(Note: Since maybe I need to clarify the setup a little: Yosuke's father has been shuffled over to Kanagawa to set up a new Junes, and Yosuke's been sent to the nearby private school in what I would assume is some desperate attempt to get his grades to a respectable level in the last year of high school. Set post-Persona 4, ignores pretty much anything outside P4 Golden canon. Also, probably obviously, post-Prince of Tennis canon.)

He's a new transfer student, comes in a few weeks into the winter semester, sits in the row ahead of you a few seats over. You notice; well, everyone notices new transfer students. This one's clearly been through the process a few times, not stuttering too much when he introduces himself and buddying up to the guy next to him with practised ease. He's decent-looking, you think: wiry and lanky, and puts effort into his hair. Wears his headphones like a talisman, but Rikkai's pretty lax about these things and nobody'll tell him to take 'em off as long as he doesn't actually use them in class.

You let yourself be caught looking over at him, and he smiles at you in a friendly way. Good.

Hanamura introduces himself to you a few days later, seeking you out at lunch. Yagyuu's fucked off somewhere with a girl, and Yukimura's gone off to whisper in a corner with Yanagi, and Marui's… well, who cares where Marui is, it doesn't much matter, the point is that you're all by your lonesome for once. Hanamura politely asks if you mind him joining you, and you shrug acceptance of his company.

He's pleasant enough. Chatty, a bit self-effacing, but he's got a thread of confidence under the twitchiness that's kind of intriguing.

"...so yeah, I'm sort of not sure which clubs are worth joining," he says, half-laughing.

"I wouldn't know," you admit. "I mostly just have tennis."

"Tennis, huh. Even in winter?"

"Only once a week now, but yeah."

He fiddles with his drink. "The team here's pretty good, huh?"

"We're national champions," you say smugly. "Best in Japan." And fuck you Seigaku, you think privately. It'd been a tough battle this year, but none of you were letting them win the title again while you're still in high school.

"So I guess you're..."

"...one of the best tennis players of my generation, pretty much," you say, with a grin. It's a brag, but it's a truthful brag, and his eyes widen appreciatively.

"Wow." You can see him try to come up with a comparable boast of his own, and for a moment something in his eyes flickers as if he does have something, but he lets whatever it is go and smiles softly instead. "I'm, uh, not much for sports."

You tip your head to one side. "Huh." You think he's telling the truth, but he's got a sort of lean muscled-ness and poise to him that makes you wonder. "But you work out, right?"

He blinks. "Sorry?"

"Wow, that kinda sounded like a line. But you look like, I dunno, like you're pretty fit?"

He laughs it off, and asks about music clubs, which you don't really know much about but you bullshit your way through it enough and he seems entertained enough. Mostly, though, you're trying to work out who he reminds you of, and it's a startling thought when it occurs to you: he reminds you very slightly of Sanada.

Not literally, of course, just in one very specific way: he holds himself like a fighter, like he's supremely confident in his ability to take you down physically.

It's an interesting enough realisation to make you seek him out a few days later. He's on the roof, a half-finished bento open beside him, those headphones firmly in place as he sprawls out on one of the low walls.

He's happy enough to talk. You engage him in conversation about schoolwork: it turns out he's pretty shitty in maths, and you toy with the idea of offering to help him study as you talk. Honestly, you kind of like the guy, and you're not even sure why, but academically he really needs a kick up the ass.

You don't get the chance to offer, though; he gets a call and his entire face sort of lights up.

"Ah, I should take this - sorry," he say.

Before you can even assent he's answered the call.

"Chie," he says happily, moving away. "Thank god. How's it going - oh man, you're kidding, that's hilarious. Hey, did you see that Risette thing the other day…" and then he's out of earshot, leaving you with half his bento and a vague sense of envy at whoever this Chie is.

You're actually near enough to hear when someone drops the obligatory warning in Hanamura's ear; tennis players, they're all a bit, y'know, with an accompanying waving of hands. You scoff quietly to yourself, and remind yourself to tease Yagyuu again - apparently his best efforts to work his way through the female population of Kanagawa haven't made any impact on the fact that the whole school has decided the tennis team is full of queers.

Not that anyone says anything to the members directly, not with their string of victories behind them. And there's a pretty solid foundation to it: you tend to think of yourself as unpicky, sure, but even discounting that you rather suspect the whole team - including Yagyuu, thank you very much - would swing that way for Yukimura if Yukimura hadn't apparently subsumed his sex drive entirely into tennis. Still, it's a boring little set of prejudices to have to deal with. As if it makes anyone less of a man because he notices other men sometimes. As if it'd make anyone less of a man if they noticed someone like Tezuka or Atobe or Tachibana.

Hanamura, to his credit, says, 'so what', and then tells his informer to stop spreading rumours in a tone that makes it sound like he really isn't in the mood for it, and then he glances over at you thoughtfully.

You hold his look for a moment, then shrug and turn your gaze back out of the window.

It's not your usual style to chase people around, and so you deliberately don't. You hold yourself aloof for maybe a fortnight, but you're distracted enough for Yukimura to make acidic comments about your attention span and for Yagyuu to ask which girl you've gotten all twitterpated about. It's embarrassing, but, well, you can't stop wondering if you're right and Hanamura's really used to fighting. And if so, how? Was he in an actual gang at some point? You imagine him done up like a yankee delinquent, all pompadour and cut lip and nonchalant arrogance and fuck apparently that's a whole new kink you hadn't realised you had before.

It only gets worse when you spot him idly tossing his knife up and down in the lunch hall. Used to handling knives, your internal voice says smugly, and you nearly choke on your onigiri and Marui has to thump you hard on your back so you can breathe again. At least choking is a good excuse for how pink you are.

Hanamura catches up with you by the shoe lockers one day, in the end, and asks you casually if you wanna hang out. You feign diffidence for approximately four seconds before you agree, grabbing your sneakers and suggesting a noodle bar a short walk away. He seems pleased, but not actually surprised. Fuck, maybe he's noticed you checking him out. You're not sure you care, honestly.

Half a bowl of noodles later, and he keeps peering at your roots with barely-concealed interest.

"Hmm?" You grin, and tip your head forward to give him a better view. "Take a look, but your hair's hardly natural either."

"Ah? Nah, it's… my best friend, he's grey, and your hair sort of reminded me of his. But you dye it, right?"

"Yeah, this is all bleach and toner," you agree. "Your best friend's got grey hair? How old is he?"

"Our age. Weirdly, it looks really normal on him." Hanamura snorts, as if remembering something. "Doesn't stop him getting all the ladies, that's for sure."

"Alright for some," you say with a grin. "How're you doing with the fair ladies of Kanagawa, hmm?"

"Oh, you know. They think I'm a bumpkin," he says, without venom. "I'm okay, though. It'll work out somehow, it always does."

"Yeah? You're settling in okay, then?" You haven't noticed him making any specific friends, really. He seems popular enough in a sort of mid-tier way, not really short of people around him but without a particular clique either. Maybe he has friends in other classes; you mostly hang out with people who aren't in your class, after all.

"Sure," he says. "I'm sure the girls'll notice my stunning good looks soon enough, haha."

"You want 'em to?"

He gives you a weird look. "Of course. I like girls."

You snort, because yeah, fair enough, that wasn't the subtlest push for information in the world. "Yeah, but do you like Rikkai girls? Didn't I hear that you used to hang out with an actual idol?"

"Maybe. Didn't I hear that you hang out with the son of the Atobe group?"

"Yeah, but he's not hot." You pause, then grin. "Well, actually, he is, but there's no way I'd tell him that, he's insufferable enough as it is."

Hanamura blinks, as if a little startled, but then smiles. "Heh, well, Rise sure knows she's gorgeous. And she's so not into me like that."

"Yeah, but it's gotta mean your standards are set kinda high, am I right? So they can even compare to her?"

He laughs. "Rise wasn't even the hottest girl in my old school, you know? Super cute, but-" and he starts telling you about other girls he knows, and you pretend to pay attention but really you're just replaying the awareness that you just described a guy as hot in front of him and he didn't freak out, thank fuck.

Yagyuu breaks up with the latest girl of his a couple of days later, and honestly it's a relief - hanging out with him is a good distraction, keeps you from thinking about the tangled confusion that is your attraction towards Hanamura all the time. Yagyuu's pretty bitter about the break-up, and that's useful too; he's way more fun when he's in a vindictive mood.

It lasts a week, then Yagyuu gets another fucking girl, like it's as simple as that for him, and you're suddenly Mr Third Wheel again. In somewhat of a snit, you start imposing yourself on Hanamura more often. He doesn't object. He does carefully ask if you want a job at his dad's store, though, and when you burst into laughter at the very idea - like you need to earn extra cash, your parents would probably be insulted at the thought - he seems to relax in a disproportionate way. Shit, did he think you were making nice just so he'd hire you at his parent's place? Is that what he expects from people? It's another puzzle piece to fit in, and it reframes his lack of close friends into a wariness at being used. You sort of approve, even. Better to be cautious than to be a doormat.

You're actually hanging out in a group for once - you, Hanamura, Kirihara, and some kid from Kirihara's class - at an arcade downtown, when Hanamura gets pulled aside by a slim little scrap of a thing in a blue coat.

"Naoto," he says delightedly, in a tone both affectionate and joking, and the - girl? boy? - blushes and smiles up at him. "What on earth are you doing here?"

"I'm investigating some leads locally. I was going to contact you but I wasn't sure I'd have time to socialise… are these your friends?"

Hanamura nods unhesitatingly, and introduces you to Shirogane. The kid turns out to be some kind of juvenile detective, of all the things, and obviously very fond of Hanamura. Kirihara is fascinated, of course, and you decide to pull the kids away before they embarrass themselves too much and let Hanamura actually have a little catch-up time with his friend.

You eavesdrop, though, as much as you can from your new position supervising the two brats on the claw machine. It's clear they're genuinely friendly, though Shirogane seems sort of uptight and you can't imagine how they'd ever have become close. Shirogane begs off to go do more police work after a while, and Hanamura hugs - him? her? - fondly for a moment before letting the kid go.

A fricking police detective, though. That probably throws the delinquent theory out, at least.

"Must be handy," you say offhandedly when Hanamura strolls over, "having a friend who can help you get out of trouble, huh."

"Sure is," Hanamura says, and then laughs. "Man, you have no idea. Last year, when we got hauled in for questioning - well, let's just say, it was really good to have her around."

And you're back to the delinquent theory again. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." Hanamura grins over at you. "Inaba was pretty busy for a country backwater, that's all I'm sayin'. Ooh, hey, is that the latest Zombie Havoc over there? C'mon, I'll spot you a game."

Inaba, he said. You look into it, then you bribe Yanagi into looking up the place properly, and there's definitely a story there. Some kind of local serial murders, a copycat somewhere in the middle, and finally the real culprit turned himself in. That's where Hanamura was last year, and his friends too - the idol Risette and that kid detective were definitely involved, since they both went missing for a while - and you're betting that Hanamura's one of the group of local kids vaguely alluded to as having 'assisted the police in their enquiries'. And there's a bunch of information that doesn't seem to connect; a bunch of stuff about prophetic TV shows at midnight, stuff about weird fog that stopped showing up when the murders stopped, and persistent rumours about a group who rescued kidnapped victims before the serial killer could dispose of them.

Yanagi's pretty intrigued, and Yagyuu's pulled in too once you show him some of the clippings. They theorise a bunch, about the local kids being the same group who rescued victims and maybe also got the culprit to admit his crimes. You let the two of them talk it out, without mentioning Hanamura's possible involvement - though probably it takes Yanagi about three seconds to work it out, in fairness - and shit. It all adds up, tallies with what Hanamura's let slip along the way. Hanamura wasn't a delinquent, he was some kind of vigilante goddamned hero, way out in bumfuck nowhere with a bona fide nutjob killer on the loose. Fuck.

No wonder he doesn't talk about his old school in much detail. No wonder he's always texting old friends, talking to them. It must be hard to connect with new people the same way you had with people you'd solved a murder with.

But Hanamura seems to like your company enough. After he realises you're not angling for a job, he starts asking you if you wanna hang out more often. He has appalling taste in music, and so-so taste in comics, and he seems utterly baffled when he comes to watch a tennis practise one day - 'you're all so intense about it', he says, as if you'd get to be the best any other way - but there's enough in common for you to talk easily, and you figure that maybe it's good for you to spend a little time with someone who doesn't think the most important thing in the world involves nets and racquets and balls and trophies. It's certainly a nice change, at least.

Besides, he keeps checking you out when he thinks you're not looking, and that's something you're totally on board with.

Two weeks later, and Hanamura's hanging at your house for the third day in a row - ostensibly to watch movies, though honestly you've spent most of the time sneaking glances at him, and smirking when you notice him doing the same in return - but he's been sending texts to someone else all afternoon and it's driving you crazy. You're right here and kinda horny, and his mind's halfway to fucking Osaka or wherever this alleged best friend of his lives.

He drops the phone when you climb into his lap, though, and once you start kissing him you're pretty sure you have his full attention.

"Shit," he says when you let him up for air. "Are you for real?"

You shift forward, grinding yourself into him even more. "You objecting?"

"W-well, no, really no, and-"

You kiss him again, and his hands grip you encouragingly - and you were right, he's got some serious muscle in those arms - and all in all it's going pretty well until his phone buzzes again. He glances down at it, you pull his mouth back to yours, and his hands are under your shirt by the time his phone buzzes again. Which, in his defense, he ignores, and then it rings.

"I really should-" he mutters into your mouth.

You groan, and slide off his lap. "Fine."

He looks gratifyingly dazed, at least, as he picks up his phone. "Dude, this is really not the best time-"

You snort. No kidding.

"That thing I was talking about? Is kind of happening, right now, partner, so if-"

Even from here, you can hear the laughter from the other end of the line before something you can't make out.

Hanamura sighs, and holds out the phone to you. "Go on."

You blink, then take the phone. "Yo, am I being vetted here?"

"Ha, no," says the soft, unexpectedly Tokyo-accented voice at the other end of the phone. "It's just that Yosuke hasn't shut up about you in ages, so I just wanted to say; thank god you're actually into him."

"Ah," you say, as it clicks. "You must be Yu, right?"

"Yeah. Nice to meet you, and uh, I should let you go before Yosuke actually plots my tragic death, I guess."

"Wait, wait," you say, as enough blood returns to your brain for you to grab the chance, "lemme just ask: you guys, back in Inaba."

"Hm?"

"You… " and you can't work out how to ask, or what to ask. "It is over, right?" you ask, instead.

"I hope so," says Yu on the phone, at precisely the same time that Hanamura says 'what the hell, of course it is' next to you. "It certainly should be," Yu continues, as you hold up a hand to hush Hanamura. "I don't know exactly what he's told you, and I can't promise we'll never get dragged into something again. But we should be good from here on, I think. Certainly the worst of it is done with."

You make a thoughtful noise, and hand the phone to Hanamura, who murmurs something into it before hanging up.

"You don't have to tell me," you say, before he can launch into any kind of explanation. "I kinda figure I'll have to either not believe you, or you'll have to leave a bunch of stuff out, or something. I just wanted to know I wasn't going to get dragged into crazy murder-solving fun-times, that's all."

He nods cautiously, and then takes your hand. "I... uh. Look, it was a really weird time? There was a bearchild living in my room, and fights in a TV, and my friends and I all kind of saw each other's worst aspects up close and personal. And we solved the case, and, y'know, saved the world and all that."

You raise an eyebrow, not sure which bit of that to take issue with first. "The whole world, huh."

"Yeah." He looks down at your joined hands. "A really weird time. And some stuff sort of lingers. But I… Rikkai's a good school, and I like being in an actual city again, and what we were doing before? Really good. So, if you're okay with possible future occasional weirdness…"

"In case you hadn't noticed," you say, and you put your free hand on his thigh, "I am pretty fucking weird myself. But try not to outweird me, alright?"

He smiles, and leans in and lets you kiss him.

Hanamura's absurdly twitchy about people finding out you're hooking up, and that's, well. It's okay, you guess. Most of your close friends might be fluid about this sort of stuff, but then most of your close friends are - whisper it - tennis players.

At first you kind of worry - in a distant way - that he's gonna jump ship for the first pretty girl who confesses to him, that you're really just a, an outlet. But when it happens, he just sort of clumsily turns the girl down and seems surprised that you'd expect anything else. He likes you, he says, and then that gets sort of swallowed up as you set about trying to see how far south that blush of his actually extends.

It's an actual fucking relationship, you realise after you turn down a confession about a week later. Crap. Well, you guess you'll make the most of it; who knows what'll happen when you finish school. Cross that bridge when it arrives, and all that.

Eventually you get the whole Inaba story - not from him, but from Yu, who it turns out lives just north of Tokyo and who gladly comes down to meet his best friend's boyfriend when you hint that you'd actually be interested in that.

He spills it out over coffee, the three of you huddled up in a corner of the shop and with Hanamura glancing over his shoulder nervously on several occasions to make sure nobody's listening.

It's pretty fucking unbelievable, but Hanamura'd told you it would be and you try to suspend your disbelief. Yu isn't the best yarn-spinner on the planet, and he includes a bunch of stuff that you're not sure is really important - does it really matter that he made friends with some old biddy, or that his uncle's a drunk, or that he banged some nurse? - but the core of the story is terrifying if it's true, ancient gods and demons and summoning manifestations of inner selves and lots of violence and misery and geez, an actual murderer whose main motive was boredom and horniness and plain old fucked-up-ness.

Yu wraps it up somewhere around the third cup of coffee, which means you're pretty fucking jittery and it's kind of a struggle not to just glare and accuse them of complete bullshit.

But you've seen Hanamura's old kunais, the edges chipped and stained faintly green. You've seen him spin knives in his hands with the ease of long practise. You've met his weird 'foreign' friend Teddie, with his puns and his odd innocence. You've heard him mutter about shadows in his sleep, traced the faint scar lines down his back and thighs. He's fought, and fought hard, and this story makes about as much sense out of what you know as anything you can think of would.

You order a water, and sit there trying to process. Yu sits back, while Hanamura leans in as close as he can without actually getting into your personal space.

"I can stick my hand in a TV at some point, if you want," Yu says after a while, carefully. "That usually convinces people."

"...so you can still do that?" You kind of figured it'd be a temporary thing. Shouldn't it be a temporary thing?

"Yeah. The other world's still there, even if it's different now."

"And everything associated, that's still sort of around." Hanamura shrugs. "I can still hear Susano-o. He likes you, by the way. Gets all poetic about your eyes and hair, it's kinda embarrassing."

Well, that's sort of weird. And flattering, probably. You make a mental note to tease more details out of Hanamura later.

Yu coughs lightly. "Well, anyway. Now you know."

"Yeah." You wonder, just for a moment, what your 'persona' would look like, then shove the thought aside. You really never want to have to find out, you think. Besides, there's every chance it'd just look like Yagyuu, and wouldn't that be a kick in the teeth. "You guys know it sounds-"

"Delusional," says Hanamura, flatly.

"Yeah." You let yourself shift sideways, so your knee presses into Hanamura's leg. "But it's okay. I think I'm okay with… well, with believing that's what you actually think happened, at least."

"It's a start," says Yu, and smiles.

"I'll trade you," says Hanamura privately, later that evening. "You believe me, and I'll believe your stupid tennis stories about skeletons and psychics and eagles."

You think about that, and you keep thinking about it as he tries to sweeten the deal by kissing that little patch of skin on the back of your thigh that makes you shiver every time. It's not really a fair trade, you think - it's not like you're claiming you fought a giant goddess that wanted to swallow the world in fog - but maybe from his perspective it is. He's never even had Yukimura put the yips on him, why would he believe anything crazier could possibly happen to you in a game?

Ah well. At least he'll humour you. And despite your protests… you kind of like not being the weirdest one in the relationship.

"Sure," you say, hauling him upwards so you can kiss him properly. "We'll trade. With penalties for evidence of disbelief."

Hanamura grins, and lets you kiss him, and then pulls his head back and gives you a sudden look of suspicion.

"Hm?" you say, letting your hand tangle in the hair at the back of his neck.

"You agreed way too fast."

Damn, he's got you figured out.

He pulls back even further. "Shit, you're really going to hold me to this, aren't you."

"Oh, absolutely."

Because, of course, he's right. He's going to have to at least pretend to believe every tennis story you can dream up for him. The poor bastard. It's going to be hilarious seeing how far you can take it before he cracks.

You run your finger along a scar on his chest, thoughtfully. "You sound dubious already, you know."

"Crap." He dips his head, as if in agreement. "Go on, then, a penalty. But go easy."

"Poetry. My eyes and hair, right? I'm fascinated."

He blushes again.

Oh yes, you think, as he starts downplaying his earlier admission frantically. This whole relationship is going to be fun. You privately think, though, you won't push him too far.

You do like the boy, after all.

Author's Note:

Um. Oops?

So this is more or less what happens when I think 'why do I like my favourite characters and would they like each other'. Shamelessly self-indulgent, and I have no idea if the crossover fandom for this is any bigger than me and about four other people I know.

Also explores some thoughts I'd had about how the events of P4 would affect Yosuke's behaviour if he had to transfer to another new school, especially one where nobody'd give a crap about his association with Junes really because hell, they don't need part-time jobs and it's not going to impact their family businesses. And Yosuke came out of P4 with a solid set of presumably-lasting friendships and a sense of self-worth.

Niou is just Niou, as always. I kind of feel like any storm deity worth the name is gonna be fairly grabby-hands towards him, really.

PS: the WIP title for this has been Niosuke and that has been making me giggle more than is actually reasonable. I am easily amused.