»Distractions | MatsuHana«

»4«

"Come on in~" Oikawa says after opening his front door.

I follow him to the living room, a bit surprised by how neat it is. His parents are often out of the country, since one is a business woman and the other a flight attendant. That means he has the house all to himself most of the time. I barely ever visited this place, but I do remember that it was a mess whenever he was alone.

"Are your parents home?" I ask him curiously.

"Hmm? No, why?" he replies as he puts the bag of groceries he was holding on the table.

I do the same, placing another bag next to his. "Well, it's pretty clean here. I expected this to be more chaotic, since you're on your own."

The brunet pouts. "Hey, I can take care of myself! You sound just like Iwa-chan now."

"Oh, I see. He came over, got mad, and told you to tidy up?" I joke.

To my surprise, his face colours a slight shade of pink. "I was kind of hoping he would come over tomorrow, so I tried my best..."

I laugh. That's the kind of stupid thing I would expect from him. "Well, too bad I'm here to ruin it. Also, weren't you mad at us for leaving the two of you alone somewhere? Yet you still want him to come over?"

My friend looks at me with a gaze filled with betrayal. "No, you guys are so mean for that!  I have to mentally prepare, you know! Don't you understand that at all?"

There he goes, talking about my feelings, which I absolutely do not want to discuss with him. "No," I answer shortly.

"How? You're always hanging out with him, right? How do you not get all awkward and die inside? How are you able to hold back all the time?" Despite my unwillingness to have this conversation, he continues.

I ignore him and start taking the groceries out of the bags. "Let's put away the milk first..."

"Don't ignore me!" Once more, Oikawa pouts.

While I go through his cabinets to see where everything is supposed to go, I glare at him. "Didn't I tell you to shut up about it?"

He's taken aback by this. "But isn't it fine when we're alone...?"

"I'd rather you pretend you never noticed," I sigh. "Where do you keep your big bowls?"

"Sorry," he replies in a lower volume. "I was just kind of happy that I finally found someone to share all this with..." Please don't try and make me feel bad, damn it.

With big, sad puppy eyes, he approaches me and seemingly makes a bowl appear out of thin air. "There you go..."

Another sigh. "You can still share it with me, you know. Hanamaki would be glad to hear it, too."

"But I thought we could support each other, and relate to each other, and, you know... Finally feel understood, I guess? I don't know about you, but I've genuinely been a mess about all this." The tone in his voice sounds honestly dejected now.

I'm not very good at handling people's open, negative emotions, so I end up giving in. "I always find ways to distract myself. After a few years, I learned when to do what, and how long I can allow myself to do certain things."

His eyes now start to sparkle as he quickly recovers. A bit too quick, actually. Did he trick me? "Really? What kind of distractions?"

"Anything's fine, as long as it can keep my mind busy." I take the margarine and the brown sugar that I put on the counter. "Could you preheat the oven and hand me a mixer?"

"But doesn't your mind wander off, anyways? Don't you find yourself thinking things that you shouldn't be thinking, or staring for a bit too long, or almost letting something slip?" He carries on while doing what I asked him to do.