I wouldn't fall for someone I thought couldn't misbehave
Hozier
"Okay. That one. Scale of one to twelve?"
Yamato doesn't look up. Knows better.
Taichi, meanwhile, has been ogling right along with her. They'd been playing this game since uni, or rather, since Mimi began visiting him at uni, the only one of their friends with the free time to make the trek at regular intervals, having elected to forgo postgraduate school herself while flitting between passion projects. Sora and Jou had been studying at either ends of the country then, and Koushiro had just begun making headway with his start-up, each of them on such different trajectories it might have been impressive how close they'd managed to remain if it weren't for the fact that the minute they reunited they lapsed back into being dumb teenagers, like some embarrassingly successful Pavlovian social experiment.
Case in point: Yamato can't be sure, but he continues to suspect that the shenanigans conducted on one of the first visits after that backpacking trip had resulted in the dare behind the dirtiest picture Taichi'd ever sent him, the time difference of Yamato's externship abroad such that he opened the text in the middle of a morning keynote lecture by a Nobel prize-winning astrophysicist, and made a sound so indecent the entire two-hundred-and-fifty person auditorium had turned to stare at him.
Several things had happened in very short succession after that: Yamato snapped at Sora to get her on-again girlfriend a job so she could stop goading his off-again boyfriend into doing juvenile shit ("Anything you're getting from him, I'm getting her version of," Sora'd countered, world-weary, "so hear me from experience when I tell you the illusion of choice was our first mistake."); immediately downloaded to his phone the best security app Koushiro could recommend ("Should work for your cloud-based devices, but he recently asked me how to send a fax, so I guess just be more diligent about all your incoming mail," Kou'd warned, unknowingly blessing Yamato with a fresh new anxiety.); blocked all of Mimi's accounts yet again ("You'll never escape my love!" sent by email mere minutes after the block from a new handle seemingly created for such a purpose, convincing him that for all her claims to pacifism, Mimi would make a very dangerous government counter agency asset if she put half the mind to it); tried in vain to dispatch Jou—then the closest one to Soumei's campus at still a day's travel—to go be the mature adult who will do something about the obnoxious duo before Yamato's career potential tanked even further ("I love you, so I'll be honest with you: I'm too scared to go near him when he's bored, and definitely not if the two of them are bored together. Please respect my privacy at this time."); and—after he'd gotten his pulse back to normal—texted Taichi as sternly as possible that if he ever pulled a stunt like that again, why, there would be consequences, mister. Taichi's reply had been immediate, setting his pulse right off again. so come put me in my place.
"Mm…eight?"
Taichi yawns and drops his head into Jou's lap, kicks his feet into Sora's. Spreads himself across the picnic blanket, taking up as much space as they'll give him without his asking. Not that he's ever asked. "Seven."
"What!" Mimi fists her small palms over her knees in frustration, always ready to stage a performance. This time, the only thing keeping her from launching into another drama is the gentle tug Yamato gives on the plait of her hair in his hands. It's the best fishtail braid he's practiced yet, but still not quite to his standards. Meant to host his niece for two weeks later in the summer, the longest he's ever minded her without either of her dads. He needs it to go well. "How is that a seven?"
"How is that not?"
"But the length! The girth! The width of—,"
"Exactly," and throws his arms open, making Jou sigh with resignation when Taichi's suddenly outstretched hand smacks the sandwich he'd been eating out of his own. Koushiro tears off half of his and offers it over, a wordless apology on behalf of his best friend, who hasn't noticed the exchange, or his fault in it. "You've got to imagine it in full flight, Mimi. You know that."
"I'm very uncomfortable with this conversation."
Mimi grumbles, "It's not a conversation, Jou—it's a game ," emphasizing the last word as though that should make him improve his opinion. (It did not.)
"About birdwatching," says Koushiro, explaining it further. Everyone turns to him, and he narrates the rules he'd discerned from observation, having joined in whenever his schedule permitted. Of them all, Koushiro had proven himself the most consistently patient with the undisciplined force that an unsupervised Mimi and Taichi were when at their most bored. Didn't even seem to mind all that much what pranks they pulled, just enjoying being with his friends on his rare days off. "You see a bird and guess the wingspan. Actually kind of fun. There's a lot of interesting migratory patterns at the moment, around here."
As the awkward silence begins to settle, Sora takes pity first. "It's a euphemism, Kou."
He frowns at her sitting across from him on the blanket. "Hm?"
Yamato's pity is less indirect. "So they can talk about penises in public."
Jou is choking, but no one's paying attention. Koushiro's devastation is almost palpable. "But we—no, but I've been, we've been birdwatching for years—?"
"I mean, we did see some cool birds when you played along, but I truly thought you knew it wasn't real birdwatching." Taichi sits up, offers a lopsided smile, trying not to laugh.
Mimi joins in on the reassurance, which is to say, she makes things worse. "And you always spot the best ones, Kou! Like, remember that water rail you saw following that really fit footballer in the light grey joggers?" Pauses to sigh, eyelashes fluttering languidly. "Just the idea of it. I don't think my panties have been dry since."
Taichi finally reaches around to thump Jou on the back, which only appears to make the coughing worse. Koushiro stares blankly at Sora, rudderless.
"She means her straight girl panties," says Sora, intended as a helpful clarification (it was not), and with the kind of unbothered dismissal that could only have been built up by time-tested tolerance. Yamato is very familiar with such lessons of patience. They exchange a look of mutually assured sympathy. "And as objectifying as it is, it's harmless so long as they keep the commentary to themselves."
Jou finally finds his voice, a hand clutching at the front collar of his shirt in lieu of pearls. "How is that harmless? You're—Taichi, you're a public figure—,"
(Hurt by this singling out, Mimi whips her head towards him, completely ruining the start of the next braid on Yamato's to-practice list. "So, what, my reputation isn't important enough to ruin?")
"I am great at compartmentalizing," says Taichi. Picks up the part of the sandwich half Jou'd spit out during his coughing fit and scarfs it down before a horrified Sora can intervene. Mimi stops her complaining long enough to pinch Koushiro's thigh, concerned by his utterly still posture, making sure he's not gone into shock. This causes an involuntary muscle spasm, and Koushiro's foot hits Jou square in the lower back, upturning tubs of assorted cut fruit and handheld pastries and chocolate fudge squares, as Mimi wails in dismay and Jou howls in pain and Koushiro scrambles to help and Taichi starts crawling about sucking up the spilled food with his mouth until Sora lunges to grab him by the ankle and haul him away from the strawberry that'd rolled into an ant pile.
Observing the chaotic scene without once moving from his corner of the picnic blanket, Yamato wonders whether their learned codependence shouldn't be the subject of a scientific study. Hasn't got much proof, but he's certain his brother's friends don't regress around each other like this, though they had been earlier to settle down in general, more emotionally grounded overall, perhaps. Miyako and Ken had tied it up her last year of college; Iori did the same at his turn, too. From secondary school onwards, Hikari had always had a steady boyfriend in uninterrupted rotation, and Daisuke and Takeru, who found marriage to be worth neither the paperwork nor the fuss, had been doing a lot better recently. Yamato looks back at his handwritten list of popular hairstyles, chewing his lip. He really needs this to go well.
"It's not about compartments," manages Jou through a wince, motioning for a guilty-faced Koushiro to forgive himself already. "You don't get compartments anymore."
"Why've they given me an office with windows, then?"
"That's not—what?"
"What?" Taichi turns onto his stomach, one of Sora's legs thrown over the backs of his knees to hold him down until Mimi and Koushiro have finished cleaning up the spoiled picnic. "I've gone from a cubicle to an office now. More compartments." Mimes stacking and unstacking a nesting doll. "Soon I'll be at least half the year at mission headquarters."
"In New York?" Sora hides her surprise poorly. She looks at Yamato, who continues studying his list.
"Is that why we're here?" Now Jou's looking at him, too—or, rather, looking like he's about to hear Yamato and Taichi tell him that their split is absolutely not your fault, kiddo, so just know how much we love you, before going into the details of the weekend and holiday custody agreement.
"If I can keep compartmentalizing." Says all this neither as a boast nor a complaint, which makes Sora mask her reaction behind a frown. Yamato puts the list down, which is when Mimi remembers her promise. Scuttles back in front of him, cross-legged, combing through her hair with her fingers.
"I don't think you're using that word right," says Jou.
Taichi rolls his eyes. "You want the office with the windows, you learn to separate the personal and the professional."
"Your problem is you think that's possible." Sora lifts her foot off him enough to sit up again. Cross-legged now, too. Jou turns as well, and they find themselves in a circle, no one left outside, or behind.
"All sorts of things become impossible in my field." Taichi's still speaking, smooth drawl. Only Sora, Koushiro, and Yamato seem to know what kind of tell it is, when he doesn't stop talking. "I just shield all of you from it. Hence, the compartments."
Koushiro is silent, and Sora's frown deepens, their radiating disapproval powerful enough that Jou knows better than to compliment Taichi's efforts to expand his conjunctive vocabulary. Her stare is fixed on Yamato, so he speaks up. "You all know what they're like." Refuses to use their stupid name. Mimi flinches, as though he had. Sora's face drops at once.
Jou ventures, hesitant, the first to break the silence, "Miyako said a couple of them came back to Hiroaki's bar," like they didn't all already know this. They'd been among the first to know, but they also hadn't talked about it, not really. Another difference between them and his brother's friends, Yamato guesses.
Had witnessed this difference firsthand, sat at Takeru's kitchen table the same afternoon the assault had happened, his niece and Miyako and Ken's oldest next to him coloring in the poor approximations of an airplane he'd drawn on the back of the two speeding tickets he'd gotten on the way over, dropping everything the minute Ken'd called him from the precinct. Iori was sitting with a very pregnant Miyako on the couch, her swollen ankles raised onto the throw pillows Daisuke'd paused to prop up for her before going back to pacing agitated circles around the room, while Ken followed in close step, pulling every object Daisuke picked up out of his hand and tucking it back out of throwing range. Takeru and Hikari at the ER, with his father. Fourteen stitches to pull Hiroaki's left eyebrow back together, and the police had taken the brick that had shattered the bar window for evidence. Takeru not burying the frustration in his voice when he'd reported that their father had refused a babysitter, as he called it, so Yamato had told his brother to just take Hiroaki directly home and they'd sort it later. Had stayed this long to wait for Takeru's return, devise a casual check-up plan, split up the shifts until Yamato would have to leave for his next research mission.
Daisuke was arguing in response to something Miyako had finished saying. "No, it's the intolerance."
"People fear what they don't understand."
"Bullshit," not bothering to censor his language. "That's a conservative dog whistle and you know it, Hida."
Ken then reminded him, "I didn't understand, so I was afraid. I hurt a lot of Digimon, and a lot of people, because I didn't."
Daisuke'd turned to his best friend with a fearsome expression, hands fists at his sides. "For the last fucking time, stop fucking comparing yourself to the bastards!"
"Daddy!" The piercing squeal nearly had Yamato jumping out of his chair, her friend looking on in wide eyed shock, tiny palms pressed over her little ears to save her innocence. "That's three bad words!"
Already striding to the kitchen, wresting off the lid to a ceramic Chibimon cookie jar Mimi had made during her pottery passion project phase, smacking three of his famous miso toffee shortbread rounds onto the table. "I know. Daddy's sorry, sweetheart." Slapped down two more, preemptive apologies. "That's good counting, though. Daddy's really fucking proud of you."
"Absolutely not!" Miyako's voice interrupting the girls' scandalized giggles. "That's way too much sugar before dinner—,"
"It's sugar and butter," sneered Daisuke in his most insufferable shows what you know tone. Stuffed one in his own mouth, offered another to Yamato, who'd shaken his head. Hadn't paying attention when he'd handed the cookie to him, though, leaving Yamato to scramble to catch it when he let go without looking. Clutching at the ceramic jar in his arms as he walked back over to the living room, stopped in front of the flat's entrance, staring at the door. "Things were supposed to be getting better."
"That depends on how you were looking at things." Iori's voice kind, if somber. Had seen a lot in his law practice, and heard of worse. "They've just been getting bolder, but they've always been around. Escalated from sending hate mail to vandalizing my wife's volunteer legal aid clinic twice last month."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Ken paused long enough in the surprisingly difficult task of prying the cookie jar from Daisuke's ironclad hold to look over at Iori, who smiled in appreciation.
"We're all right now. It was scary, but we both have recourse for counseling support if we need it." Miyako patted his shoulder, squeezing a little. "I think I'd just prefer not having to need such a specific benefit as part of the job."
"Good luck." It started as a growl, but Daisuke's shoulders had sunk too low. "At this rate, it's a wonder Taichi ever gets to come home. Sorry." This directed vaguely in Yamato's direction, still staring at the door. Used to him, and aware he was within earshot of the girls if he did retort, Yamato hadn't even bristled, but found himself fully taken aback when the others all looked over at him at the same time.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Miyako asked him, tender with her sincerity at the right moments.
Yamato had meant to say everything would be fine, they were fine, his father would be fine, Takeru would be fine, Taichi would be fine. Froze up instead. He could feel it crawling up his throat, needing to answer her, have someone else know what all of this was doing to him. Feels it slithering back now, too, Taichi looking at him from the other side of the picnic blanket, smiling at Yamato when their eyes meet.
"He's fine." Remembers the curt voice note his father had sent him after catching his sons switching off watch duty a couple weeks into the unsubtle scheme. Hiroaki still had a scar over his dulled left eye. Walked slower than before, more cautious, the localized damage to his sight likely permanent. Told his boys he'd been through an entire lifetime before either of them had come along, proof that this was nothing. Hadn't become a journalist to make friends. A small price, Yamato , he'd said to him, in the voice note. Because we're going to win this fight, for both our worlds. Tell Taichi not to stop. Yamato rubs his face, an excuse to pinch the bridge of his nose, stay the well of feeling. When he opens his eyes again, Taichi's still looking at him. "It's not as bad as we thought, at first. Bar's gonna reopen in another week, probably." He wouldn't be here for that, but Takeru would. It upsets him, how much he isn't around, unable to help. Closes his mouth hard at the thought, while Sora passes him a knowing look but saying nothing to it.
"Maybe it would help, if we let them see we're more alike than different." Mimi's optimism contagious, at the best of times. At the worst of times, it just makes them feel sorry for her.
"That's assuming they're to be reasoned with." Jou shakes his head. "You don't write a fascist manifesto called 'Humans for the Anti-Digital World Movement' because you believe in reason."
Mimi's lip trembles, which Yamato can sense just from the way her hands curl up silently on her knees, and how softly Koushiro's looking at her from his other side. He touches a hand to her leg, letting her off the hook as his hairstyle guinea pig. She immediately scooches into the space between him and Sora, who threads her hand through Mimi's half-braided waves, soothing them out for her. A reserved person by nature, Sora isn't the physically affectionate one between the pair, but she is the more attentive. Relieved to feel her close, Mimi lifts her hand to tuck thick strands behind her ears, her fingers linking briefly with Sora's still stroking her hair, the sort of private affection that's impolite to watch, so Yamato doesn't.
"That's why we don't give 'em a reason," says Taichi. Not an inch. Unyielding, like in his youth. Gets serious then, glancing at each of them, the sort of voice he uses at the workplace, or the world stage. Even Jou straightens a bit, addressed like this. "But don't engage if they escalate things again. New policy is not calling attention to ourselves, alone. Keep the focus on the whole picture. All of this is bigger than any of us."
Koushiro the one to make the connection. Looks between the two of them. Surprised, like he should have figured it out sooner. "Is that why you never wear your rings in public?"
Taichi actually stutters, caught off guard. Unlike him, so Yamato speaks up again. He's aware he's not participating much, but he's hated this kind of conversation too long to pretend otherwise. "I asked him not to," which was true. Might as well , is what Yamato actually had said, standing open-palmed at the entrance to their bedroom one morning, Taichi's left hand wrapped in the necktie he'd been threading into a half-Windsor, mobile tucked between his ear and shoulder. Only got less than half, Taichi well trained in the elaborate performance of confidentiality that was having classified work calls in earshot of someone else, but everyone knew about the incident at the Digital Gate under construction just outside Berlin. Yamato's projects suspended indefinitely, halting months of research, a frustration compounded by the fact that Taichi's workload grew that much more. JAXA's Digital World initiatives had always been indebted to international peacekeeping trends, politics rearing its ugly head at the expense of the common good. It had been tense, to say the least, always so whenever their work impacted each other's. So he drew the line Taichi hadn't. One thing that's theirs, nothing either of their worlds could touch. Promise me.
Taichi doesn't add anything else. Runs a hand through his hair a few times, making waves. Another tell, which is why when Jou starts to ask about New York again, Sora speaks over him before he can finish, settling the conversation's end as swiftly as possible. "Let's just agree major life changes are shared in advance, once they are decided."
"Itemized and notarized, kindly, please."
"Shut up." Ignores Taichi's grin, shuttling the topic on to the next. "Who's still coming for drinks?"
Koushiro raises his hand, though tentatively, and Jou shakes his head. "Double shift tomorrow," by way of explanation, and Mimi, coming back to herself, has enough restraint to not stick out her tongue to boo the mature choice until Yamato and Taichi join in also.
"Parents' dinner," defends Yamato, immediately holding up both hands, Taichi adding, "Both sets, okay, so have some sympathy."
Mimi turns to Sora with the most serious gravity. "This is why we can never get married."
"Our parents were getting dinner on their own even when we weren't together," is evidently not the kind of plea to reason that impresses Mimi much, so Sora just sighs, twining their hands together in her lap.
Koushiro stays back to help tidy their picnic spot, and Jou walks Yamato and Taichi to the next corner. He's trying not to make it so obvious, glancing over every three seconds. "It's just that New York is so far."
"You travel for work, too," says Taichi, swinging an arm around Jou's neck, affectionate.
"Mostly to the Digital World and back."
"Even better," sighing a bit, unable to hide the envy. "I'd rather take on Digital World whackos than these ones anytime."
"But you'll be okay." It's more of a question, and he's looking at Yamato when he says it. Embarrassed to be this obvious, Yamato avoids the attention, and Jou doesn't press. Hugs them both tight at the intersection, splitting off in another direction.
"How does he always smell so good?" mutters Taichi, distractedly watching Jou disappear around the corner. "Like, we've been outside for half the day."
"He hasn't been rolling around in ant piles, for starters."
"What if I need the protein?"
Yamato doesn't humor him, but does take his hand then, alone on an empty street. Tucks both their hands into his jacket pocket, his thumb pressed to the high center of Taichi's palm. "I think you need to stop bringing up New York until it's a done deal."
"Might never be," falling into step with him. "They'll probably send Yuri, or Rosa. All the higher ranks. You know how it is." Glances at him without turning his head. "But someone's got to prepare them for us not being around as much."
"I can't talk about work." Literally. Under so many NDAs he gets uncomfortable even mentioning that fact alone.
"You just like that no one gives you grief about what you do compared to me." It's not exactly untrue, but then only Taichi's aware of the kinds of projects Yamato's started to take on.
"Not inconvenient, no," exhaling sharply when Taichi's elbow digs into his side, a little retribution. They've reached their building's lobby, where the concierge informs them a package has arrived for them, sent ahead to their flat on the seventh floor. Taichi immediately curious, which deflates into horror at the size of it, blocking the entire front door. It'd arrived in its original packaging, the picture displaying a group of children playing happily with a doll house the size of a large dog shed. The heaviness Yamato's felt all day lifting just the tiniest bit at something finally going right, squatting to look over the luxury toy and inspect all is intact.
Taichi, meanwhile, hasn't moved. "Aw, babe, you bought us…a house?"
"Takeru says one of her friends has one, but stopped inviting her when the other parents found out he writes children's books about the Digital World." Yamato unlocks the door and moves to one end of the box, Taichi behind the other, lifting together.
Thin smile wrung out at the corner of his mouth. "Cunts come in all ages, do they?"
Sets his corner of the box down just past the entrance threshold, a little more sudden than Taichi'd anticipated, stumbling slightly. "Don't call a six-year-old a cunt."
He grins back, upright again, hands on his waist. Determined. "We'll be better parents than that."
He could say it then. Everything he's been rethinking, calculating the hidden costs of raising a family between warring worlds. "Yeah," says Yamato instead. Looking at him across the pretend play house. "We will."
Taichi sighs, exaggerates a heavy exhale, eyes closing for a moment. "You keep talking about us like that, I'm gonna need a few minutes before dinner."
"Forget it," unswayed, rolling his eyes at the unsubtle transition. "It's at least forty minutes even getting across town, and we have to pick up Dad first."
"Nah, he's already at my parents' place."
Yamato waits for the threads to come together in his head. "What?" Hiroaki had been so definitive in the voice note. Old dog, set in his ways insufferable, a committed loner with inflexible personal habits. Hadn't become a journalist to make friends.
"I told Dad I couldn't make it to his poker game anymore, you know, because of this picnic. Guess he had to fill the seat last minute, or forfeit his turn to host with his group." Shrugs off both the high likelihood that Susumu will hold a grudge at his son's flakiness and the generally convenient turn of events for Hiroaki's plans for the day. A tactical move so casual the lack of effort behind it a little inspiring, how everything always seems to go Taichi's way.
Yamato looking at him blankly. "You took care of it?" A stupid question, really.
Taichi just shrugs again, turning from him to walk back to their bedroom, change his shirt at least for the dinner. Always the most minimal effort possible, begrudgingly offered, like he was doing you the favor.
Yamato probably says something at the start, something embarrassingly unromantic like, "Take off your clothes," or "Get on the bed," because they really did have just a few minutes, even with the smidgen of extra time Taichi's pulled strings managed to buy. It'd never be enough. That's all Yamato knows, pressing his weight against him as they sink into the mattress, kissing him hard enough to bruise his mouth, jeans unzipped and briefs pulled down just enough to get right to the point. There's never enough time with him.
A feeling Taichi shares, even if he puts it less poetically. "If you're not in me in the next minute, I'm divorcing you."
Bites his throat, then murmurs over the whimpering groan Taichi makes beneath him, "That's not funny."
"Right." Never really as compliant as when Yamato's got him like this, surrendered control. "Cum now, laugh later?"
"Did you just make fun of yourself?" Yamato does smile then, finding a good grasp at the curls near the back of Taichi's head, making him hiss low.
"Mm?" Already lost, unfocused on anything outside of him. This has always been true, even if Yamato hasn't always believed it.
He doesn't often top, but the payoff of getting Taichi to shut up for even a few minutes is always tempting. Finds him so ready the prep barely an effort. Takes his time at the start, lets him settle into it, stretched tight around him, breathing through his mouth. Kisses up his jawline, wetting his tongue on unshaved stubble. Taichi makes an impatient sound at how slow the tease is, angling his hips up to meet his, trying to make him move. Needing it, and not above begging. Reprimanded with another bite and lick and repeat, everywhere Yamato knows a buttoned shirt will hide the things only he can do to make Taichi fall apart.
Which he does, always. He's not the most considerate person, though Taichi also believes he shouldn't be faulted for this. His head just works differently than others', but the point is that it works. Method to the madness, or at least plans for something like the idea of a method one day, behind it all. But nothing ever emptied sense from him as quick, or made him act quite as dumb, than when Yamato was inside him. Twice as liable to be ten times as stupid over dick this good. Gets real talkative, too, not at the start, but after a while, without fail. Saying all kinds of things, strung out on him. And still, even then, always short of what he really means.
Like how he's not thoughtful, but he probably won't ever forgive himself for not being the first to give in, wasting so much time at the start.
Or how he's not sentimental, but the emptiest he ever feels is when he slips off his wedding ring every morning, keeping the only promise that has ever broken his heart.
Or how he's not romantic, but if it were Yamato or the world, Taichi knows he'd burn the world.
You don't have to sing it nice, but, honey, sing it strong
Hozier
"I had really hoped you'd mature with age."
Taichi snorts mid-sip, getting whipped hot cinnamon chocolate up his nose, the extra sprinkles he'd asked for stuck to his upper lip. "I'm sorry to disappoint."
Sora watches him sop up the spilled drink, wipe his mouth on his sleeve, lanyard tucked into the breast pocket of his button-up. He still wears the one he got as an attaché, security picture fresh out of graduate school. You'd never know his rank now by the look of him, which Sora supposes is the point. His face recognizable everywhere, hiding in plain sight the only way to live a normal life, whatever that meant.
"You don't disappoint." She's being extra nice, even offering him the fried beignets she'd ordered with her flat white, which means this is not going to go the way he'd hoped.
"That bad, huh?"
Sora shakes her head.
Taichi eats three beignets pieces before she speaks again.
"I think it's best you leave this one alone."
"Three days, Sora."
"And he's taking the medical leave, isn't he?" Sharp, playing again the role of only child of separated parents, forced to be the listening ear and anxious mediator to a failing marriage before she had even turned ten. Hears herself fall into step again, however resentful her childhood had made her. Looking on at him with guilt, softening her expression then, "I'll make sure he takes all of it. Okay?"
Taichi eats two more beignet rolls.
She sighs heavily, drumming her nails to the tabletop. "I hate having to choose between you two." More to herself than to him, but of course he seizes on it.
"It's me, though, right? If you had to?" Like he's relieved he can make a joke about it, falling back on habit. Flicks her earlobe when she doesn't entertain an answer, and she scowls, snapping her head back. Taichi chuckles, holds up a puffed dough half as a peace offering. "Right? Right?"
Sora smacks it out of her face when he tries to feed her. "You are such a child."
"All the more reason to choose me," and scoops the beignet off the ground, popping it into his mouth before she can register what he's done. The visceral disgust makes her forehead wrinkle. She pushes the basket out of his reach, but he manages to grab a handful more rounds. "I need a mother."
"You have a mother." The pitying tone, expressed solely for the absent Yuuko, just riles him up more.
"Maybe if I had two, I wouldn't have turned out like this."
"Don't blame women for that." Exaggerates the look she gives him, sizing him up, the twitch at the corner of her mouth the only hint he has. Grins back at her.
"I've always liked you best, Sor."
"You've gotten better at lying."
He shrugs in je ne sais quoi , taps his chest. "Multitudes."
"Please. You've always been one-tracked." She's still smiling, believing this to be some kind of compliment.
"My own worst enemy." Laughs it off, and she stops smiling.
"You are not a failure, Taichi."
Drops the beignet before it reaches his mouth, the color of his eyes changing. "Jesus, Sora."
"A lot of relationships end wi—,"
"Enough. Okay?" The tone of voice he uses when he wants to end a conversation, and not nicely. "This is about him, not me. I didn't get us here. So why the fuck am I the bad guy still? Because I didn't have time to sign the fucking papers right away? He still complaining to you about that shit? Or is it more about how I have a job that matters more than him— his ." The self correction as seamless as it could be, but he's still pale, face drained, stunned with himself, caught in a lie he hadn't yet realized he'd believed.
Sora has the grace to not let him sit with it alone. "No one thinks that." The kind of friend who wouldn't rest until it was true, if it wasn't. This, he doesn't doubt. Himself, however.
"I don't think it matters." He doesn't recognize his voice then either, so he's not surprised by the way she sits straighter in her chair.
Sora understands then that something is about to change. "What did you do?" If her voice is hollow, it's because her heart has sunk to the lowest parts of her chest.
He nods, staring past her. Bounces his knee, a nervous twitch. Wipes his mouth with the heel of his hand. "Remember that three-year JAXA-ISS research project? Scouting north, where the Digital Gates are the thinnest? Kou consulted on it, and the UN chaired the coalition for member buy-in. Not my division, but I'd helped on some of the early drafts. Remember?"
"They needed three pilots." Recalls this dimly, and with apprehension.
Taichi bows his head, another nod at the ground. "Uncharted territories, completely new field of research. Right at the edge of the known possible. Everything he loves." Holds his breath, scanning the road ahead of him, then up to the horizon line. His leg is still shaking under their table. "So I called in a favor with the Under-Secretary. They dropped him from the shortlist the next day."
Sora turns her hands around in her lap, so her palms lay open, empty. The posture of numbed defeat, the surrender of any defense. "Taichi."
Shakes his head, chewing at his bottom lip. It's scabbed over, where he'd bit through it already, days before. "I'd never done that before, and I've never done it since. I swear, Sor. Never."
It didn't matter, of course. The look to her wide eyes saying the same thing. Once, and it was over.
He leans forward, the tremor of his knee enough for him to put his hand on it, trying to still himself. "After all that happened, you know, after Takeru—," sinks his teeth into his lip, and stops. "He said yes to anything that would take him from here. You saw. Like he didn't want—," and restarts suddenly, skipping ahead, looking right at her, have someone else know what all of this is doing to him. "Three years—three whole fucking years, and he didn't hesitate once. Not fucking once."
It's the most he's ever admitted aloud about any of it, and she just sits there, an utter blank. He keeps talking, one of his tells, running both hands through the waves of his hair. Leaving out the worst part, always short of what he really means.
Like how he isn't sorry, drawing the line Yamato wouldn't.
Or how he had known, even then, what it would cost.
Or how he wouldn't have hesitated either.