Coffee and a Sgian-Dubh
by: Yidkirkin of the Warhammer
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
SPOILERS
Completely by coincidence, Koyama's grocer closes its doors only a week after Sakurai starts taking the graveyard shift regularly upon his manager's request. They don't even realize it until a few weeks after that, when Koyama stops into the store two days in a row and Sakurai is there again.
"You don't usually buy anything when you come in." Sakurai says, sounding accusing even when he's scanning the milk and spices as calmly as ever.
"The place I went to before closed up." Koyama shrugs and takes his wallet out to pay. "You're not usually in here two nights in a row."
"980 yen. The manager needed someone she could trust to be here unsupervised." Sakurai punches in Koyama's total and hands him back his change; Koyama tosses the coins in the tip jar and for a moment the scrapes on his knuckles hold Sakurai's full attention. "...and someone who doesn't mind cleaning."
"Well, you're the man for that job." He jokes with an amused huff, remembering how pristine Sakurai kept his quarters at the division. "Oh, uh... how was the coffee?"
It takes Sakurai a moment to recall what exactly Koyama is asking about –he notices the other man tugging at his earrings again, and he wonders what he has to be nervous about. "It was good." He says, and when the corner of Koyama's mouth quirks up, he feels relieved. "A little strong, but I actually liked it better that way."
Koyama chuckles and appears to be in a better mood as he bags his purchases up –when he leaves his cheeks are pink and he waves at Sakurai through the window before he rounds the corner. Something twinges in his chest and he goes back to his inventory, but he doesn't get much done in the two hours he has left until he finishes.
Sakurai walks home in a thoughtful lull, mind churning over a few small incidents from their past several interactions and connecting them together. He prides himself on his intelligence, or at the very least his ability to see the whole picture, and by the time he closes the door to his apartment behind him he's realized what's been nagging him lately.
He's attracted to –to Koyama of all people, in a way that is most certainly not solely physical.
Sakurai sits at his kitchen table and pours himself a cup of cheap sake, and he thinks about that for a while. On the one hand, if he was simply attracted to Koyama based on his body he wouldn't think it was strange at all; Sakurai has had sex before and appreciates muscles shamelessly, though if he has to be honest it's always been more out of curiosity for the act itself rather than any desire to be closer to whoever he chose. Moreover, this is Koyama; a man whom Sakurai has spent nearly seven years with, five of which he was his partner regardless of the mutual dislike at the time and the last two years he's spent more than his fair share of time staring. Now they have a sort of friendship, to some degree –if looked at objectively, the attraction to his body and the amount of time Sakurai has known him leading to a romantic attraction make perfect sense.
But if he stops and really lets himself dwell on it –how the hell had this ever happened?!
Because he's stupid, Sakurai thinks derisively, downing the rest of the sake in one go. First he goes and starts relying on the guy, and now he has a –a –a misguided, foolish, juvenile crush on him! This should never have gone farther than occasionally admiring his physique, he should never have allowed himself to think that maybe, just maybe Koyama turning into less of an asshole lately, smiling at him, staring back, could mean –could mean-
Sakurai's temper surges and without thinking the cup in his hand is shooting though the air and smashing into pieces against the opposite wall.
Breathing heavily, he feels better for barely a second before it catches up to him and his anger shorts out, leaving him nothing but tired. Putting a Curse on the room so the shards littering his floor won't harm him, he grabs his dustpan and starts to clean up, not even able to feel glad that there hadn't been any liquid in the cup when he threw it.
He can't let this go on. He has to stop himself from getting his hopes up –he just has to remember that letting himself get too attached, that even for a moment believing this security might last, it will only hurt him in the long run. It's never once changed since he was a child, and he has no reason to think the cycle will break now that he's playing at independence.
Sakurai dispels the Curse and tosses the porcelain into his sharps box, and he makes his way over to his bedroom closet. He feels like a child again in the worst of ways, but the snapped sword in it's worn out, dented scabbard has always made him feel safer even in his most vulnerable, frightened moments. This –infatuation with Koyama is far from his lowest point, but Sakurai can't bring himself to put it away.
It's too early but he crawls into bed anyway, places his oldest sword on top of the covers next to his arm –just the right distance to grab it if he needs to. For once he finds himself sorely missing the simple days in seventh division before he became a Cadre. Little else save for training and briefings and wasting time in between, and while hindsight lets him see that it was a terrible place it was still so much simpler than all this that Sakurai has to deal with now.
His only respite is that unless Koyama comes into the store he won't have to see him until the next ex-Scar dinner in two weeks. Hopefully that will give him enough time to steel himself; to cut himself off until he no longer feels this way for him.
Vvv
When Koyama walks into the restaurant and sees that Sakurai is sitting in between Terada and Muraki on the opposite end of the table, he knows that something is going on. Besides the trend till now of the others leaving two seats next to each other empty even if Koyama and Sakurai are the last to show, Sakurai doesn't so much as glance his way when he greets the table as a whole.
Koyama slots into the last available seat between Tsuchiya and Mukai and tries not to let the snub bother him too much; at the very least Sakurai isn't trying to hide that he's in a foul mood which is always the worse of the two options. He should just be thankful that he hasn't attempted to spear Koyama in the arm with one of his swords –his bad moods back in Claw were nothing to scoff at. They've all done admirably at maturing in the year and a half since the seventh was crushed, and a bad day is neither unusual nor something to take offense over –lord knows how many Koyama has had.
"Koyama?" Tsuchiya asks, and he suddenly realizes that she's been trying to get his attention since they gave the wait staff their orders. "Did you even hear me?"
He feel the back of his neck heat up and ducks his head. "Eh, sorry Tsuchiya. Was distracted." Her eyes slide to Sakurai and back and he just knows his blush has spread to his face. "What'cha need?"
"Can you pick Mukai up from school this week?" She says after a considering pause. "I have a training course from noon until five, Monday to Friday. I'd really appreciate it."
Of course Koyama agrees; there isn't much he won't do for Tsuchiya these days, there isn't much any of them won't do if she asks something of them. They all acknowledge that she's the one working the hardest out of all of them, with two jobs to juggle on top of caring for Mukai –Muraki is usually the one she asks for this sort of thing, but he must be busy.
"Hope you don't mind spendin' time with this old guy, Mu-kan." Koyama says to her once he and Tsuchiya have hammered out the details a bit. He still doesn't like kids too much, but Mukai is a soft spot for him and she's not all that different from Sakurai really, so he at least has an inkling on how to handle he from that aspect.
Mukai fiddles with one of her tiny puppets in her lap and doesn't acknowledge the waiter who sets her drink down on the table; Tsuchiya murmurs about manners, but Koyama doesn't see it as so much of an issue. For all of Mukai's eeriness she's still a kid, and should be allowed to act like one while she can.
"Ko-san, why are you and Sakurai-san fighting?" She eventually asks, and it throws Koyama for a bit of a loop. From her other side Takeuchi's eyes meet Koyama's, but no one else from further down seems to have heard.
"That's... he's just... tired, Mu-kan. Sometimes people just need some space." Not that he can even begin to guess why, but she doesn't need to know that. "He'll be fine soon, I promise."
Thankfully she accepts his answer and returns her attention to her small puppet, but the question does bring his thoughts back to the fact that Sakurai is acting decidedly not normal. Koyama sips at his iced tea and watches Sakurai for a while to see how he's interacting with the two beside him –or rather, how he isn't. They aren't the most social bunch, it's true, but Muraki is talking lowly with Takeuchi and Terada looks like he would rather be Hanazawa's training dummy than be sitting in that seat right now. Sakurai himself is pointedly staring at his tea and appears to be dozing off at the same time, and he doesn't seem any livelier until his food arrives some ten minutes later.
"What's going on with you two?" Tsuchiya asks near the end of the night, long after Terada has gone and just after Sakurai begged off to go home and sleep. "This is pretty much the first time you haven't sat together."
It's also pretty much the first time they haven't spoken to each other for an entire meal. Tsuchiya must have been waiting for Sakurai to leave, because now everyone left at the table is looking their way –even Matsuo who generally feigns ignorance of gossip everyone knows he loves to hear.
"Uh..." Koyama's brain stalls for a moment. He could lie and say that they had an argument, but that feels wrong –these are his friends, he should be able to confide in them without having to worry over it. "I... don't know." This is so embarrassing, Takeuchi is wearing his serious face but Koyama just wants some advice after the off putting cold shoulder and he doesn't care who he gets it from. "I thought we were starting to get along a little more. I've been tryin'a be nicer and he hasn't been such a prick lately, but I dunno what's wrong now."
No one at the table says anything for a long minute, and then Muraki clears his throat awkwardly. "Er. 'Starting to'?"
"So you two aren't a thing?" Matsuo blurts out. "I thought you got together after that near miss in Hokkaido!"
The entire table winces as one –they all remember Hokkaido. "Y-You thought me an' Sakurai were-?" He starts, not meaning to sound so angry –Tsuchiya averts her eyes and Takeuchi nods solemnly, and Koyama's ears must, must be spewing steam by now.
"What else could we think? The tension between you two has always been –well, I couldn't've let it be if it were me!" Matsuo sounds more offended than Koyama thinks he should.
"Well, what Matsuo means is –is that-" Tsuchiya sighs and shakes her head. "Never mind. You don't have any idea why Sakurai could be angry with you?"
"I haven't seen 'im in nearly two weeks, nothin' happened then either!"
"If nothing happened on your end, then it has to be his issue. You like like him, right?" Mukai sounds so matter-of-fact that everyone looks to her, entranced by her wide and piercing eyes. "Why am I asking, of course you do! It's obvious what's going on."
She looks around at each of them and blinks owlishly at the blank stares, apparently realizing that none of them know what she's talking about.
"He's scared! Either he's noticed that you like like him or he thinks you might be losing interest, and it's scaring him!"
Koyama has a hard time believing that anything could scare Sakurai; this is the guy who got them their first safehouse by clearing Yakuza out of it, who could cut someone down without losing a shred of composure, who tried (and damn near succeeded) to cut off a fourteen year old's head as recently as eighteen months ago. Moreover, the man's as dense as a brick when it comes to –well, people coming on to him –and Koyama would know since he's been trying to flirt for the better part of half a year. There's no way he's caught on and no damn way it's made him scared.
"My... counsellor says..." Mukai's voice is small and Koyama doesn't like kids all that much, but Mukai holds a softer spot than he'll ever admit and so he listens. "She says... that when people leave you a lot, you start... thinking it's gonna happen again. Knowing it's gonna happen again even if it's not true. I –I wasn't supposed to tell but –but we're –you're the only ones who've stuck around for either me or Sakurai-san. H-He could ha-andle that but –but now he must think something's changed, Ko-san!"
Mukai is close to tears and can't go on, but she doesn't have to. Koyama was spot on when he compared her and Sakurai but he wishes he wasn't, since if Mukai's right about what she's talking about...
"Hey, hey, come here. Mu-kan, come here." Koyama scoops her up despite her protests and stiffly wraps her up in a hug, squeezing just enough to get her to relax a little easier and glad when it works. "Thanks for tellin' me, I know it was hard. Now you don't worry 'bout a thing; I ain't going to let Sakurai shut 'imself up and we ain't going anywhere on you, alright?"
"...it's stupid to be scared." Mukai mumbles, not trembling so much.
"No." He remembers a time when he didn't know where he was going to get his next meal, when sleeping next to the wrong intersection could mean something worse than a mugging, and his grip on Mukai tightens. "What's stupid is that you have to be."