Soul || KNY x Reader

09 ≈ There's Some Angst In This One, Folks

Above is your kitsune mask that I designed.

———

Tanjiro wouldn't exactly say that he's ever had a crush on someone.

He grew up on a mountain with his family and his only interaction with other people would be the trips he made to the village that lived at the foot of the mountain and Old Man Saburo who lived alone. He made the trips with his mother when he was young, then went by himself after that, accompanied occasionally by his younger siblings. Since he'd lived with his family and the people in the village were usually people older than him by a few years, he'd just felt like they were an extended family to him.

The first time he met (Y/N), he thought of her as the same, someone who'd needed his help and relied on him. He'd stepped up to the role, helping her as much as he could with Japanese, encouraging her through her training, and teaching her etiquette (he still considers himself a failure when he couldn't teach her how to use chopsticks even after a year since she'd been here).

Tanjiro realized pretty soon that she was someone who enjoyed physical touch, so he made sure to give her lots of head pats and hugs whenever he could. He thought it felt like he was giving a hug to a sister, but now he realized that it had always felt a little bit different.

Tanjiro had realized this about six months ago, when (Y/N) had started going for training away from him. When she wasn't in his line of sight, he worried for her well-being (at the time, seeing to the shenanigans she got up to and the injuries she continuously received, he thought it was justified), throwing himself into his own training to push those worries aside. He knew that she was stronger than him, much stronger. He shouldn't have to worry about her so often, but he did.

Once he realized that fact, Tanjiro started wondering about their past conversations, wondering where things had changed, where his heart started to yearn for her and where he started wishing that they grew closer. For the life of him, he couldn't figure it out. Maybe it had been like that from the beginning.

Since then, he'd paid more attention to the things he felt while he was around her, trying to recall what his mother had said about what she felt with his father when they first met.

"It's no fluttery feeling in your stomach. It is a lighter feeling in your chest, a sort of reassurance in your heart that, with them, everything would turn out alright."

He was four, so he didn't understand what it meant, but now, he understood exactly what it was she was describing.

Every time Tanjiro was around (Y/N), he could feel less worried about his and Nezuko's futures, less angry and pressured to avenge his family, and just relax like the boy he was.

And he could tell that she felt the same around him. Throughout the day, she'd be tensed and vaguely stressed. He wasn't sure what it was she was stressed about, but it seemed to be a big problem seeing how it plagued her almost every waking second of her day. But whenever she'd see him, her smell would sweeten a little and she'd give him a big, heartwarming smile.

Even then, in Tanjiro's mind, it didn't click.

He could now shamelessly say that he was as oblivious as a rock.

Currently, looking into her eyes, he could tell that whatever she was going to tell him, he knew it would affect him a lot.

"Tanjiro," Her voice started, an excited glimmer in her eye, "I'm going to the Final Selection this year!"