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About Us

Chapter 2

By Miki

The moment the chauffeur opened the door, Yuuta realised he had to let go of Atobe's hand.

He hesitated for just a second, and then pulled his hand away from Atobe's – Atobe was going to pull him out of the vehicle if he got his way – and somehow, he ended up standing awkwardly next to Atobe at the kerb of the road.

He shifted his feet and took a step away from Atobe, instinctively trying to put just a little distance between them again.

People stared as they walked past.

"Yuuta?"

Atobe raised an eyebrow at him, seemingly demanding an explanation as he held out his hand again. Yuuta felt his cheeks turning pink and he looked away, hurriedly shoving his hands into his pockets.

"So… Are we doing in?" he asked, trying to distract Atobe.

"A-Ah, of course…" Atobe replied, quickly taking back his hand and putting it into his pocket as well.

Yuuta watched him step toward the door. His chest felt just a little bit tight and he grasped the material inside his pockets.

(S)

Atobe glanced at Yuuta, watching him stare at the menu in serious concentration. They'd given him the menu in French again, which made Atobe wonder how much longer it would be before Yuuta asked for a translation. Under the table, he tentatively inched his foot along the ground, trying to estimate the distance to Yuuta's legs.

It wasn't such a big table so Yuuta's legs should be –

"Atobe?"

"Yuuta?"

He looked up quickly, his foot pausing in its movement.

"Which one is the dish I like?" Yuuta asked, looking a bit embarrassed.

Atobe blinked. "Which one…" he repeated. He glanced down at the menu, trailing his finger down the page. "Ah, that's right. You liked the casserole, didn't you? You tried some of mine the first time we came here."

"Er…"

Atobe raised an eyebrow at the look on Yuuta's face. One would think he could remember which were the dishes he liked and which ones he didn't like. "The garlic snails, remember?" he prompted.

For a moment, Yuuta simply stared back at him. Then he put his hand to the back of his head and Atobe realised he suddenly looked incredibly uncomfortable.

"Actually…"

Atobe waited.

"I… don't like snails."

(S)

Yuuta wasn't sure if it was really a good time to have said something… like that.

Atobe looked horrified. He looked like Mizuki had looked the time that first year had presented his white school shirt to him in pink because he'd thrown it in the wash with Mizuki's underwear. He looked like he was possibly in shock.

"So what don't you like about snails?" Atobe asked finally, one eyebrow raised.

Yuuta tried not to look at the expression on the other boy's face. Somehow it always made him want to either hide or blurt out the first thing that came to mind, just so that Atobe would stop it with the eyebrow.

"You do, of course, realise that we're currently sitting in one of the country's most celebrated French restaurants and that what you just said is quite possibly sacrilege?" Atobe prompted, taking a sip of his water.

Yuuta fiddled with his fork. He couldn't believe Atobe was taking it so seriously.

"So what did you actually think of the casserole last time you tried it?"

Yuuta sighed. Now he was going to have to make another confession.

"I didn't try it," he admitted.

"You didn't…" Atobe repeated.

Yuuta looked up at him, trying not to smile at the look on his face. He looked confused.

"But I gave you some of mine," Atobe insisted; 'some' meaning one individual snail.

Yuuta tried not to laugh.

"I… didn't eat it," he confessed. Then – quickly, so that Atobe couldn't say anything else – he added, "I didn't drop it under the table or anything, you know."

"So what did you do with it if you didn't eat it?" Atobe demanded.

"I put it in my soup…"

Atobe looked speechless. But of course, Atobe was almost never really speechless.

"So you put a piece of my favourite snail casserole in your onion soup, which was then taken back to the kitchen and thrown into the garbage because you didn't eat the last of that either…"

"Er… Yes?"

"Well," Atobe huffed and flicked his menu, "I guess we know what you won't be ordering today then."

Yuuta blinked, watching the other boy with his perfect hair and his straight tie and his French menu and that look of absolute incense on his face.

He wondered what it was about Atobe that made him want to laugh right now. Then he wondered if perhaps he should hide his face behind his menu, just in case Atobe realised he was laughing and got grumpier.

(S)

"What is it?" Atobe demanded, placing his menu flat on the table and giving Yuuta what he hoped was the "I'm unimpressed" look.

Yuuta's smile twitched and he tried not to look Atobe in the eyes.

"Nothing," was the response, and Atobe knew Yuuta wanted to laugh at him.

"Honestly," he sniffed, "you don't need to…"

He trailed off as Yuuta lost control and burst into laughter. A quick glance around the restaurant revealed that no one was watching them – except the waiters, and that was their job – so Atobe sighed and kicked his leg out under the table. It wouldn't do to have waiters seeing him doing less than suitable things above the table, even if Yuuta was currently laughing at him.

Except that now, he was staring at him in surprise.

At least now Atobe knew it wasn't very far to Yuuta's legs at all.

"I can't believe you just kicked me," Yuuta blinked.

"I can't believe you wasted such a precious snail," Atobe replied, his tone flat and his eyebrow raised.

Yuuta though, couldn't keep a straight face for very long, since Atobe saw his lips curve again as he grinned.

He was starting to wonder what on earth he was doing in here with the boy when he seemed to be absurdly intent on laughing the entire evening and never getting around to ordering anything at all.

"Atobe," Yuuta said.

Atobe flicked his hair.

"I'm sorry about the snail," Yuuta apologised, "but you know… It's okay to laugh… about stuff."

Atobe sighed.

Yuuta smiled at him a little uncertainly and Atobe was reminded for a moment that it was just the two of them here. If out of seven days in a week, he could only spend one or two nights with Yuuta, then… Maybe he ought to be laughing about the snail instead of feeling so annoyed about it. And besides, he wasn't truly annoyed, although it was something of a dent to his ego that someone wouldn't do as he'd asked.

Not that he'd really asked; it was more like he'd assumed…

Really, though, wasn't that just a little bit immature of Yuuta not to try the snail and still declare he didn't like them?

(S)

Yuuta looked across at Atobe's dish, rather glad he hadn't eaten that snail last time after all. There was something really wrong about eating such weird, small, shrivelled up things as snails. He really couldn't see why people would eat them at all, except that they were supposed to be a delicacy in France, but French people probably had weird tastebuds.

He picked up his spoon, preparing to start on his soup – which was about as normal as soup could be and definitely didn't have any snails in it – when Atobe smirked at him.

"Yuuta?"

Something told Yuuta that he wasn't going to like the words that were going to come out of Atobe's mouth.

He watched as Atobe picked up his fork and skewered one of those small, yucky things and then held it out to him.

"Here, try it."

Yuuta froze.

"Honestly, you can hardly tell me you have a dislike for them if you've never tried them before," Atobe continued, pushing the fork slightly closer to Yuuta's mouth.

Yuuta opened his mouth to protest –

He didn't like snails. Snails were yucky and slimy and came out of the garden where they left those weird slimy trails all over the ground. Normal people stepped on them. Normal people didn't put them in their mouths. Normal people didn't…

Before he could get anything out of his mouth, he found himself with the fork shoved into his mouth instead and he instinctively closed his lips on it.

And Atobe pulled the fork from his mouth, effectively leaving the snail on Yuuta's tongue.

Yuuta was frozen. There was a snail in his mouth.

A snail.

Oh.

He could taste butter and garlic and… and…

He watched Atobe call the waiter over, handing him the fork and asking for a new one. Did Atobe think he had funny germs or something? Jeez.

He watched as the waiter returned, fork in hand, and proceeded to place it on the table, fixing up the cutlery into lines again.

He watched as Atobe skewered another snail with his fork, and put it in his mouth, chewing and swallowing.

"Do you still have that thing in your mouth?" Atobe suddenly asked, and Yuuta simply stared back.

He wanted to spit it out. He could swear it felt like it was crawling on his tongue. Was it even cooked properly? Maybe they'd made a mistake and it was still alive.

For a moment, Atobe had that incredulous look on his face again. Then, all of a sudden, he grinned.

"He-" Yuuta started to say, forgetting he had something on his tongue.

He coughed unpleasantly for a moment and swallowed it down, hurriedly reaching for his water and gulping down half the glass. Atobe was laughing at him.

"What's so…"

He wanted to ask what was so funny, but he didn't, because Atobe was laughing.

Atobe… was laughing.

Yuuta couldn't help it. Snail completely forgotten, he smiled back.

(S)

Atobe walked Yuuta to the lobby of the dormitory.

Yuuta didn't protest this time, and Atobe decided to risk his chances, stepping just a little closer to Yuuta as they reached the glass doors.

"Well…" Yuuta said, speaking just to fill in the silence.

"Hm?"

"I'm going in then."

Atobe tilted his head slightly.

"Aren't you forgetting something?"

Yuuta looked at him quickly, in the middle of turning around.

"What?"

"Where's my thank you?" Atobe demanded, all his concentration going in to keeping his face straight and trying not to turn pink.

Instead, it was Yuuta who turned pink. "Um… But I don't-"

Atobe rolled his eyes a little, his embarrassment hidden as he slightly jerkily grabbed Yuuta's tie and pulled him, stumbling, the two small steps back to him. "I meant," he said gently, "like this."

And he quickly pressed his lips to Yuuta's before Yuuta could say anything else.

Yuuta's eyes looked the size of saucers when Atobe pulled away a moment later.

"I…"

"I had a good time tonight," Atobe said, letting go of Yuuta's tie and wondering if those wrinkles would have to be ironed out. "You're free on the weekend, aren't you?"

"Er… I think so…" Yuuta blurted out. "But I-"

"Well," Atobe cut him off quickly, "I'll see you then."

Yuuta stood still, his mind completely blank for a good five minutes even after he'd heard Atobe's "good night" and seen the black vehicle drive off.

Atobe was so… Atobe was…

He glanced behind him, seeing the rows of lit dormitory windows and the people moving around in the rooms behind them. He wanted to tell himself that Atobe was either crazy or stupid. Anyone could have seen them.

Yet… He couldn't help but look forward to the weekend and hope that maybe, Atobe would be crazy enough to do that again.

.tbc.