As soon as they're down by the riverbank Yosuke sprawls out on the slightly overgrown grass, so Yu follows suit, letting his body sink into its softness. It seems unseasonably bright and warm for an early November afternoon, with no wind to carry chilliness from the river or whisk his words away at the wrong moment.

He doesn't even need a sweater.

Yu turns his face towards the autumn sun and tries to think of it as a good sign.

"You know," Yosuke says, unprompted. "A couple of months ago I wouldn't have been caught dead saying I missed this place."

Yu smiles at that. In the light of all they've been through so far, having spent what seems like months inside of a bizarre alternate dimension, the feeling is more than relatable. "And now?"

"Now, I'm glad to be home." Yosuke stretches while he says it, releasing a pleased sigh at the end. The sound tugs at Yu's attention for many reasons and, though he told himself he wouldn't look too much, he can't help himself.

He sits back up and, angling himself toward Yosuke just so, hugs a knee to his chest to rest upon. Yu's gaze sweeps over the length of the brunet's body, lingering on his midriff and the strip of bare skin there.

The distance between them is so short; he could trace the circle of Yosuke's navel, or maybe brush a thumb over the jut of his hip bone. He could hook his fingers through a belt loop, pull gently, and bring him in close. Close enough that their noses would touch and that his vision would blur. Close enough that the aim of his lips wouldn't miss.

God.

He wants to reach over and touch him so much. Anything. Anywhere. Any touch would do.

Briefly clenching his fist, Yu pushes himself to look elsewhere. He chooses the sky again.

"Me too," he agrees belatedly. Or at least it feels that way – he's barely kept his head above the rising tide of his emotions lately and, like he's already living underwater, everything is skewed.

Graciously, a natural lull in their conversation serves Yu the perfect opportunity, though he almost lets it pass him by. Yosuke is on his side now, facing him, with his eyes closed and his head pillowed on his arm. Soft and serene in his relaxation, Yu is loath to disturb him but he reminds himself – he's gotta get this water out of his lungs.

He needs to be able to breathe again, no matter how the day turns out.

"Yosuke," Yu calls gently and, with an internal sigh, realizes that he even enjoys the way the other boy's name feels on his tongue.

"Mmm?"

Yosuke's response is a sleepy, barely-there acknowledgement, born of being the kind of person that can snooze anywhere if the ambience is right. If he's safe. And just like everything else about him right now, Yu finds that little habit painfully adorable.

"Can I…" Yu begins slowly. Uncharacteristically nervous and resisting the drive to bite his lip, he rubs the inside of his wrist with his thumb instead. Vigorously. "Can l tell you something? And, um, can you sit up for it?"

"Huh? Yeah, of course, partner," the brunet responds, yawning. He blinks a few times as he pulls himself upright and crosses his legs. Then, as brightly as ever, he puts all his focus forward. "What's up?"

Yu's stomach somersaults familiarly. The warm weight of Yosuke's full attention never fails to set his heart to galloping, though, this time, he doesn't bother trying to rein it in. Thus he hardly hears his own voice over the beat when he says, "I wanted to tell you that I love you."

But either Yu's voice is holding steadier than he anticipated or Yosuke doesn't notice the tremor, because he simply gifts the platinum-haired boy with an easygoing grin and one of those ambiguously flirty winks he's gotten so, so good at.

"Dude, that's it? I'm your best friend, of course you love me."

Nononono–

Shit. Shit. He said it wrong.

Tucking away the panicky annoyance at his own oversight, Yu amends quickly, "In love with."

"In love with?" the brunet echoes back. After a moment, his brow furrows and he folds his arms over his chest. "I'm not following."

A small, anguished part of Yu screams. It'd be so much easier if this was like the movies, where he could grab the other boy, stare deep in his eyes, and Yosuke would just know. He'd know and Yu wouldn't have to say anything at all.

Why can't it be that easy?

"You. I'm in love with you, Yosuke. That's… that's what I'm trying to say."

Falling quiet, Yu stares at his lap; at his quaking hands.

He's afraid.

He's genuinely, honest-to-god afraid of the look that might be on Yosuke's face now. Of what he'll say. And the longer the silence between them stretches, the harder fear grips.

He wonders if it shows.

Finally, Yosuke sighs. It sounds bone-deep. "You know I'm not really like that, right? Seriously, Yu, is this another one of your pranks?"

Yu's head snaps up. Yosuke's pinching the bridge of his nose as if fighting back a headache.

Oh. Oh no. He thinks he's kidding.

Yu's heart plummets into his stomach and his stomach into his feet. The grass beneath him should be crimson with how it feels like he's bleeding out. Still, he presses forward; if anything, he can't waste the courage he's spent all this time gathering.

"No, it's– I–" he stumbles and stops, much to his renewed frustration.

Straightening his back, inhaling through his nose, he digs deep for the steely resolve that's helped him stare down death. Then, in a desperate whoosh, he lets it all go.

"I think you're amazing, Yosuke. I think you're amazing and hot and funny and, yeah, sometimes you're a bit clumsy and you drop sharp things and you say the wrong thing but–"

Yosuke's eyebrows go up.

"–but I like that too. It's never really been the wrong thing to me. I love you. I mean it."

Yu's throat tightens again near the end and the last little bit comes out as a whisper.

Somehow a crushing pressure remains, even with his feelings out in the open and off his chest. Yet that pressure might be the only thing keeping him here on the planet while Yosuke stares at him with the blankest expression he's ever witnessed.

Despite that blankness, though, or maybe because of it, Yu can see the wheels turning in the brunet's mind. Processing new information. In the meantime, Yosuke's extended silence crawls up his spine like an army of ants.

Eventually, tackling Yu's gaze head-on, Yosuke says, "You're not joking."

And it's with such little inflection that Yu can't tell what emotion lies behind the words. He can't tell anything about how Yosuke is feeling right now, and that, too, terrifies him.

Dejectedly, Yu shakes his head in answer and Yosuke counters immediately; warily. "So nobody put you up to this?"

"What? No," comes Yu's plaintive, defensive, wide-eyed, knee-jerk response. Certainly, a death by a thousand paper cuts would hurt less than this, than being accused of faking for someone else's amusement. "It's just–"

Abruptly, mid-sentence, Yu pauses, and under his breath, he repeats Yosuke's question back to himself.

Now it's his turn to be confused. "Wait, why are you asking me that?"

With a nervous laugh, the emptiness on Yosuke's face fades away, overtaken by the familiar, unguarded expressiveness Yu is so fond of. As if a switch were flipped, he looks shy, embarrassed, and apologetic, with a rosiness blooming steadily across his cheeks. He glances at everything but the boy across from him, rubbing the back of his neck.

"I wasn't going to say anything. Ever," Yosuke murmurs. The emphasis on ever is as heavy as his blush, now up to his ears. "So…"

He scrubs a hand over his face and when it drops away to his lap, there's a small, even shyer smile left behind.

"...I'm glad you feel the same way."

For the length of time it takes for Yosuke's words to sink in, Yu sits in stunned speechlessness. He's overflowing with emotion – like a dozen rivers emptying into a pond – but he feels buoyed by the rush this time, cradled by the same waves that just raged.

Drained of doubt and dread, he isn't drowning anymore.

"Hey, Earth to Yu! Ground control to Major Tom!"

Yu hears Yosuke's light teasing and he blinks, becoming aware of the hand waving in front of his face. He vaguely recognizes the last part from a "classic" Western album the brunet made him listen to, so he (kinda) gets it.

He's only now noticing the persistent twinge in his knuckles, damning evidence of how tightly his fists were clenched, so he knows he spaced out there for a second.

But why wouldn't he hit the atmosphere? He feels lighter than air.

"Sorry," Yu says, lips quirking into a smile. "You just shocked me. In a good way."

More than a good way, he'd say, if anyone happened to ask. Because now that he's started, he can't stop smiling. He's excited. Exhilarated. So much so that he could shake apart from the strength of it, and it only intensifies when Yosuke goes on to coyly admit,

"I sorta shocked myself too, when I realized you were a different kind of special to me."

Yu remembers that day clearly. He had gone to bed that night hoping, even then, that special meant something more.

"But you weren't going to tell me?"

"No."

"Ever?"

"Never."

Ouch. Though he appreciates it, knowing that the brunet would have never made the first move troubles Yu enough to dim his gigawatt smile. Yosuke reacts to the shift as quickly as it appears, affectionately interrupting Yu's explosively sudden inner monologue

–if I didn't say anything? what if Yuki didn't say anything? what–

with "You're braver than me, partner, you know that. Always have been."

And there's a split-second between hearing and thinking where Yu fixes his mouth to protest that. As his partner, as his second-in-command, and purely as his friend, Yosuke has taken so many Mudos and Hamas for him that even the thought of counting them out is terrifying.

Then it clicks; he's not completely oblivious, after all. Yu can tell when someone's trying to soothe him. When Yosuke's trying to soothe him.

So he says thanks instead and, upon quickly scanning the area to find it empty, tips forward to peck the brunet on the cheek.

Instant giddiness swells behind Yu's ribs when Yosuke splutters and reddens all over again, almost cartoonishly failing to state a single, intelligible syllable in response.

God, he's wanted to do something spontaneous like that for ages .

Yu leans over and pecks again, on the other cheek, before Yosuke can recover. He finds the shorter boy's impression of a ripe tomato, as he slaps both hands over his cheeks, is positively TV Award-worthy.

"Partner," Yosuke whines, fidgety and flustered, and his tone is reminiscent of the joking falsetto Yu got from him at every stop of the Group Date Café.

It's too cute. It's too much.

He flops backward against the grass hard, as if critically hit, and laughs. It starts as a giggle and becomes a deep, relieved belly laugh that – while out of place for the situation – dissolves the final pressure in his chest.

They're gonna be okay.