Chapter Text
Hizashi looks at him, pleadingly, expectantly, while he waits for Oboro’s reaction. The words still lie heavy in the air, and the quiet is only broken when the noodles slip from Oboro's chopsticks and back onto his tray.
“You…” Oboro stops, then tries again. “You have a crush on Shouta?”
Hizashi shushes him and looks around in panic. “Not so loud!”
First off, Hizashi telling anyone to be quiet is so funny, he almost laughs. Second, his hero name is Loud Cloud, it's almost his job description. Third, no-one else is ever up on the roof… Well, except Kayama a few times, but that’s hardly sound statistics to go by.
The only reason he doesn't laugh is because he doesn't want Hizashi to think he’s laughing at his shared secret. He couldn't stand it if Hizashi ever felt as if they were laughing at him, instead of with him. So Oboro musters all the seriousness he’s capable of mustering (though hard) and repeats himself quietly.
“You like-like Shouta?”
“Yeah. I don't know what to do!”
“You just, like, tell him. What's so difficult about that?”
“Oboro!” Hizashi grips his hair. His sacred, styled hair that takes him fifteen minutes to get into place in the morning. Clearly, this is a matter of great importance, for him to risk messing up his hairdo. “What if he doesn't like me back? What about our Trio? The Three Dumbigos? What if I freak him out, and we can't hang out like normal anymore?”
Oboro shrugs. “You have to woo him first. Flirt with him. Have him fall in love with you too.”
Last year, Oboro dated a girl in class B, for three whole weeks. They broke up without drama, but he still feels like those three weeks gave him some very important life skills. Experience he doesn't mind sharing with Hizashi, by taking him under his wing. Someone has to be the adult here, and in a way, it’s always been Oboro.
The notion seems absurd to Hizashi, whose mouth is opening and closing like a goldfish. Oboro almost wants to take a picture of it. Surely he has broken some sort of world record in how long one can silence Hizashi. So he tries again.
“You can give him chocolates? Or books, he likes books. Take him to a movie or something. Buy him popcorn, walk him home. Hold hands.”
“And then what? Say Shouta, wanna smash faces? Come on!”
“A more romantic statement wouldn't hurt,” Oboro snorts now, unable to fully hold back his laughter.
Hizashi slaps him on the arm. “Don't laugh! This is serious! It's about, like, love and war and stuff!”
Oboro swallows his laugh, feeling regretful. “Sorry. What war?”
“Against, I dunno, Shouta's lack of romantic interest in me?”
“How do you know he isn't interested when you've not even asked?”
Hizashi gets to his feet and starts pacing back and forth. Oboro slurps some noodles while watching. “It has to be good. It has to be sweet, but not grossly so. It has to be great, but not flashy. It has to be so he can say no thank you without ruining our friendship, but not so casual he doesn't want to consider saying yes.”
It’s incredibly fascinating watching Hizashi like this. Some of their classmates might think he’s only a class clown - loud and laughing at anything and everything - but they clearly don’t know him well enough. Oboro knows how much work he puts into training, his classes, his webcast. He’s a jack-of-all-trades, and he makes it work. It takes a lot of energy to do all the things he does, and he deserves the credit. Sure, he can blindly follow Oboro’s antics and ideas. That doesn’t mean he’s a sheep who can’t do the work himself.
The problem is that while Hizashi’s emotional about everything he puts his heart into, he sometimes lacks the calm rationality to work his way through the motions and into results without a little push. As it is, he’s also emotional about everyone, afraid of rubbing people the wrong way or disappointing them. Perhaps also of being disappointed in himself. Even when he’s impulsive and clowning around, it’s as much for everyone else’s benefit as for his own. He doesn’t crave perfection - he just needs to be liked.
On the other hand, Shouta has the details down to a T. He's rational, he’s logical. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have feelings. It’s just, sometimes Shouta too is in need of a little push, in order to figure out or put words to those feelings. Until he finds a way to do that, he reacts by closing in on himself, which makes him grumpy. Oboro’s certain it’s because of all the brainwork Shouta uses trying to understand feelings in a rational manner. It would make anybody grouchy. He can totally imagine Shouta having a crush on, for example, Hizashi, and not realizing it unless someone spells it out for him. Until then, he might go around assuming he’s having stomach cramps.
It’s Oboro’s job to help both his friends work through their emotions and rationality in a healthy manner.
“Don't make this so complicated. Ask him out somewhere? Like, the bookstore or something. Or the arcade.”
Hizashi swings his arms out in indignation. “So I say-” and his voice rises in volume out of sheer frustration “-come to the bookstore with me after school?!”
A third voice chimes in from the open door down the stairway. “Yeah sure, whatever.”
They both freeze. Shouta comes into sight, stepping into the sunlight from the shadows, carrying a tray from the cafeteria and looking only mildly interested. Not at all like he’s heard any sort of confession of undying love.
“Did you finally save up enough lunch money to buy that book you’ve been drooling over?” he asks Hizashi, as he sits down next to Oboro.
Hizashi takes a moment to answer, but then he breaks out in a wide grin. “Yeah! Yeah, I wanna buy the one about the British punk rock movement! And uh…” he glances at Oboro, who tries to give him a look that says you've got this, bud.
He hasn't got this.
“Oboro said he needed… like, more sketchbooks! For art! Yeah! So, we were thinking we'd all go together! Like we always do.”
“Uh-huh.” Shouta hasn't even looked up from his food, instead focusing on the task at hand. “Sure, I'll tag along.”
Oboro looks at Hizashi.
Hizashi looks at Oboro. His face is so pink, if Shouta paid attention, he'd surely know something was off. Then again, maybe he’d think it’s Hizashi who has stomach cramps.
Oboro would swear that between the three of them they only share one braincell, and right now, he’s the one holding it.
They end up going down to town together. They get all the things none of them needed, and then some. When it's time to split up, Shouta waves, and disappears down the street in the direction of his own apartment.
The moment he’s out of sight, Oboro steps in front of Hizashi, grips his shoulders, and shakes them.
“You didn't tell him anything! You barely even tried to woo him, even a little.”
“Oborooo…” Hizashi wails. “Come on, bro! You can't expect me to just… just tell him! It has to be the right time.”
“Alright, fine.” He doesn't take his hands off Hizashi's shoulders, instead piercing him with a serious look. “But you will, right? Eventually? At the right time?”
Under his hands, the shoulders slouch. “Okay,” Hizashi says, defeated. “Fine. When I find the right moment.”
“You promise?”
“Oh come on-”
“On your mother's grave. Isn’t that what they do in English?”
“She ain't dead, also, don't drag her into this!”
“Fine, on mine then.”
Hizashi groans, loudly, tilting his head back. “You'll jinx it! That’s totally bad luck!”
“Do it!”
“FINE, fine, dammit, fine-” he says in English. “I promise. When the time’s right, if I still have a crush on him, I'll tell him.”
Oboro's content. He puts an arm around Hizashi's shoulder as they walk towards home together. “Good. And I wanna officiate the wedding.”
It would have gone swimmingly, if Oboro had not gone ahead and died.