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[lapidarius]

"This is Kakyoin Noriaki. Please leave a message, I'll contact you as soon as I can."

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[lapidarius]

[lapidarius]

[PROCESSING COMPLETE]

done

[lapidarius]

...

[Excuse him while he looks to Fugo, up to the mistletoe, then back and quickly muffling a laugh behind his hand.]

[ohhhhhh my god giorno you weird little kid]

[unholey]

[Oh. Oh, no. Oh no. An anxious knot twists in Fugo's stomach as he watches the look on Kakyoin's face drift from confused to contemplative to entirely too much thought to dawning comprehension, shock, and--]

Don't laugh! [Fugo blurts, the tips of his ears bright red as he abruptly sets his cup of coffee down on the floor hard enough that the liquid nearly sloshes over the rim. He then makes a valiant attempt to escape by scooting back into his bedroom, which is sadly foiled by the plant hanging on his door frame and his back hits an invisible wall.] Don't laugh, it isn't funny!

[lapidarius]

I'm sorry, I'm sorry-!

[Unable to quite get the smile off his face but quickly pulling the brakes on his laughter, Kakyoin held up both hands defensively.]

I won't say anything, I promise. And I'll leave if you'd rather I did that.

[unholey]

Well, who's left not to tell? [Rationally speaking, Fugo knows he shouldn't snap at Kakyoin. But, here he is: trying not to laugh about Giorno's completely unsubtle mistletoe trap, right in front of him. Stubbornly, Fugo pushes against the invisible wall that's keeping him stuck in place.] Jotaro? Holly? I'm sure they'll both think it's hilarious, I can't think of any better way to broach the conversation.

[lapidarius]

Come on, you're overreacting. It's not you I'm laughing at, it's Giorno being Giorno. [He gestured slightly to the mistletoe.]

[unholey]

[Overreacting, Kakyoin calls it. Overreacting, like he hasn't been gnawing on pencils and biting his nails and running until his lungs ache trying to think of a way to broach to Giorno how do you think we should tell the others. It's hard, when neither of them know what words to use and both of them have been worried about it. And... here he is, by himself, tired, and totally unprepared for all of his fretting.]

Do you want to know how long that's been up there? [Fugo points up at the mistletoe, the gesture sharp and frustrated.] Since the first of the month!

[So. Really. It's not... just Giorno being Giorno. It's mostly Giorno being Giorno. But Fugo is very well aware that if he had seriously approached Giorno about taking it down, this. Would not be a problem in the first place.]

[lapidarius]

...Have you tried asking him to take it down, if you're this unhappy about it?

[this seems like a reasonable question]

1/??

[unholey]

It's not-- [. . . U G H . . .]

[unholey]

[Fugo brings both of his hands to cover his face, which is. It's just getting redder. Redder and redder. His voice, beyond embarrassed, is muffled from underneath his palms.]

It doesn't. Make me unhappy.

[unholey]

Don't ask me if it's embarrassing, because of course it is. I woke up that morning and he was just waiting here, with this absolutely insufferable look on his face.

[And every morning after that, when they meet up, Giorno just-- he smiles. Like he can't really believe that it's still up there, that Fugo's continued to play along with his silly game for this long. Like he can't believe that Fugo wants to kiss him every morning before he does anything else.]

But it makes him happy. And if I can accomplish that with something as simple as-- [Mmppphhhh, no, he's not going to say it. There is only so much honesty he has in him about this very touchy subject.] I don't mind being embarrassed.

4/4

[unholey]

... I'm just unhappy because I didn't want you to find out this way. [He lowers his hands, fingers instinctively catching along his elbows.]

[lapidarius]

...

[oh honey.]

Can I tell you a really stupid story?

[unholey]

Well, I'm obviously not going anywhere. [Here he is. Literally stuck. Unable to weasel his way out of the conversation.] Go ahead. I'm listening.

1/3

[lapidarius]

[he offered to leave, geez fugo]

I didn't know I liked Jotaro. At all. The whole concept flew completely over my head until Giorno pointed it out to me. And once I was able to process that, I didn't know what to do with it. Eventually I just got so frustrated with my own incompetence at telling him that I just broke down and kissed him out of nowhere.

[and then time stopped and they were a trainwreck of Trying Very Hard for a while.]

What I'm trying to say is that the details aren't always going to match up to whatever ideal you have in your head. Stupid things like this- [he gestured to the mistletoe] -are definitely going to happen here and there, and whoever doesn't know could find out in the stupidest way possible. Hell, neither of us told Polnareff and he was the most obnoxious person alive about it when he found out. And-

[lapidarius]

[Who even had they told directly? Jonathan, a couple others, and the rest had just found out one way or...an...other...]

[lapidarius]

...Shit, we didn't tell Jolyne.

[unholey]

[Fugo curls a little tighter into himself while he listens to Kakyoin's story, stomach twisting. I didn't know I liked Jotaro. No, that's it. He's always known: he was just afraid of the word. Of giving it shape in his thoughts, let alone making it real by saying it. He's liked Giorno-- he's loved Giorno-- for so long. And it's not like he has any expectations, either. Because...]

... I don't know what I'm doing. I don't- [His fingers twitch.] I don't think either of us know what we're doing. What sort of words to use, how to talk to anyone about it. Anything.

[He's never had anyone in his life like Giorno. Everything is new and everything is absolutely terrifying whenever he sits and actually thinks about it. A small smile, brief and nervous, twitches across his face at the mention of Jolyne.]

You probably should tell her. Sooner rather than later. Otherwise she'll be here for months and every time you think about you'll get a stomachache. [...] Thanks, Kakyoin.

[lapidarius]

[Sighing, he pressed a hand to his face. That...was probably going to go badly. But for now Kakyoin set that aside and focused back on Fugo and the conversation at hand.]

Giorno's excellent at giving advice, but I worry he's not always the best at following his own. Even so, I think you'll both be okay. It's fine if you don't know what you're doing, as long as you actually try. Talking about it isn't going to be easy--you just have to be as honest as you can and take things one step at a time instead of rushing ahead.

action, but gone without a trace

[tonic]

[ Guess who’s getting a gift this Christmas! You, for making sure Tonika didn't run off and feed herself to the wargs. ]

[berrynice]

... Possibly.

[child how long must it be before you stop dodging the truth around her

SIGHS]

Well, I'll go look around the other side of the store for something to use, and if I come back to find everything neatly taken apart, I won't look a gift horse in the mouth. Okay?

[boys]

[unholey]

[One. Step at a time, huh. Fugo goes distantly pink around the ears and he has to firmly remind himself that his collar is fine and that if he adjusts it now, it would just call attention to an area he wants to hide. Instead of addressing that piece of advice--(which, although sound, is... for such cautious people, they're both so impulsive sometimes)--he chews on something else. And that's that Giorno, who's so good at reading other people and giving advice about relationships, is awfully clumsy with his own.

When he steps away from his own anxieties, it's ... not hard, to see the shape of Giorno's. Giorno, who always looks out for him. Giorno, who always worries about the happiness of others before and over his own. Giorno, who asks him in dozens of different ways stay with me. Giorno, who pulls him close because he's so sure that there will come a day when the space by his side occupied by Fugo will be empty.]

[If they ever talk about this-- this thing they are, this wonderful and terrifying whatever they've started-- Fugo realizes that he is going to be the one who has to start the conversation. He's worried, enough that it makes him sick some days, but Giorno is the one who is afraid.]

How... do you do that? [Fugo sets his mouth in a line, worried and folded tightly into himself--but now that he's made his decision, he's not going to shy away from the atsk.] Talk to Kujo about something neither of you want to bring up, but needs to be discussed.

[lapidarius]

...hm. It's-...We've gotten better at it, but that doesn't make it simple.

[Kakyoin fell silent after that, pulling his knees to his chest and folding his arms over them. There was an answer to this question and he knew it, but it wasn't one which was easy to form from the general haze of miscommunications and arguments and apologies and just experiences.]

Sometimes we just understand one another. Usually when we have to fight someone, but it applies in other situations too. We're a team that got to know each other under some high-tension circumstances--it was either adapt to reading him and understand what he was going to do next, or fall behind and put everyone at risk for it.

[He'd caught on fairly well, if he said so himself. Jotaro was not an easy person to understand on sight, but Kakyoin always had an eye for detail and nuance. And in turn, hadn't Jotaro learned to see what no one else ever had in more ways than one?]

But you can't...rely on that all the time. [Taking a slow breath and idly tapping thin fingers on his arm, Kakyoin started to piece together what he wanted to say.] Don't always assume you know what the other's thinking, because sooner or later you'll be wrong. And sometimes...things need to be said rather than left as something you think is just understood, so it can be clear without any room for misunderstanding.

It's hard--almost impossible, sometimes. But the best advice I can give is just talk, and listen to each other when you do. Sometimes it feels impossible, or hurts more than I can even describe. But keeping everything quiet is going to hurt much, much more.

[unholey]

[Fugo listens intently, taking in Kakyoin's words like a student in a lecture hall; his posture is still tight, less because Kakyoin is making him feel uncomfortable and more that he trusts Kakoin not to look down on him for keeping himself so tightly folded together. Jotaro and Kakyoin met during dangerous circumstances; Kakyoin learned to read his tells to be better able to predict him in combat situations. And, in turn, Jotaro learned to read him.

The explanation seems... so simple, honestly. That however well you know a person, you can never know exactly what they're thinking. And however much it hurts to talk about something painful, it hurts so much more to keep it inside.]

It seems so obvious, when you put it like that. [He doesn't mean that in a derisive way. Only that he's... it seems so simple. Of course pain accumulated over time will eventually outweigh the hurt of one conversation-- however impossible or painful it is in that one moment.]