stealhearted | are you hurting the one you love?

[He narrows his eyes, watching Akira bunch up under the idea of expressing weakness. Expressing humanity. It's a startlingly familiar thing to look at, and he can't quite tell why until it occurs to him that it's what he saw in the mirror every morning when he was putting himself together to be the Detective Prince. To be Shido's little pawn. He swallows around a knob of nausea at that concept, rolling his head from side to side to crack his neck, then lifting his shoulders, and when he drops them again he looks back to Akira with a bland expression.]

Do you not know how, or do you not want to?

It's a little of both. It's different with you. [ Akira doesn't know how to describe it. Akechi still needs things from him; he still takes care of Akechi, but if he couldn't -- when he can't --

Akechi hasn't left. Maybe because he can't, but he could have left to go do laundry. He doesn't have to be here, in this room, focusing so hard on Akira when Akira would be fine, because Akira is always Fine. ]

No one's ever wanted to hear about things like that from me. I don't mind. I like to listen to other people.

But you... like it when I talk, too.

You listened even when I never said anything.

[It's a plain statement, and he thinks nothing of it until he realizes how weighted it is, and he has the grace to be embarrassed, averting his eyes and squirming.] Also I tried to throttle you in your sleep, and you didn't force me to stay up here or talk about it, which is why I'm not forcing you, I'm asking you, I'm trying my best here, okay? I told you I'm not good at this.

Goro. [ Akira sounds a little amused, and he reaches up, letting his knuckle trace down Akechi's cheek. ]

I don't really know what I'm doing, either. I know you're not forcing me. It's nice that you listen. I'm just -- not good at talking about myself.

You're going to laugh, but--

I feel like a burden, too.

[His embarrassed huff goes out of his shoulders and he drops to sprawl across Akira's chest, scowling up at him.]

I should laugh at you, you mean. Don't call my by my first name so casually, we are not there yet. [Goro you are literally laying on his chest slotted to his side like a human-sized cat--]

Regardless-- you aren't a burden. You're a pain in my neck, head, spine and approximate entire skeletal structure, but you aren't a burden. If you're a burden, then I invented the term and concept, and we all know you won't allow that to be believed.

We're at "periodically calling each other by the first name during emotional conversations" part, I'm pretty sure. [ Akira's humor is coming back a little, so that's a good sign. He leans in to burrow into Akechi a little more, wrapping around him a little more solidly. He's nice to hold. Their heights should make things awkward, but it doesn't; it feels like they can slot together perfectly, even if Akira's pretty sure they're both going to suffer numb arms pretty soon. ]

...thanks, though. [ Akira's quiet for a moment, but it's the kind of quiet where it's clear he's mulling over something, trying to decide what he should be saying. ]

My parents, uh. They're not bad people or anything, but they weren't really around much, and when they were, they were never really satisfied with anything I did. So I always started trying to do things that made people like me more, but then people only liked me because I did those things...

Anyway, it's probably a whole complex now.

[He wheezes a faint sound when Akira burrows into him, rearranging himself so it's comfortable to let him do so. The arm he has under Akira is already going numb from the fingers back, but he doesn't seem to care enough to do anything about it.] You just like calling me Goro to irritate me.

[His mouth pulls crooked, and he hunches inward, settled atop him the way he is.] ...don't thank me, either. [He takes note of the pensive silence and keeps his own, giving Akira the time to think and then to speak, eyelids falling half closed in understanding.] Not neglect, so much as just absence, and as a result they had no relationship with you, so only knew how to blindly push you to do things they wanted you to do as opposed to things you wanted to accomplish. That's a very common Japanese household problem-- I don't mean that to undermine yours. [He reaches up to play with Akira's hair, a bit.] ...it's not so simple, to break out of ingrained habits established when you're young, especially not when it's a desperate desire to please, even at your own expense, but... From an outsider's point of view, if you'd told any of them you needed an ear, I'm sure they'd have listened. [He's speaking to himself as much as he is to Akira, he realizes, so his expression is a little sour and he won't look Akira in the eye.]

I know they would. Everyone here has been so kind. But I'm always afraid of what will happen if I ask, and they just... don't want to listen.

[ There's another moment where he doesn't speak right away, just leans into Akechi's touch, letting his eyes close. It feels nice to have Akechi's fingers in his hair. It's intimate without being cloying, a gentle touch that makes him want to sink into it and never stop. ]

In Maruki's world, you were the only one who had time for me. It felt like their ideal worlds didn't have room for me. [ It's not true. They still liked him; they were still friends. But they didn't need him. Their bonds were frayed, without meaning, without conviction.

Akira doesn't think they'd have held, in that world. ]

They weren't kind because they had to be, you realize. [He presses the point of his chin into Akira's chest for a moment, scowling slightly.]

[But then he lets up, clearly not caring much for the mention of Maruki or his reality, but allowing it in favor of deciphering the statement.] ...I think you decided that for them. You decided their happiest lives didn't include you, or didn't need you, because there wasn't a need for the Phantom Thieves. [He scrunches his face, not-quite frowning and twisting a lock of his hair between his fingers, similar to the nervous tic Akira does on his own.] ...you don't have to be helping someone to be in their lives. You don't have to be needed to be wanted. [He should really listen to his own advice, but, yolo.]

[ Akira's hand stalls for a brief moment, but then restarts, carefully, slipping up to Akechi's face to shift him up until Akira can look him in the eyes. ]

Neither of us can take our own advice, can we? [ Akira murmurs, a little quiet, a little rueful. They're both terrible at this. Even now, with Akechi literally forced to be near him, Akira is afraid of losing him, of Akechi leaving.

He's afraid to do things incorrectly in case Akechi decides it isn't worth it. ]

[Clarity hits him like being doused with ice water at Akira's shifting, until their eyes meet. He doesn't look away, but the way he recoils slightly makes it clear he wants to, but decides it's more important to keep the eye contact.] ...there are a lot of things I'm aware of that I've spent the better part of two years avoiding anyway, unfortunately.

...You don't have to promise anything, [ Akira says, slowly, letting his finger slip across Akechi's cheek like Akechi is a favorite stuffed toy from childhood, like a security blanket that Akira can't bear to get rid of. ]

But... I promise. I'm not ever going to get tired of you, or want to leave you. I want you to be able to believe that, one day.

[That's where he breaks the eye contact, flinching like Akira's words struck him.] Please don't. [It'll hurt more when he can't if he promises. If Akechi allows himself to believe the promise.]

[His breathing shallows again for a moment, but he reroutes it, shaking his head and fixing his eyes somewhere on Akira's chin, instead. He can't meet his eyes, but this isn't supposed to be about him and his constant myriad of problems.] We aren't talking about me, right now. But I'm-- not a cop, I never was, even for working with them, and if we run into another on the street you don't have to put on Joker's mask and come back here shaking. I've dealt with them a lot in the past few years, you know? I don't want it to become widespread knowledge that I'm here, but a few cops making mention of a Detective Prince lookalike will just upset the brass, so let me handle it.

[ Akira considers Akechi's words for a long moment, and then, almost cautiously, almost carefully, like he might be misunderstanding -- ]

You're saying you'll protect me? [ Which is something Akira doesn't... He's not sure anyone has ever protected him from something, actually? What a strange concept, to have someone try and shield him from something he can deal with even if he doesn't want to. ]

[That makes him look at him properly, startled by the caution in Akira's tone. He blinks, tilting his head slowly.]

It's hardly protecting you when it's just bluffing to a cop about why a high school student isn't in class, Kurusu.

It's not what you're doing. It's what you're trying to prevent. [ Bluffing to a cop isn't hard, but that's not the important part -- it's preventing Akira from being a wreck afterwards, preventing him from throwing himself face first into brewing coffee so he can avoid his own trauma response. ]

[He just tilts his head, entirely not understanding. He doesn't realize that lying to a cop so Akira doesn't come back to Leblanc shaking is protecting him from himself, from getting lost in his head and shaking his way through making coffee and cleaning equipment. He registers belatedly that it's... unusual, perhaps, but--]

...it's the same as always, you having a fit and shaking out of your skin up here is inconvenient. I'm simply ensuring the optimal response. [He sounds like a fucking robot when he says it, and he knows that. He can't make himself settle on the idea that he cares. That he's capable of being a caring person.]

[ Akira gets it. Between Akechi's fear of caring and then being rejected, and the fact that he spent so long studiously refusing to admit he gave a fuck about anything, admitting he cares must be absolutely terrifying.

He thinks they'll get there, probably. ]

You could have just let me go back down to work it off. [ Akira says, gently, not wanting to set off another vehement denial but not wanting Akechi to so easily reject the prospect either. ]

It's okay. I... like that you care. It helps.

[Math lady meme.png.]

I literally just said it's because it's inconvenient, don't invent your own narrative, here. [So says the one squirming around until he can lay more fully across him. It might be awkward, with the way he climbs so his hips rest between Akira's thighs? But he's not meaning it sexually in any capacity, he's just a heat leech and Akira is a skinny furnace. He's... projecting, and even he can tell, but Akira's insistence that he likes that he cares, that it helps, just makes his stomach twist itself in knots.]

It wouldn't have inconvenienced you. You could have just gone to do laundry and ignored it. [ A beat, and then: ] I'm glad you didn't. Staying here with me, like this... It feels like, even if it might be a burden, it's one you don't mind bearing, sometimes.

[ Which Akira thinks might be more accurate for both of them. They do have burdens, exhausting emotional ones that take too much energy to deal with, but --

maybe it's the kind of thing they're okay with dealing with. ]

Conveniently for you, I didn't especially feel like messaging Sakura to ask if I could borrow your cat, since I can't message him directly as he lacks thumbs. I wasn't about to go do laundry without your requested quadrupedal chaperone, so I suppose I will just have to continue to wear your things until such a time you aren't rattled by errant policemen. Therefore, it evens out.

[A beat, and he closes his eyes.] Besides, you're warm and I am not.

...you know they live around the corner, right? [ Akira sounds deeply amused by this, but just responds to Akechi's declaration of how much he doesn't care by reaching up to wrap his arms back around Akechi's hips in a loose, easy hold. ]

Thanks, though. I feel better.

You really think Sakura would have answered the door? [He makes a vague grunt of a sound at Akira's arms looped around him, but doesn't deter the contact.]

[He also doesn't say anything to the thanks, because saying he wasn't welcome or he hadn't done it for him would just be beating a dead horse, at this stage, so he just grunts again, little wordless sound of acknowledgment to prove he heard him.]

Yes. She's not afraid of you. [ Futaba would, as she once put it, "fight Akechi behind the Denny's at 3AM", which was a very clear mental picture Akira thinks about sometimes.

She might actually win on sheer shock value alone. It always makes Akira want Denny's omurice, though. ]

I'll text her whenever you want to go, though.

no subject

no subject

1/2

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject