The last thing Arakita ever expected was to have a crush on anyone, let alone fucking Toudou Jinpachi.
Considering where they had started back when they had first met—always bickering with and insulting each other, and not really spending any time together unless forced to—this revelation would probably come as a great shock to anyone, really. But it catches Arakita completely fucking off guard more than it would anyone else.
The Great Crush Revelation hit him near the end of the summer of their third year in high school. He had been minding his own damn business—which apparently is a new way to spell out disaster, go figure—when Toudou had decided to all but barge into Arakita’s room like he lived there, and announce that they were going to have a competition. Loser would buy dinner.
Even though he had acted annoyed and uninterested in the idea, Arakita still participated anyway, and didn’t mind it. Somewhere along the way, things like this had become something for them. When initial distaste and animosity had melted away as they warmed up to each other, Toudou and Arakita somehow, someway ended up becoming close friends. And accompanying friendship were random trips to each other’s rooms, studying together, and just spending time together in general, especially since graduation was fast approaching and they wouldn’t get to have things like this much longer.
In the end, Toudou’s idea had been to challenge Arakita to a race. And like hell he would lose to Toudou at anything, let alone a race.
“You’re so annoying.” The words are more of a diversionary tactic than an actual insult, but playful banter and practiced, habitual arguments are something that they’ve fallen into as well.
“If you keep wasting your breath talking to me, you’ll lose!” Toudou singsongs, laughing as he turns his head to look at Arakita just a tiny bit behind him. “Not that you ever stood a chance, anyway. And really, Arakita, like you’re any better?”
“Oh, well sorry to annoy you, looks like you’re stuck with this, though, because that’s just the way I am.”
“Well, I happen to like you that way, so don’t go around changing, idiot.”
“What is that—?”
For that brief moment, as lame and cliché as it sounds, it feels like time has stopped, or, not so much as stopped as it is that Arakita is more hyper-focused on Toudou than he was before. Like he’s seeing something he never has before, considering something that he hadn’t until now.
As the glow of the setting sun hits Toudou’s profile, and his obnoxious—but hell, kind of endearing in it's own weird and familiar way—laughter that Arakita has grown used to and welcomes echoes while he pulls further ahead of Arakita now, it seems to be one of those fabled Moments.
The ones you want to be cynical about and don’t believe in until they actually hit you square in the face. The ones you emphasize with capital letters or italics or underlines. Because it’s one of those unforgettable ones that you keep with you—whether it’s unconscious or not—because you enjoy it, or it’s had some sort of impact on you. One you don’t want to forget. Ones that have been existent before, but maybe not so obvious. But then, bam, they’re there. And you’re, for lack of a better way to put it, fucked.
But for this one moment, among the comfortable atmosphere and clarity, there’s a sense of honesty that seems fresh and new, welcomed and needed. The kind that causes a feeling like this so suddenly, but also explains it and puts it into place.
“Have fun paying for my dinner!” Toudou calls over his shoulder.
“God dammit!” Arakita speeds up, the reverie of the moment broken, seeming far away and like a dream now.
(He even considers passing it off as just that, but then there’s really no explanation for the racing of his heart or that warm sense of clarity. Like he’s just realized something important that he hadn’t even realized existed before.)
When he thinks on it later, though, in the darkness of his bedroom that night, he thinks on it, and slowly comes to the agreement with himself that the moment of realization explains the way he always feels around Toudou, the way he doesn’t want that to end. And it’s a damn crush. One that he didn’t think he wanted, but that also makes sense and he’s not completely against.
A crush on Toudou. His damn best friend. Of all people.
Everything, all of this, is the equivalent of someone throwing a brick at him when he wasn’t ready for it, so he stood absolutely no chance in hell of ever catching it, let alone stopping it.
But… part of him—the totally irrational part where what his heart wants matters more than what his brain thinks—doesn’t mind that.
Unbelievable.
But now, this leaves the pressing matter of what the hell he’s supposed to do about it—act on it or just shut his mouth and let it go. Better to keep it to himself than bring up something so ridiculous to Toudou and risk rejection as well as ruining this comfortable best friends thing they’ve managed to fall into.
Or, there’s the option to do something rather than sit back and let it be. To try. To take initiative and take that step forward.
Hell, that’s what his heart is fucking telling him to do, after annoying and careful consideration.
But… that’s something that can be dealt with and decided when it’s not 2:00 in the fucking morning. Yeah.
FILL: SWAG 2016
The last thing Arakita ever expected was to have a crush on anyone, let alone fucking Toudou Jinpachi.
Considering where they had started back when they had first met—always bickering with and insulting each other, and not really spending any time together unless forced to—this revelation would probably come as a great shock to anyone, really. But it catches Arakita completely fucking off guard more than it would anyone else.
The Great Crush Revelation hit him near the end of the summer of their third year in high school. He had been minding his own damn business—which apparently is a new way to spell out disaster, go figure—when Toudou had decided to all but barge into Arakita’s room like he lived there, and announce that they were going to have a competition. Loser would buy dinner.
Even though he had acted annoyed and uninterested in the idea, Arakita still participated anyway, and didn’t mind it. Somewhere along the way, things like this had become something for them. When initial distaste and animosity had melted away as they warmed up to each other, Toudou and Arakita somehow, someway ended up becoming close friends. And accompanying friendship were random trips to each other’s rooms, studying together, and just spending time together in general, especially since graduation was fast approaching and they wouldn’t get to have things like this much longer.
In the end, Toudou’s idea had been to challenge Arakita to a race. And like hell he would lose to Toudou at anything, let alone a race.
“You’re so annoying.” The words are more of a diversionary tactic than an actual insult, but playful banter and practiced, habitual arguments are something that they’ve fallen into as well.
“If you keep wasting your breath talking to me, you’ll lose!” Toudou singsongs, laughing as he turns his head to look at Arakita just a tiny bit behind him. “Not that you ever stood a chance, anyway. And really, Arakita, like you’re any better?”
“Oh, well sorry to annoy you, looks like you’re stuck with this, though, because that’s just the way I am.”
“Well, I happen to like you that way, so don’t go around changing, idiot.”
“What is that—?”
For that brief moment, as lame and cliché as it sounds, it feels like time has stopped, or, not so much as stopped as it is that Arakita is more hyper-focused on Toudou than he was before. Like he’s seeing something he never has before, considering something that he hadn’t until now.
As the glow of the setting sun hits Toudou’s profile, and his obnoxious—but hell, kind of endearing in it's own weird and familiar way—laughter that Arakita has grown used to and welcomes echoes while he pulls further ahead of Arakita now, it seems to be one of those fabled Moments.
The ones you want to be cynical about and don’t believe in until they actually hit you square in the face. The ones you emphasize with capital letters or italics or underlines. Because it’s one of those unforgettable ones that you keep with you—whether it’s unconscious or not—because you enjoy it, or it’s had some sort of impact on you. One you don’t want to forget. Ones that have been existent before, but maybe not so obvious. But then, bam, they’re there. And you’re, for lack of a better way to put it, fucked.
But for this one moment, among the comfortable atmosphere and clarity, there’s a sense of honesty that seems fresh and new, welcomed and needed. The kind that causes a feeling like this so suddenly, but also explains it and puts it into place.
“Have fun paying for my dinner!” Toudou calls over his shoulder.
“God dammit!” Arakita speeds up, the reverie of the moment broken, seeming far away and like a dream now.
(He even considers passing it off as just that, but then there’s really no explanation for the racing of his heart or that warm sense of clarity. Like he’s just realized something important that he hadn’t even realized existed before.)
When he thinks on it later, though, in the darkness of his bedroom that night, he thinks on it, and slowly comes to the agreement with himself that the moment of realization explains the way he always feels around Toudou, the way he doesn’t want that to end. And it’s a damn crush. One that he didn’t think he wanted, but that also makes sense and he’s not completely against.
A crush on Toudou. His damn best friend. Of all people.
Everything, all of this, is the equivalent of someone throwing a brick at him when he wasn’t ready for it, so he stood absolutely no chance in hell of ever catching it, let alone stopping it.
But… part of him—the totally irrational part where what his heart wants matters more than what his brain thinks—doesn’t mind that.
Unbelievable.
But now, this leaves the pressing matter of what the hell he’s supposed to do about it—act on it or just shut his mouth and let it go. Better to keep it to himself than bring up something so ridiculous to Toudou and risk rejection as well as ruining this comfortable best friends thing they’ve managed to fall into.
Or, there’s the option to do something rather than sit back and let it be. To try. To take initiative and take that step forward.
Hell, that’s what his heart is fucking telling him to do, after annoying and careful consideration.
But… that’s something that can be dealt with and decided when it’s not 2:00 in the fucking morning. Yeah.