Notes:

+ written for a tumblr shipping meme, prompted by fangirlingforeverz: "Dom/top? Sub/bottom? Any switches?"

+ my first ayahina :'D

+ veers from plot canon.

+ this is the clean version that complies with FFN's rules. if you'd like to read the full, just search for my account on Archive of Our Own (same username).

+ hope you like it~

"O — onee-chan? Onee-chan!"

Hinami voice breaks. She runs, heart burning in her chest. By the time she catches up, her right knee is bloody from stumbling no less than twice on the pavement, and she's crying, but not from pain. She throws her arms around Onee-chan, buries her head into her chest, and only then realizes that it something is wrong.

This isn't Touka's smell.

She lets the person go, so frantically that she practically shoves them away from her. They catch their footing, regard her from behind their mask. It's a rabbit-shaped mask, with the same silhouette as Touka's. But, now she can see clearly something that she thought before was just a trick of the lighting: the mask is black.

The person fits their hand beneath the mask's chin and tips it up and over their face. The eyes she sees — and the hair color — are all a match.

But, this person's expression is entirely different. For one thing, Touka would never look at her with such wariness and suspicion and faint, faint disgust.

Belatedly, Hinami catches the whiff of something familiar, something that makes her blood cold. It's the smell that haunts Kaneki's possessions sometimes, the smell that didn't exist until she saw him with white hair. And it's coming from this person.

She trembles. Should she run? Is it too late to run?

Please, she thinks, please don't kill me, but before she can open her mouth to say it, a cry and a crash ring out from the direction of Anteiku — from the direction of the battle. Hinami screams and flees — but she doesn't get further than two steps before she's grabbed.

"No!" Hinami cries. "No, no, let me go, let me go, let me —"

"Shut up!" the ghoul growls at her, shaking her arm until she stops panicking. He tugs off his hooded jacket and drops it onto her shoulders, jamming the hood over her head. "Cover your face! And come on!"

And they flee.

:::

She has nowhere to go.

"Of course you may stay with us, Hinami-chan," Eto says. "For as long as you like." She adjusts her glasses, looking Hinami up and down, and a smile unwinds across her face.

"She's your age," she remarks, and Ayato scowls.

"Don't you try setting up anything. We're not characters in one of your stupid books," he snaps, and Eto sniffs.

"It's clear you haven't read any of my books if you think that's the sort of setting up I'd do. Anyway, I wasn't the one who told you to go out of your way to save her. Though I'm very glad that we reached you in time, Hinami-chan."

"I'm really glad too," Hinami says quietly. "Thank you."

Eto gazes at her, lips pursed, head tilted. She seems to be searching for something, and after a moment, seems to find it; she laughs, delighted.

"Anyway, I don't think I need to intervene. It seems that things will work out just fine on their own."

"Sorry," Hinami murmurs, "I don't understand what you mean."

"Don't bother," Ayato snorts. "Let's go."

:::

By the way everyone's teasing him, you'd think they'd never seen two young people in the same vicinity before.

"Such a cute girl!" Eto says audibly every time Hinami comes by. And then, less audibly: "You should act soon before she decides to make a move on someone else."

"Shut up! Ugh!"

It's annoying to get hints dropped all the fucking time. Especially when it's not like he's totally immune to the basic fact that Hinami is pretty cute. Every time she calls out for him — "Ayato-kun?" — Ayato's brief flush rivals only Eto's.

("She calls you 'Ayato-kun'? That is so cute! Can I call you that too?")

("No! Fuck off!")

He has so many things to worry about. For one, all the ghouls have been laying low since the destruction of Anteiku, and it's taking everything he has not to crash one of the Dove bar parties. Communication lines are bad, but this doesn't stop Hinami from asking him questions about the whereabouts of certain ghouls every day.

"Ayato-kun," she calls one day, and he whirls on her.

"What?" he demands. "If this is about that person again —"

"Yes! Onee-chan! Did you finally hear from her?!"

It is so weird that she calls Touka that. He must be making a face because Hinami's smile drops, and she hastily backpedals.

"I — uh — I mean, Touka-chan."

"No, Hinami, once again, I haven't heard anything. And honestly," he tells her, "I don't really expect to. She's so weak there's no way she would have survived that battle if she were a part of it. If I were you, I'd give up hoping for news."

Hinami has endured all sorts of behavior from him, and other Aogiri members: snaps, teasing, dismissals, barked orders. But now is the first time her eyes light with anger.

"You're wrong," she says in a low voice. "There's no way. Onee — Touka-chan is really strong. She definitely made it out."

Fuck, he doesn't even want to argue with a mentality like that. He got tired of dealing with it years ago, when he abandoned it himself.

"Fine," he says, with a shrug. "If it makes you happy."

"What about you, Ayato-kun?" she demands. "It's clear you don't have any hope. Does that make you happy?"

He doesn't even bother to waste his breath answering.

:::

They don't have many safe houses any more, so Hinami "has to" stay at his place. (Eto declares this with a grin, and Ayato doesn't give her the satisfaction of hearing his protest.)

It turns out to be not as troublesome an arrangement as he thought it'd be. He's usually out doing things anyway, and most of the time when he gets home she's asleep, all bundled up in several blankets on the couch. He always pauses when he glimpses her, and walks quietly not to wake her. She's the most cheerful ghoul in the place but even he can't miss the dimness in her eyes sometimes, and it's only when she's asleep that she really looks like she's at peace.

One night he's startled when he finds his hand brushing her hair behind her ear. He's even more startled when he feels something stir in the bit of his belly, and unsettled when it grows with every day that passes, every small smile she puts in his direction, every little "Ayato-kun!"

It's getting to the point where the places that he stares off to in idle moments start to fill with images of her smooth neck. The length of soft calf that is sometimes exposed beneath her blankets when he comes home. The fingers that are so gently curled when she sleeps.

One time he comes home a little earlier than usual, hoping, for some reason, that she'll be awake. She is, and he regrets it immediately, because at the sight of him she jumps and swipes at her eyes.

"A-Ayato-kun," she sniffs. "W-welcome home."

Welcome home. When was the last time someone told him that? The effect would probably be more touching if her eyes weren't so red.

"What happened?" he asks, and she shakes her head vehemently.

"I-It's — it's nothing, sorry, I just…I'm sorry. P-please don't worry about me."

Like hell he won't, especially when she looks like that. He rummages around for a tissue box, then gives up and rips off a couple squares of toilet paper for her to blow her nose on. When he nears her again, he hesitates — she's wearing one of his shirts — and the thought, suddenly, that his skin has been somewhere that her skin now is, is both weird and disturbingly intriguing. She ends up taking the napkin from his stalled hand and dabbing her eyes and blowing her nose.

"Thanks, Ayato-kun," she murmurs. "That's really nice of you."

She balls the napkin up and puts it on a table. Then she clutches the blankets against her breasts — no, not even against them, beneath them, and they are pushed up. He can just see the line of her cleavage in the collar of his too-large shirt. His throat is dry. Is she even wearing a bra?

Too late, he realizes that she is silent, and staring at him, and he has no idea how much time has passed.

"Um," he says, "what? Huh?"

And then, "Oh, right — right — y-yeah. Sure. You're welcome."

And then, "You said thanks, right? For the — uh — napkin?"

She's watching him carefully. Oh, fuck, she definitely noticed him staring at her boobs. He probably should avoid looking at her for the rest of the night. He stands and flees — but he doesn't get further than two steps before he's grabbed.

"W-wait, Ayato-kun," she says. Her voice breaks a little and she clears her throat, shakes her head. "Um. Do you want to do it?"

He stares.

"You know," she says, when he doesn't answer.

"What?"

:::

"What?" Ayato repeats when she grabs his other hand, gently, and opens it so his palm presses against hers. Hinami eyes him somberly. Her body is still a little trembly with her tears, with the exhaustion of waiting and worrying and fighting off images of Touka and Kaneki dismembered and stuffed in to suitcases and used to kill all her other friends.

Her body is also trembly with something else, and though she's never really experienced it before herself, she knows exactly what it is. Goodness knows she's spent enough nights blushing into her pillow whenever Kaneki visits. The walls are too thin and sometimes they're at it without even realizing she's present, and within earshot. And eyeshot. And noseshot.

She pulls him onto the couch with her and for all that Ayato is supposed to be so strong he flops over easily, turning first pale and then bright red. Despite herself, she laughs a little. He's really just as pretty as Touka. It's been a little hard to ignore.

Her heart hurts so much. Does it really feel so good that she can forget her pain for a while? She's just so tired of crying all the time. Of crying herself to sleep, alone. Of being so helpless.

Hinami kicks herself out of the blankets, crawls, positions himself over his body, the way she's seen before. She's still holding his hands, and her weight keeps him down, but he doesn't fight her; mostly he still seems shocked. He doesn't protest at all when she bends down and presses her lips against his, clumsily at first, and then with a confidence not backed by any experience at all other than peeking shyly around the corner at his sister. She feels his breath move fast, shallow, in and out the corners where their mouths meet, and she presses a little harder, until his breath has nowhere to go but to her. This is kind of weird, a little wetter and messier than she expected. She closes her eyes and tries to feel it better in case she's just not feeling it just yet.

He opens his mouth and a sound is smothered against her tongue and teeth, and then his mouth moves a different way, like maybe he is finally kissing her back. She lifts her head a little to catch her breath, but he leans up to follow her, and impulsively her grip on him tightens, keeps him down. He bites back a quiet curse, and then a loud one when she drops her weight onto him.

"Ow!"

"Oh — sorry — did that hurt?" She raises herself up quickly.

"Yeah," he snaps.

"A — a little," he amends in a mumble.

She tries again, settling more gently onto him, hips grazing back and forth as she lowers herself down again. This time she feels the muscles of his wrist flex against her as his fists open and shut, can feel the little spasms of his body when hers rests along the length of it. Her head is aligned perfectly with his throat, where the special Ayato smell of him is strongest, where it overpowers the Aogiri Tree smell, and the lingering scents of whatever battle he's most recently been in. She nuzzles in and inhales and feels goosebumps rise against her nose.

Still missing something, she thinks, and finally she pulls his hands down and move them up and into her shirt.

"What," Ayato says, in a voice that sounds perilously like a squeak.

"Yeah," she encourages in a whisper. "Um, maybe you can…"

She swallows, too embarrassed to say it, but she rests her hand on his hair and he gets it immediately. He pushes up her shirt up to her sternum and her hand tightens in his hair, guiding his mouth up.

That does it. This time Hinami is the one that squeaks, and soon she feels breathless, and feels her back arching, and feels her heart soaring, and she fumbles to undo Ayato's zipper.

:::

The next morning they need to visit Eto's place to restock on food. They don't say a word, and Eto doesn't suspect anything until she hands Ayato the package, and he mumbles, "Thanks."

Eto blinks. Turns toward him in shock. She whisks her glasses off to clean them and then jams them onto her face again, looks back and forth between Hinami and Ayato. The former smiles back, head tilting in question; the latter glances away.

"What?" he demands, staring at her doormat.

"Nothing," Eto says, smiling and giving Hinami a wink. "Go on, run along."

Things worked out just fine on their own, just as she expected.