Years later, if you asked Kagami what were the top three most memorable moments of his high school life, he would tell you that it's the first time he heard Coach say he'd be a starter, the first time he dunked from the free throw line, and their first win at the Winter Cup finals. None of that is a lie, but it's not the whole truth either. Privately, he has another list, Aomine's first genuine smile as he ate the ridiculously huge burger he made, their first clumsy kiss, and this, Aomine standing in front of Touou's gates looking determinedly down at the single wild flower in his hand.
Kagami's first thought at the sight, is that Aomine is such an idiot. Other students are openly staring at him as they pass by but he doesn't seem to notice. He's obviously going over what to say when he sees Kagami, probably overthinking it as much as Kagami is. He also obviously just picked up the flower on his was to school from the side of the road judging by the shabby state of it and the way it's drooping away from his hand.
Kagami's second thought is that he's also an idiot for finding this cute, worse, attractive. Annoying as it is, all this makes Kagami want to do is kiss him again. He thought he'd had this under control. Last night, he was shocked, but somewhat rational with a lot of help from Alex. Today, Aomine's lame attempt at romance makes him want to throw himself at him. Who knew he could be this pathetic. He went months without any of these feelings overflowing to the surface but one kiss and suddenly everything's different.
Not the world, no, nothing so dramatic. But nothing about his relationship about Aomine could ever be the same again, he just can't think of him the way he did before the kiss. He's pretty sure the feeling is mutual. But he can't let this ruin them, or the team. He likes him, he really likes him, but he's not the type to let that get in the way of his dreams.
"Why are you holding a flower?" he asks, when he's finally standing in front of Aomine. He struggles to keep his face as neutral as possible.
Aomine snaps out of the daze he seemed to be in, head snapping up. He gapes at Kagami for a moment before looking back at his flower, which sadly looks like it's on the verge of wilting. He quickly stuffs it into his pocket and clears his throat.
"I just, uh–" he coughs again "–I need it. For–" he waves his hand "–you know."
He really doesn't, but this isn't the time to tease him. "Alright." he says slowly "Were you waiting for me?"
"Yeah." Aomine says with a sigh, no bullshit, Kagami's glad. Beating around the bush is something they both dislike.
"We can't exactly talk here though." Kagami glances to one side and sure enough, his eyes meet that of a curious on-looker (who then hastily looks away).
"Obviously." Aomine huffs "Lunch? On the roof?"
"That wouldn't be very private, no one eats at the gym right? Let's go there."
"That's too far from our classroom. Why don't we just skip school?"
Kagami frowns "They're celebrating our win at the morning assembly, it will be too damn obvious that we're not there."
"Satsuki will cover for us."
"The gym," Kagami insists "just walk fast, we're athletes."
"Fine." Aomine grunts "But if we're late for English I'm blaming you."
It's reassuring, Kagami thinks as they head up to their classroom, that they fall into an easy banter even when what they're talking about is a heart to heart that will probably have very serious effects on the future of their team (and that will also probably be extremely embarrassing since neither of them are used to that sort of thing).
They're praised by the principal during the morning assembly, and they receive a mix of enthusiastic cheers and polite applause from the student body. As they were on stage, Momoi would periodically shoot both him and Aomine meaningful looks. She obviously knows something. He wouldn't be surprised if Aomine talked to her about it immediately after walking off.
Time passes both quickly and slowly as lunch time approached. Kagami's never been a good note taker or student in general, but today he was even more useless at pretending he was even remotely studious. He couldn't fall asleep either, head swimming with predictions, best and worst case scenarios.
Aomine, true to form, is asleep. And he makes no attempts to be subtle about it.
Their teacher doesn't call him on it, maybe a concession for making the school proud or a sign that they've given up on keeping Aomine awake when he wants to sleep.
When lunch time finally arrives Aomine is still asleep so Kagami kicks his chair, finding satisfaction in the way he tumbles onto the floor, reflexes only just managing to let him land in an awkward crouch.
Aomine glares at him "What the f–"
"Don't curse asshole," he grins "let's get moving."
Kagami doesn't wait to see if Aomine follows him because he knows he will. He walks briskly, taking big strides and skipping steps on the way down the stair case. He can hear quick and heavy footfalls from behind him, the only sign Aomine is there.
The gym is thankfully as empty as he expected, and they're completely alone. He skips up to the stage stops right across the basketball hoop then turns around. He doesn't look at Aomine's face yet, instead he sets their bentos down in front of him and takes his seat. Slowly he unpacks them, segregating their shares and carefully placing their chopsticks beside their bento.
Taking a deep breath, he places his hands on his knees and grips tight. He looks up finally, to find that Aomine is still standing, expression seemingly neutral, but to someone who knows him, the subtle tightness of his jaw and the press of his lips are screaming tension. Kagami's a bit pleased that he can now recognize what Aomine looks like nervous, even when Aomine's desperately trying not to let it show.
"Sit." he says, gesturing to the space in front of him.
Aomine follows without any objections, verbal or otherwise. He looks Kagami right in the eye as he does it, and it makes his heart race. Suddenly he feels a weight in his chest and it makes him feel queasy. He licks his lips and swallows.
"Why," he chokes out finally.
Aomine runs his open palms across his thigh, as if he's wiping his sweat onto his uniform trousers.
The pause gives Kagami the strength he needs to ask: "Why'd you kiss me?"
A pained look passes Aomine's face briefly before it shifts to one of resignation.
"I wanted to." he says, with a shrug that looks more forced than casual "I kind of, well..." he scratches the back of his head, frustrated "I like you. Have for a while now I think."
Until the kiss, Kagami had never expected a confession like this from Aomine. Even after the kiss, Aomine confessing any sort of romantic feelings for him or anyone seemed so far removed from reality that Kagami found it much more likely that he'd only had a fever dream or, even more likely in his mind, Aomine was confusing the high of a great basketball game for a different sort of affection and was regretting that it ever happened. But he had prepared for a genuine confession, or so he'd thought.
Now that it had actually happened he sits here mute, uncomprehending. He doesn't know how long his silence lasts but it's long enough that Aomine looks both uneasy and annoyed.
"You could, you know, react." he says, frowning down at the food before him.
"Sorry."
Aomine's head shoots up, looking stricken.
"Not about that!" he shouts "I meant for staring like a dumbass." he sighs, runs a hand through his hair. "Are you serious?"
Aomine looks like he's preparing to take offense but Kagami interrupts him.
"I mean it. I need to know if you're serious, because I don't want to fuck up the team and myself just to play at being boyfriends."
"I'm not– is that what you think about me you bastard!?"
"I don't know what to think! You've never showed any signs of liking me and it's awfully convenient that it happens right after we win the Winter Cup!"
"For your information, every time I bumped my head onto your stupid ass forehead, it was an excuse to get as close as I could without kissing you. One time it was an excuse so you wouldn't notice I almost kissed you in the middle of a whole damn stadium. And do you see me crashing anyone else's houses!?"
"Uhm, Momoi's?"
"Eww! No! Satsuki's like my sister! Shut up, don't say stuff like that!" he growls "And what do I have to do so you'll believe me? Kiss you again? Give you a hand job? Because I will do it you just watch."
"You can't give me a hand job when we're in school where anyone could walk in, what the fuck!? We shouldn't even be talking about this here!"
"Well you're the one who won't believe me." Aomine huffs, but then pauses, eyes widening "Wait, does this mean you wouldn't object to a hand job? Just not here?"
Kagami puts his head in his hands "Why do I even like you?" he grumbles.
"You like me?" Aomine asks, sounding a bit breathless.
Kagami looks at him through his fingers sees Aomine grinning, teeth bright, eyes wrinkling slightly. "Yeah," he says, a grin slowly spreading on his own face "for some weird reason I really, really like you."
Aomine leans forward, puts his hands right in front of Kagami's knees. "Well," he says "that's great because like I said, I like you too. Really, really like you. Like you enough that I would kiss you in public."
"Please don't."
"How about right now?"
Kagami glances at the entrance. Empty. He looks back at Aomine who's slowly inching closer, then down at his lips.
"Make it quick."
-o-o-o-o-o-
They're late for English, as he predicted, and the teacher scolds him more than he does Taiga, as Taiga predicted, but Aomine find that he just. does. not. care about that right now. He's on a high that he refuses to fall from no matter how many disapproving looks his teachers throw his way.
He makes a few abortive attempts to pass a note to Taiga throughout the rest of the day, but he doesn't know what to say. Maybe there isn't anything else to say right now anyway. He watches him instead, he doesn't know if their classmates notice him staring. Ryou probably does, but he'd never say anything. If it won't affect the game, the members of the Touou basketball team tended to mind their own business. Well, maybe not Wakamatsu or even, to a lesser extent, Taiga. (And they're in charge of the team now, but Aomine's not going to think about the repercussions of thatjust yet)
The sound of the final bell ringing is music to his ears and he jumps out of his seat immediately after their teacher dismisses them. He slings an arm around Taiga, grinning.
"Walk you home?"
Taiga makes a sound somewhere between a snort and a laugh "You just want a free meal Ahomine."
"And then some," he replies, and he enjoys the flush of Taiga's face "and what happened to Daiki?"
"Talking about yourself in the third person now?"
"I meant, what happened to calling me Daiki? We talked about this Taiga."
Taiga gives him a sheepish sideways glance. "Didn't think you remembered that, you never brought it up."
"Kept slipping my mind, but now that you're my–" Taiga shoots him a warning look "–well, you know. You should start calling me Daiki."
"These things take time you know," Taiga gets red all the way to his ears "it's embarrassing."
"I've been calling you Taiga since forever."
"You have no shame, it's easy for you."
"That sounded like an insult, but I can't help but think it was a compliment."
"You would."
A loud squeal startles them both, and Aomine's arm slides off Taiga's shoulder as he presses his hand to his chest. They turn to their classroom door to find Satsuki jumping up and down and clapping.
"You worked things out!" She shouts, looking like she's about to burst into tears. "Oh, this must be what it's like to see your daughter get married."
"Uh, excuse me?"
"Oh not you Dai-chan, Kagamin," she huffs "what's wrong with being a daughter though?"
"Nothing, except we're both men."
"Details." she waves a hand "Besides, I'm talking about my feelings, it's just an analogy. You two can do whatever you want with yourselves."
"I don't get what you mean," Taiga says "and I have a feeling that I don't want to know."
"Neither do I." Aomine grunts. "Now that you know what's going on Satsuki, go home with one of your other friends or something."
"Mean!" Satsuki huffs "I wasn't going to tag along! I'm not insensitive like some people."
"Hey! I'm very sensitive."
"To insults directed at you maybe." Taiga teases "But the other kind of sensitive too sometimes."
"Once in a blue moon maybe." Satsuki nods.
"You both suck." he crosses his arms "How could either of you claim to love me?"
"Love!" Satsuki eyes light up "Is that what you said?" she's acting like they're actually getting married.
"I wouldn't go that far just yet." Taiga says, turning a bright shade of pink yet again.
Yet, he says. Aomine grins. "Yeah, not just yet."
"Still, that's wonderful, I'm so happy for you two!" again her eyes grow visibly damp, but she holds it in. "But I swear, if you ever break up and then ruin things for the rest of the team I am going to make life very hard for the both of you."
Taiga snorts "Guess we'll have to get married then."
"You mean we're migrating to America?" he says it like a joke, but immediately Taiga stills. Satsuki looks back and forth between them as Aomine realizes what he'd just said.
"I am going back to America." Taiga says stiffly.
"I know." Aomine replies softly, hooking one of his index finger's with Taiga's. "Let's go home?"
Taiga's finger curls into his "Yeah."
"Well, I'm going home with my friends then." Satsuki says, raising an eyebrow at Aomine. She looks like she's expecting something from him. Aomine's not sure what she wants, but she says no more and leaves them alone again.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-
They leave Touou in silence, side by side but not touching. Not what Kagami envisioned when Aomine said he'd walk him home today but reality has a way of putting a damper on things.
When Kagami came back to Japan, he knew he might make some good friends but it never occurred to him that he might meet someone that would make him even a little bit reluctant to leave. Life happens, that's just the way things are.
But Aomine is a once in a life time person. Dating or whatever aside, Kagami doesn't know if he's ever going to get to play basketball with someone like Aomine again. There are many people in the NBA who are better than Aomine, sure, but the easy effortless way he moves, his formless shots... Aomine's style has a certain grace to it that Kagami's never before seen in his life and he thinks, he might never see it again. To leave that behind, on top of leaving the person he's grown so fond of behind, well, it's far more difficult that Kagami had thought it would be.
He sighs when they get to his front door. He wonders if Alex is in there. He kind of hopes she isn't. If she sees their down state they're probably in for a lecture or worse, painfully obvious knowing looks.
He's just getting his key into the keyhole when Aomine says "Hey." in a soft voice. Kagami turns to him to find him frowning at his feet.
"I've been thinking about getting an English tutor." he shoves his hands in his pockets "What school did you say you were applying to?"
Kagami gapes at him for a long moment. For the second time today Aomine's rendered him speechless, making him doubt if he's still in his bed dreaming up this entire day.
"What're–" he turns his whole body towards him "Do you want to go with me to America?"
"Well," Aomine clears his throat "I can see myself in the NBA. It's a nice picture." he smiles "You're there too maybe."
That startles a laugh out of him "Is that right? Pretty confident for someone who wasn't even listening during English earlier. We'll both need better grades to get into UCLA you know, even if we do manage a scholarship."
"Well, I've got some good motivation now." he shrugs grinning wider, Kagami's hearts skips a beat.
"That's," he turns back towards the door "we uh, we better get inside."
"Embarrassed?" Aomine's voice is so close to his ear that he drops his keys.
"Don't do that!" Kagami shouts, putting his hand over his ear as he bends down to pick up his keys.
Just then he hears the door click open and he's faced with Alex's bare feet. He hears Aomine say "wow" in a stage whisper, and then he's sure her feet won't be the only thing that's bare. She's wearing a t-shirt at least, but it's short enough that you can see her belly button, and she's got nothing else on besides her underwear.
"Alex, how many times have I told you to wear pants." he steps in, pushing Alex further into the apartment by her shoulders.
"Don't be such a prude Taiga." she teases, while he struggles to remove his shoes, and then peering behind him she adds "Hey there genius boy, here to make out with Taiga again?"
"Uh." is all Aomine manages to say before Kagami manhandles her into the guest bedroom, shouting at her to get dressed.
When he gets back to Aomine he finds him going through his cds intently, although there's a faraway look in his eyes that suggests the cds arent really what he's thinking about.
"Can we just order dinner?" Kagami asks "I'm still a bit tired to be honest."
"Sure." Aomine shrugs, still gazing at the cd rack.
Kagami calls a ramen shop and places an order for all three of them, when he returns to where Aomine is, he's seated himself on the floor legs splayed out in front of him and under the table. He's staring at the ceiling with a crease on his forehead. Kagami wonders if he's troubled about the thought of moving to America. It's nothing short of a life changing experience after all.
So he says, "You don't have to force yourself." and then when Aomine turns his gaze at him "I don't want you to go and just your life plans for me."
Aomine eyes furrow "What are you talking about?"
"Just that, if you had other plans for your life, don't throw them away just to go to the NBA for me, you're your own guy."
Aomine stares at him for a moment in disbelief "If you think that I'm doing it just so we could continue dating you really are an idiot."
That gives Kagami pause "So why are you doing it?"
"Well," Aomine sighs "I'm not going to lie, you're pretty great, that's part of the reason, but it's not just because I like you. I just–" he squeezes his eyes shut, breathes out through his teeth "I've never seen anyone play like you. If there's a chance to keep playing with or against you, I'm taking it. I had plans sure, but I want this more than any of those plans. Those were pretty boring to be honest." he stares right into Kagami's eyes "This is more for me than it is for you. I hate being bored."
Kagami gapes at him for a beat then starts laughing so hard tears well up in his eyes. Aomine looks extremely offended.
"Why did I ever think you'd have romantic reasons?" he says through giggles.
"I think it's plenty romantic Taiga." Alex strolls in with a grin on her face and a pair of pedal pushers on. "Get to the NBA, play for ten to fifteen years and if you're still together by then get married, adopt some kids, run a business together till you're old and grey and live happily ever after."
Kagami raises an eyebrow "That was unexpectedly detailed."
"It's a good life plan is what it is." she slaps him on the shoulder then sits on the floor across Aomine. "What do you think Aomine-kun?"
Aomine doesn't answer immediately, glances to one side, expression thoughtful. Just as Kagami's taking his seat beside Alex he says "Playing basketball and getting married sounds good, I don't know yet about kids though."
Kagami slips a little as he sits down "We only just started dating!" he shouts, feeling his face heat.
"Oh, I think you've kind of been dating for a while." Alex snorts "Only difference now is you finally got around to kissing."
"God." Kagami groans burying his face in his hands "I knew you would be terrible about this."
Alex slaps him on the back "Don't be shy Taiga, look, Daiki over here isn't embarrassed."
"He's never had any shame to begin with!" Kagami exclaims.
"Still taking that as a compliment." Aomine quips.
"Well it's still not a compliment, Daiki." he meant to tease, but saying Aomine's first name makes him flush.
Aomine grins "You finally said it."
"Shut up." Kagami huffs and turns away from him, only to be faced with Alex's Cheshire cat grin.
"Cute," Alex says "real cute."
"You shut up too."
They spend the rest of the night talking about America and the NBA. Aomine tries to hide his excitement, but there's a light in his eyes as Alex talks about her experiences, and who they'll probably be playing with when they get drafted. It's not the first time Kagami's talked with Alex about this, it's come up several times while he was growing up. Every time they talked, she'd say "if he got drafted". He can't help but feel a bit giddy when he notices that for their entire conversation that night, Alex has been saying when.
-o-o-o-o-o-
Dating doesn't really change much in their relationship. Aomine comes over for dinner, sometimes he stays the night, they go to school, they bicker, and no one except for Momoi and Alex seem to notice anything's different. Occasionally there's kissing. Occasionally there's lots of kissing. Occasionally, they might get really riled up but decide they're not quite emotionally ready to go there yet.
"Physically I'm ready." Aomine had said "Physically I'm very ready."
But they had time. So, taking it slow seemed... smarter. Better, at any rate.
When the seniors graduate, Wakamatsu gets really emotional. He doesn't cry but it's a near thing. Kagami finds himself getting a bit emotional too, but he keeps it in check. The team bows down to their seniors in respect. Imayoshi doesn't wish them luck. He says they don't need it. Kagami found it surprisingly encouraging.
Alex flies back to America right in time for practice to start up again. Kagami's apartment feels strangely empty, but he's never lonely because Aomine and Momoi often visit.
Aomine tries to skip their first day of practice, but Wakamatsu manages to coax him back by saying "Kagami's gonna be better than you soon if you don't watch out." Kagami remembers Aomine's nostrils flaring, he never skips practice again.
Being vice captain is something he has to get used to, but he doesn't really have problems with the other third years, and he's thankful. His work involves a lot more meetings with Wakamatsu, Momoi and Coach than he thought, but it's fulfilling.
It's going to be a good year, Kagami thinks, and he's looking forward to it.
-o-o-o-o-o-
A/N: So this is it. This is the last chapter. I had planned for this fic to be longer, as you might have noticed from my previous end notes. Everything that happened in this chapter beginning from Aomine's POV was supposed to span a few chapters. But, as Kagami said this chapter, life happens. I'm extremely busy, writing this takes a lot of mental energy and a lot of hours of my day. People asking me for updates drains me emotionally because I feel guilty. So after writing three versions of this chapter in the months since chapter 28 and scrapping them both because I wasn't happy with them in the least, I began writing this version and decided it had to be the last.
That said, I hope this chapter doesn't seem so rushed. I really wanted to give this a proper ending. I wrote it as I wrote all my other chapters, with a pace that felt natural, going for a slightly slice of life feel, etc. So personally, I didn't think it feels rushed, but, you will all be the judge of that I guess. Also, while I say that this is the last chapter, there will be an epilogue set in the future as I had originally planned. When I'll be able to upload that, I can't tell you, hopefully it's soon. I might also write other fic set in this universe, but those will just be one-shots, I don't think I'll be writing something quite this big again any time soon haha.
Thank you to everyone who's been reading this fic from the start. Thank you to everyone who came in half way or near the end. Thank you to everyone who left a review, put this in their favorites and sent me supportive messages. Thank you all, I couldn't have finished this fic without you.
