⊱ 𝐇𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄 ⊰

[I promise I'll stop the angst at some point I just have two more side stories to do-]

Kunikuzushi looked at his phone screen, the brightness burning his eyes in contrast with the dark room and sky outside. He was staring at your contact; specifically the 'call' button. He knew you probably blocked him and you didn't wish to speak with him at all, so there was barely a chance you'd pick up. Plus, it was late at night.

He turned onto his side, the mattress beneath him dipping with his weight. He sighed and clicked it. The call actually went through, which surprised him. He held his breath while his phone rested in his shaky hands, waiting for the ringing to end.

Unfortunately, time ran out and you didn't pick up. He finally exhaled and clicked the power button, putting his device to sleep. He set it beside him and returned to laying on his back. His mind was empty, but his heart was full of things he didn't want to feel anymore. Tears spilled past his eyes, though he tried to keep his sobbing quiet so he didn't alert his mother.

He had to tell you everything. He had to admit what he did wrong, why he treated you so harshly, and that he wanted to truly be with you. He wasn't sure what he wanted your reaction to be, though. Maybe you'd be better off pushing him away.

━━━━⊱✿⊰━━━━

"How was your first night here, Y/n?" Hina asked as she stood in front of the oven. "Shirou, please set the table!"

"Yeah, yeah!"

"It was good, thank you," you smiled. It was probably more mediocre at best, but you weren't about to tell her that. After all, she couldn't fix it anyway. It was slightly difficult to fall asleep since you knew you'd be practically living with them and it felt like you'd moved houses... Of course, the last time you moved to a new house was in third grade.

"Glad to hear it," she nodded. "Shirou!"

Her son rushed down the stairs, purposefully using more force with his steps to create more noise. She rolled her eyes and gave him a short-lived glare when he entered the kitchen/dining room area. The room was large, with the kitchen on the right side and the dining table on the left side.

"Did you stop to wake up Gorou?" She questioned as he harshly ripped one of the drawers open and grabbed a bunch of silverware.

"No," he grumbled, reaching up in one of the cabinets and grabbing four plates. "That's what the stomping was for."

She sighed, "You're ridiculous. And stop being so careless, you're going to break something!"

"Um... I can go make sure he wakes up, if you want," you said, desperate to get out of the room. You were feeling unbelievably awkward since you were alone with Gorou's relatives without him there to keep you sane.

"Please do."

You hurried out and up the stairs. You softly knocked on his door to see if you'd get a response, but after a few minutes, you didn't hear anything, so you cracked the door open just a bit.

"Gorou?"

He was hugging his tail, facing the door as a giant blanket covered him. You could still see the tip of his tail from the top. You fully stepped into the room and cautiously sauntered over, wondering what would be the best way to wake him up. As you were thinking, you admired his facial features and realized how peaceful he looked when he was sleeping. You didn't get to linger on it the previous night because of your abrupt awakening.

"Gorou," you murmured, gently nudging his arm.

His eyes slowly fluttered open and adjusted to the light. The first thing he saw was you, under the sunlight that was shining through his bedroom windows. His eyes widened and you gave a small smile.

"Good morning, sleepyhead."

"Wh... Y/n?" He muttered, his voice at a lower tone than usual. You actually really liked it.

"Congrats, you can see," you chuckled quietly. "C'mon, you need to get up. I don't wanna be alone with your family, it feels awkward."

He smiled and sat up, letting go of his tail and rubbing his eyes, "Sorry, they're a bit much."

"Yeah, it also seems like they're arguing and I don't wanna be in the middle of that."

"Already?" He whispered to himself as he hopped out of bed, stretching his arms above his head.

"...Is that normal?" You asked hesitantly.

"Unfortunately. They fight a lot. I guess you could say... their personalities don't mesh well," he said, turning away from you and walking to his closet, looking for clothes.

"That sucks," you sighed.

He grabbed a few articles of clothing, "It's whatever at this point. Oh, but did you get any sleep last night?"

"I got... some sleep."

"Better than nothing, I guess."

"Yeah..."

An awkward silence ensued until Gorou turned back to you, "Uh, Y/n, I need to change."

"Oh! Right, sorry."

You hurried out of the room with a red face and closed the door. You pressed your palm to your forehead to feel the temperature and found that it was sweltering. A part of you wanted to imagine what he would look like-

No.

You hit yourself in the head for your inappropriate thoughts and fanned your face, trying to cool down. After a minute, your temperature died down and you reluctantly walked down the stairs since it felt creepy to linger outside Gorou's door while he was changing his clothes.

"He's awake," you stated as you uncomfortably entered the kitchen.

"Good," Hina smiled. "You can go ahead and sit down, hun. The food's already at the table."

You nodded and sat down. You didn't touch the food, since you were scared it would be rude, even though your hunger was practically eating you for breakfast. You waited, very impatiently, for everyone else to sit down.

Gorou raced as fast as he could so you wouldn't have to be alone in the unfamiliarity of his house for too long. He slid with his socks into the kitchen and almost knocked into the counter against the wall.

"Well you're eager this morning," Hina observed. "Hm, I wonder why..."

"Mom!" He hissed quietly, causing his mother to laugh.

"Alright, alright, go eat your breakfast."

He sat down beside you and began digging into his food. You glanced over from the corner of your eye before leaning over and whispering to him.

"You don't have to wait for everyone else before you eat?"

Startled by your voice, he turned his head, "No, don't worry about it!"

"Sorry, I just feel... weird," you sighed, picking up your fork and poking the food with it. "I need to stop being a downer, oh my god."

"It's okay to be sad, Y/n," Gorou said. "I'm sure it's hard not to be, in your situation."

He placed his hand over yours and you smiled softly to yourself before it faded back into a frown. Suddenly, the chair across from you screeched as Shirou pulled it out, sitting down at the table. You winced at the sound.

"Ew, go be lovebirds somewhere else," he gagged.

You rolled your eyes but said nothing as Gorou retracted his hand. You got to eating and felt your hunger being slowly satiated. Hina took her seat and everyone sat in an awkward silence. You could barely look up from your plate.

After a while, Gorou cleared his throat, "Um, Mom... Y/n and I won't be here on Saturday."

"Oh?"

He gave her a quick glare before elaborating, "We're going through the play for drama class. It'll probably take until the evening."

"Your teacher is keeping you there on a Saturday?" Hina questioned, narrowing her eyes.

"Yeah," you said. "We're finalizing everything before we perform it."

"Wait, when's the performance? Is it soon?" Hina asked.

"Miss Yae said it would be the Tuesday after next week so she could have time to... advertise. It'll be at five o'clock."

"Thank you," she nodded. "Gorou never tells me these things until the last minute."

"Mom," he groaned.

"What? You always say 'I fOrGoT' but I think you do it on purpose just so I don't go. Are you embarrassed? Hm? Are you embarrassed of your mother?"

"No, I swear that's not-"

A small smile pulled at your lips as you watched them interact. You always wanted to have a mother you could banter with, or at least have a good relationship with.

━━━━⊱✿⊰━━━━

Scaramouche arrived at your house after school hours, when you'd normally be back already. He wanted to apologize and explain everything, but what he was greeted with wasn't what he expected when he knocked on the front door.

The door swung open and M/n stood with a bored expression on her face, "Oh, are you one of Y/n's whores?"

He was flabbergasted by this greeting, and wasn't sure how to respond.

"Uh... No? I'm just here to talk to her..."

"Oh. Well, too bad," she shrugged. "I kicked her out yesterday."

She said it so casually that half of him hoped she was kidding, but... it wasn't a very funny joke, and she didn't seem to think so either. He hesitated in his response, feeling intimidated by her presence. She reminded him of his own mother.

"...Do you know where she is now?" He asked.

"Probably with her new boyfriend," she scoffed.

New boyfriend...?

"Oh."

━━━━⊱✿⊰━━━━

Without another way to find out where you were living, Scaramouche attended school the next day. He tried to talk with you during the day, during lunch and science, but you ignored him like your life depended on it. You could barely manage even looking at him. The entire day went like this, with you on edge and alert in case he was somewhere closeby. He hated that he was making you feel so unsafe, but that's exactly what he was trying to fix.

He noticed you spending most of your time with Gorou, even inviting him to eat with your friends. This was... a surprise, to say the least. He assumed you were dating him, or at least close enough to be. It hurt Scaramouche to see that he'd been replaced by the person you used to hate more than anyone, but he knew he deserved it.

After classes ended, he saw an opportunity to walk up to you, but seeing that Gorou was by your side, he couldn't bring himself to go. He sighed as he watched you walk away. He decided he'd try to message you later, since it seemed you didn't block his number. He really was a coward; all he wanted was to fix things, but he couldn't even do that right.

━━━━⊱✿⊰━━━━

Gorou opened the door to his house and you immediately heard yelling, putting you in a mild state of distress. Gorou sighed and walked in with you following behind. You closed the door as you watched Shirou and Hina argue in the living room.

"Shirou, you're going to be expelled if you keep up this behavior!"

"So what?" He snapped. "It's not like you think I have a shot at a good future anyway!"

"That is not true."

"Oh, we both know who your favorites are, and they're not even here."

Gorou begrudgingly interrupted, "What happened now?"

"Your brother got into another fight," Hina sighed with frustration. "Please talk some sense into him."

"I don't need him to tell me," Shirou retorted. "I need you to listen to me!"

"You're absolutely ridiculous."

Gorou rolled his eyes and turned to you, "You can go up and rest. I'll deal with them."

"Okay..."

You sauntered upstairs and went to your new room, throwing your bag on the floor and closing the door. You didn't have much to do aside from lay on the bed since there wasn't a desk put in yet. You could faintly hear everyone talking, but it was difficult to make out the words themselves. Not wanting to be eaten alive by boredom, you decided to stand in the hallway and listen in.

"You guys need to learn how to deal with this yourselves," Gorou said, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Why can't you just listen to each other?"

"There's no way to justify hurting other kids," Hina stated.

"You never even asked if they started it!" Shirou huffed. "Whatever, I'm going to my room. It's obvious she doesn't care about me."

Hearing that, you quickly retreated back into your room and heard a buzz from your phone. You pulled it out of your pocket and looked to see the notification.

Scaramouche

You stared at the message, astonished that he bothered to text you. You also forgot you had his number unblocked. Your eyes scanned the text repeatedly and you sat on the edge of your bed, thinking of whether it was a good idea to respond or not. Maybe he wanted to apologize? But what if it was about something else? Then again, what else was there?

You bit your lip as you typed a reply.

Me
Time and place?
sent 4:26 pm

Scaramouche was shocked when he saw your message pop up on the screen, but it made him smile nonetheless. He hurried to send his next text so you'd see it immediately.

Scaramouche
After school, at the park near my house.
sent 4:27 pm

Me
k.
sent 4:27 pm

Gorou promptly knocked on your door and you told him to come in, so he walked in and closed the entrance behind him.

"Hey," he greeted. "Sorry about that."

"It's fine," you shrugged, turning your phone off and setting it next to you. "So how'd it go?"

"No progress, as usual," he grumbled, throwing himself onto your bed with his face against the blanket.

You smiled slightly, "Well, it's still nice that you try to help them."

"Thanks," he said before sitting normally on the edge of the bed. "Anyway, how are you doing?"

"I'm... okay," you replied hesitantly. "Um... Scaramouche messaged me."

He immediately reacted to your statement, raising his eyebrows with surprise, "What did he say?"

"He asked to meet up tomorrow after school."

He frowned and furrowed his brows, "...You're not going, right?"

"I agreed to," you responded, turning your head away. "...Sorry."

"Wh- You have nothing to be sorry for, Y/n. I'm not letting you go alone, though."

You looked back at him with puzzlement, "Since when were you Mr. Protective?"

His cheeks flared pink and his ear twitched, "Um, since we became friends, I guess. I just- wasn't showing it as much... Is it bad?"

"No," you shook your head. "It's... nice. Why can't I go by myself, though?"

He gave you a look that suggested the answer was obvious, but you weren't sure what he was referring to. After a moment, he figured you weren't going to realize so he elaborated.

"Because you said he just wanted you for sex. Someone needs to be there in case he tries anything."

"Ohh, that... You do know he could beat you with one kick, right?"

"I-I know that!"

"Just making sure!" You laughed. "But thank you. For caring so much."

"It's not like I can help it," he said. "You're kinda hard to love, but I do anyway."

You feigned an offended expression while you laughed, "How dare you!"

"I'm sorry, it's true! We've known each other since elementary school and I'm just now falling in love with you. I think that says something about you."

Your face warmed up from his words, but you were still smiling, "Or that just means you're blind as hell. I have no idea what you weren't seeing before, I'm amazing."

"You bragging about being amazing isn't something I find amazing," he chuckled, leaning closer to you and lowering his voice to a whisper. "Everything else is marvelous."

"I-"

He captured your lips in a loving, slow kiss. You hastily shut your eyes and leaned into his touch. You were like a bird, being freed from its cage and flying into the sky. Kissing him made your skin a blaze of colors; shades of red and pink. You loved the feeling he ignited within you. You both mutually pulled away and said nothing. You only stared into his eyes until you both silently agreed to keep going and pressed your lips together once more.