Have We Met Before? { Kazuha x Scaramouche / KazuScara }

→ Chapter 6 - A Shared Meal

Not even a few hours after Scaramouche was told of his time off from work, he found himself holding heavy crates whilst standing on the populated docks of Liyue.

How did he end up in this position?

After Scaramouche had reluctantly informed Kazuha that he had the week off, he quickly took advantage of the fact and put him to work.

The audacity this man had to boss around a Fatui harbinger to do his own bidding. But better yet, why in the world was he actually going along with it??

Scaramouche could easily stop this nonsense with the snap of a finger, and yet, he didn't. In all honesty, he wasn't entirely sure why either. Maybe he just wanted something to pass the time, and manual labor sure would do the trick.

Or maybe he genuinely wanted to be around Kazuha?

Scaramouche internally denied that, thinking the reason was the former. He didn't get to do manual labor jobs very often, he even noticed he was starting to grow out of shape after sitting in an office all day. Perhaps this was good for him.

And what else was he to do? Just sit around in his inn all day long? Anything seemed better than that. As much as he loved being alone, him being by himself made it easier to think about the things he'd rather not think about. At least this way, he'd be distracted.

Scaramouche placed down a heavy crate onto the floor, it was the last one luckily. He looked up from the ground to see Kazuha writing something down on a piece of paper.

"What was the purpose of this anyway?" Scaramouche asked him, slightly out of breath and honestly kind of sweaty. He really needed to get out more..

Kazuha replied, "I've gone over this before, Captain Beidou is out for a few weeks, but she left me a list of tasks that had to be completed on behalf of the crew."

Scaramouche sighed, "And you had to drag me into this?"

He simply chuckled, "Call it 'giving a friend a favor'," Kazuha walked up to him, placing his hand on Scaramouche's shoulder, "But look at the bright side, now I owe you one."

Scaramouche could've sworn he saw Kazuha wink.

By the time he could process what he had said, Kazuha was already walking away, probably to turn in whatever documents he was holding.

As if it was out of pure habit, Scaramouche moved his hand over the place Kazuha had touched. Perhaps he was just overthinking, but it almost left a tingling feeling on his shoulder. He felt as though his touch was still lingering there.

So many strange thoughts had been going through his head as of late, he was starting to wonder if there was something deeply wrong with him.

He wondered if what he was feeling was even normal. Then again, it could probably be from the lack of human connection he'd had in his past, but he'd never felt like this before. Was this what it felt like to have a friend? He might've even gone as far as to say he genuinely enjoyed being around him.

Honestly, it baffled Scaramouche that there was a person out there that he wasn't purely disgusted by. Sure, Kazuha was a bit of an odd ball. He was definitely quite different to other people, far too persistent and calm than most, but even so, he always left Scaramouche in a better mood after leaving his presence. It was strange, and something that he needed time to get used to.

♢♢♢

In the midst of all the manual labor the two endured all morning, Kazuha had asked Scaramouche to have lunch with him. Though hesitant, he said yes, only because Kazuha offered to pay.