Inside Your Mind

78 - Denki Kaminari

Baby, you're like lightning in a bottle

"Okay, but I absolutely love the aesthetics in your room, Toshi! It kind of really suits your depressed and edgy vibes." Denki Kaminari said, as he was standing in the door to Hitoshi's dorm room.

"Yeah, whatever, Calamari, are you going to come in or not? It's drafty." Hitoshi replied, barely even looking up from whatever he was doing at his desk. Probably another essay, Hitoshi was wild about those.

"Sure thing. You wanna go and grab a coffee and some cake later?" Kaminari asked, ignoring the fact that he had called him 'Calamari' earlier. He just did that to mess with him and Kaminari kind of enjoyed it. It felt like an inside joke, somehow.

He waltzed into the room and realized it already smelt unmistakably of Hitoshi - coffee, cheap laundry detergent, a wild mix of shampoo and shower gel smells and a certain sleepy, dusty smell that reminded Kaminari of cozy evenings wrapped up sleepily in some light blankets.

"And close the door behind you." Hitoshi said, rolling his eyes. Kaminari laughed and turned around to close the door. He was so used to always having his door open, he often forgot that other people liked having some privacy. He liked it when people came by his dorm room for a quick chat, but Hitoshi definitely wasn't the type for that.

"Sorry, sorry. So. Coffee and cake later?" he asked again. Hitoshi sighed and looked up from his papers.

"I dunno, I really have to get this done..."

"Come on, Toshi. It's on me." Kaminari replied with a big grin on his face. Hitoshi squinted at him.

"Fine. But I really gotta finish this bit first. And uh... get dressed." he answered, self-consciously looking down on himself. Kaminari hadn't even realized, but Hitoshi was only wearing an oversized shirt and a pair of boxers. It looked like he hadn't really planned on leaving his dorm at all.

"Pfft, fuck getting dressed. You look fine the way you are. Damn fine, actually." Kaminari said, letting himself fall onto Hitoshi's bed, hoping to distract from the light blush that was spreading over his cheeks.

"As much as I'd like to walk around in underwear, I doubt people are going to take too kindly to it. But yeah, it's much too warm to do anything, really. I can barely focus on this stupid essay." Hitoshi groaned in frustration.

"What's that even about? We're in the middle of summer break, why the hell are you writing essays?"

"Does Aizawa look like he's going to give me a fucking break?"

"Man, he sure asks a lot from you." Kaminari commented, shaking his head. Hitoshi just shrugged.

"I'm just glad he's taking time to help me with this. I'm not going to take that for granted, he's super busy. Apparently, the police only now really had time to rehash everything that happened at the summer camp, so him and my sister are basically living in that office. They're constantly working, it's insane." he said, while typing up some more of his essay. Kaminari raised an eyebrow.

He knew he wasn't the brightest candle on the cake, but he had heard the rumours. And he had seen Kaori and Aizawa hugging for an unusually long time, when he had come over to talk about the dorms. And she had been wearing that turtleneck, even though it was extremely hot. Kaminari maybe wasn't super smart, but he wasn't completely stupid either. There was definitely something going on with those two, he just didn't know whether it was a good idea to mention it to Hitoshi.

"Are they? Wow. I've been wondering where Kaori was, I hadn't seen her around the place. I kinda figured the two of you would move in together." he commented. Hitoshi just shrugged and turned around to face him.

"That was the plan, but she got a call that morning to head to the office, so she just dropped me off and collected her keys, before heading into work. And then I've only seen her a few times. I think she has been back and forth between home, the office and the dorms, dropping some stuff off and catching some sleep. And I mean, it's only been three days now. They might be done with working through all that stuff soon, after all they only need her for the eye witness accounts. She won't actually work on the case." Hitoshi explained the situation.

"Huh. She sure seems busy with Aizawa, huh?" Kaminari muttered, not sure if he was hoping for Hitoshi to hear that or not. He didn't want to offend him or anything, but he was just so curious.

"Don't tell me you're buying into those rumours." Hitoshi just replied, putting down his pen with a sigh. He closed the numerous books after placing either pens or bookmarks inside them and finally locked his laptop and shut the lid.

"Well, are they true?" Kaminari asked. The question was already out there, maybe he's get some information out of him.

"Of course not. I don't think so. At least not the last time I asked her. And even if they were, do you really think I'd tell you? It'd be all over campus the next day." Hitoshi replied and got up to rummage through some of the boxes that were stacked up in his room. It seemed like he had been way too lazy to unpack anything he didn't immediately need. As he was searching through the boxes he threw a bunch of clothes to the side, until they started forming a neat little pile.

"That's fair. But still, don't you have a theory or something?" Kaminari wanted to know. Hitoshi gave him a disgusted look.

"No. No, I would prefer not to know who my sister is sleeping with. I'm not a total creep, Denki." he answered and grabbed a pair of jeans.

"Right, right. Sorry. I won't ask about it. I just get some weird vibes between them, if you know what I mean."

"Trust me, I know what you mean. But I've decided a while ago that it's none of my business and my life has been much more peaceful ever since." Hitoshi answered as he put on the pair of jeans.

"Yeah, I suppose. So you're done with your essay?" Denki wanted to know, smiling at Hitoshi's hair moving in every direction imaginable while he was jumping up a few times to get into his pants.

"I'm far from done, but I won't be able to focus on much anyway. I haven't been able to focus for the last 30 minutes, before you came up here. Maybe I need a break." he answered and sighed again, grabbing a few things he'd need on the way.

"You definitely do. You're going to overwork yourself, if you go on like that." Kaminari agreed, even though he had no idea of Hitoshi's actual study and sleep schedule. He knew that he didn't sleep much and slept at weird hours. He knew that he studied a lot and did an insane amount of extra work. But he never really thought, it was the right time to actually ask whether Hitoshi got enough sleep or whether it would be better for him to take a bit of a break.

"Yeah, well, let's get going. Where are we even going?" he wanted to know. Kaminari hadn't thought about that.

"Uh... how about that one cat cafe that opened just down the road? It seemed pretty nice. Very cute." he suggested. Hitoshi gave him the tiniest, grateful smile and Kaminari died a million deaths, because getting a smile from Hitoshi was such a rare occurrence and it was the sweetest thing in the entire world.

"How did you figure out that I missed Kage and Kiri?" he asked quietly. Kaminari smiled widely.

"Everyone knows how much you love your cats! When are they moving in, by the way?" he wanted to know.

"Soon, hopefully. I think Kaori is just getting some more paperwork done, so they'll be allowed into the dorms. I still can't believe that they actually let us keep them on campus. And so far, you're one of the few people who knows about my obsession with cats. You should feel privileged!"

"Really? Privileged enough to take you on a date?" Kaminari asked. He didn't know why he said that, it was a spur of the moment decision and he was already panicking about it. Hitoshi just looked up to him with a smile.

"So this is a date, huh?" Hitoshi asked, glancing down at him with a playful smirk. Kaminari rubbed the back of his neck.

"I mean, it could be..." he said, feeling his cheeks heating up. God, why was he being such a dumbass? Hitoshi chuckled a little, pulled him closer and pressed a small kiss on his forehead.

"You're cute. Let's go then."