually— battles with his yearning for the warm interior of the building behind him, his phone buzzes in his back pocket. He sighs and contemplates how to reach the phone in his pocket while juggling two cups of coffee, fearing that maybe Kougyoku had decided to skip class entirely and leave him waiting for her.
But he quickly scraps that idea, Kougyoku's desire for perfect attendance would surely overpower her need to stay indoors and away from the harsh elements.
He can imagine her now, staring out at the snow from the safety of her bedroom window with the blinds halfway drawn. She'd talk to herself about how cold the weather looked as she wrapped her fuzzy blanket— the one with the flower pattern, of course— tighter around her shoulders and contemplate making hot chocolate.
Aladdin frowns, he won't forgive her if she decided to skip and left him standing outside looking like an idiot.
I'll probably end up with a cold, he thinks, and then she'll feel sorry for me.
It's then, when an absent-minded smile on his face at the thought of Kougyoku feeling obligated to nurse him back to health and give him hot chocolate and cookies shaped like reindeer, that remembers the phone in his pocket and nearly drops the two cups in his hands when subconsciously moving to reach for it.
"Shit," He curses, kicking the snow on the sidewalk with one of his feet and gasping when he nearly loses his balance.
"Aladdin, be careful!"
His head snaps up, looking from side to side before his eyes lock onto a figure jogging toward him frantically.
It's a pink-haired collegiate, undoubtedly late for class, scarf nearly falling off of her, in skintight denim jeans and an oversized sweater— and sweater paws.
Kougyoku has sweater paws.
Very long, very noticeable sweater paws.
You know, sweater paws. That thing that happens when someone small and cute wears an overly large jacket or sweater, and the hem drags down over their hands until all you can see are the tips of their little fingers poking out, and said small person clutches at the sleeve in their hand instead of rolling it up so it would fit properly.
Aladdin tilts his head to the side, an eyebrow raised as she stumbles a bit in the snow, a blush from both the weather and embarrassment coloring her cheeks.
He's, admittedly, a bit stunned. Actually, that's a bit of an understatement.
All of his internal processing has shut off, except for the connection between his eyes and his brain as his neurons fire at double-time to comprehend the existence of the person before him. He forgets about the phone in his back pocket, he forgets about the now-cold cups of coffee in his hands, he forgets about the pestering eyes of the barista at the kiosk that's still open at the street corner behind him— he even forgets about the warm building behind them.
Because Kougyoku looks cute.
She looks downright adorable, not unlike a kitten with her shower-clean and ruffled hair. Her nose is tinted pink when she slows her jog into a walk, waving and smiling at Aladdin and he's worried because he cannot breathe and it feels like there's a fire deep in his bones spreading through his body. The feeling in his lungs his threatening to crush him from the inside and he hopes the burning in his cheeks can pass for frostbite because he doesn't want for Kougyoku to ask him why he's blushing.
"Hey, Aladdin!" She smiles at him as she finally comes to a stop— no one should smile like that, Aladdin feels like he's going to go blind and he's worried for the health of everyone that could walk by them and see a smile that bright. She's dragging a hand through her hair that looks like it dried on her run to the college, it's so fluffy and bouncy and Aladdin swears he can smell the vanilla bean shampoo she insists on using. "Thanks for waiting, Kouha turned off the alarm this morning without waking me up first."
"Of course he did," Aladdin rolls his eyes, trying his very best to avoid looking directly at the shorter individual. Kouha, Kougyoku's brother, had decided to stay over at her house for the week with the claim that it was because they were family and the holidays were coming up. Everyone knew it was because he'd gotten into a fight with his girlfriend, though.
Silence fills the freezing air and for a moment he wonders if he's done something wrong, and he glances down at her, and finds her staring directly at the cups in his hands.
"Oh, sorry! Here—" He hurriedly hands her one of the cups. "It's cold now."
"That's okay," She giggles and Aladdin's throat constricts a tiny bit.
She takes a sip from the cup and makes a face of utter disgust and the glares up at him. He realizes that he handed her the wrong cup and feels laughter bubble up and out of his chest, and he fears that it sounds forced, but she joins him a mere second later. His eyes— tears forming at the corners due to the wind and the combination of laughter— lock onto her as she rubs at her face with one of her sweater paws, her face undoubtedly numb and windburned as she holds out the cold, black coffee for him to take back. He can see everything, the rosy flush on her face and the flutter of her eyelashes as she laughs and the pretty pink of her lips that are most definitely covered in a layer of lipgloss.
That's when he snaps.
A slur of "Holy fuck you are so cute oh my god" followed by "I love you so much why are you like this" and "You look adorable Kougs this isn't fair I feel victimized" escapes his mouth in a jumbled and incoherent mess before he can stop himself. He's flushing to the roots of his bright blue hair in embarrassment and frustration and adoration all at once, heart racing and butterflies attacking his ribs on the inside as his eyes widen in horror of what he's done.
Kougyoku looks shell-shocked for several seconds, nearly dropping the coffee she was still holding out for him to take, before her face scrunches up in delight and her eyes shine like two captured stars with her laughter shaking her entire body.
"Don't laugh," Aladdin whines, the blush on his face hurting. He's going to be in pain over this experience later, he just knows he is. "I can't believe I did that. I've been planning out a confession for months and I just ruined it in one go and it was so well-thought out and I cannot believe I just did that—"
"You're adorable, Aladdin!"
"I made note-cards okay, it was going to be romantic as fuck when I finally did it," He continues, covering his face with his hands. "I was going to buy you your favorite ice cream and— god I can't believe I just did that—"
"Calm—" She's clutching her stomach from how hard she's laughing and it's breaking her sentence apart. "Calm down, you're such a sweetheart when you want to be."
"It's your fault for showing up here looking like— looking like—," It's not that he doesn't have enough to say, it's that he has too much and he's trying desperately to calm himself and to not clutch the cheap coffee cup in his hand.
"Looking like what?" She's blushing, too, but she's still giggling and his heart is racing.
"Looking like the cutest, warmest fucking cinnamon roll on the planet," He blurts after a moment, staring down at her. This whole confession, if it can be called that, has been a disaster and he wishes he'd kept his mouth shut like he'd been planning to. "Aah, this is such a mess."
A moment of silence passes and the cold begins to feel like pins and needles against his skin again as she stares at the cup in her hands.
"Sorry for ruining your confession," Kougyoku's blushing awkwardly and Aladdin sucks in a breath, preparing for the inevitable rejection. "Maybe you can try again sometime?"
"Maybe," He laughs, turning his face away from her. "Sorry for the—"
He feels cold fingers against his cheek and he's turning his head to look back down at her.
"By the way, have you noticed that this is your sweater yet? I stole it from you two winters ago to get your attention and you still haven't noticed."
"O-Oh," is all that Aladdin can say, wide-eyed and gratifyingly breathless. "Looks like we both need to work on this kind of stuff, huh?"
"I guess so," and, again, there's that chiming laughter Aladdin loves so much.
In the end, they both skip class, cold and laughing as the snow continues to fall around them and still holding the cold cups of coffee, while talking about what kind of cookies they're going to make and what movie they're going to watch when they get to Kougyoku's apartment.