Kagami and Aomine had spent their summer together virtually attached to the hip as promised. Basketball, cicadas, crayfish, sleepovers; they did it all. They even came naturally to each other on first name basis (finally) since Aomine called Momoi by her first and figured he could do the same for Kagami. Kagami even got to calling Momoi by her first name and she his, seeing as she spent a lot of time with them as well. She handled the news of Kagami moving fairly well although a few tears were shed, she told him he absolutely must come back for summers or she'll never forgive him.

It was the last festival of the summer; Kagami and Aomine were waiting to meet up with Momoi.

"She's late of course! I don't understand why girls have to take so long to get ready…" Aomine grumbled eager to get on with the festivities.

"She's just excited, and I'm sure putting her yukata on takes some work." Kagami said trying to subdue the anxious Aomine.

They both were wearing yutaka as well but they weren't as elaborate as the women's ones they saw at the festival. Both Kagami and Aomine struggled with putting their obi on until Aomine's mother came to help.

"Oh, there she is—Uwooh!" Kagami suddenly shouted in surprise.

"Satsuki!?" Aomine said equally surprised.

Momoi came trotting up to them with a bright red yukata with an elaborate flower pattern trimmed with pink and white. Her pink hair was half up and styled in slight curls and parted to the side. She had just the right amount of makeup to where it seemed almost natural. In other words – she just looked extremely beautiful and the two boys couldn't believe their eyes.

"Sorry, you guys! My mom insisted on styling my hair so it took longer than I thought it would."

"Satsuki! You look like a princess!" Kagami said without much thought as to how loud and how embarrassing that was to shout in an area filled with people.

Momoi blushed almost as red as her yukata. "T-Taiga! You're exaggerating…" she looked away flustered.

"It's true though, you really do look pretty," Aomine agreed with a smile.

Momoi couldn't have gotten redder but decided to play it off. "Well, if I am a princess then you two are my princes, so you should buy me some takoyaki!" she said swiftly walking past them towards the festival.

Both of the boys 'tsked' almost unanimously and Momoi giggled to herself.


The three of them played almost every game and bought almost every food their allowances could afford during the night. Of course, Kagami with his large appetite bought the most food and enjoyed every bite. The night was coming to a close and the fireworks were starting soon. Momoi had ended up running into a group of her friends from school and asked if she wanted to watch the fireworks with them which left Kagami and Aomine to themselves.

"Che, she ditched us even though you're leaving so soon!" Aomine complained as they walked to find a good spot to view the fireworks. Just saying those words out loud made Aomine a little upset that his best friend was going to be moving far away.

"It's alright, she spent pretty much the whole festival with us so it's fine that she just watches the fireworks with her other friends. She looks really pretty tonight though, doesn't she?"

This had to be about the 3rd time Kagami has said that, and while Aomine agrees, he can't help but feel a little jealous that Kagami seemed to be entranced by Satsuki. And why exactly he felt jealous, he couldn't really figure it out himself. And it was kind of annoying.

"… Do you like Satsuki or something?" Aomine mumbled, wondering if he'd regret asking that.

"Ah… eh?" N-No!" Kagami awkwardly answered moving his hand side to side.

"That suspicious answer means you're lying."

"I'm not! Really, I don't feel that way about her!"

"Liar."

"I'm definitely not lying!" Kagami was getting frustrated now. "How about you then? How do you feel about Satsuki?" He made an effort to push the conversation away from himself.

"Hah? What are you ,crazy? Satsuki and I are basically like brother and sister! That's gross!" Aomine shouted in his defense.

"Well, that's pretty much how I feel about her too! She's more like a sister or a cousin or something…" Kagami trailed off. "I just thought she looked pretty because she's sort of a tomboy, so it was nice to see her looking so different…"

Aomine sighed. "Then how do you feel about me?" the words came out of his mouth before he even realized what he was saying. 'Dammit that just sounds way too weird' he thought to himself instantly regretting that he didn't think before he spoke.

"Huh? You're my best friend, obviously!" Kagami answered right away like that was the stupidest question in the world, apparently not catching on to the awkward timing of the question.

"So, not like a brother?" Aomine asked again like he was on auto-pilot.

"Hmm," Kagami took the time to think about this one, "Well, for some reason 'brother' doesn't really come to mind. We're really close and all that but our relationship feels a bit different from 'brothers' you know? I think 'best friends' is closer. Although, if you were my brother that would be awesome."

Aomine liked this answer, actually. Maybe it was because brothers didn't really have a choice in whether they were tied together or not, but friends chose who they were friends with and so it seemed a lot more special that he was the 'best' one.

"Same here." Aomine said finally plopping down in an area of grass, "You're my best friend."

Kagami sat down next to him, "Good. And don't ask if I 'like' Satsuki again, that was weird," he nudged his friend in the side.

"Haha, sorry, I was just making sure."

"Making sure?"

"Ah… never mind…" Aomine said and was glad that Kagami didn't push further because honestly even he didn't know what he was making sure of.

The fireworks finally started after a few minutes and soon the night sky was filled with beautiful flowers made of light and color. Fireworks during the summer really were the best. Everyone 'ooed' and 'ahhed' at all the different shapes the fireworks took.

"Oh! Did you see that one, Daiki? I've never seen one like that before!" Kagami was a little easily excitable over them but it was pretty amusing, almost as amusing as the fireworks themselves.

Aomine watched him for maybe 20 seconds, ignoring everything else completely. Kagami's face lit up almost as bright as the sky was now and the smile on his face was huge. Soon, Aomine felt it again. The fluttering in his chest and quickened heartbeat. It felt funny and again, he wasn't sure what to think of it, but soon he was snapped back to reality.

"Oi, Daiki, what the heck are you looking at?" Kagami had looked away from the show. "You aren't watching the fireworks!" he said pointing up with a slight furrow of his brow.

"Oh, sorry, I just thought it was funny how you were acting like a little kid just now," Aomine played it off and gave a laugh.

"Shut up! Fireworks are exciting no matter what age!" he contested going back to gawking at the sky. Aomine followed suit and tried to put the weird feeling to the back of his mind.


After the festival they managed to meet back up with Momoi and headed home. Both of them insisted on walking her home since her parents left early before the fireworks started and they promised to get her back. She thanked and hugged both of them before going through her front door. Aomine insisted on walking Kagami home and Kagami argued that he was 'not a girl like Satsuki' and could get home fine without him but after Aomine said he just wanted to talk some before separating he quietly gave into the fight. Aomine used the excuse of talking about his first visit of checking out the Teikou gym but really it was just an excuse so that he just wanted to spend whatever time he could with Kagami before he had to leave. Kagami eagerly listened with excitement and promised to tell him all about his middle school basketball experience would be. Aomine was sad that they wouldn't be sharing the same gym but smiled nonetheless.

Arriving at Kagami's house, he was ready to say goodnight to his friend and head in but was stopped by a tug at his sleeve.

"What's wrong?" Kagami asked seeing his friend with a solemn face.

Aomine said nothing but kept his grip on the sleeve and soon was squeezing Kagami into a hug so hard it almost hurt.

"W-What the hell, you're squeezing me too hard!" Kagami strained to say but soon felt the grip easy up. "What is wrong with you…?" he was a little confused by Aomine's sudden action and he had still not said a word but Kagami's arms had reached around Aomine's back to return the hug.

"I'm just going to miss you… dammit… you'll be gone in a week." Aomine mumbled into Kagami's shoulder.

"Hah… Jeeze, I'm gonna miss you too, you know? But there's still a week, and I'll be back…" Kagami tried his best to comfort his friend. "And what's with the hugging me all of a sudden? You rarely do that."

"I just… wanted to hug you, idiot… Why do I gotta have a reason…" Aomine could feel tears welling up in his eyes but he managed to win the fight of holding them back.

Kagami was now the one squeezing Aomine, "I promise I'll be back, and next summer we'll see fireworks together again."

Aomine's chest was burning up and his heart was once again beating faster and faster. It was strange and weird and he wasn't sure he liked it and slowly pulled away from Kagami.

"Yeah, I'll be waiting." He said with a smile and Kagami returned the smile with a big, cheesy grin. They bid each other farewell and Aomine walked home by himself, bursting into tears half-way there but drying them off before he entered his front door.

Aomine had never had such a good friend as Kagami. Or maybe it was that he never had a friend quite like Kagami. It hurt to see him go and everything was better when they were together. He tried comparing their relationship with his and Momoi's relationship but they weren't quite the same. Yes, Aomine would be upset to see Momoi be in the same situation as Kagami but if she promised to come visit every year and move back after three years, he'd probably be totally fine with that. So why was the idea of that happening with Kagami so hard to handle? It frustrated him so much and he couldn't figure out why. That night, Aomine had difficulty sleeping.


End chapter

Things you probably know but here it is just in case:
*Yukata are summer kimonos worn by both men and women and are popular attire for summer festivals! Obi are the sash the go around the waist into a bow.
*Takoyaki are pan fried octopus balls that are a popular snack.

I know this story kind of starts off as a "what if Kagami never moved to America" feel but it's mostly just a "what if Kagami and Aomine were childhood friends" so 'not moving to America' was never something that wasn't going to happen. But trust me, I have my reasons. (:

Next update will take a while because I will be EXTREMELY busy next week and will be traveling as well.