SK8TEMBER'21 SERIES

Let me protect you.

Kaoru never saw himself as an over protective parental figure... until Miya injured his head very badly.

It happened a few weeks ago. They were at S, and that night, Shadow and Miya raced in a beef. All the gang were cheering for both of them, but Kaoru had to admit that he always cheered harder for Miya. He was so soft for that boy. Their race developed like it always did: Miya having the upper hand of the race, and Shadow trying to sabotage him with his silly tricks. And as always, it didn't work to slow Miya in the least. But to everyone's surprise, in one of the most difficult curves that Miya always mastered to grind his skate on the inner side of the road with a rail slide, he lost balance, hitting the ground with his head.

It wasn't an uncommon thing in the long history of Crazy Rock, everyone had injured themselves to some degree at one point of their lives while beefing. But Miya never injured himself that badly ever before. And before he could think about it, Kaoru was running to Miya's side, who was unconscious on the ground, carrying him in his arms.

When he saw how much Miya was bleeding, he panicked.

"Joe! Bring the car here. Now!" Kaoru demanded, throwing at him the keys of his car.

Kojiro hurried to get the car and bring Miya to the hospital.

It was a very chaotic and stressful night. As soon as Miya's parents showed up to the hospital, Kaoru apologized, somehow feeling guilty for what happened to Miya. After all, he and Kojiro —well, and Shadow too— were the adults in their weird and close friendship circle.

He knew that kind of injuries sometimes were the price to pay for skating, but that didn't make him feel better at all.

Kaoru refused to go home until they heard Miya's diagnosis. He had a concussion and needed a few stitches on his scalp. The doctor told them it wasn't that bad as it looked, but it was better if Miya wouldn't skate for a couple of weeks to rest as much as he could.

Miya stayed in the hospital for a couple of days until they were sure the concussion wouldn't be a problem anymore.

And after that, Kaoru started to feel like a very over protective dad —even if Miya insisted he was the mom of the group—, and it didn't help that Miya was even more stubborn than him.

A week after he left the hospital, Miya went to Sia La Luce... skating.

"You're gonna make Cherry freak out." Kojiro said, placing a portion of pizza in front of Miya.

"Tell mom I'm perfectly fine." Miya said, pointing his chin up.

"Tell him yourself." Kojiro said amused, looking at some place past Miya.

Miya turned his head, looking at a very pissed out Cherry, grimacing at that hard stare that was being directed at him.

Kaoru went directly to where Miya was sitting, ignoring his husband for a second and grabbing Miya's skateboard.

"What the hell are you doing with this?!" he asked, sounding very, very pissed.

But Kojiro knew his husband more than anyone, and he knew he wasn't pissed at Miya. He was sickly worried.

"How am I supposed to come here, walking?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant.

"Yes? That's the whole purpose of not skating for a couple of weeks and resting?" Kaoru said, exasperated.

Miya huffed, tugging his skate from Cherry's hands.

"Yes, mom." he finally conceded.

Kaoru knew this wasn't the last time Miya was gonna be a stubborn brat, so he had to think of something to protect him in some way.