Birds of a Feather Collection

'Professional' Relationship. Part Two: Wet Kiss

— Part 2/3. Hawks and you finally get to go on that date he promised in exchange for that interview. Surprisingly enough (or not) it's turning out to be a grand experience.

The ambient music flooded over the speakers mounted on the entrance gates and it mixed with the enthused cries of children as families entered through with tickets in hand into one of the few places you never tired of visiting. Absurd as it had been to come to this so-called 'friend's outing', you didn't regret it one bit. You'd missed the deadline for getting those anniversary tickets for Tokyo Disneyland but thanks to that blabbering pigeon at least you'd get to enjoy this little reprieve, even if it meant going out with him for the day—suppose I should at least call him by his name today as thanks. It wasn't all bad, you supposed. You did sort of fancy him despite your personal policy being a 'no heroes allowed' kind. As a journalist you knew they held a two-faced job that often involved putting up a facade when working that wasn't precisely the same one they used on the everyday wringer outside of it. Some were nice people in and out of the job, while some others had a thing or two that they hid from the rest of the world. A rather unsavory thing more often than not. That notion itself kept you at arms-length from Hawks, especially considering your already rather close relationship. Sure, he could be charming and charismatic now but you dreaded what could possibly be hidden behind that wolfish grin and amber eyes of his.

No, not today. You weren't going to think about that today. This was just an outing among friends, enjoying the best place to freaking forget about work and life in general. This was the happiest place on earth and you'd be damned if you weren't going to relish being here on such occasion. Clicking your heels as you waited by a bench, you checked your wristwatch a couple of more times when the time came to be so close to 8. You'd agreed on meeting here by then and no way were you going to miss a thing because this bird wasn't an early riser. The loud fluttering and slight huffing took you by surprise as it came so close to you. Not far away, you caught a glimpse of those red wings as Hawks stopped near the bench you waited by, chuckling as he tried to nonchalantly catch his breath. Your brow knitted together but he interrupted you before you could even ask a single thing.

"Sorry about that." He flashed you a lopsided grin that seemed more boyish than anything. "Got caught up at my place."

One of your eyebrows raised as a smug smirk ghosted onto your lips. "You mean you overslept?"

"No," he cleared his throat before standing straight, his wings folding themselves against his back. "I just got caught up getting ready."

"Uh-huh." Good thing you texted him eight times to wake him up that morning. Like hell were you gonna miss anything because of his late ass. That reminder washed all traces of annoyance away though as you hopped between your feet, grasping at the air in front of you. "Forget it! Let's go already!"

Grasping the open lapel of his brown leather jacket, you dragged him up to the entrance to go through. Almost instantly at crossing the overpass, a genuine smile spread across your lips at entering Main Street, U.S.A. Despite being a weekend, it wasn't as crowded as you expected it to be. You let go of his jacket to trot up to the end of the square where the street led down to the castle. Goodness, it'd been far too long since you last came here. I missed this.

"Am I gonna need a child leash for you, love?" Hawks asked as he strolled up to catch up to you.

"Maybe." Right now, you didn't mind playing along with his jokes. Here, you weren't on the job, or dealing with life, or having people breathing down your neck for one thing or another. Here, you could just be free for one day and be what you never got to be when you were little: a happy kid. Overhearing the Dapper Dans so close by, you bounced on your feet a couple of times, the skirt of your dress flouncing with you as you snagged his wrist and took Hawks to watch barbershop quartet. A crowd was already gathered there around them and clapped as they finished the set they'd been midway through singing. Bouncing on you feet as they started 'Mr. Sandman' you sang along under your breath as Hawks looked over a map.

"This place is huge."

"Not even—'make her the cutest that I've ever seen'—and lose the map. I've got it memorized."

He let out an amused whistle and gave her a sidelong glance, "You do?"

Before you could answer, one of the Dapper Dans gave you a look and walked over to you as the rest joined in to sing the next verse. As you sang along pleased as could be, Hawks didn't appear to like what he was seeing despite the small grin on his lips. You didn't notice his wing having curled behind you until the quartet retreated back to their spot and finished their song. You gave it a raised eyebrow before turning it to him with a smug smirk of your own.

"Are we two children looking out for each other? Is that what this is going to be?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Offering a tight-lipped smile her way and zipping it shut, Hawks shrugged his shoulder lightly.

Sure thing, bud. Well, there was definitely more to see than this so you quickly took him away to the rest of the park.

"You know, I'd appreciate this whole 'getting wet' situation better if it weren't in this kind of circumstance." Scrunching your nose at his innuendo, you smacked his chest lightly getting a gruff chuckle from him as you stepped forward, your turn for Splash Mountain coming ever closer. His dark sunglasses raised over his head, Hawks scratched at the spot you hit before leaning in to be heard better over the noise in the cluttered tunnel. "What's a guy to think after an hour of standing so close to such a beauty as yourself, angel?"

"We were on my phone playing games most of that time." Said phone was in your hand as you exited out of every game you downloaded for this very occasion. You had a hunch that Hawks wouldn't be too keen about waiting in long lines so you prepared yourself as well as you could with every type of game imaginable. Not to mention extra batteries for charging your phone. It amazed you how even those only kept his attention for so long. "Even that didn't last longer than what, 45 minutes before you started texting Endeavor-san?"

Scoffing at the mention of the No.1 hero and his own personal favorite one, Hawks checked his phone one last time to see if Endeavor had responded to that last dumb text he'd sent. "What can I say? It's easy and fun to rile up the old man."

"I'd imagine he would be when you're bothering him on his day off," you reminded him.

"He likes me too much to ignore me."

"Tolerates you is more like it."

"You hurt me, sweetheart. Right here, like a knife twisting in my poor, poor heart." Exaggerating his pout, Hawks patted at his chest not much higher of where you'd smacked him a few moments ago. Rolling your eyes at his flamboyance, you moved up the line more and meant to turn to talk to him about that when he surprised you, leaning forward and wrapping his arms around you from behind.

There wasn't any denying how much your heart skipped at having him so ridiculously close to you. He was leaning over in a way that let him press his whiskered cheek against yours and easily wrap his arms over your shoulders. "W-What are you doing?"

Hawks lifted his phone and held it a little bit away from you, the front camera showing the picture about to be taken if he pressed the button his thumb hovered over.

"Say cheese, my love." A soft click went off and he lowered the phone to look at the picture but didn't move away an inch, his breath brushing against your exposed collarbone as he inspected the photo. "I don't think I told you but you look cute in your outfit."

"T-Thanks."

Even as you moved forward—with the few people in front of you, you guessed that the next log would be yours—he didn't move away from you. Instead he easily fell in tandem with your steps and followed right behind you. It wasn't hard to admit that having him so close, the warmth of his body practically permeating onto you, felt rather nice.

Knowing your mind would go places you didn't want it to if you left it to its own devices, you kept going at the topic he'd brought up. "Mako chose this for me."

"Well, she surely knows what looks good on you then, because you look lovely."

"She said the same thing. Also said something about me dressing my age instead of like some old secretary."

"Well, that's just mean," he pouted, his wings coming to huddle on either side of you as you moved into the small partitioned area you had to wait at.

"Ditto."

You couldn't say much more as the log approached and you were told to enter it. Because of Hawks' wings, you were assigned the back end of the log. Policy, they said. Apparently those people with cumbersome Quirks rode on the back. Thank goodness too because the front was just not the best place to be if you wanted to stay relatively dry. Not like the back was any better. Though double seated, you had to scoot a little bit more because of his massive wings. But as the log moved forward you tapped his shoulder and leaned over to whisper in his ear, "Mind losing some feathers, pidge? I'm a little cramped over here."

His cheeks inflated a little as he frowned down at you. "I left most of them at home, mind you, and you're still calling me fat?"

"What? No, I'd never—how did you even come to that stupid conclusion."

Snorting at your reaction, he lost the frown pretty quickly and let out a boisterous laugh just as the log took its first big dive. Though knowing it was there, you still were taken by surprise, more so because of Hawks' sudden joyous cry as he raised his arms on the way down. The waves splashed around, jumping onto you and wringing a surprised squeak out as your skirts dampened a little. Moving your leg over his to avoid the worst of it, you felt Hawks' arm come around from behind you to grab your waist and hold you in place.

"Don't think we're allowed to have lap seats, sweetheart, but I won't tell if you don't."

"Quiet, you—oh, look!" Patting his leg a couple of times, you pointed out at the animals that popped in and out as the log went along its due course. You hummed the tune under your breath, stopping only long enough to fill in the gaps that Hawks didn't know about this particular story. Apparently this was his first time coming here and he knew close to nothing about the place. Surprising, really, with how wealthy he was.

Though I guess only some grown ups are as obsessed with this place as I am.

Shaking that thought away, you did your best to enjoy the ride as it went along. Not hard really, as you tapped your feet to the song you hummed along to. The next dive took you for an even bigger drop and had you screaming a little as the water crashed against you, wetting your side. Hawks squawked beside you, his wings curling flush against you both as he tried to spare them from getting too wet. As the jovial song changed to its darker counterpart, Hawks bent his head down closer to you to be heard over the animatronics. Instinctively, you leaned in to hear him better, not minding him so close to your face now that you were lost elsewhere.

"Quite grim for a child's ride, no?"

Chuckling at his comment, you cupped your hand over his ear as the log began climbing up the inclined slope for the big final dive. "I don't think they like the story as much as they do the splashing." When he raised an eyebrow at you, you only raised a finger for him to listen beyond the singing voices to hear the shrieks of the people ahead of them as they fell down.

"How likely are we to get wet?"

"No idea!"

Shaking his head at how you could be so happy about this, he clutched onto your waist as you got to the top of the incline and finally tipped over. The splash came in a flash and it had you both laughing your hearts out by the end of it. Hawks carded his fingers through somewhat wet hair as the animals started singing 'Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah' making you forget completely about your damp legs. You started whistling along to the tune almost instantly, your head bobbing side to side as you did so. The chuckle that you heard from him made you turn to catch him as he leaned in close to your face. Doing that at the same time, his lips brushed against your jaw as he whispered against your ear, "Gotta say, if this is what it takes for me to see your smiling face more often, they might as well just sign us up for that annual pass already."

You felt your cheeks flush at the comment and his close proximity but forgetting that for a bit, you simply chuckled and brought his head closer to yours to nuzzle against as thanks for the suggestion. The instant you did that, you felt his wings stiffen behind you and glanced over your shoulder to peek at them as the log came to a stop, your hand still cupping the other side of his face. There didn't seem to be anything wrong with them, but you asked him anyway after you two got off and out of the attraction's waiting area.

" 's nothing, love. They're just a little wet is all." Giving himself some space, Hawks spread out his wings behind him and ruffled each individual feather all at the same time, spraying droplets all over the place. You covered your face instantly as he did this to spare yourself the second splash and giggled as he took one wing into his hands to card his fingers through them to smooth them over. "A little 'you might get soaked' would've been greatly 'preciated, though."

"Hey, there was a warning at the start of the ride's line remember?" As you say this, you walked up and took his other wing in hand, sparing a glance at what he was doing to do the same yourself on the other.

The feathers gently moved as your fingers carded through it as if caressing your hand, or simply relishing in the sensation. You were so focused on the task that you didn't realize when Hawks had come up so close to you, his head bending down slightly to whisper in your ear, "You've got such gentle hands."

Swallowing down the lump that got so suddenly stuck in your throat, you tried your best to concentrate on what you were doing instead of his haughty, low voice next to you. But your mind, for some reason, didn't get the memo in time and let slip what it was thinking instead. "You feel that?"

"Yeah." His other wing curled around you, hiding you from the rest of the oncoming crowd as his hand fell over yours, his fingers delicately twining through yours through his crimson plumage. "It's rather nice and comforting…your touch."

The way he said that flushed your face so much that you swore it matched the dark shade of his crimson wings. Clearing your throat to get those thoughts away from your mind, you patted his wing with your other free hand before taking a couple of steps away to give you space to breathe. And think.

"W-We should get going."

"Sure thing, love," he gave a small tug to your hands that were still clasped together, fingers entwined between each other. "Where to next?"

Hawks wasn't holding it tight enough for your hands to be locked together. You could tell that they would easily fall apart if you simply pulled away. Thing was you didn't like that idea. Of him letting go of you. Not one bit.

So don't.

It wasn't wrong. Whatever happened here didn't concern the outside, after all. This was your happy place. Your safe haven away from a world that you just…didn't like in the least. And if just for today, that happiness came from spending it with this man then who were you to deny yourself that little piece of heaven?

Mind made up, you tightened your hold on your joined hands and shared a small genuine smile with him. "It's not far. But I'm sure there's a long line so we should hurry there, Haw—"

Before you could finish your sentence, his lips brushed gently against yours keeping you from saying his hero name aloud. Though utterly taken aback by the gesture, you didn't dislike it at all. His wings covered for you pretty well and it was just a small kiss. A little tiny kiss on the lips that sent your heart soaring. Hawks didn't force you beyond that and instead took a few steps away to give you some space while his hand still held onto yours.

"Sorry about that but…we agreed on no hero names today, remember?"

Though you felt your cheeks ready to burst from how warm they were, you pouted at him for the cheeky ass move he made. "You could've just reminded me like a normal person, you over sized pigeon."

That wolfish grin you knew so well came to his lips at your words, "Aw, but where's the fun in that?" When you didn't chastise him any further, he let his wings fall and tucked them against his back once more before tugging at your hand for you to lead the way.

Sighing a little while shaking your head at his antics, you smiled all the same, leading him away while still walking right by his side. Boy, this was going to be a long day. Hopefully, one you'd never forget.