Chapter Text
Retsuko was hiding something. A year ago, it would have sent Haida into a spiral of depression, thinking Retsuko didn't trust him enough to share her problems. As it was, the fact that she was eating day-old bread crusts but still smiling when Haida asked how she was feeling left him uneasy.
What was threatening to send Haida into a spiral of depression was that Tadano was hiding something. Or at least, he looked pensive when the topic of Retsuko came up, and was unable, or unwilling, to explain. And of the two of them, Haida felt more entitled to Tadano's thoughts, seeing as they'd been dating for three months.
In some moments, it still felt impossible, like something out of a TV drama - the wealthy playboy sweeping into the life of the lowly office worker and showering him with gifts, fancy vacations, and the like. In other, more frequent moments, it was shockingly mundane - Tadano liked decent booze, good food, and, for some reason, humoring Haida's taste in movies and TV, which Fenneko had assured Haida was abominable. And they weren't quite at the 'lavish vacations' point of their relationship, although Haida was trying to steel himself for whatever Tadano considered an appropriate birthday gift (it would give him a good baseline for subsequent holidays, if things went on that long). And Haida was certain, if he got in an accident, or got sick, Tadano would swoop in to help him.
The best thing, though, was every moment Haida found himself staring at this amazing man who'd agreed to figure out if they worked together. Not in disbelief that Tadano was with him, because a halting conversation a month in, after five or six dates, had given Haida some confidence that there were good reasons for Tadano to be with him. But those quiet moments when Haida was overwhelmed by - fondness for Tadano, warmth seeing, or even remembering, the little moments that made Tadano the person Haida wanted to be with.
Like right now, for instance. Tadano was making rice - he had proven a disaster in the kitchen, but through diligent study of online videos, had mastered rice, and was approaching eggs with similar enthusiasm (if slight confusion, as well, at how many ways there were to prepare eggs, when there was basically one for rice). His experiments in the kitchen had been precipitated by Retsuko's shock that Tadano, a grown man, couldn't even cook rice, and Fenneko's subsequent mockery that she had threatened to take to Twitter. Haida was trying his hand at curry, refusing to be shown up by a man who had destroyed one pan already before learning oil was essential to the process of cooking eggs that didn't bond to their cooking surface.
Haida was watching Tadano out of the corner of his eyes during this process, because there was something so endearing about the focus Tadano brought to this task. He proudly called himself a slacker, but only, Haida had discovered, for the things in life he found unimportant. His dream, the people he cared about - he put in an effort for.
(And Haida was well aware he could watch Tadano without the subterfuge, but his instincts were to admire without being noticed, and such habits died hard.)
It was also charmingly domestic, leaving a buzzing warmth in Haida's heart. Tadano was - rootless by nature, but settled into Haida's space easily when he came over (which was more often than not, when he didn't have duties elsewhere, and he did, more often than a self-proclaimed slacker would). It also left Haida anxiously aware of his own feelings, or, rather, anxiously aware that he didn't know Tadano's feelings.
Asking someone out was (theoretically) easy. Dating - finding yourself seeing the same person several nights a week, talking all the time - was (actually) easy, presuming you had chemistry. Tadano clearly liked Haida, but.
There were questions you asked when you had been seeing someone for a while, and not only was Haida ignorant of what Tadano's answer would be, he didn't know if Tadano was asking the questions of himself. Fenneko, in an attempt either to embarrass Haida or act as his wingman, had, one night at a bar, dragged out Tadano's feelings on marriage, which.
Marriage hadn't been on Haida's radar at that point - he'd always relegated that possibility to the women he'd been attracted to. But knowing, now, that it wasn't an option-
Raised questions. And he wasn't certain what answers would make him happy (was there an answer that would make him happy? Twenty-five years of experiences suggested there was not).
"Sooo," Tadano murmured, inches from Haida's ear, making Haida jump and nearly upend the pot of curry over both them and the kitchen. "When is this done? Because our rice is finished."
"Well, this needs to simmer," Haida said. "For at least half an hour. So." Tadano's ears drooped, and Haida was ready to eat plain rice now, and curry without rice later, just to relieve his boyfriend of the disappointment of having to wait to eat the rice he had painstakingly cooked.
But instead, Tadano set a kitchen timer and dragged Haida to his bed to make out for half an hour. He shoved Haida back down when the timer went off, removed the curry from the stove, and carefully prepared two bowls of rice and curry (the curry poured over the top of the rice, like civilized people did), and set them on the table, beaming at Haida like he'd accomplished far more than he had.
But Tadano had made the rice, and had left Haida warm and relaxed (if a little uncomfortable as he stood, as Tadano was rarely moved to more strenuous activities in bed if he weren't ensured much more time than half an hour), so Haida returned the beaming smile with an appropriately affectionate one as they sat to eat.
Tadano elected to stay over, spending most of the evening latched onto Haida as they slept, or rather, while Tadano slept and Haida worried.
Not about whether Tadano loved him, because he suspected the question would confuse Tadano (Tadano's resistance to labels had made getting him to admit he was Haida's boyfriend something of a trial, so Haida had no illusions about the effort involved in making Tadano define his feelings). Not about whether Tadano's disdain for marriage meant he didn't believe in commitment altogether.
But about what Tadano was keeping to himself, and the worry that it was connected, somehow, to what Retsuko was concealing.