#omwk

Despite her father’s protests, Ms. Takashi insists to drop Taichi off at his place before she drives home. It’s almost a two kilometers detour, but it does mean Taichi will get to exit the car sooner, and he’s willing to bet Ms. Takashi appreciates that as much as he does. They go through the ride in silence, barely broken by Mr. Takashi’s increasingly feeble attempts at starting a conversation, and by the time they pull up in front of Taichi’s building it’s all he can do not to burst out of the car and flee without a word.

He hurries through the goodbyes, trying his best not to catch anyone’s eyes, and bites on a sigh when Yamato mumbles a quick ‘I’ll walk you’ before exiting the car in turn, without regard for his mother’s attempt at protesting.

They stride across the sidewalk in silence, back resolutely turned to Ms. and Mr. Takashi, pass the double glass doors without a word—Taichi doesn’t even mutter half-hearted threats at the faulty key to his mailbox—and come to a halt in front of the elevator while they wait for it to come back from the twelfth floor. On his left, Taichi can feel, more than he sees, the way Yamato purses his lips in concentration, giving Taichi ample time to cringe at what is sure to be coming before he finally says:

“’Maybe Gabumon has a sister’,” dragging the words out to maximize their power.

It works admirably well, and it feels like eighty percent of Taichi’s blood floods up to his face in the a split second as he covers his eyes with one hand and all but begs:

“Please stop talking.”

“No, really,” Yamato insists without looking away from the elevator, “it’s an interesting strategy to avoid that dinner.”

“I’m never gonna be able to look your mom in the eyes again,” Taichi half-whines, the heat in his face so bad he almost wants to take his coat off.

“Look at it form the bright side,” Yamato continues, voice ridiculously—and unfairly—steady throughout it all, “at least you know you deserve your crest—it takes a lot of courage to suggest people take up best—”

“Oh my god,” Taichi exclaims, burying his face in his hands, seconds away from puffing smoke out of his ears, “just shut up!”

“Relax,” Yamato says, laughter seeping in at the edge of his voice, “it worked—the families meeting is definitely postponed now.”

Taichi uncovers his face just long enough to smack his friend in the arm—it doesn’t quiet him down, though, just makes him throw his head back in a bark of laughter that could put his grandfather to shame.

“It’s your fault anyway,” Taichi protests, fingers muffling his words, “if you didn’t hate your family so much—”

“I don’t hate them,” Yamato cuts in, tone just firm enough to make Taichi come out of his little hiding place, “it’s not my fault they still want to pretend their divorce never happened.”

“Okay,” Taichi concedes, softening his voice as he knocks his shoulder against Yamato’s, “but if you didn’t put so much effort in keeping us apart I wouldn’t have panicked, and we wouldn’t be in this situation.”

“Which would be a shame,” Yamato answers, shoulders barely even stiffening as he speaks, “since I’d have missed your face just now.”

Taichi’s face contorts in surprise and mock offense as Yamato snorts in laughter again, and they exchange a few weak punches before the elevator doors ding open in front of them. Taichi pulls his tongue out at Yamato as he steps inside and pushes the ‘close ’ button with a grin threatening to break out on his face. Yamato rolls his eyes at first, then his face contracts and he holds the door back, mouth pinched with the weird kind of solemnity that comes with important topics.

“Do you think we should do this? The dinner, I mean?”

“I...think your granddad wants to know who his grandsons friends are,” Taichi says, thinking of the many times Yamato declined to have dinner with his family when there wasn’t anything actually in the way, “and I think your mom’s just trying to be your mom again.”

“She’s sixteen years too late,” Yamato snaps—Taichi, who sometimes still refers to his parents’ flat as ‘home’, watches him pause, pinch at the bridge of his nose, and take a deep breath before he says: “the old man and her—they think I made a choice, but I didn’t. I was nine!”

“Yamato—”

“Look, I’ve waited thirteen years for them to be my parents again,” Yamato insists—Taichi almost turns away from him when his voice thickens, but Yamato hasn’t tried to hide his wounds from him for years. He’s not about to stop looking at them—“I’m done. I wish I weren’t, but I’m done.”

“Okay,” Taichi says, knowing better than to push the topic.

Neither he nor Yamato are in a state where they can really handle this conversation—years and years of trying to bridge such a defining gap in their understandings of the world has taught them this, at least: family talks never end well unless proper conditions are met.

Standing in a public hallway while they hog the elevator to themselves doesn’t even come close.

“Fine,” Yamato says after a while, wincing when two sharp honks pierce through the air, “let’s do this.”

“You don’t have to,” Taichi reminds his friend but, well.

He knows what the look on Yamato’s face means, and he knows it’d take a severe beating and quite a lot of yelling to change the guy’s mind now.

(He should know, he’s done this before.)

“You’re my best friend,” Yamato starts, and Taichi can’t help but interrupt with:

“Second best friend.”

“Yeah, okay—”

“Or should that be third? Because Sora—”

“Taichi!” Yamato protests as his mother’s car—although, Taichi would bet, not Ms. Takashi herself—honks again, “are you even going to let me finish?”

“Sorry,” Taichi replies, fingers itching to hit the ‘close doors’ button, “go on.”

“You’re my best friend,” Yamato says again, almost like it’s no big deal except for the way his knuckles have grown white as he grasps the elevator threshold and the way his blue eyes won’t let go of Taichi’s, “and I know it matters to you. So let’s do this.”

“Okay,” Taichi replies, too breathless for comfort. Then, when the unexpected moment threatens to stress him out even more: “I can’t believe we’re close enough for you to invite me into your other life.”

“Okay that’s it,” Yamato says, rolling his eyes as he straightens up, “I’m canceling the thing!”

“No, no, no!” Taichi protests, laughter creeping into his voice even as Yamato grunts when someone honks again, “no take backs allowed! I’m officially meeting your parents!”

Yamato’s face grows four shades redder than usual as he all but throws himself away from the elevator, spluttering something indistinct about his father not being invited—no surprise there—and Taichi puts his best grin on as the elevator dings to signal the end of its wait.

“Think of all the embarrassing baby stories I’ll get to hear!” Taichi yells through the closing door, and laughs when Yamato slices a finger across his neck.

{ooo}

“You’re in a good mood,” Agumon remarks when Taichi enters the apartment a few minutes later, “that’s nice!”

“Yeah, it is,” Taichi agrees as he hangs his keys next to the door, “it’s been a while. Where are the others?”

“They phoned earlier,” Agumon explains while Taichi marches to the kitchen and dives into the fridge without waiting—he’s feeling ravenous, and if he’s got to wait for his roommates to come back before he can eat he’s going to need some sustenance—“said they’d be out late and we shouldn’t wait for them.”

“Really?”

Taichi pauses in his exploration of the—empty—quarter of the fridge not devoted to Daisuke’s professional supplies to frown in surprise. Veemon and Daisuke have been coming back from work exhausted every night for a while now—it’s a cause for celebration in that it means their business is doing well, but it also makes the news surprising.

“Where did they go?”

“I don’t know,” Agumon replies—Taichi doesn’t have to see him to know he’s shrugging, and he can’t help but return the gesture, even hidden behind the fridge door.

“Just the two of us then,” he says with a smile, “wanna order some Chinese?”

“You don’t like Chinese food,” Agumon remarks when Taichi straightens up—he blinks, a little owlishly, when their eyes meet, but Taichi shrugs:

“Felt like indulging you. It’s been too long since I did that.”

Agumon doesn’t bounce in place—he’s been doing that less often lately, and while at first Taichi wondered if maybe that was his fault, or at least due to his state of mind, it ‘s starting to look more like one of the little ways in which Agumon ages, too. Instead, Taichi finds himself looking down at interrogative green eyes, Agumon’s head tilting to the side as he works on the question he obviously wants to ask.

“What?”

“You really are in a very good mood,” Agumon says.

He grins, wide and a little smug like he’s figured something out that Taichi hasn’t yet, before he turns around and leaves the kitchen. Taichi blinks after him for a second or two, but then—why be picky? He’s in a good mood, Agumon is in a good mood, there’s no reason to try and dissect the situation, after all.

He smiles, unsurprised, when Agumon suggests walking to the restaurant instead of ordering through the phone.

{ooo}

“How long has it been since we did that? It feel like it’s been ages!”

“It probably has,” Taichi admits.

They’re on their way back, strolling along the semi-empty streets in their matching winter coat—Taichi always thought the identical outfits were a bit too much, but Agumon was so happy when Sora offered to make them he didn’t have the heart to protest. They’ve been doing this for a couple of years now, pulling the thing out of storage every winter, and Taichi is finally getting ready to admit it’s actually little cute, sometimes.

“We have to do that more often,” he says with a contented sigh, “I missed it. It’ll be nice.”

“Oh,” Agumon adds, the familiar bounce back in his step, “we should go with the others too! We can invite Sora and Biyomon for the weekend, and Mimi and Palmon can portal back, and we’d all go to the restaurant together to celebrate Yamato and Gabumon’s visit! Wouldn’t that be nice? We never do that in the human world.”

Taichi pauses at that, trying to picture what the evening would be like—all their friends gathered together like old times, with the same cheap food and the same silly jokes they used to build and maintain their friendships with. This time, the digimons wouldn’t have to pretend they’re toys though. They’d have their own seats and their own plates and their own orders and they’d be able to talk and laugh and joke with the rest of the group, as carefree and loud as decency would allow.

They’d talk about the good old days, jokes about the things they’ve done, the places they’ve been, the friends they met...and none of it would ring a bell for Agumon, or Gabumon, or any of the older ones.

Taichi’s smile falters a little, and Agumon stiffens beside him, sensing the problem before he even really has to guess it—he’s looking for something to say, maybe even a way to change the topic, claws clicking in the air, when Taichi surprises them both by saying:

“Actually, we’ve done it plenty of times before.”

He’s not sure why he said it—it scratches at the corner of his eyes, tightens his throat on the last words, but he doesn’t stop. Keeping his mouth shut about this—about a lot of other things but mostly, he’s come to realize in therapy, about this—hasn’t exactly worked in his favor so far, after all. He might as well keep going.

Besides, he reminds himself as he watches Agumon carefully school his features to dim his curiosity, he’s not the only one who needs to have this conversation.

“There was this coffee shop,” he explains, laying a hand on Agumon’s shoulder and drawing strength from the contact, “we’d meet there when we needed to talk about what needed to be done about the Digiworld, back when Daisuke and the others were called.”

“Why not before that?” Agumon asks with a blink, and Taichi’s lips twist into a half-nostalgic, half-bitter smirk:

“It was different for us. We got pulled into the Digital World—that’s how we know about the tramway.”

“And why not meet at one of your houses?” Agumon continues, quite clearly hanging on to every word.

God, they really should have had this conversation a long time ago.

“Their parents didn’t know digimons existed,” Taichi says with an apologetic shrug, “I mean, my parents and Ms. Takashi knew about you guys, but they were the only ones, and they weren’t too happy about us having to save the world and all. We’d done this alone before—didn’t have a choice the first time around. That time, we just thought the time we’d have to lose trying to explain the situation, to convince Daisuke’s parents, and Iori’s mom, and all the others, that we weren’t crazy—it didn’t seem worth the risk of losing the Digiworld, or having our own parents find out. For the most part we barely even thought of getting the adults involved, though at some point we ended up not having a choice anymore.”

Taichi shrugs again, and puts a lot of effort into not looking away when Agumon nods the eerie silence of late winter falling over them like a thick coat of snow over a sleeping town. Taichi, still gripping Agumon’s shoulder, forces his fingers to relax one by one, and he’s surprised to find the gesture releases a tension in his stomach he was barely aware of, like untying a knot.

Agumon, deep in thought, doesn’t seem to realize what’s going on, so Taichi puts the quiet time to good use and breathes in deep through his nose, exhaling through his mouth and trying to picture the bad feelings—the nightmares, the loss, the sense of something irrevocably missing—exiting his body along with the thick puff of white smoke he blows out into the wind.

After a while, Agumon says:

“Some of the others won’t want to do this, will they?”

“Maybe not,” Taichi agrees, unable to figure out who’s more liable to refuse.

It’s not like they’ve talked about this enough among themselves for him to have a clear idea of what they think or feel on the topic.

“If they do say no,” Agumon continues, hesitating somewhere in the middle, “can the two of us still go? I’d like to see the places where we were together.”

It takes Taichi a few seconds to answer—take a deep breath first, bracing himself against the first, cowardly instinct telling him to say no and run for the hills before he can nod.

“Okay,” he says with a slight tremor in his voice, “let’s do that.”

{ooo}

‘I told Agumon we’d visit our old hangout spots in Odaiba,’ Taichi texts Yamato that night as he lays in bed, stomach too full to sleep.

Agumon, as always, seems entirely impervious to the very concept of over-eating, and he’s already snoring the night away in his hammock, the sound more soothing than it has any real right to be. Taichi tries to focus on it to keep his mind busy—or at least, keep the anxious thoughts at bay—and it works so well his heart skips a beat when his phone vibrates against his chest.

‘any particular reason?’

Taichi glances at his alarm clock and frowns: it’s past midnight here, which means it has to be class time back in Paris. He’s wondering what possessed Yamato to break his self-imposed ‘no texting back unless it’s life or death’ rule, when he remembers Yamato is right there in Japan, probably jet-lagged to hell and unable to sleep as a result.

The thought makes Taichi grin as he types:

‘He said we never did outings with the whole group in the human world. I figured it was time he heard the truth.’

‘Congratulations,’ comes Yamato’s reply, and Taichi muffles a snort in his hand before he asks:

‘What for?’

‘1. Ur the 1st to do it. 2. I know its not easy.’

Taichi snorts, and then sobers up as he admits:

‘I don’t want to do it. Feels like I’m going to lose him again.’

Yamato’s answer is longer in coming this time— Taichi has time to put the phone back down on his chest and stare at Agumon, silhouetted in the dim lights of the city as he shuffles in his hammock. It’s ridiculous, really—he’s right there, and he’s not about to vanish into thin air because he sees a place he doesn’t remember.

Taichi has been down this road before—making new memories, introducing Agumon to the city he grew up in—and it didn’t end very well for him.

‘I think we should all do it,’ Yamato’s next text reads when Taichi thumbs it open , ‘itd be better 4 all of us’

Taichi frowns at his phone and sighs. Yamato is probably right—at the very least, Taichi agrees with him on the most part—but it’s not like either of them can make the rest of the group join the train without upsetting them to frightening degrees. Taichi himself would gladly take his promise back if it didn’t mean hurting Agumon for no reason.

‘Im serious,’ Yamato texts again when Taichi waits too long before he answers, ‘its been 8yrs. Its time we quit making the other walking on eggshells bc they got lucky & we didnt.’

‘I know,’ Taichi answers him, blinking against the sudden brightness of his bedside lamp, breathing wet when he tries to brace himself for the second part of his message: ‘I just don’t know if I’m ready for this.’

He lets the sob that’s been building in his throat slip past his lips, as quiet as he can manage, and clings to his phone until he feels it vibrate between his fingers again. Then he turns the light off—lowers the screen brightness to spare his eyes—and rolls on his side before he reads Yamato’s answer:

‘idk,’ it reads, ‘im not. Uve never backed down so far tho. Don’t think u will now’

Taichi smiles at that, throat tight around the things he’s been clinging to for the past eight years, and it takes him several tries before he manages to type:

‘Are you crying?’

‘shutup’

‘I’m crying.’

It’s not even an exaggeration, although Taichi kind of wishes it were. There’s no point in pretending the contrary though—ignoring the burning trails sliding along his c heeks, ove r his nose and into the pillow as he tries to stay quiet so he won’t wake his partner up won’t make anything disappear.

Outside in the living room, the entrance door clicks open and shut in rapid succession, and the next buzz of Taichi’s phone comes backed up by Daisuke’s voice hissing at Veemon to be quiet.

‘me too,’ Yamato admits.

Taichi smiles at that—wonders how much effort it took for Yamato to type the message, let alone actually hit send. At least it proves he’s not alone in this ridiculous, stupid boat. He still has his best friend by his side, like always—as it always should be, really—and that makes things a little less overwhelming.

‘Do you want to come along?’ He sends, almost without thinking, ‘I think I’m going to need a rehearsal if I want to stay dignified when we do this all together.’

‘of course. wouldnt want 2 damage ur image of fearless leader ;)’

‘You’re a butt.’

‘butt u like me,’ Yamato replies, dragging a snort out of Taichi—he muffles it into his pillow, cheeks aching with an abrupt grin, but Agumon still stirs in his sleep.

‘Don’t make me laugh,’ he tells Yamato ‘Agumon is going to wake up.’

‘sry. When do u wanna go?’

‘Ideally, tomorrow, but my schedule is full so....Tuesday?’

‘can’t thats when Papy wants to invite u guys. Ur dad already said yes.’

‘Fine,’ Taichi replies, shrugging as he types, ‘Wednesday then?’

‘ok’

‘Good. See you Tuesday then. Now go to sleep.’

‘yes mom’

Taichi takes a picture of him pulling his tongue out—between the excessive contrast, his puffy face, and the weird angle, it looks bad enough that Hikari would probably gasp in horror at the sight of it, but it makes Taichi laugh, so he sends it anyway.

He gets a little heart in response, and he’d be lying if he said it doesn’t make his stomach flutter a little.

{ooo}

Taichi emerges from his bedroom at ten past six the next day, bleary-eyed and wishing he could go back to sleep with every fiber of his being. There are classes to attend though, official business to pay attention to, and he’s so focused on not being late he almost doesn’t notice Daisuke, tying his shoelaces in front of the door.

“You’re late,” Taichi yawns, one hand scrapping at his scalp while the other covers his mouth, “you’re never late.”

“We stayed out late last night,” Daisuke says around a mouthful of what looks like an onigiri.

Taichi almost remarks midnight hasn’t been a very late hour since Daisuke started working in the food industry, but that would mean admitting he was awake at the time, too, and he doesn’t want to do that.

“Oh,” he says instead, “did you guys have fun?”

“Yeah, we were with—” Daisuke falters a little, swallows the last of his food with an audible gulp as he stares up at Taichi and finishes: “uh, a friend.”

“Good for you,” Taichi tells him with a smile.

He pads through the living room and into the kitchen then, navigating by smell more than sight until he’s more or less sticking his nose into the mug Agumon fixed for him and left on the table. The smell of dried leaves fill Taichi’s nostrils, bringing a gust of wakefulness into his brain, and he sighs. That’s a good way to start the day.

Taichi rubs at his eyes with the heels of his hands, and he’s reaching for the rice cooker, hoping to make something appetizing out of the leftovers, when Daisuke clears his throat in the kitchen doorway. Taichi stares at him—at the way Veemon presses close to his knees, at his shoes, which he hasn’t bothered taking off before he walked back inside.

“I was with Akiko,” Daisuke says with a small, almost unnoticeable shift of his weight, “you know, the girl—”

“Yes,” Taichi agrees, aware he’s cutting Daisuke off but too eager to dispel the awkwardness to act otherwise, “I remember.”

“Oh. Good,” Daisuke says, “well, I was—we were with her, and it kinda—that was sort of a date?”

Taichi smiles at the news, pleased—and maybe a tiny bit relieved, too—that he doesn’t have to put any effort into it.

“I’m glad for you,” he says, and chuckles when Daisuke’s surprised blink turns into a frown.

“Really?”

“Yes, really,” Taichi promises, reminding himself it’s his fault Daisuke is acting skeptical now, “I gave you terrible advice last time—and not all of it came from a good place either.”

Both he and Daisuke color at the reminder, but honestly, Taichi should be the embarrassed one, here.

“This time, you’re making your decisions on your own, and I finally have the brains to be happy for you instead of an over possessive ass.”

“You kind of were,” Daisuke says with a rueful smile, “but I’m glad you’re happy.”

Veemon whoops, prompting Taichi and Agumon to laugh at him a little, and then Agumon all but chases their roommates out of the door before they get really late and start disappointing their g rowing crowds of re g ul ars. Taichi and Agumon settle at the table in silence, Taichi humming under his breath as he goes, and Agumon grins.

“You’re in a good mood again,” he says while he settles leftover chicken and a couple of eggs between their two bowls.

“I am,” Taichi agrees.

“Even though we’re going to visit Odaiba tomorrow?”

Taichi feels his smile falter as he looks at his partner. It’s not that the good mood has vanished, per se—but the topic at hand would put a damper on most conversations, he’s pretty sure. He takes a sip of his tea, mostly to give himself time before he has to speak—and says:

“Actually, I don’t think we’ll be able to make it tomorrow. Yamato’s grandfather wants to have dinner with us,” he explains when Agumon’s features shift from caution to betrayed surprise, “we’re invited at Ms. Takashi’s place tomorrow night. Do you mind a lot if we do this Wednesday? I can shift my meetings around so I’ll be done earlier.”

“Oh,” Agumon says with obvious relief, “no, that’s okay! I’m sure dinner with Yamato’s family will be enough for one day.”

“That’s what I figured,” Taichi agrees with a nervous chuckle. He sips at his tea again before he asks: “and, uh...do you mind if Yamato and Gabumon come along? I’m not sure they will—I don’t know if Gabumon has agreed yet—but I’d like to have some support there while we do this, if you don’t mind?”

“Okay,” Agumon agrees, relief turning into a little smile, “I think I could use a friend there, too.”

Taichi nods, sort of wishing they could invite Tentomon along, if only for Agumon’s sake—they are, after all, closer than Agumon and Gabumon are—but if he’s being honest, this isn’t a moment he’s comfortable sharing with anyone other than Yamato. Not even Noeru.

{ooo}

Dinner at Ms. Takashi’s turns out to be about as awkward as Taichi anticipated—more so, even, when the picture albums got taken out of their shelves, and the rarefaction of Yamato’s face as the years went by was impossible to miss—and Taichi comes out of it kind of wishing he could just erase it from his memory.

There’s no real disaster to mourn for though—awkward silences and one moment where Taichi kind of thought Yamato would manage to pick up a fight with his mother right then and there about cooking, of all things—and Yamato’s chuckle when Taichi remarks as much is short, filled with nerves and things he probably thought but didn’t say.

“Yeah. Could have been worse,” he admits, running a hand in his hair, “remind me to send something nice to your sister—I think she single-handedly saved the day there.”

That, in Taichi’s opinion, was more of a collective effort—between Mr. Takashi, Takeru, and Taichi’s family, the whole thing managed to end on an awkward, but ultimately not really harmful note, which is probably the best they could have hoped for. Yamato won’t be the only one sending baskets around in the upcoming days, but he knows better than to say that.

“So,” he says instead of voicing the thought, forcing his tone to remain light and vaguely unconcerned, “do I have to come in or can I trust you not to fight with your father?”

“I don’t think he’s here,” Gabumon replies from where he’s unlocking the door already, “no need to be worried.”

“I don’t fight with him,” Yamato retorts with a playful shove at Gabumon’s head, “you can’t fight with someone you don’t talk to.”

Taichi shrugs, not quite acquiescence, not quite apology, and gives Yamato a playful punch in the shoulder.

“Are you gonna be okay?”

“Yeah,” Yamato sighs, tired fondness filling his smile, “thanks for sticking around for a bit.”

“No problem,” Taichi says without even needing to think about it, “see you tomorrow?”

“Four PM,” Yamato replies with a nod, “we’ll be there.”

{ooo}

When they reach the newly renamed DigiCafe on Wednesday, mist clings at the edge of the windows, almost masking the digimon-friendly announcements—‘We provide adapted seats!’ one of the signs proclaims, while another shows a cartoonish Biyomon swirling in a specially-made Kimono Taichi recognizes as Sora’s design, and announces the existence of a fashion corner somewhere at the back of the cafe. Taichi smiles into his thick scarf at the sight.

“I knew she had a partnership with a coffee shop,” he remarks to Agumon, who stands shivering beside him, “but I didn’t know she meant this one.”

“Do you think she did it on purpose?” Agumon asks, and Taichi shrugs.

It doesn’t really matter whether Sora chose this specific shop for their history with it, after all, so long as her work gets the success it deserves. Agumon doesn’t seem too bothered by Taichi’s lack of curiosity, though, as he turns back to the window and stick his nose to it, trying to see what’s going on inside. Taichi rolls his eyes at him with a little chuckle, glances at his watch—almost five past four already—and grins when he finally spots Yamato and Gabumon walking up the street.

“Finally!” He calls out, purposefully exaggerating the impatience in his voice, “I was starting to wonder if you’d ever get there!”

“It’s barely been five minutes,” Yamato protests while Gabumon, after a perfunctory greeting for Taichi, goes to look through the windows alongside Agumon, “calm down.”

“You’re right,” Taichi agrees with mock solemnity, “by your standards you’re positively early.”

Yamato grimaces, shoving at Taichi’s shoulder without malice, and Taichi snorts a little before he suggests they step inside.

“I don’t know how you can stand the weather dressed like this,” he says, gesturing at Yamato’s open jacket over a thin woolen jumper, “but some of us are non-furred reptiles.”

“It’s below zero in Paris these days,” Yamato shrugs as he nods and holds the door open for the others to step through, “makes six degrees feel toasty.”

Inside, the shop is peppered with pink and red hearts in preparation for Valentine’s day, and Taichi pauses on the welcome mat to take it all in. The walls have changed colors, and the counter was replaced at some point in the past eight years, but the tables are the same, and the large booth they used to sit in is still there at the back, framed by digimon-oriented fashion instead of potted plants. A couple of customers come in behind them, shuffling around their little group to find tables to sit at and casting curious glances at them.

“Am I the only one who feels like we’re making a bit of a scene?” Yamato asks, and Taichi shrugs.

“Honestly, I couldn’t care less. We’ve earned it.”

Yamato snorts at that, but he knocks their shoulders together, and Taichi smiles. They have earned this moment. They’ve spent so many hours there, as children and as teenagers—emergency meeting, worried and tense, where the digimon had to pretend to be plush toys between two sentences, but more simple times too. How many times did they gather here here to talk about the things they’d seen, the things they’d done, the things they couldn’t tell anyone else about?

Mimi cried her heart out here, on the verge of moving to America, knowing she’d have to miss everyone else on top of Palmon. Takeru banged his fist against the wood when they tried to tell him his obsession with angels had gone too far. They’ve all cried and laughed and argued here, so much of their lives left between the walls they all knew the staff by heart by the time they had to go through with the Reboot.

They’d planned on taking Meiko here, too—not just the crisis meetings she’d seen since entering the group, but a proper group outing. They’d been tossing ideas around for ways to bring her more fully into their little family—simple, gentle pranks they could play on her to mark her arrival properly...but of course, those never came to pass .

The Reboot happened. Mimi left for the U.S. again. Yamato got accepted in the exchange program for Moscow. Sora started thinking about Kyoto for her superior studies. Before they knew it—before anyone had time to blink—they scattered around Tokyo—around the world—and forgot about their plans for Meiko’s welcome, too caught up in a grief she understood but didn’t quite share.

“I think it’s time we sat down,” Yamato says after a long silence—Taichi jumps a little, but he nods anyway

He ignores the new, pastel-green paint on the walls, glances at the chocolate- colored couches without seeing them, and breathes through the longing in his chest when they sit down together, the whole scene missing at least twelve protagonists to be considered complete. The coat stand that spared their group countless questions and awkward moment is still there—the chip in one of the tables, too, under its fresh coat of brown paint—and the waitress who walks up to their table looks painfully familiar, even though Taichi can’t seem to remember her name.

He orders whatever Yamato is having, brain too full with statics to pay any kind of attention to something as trivial as a drink, and blinks a couple of time to try and clear his head. It doesn’t work.

“They changed it,” Yamato remarks—Taichi blinks in confusion, until he realizes his friend is talking about the coat stand.

The bottom of it, more specifically, is brand new—the owners must have gotten the same model then. Taichi smiles—chuckles, even, and says:

“You can hardly blame them.”

“Why’s that?” Gabumon asks, abandoning what seemed to be a rather thorough observation of the street outside the window, “what happened?”

“Tokomon chewed through it once,” Yamato replies with a little smile—on Taichi’s left, Agumon laughs at the thought, and Taichi rolls his eyes.

“Laugh all you want,” he tells his partner, “one time I had to pull you off a hat because you though the fruits on it were real.”

This time it’s Gabumon who snorts, muffling the sound behind his hand while Agumon reddens, expression more sheepish than the situation really requires. They have, after all, had moments here that were far more delicate than that. At least with the coat rack, all they had to do was act surprised and ask if anyone had come in with a dog.

Agumon laughs when Taichi tells him as much and, before long, he and Gabumon start asking questions one after the other, so fast it’s like they’re afraid they won’t have time for them all—which, is Taichi is being honest, is partially his and Yamato’s fault for being so tight lipped. There’s no resentment in their attitude though, no re strained anger that Taichi can sense, and that, more than anything else, soothes his nerves. He speaks more freely after that—slips into the enthusiasm of the moment, recalling one story after the other, laughing at the anecdotes he hasn’t heard yet and, for the first time in nearly nine years, smiles when he thinks of the things that happened before.

In many ways, it’s a bit like going back to the Digital World and visiting the places he used to know—like taking Agumon home after the Reboot happened and they learned how to be friends again: same as it was before, except for the parts where it’s not. It doesn’t hurt as much this time around.

“Shit,” Yamato exclaims later on, while Taichi is in the middle of telling their partners about their first meeting with Frigimon, and how he couldn’t feel his butts for hours afterwards, “I think they’re closing.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Taichi replies with a roll of his eyes, “they’re open until seven.”

Yamato’s wrist all but knocks him in the nose as he shoves his watch under Taichi’s nose, and Taichi can’t help but pull a surprised grimace when he sees the time. So, maybe he got a little lost in the moment there, because he really didn’t notice it was so late.

Then again, who could blame him? He hasn’t been in the same room as Yamato in ages—excepting Ms. Takashi’s dinner, that is, but that was nowhere near as comfortable as this afternoon has been—hasn’t talked about all these things in years, and he’d almost forgotten how fun it can be to spend time with his best friend.

He muses about this as they pay for their teas and bicker about who should pay the bill, since Yamato ended up drinking both cups of teas—‘next time just pay attention to what you’re ordering, dummy.’ ‘why do I even put up with you?’—and while they get dressed to face the cold. They’re about to says goodbye when Taichi blurts:

“Wanna go get dinner?”

Agumon whoops in assent, and Gabumon approves with a large smile—at that point, Taichi knows, Yamato doesn’t really have a choice anymore, but he doesn’t look bothered in the least when he agrees. Taichi might grin a little too hard at that, but hey, this is Yamato. If he can’t be a bit a of a weirdo with his best friend, he’ll never manage it, will he?

“Can we got to that ramen place Veemon keeps talking about?” Agumon asks with a hopeful look, “it sounds delicious, and I’ve always wanted to go but—”

“Only if they do takeaway,” Yamato warns with a sigh, scratching at Gabumon’s head, “I think I’ve had enough emotions for today.”

“Yeah,” Taichi agrees, “plus it’d make things awkward if they remembered your date with Jun.”

“You went on a date with Jun?” Agumon asks, the volume of his voice raisin with his surprise, “really?”

“As in, Daisuke’s sister?”

“That was before I knew I was gay,” Yamato replies with a long glare at Taichi, “and she forced my hand!”

“Yeah, she was kind of weird back then,” Taichi agrees, smile turning a little uneasy at the memory.

He laughed at it in the moment, but looking back, if he’d been the one actively pursued by a girl three years older than him at fourteen, he probably wouldn’t have liked it either.

“She grew out of it,” Yamato shrugs, “but there’s a reason we’re still not close.”

Taichi chuckles again and knocks their shoulders together as they make their way down the street—he’s surprised to feel something grab his leg a minute later, and even more so when he realize Agumon grabbed a hold of both his and Yamato’s knees, hugging them to his chest in a way that forces them to lean on each other to avoid an awkward fall.

“Thank you for doing this!” he exclaims, Gabumon fishing a smartphone from inside his fur so he can snap a picture, “It’s just like old times!”

“I don’t think we ever went for tea together though,” Yamato points out, patting awkwardly at Agumon’s head, “when we went out it was mostly as a group.”

“Yeah,” Taichi agrees, squeezing at Gabumon’s shoulder just to make sure he doesn’t feel left out, “we used to hang out at the soccer field or in Yamato’s band’s practice room, most of the time. Or at home.”

“Oh, great!” Gabumon exclaims with undisguised delight, “that means this is both old and new, right? The same, but different.”

Agumon takes a shine to the idea before Yamato is even done nodding, and the two digimons end up chattering about it all the way to the restaurant, Taichi and Yamato looking at them like they’re proud parents realizing their children are all grown up. It may not be the best metaphor, considering the fact that they’re supposed to have an equal partnership with their digimons, but the sense of affectionate pride inherent to the idea is definitely something Taichi feels right now, and he can’t help but look over at Yamato, just to know if he’s grinning like an idiot, too.

(He definitely is.)

“So,” Taichi says after they’ve exchanged gently-mocking grimaces and red-faced grins, “that was actually pretty nice.”

They’re nearing the restaurant now, the smell of noodle soup strong enough that Agumon has his nose in the air already, and Taichi slows down a little, unwilling to let the evening end just now. Yamato, matching his pace, chews on his bottom lip—Taichi sees his jaw working from the corner of his eyes—before he asks:

“Wanna come have dinner with us? My place is closer than yours.”

Taichi agrees with a large smile—he’s not sure how obvious his relief is when Agumon doesn’t seem opposed to the idea—and decides to enjoy the way his stomach contracts when Yamato all but beams in response.

(He’s pretty sure no one else in the world realizes how much Yamato can smile, given the proper circumstances, and the thought doesn’t do anything to settle his heartbeat.)

{ooo}

“Okay,” Taichi yawns when he realizes Mr. Ishida’s clock reads eleven, “I know I’ve said this before, but I really have to go now.”

Agumon perks up at this, and starts gathering the takeaway boxes before Yamato can actually say anything—Taichi watches his friend’s nose wrinkle a little bit in embarrassment, same as it has for as long as Taichi can remember, and they sigh with almost comical synchronization. Neither of them moves until Agumon comes back from his first trip to the trash can though, steps carefully quiet so he doesn’t wake up Gabumon, who went to sleep almost an hour ago now.

Soon enough, there’s nothing left for Taichi to do but gather his things, wrap himself into his coat again, and let Yamato hold the door for him as he exits the flat. He steps out on the landing, presses the call button for the elevator with Agumon leaning against his knee—from the look of it, he’s almost ready to fall asleep where he stands, and regret prickles at Taichi’s gut at the thought.

Then he realizes Yamato followed him outside, and he chuckles:

“Are you going to walk me home? Because we might be starting an infinite loop here.”

“I’m just being polite, dum dum,” Yamato deadpans with a roll of his eyes, but Taichi decides not to take the hint:

“Right,” he teases, “just admit you can’t get enough of me. It’s embarrassing for you but I’ll be nice about it, promise.”

“Yeah,” Yamato replies with a small eye-roll, “I don’t want tonight to end, so I’m delaying as much as I can.”

Taichi’s stomach does a little flip at that, and for a second there he almost calls the whole thing off—almost asks if he can stay the night and roll a mattress out for Agumon. The elevator door pings open at that moment though, sta rtli ng him a little, and when Agumon steps into the cabin on autopilot, Taichi gestures at it with a little wave:

“My ride’s here,” he says, awkwardness heating his cheeks up the longer he stays, “so I’ll just—”

“’Course,” Yamato replies with a nod, one hand rubbing at the back of his neck. “Goodnight.”

Taichi waves goodbye in turn, maintaining eye-contact until the doors close between Yamato and him, and then he sighs, vague disappointment niggling at his stomach before he even manages to process it.

“That was a good evening,” Agumon mumbles at him—he’s resting his cheek on Taichi’s knee again, so the words come a bit slurred when he adds: “’m glad it’s over though. ‘M tired.”

“Yeah,” Taichi admits with a smile, “it’s late.”

Today was an excellent day as it is—no need to focus on the things he couldn’t have.

Taichi and Agumon wait in companionable silence until their reach the ground floor and the doors let out a little ping before they open. Taichi readjusts his scarf, steps out of the elevator cabin, and he’s just about to push the hallway door open when the sound of naked feet clatters down the staircase.

Turning around, Taichi is surprised to find Yamato there—red-faced and maybe a little embarrassed as he jogs through the hallway at a more sedated pace to stand in front of Taichi. Beside him, Agumon makes a sleepy noise of protest, but Taichi is too busy trying not to smile like a gigantic idiot to pay attention to that—he does make a mental note to do something nice for his partner later, but he’d be lying if he said his consideration went any further than that.

“So,” Yamato pants, wiping sweat off his forehead, “I wasn’t joking when I said I didn’t want the evening to end.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Taichi answers.

He pauses, swallows in a futile attempt to settle his stomach—his heart, the delightful shiver in his fingers—as he tries to sort his words out but Yamato, as has often been the case, beats him to it:

“Also,” he says, redder than before, shoulders stiff like he’s bracing himself for something unpleasant, “I kind of—I really wanted to kiss you up there.”

Taichi has heard about face-splitting grins before—thought he’d sported some himself, once or twice—but right now he’s pretty sure he’s never smiled this hard in his life. He’s pretty sure he looks manic—he definitely looks like a manic idiot.

He couldn’t care less about it.

“That’s good,” he says, turning a little breathless when the fluttering in his chest solidifies into something easier to identify, “’cause I wanted you to.”

Then, because Yamato looks a little too surprised—relieved, delighted—to do anything about it, and because Taichi is supposed to have the crest of courage, dammit, he stands up on his toes, laces a hand behind Yamato’s neck, and brings their mouths together.

There’s a blank in his head at first, as his brain fills with a thousand variations of ‘nice’, with maybe a little bit of ‘finally’ thrown in for good measure, even though he hasn’t been aware he was waiting for this until a few minutes ago. Then his brain adjusts a little and his senses come back, one by one—he registers the tingling of his mouth, almost unbearable where Yamato’s lips barely touch his, the way Yamato’s hair tingles against his fingers wher e it s lips out of a loose topknot...and then Yamato’s hands, slipping from his waist to his back, strong arms pulling him into a hug and lifting him off the ground when Yamato straightens to his full height.

It takes them a while to pull away from one another—first there’s a graze of teeth on lips, then tongues, then sighs—but eventually Yamato’s arms kind of give out, and Taichi falls back to the ground with a little thump and a gigantic, probably very ridiculous grin on his face.

“So,” he manages after a few seconds of stunned silence where he and Yamato kind of just...stare at each other, like they haven’t seen each other’s face a thousand times, “I vote we go back upstairs and put your couch to good use.”

Yamato stiffens at the words, and for the most horrifying second of the past eight years, Taichi thinks he’s said exactly the wrong thing and ruined everything.

“Okay,” Yamato says when he notices Taichi’s frown, “I’m pretty sure you weren’t talking about sex, but on the off chance that you were—”

“What? Oh, no!” Taichi promises, fear slipping out of him in a bout of laughter, “no, definitely not. I mean, it’s definitely something I’ll think about in the future—” Yamato rolls his eyes at that, and Taichi swats him on the arm, pleased to notice they haven’t broken their embrace, even with the abrupt change of topic, “but for tonight I really just want to make out. A lot.”

“And you couldn’t say that before we left?”

Taichi and Yamato both jump at the words, and Yamato bursts in nervous laughter, hiding his face behind his hands while Agumon looks up at the ceiling like he’s going to find some patience just hanging there, ripe for the taking. Taichi wishes he could stop laughing, if only for Agumon’s sake, but he’s too giddy for it, so he picks up the digimon in his arms instead, and promises him a comfortable bed as soon as they get back upstairs.

He’s spent many a comfortable night on Yamato’s spare mattress, after all, and he’s got a feeling he won’t be using it tonight.

{ooo}

“Sorry about the back and forth,” Taichi tells Agumon while they wait for Yamato to pull the futon out, “I promise I didn’t plan for this.”

“I hope not,” Agumon grumbles, sleep already laced through his voice.

He keeps the annoyed facade for all of thirty seconds, before he asks:

“Does that mean you and Yamato are dating now?”

“No,” Taichi replies without hesitation, “it just means we wanna make out, and we will.”

“Same as before, but different?” Agumon asks, and Taichi nods.

“Yeah, basically.”

Agumon gives Taichi a very serious look then—it’s a little hard not to chuckle with nerves, but Taichi manages fairly well, until Agumon says:

“Humans are weird.”

Taichi watches his partner glare at Yamato when the declaration makes him laugh, then cross his arms together and say:

“You’re lucky you make him happy.”

Taichi barely manages to restrain his laughter long enough for Agumon to step into Yamato’s bedroom with a haughty air and click the door shut behind him.

“Okay,” Taichi huffs once he and Yamato get their breathing back, “I have no idea where that came from.”

“Oh, really?” Yamato snorts, “Because I remember you telling Takeru something along those lines when he and Hikari told you about their relationship.”

Taichi has no memory of that, but it sounds far too plausible for him to dare protesting, anyway.

“I’ll talk to him tomorrow,” he promises instead, “just because I behaved like a stupid butt doesn’t mean he should do the same.”

“Don’t bother,” Yamato replies with a smile and an easy shrug as he walks back to the couch, “I’m glad there’s someone else out there to protect you.”

Taichi swallows a smile and a nervous chuckle, forcing his face into the closest approximation of calm indignation he can manage. It doesn’t work, of course—the grin pressing at his lips is too strong to stay off for long, for once, and even without that, Yamato probably knows him well enough to call his bluff anyway. No point in persevering.

Still smiling, Taichi scoots closer to Yamato, angling his legs so their knees are touching, and gives Yamato a playful nudge.

“So,” he says without managing to keep the goof out of his voice, “about this kissing thing—”

“At the risk of ruining the mood,” Yamato cuts in, grimacing an apology around the words, “I have to ask: why did you tell Agumon we weren’t dating?”

His neck turns red as he speaks, and Taichi blinks at the sight for a second before he realizes what’s going on, and grabs Yamato’s hand.

“It’s not because this is a one time thing!” he promises, pressing Yamato’s fingers between his, “I don’t want it to be a one time thing—I want it to be a many, many times thing. All the time thing, if possible.”

Yamato snorts, posture relaxing at Taichi’s silliness, and Taichi smiles with relief as he continues:

“It’s just—I know you’ve got issues about the whole...letting people know thing. About dating. And, I’m not gonna lie, I’d love to share the joy with everyone else, but I also want you to no freak out, a lot more than I want other people to know what’s going on in my life. So, unless you’re ready—really ready, don’t say yes because you think that’s what I want to hear—to put it all out in the open, I’d rather keep this between us. It’s not like the others really need to know anyway.”

Yamato snorts and rolls his eyes, but moisture clings at his eyelashes when his thumb brushes against Taichi’s, fond smile seemingly settled there for a long while to come.

“Same old, same old, then?” He asks, gentle sarcasm struggling to come through his grin.

“Except there’s gonna be kissing,” Taichi points out, unable to keep the excitement from his voice, “lots of it, if I have anything to say about it.”

“You sound like a horny teenager,” Yamato says with a roll of his eyes.

He does lean in for a kiss, though.

{ooo}

“Can I ask a stupid question?” Taichi whispers several hours later, when they’ve changed into something closer to pajamas and slipped into Yamato’s bed.

He stares at the back of Yamato’s head as he speaks—the blond of his hair turned almost silver by the strips of moonlight filtering int—and he’s half expecting something like ‘you mean another one?’ come out. Instead, Yamato keeps his back to Taichi to yawn into his pillow:

“I was never interested in Daisuke.”

“That’s not what I was going to ask,” Taichi says.

He watches Yamato’s shirt shift when he snorts:

“Liar.”

“Okay, I wasn’t going to ask that first,” Taichi amends with a fond grin, “I’m just wondering—how long have you been wanting to do this?”

Taichi hears Yamato take a deep breath before he wriggles around and brings then face to face, the darkness swallowing his features until only the glint of his eyes remain.

“Wanna know the truth?”

“Nothing less from you,” Taichi says, copying Yamato’s serious tone and reaching up to fit their hands together, “you know that.”

“I’ve been thinking about it on and off since I figured out I was gay.”

“And you didn’t do anything about it?”

Agumon stirs and shifts in his sleep at the words, but in Taichi’s defense he did just discover he and Yamato could have been making out—and more—for years now. Given how pleasant the whole experience has been so far, he’s pretty sure he can be excused for his belated offense. Somewhat.

“Well, obviously I wasn’t ready,” Yamato replies with a shrug.

Taichi nods—he did more or less witness the whole process, after all.

“But also—we lived on different continents, we had different goals...I mean, I’m working toward a job that’ll take me off planet for months—”

“That’s a really stupid reason for not saying anything,” Taichi points out, and gets a swat on the shoulder for his trouble.

“I never said it was smart,” Yamato replies, sounding very much like he’s rolling his eyes, “’sides, those weren’t my only reasons. I didn’t want to risk freaking out and ruining our friendship—”

“You know it’d take a lot more than that, right?” Taichi asks, finding Yamato’s free hand with his own, “Unless you somehow, I don’t know, hurt or kill Hikari, you’re stuck with me forever.”

“That’s what I figured out, eventually,” Yamato replies with a chuckle—he surprises Taichi by bringing their linked hands to his chest before he continues: “you got sick around that time though, and I figured—depression makes you do things you wouldn’t normally do. You get better eventually, and when you think back on it you look at some of your decisions and think ‘what the fuck was I even thinking back then’, you know?”

“Like when you....”

Taichi lets his voice trail off, unsure what words to use, and tugs at Yamato’s wrists instead.

“Yeah, like that,” Yamato admits, head shifting as he lowers his gaze. “Or like when you tried matchmaking.”

“Urgh,” Taichi grunts with a disgusted grimace, “too soon.”

Yamato laughs at that, muffled and quiet to let their digimons sleep, but he wriggles closer in the same movement, and he plants a light kiss on Taichi’s knuckles, which may or may not short-circuit his brain for a second.

“I just didn’t want you to look back on this—on us—and wonder what went through your head when we started.”

There’s a brief silence, which Taichi doesn’t quite know how to break, before Yamato adds:

“I mean, maybe we’ll still end up fighting and not wanting to talk to each other ever again someday, there’s no way to know—but at least now I’m reasonably sure it’ll be us fighting, not me and your sick brain.”

Taichi considers being a little offended by that—he must have learned some form of lesson from the past few months, though, because he nods instead. It’s not like he hasn’t let his sick brain get the better of him yet.

{ooo}

On Thursday, Taichi wakes up at half past eleven with his face pressed into Yamato’ s green pillow, a nd not even a trace of self-consciousness appears when he breathes the smell of it in. He’s slept in this room dozens of times, has had all the occasions in the world to memorize the way it smells in the morning—but, like depression, going from best friends to best-friends-who-kiss must rewrite brain chemistry because Taichi could swear it was never as pleasant as it is now.

He grins a little at the though, and takes the time to stretch each of his limbs into wakefulness before he even attempts to sit. He’s already missed all his classes for today anyway, and he rescheduled his therapy appointme nt just in case their trip through memory lane left him too depressed to function...he might as well enjoy the change of plans.

Taichi leaves the room with a quick cursory glance— Agumon is still snoring the morning away, but the others are gone—and makes his way to the kitchen. He finds Gabumon there, shaping rice into onigiri while Yamato fiddl e s with the electric kettle and a box of tea leaves. Taichi takes a mome nt to appreciate the way Yamato’s clean pair of jeans hug his butt before h e leans against the threshold, crossing his legs just in case wearing only boxer shorts prove to be an advantage.

“Hey, science side of the room,” he yawns, “can you explain why your sweat-soaked pillow suddenly started smelling good this morning?”

“It’s because you’re a gross-ass sap,” Yamato tosses over his shoulder.

Taichi snorts at that and, since Yamato’s refusal to turn around makes his posing useless, he goes to sit at the table and help Gabum on out with t he onigiri. He’s not surprised when Gabumon levels him with a long, speculative look—Yamato may be the most secretive person ever created, even he has his limits—before he says:

“I’m glad you guys are happy.”

“It’s ‘cause they’re kissing friend now,” Agumon yawns as he waddles into the room, nostrils shivering toward the counter, “humans like kisses.”

“Kisses are nice,” Gabumon agrees with a little shrug as he goes back to his work, “sometimes Yamato kisses me when we have different schedules. I like it.”

“Really?” Taichi asks, glancing up at where Yamato is trying very hard to set up the teacups in a casual way, “I didn’t know that.”

“It’s not the same kind of kissing,” Yamato says as he turns back to the counter, “and you know it.”

“No, no, please,” Taichi insists with a little wave at Gabumon, halfway to laughter already, “tell me more, Gabumon. Does Takeru kiss you too or is it just Yamato?”

“You’re an ass, Taichi,” Yamato protests, without heat, and Gabumon blinks between them in obvious confusion.

“Well, like Yamato said,” he starts, darting a glance to Agumon, who shrugs in the corner of Taichi’s vision, “it’s different—Takeru doesn’t do it because he lives here and Yamato uses a French kiss—”

Taichi bursts out laughing seconds before his lips touch his teacup, smearing hot tea all over his fingers and the table—he’d feel a little guiltier about it if Yamato hadn’t slapped both his hands over his mouth, neck cherry red where he’s bent at the waist, shoulders shaking. Taichi, bent in half over the table, laughs so hard he almost chokes on his own spit, tears streaming down his cheeks even as Gabumon says:

“I’ve said something weird, haven’t I?”

“It’s okay,” Yamato replies, voice still thick with laughter, “Taichi can explain.”

“What?” Taichi protests, sobering up in record time, “why me?”

“’Cause that’s what I’d have said if we’d had this conversation yesterday,” Yamato smirks.

Occasionally, Taichi thinks about telling Yamato to cut the automated texts off. There’s no need for him to remind Taichi about eating when Agumon and Daisuke do that on their own, after all, and having to take his meals with three pairs of eyes staring at him like he’s going to start putting his food is unnerving enough…the truth is Taichi doesn’t really mind, though. Perspective is everything, and now that he’s—reluctantly but sincerely—accepted the idea that he really is depressed, listening to his phone whistle Yamato’s ring tone has pretty much turned into the better part of his day, especially on days the ‘go get dinner’ text turns into the start of a long conversation—the kind that lasts for hours, which they hadn’t really had in months.

It does wonder for Taichi’s moral, even better than Daisuke’s insistence to fatten him up with the best noodles in Tokyo.

“You’re just biased,” Daisuke protests when Taichi uses the word in front of him one night.

He’s pink with pleasure though, so Taichi doesn’t take offense with it.

“If I was,” he points out around a mouthful of beef-flavored ramen, “I’d say you have the best cooking in Tokyo, but we all know your cakes are disgusting.”

“I like Daisuke’s cakes!” Veemon chimes in from his place on the back of the sofa, “they’re sweet.”

Agumon, lying on the carpet, agrees with his fellow digimon, Taichi accuses him of trying to coddle up to the cook and, in the middle of their pretend-argument about Daisuke’s horrendous baking—‘no, really, it’s terrible’ ‘yeah, I know’—Taichi realizes he hasn’t had that much fun since…well, basically since Hikari moved out of the flat.

That’s about four months of disturbingly low moods, almost four pounds lost to disastrous eating habits, and two nearly destroyed friendships.

It’s good to think he might be pulling himself out of it.

“Taichi, are you okay?” Daisuke asks, jostling him out of his reflexions, and Taichi barely even has to put effort in the smile he answers with:

“Actually, yes. I’m pretty okay.”

It’s been almost a month since he fought with Agumon. They’re not exactly back to what they were before—will never quite get back to what they were before—but Taichi has talked enough about it enough by now to begin making his peace with it.

“Okay enough to come play soccer with us Saturday?”

Taichi has a ton of files to reviews and homeworks to do before next week, and he could probably use every minute of the weekend to work on them.

He says yes anyway.

{ooo}

“I hear you almost broke Takeru’s nose yesterday,” Yamato says when he phones on Sunday, barely giving Taichi time to put the receiver to his ear before starting.

Taichi fakes a dramatic sigh:

“Hello to you too,” he says, and doesn’t miss the smile in Yamato’s voice when he replies:

“It’s been a while since you did that.”

“What,” Taichi asks, raising his eyebrows even though his friend can’t see it, “say hello?”

“Insist on saying ‘hello’ even though the conversation has already started,” Yamato corrects. “That was the first clue you weren’t feeling well.”

Taichi blinks at the balcony’s banister, fingers tugging at the edge of the hammock he brought out to enjoy the sunny afternoon. He swallows, throat a little too tight for comfort, then says:

“Sometimes your eye for detail freaks me out a little.”

“Noeru would be proud,” Yamato deadpans, and Taichi snorts.

Joke about their scientist friend aside, the observation really is shocking, even if it isn’t quite for the reason Taichi implied. He hadn’t even realized he’d stopped insisting on proper greetings, even though he’s spent over a decade trying to convince Yamato to actually use them.

It’s not that big a deal—he and Yamato would have argued about it a long time ago if Taichi really minded—but it’s still weird to think something that automatic can get lost.

(It’s also weird to think something that small can get noticed, but then this is Yamato. He notices the weirdest things.)

“Well,” Taichi says after a beat, pushing on the ground with his hand to rock the hammock, “I guess it means therapy is working.”

“So does the soccer game,” Yamato agrees, “though I still don’t know why you tried to brain my brother.”

“I didn’t try to brain him,” Taichi protests, free hand raising toward the sky—or, more accurately, the upstairs neighbors’ balcony—“he got distracted ogling my sister—if anything, you should be blaming him for thinking it’s spring when we’re barely even in January!”

Yamato snorts on the other end of the line—then there’s a man’s voice somewhere in the background, and Taichi listens to the sound of his best friend speaking French—probably to Mr. Takashi—and laugh before he tells Taichi:

“Papy says if they get too hormonal you can always try to hose them.”

“For my own mental health,” Taichi says as his ears heat up, “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.”

“Takeru usually reacts the same,” Yamato replies with an easy chuckles, “you guys are too sensitive. I think it’s funny.”

“That’s ‘cause France corrupted you,” Taichi retorts, smiling when it makes Yamato snort.

“Didn’t notice anyone complaining. People compliment me on my smile now.”

“You can smile?”

“Fuck off.”

Taichi tries to muffle his snort of laughter with his hand but, if the displeased noise Yamato makes is any indication, it doesn’t work all that well. From the corner of his eyes, Taichi spies Daisuke looking at him with a somewhat puzzled expression, and he gives a vague ‘it’s nothing’ gesture before he tells Yamato:

“Seriously, it’s goo you’re letting people see what a great guy you are. I was getting tired of people thinking I lied.”

“You’re an ass,” Yamato says, the smile in his voice belying the insult, “you think I can’t hear your stupid voice through the phone?”

“You’d get to see it if we could do video chats.”

Yamato mutters something about the price of data plans in France, material impossibilities and other very reasonable arguments that the two of them have been trading on and off for eight years. This time, they skip the ‘old buildings aren’t kind to the Wi-Fi’ one, but it’s a near thing.

“Don’t worry,” Taichi cuts in after a moment, “I know. Still means you don’t get to see my face when I’m finally putting a smile back on it.”

“It’s okay,” Yamato says, “I’ll catch up in next month.”

Taichi straightens in his hammock so fast he almost stumbles out of it, startling Agumon out of his nap when his foot accidentally bumps into a scaly belly.

“Aow!” Agumon protests, blinking in all directions before he focuses back on Taichi’s very red-feeling face: “Are we under attack?”

“Yamato is visiting next month!” Taichi replies, unconcerned about his voice’s sudden rise in pitch, “and he almost didn’t say it!”

“I just did,” Yamato protests on the other side of the line.

Taichi makes a shushing motion with his hand before he remembers his friend can’t see him. Then he says:

“You should have been leading with that instead of pretending I nearly killed your brother! Are you portaling home?”

“First of all,” Yamato says with an exaggeratedly cross voice, “I didn’t say you tried to kill him, I said you tried to give him a concussion.”

“Details,” Taichi manages, but doesn’t protest when Yamato clicks his tongue at him:

“And to answer your question: I’m flying in. Papy is coming along, and we agreed the temperature change wouldn’t agree well with him, especially with the trek from one tower to the other.”

“Not to mention he doesn’t have cross-borders privileges,” Taichi agrees.

It’s one of the nicest parts of being recognized as the Chosen Children: now they can travel through the Digiworld and back wherever they need to go instead of having to bother with long flight hours. So far, it’s given their group a lot more time together, when Mimi and Yamato didn’t have to go through twenty-four hours journeys, but putting an eighty-nine years old man through the abrupt climate change would have been kind of cruel.

“It’s nice he’s coming along,” Taichi resumes after a short pause, “I’m sure Takeru will be thrilled to see him again.”

“I think he’s mostly coming along for my mom,” Yamato says—Taichi hears his grandfather protest, somewhere in the background, and for a long moment the phone only lets out the sound of good-natured bickering in an impressive mix of French and Japanese.

Taichi listens to the two of them without disguising his amusement, pulling one leg out of the hammock to rub at Agumon’s belly—the digimon shifts in his sleep, but otherwise doesn’t seem to complain—and smirks when Yamato’s voice shifts from not-quite-annoyed to embarrassed.

“Getting grilled?” Taichi asks after Yamato all but squeaks in protests.

“Oh laugh it off all you want,” Yamato replies with a hiss, “he’s planning on doing the same to you when we get there!”

“What?” Taichi croaks, head jerking upright in surprise, “Why would he want to do that? I’m not his grandson!”

“I think it’s his revenge for you not waiting until he could meet you, last time,” Yamato explains, and Taichi blushes.

“Is there any way I can get out of this?”

“In your dreams” Yamato says.

Taichi sighs.

{ooo}

Daisuke comes home late that night, even by restaurant-owner standards. The good point is Taichi managed to complete his homework before his roommate got home. The also-good-but-less-practical point is that by the time Veemon and Daisuke walk past the door, they’re both exhausted enough that they don’t even seem to realize Taichi’s there until he’s squirmed his way out from under Agumon and gotten to his feet. Taichi helps Daisuke get rid of his coat, asking if he’d had dinner already.

“There’s some tea, too, you look half-frozen!”

Veemon cheers a little at the mention of hot tea, and Daisuke smiles down at his partner’s retreating form before he sighs.

“Dinner sounds great. They robbed me blind tonight—if this keeps up I’ll get to New York faster than I thought I would.”

“That…would be great,” Taichi says, pausing to brush imaginary lints of Daisuke’s coat as he speaks.

He’s glad Daisuke’s expatriation project is shaping up well, he really is. That doesn’t mean he’s fully ready to let go of his friend yet.

“It still won’t happen for another couple of years,” Daisuke says when Taichi’s pause stretches a little too long, “I’m far from having enough fund for now, and the immigration process is a pain anyway.”

“Yeah,” Taichi agrees, surprised to find the smile he gives Daisuke doesn’t take as much effort as he thought it would, “there’s still time for me to get over myself, right?”

“Right,” Daisuke agrees, “but no matchmaking this time.”

Taichi blushes to the root of his hair, but he figures he deserves the jab, and doesn’t protest. He pulls Daisuke to the dining table instead, and sits him down just as Veemon comes back from the kitchen, holding two steaming mugs of tea and grinning wildly as he announces:

“There’s sushi!”

“Yeah,” Taichi confirms, “I wanted to wait until you guys got home, but Agumon had a hard time restraining himself from eating half of it when we made them—”

“You made them?”

Taichi turns away from Agumon’s grimace to look at Daisuke again, and he rolls his eyes when he discovers his friends’ hesitating expression.

“It’s sushi,” he says with a ‘duh’ face, “they’re lopsided but even I can’t mess it up that badly.”

“No, no, that’s not what I meant!” Daisuke promises, blushing as he fiddles with the edge of his sleeves, “I just—I didn’t know you cooked.”

Taichi doesn’t, usually. He can survive on his own, of course, but he also knows this isn’t his area of expertise and, between Daisuke, Yamato and Miyako—plus Mimi’s recipes, when she visits—their group is already well staffed in cooks who are far better than him.

“I don’t do it often,” he admits.

Agumon jumps off the couch at that moment, walking up to Taichi’s leg and nudging his knee as he says:

“It’s because Yamato’s coming home next month! Taichi only cooks when he’s in a really good mood!”

“Agumon!” Taichi protests while his Digimon starts toward the kitchen to retrieve the tray, “you ruined the surprise!”

“Oh, he told me already,” Daisuke says with a little shrug.

Taichi turns around to stare at Daisuke, trying to get his brain to work around a quick time calculation. Tokyo is eight hours ahead of Paris, so either Yamato told Daisuke at some point after they hung up—knowing Daisuke’s refusal to even think about his phone during work hours, this is unlikely—or that conversation took place before Taichi and Yamato talked earlier…which would mean Yamato technically shared the news with Daisuke yesterday.

“Taichi,” Daisuke asks when Taichi’s silence lasts too long, “is everything alright?”

“Oh—yeah. Yes, of course. I’m just—I’m a little surprised he told you first, that’s all.”

“Oh, it just came up,” Daisuke replies with a shrug while Agumon re-enters the living room and settles the sushi on the table, “we were talking about the concerts we’d like to attend and the conversation sort of shifted.”

Taichi nods at the new information, surprised there was even a conversation to drift away from. He may have gone overboard with the idea in the past few months, but Yamato and Daisuke really didn’t seem to have much to talk about in the past eleven years. That they should start now is unexpected, to say the least.

In fact, Taichi reflects as Daisuke and Veemon settle into their meal without a word, he can’t even remember the last time Daisuke and Yamato had a non-saving-the-world-related conversation that went deeper than social chatter during their group picnics. He’s pretty sure that was before the Reboot though.

The two halves of their group have grown a little too stretched apart after the fact for the contrary to be very likely.

Taichi watches Veemon and Daisuke wolf their meal down in record time before they retreat to their room for well-deserved sleep, then goes to take care of the dishes in a bit of a haze, unable to get the fact that Yamato told Daisuke about his visit before anyone else. Why would he?

{ooo}

Taichi finds himself paying far too much attention to Daisuke’s texting habits, to the point where Agumon feels compelled to ask if he’s going to try finding the boy a partner again.

“Certainly not!” Taichi replies, almost—but not quite—offended by the suggestion, “I learned my lesson, and Daisuke doesn’t deserve to go through that again.”

Plus, it’s not like Ken didn’t suffer from it, either. Just because Taichi never really had the guts to talk to him about it doesn’t mean he can’t realize what he did to the guy.

“I’m just curious.”

Obsessed would probably be a more accurate description, but he’s pretty sure that would only make people panic again, which would be doubly frustrating considering he’s doing fairly well in terms of recovery so far.

He goes out to the gym every day—even got a subscription specifically for that purpose—keeps a tally of the conversation he has to make sure he stays in touch with his friends—Sora called him excessive when she saw the picture, but Jyou and Noeru both said the important part was that it worked, so Taichi doesn’t mind. He’s even taken to block at least five hours every weeks to spend time with Agumon without talking about politics—at least not the ones they’re involved with.

He’s doing so well his therapist complimented him on his progress during their last session! He did tell her having a plan made everything easier, but when he pointed the flaw in her reasoning, Agumon said having a plan didn’t mean you’d put it all to work, which warmed up his heart.

(Yamato said ‘shut up, you’re doing great’ which made him snort.)

And yet, through it all, Taichi can’t get the thought of Daisuke and Yamato texting out of his head.

It’s at the forefront of his mind when he passes through the living room and finds Daisuke typing away on his phone, when he hears it ring with one of the Teenage Wolves’ most popular tunes, when Yamato takes a little longer than usual to answer in their conversations. It’s ridiculous, obsessive, and inconvenient, but no amount of logic or trying to talk himself out of it manages to calm Taichi down, so he does the second best thing to talking things out with Yamato: he calls Sora.

“It’s getting way out of hands,” he tells her after they’ve exchanged a couple of pleasantries, keeping his voice quiet so Agumon, lying next to him in the bed, won’t wake up, “I need to figure something out.”

“No offense, Taichi,” Sora chuckles into the phone between two bites of what must be a very late dinner, “but your personal relationships are always getting out of hand.”

Taichi opens his mouth to protest, flailing at empty air when the words stay stuck in his throats, and it’s easy for Sora to keep going through his surprised spluttering:

“You’re still joking about Hikari and Takeru breaking off,” she says—Taichi sees her tick the item off with her fingers, and he protests:

“They still might!”

“We have a betting pool to know how soon they’ll get engaged,” Sora deadpans, face going completely blank on Taichi’s computer screen, “even Jyou noticed. Also, you’re somehow the one who misgenders Noeru most often despite being one of her most vocal support when she came out—”

“I’m distracted!” Taichi pouts, and Sora’s face softens when she chuckles.

It doesn’t prevent her from continuing, however, and Taichi winces when she raises a third finger:

“You convinced yourself Daisuke and Ken would make an okay couple even—”

“I have an excuse for this one,” Taichi interjects, but his ears grow hot anyway, and Sora plows on:

“Even though we gave you extensive—and, I assume, loud, in Yamato’s case—warning that you were making a mistake. And of course, there’s the part where you never stopped asking me for advice on how to deal with Yamato, even when we broke up and I really needed you to pay attention to me, too.”

Taichi winces again, ears burning harder as the list of his failures goes on, and he almost reaches for Agumon before he decides against it. He messed up, more than once, and sometimes in an epic fashion, but just because he needs comfort right now doesn’t mean he should prevent a friend from getting some well-deserved rest after heavy construction work in the Digiworld.

He’ll have to handle that alone.

“Sora,” he starts, lowering his voice a little, “I’m so—”

“I’m over it,” Sora promises before he can finish, “and besides, it’s not like you didn’t care about me back then. We all know you care—that’s part of why we like you—it’s just that you’re always one interpersonal crisis away from disaster.

“Thanks,” Taichi manages, half-sarcasm, half something a little heavier, “you’re making me feel so much better.”

“I’m your friend,” Sora replies in a stern voice, one hand playing with the tip of her hair, “I’m supposed to tell you the truth, not just what you want to hear.”

“I’m pretty sure Yamato agrees with you on that,” Taichi mutters, and this time there’s a real grin on Sora’s face when she answers:

“How did you think we managed six years together exactly?”

“Sugar and spice and everything nice?” Taichi asks, trying to steer the conversation back to lighter grounds, “the power of love and friendship bracelets?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sora sighs.

Taichi blows a raspberry at her in retaliation, and the long moment they spend making increasingly stupid faces at each other takes at least ten years off of Taichi’s shoulders, time slipping away as easily as puffing his cheek and going cross-eyed. Times like these never fail to remind him exactly why the two of them became—and stayed—friends, and by the time they remember to stop, if only so they’ll finish dealing with the important stuff, Taichi couldn’t keep a fond grin off his lips if he tried.

(He really, really doesn’t.)

“Seriously though,” he says after a short, comfortable silence, “what do you think they even talk about? It’s like they can’t get enough of each other.”

Sora frowns at the word, quite possibly—and, if Taichi is being honest, legitimately—wondering how Taichi knows that, but she doesn’t ask the question, for which Taichi is actually pretty grateful. This conversation is embarrassing enough in itself, there’s no need to add to it.

“I don’t know,” Sora says with a shrug, “they like each other, I guess. The worse that could happen is you get your wish and Daisuke ends up dating one of us.”

“I didn’t say I wanted him to date one of us!” Taichi protests, but doesn’t insists when Sora levels him with a blank stare.

He did kind of say that, after all, it just—well, it never occurred to him that Yamato could be an option.

“You said he shouldn’t date someone who ‘doesn’t know what it’s like to be one of us,” Sora insists, driving the point home with finger quotes, “either way, if they do end up dating, you should be happy.”

There’s a short pause, and then Sora only sounds half-teasing when she asks:

“Unless you’re thinking of getting involved?”

“Oh no!” Taichi replies immediately, raising his hands in defense and protest, “no, I’ve learned my lesson there, and Yamato would never forgive me anyway.”

“He totally would.”

“Maybe,” Taichi concedes, unsure of how aware Sora is of Yamato’s dating-related issues, “but he’d give me a hard time about it, and he’d be right to. No, I’m not doing anything about it—but I can still have opinions.”

“Fair enough,” Sora concedes with a nod, “so what’s yours?”

“It’s a call for disaster?” Taichi says, maybe a little bit too fast to sound entirely casual. “I mean, Yamato can be as anal as Jyou sometimes, except he’s harsher about it, and Daisuke is loud, impulsive, disorganized—”

“Okay first of all,” Sora cuts off with a roll of her eyes, “I’m pretty sure you’re talking about who he was five years ago, maybe longer. And secondly, Yamato has been dealing with your disorganized butt for nearly fifteen years and he’s not dead yet.”

Taichi closes his mouth, forced to admit Sora has a point, and nods in concession. He still thinks a romantic relationship between Daisuke and Yamato would be a bad idea, but it’s not like there’s anything he can do about it—he meant what he said about remaining uninvolved for everyone’s sake.

“Yeah,” he admits, hoping his disappointment doesn’t bleed into his voice, “I guess you’re right.”

“Which reminds me, Mimi and I were talking and we thought it’d be nice to have a big gathering for the anniversary. Every-team-in-the-world big.”

Taichi, who was halfway back to ruminating about his problem already, straightens up and blinks at Sora, who’s looking at him with a long-suffering expression.

“You weren’t listening anymore, were you?”

“With one ear,” Taichi mumbles, bowing his head in apology while Sora rolls her eyes.

“Look, I’m pretty sure Yamato told you this already, but if you really think it’s better for Daisuke to date someone who ‘gets it’ then his only real options are Yamato or you. If the two of them dating bothers you so much, maybe you should consider making a move.”

“Wha—a move toward whom?”

“That’s really not my question to answer, Taichi.”

Taichi wants to protest at that—defend himself somehow, although he’s not sure what accusation to defend himself again, but he’ s not quite sur e what t he accusation is here, exactly, so he pushes the topic at the back of his mind and asks Sora about her gathering project.

“I tossed the idea out on the forum,” Sora explains with an excited smile, “lots of people sounded interested, so Mimi and I thought we could do it in August, since that’s when it all started? Plus, it’d give us about six months to prepare, which would make a lot of things easier. What do you think?”

Taichi thinks it’s great, actually—feels his chest stir with excitement for the first time in who knows how many weeks at the thought—and by the time they hang up it’s well past midnight, far later than Taichi usually goes to bed, but the tiredness is worth it.

He dreams about a picnic with hundreds of attendants, and stupid romantic combinations.

{ooo}

February falls on Tokyo with a fresh layer of snow, the weather abnormally cold even for this time of the year. Most children are delighted but Taichi, like many other adult and working-age people mostly wishes there could be a way for bad weather not to make his commute twice as long as usual. One of his teachers has a car accident because of it, forcing him t o go through a whole ordeal in order to find something that accommodates his work, university, and his weekly phone calls with Yamato, which often end up lasting through most of the afternoon.

He spends almost an entire session talking about this—well, about his relationship with Yamato in general, but that’s the starting point.

Not that the topic itself has never come out before—they’re too close, and Yamato has done too much to help Taichi throughout the years and this particular depression for his name to stay entirely out of the conversation. It’s the first time Taichi spends so much time talking about him specifically though—usually, it’s either about the group in general or Agumon in particular, and the numerous ways in which the Reboot still affects them—and the idea makes him chuckle as he texts his friend to say just that.

‘Just leave my awkward moments out of it plz,’ Yamato replies almost instantly—he’s probably hanging around his granddad’s apartment and enjoying a day off right now, the butt. ‘Talk me up if u can.’

‘Should I mention your impeccable taste in shampoos next time?’ Taichi teases back.

‘Its clearly > my taste in men.’

Taichi startles a couple of tourists when he snorts in the middle of the street, but he’s still riding the post-therapy lightness, so he chuckles as he types back:

‘Don’t sell yourself short: you’ve got me as a best friend. It can’t be that bad.’

Yamato sends him a string of grimacing emoji—and one raised fist—at that, and Taichi is halfway through a response in the same spirit when his phone buzzes again:

‘Reminds me: how r things w/ version 2.0?’

Taichi pauses in the street—apologizes when someone bumps into him from behind—and frowns at his phone as he starts walking again, typing at the same time:

‘Fine. We’re going bowling this weekend. Why?’

‘Been a while since I asked.’

‘I’d have thought he’d tell u,’ Taichi replies, muttering as he types, ‘with how much u two talk lately. I thought u didn’t think he was smart enough to talk to?’

‘Turns out I was wrong & hes + interesting when im not being overprotective of both our siblings,’ Yamato replies—Taichi can almost see the shrug that must have come with it.

He wonders, a tad randomly, if Yamato is still having breakfast or if he’s started on the working out part of his day already, but the thought flies out of the window when his phone buzzes again:

‘Y the U of irritation?’

‘I’m not irritated,’ Taichi replies, but his jaw is set and his lips are twitching, and he doesn’t have the faintest idea why.

He gets an eye emoji in response, and tries to decipher the meaning of it for several seconds before he writes back:

‘?’

‘Means I din’t believe u.’

‘??’

‘French expression, dont deflect.’

‘I’m not deflecting,’ Taichi types, and Yamato’s retort comes so fast Taichi almost wonders if he wrote it before he got an answer:

‘Dont lie 2 me, I know ur txting style.’

‘Whatever,’ Taichi replies, ‘just leave it alone.’

He shoves his phone back in his pocket and quickens his pace, ignoring the buzzing against his thigh until it finally stops.

He tries not to think too hard about why that makes him feel worse instead of better.

{ooo}

Yamato is supposed to fly in to Japan during the second week of February, and Taichi barely talks to him through the first week of the month, which is probably why he’s so surprised when Ms. Takashi phones and asks him to come greet Yamato and his grandfather at the airport.

“I’m not sure,” Taichi starts—then he catches himself, clears his throat, and starts again in a steadier voice: “I don’t mean to be disrespectful, Ms. Takashi, but shouldn’t Takeru be the one who comes along with you? I wouldn’t want to intrude on a family reunion.”

“Takeru has classes that day,” Ms. Takashi replies—Taichi can hear how strained her smile is as she speaks, and he fiddles with his chopsticks while Agumon, Veemon and Daisuke do a poor job at pretending they’re not trying to listen in.

Strained smiles never bode well for anybody.

“It’s really either you or no one,” Ms. Takashi completes.

Taichi squirms in his seat a little. It’s not that he doesn’t want to see Yamato—they’re best friends, for heaven’s sake, and he’d be lying if he said he doesn’t miss Yamato like crazy but, well. This is a family reunion—it’s meant for families. Not to mention he doesn’t quite feel ready to meet Mr. Takashi just yet.

(The fact that he will probably never be doesn’t do anything to make him feel less nervous, either.)

“I don’t think he’d blame you for coming alone,” Taichi tells Yamato’s mother, and she sighs before she asks:

“May I speak frankly, Taichi?”

“Of course,” Taichi hears himself say, stomach sinking before the words are even fully out of his mouth.

There are conversations you don’t want to have with your best friend’s mother.

He exchanges a look with Agumon anyway, and waits until his partner nods before he excuses himself from the breakfast table, leaving his rice almost untouched. He’ll have time to finish it later, but he’s pretty sure he’s going to appreciate having some privacy to hear the next couple of sentences.

“We don’t understand each other,” Ms. Takashi says while Taichi fumbles with his bedroom door, catching him by surprise, “I don’t remember a time when we did. We’ve had a strained relationship ever since his father and I divorced. I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

In all honesty, it would have been hard not to notice—there’s only so many time one can usher you away from a parent—from an apartment—decline invitations under false pretenses and steadfastly avoid discussing their relationship with their family before it becomes suspicious.

Taichi isn’t sure Ms. Takashi knows that more than one of his visits to Yamato’s apartment was canceled because Mr. Ishida came home when he wasn’t supposed to.

“I…had suspicions,” Taichi admits carefully, trying to walk the line between lies and delicacy.

“He doesn’t set a foot at my place unless his brother is there, Taichi,” Ms. Takashi replies in a dry tone, “I’m fairly sure you had more than suspicions.”

Taichi, still standing right behind his door, shifts his weight from foot to foot, ears warming up in embarrassment, then mumbles a feeble acquiescence.

“It’s okay,” Ms. Takashi says. “I’m not thrilled about it, obviously, but I grew used to it. The only thing is, since Takeru won’t be here, and I don’t know how my father will react. You’d be doing me a favor by coming along.”

“Alright,” Taichi says, trying—and failing—to erase the sigh from his voice, “I’ll come. When is he landing again?”

Actually, Taichi knows perfectly well when Yamato and his grandfather will be landing, but asking the question gives him times to digest the conversation—makes it feel more like something ordinary rather than the strange, sort of embarrassing and probably somewhat painful favor Ms. Takashi paints this thing as.

It also prevents him from saying she’s the one doing him a favor there, which is good. He’s not sure how he’d explain that one.

“Six PM,” Ms. Takashi answers—there’s a relief in her voice Taichi has heard in his mother’s words before, and the thought makes him close his eyes against the light as Ms. Takashi says: “I know you live closer to the airport than I do, but I’m a little worried about traffic…can I come and pick you up at four thirty?”

“Yes,” Taichi says after a short pause, hoping the traffic will jam and spare them both thirty minutes of awkwardness, “of course.”

“Perfect,” Ms. Takashi says, voice colored with a tentative smile, “thank you Taichi.”

“It’s not trouble,” Taichi answers without lying, and Ms. Takashi chuckles:

“I know. It’s not the first time you do Yamato a favor that way.”

Taichi wants to protest—say something nice, maybe, say Yamato won’t consider his presence a favor—but the lie sticks against the roof of his mouth and Ms. Takashi answers before Taichi manages to find his tongue.

He pockets his phone with a heavy, tired sigh, and rubs at his temples to stop the headache building there. He can’t bring Agumon along—there wouldn’t be enough space left for Yamato, Gabumon and Mr. Takashi, but boy does he wish he could.

Sighing one last time, he makes his way back to the living room and resumes his seat at the table, breakfast thoroughly unappealing now that his stomach is all in knots. He picks at his rice for a moment, unable to move his thoughts away from the way Ms. Takashi sighed when he agreed to follow her at the airport, and jumps a little when Daisuke asks:

“So, are you going after all?”

“Yes.”

Taichi shrugs and scoops some rice off his bowl—gives himself something to do while Daisuke stares at him like he’s suddenly turned into a puzzle:

“Can’t Takeru go? He’s the guy’s brother.”

“He’s got classes,” Taichi replies, and avoids Veemon and Agumon’s matching stares by looking down at his plate before Daisuke continues:

“Then why doesn’t she go alone? It’s not like she needs you there.”

Taichi closes his mouth tight, takes a deep breath in, and counts to ten before he answers:

“Look, this is complicated.”

“It sounds like Yamato’s mom thinks he won’t be happy to see her,” Daisuke replies, and the genuine curiosity in his demeanor is the only thing that prevents Taichi from snapping when he replies:

“Like I said, it’s complicated. I know it’s his mom, I know it sounds weird, but not everyone has the same family history, okay?”

“Okay,” Daisuke replies, mollified and possibly a tad embarrassed by Taichi’s reaction, “it’s just—I didn’t know about that.”

Taichi shoves another chunk of rice in his mouth before he can say something mean, and tries to ignore the way his stomach clenches at the very impulse.

{ooo}

“It doesn’t make any sense,” he mutters into his pillow later on, when Veemon and Daisuke have left for work and Taichi’s brain couldn’t handle any more studying if his life depended on it, “why would I even want to be mean to my friend over something that stupid?”

He presses his head into the pillow again, hoping against reason that it’ll open up and swallow him whole—or at least suck his brain out of his skull so he can stop wondering if he’s falling back into unmanaged depression or if he’s just a natural butt now.

Agumon, sitting by his hip on the bed, shifts a little—he must have raised his paws, because Taichi feels claws scratch against his ribs—then says:

“Maybe your therapy isn’t helping as much as it should?”

“But it’s going fine!” Taichi replies with too much of a whine for his own comfort, “It’s not perfect but it’s working—I’m doing better aren’t I?”

Taichi turns his head just far enough to see Agumon nod and smile at him, and then he sighs in relief. It’s too soon to start spacing appointments out—Taichi himself doesn’t feel ready for it, although he certainly wouldn’t complain about having one less thing to juggle with in his timetable—but he’s doing better. He’s been a better friend lately, too, which is nice.

Besides, he didn’t stop to think about Daisuke’s feelings when he tried matchmaking last year, so stopping because of them now is…a good sign, he supposes.

The problem being, of course, that it begs the question: what on earth is going on in his stupid brain this time?

“But that makes even less sense,” Agumon says after a beat—this time Taichi stays safely buried in the warm darkness of his pillow—“that would mean you want to do that because you like it or something—you don’t, do you?”

“Of course not!” Taichi protests, turning around fast enough to give himself a headache.

He sits up on the futon, crossing his ankles together and resting his hands on top of them as he stares at the world map on the wall—the pins and flags identifying each team member offer no answer to his questions, though, and he closes his eyes again as he sighs and flops back onto his pillow:

“I don’t like being mean, it’s just—I don’t know. It’s more like I wanted to scold him, but he was just being concerned!”

Silence falls over the bedroom again, and Taichi grabs around his bedside table until his fingers close around the stress ball Jyou gifted him with two years ago. He kneads at the foamy plastic until his forearm starts aching, and he’s only just switched hands when Agumon asks:

“Do you think Yamato should be different with his mom?”

Taichi stretches his neck to look at Agumon again, frowning in confusion:

“Why would you ask that?”

“I don’t know,” Agumon shrugs, “maybe you just didn’t want to tell him he was wrong.”

“Agumon, I tell Daisuke he’s wrong about stuff all the time,” Taichi points out, but Agumon shrugs again:

“You’re always harsher when people are wrong about Yamato. Maybe that’s all it is.”

Taichi considers the notion—examines what he knows and thinks about his friend’s life for a long time before he answers, a little more carefully this time:

“I don’t think that’s it. I think it’s sad Yamato and his parents don’t get along—it’s just not my business to tell him what to do. And I don’t think it’s Daisuke’s either, especially if Yamato didn’t talk to him about it.”

“That sounds fair,” Agumon replies, looking out through the window with one paw on his chin, “but if you’re not there to help fix things, maybe Daisuke is right and Ms. Takashi doesn’t need you here.”

“That’s not what I said!” Taichi replies before he even processes the sentence in full, coming face to face with Agumon as he straightens up again, “Just that I’m not going to fix things!”

“Then why did she ask you to come?” Agumon asks, and Taichi shrugs as he tosses the stress ball against the wall:

“She thinks I’ll make things less awkward because I know how things are between her and Yamato.”

“So, maybe if Daisuke knew what things are like, he could have gone as well, right?”

“No!”

Taichi’s cheeks all but burst in flames at the outburst, and he starts torturing his ball again the second it bounces back into his hands, squirming a little under the way Agumon stares at him, like Taichi ended up exactly where he was wanted.

“You know,” Agumon says in a softer, slower voice, “it kind of sounds like you’re just mad at Daisuke because he was puzzled you agreed to go.”

“I’m not Yamato,” Taichi protests, blushing harder as his heartbeat picks up for no real reason, “I don’t feel like a failure if I can’t do my friends a solid every time they have a problem.”

“Maybe,” Agumon answers with another shrug, “but that’s not what I meant. Also, you didn’t make that sound very nice.”

Taichi gapes at Agumon, who smiles like Taichi is missing something very obvious—it’s not a familiar sensation. Either Taichi is usually more perceptive, or Agumon doesn’t bother pointing it out—and exits the room without another word.

{ooo}

The mystery is still intact the next day, when Ms. Takashi pulls up in front of Taichi’s building, hair pulled in an impeccable bun that does nothing to hide the lines around her mouth. Taichi, heavy bags weighing under his eyes, greets her and slips into the passenger seat with a poorly stifled yawn. He has to pull at the door so it’ll shut properly, too distracted to do it right the first time around, and he’s still trying to make sense of Agumon’s words—of his ridiculous, incomprehensible inability to put the thought of Yamato making new friends, or deepening old friendships, to rest—when Ms. Takashi turns the radio on and Taichi jumps so hard he’s pretty sure his hair brushed the car roof.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Ms. Takashi says with a nervous smile while she steers the car back in traffic, “It’s just—I sort of assumed we wouldn’t be talking much?”

“It’s okay,” Taichi replies, trying not to look too relieved at the thought, “I just got a little lost in thoughts, that’s all.”

Ms. Takashi nods and, for a while, agonizingly slow traffic and more examples of poor driving Taichi has ever witnessed fill the emptiness between them, Ms. Takashi’s knuckles white on the steering wheel while she grits her teeth at the third car that fishtails her.

Taichi has met all of the chosen children’s parents—as far as the Odaiba group is concerned, that is. He gets along fine with them, for the most part, and he’d even call Kou—Noeru’s mother a friend in her own right, if the thought didn’t sound a little odd even to him. He’s met Daisuke’s parents, Sora’s, Mimi’s, Ken’s—all of them, and he’s had many an interesting, if occasionally awkward, conversation with them.

He’s only even seen glimpse of Ms. Takashi and her apartment, squeezed between two errands Yamato was never willing to postpone, a distant, obviously concerned parental figure whose attempts at creating a bond never truly met a response. It is, technically, more than he’s seen of Mr. Ishida—always busy, always tired, always drifting between work and the oblivion of sleep, something Taichi understands a little better now than he did then—but Mr. Ishida rarely asked questions, and the answers always seemed to have a hard time sticking.

Yamato was always more comfortable with gruff silence than begrudging conversation.

Sitting with Ms. Takashi now, squeezed in a small green car Taichi is fairly sure not even her can be comfortable in, feels a bit like getting stuck in the elevator with a strange neighbor you never quite got around to talk to and be reminded how weird it is to be so distant when you could be so close.

It’s not an exercise Taichi likes to indulge in, and he spends the first leg of the ride pretending he’s very interested in what the radio news have to say, only to wince when his name is mentioned in a cringe-worthy debate—neurodivergent children: should they be allowed to keep their digimon partner? Can they even understand what that entails? Should digimon paired with these children even be considered healthy? Join our experts for the discussion by calling the following number!—and Ms. Takashi starts speaking again:

“Tough debate, isn’t it?” She asks, an obvious opening to start the same discussion in the car.

Taichi doesn’t feel up for that kind for nonsense, though, so he decides to short-circuit it entirely:

“I don’t know a thing about neurogdivergent people,” he says, “but I don’t think a debate on digimon rights that doesn’t invite at least one digimon has much legitimacy to begin with.”

On the radio, Meiko—without Meikoomon, who was barely even mentioned in the introduction—sounds more and more agitated as the debate goes on, and Taichi’s fingers twitch in solidarity.

“May I turn it off?” He asks.

Ms. Takashi nods and turns the knob herself.

“I imagine you have to listen to that kind of things often,” she says quietly, and Taichi doesn’t stop to think before he scoffs and says:

“I wish this was the worst of the nonsense we hear every day.”

He blushes when he realizes the liberty he’s just taken, and glances at Ms. Takashi as he straightens up in his seat. Her eyes are still carefully set on the road, and she doesn’t seem offended—she always did have dif ferent ideas about what was improper or not. Yamato always seemed to think her growing up in Paris was the cause, but then he doesn’t seem to realize he shared that trait with her before he moved to France.

“Sorry,” he says anyway, just in case, “I’ve—hit a rough patch, lately. I’m a little cranky. But I’m doing better now.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Ms. Takashi says, “I’m sure things must be a lot to handle.”

Taichi nods and, for a few minutes, they sit in silence together, inching their way toward the airport, until Ms. Takashi makes anther valiant attempt at conversation:

“Takeru tells me you guys are planing a camping trip this summer?”

“Yes,” Taichi replies, hands coming up to fiddle with his seatbelt, “it’s our fifteenth anniversary as chosen children. We thought it’d be nice to celebrate with a little gathering.”

“For a week?” Ms. Takashi asks, smile strained around the edge in her light tone, “that’s quite the pilgrimage.”

Taichi squirms in his seat again, looking down at his knees and tensing up further when Ms. Takashi sighs next to him:

“I’m sorry. I know it’s not fair to talk like it’s a bad thing. It’s been years since anything dangerous happened.”

“Yes,” Taichi mumbles, and doesn’t look up when he notices Ms. Takashi leaning forward from the corner of his eyes.

“Then again, that was also the case last time, and we all—”

She cuts herself off, straightens up, and takes a deep breath in—Taichi squashes the sudden impulse to apologize, knowing it wouldn’t change anything. It’s not like he can promise to stay uninvolved if something else happens in his lifetime. He can barely remain uninvolved during peace time as it is.

“I’m sorry,” Ms. Takashi says again after a few more deep breaths, dropping the attempt at levity, “it’s just that every time you kids go there—”

“My parents don’t like it either,” Taichi admits, somehow managing to bite on a petulant ‘we’re not kids!’ before he makes things really embarrassing.

It’s really not Ms. Takashi’s fault some of his hackles are that easy to rise.

“My dad always arranges his business trips for when we leave. My mom has gotten better at not fussing, but I think she still wants to—I don’t think any of our parents are very big fans of the Digiworld.”

“Can you blame us?” Ms. Takashi retorts, turning to look at Taichi for the first time since they got in the car—he keeps his eyes focused on his knees, but the movement is unmistakable—“every time you guys get called out there, Takeru comes back with more nightmares and a thinner smile, and Yamato becomes even more of a stranger!”

“It’s not always easy,” Taichi says, a beat too late, “but if we don’t do it—”

“’No one else will’, I know,” Ms. Takashi snaps, cutting him off mid-sentence, “that’s what Yamato always says. Don’t think I don’t hear it for the dismissal it is.”

Taichi winces, and steals a glance at Ms. Takashi as the traffic around them eases off a little and the car speeds up in response. The lines around her mouth have grown harsher, eyebrows creasing deep above her eyes, and it’s easy for Taichi to see the way her lips curl into a sneer, even in profile. He’s seen the same face on Yamato enough time to know it anywhere by now.

“Sometimes,” Ms. Takashi admits through gritted teeth, voice low enough Taichi almost doesn’t hear her, “I wish digimons had never entered our lives.”

“You should probably not say that in front of Yamato,” Taichi replies without thinking.

He doesn’t back down when Ms. Takashi turns to glare at him, Takeru’s ‘how thick can you get’ face written all across her features.

They don’t talk for the rest of the ride.

{ooo}

They find Yamato and Mr. Takashi cornered by a small crowd of admirers—digimons mingling with humans in their mid-twenties and Knife of Day shirts, for the most part, although Taichi spots one lone Teenage Wolves fans—waving pens, notebooks and smartphones in Yamato’s face. There can’t be more than twenty persons there—twenty-five, maybe—half of whom seem to have been dragged in by eager partners trying to reach Gabumon more than their own will, but it’s enough to pull at the edge of Yamato’s smile, shoulders rigid as he sidesteps someone’s attempt to grab his shoulders. Taichi snorts at the sight, while Ms. Takashi readjusts some invisible flaw in her hair, pulls her handbag up her shoulder like some kind of armor, and takes a deep breath before she walks up to the little crowd.

Mr. Takashi, a lanky octogenarian with thick-rimmed glasses and a checkered cap on his head, puts a gentle hand on his grandson’s shoulder, and the small gaggle parts almost instantly, revealing a fully-loaded luggage cart with a grinning Gabumon on top of it. Taichi stays a few steps behind Ms. Takashi as she walks up to her son and gives him a brief hug—Yamato, stiff as a board, seems to suffer through it more than he enjoys the contact—before letting her father smack a resounding kiss on each of her cheek and envelop her in a bear hug with cheerful laughter.

Yamato, as soon as he’s left alone, retreats to the luggage cart, clinging at the handle until Gabumon notices Taichi and jumps off the suitcases to greet him.

“I didn’t think anyone would be here,” Gabumon exclaims as he reaches up to shake Taichi’s hand, “what with Takeru being busy and all!”

“I’m just subbing,” Taichi replies with a face-swallowing grin that belies his shrug, “I’ve got instructions and everything.”

“I missed your stupid jokes,” Yamato says with a snort, and all of a sudden Taichi finds himself pulled into a hug that leaves him flabbergasted for the three seconds it lasts.

He blinks when Yamato releases him, heat spreading across his cheeks as he checks the airport—nobody staring.

“Is that how they greet people in France?” He asks, mock-offense failing to resist Yamato’s wide smile.

“Come visit and you’ll know.”

Taichi rolls his eyes at that, but instead of serving Yamato the same jokes about the French being lazy and permanently on holidays, he goes for sincerity and says:

“I missed your stupid face.”

It finally stopped growing sharper, leaving enough of the teenager Yamato once was for him to be recognizable in a second, even for strangers. He’s got broader shoulders now, probably due to the intense exercise his chosen career requires . His hair has grown longer again, almost back to shoulder length, and when Taichi gives him a once over, it’s easy to notice the blue lines peaking from under his coat sleeve.

“Dude,” Taichi exclaims, “eyebrows rising to the top of his scalp, when did you get a tattoo?”

“Last September,” Yamato says with a shrug. “I wasn’t feeling too well, and I needed something to get me back on track that wouldn’t make Papy freak out.”

He raises his eyebrows meaningfully, and Taichi sort of wants to scold him for joking about his suicide attempt, no matter how old it is—Takeru doesn’t know about it, though, which means Ms. Takashi definitely doesn’t know, and cowardly as it may be Taichi really doesn’t want to have to break the news to her. He settles for exchanging a long-suffering glance with Gabumon, whose answering smile looks too brittle for Taichi’s taste.

“Wanna see?”

Taichi nods, and stands back as Yamato pulls the fabric up to reveal all nine of their crests—friendship at the top, then courage, reliability, love, hope, knowledge, honesty, light, and kindness— lining up from the tip of his wrist to the crook of his elbow . Taichi’s eyes widen.

“Woah,” he says, a little more hoarsely than he planned for, “I knew you liked us but I didn’t know it went that far.”

“Don’t worry,” Yamato replies with a shrug, “when we did tests to see what Hogwarts house we’d get, my friends were convinced I’d end up in Ravenclaw.”

“Dude,” Taichi says with a disbelieving raise of his eyebrows, “has any of them ever actually met you?”

Yamato scoffs, but there’s a smile curling at his lips, and Taichi’s grin widens again in response, shoulders unlocking as they speak. It really is good to be reunited to such a close—and old—friend, like getting a piece of your own life back.

Like all good things, though, it must come to an end, in this case because Ms. Takashi is done greeting her father, and she moved toward her son, shoulder sliding between Taichi and Yamato—just an inch, but it’s enough for Taichi to take the hint and step back, wondering how his friend manages not to pull a muscle when his face closes off that fast.

“Hi, Yamato,” Ms. Takashi says, shoulders squared under her elegant brown winter coat.

Yamato is wearing a leather—or leather-like—jacket, and Taichi almost wonders if he did it on purpose, just so he could keep as much distance between them as possible, even on the visual scale. He greets his mother with a stiff gesture, Gabumon stepping closer to his knee, and Taichi worries at his lips with teeth—until Mr. Takashi walks up to him with a large smile and holds a hand out:

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Kamiya.”

“Pleased to meet you too,” Taichi replies with an embarrassed smile, “how did you know—”

“Yamato has some pictures in his room,” Mr. Takashi explains, “he showed them to me after your little friend visited us.”

The tips of Taichi’s ears heat up.

“About that,” he says, running a hand over his neck, “I’m sorry I didn’t stay long enough to greet you, I was—”

“That’s quite alright, young man. You had other things to think about at the time.”

Taichi manages an apologetic grimace, then turns to look at Yamato and Ms. Takashi, whose conversation took a sharp rise in volume before going back down. From the corner of his eyes, Taichi sees Mr. Takashi frown, deep line moving around his mouth, along with a long scar up his neck.

“Are they always like that?”

Yamato and his mother look about three words away from a genuine argument—him, his shoulders tense as he shoves his hands deep inside his jacket and her, tall and ramrod straight behind the numerous buttons of her coat. Between them, Gabumon has a hand firmly pressed in the crook of Yamato’s knee, eyes riveted on the conversation above his head, and Taichi sighs.

“Not where I can see them,” he admits, “but I don’t think it’s very different from their usual.”

Yamato, for all that he’s got a perfectly ordinary human body, manages to look prickly enough to put a porcupine to shame, and Taichi crosses his arms over his chest as he watches him hiss something at his mother, jaw tense and shoulders set. Beside him, Mr. Takashi mutters something in French that sounds somewhat long-suffering, and Taichi wonders, not for the first time, which parent Yamato got his stubbornness from.

Gabumon doesn’t seem to have any idea what to do.

“Somehow,” Mr. Takashi says after a few seconds of silence, “I’m not surprised. He’s exactly like his mother at his age.”

“Really?” Taichi asks, unable not to turn back to the man in curiosity.

“Oh, yes. She used to fight with her mother and I about our moving to France all the time, until she turned twenty-one and her birthday gift to herself was a one-way ticket to Tokyo.”

Taichi blinks for a second, before a wry smile twists at his lips and he signs:

“Fast forward thirty odd years, and here we are.”

“Pretty much,” Mr. Takashi says, with something not unlike pride coloring his voice, “although Nancy tells me you are quite adept at dealing with this aspect of my grandson’s personality?”

“Yeah,” Taichi mumbles, rubbing at his neck again, “my sister says we’re the biggest boneheads she’s ever met.”

Mr. Takashi laughs—a brief bark of sound that throws his head back and bursts out of him like a balloon popping—and Taichi can’t help but look toward Yamato for help a this, startled by such an intense reaction. Yamato notices him—seizes the occasion to turn away from his mother and exchange a couple of sentences in French with his grandfather, before Mr. Takashi suggests it might be time to get going.

Yamato commandeers the luggage cart before anyone has time to make a move for it, and Taichi ends up sandwiched between him and Mr. Takashi, Ms. Takashi walking at the other end of the line, heels punctuating their advance with resonating clicks. They make their way to the elevator shrouded with awkwardness, Mr. Takashi somehow managing to maintain a steady stream of questions that Taichi can’t quite answer with monosyllables, which counts as their conversation for the time being.

They cover Taichi’s job—stripped down to its barest bones—his wishes for the future—keep doing exactly what he is now—his family life—fine, for the most part—and how his and Yamato’s friendship began—with a fistfight or ten, more or less, which makes the old man laugh like it’s the best joke he’s ever heard again—before Mr. Takashi shakes a finger in Taichi’s direction and says:

“I almost forgot to ask! How is little Kotomon—”

“Koromon,” Yamato corrects—Taichi imagines he can hear his jaw crack when he opens his mouth, and bites at the inside of his cheek to keep his laughter in.

“Right,” Mr. Takashi continues, taking the interruption in stride, “how is Koromon doing?”

“Uh, fine, for the most part. He’s been working with me more these days so he’s tired, but nothing like it was the last time you saw him.”

“I certainly hope so,” Mr. Takashi says in a stern voice as they reach the elevators—Yamato’s yelp of protest mingles with the bell announcing the opening of doors, and Taichi’s ears heat up.

“Yeah,” he mumbles, looking down at his hands while he twists his fingers together, “he says ‘hi’, by the way.”

“Likewise,” Mr. Takashi answers with a small, seriousness leaving his face as fast as water wiped off with a towel, “I did tell him not to be a stranger—but perhaps, the best way to avoid that is to have you come and dine with us at some point this week? I would love to spend some time with a young man my grandson speaks so highly of.”

“Papy!” Yamato yelps, face growing at least three shades redder while his mother splutters:

“I’m sure Taichi will be very busy—”

“Nonsense,” Mr. Takashi dismisses with a wave of his hand, “it’s only one evening—and I’m sure you’ve had him over plenty of time by now, it’ll hardly be a new experience at all.”

Taichi keeps his face ostensibly turned toward his hands, but he keeps an eye out for Yamato’s reaction nonetheless, and he’s fairly sure he sees him look at his mother for a bit before she speaks:

“If we’re going to have Taichi over,” she say, “we might as well invite Hikari too—she’s Taichi’s sister,” she adds for her father’s benefit, “and Takeru’s girlfriend.”

“It doesn’t have to be a family gathering, mom,” Yamato mutters from Taichi’s left side, earning himself a glare from Ms. Takashi.

“It’s not my fault Takeru is involved with your closest friend’s sister.”

“I’m only the second closest,” Taichi blurts out without thinking, “but maybe Gabumon has a sister.”

Yamato slaps a hand over his face, deafening in the resounding silence that falls over the cabin, and Taichi does his best to make himself as small as humanly possible.

Daisuke leaves for an improvised holiday at his sister’s without saying when he’ll be back, and Taichi buries himself in work, studying textbooks and prospective bills until he can’t see straight and Agumon has to drag him away from his desk and into bed. It’s not the healthiest solution by a long short, but it works, and that’s all Taichi has any right to ask for.

If he hadn’t been so stupid, so stubborn, if he’d listened to everyone’s warning, he wouldn’t have to sit alone in an apartment meant for two and wonder how his maybe-no-t-for-that-much-longer roommate is doing okay. He wouldn’t have to watch Agumon grow concerned and confused in turns, and he definitely wouldn’t have to deal with Yamato calling every day to grill him on his activities.

“I worked,” Taichi half-sighs, half-snaps after a week of that little game, “it’ll be the same tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that—can you please stop stalking my every move?”

“You’re the one who told Ken if I wanted to know how you were doing I should ask you.”

Taichi groans into his cereal bowl at that, and then again when a glance at the clock above the door tells him this is only the start of Yamato’s day. Wonderful, really, that’s exactly what he needed.

“I said it so he’d leave me alone,” he mutters, without any hope of Yamato taking the hint, “I thought that was obvious.”

“It was,” Yamato agrees, “I just don’t think it’s a good idea to leave you alone these days.”

“You’re still convinced I’m depressed,” Taichi snorts without humor, “aren’t you?”

“You still haven’t shown me anything that hints at the contrary.”

“How would you know about that,” Taichi replies, voice intentionally sharp, “you’re on the other side of the planet!”

Yamato, on the other end of the line, falls silent. Taichi’s left hand abandons his spoon to rub at his face, something heavy settling on his shoulders in the blink of an eye. There’s wetness under his fingers, but he ignores it and swallows past the tightness of his throat instead, forcing his back to relax a little while he bends down to rest his forehead on his knees:

“Sorry,” he mumbles after a beat—Yamato doesn’t respond, and Taichi almost curses under his breath. Yet another stunning exploit from the worlds-renowned diplomat. “I know you want to help. It’s just—I’m tired, okay? And the thing with Daisuke put me under the weather. But I’m not sick.”

“I’d believe you,” Yamato replies, “except I also know you wouldn’t tell us if you were.”

“I always tell you when I’m under.”

“Not since the Reboot,” Yamato counters, and Taichi closes his eyes.

It’s not a topic that comes up often between them—as in Yamato and him, of course, but also where the rest of the group is concerned. There are too many things there they haven’t completely digested yet, too many wounds not all of them share, too many bridges none of them has the energy to build.

Too many conversations that, to this day, still hurt too much to be had.

“I know,” Taichi admits, eyes still closed—the darkness, somehow, makes it easier to keep talking, to pretend whatever he says will be gone when he opens his eyes again. “I really flunked out, back then, didn’t I?”

“That’s not what I meant, Taichi.”

“It’s okay,” Taichi promises, and means it—wants to mean it with every inch of his soul—“I know I did. But I’m not doing that this time. I’m not depressed.”

Taichi listens to Yamato sigh after that, splutter for a bit as if considering what to start with. In the background, Gabumon’s voice asks what’s wrong, and Taichi winces because, really, this is the exact opposite of what he wanted.

“What’s wrong is my best friend is being a self-sacrificial idiot,” Yamato replies with more vehemence than Taichi would have expected, “depression is not ‘flunking out’ anymore than a broken leg or a cancer is, you dumbass! Or if it is, you’ve got about ten years worth of yelling to catch up with!”

“That’s different!” Taichi protests, eyes snapping open in surprise, “I’m not going to yell at you for that!”

He’s done a lot of yelling at Yamato over the year—in surprise, in fear, in anger, in reproach, even in encouragement sometimes, but never for failing their friends. Sure, there were times his help was needed and he couldn’t give it, but that wasn’t his fault—you can’t just rewrite your brain chemistry through sheer force of will, not even when you’re the stubbornest butt ever created.

“Then why do you assume I—or any of us, really—would yell at you for the exact same thing?”

“It—I don’t think you’d yell at me,” Taichi replies, scrambling for words in a way that leaves him breathless before he’s even started, “I’m just not—I can’t, okay? I can’t be depressed.”

“You can’t decide that, Taichi,” Yamato says and the softness in his voice reminds Taichi of the way he talked to Takeru sometimes, when the kid was down. “’It’s not like you can rewrite your brain chemistry through sheer force of will’, remember?”

Taichi closes his eyes again, pressing the heel of his palm against burning eyelids, and gritting his teeth when he finds them wet again.

“I can’t,” he repeats, voice pitched high with the despair flooding his veins, “I’m the leader! People count on me—I can’t just—give up!”

“Oh please, like you even know how to give up!” Yamato retorts, hotly enough for Taichi to picture his furious expression as if he were here, “You didn’t give up when we File Island exploded, did you? You were just a kid, and you got us all back together. You didn’t give up then, and you didn’t give up later on, ever, because that’s just not what you do.”

“I gave up after the Reboot,” Taichi points out, ears burning with shame at the memory, “if you hadn’t kicked my butt into action—”

“If you’d really given up,” Yamato counters without waiting for Taichi to finish his sentence, “it wouldn’t have made a damn difference. You’re the bravest person I know, alright? Sometimes you just need to be reminded, but that doesn’t mean you’re failing—do you want me to count all the times you had to kick my ass back into action?”

Taichi chuckles despite himself, and wipes a hint of snot on his wrist before he manages a feeble:

“It’s not a contest,Yamato.”

“No, it’s a demonstration,” Yamato replies, the smile audible in his voice. “You say you’re failing us if you’re depressed but you’re not. You’re just sick, that’s all.”

“Okay, but—”

“I know, I know,” Yamato cuts in, “you’re the leader—believe me, I spent enough time resenting you for it back then to remember. You’re good at it too—better than good, even, you’ve gotten us out of more shit than I can count, and we all know that. There’s a reason we’re so comfortable with relying on you, okay? But a team goes both way. If we’re not capable of picking up the slack when you’re too sick to do your job, we’re the ones failing you.”

Taichi doesn’t have enough words to figure out what the sudden, tight warmth in his chest—his stomach, his hands, hi neck—means, let alone express it, so he scrambles for an excuse to end the conversation before he can embarrass himself.

{ooo}

The second week of January turns into the third, and doesn’t bring any sign of respite on the work front. Taichi is called in to sit as a witness in two different prosecutions—in one case, a man’s dog has been attacking a Tokomon. In the other, a Betamon stands accused of setting a kid on fire. Both of them suck and leave Taichi too drained to give the situation proper thought, condemned to turn the facts in his head over and over and over again without managing to figure out a convincing way to present his arguments which, as he’s come to discover while on the job, pretty much means useless.

“Tell them to ask for a specialist at the stand,” Yamato tells him one night, after Taichi has ranted about the case to hell and back, “Betamons don’t even have fingers, there’s no way any of them could use a match, let alone a flame thrower.”

“I guess,” Taichi says, staring at the the mess of paper sprawled in front of him—maybe Hikari had a point about the whole cleaning up thing—“I still don’t know how to convince them Digimon are good, you know?”

“You don’t,” Yamato replies in short breaths, over the noise of a car engine—he must be jogging then, which means it’s actually earlier than Taichi thought—“we’re trying to convince the world they’re people. It means some of them will suck.”

Taichi grunts at that, unwilling to agree despite the truth of Yamato’s statement. So many things in his life—in all of his friends’ lives, really—would have gone horribly wrong if not for the help of Digimon. Yes, sure, they’re people, and statistically that means one day there will be Digimons on trial for theft, murders, and any number of horrific things the lot of them will shiver about.

That doesn’t mean Taichi has to like the idea though—doesn’t mean he’s ready to just...throw the entire species into an arena they have no way to master, even after seven years of continuous contact between the human and digital world. Every time he thinks of it, he’s reminded of the many things Agumon still fails to grasp, the political and social subtleties he still struggles with after eight years of exposure...and the two of them have an actual, battle-hardened bond. What about the Digimons who don’t have that, or whose families don’t accept or care for them?

“This is such a mess,” Taichi sighs, failing to chase the fatigue away when he rubs a hand over his face, “I don’t even know what good I’m doing—I should just quit.”

“Don’t you dare!” Yamato replies immediately—there’s a pained exclamation then, followed by some form of apology in French, and then he repeats: “don’t you dare resign now, Taichi.”

“I fail to see the difference it’d make, honestly. I mean, I did an okay job back at the beginning, but it’s not like I have that much impact over it.”

“Right,” Yamato replies with undisguised sarcasm, “it’s not like you’re the guy who single-handedly create the Department of Digital Affairs, staffed it, organized it, made sure Digimon got legally treated like people—”

“On surface,” Taichi replies with a sigh, “but they still have almost 90% chances of losing any trial they’re involved in regardless of the case, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg—they can’t even get proper insurance yet!”

“Yeah, there’s still work to do,” Yamato agrees, “but at least if I get a job with the JSA, Gabumon will get on the payroll. The ESA barely acknowledges Digimons exist—did you know they extended the recruitment age last so they could hire a guy who didn’t have a partner instead of someone who did?”

“No,” Taichi admits, “I didn’t.”

“Well now you do. Look, I know you’re tired and you feel like nothing you do makes a difference, but that’s not true. It’s just the depression talking.”

“How many times will I have to tell you I’m not depressed before you believe me?”

“Don’t know,” Yamato retorts, “how long did it take you to believe me after I split up with Sora?”

Snorting really is the only possible response to that,because they both know Taichi never did. Well, he did, eventually, but not until Yamato went through his third round of therapy, put almost five kilos back on, and Taichi nearly hit him in the face twice. The whole thing was a mess, really, and that’s just the part Taichi was actually privy to.

Honestly, even if he is depressed—he still maintains he isn’t, but he might as well indulge the theory if it serves to make a point—he’s nowhere near where Yamato went back then, and the comparison is frankly exaggerated.

It nags at Taichi’s mind though, nudging at his brain and heart until his pulse quickens in his veins and his blood runs cold with the idea. He’s feeling tired now—goes through the motions more than anything else, and it’s easy to tell someone more passionate would do a better job of it. If it’s just a rough patch, well—he’ll just have to grit his teeth and stick it out.

What if it’s more than that though? Suppose, for a moment, that Yamato is right, that things don’t get better, and this is how he feels about his job for the rest of his days, what then? The Digiworld needs somebody who actually cares, not just a guy who’s never bothered to learn to how to do anything else.

Besides, if Taichi keeps pretending he really is depressed and follows the logic, it begs the question of what happens if he doesn’t get better. Does he let things deteriorate until he makes one mistake too many and finally manages to ruin everything? Does he get number and number about everything and accepts things he should fight tooth and nails?

Because if then—if that’s what’s going to happen, then Digimons are definitely better off without him in command.

“I don’t want to be a burden,” he tells Yamato after silence has stretched between them for far too long, “it’s one thing to be a lazy slacker who can’t be bothered to clean his own flat, it’s another to turn incompetent.”

“You won’t turn incompetent,” Yamato dismisses like it’s he’s telling Taichi the Earth isn’t suddenly going to start turning the other way around, “you’re not the kind of guy who’d let himself do that.”

“Was,” Taichi corrects before he thinks better of it.

He remembers being the guy Yamato talks about—for the most part, at least. Sometimes his friends see things he never quite catches in the mirror, but that guy might as well be light years away now, for all the good he does.

“Depression isn’t who you are, Taichi. It’s just something that goes on in your brain.”

“Some people would say that’s what makes it who you are,” Taichi points out, and he’s not surprised to hear Yamato snort.

“People who say that haven’t been depressed. That kind of bullshit only makes it harder to get out of the gutter.”

Taichi has to smile at that—it’s a little stretched, maybe, but it’s sincere, which as far as he’s concerned is another sign he’s clearly not depressed. He knows depressed people can still smile—he’s seen it, after all—but the difference is he means it.

Clearly, things can’t be that bad.

“I guess,” he concedes nonetheless. Then, because it kind of has to be said: “Don’t worry though. I’m not actually thinking of resigning. I can’t do that to Meiko, anyway.”

“Good,” Yamato answers—Taichi thinks he hears something not unlike relief in his voice when he says: “I wouldn’t let you anyway.”

“Right,” Taichi retorts, adding a flippant eye-roll for good measure, even if Yamato can’t see it through the phone, “like you could stop me if I really wanted to.”

“Not directly,” Yamato replies, frightfully matter-of-fact about it, “but I did tell Agumon how bad an idea that would be.”

Taichi’s pen drops out of his hand, and he finds himself actually taking his phone away from his ear just so he can stare at it in disbelief.

What?

“You did not seriously give Agumon instructions on how I should be allowed to give my life.”

“No,” Yamato agrees without the faintest trace of embarrassment, “just a solid explanation on why you quitting would be not only be stupid—because you’re good at what you do—but also extremely damaging to your well being.”

“How dare you—” Taichi starts, only for Yamato to cut him off:

“Look, I didn’t tell him to actually stop you—no one’s going to tie you to a chair until the urge to ruin your life passes. I’m just making sure there’ll be at least one person you listen to that’ll be willing to talk some sense into you.”

“How dare you?” Taichi repeats, not placated in the least by the explanation, “how dare you presume you know better than me how to live my life?”

“Same as you did when I talked about giving up on being an astronaut,” Yamato replies, and Taichi gives up on controlling his volume right then and there to yell:

“You don’t get to direct my life!”

“No, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you ruin it because you’re too scared to admit you need help!”

“How would you even know what’s going to ruin my life?” Taichi all but screams, “You’re the one who decided to freaking exit it!”

He hangs up before Yamato can respond to that and throws his phone at the wall hard enough to crack the screen open. Fury batters at his temple, makes his head boil and colors the world red until even the rain outside becomes intolerable and, in a brief flash of concern for his neighbors, Taichi finds himself seizing his Digivice from where it’s resting at the foot of the coffee table, pointing it at his laptop, and transferring himself to the Digiworld without even bothering to check the destination coordinates.

He’s kicking at bushes before he knows it, pouring all the strength of his sudden but seemingly unending rage in the gestures until all that remains is a small mound of vaguely green and blue-ish pieces of smashed leaves.

He swallows against the urge to scream so hard it almost feels like he’s going to choke on it.

{ooo}

He must have dozed off at some point during his improvised relaxation exercises—remembers stomping aimlessly through the forest for a while before the prickling of anger under his skin grew too strong and he had to stop, lie down, and make himself go through every breathing trick he knows of—because when he opens his eyes the sky is definitely darker than it was when he got here. His body aches in all sorts of new and creative ways, including an awkward bruise on his butt from some unidentified object digging into the flesh for too long.

Taichi rubs at his eyes as he sits up, yawning and stretching until it doesn’t feel like he’ll tear a muscle if he tried to get to his feet. It’s still a hassle, but it’s a manageable one, and at least there’s no one to see him wince like an old man. Then, once he stops swaying on his feet, he takes a bleary look around, walks a couple yards farther in the forest...and groans when he realized he’s reached Tramway Lake.

Like he freaking needed that right now.

He sighs, running a hand over his face, and he’s about to turn around when a handful of iridescent butterflies reaches him, fluttering around him until he has to squint to see anything beyond them. He swats at them a couple of time, unsurprised when they don’t back down, and finally resigns to following them to the stupid tramway car.

Taichi hasn’t been there in years—not since he followed the others to retrieve their partners after the Reboot—and the signs of decays are impossible to miss. The tramway itself is covered in flora, for once, vines and grass and flowers growing around, on and inside the old hunk of meta, as if trying to hide it from view, erase it from memory. How did it survive that long, it’s a mystery.

It’s been fifteen years since they came here for the first time—fifteen years full of fighting, erosion, spontaneous data evolution, and one poorly though-out reboot. By all means, the lake—the beach, the tramway, all of it—should have vanished like an old wound scabbing over, and yet here it remains, ugly and sore as an old scar.

Taichi stares at it for a long time—tries to remember what it felt like, to see it the first time, a pristine imitation of the safer, better known world of humans in the middle of a place filled to the brim with creatures that wanted him and his friends gone—or better yet: dead. The wonder—the relief, the childish hope—has faded, washed away by years of more and more hardships thrown at his face, and although Taichi searches his own heart for a fraction of the things he felt, he can’t find anything but emptiness.

“Why do you all keep staring at random things?”

Taichi jumps and turns around fast enough to tear a hole in the grass, only to end up face to face with a very confused-looking Agumon. He doesn’t move as his partner trots up to him, standing by his side to look at the battered, rusty tramway car and its faded yellow paint.

“Hi,” Taichi manages after a beat, unable to prevent awkwardness from leaking in his meek little wave, “Weren’t you supposed to help out at the Tokomon village today?”

“I was on my way home,” Agumon says with a smile and a shrug, “it’s shorter to go through the woods than follow the road.

‘The road’ is actually more of a dirt trail, meant to ease the way for Digimons unfamiliar to the area on their way to File Island. Taichi never quite learned how the pilgrimage started—some kind of legend, from what he heard, sprouting out from heaven-knows-where after they finally managed to get rid of that freaking virus back in 2005.

It’s only Digimons for now—possibly a handful of Chosen Children as well, though considering a bunch of them have refused contact with the Odaiba team since the Reboot, it’s hard to tell—since Digivices are the only way to open a gate to the Digiworld. Taichi has hear talks, though, of what a mane this place could be if one could only get their hands on it. He keeps his association with the people who think like that to a minimum, and thanks whatever deities exist for each year the portal remains closed, but that doesn’t prevent him from hoping the Digimons will hurry up and put proper touristic structures in place, just in case.

If somebody’s going to make money off the Digiworld, it might as well be the people who live in it, and there’s no better way to ensure that than make sure the place is already well occupied when someone barges in with colonization projects.

“Are you going to answer my question?” Agumon asks, and Taichi realizes he got lost in thoughts again.

“What?”

“That thing has been here forever,” Agumon explains with a shrug that tightens around Taichi’s heart, “but every time we walk past it with one of you, you stop and stare.”

“It’s...close to where we met,” Taichi answers, gut constricting as he clasps his hands together, “and easier to find.”

Pregnant silence slips between them, until Agumon’s eyes widen and he comes up to hug Taichi’s waist, child-like spontaneity always bubbling under the surface of his Rookie form. Slowly, a little heavily, Taichi raises a hand to scratch Agumon’s head behind his ears—a soft spot he made good use of after the reboot forced them all to rediscover one another.

“It’s okay,” Agumon mutters somewhere into Taichi’s belly, his head bobbing with a nod, “I’m glad you remember all of me.”

Taichi nods, and turns his gaze back to the damaged tramway car. One day, enough time will have passed for it to fall out of existence altogether, the metal finally succumbing to the red spots already flourishing on its flanks. The thought presses at Taichi’s throat, and he can’t get rid of it no matter how hard he swallows.

One day, no one will remember this anymore—there won’t be any fading paint left, no wheels, not even a pile of rubble to remind passing Digimons that there was something there, once. Time will do its job, and it’ll be like nothing ever happened, like the lake—a third smaller already—was never there, and the seven kids who sought refuge on its bank never even existed.

In a way, it’s already stated.

No one looks at this thing the way he and the others do after all, not even their partners, why would complete strangers be any different? They’ll see a clearing, a cave, something that was once a lake, and they’ll never know how hard it was to pull a little boy and a little girl out of them. They’ll never know seven children could have died there, and in a hundred other places besides.

They’ll never look at the horizon and think ‘one of our friends died on top of this mountain, and then twice afterward’. They’ll never know what it was like to be called here and then leave, come back, leave again, and then lose everything on the third try like some kind of big, cruel cosmic joke. They’ll never know, never imagine—never care—about the day a lost little boy listened to another lost little boy playing harmonica and they somehow started a friendship that took fourteen years and several thousands of miles to start fraying.

Taichi thinks about all that—lets it all churn around in his chest, his guts, his the softest parts of his heart before he clenches his fist, greets his teeth, and starts tearing at the leaves. He pulls at them with all his weight, tears entire chunks of them off the metal, flakes of paint coming along and landing in his hair even as Agumon tries to stop him—Taichi doesn’t listen. He pulls and pulls and tears until he’s soaked with sweat, almost melting in his winter clothes even as he braces himself against a rust-red wheel to pull at a thicker root.

He’s panting—overheated and gross—by the time he’s done, surrounded by the cold silence of a winter night, and he almost doesn’t notice when Agumon sets a clawed paw on his elbow.

“Taichi,” Agumon says in a gentle tone when Taichi fails to react, “you’re crying.”

“Yeah,” Taichi manages as he folds into himself on the sand, “I know.”

It doesn’t stop for quite a while.

{ooo}

It’s long past dinner time when Taichi and Agumon finally make it back to their flat and find Veemon and Daisuke watching TV in the living room, almost as if nothing happened. Two full bowls of noodles wait on the table next to two empty ones, and Taichi’s stomach drops like a stone when he realizes Daisuke and his partner must have been waiting on Agumon and him for a while before they ate.

“Gone for a walk?” Daisuke asks, more concern than awkwardness in his expression.

Taichi nods.

“I needed a break from work,” he says, which isn’t entirely a lie, even if the causes were more complex than that.

He watches Agumon gather the bowls and carry them over to the microwave as he braces himself to ask:

“I didn’t think you’d be back from Jun’s so soon.”

“Neither did I,” Daisuke replies, managing a little smile to go with his shrug, “but we got on each other’s nerves faster than I thought. Do you want us to turn the volume down so you can work?”

Taichi frowns—almost asks what Daisuke is talking about—before he notices the way Veemon nods at the neat stack of paper sitting next to the TV, carefully ordered according to Taichi’s color-coding system. The pile of dust has been swept out from behind the apartment door, and when Taichi glances at the kitchen, the pile of dishes he kept meaning to wash is gone.

“Thank you,” he mutters, ears heating up faster than he thought possible, “but I think just the image would be enough to distract me.”

He bows a little—in thanks and apology both—and hurries to his bedroom before Daisuke’s worried expression and Veemon’s innocent question—‘Why are his eyes so red?’—turn the weird wobbling of his knees into something even more pathetic.

{ooo}

Dinner is a predictably bleak affair, despite a full five minutes spent trying to work the enthusiasm for it. Trues, Taichi hasn’t been enjoying food to its fullest these past few weeks, but then he was living off instant ramen and other junk food items all through Daisuke’s absence, so there’s nothing suspicious about that. Daisuke’s noodles failing to cheer him, on the other hand, is a bit of a different picnic. There’s a reason Taichi volunteered for every round of recipe-testing, and contrary to what Yamato said it most definitely wasn’t a bottomless stomach.

Tonight though, the dish seems to have lost its deliciousness in profit of the bitter tang of knowing he doesn’t deserve his friends.

(Taichi manages a smile when Agumon polishes off the last of the meal, though. At least one of them is properly appreciative of Daisuke’s talent.)

Taichi pulls his textbooks out as soon as he’s done with dinner, shoulders drooping with the gesture, even as his head fills with cotton. He pushes through it, though: if he stopped studying every time it felt beyond his strength, he wouldn’t have gotten anything done for at least a month.

He doesn’t have time to get fully into it though, because he’s barely cracked the first one open when Agumon asks in a pensive voice:

“Do you think you should see a sychatris?”

“Psychiatrist,” Taichi corrects, before he registers the question and turns around with a frown: “where did you even hear that word?”

“I asked Gabumon how Yamato got better,” Agumon replies with infuriating candor, “after he broke up with Sora and got sick in the head. Gabumon said that’s what that type of doctors was called.”

Taichi stays silent—can’t muster the energy for a shrug even as he looks around his room and notices the pieces of his phone lying next to the door. The screen, clearly damaged beyond repair, nicks at his thumb when he tries to slot the parts back in place, and Taichi hisses.

“So,” Agumon asks again after a moment, “do you think you should see a psychiatrist?”

“No,” Taichi replies around his thumb, “because I’m not sick.”

“But you haven’t been very well for a while now,” Agumon protests, more puzzlement than insistence in his tone, “and Yamato said—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Taichi cuts in, “’Taichi’s going to do something stupid again, blah blah blah’—don’t worry, he told me.”

“That’s not what he said,” Agumon starts, but Taichi’s head buzzes too hard for him to register the words before he says:

“I’m not like him—I’m not sick. I don’t need a psychiatrist.”

“I’m just saying,” Agumon, tries again, but Taichi’s patience is coming apart fast and he cuts his partner off again:

“You’re just saying I should do what Yamato said, or what he did, or what he thinks—or whatever,  really.”

“But—”

“He’s all I hear about these days!” Taichi continues, anger burning at his temples, “When he’s not calling me you guys keep telling me I should live my life according to him, well guess what—I’m a freaking adult, and I don’t need anyone to babysit me, let alone a guy who stormed off to the other side of the world!”

“But Taichi, he’s trying to help! You’re not—”

“Not what? Mature enough?” Taichi spits, going from anger to rage, to fury, “Adult enough? Brave enough? I’m not enough of a leader? The war’s over, Agumon! Nobody needs me to be these things anymore!”

“Taichi!”

Taichi pushes Agumon’s paws away from him in a brusque gesture that earns him a long scratch on the forearm, blood boiling a fever into his skin as he all but shouts:

“Don’t ‘Taichi’ me! I don’t care what everybody says, I’m fine! And if you think Yamato knows better than me about this then you can fucking go to him instead of bothering me about it!”

Taichi turns away from Agumon with a strangled exclamation of anger, heart racing with it until it feels like he’s about to faint and he has to scream into his pillow before the whole thing becomes too much. He stays like that for a long while, face shoved into the fabric of his bed until his breathing goes back to something vaguely normal and he finally registers the thirst that’s been clawing at his mouth for who knows how long.

With a grunt, he peels himself off the bed—groans again when he realizes it’s almost eight PM—and half-stumbles to his bedroom door. He almost knocks into Daisuke and Veemon when he opens it, and barely has time to wonder how long they’ve been standing there before Daisuke frowns and asks:

“Is everything okay? Agumon left in a hurry. He wouldn’t tell us why.”

Taichi snorts at that, pretty sure he was loud enough for half the building to hear what went on, but he doesn’t have time to speak before Veemon says:

“He looked kind of sick! Kind of like that weekend after Oikawa—”

“He’ll be fine,” Taichi snaps while Veemon slaps a hand over his mouth, “can I go get some water now, or is the interrogation not over yet?”

“Woah,” Daisuke says, face souring, “calm down, we’re just trying to help here!”

“Right,” Taichi replies, “like you’ve got any reason to want to be nice to me right now.”

He pushes past a gobsmacked Daisuke and, instead of the kitchen, head for the bathroom, where he dives under the hot spray as fast as humanly possible. He finds the living room empty and Daisuke’s door firmly shut when he comes out, heart and gut sinking at the sight, and retreats to his room without a sound.

He’s not sure hows he falls asleep despite the biles burning at his stomach.

{ooo}

Loud banging on the door wakes him up some time later, fast enough that he doesn’t even think of checking the time before he grunts into his pillow—most likely manages to make it sound like ‘go away’—but all it does is make the banging louder and closer to the ground, like whoever is on the other side of the door switched from fists to feet.

“Go away,” he yells, stubbornly keeping his eyes closed even as he angles his mouth away from the pillow so there won’t be any mistaking him this time.

“No!” Yamato yells back through the door.

Taichi’s eyes snap open, and he straightens up fast enough to make his head spin with sudden loss of blood, Yamato’s foot still pounding at the door.

“I’m warning you,” Yamato shouts without a pause in his kicking, “I’m not going away until you open the fucking door or it falls down!”

Taichi knows Yamato well enough to realize he’s perfectly capable of putting his threat to execution, and once his head stops spinning he doesn’t waste time in getting to his feet and padding to the door to the dull rhythm of his bedroom walls’ shivers.

He finds Yamato standing there in a gray shirt and and blue boxer briefs, crazy bed hair framing the redness of his face where pillow creases are only just fading. Taichi watches him grip the door, wedge his foot in the threshold, and glare like he’s daring Taichi to try and break his toes to get out of that argument.

“Picture this,” Yamato says, voice tight and knuckles white around the door frame, “It’s one in the morning, I’m finally asleep after the shittiest fucking day I’ve had in a while, and then my grandfather starts hollering about finding a potato-shaped worm with antennae in the kitchen.”

Taichi’s blood freezes in his veins, and he tries to push the door closed but Yamato won’t have it: he pushes back hard enough to send Taichi reeling back, slips into the room, and pushes the door shut before he continues:

“So I make sure my granddad isn’t having a heart attack there and then, get Gabumon to help him back to bed, and when I finally try to get to the so-called rat who do I find?”

“I—“

“Koromon,” Yamato says before Taichi can even really start his sentence, “crying his heart out on the tiles.”

“Of course he rant to y—”

“And then,” Yamato continues, his glare promising fierce retribution should Taichi try to interrupt again, “when I finally get him to calm down and get here, I find Daisuke all but sulking on the couch because apparently being an ass to one person wasn’t enough to fill your daily quota!”

“All I did was tell him to leave me alone!” Taichi protests at that, “he was being intrusive, and Veemon started talking about—”

“What? How terrible you’re acting?”

Yamato still looks ready to chew Taichi’s head off—or, failing that, tear him a new one—at the slightest hint of a dissatisfying answer, and the thought of it—of having to stay polite and calm when Mister Yamato portaled his righteous butt over to Japan just so he could have a good yelling—turns Taichi’s fear to anger, heat flaring all through his head tay polite and calm and deferent just because mister Yamato has decided to get his gracious ass back to Japan solely in order to yell at him—turns his fear to anger, flares up in painful heat between his ears as he explodes:

“You know what? Screw you! It’s none of your business what goes on in my life—”

“It is when your Digimon comes crying into my kitchen at ass o’clock in the morning!”

“And what are you gonna do about it, punch me in the face?”

“Trust me,” Yamato replies, low and utterly serious, “if I thought it’d help I would!”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Taichi hisses, rigid with fury, voice hoarse from how much he still wants to scream, and Yamato sneers:

“Yeah, sure, nothing in life gives me more pleasure!”

“Well you can go be judgmental somewhere else,” Taichi tells him, crossing his arms over his chest—Yamato’s hands tighten into fists, and he grows at least two shades redder—but doesn’t move—as Taichi steps into his personal space: “All I hear these days is ‘Yamato this’ and ‘Yamato that’, even my own freaking Digimon—”

“Is that why you kicked him out?” Yamato cuts off, face going slack with disbelief, “because he dared to remember someone had a similar problem and tried to use the same techniques to help you?”

“No,” Taichi hisses, heart beating impossibly faster when he steps forward again and Yamato still doesn’t give an inch, “it’s because I’m tired of people always shoving you in my face when you fucking left eight years ago!”

Taichi watches Yamato deflate at that—blink a little—and then something seems to click in his demeanor: he straightens up to his full height, towering over Taichi with all the rigidity of a five inches gap, and suddenly Taichi finds himself stepping back and thinking ‘oh shit’.

“Taichi, did you seriously do this to Agumon because you’re pissed at me for leaving?”

“I’m not!” Taichi insists, voice climbing and cracking on the last word, “but it’s high time people understood I can live my life without you!”

“And what are you gonna do next time Hikari offers advice?” Yamato asks, voice still dangerously low, “slap her in the face because she’s got her own life and you can’t stand it?”

“That’s not—”

“They’re trying to help, you moron!” Yamato screams—Taichi hears something falls to the ground in the general direction of the kitchen, but he’s too caught up in the argument to be embarrassed that Daisuke might hear—“Because you’ve been acting like a fucking depressed mess for the past two months now, and you won’t fucking listen to reason, and we’ve all got enough collective experience to know therapy is an important part of the healing process!”

“Then why not talk about Sora?” Taichi replies in the same volume, hands aching with how tight his fists are, voice grating at his throat until it almost feels like it’s about to start bleeding, “Why not talk about Ken, or Iori, or Takeru—”

“Because I’m your best friend! Because you’re being an ass, and because apparently I’m the only one who’s willing to actually try and knock your head out of your fucking ass!”

Yamato takes a step forward in anger, and when Taichi tries to step back he stumbles on his futon falls head over heels on the ground, knocking his head against the floorboard in the process—it doesn’t stop Yamato though, but Taichi refuses to look at him even as he keeps shouting:

“Because when Daisuke came back, he found you living in a fucking mountain of instant ramen and chips bags and Hikari told him you hung up on her the last time she tried to talk about it, because you haven’t called your mother in three weeks—which you’ve never forgotten to do before—and because Koromon was convinced you hated him and never wanted to see him again!”

Taichi screwed his eyes shut at some point of Yamato’s tirade, and he presses a hand against his eyelids now, clammy skin unable to stop the burning there—unable to do anything against the sharp stone lodged in his throat, shattering his breath in some pitiful, fragmented thing he barely gets any oxygen out of.

“I don’t hate him,” he manages eventually, and flinches when the futon dips under Yamato’s weight, “I don’t—I never meant—I’m the leader!”

His voice turns into a whine, and he swallows hard around it, painful and shallow—Yamato’s hand come to rest on his shoulder, fingers pressing into the flesh there, and Taichi has to make an effort not to lean into the touch. Instead, he forces out some kind of pitiful squeak and:

“I can’t just expect you guys to solve my problems for me! I’ve got to deal with it my own way!”

“Aside from the fact that we’ve already established this very idea is bullshit,” Yamato says, voice soft through the hoarseness of too much shouting, “so far your own way includes pushing everyone away from you, saying hurtful things you don’t really mean and—correct me if I’m wrong about that one—hating yourself for doing it.”

Taichi shrugs, but he doesn’t move his hands away from his face as he gulps painful breaths between his wrists. Sometimes, having someone who knows you that well is a real pain in the butt.

“You wanna know who that reminds me of?” Yamato asks after a stretch of silence, and this time Taichi snorts.

“Not really.”

“Too bad, I’m sure you’d know the guy.”

Taichi reaches back to swat at Yamato—ends up knocking against his friend’s knee, hissing in pain and, somehow, laughing about it into his palm.

He wipes at his eyes then, cool wetness collecting on his hands as he does. His backbone pops when he straightens up and sits properly on the futon, staring down at his hands—they’re pale, shining with tears in the thin stripes of city lines that filter in, and Taichi flexes the fingers just to make sure they’re really his.

Outside the room, Veemon’s voice says something, too muffled to hear—either that, or Taichi doesn’t have the brain power required to process the words just now—and then there’s a shush, and silence.

His ears burn.

“Anyway,” Yamato continues without turning, leaning back on his hands, “this guy—let’s say his name is Tamato—”

Taichi snorts again, and gets a light slap on the shoulder for it.

“He did the same thing, and then his best friend punched him in the face—”

“Kicked him in the shin,” Taichi corrects, and Yamato frowns:

“Wasn’t that the second time around? I’m talking about the third. The big one.”

“Whatever,” Taichi shrugs, and while he’s not completely relaxed, he at least manages to unfold his legs from under him, “it doesn’t really matter.”

“It does though,” Yamato replies without missing a beat, “’cause if it wasn’t for the punch Tamato wouldn’t have realized he could—and should—ask for help.”

“You haven’t punched me in the face,” Taichi mumbles for the sake of argument, and Yamato rolls his eyes:

“That can be arranged.”

Taichi turns to stare at Yamato with a shocked look that should, frankly, not be there. It’s not like either of them has ever hesitated to start punching when they felt it was warranted, but the casualty of Yamato’s offer it’s...new. Not bad—nor particularly good—just new. Taichi had forgotten their friendship could still surprise him.

“Seriously though,” Yamato says after a while, “I’m not yelling at you ‘cause I like it. I do it ‘cause—”

“Cause I deserve it,” Taichi admits, gaze shifting from Yamato’s decidedly more awake face to his own knees, “I’ve been a complete asshole these past few months. Especially today.”

“Yeah,” Yamato admits, shifting to sit cross-legged on the futon, “but it’s also because you’re capable of being better than that.”

“Ha. I’m not sure everyone would agree right now.”

Yamato snorts at that, and it takes effort for Taichi not to squirm.

“Yeah,” Yamato says, dripping with sarcasm, “they all hate you. That’s why Daisuke pretty much begged me not to be too hard on you, and Koromon barely even admitted you treated him like crap.”

“I think you got just as hard as I needed,” Taichi mutters.

It takes him a few seconds to catch up when Yamato snorts, and then they’re both laughing at the terrible double entendre, fresh tears flooding Taichi’s face—they don’t burn this time around, though, which is honestly a relief in and of itself.

“Look”, Yamato says a few minutes later, wiping tears of laughter off his cheeks, “people like you enough to forgive your crap. Deal with it.”

Taichi snorts again—it doesn’t devolve into laughter this time, his nerves settled enough not to need the pressure relief anymore—then sighs before he asks:

“What do I do now?”

He’d probably deserve for Daisuke to yell at him for thirty minutes straight, but then he can’t exactly walk up to the guy and ask that favor of him. Sighing again, Taichi brings his knees up to his chest and winds his arms around his legs, while Yamato turns to squint at him:

“You do realize the irony of asking me that just now, right?”

“Shut up,” Taichi mutters at Yamato’s gentle mocking, shrugging the concern off.

As Yamato himself stated, he hasn’t exactly been stellar in the decision-making these days, he might as well take the advice now that he’s finally ready to ask for it.

“I’m still annoyed,” he admits, guts tight with too many things he needs to make amend for, “but clearly you guys were right. I am incapable of dealing with this on my own.”

“Yeah, because depression is a bigger deal than your average cold,” Yamato points out.

“You did it,” Taichi counters, “you were on your own—”

“If you discount the phone calls,” Yamato counters, ticking items off on his fingers, “the emails, the visits, Gabumon’s headbutts, your yelling, my granddad...do I need to keep going?”

“Nah,” Taichi says—it turns into a yawn halfway through, and Yamato answers with one of his own before Taichi finishes: “I think I get it. Gotta be more like you,” he finishes in, only half-joking.

Yamato swears under his breath, closing his eyes and sweeping both hands over his face as if trying to push some patience into himself. To be fair, Taichi definitely had the same reaction to him at various point, so it’s not like this is a shock.

“Let’s go over this one last time,” Yamato groans after a bit, “people aren’t trying to turn you into me, they’re trying to help you with the solutions they know worked for the most similar case we’ve had, which happens to be the way I failed to deal with depression. If you wanted them to take you on beach holidays and jogging trips, you should have done like Sora and gone catatonic.”

“Hey!”

Taichi punches Yamato’s shoulder for that, less than gently, because there are ways to discuss this that don’t make it sound like Sora was just trying to be interesting, dammit!

It doesn’t change the fact that Yamato has a point, though—learning ikebana may have been a life saver for Sora, but it probably wouldn’t have worked as well for Taichi. Certainly, even.

God, but he’s been so stupid.

“Seriously,” he asks, ears burning in shame again, fresh heat prickling at the corner of his eyes when he blinks, “what do I do now?”

“Get some sleep, for starters,” Yamato yawns, “and not just ‘cause I’m tired. You’ll think better once you’ve rested a little. Then, you’re gonna do what you do best: screw your courage to the sticking place and do the right thing, even if it sucks.”

“Will you do the thing where you stay close an pretend you’re not listening in?” Taichi asks, and he’s relieved to see Yamato roll his eyes, as if anything but that was completely unthinkable.

Taichi may be a bone-head, but at least he’s got great friends.

“I missed you,” he admits, the words tumbling from his mouth just as he thinks them, and when Yamato bumps their shoulders together he adds: “I’m sorry I got upset with you. You’ve got a right to live your dream, even if it’s on the other side of the world.”

It’s not even like they haven’t been in contact either, really, it’s just—France is terribly far away, and phoning is just not the same thing as a real sleepover.

“I missed you too,” Yamato says, fondness chasing some of the obvious fatigue out of his features. “You know I didn’t mean you had to start on things tonight, right?”

“Yeah,” Taichi says with an awkward little smile, “but I don’t think Daisuke is asleep, and I’m not going to get any rest until I do this anyway.”

“Okay,” Yamato says with a nods, getting to his feet when Taichi does, “but maybe you should let Koromon sleep on this as well before you talk to him?”

His words are soft, careful, and Taichi nods. He doesn’t like the idea of waiting—was never really good at leaving problems alone, especially when he’s got a solution, or even just the beginning of one. He wants to do this right, however, and right now Yamato is probably in a better position to judge than him.

“I really screwed up,” he sighs, carding a hand through his hair, “didn’t I?”

“Oh, you should have seen me at my lowest,” Yamato says with an easy shrug, “you’re not even close.”

“What did you do?” Taichi asks without bothering to hide his disbelief, “Slap Gabumon in the face?”

“I sent him out so I could lock myself in the bathroom and slice my wrists open in peace.”

Taichi turns back around to face Yamato so fast he almost topples right into the guy. He doesn’t, though, and they stand like that for a long time, Taichi’s hand hanging limply at his side while Yamato shifts from foot to foot, hands moving to his hips like he’s trying to hook his fingers into the belt of his boxers.

When, at last, it appears Yamato isn’t going to provide more detail on his own, Taichi breathes:

“When?”

“Winter after Sora and I broke up, not long after I met Guillaume.”

Taichi has heard the name before—Yamato’s first boyfriend. He didn’t know about the history that came with it, though.

“I...wasn’t ready,” Yamato adds, looking like he’d rather be saying anything else, “things with Sora got—ugly. We got really nasty with each other and then the whole gay thing I—I don’t know. It made sense at the time, but I—”

“Couldn’t explain it if you tried?”

Yamato shrugs at that, and Taichi nods in understanding. He hasn’t given his ‘conversation’ with Agumon proper thought yet, but the motives for it—the things that made him tick and essentially go berserk—seem fuzzy already, like some kind of weird spell came over him and changed him into something he can’t quite recognize.

It’s still him, though, and he’ll have to deal with that soon, but not just now. There’s a more pressing topic, just now.

“No wonder you panicked when I missed that call,” Taichi mutters, the memory of Ken’s anxious face floating at the edge of his mind. Then, barely above a whisper, he asks: “What stopped you?”

“It hurt,” Yamato answers with a grimace that seems to say ‘dumb, uh?’, “and there was a lot of blood. It scared the crap out of me, so I called my granddad. He came home like a freaking hurricane, closed the whole thing up—turns out the cut was too shallow to even work—and then he slapped me in the face so hard I got a headache.”

Yamato half-chuckles, half-snorts at the memory, and Taichi has to bite the inside of his cheek not to scold him for it.

“He made me swear I’d tell my therapist about it—I did, and she referred me to a psychiatrist so I could get some medication. Gabumon refused to talk to me for three weeks straight.”

“Alright,” Taichi manages to say, trying—and failing—to make it sound like a light comment, “clearly, you win.”

“Yeah. Don’t tell Takeru.”

Taichi nods—then, on impulse, he pulls Yamato into a lopsided hug. His friend stiffens a bit at first, but he relaxes quickly enough, and Taichi sighs with relief he didn’t even know he should have felt.

“I’m glad you’re still alive,” he says, the words far too late but important anyway, “and I’m glad you’re enough of a friend to yell at me when I need it.”

“Yeah,” Yamato sighs, head bent to rest on Taichi’s shoulder, “me too. I’m glad I haven’t managed to ruin our friendship yet.”

Taichi snorts, and flicks Yamato’s ear.

{ooo}

Once Yamato has left though the DigiPortal, Taichi takes a look at the golden light slipping out from under Daisuke’s bedroom door, and decides he’s going to need some props.

He ends up standing in front of the door several minutes later, two steamy mugs of hot cocoa in hands, and wondering how he’s going to knock without toppling the frankly obscene amount of whipped cream and mini-marshmallows he managed to stack on top when the door opens, revealing a sleepy Veemon in the middle of a yawn while his free hand scratches idly at his butt.

“Oh,” the Digimon says when he realizes Taichi is there, “hi, Taichi.”

“Hi,” Taichi replies, resisting the urge to squirm or wave, for fear of spilling whipped cream on the floor, “I thought I’d—may I come in?”

Taichi carefully holds the cup out with what he hopes is an appropriately contrite and embarrassed expression, and tries not to look too obviously relieved when Veemon nods. On the bed, Daisuke groans when Veemon shakes him back to awareness, and turns around in the slowest, most sluggish way Taichi has ever witnessed. He doesn’t allow himself to be impatient about it. Veemon waits for Daisuke to blinks at Taichi—for his eyes to widen when he notices the mugs—and hurries out of the room, claws clicking on the floor as he makes his way to the bathroom.

Taichi waits for Daisuke to awaken properly, and hopes the whipped cream doesn’t end up melting on his fingers.

“Hi, Taichi,” Daisuke manages after some more bleary blinking and a lot of squinting, “is that for me?”

“And Veemon,” Taichi confirms, handing one of the mugs over.

Taichi glances at the alarm clock while Daisuke bites half the cream off his drink in one large gulp—nearly nine PM. Hopefully, the neighbors will forgive the noise.

He turns back to Daisuke just in time to see his nose emerge from the ceramic cup, a spot of whipped cream clinging to his nose when he gives Taichi a grin:

“Thanks,” he says, “it’s awesome.”

“It’s the least I can do,” Taichi says, a little too low, while his stomach twists and the distant flush of the toilets punctuates his sentence, “after....”

“It’s forgotten,” Daisuke says, hand swiping at some imaginary speck in the air, “right Veemon?”

“It is if you say it is,” Veemon replies, all but pulling his mug out of Taichi’s hand, “there’s not much I wouldn’t forgive for a treat like that!”

Taichi watches Veemon sit down on the floor and dive into his cocoa with a happy wiggle of his stubby tail, fishing marshmallows out of the drink with delicate swipes of his claws. It makes Taichi smiles, and when he looks back at Daisuke, the latter mouths ‘Tail!’ at him with a fondly mocking expression on his face.

“Seriously,” Veemon says after a bit, “Wormmon explained—it’s like when Ken was the Digimon Emperor. It’s not really you. So it’s okay.”

“It’s more complicated,” Taichi starts, but Daisuke cuts him off:

“You’re sick is what he means. What you did wasn’t nice, but it also wasn’t really your fault, in a way, you know?”

“I pretty much insulted you for trying to help me,” Taichi points out, frustration mounting when Daisuke doesn’t seem to get it, “I called you a bad friend!”

“Yeah, like I said, rude,” Daisuke replies with a shrug,”but also not as bad as you seem to think it is.”

There’s a pause when Taichi tries to figure out how to answer that. If he’d said the same thing to Yamato—when he said the same thing to Yamato, several years ago—he’d have gotten punched in the face. He did, too, once.

Daisuke, on the other hand, seems to have taken it far better than Taichi had any right to expect.

“I treated you like crap,” Taichi manages at last, “even if I’m sick, that doesn’t make it alright!”

“It doesn’t,” Daisuke agrees, “and if you keep acting like I’m not your friend I might think of taking Yamato’s advice and slapping you in the face. But right now, we’re okay.”

“But,” Taichi splutters, unsure why he’s even pressing his luck so far, “I don’t deserve it! Being sick—”

“But Taichi,” Veemon pipes up from his place on the floor, “forgiveness isn’t about what you deserve.”

It takes a long time—and Daisuke’s increasingly amused expression—before Taichi manages to close his mouth after he hears that.

He may or may not have to wipe his eyes again when he leaves the room.

{ooo}

Taichi’s heart beats fast when he follows Yamato into the kitchen of his French apartment the next day. He barely pays attention to the uneven floorboards, the moldings on top of the walls, the authentic baguette discarded on the table. All he’s got eyes for is the way Koromon freezes, and Gabumon waits until the smaller Digimon nods before he exits the room with Yamato.

“Hey,” Taichi tries, mostly because it seemed to work with Veemon last night.

He’s not prepared for the wet note in Koromon’s voice when he says:

“Hey.”

“I’m sorry,” Taichi says, words rushing out of him with the urgency of something absolutely vital, even as he goes to his knees, “I shouldn’t have treated you like that—you were trying to help. It wasn’t right of me to blow up at you, even if I’m not feeling well.”

“I thought you hated me,” Koromon says with a glance at the corridor next to the kitchen.

Evidently, he’s been prepared for the conversation. It doesn’t bother Taichi as much as he would have thought.

“I thought you’d never want to see me again. You swore at me!”

“I’m sorry,” Taichi repeats, “I don’t know why I said the things I said, I never—I’m not even really that upset about being compared to Yamato it’s just—everyone’s leaving. They’re all—I don’t know. Nothing is ever going to be the same again, nothing is, and no one remembers and—and—it doesn’t matter, actually. It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. I was cruel, and mean, and wrong. I’m sorry. I don’t want to lose you.”

“I don’t want to lose you either,” Koromon says, “but you can’t do that again. I want to help you, but I can’t do it if you won’t talk to me—or let me ask other people to understand what’s going on.”

“I know,” Taichi says, pulling his head even lower, “I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry I said something wrong,” Koromon continues, but this time Taichi doesn’t let him finish:

“You didn’t. It’s me. I got—I’m not sure what got over me. But I shouldn’t have let it hurt you. I promise I’ll do my best to answer your questions from now on.”

Koromon gives Taichi a long, quizzical look—Taichi tries not to squirm too much even as he steals a glance up—and then he digivolves to Agumon with a whistling pop, and pulls at Taichi’s shoulders until their eyes are at the same level.

“Good,” Agumon says, and then Taichi is engulfed into a hug.

He hugs back with all the strength he has, breathes the smell of Agumon’s scales as deep as he can as relief floods every inch of him, dragging tears out of him he doesn’t even attempt to wipe off.

“You were right to leave,” he half-whispers, half-whines, tightening the hug when Agumon tries to pull away at the words, “not because I don’t want you around, but because you deserve better. I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want you to let me hurt you. And I don’t want to lose you a second time.”

“Yamato said I was right, too,” Agumon mutters after a brief, tense pause that ends with him melting into the hug again, “and Papy, too. It didn’t feel good.”

“I know,” Taichi tells him, “but you were still right. Sometimes doing the right thing hurts.”

“That fucking sucks.”

Taichi pulls away from Agumon to stare at him in surprise and, before they know it, they’re laughing themselves silly, nerves seeping out of Taichi with every tears leaking on his cheeks. He hugs Agumon again, tears of laughter turning into tears of exhaustion as easy as flipping a switch, and it’s a relief when Agumon pats his back through it all.

“So,” Agumon asks when Taichi is done drying his eyes and blowing his nose several minutes later, “what are you going to do now?”

“First,” Taichi says with a glance at the mechanical clock hanging above the door, “if you’re okay with it, I’d like to go home and get breakfast.”

“Sure!” Agumon says, usual grin back in place over his lips, “I don’t think anyone here will mind.”

“We won’t,” Yamato pipes up from...wherever he is, really, Taichi doesn’t actually care.

“Okay,” he calls back instead, smiling despite himself, “thanks for the input, eavesdropper!”

Agumon hides his laughter behind his paws, and Taichi smiles at the gesture, before he continues:

“Then, I’m going to book an appointment with a therapist—it’s a bit like a psychiatrist,” he explains when Agumon’s face turns interrogative, “and we’ll see how it goes from there. Deal?”

“Of course,” Agumon says.

“You,” Yamato hisses into the phone before Taichi is even done greeting him, “are the worst meddler in the history of sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Taichi replies without missing a beat, but all it gets him is a snort that ends on a jaw-cracking yawn.

There’s a sigh then, carrying the mental image of Yamato pinching at the bridge of his nose over the phone while Taichi tries to pull his socks on one-handed without falling on his face.

“Are you seriously trying to tell me you have nothing to do with Daisuke’s break up?”

“Okay, first of all,” Taichi corrects, eyebrows knitting in a frown of his own, “it’s not a break up when the people involved aren’t even dating. Second—come on, at least listen to me before you start groaning!”

Yamato mutters something about a headache, which Taichi hears as the jab it is even as the sound of a chair scrapping on floorboard rises and falls in the background, followed by the dull slap of a thick book falling shut. Taichi glances at the clock, and almost groans in turn when he realizes it’s past midnight in Paris, which means either Yamato forgot about calling him until it was time for him to go to sleep, or he stayed up just so he could yell at Taichi as fast as possible.

Freaking typical.

“Look,” he says instead of starting another argument—which, given his history and levels of irritation, he’s kind of grimly proud about—“he asked me if he should date that girl! All I said was that if he had to ask me then it might not be the best of ideas.”

“Which you knew was going to drive them apart,” Yamato says, but doesn’t ask. “But you still said it because she’s not one of us and you don’t like that.”

“That’s got nothing to do with it!” Taichi yelps, hating the way it makes him sound guiltier than he truly is or feels.

All he did was answer his roommate’s question and give a sincere piece of advice—Yamato may not like it, but that doesn’t make it wrong, thank you very much! Besides, it’s not like he’s telling Daisuke he should stop all kind of dating—or any dating at all really. If he’d tried to convince the guy to stay single, now that would have been egoistical and downright cruel, but Taichi has no motive of that kind, and he crosses his arms over his chest in annoyance, shoulders tightening when Yamato insists:

“Right. I assume it has nothing to do with wanting to keep him as a roommate either?”

“Of course not!” Taichi retorts, and he almost hangs up when Yamato sighs his ‘why are we even friends’ sigh. Instead, he insists: “It doesn’t, Yamato! I’m trying to spare him useless pain, why would you even think—”

“Because you’re still grumbling about Hikari and Takeru dating even after seven years—”

“I don’t mind them dating,” Taichi starts, but this time it’s Yamato’s turn to interrupt with:

“You tried to convince her their flat was too big,” he says, voice rising in volume and decreasing sharply, probably when he remembers the time it is at his place.

“Well it is a little—”

“It’s twenty square meters!” Yamato hisses, pitch climbing up as he makes obvious efforts to stay quiet, “And it’s not like it’s a new problem either—you’ve never really been okay with any of us dating.”

“I congratulated Mimi and Koush—wait, has she picked her new name yet?”

She only came out as a transgender woman a couple months ago, and she’s been hesitating on a new name ever since—it makes sense she’d want to take her time about it, but sometimes Taichi can’t help feeling like it’s a bit of an awkward situation.

“Not yet,” Yamato says after a moment of reflexion, tone calmer for the interruption. “But even if we overlook the fact that you also congratulated them on their breakup after only three months, your main source of happiness back then was, and I quote, that they ‘kept it in the family’.”

Taichi has to wince at that, because this was really not his shiniest moment. Still, he thinks as he locks his flat behind him and bypasses the elevator in favor of the stairs, more conductive to an argument, Yamato is definitely giving the incident more weight than it deserves.

“Alright,” he admits with a sigh even as he switches the staircase lights on, “the phrasing was a bit creepy but—”

“It was downright gross,” Yamato interrupts, apparently determined not to let anything slide, “and not just because of the wording—you can’t just act like there’s no one else we can date than other chosen children!”

“Well it’s not like anyone else is going to get what it’s like!”

It’s been fourteen years since their first trip to the Digiworld, and Yamato may dislike it but the fact remains that, as experience has proved numerous times, even the other groups of chosen children can’t quite share the experience. Turns out US-comics were wrong: when the strange monsters tried to destroy the earth, it’s Japan that got the worst of it.

It’s nobody’s fault, really, and Taichi hasn’t resented the fate he got saddled with in years now, but the other teams, they had it easy. And even if they hadn’t—even with the non-negligible amount of crap that fell on their noses—they didn’t go through it the same way Taichi and his friends have, they don’t carry the scars the same way they do. They have different cultures and different roles and different expectations and that’s okay...it just means not even them understand what the experience was like for the Odaiba kids.

“Daisuke doesn’t care,” Yamato says, voice muffled by a rustle of fabric against the phone receiver.

He must be getting ready for the night.

“How would you know that,” Taichi asks even though it is, admittedly, not the kindest argument to pick, “you barely even talk to him!”

“His sister does,” Yamato replies without a pause, but his voice sounds tighter around the words, “and so does yours, and they both agree he didn’t even seem to realize there was a difference to be felt until you shoved it in his head.”

Taichi didn’t think people could really splutter indignantly, but what he’s doing right now really does sound like it. It’s entirely Yamato’s fault, though, because the nerve—the willful misinterpretation is just—how dare he! Yes, sure, most of them are dealing with it okay—they’ve got mostly normal lives if you except the occasional star-struck Digimon and a recent offer for a documentary about their adventures from a very reputable history channel...and yes, sure, they’ve all got twelve other Chosen children—plus their Digimon partners—to confide in and rely on, and that plays a lot.

It doesn’t erase everything though—Taichi has yet to hear about a group of friends who’s faced as many cases of depression, of nightmares, of random outbursts and awkward moments as theirs has, and Yamato of all people should know how hard it can be to go through this.

To mention that would be a low blow, though, and Taichi steers away from the argument, bringing up his other concern instead:

“You haven’t met the girl,” he says, “there’s something off about her!”

“Akiko’s biggest flaw is that she’s not one of the people we’ve been exclusively hanging out with since fifth grade,” Yamato snaps, “and you know it. Maybe I haven’t seen her, but I know she’s as much of a scatterbrained dork as Daisuke, which—”

“Now you’re making it sound like he’s stupid!” Taichi protests.

He hears Yamato stutter a bit—there’s echo in the background, almost drowned out by the sound of traffic on Taichi’s end of the line, but it does still sound like Yamato has retreated to the bathroom—before he recovers and hisses:

“He dropped out of school to open a noodle cart for fuck’s sake!”

“Which he’s paying his part of the rent with,” Taichi points out, “and it’ll cover the rest of his expenses too, so if you think he doesn’t deserve better than a simple waitress just because—”

Yamato swears on the other end of the phone, and Taichi does groan at that, temples beating with a headache even as he reaches his bus stop and glares at the street. Stupid Yamato, shoving his stupid face on the other side of the stupid world, like there aren’t any decent universities in Japan offering the stupid biology degree he decided to go for.

At least if he’d stayed, they could have this stupid argument face to face and settle it over a cup of tea or whatever.

“Do you even hear yourself talking?” Yamato asks when he’s done hissing invectives into the phone, “’he deserves better than a simple waitress’, seriously? Did we take a jump back to the eighteenth century I wasn’t aware of?”

“All I’m saying,” Taichi ties to say, only to be interrupted right away, real anger cracking through Yamato’s voice this time:

“All you’re saying is you’ll literally grasp at any reason Daisuke shouldn’t date Akiko, all because you can’t stand the idea of him leaving you behind like your sister did!”

“Hikari didn’t leave me behind,” Taichi protests, hand closing tighter against his phone, “she texts me almost as much as you do!”

“And yet,” Yamato retorts, sarcasm dripping from his voice thick enough Taichi can hear it over the bustle of commuters climbing on and exiting the bus, “you still act like she did, including with this.”

Yamato sighs, like he’s had this conversation far too often already—he hasn’t, Taichi would know—and insists:

“I know you don’t mean to hurt anyone, Taichi, but that’s what you’re going to do if you keep going that way.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Taichi says, annoyed enough by now that he barely notices the streets his bus is driving by, and nearly misses the stop for his university, “I’m not going to hurt him.”

On the other end of the line, Yamato’s snort—wrapped in the sound of running water, possibly because he’s run out of patience and decided to brush his teeth in the middle of a conversation like some kind of animal—is quite explicit as to how much he believes that. Taichi takes a deep breath and counts the steps from his bus stop to the university gates before he has a chance to explode.

There’s a bit of scratching, the sound of someone spitting, and Yamato sighs again:

“There’s only thirteen of us in Japan, remember? And none of the girls are available. That’s a pretty limited dating pool you’re building him.”

“Mimi and Miyako are into dudes,” Taichi points out, but even he can’t argue when Yamato scoffs.

“Mimi is even farther away from Japan than I am and she’s not the long-distance relationship type. And the very idea of Daisuke and Miyako in any kind of romantic relationship is just begging for disaster.”

“Okay,” Taichi admits, because he may be as stubborn as Yamato, but even he knows a losing battle when he sees one, “no girl available. But Daisuke is bisexual.”

“And who do you think is going to date him? You, Iori, or me?”

“I don’t want to date Daisuke!” Taichi protests, ears warming up a tad too fast.

He’s not the last to call Daisuke easy on the eyes—to the guy’s face, even!—and he may or may not have toyed with the idea a little on one of the rare occasions he drank too much, but the truth of it is, aside from the rather obvious lack of romantic attraction there, that would make things even more awkward when well-meaning strangers mistake them for brothers.

Really, they’re better off as friends.

“Well,” Yamato deadpans, “then considering I’m not interested in dating him—”

“You’re not interested in dating, period,” Taichi replies, unable to hide the hint of triumph in his voice.

“It’s not about my issues, Taichi,” Yamato half-sighs, half-yawns as a door clicks shut in the background, “I’m not interested in anything remotely close to romantic with Daisuke, which leaves him with Iori, and I’m pretty sure his partners would murder Daisuke in less than a day.”

“Ken isn’t dating anyone.”

“I don’t think you’ll get our second token straight to date a guy.”

“We don’t know that he is,” Taichi protests, lowering his voice as he nears his classroom, fifteen minutes early, “he could still be in the closet.”

“We’ve hit every stripe on the rainbow-meter,” Yamato deadpans in a rustle of sheets, “either he’s straight or he’s clearly not ready for dating.” A yawn. “And even if I’m wrong, you can’t just play pair the spares with our friends.”

“They’re barely even your friends,” Taichi snaps.

It’s a low blow and he knows it—Yamato may not speak with Daisuke on a regular basis, but he’s already demonstrated he was willing to go the extra mile for the guy’s sake anyway. Out of all the chosen children Taichi knows of, Yamato is probably the one whose bond to the rest of their little community are the strongest—there’s a reason why the rallying point shifted from Taichi to him in later years, after all.

Yamato’s relationship to Daisuke is still nowhere close to what he and Taichi have, though, or even to what exists between Yamato and Jyou, or Koushiro, whatever name she might end up picking. Yamato is a devoted friend, and so is Daisuke—it’s just easy to see their circles aren’t exactly perfect matches.

“Fuck you,” Yamato replies, the gritting of his teeth almost audible even through the phone, “you don’t get to tell me I’m a bad friend when you’re the one about to send him head first into the fucking wall!”

“He and Ken like each other,” Taichi replies, ears burning at him without it being enough to stop him.

“So did Sora and I,” Yamato spits—this time Taichi forgets to keep an indoor voice when he protests:

“That was different!”

He wasn’t privy to the whole disaster—there are things about those five years of dating (and one year of post-breakup chilly awkwardness) not even Takeru knows about, both the former couple and their Digimons incredibly tight-lipped about the whole affair. Taichi stood by the two of them throughout it all though, left them in peace when they needed him to, yelled at them when they needed him to, and collected the freaking pieces when they needed him to.

He may not have seen the car crash, but he was there for the clean up and oh, boy, is he glad he had help with that, because he’d have ended up in the gutter right alongside them if the others hadn’t picked up the slack.

At some point it almost seemed like their group wouldn’t survive the shift.

“We liked each other,” Yamato repeats. “See how ridiculous you sound now?”

“Look, it sucked—big time,” Taichi agrees, because there was never any way to beat around that particular bush, “but Ken and Daisuke are older—they know what their sexualities are by now.”

“I didn’t at their age.”

Taichi swallows back another, more pointed low blow—he can still hear Yamato’s anger simmering under the thin layer of ice in his voice, and putting a spark to it now would really be asking for an explosion. Instead, he says:

“Hikari and Takeru are happy.”

“Exception that confirms the rule,” Yamato replies with a hint of dark humor, “the rest of our intra-dating attempts only ever ended up bitting us in the ass. I’m pretty sure we’ve all had enough of dating other Digisaviors for a lifetime, thank you very much.”

“Digisaviors?” Taichi repeats with a blink, “where the hell did you pick that?”

“That’s what they call us in France,” Yamato brushes off, “don’t try to drop the topic. I’m your friend, okay? And as a friend I’m telling you you’re about to fuck up big time and you need to stop.”

“And I am telling you, you’re wrong.”

There’s a break in the conversation while Gabumon’s sleepy voice whines in the distance—poor guy must have had a hard time staying asleep with Yamato talking almost nonstop for the last, what? Half hour? How is he even still awake anyway? Last Taichi checked, Yamato went out like a light at eight PM like the old man he’s always secretly been.

Taichi listens to his friend apologize to his partner in a more subdued voice—frowning when they switch to French for a couple of sentences before Yamato sighs-yawns again:

“You’re a brilliant politician,” he says, and Taichi’s chest warms at the words, even though he can’t quite manage a smile for it after such a long-winded argument, “but sometimes when it comes to our friends you’re so oblivious you make me want to slap you across the phone.”

“Well screw you too,” Taichi replies as the door opens up to let the previous class out, “I’ve got class. Bye.”

He hangs up before Yamato can say anything else, and spends the rest of the morning ignoring the weird mix of satisfaction and nausea hanging at the edge of his stomach.

{ooo}

Hikari and Takeru, when Taichi visits them for the first time, look nauseatingly domestic. It hasn’t even been three months since they moved in together—a fact which, Taichi might add, none of their parents were ecstatic about—but their cupboard of a studio looks homely and lived-in already. It’s tiny, sure, and the fold-up couch at the back looks enormous, cramped as it is between the tiniest of bathroom and a cooking area that barely deserves the name, but the kids move through it like they wouldn’t give up the occasional bump for all the space in the world.

Taichi kind of wants to gag, but that would be pushing it.

“I still think you’re too young,” he mutters around his cup of tea, and while Takeru stays silent—although close as he is, it’s impossible to mistake the way he stiffens at the words—Hikari doesn’t share the same restraints:

“If you start this conversation again,” she says with a daring look in her eyes, “I will kick you out.”

Taichi manages half of a placating gesture with his right hand while the left keeps his mug close to his mouth, hiding his face from view. The words press at the edge of his lips, lemon-sour against his tongue, but even he can only have the same conversation so many times before he gives up, and he’s had the this one with Hikari often enough that he knows her arguments by heart now.

‘We haven’t been kids since 1999, haven’t been at peace for that long ever, haven’t got any reason to breakup, haven’t got any reason to wait’—Taichi has heard it all.

If he’s being very honest with himself—he doesn’t like to, where this topic is concerned—Taichi is also capable of admitting that all these ‘we haven’t’s come shadowed in a lot of ‘we have’s. ‘We’ve been supporting and helping and understanding each other since before we were ten,’ Hikari probably thinks, but never quite says, ‘we’ve been sent to war younger than anyone else, we have a right to enter peace early, too’.

Maybe they do.

It doesn’t mean Taichi has to approve.

“Fine,” he says anyway, because there’s a difference between disapproving his sister’s choice and actively antagonizing her over it, “so how do you guys keep this place clean? Did my sister move in with a neat freak?”

“Of all the possible subjects,” Hikari starts with a long-suffering sigh, but Takeru beats her to it:

“Sorry, wrong brother.”

“It’s a dual effort,” Hikari approves, tone still stiff, while her boyfriend throws Taichi a worried look.

Taichi’s lips lift at that, thin and short-lived. He hasn’t forgotten the way he argued with Yamato last week—hasn’t missed the absence of texts other than the automated ‘go eat something’ Yamato sends so Taichi won’t forget one too many meals in profit of his political sciences textbooks and drop dead in a pool of his own sweat.

(Yamato’s words, not Taichi’s.)

Despite it all though, it’s impossible not to remember how insanely ordered Yamato’s bedroom always seemed whenever Taichi visited the Ishida’s, before Yamato decided a year in Moscow to learn Russian wasn’t long or far enough away and picked a French university for his higher education.

“How do you keep things clean?” Hikari asks after a pause—Taichi may have gotten a little sidetracked there, because she’s gone from irritated to almost worried in record time.

“Dual effort,” Taichi replies, deliberately paraphrasing her, although it sounds more flat than teasing, even to his own ears. “We clean up after ourselves in the common areas and we deal with our own rooms. Why, how many centimeters of filth did you think I lived in?”

Hikari’s fingers twitch, same as they do whenever their parents get a little too overbearing during their weekly phone calls, and Taichi almost takes offense at that—he’s ready to admit he didn’t start his visit in the best way, but there’s nothing to be annoyed about in what he just said, honestly!

“We’re just a little worried,” Takeru says in a soothing tone, one hand landing on Hikari’s shoulder all casual like, as if Taichi weren’t going to notice the way his thumb rubs circles over her jumper, “you’ve seemed a little down since we moved in here and—”

“It’s the end of November,” Taichi points out with a roll of his eyes before Takeru can finish his sentence, “I’ve got a ton of exams coming up. Of course I’m tired.”

He doesn’t miss the glance floating between Takeru and Hikari—doesn’t miss the little twist of Takeru’s lips like he’s seeing something he was bracing himself for—and he’s a little more forceful than he should be when he sets his cup down on the tiny coffee table:

“You know I can take care of myself, right? I’ve got the rent covered—”

“It’s not the rent I’m wo—”

“I know how to operate a washing machine and a vacuum cleaner, I can even cook, contrary to what your brother likes to pretend!”

“Hey, let’s not get Yamato involved,” Takeru says, raising his hands in defense, but Taichi’s annoyance is loose now, and he doesn’t really try to restrain himself when he says:

“Don’t worry, he doesn’t need me to involve him in pretty much every aspects of my life, he does that perfectly well on his own!”

Both Hikari and Takeru’s eyes widen at his words, and Taichi has to make a conscious effort to stay seated, breathe in deep and swallow some of his anger down. They’re trying to look out for him, he reminds himself. Sure, they’re insulting him—and possibly Daisuke, a little—when they act like he’s going to crash and burn now his little sister has left him behind, despite the presence of a roommate who proved a perfectly sensible leader and friend in difficult time.

Still, their hearts are in the right place, and Taichi clings to that for as long as it takes to calm himself down—at least until he’s reasonably sure he won’t let his words say imply things he doesn’t really mean.

“Look,” he manages after a while—the others, he notes, have waited him out, like defusing a bomb, and the thought makes him clench his fists together—“Daisuke and I may not be in the same state of domestic bliss as you, but that doesn’t mean we’re headed for disaster either, thank you very much.”

They share a look again—full of things they’ve already discussed to hell and back, Taichi bets, full of things they don’t want him to hear although, judging by the way they look at him afterwards, he might be concerned anyway.

“Okay,” Hikari says at last, articulation as careful as the hand she extends to touch Taichi’s knuckles with, “it’s just that I’ve—I’m a little concerned about that thing with the waitress—”

“Oh my—” Taichi cuts himself off to brush a hand over his face, “let me guess, Yamato called you?”

“I learned it from Daisuke,” Hikari replies, eyebrows drawing together, “I didn’t know Yamato knew you were involved.”

“When does he not know a thing about me?” Taichi scoffs, “Whatever I don’t tell him he can learn from any of us—even my own sister, apparently!”

“First of all,” Hikari counters, visibly refusing to back down, “I’ve already said I didn’t tell him about what you did. And secondly, can you really blame us? He’s the one who gets the best results when it comes to getting through to you!”

“He’s on the other side of the freaking world,” Taichi snaps at her, getting on his feet, “you guys need to stop pretending like he can control my life from there.”

“Nobody thinks that!” Takeru yelps, indignation written all over his features,but Taichi doesn’t believe him.

People running to Yamato as soon as they have a problem with Taichi—or what he’s doing, or how he’s living, apparently—is nothing new, of course, but for the love of everything, the guy left Japan over eight years ago, it’s time everyone started getting with the program!

“Look,” Taichi says, kind of proud of how he manages to keep his voice level despite the abrupt urge to yell until everyone leaves him alone, “I’ve got Agumon and Daisuke, I’m doing fine, and I don’t need Yamato to chaperon me, thank you very much.”

He gets to his feet after that, gathers his things and leaves before Hikari or Takeru can protest—before one of them can say something that will be blown out of proportion and they have a real argument.

Then he goes home, settles into some old comedy reruns with Agumon by his side and some leftover pizza in his plate, and waits until Daisuke comes home so he can investigates the guy’s feeling for Ken a little more thoroughly and finally clear the day’s frustrations and contrarieties out of his mind.

{ooo}

For a few days, Taichi worries Hikari’s intervention—and the text-based mutual apology they engage in the day after—means she’ll try to get more involved in his life again. Part of him wouldn’t mind, but she is his little sister: he’s the one that should take care of her, not the reverse. Much like the rest of their group, though, Hikari is simply too busy to make time for anything that isn’t her immediate life.

Taichi himself barely even leaves his flat unless he’s got classes or he needs to attend a work meeting in person which, given most of his meetings involve Digimon—and therefore a webcam or two—is getting fairly rare. The end result is that he shares his time between studying, trying to convince his country’s government to officially condemn the USA’s decision to maintain Digimons’ legal status as pets, and the blissful, mind-numbing relief of bad comedy and not wearing that isn’t at least at pajamas-levels of comfort.

He gets a couple of texts from Sora inviting him over to Kyoto—refuses, too tired to bother with the effort after so much mental exhaustion—and a long email from Kou’ he has yet to answer—he wants to, he does, but it’s kind of hard writing something long when the only thing you have time for in your life is work, work, work, and some bits of university crammed in there. Taichi can barely make time for Agumon these days, he can’t be blamed for not joining the others on their outings, collective or not!

The only positive effect of this, really, is that studying until the small hours of night means more chances of catching Yamato in the middle of his day, which means they end up texting even more than they did before their fight, saving Taichi’s social life from being entirely limited to his own flat.

Ken’s visit are a good thing, too, but for different reasons.

He’s constantly around these days. He pretends he’s there to see Taichi, which is a little ridiculous—then again, maybe Yamato’s theory has merit and the kid isn’t quite ready to put himself out there—but he’s always willing to talk about Daisuke—or Veemon, or the things he and Wormon do with the other two—whenever Taichi steers the conversation in that direction.

It’s adorable in how oblivious Ken thinks Taichi is, and kind of refreshing in the innocence of the scheme, although Taichi sometimes wants to tell Ken being more forward, or at least talking to Daisuke, would be more efficient.

Either way, though, his matchmaking projects are looking quite auspicious, and while he tries to keep them to himself so he can avoid Yamato’s disbelieving sarcasm and reproaches, Taichi can’t help but feel very satisfied by his good work.

{ooo}

“I will never understand,” Yamato sighs into the phone in the middle of a Saturday night in early-December, “how you can be such a brilliant politician and fail so completely at understanding people at the same time.”

“I’m going to pretend I only heard the nice part of this,” Taichi says, stretching his legs under his parents’ kotatsu, “but only because I feel magnanimous.”

His parents treated him to the best home-made meal ever for lunch—or at least the endless chain of instant ramen and leftover junk food he survives on when Daisuke doesn’t bring noodles back from work made it feel that way—there’s a heater roasting at his feet, and so far he’s spent his afternoon doing exactly nothing but watch Agumon snore the time away between two micro-naps of his own. Throw in his mother’s solicitude—her constant concern over his well being just short of overbearing—and the satisfaction of being positively toasty when it’s only six or seven degrees out, and you’d be hard pressed to find more mollifying conditions.

“I’ll repeat myself then,” Yamato replies, something sizzling on his end of the line.

Taichi glances at the kitchen clock, and raises an eyebrow when he realizes it must be around eight AM in France...by Yamato’s standard, it’s a positively indecent time to be having breakfast.

“You suck at figuring out what the rest of us want.”

“I don’t!” Taichi protests, patience shrinking faster than snow on a Meramon as he straightens up, “I told you, Ken just keeps talking about Daisuke—”

“Do you even let him talk about anything else?” Yamato interrupts with far too much sarcasm, “Maybe he’d be happy to talk about your job, too.”

“My job is boring,” Taichi replies with a shrug, nodding at his mom when she comes to sit beside him with her crosswords, “why would he want to ask about it?”

“He’s polite,” Yamato replies without missing a beat—the sizzling stops, replaced by the sound of a pan scrapping against something hard, and a persistent buzzing coming to an abrupt halt before Yamato continues: “he genuinely cares about you—oh and also you’re one of the people who has the most influence on whether or not Digimon will be allowed in the police force.”

“I’m not that influent, Yamato.”

“Fine,” Yamato deadpans, “maybe he’s just doing this because Hikari and I asked him to check in on you since he’s the one that lives closest to you with the most free time.”

“Right,” Taichi snorts, opening and closing his free hand into a fist near his head for his mother’s benefit, “like I’m going to believe that.”

“Then we’re back to the ‘your work is not boring’ part of that conversation,” Yamato concludes, so matter of fact Taichi can almost see him shrug.

“Please,” Taichi protests with a grunt loud enough to make his mother turn away from her crosswords and back at him, “last week I had to talk a bunch of Numemons not to attack the prime—”

“There was an attack?”

Taichi turns to look at his mother—the worried lines around her mouth and under her eyes, the frown crinkling at her eyebrows as her knuckles whiten around her pencil—and almost wants to slap himself in the face for being so careless. He’s usually better at controlling his vocabulary—but then it’s harder to remember when he’s talking to one of the others.

Now his mother looks pale and tense, bracing herself for the worse before Taichi can even blink, and he can’t blame her for it—he knows he can’t, not with everything he already put her through—but that doesn’t prevent the spark of irritation blooming in his chest, tightening the fingers of his free hand around his thigh as he reassures her:

“With stink bombs, mom. It’s gross, but it’s not dangerous.”

“Really?” His mother insists, and Taichi clamps down hard on the wave of annoyance roiling against his stomach.

“Yes,” he promises, hating the way it’s not enough to placate his mother’s worrying.

“Would you tell me if it was?” She insists, and Taichi sort of wants to answer ‘no’.

He never has, after all—not when he was a kid and it could have meant getting out of things entirely, not when he was a preteen he wasn’t even directly involved, not when he was a teenager and he and his sister cried into her shoulder for almost an hour. What else was he supposed to do, anyway? It’s not like she could have done anything but sit and wait, none of the people actually involved having time to stop and explain the situation to her—Taichi has done a lot of that when he was a kid, watching doctors and nurses busy themselves with his little sister without realizing there was another child there. He wasn’t about to put her through that as well.

He started counting the weeks until he could move out of the family flat when he peed his bed a few days after Yamato left for his semester in Moscow, and hasn’t even dreamed of coming back ever since.

“You know what,” he tells his mother, face aching with a stiff smile, “I think I’m going to take this call outside.”

“Sweetie,” his mother tries, easily sensing the distance, “you don’t have to—”

“No, it’s okay,” Taichi tells her, getting to his feet before she can touch him, “I’m feeling stuffy anyway. I can use the fresh air.”

He gives his mother one last would-be reassuring grimace, and tries not to look too obvious in his flight as he steps out on the balcony with nothing but slippers and a thick pullover to protect him from the cold. He sighs as soon as the glass door slides shut behind him, and purposefully keeps his gaze fixed on the skyline so he doesn’t have to watch his mother instead.

“Outsider freak out?” Yamato asks after a while, voice softer than before.

“It’s my fault,” Taichi says with a shrug—his voice is a little thick, but he’s pretty sure he’s going to catch a cold out there, so he doesn’t let it bother him too much—“I slipped.”

Yamato hums in response, and Taichi almost asks if Yamato thinks he should have known better, too, but his stomach constricts at the thought, and the question leaves a bitter taste of bile in his mouth when he swallows it down. Instead, what he asks is:

“Does it ever happen to you?”

“Like I talk to my parents enough for them to freak out.”

“Takeru could,” Taichi says, but Yamato scoffs.

“To my mother, maybe. Not the old man, though.”

Taichi nods at that, and then Yamato tells him to wait before he starts saying something in French—Taichi has no idea what. He’s not surprised by Yamato’s dismissal—has spent enough nights at the Ishida residence before Yamato left the country to take an educated guess as to why his friend is so close-lipped around his family—but that doesn’t prevent his heart from sinking as he listens to Yamato exchanges what must be goodbyes with his grandfather.

It’s hard to understand that kind of situation when you haven’t lived it, after all, and Taichi doesn’t need someone who doesn’t get it right now.

“Pappy flipped out once,” Yamato says after silence has stretched between them for several seconds with no ending in sight, “it was definitely my fault. We...talk more. Since then.”

“Do you tell him about the nightmares?”

Yamato makes a garbled noise around his breakfast that could mean anything from ‘I don’t have nightmares’--Taichi has countless middle-of-the-night texts and conversations that say otherwise—to ‘we sit at the kitchen table and swap war stories: I talk about Digimons and he talks about killing Nazis’ —or whatever Yamato’s grandfather did back in the French Resistance. Something in Taichi’s stomach twists at the sound, somewhere between envy and sadness, and since he can’t quite figure out which is which he decides to go back to safer grounds:

“Well, we can’t prevent them from worrying,” he says, trying to sound more cheerful than he really is, “but at least we can rejoice in the future success of operation Kensuke—and shut up, it’s a great portmanteau.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Yamato deadpans, and it’s easy to reply:

“You were about to.”

“You never know,” Yamato says with a rattle of cutlery jostling around in a plate, “if reason doesn’t work maybe aesthetics will.”

Taichi blows a raspberry into the phone out of principles more than anything else and, unsurprisingly enough, the only thing they exchange from then on is childish bickering, until Yamato has to beg out of the conversation so he can go attend his latest bootcamp. Taichi pretends to think Yamato is just admitting defeat, but the truth is he can’t feel his toes anymore and it’s a relief to come inside. He rubs some warmth back into his arms, wincing as returning blood prickles along his veins, and then startles when he realizes his mother is still there, looking at him like he just did something adorable.

Taichi hasn’t seen that kind of smile on her—or on his father, for that matter—since he was a child trying to act older than he was for his sister’s sake. The Digiworld and its host of complications erased that smile right off Taichi’s parents’ face when it turned out he really had to make decisions that should have been far beyond his years, and seeing it back because of something as simple as a conversation with his best friend makes Taichi pause.

“What?”

“I was just thinking how much you’ve grown,” his mother says, a touch of nostalgia gracing the edges of her smile, “not so long ago a disagreement with Yamato would have ended in a shouting match.”

Taichi’s face floods with heat, and he looks to the ground as he remembers a week of near complete silence in the aftermath of what should have been a fairly innocent argument. ‘I’m twenty five, ‘ma,’ he mutters instead of telling her about that.

She’s still smiling when he leaves, and that’s worth more than the exact truth.

{ooo}

He manages to phone Sora a few days before 2013 turns into 2014, and catching up with her somehow manages to shave something like ten years off his shoulders. It’s early in life, maybe, to think like that, but that doesn’t prevent Taichi from feeling the difference when the weight vanishes.

He’s not sure how they get around to discussing Daisuke and his growing crush on Ken, but he does know how flabbergasted he feels when she says:

“I just hope it’s not going to go too far.”

Taichi blinks at her through the video chat window, face owlish enough that Biyomon giggles at him from behind Sora’s shoulder. He’s a little too caught off guard to care though, because what on Earth?

“What do you mean, ‘too far?’”

“Well Ken is clearly not interested,” Sora explains with a wide shrugs—she pauses to answer a presumably important text before she finishes: “if Daisuke falls in love with him it’s going to make things really awkward. And painful.”

“Or not,” Taichi manages after chasing his own voice for a few seconds, “might be you’re wrong and they’re going to be perfectly happy together.”

Sora’s shoulders move like she’s putting their hands together—picking at the skin around her nails, maybe—and then she mumbles:

“Maybe.”

She sounds skeptical, at best, and changes the topic fast after that, grilling Taichi on his work and home life. He lies a little—makes up a couple of solitary outings just to spare himself the shame of admitting his social life has pretty much vanished, and does his best to sound like Digital World diplomacy is as fascinating a topic as it was when he started out—but mostly sticks to things that would be true if he wasn’t so busy and tired.

He brushes her off—gently—when she tries to warn him again, though. She may have the crest of love but she’s too far to have real clarity on the situation, and Taichi isn’t that brainless thank you very much.

{ooo}

It takes some effort not to gloat when Ken’s visits increase after their group’s New Year reunion—Taichi didn’t miss the effort Ken put in preparing the whole event and while simple kindness was definitely involved in the process, it certainly doesn’t explain the kid’s enthusiasm about it, or how much discussion of Daisuke’s qualities, life and project he can endure. Even Taichi is getting a little tired of the topic, and he’s the one who usually starts with it!

He’s had to slow down a bit in the past few days, because Wormon asked if Taichi was interested in Daisuke which wouldn’t be a problem if not for the fact that it isn’t what Taichi is going for at all. Besides, knowing Ken’s tendency to close up when he’s upset—second only to Yamato in that regard—if Taichi doesn’t set him straight, pun completely unintended, he might end up giving up on what might turn out to be the best thing of his life.

That would honestly be unacceptable.

So, Taichi makes it clear he’s not interested in Daisuke that way, keeps encouraging both Ken and Daisuke’s attention to the other, and celebrates with a much deserved sake shot one night—or maybe more like two or three.

(Agumon and Daisuke freak out when they find the bottle—not even half empty—so Taichi decides not to have a long-distance toast with Yamato about it, but that doesn’t prevent him from cheering a little every time he spots even the smallest sign of progress in his project.)

{ooo}

Taichi spends most of the weekend after New Year’s sitting on his TV with leftover cereals, watching reruns of Takeshi’s Castle while the others are either out or, in Agumon’s case, visiting a Tokomon village on File Continent. It’s not a bad program: it keeps complicated thoughts at bay and lets him idle the day away without guilt, which is all he’s asking for these days.

He spends an unusually bright Sunday morning like that, ignoring the world around him until someone runs up to his door—the footsteps echo through the corridor for a long moment before there’s banging on the door, and Ken’s voice calls out Taichi’s name through the wood. Taichi blinks and sighs at the sounds, peeling himself from the couch with the ache of too little movement in his joints before he makes his way to the door.

“Oh my—are you alright?” Ken manages, out of breath, when Taichi opens the door and nearly brains him in the process, “You weren’t answering your phone!”

“...I was sleeping?” Taichi replies, shaping the words with more care than entirely necessary, “what’s the matter?”

“Yamato tried to call you six time,” Ken replies, breathing slowly getting back to a normal rhythm, “you didn’t answer!”

“No,” Taichi repeats, more slowly, “because I was sleeping.”

It’s far too early for Yamato to be calling though—it must be around three AM in Paris right now, which is closer to late yesterday than it is to early this morning, and Taichi frowns when he realizes there’s only one possible explanation for the disruption.

“What happened?” He asks Ken even as he rushes back to his bedroom to retrieve his laptop, “Is Mr. Takashi going to be alright?”

“What?”

“Mr. Takashi!” Taichi repeats, opening his laptop in the same breath, “If it were a Digimon thing you’d have led with that so Yamato called for something else, and unless something happened to him or Gabumon, then it’s got to be his grandfather, so how is he?”

“I don’t know,” Ken replies, crossing his arms over his shoulders, “Yamato didn’t mention.”

Taichi pauses, confused.

“Then why on earth is he calling that early?”

“Taichi, it’s not early,” Ken says with the same careful enunciation Taichi used earlier, “it’s almost five PM.”

Taichi stares at Ken over the edge of his laptop, the orange glow of his screen almost painfully bright between them while he scrambles to gather his thoughts, and yet only manages a feeble:

“What?”

“It’s almost five PM,” Ken repeats like Taichi might break if the news is delivered too abruptly, “Yamato asked me to check in on you because you missed your phone call.”

“I—ju—what?” Taichi stutters, still unable to make full use of his braincells, “what do you mean he asked you to check in on me?”

“Well,” Ken answers with a heavy blush, “we’ve all been sort of worried about you lately, and you didn’t seem ready to listen, so I agreed to keep an eye on you...then when you didn’t answer on Skype or on your phone, Yamato asked me to pop by and I just...trusted his instincts, I guess.”

“...what?”

Ken’s face goes from flushed to beet red in record time, and Taichi almost feels his own eyes turn into panicked spirals as one realization follows another and he all but yells:

“What do you mean, you were keeping an eye on me?”

“Like said,” Ken says, shoving his hands behind his back, “we were all worried...I’m the one who lives closest, and your place is on my way from the academy, that’s all. Why did you think I spent so much time here?”

“To see Daisuke?” Taichi replies, hoping the high-pitch of his voice doesn’t erase the ‘duh’ from it.

“I see him every day while he works,” Ken points out, puzzlement pushing at the edge of his obvious discomfort, “I can talk to him there. Besides, if I were visiting him, I’d at least talk to him.”

“Okay,” Taichi answers, bringing his hands up to rub at the slowly-forming migraine between his temples, “so you’re...not interested in him?”

Ken blinks and looks down at his crossed arms as if expecting Wormon to be there—as if looking for comfort in the shared confusion—before he shakes his head with a helpless little shrug and says:

“You know I’m straight, don’t you? I mean. I’m actually demiromantic, but I’m still not interested in men.”

Taichi’s eyes widen, heart hammering louder and louder in his ears and against his ribcage as he absorbs the enormity of his mistake.

Months—he’s spent months encouraging Daisuke’s crush, shedding as much of a positive light on the prospective match as he could manage, plotting and congratulating himself on a project well-managed, and all that for what, exactly?

He shies away from the answer like stepping back from the edge of a cliff you were about to fall off of, clenches his fingers into fists, and tries to breathe deeply through his nose. What does his reasons matter? The result is exactly the same: he was warned against this. Extensively so, even, but it wasn’t enough to stop him, and now Daisuke’s the one who’s going to pay the price.

“Oh my god,” he mutters, “what have I—”

“It’s okay,” Ken interrupts, clearly misreading his intent, “what matters is you’re safe.”

Taichi looks back at Ken’s face then—stares at the concern in his dark eyes—and tries to listen to his friend’s word while his brain slowly turns into some bland cotton-candy thing.

“It’s just—you’ve lost a lot of weight in the past few months,” Ken says like he’s reciting a list, “you haven’t been playing soccer—Hikari said you didn’t even eat much even when your mom was cooking. And then Yamato told us you sounded bored about your work and you’d started texting him at odd hours—it wasn’t that hard to put two and two together.”

Taichi frowns at that, going over Ken’s speech in his head—abrupt weight loss, lack of appetite, loss of enthusiasm...and okay, he woke up at five today, but that’s just because work and university left him positively exhausted for heaven’s sake!

“You think I’m depressed?” He asks anyway, just to confirm—he manages to be disappointed at the way Ken’s face softens no matter what, and squashes the feeling as hard and fast as he can manage. “I’m not depressed,” he promises.

“Taichi,” Ken starts, but Taichi cuts him off:

“I’m really not. I’m just super tired—I see how it can look that way, but just because it looks like it doesn’t mean I am.”

“In my experience,” Ken starts, but Taichi cuts him off with a raised hand:

“Ken, I’m not depressed. Stop worrying, and tell the others too—I’m fine. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have something important to take care of.”

He all but pushes Ken out of the apartment after that, deploying considerable amounts of energy on convincing the guy not to worry—it doesn’t look like it works but, at last, Taichi is alone again, and he can finally catch a breath.

After all, if he’s going to have to break a friend’s heart—all through his own usual, pathological, bullheaded stupidity—he might as well take some time to figure out the least bad way of doing that.

If it even exists, that is.

{ooo}

Daisuke looks down at his hands while Taichi’s face catches fire, sweat boiling under his armpits while the burning heat of shame licks at his neck and ears.

It’s only been a couple of hours since Ken left the flat, and maybe Taichi could have given himself more time before he had to face this conversation, but what would have been the point? Delaying things protects no one but himself, and if anything he deserves the discomfort after what he did. He’s the bearer of Courage, dammit! He’s supposed to be a leader—to keep his team safe—and all he’s done lately is set one of them up for heartbreak while he made all the others worry!

Suffering for it won’t change anything to the situation, but at least it should ease his mind.

“I really am sorry,” he promises for what must be the third time in as many minutes, “I don’t—I shouldn’t have encouraged you without knowing...I shouldn’t even have gotten involved at all, actually. I never meant for you to get hurt—I’m so sorry.”

“Well,” Daisuke starts, almost—but not quite—managing to hide the shiver in his voice, “you were trying to help. That happens.”

Taichi opens his mouth to answer—tries to nod in assent and accept the forgiveness he’s so readily presented with—but the words stick at the back of his throat and he looks at the ground instead, fingers digging so hard in the flesh of his thighs even his knuckles ache. He stays silent, and lets the weight of his shame drag his shoulders down, down, down, until he’s almost kissing his own knees.

He barely resists the urge to bang his head against the bones when, after a long, painful silence, Daisuke leaves the living room and slams the door to his bedroom shut behind him.

{ooo}

“I can’t even believe anyone thought I’d make a good ambassador,” Taichi tells Yamato when he catches him on the phone a several hours later, “I’m so—so—stupid and selfish!”

Yamato half-yawns, half-grunts into the phone, and Taichi listens to the rustle of fabric on his friend’s end of the line, followed with another soft grunt when—Taichi assumes—Yamato realizes what time it is.

It strikes him, now, that there is quite a lot of irony in waking someone late at night so he can complain about being too selfish, but then the damage is already done by now—and Yamato will just call back if Taichi hangs up anyway.

“Sorry,” he says nonetheless, glad, for once, that Agumon isn’t here to witness the interaction, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize—”

“Calm down, it’s barely past nine here,” Yamato tells him in a whisper—Gabumon must be sleeping in the same room, meaning Taichi could end up indirectly waking the Digimon up as well.

Things just get better and better.

“The real question is why are you up at five AM?”

“You were right about Daisuke,” Taichi admits in lieu of an answer, ears still burning, “about Ken—about everything.”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line—Taichi imagines he can hear Yamato frown, impossible though he knows it to be.

“I assume,” Yamato says in a careful tone, “that you apologized already and he didn’t take it too well?”

“He took it very well, actually,” Taichi admits in a tight voice, “better than I had any right to hope for. He thought I was just trying to be nice.”

“So you set him straight.”

Taichi swallows around the thick lump in his throat—refuses to let the burn of his eyelids become anything more, even if it takes some loud, deep breathing Yamato is sure to identify. At least the living room is dark now, and neither Daisuke nor Veemon have given any indication they wanted to come out so far.

“I didn’t even have enough guts for that,” Taichi admits, shame rushing back to life with the words, “I just sat there and let him figure it out for himself.”

“At least you didn’t lie,” Yamato points out, tone more gentle than it has any right to be—it stiffens Taichi’s back, claws at his throat until he hisses:

“You sound like you don’t even mind!”

“Fine. You were stupid, pigheaded and selfish, and you got Daisuke hurt, just like I said you would,” Yamato says, each words sharp as a knife, “does it make you feel better?”

“No,” Taichi admits.

In Yamato’s defense, it’s not like anything has a chance of succeeding at that just now.

“Then saying it was pointless,” Yamato says, voice barely above a whisper, “you’re a decent human being. You feel bad enough about this without me adding to it.”

“For all the good it does to Daisuke,” Taichi mutters, and Yamato snorts.

“I don’t think you can do anything about that just now,” he says, “you’ve said your piece, now give him space so he can think things through. Then we’ll see how it goes.”

Taichi sighs and nods, even though he knows Yamato can’t possibly hear that, much less see it.

Yamato’s right, though: there isn’t much to be done about Daisuke’s predicament right now, and it’s not Taichi’s place to do it. Excruciating as it is, the only thing he can do is wait.

“What if he doesn’t want anything to do with me afterwards?”

The question left Taichi’s lips almost of its own accord, cold dread flooding his lungs at the though. What if Daisuke decides to leave for good—what if the others feel like they have to make a choice, what if Taichi’s stupidity just damaged their group beyond repair?

“I don’t think he’ll do that,” Yamato starts, but Taichi snorts before he can finish his sentence:

“How would you even know that?”

“Because I wouldn’t,” Yamato says, matter-of-fact tone blurring into a yawn. “We’re not close friends, but we share a crest, remember? He’ll need time, sure, but I don’t think he’ll leave entirely.”

Taichi nods again, the motion just as useless as it was before, and wipes at the edge of his eyes with his palms. Really, he’s being pathetic—Yamato’s right. There’s nothing he can do to help right now, and sitting in the dark like an idiot won’t change anything to his situation.

With a sigh, he gets to his feet—winces when his knees crack as he straightens up—and then he says:

“He’d have a right to leave though. I basically broke his heart because I was afraid he’d leave the flat.”

“I know,” Yamato replies, “you messed up, there’s no hiding that. I just don’t think it’s entirely your fault.”

“I’m not depressed,” Taichi replies automatically, before he amends: “well, obviously I am feeling depressed, but I’m not actually sick or anything.”

“Then you’re doing a good job of pretending,” Yamato says, and Taichi pauses at the edge of his bedroom, one hand on the threshold to hold himself steady:

“I’m not,” he insists. Then, tiredness stretching his voice into some sort of half-whine he barely recognizes: “can we just leave it at that? I’m not up for a debate about it. I’m fine. Overall.”

“Okay,” Yamato says in that way that means he still disagrees but doesn’t want to fight about it—in a way, it’s almost worst than having to argue the point. “You should go to sleep now, though. You’ll feel better tomorrow.”

“I don’t feel like sleeping.”

Taichi would say he’s not tired—if anything, it would salvage the sad remnants of his dignity, if only to his own eyes, even if not much of it is left to spare where Yamato is concerned—but the truth is he hasn’t been that exhausted since the weeks following the Reboot. It’s a bone-deep ache, something thick enough to coat his entire being and spirit, and right now he doesn’t have the energy to pretend otherwise.

It’s not like Yamato hasn’t already seen him at his worst, anyway. What’s one more instance in the grand scheme of things?

“At least go to bed,” Yamato insists, and Taichi honestly only agrees because putting up a fight is too much of an effort just now.

He makes his way to his bedroom on autopilot, free hand in front of him to avoid bumping nose-first into the wall as he feels his way to his bed. He collapses on it without bothering to take his clothes off—he only even put them on out of respect for Daisuke anyway—and keeps his phone against his ear when he pushes his head into the pillow.

It takes him a second to register the sounds of movement on Yamato’s end of the line, and then he’s yawning into the phone:

“What are you doing?”

“Getting my guitar out,” Yamato replies after a brief pause—he must have gotten earphones to free his hands, then.

“You think a lullaby’s going to put me to sleep?”

“I know I’ve put you to sleep that way before,” Yamato replies without missing a beat, “shut up and enjoy.”

Taichi chuckles, surprising himself with it, but he does manage to shimmy out of his dress pants and slip under the covers while Yamato tunes his instrument.