Archive of Our Own

Hajime wouldn’t call himself religious, but whoever decided to call him at this time of night deserves the wrath of every god that’s ever existed.

He groans into his pillow when his alarm clock mockingly flashes ‘2:57’ at his sleep-addled brain. Hajime almost chucks his phone across the room until he registers the obnoxious trill of Tooru’s specific ringtone that he insisted Hajime use ‘in case of an emergency Iwa-chan!’

He prays this isn’t an emergency.

“Hello?”

His throat is dry and his voice is totally shot, but that doesn’t matter. The person who responds on the line is decidedly not Tooru and is almost completely drowned out by music playing in the background.

“Uh, hey! Is this Oikawa’s boyfriend?”

“Oikawa doesn’t have a boyfriend,” he says immediately, “I’m his friend, is he okay?”

As far as Hajime knows, Tooru definitely does not have a boyfriend. He would’ve talked his ear off about it by now, and Hajime would have to put even more effort to act as if he’s not embarrassingly obsessed with his best friend.

“Yeah he’s ok— woah, wait, isn’t this Iwa-chan—?”

“—Iwaizumi.”

“Okaaay...” The person on the line says it as if Hajime said something odd, but he does not have the mental capacity to read into it any further before they continue, “That’s interesting. Anyways, Oikawa is totally trashed and refuses to let anyone take him home except for ‘his Iwa-chan’.”

Hajime is already stumbling around his dorm to find a shirt and a pair of pants, maybe a sweatshirt too, “That idiot…Can you send me the address?”

“Yeah, of course! Just as a warning Iwaizumi, Oikawa’s being much more—“

The person on the line is interrupted by a voice that Hajime could recognize from anywhere, and at a volume that’s absolutely unacceptable for three in the morning, “Are you talking to Iwa-chan??!!”

“Jesus Oikawa–”

Tooru completely ignores him, and demands whoever called him to put Hajime on FaceTime.

“Right— right there Yumi-chan, the button is right there,” he slurs, the mic picking up whatever fumbling is going on in the background.

Hajime has only seen Tooru drunk a handful of times, but he’s never heard him sound this out of it. All he knows is that drunk Tooru would get more clingy than usual - there was one time during their first year at university where Tooru threw himself over Hajime and laughed so close to his neck that he had to excuse himself before he did something completely non-platonic, like confess his undying love for him. Or how he liked the feeling of Tooru’s hand on the back of his neck a little too much. Or maybe how—

“Yuuuumi-chaaaan, is it really that hard to find the button?”

“Oikawa you’re literally holding the phone..”

“Oh!” Then just like that, Tooru’s face takes up the entire screen. He’s colored in pink and green lights and is smiling dopily down at Hajime at an angle that would be unflattering on anyone else.

Tooru has turned him into an embarrassing sap.

“Yumiyumiyumiyumiiiii,” Tooru whines, he shoves the phone so close to his face that Hajime can only see his nose and the corner of his eye, “Oh my god Yumi, isn’t he just so..he’s just— look, look,” Tooru moves away from the camera and points it towards whom Hajime assumes is Yumi, “Isn’t he just so handsome?”

It’s during this moment Hajime has to remind himself that friends call each other handsome all the time. This isn’t weird at all, given how long the two of them have known each other. These kinds of comments are completely platonic and normal.

Hajime feels his face burn as a woman with short, dyed curls appears on his screen with her eyebrows raised, “He’s also shirtless.” she says.

Tooru suddenly gasps and Yumi is ripped away from the screen, “Yumi, don’t look!” He directs his attention to Hajime, “Iwaizumi Hajime, where is your shirt young man?”

He can tell that Tooru’s trying to look stern right now, but he’s blinking so frequently that Hajime cannot take him seriously. He sets his phone on his bed, and swears he can hear Tooru whining in the background as he pulls on a shirt, “It’s three in the morning,” Hajime says, “I always sleep without a shirt on. You know this.”

By the time Hajime picks his phone back up, Tooru’s spewing a litany of right right right’s before his attention is pulled somewhere off screen.

“Yumi-chan, listen to me,” Tooru’s attempting to whisper but he fails miserably, “ask Hajime if he’ll pick me up without his sh—“

“Absolutely not.” She interrupts. “Iwaizumi, did you get the address?”

“Yeah.” It looks like the place they're at isn’t too far from their apartment, thank god. Despite Hajime’s dedication to the gym, Tooru is still six whole feet of athlete and muscle mass, and he knows Tooru’s going to be leaning on him during the entire walk home.

There’s a huge grin on Yumi’s face when she says, “We’ll see you in a little bit, Iwa-chan.”

“Yumi-chan, don’t call him that!” Tooru yells, “And don’t hang up yet! I need to tell Hajime how ho—“

“You’ll thank me later for this Oikawa, bye Iwaizumi!!”

Hajime’s met with his screen saver and the silence of his dorm room after she hangs up. He doesn’t stop the sigh that escapes his lips and heads outside to unlock his bike from the rack. A good ten minute bike ride gets Hajime to the neighborhood he’s looking for. The cars lined along the street tell him that he must be getting close to the party, his thoughts only being confirmed by the increasing thump of the bass emanating from a house at the end of the road.

How have these people not gotten a noise complaint?

Hajime props his bike against the mailbox, grimacing at whatever sticky substances are splattered against the metal. If Hajime didn’t know any better, he would wonder what Tooru enjoys about parties like this.

Hajime finds his comfort in relaxing at home after a long and stressful week, there’s nothing better than homemade dinner and a Godzilla re-run on a weekend night. Tooru though, even if he doesn’t normally drink, lives off the lively atmosphere that comes with any kind of get-together. The other man thrives off the attention, and Hajime knows better than anyone how hard it is not to give it to him.

People are scattered across the lawn and porch, many of them laughing or engaged in some sort of conversation. There are a handful of people passed out in the grass, but it seems as though there are others that are keeping an eye on them.

After Hajime walks up the porch stairs, he nearly trips on a body that’s lying face-down against the wood. He curses when his head almost meets the front door, but soon realizes that the corpse-replica is someone he knows intimately well.

“Oi, Shittykawa.”

He kicks Tooru's shin once, then twice before his eyes shoot open as if he wasn’t just drooling over the front porch.

“You nearly killed me.”

Tooru gives an uninterested hum as he rubs the sleep away from his eyes. His hair is stuck up in odd, brown tufts, and there’s a red mark against his cheek from where it was previously plastered against the patio. It’s sickeningly adorable, and he’s already bending down to help him up when someone clears their throat in front of them.

“So you’re the infamous Iwa-chan?”

Yumi has one foot propped on the porch swing as her other leg rocks the chair back and forth. She’s smirking in a way that seems as though she knows something that Hajime doesn’t before hopping down to help Hajime pick up Tooru. By the time they’re all standing up, their height difference is undeniably clear where Tooru is lopsidedly balanced between the two of them.

“Yumiiiii,” Tooru whines, voice raspy from disuse as he leans his entire body weight against Hajime, “Don’t call him that.”

With both of his arms wrapped around Hajime’s shoulders, he leans forward to the point where his lips move against the shell of Hajime’s ear, his breath unbearably warm when he says, “You’re my Iwa-chan.”

He knows the sweltering June heat isn’t the cause of the blush creeping across his face, and with the way Yumi is looking at the two of them, she knows it too.

“You two are hopeless.” She sighs.

“I uh, don’t know what you’re talking about,” he stutters lamely, before attempting a bow with an entire man leaning against him, “Thanks for watching him, I know he can be a handful.”

She blinks at him before breaking into a fit of giggles.

“Oh, I’m sure you do,” she says, nearly tripping over herself on her way to the front door.

He frowns as she readjusts herself against the doorframe, Yumi’s definitely more drunk than he thought she was. She seems mildly more stable as she stumbles back into the party, “I’m gonna go find my girlfriend!” She yells at him, “Happy Pride month, motherfuckers!”

Tooru is mindlessly poking at the furrow between Hajime’s brows as he watches Yumi disappear between bodies and flashing lights. His face hovers an inch away from Hajime’s, where he’s whole mindedly focused on his task on pressing his finger into Hajime’s forehead.

“Do–”

Poke.

“not–”

Poke.

“–frown, Iwa-chan.”

He pokes him one last time before nodding his head in satisfaction, “It’s so so soo cute,” he slurs, “but you need to look perfect for this, mmmkay?”

Hajime’s body is just now processing that it’s nearly four in the morning, and he finds himself struggling to keep up with anything Tooru’s yapping about.

“Wait, woah,” he stumbles, “Perfect for what?”

Tooru groans in the most dramatic way possible before tossing his head back, rolling his eyes as if Hajime’s the one muttering nonsense, “For my dream, Iwa-chan, duh!”

“Uh, ok–”

“You!” He interrupts, pointing his finger at Hajime’s face, leaning in conspirationaly, “You, my dear Hajime, are in my dream. So you have to do what I say, okay?”

Tooru is trying so hard to make eye contact with Hajime, but he keeps looking down, then back up and Hajime decides that it's his turn to roll his eyes.

“No way, buddy. We’re going home.”

Tooru squawks, affronted, “Iwa-chan that’s not fair!”

“What’s not fair is you waking me up in the middle of the night.”

“But!” He tries, “But–”

“No buts,” he chides, walking the two of them down the stairs, “We’re going home.”

“UGH!”

In a feat that Hajime has never once seen Tooru do in his entire life, does the other man willingly fling himself onto the ground, straight into the grass.

“Oikawa, what the fuck–”

“It’s not fair, Iwa-chan!” Tooru wails, “You’re not allowed to be bossy in my dreams!”

This was one of those moments where Hajime wishes Hanamaki or Matsukawa were here to affirm that what’s happening is very much real, very ridiculous, and very much in need of filming. But instead, it’s only Hajime and an inconsolable Tooru, surrounded by a bunch of plastered college kids on a Saturday night.

Hajime comes back to himself when Tooru has clearly given up on scolding him, but is instead rolling himself back and forth in the grass, mumbling one thing or another about cooling himself off. With a sigh, he crouches down to Tooru’s level, pressing a hand into the chilled grass and the other on Tooru’s shoulder, “Are you cooled off yet? I’m really tired, Tooru.”

That seems to stop his ministrations. Tooru pulls himself onto his elbows and pouts, bits of grass clinging onto his shirt and hair as he huffs at Hajime, “Yes, I’m cooled off. No thanks to you.”

Hajime hangs his head in defeat, pulling his hands down his face.

What does that even mean?

No, seriously, what does that mean?

He lets himself release a sigh capable of moving mountains as he comes to the realization that this night is going to be longer than he anticipated. He flops himself into the grass next to Tooru and takes in the stars, and the vibrations of the bass, and the warmth of Tooru tucking himself into his shoulder.

Hajime barely has a moment to process this new development before the other man lifts his torso on top of Hajime’s, blocking the sky and blowing the scent of alcohol directly into his face.

He grimaces right when Tooru says, “Now this, Hajime, should’ve been the plot of Inception.”

“The movie?” He asks.

“No, the musical!” Tooru cackles, flopping himself back into the grass.

Hajime finds himself cracking up at Tooru, and the way he snorts as he rolls himself on the ground, again.

“You could be Dom, Hajime…” Tooru sighs wistfully, “BUT INSTEAD OF STEALING SECRETS,” He yells towards the house, “YOU STOLE MY HEART!!”

A few people whoop and cheer in response, but Hajime has a hard time hearing them over Tooru’s admission, and the rapid thumping of his own heart. Tooru’s always been a flirty drunk, leaning on Hajime more than necessary and whispering sweet nothings into his ear. He has only seen Tooru drunk a few times, but he’s sure with the other man’s personality that he’s the same towards others when he’s not around.

He doesn’t let himself dwell on this thought for too long, because Tooru is slowly crawling towards the road, singing an off-key version of ‘Don’t Go Breaking My Heart’ as he stumbles through the grass.

This is ridiculous.

Tooru’s ridiculous and Hajime loves him for it.

After several minutes of arguing with a brick wall, Hajime eventually gets Tooru to walk home with him, but on the one condition that Hajime buys him something from the corner store.

They’re about ten minutes out when Hajime spots a landmark they should’ve passed five minutes ago, remembering that he left his bike leaning against that sticky mailbox back at the party. He curses to himself, readjusting Tooru’s arm on his shoulder. Whatever. He can just pick it up tomorrow.

Suddenly, Tooru cuts off his rambling about the newest alien documentary that’s just come out (he makes a note to watch it with him later) to stare at his feet dragging next to Hajime’s.

Hajime looks up at Tooru then, taking in his pouting profile. There’s still a piece of grass tucked behind his ear that Hajime wants to wipe off, his lashes fluttering gently against his cheek with each and every breath he takes.

Even now, Tooru’s arrestingly beautiful under the dim streetlights.

The thought makes something tighten in Hajime’s chest, makes the beat of his heart pick up its pace in a way that only Tooru’s presence does. He wonders if Tooru meant what he said, about Hajime stealing his heart. If there’s some that way Hajime did, he sure as hell doesn’t remember how.

All he knows is that Tooru has always had him in the palm of his hands.

“Iwa-chan!” Tooru yells from across the store, “Help me decide!”

Hajime gives an apologetic wave to the woman at the cash register. The bags under her eyes and the way she leans against the counter, bored and exhausted, tells him that she definitely does not get paid enough for this.

“What, Shittykawa?”

Tooru points at two near identical packages of fluffy, white dough, the only difference being a change in font and color on the labels.

“Which will the great Oikawa-sama feast upon tonight?” He asks as if he’s a nobleman, deciding on a decadent dessert rather than a cheap convenience store snack, “Milk bread? Or an, uhm, a slightly different milk bread?!”

“Uh..”

“Oh, and don’t call me Shittykawa.” He tacks on, “That’s a forbidden word in this kingdom.”

Hajime entertains Tooru for a total of five seconds, pretending that he’s genuinely considering the options in front of him before he sighs, turning towards his best friend with a grave look on his face, “Oikawa-sama, tonight you will be eating…”

He pauses, waiting for Tooru to lean forward as if that will speed up Hajime’s response, “Crackers.”

He brandishes a small plastic bag from behind his back, where two drinks and crackers rustle inside next to his receipt.

“I’m not getting you milk bread, you’re going to puke it back up.”

Tooru gasps, offended, “Me?! Puke–? Iwa-chan I would never.”

He appears to be genuinely upset by this accusation, leaning his body back against the wall of chips that are no doubt being crushed under his weight. Even when drunk and obnoxious, Tooru still manages to look like a model, tossing his head back in disbelief against an unlucky bag of shrimp chips.

Though against his will, Hajime’s learned one thing tonight: the only way he’ll get Tooru to do anything is if he buys into whatever fantasy the other man conjured in his head. He pulls on Tooru’s wrist, leading time towards the exit.

“We have another adventure, Tooru.”

Tooru instantly wraps his arm around Hajime’s, all smiley and pleased, “You read my mind, Iwa-chan! Good job!”

Hajime knows better than to drag Tooru back to their apartment, he had tried right before they stopped at the corner store, and that ended with Tooru throwing himself at the ground, again. When he reminded Tooru that he’s a setter that wants to play professionally, he was met with a look as if Tooru thought that he was the ridiculous one, before he dutifully reminded Hajime that ‘None of this is real, silly Iwa-chan!’.

He already knows that the bruises and scratches on Tooru’s arms will be very real in the morning, so he mentally reminds himself to pull out the first aid kit when they get back home.

In the meantime, Hajime’s dragging Tooru to a park that’s a short walk away from their apartment. When he steals a glance at the taller man, he finds him humming and hopping on their way to the field surrounding the playground.

Hajime leads the two of them towards the swingset, where he hands Tooru his own drink and opens up the bag of crackers. They sit there like that for a moment, gently swinging back and forth after Tooru decided that the crackers were, in fact, acceptable, and took the bag for himself.

“Say ‘ahhh’ Iwa-chaaan,” Tooru tries to stick a cracker into Hajime’s closed mouth once, then twice, before his other hand takes a hold of Hajime’s jaw. He opens his mouth only to gasp at the shocking warmth of Tooru’s fingers digging into his cheeks, and he’s about to scold him before a cracker is shoved onto his tongue.

Tooru pats Hajime’s cheek once he’s done, watching him chew with an odd intensity when he purrs, “Good boy, Hajime.”

Hajime can hear Tooru’s giggles as he chokes on the singular cracker, coughing its buttery remains into the wood chips near his sneakers.

“You can’t just – cough, don’t say shit like that, Oikawa!”

Tooru cackles at that, whipping his head back so far that he nearly stumbles off the swing set. He’s about to yell at him for throwing himself around for the nth time that night before Tooru tosses his head back again, this time with his legs swinging in the air, and lands on the wood chips with an ‘oomf’.

Hajime’s up before he knows it, hovering over a groaning Tooru with his drink and cracker bits long forgotten behind him.

After Tooru’s done spewing a string of ‘ow ow owww’ he sends Hajime a chilling glare, “Why didn’t you catch me?!!” He squawks, way too loudly for what now has to be five in the morning.

Hajime gives him a hand, “My apologies, I was too busy choking to catch you from flipping off the swing.”

He rolls his eyes as he pulls a grumpy Tooru to his feet, the other man huffing and puffing as he fails to wipe off the wood chips clinging onto his shirt.

“I take back what I said,” he pouts, “You have not been a good boy.”

Hajime snorts, “What am I, a dog?”

Tooru hums pensively at that, and lifts his hands in an attempt to push at Hajime’s shoulders. Instead, Tooru pats his sweatshirt, brushing what seems to be grass off of his chest before his hands stop where the drawstring hangs from the hood. He seems to get lost there for a moment, Hajime watching him lick his lips as Tooru’s thumb brushes against the base of his neck. He shivers at the touch.

“Maybe we should put a collar on you,” Tooru mutters, so quietly that Hajime barely hears him, “so that everyone knows you belong to me.”

Hajime can’t help but heat up at the tone of Tooru’s voice, suddenly serious after laughing and joking the entire night. His eyes are focused on Hajime’s, and the other man seems more alert than he has been since Hajime picked him up.

“And then..” Tooru whispers, “And then I can teach you sOME OF THE BEST TRICKS KNOWN TO HUMANKIND!”

The sudden change in volume has Hajime reeling back, attempting to push the cackling man away from him, “Quiet down, you ass!”

Tooru’s too distracted telling a tree that he will defeat you, Tobio-chan. Just because you brought your cute little Shouyo does not mean I’ll let you win.

When he turns back to Hajime, he swears his best friend says something along the lines of “Do a trick, Iwa-chan!” before he breaks into another fit of giggles.

Once his laughter dies off, Tooru is back to his previous mood. Or at least, he would be if it weren’t for the way he was obviously trying to hold back a smile in the wake of Hajime’s frown. Tooru’s hands loop behind his neck, fiddling with his hoodie and the short hair at the nape of Hajime’s neck when he whispers, “Iwa-chan..”

“Hm?”

The cool press of his cheek slides against Hajime’s, and he can’t help but run both of his hands up the length of Tooru’s back hoping to warm the chill shivering down the other man’s spine. The brunette released a sigh, followed by a petulant sniff.

“I’m really cold.” He whines.

Chuckling, Hajime pulls away from Tooru, “Of course you are.”

Before the taller man gets the chance to complain, Hajime tugs his sweater off his body. When he hands the fabric towards Tooru, and gets nothing but a head shake, he rolls his eyes and pulls the sweatshirt over the brunette’s head.

Tooru watches as he drags his now limp arms through the sleeves. Seemingly pleased with the action, he lets out a hum when Hajime tugs the shirt down the rest of his torso.

“Better, you big baby?”

He nods his head, but his eyes are closed, long lashes kissing his cheeks as if he’s about to fall asleep at any moment now. Hajime lets him stand there as he picks up their trash from the ground. Once everything is gathered, he tugs on Tooru’s hand in hopes to start heading back to their apartment. When he opens his eyes, Tooru’s smiling down at him all dopily, opening his mouth to say something before he’s interrupted.

“What are you two hooligans doing out here?!”

Hajime turns around in surprise to see an old man wielding a flashlight, and a leash holding onto a very angry looking long-haired chihuahua.

He blinks.

“Uh–”

“Do you have any idea what time it is?!” The sun is just barely beginning to rise, but even Hajime can see the ruddiness of the old man’s cheeks, “I’m out here on my morning walk, when I hear you two yelling and–”

“IWA-CHAN, RUN!”

Before he knows it, Tooru has latched a hand onto his forearm, pulling him into a full blown sprint across the field and towards their apartment.

“Wait, you two get back here—!”

Whatever else the man has to say is overpowered by the force of Tooru’s laugh, twinkling as bright as the ray of sun currently breaking across the horizon. His hair is blown away from his forehead in golden waves, and he turns over his shoulder to yell, “Bye bye, police-chan!”

Hajime can’t help but laugh with him as they continue to run, not being able to remember the last time he and Tooru had done anything that felt this reckless. By the time they get up the stairs to their complex, they’re both taking turns between panting and laughing as Hajime pushes the keys into their front door.

“Home sweet home!” Tooru yells, before flopping over the back of the couch to land on the cushions, “I can’t believe we ran away from the police.”

“Tooru, that was an old man.”

“Nu-uh!”

Once Hajime’s done untying his own sneakers he walks into the living to remove the shoes Tooru forgot to take off of his own feet. Tooru has his arms tucked behind his head, wiggling his toes after Hajime tosses his shoes back towards the door.

“You wanna know how I knew that was a police officer, Iwa-chan?”

Tooru has a dumb smirk on his face when he says the words, as if Hajime has missed something very obvious. In a tone he would only use towards a child, he says, “How, Tooru?”

“Because of this!”

It’s then that Tooru pulls something from his back pocket, only to wield a disturbingly flat package of milk bread in front of Hajime’s face. The bread is squished and misshapen, with one side already being open in a way that could not have been on purpose.

The only thing unfamiliar about the bread is its packaging, it’s clearly not the brand they normally buy. Actually, now that Hajime thinks about it, the only place he’d seen that was–

“Wait, is that from the corner store?!”

“Yes!” Tooru yells triumphantly, “Iwa-chan said no milk bread, so I took it! Ha-ha!”

Hajime stands at the end of the couch, dumbfounded as Tooru continues to cackle like a B-rated villain.

“You cannot inception me Iwa-chan, I am impossible!”

There’s no way that Tooru has any idea of what he’s is saying, but it takes Hajime a moment to process the way he felt so smug about stealing a package of milk bread that looks like it had been stepped on, before he breaks out into an uncontrollable, hysterical laughter. This entire night has been one crazy thing after another, and soon enough Hajime’s wiping tears from his own eyes and clutching his stomach as he cracks up over Tooru’s, well, everything.

By the time he’s able to breathe, he nearly loses his breath again at the way Tooru’s staring at him, cheeks flushed with his hair haphazardly splayed on their old couch. He then has the nerve to whine when he spots Hajime looking back at him, turning his head into a decorative pillow, muttering something incomprehensible.

Feeling particularly light, Hajime crawls his way towards Tooru’s head, and brushes back some of the hair sticking to his forehead. Hajime’s at that stage of exhaustion where he’s feeling a little delirious, but he doesn’t care as he watches Tooru shoot him at a glance.

“What’d you say?”

“I said it’s unfair how cute you look when you laugh..” He mumbles, definitely pouting.

By now, he feels like it’s safe to say that Tooru likes Hajime, romantically, to some extent. At least, that’s what he wants to think. While Tooru and him are both close normally, he’s never heard Tooru talk to him like he has tonight. There’s a part of Hajime that hopes that it’s Tooru being honest, that liquid courage loosened his tongue, but he doesn’t want to place any bets before he knows where Tooru stands sober.

Tooru’s still looking at him all sweet and doe eyed from the couch, seemingly pacified by Hajime’s hand brushing through his hair when he says, “You should give me a goodnight kiss.”

Hajime smiles, leaning to press his lips against Tooru’s sweaty forehead. He can feel the heat of Tooru’s breath skimming along his neck, so he pulls back with a shudder and is met with Tooru’s frown.

“I meant on the lips, Hajime.” He pouts.

“Let’s talk about that in the morning, yeah?”

“Ugh.”

Hajime can tell that Tooru was attempting to roll his eyes, but instead he opts to close them, smacking his lips together as he adjusts for bed.

“Let’s talk about you getting that collar too..” He mumbles, “Bad Hajime…”

Hajime laughs as he drops himself onto the carpet right next to the couch. He thinks about Tooru’s warmth, and all the events from tonight, and falls asleep with a smile on his face.

Oikawa Tooru wakes up with what has to be the worst hangover he’s had in his entire twenty-two years of existence.

With a groan, he tries stretching his stiff muscles on what he now recognizes as their nasty old couch. Gross. The sun is too bright, his skin is disgustingly sticky, and his body feels like a bruised fruit that’s been abandoned at the bottom of a trash bag.

Speaking of abandoned.

“Iwa-chan,” he croaks. Of course. On top of everything else, something had clearly died in his throat and sucked whatever remaining moisture along with it, “Iwa-chan I feel like death!”

“Give me two seconds, Stinkykawa.”

Soon enough, there’s the sound of padded footsteps coming from down the hall. Hajime must’ve just taken a shower, given by the way his hair clumps into tiny black spikes on top of his head. His usual scowl is softened by the pink flush of his cheeks, and Tooru can’t help but follow a stray drop of water that drips from the hard line of Hajime’s jaw onto his shirtless–

Okay, woah. Stop. This is too much for– he takes a peak at the stovetop – two in the afternoon.

At this point, he’s already sat up and is in the process of regretting every decision he made last night when the stupid nickname gets to his brain. Obviously offended, he yells, “I will have you know that I am not stinky! Unlike some people!”

Hajime has now walked in the living room, placing a cup of water and a tiny pill onto the coffee table. The look the Hajime gives him tells him that they both know Tooru’s spouting bullshit. Though, once Hajime gives him a proper once over that he can’t help but flush a little at, the other man breaks out into laughter.

When Hajime doesn’t stop after an entire minute, Tooru goes, “What?! What is it?”

He knows that all he needs is a quick shower and an hour in the bathroom to become the beautiful Oikawa Tooru that the world knows and loves. Sure, he’s not the best morning person once he wakes up, but he can’t look that bad. Right?

It’s not often that Tooru gets Hajime to laugh so freely, completely unprompted. He lets himself bask embarrassedly in the warmth of it all as he swallows back the tiny pill with the glass of water. Once he’s finished he raises an unimpressed brow, “Are you done yet?”

“Yeah, yeah, just–” Hajime wipes a tear from his eye and sighs, “This,” he says, gesturing towards Tooru’s, well, everything, “is just karma for what you put me through last night.”

Before he gets to ask what he meant by that, Hajime has already closed the distance between them.

At first he just takes the empty glass from Tooru’s hand, but then he’s stealing Tooru’s breath with a look filled with an unmistakable fondness that he’s only imagined in some of his sweetest dreams, the ones where he would wake with a bittersweetness cloying against his ribs. There's a hand running through his hair, warm and unbelievably soft despite the callouses on Hajime’s palms. Tooru leans into the touch just as it’s taken away with a low chuckle.

When Hajime stands back up, there’s a boyish grin across his face as he dangles a wood chip in front of Tooru, “You should probably go and take a shower, trust me.”

And just like that, the moment’s gone.

Tooru waits until the other man is walking towards the kitchen before yelling, “I’m pretty sure that trick is done with a quarter, Iwa-chan! Not a wood chip!”

Feeling oddly flustered and too sweaty for his own good, Tooru stomps his way to the bathroom. Though once he arrives, in his defense, he does wait five seconds after making eye contact with himself in the mirror before letting out a shriek that would kill a lesser man.

Stray wood chips and clumps of grass are littered throughout his hair, making his usual chocolate-brown waves look like a mound of dirt instead. There’s a small scratch under his left eye, and only after ripping off his shirt and sweater, the latter he briefly clocks as Hajime’s, does he realize why he feels so sore.

His arms are spotted with scratches and bruises, and Tooru for the life of him cannot remember what he’d done at that party to earn any of these. There were drinks with Yumi-chan, then some dancing, some more drinks with Yumi-chan, a drinking game, more dancing, then…

He sighs.

Honestly, Tooru can’t recall anything that happened after Yumi dragged him outside when she called Hajime. Hell, he doesn’t even remember what he’d said on the phone, or how they would’ve gotten back to their apartment. What he does recall was the odd comfort of patio wood against his cheek, then waking up feeling like he’d been run over by two buses.

Consecutively.

Before he can spiral any more than he already has, there’s a quick knock on the bathroom door, followed by a tan arm holding a towel, “Delivery,” Hajime drawls.

“Iwaizumi Hajime,” he gasps, clawing the door open, “What happened to me last night?”

Hajime clearly didn’t expect Tooru to stick his head through the door, so when he looks up, he jumps back slightly from the proximity of Tooru’s face. Once he recovers, he’s smirking (and much to Tooru’s disappointment, he’s no longer shirtless, but that’s irrelevant) when he says, “You.”

As if that explains anything.

The roll of Tooru’s eyes must tell Hajime as much, because the other man drops off the towel before disappearing down the hall.

“I’ll fill you in after you’re done with your shower.”

Tooru scrambles to pick up the bundle of fabric, one of the fancy microfiber towels that he insisted were necessary for their apartment when he and Hajime were searching on the internet for living necessities. He remembers the way Hajime rolled his eyes so sweetly that it almost made Tooru sick as he added the towels to the cart.

“Oh,” Hajime calls, “And I’ll help you ice the bruises on your back.”

“Wait, the ones on my–?!”

Tooru twists himself in the mirror just to see the ugly purple splotches scattered across his back. He doesn’t hold back when he lets one of out the loudest sighs known to man.

It’s only after his shower that he recalls more of what happened from last night, bits and pieces of his dream coming back to him as he towels off. Tooru prides his own brain on its creativity when conscious, but the stretches of his imagination are constantly being tested within the realm of his dreams.

He was royalty, at one point, with Hajime as his squire, deciding on which royal dessert to feast on that night. There was also a high-profile police chase with his partner, again his best friend, with a prized piece of milk bread as the reward.

He remembers the part where Hajime was a dog (this one was Tooru’s personal favorite), and they won an international dog trick competition (suck it, Tobio), then there was a random depiction of Inception, but as a musical, with Hajime as the lead.

He sighs wistfully as he combs his hair through the post-shower steam.

And of course, Tooru couldn’t forget the last part, where Hajime had tucked him into the fluffiest bed he could imagine, and placed a sweet kiss onto his forehead.

Tooru’s hopeless, he knows.

He doesn’t remember when Hajime, scrawny and smelly Hajime, suddenly became the object of his affections. The man of his dreams. And so, well. Hot.

It was definitely sometime between the transition of junior high to their first year of high school, probably when Tooru watched his best friend flounder through a confession to their older co-worker at the ice cream shop they’d worked at over that summer. She rejected him, and Tooru consoled him through Godzilla re-runs and many rounds of Mario Kart, but he remembers how he felt that day. He remembers how Hajime pushed his shoulders away from his ears, determined, and the way he clenched his fists and wished, wow, I’d really want Hajime to look at me like that someday.

How cliche, Tooru thinks, it is to fall in love with his best friend.

Now that his hair is finally coiffed to his liking, he sighs as he leaves the steamed sanctuary of their bathroom. Conveniently enough, the first aid kit was left on the sink counter, so Tooru carries it with him as he makes his way to the living room.

The other man is already sitting on the couch, surfing through the channels when he hears Tooru enter. He’s expecting some sort of quip, or smartass comment, but instead, Hajime just blinks when Tooru walks into his line of vision.

Tooru decided to forgo his shirt since Hajime is going to help him with the bruises on his back. He’s obviously staring at the marks and scratches along his torso, so Tooru smirks when he says, “Take a picture, Iwa-chan. It’ll last longer.”

Much to his surprise, Hajime just mutters a ‘shut up’ before he’s turning back to the TV, ears red. Weird.

When Tooru sits down, he gives Hajime’s forehead a gentle flick, “What’s gotten into you?”

Instead of retaliating, Hajime just turns to him and sighs, “Nothing,” he takes the first aid kit, their fingers brushing when he says, “Turn around.”

“Whatever you say, Dr. Iwa-chan.”

He gets a shove for that comment, but he properly turns to face the end of the couch as Hajime readjusts himself behind him. For the first minute or so, they don’t talk. The low murmur of the TV combined with the afternoon sun and the gentle touch of Hajime’s hands across his back are calming in such a way that talking would disrupt the peaceful atmosphere they’ve accidentally created.

Though, after a particularly warm press of Hajime’s hand against his shoulder that sends a pleasant shiver throughout his entire body, Tooru decides fuck the peace. He’s spent the past twenty-two years of his life without a single drop of it, so why start now.

“I had a weird dream last night–”

“We can talk about what happened yesterday–”

After a brief moment of silence, they both laugh. Of course, Tooru thinks, even now they’re both on the same page.

“You go first.” Hajime says, and Tooru’s tempted to turn over his shoulder to see if he’s smiling. Instead, he relays everything he remembers from his dreams last night, except for the kiss. Hajime seems as invested in his dream-retellings as per usual, adding in the occasional hum to signal that he’s listening.

When Tooru finishes, Hajime’s already closing their first aid box, finished with applying whatever creams or ointments he’s been putting on Tooru’s back.

“That checks out,” he says.

“That checks out?” He parrots, turning around to where he’s now fully facing Hajime, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Hajime places his arm on the back of the couch, leaning into one of their decorative pillows in a way that’s unreasonably distracting when he says, “It means that you do remember what happened, in that weird way of yours,” he smirks when he says the next part, “Yet somehow, you still have no clue what went down last night.”

There's a lilt in his tone that suggests that Tooru is missing something so completely obvious, “Care to enlighten me then?” He asks, crossing his arms over his chest, “Because the last thing I remember was passing out on the patio.”

“Honestly, if anything, that’s where it all began.”

Tooru is still frozen in his spot on the couch when Hajime finishes relaying the events of last night.

( “I threw myself onto the ground?!”

“Yes.”

“Multiple times?”

“...Yes.” )

Hajime had started off with describing the grass rolling scene, before transitioning to the incident at the konbini.

( “Wait, so you’re telling me I stole the milk bread..”

“Yeah, it was pretty funny.”

“Funny–?! Iwa-chan I am not a thief–”

“Well, you know what they say. About the shoe fitting or whatever..” )

Apparently, Tooru had also flipped himself off of a swing, which explained the soreness of his back. This supposedly happened right before he asked Hajime to do a trick, as if the two of them were truly at a dog show.

( “You also forced a cracker into my mouth and called me a ‘good boy’.”

“I am, um, very sorry for doing that.”

“Well…I didn’t hate it?”

“Okay, we are so talking about that later.” )

And lastly, Hajime had gone into detail on their police chase, which actually just turned out to be the both of them running away from an angry, old man.

( “Yeah, you thought he was going to catch you for stealing the milk bread.”

“Speaking of that milk bread…”

“Oikawa, no. I am not letting you eat that shit, I don’t even know where it went.”)

Since Tooru was still shirtless, Hajime had offered him one of his shirts that was lying near the couch. He gladly takes it, but he can’t help but feel like there was something Hajime’s not telling him. It’s the one part of his ‘dream’ that he couldn’t get out of his head, the moment that’s been playing over and over again since he left the shower.

“What about the part where you kissed me?” He asks innocently.

The flush he receives in response is unbearably satisfying. Tooru revels in the way he opens his mouth, as if to protest, before shutting it almost just as quickly. Hajime’s bottom lip is temptingly wet from a sweep of his tongue, something that he only does when he's nervous and Tooru has to pull his eyes away when he continues.

“I distinctly remember getting a forehead kiss… unless that was just another part of my imagination?”

Hajime’s slowly burying himself further and further into their couch as Tooru crawls closer. Now that he’s seen this side of Hajime, Tooru feels like he can’t let go, like he has to absorb every single reaction the other man is giving him before it slips away.

“That’s because,” Hajime starts, pausing to steel himself, “That’s because it wasn't.”

“It wasn’t your imagination, I mean. You asked for one. A goodnight kiss.”

Hajime’s giving Tooru his full attention now, his beautiful, green eyes holding onto Tooru’s. The warmth of his chest below Tooru’s is intoxicating, and he’s nearly whispering when he asks, “You have no problem telling me ‘no’ any other time, what was so different last night?”

“Maybe I didn’t want to.”

The words are practically spoken against Tooru’s lips, and he can feel the warmth of Hajime’s breath against his, minty in a way he hopes to become familiar with very soon. 

“Tell me I’m not reading this wrong, Hajime.”

“You’re not, Tooru. Not at all.”

It’s then that Tooru leans down, closing the delicious heat between them to taste Hajime directly from the source. Their first kiss is sweet and chaste, and Hajime gives a soft hum when Tooru pulls back to give him a second and a third. He could get addicted to this, he thinks, when a warm hand sweeps up the length of his neck, closing in a soft grip to pull the hair at the crown of his head.

He groans against Hajime’s lips, and the hand in his hair responds with a gentle tug when Tooru hears it: the telltale crinkle of something soft and squishy between the two of them. When he pulls away, Hajime chases his lips in a way that’s so subtle and so hot, that Tooru nearly ravishes him against the couch until he hears the sound again.

“What is it?” Hajime asks, low and breathless.

Tooru can’t help but give him another quick kiss before he says, “Sorry, I just swore that I–”

And that’s when he sees it.

Plastered against the inside of Hajime’s right thigh is a flattened package of milk bread, its contents half smeared against the fabric of the other man’s sweatpants, while the other half has practically exploded beneath the plastic.

Well, now they know where that went.

“Iwa-chan, oh my god,” he starts, “Is that— Is that milk bread on your pants, or are you just happy to see me?”

By the time Hajime comes back to planet Earth, Tooru is laughing so hard that he can barely hear Hajime’s ‘What the fuck?’ before he’s releasing a trademark sigh.

“Of course,” he says, “Somehow this, of all things, comes back to bite me in the ass.”

Tooru is already getting himself off of the couch by the time Hajime makes the comment, and the other man doesn’t look as bothered as he sounds. He’s peeling the milk bread off of his thigh with a displeased grunt, and Tooru wants to coo at the furrow of his brow when he tosses it into the trash.

“I should probably change out of these,” Hajime announces.

“Yeah, you probably should.”

When his best friend just continues to stand there, hands on his hips as he glances towards the couch, Tooru raises his brow, amused, “So do you need any help, or..?”

Hajime turns to give him glare, “No, it’s not like–” he runs a hand through his hair, sighing, “We should just talk about all of this, you know?”

Tooru closes what little distance remains between them, grabbing the hand from Hajime’s hair to squeeze it in his palm, “Yeah,” he says, “Of course.”

Hajime gives a firm squeeze back, twisting their hands so their fingers interlock. Tooru remembers how they would do this when they were little, holding hands on their walks back from school, or under the sheets at sleepovers. It wasn’t until junior high that they stopped, Hajime saying that it was ‘something for kids’ and how ‘they’re too old for that now’. Him initiating something like this after not having done it in so long makes Tooru’s heart ache in a way so sweet that it’s almost hard to breathe.

“I’ve liked you for so long, Hajime. You’re the best person I know,” he looks up at Hajime then, hoping to convey his sincerity through both his actions and his words, “We can hash out some more things later, but right now all I really want is for you to be my boyfriend.”

”If you’ll have me.” He tacks on, no doubt red in the face as he steels himself for Hajime’s response.

One moment, Hajime’s blinking at him rapidly, and the next, there’s a pair of strong arms wrapping around his torso, engulfing Tooru in a warmth that’s incomparable to anything he’s ever felt before.

“Of course I’ll have you, dummy.”

He feels the words more than he hears them, the chapped softness of Hajime’s lips moving against the side of his neck as Tooru hugs him even tighter.

“It’s rude to call your boyfriend names, you know.”

Hajime hums, and places a kiss under the line of his jaw, “My bad,” he says, not sounding apologetic in the slightest.

They stand like that for a moment longer before Hajime seems to remember the sugary goop stuck to his pants. When he pulls back, Tooru realizes that some of it smeared onto his sweatpants too.

“Iwa-chan, look what you’ve done!” He wails.

“Is that milk bread on your pants, or are you just hap—”

“IWA-CHAN!!”

The rest of their day is spent doing laundry, cleaning the milk bread off of their couch (“We really need to get a new one”, “Smartest thing you’ve said all day, Iwa-chan”), and catching each other up on the disgusting amount of pining they’ve been doing over the past ten years.

( “I’ll never forget how passionately you confessed to Mika-chan…”

“...Who?”

“The one from the ice cream shop?”

“…”

“Strangely enough, I don’t remember that.”)

And at the end of the night, when the two of them get into Hajime’s bed, Tooru gets to snuggle against the planes of Hajime’s bare chest – one of many perks that he will always take advantage of now that they’re officially dating. As Hajime sleepily wraps his arm around Tooru, giving him a gentle kiss against his forehead, Tooru goes to bed knowing he’ll get to wake up to something better than anything he could come up with in one of his dreams.