#araoi

He sniffs Aoi’s neck, waking him up, Arata didn't want to though: Aoi has been staying up late the whole week due to his busy schedule.

"Oh, I didn't hear you," Aoi says, yawning.

"Hey, sleep a little more," Arata replies.

"Was I sleeping?"

Arata squeezes Aoi's waist a little more. "Yes."

Slowly, Aoi tries to get up, but Arata holds him tight.

"Rest a little, you're tired."

"But I said I'd make you pancakes."

Arata buries his face on Aoi's back, felling his shoulder blades move as he tries to get up.

"Geez, Aoi I can't believe you're more than twenty and I still have to take care of you like when we were kids," Arata murmurs on what Aoi – after years of being together – recognizes as his half serious tone.

"Look who’s talking!"

"We're both kids then."

Aoi gives in and turns to kiss Arata's forehead. "How was class?"

"Awful."

He pushes Arata's bangs to the side and caresses his hair.

"Really? Weren’t you going to the hospital today?"

Arata nods and takes Aoi's hand to kiss his palm, pressing his nose to inhale his scent, humming softly as he kisses one time each fingertip, trying to delay his answer, successfully because Aoi continues talking:

"You were really excited this morning, though…"

Arata looks up to the window, the sky is clear as Aoi’s eyes, then looks at the real deal, to see them sparkling, looking back at him with devotion. Then he notices his own emotionless reflection on Aoi’s pupil and remembers:

"An old lady passed away."

Gently, Aoi caresses his cheek and jawline, noticing the mild affliction on his sleepy eyes and slightly puckered lips.

"That's sad, cookie."

Arata nods and pulls Aoi closer. "She was sick, but still. It was awful."

"I know, I know," Aoi murmurs as he puts a lock of hair behind Arata’s ear.

"My classmates cried – some of them. I didn't, that's the worst part."

"I'm sure it wasn't because you didn't feel sad about it."

Arata kisses Aoi's cheek and buries his face on his neck, feeling on his safe place.

"Abe-sensei congratulated me, he said that since I'm going to be a doctor it’s good that I’m acting like one already," Arata slurs the words, blowing them against Aoi’s collar.

Aoi pecks his temple and hums a little to ease Arata.

"I'm not proud about it, Aoi, it’s... it’s terrible."

"We both know how it is, huh? Do you want to keep talking about it?"

"Let's drop the subject, 'kay? You have too much on your mind."

Aoi shakes his head.

"Sweetheart, we can talk, but if you're really sure I'll drop it."

Arata nuzzles to his chest.

"Let's take a nap."

Aoi looks at the work piling on his desk before nestling to his boyfriend's side, they stay quiet for a while, hearing the sounds of the street and the birds.

"Can we go to a shrine?" Arata asks. Aoi hums in response, so he keeps talking. "I want to pray."

"Tomorrow, 'kay?"

Arata closes his eyes and feels Aoi's breathing, his chest calmly going up and down.

"Just to be safe...  you’re sure that I mean it when I tell you that I love you, right?"

Aoi chuckles and opens his eyes.

"Araaataaa-kun, we've been dating for years, I'm sure, because Arata shows it through actions."

Aoi leans on to peck his cheek, his skin is still a little cold from the wind, but the part where his lips touched it reminds warm.

"I love you, Aoi."

"I know, you went to three different stores yesterday just to buy my shampoo, testing them just by my smell."

"Aoi-kun is always like that with me."

"Because I love you, too."

Arata leans on and kisses Aoi before muttering a good night and drifting into slumber.

But Aoi isn't sleepy anymore, so he caresses his hair and kisses softly his temple, contemplating how as Arata’s mouth starts to curve on a small smile, a tear descends from his lacrimal to his nose stopping on the tip. Aoi carefully wipes it off with his finger.

“Aooi… pancake…”

Aoi lets out a giggle and covers his mouth to not wake up Arata, and moves closer, to nestle right to his side, closing his eyes, hearing the soft murmurs of Arata’s sleep talk, which slowly decrease until there’s nothing but snoring along with the chirps of the birds outside.

Aoi feels at ease, even if he has tons of stuff to do and Arata is sad; it’s okay, because on times like these, Aoi can rest from his schedule and Arata has someone that always understands him.

It happens one day when Aoi doesn’t go to class, so Arata has the duty to take him his classwork, because Aoi doesn’t really believe in resting. To his surprise, Chihiro is over along with his wife and their daughter, Eri.

Arata climbs up the stairs already hearing Aoi’s laugh mixed with his niece’s. His heart flutters a little, and he smiles as he pictures Aoi playing with dolls or getting his hair done by Eri. Little does he know, Eri is using for the first time in her life the new makeup kit Chihiro bought her for her birthday, so he almost has a heart attack as he opens the door of Aoi’s room, without knocking.

As expected, kid’s makeup are full of bright colors and glitter nail polish. He notices it as he sees Aoi himself painting his nails.

“Arata,” Aoi greets him, smiling, his teeth framed with some kind of fuchsia lip gloss.

Arata waves his hand little, too astonished to pronounce a word, until he seats in front of Aoi and Eri, who is talking to his uncle. He scans Aoi’s face, his makeup was obviously made by an 8 years old girl, but he thinks it looks good, just because Aoi is the one wearing it.

“How was class today?”

“Good.”

“You fell asleep, didn’t you?”

The motion of Aoi painting his nails is distracting, but no more than Eri applying blush to Aoi’s natural pink cheeks, Arata presses his hand to his chest, looking for his heart to calm it down. “How did you know?”

“It was a joke,” Aoi giggles.

“Uncle!” Eri protests. “Don’t move.”

“Sorry, I won’t.”

Aoi stays still, Eri turns and take the eye shadow palette. “Which color?”

Aoi shrugs. “Let Arata decide.”

Eri turns to Arata. “Arata-san, which color?”

Arata gazes the palette intently, taking it as a life-or-death decision, even if every color looks suspiciously alike.

“The silver one.”

“Glitter eye shadow,” Eri murmurs and takes the sponge brush. “Oka-chan uses that kind of eye shadow.”

“And she looks good, doesn’t she Eri-chan?” Aoi says.

“She looks good,” Eri nods, sticking his tongue out as she applies silver glitter onto Aoi’s eyelids, on top of the pink one she used as a base.

Eri sits back in her place, making a hand motion for Arata to appreciate his piece of art. Arata nods. “Good job Eri-chan.”

“Wait here, uncle, I’ll bring otou-chan and oka-chan.”

Eri leaves, they hear her going downstairs as she calls her parents. Arata moves to sit beside Aoi.

“How do I look?” Aoi asks, pursing his lips.

“Mouthwatering.”

Aoi giggles a little, Arata cups his face.

“Eri-chan can come back in any minute,” Aoi says, caressing Arata’s fingers. “Besides, you’ll mess up my lip-gloss.”

“Haven’t you considered to buy one of those? I mean your lips ask to get kissed,” Arata replies, getting closer.

“Should I?” Aoi’s heart pounds hard as he closes his eyes.

“I’ll get you one, since you’ll have to re-apply it every time I kiss you.”

With that said, Arata closes the distance between them.

The lip-gloss is sticky, because it’s meant to be a toy for kids, not a reason for Arata to kiss his boyfriend. But Aoi’s lips are tender as always, and the way he parts them just a little to taste Arata’s lips, plus the plastic glitter-ish mixture, are something that has him going for a second kiss as soon as they break it for air. They make out, but it’s when Arata is kissing one by one Aoi’s painted nails that they hear Chihiro’s voice in the corridor and Arata just reacts to rub his hand over his lips to clean the remainders of their kisses.

Chihiro doesn’t say anything about the missing lip gloss on Aoi’s lips nor about the suspiciously fuchsia stains on Arata’s chin, but he does take Eri with him so they can discuss ‘guys’ stuff’. He closes the door behind himself and Arata stretches his neck to kiss Aoi again, Aoi presses his index to his boyfriend’s lips.

“We have to get stuff done.”

“Not fair,” Arata groans. “You, looking all pretty… there’s no way I can keep my hands to myself.”

“Homework, then kisses. Deal?”

“Deal.”

The deal lasts until Aoi leans on Arata’s side to explain some math thingy later that afternoon. Aoi is not surprised, neither disappointed when Arata leaves with rosy cheeks, a small smile and the promise of getting him a lip gloss.

He does, two day later, when Aoi comes back to class and Arata is waiting by his desk, which has a small package on top of it.

“Morning Aoi-kun.”

“Hi Arata,” Aoi greets him as he sits.

Arata doesn’t attempt to move, Aoi smiles, already knowing what to do.

“What’s this?” he asks, pointing at the package.

“I guess you have a secret admirer.”

Aoi plays a little with the red ribbon. “Should I open it?”

“Yep, if I was that person I’d surely like that.”

He doesn’t reply, just takes the wrapping paper and rips it a little to see a pink-ish purple cylinder.

Arata looks at both sides, just because Aoi won’t be so pleased if someone hears what he is about to say. “It’s your color.”

“Why are you so sure?”

“Every color is your color, God, Aoi.”

Aoi giggles. “I kind of differ with your opinion, since Eri-chan has made my makeup many times I can tell there are colors that don’t suit me.”

“Well the woman at the store said it was and I believe her.”

The classroom is empty now, the girl who was sitting in the first row went out to make a call, so Aoi brushes Arata’s chin lightly.

“She doesn’t know me, sweetheart, she said that because she wanted to sell you this lip gloss.”

Arata makes a sound. “Open it, I know by heart how to match your skin complexion. Also, don’t talk about her like that, she even asked your hair color and everything.”

Aoi rolls the cap and takes it off just to find the brush covered in a peachy pink sparkling mixture. Arata hands him a pocket mirror.

“Aneki gave it to me.”

“Why?”

“I said ‘aneki I need a pocket mirror’ and she gave me this.”

Aoi doesn’t question it, since the Uzuki household is unusual, from grandparents to Yuka’s daughter, and years of being friends, and more than that, have taught Aoi to just embrace the weirdness of his own jack-in-the-box.

The classroom is still empty, since it’s early in the morning, Arata yawns, he’s never been the one to wake up early, so Aoi doesn’t have any other option to apply a small amount of lip-gloss on his lips just because Arata did his best searching for it and now is doing the utmost to stand beside his desk in the classroom. Aoi smiles to himself in the mirror and poses a little before looking up to Arata, who’s looking back with stars in his eyes.

“You look beautiful,” Arata says sheepishly. “My prince.”

Aoi blushes, but he isn’t ashamed, because Arata is smiling like an idiot as he blushes too.

“Don’t call me prince.”

“Wrong, Aoi, I called you ‘my prince’. It feels different.”

Aoi traces a heart on the hand Arata has on his desk, feeling warmer than ever. “It does feel different.”

That’s the first memory that comes to Arata’s mind the moment he enters to Aoi’s room again and sees Eri sitting in front of his uncle with a makeup kit that isn’t actually a toy for kids.

It’s been years since that episode and a lot of lip glosses had been on Aoi’s and Arata’s lips, Eri has grown up and now she wants to be a cosmetologist, thus Aoi keeps being her canvas.

“Arata, sit for a little while, Eri-chan is finishing my makeup.”

He tries to look through Eri’s back, Eri moves so he can’t.

“Arata-san!” she says. “It’s not finished yet.”

It’s been years since his own niece was Eri’s age, so he knows he mustn’t interfere in those kind of matters, so he sits, daydreaming about how Aoi is going to look.

Arata doesn’t have any particular style of makeup that he likes, but he kind of has a thing for pink lip-stick, so he crosses his fingers for Eri to finish quickly.

“How was work today?” Aoi asks.

“Uncle! I’m trying to work on your lips.”

“I don’t like photo-shoots.”

Eri puts the lipstick down, as she appreciates her piece of art, then she moves so Arata can see Aoi.

The makeup is simple and yet it makes Aoi look stunning, or maybe is that he is in fact stunning to Arata’s eyes.

“So?” Eri asks.

Arata doesn’t reply, Eri giggles a little.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” she says, because it’s been years since the last time she bought the story of childhood friends.

Eri pick her cosmetics up and leaves, Arata sits beside Aoi like he always does, but feeling again like a lanky teenager.

“How do I look?” Aoi asks now.

Arata scans the makeup, starting with his perfectly made winged eyeliner and his long lashes, the foundation and blush and other things Eri uses that really don’t have anything to do with Aoi’s pretty face so he just ignore them in order to look at the lips covered with fuchsia lipstick and some kind of glossy coat that Arata can’t really name.

“Mouthwatering,” he replies remembering again the first time he saw Aoi with makeup on.

Judging for Aoi’s reaction he remembers it too, as now he is the one that leans on for a kiss.

“Won’t it ruin your lipstick?”

“It’s waterproof.”

Arata cups Aoi’s face, smiling. “Let’s see if it’s kissesproof.”

Aoi snorts, but Arata is more focused on kissing those lips so he ignores what Aoi will say when he opens his mouth to kiss him.

The kiss is obviously not as desperate as they were before, when Eri still used his glitter-ish palette and Aoi painted his nails with whatever she had in there. But it doesn’t make it any less good, any less loving.

“Chi-chan is downstairs,” Aoi says breathlessly, laying on the floor beneath Arata.

Arata closes the door, because he won’t just go home with that and they kiss for a while until Eri knocks the door before she opens it.

“Uncle, again!” she says. “I told you it’s waterproof not everthingproof. I wanted to snap a picture.”

With that said Eri closes the door, clearly annoyed.

Aoi takes the pocket mirror Arata gave him years ago.

“Clearly it’s not kissesproof” Arata comments, seeing Aoi’s chin, cheeks and nose covered in pink lipstick.

Aoi turns to his boyfriend, then hands him the mirror, Arata looks his reflection and whistles.

“Not surprising, though,” he says. “You were kissing me really good.”

“Feel bad for Eri-chan,” Aoi replies. “She worked really hard.”

Eri opens the door again, with his makeup kit in hand. “I’ll retouch it and clean your face to take the picture.”

“But…” Arata says.

“And you’ll let me do your makeup too, Arata-san.”

Arata shrugs. “Sounds good.”

Eri wipes off the remainders of the lipstick from Aoi’s face and applies it once again, Arata looks at them from the bed, smiling like a fool, Eri looks up.

“I… whatever,” she says. “I won’t waste my new kit on you guys.”

“What’s up Eri-chan?”

Eri points at Arata, Aoi turns to see him.

“I know Arata-san will mess it again and that is so not worthy.”

Aoi blushes. “Eri-chan! You shouldn’t say that.”