afterimage of a shining sun

[adustyspectacle]

Alright, I'm making sure this time I wouldn't leave this journal for such a long time. I'm gonna go post some fics I've written in the mean time. This one's Maehara/Isogai from Ansatsu Kyoushitsu.

Read it in AO3 here.

---

When he opens his eyes, Maehara sees Isogai.

It makes him instinctively smile, because he’s never not happy to see his best friend’s face. There’s a familiar look of worry and concern in his eyes, and it makes Maehara’s heart flutter that it’s for him.

Funny. He’s potentially dying from being infected by an unknown virus, but all he can think about is kissing his best friend senseless. (Not that he has the courage. If he did, he would have done it years ago.)

Maehara remembers what Takebayashi told him when he was lucid enough to ask—that the others went to get the cure. Isogai is back, and judging from the noise, so are the others, so that can only mean a good thing. He’s still weak from the pain, and his skin still feels hot, but he manages to sit up, with a little help from Isogai. His best friend’s hands settle on his shoulder, and once again Maehara’s heart skip a beat.

“Hey.” His voice is slightly raspy from disuse.

“Hey,” Isogai echoes back, his words as strangled as his, a strained smile painting his features.

“I take it the mission was a success?”

“Ah… yeah. Sort of. Turns out what you guys were infected with wasn’t all that deadly to begin with.”

Maehara lets out a sigh of relief. It’s only right then that he realises the enormity of the situation—he could’ve died. He’d never see his parents again, or his friends.

He’d never see Isogai again.

“Are you sure? Because this totally feels like dying,” Maehara says, trying to make light of his condition and distract himself from his thoughts. And while it worked on him, his best friend’s smile falls and his hands tighten its grip on Maehara’s shoulders.

“Please, don’t…” Isogai shuts his eyes. “Takaoka—”

“What?” A cold shiver runs through Maehara’s spine, and his stomach clenches in phantom pain.

“Takaoka… he was the one behind this. We were on the roof, and he trapped Nagisa with him, and then he…” Isogai’s voice is becoming more and more panicked, and it worries Maehara. His hands immediately find themselves holding his best friend’s face, fingers splayed on his neck and a thumb gently rubbing his jawline. “He lied, he was never gonna give the antidote, he blew it up, all of it, he blew it all up, I thought you were going to die—”

Isogai breaks into tears.

The last time Maehara has seen his best friend cry like that was when Isogai’s father died. Back then, he was too afraid to do the wrong thing, and too young to know what to do. So he just stood there by his side, angry at himself and completely helpless at easing Isogai’s pain.

While right now he’s still not sure on what to do, he isn’t afraid any more. Maehara pulls Isogai into a hug, and his best friend easily complies, releasing his grip on the blond’s shoulders and wrapping his arms around Maehara’s chest, while also resting his head on Maehara’s shoulders.

Maehara does the same, except he wraps his arms around Isogai, one hand cradling his neck and the other resting atop his head. His fingers thread along his best friend’s soft, black hair, caressing them while he whispers comfort and reassurance into his ear.

“I’m okay, Yuu-chan, I’m okay. You don’t have to cry. I’m okay.” Isogai sobs harder, so Maehara pulls him tighter, wishing and hoping that he could squeeze the pain away.

It takes Maehara a while to notice that the room fell in hush silence, with every single one of his classmates looking at the two of them. Most of their face are painted with concern, but all of them are surprised. They’ve never seen Isogai in tears before—he’s always smiling, and in control.

Maehara ignores all of them and focuses himself on Isogai only. How wet his shoulder right now from the tears. How warm he is, despite the blond’s fever. How Isogai’s hands are gripping his back, scared of letting go.

God, he loves him. It pains him that Isogai’s so distressed, but a part of him is so, very happy. Ecstatic, over the moon, fortunate and blessed—there isn’t any words he knows that’s adequate enough to describe it.

Isogai cares for him enough to spill tears over. Maybe he wouldn’t love Maehara like the blond loves him, but he’ll take what he can get. It’s more than enough.

He doesn’t know how long it was until Isogai’s tears subsided into the occasional hiccup and sniffle. His breathing is heavy, and the hold he has on Maehara doesn’t feel as desperate, although it is still as tight.

“You okay now, Yuu-chan?” Maehara asks, gently, softly.

“Don’t call me Yuu-chan,” Isogai mumbles. “And yeah. Thanks, Hiro-tan,” he adds.

The blond chuckles. “Don’t call me Hiro-tan either.”

Isogai’s grip on him is loosening, and Maehara can’t help but feel sad. Still, he releases his hold on his best friend too. Isogai’s eyes are red from crying, and his cheeks are obviously stained with his tears.

His best friend smiles. “You should get some sleep,” he says. His voice sounds normal now, albeit a little hoarse.

“What about you?” Maehara asks.

“I need to get some air.”

Maehara nods, and yawns. He feels tired, not just from the fever. He slowly lowers himself into his futon and closes his eyes. “Come back soon, Yuuma.”

---

Dawn has always been Isogai’s favourite time of the day. It’s beautiful, the way the first rays of sun peek over the horizon, how it chases the last vestiges of the night and bathes everything with a warm, golden sheen.

Dawn is even more beautiful now, with the sand on his feet and the soft lull of the ocean in his ears, while its waves catch and play with the light, making it sparkle.

He takes a deep breath of the salty tang of the breeze and commits every little detail in his memory. He never wants to forget anything about this trip.

(Never mind that he could never forget.)

The events just hours before was a harrowing experience. Frankly, he can’t fathom how he managed not to fall apart during their time at the hotel, with Maehara (and his other classmates to some extent) on the brink of death. Even more so when Takaoka (the bastard) blew up the supposed antidote.

But he managed. So it actually took him by surprise when he just started crying. He would have been more embarrassed that he broke down in front of everyone, but his best friend’s presence was comforting. Nothing else mattered at that moment, because Maehara was alive.

It terrifies him, that he almost lost Maehara, that he was only saved because of luck and circumstance. Isogai felt helpless back then at the roof, and he still feels helpless even now.

He feels helpless because if Maehara died then, he would never know how much Isogai loves him.

There is a soft pitter-patter on the sand that indicated footsteps, and when Isogai looks over his shoulder, his breath hitches. Maehara looks healthier, his skin less pale and the red flush of a fever is absent from his face. He’s smiling, and paired with the soft, golden glow of dawn, he looks absolutely beautiful.

Isogai smiles back as his best friend silently sits beside him.

“How long have you been here?” Maehara asks.

“Since last night.” The blond raises an eyebrow at that, and Isogai answers with a shrug. “Can’t sleep.”

His best friend hums his assent, and for a while they just sit there in the sand, listening to the waves and watching the sun as she slowly inches towards her place in the sky. The silence is peaceful and comfortable.

Isogai has never been one for snap decisions. He thinks through each and every choice, compiling a neat list of advantages and disadvantages inside his head, whether the benefits outweigh the risks, and whether the outcome and consequences of said choices are favourable—most of the time towards the people he cares about, and rarely towards himself.

He’s never been good at that last part. He supposes it stems from being thrust with responsibility at an early age, with his father dead and his mother trying her best to raise him and his siblings by her own. Everyone else has to come first; he doesn’t have the time nor the inclination to be selfish.

Isogai lets himself be selfish for once. He looks at Maehara straight in the eye, quickly leans over, and kisses him.

It isn’t how he expected kisses to go—not that he has any frame of reference, considering it’s his first kiss. He’d catch Maehara kissing whoever his current girlfriend was every now and then, and Isogai sometimes imagined himself in that girl’s position—useless dreams of course, but it passes the time.

The kiss right now is just a touching of the lips, because Isogai doesn’t know what to do and Maehara’s probably too stunned to react. Still, it feels soft and warm and wet. Somehow sweet, but his mind protests because he’s pretty sure Maehara should have morning breath (or whatever the equivalent is for being ‘bedridden and on the doors of death’ kind of breath). But he doesn’t. It’s sweet and rich and flavourful it almost makes Isogai dizzy.

He pulls away and opens his eyes, not realizing he shut them closed. Maehara’s eyes are wide with surprise and his lips are slightly parted in shock.

“Sorry about that,” Isogai says. He allows himself to be wistful, and so he smiles, a bit sad. He’s had years to come to terms, ever since he realized his feelings towards his best friend, and that there will never be anything romantic between them—he’s found peace in caring for Maehara as his best friend.

A small voice at the back of his mind is screaming at him, that the kiss would put an end to their friendship. But right now, nothing mattered, nothing at all except for Maehara to know that he is loved.

“I love you, Hiroto. You’re like family—no, you are family to me, and you’ve been there ever since we were kids. How could I not love you? I wasn’t going to say anything, but… with what happened, I… I just wanted you to know—”

Maehara is still too stunned to speak, but Isogai stops when he sees tears streaking down his best friend’s face. “Hiroto? Why are you crying?”

That pulls the other boy out of his shock and his hand shoots up to touch a cheek. Maehara stares at his hand, seemingly surprised that he’s of his own tears. “When?” he asks in a quiet voice.

“When what?”

“When did you… did you know, that you…”

“That I love you?” Maehara nods. “Uhm… first year of junior high. Around the time you got your first girlfriend,” Isogai replies, chuckling at the irony. “Although I think I felt it earlier than that. Back when dad died. You were always trying your hardest to distract me from my grief. I felt it then. I just didn’t realize until later that it would also involve me daydreaming about kissing you and holding your hand and other stuff like that.”

Maehara half-laughs and half-sobs in turn. “You mean to tell me we could have been doing this a long time ago?” It’s Isogai’s turn to be surprised, although it doesn’t last long as Maehara’s kissing him again.

His second kiss is better than his first. For one, Maehara’s enthusiastically kissing him now, and Isogai tries to return the favour. He feels clumsy, and all of a sudden he’s nervous, because he doesn’t really want to disappoint. His best friend has had a lot of experience—with girls, mind you, but the generalities are the same.

But Maehara’s still kissing him, so he figures he’s not doing so bad. He breaks away though, because he needs to breath. Isogai’s surprised that he didn’t notice Maehara’s hands cupping his jaw—tender and loving but also firm and steady enough that the two of them are only a few centimetres apart even after taking a break from the kissing.

He stares at his best friend’s face, transfixed. Maehara’s brown eyes seem shining, his cheeks are dusted with a faint blush, and his smile is so dazzling, full of joy and hope and love that Isogai would’ve crumpled if he had been standing.

“I—uh, I thought… I thought you like girls,” he manages to say. Maehara looks away, embarrassed and guilty.

“I like them well enough, but… the only reason I started dating around was because I was trying to forget I’m madly in love with my best friend.”

“But we were still pretty much attached at the hip even when you’ve had girlfriends, so I have no idea why you thought that would work, Hiro-tan.” Isogai smirks, and Maehara’s blush deepen.

“Sh-shut up! I’m not like you, I can’t… I was too scared to say anything, but… If I wasn’t dating around I would’ve probably done something rash like kiss you or something, and I didn’t want to lose you…” Maehara sighs. “How did you stand it, Yuuma?”

“Well, you already had a girlfriend when I realized, so there really wasn’t much that I can do.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I’m glad it worked out in the end. Except for the nearly-dying part.”

Maehara’s smile is beautiful, and Isogai would never tire of seeing it in his best friend’s face.

Dawn has always been Isogai’s favourite time of the day. With the sand on his feet, the soft lull of the ocean in his ears, and his best friend healthy and alive beside him, it’s turning out to be the best dawn Isogai has ever experienced in his life.

Isogai closes the distance between them and kisses Maehara again.