Archive of Our Own

There’s this thrill. A little flutter that comes to life in your stomach when you start learning to skate. The first few times you fly down a ramp, drop backwards on a bowl, grind on a handrail, land on your feet, even if you immediately eat shit after sticking it. There’s this thrill. 

Reki had gotten used to the feeling, had forgotten it. Langa changed that.

What Reki realized later was that, without the adrenaline rushing through him, the thrill Langa’s touch gave him was like honey, dense and sickly sweet. It was startling at first, without his heart already beating at an insane rate, to feel it pick up suddenly because Langa was playing with his hair or feel his face heat up at a smile. It settled in his chest and dripped down to his stomach.

Reki told himself it was just because it was new. A new friend, new feelings, new…things. 

Whatever it was, it made Langa laugh.

“You’re doing it again,” Reki said, trying to focus on tightening the trucks on Langa’s board.

He could hear the laughter in Langa’s voice. “Doing what?”

“Staring. It’s distracting, man.”

“What am I supposed to do then?”

“I dunno,” Reki mumbled. He finished tightening the kingpins, eager to change the subject. “Here, try it now.”

“Yeah, okay,” Langa said, taking his board back. He jumped on, leaning forward and backwards and pushed off, doing the same tests, down the Kyan driveway. “Feels stiffer.”

“Good, that means your wheels won’t bite and you won’t eat shit.”

Langa smiled. Reki felt warm. “Thanks.”

“Yeah, don’t mention it,” Reki said, looking away and rubbing the back of his neck.

“Wrist still hurts, though.”

“That’s outta my wheelhouse, bro.”

“But you could kiss it better.”

Reki was absolutely sure his face was red. His hand flew up instinctively, shielding his face. “Man, you’re so embarrassing. ”

Langa laughed. It was such a good, infuriating sound. 

“You’re so red,” he said, closer than Reki expected him. Langa pulled his hand away from his face. Closer, a soft smile still managing to reach his blue eyes. Reki felt lightheaded. 

Closer, and Reki’s heart was doing a grade-A effort to burst in his chest—

Langa threw his arms around Reki’s neck, holding him tight and blew a raspberry into his cheek.

“ DUDE! ” Reki tried to push him away, but Langa held fast. He was laughing into Reki’s ear, full-belly and too loud for it to be pleasant. “Get off! ” But Reki was laughing too. 

“Okay, okay,” Langa pulled away, but only just. “I just want to see you loosen up.”

“We’re on my driveway,” was all Reki could think to say.

Langa shrugged a shoulder. “We could go to your room.”

Reki’s spirit left his body. “ Langa! ” He was just grateful Langa wasn’t a guy that spoke too loudly.

Langa chuckled, kissing Reki’s nose. “I wish you could see how cute you are.”

“I am not cute, ” Reki hissed. 

But Langa would always insist otherwise. 

Being Langa’s best friend was extremely different from being…this. They were still friends, they still stole each other’s lunch and watched skating videos and went to S at night and hung out, making each other laugh. It was the extra stuff that dripped molten honey into Reki’s stomach. The way their hands sometimes brushed, the loaded looks they shared late at the skatepark, the stolen kisses in their rooms behind closed doors, even the small tweaks their games had undergone. 

Games with unspoken but well-defined rules, like avoiding the most segment indentations on the sidewalk or the sharpest carve without getting wheel bite. Winner used to get bragging rights or maybe got a free lunch, but now it had a different air. A layer of flirtation and pride that wasn’t there before, a film of exciting danger when executed in front of others. The games off their boards were even worse. They were playfully competitive about almost everything. And that playfulness had started to get mixed into all of this.

Reki wasn’t entirely sure how it had happened. It felt like an accident. It felt like the natural progression of their friendship. Like the next addition to their handshake, a little clumsy while they figured it out, but that eventually became a natural sequence. 

“ Very cute,” Langa said decidedly. He leaned in again, only for Reki to bring up his hand to cover his mouth.

“Neighbors.”

Langa only rolled his eyes before stepping back to kick up his board, letting out a rather dramatic huff. 

While his family liked Langa and his mother swooned over how patient he was with Chihiro and Nanaka, the Kyan’s still lived in an old neighborhood. Traditional. Easily scandalized, susceptible to heart failure. Reki rather liked not calling attention to himself or having to dial an ambulance for someone’s unsuspecting Baachan.

His mother didn’t ask many questions over the evolution of their friendship. His sisters thought Langa was cool. His father was glad to see he’d made a friend and stepped outside of his workshop more often. It was a quiet thing. An arrangement that worked for them.

Langa, as deceptively quiet as he appeared, was much louder about the whole ordeal. Reki understood it as the foreign influences he grew up around. His mother also seemed to have picked some of that up when she’d moved to Canada, because Langa had once referred to Reki as his boyfriend to her and Reki was still being invited over to dinner.

And he supposed that’s what they were. Boyfriends. It was objectively the correct label, but due to the progression of their relationship it felt…insufficient. Langa was more than just his boyfriend and he was more than just his best friend. There wasn’t a word for what Langa was, for what they had.

Reki didn’t mind that, it wasn’t something he lost sleep over.

“Here,” Reki said, grabbing the front of Langa’s shirt and pulling him into the workshop. Langa was already smiling when Reki leaned up to kiss him. “Quit being such a baby.”

Langa hummed into the kiss, bringing his hands to Reki’s waist, pulling him closer. Reki’s heart beat a little heavier in his chest, his stomach fluttering lightly. There was that thrill, all the more devastating in the quiet stillness of the mundane. The molten honey dripped and pooled in his stomach and down between his legs, making him push Langa further into the wall, slotting a knee between his legs.

Langa’s fingers dug into his hoodie and his mouth sucked lightly at Reki’s bottom lip before pulling away, breathing heavily.

“Room?”

“Room.”

They tripped out of the garage, faces flushed and uncomfortable in their jeans, when they screeched to a halt at the genkan. 

“Boys! I was just coming to get you,” Reki’s mom greeted them, a little surprised to find them stumbling in. Her voice was like a bucket of cold water for Reki. “Koyomi wanted to go to the stake park. Can you accompany her?”

Langa was as stiff as a board beside him, but Reki managed to stutter out, “Uh, yeah, sure. Yeah.” He took a steadying breath, leaning out of the hallway. “Don’t forget your helmet, squirt!” In response, he heard retreating footsteps thudding away inside the house. She wasn’t about to crack her head open on his watch.

“Were you just racing? You seem out of breath,” his mother asked with curious concern. “I thought you were just outside.”

“Hm, yep. You know how it is,” Reki quickly, pushing Langa back and out of the house. “We’re waiting outside, Ko-tan!”

He heard a very disgruntled, “Don’t start!” from inside before stepping out after Langa.

The tension bled out of him as soon as he shut the door behind him, laughing when he saw Langa slump against the door, looking razzled. Langa snickered, pushing Reki as he laughed.

“Shut up,” he managed, with no real heat behind it.

“I didn’t say anything,” Reki chuckled.

“Man, talk about cockblocking,” Langa said more seriously, making them both burst out into a laughing fit. 

“ Holy shit, Mom,” Reki said to himself. “It’s like she knew.”

“It’s a mom thing. It has to b—Woah!” Langa almost fell back on his ass when Koyomi opened the door.

“Reki—Oh, sorry, Hasegawa,” Koyomi said, taking a surprised step back.

“Come on,” Reki said, ruffling her hair. Koyomi ducked, slapping his hand away.

“I told you to stop calling me that,” she said, starting again. 

Reki shrugged. “I will when you stop being a little brat.”

Koyomi stuck her tongue out at him and dropped her board, kicking off into the street.

“Don’t go too far ahead! Within my eyesight at all times!”

“Keep up then!” She called back to him.

Reki rolled his eyes. “Brat.”

Langa nudged him, a silent let’s go.

They fetched their boards and kicked off, catching up to Koyomi. She was naturally very good, reminding Reki of Langa and his prodigy-like skill. His sister was nowhere near that, but Reki found that she didn’t struggle too much in picking up new tricks. Seeing his sisters have an interest in skating did soft things to his heart. It made him feel loved and important as they clung to his sleeves asking him to teach them or explain something. 

And as annoying as Koyomi could be, it was fun to skate with her. It gave them more common ground beyond just being siblings. On the rare days Langa wasn’t around, Koyomi would wander into his workshop and ask what he was doing. At first, he’d thought she’d just wanted to annoy him, but she always seemed to pay attention to his answers, her follow-up questions evidence of her attentiveness.

The ride over became a soft race, never getting ahead of Koyomi. Langa simply inched forward and waited for Reki to notice. They quickly switched over to the sidewalk, as rude as it was to pedestrians. The wheels they had were for the park, not for cruising, going at a higher speed meant tripping on a small pebble and wiping out. They weaved through people and narrowly avoided street signs and bus stops. 

The race was a tie, it always was in slow cruises, but it didn’t stop them from bickering otherwise. Langa kicked up first, Reki ran farther, it only counts if the wheels are on the ground and it’s about the rider not the board . But any argument was a good excuse to get into each other’s personal space.

The skate park was moderately populated, scattered with a few regulars at S and kids ranging from Koyomi’s age to Reki and Langa’s. 

“Hey, wasn’t that stupid and dangerous? Riding on the sidewalk with so many people?” Koyomi asked, shooting Reki a knowing look.

“Do as I say, not as I do, Ko-chan.”

Koyomi broke away from them shaking her head and started practicing her range of tricks, landing a majority of them.

Reki watched her like a hawk, as she talked to other kids in the park and asked how they did their tricks. When Langa started skating down the half pipe and sliding against rails and popping off benches, the kids wandered over to watch and wonder how he’d managed it.

Langa had a finesse to skating that went unnoticed to the untrained eye. His posture and articulation was, frankly, unreal. He rarely stumbled a landing, his knees and ankles working in tandem to jump, land, and continue gliding down the pavement. He made it look easy.

“Woah, what’s that move called?” Koyomi asked him excitedly.

Langa kicked up his board and shrugged. “I dunno, Reki taught me. I get the names mixed up.”

“Reki, Reki, what’s that move,” Koyomi insisted, tugging his sleeve. Reki couldn’t help the smile on his face.

“It’s a fakie big-spin,” he said. “But that’s too soon for you. You gotta get used to the stance before you start doing tricks with it.”

“What? Why?”

“It’s basically riding backwards, it’s very awkward at first.”

Koyomi scrunched her nose. “Sounds…scary.”

“It’s part of skating,” Reki said with a shrug. “You’d only be doing half the tricks without it.”

She seemed less unsure, so Reki added for good measure, “All skateboarding is, is practice.”

“Okay,” she said, regaining some excitement.

“Go practice near the grass, though,” he said. “You left your elbow pads at home.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she waved him off, walking to a patch of grass. “So how do I do this?”

“Start with your natural stance, but look back—no, not over your shoulder,” Reki said, walking over to her. Langa joined him as he talked Koyomi through the basics of staking in a fake stance. 

“You’re really good at this,” Langa said, leaning his chin on Reki’s shoulder as they watched Koyomi do longer laps in the stance.

“Hm? Bend your knees!” His eyes never left his sister, but he nudged Langa with his shoulder encouragingly. “What was that?”

“This; you’re good at teaching,” Langa said simply.

“Oh, thanks,” Reki smiled, glad Langa couldn’t see him blush. A little surge of pride coursed through him. He liked being good at things related to skateboarding. He was okay at riding, which he’d made peace with. But he was good at making boards and designing them, which he took pride in. He hadn’t realized that he’d also been teaching, at work with customers, at home with Langa and his sisters. It’d come naturally to him. 

Langa tugged at his arm for him to follow, sitting on their boards as they watched Koyomi. He linked his pinky with Reki’s where their hands met on the board, small and casual, something that stood out to no one, except Reki.

Reki was used to getting odd or rude stares in the street for skating. And he also knew he’d get them if people saw him holding Langa’s hand. They never talked about it, but it didn’t seem necessary. They avoided being overly clingy in public, at least no more than they had been before. It was small and only for him to know, and his heart would skip a beat every single time. It was nice.

“So,” Langa knocked his board against Reki’s, “when are we getting food?”

“We already ate,” Reki chuckled.

“Yeah, like an hour ago,” Langa mumbled.

“You’re hungry?”

Langa just raised an eyebrow at him.

Reki snorted. “Yeah, okay. Let’s give Koyomi a few more minutes.”

Langa sighed contently, leaning back on his hand and tapping his toes, which was his equivalent of a happy dance. Reki was unsure how he’d missed how endearing Langa was. 

“We’re going to Joe’s, right?” 

“Do I look like I’m made of money?”

Langa nudged his foot and Reki knew that if he looked over, he’d absolutely give in.

“Langa.”

“ Reki. ”

When did this happen? When did his resolve completely melt away when it came to Langa?

“Fine. But you’re paying for what you eat. No way am I splitting half the bill again.”

He looked over to see Langa scrunch his nose.

“Maybe we can go to the konbini down the road,” he suggested instead. Reki laughed at that.

“That’s what I thought.” 

Koyomi was bending her knees far too low, like she was about to pop a fake ollie. 

“Ko-tan!”

Her head snapped up, cheeks splotched red. She kept defiant eye contact, riding almost at her normal speed. She popped the damn ollie. Unsurprisingly, her back foot slid off the board, her front foot almost kicking the board away from herself entirely when she tried leveling it. 

Reki sprung to his feet, but he knew she’d only be slightly frightened. No sprain or bruises, just a lesson learned.

“Could ya ask next time?” Reki scolded once he’d given her a once-over, making sure she was alright.

“I don’t need permission,” Koyomi huffed indignantly.

“No, you need direction,” he said, crossing his arms with his stern big brother tone. “Always practice something new standing still if you can. Gain some confidence first, don’t just do it to spite me. You could get badly hurt that way.”

He bickered with her back and forth until she stuck her tongue out at him. He was right, but she would refuse to say so. 

“Come on, let’s get some food.” 

At once, Langa sprang to his feet, kicking up his board. Reki shook his head smiling, knowing that Langa would finally use those long legs of his to walk as fast as they would carry him.

His mom would probably give him an earful for spoiling Koyomi’s dinner, but it always got him good big brother points with her. Balanced scales, just how he liked all his affairs.

Langa liked to push the limits of what he could do. It was a rule he applied to most facets of his life. How late he could stay out without his mother noticing, how dangerously he could skate at the S track, how much Reki would allow him before he drew a line. 

That one was especially fun. 

It always started small. Experiments to see how much Reki would allow. How long their hands touched, how long he could lean his head against his shoulder. Sometimes it was a game with himself, his favorite being how long he could keep Reki’s eyes on him when he skated. But the goal was always the same: a little longer, a little more than last time.

So he was caught off guard when Reki was the first to bump their noses together. 

They’d been in Reki’s shop, Langa watching Reki work on a new board design in his sketchbook. He was sucked into his work, so Langa could play all the games he wanted and Reki would barely notice.

He’d nudge his knee or lean as close as he dared, rest his chin on his shoulder or play with the loose strands of hair that strayed from his headband. As long as it didn’t disturb his hand or hinder his lighting, Reki didn’t seem to care.

Then his head snapped up and turned to Langa, looking like a thought had crashed into his head and he had to immediately relay it, the urgency vanishing when he saw how close Langa had been. Something sparked in his eye, like he recognized the game, like he was now a player, and he’d closed the little distance there’d been between their noses. A playful bump. 

Langa’d been immediately hard and red faced, yanking away from Reki and making him burst out laughing.

“Not so bold now, are you?” Reki’d said. They’re competitive nature took the wheel after that.

Langa had a full gay crisis everytime he stayed over at Reki’s, wondering how much of the game was just that, a game, or something more. The something he’d craved and sought through his limit-pushing. The silent part of it, the manifesting-his-embarrassing-feelings-for-his-best-friend-without-ruining-their-friendship part. 

Langa liked to push and Reki liked to surprise him. 

Langa had started a regrettable game of footsies in Reki’s garage; Reki had picked it up in the worst place possible.

It was late and they were tired and Langa was growing irritable at the commotion around them. It had been a long night at S and Shadow had taken on more beefs than they’d expected. They were supposed to meet at Sia la luce well over an hour ago and Miya was berating Shadow over his ego.

The car ride over was insufferable. It was a miracle Joe let them inside the restaurant when they got there.

“The stove is cold, Hiromi ,” Joe greeted Shadow pointedly. Reki snickered at the name. It took Langa a second to register that Joe knew Shadow’s real name.

The bravado of his persona was all but snuffed out for the night, “Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry, but don’t punish the kids over it. I was their ride, it’s my fault we’re all late.”

Whatever speech Joe had prepared died quickly on his tongue, caught off guard by Shadow’s apology. “Well, I was hardly going to starve them. Let me go warm up their plates.”

Cherry was sipping wine quietly at the bar, his eyes following Joe to the kitchen.

“He’s got a soft spot for you,” Cherry said as they took their seats at their usual table. “He saved a portion in case you managed to arrive.”

“Never would have guessed,” Shadow mused.

“I was talking to the kids.”

“Well, the kids are hungry ,” Miya said, raising his voice so that it would reach the kitchen.

Langa was just praying for his plate to magically materialize in front of him.

That’s when he felt Reki’s foot on his calf.

He looked up to find Reki enthralled in a very natural conversation with Miya, as they tried and failed to make their utensils do skateboarding tricks with their fingers. Miya was laughing and Reki’s foot was travelling up to Langa’s knee. 

It was his foot. His socked foot at the very least. Reki had kicked off his shoes, or maybe just that shoe. But, Mary Mother of God, it was grazing his inner thigh. 

Langa tried to look relaxed, natural, unbothered. Definitely not fighting a boner like his life depended on it. Definitely not blushing harder than a sunburn caught on a snowy slope. And most definitely, he tried not to look like someone that had his best friend’s foot nearly tucked into his crotch.

Then Reki looked, finally looked, over at Langa. Still acting like he and his foot were two separate entities, giving Langa a smile, before going, “Hey, food’s almost here, stop looking so glum.” 

Langa huffed a breath, playing along and burying his head in his arms on the table. He looked down at his lap and—yep, that was Reki’s foot, with his yellow sock. The foot shifted one last time, his toes wiggling almost as if waving goodbye, and he pulled away.

Reki could win this particular round for all Langa cared, he was too hungry and taken by surprise to muster the courage to tease him back in such a public place. Even if they were only surrounded by four people.

When Langa finally looked up, his plate had materialized in front of him, a prayer answered.

“Thank you for the food, Joe!”

Langa had long assumed they were engaged in a game of chicken. Any other thought was too painful.

But his heart would lift traitorously everytime they were alone and Reki just seemed to melt.

Sometimes it was things he could easily chalk up to other things, like when he leaned on his shoulder while they watched skating videos in bed. Reki was just tired or sleepy or just wanted a better look at the screen. 

But sometimes it was things that were harder to explain away, like the way he sometimes caught Reki staring at him, with a look that was hard to put into words. A look Langa was too scared to name.

But whatever notion he had that they were playing a game was shattered one night, while Reki was sketching quietly in his room. Langa was leaning on his left side, watching Reki’s hand work. His fingers twirled his pencil and tapped the page pensively. He sat back, giving Langa one of those unnameable looks.

“Mind if I try something?”

“Sure,” was all Langa could say.

He sat forward, hand reaching up to Langa’s jaw. At first, Langa thought that Reki would stop at cupping his cheeks, but his eyes were stuck on Langa’s lips and he felt closer than Langa remembered and Langa’s heart was gonna beat out of his chest and—

Reki kissed him. It felt like falling off a cliff, like his stomach had jumped without him and left him sitting at the edge of Reki’s bed. And Reki was pulling back, not hurriedly or panicked, but back, away.

“Was that too weird?”

“Only if you’re messing with me.”

“Dude, what?”

“Is this your way of trying to win?” Langa’s heart was hammering like a rabbit. “Reki, I swear—”

Pain flashed in Reki’s eyes. “Win? What the hell are you talking about? Is this a game to you?”

“Isn’t it to you?” 

“No! What the fuck would possess you to think that?”

Langa clamped his mouth shut, every possible answer sounding absolutely horrible. Because if this wasn’t a game, that opened up the very real possibility that Reki might have feelings for him. Or simply wanted to kiss his best friend. Or thought that this was normal for best friends to do? Langa recalled how Reki had mentioned a lack of friends before him. 

But it wasn’t a competition Reki wanted to win. Which was a relief.

“So, what are we doing?” Langa asked, hoping Reki wasn’t mad enough at him to not answer.

“Do you have to ask?”

“Well, clearly, I do.”

Now it was Reki’s turn to pause.

“Well…it’s not like I need to say that I like you. We’re best friends, of course I like you.” 

Langa felt his stomach drop. Is this what Reki thinks best friends do?

“So…?”

“So, you know when you’re skating along a bowl and you drop back, and the first few times it feels like you’re falling and it’s terrifying, but it’s also this thrill? Like, this addicting drop in your stomach? It’s like that. Every time you lean on me or play with my hand or, y’know, the other stuff.”

Yes, the other stuff. The feet creeping up thighs, the hands dipping into shirts, the dangerous games Langa had started, the thinly veiled inappropriate outlets he’d created for his very gay feelings for his best friend. 

Langa felt close to heart failure. And Reki was actively trying to kill him, his hand reaching up again, thumb brushing under his lip and across his cheek.

“Reki, I feel like I have to tell you that best friends don’t kiss on the regular.”

“And what if I thought we were more than best friends?”

“What, like…boyfriends?”

“Sure.” 

“Sure?”

“I mean—yes, like boyfriends. I just thought it was mutual.”

Hope—no, relief, lifted his heart. “It is.”

Reki gave him a look. “Then what the hell was all this?”

“I thought we’d stop being friends. If it turned out it wasn’t mutual.” 

“Well, I thought I was being super obvious.”

“I hoped I wasn’t.” 

That made Reki snort a laugh. 

“Man, we are terrible at this.”

“So…”

“So. Is it cool if I kiss you again?”

“Yeah, it’s cool.”

And there was this thrill, butterflies swarming his gut and a maybe-not-as-traitorous boner he didn’t feel as bad for. Reki was kissing him again, and Langa pulled him closer by his hoodie, a wave of his scent and warmth hitting him and making him smile.

Reki’s hands pulled him closer and closer until he was being pulled over Reki’s lap. Hands were roaming over Langa’s undershirt, Reki pulling back only to burrow into Langa’s neck. A shiver ran through him when he felt Reki’s mouth against his skin.

They kissed forever. Or it felt that way, until Mrs. Kyan knocked on Reki’s door. Langa practically leaped out of his skin and Reki’s lap, too panicked to land on the bed, slipping off and tumbling to the ground. Reki pulled a pillow over his lap, his face flushed and his hair a mess, headband askew.

“I—what on Earth are you two doing? I said no tricks indoors, you could hurt yourself badly, Hasegawa.”

“Yes, ma’am. Sorry , very sorry,” his panic tongue-tying his Japanese.

“You should know better, Reki, with that broken collar you had.”

“Sorry, Okasan. It won’t happen again.”

She shook her head, composing herself. “I came to remind you that tomorrow it’s your turn to serve breakfast. I know you tend to forget when Hasegawa stays over.”

“Okay, will do. Good night, Kasan.”

She nodded. “Good night, boys.”

They stared at each other, two deer caught in headlights, and laughed.

Langa began to push new limits with Reki, seeing where he would allow more intimate displays of affection and where he wouldn’t budge. He couldn’t help test the boundaries set before him. Not when he was allowed to be in love with his best friend.