I've been trying to find my inspiration again. I don't think I've succeeded, but I did write this over the course of the past three weeks, so, well, I thought I'd post it even if I'm not all too pleased with the end result.

This was supposed to be a fun, short little post-breakup/pre-makeup fic, but then it got long and angsty and basically horrible, but, well. Yeah. Warnings include shounen-ai, grammar mistakes / errors, more angst than usual, etc. Title from The 1975's "The Sound."

Enjoy? – Luna

The Sound of Your Heart

Shinichi is having a good day. For once, he didn't stay up too late watching Sherlock reruns or engrossed in a case file, and as a result, his eyes are actually staying open as he walks into the police station. The teenaged, nose-pierced barista at the corner coffee shop finally learned how to use the espresso machine after four months of employment, and Shinichi can actually drink his coffee without experiencing a strong desire to throw up in the nearest trash receptacle. The birds are chirping, the sun is shining, and the world is a generally great place to be. Shinichi hasn't felt this at peace since – since, well –

– Until he rounds the corner and comes face-to-face with Kuroba Kaito. Shinichi is fairly certain the birds all simultaneously choke to death and the sun collapses in on itself and the earth begins to shake beneath his feet.

To his credit, Shinichi restrains the strong and intense longing to empty his coffee cup over Kaito's head. It takes a lot of concentration, though, and doesn't leave him with much ability to speak, which would explain why he stands there staring mutely at Kaito for what feels like a few millennia.

Kaito, on the other hand, looks a bit like someone who's run into a distant relation in the supermarket – sort of goggle-eyed and frozen in a smile of obviously clenched teeth. Good, Shinichi thinks childishly in the one part of his brain that's not slowly atrophying into dust.

"Oh, uh," Kaito says, displaying the Charm and Eloquence that he's so well known for. A few emotions flicker across his face, too quickly for Shinichi to label, before he settles on a neutral, void-of-emotion, "Shinichi."

"Am I hallucinating," Shinichi asks faintly. "I hope I'm hallucinating. Why are you here?"

"I'm a witness for a case," Kaito explains, taking a small step backwards. His gaze drops to the coffee in Shinichi's hand, as if he's calculating what degree his burns will be if Shinichi decides to throw it at him. "I… didn't know you still… worked here."

"Obviously," Shinichi replies (okay, he doesn't "reply" so much as "snap angrily while glaring," because he may be slightly hurt, seeing as he at least keeps up with what Kaito's doing these days). He switches his coffee from his left hand to his right and rearranges his grip around it, as if hefting its weight in preparation to throw it. He's gratified to see Kaito's eye twitch. "Where else would I be?"

"You always said you wanted to start your own detective agency," Kaito reminds him, and that's definitely playing dirty, because that was something Shinichi told him in confidence, when Kaito was drooling onto Shinichi's pillow and Shinichi was still trying to recover control of his faculties and therefore was unable to stop himself from saying idiotic things. Idiotic things like "You know, I want to start my own detective agency someday," and "Okay, fine, I do think you look good in the suit" and "I hope you know that I love you and your stupid monocle, even if monocles are completely useless and you're only slightly more useful than they are."

Anyway.

"Well, obviously, I haven't done that yet," Shinichi retorts. He's about to bring up the Valentine's Day Incident – if Kaito wants to dredge up the past, Shinichi will – but he's interrupted when Megure breezes towards them. He's got his face frozen in the kind of gigantic, forced smile that shopping center Santa Clauses wear, and he pats Shinichi on the back so hard Shinichi nearly tips over.

"It's so good to see both of you," he says loudly, shouldering bodily between. In a quieter tone, he adds, "Kuroba-kun, I told you to come in after eight o'clock."

"Sorry," Kaito mutters, sounding absolutely unrepentant. "As far as I could remember, Shinichi always comes into work at five in the morning, so I thought even if I came in at eight, we wouldn't run into each other."

"First of all, it was six at the earliest," Shinichi hisses, nearly stomping on Megure's foot in his haste to get into a position where he can glare fully at Kaito. "And second of all, could you maybe grow up and stop being a passive-aggressive little shit for one second –"

Kaito scoffs. "Oh, that's funny, coming from you, of all people –"

"Stop," Megure shouts, dragging them apart with enough force that Kaito stumbles a few steps backwards. Shinichi didn't even realize that they'd been creeping towards each other. He crosses his arms and looks away as Megure continues, "For some reason, I thought the two of you were grown men, not children who can't behave like civilized human beings. I don't know why, seeing as neither of you are anywhere near being emotionally mature, but I did, and that's why I thought it might be all right for Kudou-kun to oversee your case, Kuroba-kun. It appears I was mistaken. Kudou-kun, I'm taking you off the Kawamoto case." His tone brooks no argument.

Above his own horrified squawk, Shinichi hears Kaito snicker, "Aw, isn't that too bad," in the world's most patronizing, annoying tone, and he just – ugh.

"Don't you dare take me off the case," Shinichi demands, forcing Megure to meet his eyes. "I can do this. I want to solve this case." He hadn't really, but once glance in Kaito's direction is enough to make him grind his teeth.

Megure gives him a look that communicates Extreme Incredulity. "Judging by what just happened, I think maybe it would be for the better to take you off the case."

"No, I think it would be a great opportunity to learn how to get along with Kaito again," Shinichi says through gritted teeth. In his periphery, Kaito is rolling his eyes. "We could rekindle our relationship." He doesn't even mean it in the full-out we should move back in together and get engaged again sense, more in the we should stop actively wishing death upon each other and perhaps become friends of the "hello how are you that's great bye" variety meaning, but Kaito makes a derisive snorting noise and looks so irritated that Shinichi almost wishes he'd meant the former.

"Do you really think so, Kudou-kun?" Megure's eyebrow makes a bid for escape, crawling up his eyebrow slowly. "Are you sure you want to handle this case? I can put Hakuba-kun in charge of it."

It pains Shinichi a little to think that at this point in time, Hakuba gets along with Kaito better than he does. He squashes the thought, obviously, because Kaito is actually the spawn of every evil deity ever and it shouldn't matter. "Please don't take me off the case."

"Well…" Megure's gaze flickers between them. "Since Kuroba-kun is such a high-profile witness and this case involves the yakuza, we were planning on having the investigating inspector bodyguard him until the investigation is complete. So let me ask again: are you sure?"

The investigation will probably take a few weeks. There are a lot of leads to follow and suspects to research. There are background checks and license plate numbers and tax records to wade through. Bodyguarding Kaito would require being in close proximity to him for however long it'll take. Shinichi is about to sacrifice his pride and admit that no, he definitely isn't sure and he definitely doesn't want to stay on the case –

– But then Kaito gives him this expectant look. And maybe Shinichi just knows him too well or he's reading into it or something, but he sees something that looks a little too close to Go on, give up, just like you gave up on us in Kaito's eyes. As if Kaito expects him to just back down because things aren't easy. It's accusatory and bitter and Shinichi despises it more than anything else, that insinuation that Shinichi didn't – doesn't – care. That he hadn't been as invested in their relationship as Kaito had.

That's what drives him to say, "No, I absolutely want to stay on this case. I'd love to spend more time with Kaito." He allows himself a moment of triumph when Kaito's eyes widen, and then promptly wants to bash his head against the wall, because he just finished maybe getting over Kaito.

"So what you're saying is that you happened to see a deal being pulled off after one of your shows, which they were attending for some reason," Shinichi says. He knows he sounds incredulous, but it's hard not to when your ex-fiancé apparently can recognize the signs of a drug deal going down between members of yakuza clans after one of his ridiculous magic shows. "And you didn't get caught."

Kaito gives him a withering look. "No, I didn't, because I'm actually more intelligent than sixteen-year-old you was."

"Go to hell," Shinichi retorts as he gets to his feet and storms out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him. It's the fifth time he's done that in the past hour. Kaito sulks at the table, looking equal parts petulant and miserable.

Megure rubs his forehead and sighs. It's going to be a long, long time before they can go home.

See, Kaito is under no false illusions that relationships are supposed to last forever. Sure, he's a bit of a dreamer, but believing that one day he'll have a fairytale, happily-ever-after ending complete with a sunset straight out of a Monet – that's a whole other level of naivety.

Well – he says that, but Kaito will admit that he still sort of thought he and Shinichi would last longer than six years. He'd been expecting maybe sixty years, or possibly six hundred. Maybe it's just because he and Shinichi beat the odds in so many other ways (what with the whole six-year-old thing and the fact that Kaito hasn't been thrown in jail yet) or maybe it's just because Kaito was really, really attached to the idea of waking up next to Shinichi for the rest of his life, but, well. Now it's all been rendered a bit moot, basically, since Shinichi has apparently decided Kaito is essentially the cancer of humanity, and the feeling is pretty much mutual.

It's still hard to take a step back and realize that Shinichi would probably rather undergo open-heart surgery without anesthetic than have to be around Kaito, though.

"I can't believe you'd stay on the case just to prove a point," Kaito grumbles as he unlocks his front door. Behind him, Shinichi is looming, probably trying to look intimidating. He looks more lost and tired than anything, though; Kaito recognizes the fall of his shoulders and the way his brow creases a little. Kaito can't blame him: they were in the interrogation room for hours, and now it's nearly seven. The sun is in the process of sinking below the horizon, and everything seems dyed faintly orange.

"No, I just didn't want the first time I got pulled off a case to be because of you," Shinichi snaps. Now he sounds bitter and annoyed, the way he used to sound when he ranted about how they couldn't even get properly married and the sheer injustice of the law, and Kaito grips his keys hard enough that the teeth dig into his palm as he shoves the door to his house open.

"I guess work will always be first in your life, huh? Nothing's ever more important than your cases and your career," he grits out as he flicks the lights on and steps out of his shoes. Shinichi shuts the door behind him with definitely more force than necessary – Kaito can't recall his doorframe ever shaking quite like that – and unlaces his shoelaces so vehemently Kaito half-expects them to snap.

"I don't have the time or desire to pander to your attention seeking right now," he says when he straightens. He pushes past Kaito – firmly, but not roughly; Kaito doesn't think Shinichi will ever try to hurt him, no matter how much he wants Kaito to cease to exist – and heads straight for the bathroom. "I'm taking a shower. Don't get shot or whatever it is I'm supposed to be protecting you from." The bathroom door swings shut behind him. Kaito can hear the heater turn on.

Sighing, Kaito digs out a pair of slippers before he slumps into the living room and throws himself down onto the nearest couch. How is this his life, honestly? How is he actually sitting in his living room listening to his ex-fiancé taking a shower two rooms away?

He's turned on the TV, mostly for something to fill the silence, and is engrossed in one of those intense cooking shows that feature weird ingredients (this episode involves satsuma oranges and yerba mate) when he hears the bathroom door open in the distance. Glancing up, Kaito has half a second of wait what before it registers that he's staring at a naked Shinichi who's – damp. And surrounded with steam. And – and that's when Kaito shuts down a little, because Shinichi is unfairly gorgeous and that hasn't changed, unfortunately. It's probably an unspoken law of the universe that Kudou Shinichi will never be anything less than breathtaking.

"You moved your towels," Shinichi is saying when Kaito finishes rebooting his brain. And then he gives Kaito this disdainful look, as if his current state of undressed river god is Kaito's fault, somehow. As if Kaito purposefully moved his towels to inconvenience him because Kaito despises him that much. As if Kaito was the one who insisted that he walk out of the bathroom naked and give Kaito a free show.

"My sink flooded and I started storing my towels in the hallway cupboard after that," Kaito informs him through gritted teeth. "Sorry that you weren't around to witness it."

Mouthing tightening, Shinichi's face goes shuttered and cold, and he storms off. Kaito stares after him, then down at the little puddle of water pooling on the floor, and then turns his attention back to the TV. He'll clean it up later, when he feels less like drowning himself. Sure, he'd been the one to break up with Shinichi, but he still doesn't think he deserves whatever this is.

He lends Shinichi a set of pajamas later, since they haven't bothered to stop by Shinichi's house to pick up an overnight bag. Shinichi takes the sweatpants and faded t-shirt with a twitchy, pinched expression; Kaito realizes that the shirt is one that must've originally been Shinichi's, considering it's printed with the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department's insignia. Shinichi has the grace not to say anything, though.

Later, Kaito hovers uncomfortably as Shinichi makes up the couch, tucking Kaito's spare sheets into place. It's surreal – he can't recall a time when Shinichi ever slept on the couch. It probably happened at some point, considering they were friends for a while before they even started dating, but Kaito just – can't remember it. He stares blankly as Shinichi fusses with the corner of the duvet before turning to give him an expectant look.

"Good night," Shinichi says, without any inflection, and Kaito nods once before he scampers off into his bedroom, sitting on his bed in complete darkness. The sliver of light beneath his door disappears when Shinichi turns the light off. He can hear the rustling of sheets, the creaking of springs, as Shinichi lies down, and then silence.

Kaito exhales and gets back up to change into something more comfortable. He doesn't realize he's wearing a sweatshirt with I AM SHERLOCKED written across it until he's already falling asleep.

Shinichi wakes up around six-forty-five with a couch spring trying desperately to burrow into his back. It annoys him for about three minutes until he remembers the night he and Kaito had bought this couch in unassembled pieces and tried to put it together without looking at the instructions. The whole thing had ended in messy floor sex that was only interrupted by Shinichi laughing himself sick when Kaito slipped on some bubble wrap and ended up spraining his left hand, somehow.

The second he remembers that, Shinichi forces himself to get up and sit at the kitchen table instead of doing anything regrettable like crying where Kaito can easily find him. He's never good at controlling himself in the mornings, and the last thing he needs is Kaito having the satisfaction of knowing Shinichi is still living in the past.

He spends a few seconds glancing aimlessly around the kitchen before he caves in to the urge to turn on Kaito's coffeemaker. He in the process of fixing a cup for himself, pouring half-and-half meticulously while trying to decide whether Kaito would want some, when Kaito's bedroom door swings open and Kaito pads into the hallway. Predictably, he looks inhumanly good, all sleepy and mussed. His pants hang obscenely low on his hips, and is that the I AM SHERLOCKED sweatshirt Shinichi thought he lost?

"I smell coffee," Kaito mumbles as he stops in the doorway to the kitchen, swiping at his face. His shirt rides up. Shinichi realizes he's staring just as he discovers that he's about to spill creamer all over the counter and sets the carton down hurriedly.

"Do you want some," he asks awkwardly. Thankfully Kaito doesn't seem to notice, seeing as he's still rubbing at his eyes, and when Kaito nods and throws himself down at the kitchen table, Shinichi turns to rummage around in the mug cupboard. It's not until he's finished stirring sugar into the cup that it occurs to him that he pulled out Kaito's favorite mug (printed with KID symbols) and added just the right amount of sugar and creamer. Force of habit, probably.

Kaito takes the mug from him without comment. He drinks it in slow, long swallows, eyes partially shut and affording Shinichi a devastating view of the dark, long arc of his eyelashes. Shinichi burns his tongue gulping down his coffee and staring over Kaito's shoulder.

"You can't even look me in the face?" Kaito mutters after a moment, startling Shinichi out of his thoughts. Shinichi glares at him once he realizes what Kaito said. Kaito looks unblinkingly back at him, brows drawn low over his eyes.

"You know what?" Shinichi retorts, about to launch into a scathing speech designed to cut Kaito to ribbons, before he takes a deep breath and sets his cup down. Kaito's looking at him with his mouth set in an expectant line, like yeah, let's get into this again, let's get at each other's throats again, that's what we're always going to do now, and it makes something behind Shinichi's eyes hurt.

"You know what?" he repeats in a quieter, calmer tone. "We're stuck with each other, okay? At least for now. And we've got two choices: we can make each other miserable or we can try to get along. It's up to you."

"I'm not the one who started any of that shit," Kaito mutters, but he goes back to his coffee without another word. Shinichi takes that as implicit agreement. He counts it as a success and finishes the rest of his own coffee in silence.

They swing past Shinichi's house before they go to the police station. Shinichi feels distinctly uncomfortable as he unlocks his front door – he hasn't been this awkward around Kaito for a long, long time. Is this how Kaito felt when they'd gone to his place?

Kaito stays in the front entry while Shinichi goes to his room to pull together a bag. He tries not to pick anything that bears any relation to Kaito, but it's a difficult task when he can't remember which sweaters were once Kaito's or which jeans were a gift from Kaito and he hasn't exactly gone clothes shopping since they broke up, considering most of his time had been taken up by drinking and lying in bed.

Anyway.

He returns downstairs with a duffel bag full of the shirts he was eighty percent sure had never belonged to Kaito and a few pairs of jeans only to find Kaito staring at a pair of slippers sitting at the edge of the genkan.

For a second, Shinichi has no idea why Kaito's so fixated on a pair of faded house slippers that probably cost around five hundred yen, but then he looks closer and realizes they're the slippers Kaito used to always wear whenever he was over. They were originally bear shaped, with little embroidered faces and triangular ears attached to the top, but over time they've turned from light brown to gray and the ears are barely hanging on by a thread. They were a gag gift from Hattori a million years ago, but Kaito loved them to literal pieces. Shinichi doesn't remember leaving them out, but then again, he doesn't remember putting them away when Kaito left him. Most of what he can recall from the time period directly after the breakup is dimly lit bars and staring at the walls.

"You didn't throw them out," Kaito remarks quietly. Shinichi hikes his duffel bag higher on his shoulder, not entirely sure if he's supposed to look directly at Kaito.

"I wouldn't," he finally settles on, hazarding a fleeting glance. Kaito isn't looking at him – he's biting at his bottom lip as he extends a foot to toe at the slippers, seemingly to check if they're tangible.

"I don't know. I sort of expected you'd make a bonfire out of all the stuff I left behind," he admits. One hand lifts to rub at the back of his neck.

"I would've, but I just didn't want to explain to the arson department why I set my own house on fire with myself in it. Though I suppose I'd be too dead to worry about any of that," Shinichi is saying before he can stop himself. Kaito's head snaps up. His expression is half-bewildered, half – Shinichi doesn't know what emotion that is, but it looks almost like hurt.

"What do you mean?"

"Well," Shinichi mumbles, looking fixedly at the door over Kaito's shoulder, "there – there are a lot of things that you left here. It would just be easier to burn the whole place down." Memories, he means, but he doesn't think he can say that casually.

"I'm talking about the implied suicide part," Kaito clarified. Shinichi can feel his gaze, hot and demanding on Shinichi's face. "The part where you burn yourself to death."

Shinichi clenches his jaw. He'd thought they'd had an agreement not to argue, to try to be civil, but forcing Shinichi to say it – that's hardly civil of Kaito.

"If you think about it," he says, as flatly and emotionlessly as he can, "I'm just another thing you left behind." And then Shinichi shoves past Kaito and walks back to his car without breathing the whole way. He sits in the driver seat and prays desperately Kaito doesn't say anything, and someone up there might finally be taking pity on him, because when Kaito gets into the car five minutes later, he doesn't.

"You and Kudou-kun seem to be getting along better," Megure says in a conspiring tone later that day. Shinichi has been drawn away by a new update on Kaito's case – something about a known yakuza member who fits the description Kaito had given – and Megure has dragged Kaito into his office for some help on "detailing the nature of the witnessed transaction." It's a windowpane-transparent excuse. Takagi keeps sending him consoling looks through the little window set in the door to Megure's office.

"I… well, maybe," Kaito hedges, glancing down into his lap. Shinichi – Kaito doesn't know what Shinichi's thinking, for maybe the first time. Shinichi has always been easy to read (or at least he became easy to read within the span of their relationship). But now, when Kaito thinks back to that morning, with his slippers still out at Shinichi's house, as if Shinichi's just waiting for him to come back, and Shinichi's cryptic, vulnerable comments – Kaito doesn't know what he's supposed to think. He'd thought (well, assumed) Shinichi had moved on, but – "Is Shinichi seeing anyone?" Kaito blurts out.

Megure blinks at him for a second before he coughs uncomfortably into one hand. Dread wells up in Kaito's stomach, because he'd been expecting an emphatic no, which that reaction definitely is not.

"Well," Megure begins in a voice that is carefully measured in cups and tablespoons of delicacy, "technically, there's nothing official going on, but there's a forensics officer who, ah, has taken interest in Kudou-kun."

Kaito never knew his voice could sound so flat until now. "And how has Shinichi responded to their advances?"

"I…" Megure blows out a breath. "Rika-kun is a very pretty woman," he says instead of an actual answer. "Kudou-kun doesn't outright say anything about how he thinks of her, but he's taken her out to coffee a few times."

"I… see." Kaito logically knows he shouldn't care – he was the one who called the engagement off, after all – but his facial muscles apparently haven't received that message, because his jaw refuses to unclench when he tries to smile.

"It's nothing serious," Megure hurries to assure him, looking worried at Kaito's sudden lack of motor function. "Nothing compared to what it was like when you two split up, I mean. He didn't solve a case for weeks, you know. Our investigation success rate went down by thirty percent."

"Sure." Kaito sighs and runs a hand through his hair. Megure seems so intent on trying to force them back together that he's reduced himself to lying. "Anyway, none of that matter now, anyway. We're two separate people with two different lives."

Megure looks unconvinced. Kaito leaves before he can stop him, walking through the rows of desks until he locates Shinichi's tiny office, the door to which is partially hidden by the large potted fern sitting beside it. That fern had been an officewarming gift from Kaito. Kaito is surprised to see it still alive.

He's even more surprised to walk inside and find Shinichi laughing with one of the most beautiful women he's ever seen, no exaggeration. She has the sort of razorblade cheekbones that mere mortals and most models have to fake with contouring and well-planned lighting, and her hair falls around her face (and sizeable chest) in softly curled brown waves. She leans towards Shinichi in an unmistakably flirtatious way, the collar of her shirt parted almost scandalously low as she sets a takeout cup (presumably of coffee) on his desk. The way Shinichi looks at her is appreciative and admiring, comparable to how he used to look at Kaito –

Kaito's not sure why, but he accidentally slams the office door loud enough that both the woman and Shinichi jump a little.

"Sorry to interrupt," he drawls when Shinichi gives him a reproachful look. "I just wanted to see what progress Shinichi made."

The woman's sculpted eyebrows are halfway up her forehead. "Who's this?" she asks Shinichi, as if Kaito isn't standing directly in front of her. She gives him the kind of look one usually gives roadkill – sort of pitying and apologetic while simultaneously disgusted and horrified. Kaito scowls at her. He doesn't even know who she is – what has he ever done to her?

"This is Kaito," Shinichi informs the woman, apparently oblivious, and Kaito watches as her expression blanches and then goes blatantly revolted, as if "This is Kaito" is code for "This is a giant dead rat carrying the bubonic plague." Shinichi clears his throat. "You know who Kaito is."

"Kuroba Kaito," the woman says, acting as if it physically and spiritually pains her to say Kaito's name, which is obviously uncalled for. Her nose wrinkles afterwards, as if Kaito's name is literal poison. She leans against Shinichi's desk as she eyes him critically. "Yeah, I know who you are."

"Pleased to meet you," Kaito ventures after a long moment of awkward staring. He narrows his eyes at her. "And you are?"

"Kobayashi Rika," she answers curtly, and oh, this is Shinichi's forensics officer? Kaito really wishes she at least didn't look as if she walked down a runway, through a photoshoot, and off a full-color two-page spread before coming to work. "I'd say it's been a pleasure, but I try to avoid lying."

Before Kaito can even try to figure out what the reasonable, sane course of action would be, Rika drapes herself across the desk to kiss Shinichi on the cheek. She leaves a perfect lipstick print when she pulls back. Kaito has the strong and ungentlemanly urge to push her into a pool of acid.

"I suppose I'll have to see you later, Shinichi-kun. Enjoy the coffee," Rika purrs softly, patting Shinichi on the face with her well-manicured hands, and Shinichi, wearing a resigned look, just shakes his head at her before she stalks past Kaito, surprisingly steady in her needle-narrow heels, and leaves the office.

"I don't know what I was expecting," Kaito mutters after Rika is long gone and an uncomfortable silence has fallen. "It makes sense that you'd pick someone from work to date. Of course."

"What?" Shinichi, who had been using his thumb to wipe the lipstick off his face (it wasn't working; he'd mostly just smeared it into a rosy mess), looked up at him with eyebrows arched. "What are you talking about?"

"Your new girlfriend," Kaito answers as he drops into the visitor's chair across from Shinichi. He hooks a thumb over his shoulder. "Kobayashi. Or – or Rika, I guess." Kaito, irrationally, finds himself hoping they aren't at the first-name, no-honorifics stage of their relationship.

"Rika?" There's a wrinkle between Shinichi's eyebrows. "Rika is a friend, but that's all." He frowns and looks away. "And even if she wasn't, it shouldn't matter." His left hand twitches a little, almost impulsively. Kaito's gaze zeros in on the mostly faded tan line on his ring finger. His throat is dry.

"Right." Kaito swallows. "So how's the case coming along?"

Shinichi regards him for a few moments longer before he pulls a few sheets of paper out of a folder sitting in front of him. "We've got some suspects who fit the description that you gave, at least," he begins, and Kaito relaxes against the back of the chair.

Kaito is, at heart, an undeniable diva. Shinichi really doesn't know how he's forgotten about that when he's actually gone sweater shopping with him and witnessed the true terror of Kaito comparing angoras to cashmeres for two hours straight, but he has. Somehow. And for some inexplicable reason, it still surprises him when Kaito drags him out to a Michelin-starred restaurant in Tokyo, because Kaito "likes nice things, okay, and you're not going to stand in the way of me enjoying my life."

Once he gets over his initial shock, he starts notices the paparazzi. There are two people with badly-concealed camcorders at the table next to them, conspicuously not wearing the required shirt and tie, and Shinichi is about eighty percent certain he just saw someone hide behind the maître d', if her uncomfortable expression is any indication.

"Kaito," he begins carefully, about to suggest they get out of there, when Kaito looks up from his unpronounceable and basically indecipherable menu to meet his eyes. He looks especially good tonight; he hasn't got enough gel in his hair to keep it perfectly slicked back, so it's curling a little around his temples and at the nape of his neck, and his tie is a deep sapphire that Shinichi vaguely remembers picking out for him. Shinichi flashes back to the drive over, during which Kaito had waxed lyrical about this particular restaurant's duck à l'orange, and his resolve crumbles like wet sand.

"Yes?" Kaito asks, expression quizzical, and Shinichi sighs and looks past him for a moment. The teenage girl sitting with her parents at the table behind Kaito guiltily ducks her head. Shinichi sees her tuck her phone into her clutch. Another pair of poorly-disguised reporters slid into another table a few meters away.

"Never mind," Shinichi says, and snaps his own menu open to look over the various options. He's not going to ruining Kaito's night, he decides. Kaito seems happy, and if he's completely honest, that's the only thing he's ever truly cared about.

When Kaito first started out as a magician, he didn't think he needed an agent of any kind, but once he started getting calls from various venues across the nation and he started murmuring names of theaters and times in his sleep (according to Shinichi), he turned to the only person he felt he could trust to handle his schedule and appearances. And that was Aoko.

Aoko makes an excellent agent because she's good at fielding interview questions and keeping his schedule straight. She's also an excellent agent because, in Shinichi's words, she "doesn't take his shit." Kaito will never admit to giving any shit, but he imagines Shinichi and Aoko have differing opinions on the matter.

So when he's sitting outside of Shinichi's office, alternating between games of Bejeweled and sneakily watching the way Shinichi directs his officers, and he gets a call from Aoko, he's not entirely surprised. She's perceptive enough to notice the bits of media speculation that have started to appear after that dinner they'd had.

"You and Kudou-kun," she says the second he picks up. Kaito winces, rubbing at the bridge of his nose.

"Would you believe me if I said it wasn't my fault," he offers hopefully. There is a heavy pause that somehow speaks volumes. Volumes of disdain.

"I know you think Kudou-kun is a 'soulless robot sent from the future to wreak havoc amongst undeserving, innocent, lamblike magicians,'" Aoko begins, talking over Kaito when he tries to remind her that he said that once after doing fifteen shots in quick succession and that it isn't indicative of his worldview in any way, "but generally, he's quite reasonable. For one, he didn't stab you in the face when you accused him of not caring about you, which I would've done if I had been in his position."

"You're my friend; aren't you supposed to be on my side?" Kaito says in a tone that definitely doesn't count as a whine. He slumps further in his chair, glancing up to see Shinichi bent over the desk of one of his newest officers; the officer practically has stars in his eyes when he looks up at Shinichi. Kaito quickly returns his gaze to the patch of carpet by his left foot. "You're supposed to tell me that Shinichi was a horrible, heartless person and that I deserve better."

"I don't make a policy of lying," Aoko informs him flatly before she clears her throat. "That's not the point. I just want to know if there's anything I should be aware of. You know, dramatic re-engagements or public spottings."

"Public spottings, yes. Re-engagements, no," Kaito tells her. "I melted the rings on the stove. It's never happening again." It's a blatant lie – the rings are stashed in the bottom drawer of his nightstand, underneath some of the articles about the two of them and a few of the cute couple photos he couldn't bring himself to throw out. He's weak, he knows.

Aoko snorts derisively. Kaito considers finding an agent who will nod along and agree with anything he says. "Sure, Kaito. Are you going to explain what's going on?"

"You remember how I overheard some yakuza bosses? Yeah, well, when I went to the police, it turned out that Shinichi was already working a case against one of them, so I ended up helping him. And then Inspector Megure said that Shinichi has to bodyguard me for the duration of the investigation. So here we are." Kaito blows out a breath.

"Your life is a rom-com," Aoko remarks, sounding unreservedly fond. "Well, if that's all it is, I've got to go. I'm supposed to help Aki's class with their macaroni art at ten."

"I still find it hard to believe that Aki is Hakuba's spawn," Kaito mutters under his breath, because Aki is the sweetest little girl he's ever met, and Kaito doesn't know how someone with half of Hakuba's DNA turned out so well.

"I just love it when you insult my husband," Aoko says, sugar-sweet in a way that means Kaito's going to find needles in his bed someday, and hangs up.

Kaito pushes a breath out from behind his teeth before he tucks his phone away and glances over at Shinichi, who's still talking to the same man. He's got a look of intense, focused concentration on his face as he gestures at something on the officer's desk; striped with the midmorning light pouring through the slats of the blinds, he's something nearly ethereal. It's a horrible, harlequin-novel thing to think – Shinichi is literally talking to someone beside a window; he's not exactly a Byronic hero of old – but Kaito is helpless not to think that he's gorgeous. It's a built-in instinct, at this point.

It's at that moment that Shinichi glances up and makes eye contact. For a tense moment, he looks bewildered, but then he smiles a little and ducks his head back down. Kaito digs his phone back out to shakily get through another game of Bejeweled. His heart doesn't ache behind his ribcage. Definitely not.

Shinichi probably should've expected it, but Kaito, being the stubborn, willful person that he is, refuses to cancel his shows even when there's a possibility he's going to be sniped straight off the stage. The police have made progress with the case – they've set eyes on yakuza leader Kawamoto Shinpei, whom Kaito has positively identified as one of the men he'd overheard, and they've started scoping out the place at which Kaito thinks the deal is supposed occur (a warehouse in Haido that belongs to a shell corporation that the Kawamoto group owns). If Kawamoto gets suspicious, it would make sense for him to retrace his steps and try to figure out who leaked information to the police.

But it's still a little odd, Shinichi thinks, watching Kaito from the wings. Kaito has always been an irrepressibly good showman; he always knows just what to say to make the audience laugh, how to make every second of his show feel like a private moment, as if he's doing the magic for you and you alone. Or at least, that's how it's always felt for Shinichi. Now is no exception, because Kaito keeps casting short, fleeting glances over at Shinichi. He's not actively ignoring his audience, of course, but he seems nervous, maybe. As if he's trying to make sure Shinichi isn't scoffing at him.

Kaito is in the middle of sawing himself in half (he used to try to convince Shinichi to be his assistant for tricks like that; Shinichi, knowing what kind of costumes Kaito would force him into, declined vehemently) when Shinichi's phone buzzes at his hip. Shinichi pulls out his phone to discover Rika has texted him a single row of question marks. He heaves a sigh of half-fondness, half-irritation.

He's in the middle of debating how to respond to her text when Kaito finishes "reassembling" himself and intermission begins. The curtain drops and Kaito crosses the stage to stand in front of him, ignoring the assistant who tries to brush more pressed powder onto his face. "What did you think, Shinichi?"

"Huh?" Shinichi finally sends the text (im at one of his shows no time to talk ok) before he looks up. Kaito is giving him the wounded, annoyed stare that used to precede a night of arguing and eventual makeup sex. Without the promise of makeup sex, Shinichi discovers that he really doesn't like the look. "The show was great, obviously."

"Were you watching?" Kaito asks. His gaze drops down to the phone that Shinichi's still holding. "Who were you texting? Kobayashi?"

"Get off the whole Rika thing, for the love of God," Shinichi groans. "I already told you there wasn't anything happening there." He almost wishes there was. Then, at least, he wouldn't be getting worked up over the deadly combination of Kaito's pout and crossed arms. "And anyway, I only texted her when she wanted to know what I was doing. Don't worry; I was paying you all the attention I could."

Something like hurt comprehension flickers across Kaito's face before he looks away. "I don't – I don't mean that you always have to pay attention to me, or that you can only pay attention to me," he mumbles awkwardly. "I just… I just like it when you do. I didn't – it wasn't that you didn't pay me enough attention, I just… maybe I didn't feel like I was the most important thing to you, and I didn't like that." He smiles faintly, not quite making eye contact. "You know that I don't like being second best."

Shinichi has half a heartbeat to wonder Are we really getting into this right now? Between acts of his show? Where anyone can hear us? before he decides that it doesn't matter and he reaches out to touch Kaito lightly on the arm. "I know," he murmurs, glancing up to meet Kaito's eyes, and he finds that Kaito is looking at him softly, warmly. It's a look Shinichi is familiar with, mostly because it used to be directed at him on a regular basis, whenever he did something like wash the dishes on Kaito's night or give in to Kaito's desire to watch bad rom-coms or tied Kaito's tie for him before a show.

For a full moment, Shinichi almost forgets that they ever broke up, forgets the horrific past six months of his life where he vacillated between despising Kaito's existence and wishing he'd given up every case and every investigation that had eaten up his time. Shinichi looks at Kaito and remembers how much he loved his smile and the way he'd fit in his arms, all the Sunday mornings and Friday nights they'd shared.

Just as Shinichi is considering reaching out towards Kaito, considering pushing the wild slant of his hair out of his eyes and holding his face in his own two hands, Shinichi's phone rings. They both look down at the screen to see Rika's picture above the words KOBAYASHI RIKA: CALLING. In the photo, Rika is doing a vaguely sexual pose, featuring a ballpoint pen and Shinichi's office chair. Shinichi winces. Excellent.

Kaito jerks away from him as if he's been burnt, giving him a betrayed look. "Well," he says, sounding abjectly affronted, before he storms back onto stage to angrily shuffle a deck of playing cards and glare at the curtain. Shinichi sighs and takes the call.

"You just ruined a moment," he informs Rika, pressing his phone to his ear.

"Between you and Kuroba? Good," Rika snaps. "Let's all recall the time I had to hold your hair back while you threw up and cried over that asshole for three hours straight."

"You didn't hold my hair back," Shinichi reminds her. "It's too short." He doesn't deny the throwing up and/or crying parts. Those parts are unfortunately true.

"Not the point," Rika insists. "The point is that you shouldn't get involved with him again, Shinichi-kun. Don't forget how messed up you were after he left you."

Shinichi looks over at Kaito, who's now petting one of his doves with the sourest expression Shinichi's ever seen. "Yeah," he replies, quiet. "Yeah, I won't forget."

The first thing Kaito hears when he stumbles out into the kitchen, yawning and trying to keep his eyes open, is, "There are articles about us."

Kaito manages to keep his eyes open long enough to see Shinichi bent over his phone. He's sitting at the kitchen table with his customary cup of coffee (he's started using the old hand-painted floral mug he used to love). Kaito's KID-printed cup is across the table from him, steam rising from its surface. It's nice, almost, being back in this familiar rhythm of mornings. It's also a little excruciating, but that's not the point.

"What do you mean, there are articles about us?" Kaito asks as he slides ungracefully into the seat across from Shinichi, making an inhuman noise when he bangs his leg on the underside of the table. Shinichi shoots him a half-worried, half-disbelieving look but goes back to scrolling quickly enough.

"I mean there are articles speculating about the state of our relationship. There are pictures of me at your show," he explains, eyebrows knitting. Kaito takes a sip of coffee, which is a mistake when Shinichi adds, "For example, this one is titled, 'Is the magic back?! Kudou and Kuroba Whip out the Handcuffs and Engagement Rings Yet Again: "I was lost without him!" Kuroba claims while sobbing profusely,'" and Kaito ends up spewing coffee all across the table.

Ignoring the droplets of coffee now staining his shirt, Shinichi squints over at him. "Did you give an interview when I wasn't looking?" One where you sobbed profusely, his eyes seem to be asking. Or mentioned the thing we used to do with my handcuffs.

"No," Kaito answers hotly, wiping coffee off the table with his sleeve. "No, there was no interview and no – no profuse sobbing." All his sobbing had been done months ago behind closed doors and within easy reach of his liquor collection, but Shinichi doesn't need to know that.

"It's the media speculating as usual," Shinichi concludes, daintily lifting his mug to his lips. Kaito has to physically stop himself from saying, "'As usual' isn't all that fitting anymore, if you'll recall," like a true masochist. Instead, he clenches his teeth and tries not to look directly at Shinichi. He's been doing that a lot lately, avoiding Shinichi's gaze. It's making him remember too much.

"Remember the articles that ran the first time they got a picture of us kissing in public?" Kaito says instead of anything more embarrassing. He grins when Shinichi groans.

"I try to forget about that," he mumbles, rubbing at the inner corners of his eyes. "My eyes were half-closed in all the shots. Maybe that's just how I look when I kiss people."

"I thought you looked great," Kaito insists, and Shinichi reaches over blindly to slap at him. "I still have one of the pictures framed in my room." He regrets saying that the instant it leaves his mouth, because they've sort of got this unspoken agreement not to bring up all the leftover memorabilia neither of them has let go of, but Shinichi just makes a disparaging sound and drops his head on the table.

"And when we got engaged," he grumbles, his voice muffled into the table. "Remember when some tabloid ran an article about how we were going to get married at one of your shows? And that our rings were going to be shaped like handcuffs?"

"That show did sell out faster than usual," Kaito agrees solemnly, pressing one hand to his heart. Shinichi makes a hand motion that suggests that if he was holding something, he would throw it at Kaito. Kaito grins at him.

"And – and when we broke up," Shinichi continues, and Kaito physically feels his heart drop to the ground, because Shinichi sounds so unsure and unsteady, "the articles were all about how the magic was dead and how I murdered the romance or whatever."

"That happened, yeah," Kaito agrees as quietly as possible. He reaches out to touch Shinichi's hand, just lightly and without real intent, and Shinichi maneuvers his head until he can look Kaito in the eye. He doesn't do anything but smile faintly at him, though, a little half-smile paired with sad eyes, and Kaito can't help it when he looks away first.

He'd been sure of his decision when he'd told Shinichi he was breaking up with him. Now… he's a lot less sure, at least.

Because there's some unspoken universal law that nothing in Shinichi's life goes to plan, Shinichi gets sick on the day of the deal.

It's not even the kind of "blow your nose obnoxiously and cough a lot but be generally all right and of reasonably sound mind" sickness that he could maybe handle. It's the kind of "I can't remember my name and my head is pressure-cooking my brain and everything hurts" kind of illness that sneaks up on him two weeks into the investigation. He wakes up on Kaito's couch shivering so violently he's surprised he hasn't shaken straight out of his clammy, too-tight skin. He wants to panic about how he's going to miss the most important day of the investigation, but all he can do is stare at the ceiling and wonder if his eyeballs are going to fall out of his head, because that's how it feels.

Shinichi has a feeling that if he tries to move he's going to end up falling off the couch, so he ends up vibrating in place until Kaito emerges from his bedroom. Kaito takes one look at him and his eyebrows shoot up his forehead. Ridiculously, Shinichi spends a moment wondering how bad he must look right now (Kaito's seen him after a gunshot wound and a broken leg, so if he's making that kind of expression Shinichi must look as if he's been tossed into a volcano), before he reminds himself that it doesn't matter.

"Good morning," Shinichi tries to say, but ends up making a dry creaking sound instead, a bit like a rusted door hinge. Kaito's eyebrows take flight.

"You look like you've been hit by a double-decker bus," he comments, sounding halfway impressed. Shinichi tries to glare at him, but his eyelids have starting feeling progressively stickier and sleepier, and he can't quite keep his eyes open long enough to do it.

"Sorry for have a weak immune system," he croaks, rolling so his back is towards Kaito and curling up. The spring, which has been wreaking havoc on his side for the past two weeks, presses cheerfully into his stomach. Shinichi shivers pathetically and tugs the blanket together around himself. His immune system's been shot to hell ever since the whole shrinking thing, so whenever he gets even a little stressed out, he ends up bedridden for at least a day. And, considering how stressful the last few weeks have been, Shinichi's surprised he's managed this long.

"Kobayashi probably poisoned you with all the coffee she gave you," Kaito mutters, sounding about seventy-five percent bitter, and Shinichi groans loudly at him and kicks at him blindly. He doesn't make contact, but it's the thought that counts.

"Oh my God, get over Rika," he hisses, clutching at his head. Kaito's possessive ex spiel is bewildering at the best of times, and right now it's the absolute worst. "I'm dying, and you're literally standing there being an asshole."

There's a slow pause, as if Kaito is contemplating his options, and then Shinichi is abruptly airborne. For a horrifying second, he thinks that he's fallen off the couch, but then he realizes that Kaito has picked him up in a bridal carry. He thinks he should either be darkly amused at the irony or scandalized, but he can't muster up the energy for either.

"Where are you taking me," Shinichi mumbles, trying to get his eyes open again. Even through his stuffed-up nose, Shinichi can faintly smell Kaito – the scent reminds him of like something warm and sweet like baking cinnamon rolls. Shinichi's always thought it's the combination of the sugar scrub Kaito insists on using and the cinnamon body wash he uses. "What's happening?"

"I'm taking you to bed," Kaito responds from over Shinichi's head. Shinichi almost chokes.

"Um –" he begins, then breaks into a coughing fit.

"Not like that," Kaito says. Shinichi can hear his voice rumble in his chest from where his ear is pressed against Kaito. "You can't stay on the couch when you're dying. I may have called you some unflattering things, but I'm not entirely heartless."

"Right," Shinichi manages, turning his face into Kaito's shirt. He doesn't know what expression he's wearing, how his face is betraying him, and he doesn't want to give Kaito the opportunity to see it.

"You've gotten lighter," Kaito remarks, almost inaudibly. He probably doesn't mean for Shinichi to hear it. Shinichi can't help but wonder if Kaito is aware of all the little things he remembers, all the little remnants of relationship that he keeps bringing up, or if it's just second nature. He doesn't know which would be worse.

Kaito sets him down on something soft, and Shinichi immediately knows it's Kaito's bed. He used to spend a good amount of time here, after all, and he knows the exact firmness of it, the way there's slight a dip on the right side where Kaito's hip usually presses into the mattress. He knows he's been put on the left side, because that's where he used to sleep, and because it's cold against his skin.

"Stay here," Kaito says softly, as if he didn't just carry Shinichi into his room because Shinichi couldn't really walk, and Shinichi sighs and pushes his face into the pillow beneath his cheek. Kaito's sheets are a different color, he thinks inanely before he shuts his eyes; they're plain white, now, and they used to be striped with pale blue pinstripes.

When he opens his eyes an indeterminate amount of time later, he discovers that there's a bowl of rice porridge sitting on the bedside table. He imagines it smells faintly of green onions and miso, the way Kaito always made it.

"You're awake?" Kaito's voice says from overhead. Shinichi rolls onto his back to look at him – he's sitting on the right side of the bed, and he puts down his phone when they make eye contact. "Feeling better yet?"

Shinichi opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. His throat feels sandpapery and dry. Kaito motions for him to sit up, and once Shinichi does, he hands him a mug. It's full of strongly brewed ginger tea, Shinichi realizes from the first sip, and he wrinkles his nose but drains the whole cup anyway.

"Thanks," he mumbles, putting the mug down on the nightstand. Kaito's watching him with unexpected warmth to his expression, a touch of nostalgia. "You didn't have to do this."

Kaito looks at him with amusement. "Of course I did. I think it's been made abundantly clear that I'm absolutely horrible at leaving you alone."

For a moment, Shinichi considers making a comment about how he'd done it easily enough before, but he decides it's not worth the effort when his head feels like a ticking time bomb and he's exhausted down to his core. Besides, he likes the look of fondness on Kaito's face, and he's not quite masochistic enough to endure the sourness that's bound to overtake Kaito's expression if he says that.

One of Kaito's hands finds its way to Shinichi's forehead, fingertips cool where they trail across his temple. Shinichi lets out an involuntary sigh, relaxing into his touch.

"You're warm," Kaito announces, completely unnecessarily. His hand lingers for a little too long, pausing to brush over Shinichi's relaxed eyelids and trace the edge of Shinichi's jawline, before Kaito retracts it. "You should sleep a little longer. I'll get some cold medicine."

"Mm." Shinichi lets himself melt against the sheets. His eyelids drop fully closed, and he's about to fall asleep when he feels a touch against his mouth, a press of lips he's all too painfully familiar with. He instantly jerks awake, feeling as if someone has pressed a live wire to the back of his neck, and Kaito pulls away quickly, eyes wide. They look at each other for a long moment. Shinichi's head is swimming, and he really doesn't have the capacity to deal with this right now.

"Don't," he murmurs, because it's the only thing he can think to say. "I – don't."

"Okay," Kaito agrees. His deer-in-the-headlights expression doesn't fade even as he stumbles to his feet. "Yeah, I really shouldn't – okay." He backs out of the room, never breaking eye contact, even when he bumps into the doorframe and nearly trips. It would be funny if Shinichi wasn't mentally reliving the past minute, over and over again on an infinite loop.

It takes Shinichi another thirty minutes to fall asleep. When he wakes up again, the congee has been reheated, if the steam rising from its surface is any indication, and there's a pile of various pills beside a new mug of ginger tea. He can hear Kaito moving around in the living room and the sounds of a reality TV show playing. He lies in bed for a long, long time before he gulps down the medicine, eats half the bowl of porridge, and stumbles into the living room with Kaito's duvet wrapped around his shoulders like a cape. Kaito looks up when he walks in, scoots over on the couch, and offers Shinichi the TV remote. It's a concession of some kind.

Shinichi accepts the remote and, not vindictively at all, changes the channel until they're watching the most recent episode of Detective Samonji.

Kaito hadn't really been paying much attention to the investigation – he'd been more concerned with the more prominent fact that he was living with his ex-fiancé – but he had still known what day the whole takedown was supposed to occur. Somehow, he's still surprised when he walks into police headquarters with a mostly healed Shinichi a few days later and Megure looks at him with confusion, as if he's wondering why Kaito is even there.

"Why are you even here?" Megure wonders, and yeah, Kaito totally pegged that look.

"Should I… not be?" Kaito replies, and Megure nods.

"We got Kawamoto," he says, a little accusatorily. "I texted both of you. Kuroba-kun, you're free to do whatever you like. You were very helpful; we couldn't have done it without you. Kudou-kun, I've got another case for you to start working on."

"Oh," Kaito mumbles belatedly, after a long, uncomfortable pause.

"If you can, could you get the file sent to my office?" Shinichi asks, face a little blank, and glances hesitantly at Kaito. He's wearing an expression of polite discomfort, the kind he used to wear when saying meeting Kaito's mildly insane university friends, who were mainly theater types who quoted Shakespeare arbitrarily. With a flinch of horror, Kaito realizes he's been demoted to the same status as his university friends. "Kaito, I, uh… it's been –"

"I might as well stay for the rest of the day," Kaito blurts out. He's relieved to see Shinichi's expression warm into something a little less uncomfortable. "I'm already here, so. You know."

"Right," Shinichi agrees, and he's smiling. It's a tentative thing, his smile, tentative and a little unsure, as if he thinks Kaito is playing a joke on him and he's going to end up humiliated, but the fact that it's even there enough for Kaito. "Right, I – yeah." Shinichi nods. "You want something from the coffee shop down the street? I was thinking of going to get something."

"Mocha," Kaito says, mostly to see Shinichi roll his eyes (it's an old argument; "the chocolate ruins the taste of the coffee!" being Shinichi's perspective on the issue) before he turns and jogs out of the station. When he turns back around, Kaito jumps when he finds that Megure is watching him with narrowed eyes.

"What?" he demands, probably more defensively that the situation warrants, and Megure just shakes his head slowly.

"Would you believe me if I said that this is the happiest I've seen Kudou-kun since you broke up with him?" he asks, and when Kaito scowls at him, he shakes his head. "I'll never understand what made you end things with him, Kuroba-kun." With that cryptic and mostly unnecessary comment, Megure turns and walks off, probably to go be enigmatic at his officers.

Kaito wanders around the station for the first two minutes of Shinichi's coffee run, but then he gets annoyed with all the stares he receives (apparently gawking at Inspector Kudou's famous magician ex-fiancé never gets old) and retreats to Shinichi's office.

Which – is occupied. Because Rika is sitting on Shinichi's desk.

She looks up when he comes in, and her eyebrows do something complicated on her face before she settles into a disapproving glare. Kaito glares right back at her.

"I don't know what I did to make you hate me," he states without preamble, "and I'm not even sorry about whatever it was."

"I don't like you because you messed Shinichi-kun up for a long, long time," Rika informs him flatly. Her eyes are unimpressed beyond words, even as she uncrosses her legs and folders her arms across her chest. "And if you're not sorry about that, then I can say that I absolutely despise you, Kuroba." She means it, too. Kaito can see it in the way her mouth curls around his name.

"I don't think you really understand the situation," Kaito counters, shutting the door and leaning against it. "You don't know why we broke up."

"I know that Shinichi-kun didn't sleep and didn't eat for months," Rika retorts, getting to her feet. Kaito has never been more intimidated. "I know that Shinichi-kun almost ended up an alcoholic and that he spent more time lying in bed than closing cases. And I was the one who had to watch all of that while you went on with your life."

"I," Kaito begins, but there's really no comeback to that, is there? Because now he's picturing it, Shinichi curled up in bed as he slowly wastes away, tired and sad and lonely, and Kaito being the cause – it's the mental equivalent of a stake to the heart. He swallows hard, looking away. "It's not as if I came out of it unscathed, either." And he hadn't. His tear ducts still ache more often than not, and his shows petered out for a month-long period, and there's always the lingering taste of guilt at the back of his throat.

"Don't try to make this about you," Rika snorted. "This isn't. You're not allowed to come waltzing back into Shinichi-kun's life and play with his emotions because you want revenge or whatever it is. This isn't a joke to him. Do you realize that?"

"Is this because you're jealous of me?" Kaito asks before he can stop himself. "Are you jealous that I have this much power over him? Because Shinichi is still hung up on me?" He's almost expecting it to be a conversation ender, but Rika just laughs. It's not an amused laugh. It's more of a scoff, really.

"Of course I am," she answers without hesitating. "I've cared about Shinichi-kun for a long, long time. I would've gone for it back when you first left him, but even I could tell I'd only make him more miserable. He'd probably start thinking that he'd taken advantage of my feelings or something, when it would clearly be me who was taking advantage of him."

"You…" Kaito doesn't know how to finish the sentence. He ends up just looking at her.

"Yeah, me," Rika says roughly. Her mouth curves downwards. "Don't pity me, you asshole. I don't want your pity. All I want is for you to get out of Shinichi-kun's life. He had a hard enough time recovering the first time you let him down." She shoves past him, slamming the door open as she goes.

Kaito stands there for a moment longer. His heart feels like it's bruising his ribcage from how hard it's pounding. Rika is right, is the thing. Kaito doesn't have the right to come back into Shinichi's life and – and leave him again. Kaito doesn't deserve Shinichi, not after what he's done. Rika should get to be with him – she hasn't broken his heart and made him miserable. God, Kaito is selfish, trying to insinuate himself into Shinichi's life again, falling in love with him again when Kaito's already had his chance and ruined him once.

Before he can think, Kaito is running out of Shinichi's office, heading for the entrance to the station. He has to go. He has to do the right thing and leave Shinichi alone –

He's hurrying down the sidewalk when he literally runs into Shinichi.

It's a miracle that Shinichi doesn't spill any of the coffee he's holding; he juggles the cups for a moment, but none of it spills. "Kaito?" he asks, lifting his eyebrows at Kaito. "Are you okay? You're kind of…" He motions vaguely at his own face with one cup. "Pale."

There are a lot of things he could say, but all Kaito can manage is a weak, "I'm so sorry." And he means it.

"For…?" Shinichi trails off, giving Kaito a quizzical look. He squints a little. "Did you put post-its all over my office again? Those were a pain to take down."

"No," Kaito chokes out, looking down at the sidewalk. There are people parting around them, businessmen on their phones and harried mothers with their children, but all he can see is Shinichi's face. Kaito is such an asshole. "No, I'm – I'm sorry for everything I did."

"Oh," Shinichi says after a moment. He looks a little as if he doesn't know how to react, blinking rapidly and licking at his bottom lip. "That's – well, it's in the past. We're good now." He looks as if he's considering saying It doesn't matter, which is an absolute lie.

"No, it's not," Kaito groans, shutting his eyes. "It's not in the past. I'm going to do it again. I'm in love with you again – well, maybe not again, I don't know if I was ever not in love with you, and I'm going to hurt you again because I'm a selfish –"

There's a loud crash, and Kaito opens his eyes to see that Shinichi has dropped both cups of coffee on the ground. Coffee stains the front of Shinichi's pants. The empty cups roll into the path of a passing woman, who gives them a disparaging look before she kicks them off to the side. Kaito looks at Shinichi, who's staring at him with huge eyes and parted lips.

"Sorry," Shinichi breathes, though he doesn't even look down to survey the damage. "Sorry, I – you just –" He moves forward, slowly and jerkily like a sleepwalker. His hands are warm when they touch Kaito's cheeks, the shape of his thumbs familiar as they slot into place right in front of Kaito's ears, and Kaito's heart does something spluttery and exhilarated in his chest, because could it be that – is Shinichi –

And of course that's when there's the sound of a gunshot and pain explodes in his abdomen. Kaito looks down, vision abruptly swimming, to find blood gushing from the newly acquired hole in his side; his hand comes away painted bright red when he touches it to the wound.

The last thing he sees before he blacks out is the horror on Shinichi's face.

The reason Kaito gave when he broke up with Shinichi was that Shinichi always missed anniversaries – anniversaries and dinners with the Hakubas and birthdays and Valentine's Day and so many other relationship milestones – because he was busy with work, with cases, with investigations and corpses and mysteries, and he didn't care about their relationship as much as his job.

Shinichi still remembers the way Kaito had phrased it, all fanged, cutting words that left puncture wounds combined with the coldest glare Shinichi had ever witnessed. He'd stared in silence as Kaito listed off all the engagements Shinichi had missed and all he could think was you have no idea, do you. Because Shinichi loved a scarce few things in the world – his friends, his parents, the thrill of bringing a criminal to justice, Sherlock Holmes – but Kaito was the one thing he loved most. Kaito was supposed to be a constant, no matter what happened in Shinichi's life; Kaito was home and Kaito was always.

Kaito hadn't believed him, but that didn't make it any less true. That doesn't make it any less true.

The smell of antiseptic and starched sheets is the first thing Kaito is aware of when he opens his eyes. The second is how much his side hurts, which – surprise of surprises – feels as if he's been shot. The third is the feeling of something in his hand, something delicate and warm. It's Shinichi's hand, he discovers when he muzzily turns his head to look. Shinichi is folded half onto the bed and half in the visitor's chair beside Kaito's bed – oh, they're in a hospital. That would explain the white walls and unnatural stillness.

Shinichi is asleep, his hair twitching with every long, drawn-in breath he takes. Kaito tries to move his free hand to smooth it down, but he stops when he sees the IV taped to his wrist. Instead, he gently tugs his hand free of Shinichi's and rests it on top of Shinichi's head. Shinichi makes a soft noise, coughs a little in his sleep, and burrows into Kaito's kneecap.

"He's been here since you came out of your operation," a voice says from the doorway, and if Kaito could, he'd jump. He peers towards the door, where Rika is standing with a blank expression. "You were shot by some of the lower members of the Kawamoto clan who were trying to curry favor with some of the clan's allies. The police are investigating at the moment."

"And Shinichi?" Kaito chokes out from his dried out throat. Rika quirks an eyebrow at the cup of water on his bedside table, and Kaito reluctantly removes his hand from Shinichi's hair to take a sip of it. His limbs feel heavy, and he spills water down the front of his hospital gown. Rika doesn't move to help him, though.

"Like I said," she tells him, "he's been here with you. He hasn't gone home for longer than an hour to shower, and he intimidated all the nurses into letting him stay. He didn't even try to chase after the people who shot you; he was too busy calling an ambulance and trying to stop the bleeding. After all," she adds with a sigh of long-suffering, "you are the most important thing to him."

"I…" Kaito looks down at Shinichi. His face is slack with sleep, and he's drooling a little bit. Kaito swallows. "I know." And he does.

"You better," Rika says imperiously before she leaves, shutting the door quietly behind her. Kaito can hear her heels clacking down the hallway.

Shinichi stirs a moment later, his eyelashes fluttering as he opens his eyes to look up at Kaito blearily. "Hi," he says, affectionate and sleepy.

"Hi," Kaito agrees, and coaxes Shinichi upwards until he can press a kiss to his mouth.

"I take it we're going to try again," Shinichi murmurs when he pulls back. Kaito nods wordlessly, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear with his one working hand and ignoring the flash of pain in his side.

"Good," Shinichi says, gently nudging Kaito over so he can lie on the left side of the bed.

"So we're a thing again," Kaito says into the phone.

Aoko is silent for a moment. "Is this supposed to be surprising?" she finally asks.

Kaito cards a hand through Shinichi's hair. Shinichi is beaming at him, elbows propped up on the bed, and there's fading daylight from the window catching in his hair. He looks exhausted, circles under his eyes and eyelids drooping, but he's also happy and beautiful and the best thing Kaito's ever seen.

"Not really," he tells Aoko. "I just wanted to let you know."

(Anyway, yeah, no, I still haven't rediscovered my inspiration. Shame.)

If you enjoyed this fic, please consider dropping me a review, and I'll see you all hopefully soon! - Luna