Work Text:
1
“Langa! Keep up, man, what are you doing back there?” Reki called back to Langa as they made their way home from the skatepark. They had lost track of time like usual; it was late, the sun long gone from the sky, and Langa seemed to be lost in thought over something, trailing back behind Reki with his arms limp at his sides.
Lack of dinner, maybe, Reki thought as he slowed to match Langa's pace. He coasted silently alongside him for a few moments until a familiar growl confirmed his suspicions, easily loud enough to be heard over the sound of their wheels grinding against the concrete.
“Hungry?” Reki asked, nudging Langa across the gap between their skateboards.
“So hungry.” Langa mumbled, his eyes glazed over, and Reki wondered if he might be imagining a large hamburger, if not an entire plate of them.
“Well, I’m sure we have some leftovers you can have,” Reki replied with a knowing smile, “mom always saves some for you.”
Langa perked up at that, snapping out of his hunger-induced trance as he looked over at Reki. “Does that mean I can stay over tonight?” He asked hopefully, his board wobbling precariously under his feet as his body shifted in excitement.
“Careful!” Reki reached out to steady him, and their hands fumbled together as Langa simultaneously reached out to balance himself.
.
.
.
“You know...” Reki glanced down at their linked hands, supporting Langa’s weight just enough so he wouldn’t fall, then back up at Langa. “If you wanted to hold my hand, you could have just asked.”
Wait.
He froze for a split second, breath caught in his throat as the realization of what he'd just said set off about fifty different warning bells in his head. And in his brief moment of panic, he did the first thing that came to mind.
He winked.
He flashed a wide grin, the kind that came easy when he was around Langa, followed by an overexaggerated wink that sent Langa toppling over his board and into a trash can on the sidewalk.
“Shit– sorry!” Reki skidded to a quick stop and rushed over to Langa, muttering apologies under his breath as he pulled Langa up from the ground. “Sorry, man, I shouldn’t ha–”
He paused mid-sentence, unable to look away as Langa’s face flushed a deep pink under the dim light of the street lamps.
The wink had been a joke, a quick way to cover up the feelings he’d accidentally let slip. But that look… that look made him want to do it again. And again. And again.
.
.
.
“Uh… y-yeah, you can stay over tonight.”
2
“Kyan!” A naggingly familiar voice called, startling Reki out of his thoughts. The pencil he’d been lazily tapping against his notebook clattered onto the desk as he looked up toward the front of the room.
Ah, right...
The nagging voice belonged to his teacher.
“Pay attention, this will be on the exam.”
Reki groaned inwardly and nodded, eyes glazing over again as he faced the board instead of the window, his mind drifting back to where his thoughts had been earlier, to the strange dream he’d had the night before.
Langa had been in it, which wasn’t that unusual; he frequently appeared in Reki’s dreams these days. But this time, he appeared as... a prince of all things, while Reki…
God.
His face grew warm just thinking about it. He knew he liked Langa, but dreaming about being his… his princess… It was a whole new level of weird. He tried to rationalize it; clearly it was just his brain’s way of processing the many times he heard a classmate call Langa a prince around school.
“Prince Langa” this, “Prince Langa” that… It was no wonder he was subconsciously thinking about it, somehow morphing the thoughts into the skateboarding fairytale he’d dreamt about.
Unless…
“Reki?”
Reki blinked, Langa coming into focus beside him.
“It’s lunchtime.”
“Already?!” Reki yelped and glanced up at the clock, cringing when he realized he’d been daydreaming about Langa for almost an hour, somehow missing the bell entirely. “Ah– sorry, man, let’s go eat.”
He quickly ushered Langa out of the classroom, and while Langa purchased an obscenely large sandwich from the school store, Reki waited off to the side, clutching his bento as his mind drifted to the incident from the week before.
They hadn’t talked about it, but Reki was still thinking about it. Mostly about what Langa would look like if he blushed like that during the day. It was dark last time, and while he could still see the red on Langa’s cheeks, it had probably been somewhat muted by the darkness.
“You seem distracted today.” Langa said after they claimed their usual spot on the roof, immediately digging into their lunch. Reki had been lost in thought for a while but he knew how he wanted to respond, the words floating on the tip of his tongue.
“Yeah… by you.” He replied with a flirty wink, and–
Wow.
Langa’s face flushed a dark red, much darker than before, the color reaching all the way to the tips of his ears. It was quite possibly the cutest thing Reki had ever seen.
“Rek–” Langa started, but his voice caught on the sandwich he’d forgotten was in his mouth. “You shouldn’t do that while I’m eating,” he wheezed out, coughing up bits of bread.
“Sorry, sorry, just kidding!” Reki laughed, clapping a hand on Langa’s back a few times before changing the subject to skateboarding.
3
“Dude, look at this!” Reki exclaimed, expertly packing the sand in front of him into a small tower.
“That looks awesome, Reki,” Langa replied, eyeing the various details of the sand castle before them. “You’re so talented.”
“It’s just a sand castle,” Reki snorted, hopping to his feet and making a trench from the moat surrounding it to the water. When the next wave hit, the water ran up the beach, filling the moat as he stood back and admired his creation. “Okay, now we can swim.”
Grabbing the round floaty next to him, Langa cheered and rushed down toward the water, his feet kicking up sand as he went.
“Wait up, man!” Reki hollered, grinning as he chased after Langa and dove into the ocean. The water was fairly warm, though it was still a refreshing break from the sticky summer heat, and as Reki swam beneath the surface, he wondered why they didn’t do this more often.
When the urge to breathe became too persistent, Reki made his way back up toward the light filtering through the water, gasping for air as he surfaced.
“This feels so good, Langa,” he whined, floating in the shallows for a few more seconds before standing up and shaking the water out of his hair. “Hey, we should do this mo–”
His voice caught in his throat when he noticed Langa staring. And not the kind of stare from just meeting his gaze or listening to him speak. No. He was staring. Staring at... Reki glanced down, noting how his swimming trunks stuck to his body, how the water was dripping down his bare shoulders and chest...
“Like what you see?” He looked up with a grin, winking almost without realizing he’d done it and watching as Langa slipped off his floaty and landed in the water with a loud splash.
“Reki!” Langa poked his head up out of the water, the water gurgling around his mouth as he spoke. He looked a bit faint, face red from the heat, embarrassment, or a bit of both.
“Oi, you okay, Langa?” Reki laughed, rushing over to pull him from the water, leading him back onto the beach. “You look a bit warm. Maybe we should sit in the shade or something.”
Langa nodded, so Reki pulled him along until he found a slightly shaded spot closer to the road. He shook the towels a few times before laying them out on the sand, plopping down and pulling Langa down next to him.
“Does it feel better in the shade?” He asked, a slight shiver going down his spine when Langa slumped sideways, dropping his head onto Reki’s shoulder.
“Mhm,” Langa replied quietly, “much better.”
4
Ding!
Reki looked up from the counter at Dope Sketch out of habit. “Hey, let me know if I can help with anything,” he said to the man who had entered the store. They returned his smile but didn’t stay long, casually browsing the shelves and then leaving without buying anything.
Sighing, Reki slumped forward onto the counter, returning to the skateboard sketch he’d been working on. It was so unbearably boring when he and Langa had different shifts; even his will to draw seemed weak compared to how excited he usually was when coming up with new designs.
It felt like hours passed before the bell sounded again, though Reki stifled a groan when it did, burying his face into his notebook as the door swung open.
“Hey, let me know if–” He looked up. “Oh, Langa!”
Langa smiled and strolled over to him, clasping his skateboard tightly in his hands. “Hi, Reki.”
“Hey, come here often?” Reki grinned and leaned over the counter, giving Langa a sultry wink.
The blush wasn’t any less noticeable the fourth time, and Reki had a hard time keeping a straight face, ignoring the urge to just jump over the counter and kiss Langa senseless.
“Y-Yes, I work here, Reki,” Langa stuttered out, a remarkably stoic expression on his face considering how red he was. And then his eyelids fluttered. A couple times.
He continued to bat his eyes awkwardly, like maybe there was an eyelash bothering him; though, frankly, it looked a bit too weird for even that and Reki couldn’t hold back any longer.
“The hell are you doing, Langa?”
“Winking.”
.
.
.
“Dude, that’s not how you wink!” Reki burst into a fit of laughter, clutching at his stomach as Langa looked at him in confusion.
“It’s not?”
“No! Oh my god, dude, you gotta do it once, like this.” Reki winked to demonstrate. “And like… you gotta come up with a better line than that!”
“Oh, okay.” Langa nodded seriously, and Reki couldn’t help but wonder if he’d said a little too much.
5
“Nii-chan!”
Reki blinked his eyes open, grunting in pain as something sharp jabbed into his stomach. Looking down, he saw Nanaka and Chihiro draped over him, the source of the pain likely being Nanaka’s foot wedged between Chihiro and his stomach.
He reached down and attempted to wrestle them off his body, resorting to tickling when they wouldn’t let go and stifling a laugh when they fell onto the bed in a heap of giggles.
“Play with us!” Chihiro said as she bounced excitedly on the bed, tugging at the hem of his shirt.
Reki squinted at them. “I was sleeping, you know.”
“But Langa is here!”
“What? He is?” Reki asked, scooping the twins up from the bed and heading out into the hallway. “You’re not lying to me, are you?
“Noooo!” They squealed, trying to wiggle free as Reki paused near the front door. Langa’s board and shoes were there, a sight he didn’t have time to be surprised by as Nanaka tugged at his hair, turning his face to the living room where Langa was seated on the couch.
Oh.
Suddenly aware of the pounding in his chest, Reki carefully set the twins down, eyes still fixed on Langa’s as they ran over and clambered up onto the couch beside him. Langa’s hair was pulled back into a messy ponytail, a look that Reki had seen only a few other times, but this was the first time it made him feel like all of the air had been sucked out of his chest.
“Man… you’re too good looking,” Reki huffed, meaning every word as he sunk down onto the couch cushions. “No wonder all the girls call you Prince Langa.” He glanced over at Langa and winked, and the blush that followed was almost too much when he was already this far gone.
“Maybe you can be the princess, Reki,” Langa replied out of nowhere, managing to pull off a near-perfect wink as he said it, and Reki thought he might have a heart attack.
“I-I… see you f-figured out how to wink.” He stuttered, an intense heat burning at the back of his neck while his heart pounded out of control.
“I’m... learning.” Langa smiled back. “Did I do it right?”
“Yeah… you did.” Reki breathed out, tugging his headband down slightly over his eyes. “Just... give me some warning next time, man.”
+1
“Dude, look at Joe.” Reki nodded over to where Joe was standing. It was well after midnight, and Joe was standing at the starting line at S, surrounded by multiple women, most of which were hanging onto his arms or ogling his abs. “His abs are a chick magnet!”
“His abs are hogging all the attention,” Shadow grumbled.
“Maybe you should challenge his abs to a beef,” Miya suggested, cackling and ducking out of the way when Shadow took a swing at him.
“Where the hell is Cherry anyway?” Shadow huffed, pulling back after Miya danced out of reach. “I just might do that if he doesn’t get here soon.”
“Probably decided to spare his eyesight,” Langa replied, nodding at the ladies now squealing over something Joe had said.
Reki laughed, flinging an arm over Langa’s shoulder. “What, would you hate if they were all over you like that?”
Langa nodded, leaning in closer as Reki wrapped his other arm around him.
“I can’t take my eyes off your abs, Langa!” Reki mimicked the squeals of the women hanging onto Joe as he shook Langa back and forth. “Your muscles are my life, Langa!”
“Rekiii, let gooo,” Langa whined playfully, but Reki didn’t want to. He liked having an excuse to hold Langa like this.
“Your musk is like heaven, Langa!” Reki continued, grinning as Langa started to turn a bit red. Maybe he could...
“Kiss me, Langa!” He giggled, adding the wink out of habit and watching as the flush spread across Langa’s cheeks. His little game was almost natural now. He knew the steps, knew what to do, knew how Langa would react…
Ah, wait. This isn’t...
He fidgeted as Langa’s arms snaked around his waist.
This isn’t what he usually does...
He gulped as Langa’s face came within a few centimeters of his own.
Ah! So close!
Reki squeezed his eyes shut; he could feel short puffs of breath on his skin before Langa’s lips pressed against his, soft but insistent. It was only for a few seconds, but Reki could already feel himself melting into Langa’s arms, wondering why he hadn’t just done this from the beginning.
When Langa pulled away, Reki blinked a few times, attempting to process what had just happened. His face burned; his heart pounded so loud he could barely hear the crowd around them.
“Y-You kissed me,” he stammered, arms still wrapped tightly behind Langa’s neck.
“Reki," Langa huffed back at him, "you asked me to.”