Yours to Hold (An OHSHC fanfic) [Completed]

Chapter Twenty-One

That was probably the last question I’d expected to come out of her mouth. For a moment I just stared at her. Unsurprisingly, she just continued to wear an expectant, soft smile.

What do I think of her boys?

I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but yet not a single word came out. What was it with Honey and his family’s tendency to strip me of my ability to speak? It was like they’d made a game of it.

Her boys.

It was glaringly obvious that she was talking not just of Honey, which would have been easy to answer, but of Mori as well. Despite my best efforts, I didn’t find that to be such a simple answer. Which was strange- it should have been simple.

“They’re… my friends.”

Miku looked like she might laugh. With a small shake of her head, she dismissed that answer and sent my cheeks burning. I wasn’t dumb. I knew what she was asking.

“Honey is really nice,” I said instead, attempting to push my embarrassment away. “I like him a lot, and he’s easy to be around. He honestly reminds me of a little brother.”

Hopefully she’d leave it at that. As much as the word ‘friends’ was playing through my mind, it didn’t seem to want to come out of my mouth in relation to the other boy I knew she was talking about. As I’d expected, however, she clasped my hand a little tighter in hers and gave me what was now a wry, and highly amused, smile.

“Yes, I’d expected about that much,” she answered honestly. “You seem to get along well, and from the stories he’s told it would only make sense. Let me revise my question… what do you think about my Takashi?”

I tugged my hands away from hers. Her brow simply raised with the motion and I dropped my gaze, wringing my hands together. Why the hell was it so hard to spit out the other sentence? Mori and I were friends as well. At the same time… how did I describe it? He didn’t feel like a brother.

I hadn’t had many male friends before this- perhaps that’s what I was looking for. The way you normally described male friends. Honey was too similar to Aki to fit that, but Mori…

“Mori…”

“Takashi,” Miku corrected.

I paused, my cheeks flushing an even brighter shade of red than before.

“Takashi-kun…” I managed, testing the word out as I did.

The funny thing was, as embarrassing as it seemed, the name felt nice. The lack of formality to it didn’t set my nerves on edge as I might have thought it would.

“That’s still not right,” Miku mused. “It doesn’t sound cute enough. Try Taka-kun. That sounds nice.”

“...”

“Okay, okay, Takashi-kun for now,” she gave in with a laugh. “Now, go on.”

“Takashi-kun… he’s a good friend too,” I said finally. I forced myself to raise my eyes to meet hers before continuing. Not looking at her felt like running away. “He’s easy to talk to, even if he doesn’t always have a lot to say.”

My words pulled up the memory after the tournament. He’d automatically been the one that I’d felt comfortable voicing the question of what I’d done to, even if we hadn’t seemed that close.

“It’s not as obvious right away, but he’s as nice as Honey, if not nicer. Honey...no offense, has a bit of a selfish side to him. Mo-Takashi-kun doesn’t. He’s…. he’s sorta… he’s…”