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Hajime only ever visits when Oikawa is planning to pull an all-nighter.
"You help me stay awake," Oikawa says with a blinding smile on his face that causes all the girls to titter and all the boys to chuckle at whoever he aims it at.
That sort of thing doesn't work on me, Hajime wants to say but he just nods his assent every time. He was never a very good liar. He goes back to fiddling with his phone just as the homeroom teacher walks in to start class every single time.
"Tooru has been holed up upstairs since school let out," Oikawa's mother says upon Hajime's long awaited arrival. "Don't let him stay up too late," she adds and they share a wry smile because the purpose of Hajime's presence is just that, to keep Tooru awake until he finishes studying for their math exam tomorrow afternoon. If only he hadn't put it off for so long, then maybe he would have been able to get some sleep tonight.
As he takes the stairs two at a time, a flimsy promise falls from his mouth, "I'll make him take naps at least," even though they both know Tooru won't do anything he doesn't want to.
Hajime opens the door to Oikawa's room without knocking, without preamble. Oikawa might have become the sort of boy who likes to preface every action with gaudy flourishes and charm as saccharine sweet as the strawberry shortcakes he makes on Tuesdays, but Hajime is but a humble baker, solid crusts and soft, subtle flavors for simple things, so he is not bound by the same rules.
He sets up in a corner of the room quietly. Oikawa sits inside a ring of papers and looks ready to either build a set of paper wings to fly into the sun with or summon some kind of sinful demon to sell his soul to in order to ace trigonometry.
As engrossed as he is in doing problem sets and looking up vocabulary words, he's thoughtfully left a corner of his room next to his bed clear for Hajime to set up his own little station. Oikawa has put off at least three weeks of homework to do the night before the final exam and now he's suffering for it.
"Not without good reason!" Oikawa would say if he were capable of defending himself aloud. "I was working on my latest culinary masterpiece. Did you see how fast my bichon au citron sold? I worked really hard on perfecting the Bavarian cream filling!"
Hajime takes his math notes out of his bag first and Oikawa holds out a hand for them without even looking away from his half-frantic scribbling.
He hands the notes over. Oikawa was lucky he liked him so much because he wouldn't be handing over his precious math notes and preparing to sit here for over half the night with him otherwise.
Even when they were growing up together, Oikawa had shown signs he had the makings of a star. Now he is a rising star, shining so bright he blinds the people near him and drawing strangers in to orbit around him.
He mans the counter of the bakery with the kind of practiced ease, which Hajime envies.
But it's only when he returns to the backroom, that Hajime recognizes the Oikawa he's known since they raced across the jungle gym in the second grade. His smile takes on an edge as sharp as the paring knives they use to slice fruit. His brilliance only becomes more apparent. When he stands next to Hajime mixing batter and reminding him in a cool voice to keep the crust light, Oikawa has never seemed more familiar.
It's for these reasons Hajime took to studying for his math exams ahead of time, finishing going over his own notes a day ahead of time, so Oikawa could look over them the night before. Oikawa always forgets to take notes in class.
What a dumbass.
Hajime cracks open his history textbook he brought along and prepares to be bored to tears as he flips to the appropriate chapter. 1200 BC may have been an important year for the development of human civilization but Hajime could honestly care less.
In the second hour, Hajime is unsympathetic but still optimistic. Maybe Oikawa will finish before one in the morning; the night is still young even if it is eleven o'clock. It would be nice if he didn't have to stay up too late the day before his own math exam, because he also had to open the shop tomorrow morning too.
"Study break, Iwa-chan?" Oikawa asks some time into hour three. He's only gotten up to stretch twice before and left the room for a snack break once. Hajime is still holding out hope they'd be able to get some sleep before one.
This time, Oikawa stretches loudly, joints popping and snapping. He yawns loudly too, and Hajime can't help but notice his teeth flashing in the half light of his desk lamp, the only illumination in the room, and how soft his lips look as they curve into a small grin like he knows Hajime won't refuse.
"Sure," Hajime says, taking Oikawa's proffered hand. Even after he straightens, he doesn't pull away from Oikawa's touch, the closed the circle of clever fingers around his wrist is cold, but his skin still tingles as if he had been burnt.
"Iwa-chan."
The air is tinged with a strange tension. It's like the faint taste of bitter cocoa power tainting what is supposed to be a light and sweet raspberry vanilla tart because someone didn't wash the mixing bowl properly. It's cloying and strange.
"What." Hajime says flatly in an effort to dispel the feeling, leaning in closer despite himself. His hands come up to clutch at Oikawa's shirt and he's not sure if he means to pull him closer or shove him away. He's pressed up against the wall just to the side of the bed, Oikawa's back to his desk, studies forgotten. He meets his gaze at first, challenging, daring him to make a move and Oikawa doesn't budge as he peers into Hajime's face. He makes the choice in that moment, and tugs on the soft, worn material of Oikawa's shirt to pull him closer so that Oikawa catches himself on the wall. He decides to let that sharp, sharp smile press insistently against the curve of his jaw. Hajime tries not to shudder.
"What did you think?"
"Think of what?" Hajime says absently, his head tilted to regard the ceiling, flat and white and boring, as Oikawa's smooth and rich voice reverberates through his ribs, as Oikawa's lips murmur against the ticklish skin at the side of his neck. It's good, it's familiar, but because they're pressed so close together it feels new and different.
"Of my new recipe. How was it?"
"It was nice."
"Just nice?"
"Yeah. This is nice too."
"Iwa-chan!" Oikawa exclaims, pretending to be scandalized, but Hajime already feels the pleased way Oikawa curves his spin to press them closer together and he smiles to himself for just a moment.
He's almost certain Oikawa can feel the clench of muscles under his skin betraying his effort to keep calm because somehow his hands have snuck under Hajime's shirt. A smug grin is pressed against his pulse. Those questing fingers are dragging down his sides, and teasing the skin just above the waistband of his sweatpants. He doesn't want Oikawa to know how flustered he is, doesn't want to react, but his presence is a intoxicating when he's pressed up so close, as if Hajime's skin was simply too thin and permeable.
When Oikawa kisses him, it's just barely more than a peck, a brush of lips, a fleeting thought that fled when a sunbeam shifted across the floor too suddenly, and that's what made it the most memorable. It's a rare moment when Oikawa is doing something with so little fanfare.
Is this sustainable, Hajime thinks to himself. He doesn't know what to do with his hands, but he wants to press them into Oikawa's hair and bring his lips to his own once again so he can try to taste the stuff of stars off of them, cosmic dust and rain, sunshine and Bavarian cream.
Instead of doing any of these things, he pushes back gently with his hands flat against Oikawa's chest and he falls back onto his bed easily enough. He tries to drag Hajime down with his momentum, down towards rumpled sheets and cold fingers and that infuriating smile, but Hajime manages to brace himself against the wall and refuses to fall.
"Go to sleep," Hajime mutters gruffly, grabbing the sheets to wrap Oikawa into them like he was trying to make the world's most sickly sweet magic crescent puff. "It's late and you've been awake for too long."
"Come to bed with me," Oikawa says in a breathy voice, and even though Hajime is sure he isn't serious, it makes his knees go a little weak. But only a little because to say otherwise would mean would mean lying like a lying liar.
"No," Hajime says in an attempt to be firm. "Not tonight," his traitorous mouth adds.
What a sight they must make, Hajime leaning over Oikawa who is making a valiant attempt to escape his blanket cocoon, the two of them half tangled in the sheets and the air laden with unsaid words. Oikawa's cold hands have left warm impression against his skin and Hajime feels branded.
"Take a nap. I'll wake you in a bit and we can watch the sun rise together, yeah?"
"Sounds good."
Oikawa turns away from the light of his desk lamp and curls up into a ball, his hands coming up to settle near his head while Hajime takes the table and sits with his textbook open in front him but his mind a thousand light years away flying through space, orbiting a star, smelling the sharp citrus tang of lemon soap, and wondering just how thinly a knife can slice a situation.
The sun rises at around four thirty in the morning, and Hajime turns away from his textbook, but he stops short of shaking Oikawa awake, his hand just hovering over his shoulders.
He could wake Oikawa and he would look sleepy and grumpy, the bags under his eyes more pronounced when his eyes aren't fever bright. His hair will look even stupider, more fluffy than ever, and unstyled so it'd be flying all over the place. He would look vulnerable and he would be tired and he would think the only way to grow awake is painful and jagged.
Hajime could let him sleep and he would continue to look peaceful, his hands curled near his head and his legs tangled in his sheet. He's not wearing a dazzling smile to impress when he's sleeping. Instead his lips look a little dry and he looks unworried. Not even the fear of failing trig, which is unlikely with the help of Hajime's amazing notes, could possibly wake him from whatever pleasant dream he is currently floating through.
In the end, Hajime just shuts the blinds tightly so no light could possibly sneak in after closing the window a bit more to prevent the morning chill from stealing in. He draws the curtains for good measure and turns off the desk lamp before he leaves.