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vannahfanfics · 2 years

Text

Of Blue Cocomos and Astute Observations

Word Count: 5555

Romance, Fluff, College AU, Quirkless AU, Getting Together

Summary: Fuyumi's friends drag her out to a bar to celebrate the successful completion of their midterm exams. Just as she's beginning to acclimate to the chaotic atmosphere, Fuyumi realizes that she's landed herself in the sights of one Keigo Takami, who's rumored to be the campus' resident heartbreaker! But is there more to Keigo than the rumors say?

Howdy! Back at it again for the @hawksbigbang with some Huwumi! Be sure to go give some love to my artist @fictionalsownme for her lovely art, and also a big thanks to my beta Ris for cleaning up the story for me! Enjoy~

Fuyumi wasn’t sure if her head was pounding from the alcohol or the music. Well, she’d only had one blue cocomo so far, so it had to be the music. It vibrated on the air like it intended to beat it to death, the rhythmic thoomp-thoomp-thoomp of the resounding bass strong enough to make ripples in the blue liquid filling up her martini glass. The strobe lights flashing around the nearby dance floor only strengthened the headache beginning to form in the base of Fuyumi’s skull. Squished in a booth between her two friends, Fuyumi felt her muscles twist that much tighter, and she suppressed a whine.

She was just not made for clubbing. Point, blank, period.

Fuyumi had just passed the midway point of the first semester of her junior year of college. Her friends had been especially adamant about going out since the midterms of the teaching program had been particularly brutal. After over two years of resisting peer pressure, Fuyumi’s resolve had finally crumbled in the wake of such exhausting tests. It was totally normal for girls her age to go out, she’d tried to convince herself. She deserved this. She could just have a drink or two, dance with her friends, and be back by midnight. No big deal.

Now, however, Fuyumi had a feeling that midnight would come and go and she would still be trapped in this booth.

In a vain attempt to try and loosen herself up, Fuyumi sipped at the cocktail again, grimacing at the hint of vodka she could taste despite the overwhelming flavor of coconut. The bartender had even halved the amount of alcohol at her request, but she could still feel its sting against her tongue. It wasn’t surprising, really, considering that this was her first alcoholic beverage in at least a year. Drinking, like going to clubs, wasn’t really one of Fuyumi’s pastimes.

Her friend’s elbow suddenly reared up to strike the underside of the martini glass still at her lips, and Fuyumi’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head when a large mouthful of the drink sloshed to the back of her throat. She snorted on instinct, and the liquid rushed up to sting her nasal passages. She ripped the glass from her mouth to slap a hand over her mouth. She was just barely able to suppress the coughing fit that surged up with frightening speed. Oblivious to her hunched posture and watering eyes, Fuyumi’s friends just continued to excitedly chatter about finishing up midterms. With a groan, Fuyumi slumped over the table, and her forehead hit it with a light thunk.

She should have just stayed home.

With a sigh, Fuyumi turned her head and pressed her cheek against the slightly sticky table to pout petulantly at her half-drunk martini. Surely it couldn’t be that bad, right? After all, her friends were having so much fun. Their cheeks stained pink from the alcohol flowing through their veins, they seemed completely unbothered by the atmosphere as they chatted animatedly. Really, one would think they were sitting outside of their favorite café having their morning coffee instead of in a loud club, mere feet away from the sweaty, writhing mass on the dance floor.

However, Fuyumi couldn’t help but think of all the terrible things she’d heard about nightclubs. Between the ghastly things they showed on true crime dramas and the many whispers of spiked drink incidents that circulated around campus at frightening frequency, Fuyumi had a myriad of reasons to flee as far from this place as possible. But her friends wouldn’t have brought her here if it was that dangerous, right? And there was safety in numbers.

That being said, when she looked back to the dance floor to see a man totally grab a handful of a passing waitress’ behind, suddenly the booth was a heck of a lot more comfortable.

As that crossed her mind, it became apparent that one of her friends had finally taken notice of Fuyumi’s plight. She lightly swiped a hand across Fuyumi’s shoulder as she took a sip of her drink, then popped her lips off the straw with a satisfied sigh. After swallowing, she set the drink down to turn in the booth and put a hand on Fuyumi’s back.

“Aw, why the long face, Fuyumi?” she cooed before finishing off her Bahama Mama. She slammed it down on the end of the table, then motioned for a passing waiter to bring her another. With a giggle, she turned back around to chirp, “Don’t worry about everything else going on! It’s no different than any other time we get together,” she encouraged. “We go out all the time and nothing happens, right?”

“Yeah!” another one of Fuyumi’s friends piped up, smiling as she used the thin straw to stir the ice of her mojito around. “Literally, the only difference between this and the places we usually go to is the music is actually good.”

All of them snickered, and Fuyumi managed to crack a smile.

Yeah, she told herself as she pushed herself back up into a sitting position. I’m overthinking it. It’s new, but that just means it’ll take some getting used to. And besides, all my girl friends are here for me. They won’t let anything happen. She exhaled contentedly as the tension eased from her shoulders. Yeah! What’s life without stepping out of your comfort zone? She grabbed her drink and took a healthy sip of it, and this time, she tried to pay less attention to the vodka. When she didn’t fixate on that, she found that it was actually quite good!

“Yeah! There’s our Fuyumi!” one of her friends cheered when Fuyumi finished the drink and flagged down the waiter to get her another. “Next thing you know, she’ll be out there tearing up the dance floor.”

“Maybe she’ll even go home with someone?” her other friend grinned suggestively, wiggling her eyebrows.

“Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa,” Fuyumi chuckled while holding up a hand, “one step at a time, girls!” She ignored the tang of pain that pierced her heart at the second jibe.

Silly, she thought with a placid and forced smile. A little alcohol isn’t going to suddenly make me noticeable. But she didn’t want to sour what was looking to be a pleasant evening with intrusive thoughts, so she hastily threw that thought to the back of her mind. They were just tipsy and joking. That’s all.

They all exploded into laughter, and when Fuyumi’s second cocktail arrived, they clinked their glasses together. As Fuyumi settled back against the plush seat of the booth, sipping daintily at her blue cocomo, she found that this was actually quite enjoyable indeed. Though the atmosphere was chaotic and loud, that also made it the perfect place to cast away all one’s worries and release inhibitions.

Well, not too many inhibitions, Fuyumi thought with a light chuckle. She looked out at the rest of the club. I’ll just start small—

The thought stopped short in her mind as her gaze, which had been idly sweeping over the bar, halted on the very attractive man sitting there and staring right at her.

Waves of golden locks crowned his head and framed his incredibly handsome visage. As he tilted his head, the light of the burning fluorescents hanging above him caught in his equally auric eyes. The suave smirk curling on his lips seemed to accentuate the sharpness of his jaw—seriously, Fuyumi wouldn't be shocked if it could cut diamond. Indeed, he was easily the most gorgeous human being that she'd ever clapped eyes on.

Fuyumi tried to rip her gaze away from him. She didn't want to be caught staring even though she'd caught him staring, but she was so entranced by him that she just kept ogling him with wide eyes and a slightly agape mouth. Even if she had averted her gaze in a reasonable amount of time, it wouldn't have mattered; the handsome stranger was well aware that he'd been noticed. He winked one of those pretty golden eyes at her and raised his beer bottle in greeting, and as that salacious smirk spread further across his mouth, Fuyumi felt little tingles run all over her body and her skin flush with heat. Apparently he could see her blush from all the way over there because his impish grin just widened more. Any bigger and it was liable to crack his face in half, but oh, was it sexy!

"Guys. Guys!" Fuyumi hissed under her breath when she finally tore her gaze away from the bar. "There's a guy at the bar looking at me!"

"In a good way or a creepy way?" her mojito-sipping friend frowned while craning her neck to survey the scene.

"I think it's in a good way," Fuyumi answered unsurely. She sure thought it was because he was interested, but again, she had limited experience with this sort of thing. Even buzzed, her companions would be able to sniff out any ill intent. She kind of wished that they weren't slightly drunk, however, because they were completely indiscreet about it.

"Oh my God. That's Keigo Takami," her other friend gasped, slamming her Bahama Mama down against the table so hard that the orange slice garnish popped right off.

"Holy shit, it is !"

Her friends did not sound excited about it, prompting Fuyumi to look between all of them wildly.

"What? What is it? Who's Keigo Takami?!"

"Girl, he's only the most infamous boy on campus right now!" another one of her friends huffed with a roll of her eyes. She paused to sip at her rum punch, then continued, "I'm sure even you've heard some rumors, Fuyumi."

In favor of learning more about this supposed rapscallion who'd taken a keen interest in her, Fuyumi ignored the unintended jab at her lackluster social life and instead pressed, "I don't know! What are people saying?"

"He's a heartbreaker," Fuyumi's cohort chimed in unison. Her mouth dropped open, and she shot a quick glance at Keigo over her shoulder; he had become engrossed in conversation with the bartender. However, like he could sense her eyes on him, his eyes suddenly flickered to peer at her out of his peripheral vision. When their gazes locked, his smile widened.

"Oh dear!" Fuyumi wheezed and hastily ducked down in the booth again.

"Yeah," one of her friends continued while idly swirling her cocktail around with the straw. "He's a senior. Apparently he's taken it upon himself to 'go out with a bang'—by banging every girl he can. He charms his way into your bed, then he's gone before you wake up in the morning."

"Gone to hop into someone else's bed," another one nodded sagely. "I heard he made it through the entire cheerleading squad in a week!"

"And it's not just that!" her third friend piped up. "I heard he's kind of a thug! Just the other day, a girl was telling me how he just zooms around campus on his motorcycle and has totally almost run people over!" She dropped her voice low and leaned in to whisper with wide eyes, "I've even heard that he sells drugs. Not like, weed or stuff like that. The hardcore stuff!"

“What? Noooooo,” Fuyumi gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. She resisted the urge to look at him again; if he was really that bad, she didn’t want to act just as interested. But… she was. And so despite herself, she peeked out of her peripheral vision at him. Could all those nasty rumors really be true?

Fuyumi had never really been the type to assume things based on rumors. So, there was really only one way to find out the truth.

She screwed up her face into a determined frown, grabbed her blue cocomo, and downed it all in one go. She shook her head vigorously to clear the fuzz of the alcohol. Then, with a resolute huff, she jumped up from the table.

“Oh, oh my,” she stammered as the world suddenly spun around her. She grabbed onto the back of the booth seat while her two friends grabbed onto her body to steady her. Okay, it had looked cool and all, but maybe chugging the drink hadn’t been one of Fuyumi’s brightest ideas.

“Fuyumi, are you really going over there?” One of her friends frowned anxiously when Fuyumi, undeterred, swept her slightly sweaty bangs out of her ruddy face and straightened back up. “Even after everything we told you?”

“Yes,” she asserted. Small wonder that alcohol was colloquially known as liquid courage because bold was the only way to describe how she felt right now. “I don’t take stock in rumors. If he truly is some slimy sleazeball, then I’m going to find out for myself.”

She was just going to talk to him because she was curious. No, it had nothing to do with the fact that he was looking at Fuyumi out of all the women in this bar. Nothing at all, she told her brain as the intrusive thoughts tried to muddle their way back up to the surface.

Because if she started thinking about it, she might convince herself she imagined him staring at her in the first place.

Her friends were so giddy by Fuyumi’s sudden brazenness that all reluctance evaporated instantly. With a chorus of delighted squeals and whoops, they shoved her away from the booth and into the throng. Fuyumi gasped, stumbling over her wedge-heeled shoes, and she instinctively glanced up at the bar. Despite her desperate plea for the opposite, the handsome stranger had borne witness to her clumsiness; his gold eyes sparkled with amusement, though he did try to hide his chuckle behind the rim of his beer bottle. Fuyumi wanted nothing more than to admit defeat and slink back into the booth already, but she steeled her nerves.

Just a little stumble, Fuyumi! she told herself and smoothed her palms down the fabric of her jeans—her friend’s jeans, actually, pale blue skinnies that hugged her figure and “made her ass look great,” to quote her eager companion. Fuyumi had been hesitant at first to wear them, especially when her other friend had whipped out a black crop top. Fuyumi didn’t even like to wear two-piece swimsuits; the idea of walking around a bar with her midriff showing had nearly made her combust on the spot. But with the way Keigo’s eyes roved slowly up and down her figure as she approached, she found herself grateful she’d caved to her friends’ insistence. By golly, she might even go as far to say she felt sexy.

At least for the half a minute it took to walk up to the bar and stub her toe on a barstool. Nothing sexy about that.

A high-pitched whine threatened to burst out of Fuyumi’s mouth, but she caught it at the last minute, her cheeks puffing out and turning red with the strain of keeping it contained. She grabbed onto the back of the barstool as her knees buckled with the pain, and the already confusing atmosphere of the bar swirled with the water that flooded her eyes. She was so distracted by the white-hot snakes of pain shooting up her leg that she didn’t notice Keigo rise from his chair and come to her side—that is, until she felt his large hand come to rest on the small of her very exposed lower back, and suddenly, her nerves had something else to get in a tizzy about.

“Is this your first time wearing those?” Keigo chortled with a gesture down at her wedges.

Fuyumi glanced down, and when she looked back up at him, it was with a mortified blush.

“Y-you can tell?” she whispered in horror. Fuyumi much preferred comfortable and flat-soled shoes, especially since her practical training as a teacher required a significant amount of time on her feet. Screw societal views of female professionalism, Fuyumi wanted to keep her toes, thank you very much. Of course, just like the rest of her ensemble, she’d borrowed the wedges from her friends to “complete the look,” as they’d put it. It had taken her five minutes to walk from her front door to the car because she kept tripping—and sitting at the booth hadn’t exactly made her more acclimated to them.

“You don’t look very sure on your feet,” Keigo hummed, his hand continuing to rest on Fuyumi’s back as he guided her up into the barstool. “But you clearly aren’t drunk, so I figured it must be the shoes.”

“That’s a very astute observation,” Fuyumi blinked in surprise.

“That talk’s too educated for me, sweetheart,” Keigo laughed.

Fuyumi’s face flushed with embarrassment, more at her fumble than the pet name. How could she be so silly? It was so easy to forget that not everyone studied literature and thus had an elevated vocabulary. She opened her mouth to correct herself, but stopped short when Keigo gave her a bright grin. He… He was joking? The realization made her feel like she was knocked off-kilter, prompting her to clutch onto the bar.

Oh, dear, what had she gotten herself into?

“Another ‘astute observation,’ if you will,” Keigo continued as he hopped up into the barstool beside her, “but you don’t do this often at all, do you?” He punctuated the “this” with a vague gesture around the club. It was quite embarrassing to be read like an open book, but Fuyumi hadn’t the heart to try and argue. Instead, her head flopped forward with a groan.

“No, not at all,” she admitted. “My friends talked me into it. Wanted to relax after midterms…”

“By taking you to the least relaxing place you can imagine,” Keigo finished for her with another chuckle.

“Exactly.” Fuyumi sighed and looked back up at him with a pout.

“It be your own squad,” Keigo snickered, then lazily waved at the bartender. The man set down a fresh beer in front of Keigo, then looked expectantly at Fuyumi.

“For the miss?”

Oh, shit, what was the name of her drink again? Something with coconut? She really didn’t want another cocktail, but she couldn’t lose face in front of Keigo. Ugh, but the two she’d already had were fuzzing up her brain; goodness knows what state she would be in after a third, While she sat there, pink-faced and silently trying to dig the name of the cocktail out of the recesses of her mind and solve her mental debate simultaneously, Keigo smirked knowingly.

“Get her the fancy water,” he chirped.

“F-fancy water?” Fuyumi stammered, and Keigo just winked as the bartender flounced away. He returned a few seconds later with a martini glass, which Fuyumi stared owlishly at after he set it down in front of her. She blinked, then hesitantly leaned forward to sniff at the clear liquid inside. It was water, all right, and the “fancy” bit came from the olive on a toothpick garnishing the rim. To the casual observer, it would appear to be a run-of-the-mill martini.

“I don’t know whether to be offended or charmed,” Fuyumi said as she sat back up to give Keigo a soft smile. She said that, but she was one hundred percent charmed by his consideration for her feelings. If he was some kind of philanderer, it was easy to see how women so easily fell under his spell, because he was quite adept at figuring them out with a mere glance.

Wait a second!

Ack! Fuyumi, you need to be more on your guard! she scolded herself. Ohh, she had almost fallen under his spell, just like that! Fuyumi wasn’t making any assumptions, but that didn’t mean she didn’t need to be on her toes. She inhaled sharply to recollect herself, then picked up the martini glass to sip at the water. Okay. Focus. You need to feel him out first—

Aaaaaaaand that train of thought immediately derailed as soon as she turned to see him watching her dreamily, his cheek leaned in his hand. Keigo was just too damn pretty, all golden and god-like under the light of the cheap fluorescents.

“I’d hope it’s the latter,” he hummed in that honey-like drawl of his.

Fuyumi spit the water back into the martini glass.

Keigo snorted piggishly with laughter, head slipping from his hand as he leaned forward. Fuyumi’s face flushed tomato red, but she was unable to do anything but just watched wide-eyed as he cackled at her little display. After a good minute of laughing, he whipped his head back with a sigh, his face red and eyes a little watery.

“I’m gonna try three for three here—you don’t get flirted with often.”

“I think the fact that I just did a spit-take answers that question,” Fuyumi huffed bitterly while setting the martini glass down on the bar. Water wasn’t very appetizing when it had your own saliva floating around in it, after all. “I have to commend you,” she said with a wan smile. “You’ve effectively riddled me out, and yet you don’t even know my name. Quite bold of you, if I dare say.”

“I suppose bold begets bold,” Keigo replied with a raise of his eyebrow. “After all, you came to me.”

Fuyumi’s mouth dropped open—did he just use the word beget ?—and Keigo grinned at her reaction.

“I know smart words too,” he teased, “but there’s a word missing from my vocabulary. Care to enlighten me?”

Fuyumi couldn’t help the breezy sound she released at the blatant—and honestly, very smooth—flirtation. She wanted to come up with something snarky to counter, but she could only open and close her mouth a few times, mind hopelessly blank. Finally, she yielded to his wiles and uttered a meek, “Fuyumi.”

“Fuyumi,” he echoed, rolling it over his tongue like he was appreciating a piece of candy rather than her name. “It’s a very beautiful name.”

“Th-thank you.” She squirmed in her seat as she considered that she should probably ask his name, though she already knew it. “And you are?”

“The name’s Keigo, sweetheart,” he responded breezily. He relaxed against the bar again, his propped elbow lazily holding his beer while the other hand resting on his knee, hand dancing dangerously close to Fuyumi’s own. Just the proximity made her skin tingle, a sensation so distracting that she almost missed his follow-up question. “So…”

Oh, here it goes. He’s going to ask me to go home with him already? Fuyumi feared, her stomach lurching like a flipped pancake. She was honestly quite disappointed. Despite her own inhibitions, she found Keigo quite fun to engage with, and she had hoped to at least talk with him a little more. A rejection was already burning on her tongue when Keigo continued, but thank goodness she didn’t let it out.

“Tell me about yourself.”

“O-oh,” Fuyumi wheezed, the surprise making her voice a little screechy. Keigo quirked his brow at her shock, to which she shyly blushed and muttered, “S-sorry, I just—I don’t do this often, as you know. I’m not quite sure how these conversations go.” A feeble lie as any, but thankfully, Keigo seemed to take it at face value.

“Don’t worry about it,” he smiled kindly, and Fuyumi found herself melting down into the barstool a little bit with how warm it made her feel. He looked so genuine, with his soft smile and gleaming eyes; how could the person before her ever spark such vicious rumors of debauchery and unpleasantness? “Just do what feels comfortable for you.”

“A-all right,” Fuyumi nodded and straightened up in her chair. “Let’s see. Well, to start, I’m an education major…”

And just like that, Fuyumi found herself comfortable— more comfortable than she ever imagined she would be sitting at a bar talking to the most handsome man ever (who could be a hooligan in disguise, to boot). Everything around her—the loud music, the sweaty and sticky air, the pungent sting of alcohol, the mass of people—everything just melted away until it was just her and Keigo, suspended in a soft little golden bubble, their own universe far away from the din and chaos. If someone asked her, she would never be able to recall the conversation because they simply talked about anything and everything; it just felt so natural talking to him that she found herself sharing things she never dreamed she would share in a casual encounter.

And Keigo shared too. He was just as engrossed as she was; for everything she had to say, he had something to respond with. Sometimes funny, sometimes charming, sometimes endearing—but always equivalent. Fuyumi couldn’t imagine that someone whose main goal was seducing her would feign half as much interest as Keigo seemed to have in her. And so, by the time the third hour that they had been sitting there together had passed, she had all but forgotten the rumors that surrounded the charismatic and handsome man before her.

All she could think about was how overjoyed she was to be the subject of his attention. Fuyumi knew herself; she was bookish, she was dedicated to her studies, and she wasn’t conventionally attractive. Never in her wildest dreams would she have thought someone like Keigo would give her a second glance. But here he was, and he hadn’t taken his eyes off of her damn near this entire night, and the rush of esteem that realization sent through Fuyumi’s body had her eyes watering up suddenly in the middle of their conversation.

“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered and ducked her head in embarrassment, trying to discreetly wipe at her eyes. Keigo, of course, looked down at her in concern, for their topic of conversation certainly hadn’t been anything to cry about. She sniffed with a nervous laugh, and then admitted, “I just—Oh, I suddenly thought about how crazy it is that someone like you is talking to someone like me , and…”

The dark beast that lurked in the back of her mind reared its ugly head, preying on the moment of weakness that flickered through her. It latched on with its sharp claws and bore down with its pointed teeth to inject her with a cold rush of dread. What was she thinking? This couldn’t be happening. She peered up at Keigo through her bangs, where he was still staring down at her in unease. It looked so convincing, but—it had to be an act, right? Oh, she’d played herself a fool. Keigo wasn’t interested. Fuyumi was just easy prey, and she’d almost let herself fall right into his clutches.

Bitter and frustrated tears burned at the corners of her eyes. She was such a fool. She looked out at the booth where her friends had been to find it now occupied by a group of middle-aged men embroiled in a rowdy card game. She’d been here for three hours! Of course her friends had gone home. Go home—yes, she should go home.

Just as she made to slip out of the barstool, Keigo released a frustrated sigh.

“Ugh, I should have known this would happen. She’s dragged my name through the mud.”

The unexpected outburst gave Fuyumi pause, and despite the alarm bells ringing shrilly in her head, she found herself looking up at Keigo. For the first time that night, he wasn’t looking at her. Now, he was hunched over the bar with his fingers laced over his mouth and his eyes burning into the mirror serving as the bar’s backsplash. Its smooth glass reflected the utterly self-loathing look on Keigo’s face, nearly hidden by the mess of bottles coloring the bottom border of the mirror.

Nearly. Fuyumi didn’t miss it, and that’s why she sank back down into her stool with a soft breath of, “What?”

Keigo’s gaze flicked to her, then back to the mirror. After several moments of consideration, he dropped his hands from his mouth to release a heavy sigh too big for his lungs to hold.

“You’ve heard the rumors.” It was phrased as a statement, not a question. He knew, and so Fuyumi just nodded. Keigo clenched his teeth and raked his fingers through his golden curls with an aggravated growl. “Shit, and here I thought that I’d finally found a girl that hadn’t heard the trash spewing from her mouth…”

He grumpily turned to face Fuyumi, who was just sitting there in quiet stupefaction.

“My ex-girlfriend,” he explained disdainfully. “I dumped her because she cheated on me, and now she’s going around campus tellin’ everything with ears that I cheated on her. Plus that I’m hopping in bed with anything that has a pulse!” As he ranted, a red flush began to creep up his neck; there was no doubt that the emotion this man was feeling was genuine.

“Wh-what about the drugs?” Fuyumi inquired meekly, and Keigo looked at her, incredulous.

“What?! She’s saying that I sell drugs now?!” he cried, voice high-pitched and squeaky. Several heads turned to look at him in suspicion, and he ducked down, embarrassment adding to the color on his cheeks. He sighed wanly and palmed his forehead with a defeated groan, “Ugh, this is a disaster. At this rate, I’m not gonna even be able to graduate. I’ll have to fucking transfer…”

Fuyumi gazed down at Keigo, just watching as he mumbled angrily to himself. She could leave if she wanted to. She could chalk this display up to a last-ditch effort to seduce her, add her as another notch to his bedpost. She could let that wicked beast in her head have its victory, let her stay convinced that no one could ever look at her the way Keigo had throughout the night without having ulterior motives—let her stay convinced that she was fundamentally flawed somehow and that she was intrinsically undeserving of being thought beautiful. She could crawl back into the little box she’d trapped herself in, the comfort zone that had somehow turned into a prison of her own insecurities.

Fuyumi didn’t want that. She didn’t want to believe that Keigo was a liar and a philanderer. She didn’t want to believe that the only thing she was worth to him was another lay. And so, she didn’t leave. Instead, she leaned forward to slip her hands around Keigo’s cheeks to slowly raise his head to look at her.

“You’re still here?” he gasped in shock.

“Yeah,” Fuyumi smiled sweetly. “I’m still here.”

“But—But what about,” he fumbled, tongue flicking out to wet his lips as his eyes searched all over her face for some sign of rejection or disdain. When he could find none, he swallowed thickly and whispered, “But what about all the things you heard?”

“They’re just rumors,” she shrugged simply. “I can choose whether or not to believe them.”

“And—” Keigo swallowed again, followed by a shaky breath. “Do you?”

“Come on, now, what happened to your astute observations?” she couldn’t help but tease. “Does it look like I do?”

Slowly, a giddy smile spread across Keigo’s face. He sat up, hands coming to rest over hers that were still pressed to his warming cheeks.

“Gonna try at four out of four,” he purred, a rumbling sound in his chest that was so alluring paired with the smolder of his half-lidded golden eyes looking at Fuyumi so adoringly. “And say no?”

“No,” she confirmed with a nod.

“That’s a relief,” Keigo said, visibly relaxing before her. “I was afraid I’d gone and lost the prettiest girl I’ve ever seen.”

Despite herself, Fuyumi’s face must have pinched on reflex. Keigo tutted disbelievingly and slid off his stool to stand in front of her, looking down at her with wide eyes.

“Hey, you can’t believe that’s not true, right?” he frowned. “Surely you know you’re drop-dead gorgeous?” When Fuyumi just looked away, her expression pained, he cooed and leaned down to press his forehead to hers. He was quite tall, but the way he stooped over her, crowding his space to look into her watery eyes, was comforting rather than intimidating.

“Fuyumi,” Keigo said firmly. “I mean it. You’re beautiful. The moment I saw you walk in the bar, I knew that if I left without saying a word to you, I’d regret it forever.”

“Really?” she sniffed. “You mean that?”

“Make an astute observation,” he smirked lightly in response. And Fuyumi didn’t have to look for very long to draw the very obvious conclusion.

“Yeah,” she laughed despite the tears rolling down her cheeks. “Yeah, you do.”

Keigo purred in satisfaction, angling his head to delicately run the tip of his nose down the bridge of hers. She sighed contentedly into his gentle ministrations, and her eyes fluttered as a sleepy happiness pervaded her system. He held her so tenderly, like some precious thing.

And suddenly, Fuyumi was very grateful that she’d astutely observed him staring at her earlier that night—and a little grateful for the blue cocomo, too. She definitely would never have gone up to him without it. But now, she considered as Keigo was pulling her out to the dance floor, she wouldn’t need any liquid courage.

All she needed to remember was that she deserved this.

#huwumi #hawks x fuyumi #fuyumi x hawks #keigo takami #takami keigo #fuyumi todoroki #todoroki fuyumi #my hero academia #mha #boku no hero academia #bnha

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