AN: This will be, eventually (like everything else I post), a collection of one-shots/drabbles focused on the DoumekixWatanuki relationship in xxxHOLiC. The prompts I'm using are from a lot of different sources (challenges, song lyrics, etc.), and the slash content will probably be just hinted at, or incredibly mild. These are going to be my first attempts at writing any of the characters in the manga, so...forgive me if any of them are completely mangled. Also, in my fan-writing, I tend to write a lot of run-ons and fragments that make sense to me (somehow) but I really have no idea if they make sense to anyone else. SO, hopefully, as these go on, the grammar and storyline problems will be improved, but these first few might be a bit rocky.
Most of these will probably be pretty short and random.
the way you walk
"You walk different."
"Huh?" Watanuki blinks for a minute, apparently trying to process the fact that Doumeki is actually speaking, rather than being silent and obtrusive like he usually is during the now-but-very-reluctantly-done-daily ritual of walking to school together, before realizing that there was actually a good chance that he was being insulted. "What's wrong with the way I walk?" he snaps, puffing up a bit and becoming not at all conscious of how his individual limbs known as legs are moving.
"Nothing," Doumeki says, shrugging.
Watanuki feels like he's being scrutinized. "Just because I don't have a hulking figure and tree trunks for legs that make me loom around like some sort of cave man, doesn't mean that I walk different. Everyone walks differently!"
"It's just…different than before." A disjointed sentence, but Doumeki seems to assume that it explains everything, and he keeps walking.
Watanuki glares at him, pausing for an instant (not examining the way Doumeki walks), before muttering something about "ingrates" and speeding up his stride to rejoin his companion.
- - - -
"You walk different now," Himawari mentions at lunch.
Snapped out of his reverie of finally being able to eat with Himawari-chan alone!, Watanuki stares at her for a moment. "Different?" His mind flashes back to the morning. "He said that too," he mutters, and a light begins flickering in his head before he effectively busts it with the mental explosion that comes from the inner outrage of actually remembering something that jerk said. "What do you mean Himawari-chan?" And he manages a meek little smile.
"I didn't notice it until Doumeki-kun pointed it out to me," she says, smiling. "Before, you used to walk like you were expecting to fall all the time. It was almost like you were trying to balance on the edge of something because you were afraid of slipping."
Watanuki stares, not exactly understanding whether or not the observation is true or means anything, not to mention he's somewhat stuck on the idea that Doumeki and Himawari had a conversation together—about him. And that Doumeki came up with something like that. "Well, I guess I've always been a bit clumsy," he offers.
"But now you seem like you have more confidence." She takes a bite from her bento, smile widening as she looks at him. "Maybe because you know that there's going to be someone to catch you, right?"
Doumeki.
A blush explodes on his face, and he looks into his bento quickly to hide it.
Like Hell.
- - - -
After school, Watanuki has to wonder why the lug head does well in archery at all—don't they ever practice? Doumeki, meanwhile, looms next to him like he's his bodyguard, which is what Watanuki's sure it looks like when people see them walking down the sidewalk together. He turns and glares at his friend. "I can catch myself, thank you."
Doumeki blinks, but says nothing.
"And I walk just fine—and just the same."
Doumeki runs a hand through his hair, but still says nothing.
"And just how do you notice how I walk anyway? Since when is it any of your business, let alone of any interest?"
For a minute, it seems like the pattern's going to continue, and Watanuki's going to have to start yelling as usual because the jerk's not even trying to make a conversation, when Doumeki says, simply, "You walk ahead of me a lot."
Watanuki opens his mouth, and then stops.
"I tend to get a good view."
- - - -
Needless to say, Watanuki ended up yelling for a completely different reason.
- - - -
And, due to the apparently ironic sense of humor that the universe must have…
Watanuki ended up falling out of a tree the next day.
On top of Doumeki.
disclaimer: xxxholic and characters © CLAMP