Through the Years

Interlude: Unusual

Tomura opens the door to his bedroom slowly to avoid the door creaking and disturbing his lover.

It was a bad night for him, even by his usual standards.
He's struggled with insomnia for years, ever since he'd single-handedly destroyed his own family.

But tonight was worse than usual, because he was ruminating on everything.

He approaches the bed as quietly as he can, moving Touya's arm so that it rests over his side while he tries to press his face into Touya's shoulder as closely as he can.
Unlike usual, Touya stirs a bit, grumbling what sounds like a complaint in his sleep.

"'Mura?" He asks groggily, his arm tightening around Tomura. "Snugglin'?"

Tomura doesn't reply, and can't bring himself to reply.
Because he doesn't deserve this. He doesn't deserve to be held like he's something precious instead of something destructive, a vessel for someone else's hatred.
He doesn't deserve the family he's been granted after causing the death of his own family.

Touya must somehow pick up that something is wrong, because he moves his face away from Tomuras fluffy hair, squinting at him in the dark.

"Babe? You awake?" Touya asks.

Tomura nods against his shoulder, and Touya is silent and still for a moment before yawning.

"'Sup?"

He can't respond. He can't tell him. Because he's the strong, level headed one in the house.
He can't let the control slip, because he's the leader of Japan, and the leader of the house, as much as Touya liked to pretend otherwise.

Touya wraps his arms around him tightly after a while of not getting a response, settling right back down to go to sleep again.
That works for Tomura, all he wanted was a hug anyway. Usually he could do it without alerting Touya because he slept like the dead, but tonight apparently was not like the others for him, either.

When Touya kisses the top of Tomura's head, strands of his hair getting caught in the others metal sutures, something breaks inside of Tomura fully for some reason, and his fingers dig into his partner's skin.

"You're freaking me out. You're never cuddly with me." Touya grumbles in the dark.

"Go to sleep." Tomura replies bluntly.

"Mmm. No. Somethin's wrong." Touya replies in his usual smartass way. "Someone write a shitty report?"

"No."

"Lose a game in a stupid way?"

"No."

"Did I do somethin' while I was asleep?" Touya asks, sounding a little sheepish.

Tomura huffs dryly, pressing closer. "No."

"All outta guesses, then. You gotta tell me." Touya says, rubbing Tomuras back a couple of times.

"Nothing. It's just quiet downstairs." Tomura replies dismissively.

But the issue wasn't the fact that it's quiet downstairs, the issue was the loudness in his own head.

Touya doesn't reply to that, just keeps him held close to him as his breathing evens out again slowly, his face buried in the top of Tomura's hair.
Tomura stays still there, listening to his breaths, trying to match them in the hopes that they'd send him to sleep too, but they don't. He stays awake all night, thinking.

Dwelling on his lost family, wondering if there was something he could have done to change their fates, to make his father love him instead of despise him.
Dwelling on the loss of Magne, how he could have stopped it from happening.
Dwelling on Touya's family and the fact that despite everything, they were all still trying to make it work.
Dwelling on Star, and all the people that hurt her.

Dwelling on his own recent history.
All For One.
How he had been used, his good qualities being manipulated and twisted into something evil.

He's still awake and pressed against Touya when the other man wakes up again, squeezing Tomura as he wakes.

"Still here." Touya murmurs, his voice a gravelly rasp like it always is in the mornings. "Never stay cuddled up for too long. Who're you?"

"Tomura." Is the dry response back.

"Smartass." Touya chuckles, tugging on Tomuras hair gently.

Tomura knows he's trying to get a kiss, but he can't. He remains still, and Touya hums a little.

"All For One, then."

Tomura doesn't reply, because he doesn't even want to go there with Touya.

"Babe, c'mon. Look at me." Touya sighs, tugging on his hair again.

"You know I hate it when you do that."

Touya sighs, moving away from Tomura slightly to lift his chin, regarding him with icy blue eyes.

"You look like shit, babe. Go to sleep." Touya says, kissing Tomuras forehead quickly.

And then he pulls away, sitting up to stretch. So Tomura rolls onto his back, staring at the ceiling.

"I can't."

"Tried smokin'?" Touya asks as he stretches his scarred body out like he always does every morning.

"You're out." Tomura replies.

"Man." Touya sighs, his arms flopping down to rub the scarring around his eyes carefully. "I'll get sum'more."

He looks down at Tomura, Tomura can feel the weight of his gaze on him even without moving his eyes from the ceiling.

"Kiss." Touya says, leaning over Tomura, caging him in against the mattress with one scarred and one metallic arm. "Won't push it."

Tomura sighs internally, but lifts his head to press his cracked lips against Touya's quickly.
Touya would usually complain, but he does stick to his word and not push it any further as he slides out of bed.

"You're gonna have to talk about it sometime."

Tomura doesn't reply, just closes his eyes and wills himself to finally, finally go to sleep.

*•*

He doesn't. And he's still waiting on Touya to pick up, running off coffee and spite alone as he tries to function through the day.
He keeps to himself mostly, staying in their bedroom with the cat because he knows he won't be too fun to be around in his current state.

"I brought you for Star, not me." He tells the calico as it bats at his hand for attention.

He knows better than to kick the cat out, though, as it was trained to stick close to whoever needed it most. He'd heard it yowling to get into Stars room too many times before to attempt it himself.
So he pauses his game to pet the fluffy cat, curious to see if the money he'd spent on a specially trained therapy cat actually works, or if it was all just some kind of sham.

"Pa?" Star calls through the door.

"Starlight." Tomura calls back.

"Can I come in?" She asks.

Tomura glances around the room quickly to make sure anything she shouldn't be seeing is out of sight before agreeing.

"Come in." Tomura calls, still petting Cloud.

Star comes in a little sheepishly, holding her laptop.

"What's the matter?" He asks, turning his attention to her.

"I'm sorry, dad told me to leave you alone today, but he's gone out and I'm really struggling with this math problem." She says quickly, as though she's expecting him to be mad at her for it. "Can you help me, please?"

He rolls his eyes and pats the bed.

"Come on, then."

Maybe the nostalgia of helping the daughter he'd never imagined he'd have would make him feel a little bit better about deserving all of this.