#im late garbage

Their relationship started off slow, full of anxiety and hiding it from their respective guardians for different reasons. (Touko did not want to have her parents aware of her happy liaison, and Byakuya had to protect his inheritance.) And while she expected public displays of affection to be rare, if they happened at all, she wasn't aware of how flustered and anxious he would be about physical contact whatsoever, even in private. Even hand holding made him shy away. So, she practiced, prepared herself for her plans. So, she would rest her hand on top of his in private sanctuaries they both felt safe at, ranging from the library, to Byakuya's bedroom. (She claimed hers wasn't safe, and he never questioned it, merely nodded, and complied with studying at his own home in the weekends.) At first he had jerked, looking at her in surprise, and they were seated across from each other in the library, her eyes peering at his, nervous smile starting to fall. It happened in such a quick, nervous mannerism, that it took a second to click in her brain. His hand slowly shifted, holding onto hers, book set down so he could flip pages with a free hand, and he read the same sentence multiple times. (His eyes moved back and forth the same way various times, showing his lack of focus.) At first mistaking it for disgust, she went to move her hand away, and his grip tightened just barely. She smiled, and realized that it wasn't disgust making him freeze, but nerves. Her White Knight was nervous to hold her hand!

She knew to start slow, moving from holding hands over a table to sitting next to each other while doing it, to leaning on him. After a while, hugs and even cuddles were allowed, and if at times his lips almost ghosted over hers, breath mingling as she closed her eyes in preparation only to feel him pull away, anxiousness obvious in body language, neither said anything about it. Their first kiss was in the privacy of his room, studying history. (A class she was shocked to hear him failing, as he shied away from any failures, and it warmed her heart he was able to tell her.) He set down his pencil, and said her name, it rolling off of his tongue softly, and she looked up, still in that pink sweater he had bought her after she eyed it for three days straight at the boutique she went too for clothes to wear to book signings, frozen to the bones by the winter she was so named for. He had hesitated, teeth digging into his nails for a second before he jerked them away. (As if afraid his father was there to say something about what a disgusting habit it was the second he did it. It ached her heart.) "Fukawa." He repeated, voice not as solid as it normally was, and she nodded eagerly, braids flailing around her head. (Tighter than usual, as he had moved over and braided them when she came over, as if to avoid reading books on war and death, and children forced to battle.) He moved aside books and pencils, a few supplies falling to the floor and rolling under his bed as he sat next to her, showing no sign of the nervousness his trembling hand revealed as it rested upon her shoulder. "Fukawa." It was said again, the nervousness pouring into the name in a way disgust once had, and she stared up at him in wonder, enamored with his very existence, watching the way his eyes flitted along her face, as if to soak up as much of her appearance as he could. And he leaned in, her eyes closing instantly, mouth ghosting over hers. She didn't expect his lips to be chapped. (She realized how silly that was, he never used any chapstick and he licked his lips occasionally when nervous.) She gripped his shoulders, the back of his shirt, even daring to dig fingers into his thigh through his pants leg. His fingers sank into her hips, hands spread along her small stature, mouth on hers, and their eyes were closed, hands not straying from their favorite spots, the kiss almost chaste but dripping with all the emotion he had scared out of him that she was pulling back in, filling him up with it until he was overflowing and uncertain of his own beliefs and confidences in himself.