Mondo Oowada woke up on his floor, twisted in blankets and pillows and Kiyotaka Ishimaru. He blinked, rubbed sleep out of his eyes, and tried to sit up. It didn't work out too well, with his arm trapped underneath Ishimaru's hip and one of his legs twisted in several layers of one blanket, and he gave up after a few minutes of struggling.

He frowned and glanced at the TV, which was playing the start screen for the horror movie they'd watched last night.

Oh, that's right. Ishimaru hadn't gone back to his room. Mondo had let him borrow something to wear to sleep, and they'd fallen asleep with the lights on, because goddam if they were going to be turning the lights off after that.

He used his free arm to shake Ishimaru awake. Ishimaru turned his face away and snuggled deep into the floor. Mondo shook him harder, and after a few more moments, Ishimaru woke up. He disentangled himself from the blankets slowly, shaking them off of his arms and legs and back. Then he turned and looked at Mondo, whose arm was still trapped under his knee.

He was without a doubt the most goddam adorable thing that Mondo Mondo had seen in his life. His hair was flattened on one side of his head, and stuck up on the other, and his eyes were a little bleary – as well as that, there was a large red mark on the side of his face where he'd slept on the floor. Mondo's shirt hung off of him so radically that it looked to be in danger of falling off, and he looked absolutely confused.

"Offa my arm," Mondo said, shoving him a little. Ishimaru complied, his face still screwed up in confusion. Then realization dawned on him.

"The movie!" he said. Then he shuddered. "The movie."

"Yeah," Mondo said. He sat up, massaging his arm to try and get some feeling back into it. "Whassa time?"

Ishimaru stood up on shaky legs to check the clock. "Nine," he said. He paused, then continued. "I have never slept in this late in my life."

"Ah, 's not that bad," Mondo said. He yawned. "Could go for a nap, actually."

Ishimaru whirled on his heel to glare.

"Just kidding!"

Ishimaru sat down hard on Mondo's bed and squeezed his eyes shut. "I must wake up," he said. He drummed his fingers against his legs and clenched his fists. "I require caffeine."

"I don't think so," Mondo said. Ishimaru frowned at him, and he stretched. "Let's go take a bath. I'm so fucking sore from sleeping on that floor. An' my arm is pretty much dead."

Ishimaru perked up immediately. "Of course!" he said. He jumped to his feet. Yeah, he didn't need any caffeine. "It is a very good thing for men to do, to show their bodies to each other and bond in their nudity."

Mondo Oowada stared. Ishimaru didn't seem to notice, and Mondo decided not to ask. "So, let's do that, and then we'll grab something to eat-"

"And then you must study," Ishimaru said. Mondo muttered a curse under his breath. "You said that you would, brother. It is only fair. I rode your motorcycle yesterday. You must study."

"Fine," Mondo said. He stood up, winced, and cracked his back. There. That was better. "Let's get going."

Ishimaru talked straight through getting undressed and in the baths themselves. Mondo managed to keep the conversation away from schoolwork, because when that happened Mondo tended to start tuning him out, and he figured if he didn't distract himself with conversation he'd end up staring too much. He didn't mean to, Ishimaru was just. Real nice-looking under that uniform.

The conversation turned to the movie from the night before. Ishimaru professed his instant dislike for the film and also a slight curiosity in seeing more like it. Mondo snorted.

"So you like that sorta thing?"

"No! It was absolutely disgusting! It made me feel as though I was being stalked and murdered myself, and I did not like that!"

"That's what it's supposed to do," Mondo said. "It's a horror flick. They're all like that."

"That is horrible."

"I mean, some of 'em are gorier, or, like, full of jump scares, and some of 'em feature monsters instead of just people… a lot of 'em are one step away from porn, too. But they're cool."

Ishimaru shook his head. Mondo had a feeling that they'd be watching quite a few in the future, if only so that Ishimaru would have something to complain about.

Or maybe just because Mondo loved the hell out of them, and he was going to share that with Ishimaru whether Ishimaru liked it or not.

His stomach rumbling pulled him out of his reflections and he stood up. "Let's go grab something to eat," he said. Ishimaru nodded and followed his lead. "God, I'm starved. This'll fuck with my eating schedule, too."

"No," Ishimaru said. "We can simply have a smallish snack at around three to hold us over until dinnertime. It is quite simple."

"Nah," Mondo said. "We can shove ourselves full of food, we'll eat now an' then again at lunch, and then we'll be too full for dinner but we'll eat anyway."

"That sounds idiotic."

"That's the plan!"

"It is most certainly not the plan."

"Well, it's my plan."

"And your plan is a stupid one."

They watched each other for a bit, and Mondo wondered if hitting something against the hard floor of the bathhouse would do permanent damage. He half-thought that Ishimaru was going to throw a punch – if he was being honest with himself, he was aware of the tension in the air and would almost welcome it – but then Ishimaru threw back his shoulders and straightened his spine.

"We will simply have to agree to disagree, then," he said. Mondo rolled his eyes and followed him out. They got dressed in relative silence, Mondo mourning the fact that they'd stopped by Ishimaru's room to grab some of his clothes to change into afterward, and then headed to get some food.

Well, at least he'd gotten Ishimaru to watch a horror movie, because he was pretty sure that the rest of his day would be absolutely boring. But it was with Ishimaru. That would be good, probably, unless that stupid-as-all-fuck crush grew.


This is the only fanfic that I'm keeping up with the one-chapter-a-week thing. But alas, this is the last chapter until December. Because NaNoWriMo next month. So there's that.