Repeat

By Sileny

Summary: There are plenty of horrible ways to break someone's heart, but telling him that he sounded like a broken record was just too much. So much that it makes him afraid of saying his three favorite words. Twoshot.

Disclaimer: poor college students own nothing

Pairing(s): Onesided HaizakiKise, onesided AoKise, eventual mutual AoKise

Warnings: Implied sex, kissing, minor language, un-beta'd (le gasp!)

I.

"Good god," Kise remembers being told, while he's sobbing and whimpering in confusion and pain (but mostly crushing, helpless confusion), "you sound like a broken record. And here I thought there'd be something nice under that pretty face."

He wonders what he had done do deserve such biting words. Kise was a very affectionate person by nature; he loved showering the people he adored with affection in the forms of cuddles and skinship, gifts and sweet words. And the people he adored usually gave back to him in various amounts. Even Midorima returned his gestures by letting him cling, if only for a fraction of a second.

So then why? Why, when he's spread out on the bed at the mercy of this man's every whim, when he loves this man so much? He loves the silver-haired man and he wants to let him know that; that's why he calls out his name and breathes out his "I love you"s because they're all true.

Haizaki takes him roughly like usual and the tears fall from Kise's amber eyes. The usual pain is numbed by shock, and when they're finished Haizaki leaves first. It's the usual, but this is the first time that the other male had verbally told Kise that he was a broken record, with all the cruelty that Kise knew was there but refused to look at because god damn it he had been in love.

He sobs, curling up on himself in a miserable little ball. It takes a good half hour before he can push his aching self up and stumble to the shower. He intentionally puts the water on the hottest setting—so hot it burns and turns his pale skin a vivid pink that reminds him of what happens to lobsters when they're boiled—and scrubs himself raw. When he's finished with his shower he wobbles back into the cheap hotel room and mechanically gathers up his things. The only good thing, he supposes, as he clutches his belongings and walks out, hair still dripping, is that Haizaki always pays for the rooms. In fact, Haizaki had this weird habit of paying for everything whenever they went out, even if it was only to love hotels.

It was enough of a gentlemanly act to have made Kise hope for more, but he supposes all of those dreams are dashed and gone, drained away like the soap he had used in the shower.

Kise comes down with the flu for a good solid week and when he gets back to school, he's apparently missed a lot. Haizaki's been kicked off of the basketball team, apparently. Kuroko tells him in his usual polite, monotonous voice: "Akashi-kun found his conduct severely disagreeable, so requested that he leave as he's more of a liability than an asset."

Akashi scolds him severely for neglecting to care for his own body to the point that he missed an entire week of school (and therefore an entire week of practice). Kise stammers apologies and wilts under Akashi's furious red gaze…

…and then promptly bends over double, face twisted into a grimace of absolute pain as Kuroko slams an Ignite Pass right into his gut. "K-k-k-kurokocchi?" he stammers out, stumbling for balance and clutching his stomach. There are tears gathering in the corners of his eyes; Kuroko's Ignite Pass hurts. "How mean," he wheezes out, "I just recovered, you know."

When he looks up, though, he's met with furious teal eyes. It startles him; the blond had never seen been this close to Kuroko when he lost his temper, and he had certainly never been on the receiving end of Kuroko's fury. He wracked his brain futilely in order to come up for a reason why the normally complacent shadow was so angry, but nothing came up, so instead he looks helplessly to the other members of the team.

What he sees shocks him some more.

Akashi is angry, understandably so because of Kise's negligence, but there's a darker, more furious spark in his eyes that stems from something else. It sends shivers up and down Kise's spine. Aomine looks peeved, as well, probably because Kise missed so many one-on-one sessions with the tanned player. But even Midorima and Murasakibara are irritated, and Kise's pretty certain that his absence would have had the least effect on those two. If anything, Midorima would probably have said something along the lines of "Good riddance," and then lectured him gruffly on how to prevent illness. Murasakibara shouldn't have cared at all unless Kise was secretly his snack fairy.

"Um… why is everyone so mad?" Kise ventures out nervously.

This time he's punched by Aomine. Teikou's ace avoids Kise's face only because Kise's whined about his model face enough that it's almost reflex to avoid it, and goes for the arm instead. Kise whimpers and shrinks back; in addition to his pained middle there's a stinging arm now, too. Was this seriously how his basketball team welcomed the recovery of one of their players?

Aomine grabs Kise's shoulders before he can voice any of his complaints, though, and gives him a good hard shake. There's a sort of desperate edge in his voice when he speaks. "Damn it Kise!" the ace half-shouts. "Why him? Of all the guys out there why did you go for Haizaki?"

"Shogocchi?" Kise asks, a bit disoriented, although a split second later his mind catches up (sort of) and he slaps a hand to his mouth. It's too late, though; the damage is done. Kise's eyes widen as Akashi's narrow into dangerous slits. Aomine, for his part, looks like he's going to go out there and commit murder with his bare hands.

"Ryouta," Akashi says, in a voice that is scarily calm and Kise doesn't even know what comes over him. All of a sudden the tears are spilling from his eyes, plummeting off his cheeks and dripping down his chin and he's wailing. He's not sure if it's because Akashi is scary—he is, a lot—or if it was because Haizaki was mentioned, but he cries so hard that none of them are quite sure what to do with him.

Somehow or another Kise ends up clutching the front of Aomine's tank top, making a mess of it and his face as he cries. "I can't—hic!—help it," he wails, voice losing some of its harshness because he's muffling it against Aomine's chest. "I—sob—loved him so—hic!—much, and I thought maybe—whimper—he would too—sob—one day but he—"

Aomine awkwardly pats his back because Akashi and Kuroko are giving him pointed looks that tell him to do so. Kise blathers on.

"—never did and—sob—said I sounded like a—gulp—b-broken record." He takes a shuddering breath. Those two words sting, even more so than his puffy eyes or his white knuckles against the black fabric of Aomine's shirt. "I only said I—hic—love him. Why can't I? Why?"

Kise cries himself to sleep, still clinging like a leech to Aomine, and Akashi grumbles a bit before crabbily dismissing the two. "Daiki, you're exempt from today's practice. Take Ryouta home and tell him that he has the next three days off. If you don't come back tomorrow though I'll triple your training menu." Of course, Akashi neglects to tell Aomine how he's going to get Kise home, so after several long minutes of standing in one spot with the petrified look of a statue, Aomine hoists the unconscious model awkwardly onto his back (Kuroko bribes Murasakibara over to adjust the sleeping blond with the promise of a packet of Pocky, which was helpful) and leaves.

When Aomine next sees Haizaki in the halls, he delivers that horrifyingly heavy model-ruining punch that he didn't give Kise. The silver-haired boy goes down, and Aomine towers over him, all wrath and rage and other related stuff, and snarls, "If you dare go near Kise or even touch him again, I will personally rearrange every feature on your face and then give you to Akashi for finishing touches."

Haizaki doesn't answer, focusing instead on gingerly picking himself up from the floor, but it'snot like Aomine was waiting for one. He had already turned sharply on his heel and was marching away, back stiff and limbs rigid.

Kise's second return to the club is much less grand and dramatic than his first. He's left largely alone for the better part of a week before the team pays a visit to his house. In fact, they're sitting in his room right now: Akashi imperiously having taken over the chair at Kise's desk, Murasakibura is curled up on Kise's bed hugging his pillow and munching a snack, Aomine is sprawled inelegantly on the end of the bed that is not occupied by the childish giant, and Kuroko and Midorima are sitting politely on the floor. Kise serves them juice and takes a seat awkwardly between his bed and Kuroko.

Akashi promptly launches into a solid lecture about how even though humans needed relationships in order to function properly, having abusive relationships was as good as having none. He then proceeded to go on about how to pick someone who would treasure him, and that if he ever had any insecurities he could always come talk to Akashi.

Murasakibara shares some of his snacks with Kise and tells him that, since they were snack buddies—Kise's not sure when this happened, but he's not about to disagree—he'd crush anyone who made him cry. It's both a reassuring and terrifying thought; Murasakibara's hands are huge and the threat of crushing is not a bluff.

Midorima gives Kise a list of things Geminis should do to safeguard their luck, ticking them off curtly on his fingers. Kise nods and smiles weakly, especially when Midorima pulls out something from his school bag—a little plastic keychain of a bowl of soup—proclaiming that it was the lucky item for Geminis that day. Kise thanks him anyway and attaches the chain to the zipper of his schoolbag. It's weird, but in a cute way. And the thought that Midorima went out of his way to get him a lucky item is touching.

Kuroko tells him that if Kise's seriously feeling down, he would be allowed one free hug a day. In all seriousness, though, the boy offers to extend a listening ear if ever Kise finds himself in a situation that he needs confiding in. Kise almost cries tears of gratitude.

Aomine is completely silent, but when everyone looks expectantly at him he shrugs and drawls out, "I'll punch anyone who makes you cry, you crybaby model."

"Um… thanks, Aominecchi…?"

Akashi takes that moment to usher everyone out, throwing out an excuse. He leaves Aomine in the room with the words, "Straighten everything out before you dare leave, Daiki." Aomine grumbles, but there's no real bite because no one in their right mind openly disregards Akashi's words, and Kise is left with six half-empty glasses of juice and one sulking Aomine. He transfers the glasses to his desk and shifts himself so that he sits facing the bed.

"Did you need something, Aominecchi?" he asks, looking up at the other boy.

Aomine mutters something unintelligible, scratching the back of his head. He surprises Kise by actually getting off the bed so that he can sit right in front of him.

"Aominecchi?" Kise tries again, and gets two tanned hands planted on his face, cupping his cheeks.

"Forget him," Aomine commands, and Kise doesn't understand. Blank amber orbs stare into eyes the color of the ocean and Aomine groans, looking exasperated. He tugs Kise roughly to him so that the blond sprawls into his chest, and he squeezes, growling out, "Forget him. You should be using your fluffy head to think of other things that won't hurt you." Aomine is furious; what was so good about that jerk that had the blond following him like a puppy? Aomine hadn't gone out of his way to smack a basketball at the boy's pretty head—because, really, he has better control than that—only to lose him to Haizaki, of all people.

Even Midorima was better than Haizaki.

(But in all actuality, Kise was supposed to have been Aomine's puppy from the moment the tanned player laid eyes on the boy, not that he was going to admit it. He's fairly certain Akashi knows already though, that jerk.)

He doesn't even realize that he's squeezing a little too hard until Kise gasps out a breathy, "Aominecchi, it hurts." There's a suspicious hitch in the boy's voice and Aomine pushes Kise away to arm's length to study him. Kise's cheeks are strangely flushed and there's this odd little wanton expression on his face. But his eyes aren't looking at Aomine; they're looking through him, at a silver-haired boy that Aomine cannot stand, and it infuriates him.

It's also infuriating that Kise's somehow so infatuated with Haizaki that he's responding to pain. Kise's masochistic tendencies when in context to Haizaki make Aomine feel sick.

He fixes the problem by kissing the blond, long and slow, deliberately gentle even though Kise is scrabbling against him and begging for something rougher. Aomine is not a gentle person when faced with something he's passionate about, as evident in his basketball style, but he'd rather die by Akashi's own hand than do anything that'll have Kise equate him with Haizaki.

"Look at me," he breathes, irritation seeping into his voice as he buries his hands into silky gold locks. "Look at someone who's loved you longer than that bastard and who loves you more than him. Look at me."

A/N: It's really weird... I dislike Haizaki yet I like him. I feel very conflicted about him.