Chapter 2

Three years before….

It was stupid. Laughable, ridiculous, and probably the dumbest mistake he would ever make in his life, but with his breath racing and blood pumping hot from the grueling one-on-one duels against his ferocious equal that had lasted hours, Kagami wasn't exactly thinking straight. He just didn't want the glorious afternoon to end, didn't want to stop feeling like he was on top of the world, didn't want to stop looking into those blazing blue eyes that made him feel aggravated and excited at the same time.

And so, he didn't take time to sort his words before he blurted out the first thing to come to mind, stopping Aomine as he was gathering his things to leave.

"Do you want to go out with me?" He wanted to hit his head against the concrete as soon as the impulsive question was out, knowing his words had gotten tangled and it would be misinterpreted.

Aomine sputtered something and whirled around to look at him like he'd sprouted a second head.

"Wh-what?" he stammered, anger and incredulity already contorting his sweating face.

"To eat!" Kagami amended frantically, sure he was turning some hilarious shade of red or purple as he struggled to get the words out, "Out to eat, I meant, Jesus…"

Aomine blinked, and then took a step back, looking like he was sizing him up warily. "What for?"

Trying to smooth over the disastrous slip-up, Kagami picked his words hesitantly, "Food? I'm hungry, I thought you would be too. I just...th-that is...I meant we could just grab something at the Maji, of c-course I didn't mean it like -"

"Sure," Aomine muttered noncommittally, apparently deciding to rescue him before he could make more of a fool of himself, slinging his bag over his shoulder, "You're paying, Bakagami."

That was fast… Kagami thought, swallowing with relief that his blunder hadn't irrevocably repulsed his rival and friend, and that he'd seemed to understand it was just an accident. No way I'd mean it the way it sounded...

Shaking his head in exasperation at his own idiocy, he grabbed his bag and the basketball they'd been using and followed Aomine, who'd already left the street court in the direction of the restaurant in question, whistling with his hands in his pockets.

.

.

"You know, it's times like these that I truly believe you're American," Aomine said, equal measures of mocking and genuine astonishment in his voice, as Kagami scarfed down his eleventh burger with the usual zeal.

Their routine of playing ball to exhaustion before getting dinner at Maji Burger had perpetuated for about two weeks, and during that stretch of time they had grown more comfortable in each other's presence, lightly poking and teasing back and forth on a regular basis. Sometimes Kagami believed Aomine was under the impression his name was in fact "moron", with the occasional affectionate "asshole" or some other variation thrown in just for kicks.

"Wot cunni say," Kagami got out around the food in his mouth, the words distorted by his bulging cheeks, he gave a tremendous swallow and continued, "I burn a lot of calories."

His rival chuckled and peeled the wrapper of his mere second teriyaki burger, "So do I, but I sure don't eat like that. You look like a fucking squirrel."

"So I've been told," Kagami shrugged, starting on yet another burger, to bring his count to an even dozen, shooting his friend a sly smirk, "Maybe you should take notes; get some meat on those bones."

Aomine gaped, looking both affronted and amused at once, and raised one long, tan arm, flexing his prominent bicep muscle with a confident leer, "Are you kidding me?"

Burger gripped between his teeth, Kagami applauded the show teasingly, though he had felt a pulse of admiration, being reminded of the athletic perfection of the player before him. At least...he was pretty sure it was admiration; respect didn't generally make one's stomach twist in knots, did it? Maybe Aomine was right and he was eating too much.

"Besides, if a normal person ate like you, they'd get obese," the dark man went on, taking a delicate bite of his own food, counteracted by him speaking with his mouth full, "You've just got superhuman abilities and a black hole for a stomach."

Kagami set down his burger, chasing a stray drop of ketchup at the side of his mouth with his tongue and shrugging again, "Maybe so...mostly I just really like food."

He could feel Aomine's eyes focused intently on him, even as his own gaze dropped to his meal, and, curious, he glanced up. Clearing his throat, his rival pointedly looked away as if he hadn't been staring, for reasons unknown to Kagami, taking a much larger, faster bite from his teriyaki sandwich...and then promptly choking on it as he tried to swallow.

Kagami watched him attempt to cough and hack to dislodge the obstruction in his throat, but then it hit him that he wasn't succeeding, color flooding his face. Leaping to his feet, he quickly moved over to the other side of the table, hooking his arms around Aomine's midsection and sharply compressing his solar plexus once, twice, before the soggy projectile flew from his mouth, across the room, plunking right into some gentleman's glass of water.

"Huh," Kagami mused as Aomine fought for air, observing the man's mortified reaction, "Even when you're choking, you've got perfect aim."

He got a painful blow from Aomine's elbow to his stomach for the remark, "Sh-shut up, dumbass…"

Wincing from the impact, it occurred to him that he hadn't moved his hands from their position wrapped around his rival, and he dazedly wondered if the red staining Aomine's cheeks was from embarrassment as well as asphyxiation. He slowly took note that Aomine was very warm by nature, the muscles of his stomach hard and compact against his knuckles…

"Let go." he blinked at the impatient, almost unnerved command - it dawned on him that his hesitation might have made Aomine nervous; being in such a vulnerable position - and hastened to obey, hands scrambling away as he backed off. Why had it taken him so long to do that in the first place?

"What happened?" he asked after a moment, returning to his booth on the other side of the table and folding his arms against the edge.

"...N-nothing, just...went down the wrong pipe." His friend still seemed terribly flustered, flushing and fidgeting, despite recovering his breath and giving the simple answer.

"Well, you should be careful you don't hurt yourself," Kagami teased, trying to gloss over the moment and lighten the strangely tense mood.

To his surprise, Aomine's flush only darkened at his statement, and he found himself thinking absurdly that red was a nice color against his bronze skin. Where had that come from? Great, now I'm blushing…

A long, awkward silence fell, the food that was still on the table forgotten and growing cold with each passing minute, not that either party particularly noticed.

"Um...it's getting late," Kagami mumbled eventually, acknowledging that he'd folded his napkin into just about every contortion possible, and it was now a wrinkled mess.

"Yeah," Aomine nodded, a little too quickly, getting to his feet, "See you tomorrow."

"See you," Kagami replied, the words hardly out of his mouth before Aomine turned and left, seeming an awful lot like he was fleeing. Is he that embarrassed? Sure, he'd been undignified for a moment, and had needed assistance, but everyone did at some point, didn't they? Must be his strength thing...not relying on other people for anything.

Somehow, he felt like there was a piece he was missing, but though he stayed for several minutes longer, and put his critical thinking through its paces until his head started to hurt, he couldn't imagine what.

.

.

They met up the next day as planned, played a few matches, ate at the Maji, and headed home as usual. At first it had been uncomfortable, and words were sparing...that weird, inexplicably tense atmosphere was back almost as soon as they laid eyes on each other… But once the ball hit the pavement and they started to play, everything else melted away, and both of them relaxed and just let loose, as exuberant and intense as always as they raced back and forth across the court, shoving and dodging and flinging vicious shots at their respective hoops. Then, exhausted almost to the point of collapse, they'd traipsed to Maji Burger and devoured as many helpings as they could eat, before calling it a day and bidding one another farewell. It only hit Kagami hours later, when he was lying in bed, that there had been almost none of the usual banter, and he'd maybe said a round dozen words to his rival in total over the course of the afternoon.

It went on like this for several days, but it was only a matter of time before the stretching tension between them snapped.

Panting heavily, sweating to the very roots of his hair, Kagami admitted defeat at the end of their fifth match; bringing his total wins to only one, versus Aomine's four. His rival was unrelenting and downright savage today, seizing the ball at every opportunity and all but trampling Kagami under his feet as he slammed it in again and again. The ferocity was startling, and if he didn't know better, Kagami would be wondering if Aomine was in the Zone; his focus blotted out everything else, and without sparing breath for taunting or strategizing, he'd simply crushed whatever was in his path without mercy or pause. Kagami had scraped a single victory, but he was lucky to have gotten that much, and the burning exhaustion that was settling on him now was like that of a real, all-or-nothing game.

His legs were shaking alarmingly, and staggering a few steps, he braced a hand against the chain link fence bordering the court, gasping for breath and dazedly glancing at his opponent. Aomine, standing a few feet away, was likewise hampered; hands braced against his knees, heaving for air as though he would run out of it at any moment. Wiping sweat out of his eyes, he stood straight and approached Kagami unsteadily, falling against the fence beside him and gripping the metal links to keep himself standing. It was surprising; Kagami didn't think he'd ever seen him quite this wiped out, and he was about to comment on it when Aomine cut him off.

"It's...no use," he managed, looking at Kagami with glittering eyes, "I can't get you out of my fucking head…"

That brought Kagami up short, and his mouth dropped open as he searched for words that had deserted him, at a loss. Aomine didn't miss a beat, lunging and harshly covering his lips with his own, grappling, sucking, and all but eating them whole. Taken aback, Kagami forgot to protest, forgot to push his rival away...and just about forgot his own name. He did register that - though it was shocking and definitely unexpected - somehow it felt right, so he shoved the budding questions and concerns aside for now and let Aomine do what he liked.

When Aomine finally broke away, it was to gulp several starved, desperate breaths, but Kagami took the opportunity to try to speak.

Try being the operative word. "Wait, wh...what did you…? Why did…?" Obviously, that wasn't getting him anywhere, so he tried to pick just one question and at least manage to get that out. "What did...you mean back there?"

To his surprise, Aomine gave a shaky chuckle, and when he looked at his rival, he could see a wide grin spreading across his face, much as he tried to conceal it by lowering his head.

"Just perfect, of course...of course it's you; how ironic," the darker man said, the words spilling over each other, as if he wasn't aware of what he was saying. He glanced up and met Kagami's gaze, his own a little pleasure-hazed and, contrastingly, a little shell-shocked, "Do you have any idea how long I've been agonizing over it? Must have passed right by at least five totally hot chicks without a second glance, and even Mai-chan hasn't been…" he broke off, and if Kagami hadn't been blushing before, he certainly was now.

"You've been driving me fucking crazy," Aomine concluded matter-of-factly, "Ever since that day at the Maji."

Once again, Kagami came up empty-handed when he tried to articulate, "Wh-what…?"

Shaking his head with exasperation, Aomine's grin slid into a smirk, "Just shut up and kiss me, you moron."

.

.

And just like that, they were dating. It took Kagami by complete surprise, but when he thought about it, he probably should have seen it coming a mile away. And honestly, he had no complaints; when Aomine had kissed him on the street court, something intangible had clunked into place, and the conflict and tension had simply fizzled out, replaced by a roaring fire of want. He wanted to be close to Aomine, to kiss him until he couldn't breathe anymore and play more brutal, exhausting matches against him, but there was one little problem...he had no idea how he was supposed to initiate that.

So while he was scratching his head wondering how the hell he was going to bring it up, Aomine was quick to snatch up the reins, and showed him precisely how it was done...namely, taking what he wanted when he wanted, if he was able. It wasn't as if he was forcing anything; Kagami was perfectly capable of shoving him away or otherwise stopping him, but he didn't see any reason to. Anyone with functional eyes would call Aomine an attractive package, and while he wasn't quite accustomed to the idea of finding masculine angles attractive instead of feminine curves, he wasn't particularly bothered.

Alright, that was an understatement. Aomine would be able to tell a different tale, judging by how he got Kagami's knees to go weak when he kissed him; got him to lean into his scorching touch, when his nimble fingers traced his cheek or jaw. There was no denying that Kagami wanted him...with a startling, preoccupying kind of want that hit him full-force at the most inappropriate of times. And as soon as Aomine realized how deeply he had him hooked, of course he started to hold it over his head.

"See something you like, Bakagami?" he taunted, tracing his lower lip with his tongue; flaming, half-lidded eyes a seductress that Kagami felt pulling him, all the way up from his toes. His mind went fuzzy, and he felt the basketball leaving his hand bounce abruptly off his shoe and ricochet in a random direction, crashing violently into the chain link fence before thudding to the ground and rolling away. Both of them just looked over at the fallen object with mild surprise, neither making a move to go after it...Aomine had never inhibited his concentration quite that badly before. Dribbling was second nature, and he could do it easily without looking at or thinking about it; he hadn't misplaced a ball like that since he was an inexperienced little kid.

"Well shit, I'll take that as a yes," Aomine snickered, motioning with a hand, "Come here."

Eager to comply, Kagami shot forward and latched onto that sinful, grinning mouth, pressing between his lips with his tongue and edging closer to him. In the week or so since they'd started dating, his confidence had taken an upswing, and he didn't feel so awkward instigating this kind of contact anymore, and could in fact be just as demanding as his rival, just as ravenous for touch and taste.

He ground his mouth against Aomine's, tongues wrestling, teeth scraping, as he was pinned against the fence, Aomine's hands at his waist. His own fingers roamed from his shoulders down his lean, strong arms, but suddenly, Aomine jerked away as if he'd been burned, breaking the kiss unceremoniously and taking one or two steps back.

Disoriented, it took him a moment to comprehend what had happened, and he gave his rival a quizzical look, closing the distance between them again. Aomine's gaze was averted, darting to the fence and the ground and anything but Kagami's face, and Kagami caught a glimpse of sweat pricking his forehead...something seemed off.

"What's wrong?" he decided to ask straight out.

"Nothing," Aomine responded immediately, compulsively gripping his left arm with his right hand. This turned out to be a mistake, as Kagami's hand quickly reached out and grabbed him by the wrist, pulling him over and examining closely. Appearing to recognize defeat, Aomine reluctantly lowered his hand, and Kagami's eyes landed immediately on what he'd been trying to conceal. The taut, vulnerable skin of his inner elbow was slightly reddened and swollen, the veins seeming to stand out more than they should have, and he thought he might have glimpsed a few darker indentations...puncture marks. There was something unnatural about it, something forced and harmful that made the back of Kagami's neck prickle with unease.

"What...is this?" his voice had dropped in volume, but something in his tone must have told Aomine he was dead serious, because he swallowed hard and extricated his arm from his grasp again.

"Just a rash," he lied, and it was plain to see that he was lying.

Kagami met his gaze with eyes like daggers. His mind was already piecing together the answer, and he didn't like it when it became clear. He wanted to ask a thousand more questions, but how long was at the top of the list.

He didn't think he would like the answer to that question either...if only because something so enormous had completely escaped his notice. How had he not noticed? Aomine hadn't even been doing anything to hide it; hadn't been wearing long sleeves or anything like that, and it had still taken actual physical contact with the area for Kagami to see it.

He didn't want to know anymore. Couldn't bear to know how long he'd been so blind. But right now it didn't hurt so much that Aomine was actively, deliberately destroying himself right in front of him, for whatever reason - and he couldn't even begin to think of why he would do this… It hurt more that his go-to response had been to lie right to his face.

TBC