It's nighttime, and Akaashi is cleaning the floor, on his knees and scrubbing the tile with a giant sponge he got on sale at the convenience store.
Kuroo always wondered why the hell he would do such a thing, considering mops exist, but Akaashi just shook his head while handing the cashier this huge sponge wrapped in plastic.
He thinks it was an excellent investment.
He was somehow not tired after going on that date with Bokuto, the two of them going to the butterfly gardens immediately after eating breakfast. Normally, he would have wanted to go home, recharge his social battery until he needed to let it run again.
But there was something about Bokuto Koutarou that made Akaashi feel alive, feeding his energy through his smile and the ideas that sprouted from his head like wildflowers, and he found himself holding his hand and letting him lead him through a bricked path to see orange butterflies and blue flowers by the water.
It made him happy to feel the sun warming over his skin with a full tummy, to see Bokuto giggle as a butterfly landed on his nose.
Akaashi would have loved to do things like this all the time.
Dates, huh?
Hm.
The sound of his phone ringing beside him startles him out of his head and he jumps with a slight panic, his heart beating and deafening him in one ear.
He dries his hand on his shirt, before flipping it open and seeing Kuroo's contact. He was supposed to be hanging out with Bokuto for the night, so there wasn't really any reason to call.
He presses the phone to the ear that was not ringing with a high whistle after accepting the call.
"What the hell do you want?" Akaashi asks, expecting to hear a response with just as much snarkiness in a voice that sounded like candle flame from Kuroo.
"Daisy, Daisy~!"
Akaashi resists the urge to fall into the suds in front of him and curl up in a ball, hoping the world would open up a hole just for him to die in, as it was not Kuroo on the other line, but Bokuto.
"Oh, um...sorry." Akaashi shuts his eyes, hoping that Bokuto didn't think he was a major asshole to his best friend with no context, just because. "Hi, Bokuto."
"Hi~!" He says again, this time with a happier tone of voice, as if Akaashi was the one to greet him first. "I was calling because, um...me and Kuroo went to Yojiyoji."
"...The children's indoor park?" Akaashi stops and sits up straight, knowing nothing good could possibly come from whatever Bokuto is about to tell him. "I thought you two went out to get tea and dinner."
"Yeah, we did! But we kinda made a detour before coming home! Um...Kuroo got lost in the foam pit and now he's stuck because there are a bunch of kids crawling on him."
They are both quiet for a moment, Bokuto letting Akaashi take in this information while Akaashi was listening to Kuroo's terrified, muffled yelling in the distance over the line, getting drowned out by giggles and the excited yelling of other children.
His best friend, twenty-one years old and about the height of a black bear standing up, has gotten himself in a war, and lost to children and foam squares in a pit.
He somehow is not surprised.
Akaashi takes a breath, staring into the suds in front of him, before he nods. "Okay..."
"I cannot lift him out of the pit. Doctor's orders!"
Akaashi sighs and stands up, wondering how he ended up having to take care of Kuroo, too. "...I'm coming."
"Thank you, Daisy! You're our hero! You know, I think he really thought he would die." Bokuto says. "He had a really scared look on his face."
Akaashi smiles and nods, holding his phone between his ear and his shoulder as he grabs the keys to the apartment, trying to figure out the fastest way to get to Yojiyoji by bus as the wet spot on his shirt grows icy against his skin. "I'll bet. Kids are terrifying."
"Do you want kids when you grow up?"
Akaashi's heart kind of skips and he finds it endearing how Bokuto asks this, as if they were not whole adults and already grown up.
"I do not." Akaashi shakes his head, holding the phone with his right hand as he leaves the apartment. "I don't like them."
"Aw, what? Kids are awesome! I'm gonna introduce you to my baby niece! She will change your mind!"
Akaashi then imagines Bokuto playing with her, maybe singing her to sleep or bouncing her in his arms while his sister is sleeping.
The idea was nice.
He smiles, flushing and looking up at the moon above him. The stars are cool over his hot skin, returning his grin with flashes of silver, glimmering among the navy sky like daisies.
Just as pretty as daisies.
"Then, I can't wait to meet her." He says, and he could practically see Bokuto beaming on the other end, dimples prodding his cheeks. "I'm coming, okay? Hang tight and don't let Kuroo die."
"You have my word! I'll see you soon, Daisy! Oh! And...um..."
"Yeah?"
"May I have your phone number? I've been wanting it for a while but...keep forgetting to ask you for it..." He hesistates on the other line. "That way I could call you directly when Kuroo is in trouble again!"
Akaashi smiles and looks to the floor. "Okay. That's fine."
And he tells him while Bokuto puts it into his phone, creating another link to each other that Akaashi was afraid of, another happy avenue from Bokuto that Akaashi tried his best not to rely on so much.
He hangs up, and while he makes his way to the bus stop, a hand in front of his cheeks to hide his blush from the universe, he thinks maybe he would have another change of heart while Bokuto had it in his hands.
~❀~
When Akaashi gets there, there are children running and screaming, sounds of small bodies slamming too hard against slides and feet taking steps way too quickly, sneaker soles screaming alongside them against the flooring.
Akaashi has the misfortune of running into an employee right at the door, looking bored and like they'd rather be literally anywhere else.
He has even more misfortune to have to make up a lie that he was here to pick up his son and his son's friend so that he wouldn't have to buy a ticket to enter.
He only had twenty minutes to pull Kuroo Tetsurou out of a foam pit before he got charged thirty dollars for a ticket to an indoor children's park.
This was unbelievable.
Akaashi sighs and holds onto his elbow with one hand, following the gate of the biggest attraction in here, a playground with tunnels and slides and nets to climb. He assumed that there would be a foam pit somewhere at the end of one of these slides, maybe towards the middle somewhere, and to his luck (luck?) there was.
He sees Bokuto glancing around aimlessly, assuming he was looking for him. There is a big, light blue bird plushie in his hands staring back at him.
Akaashi can't help but feel less stressed about this whole thing when Bokuto spots him, jutting his hand out in a wave as he smiles so big it makes his eyes squint up.
"Akaashi!"
"Hello." Akaashi glances behind him to make sure he wasn't being watched so he couldn't get caught in a lie, looking at the pit that was filled with grey and red foam squares. "Is he—"
Kuroo is, in fact, stuck up to his chest in said foam squares. His hair is messier than it usually is, somehow causing concern in Akaashi. He looked like he was in a chaotic yet stagnant state of mind, his eyes shut as if he was meditating in the middle of one of the noisiest places Akaashi's ever been to.
Is he meditating?
"Kuroo?" Akaashi asks, and Kuroo opens his eyes lazily, before they snap open at his face.
"Akaashi, thank fuck! I thought I was going to die in here." Kuroo says, exasperated. "Kids are menaces. Five of them just jumped me before you came."
Akaashi wants to laugh at him, never thinking he'd have the golden opportunity to see something like this. Kuroo's eyebrows fall as he looks at Akaashi pointedly, seeing the smile threatening to break through his features at his predicament.
"This is almost too good. I have to take a photo, hold on."
Akaashi reaches into his back pocket despite the silent protest in Kuroo's glare, before holding it up once the camera is open.
He grins. "Smile, Kuroo!"
Kuroo holds up two middle fingers and the fakest smile Akaashi has ever seen, making him actually laugh at the screen.
"I really should leave you here," Akaashi says, looking over the photo on his phone, grainy, but good for memories. "Maybe I'll join in when the kids come beat your ass again."
Bokuto breathes out a chuckle and Kuroo groans in exasperation, throwing his head back against the foam squares. "Akaashi! Please get me out, I am begging. I think I hear them coming."
Akaashi is quiet and actually does hear the distant rumbles of kids in the tunnels above them, their giggles echoing off of the plastic walls and vibrating the tubes of the slides, a stampede of bison approaching, rather.
"Akaashi," Kuroo says quickly, his eyes wide as he looks at Akaashi in panic. "They're friggin' coming."
Akaashi holds onto the side of the pit and leans forward, tilting his head. He's got to prolong this moment for as long as possible.
"What do I get out of this, Kuroo?"
Kuroo gestures to himself with both arms, looking absolutely ridiculous considering the rest of his body was hidden by foam squares. "Me! What more could you want?"
Akaashi tsks. "Hard pass."
"I'll do your laundry for a week." Kuroo offers, nodding wildly, desperate in trying to convince Akaashi to do the bare minimum of saving him. "That's pretty good, right?"
Akaashi makes a face. "Eh~. I don't think so."
"What, you don't want me to find your lace thongs? I don't judge. I think you would look great in lace!"
Akaashi deadpans, knowing Kuroo would find a way to embarrass him somehow, even in this kind of situation.
"You're losing me here, you pervert."
"I'll give you extra goodbye kisses in the morning!"
"Do all the chores for a week and we have a deal."
"A week?"
Kuroo hears the banging of the tunnels above him, more kids filtering in and making their way into the pit. He glances behind his shoulder to see a child emerge from the slide in the corner of the foam pit, her eyes on Kuroo as she lands on her back onto the foam.
"Hey! He's still here!" She yells into the slide, her voice echoing like an announcement. "He's still here!"
"Okay! A week. A week! Get me out, please!"
Akaashi smiles as he rides on a small victory, before leaning forward to give Kuroo his hand. The other clings onto it and trembles as he struggles to pull himself out of the squares, Akaashi using all of his strength to keep an anchor for him.
He holds onto Kuroo's hand with his other hand and pulls back, letting Kuroo kick his legs a little to get himself on top of the foam pit. He crawls like a newborn deer across the foam squares, his movements frantic and sloppy as he tries to get away from the children, and he gets out in time before that one kid is joined by her friends.
They were like a little gang. Akaashi shudders at the thought.
The three of them leave quickly, slipping into the cover of the nighttime and making their way back home, Akaashi refusing to make eye contact with the employee he lied to on the way out, feeling like he had a bounty on his head or something even worse.
Kuroo was still slightly worn out from his time at the playground while Bokuto was still holding onto that bird plushie and humming a tune that Akaashi could have sworn he heard before.
"I can't believe I have to keep an eye on both of you," Akaashi says, slipping a chocolate pocky into his mouth from the box Kuroo bought him as an apology, the streetlamps bright above them as they gleamed with a stark bronze.
"There's no one else I'd want pulling me out of a foam pit at Yojiyoji," Kuroo says, stretching his arms behind his back. "Thanks, 'kaashi."
"Hey! Unlike Kuroo, I am not a child!" Bokuto practically shouts, leaning forward in slight offense and challenge as Akaashi pulls out another pocky from the package.
"Yeah, but you still need supervision," Akaashi says, holding it to Bokuto's lips for him to eat, the boy humming and focusing his attention on the pocky rather than the fact that Akaashi thought he needed his extra attention.
Bokuto definitely did not mind it in the slightest.
"It's just because we know how to have fun," Kuroo says, rolling his head nonchalantly to the left to look at Bokuto. "Right, Bo?"
"Right!" Bokuto holds up a fist in emphasis, his voice muffled from the pocky, and Akaashi rolls his eyes.
"Right." He says. "I'm sure getting beat up by children was fun."
Kuroo hums in disdain, before he reaches over to grab a pocky from the package, and Akaashi lets the two of them reminisce about their day on the way to the bus while he stayed quiet and listened.
Kuroo unlocks the apartment after the walk back, claiming he would take a shower first although they had separate bathrooms.
Akaashi's feet were burning and he wanted nothing more than to come back home and finish cleaning, but as he was slipping his feet into his slippers at the genkan, Bokuto stops him, still holding that bird plushie.
"Hey, Akaashi."
Akaashi looks at him from where he was kneeling on the floor, sliding his shoes in the cubby by the door.
"I, um..." Bokuto holds the plushie out for him, a stuffed bluebird with a little top hat and a matching tie sown into the middle of it. He's seen these in the claw machines at the arcade in Jinsoku. "I saw this in the machines at Yojiyoji and thought of you! I won it for you. It's Bun-chan!"
Akaashi smiles and takes it from Bokuto, beaming despite it being nighttime. "Thank you."
"Do you like it?" Bokuto asks, and Akaashi stands up, nodding and looking at the plushie.
"It's very cute." He says, squishing it in between his hands and likes how soft it was. "Now I could be reminded of you when you're not around."
Bokuto blushes at the implication and Akaashi does not see it, as he lightly bumps into his other shoulder on purpose and it makes Bokuto smile. Akaashi goes into his room to place Bun-chan beside the duck plushie that Bokuto had, before going back into the kitchen to finish cleaning.
"Did you eat with Kuroo?" Akaashi asks, hearing the boy in question start the faucet in his bathroom to shower.
He kneels down and squishes the sponge against the floor, seeing it was still soaked in water and he still had about half the kitchen to finish washing.
"Yes. I'm kinda tired. But I wanna help you clean!" Bokuto says, and Akaashi shakes his head.
"No, Bo. No cleaning until you're better."
"I am better!"
Akaashi shakes his head again, hearing the excitement in Bokuto's voice over helping him do something like cleaning.
Akaashi does end up letting him help, only having him wipe the counters off, and by the time he was finished, Akaashi had done a shitty job cleaning the floor, only so he could be done at the same time.
Bokuto got sleepy by the time he was done with his bath, and Akaashi sent him off to his bed with a promise to wake him up if he was in trouble again, though the forecast didn't call for any storms. He made sure to grab his own plushie from his bed while Bokuto watched him leave, but he didn't look back because he knew he'd stay.
Akaashi curls up on the couch and tries his best to stop thinking of the empty space beside Bokuto in his bed.