#ageofzero

Since that class trial at the beginning of fourth grade, they'd become pretty inseparable. Phoenix was grateful to both Miles and Larry equally (which always led to Larry landing them in hot water and Miles having to bail them out of it), but things always seemed warmer, for lack of a better word, when it was just Miles and Phoenix. Even after Franziska entered their lives and took up most of his time, as Miles had a duty to be a good big brother to her (and she was, in all honesty, more of a handful than her small and delicate stature let on), he would always drop everything and come running whenever Phoenix called his name.

Something about Phoenix was just so inspiring. He listened so attentively when Miles talked about law and being a defence attorney and any other books he read. He had such an honest, straightforward way of looking at things that provided a valuable and very needed alternative perspective. Miles liked hearing Phoenix's thoughts on every single subject they discussed, no matter how simple or complex they could get. Hearing Phoenix talk at all was always nice, liable to send that tingling warmth throughout Miles' whole body. He had to fight down the constant urge to hold Phoenix's hand when they stood beside one another, had to break himself out of daydreaming up possible scenarios where he would get to hug his friend, or kiss him, or even ask him to join him on this journey to becoming an attorney.

So, yes. Miles was sure he was in love with his best friend. And he was entirely out of his depth.

Love seemed so foreign a concept, despite how easily it seemed to come to Larry and Phoenix both. The two had their crushes on plenty of the girls in their schools, but Miles never quite understood their reasoning when he asked them to explain it. Writing mushy love letters seemed a waste of time when he could be studying or reading more about law. He could also spend that time better by playing with his adopted sister. Or talking with his two very good friends. Mooning over someone to the point Larry always did, where he was prone to making a fool of himself with grand gestures (and always roping Phoenix in to help), never seemed like a great use of his time.

Miles supposed it wouldn't be falling in love without a little incomprehensible messiness. He'd read enough case files to know people went absolutely nutty for the ones they declared to love.

But all those cases were far too extreme. He needed to gather evidence, first and foremost. Then he could identify how exactly to build his own case here.

He went first to Mister Shields, who, despite being as ridiculous as Larry about the matter, was an adult at the least. (Miles had to ask his dad about dinner plans anyway, as the firm was working a tricky case and Miles wanted to make beef stroganoff again to cheer his dad up. It always worked.) It was pretty easy to find Mister Shields at the office on any day, but especially right now since Miles' dad took Miss Fey with him on the investigation this time. Approaching Mister Shields' desk, Miles opened with a blunt, "How can you tell you've fallen in love, Mister Shields?"

"Miles, bud!" Mister Shields laughed in good humour, as usual. He patted the top of Miles' head, mussing up Miles' hair, also as usual. "Not even a, 'hi, hello'? You're so much like your pops."

Miles pushed his hand away, growing sheepish at the unintentional praise. "Sorry. It's nice to see you, Mister Shields."

"So you think you've fallen in love, eh? Unless this is about me and my many affairs again."

Mister Shields grinned at him mischievously and Miles huffed at him. "I didn't say either of those. I'm just curious. You're always being foolish around other women and Larry's the same, so I wanted to try and understand it better. Why do you do those things?"

Mister Shields laughed some more, clearly not believing his intellectual curiosity. "Well, I'm not sure I'm the one to help you out here, Miles."

Miles frowned in confusion. "Why not?"

Mister Shields seemed like the perfect one to explain it, always getting distracted by the female witnesses and defendants. Just like Larry. He still went to visit Miss Kate and Mister Masters every so often, so his infatuation at least lasted longer than Larry's. Was he being facetious the whole time? That was rather cruel of him towards those ladies he flirted with, then. He said, "Each case of love is a lot like the trials your father takes on, with their own unique causes and players and bodies of evidence. Sometimes you can't help but fall for their beauty, other times it's their wit and charm that attracts you. And, if you're real lucky, sometimes it's them who falls for you."

Miles gave a dissatisfied hum. He did find Phoenix pretty beautiful and enjoyed the other boy's cleverness. "But how can you tell?" He insisted.

"All the usual signs." Mister Shields grinned suddenly, gearing up to really tease Miles. "Butterflies in your stomach when you're around them, wanting to do things just to make them smile and feel nice, thinking about them all the time, things like that."

"But. Aren't those all normal things to have and think around your friend?"

Miles' frown deepened. He was three for three on these supposed signs. An unease took root in his shoulders at the possible answer he had to face here. Mister Shields laughed and said, "They can be, absolutely. There ain't any rules against falling in love with your best friend, you know. In fact, in a lot of cases, it can be even better."

All this evidence stacking up against Miles wasn't great. "Love sounds far too complicated to be worth it." He mumbled in defeat.

"Chin up, bud." Mister Shields encouraged him. "Love can be a wonderful thing despite how scary it can seem at first. If you wanna follow in your dad's footsteps, you can't let a little thing like this bring you down. Face it head on, as if it were a difficult case."

"What do you think I'm doing right now?" Miles asked in a huff. Mister Shields just laughed at him and he sighed. It sounded silly, but it was pretty good advice. Mister Shields was good at sounding ridiculous while imparting actually useful advice. "Thank you, Mister Shields. I'll keep what you said in mind."

"C'mon, Miles. You gotta tell me who the lucky person is." Mister Shields said, getting a bit too eager to weedle this out of him. "I bet your old man would love to know his son's developed a crush, too. I promise I'll only tease you as much as any older brother might."

Rolling his eyes, Miles gave a parting, "Goodbye, Mister Shields."

Mister Shields continued laughing boisterously as Miles left the office and headed home. He could ask his father about dinner plans later. At the very least he had an answer now, even if it wasn't an ideal one. He was pretty sure about it to begin with, of course, but the confirmation beyond a shadow of a doubt was nice to have. Falling in love with his very best friend brought up a whole multitude of issues. Such as the fact that he'd only ever seen Phoenix and Larry get their crushes on girls, leaving Miles as the odd one out. (There was no way he would emulate either of their behaviours here. He absolutely refused.) Miles had no idea how to go about confessing to this crush, either.

Once home, he found Franziska laying across the floor and reading a book. Her favourite place to be when she and Larry weren't getting up to all kinds of mischief. He had to really talk with Larry about encouraging his little sister to break things when they were too wound up to sit still. Miles greeted her with an informative, "Father is still out on his case, so we can wait a while longer to start on dinner. Have you finished all your schoolwork all ready?"

"Have you?" She fired back, not even phased. Her wickedly sharp words were always a delight to parry. At least, so long as she didn't aim directly for his head. Her mischief was more likely to get Phoenix in trouble half the time, though, meaning Miles got maybe too used to deflecting her strikes. She hopped onto her knees and asked, "Why did you go all the way out to the office, anyway? If you really wanted to ask papa Edgeworth about dinner plans, then you should have called him."

He smiled wryly at how immediately she could call him out. He sat down on the floor beside her and admitted, "I had a question for Mister Shields, actually."

"Was it about how foolishly you've been acting lately?"

She frowned up at him, arms crossed over her chest as she judged him as harshly as a nine-year-old could. Which was quite a lot, she had a really good glare. (Got it from her real father, no doubt. Miles didn't remember too much about the man, having only seen him a handful of times while watching his father fight against him in Mister Masters' trial.) It was more familiar, too; Miles remembered how many times he'd been told by his teachers to quit glaring at everyone, that it was why he never could really make friends outside of Phoenix and Larry. In a quiet sort of admission, he said, "Love is pretty foolish, I agree. But maybe it's not entirely a bad thing."

"Ah-ha! I knew it." She crowed in triumph.

She leapt to her feet as she preened, taking advantage of their positioning in order to be taller than him for a moment. Miles shook his head at her childishness, though he said fondly, "Yes, you're very clever indeed."

"Don't patronise me. Anyone could see that you've been a fool for ages. I'm just proud you're finally admitting it to yourself." She gave a haughty little sniff, then sat back down and locked him in her intense stare. "Now, tell me everything about how this is turning your mind to rubbish. With any luck, I can offer my services in helping to set you up with him. You're positively helpless on your own, after all."

Miles laughed. "Ziska, you can't tell me you've got it all figured out."

"Why not? It's such an easy answer that it's not even a challenge worthy of my superior intellect." She tossed her head back, then glared at him once more. "But it'd be too easy if I said it for you. Admit it with your own mouth, Miles."

She cranked up that intimidation to the max. Phoenix and Larry both professed to it being a harrowing thing, and even Miles couldn't refute how uncomfortable it was to be locked down by it. But really, she was far too cute for it to have much of an effect on Miles or his father. Not that Miles would ever tell her as much. He preferred not being chased around for an hour by a rampaging Franziska. As casually as he could, he said, "Fine. I'm pretty sure that I've fallen for my best friend."

Saying it aloud was weird. Like there was no way to take back that declaration now that it was out in the open. Miles wasn't sure he was okay with that. Franziska made a noise in an overblown disgust, even sticking her tongue out. "Pretty sure? Miles, you are very foolish if you can't even recognise how foolishly you've fallen."

"And you're far too precocious for someone who's barely entering fifth grade."

She crossed her arms in a huff and said, "For as long as I've known you, you have been a fool for that even more ridiculous fool Phoenix Wright. That you're only realising it now just goes to show how much of a fool you truly are."

In spite of himself, he fell into a pout. "You don't have to call him by his full name every time. You don't do that to me or Larry."

"There is no other way to address him that would properly convey how much of a fool that boy is."

She huffed once more and Miles could see he wasn't about to convince her. Had he really always been in this sort of love with Phoenix? Of course he loved Phoenix, the other boy was his friend. But romantic love? It was harder to tell that since there was no way to distance himself from the question. Since he had nothing better to say, he gave the obvious, "Phoenix is my best friend."

"Which is why you continue to be so clueless." Franziska leaned back as she sighed in a long and dramatic display of her exasperation. Then she swiped up her book as she stood and gave him a condescending little pat on the shoulder. "Don't concern yourself so much with how hopeless you are. It is my duty as your sister to assist you in these sorts of matters, which is much better than you rightly deserve. But even my stupid brother should have a chance to be stupidly happy with his equally stupid friend."

"You just want to make fun of me some more." Miles argued, brushing her hand off his shoulder.

"Well, that's just the compensation I'm owed from putting up with all your foolishness."

She grinned sharply at him, his only warning for her incoming mischief, and he scrambled to his feet to give chase as she rushed off. She managed to grab his phone out of his bag and composed several over the top and sappy texts, all of which she sent to Phoenix with her signature all over them. Miles ended up laughing too hard to stop her sooner. It was all in good fun, anyway. Phoenix and Larry both had to be used to her hijacking hid phone by this point.

Right as they were preparing to get things out for dinner, their father returned with good news on the investigation. Miss Fey couldn't join them this time, so Miles and Franziska both helped as best they could in preparing dinner with their father. As they all laughed and had fun, Miles put the matter of this whole crush on his best friend to the side. He could always talk more about it with Phoenix later.

//

Phoenix had Larry pretty beat in their game when his phone chimed.

"Ooh, mister popular." Larry teased him immediately.

Phoenix rolled his eyes and finished their match, much to Larry's chagrin, then set aside his controller in order to check what it was. "It's probably my mom wanting me back home. Or Miles. His dad's on this pretty difficult case right now and he said he'd keep me updated."

"Ugh, you guys are such nerds."

Larry threw his own controller up in the air as he collapsed backwards with a dramatic groan. Ever the ridiculous one. Phoenix giggled at him, but when he saw the texts were indeed from Miles, his heart did skip a beat. It was silly, this was probably nothing more than some neat insights into the legal world, and yet more and more recently, he enjoyed any excuse to chat with his very best friend.

As he read the text, however, his giddiness fell to confusion. This was decidedly not Miles texting him. Judging by how often they called him a fool, it was undoubtedly Franziska.

Which made it all the stranger that it was a declaration of love and friendship that Phoenix was a fool for not taking more seriously.

Too curious to leave him be, Larry sat up to peek over Phoenix's shoulder at the screen and asked, "Is it your mom? D'ya have to go home now?"

Phoenix smiles in the end. No use overthinking it when it was just another one of Franziska's crazy pranks. "Nah, it's Franziska. She says I'm not worthy of being Miles' best friend."

Larry frowned at him, incredulous. "Dude, Ziska doesn't even have a phone."

"She hijacks Miles' all the time, Larry. Mostly to text you, I'm pretty sure."

"Wait, that was her?"

Larry scrambled to get his own phone and Phoenix laughed at his silliness. Before Phoenix could send any replies, he got another message. Then two more. She was really on a roll. Each one was more obviously her than the last and he appreciated her enthusiasm, but her lack of any tact was definitely more than a little suspicious.

"I guess that explains why Edgey would send me messages calling me a fool until he hit the character limit." Larry sighed, tucking his phone away and rubbing the side of his head in annoyance. "Man, if she'd coordinated this with me better, we could'a totally caught Edgey by surprise for his last birthday."

Phoenix shook his head at the memory. "Miles reads his texts, you know."

"That's another thing! He could'a told me it wasn't him. Why didn't he tell me she got his phone?"

"Maybe he knows you're smart enough to figure it out by yourself."

Larry groaned and flopped back over dramatically. Then he looked straight at Phoenix, suddenly no nonsense, and said, "So. You gonna do anything about what she told you?"

It always caught Phoenix unawares when he'd do this. Phoenix had to remind himself that Larry was mostly a goofball as a deliberate choice. He shrugged and said, "I mean, it's only according to her. She likes to mess with us."

She and Larry were usually the only ones to find their insane pranks funny. They were actually pretty scary when they teamed up, able to understand each other on a level of chaos beyond the rest of the world's comprehension. Franziska's ideas had no limits and Larry was a filthy enabler as long as he found the bit funny enough. Larry shook his head and said, "This is too mean spirited to be just a prank. C'mon, Nick."

"Mean spirited is how I'd describe her on her best day." Phoenix grumbled.

Larry hoisted himself up to meet Phoenix's level and said, "Fine. But you can't keep running away from it forever."

Confused, Phoenix asked, "Running away from what?"

"Don't play dumb here, Nick. You might be able to get away with that with Edgey, but not me." Larry grinned suddenly, goofy and worryingly confident. "You've been crushing on Edgey since we first met. Aren't you happy to hear he likes you back?"

"Wh-What?"

Though he was no doubt blushing from how much embarrassment flooded him, Phoenix huffed indignantly at his ridiculous friend. He hadn't been crushing on Miles that long. He'd had plenty of crushes, but none of them were on his best friend. (At least, that was his story and he was sticking to it until he died.) Larry tilted his head from side to side as he went on, thinking things over aloud. "I mean, you totally deserve someone way less of a stick in the mud than Edgey. Then again, you liked that girl Daria so I guess there's no accounting for taste. And I guess they say opposites do attract. Like fire and water, bread and butter."

How were bread and butter opposites? Phoenix said sternly, "I don't have a crush on Miles."

"Yes you do." Larry rejected him point black. Which, fair. He had Phoenix on that point. It was still annoying. "Ooh, you should totally let me help you confess to him, since he's getting help from Ziska on his. I'm great at making up memorable and grand romantic gestures. Just as Lisabelle! She was so into me while we were together."

Giving up for now on convincing Larry otherwise (he could be surprisingly stubborn about the worst things), Phoenix interjected quickly. "No, Larry, I'm good on my own here. I also remember how you and Lisabelle broke up."

Larry hung his head in defeat a moment before springing right back up and into action. "So, what's your plan here, then? You gotta say something, it'd be real awkward to just leave it hanging in the air between you two. Please tell me you got at least half a plan, Nick."

"I don't, because Miles and I are happy being just friends and that's it." Phoenix tried one last time.

"But you're missing out on so much more potential!" Larry shouted, throwing his hands up in the air. "Think of all the cuddling you two could be doing. The smooching! You could hold his hand like ten times more often."

"Okay, okay!" Phoenix shushed him, glancing fearfully towards the room door. He had no other choice to resign himself to this, didn't he? Sighing, he said in a much more defeated tone, "I don't know if I should plan it out. I'd rather it happen naturally, forcing it would just make it weird, you know?"

Miles was his best friend. What if he ended up finding Phoenix weird for this whole crush thing? Phoenix sighed again at the thought of it.

"Besides, you know me and plans don't mix."

Larry let his head loll back in agreement on that one. "You're like the luckiest unlucky person in the world."

Phoenix nodded tiredly in agreement. It was a fair assessment. Any time he ran into a worst case scenario (like getting such bad food poisoning on his birthday that he was out for two whole days, or that class trial which started it all), he'd also end up better off than anyone expected (Miles became his friend, they got those Signal Samurai charms for each other, they got to attend the same school and mostly stuck in the same classes). His mom called it the Wright curse jokingly, since his dad apparently used to have the same sort of wildly fluctuating luck.

"Well, you gotta at least try something." Larry went on, insistent on wringing out every single one of Phoenix's misgivings on this matter. "Edgey's just as crazy about you as you are for him. Ziska ain't playing here."

"How would you know?" Phoenix asked in a huff.

"C'mon, Nick. I know you're so dense that you missed every signal Lilah was throwing at you, but you can't tell me you haven't noticed how much Edgey's into you."

Larry levelled him with that too serious look again and Phoenix shied away. His phone buzzed again and he took the distraction gratefully. It was actually from Miles this time, apologising for Franziska's rapid fire texts and promising a chance to talk about this new breakthrough his father made in his case. Notably, he didn't mention anything about the contents of those texts; he probably knew Phoenix was smart enough to discredit them as Franziska's doing.

Larry scooted over to read over his shoulder again. Phoenix's throat went dry all of a sudden, closing up at the thought of addressing something so daunting as this thing he never wanted to even admit to.

"I just. I don't want to assume anything." He said in a mumble.

Larry rested his chin onto Phoenix's shoulder. "You're scared of everything going tits up like it usually does for you." He clarified.

Phoenix frowned at him a moment, then went back to staring at his phone. If he spoke it into existence, then it became real. There'd be no taking it back. "What if he thinks it's too weird?" He asked, grasping for any excuse he could. "You know he's never understood it when you or me had a crush on someone. What if he decides it's too awkward being my friend anymore?"

"You never know until you try." Larry pointed out.

Phoenix put his phone away and stood, upsetting Larry's position. "I should get home before mom starts worrying."

"Oh, come on, Nick!" Larry shouted, flopping onto the floor. "Where's that fighting spirit you always got? Charge on ahead like you usually do, act first and think later."

"It deserves more thought that our usual brainless approach." Phoenix protested in return.

He shook his head and left Larry's house, pausing to say goodbye to Larry's parents. They were always nice, even when he and Larry were being way too rowdy like they were. As he walked home, Phoenix worried at his lip and thought this over some more. Of course Larry would want to help. Of course Franziska would, too. They were friends, they had the best intentions. But this was way too delicate of a matter to leave it to them. It was too delicate a matter to leave to Phoenix, really! Yet he had no choice but to figure it out himself, considering it was mostly his problem to begin with.

No, that wasn't fair. It wasn't a problem, it was Miles. Nothing about Miles could ever really be a problem. Not when he was so wonderful and smart and Phoenix really was too far gone for him by this point.

He didn't pull his phone back out until he was safely at home and in his room. Larry was right, even if Phoenix was loathe to admit it. There really was no better way to know how this would turn out unless he asked. Letting that question hang in the air between them would be so much worse than ripping that blanket right off.

It took him at least a minute to punch in his statement: "If we're being serious here, then I think I'd like being your boyfriend."

He stared at it for another minute or two, then braced himself and sent it. There, bandaid ripped right off. No taking it back now.

Waiting for a response was just as agonising. He wanted to both toss his phone across his room so he wouldn't check it obsessively and to shove it beneath his pillow so he could at least hear when Miles responded. If Miles even would respond. It was dinner time now, so there was a good chance Miles wouldn't even see his text until later.

He had to put it out of his mind. He had to so something else for a while.

He went and joined his mom in the end, helping her finish up dinner preparations. He wasn't as good as Miles was in the kitchen (or Franziska, who was way too fast at learning what Miles' dad taught them), but he could follow her direction and do enough. He could even manage his weird luck enough to not make a disaster of things. That had to count for something.

As he settled into bed for the night, he saw he did get a reply. His whole body froze, but he pushed past that dread and read Miles' reply.

"If it's all right with you, I think we should discuss this more in-person. Sleep well, Phoenix."

It was both nerve-wracking and hopeful at the same time. It could end really, really badly, or it could turn out just fine. Phoenix was tempted to send back something more, to pour out all of these things swirling around in him, but he supposed they could do that more efficiently tomorrow. Hopefully. Maybe. Gosh, he hoped Miles wasn't about to crush all his hopes here.

Things would be fine. They had to be. Miles was his best friend here.

What he ended up sending was a simple, "Sounds good! Seeya tomorrow!"