A/N: Things you should know - Aomine and Kuroko are in college, have been in a relationship since maybe their second or third year of high school, and Aomine lives in his own apartment while Kuroko is still living at home to save money, or something like that.

Important: Potential trigger warning for alcohol, depression, and vague suicidal ideation.

Enjoy~

Kuroko was sitting at his kitchen table, staring at his computer with a cup of black coffee. Maybe the first cup had been a bit lighter, but that had been several hours and at least five cups ago. As the night went on, his tolerance for the bitterness of the coffee increased along with his regret for procrastinating on this paper for so long. Now it was two in the morning, he felt like his whole body was vibrating slightly, and his eyelids were almost too heavy to keep open.

So when his phone began ringing, Kuroko turned his attention to it immediately, grateful for the distraction from his current state of academic despair. And when he saw the caller ID, he brightened up even more.

"Aomine-kun, isn't it past your bedtime?" he said in lieu of a greeting when he answered the call.

"Ffffffffuuuuck you Tetsu, you're too beautiful t…. t'be such a fffffUCKING asshole."

Kuroko winced at the volume of his voice, holding the phone further away from his ear. He frowned. "Aomine-kun, didn't we already talk about you getting drunk by yourself? And how you should not do that anymore?"

"Um, yeah but. Did we already talk about how you're… fuckin… the most perfect amazing awesome wonderful person EVER because… I think… we should like, totally talk about that mooorrrrrreeee…" He hiccuped. "I mean, like… I dunno, I dun even KNOW how I got such a, a fuckin… super hot piece of ass like you. How. How, Tetsu?"

Kuroko rolled his eyes, but also found himself unable to suppress a fond smile. "I'm not sure. I guess I must have been drunk when I agreed to date you," he teased.

"Nuh-uh!" Aomine exclaimed. "I made SURE you weren' drunk when I asked you out, cuz you… you fuckin… don't care 'bout anything but fuckin SPAAAACE and shit when you do the… the drinking, too much."

"Mmm, is that so?" Kuroko probed, playing dumb. He grabbed his coffee and reclined in his seat—enough experience with drunk Aomine taught him exactly what would set him off on a rant. And he was thoroughly prepared to let Aomine distract him from this stupid paper for as long as possible.

"Yeah! Like after Kise's stupid fuckin dinner party last week?" Aomine started, and began ranting indignantly. As he did, the memory began to return to Kuroko…

-i-i-i-

"Aomine-kun," he said very seriously, sitting on the couch. "Did you know, you can be up to five centimeters taller in space? Because gravity isn't there to compress your spine? Can you imagine… how much better I could be at basketball… in space?" His voice slowly faded into a reverent whisper as he spoke.

"That's nice, Tetsu," Aomine said, straddling Kuroko's lap. "Can I kiss you now?"

"No, Aomine-kun!" he replied in distress. "Not until you help me reclaim all five of my space centimeters!"

Aomine's forehead hit the wall behind the couch. "God fucking dammit, Tetsu, you had one glass of wine."

-i-i-i-

Apparently Aomine wasn't done with just that story though. "Or, or! What about your birthday this year?"

Kuroko unfortunately also remembered this one.

-i-i-i-

"Aomine-kun, I don't wanna be drunk anymore," Kuroko whined. He'd been leaning over the toilet and throwing up on-and-off for the past hour. "I just wanna go to sleep…"

Aomine sighed, having sobered up twenty minutes ago, and continued rubbing Kuroko's back. "We can go to bed as soon as you're done puking, you damn lightweight."

"But… but… I just want my bed." He sniffled and began to cry. "Please, Aomine-kun."

"Aw, shit." Aomine pulled Kuroko into his arms and began stroking his hair. "C'mon, don't cry, Tetsu."

After a few moments of sobbing into Aomine's chest, Kuroko let out a little giggle as he remembered something. "It's okay, Aomine-kun. It's fine, hic because hic tears don't fall if you're in space!" He looked up at Aomine. "Isn't that great, Aomine-kun? I can hic cry all I want and my tears wont fall in space!"

Aomine sighed again, much more deeply than before.

-i-i-i-

Kuroko had to keep a hand clamped over his mouth to avoid interrupting Aomine's impassioned drunk ranting by laughing. Then, when Aomine seemed to finally be finished talking, he let it all out — quietly, so as not to awake his grandmother sleeping down the hall — until his stomach began to hurt and he took several deep breaths to calm down.

"I love hearing you laugh."

Aomine's voice had suddenly gone very soft, but Kuroko wasn't too concerned — he was an emotional drunk, that was just the way he was. Still, usually if he sounded like this, he was pretty close to falling asleep, so Kuroko got up, closed his laptop, and started looking for shoes and a coat. The walk over to Aomine's apartment would hopefully be refreshing, then after he tucked Aomine into bed and cleaned up his various drunken messes, he could finish his paper, go to sleep, and then give hungover Aomine a hard time the next morning, as punishment for getting drunk alone.

"I guess you're lucky I think you're so funny then," he teased, fully expecting Aomine to rise to the bait and get all worked up again. He had put on shoes and was just about to pack his laptop into his bag when Aomine spoke again.

"…I knew I would feel better if I called you," he said, his voice still very low and subdued.

Kuroko froze — okay, yeah, now he was concerned. "Aomine-kun? Are you alright?"

Aomine didn't seem to have heard him at all. "You know… did you know… you're the one who's the light? It's not me. It's… it… fuckin… it was you, all along." He let out a humorless laugh. "I'm just. Nothing, I guess. I'm. Heh. You like space, right, Tetsu? Well I'm just… I'm a fuckin… black hole. That's me."

It pained Kuroko how familiar this had become over the four years they'd been dating, and even from before that. He had a strategy to dealing with it by now, but it never got any easier to hear his boyfriend saying these kinds of things about himself. "Daiki," he said, quietly but firmly, "you are not nothing. You are very important to the world, and to me."

"It's okay Tetsu, you don't have to lie to try and make me feel better," said Aomine. "I could never, ever, ever ever ever be enough to deserve you. Not after… fffffuck!" This time it was definitely a sob and not a laugh that he let out. "Not after what I did to you, I don't even deserve to see you. Or to be human. Or to be alive."

At that, Kuroko immediately panicked, forgetting everything else and only grabbing his keys before he ran out the door and broke into a full-on sprint the moment he reached the street. The way Aomine's voice sounded right now was making his vision blur with tears, but he kept the phone pressed to his ear anyway — he didn't need perfect sight for such a familiar route, and keeping track of Aomine's condition was the top priority right now. He slowed to a jog every so often to say something to Aomine.

"Daiki, where are you?"

"Mmh? My… my 'partment…?"

After his emotional outburst earlier, Aomine now sounded like he was losing more and more awareness by the second. Kuroko continued questioning him, saying anything that came to mind, just to keep him on the phone and awake.

"Where in your apartment? Where are you sitting?"

"Uhh… th' floor…"

"Okay. Stay there, okay?"

"Mmmm."

Kuroko picked up the pace again, and for the next minute or so he focused on nothing but running, and the fact that he could still hear Aomine breathing and occasionally muttering unintelligibly. Then, when he passed the convenience store that was the approximate halfway point between his grandmother's house and Aomine's apartment, he slowed down again.

"Daiki, what have you been drinking tonight?"

"Um… let me chhhhheck." There was a pause, and then Kuroko's heart skipped a beat as he heard the sound of glass shattering and Aomine exclaiming, "FUCK!"

"Daiki?!"

The only reply he got was a stream of slurred swears and a loud thump.

"Daiki?" He began to speed up again. "Daiki, answer me, please! Are you okay?"

"I…" Aomine groaned. "Fuck, I don'… I dunno. I tried t' stannnnnd an' it di'n'… didn' work."

Kuroko was sprinting again. He was almost there. "Are—you—okay?" he asked again, struggling to speak between labored breaths.

"I dunno, Tetsu!" Aomine shouted. His voice began to take on a whimpering tone as he continued. "I… dunno anything. Ma'e… may-be I'm al—hic—ready died, Tetsu, DIED! Because, I do know… I do know one thing. You… are 'n angel."

He came to a stop at the door of Aomine's building just in time to brace himself against it as he let out a half-laugh, half-sob. Angel. It was one of Aomine's favorite pet names for him in almost any situation, from the "Tetsu you fucking angel" when he showed up to Aomine's apartment after a long day of classes with a six-pack of his favorite beer and a pizza, to the soft "goodnight, angel" as he stroked Kuroko's hair until they drifted to sleep together. And it always made Kuroko smile… except in situations like this when, along with the affection behind the word, he could also hear the unspoken "…and I don't deserve you."

Kuroko held the phone to his ear with his shoulder and pulled out his keys. "I love you so, so much. Please be okay," he said softly, then bit the inside of his cheek in an attempt to hold back his tears while he went to unlock the door. He shivered violently as the cold metal of the doorknob reminded him what a bad idea it had been to leave his house without a coat in the middle of March.

"Hmm… Ya knooow…" Aomine said, with no indication of having heard Kuroko speak. "Maybe, if I close my eyes, I c'n just… float away? Go into ssspace, wouldn' that be fun, Tetsu? I'll just… go away. Everything will be… better…" he drifted off drowsily.

"No, Daiki!" Kuroko said sharply. "Stay awake, stay with me, okay? Don't lay down. Sit up." He was beginning to panic — of course the decrepit lock would choose now of all times to jam, and his shitty copy of Aomine's key wasn't helping.

"Mm'kay I'll tryyyy." A moment later, "Oh. Ohhhh no that wasn't a good ide—" His voice cut out and was replaced with the sound of vomiting.

Kuroko slammed his shoulder against the door and pulled at the knob violently, frustrated by his helplessness. After this, he'd have to get up the two steep flights of stairs and then get through the lock on Aomine's door, and that was just too far, too much time wasted —

"Tetsu," Aomine said, his voice a barely audible whimper. "I don'… I don' feel very—" There was another loud thump and he went silent.

"Daiki?"

…No reply.

"Daiki, answer me!" He was shouting into his phone now.

Still no reply.

"Shit," he hissed, his hands shaking so badly he couldn't even maintain a grip on the doorknob anymore. There was a brief moment of blind panic in which he had no idea what to do, and all he could see were images of unconscious Aomine, badly hurt Aomine, dead Aomine —

A solution came to him, and all the exhaustion from sprinting that had been catching up to him suddenly disappeared. He left his keys in the lock, dropped his phone, and bolted to the fire escape. The lowest rung of the ladder seemed to be impossibly high above his head, but he didn't think twice before jumping for it. Somehow, he managed to grab it, and fuck if he'd ever managed more than a single pull-up in his entire life, but Aomine was on the third floor and he wasn't okay and there was nothing in the entire fucking world that was going to stop Kuroko from getting to him right now.

The first few rungs were a frustratingly long struggle, but once he got his feet up, the rest went by in a blur. Thankfully Aomine's window was unlocked, so Kuroko slid it open and tumbled into the apartment. He stumbled a bit as he stood up, and vaguely heard something crash to the ground, but he paid it no mind, not pausing for even a moment before he went to look for Aomine.

Following the pungent smell of hard liquor and vomit, he walked into the kitchen, and his heart stopped cold.

Aomine was lying on the floor, surrounded by more empty bottles than Kuroko dared to count, and his skin littered with profusely bleeding cuts, presumably from all the broken glass that was scattered on the floor.

Kuroko tried to shout his name, but a lump had formed in his throat and was constricting his voice, so all that came out was a wordless, wailing cry as he rushed to kneel by Aomine's side. He grabbed Aomine's face with both his hands — his skin was alarmingly cool to the touch, and he barely seemed to be breathing —

Aomine didn't respond to his touch — he tapped his cheek gently —

pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease

No response — slapped his cheek not-so gently —

pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasewakeup

No response — grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him —

"Wake up, wake up. Please. Please wake up. Wake up, Daiki, please. Wake UP!"

Still no response. Kuroko felt light-headed — his breaths were coming in short gasps and his eyes were burning with tears — so he bent down and rested his forehead on Aomine's chest, and it gave him just enough of an anchor to realize that he needed to call for help. He swore as he remembered he'd left his phone outside, but a quick glance around and he saw Aomine's phone on the floor within arm's reach.

After he called for an ambulance, he stared at the phone for a moment, and then the entire weight of the past thirty minutes crashed down on him all at once. His legs felt like lead, his arms were on fire, his throat was raw, and his hands wouldn't stop shaking. He was too exhausted to even cry, at this point, so he laid his head on Aomine's chest again, listening attentively to his heartbeat and counting every breath.

"I love you. Please be okay. Please don't leave me," he whispered over and over again until the ambulance arrived.

-i-i-i-i-i-

When Aomine first woke up, all that he knew was that, at the moment, the world was way too bright and way too loud and he kind of just wanted to roll over and go back to sleep. But when he cracked his eyes open a second time, he realized he wasn't in his own bed, and he wasn't in Tetsu's bed, either.

It took a few minutes, but slowly, he adjusted himself to the blinding whiteness of the room — a hospital room, he realized, hearing the obnoxious monitors beeping around him and feeling the IV strapped around one arm. There was a warm weight settled against his other arm, and Aomine angled his head to see Tetsu, holding his hand, resting his head on the edge of the bed.

Aomine grinned and squeezed his hand until Tetsu stirred, making that cute little whiny noise he always made when he woke up. "Mornin', angel," he murmured, wincing a little as his vocal cords vibrated against his dry, aching throat.

Tetsu's head shot up suddenly when he spoke, and Aomine was about to make fun of his funky bedhead (as per usual) until he saw that Tetsu's eyes were watering.

"It's not morning, you asshole, it's three in the afternoon," he said, in a wobbly version of his usual deadpan voice, tears beginning to pour down his face.

Uhh… shit. Aomine racked his memory, but the last thing he could remember was waking up yesterday afternoon having slept through all of his classes, and making the, admittedly, questionable decision to have booze for dinner. Besides that… nothing. "So, uh… what happened?" He could probably guess, but specifics would be nice.

He regretted asking almost immediately as Tetsu's demeanor darkened. "You almost died, that's what," he replied icily.

…Maybe he could still salvage the situation. "That bad, huh? I mean, this definitely isn't the worst hangover I've had," he said with a nervous chuckle.

"You mean besides the fact that you're in the hospital?"

More regret. Tetsu was starting to squeeze his hand painfully now out of anger. "Uh — "

"Your BAC was point-three-five percent when you were admitted. You were a drink or two away from certain death."

Oh. Fuck. That was… significantly worse than usual, to say the least.

"If I hadn't gotten there when I did — " Tetsu cut himself off, pressing his lips together, then bowing his head to wipe at the tears with his sleeve.

Aomine's first thought was that Tetsu looked kinda cute trying to be all angry while crying, but decided it would be a very bad idea to mention that. Instead, he voiced his second thought. "So, um. How did you…?"

Tetsu froze for a split-second with his head still bowed, then looked up. "You called me."

"Oh," he replied absentmindedly while studying Tetsu suspiciously. It may have taken him a while to figure out, but after all these years together, Aomine was fairly confident in his ability to read Tetsu as well as Tetsu could read him. And right now, Tetsu was definitely not telling him something. "I said something, didn't I?"

Tetsu met his gaze and blinked once. He didn't seem to have a response.

Yep, that settles it. "What did I say?" More silence. "Tetsu. Talk to me. What did I say?"

"You said…" Tetsu began hesitantly, looking at their joined hands instead of at Aomine's face. "You said that I was the light and not you, that you were useless. You… called yourself a black hole. And you…" He took a shaky breath. "You said that you didn't deserve to be with me. And that you didn't deserve to — to be alive." His voice broke at the very end and he was crying again.

Aomine pulled his hand away from Tetsu's to instead cup his cheek, wiping at his tears with his thumb. His own eyes began burning, and he held back the tears of frustration that were threatening to fall. He hated this. He hated that his own stupid problems kept hurting the people he loved. He hated that he was too weak to handle them by himself, and kept dumping everything on Tetsu, and watched him cry over and over again for his own useless self. "Tetsu… I'm so s—"

"Don't," Tetsu snapped, pulling away from Aomine and grabbing his wrist. "Don't you dare apologize for saying those things. I don't like hearing you say them, it breaks my heart, but… I understand." He lowered Aomine's arm and held his hand in both of his own, continuing in a softer tone, "I know that you can't help it sometimes. Feeling like that. I get it, and I don't blame you for something you can't control. So please don't blame yourself."

Aomine frowned and opened his mouth to argue, but Tetsu wasn't done.

"Instead," he said, a dangerous edge to his tone, "why don't you apologize for breaking the promise you made to me last time, which," there was fire in Tetsu's eyes now, "in case you don't remember, that was when I found you drunk and stumbling around on the fire escape, and I thought you were going to fall and kill yourself! And then you promised that you would never get drunk alone again. But here we are." He paused and sighed, his voice fading to a soft resignation as he continued. "I don't care that you drink. I can even look past the fact that, even though you and I both know that drunk and depressed can be an awful combination, you decide to get drunk anyway. I understand, and I can do my best to be there for you." He squeezed Aomine's hand. "But I can't be there for you if you don't let me in."

Tetsu was finally meeting his gaze again by the time he was done talking, and Aomine found himself unable to do anything but stare back. He was overwhelmed by just how grateful and lucky he felt to have Tetsu in his life. No matter how many times he fucked up - and that was a lot - Tetsu was always there, both to yell at him for making bad choices, and also to reassure him that making bad choices didn't make him a bad person... Aomine was still having trouble truly believing that, but he was trying.

Tetsu was still looking at him, and he still wasn't quite sure what to say. He could feel all his usual thoughts floating around somewhere, all the why are you even trying, you're too good for me, I wish I knew how to stop hurting you. But there was one that overshadowed all the rest, one warm feeling that swelled up in his chest and managed to make it past the lump in his throat. "I love you. I love you so much," he choked out, and Tetsu immediately leaned forward and wrapped his arms around him, and Aomine held him tightly and hid his face against Tetsu's shoulder and finally let his tears spill in the safe warmth of Tetsu's shirt. "I'm sorry," he murmured into the fabric.

"I love you too," came Tetsu's voice, softly and right near his ear. "Just… call me before you start drinking next time?"

"I will," Aomine answered, voice still muffled by Tetsu's shoulder.

"No," Tetsu said firmly, pulling back just far enough to look Aomine in the eye. "Promise me. For real this time."

Aomine paused for a moment to get his thoughts together so that this time, he didn't just throw out those words without really, honestly meaning them. Tetsu deserved so much better than empty promises. He steeled his resolve — yeah, he could do this, he thought, looking directly into Tetsu's eyes and saying, "I promise."

Tetsu's smile was small and teary, but still radiant enough to make the blindingly white hospital walls seem dim in comparison. Aomine leaned forward to press his lips to that beautiful smile. I'm okay, he thought. Things weren't perfect, but his heart was beating, Tetsu was in his arms, and the world was still turning. Right now, I'm okay.

Epilogue

The next day, Kuroko skipped all his classes again, bedridden with a miserable fever and the complete inability to breathe through his nose. Aomine came to visit him with a vanilla milkshake, a bag of popcorn, and an armful of their favorite movies.

"I still can't believe you ran all the way to my place without a coat in mid-March, and then pulled an all-nighter," he said, shaking his head. "You gotta take better care of yourself, Tetsu!"

…Kuroko just. Looked at him. Glared. Hoped that lasers would shoot from his eyes.

Aomine was completely unaware, as usual, and just put a movie into the DVD player, sat down next to Kuroko on the bed. He handed Kuroko the milkshake and started eating the popcorn.

Slightly mollified by the gift, Kuroko settled for slumping against Aomine's side and muttering, "I hate you."

He could hear the grin in Aomine's voice as he said, "Love you too, angel."

A/N: Hope you liked it! Check out my AO3 account, exuberant_imperfection, for some great co-written Aokuro fics I've done recently. And keep an eye out for more Aokuro fics in the future, because I can't stop writing about these dumb babies I love them.