un regalo per nuvolaluz (original) (raw)

Because
by ? // for nuvolaluz

characters/pairings: Gokudera/Tsuna
rating: PG
warnings: It’s kinda mushy. No spoilers whatsoever.
wordcount: 2036

summary: Gokudera tries to secretly give up smoking, but it’s harder than he thinks, because Yamamoto is an idiot and Tsuna chews on his pens.
notes: how the hell is this longer than my non-pinch hit?

The night sky is full of stars; Gokudera lies on his back, dazed, vacated swing fluttering above him.

This isn’t his fault.

-

It begins like this: the Tenth casts a doleful look at the cigarette hanging from the corner of Gokudera’s mouth.

Ah– no, wait; that was how it ended.

-

In the beginning, no one notices at all- except for Gokudera, who doesn’t think he’s ever noticed anything more acutely in his life. He starts to bite his lip and takes to tapping fingers angrily, something Shostakovich or Prokofiev, against tabletops and belt-buckles. And gum, a lot of gum. He becomes a pack a day chewer.

The problem is that he doesn’t want to say anything, because it seems like whining (which is hardly befitting of a mafioso), and that people don’t assume that just because they haven’t seen him smoke recently that he hasn’t.

The teacher is sweating visibly by the time Gokudera is hammering out the third movement (piano sonata number seven). Classmates avoid looking at him, and so they fucking should.

Engrossed in his gritted teeth, Gokudera almost doesn’t feel the tenth’s gentle prod.

Gokudera’s fingers pause guiltily three bars from the end, and he turns to face his boss.

Apprehensively, the Tenth says, ‘Are… are you okay, Gokudera?’ His face is a little bemused and his smile a little nervous, like he’s second-guessing his intrusion. And Gokudera is fucking horrified to realise that yet again, he’s done something to worry (and frighten) the tenth.

‘Nothing, boss!’ he says as brightly as he can, ‘Nothing, at all just—’

And then he drops his gaze and notices the pen.

More specifically, the pen that’s hanging carelessly out of the corner of the Tenth’s mouth, casually resting against his lips, chewed end leaking dark blue ink, stain blossoming against the pink. Gokudera stares, fixated – usually this would be distracting for entirely different reasons, but all he can think of is how much he needs a fucking cigarette, right now.

Distantly, he thinks he hears something crack.

Wrenching his eyes away from the Tenth’s mouth, he fixes a smile on his face that he hopes doesn’t look as strained as it feels. His voice comes out a little high-pitched when he says, ‘I’m fine boss. Don’t worry about me, I’m fine!’

The Tenth doesn’t seem convinced, but he says, slowly, ‘Okay, Gokudera,’ and he’s looking at Gokudera’s fist.

His fist, which, Gokudera realises when he turns back around, is holding a now-snapped pencil.

-

This, Gokudera reflects, was a bad idea.

His head leans against the rooftop railing, eyes closed, and from below, he can smell the smoke drifting up from behind the east wing where a student is sneaking an illicit cigarette.

This, is some exquisite form of torture.

Fuck, he thinks. ‘Fuck,’ he says, loudly.

‘Fuck what?’ Yamamoto asks.

Gokudera’s eyes snap open and he literally jumps. Yamamoto is crouched in front of him, a baseball bat in his hand and a curious look on his face, looking comfortable and for all the world like he’d been sitting watching the whole time.

‘Jesus fucking Christ,’ Gokudera snaps, ‘Don’t sneak up on me like that, idiot,’ and forgets to correct himself (What? Of course he knew Yamamoto was there, as if the tenth’s right hand man would allow himself to be caught by surprise, what a stupid thing to even suggest). His senses are just a little dull from withdrawal, that’s all.

Yamamoto merely regards him and says, ‘Actually, I’ve been here for a couple of minutes. Thought you knew.’

Gokudera scowls and scoffs, but because he’s not a brilliant liar, switches tact. ‘And you just sat there watching? That’s creepy.’

His answer is a shrug and a smile – ‘I said hello, earlier; you didn’t respond.’

Gokudera chooses to ignore this, and Yamamoto in general (this is his usual policy). He stares at the sky and decides that absolutely none of them look anything remotely like smoke gently curling from the end of a cigarette. He hears Yamamoto settle himself down comfortably beside him, and for a long while no one says anything. Then,

‘Is it about Tsuna?’

Blinking confusedly at this non sequitur, Gokudera answers ‘Is what about Tsuna?’ before realising he is encouraging conversation.

‘You know,’ Yamamoto says, like Gokudera is some kind of mind-reader. ‘The thing you’re so nervous about. You’ve been avoiding him for the past few days.’

This is offensive. Gokudera isn’t nervous at all (pft, nervous, him?); he’s just a little…tense. Understandably so. And he hasn’t been avoiding the tenth, just needed to be away from his mouth for a while (and wouldn’t Yamamoto interpret that weirdly). But Yamamoto is staring at him, obviously expecting some kind of answer, so he grunts noncommittally.

‘You should tell him, Gokudera.’ He claps Gokudera on the shoulder and stands up, swinging his bat behind his shoulder.

‘Tell him what?’ Gokudera asks suspiciously. Surely, out of everyone, Yamamoto hadn’t been the one to notice he’d quit smoking. Because that would be so pathetic, and so fucking typical, wouldn’t it.

‘That you’re in love with him,’ Yamamoto says simply.

Yamamoto has this way, sometimes, of saying the most amazingly insightful things in the most amazingly stupid, straightforward way. And Gokudera has been on the receiving end of this before, but it always leaves him feeling horribly exposed.

‘Oh,’ Yamamoto says brightly as the bell rings, ‘Great! We have baseball in P.E today.’ And then he saunters off, fingers curled around the silver bat, and Gokudera can only gape wide-eyed after him.

The rooftop door bangs shut.

Gokudera presses his palms to his eyes. ‘Shit,’ he moans.

‘I need a fucking cigarette.’

-

Pavement scrapes the soles of his trainers on the long walk home. He drags it out, wanting to avoid the apartment where Shamal will be obliviously smoking like a chimney.

‘Are you sure?’ he hears in the Tenth’s unmistakable voice. Gokudera’s head jerks up and turns around frantically, seeking the source. There, at the next junction – Yamamoto has paused his bike, foot steadying him as he leans across the handlebars to chat to the tenth. As Gokudera watches, Yamamoto says something in a low voice, and the Tenth laughs.

Gokudera feels his stomach clench.

‘Why didn’t he just say anything?’ says the Tenth with an exasperated smile.

Yamamoto shrugs- ‘You know how he is.’

Oh, shit, Gokudera realises, They’re talking about me! Yamamoto is telling the Tenth! Horrified, he runs over to stop him, ‘Wait, Tenth! It’s not truuue!’

Tsuna jumps, startled, and turns around. Yamamoto pulls himself back fully onto his bicycle, says, ‘I’ll be going then,’ and then has the gall to give Gokudera a conspiratorial wink before pedalling off.

Fucker, Gokudera thinks sourly, sparing a glance to Yamamoto’s shrinking silhouette. His breath heavy, Gokudera grabs the Tenth’s shoulders and shakes him a little. ‘Tenth!’

‘Gokudera!’ the Tenth laughs nervously, backing off slightly. ‘Yamamoto was just telling me that –’

‘I’m not in love with you!’ Gokudera blurts.

The Tenth closes his mouth slowly, and then opens it, only to close it again.

‘Yamamoto was just telling me,’ he starts again, sometime later, speaking very carefully as though he was checking every word, ‘that you had quit smoking.’

Gokudera stares. He drops his hands from the Tenth’s shoulders.

‘Smoking?’ he repeats, slightly strangled. He can feel a hot flush start to creep up his neck.

The tenth nods, slowly.

‘Smoking.’ Gokudera closes his eyes and massages the bridge of his nose. ‘Fuck,’ he swears, and delivers the nearby telephone post a vicious kick ‘Fuck.’

See, he has about ten separate fantasies about this. In most of them he’s saving the Tenth’s life, or laughing with the Tenth under fireworks, or they’re just sitting quietly snuggled under a kontatsu. There are usually flowers involved, and the one who blushes softly is always the Tenth. Approximately none of them take place on some random-ass street junction in the middle of Nanimori suburbia, and in none of them is Gokudera bright red like a goddamn tomato, and at no point does he say ‘fuck’ and kick a telephone post.

‘Gokudera?’ Tsuna reaches out almost hesitantly and Gokudera flinches away. Because he’s used to taking rejection from a lot of people, but he doesn’t think he could stand it if one of those people was the Tenth. Because he’s prepared to take rejection from a lot of people, but not, not Tsuna.

So he does the only thing he can think of, and runs.

-

_Click_- the flame jumps up, and wavers delicately in the evening breeze, a tiny, unsteady beacon in the dark playground. Practiced hands cup it, shelter it; bright orange bathes the cigarette tip. Paper crinkles and flakes away brown, edges aglow; tobacco burns. Smoke wisps.

Gokudera breathes.

‘Thought you quit?’

Gokudera whips around, the swing beneath him creaking, with a sharp comment on the tip of his tongue – but it’s not Yamamoto, it’s the Tenth, it’s Tsuna, standing awkwardly with his hands jammed in his pockets- and Gokudera’s mouth is suddenly very, very dry.

‘Tenth,’ Gokudera says guiltily. Smoke rises incriminatingly from the cigarette between his fingers. ‘I…’

Tsuna shrugs. ‘It’s okay’. He settles into the swing beside Gokudera. It’s one of the small bucket-shaped ones with the belt for children, but the Tenth fits into it perfectly. If it were anyone else, Gokudera probably would have laughed.

Feet trailing on the ground, Tsuna gently pushes himself backwards and forwards, hands gripping the chains. Gokudera stares at the cigarette burning in his fist and tries to work out what he wants to say.

‘I’m sorry for disappointing you,’ he says awkwardly. Tsuna casts him a curious look so he gestures feebly to the still-smoking cigarette.

‘Oh,’ Tsuna says. Then, ‘You didn’t disappoint me or anything. I mean, no one expects you to…you don’t have to quit cold turkey. There are patches and gum and…other things that help.’ He trails off, shrugs. ‘The important thing is you don’t have to do this alone.’

He reaches out, and gently removes the cigarette from Gokudera’s fist. He drops it to the ground and crushes it beneath his shoe. ‘The important thing is, you don’t have to do anything alone.’

Gokudera swallows, hard, because Tsuna is suddenly right in front of him, child-swing swaying in his absence; because Tsuna’s hand is still resting on Gokudera’s fist, because his poor, tired heart is banging away in his chest; and because there’s still an ink stain, blue at the corner of Tsuna’s mouth and because love, love doesn’t even begin to fucking cover it.

‘I’m not in love with you,’ he says weakly, almost to himself.

Then Tsuna kisses him.

It’s more of a peck, really, a brief, hesitant and almost imperceptible brush of against Gokudera’s bitten lips – but Gokudera freezes, and then, so does Tsuna.

‘Sorry, I just-’ Tsuna whispers against his mouth and he begins to pull back but Gokudera darts a hand behind his neck and hold him there, says, ‘No, it’s okay, it’s good’, and Tsuna nods, his face as red as Gokudera’s feels. His fringe tickles Gokudera’s forehead.

Gokudera tries to calm his breath, feels it shudder in the space between them. ‘May I,’ he asks unsteadily.

Tsuna laughs and it’s a nervous sound. ‘I think I already did.’

And so Gokudera wets his lips and leans in, and kisses Tsuna, slowly, carefully, deliberately, because this, with Tsuna, is an impossible and beautiful thing; because this is Tsuna, and he deserves something wonderful; because there’ll sooner be a bullet in Gokudera’s chest than a tumour but he’ll quit anyway, because, because, because —

— Because Gokudera is sixteen years old, fifty-two months a mafioso, two-hundred and thirteen weeks a smoker, four days in withdrawal, and approximately seventeen-thousand, five-hundred and twenty-two hours, six minutes and forty seconds in love.

‘Um,’ says Tsuna, breaking away to breathe.

‘Yeah,’ Gokudera agrees, hand still curled in the soft hair at the back of Tsuna’s neck. Tsuna’s lips quirk in a smile, and he jokes,

‘At least we can deal with your oral fixation.’

This is when Gokudera falls backwards off the swing.

He’ll deny it later, of course.