#anw I feel a bit rusty here!

[gisachi]

4, 16, 19,20, 21, 35, 39,41,42, 46!!! Sorry it's a lot. :(

Heey Anon hi! I know this took ages because I deliberately saved this for last even though this is one of the earliest requests I got. I actually already started with your request months ago and I attempted to incorporate all of the numbers. But I discontinued it because I had a hard time cramming all the kisses into one ficlet lol. So I’m scratching that and will approach this differently. Minus all the numbers I’ve already done, I will group the kisses into three, so I’ll make three ficlets for you! This is also to make up for the lateness. XD So this is the first one. Stay tuned for the other two!

20. Kissing in a stairwell, giving them an artificial height difference. 21. A chaste kiss given to each other because they are in mixed company.(1,777 words)

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He is back.

Ran has a hundred reasons to believe that this is a dream, but her senses indicate otherwise.

She looks over her shoulder and he’s there, oblivious to her watching gaze. Her eyes trace the crook of his nose, dipping down to the depression of his philtrum, to his upper and lower lip that glisten with moisture, hiding the faint lines of dryness. She hasn’t noticed until now how clear and closed his pores are or how his hair turns gingerbread brown when hit by sunrays.

He sits behind her on the couch, and she feels his chest rise and fall slowly against her back, the warmth of his meditative breath fanning across her neck and causing stray strands of hair to tickle her skin. One hand is on her waist and the other over the black and white paperback print she holds open on her knees where his eyes are transfixed.

His index finger trails along unfilled white boxes as if reading Braille, deciphering the word behind each numbered riddle, and she notices how thin but slender his fingers are and his nails trimmed short, and she blushes at the slightest brush of his hand against hers.

She takes a deep breath, taking a whiff of his scent. It’s not a scent that comes and goes as when she passes by a bakery in the early morning. It lingers for a significantly longer time, the light sandalwood and musk that is uniquely his weaving like oxygen through the air.

And when he coughs, his croak resonates on her ears, and she internalizes that this sound is not a sound coming from a phone or from those hundred voicemails she’s stored, but a sound which she can source directly from his throat, from his voice box, from the actual person that is he.

Her senses indicate that this is more than a mere semblance of normalcy.

He is present. He is right here. With her.

This Shinichi is permanent.

“Earth to Ran,” he quips beside her ear, “I said number nine across is ‘aglet’.”

“Oh, right!”

Startled from her reverie, she twirls the mechanical pencil around her fingers before filling in the four blank boxes his finger is pointing at, beside the first ‘a’ of the down word ‘Neanderthal’.

She doesn’t need to look behind her to know that Shinichi is giving a curious look, directed not on the crossword puzzle but on her.

“You seem to be lost in thought,” he inquires.

“It’s nothing. It’s just…” she pauses, taking another deep breath, “I’ve been wondering.”

“About?”

“This,” she vaguely waves the pencil between them.

Shinichi perks his head back, nose crinkling in confusion. “The crossword?”

“No, no,” she chuckles, tilting her head sideways, her nose brushing his as she meets his eyes squarely. “Us. Right here. Peace. Stability. How we reached this point.”

“Oh.”

If the words didn’t come from her, she would’ve been amused by the sudden existential declarations too. But she knows he’s as used to this as she is whenever she gets emotional, and what she feels at the moment is no different from the moments he had returned in his real form in the past but this time, he’s around for much longer.

"How you’re here beside me...and actually staying,” she adds quietly, eyes lowering to the pencil she’s holding.

With an affectionate smile, Shinichi stretches a hand to caress her cheek. His skin is soft on her skin, warm to the touch and yes, this isn’t a dream. “Well, believe it or not, I’m not leaving anymore.”

As soon as he says that, a muffled ring from his pocket disrupts their little moment.

Ran’s stomach lurches. She knows what that ring signifies.

He holds one finger in front of her face as his other hand fishes for the phone in his pocket.

“Hello? Megure-keibu?”

She’s right.

“Where am I? At the Mouri Detective Agency. Yes. Yes… Uh, now?” He peers at Ran for a few seconds. His expression, though brimming with unkempt excitement, transforms into reluctance as his eyes meet her quiet ones. “Keibu, I don’t think now is the right-”

But as much as Ran doesn’t like where the next few hours may lead, she’s more mature than she ever was and knows better than convincing a warm-blooded detective to stay when his niche calls for him.

Halting him with a hand over his that holds the receiver, she mouths, ‘Go’.

Shinichi opens his mouth and closes it again. His brows furrow and he shakes his head curtly. ‘No,’ he mouths back.

Of course, she knows what’s running in his mind for it’s the same as what’s running in hers. He’s going to leave again. Ran understands the limbo that he’s in, having to choose on the spot between the only two options that comprise his happiness.

And knowing him, she has a hunch of what he might choose.

“Kudou-kun?”

“Megure-keibu, I-I’m sorry but I-”

Ran’s grip on his hand tightens, and she speaks a little above a whisper. “Shh. Don’t worry about me, Shinichi. This is the first time in two weeks TMPD calls for you again. I know you’re waiting for this.”

Her tone is firm and compelling and genuine, as genuine as the look of understanding she’s giving him, eager to wipe away whatever doubt and guilt he might be feeling for possibly leaving her again. He might be leaving, but Ran knows he’ll return. This is different from the past where everything is uncertain. This time, this time, for sure...he’ll return.

And she leaves him quiet, so quiet she can hear the hustle of the department on the other line. With a slow and reluctant huff of breath, Shinichi regards her with a light nod, and replies to the inspector, “Got it, keibu.”

“Sorry for the trouble. I already sent Satou-keiji and Takagi-keiji to fetch you. They’ll be there in a minute,” the receiver says. Shinichi acknowledges and hangs up.

She is ready to give him a teasing look, maybe pretend that she’s mad or anything to push his buttons, but she isn’t prepared for the tight hug that comes immediately after he shoves his phone back in his pocket.

Over her shoulder, Shinichi’s remorse is palpable from the way he groans heavily.

“God, Ran. Here I go again, I’m so sorry, I-”

“Wha- It’s okay, Shinichi!” Ran laughs mirthfully. “Really.”

He raises his head from where it burrows in her neck. “No. You’re disappointed. I can feel it.”

“Listen. If I have to choose between not letting you go and then having your attention divided by the prospect case and me, or letting you go to solve the case - which I know you can do so easily - and then coming back to me afterwards with your full undivided attention on me guaranteed, you know damn well which I’ll pick, right?” she says matter-of-factly, doting his forehead with the pencil.

That isn’t a lie considering how aware she is of Shinichi’s state - those dark creases under his eyes are a sign he’s been up most nights reading mystery novels, perhaps to compensate for the lack of real life mysteries coming for him.

Now that one finally arrives, how can she let it bypass him?

Even if she isn’t a huge fan of mysteries, since Shinichi loves it, and she loves Shinichi, little by little she’s learning to be thankful when they come his way, too.

“You’re not mad, are you?” he asks sheepishly, still not letting go of his arms around her waist.

“I will be if you won’t come back,” she chides, eyes narrowing acutely. She delivers it as a joke, but he doesn’t need to ask twice to understand she doesn’t mean it as one.

Outside, they hear tires screeching to a halt, indicating the arrival of his ride. Both rise from the couch, and Ran assists Shinichi to the door before the two officers can get out of the car to fetch him.

Shinichi bids her goodbye, and she watches as the man goes down the agency stairs.

In that moment, her chest tightens.

Shinichi with his back turned and departing away from her have always left a bitter taste in her mouth. This time, he’s doing it again.

Although assured that this Shinichi is permanent, still, she always finds the need to ask.

“Shinichi…” She halts three steps before the end of the stairs, just before he pulls the car door open. “You will come back, right?”

It is a simple question pregnant with meaning if specifically asked of someone she’s had the craziest history with. Shinichi knows why, knows where she’s coming from, knows the hundred implications she implores when she asks it.

And so, pausing on his feet, he faces her resolutely and walks to her. In front of her on the stairs he leans up, hand bracing her neck before he pulls her down for a kiss.

It’s only a quick press of lips but enough to convey the answer in his heart.

Even so, in that brief interval, she becomes hyperaware of everything.

The secure hand buried in her hair. The lovely smell of his sandalwood cologne. The sight of his red cheeks before and after he meets her lips. The sweet taste that lingers even when he separates.

Her senses indicate that this is more than a mere semblance of reality. Shinichi has never pressed his lips against her before. But in a matter of seconds, he suddenly does. And she feels his message everywhere.

This, indeed, is better than what any dream can offer.

“I’ll return to you before it gets dark. I promise,” he says quietly, face a breath away from her own. With what he has done and what she has felt, she knows he means it.

By the time Ran recovers from the daze, he is already in the backseat of the police car. She notes his half lidded eyes and crimson cheeks and ears, a look that is equally shared by the two police officers in front, except that their lidded eyes are more teasing in that respect. The belated realization that they were seen leads her to blush as intensely as he does.

Satou-keiji rolls her window down to give Ran a gaily salute. “We’ll bring him home before night, Ran-san, we promise!” she parrots before zooming away, no longer catching Ran’s embarrassed wave back.

Left behind, Ran waits until the car disappears from sight, gracious smile never leaving her face. She blinks back at the horizon with his promise at the back of her mind.

“I’ll be waiting, you idiot,” she whispers in the air.

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