fairycake

Kissing him feels like safety. Like trust. Like relief. Like a reprieve. Like they were always going to be inevitable in this lifetime.

Sometimes Sakusa will pull the coin from his pocket and flip it. Sometimes Atsumu asks what it means, and other times he won’t bother to ask at all. It never matters, because Sakusa always loses.

It’s a reaction Sakusa can’t seem to control, Atsumu’s learned, like the shirking of his gaze and the tightening of his grip on whatever he’s holding. His words are always clipped and disinterested in response to whatever suggestive thing Atsumu’s saying, but his body language betrays him often enough to give Atsumu the incentive to push a little further.

“Sure? I can arrange ‘em into a neat little list. Ya like those, right? Organisation gets your dead heart pumpin’ real fast. I can hear it.”

God, he’s an asshole.

An asshole that’s out of his depth, because every time he blinks, he sees Sakusa’s eyes still hovering inches from his own; every time he clenches his fists, he feels Sakusa’s hand beneath his; every time he swallows, he feels the ghost of Sakusa’s fingers against his throat.

It takes a herculean effort to force himself to stop staring after Sakusa and do his damn job.

Atsumu’s not even sure why he’s the one mad. But he’s not mad, not really, just confused and a little desperate to get Sakusa to look at him, to talk to him, to acknowledge him. Maybe he’s also a little desperate to see if Sakusa calling him a bastard might alleviate the weird feeling in his chest because maybe he’s gotten a little too used to having someone to bounce off and now he’s alone again.

When did that become a thing?

The answer is lie down on the sofa and stare at the ceiling.

He replays the day over and over and over in his head trying to make sense of it all, and though he tries, he can’t find anything or anyone to blame other than himself.

He holds his gloved hand up and stares at it, remembering the feel of Sakusa’s beneath it, the look on Sakusa’s face when he realised what he’d let slip.

I don’t need you to make anything easier.

Atsumu wonders just how hard he made it for Sakusa instead and feels guilt gnawing at him again.

Guilt, anger, frustration, jealousy – it all seems to burn. Like the scorching heat of his switchblade is being pressed into his chest, twisting, and twisting, and twisting.

He’s not sure what’s worse. That incessant fire, or the weird sort of numb hollowness that drowns him every time Sakusa ignores him.

What do you want from me, Miya?

Atsumu thinks if Sakusa asked him that again, his answer would be different. If Sakusa threw him against a wall right now, if he got that close again, if he fisted his hand in Atsumu’s shirt and looked at his lips like he’s been thinking about nothing else for months – Atsumu would probably kiss him. Fuck that, he knows he’d kiss him, because he wouldn’t be able to stop himself. Because who else, really, has ever been able to pry their way beneath Atsumu’s skin so thoroughly?

Nobody.

Nobody else occupies his mind like that.

Nobody else makes him want to burn the whole city to the ground.

Nobody else gets it. Not like Sakusa.

Shit.

He stares at the ceiling for what must be hours. He hears music from Sakusa’s room, and it only cuts out when he locks himself in the bathroom for a shower. Atsumu counts the minutes – ten, twenty, twenty-five, thirty – until he comes back out again and returns to his room, quietly, this time.

-chan’.” Bokuto’s frown deepens, pulling on his thick brows and darkening the bright gold of his eyes with concern. “You haven’t flirted with Tetsu at all yet. Should I call Shirabu?”

Sakusa snorts a laugh next to him, and Atsumu feels his own cheeks heating. “No,” he snaps. “I’m fine. Are we done here?”

Sato laughs. “I wonder how much your Omi has told you, hm? About his expulsion from the guild of assassins. Did he tell you that it was your fault?”

“Why the fuck would he tell me that?”

He didn’t know Sakusa as an assassin – the earliest they met was at the Bounty Office bar on Sakusa’s first day. Atsumu remembers it clearly.

“Don’t change,” he blurts suddenly. “Don’t act different because you—”

Know, lies crushed and unsaid in the tight curl of his fists.

Because Atsumu can’t just stop being an asshole over the course of one night, he says, “Thought I wasn’t allowed to talk to ya.”

When Sakusa tells him to “Shut up,” relief feels like the messy spray of an extinguisher. He hides his smile in the rim of his mug.

“This is my… affliction to deal with,” Sakusa continues, glaring down at his coffee. “You weren’t supposed to find out. Ever.”

Atsumu snorts. “Crushin’ on me’s a sickness?”

Sakusa’s face twists. “Don’t phrase it that way. I’m not a schoolchild.”