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This wasn't how Kairi had imagined himself while growing up. Sharing his space with not just a criminal, but a literal monster who possessed the second shittiest personality in existence? No way could he have foreseen that one.
Yet here he was nonetheless, awareness returning in bits and pieces, the chill of his personal bastard coating his back. Cold, but reassuring. Slowly blinking sleep from his eyes, Kairi eyed the faint light peeking through his bedroom window's curtains. His phone sat on the shitty nightstand by the bed. When he moved to grab it, he did it in one smooth, practiced move despite his morning lethargy. As expected, his action had its consequences; Zamigo reached out and tugged him back in his sleep. Kairi hummed quietly in response, but let him.
Before, he'd suspected Zamigo never truly slept, because he'd used to snap to full awareness whenever anything as much as twitched near him. A life of crime must've made him more jumpy than his usual faux-relaxed swagger would've had people believe. These days, Kairi's movement received offended sounds, half-muffled curses in a language he didn't recognize, and seemingly instinctual attempts to retrieve him and what Zamigo had dubbed his "bothersome human warmth".
While he bitched, he sure didn't seem to mind the heat when he was asleep. One hand resting on Kairi's hip, Zamigo contented himself with pressing his face right into the nape of his neck. Similarly, though Kairi complained, he didn't really mind these private displays of possessiveness. Especially when Zamigo wasn't doing them consciously. It was difficult to stop himself from smiling at the behaviour, and no one could see it now, so Kairi didn't bother trying.
During quiet moments like these, Zamigo managed to be almost endearing, more like a person. However, Kairi couldn't let himself go down that route, biting his lower lip in a silent self-admonishment, a reminder. Letting himself get too soft towards the ice bastard couldn't possibly end well. They were just having sex and doing whatever this other thing was, after all.
They didn't live together or anything. The apartment's lease was in Yano Kairi's name only, and when he'd rented it, he hadn't been considering hosting his former worst enemy. Back then, he hadn't even known Zamigo had been alive. Technically, Kairi would be in some trouble if people reported how often and how long he had the exact same "guest" over, but he'd chosen this neighbourhood for a reason. Everyone knew to mind their own business, generally.
On a second thought, could Ganglers sign leases? Under an alias, maybe... but like hell Kairi wanted to be officially stuck with this guy, whether he could or not. The thing was, he couldn't.
Shori hated the neighbourhood, bemoaned that Kairi lived there, and didn't exactly approve of Kairi's choice to keep being a phantom thief, but he'd hate knowing how he spent his free time even more. So, Zamigo and him weren't a thing. They couldn't be, because Kairi already gave his brother grey hairs merely by being himself. Also because Kairi didn't like Zamigo, of course, or at least he shouldn't. He had hated him, kind of detested him still, was supposed to loathe his existence. No matter how soft those stupid bangs felt against his neck, or how soothing listening to Zamigo's breathing was after a few months of this reckless whatever they had.
Did this maladjusted criminal mess know what a serious relationship was, anyway? Did he care, if he did know? Kairi shouldn't be thinking about it; he thought about it anyway. Squinting his eyes against the glare of his phone's screen, he noted it was still early in the morning. The scant amount of sunlight outside should've tipped him off. This was way too early after the night he'd had, though it wasn't unusual for Kairi to wake up before his alarm. Half-heartedly chucking the phone near his pillow, he couldn't remember why he hadn't turned the damn brightness down when he'd been going to sleep...
Oh, right. Because Zamigo had distracted him.
If there was a single constant in his life that Kairi could rely on, it was that he could blame Zamigo for most things that went wrong. All the sex aside, that was one of the better parts of getting his space invaded like this. He definitely didn't keep letting the man in because he liked it when he insulted his botched attempts at brewing coffee or cooking. Nor had he gone insane and started enjoying it when Zamigo tried teasingly feeding him ice, for that matter.
Like Kairi wasn't getting cold enough as things were. He'd finally caved a while back and used his paycheck, buying better sheets and blankets along with a bigger bed. That'd been only because he'd wanted to sleep comfortably without being exposed and pressed up directly against the walking freezer. It had nothing to do with Zamigo complaining over his "sad single guy bedroom". Or the previous bed's frame cracking during a particularly intense evening.
Despite the protesting, the ugly flea market curtains were still there, though, too long and draped inconveniently against the floor; the pièce de résistance of Kairi's spiteful contrarianism. They clashed with everything else in the entire apartment, astonishingly even more offensive than Zamigo's poncho amalgamation. Funnily enough, Zamigo despised them. Judging by the dark looks he'd been sending the curtains the past few days, he was probably planning something nefarious. Kairi wondered if he'd still get his deposit for the apartment back if he nailed them in place. It wouldn't stop Zamigo if he'd made up his mind, but it would send a message, which was the whole point.
Zamigo's shitty personality was second only to Kairi's own, after all. Yet, the bastard wouldn't blink an eye at his nonsense, would be able to keep up. Maybe that was why Kairi did like him inappropriately much now, even if he barely admitted it to himself. Extremely reluctantly at that, and during moments of weakness, after thinking around himself in circles and spiraling for at least ten minutes first.
Suddenly, Kairi felt the overwhelming need to get up, nearly nauseating in its familiarity.
Every time he reached this damning conclusion about his attachment, he couldn't help but start tensing up, like his body was preparing for a fight that didn't come. A fight that Kairi, for once in his life, refused to start. Because he was a fucking coward and running from his misfiring feelings was easier than facing the music.
Carefully, Kairi moved his hand, covering the one Zamigo had chosen to lay on his hip. While Zamigo acted more at ease in his presence these days - inexplicably, their history considered - sudden movements at bad times could still send him up a wall. Or in someone's face, and Kairi didn't feel like melting ice off his eyebrows this soon after waking up. So he rubbed his thumb in a circle against the cool skin, keeping the motion slow and gentle. Not long after, he could feel Zamigo shifting behind him, petulantly huffing cold air against his shoulder. Kairi pressed his lips together and pointedly didn't shiver, instead opting to pinch him on the wrist.
"Ow," the jackass mock-complained, but didn't withdraw his hand yet.
Kairi rolled his eyes at the show of stubbornness. "I need to get up. Let go."
"What, not even a good morning?"
"Morning. Let go, asshole."
Snorting, Zamigo withdrew, lazily rolling back over to his side of the bed where he belonged---no, didn't belong, and that side of the bed wasn't his! It was the side of the bed where he was supposed to stay whenever he chose to take up space in the apartment. That side of the bed. Nothing else. Why was that so difficult to accept?
His heart all the way up in his throat, Kairi dragged himself to the edge of the mattress. For a moment, he held a hand against his forehead, trying to stave off a self-induced headache, desperately wishing he could simply will proper coffee into existence. Before even trying to fight the coffee maker today, he needed to both clear his head and take a shower, and he couldn't decide if it should be a hot or a cold one. One wouldn't help, and the other would remind him of the Gangler in his bed.
Of course, Zamigo couldn't let him leave the room without having the last word. Just when Kairi made it to the doorway, he heard him speak up again.
"Iced coffee in the fridge, by the way."
Pausing, Kairi looked over his shoulder at the shameless man in his bed, brain stuttering to a mortifying halt. Apparently his expression was amusing, judging by the way Zamigo eyed him, eyes crinkling and the corners of his lips twitching into that strange half-smile that felt more genuine than his sharp toothy grins. He had sat himself up, leaning back against his well-toned arms, his silly uneven monochrome hair ruffled up from sleep and their activities last night, the blanket draped over his lap.
Normally, Kairi could've rubbed enough of his braincells together to keep himself from ogling too obviously. Not this morning. Semi-hysterically, he wondered if he looked as besotted as he felt right then.
"Don't look so surprised," Zamigo chided him, tone going from forcibly nonchalant to mildly condescending, an easy shift back to their usual bickering despite the weirdly fond look on his face. "Figured you could use one morning with actual coffee, instead of black tar."
"Oh, fuck you very much," Kairi retorted, but it sounded half-hearted even to his own ears. Those very same ears grew hotter and he turned to leave before the sensation could fully reach his face.
"Mhm. Love you too."
Never mind his face. Kairi made a hasty and extremely dignified retreat, slipping inside the bathroom before Zamigo could see how badly the words had affected him, the heat quickly radiating all the way down to his shoulders. For once, no laughter followed him. The breath he took in and released the second he closed the door behind himself was loud and shaky, as though he'd just come out of a fight rather than crawling out of his own bed.
The fucker hadn't even had the decency to sound sarcastic. Seriously, Kairi couldn't stand this man. Kairi didn't love Zamigo the slightest bit, in any sense, and he wasn't helplessly smiling in his tiny bathroom at five in the morning, leaning against the door like a swooning maiden.
Fuck. Maybe he did have to talk to Shori about this.
Eventually.