pls and ty, bb <3


Fai never thought he could have them both. Not both.

He has Yuui, of course: well, he's always had Yuui. Fai will have Yuui for as long as Yuui will have him, for however long that might be. But he has Kurogane now too, though he never meant that to happen. He'd found that out on a Thursday evening after school, hidden away in the prep room long afer classes were done. The clubrooms had emptied and the playing fields fallen silent and he'd grown aware that it was late - far later than he'd meant to stay. Yes, he ought to have been home ages ago, only, in the prep room, with its white gleaming shelves and faint tang of bleach... in the prep room it had been possible to pretend that Yuui was at home too. Waiting for him. That Fai could go home and find light and noise and the waft of something warm from the kitchen. And so he'd stayed, but it had gotten late and Yuui still wasn't there. He was just locking the equipment cabinet when he heard a rap on the door.

After he'd jumped out of his skin and called out brightly to ask who it was, he'd found Kurogane waiting there: red-cheeked and scowling and arms crossed over his chest.

And Fai had felt his heart lurch about suddenly in his chest. That old familiar wash of longing and dread. What about Yuui? That horrid creeping fear. Fai still didn't have an answer for that.

Because Fai couldn't give up Yuui. Not now. Not when they were seven and not when they were sixteen, and not even when Yuui booked a flight to Rome and not Tokyo. You won't miss me, he'd said, softly at the airport. You'll find someone else instead, Fai.

Fai had found someone else, but not someone instead: a snarling puppy with a bark far worse than his bite. Tall, dark, and handsome and far too perceptive, and Fai hadn't meant for it to happen, but it did and he's glad.

And then Yuui came home. And Fai waited for everything - Kurogane, Yuui, lazy Sunday mornings and nightly home-cooked dinners - to fall apart, and it didn't. Somehow.

He didn't know he could have them both. Not both. He's always had to choose before - Yuui or not Yuui - but Kurogane is not Yuui, and Yuui is not Kurogane. And now Fai doesn't have to choose. And that thought... that thought makes him smile for real.