A Flower's Affection (KiriBaku Flower Shop AU)

Eijiro Kirishima-Meadowsweet

Well, I think I'm getting a hang of my tablet, though I still lack my adorable little flower photos on every chapter. I'll try to fix that as soon as I get my laptop back. (It was stolen by the evil people I call mom and dad.)

        Had Kirishima realized that the media had been recording his sleep-deprived early morning rant, he might have tried to temper himself a bit sooner. Had he realized that there were other heroes on the rooftop watching his scolding like a special feature cinema showing, he might have tried to be a bit more professional. Had he known that Mina would show up before he was finished, and that she would bring Ground Zero along, he probably wouldn't have even gone outside in the first place.

        But Kirishima was dead tired, so he hadn't considered any of that when he walked outside--shirtless, again, he would later realize. He hadn't even bothered to style his hair that morning. The villain who had thought he was God carried a big scythe and a bigger ego, and it had taken Red Riot nearly three hours to subdue him. Kiri had stumbled back into his apartment at three, maybe four AM that morning, and he had to wake up by six-thirty at the latest to get the shop ready by seven. He was so tired that he even forgot he was still mad at Nieto Monoma and the rest of the cafe workers, and had stumbled into Morning Miso's and promptly fallen asleep while standing in line. Monoma, sporting a dark bruise on his typically pallid face, brought him his usual order with a timid smile, and Kiri had given him an exhausted hug--the closest either of them were going to get to an apology right now. 

        Given that it was Thursday, Kiri curled up behind his counter and went back to sleep, which is what he was doing when Bigfoot decided to be an ass about half an hour later. He was very loud and very persistent, so Kirishima had thought it best to give the guy a piece of his foggy, irritable mind. 

        He wasn't sure at which point exactly he had lost his shirt. He wasn't sure if he had even put one on after returning from patrol. He was grateful that he no longer had a traitorous bruise in the middle of his chest to give him away.

        He'd gone right back to sleep after the incident had blown over, and he stayed asleep until two that afternoon. They didn't have any customers that day, since the entire block had been roped off to repair the damages to the streets and building. Kiri found he didn't mind that in the slightest.

        Looking back on it (now that it was Friday morning and Kirishima was very well rested) he'd been kind of rude, especially to Ground Zero, and he regretted that. As Mina put it, he was having a 'mood.'

        "--and I still don't know what could have possibly possessed you to walk outside during an active villain attack!"

        Kiri blinked, tuning back in to his employee's scolding, which he had honestly been ignoring since it started. Tamaki Amajiki was red-faced and out of breath, and the redhead noticed vaguely that he had been yelling for the better part of the past half-hour. The longest time the raven haired boy had ever spoken in one sitting. Kirishima had to stop himself from clapping sarcastically, reminding himself that it would probably only result in another round of angry yelling.

        "I was tired," the redhead defended weakly. He had handled the situation just fine, in his opinion. It wasn't Tamaki's fault that the raven haired boy didn't know about his qualifications to handle the situation. "I wasn't thinking straight."

        Tamaki snorted. "I would never ask you to."

        Kirishima's eyebrows furrowed, and he pushed himself up of the counter he had been leaning on. "Did... did you just make a joke?"

        "Definitely not."

        The bell at the front of the shop rang, and Kirishima leapt at the chance to do something productive. Friday's were typically busy days, people getting off of work with money to spend on their friends and lovers. Tamaki instantly ducked into the back storeroom to hide from social interaction while the redhead took the customer's order.