#shinichi is sorta ross

[trouvelle]

Emogust 26.08 — Roommates

A/N: Halfway through writing this... I realized I had no plot. This is simply a plunnie heavily inspired by (if not based on) Friends! Forgive me ;A;  School just started again, I had to tearfully bid my goodbye to summer break, and that resulted in this really late entry. @mintchocolateleaves @sup-poki ily’all !!

In the years Kaito has been legally allowed to drink, he’s made some pretty important discoveries about himself.

The first is that he really, really appreciates their guys’ night in. They do shots when they first start hanging out, sit in the corner of Saguru’s apartment (because he doesn’t have any roommates nor a girlfriend who would kick him in the ass for drenching the apartment with the smell of alcohol). He likes having his back against the cold concrete wall, the liquid cooling his throat as he feels the familiar buzz swelling in his stomach. But no matter how pleasant, it’s not really worth the shivering, anxious mess it makes him the next morning, when he’s trying to fight off the raging nausea.

He steers clear of tequila for a while after that.

So it probably should have been easier to foresee, the other discovery. Kaito and Heiji both bond really well. And they both can be really persuasive especially on the nights when Shinichi and Saguru want to be completely sober. Their excuse has always been the same—that they have jobs they want to keep. Come on, all of them have to go to work too in the morning, goddammit. Those two just don’t want to admit that they’re fucking lightweights. 

Kaito just doesn’t want to be alone in his misery. Heiji knows this, knows that Kaito is a social drinker, likes it only when he’s got someone else worse off than he is. The Osakan himself is never one to back down from any challenges. And Kaito is an impressionable drunk, will do just about anything so long as someone thinks to ask. They’re an awesome pair.

The last discovery he makes isn’t so much a discovery as it is a revelation and an inquiry. And it isn’t so much made as it is stumbled upon in the dark with bare feet and a whole lot of disorientation. It happens one of the nights when all four of them were hanging out and drinking in the huge apartment that Kaito, Shinichi and Heiji share.

And Kaito finds out that he’s really bad at keeping things to himself like this, when it’s just the four of them, a little buzzed and a lot open. He feels like he could tell them anything, because they know him now, they’ve stuck together and survived four years of college. That’s saying a lot.

So he feels safe, and he doesn’t even turn to one of them when he says, “I haven’t said “I love you” to Aoko. Do you think I should say it now?”

He doesn’t even notice the room had been so loud until it goes silent. It feels like a blanket, thick and heavy and stifling, and he turns his head to find Heiji staring down at him incredulously from the couch. He’s sitting with one leg thrown over the side. It’s close enough that Kaito could reach out and grab his ankle down, if he wanted, if he didn’t feel like that might not be such a good idea right now. “She’s not here though,” The dark-skinned guy points out.

Kaito regards his roommate in annoyance, “Thanks for stating the obvious.”

Even Shinichi pipes up, “You mean, this whole time you two have been dating, you’ve never once said it to her?"

He winces. “Is it that bad?” he asks, because why the hell not? They’ve all shared secrets bigger than this, right? This isn’t even that big a deal, in the grand scheme of things, whatever that might be. “Although I probably shouldn’t ask you. I know you and Ran say it all the time.” 

See, it’s unfair because their situations are completely different. Shinichi and Ran has been together since forever. The pair are a match made in heaven. Shinichi has a steady job as a professor in Tokyo University (The hottie of the Criminology Department, as Shinichi himself puts it.), and Ran is the star teacher in Teitan. Their relationship is solid. Their parents are also really good friends, and they’re bound to get married one day, if not soon. Shinichi is the type to, say, seize every opportunity he can get. That includes telling his girlfriend that he loves her every chance he can. But it’s also because he’s a big, sappy softie underneath his ever-silent and calculating exterior. 

The sole reason Kaito has been hesitating to say it to Aoko is because he isn’t sure that he can make her happy like Shinichi does with Ran. He knows full well that Aoko loves him the same way, that she might even love him more than he does. Part of him has always been certain that she’s the one who he will grow old with, because he doesn’t want anyone but her. But what if she can finds someone else, someone better, who can offer her an even happier future for her? He’s an entertainer, for God’s sake, he doesn’t have an elite job in an elite university like his cousin does.

“Are you gonna do it right now?” Saguru asks, chuckling a little under his breath. 

Kaito isn’t sure if he’s drunk enough to be that impulsive, just that he feels loose and comfortable. He doesn’t see what the big deal is. Except, it kind of is a big deal. Has been kind of a big deal for a while now, so much so that he’s been wanting to say it for years. Just to say it, because it’s felt like a weight on his chest for too long.

Also because he sees it in Aoko’s eyes, the flash of jealousy in her eyes whenever Shinichi and Ran calls out the three magical words to each other in the smallest of occasion here and there throughout the day. The hint of amusement accompanied by something none other than a dash of envy whenever Heiji and Kazuha calls each other by their infamous pet name “Ahou” like it’s their own version of “I love you”. 

“Hang on there. I’m not like Kudo here who needs to say it every five seconds.” He can feel the corners of his mouth sneaking upwards. You know what, maybe he should do it right now. Aoko and the girls’ apartment is literally across the hallway. 

If he does it right, it could be a good thing. And this too, is a good thing, this blossoming friendship. Because they are about to have a lot more milestones to achieve.

“Or, you know, you don’t have to verbally say it. Show that you love her through your actions,” Saguru points out, his slim fingers moving in a motion for Kaito to pass him another bottle of beer. Kaito does so with a scowl. “Yeah, like I haven’t been doing that all these times.”

Shinichi decides to give his cousin a little push. “You know, the first time I said it to Ran and she said it back, it easily became one of the most special nights I’ve ever spent with her. But then again, there were also fireworks because we so happened to be in Niagara Falls.”

Heiji face morphs into a scowl. “Yeah, yeah, like you haven’t hogged all the beautiful backdrops already.” But as quickly as his scowl comes, it leaves, his expression changes into a content one. “I remember mine too. It was an amazing night, followed by something even more amazing. Saying those three words can be a way to begin it. ‘Cuz that was also the first time Kazuha and I—”

“Dude,” Kaito narrows his eyes dangerously at him. He’d rather not hear the details, thank you very much.

Knowing that his sister has done it—and quite often too—has made him quite angry at first. Kazuha’s his little sister, and that gives him every right to keep tabs on her and control over what she should and shouldn’t be doing. But the girl is stubborn in every way. Like how he doesn’t approve of her choice of being a model, but she still chooses that path anyway. He’s proud of her all right, because she’s doing so well. She’s appeared in quite a lot of commercials and magazine covers, getting photoshoot offers here and there.

Not that he’s not proud of Aoko too. She’s rapidly climbing her way up the nurses rank in Todai Hospital, and it’s one of the best hospitals in the whole world. “At least none of us has to worry about alcohol poisoning,” Heiji once remarked, “We’ve got an actual living first-aid box with us.”

Kaito’s main concern only lies in the fact that there are many male nurses too in addition to the number of good-looking male doctors who might potentially steal Aoko’s heart away, who would’ve thought?

Speaking of the male population... he turns his attention back to the three familiar faces in the room. Shinichi is now the one leading the conversation, stern and oh-so-like the leader of their little gang. It’s just natural in their dynamic, he thinks.

Shinichi is their all prismatic and crystal-clear fluid, and Saguru is the solid rock, where Heiji is the unpredictable fire roaring all around them, where Kaito is the all-rushing wind above them.

Ten years ago, if someone had told him he would spend most of his time with a Criminology professor, an IT procurements manager with the specialization Statistical Analysis and Data Reconfiguration (it’s amazing how he remembers the exact name of Heiji’s job, seriously, all of them simply refers to him as a transponster)—both of whom highlight as criminal investigators together on the side—and a stuck-up lawyer from a fancy law school in England (Kudo and Hattori both have really boring jobs when they’re not out solving cases, but what Hakuba does is the literal definition of boring), he wouldn’t have believed it for himself.

But oh, look who he ends up hanging out with almost every single day now.

“Just say it, man. She’s been waiting for it.” someone says. It takes Kaito a second to realize he’s watched Saguru’s lips form the syllables, that the words were said in Saguru’s smooth voice. 

Saguru smirks, the corner of his mouth curling up. Kaito’s not very sure through the haze of drunkenness, but he thinks he sees mischief and amusement very evident in the blonde’s face. He turns his head to regard Saguru with hard eyes and waits.

“She makes you happy and you make her happy, that’s all,” is what Saguru says next, and almost in sympathy.

Kaito is pretty sure that’s exactly what Shinichi and Heiji have been telling him to do just a moment ago. But it seems what Saguru says is the one that hits the nail, because Kaito’s face goes from nothing—no emotion, no expression—to fierce determination. 

And then Kaito stands, grabs a cup of water, downs it in a go and walk out the door, leaving the three in utter dumbfoundedness.