ʙʟɪɴᴋ / ᴠᴏɪᴅ.

            a  breath  follows  soon  after,  his  head  dipping  further  into  the  comfort  of  his  capture  weapon.  eyes  closing  in  a  fruitless  endeavor  of  clearing  the  dry  pain  from  them   before  rightfully  blinking  them  back  open.   “don’t  forget  to  use  your  safe  word  if  you  need  to.”    

       he waits. ----- with exhaustion creeping in his bones & eyes sharp against the kid’s rounded face. he waits. a breath in & shouta adjusts the grit of threads into a more comfortable & less taxing position on around his neck. “alright.” he starts. hand lowering & deadpan lifting. “explain to me what that was.” 

      “i don’t see the problem.” shouta tries, his attention shifting briefly from the paper he’s grading to the voice hero & back again. burying his chin further into the embrace of his capture weapons, absently soaking in the warmth it offered as he carries on with his task. “---what’s so bad about it anyway?”.” 

       “you’re hovering.” he shifts, a slow roll of weight from one foot to the other as he works to free himself from the self-made cocoon. shoulders rolls, neck pops &  only after suceeding in liberating one arm, does he fish out his eyedrops & glace in her direction. “something you want to talk about? ” 

      he stops mid-lecture, haggard obsidians sweeping across the room, only to land on one denki kaminari. the apparent source of today’s interruption. ---- “i see you’re in high spirits this morning, anything you wish to share with the class?” 

            he stalls. body coming to a full stop like that of an unserviced vehicle whose engine has finally given out. she’s a rung above him. knees hooked against the ladder’s metal girth. a hand flat against its head, seeking it’s support as she reaches the trim of his apartment. hanging christmas lights. ----- lights she’d insisted on. she’s still there. hiccoughing in her own self-amusement, & he watches in absent, still processing the meat of it all, as she reaches up & wipes a tear from her eye. 

            she moves then,  clearly setting back on her task without even juggling the implications, or the effect she’s unwittingly had on him. her fingers skip over the next slough of lights in his grasp. missing by a hairsbreadth & the ladder lists under the sudden shift in gravity & ------ effectively snaps him out of the stupor she’d shoved him in. 

            shouta can feel the heat score up his neck & tinge the tips of his ears as he juts forward to steady the ladder with one hand & catch her all in one.  the flat of his other hand pressing against the small of her back with the motion. god, he can even hear the uptick of his heart slamming against the cage of his ribs ----- & she’s laughing. sure in her capture / safety, half bent against the rungs she’s clinging to. that is ---- until she looks up long enough to get stock of his expression. 

            silence has always been a blessing to him, but in this moment it’s nothing but a curse because he watches in time as her head tilts ---- calculating ---- & then cracks a grin so wide he can practically feel his future self rolling over in his grave. “OH MY GOD, ARE YOU --- “  he’s going to kill her. absolutely murder her. he steps away from the ladder, the lights, & her & pins her with the most unamused expression he can currently muster & quickly cuts her off