Notes: I wrote this a while ago on Tumblr, and just now decided to post it up on FF.N. This takes place when Yuugi and Jounouchi are in their mid-twenties or so, after they've already established their romantic relationship. Thus the use of Jounouchi's given name, because Yuugi would make the switch once their relationship shifts.
Just as it Should Be
It's when he's out running errands one day—after he's finished paying their electric bill, and when he's thinking about texting Katsuya to see what he wants to have for dinner—that he realizes that all of this . . . could have easily not happened.
The thought hits Yuugi suddenly, like a piano being dropped on him. It's so sudden, but so painful, even though no one around him notices because he's just standing in the middle of the sidewalk looking at a movie poster. It's for a horror movie, based around a serial killer that was active nearly ten years ago—Chopperman. It's funny, Yuugi thinks, because Chopperman was never caught and was actually killed deep in the basement of Kaiba Land, but the costume artists for the movie did a surprisingly accurate job anyway. Chopperman's face leers at Yuugi from the poster, and as if his blood and muscles have turned to ice, Yuugi feels paralyzed as he suddenly remembers what it was like to be in the basement of "murder mansion": the dank smell of dust and mildew, the chill that made his skin feel clammy, the sound of the oil sloshing and the guttural laughter of the serial killer that had tried—and failed—to murder Yuugi's best friend, the person he loves most in the world.
But he failed. Chopperman failed, and Jounouchi Katsuya made it out of that room alive, his nice shoes coated with oil and his wrist a bit red from where the cuff had chafed it, but otherwise unharmed.
But as Yuugi continues on his way, his heart still fluttering like a nervous hummingbird in his chest, he realizes that Death-T was not the only time he nearly lost Katsuya for good. There was the time Katsuya was tortured with stun guns by Hirutani and his gang, and ended up hospitalized for two months. He still has the scars from that, little marks of puckered flesh that don't seem to bother him very much, but that hurt Yuugi every time he sees them. But Katsuya hadn't even been out of the hospital for two full weeks before a possessed Professor Yoshimori tried to strangle him, and then tried to drag him down off the side of the building as he tried to save Anzu. Katsuya could have easily been hurt or even killed then, particularly if he'd slipped and fallen. He was lucky that it had all worked out.
Hirutani had come back, too, with the yo-yos and his insistence that Katsuya join his gang again, and his willingness to throw glass, actual shards of glass into Katsuya's eyes to win the fight. Katsuya always insisted that Yuugi was in more danger than he had been ("You were hanged, Yuugi, you could have died—") but Yuugi knows, even though he still doesn't know the full history behind all of that, that Hirutani was far more of a threat to Katsuya than he ever was to Yuugi. Had Yuugi left, Hirutani probably wouldn't have pursued him, but he would have forced Katsuya to stay. And though Yuugi doesn't know all of the grisly details, he knows enough to know that even if Katsuya hadn't died, he still would have been suffering, and Yuugi would have never seen him again.
The thought of what could have happened makes Yuugi feel a little sick, even though it shouldn't matter, because it didn't happen.
But it could have, and that's what bothers him. That horrible, awful life could have been one Katsuya was forced to live, had things gone a little differently. Or even if it wasn't that—even if it wasn't Hirutani, what about the fire at the Black Crown? Katsuya had stayed behind to pull Yuugi out of it, because Yuugi—no, he corrects himself, he was thinking. He was thinking about the Millennium Puzzle, about Atem. But he wasn't thinking about himself, or about Katsuya, and Katsuya could have died there, too. He could have died, and if he would have, that would have been Yuugi's fault.
(Of course, Yuugi will admit that he could just as easily have died, but it doesn't feel that way—the thought that he could have died doesn't feel real. Not since Katsuya was there, willing to pull him out at any cost. Besides, it's far easier to think of all the times his own life was at risk than it is to consider the times Katsuya's was. Somehow, his own life being in danger doesn't feel as terrifying, not when he always knew that things would work out, and that even if they didn't at least he was doing the right thing. But the idea of losing Katsuya like that, of—)
Then there was Battle City. There was the duel at the pier, where Malik forced them to fight and they were both dragged into the ocean by the anchor, and Katsuya saved Yuugi but left his own key back up on the dock. There was Katsuya being struck by lightning during his duel with Rishid, there was Katsuya taking a full frontal assault by the Sun God Ra during a Shadow Game and collapsing, his heart stopping, not breathing—
But he'd survived. He'd survived all of that, and then some. He was poisoned by Mokuba once. Another time he fought with the blade of a knife in his mouth (though Yuugi only found out about that one later). In middle school he was in all sorts of fights with Hirutani's gang. He'd thrown himself right on top of trained assassins during the laser tag fight in Death-T, and had they not been so caught off-guard, he could have easily been shot and killed. He'd leaped off the boat on the way to Duelist Kingdom after the Exodia cards, and if the water had been a little more rough or the current a little more strong, he would have drowned.
Time and time again, Yuugi thinks, he came so close to losing Katsuya forever. In most cases, he didn't even really think about it at the time. Once the danger had passed, and Katsuya was safe, that was enough for him. He had never realized before that it was yet another instance on top of many, that Katsuya was surely running short on his nine lives now, if he hadn't already used them all up. That from putting his foot in a shoe that reportedly held a scorpion inside to walking into a room to face a serial killer with his head held high and his shoulders back, Katsuya was alarmingly reckless with his own life, and if things had gone a different way . . . if he wasn't so fast, so strong, so lucky . . . he might have well and truly died, and Yuugi would be living without him right now.
The realization is enough so that, when he gets home and sees Katsuya sitting on the couch playing a video game—when he looks up and sees Katsuya greet him with a smile—he kicks off his shoes by the door and immediately crosses the room to all but throw himself onto Katsuya's lap, his arms wrapped tight, holding him tightly because he's so grateful that he can. So relieved, and so, so, so grateful.
"Hey, whoa," Katsuya says, because he's caught by surprise at how suddenly Yuugi hugged him, but his surprise only makes Yuugi hold him tighter. Katsuya pauses his game and sets the controller to the side before he gently returns Yuugi's embrace. "Is everything—?"
"I love you," Yuugi says, but his voice is muffled because he says it more into the crook of Katsuya's neck than anything else. He can feel Katsuya breathing, can feel the beat of Katsuya's heart against his own chest, steady and strong. He plants a small kiss at the base of Katsuya's neck and breathes in his scent: ocean scented body wash, and the "fresh spring" laundry detergent that still made him laugh whenever he remembered Katsuya's rant about what did "fresh spring" even mean, how did seasons smell like anything?
"Yeah, I love you, too," Katsuya says, and he sounds bemused but his voice is warm. "Is everything okay?"
"Yeah," Yuugi says. "I'm just . . . really glad you're here." And alive, and okay, and safe.
"Me too," Katsuya says, and he laughs a little before his tone gets more serious. "But seriously, Yuugi, what's going on? Did something happen?"
"No, not really." Yuugi pulls back to look Katsuya in the eyes, but he keeps his arms around Katsuya's neck. Katsuya is giving him a little smile, but there's concern in his eyes, too. "Not recently, anyway. It's just been kind of a weird day."
"Huh." There's something in Katsuya's expression that suggests he wants to question this, but he seems to decide against it, because in the next second his typical crooked grin splits his cheeks and he says, "Well, given how weird you're being, I'd believe it."
"I'm not weird!" Yuugi says, but it's hard to sound offended when he's starting to laugh and smile himself—because Katsuya is here, safe and sound, and well enough to tease him like this, to smile at him like this, and the appreciation Yuugi has for that fact in this moment makes him feel a little giddy. "Not any weirder than you, anyway."
"Yeah okay, whatever you say, weirdo," Katsuya says, and it's such a ridiculous "comeback" that Yuugi laughs outright. "Considering you've decided to stick with me anyway, I think that makes you the weirdest one of the two of us."
Yuugi's still trying to choke back his laughter, and as he does so he leans forward so that their foreheads bump together. Katsuya's eyes are a warm, honey brown color, and up close like this Yuugi thinks he can see little specks of gold in them.
Katsuya's still smiling, too, but after a second his expression becomes more thoughtful, more concerned again and he says, "Are you sure everything's—?"
Yuugi catches him mid-sentence with a kiss, quick and light at first, though he makes the second one slower, makes it softer. Makes it last a little longer so he can savor the feel of Katsuya's lips—warm yet chapped from the autumn wind, because he was always losing his chapstick—beneath his own. Katsuya is alive and here and safe, and they are together, and considering that, everything is just as it should be.
"Yep," Yuugi says in answer to Katsuya's unfinished question when he pulls back. Jounouchi beams at him, and Yuugi returns it before he clambers off Katsuya's lap to head toward the kitchen. "Come on, let's figure out what we're going to make for dinner."