Thank you everyone for reviewing the last chapter and for your amazing support throughout this fic! Here's the epilogue. Oh, and please make sure you read the A/N's and the afterword in the end - even if it's something you normally skip, this time I strongly recommend reading it. :)

EPILOGUE – Sayonara, France!

~o~

The evening was dawning on Champs-Élysées. They weren't the only ones watching the Tour finale, so finding a good spot proved to be impossible; some people had apparently been there since morning even though the racers were not estimated to arrive before nine pm. Mr. Pierre told them to stay in a spot that they could easily leave when it was time to head for the airport while he went to return the car to its owner. Now they were waiting for the racers along the most famous street of Paris.

Even though it was hard to see the road, the arrival of the racers would be clear from the crowd's cheering. The mood was contagious and a certain group of Japanese school boys found themselves yelling among the other audience. Then the bull came up with a great idea and lifted Naruko up on his shoulders. The redhead didn't protest at all, after all he got a vantage point. In fact, he was heard to thank generously 'the old man'.

Kinjou lifted Onoda. Imaizumi could see by himself with his over 180-centimeter height. Among Hakogaku, Shinkai adopted the idea, offering Manami a spot on his shoulders.

"Hey, me and Manami are equally tall, you know," Toudou pointed out.

"No, we're not," Manami said, flicking his ahoge. He was the one to get on Shinkai's shoulders. Next to them, Arakita was looking at them disapprovingly, or maybe he was just trying to get Fuku to act as his crane. The captain just looked at him with a bored expression.

Toudou turned to observe Maki-chan. When his partner noticed his gaze, he shook his head. "No way. I can't lift your weight."

"Hmm, I suppose not."

"I can lift you, Toudou-san," Izumida promised.

"Could you? Hey, awesome!"

Izumida squatted, allowing Toudou to climb onto his shoulders. He didn't budge even once as he straightened himself. Toudou was pleased. Now he could see everything! He waved at Maki-chan from the heights, making him only snort and turn his head away.

"Fuku-chan, come on, lift me up!" Arakita continued demanding. "I weigh like 40 kilos, maximum!"

"If I lift you, will you clean the club room alone for two weeks?"

"The fuck I will!" Arakita tucked his hands into his pockets, turning his back on the captain. He pouted for a while but then got a new idea. "Oi, Shinkai, you should lift me in turn!"

Shinkai turned to look at him. "But Manami has been watching like half a minute."

"Yeah, but I mean, after him."

"You're taller than me. Shouldn't you lift me?"

"Who can actually lift you? You probably weigh like the wreck of the Titanic."

Their arguing ceased when people around them broke out into a deafening yell.

"What's happening?" Maki-chan asked.

Toudou scoped at the street. "The front riders just arrived."

"Who's leading?"

"A guy from Giant-Alpecin," he said after recognizing the team colours.

"Might be Kittel," Izumida guessed. "He's been strong throughout the whole competition."

"Yeah, maybe it's him."

After that, talking became a bit difficult because of the noise. Toudou witnessed the next riders to arrive but then he began to feel like he would prefer to watch the race beside Maki-chan, despite the visibility dropping close to zero.

Toudou patted Izumida on the head. "You can put me down and lift Arakita instead."

Izumida let him jump back down. At first, Arakita looked like getting lifted by a second-year would be too humiliating, but he wanted to see so he swallowed his pride and climbed onto Izumida's shoulders.

Toudou inched over to stand next to Maki-chan. He wanted to offer him his hand or pinkie but the crowd wasn't tight enough for the others to not see them, so he settled for smiling and leaning lightly towards him so that their shoulders touched. Maki-chan glanced at him briefly, but it was enough to show a smile on his face too.

It was such a weird feeling to think that their holiday was almost over. It was weird that they wouldn't pack themselves in the too small vehicle and hurry from one location to another just to get good watching spots or sleep in tiny tents on a hard surface. No more heavy wheat flour meals or French babbling. Could one get attached to a country in ten days? Toudou came to the conclusion that he would miss what had happened more than where it had happened. Yes, they had had wonderful moments watching the Tour, seeing famous attractions, cycling in the Alps, and he had both his phone and camera full of pictures he wanted to show his family and friends, but the best thing of the journey that was standing next to him was from the same country as him.

When Chris Froome was announced the overall winner of the Tour, Toudou made sure that no one was watching them, leaned towards Maki-chan and quickly brushed his cheek with his lips. And then they were standing there in the light evening wind, the festivities of the Tour finale shining in bright colours and people cheering around them, and said nothing.

Unfortunately they missed the awards ceremony, because when the last riders were crossing the finish line, Kinjou's phone began to ring. He spoke shortly, raising his hand for the others to see.

"That was Mr. Pierre. It's time for us to go."

After two hours, the group of tired travellers were sitting on a plane and leaving the airspace of France behind. The majority of them were already fast asleep and Maki-chan told Toudou he'd close his eyes and try to rest. Toudou was left alone to tap armrests with his fingers. He wasn't tired yet even though it was about midnight. Too many things had happened during the past 24 hours. He tried to read his book, but after not touching it for ten days, he had forgotten half of the plot. When Arakita climbed to his feet behind him and excused himself to the bathroom, Toudou hauled himself up and moved to sit next to Shinkai, as he wasn't asleep or didn't look tired either.

"Hey, Hayato."

Shinkai lifted his eyes from his lap where one of his detective novels was lying. Toudou wondered for a second or two what was wrong with the setting, realizing then that there wasn't an energy bar hanging from Shinkai's mouth. Apparently he had run out of them and hadn't had a chance to buy more. "Hi, Jinpachi."

"Do you mind if I sit here for a moment?"

"Well..." Shinkai hesitated. "Yasutomo's going to be back soon but I guess you can sit there until that." His eyes softened and he closed his book. "Did you have something on your mind?"

"Not really. Everyone else is just sleeping and I'm not tired yet."

"It might be better to stay awake so it will be easier to adjust to our own time again."

"Yeah, maybe." Toudou leaned against the seat. "Well, what do you think about the trip now that it's over?"

Shinkai hmm'd. "Undeniably it was hard at times and there were incidents I would rather have missed." He turned the back of his hand towards Toudou, showing a lump with a tiny hole from the sting in the middle. The inflammation had gone down but the lump would probably stay there for a week or two. "But I'd do it again right away. Or maybe not right away. I could use a couple of weeks rest first."

"Yup. What's next then? Giro d'Italia, next summer?"

"Maybe. I think it depends on what kind of situations we're all in then."

Toudou huffed. Why did things have to change? He would gladly have spent another few years at Hakogaku. "But wouldn't it be cool to come together once in a summer and go on a holiday?"

"The financing might be a problem. The school sponsored this trip, remember?"

"I suppose that's true. Not everyone can afford to go on a holiday every summer." And talking about everyone, Toudou meant himself. He wasn't exactly bathing in money and from now on he would be using a lot of his savings to maintain his relationship because of the distance. Not that he complained. He was happy to spend his money on Maki-chan.

"Not that such holidays wouldn't be very nice", Shinkai trailed off and something changed in his face, his eyes getting a tone that on another person could have been called sly. On Shinkai, Toudou called it 'knowing'. "Did it work, by the way?"

"Did what work?"

"You know... the thing you asked me about yesterday."

First Toudou considered lying, but he suspected that the heat surging from underneath his neckline had already painted his face red and that Shinkai would notice if he tried to dodge the subject. His expression already told Toudou that he knew what was going on.

He coughed, focusing his eyes in the seat in front of him. "Hmm, yeah. I mean... um, yeah, it worked." Damn blush, why did it always have to come and ruin people's lives?! He used all of his mental capacity trying to force the scourge to disappear. If Arakita came back now, he would be ruined. "T-thank you. You know, for the advice."

"No worries. Glad I could help." Shinkai didn't question him any further. Instead, he placed his hand on Toudou's shoulder. "I know nothing about anything, but if you happened to sometimes wonder what the other guys think about it... it's cool. At least with me."

Toudou's throat did a weird jump. He collected himself for a good while before nodding and daring to peek at Shinkai. The same old jovial smile. Shinkai should have seriously considered a career in health care; he had a talent for calming people down.

Toudou leaned forward to check between the seats to see if Maki-chan was sleeping. He was. Then he looked to his left. Kinjou seemed to be asleep, as did Tadokoro and Mr. Pierre sitting next to him. Maybe it was okay to talk more.

Shinkai grabbed the armrests. "I think I'm gonna−"

"Are we that obvious?" Toudou asked.

Shinkai stopped. Had he been meaning to stand up? No, he just adjusted his position and relaxed again. "What do you mean?"

"I mean if you have already realized that we..." Toudou could have maybe voiced the rest of his sentence since the others were sleeping and airplane acoustics were a mysterious thing anyhow, but the words just didn't come out. He couldn't care less about Manami, but Shinkai was a different matter.

"I wouldn't say 'obvious'," his friend calmed him. "If we were back home in Hakone, I probably wouldn't have noticed anything, but now we've been practically living together and then you happened to ask what you did."

"Do you think the others have noticed too?"

Shinkai was quiet for a moment. "No, I don't think so."

"Even though we wanted a private room last night and all."

"Yeah, well... you've been together for the whole trip. I don't think the others paid so much attention to it. I can't say for Sohoku though."

Toudou felt like Shinkai had only said it to make him feel better, but who knew, maybe he was serious? Why would people even care about what others did behind closed doors? Except Manami.

"But now I need–" Shinkai began.

"You know–" Toudou said, realizing he had interrupted his friend. "Sorry, Hayato, can I just say one thing quickly?"

Shinkai nodded. "Sure, go ahead."

"I'm a bit... scared. Because not all people are that open-minded, you know? Like my parents, they will probably flip tables when they find out. And what about the rest of the club members? We have communal changing rooms and showers and if the guys think that..." he lowered his voice into a whisper. "..that I'm staring at them or..."

"It's not like you have to tell them," Shinkai said. "I'm not going to tell and you're not going to tell. Does your family need to hear about it right away?"

"Of course they don't have to hear about it now. I'm just thinking if this becomes a longer... relationship." As he suspected. He just couldn't picture a situation where he and Maki-chan broke up after all this.

"You can re-evaluate the situation again then. I wouldn't worry about it at this point. You're still supposed to float around with rose-tinted glasses and not worry about tomorrow."

Toudou let out a small laugh. "Yeah, maybe. But I'm still... thinking about it."

"Of course you are, because you're you. But maybe this would be a perfect time to let go of control, just concentrate on your new relationship and let the world rotate on its own."

"Hmm, I suppose you're right. But it's a bit hard since we live so far away from each other..."

"Two hours by train. It's not far. Maybe you won't get to see each other during school days but the weekends are free."

Toudou sighed. Shinkai made it all sound so easy. Maybe he was worrying for nothing.

"So..." Shinkai continued. "Are you pitching or catching?"

Toudou almost choked on his spit. "Wha−?"

"Which end of the field are you?"

Toudou had no idea where his body drew the energy for another sweat attack, but it felt like a steam boiler had exploded inside him. "Erm..."

"Not that it matters. I suppose it's fun either way."

"Argh, Hayato, will you shut up? My face is burning!" Toudou buried his flaming cheeks into his hands. Since when had Shinkai been throwing such comments around? "You've spent too much time with Arakita."

Shinkai merely chuckled at him.

"I'm not... I mean... I'm not really..." Toudou stuttered.

"You don't have to answer me. I'm just messing with you. But you know what, I need to pop in the toilet." Shinkai's fingers landed on the armrests again as he was about to push himself up.

Toudou was relieved to change the subject. One more minute and he would have third-degree burns on his face. "Every toilet seems to be occupied," he said, pointing at the red light of the lavatory sign.

"Yeah, but I'm gonna go and line up so no one else gets there before me."

"You can always wait for Arakita to come back. Then one toilet would be free. Where the hell is he dawdling anyway?"

"I think I'm gonna go and wait there anyway," Shinkai said. "I drank way too much water earlier and my bladder feels like a balloon."

But before Toudou got up and moved on the aisle to give Shinkai some room, the toilet's light turned green and Arakita returned to them. He wore an undefined expression that turned into anger when he saw where Toudou was sitting.

Toudou tilted his head to look at his black-haired teammate. "Wow, Arakita, you were there for like half an hour."

Arakita looked past him at Shinkai and spoke between his gritted teeth: "I know."

Shinkai answered with an apologetic shrug. Toudou's eyes sailed between the two.

"Come on, it's not Hayato's fault if you have an upset stomach. Did you eat something weird?"

For a fleeing moment, Arakita looked like he wanted to smack Toudou right in the face. Toudou instinctively leaned away, but in the end Arakita settled for insulting him instead. "Get back to your own seat, you head-banded nightmare! Go sit next to your beloved Maki-chan."

"Jeez, how impolite," Toudou muttered, but got to his feet. He had had his chance to chat with Shinkai and he didn't feel like continuing their talk in Arakita's presence anyway.

He slumped onto his seat, facing Maki-chan's tired eyes as he woke up to his movements. "Mhm, Jinpachi?"

"No need to panic. I was just chatting with Hayato."

Maki-chan blinked, looking like he wanted to say something, but in the end his eyes just slid shut again. Toudou allowed his head to roll onto his right cheek, so he could observe his sleeping boyfriend, the green wisps against the pale complex, slightly ajar lips, lashes resting on his cheeks and the small mole underneath them. He looked so... beautiful that on a whim Toudou pulled out his phone and took a photo.

He checked the picture before putting the phone away. Then he decided to attempt sleeping too and leaned back in his seat, closing his eyes. Almost instantly, he heard Maki-chan shuffling and warm skin touched his wrist lying on the armrest. Toudou opened his eyes just a little and saw long, bony fingers resting over his hand. They just lay there, waiting. Otherwise Maki-chan was exactly in the same position as before and looked like he was sleeping.

Toudou turned his hand around so that he could grab the fingers. He squeezed them a bit and caressed the soft skin with his thumb before closing his eyes again, a wide smile occupying his lips.

.

~ The End ~

A/N: Friends, Monica and Chandler, anyone?

A/N2: Must read or innocent teddy bears will suffer!

Some of you have heard this already but here comes the official announcement. Somewhere along the way I noticed that Shinara is not even close to the point I was planning to get them when I was writing the beginnings of the fic. Shinkai is too clueless, Arakita is too stubborn and they both are just "WTF, how do we get ourselves out of this mess?" On top of that, Shinkai's girlfriend is lurking behind the scenes. Toumaki has gotten their happy ending, Maki-chan has opened up to Toudou (figuratively) and Toudou has opened up to Maki-chan (literally) and all is well in their camp. They can do without my help now but Shinkai and Arakita can't. Therefore I've decided to continue their story in my next fic. It will also feature another main pairing, Ashikuro (Kuroda x Ashikiba), but Shinara will have an equally big role in it at least. So if you're reluctant to let go of the imbecile twins, you're most welcome to read the sequel!

Afterword

When I began Le Tour, I only had one single reader in mind. I decided to translate the fic into English in the hope of reaching a bigger audience, thinking that if even one more person found it, I would have achieved my goal. Little did I know that I would receive such a positive welcome and so many Yowapeda fans out there would find my story. Along this journey I've met many wonderful people, both international and Finnish.

I would like to thank all my readers who have left kudos, favourited, commented, made fan art or otherwise helped me to finish this story. Special thanks go to my Finnish readers Emmi, KikiGabriella, Nakkimakkara and Perunaprinssi who have given me a reason to write the Finnish version and the international readers such as Ollie whose reactions and "dorks-losers-frickfrack" talks are the first thing I'm waiting for after publishing a new chapter and Fomalhaut48 who always makes me feel like I don't deserve her praising. It's been one hell of a ride, guys. But my biggest thanks go to my awesome beta ladyleopardy who is everything that I can ask from a beta reader and even more. Cheers, Courtney, here's to you! *raises an imaginary champagne glass*