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Watanuki scowls as water sloshes into his shoes. His entire right side is soaking wet, the books in his messenger bag will take days to dry out, and it’s still a ten-minute walk back to the dorms. To top it all off, he’s stuck sharing an umbrella with his least favorite person on this entire planet of Earth.
“Can you move over?” Watanuki snaps. “I’m getting completely soaked.” To punctuate the point, he shakes his head, sending a spray of water at Doumeki. “And hold that thing straight, will you?”
“It is straight,” Doumeki replies, monotone, wiping the water out of his eyes. “And if I go any further to the left I won’t be under the umbrella at all. There’s not enough room.”
“Well, you really should have thought of that before you offered to share!” Watanuki yells and his voice sounds both far away and too loud under the umbrella.
Doumeki shrugs. Watanuki feels the overwhelming urge to strangle him.
Despite what he's sure would be ringing peals of evil laughter and not-so-subtle hints about fate from the headmistress if she ever found out about this, Watanuki isn’t even sure that Doumeki showing up with his umbrella had helped his situation at all. The right side of his body is still getting lashed with heavy raindrops, and now he has the added annoyance of his left side being pressed against Doumeki, who is just too warm and too big to be allowed. And obviously being cramped under this umbrella next to a human hot water bottle is affecting his body adversely, because he can’t seem to keep the blush off his face. Watanuki resolves that he needed to get out of this situation now. Right now.
He squints around the park, trying to see past the fog that kept threatening to cloud his glasses. The area was beautiful to look at in the rain, sure, but it offered little in the way of shelter. Just towering trees, and Watanuki isn’t going to stand under one of them, no way. They’ve been studying electric currents and Yuuto-sensei keeps blithely hinting that he’s going to electrocute one of them (and possibly make it look like an accident, Watanuki hasn’t quite been able to tell) before the semester is finished, just so that everyone can see the effects of electricity on the human body firsthand. And while Yuuto-sensei is probably kidding and probably doesn’t have any control over lightning, Watanuki isn’t taking any chances. The teachers at the school are unhinged. So, no trees.
Doumeki elbows him, a dull jab in his side, and Watanuki compulsively elbows him back (maybe a little too hard, honestly, but Watanuki refuses to feel guilty when Doumeki elbowed him first, okay, that’s just the way it is) before he realizes that Doumeki is pointing at something. Watanuki almost can’t make it out at first, between the rain smudging the scenery and fog covering his glasses, but he lets out an “Ohhh,” of relief when he sees that it’s a gazebo, shining through the storm like a beacon.
“Well, what are you waiting for?” he demands of Doumeki, trying to put his hands on his hips in outrage before he realizes that, right, they’re squished together under an umbrella. “The longer we’re out here, the wetter we’re going to get, so let’s pick up the pace!”
Doumeki would never do something as plebeian as rolling his eyes (Watanuki’s sure that he thinks facial expressions are beneath him), but Watanuki can feel him doing it anyway, spiritually or something, and it’s amazing how Doumeki can manage that without ever moving his facial muscles. Or incredibly annoying. Whichever. It’s even more annoying that Watanuki knows him well enough to know that he’s rolling his eyes.
They start walking faster, out across the sodden grass that squelches under their feet. Watanuki almost slips once, as the ground starts to incline, but he manages to steady himself on Doumeki’s shoulder before he hits the ground. Doumeki’s eyes slide to look at him, nothing at all in his expression, and Watanuki can feel himself turning red. He has no idea why, obviously. What possible reason could there be for him to blush? He snatches his arm away from Doumeki’s shoulder though, and resolutely keeps his eyes focused on the ground, determined not to slip again.
When they hit the steps of the gazebo, Watanuki separates himself from Doumeki with what he hopes is casual nonchalance, but, judging from the slightly concerned look Doumeki gives him (and oh, does Watanuki hate that he can derive meaning from Doumeki’s non-expressions), it probably came off more “surprised-red-panda” than he intended.
Doumeki’s gaze doesn’t linger, however, and he looks back out at the sheets of rain. “It can’t keep up like this for more than 15 or 20 more minutes,” he says, sitting down on the steps of the gazebo. “We should be able to go then.”
“Good,” Watanuki replies tightly, sitting down on the floor and starting the arduous process of wringing out his socks. “Only 15 or 20 more minutes I have to spend with you.”
Doumeki doesn’t react (he never does, does he), but Watanuki regrets saying it as soon as it’s out of his mouth. This happens sometimes, just lately, and Watanuki’s doesn’t like it. Regret feels hot in his throat and makes him wish he could call the air back into his lungs and make it so that he had never spoken. Weird, Watanuki thinks. Weird that I care what this guy thinks about me. And there’s that blush rising up again, and Watanuki fights to keep his face composed.
“I mean, um,” he says, looking down at the wooden boards of the gazebo, at his sad, wrung out socks, at his pruney fingers, at anything except Doumeki’s face. “I didn’t mean that. I’m just frustrated, and wet, and cold...and, well, you really should’ve thought of those very real possibilities before you tried to save the day with that stupid umbrella!” Well, it might pass for an apology. In some places. That are not Earth.
Doumeki seems to understand though, because when Watanuki finally gets the courage to look up at him, he’s looking back. “Well, next time I’ll just leave you out there,” he says, and Watanuki would swear there’s the hint of a smile on his lips.
“Good,” Watanuki says, nodding curtly, trying not to smile in return.
“Hey, aren’t you getting wet over there?” Watanuki asks, frowning slightly, and sure enough, there are beads of rain clinging to Doumeki, his shirt, his hair, even his eyelashes, which Watanuki desperately wishes he could unsee, because it makes his stomach twist uncomfortably to know that Doumeki has eyelashes.
Doumeki shrugs. “It’s fine,” he says, even as he gets hit in the face with another fine mist of water. Watanuki scowls.
“No, it’s not,” he says, pointing an admonishing finger at Doumeki. “You can catch pneumonia on your own time, but I won’t have you catching it while you’re with me, because then I would be obligated to, I don’t know, nurse you, or bring you soup, and I don’t want to do either of those things, so get in here, you idiot!”
“Alright,” Doumeki says, standing up and moving further inside the gazebo with a distinct air of someone humoring an odd request.
Watanuki isn’t expecting Doumeki to sit down beside him. The gazebo is definitely big enough for him to have chosen another spot to sit down, one that was less, you know, right next to Watanuki, thighs almost touching. There’s a buzzing in Watanuki’s head that he’s unfamiliar with. His hands clench in his uniform pants, and he looks up quickly, ready to snap something at Doumeki, maybe along the lines of, “Hey, dumbass, what are you doing?” but when he turns his head, he finds that Doumeki is looking at him, an expression on his face that Watanuki can’t interpret.
He feels good for a moment, thinking, hey, I don’t know him that well after all, until it occurs to him that he’s also never been this close to Doumeki before and maybe being within kissing distance elicits some heretofore uncatalogued facial non-expressions.
He hasn’t even thought the words “kissing distance” before he’s leaning in, somehow having taken leave of his own body, and Doumeki is leaning in too, and oh my god, this is happening, they’re going to kis--
“No!” Watanuki yells, and flings himself backward. “Nope, no, not happening! Not ever happening!”
Instead of looking angry, or resigned, or embarrassed, or any of the other things Watanuki is sure he would look if placed in Doumeki’s position, Doumeki just looks mildly annoyed. He tilts his head, considering Watanuki, still leaning forward just slightly. “Why not?” he asks.
And Watanuki knows that there are any number of good reasons why not, an untold myriad of reasons this can’t happen. He has made lists. He just can’t quite think of any of those reasons at the moment, because Doumeki is staring at him, waiting for an answer. It would be now, of all times, that he has no reasons to give. “I don’t know,” he spits, because he has to say something, if only to keep this moment from dragging on any longer.
“So why not ‘yes’? If you don’t have a reason,” Doumeki asks, and the fact that he sounds so logical and superior makes Watanuki want to throttle him, or kiss him, or kiss his eyelashes, and so he yells back, “I DON’T KNOW!”
“Well, if you don’t know, maybe you should reconsider,” Doumeki says, very matter of factly, and leans forward again. So confident! Like he seduces people in gazebos every day! Watanuki frowns, compulsively, because who does Doumeki even think he is, honestly? But he feels himself start to lean in too, as if he’s being pulled by gravity, or fate, or whatever Yuuko-sensei is always talking about, but he can’t think about Yuuko-sensei right now, because he has to concentrate on not falling over, one hand braced on his messenger bag and the other moving through the air, and he thinks he might be trying to put it on Doumeki’s cheek, but he honestly can’t be sure because he seems to have lost control of his body, as evidenced by the fact that he is a fleeting moment away from kissing Doumeki Shizuka.
Their lips meet, and it’s soft and dry, and Doumeki’s hand is warm on his waist, and Watanuki curls his toes against the gazebo floor. And oh, Watanuki thinks, he was very short-sighted and just plain wrong, frankly, to have a list of reasons why this would never happen, because he understands now that he wants this to continue happening, possibly uninterrupted, possibly forever. Doumeki inhales sharply through his nose when Watanuki’s hand finally makes it to his cheek and slides up into his hair, fingers dragging against his scalp; Watanuki is shocked and pleased, and he opens his mouth to say something smug before he remembers that, huh, he’s kissing Doumeki right now. Doumeki doesn’t seem to mind though, because he takes that opportunity to run his tongue over Watanuki’s bottom lip, and now it’s Watanuki’s turn to gasp.
When Doumeki pulls away, it’s with a lingering press of his lips to the corner of Watanuki’s mouth, and Watanuki chases after it for a moment, eyes closed, reluctant to let the moment end.
He opens his eyes to find that Doumeki is still close, and that’s good. He’s close enough that Watanuki can see his eyelashes casting shadows on his cheeks. This makes him smile, and then it makes him laugh, and then he can’t stop laughing. Doumeki stares at him, obviously confused.
“What?” Doumeki asks, his eyes narrowed, and Watanuki thinks that if Doumeki had the ability to look self-conscious, he would be doing it now. As it is, Watanuki shakes his head, shrugging off the last of his near-hysterics. He starts to say something, maybe about how he’s not laughing at Doumeki, he’s laughing at the crumbling of the known world order, but thinks better of it. He sighs instead (and he will not acquiesce later that it was “happily” - “somewhat content” at best, and “world-weary” at worst), and leans in to kiss Doumeki again.
He comes in a little too fast and their noses bump and their lips don’t quite match up at first, but it’s fine. It’s good.
The rain has stopped completely by the time they separate again, the sun peeking over the clouds and making the water coating the park sparkle. They gather their things and depart from the gazebo, an odd silence reigning in the wake of what Watanuki would have to admit was a major shake-up of The Way Things Are. There’s a spell over them that Watanuki’s not sure how to break. He knew how to talk to annoyingly-present-frenemy Doumeki; he’s utterly unsure what to say to the close-enough-to-see-the-faint-freckles-on-his-nose Doumeki with which he has recently become acquainted, so he stays silent.
Watanuki’s socks are not dry, and his shoes still squish oddly with every step he takes. He thinks distantly that it’s ridiculous to be embarrassed, really, except that it’s not, because he just kissed a boy he didn’t think he could even stand to be around an hour ago, and now his toes and fingers tingle every time Doumeki catches his eye, and it’s terrible. Completely awful. He wants throw up, preferably on Doumeki.
Doumeki, walking beside him, doesn’t seem to be having any such internal crisis, and Watanuki would know because he apparently has a Ph.D. in Doumeki micro-expressions. He looks as calm and collected as ever, the umbrella held loosely in his left hand almost dragging on the sidewalk.
Ah. Finally, something Watanuki knows how to react to. “If you let that drag on the ground, you’re going to ruin it,” Watanuki snaps.
“Do you want to hold it?” Doumeki asks, holding it out to him.
“No!” Watanuki says, and it verges on a screech, “I want you to hold it correctly, Doumeki, honestly. The laziness!”
“Too loud,” Doumeki says, shaking his head, but he catches Watanuki’s hand in his own as he speaks.
Watanuki can feel himself turning red, the flush spreading down his chest, and he wants to yank his hand away and run screaming from this and never look back, but more than that he wants to thread his fingers with Doumeki’s, and so he does.
Doumeki doesn’t smile (because that would require him to express human emotion) but he does shift closer to Watanuki, so that their arms are almost brushing as they walk.
“Don’t think this means I’m making special things for you for lunch,” Watanuki says, swinging their joined hands without thinking. “You’ll eat what I make and you’ll like it, understood?”
“Understood,” Doumeki says, voice dry, and Watanuki can practically taste the sarcasm, but he doesn’t mention it, because their hands are still swinging gently between them and Doumeki is graciously holding the umbrella so that it is not in imminent danger of being ruined by the pavement. There’s a warmth in Watanuki’s chest that he has no idea what to do with, and he keeps curling his toes in his shoes and feeling the solid ground beneath him to remind himself that he is still, you know, inhabiting a terrestrial planet.
Watanuki thinks, vaguely, that being electrocuted wouldn’t even register compared to this.