learashi | Sharing Happiness Is Sometimes Easier Than Sharing Lunch

Pairing: Sakumiya

Rating: PG-13

Genre: fluff, au

Disclaimer: Totally fiction people - as if I could even dream of owning them.

Summary: Nino was suddenly finding it difficult to swallow. How was it possible that everyone knew that he liked Sho, when he'd only realized himself a few days ago?

A/N: Happy Birthday southview! I hope you have had a lovely day so far (and survived the exam). *mwah*

"Buy me lunch?"

"I made my own. But we can share if you like."

Nino loved nothing better than a free meal and even though his co-worker Jun had warned him about Sho's almost literally killer cooking, he figured that he had just been exaggerating. They didn't call Jun 'Princess' for nothing.

"Sounds good. I'll just get Aiba to keep an ear out for my phone and I'll meet you on the roof." Nino replied eagerly before adding, "Oh and can you grab me a cola from the vending machine on your way past?"

"Um, sure," Sho said as he gathered up his bento box and some of his private cookie stash to pad out the meal before heading out to climb the stairs to the rooftop terrace that everyone who worked in the building used for crafty cigarettes and a chance to see the sun occasionally.

++++

"So is today the day?" Aiba asked excitedly.

"It's Wednesday, which is definitely a day, but I wouldn't describe it as the day," Nino replied from where he was perched on the corner of his friend's desk.

"Don't play dumb; you know exactly what I mean. Have you decided that the time is finally right to pounce on Sho-kun?"

"I don't know what you could possibly be referring to."

"Don't even try and lie to me. I know you like him a whole lot. You even bought him a coffee the other week," Aiba said with a knowing smile.

"That proves nothing." Nino was definitely not going to admit Aiba was right.

"Wrong! We've been friends for five years and you've never bought me a coffee. Not even once."

"Well, perhaps that's just because I don't like you enough." Nino immediately felt the tips of his ears going red as he realized that he'd just made a big mistake.

"HA! I knew it," Aiba yelled triumphantly.

"Shut up, you idiot. I don't want Jun to hear..."

"You don't want me to hear what?"

Nino turned around slowly to see his other friend standing there with a gleam in his eyes.

"That Nino likes Sho-chan." Aiba managed to blurt out his words and duck away from Nino's swinging hand at the same time, narrowly avoiding a sharp slap to the side of his head.

"Oh, that. We all know that, even Ohno-san and he's only in the office two days a week," Jun replied, sounding deeply disappointed at the lack of new gossip.

Nino was suddenly finding it difficult to swallow. How was it possible that everyone knew that he liked Sho, when he'd only realized himself a few days ago?

"But...how?...Why?"

"How do we all know?" Jun asked.

"Y-yes."

"Because you go all 'nice' around him instead of being your usual pain-in-the-ass self. It is actually quite creepy."

"But...I...only just..."

"You only just discovered that you have feelings for him?" Aiba asked, not wanting to be left out of the conversation.

"Well...yes."

"But we've had an office pool running for weeks about how long it will take you two to jump each other..."

"Shut up Aiba," Jun said, cutting his friend off. He could see that Nino was already nervous enough as it was.

"Sorry," Aiba mumbled, looking upset until Jun ruffled his hair by way of apology.

Nino couldn't believe that they all knew. If Ohno knew, then it was a fairly safe bet that Sho knew too. Ohno was the most oblivious person in the world when it came to feelings.

"How can I go and have lunch with him now? I won't be able to even look him in the face," Nino wailed as he dropped down heavily into the visitors chair in front of Aiba's desk.

Aiba looked at Jun for support. Jun was a master of dating and even though he tried to cultivate a cold and aloof exterior, it was common knowledge that deep down, he was a hopeless romantic.

Jun raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow in response, but it took a strong soul to defy Aiba's pleading puppy-eyes.

"Think about it logically," Jun said, taking a seat next to a quietly whimpering Nino. "If he didn't like you in return, wouldn't he turn down your invitation to lunch?"

"That's so true," chirped Aiba, trying his best to bolster Nino's mood.

"Since when have you ever been afraid of anything?" Jun asked, remembering Nino in the glittery red high heels and blonde wig at the Christmas party. He'd had to buy Nino dinner every night for a month after losing that particular bet.

"Maybe I should just forget the whole idea. I'm happy the way I am." Even to his own ears Nino sounded unconvincing. He wasn't happy at all. Even though he had a job that he could tolerate (which was a first for him) and two good friends in Aiba and Jun (although he'd never tell them so) he missed having someone in his bed and in his life.

"Suuuure," Jun replied with a searching look.

"Um, hasn't Sho-chan been waiting up on the roof for quite a while already?" Aiba pointed out.

"Crap." Nino jumped up and shot out the door.

++++

"Hey Nino. I'm over here." Sho called out as Nino emerged onto the roof.

Nino was relieved to see that Sho had chosen the bench seat in the only shady corner. The sun was not his friend; his skin burnt almost immediately on the shortest of exposures. Just last week Aiba had made one of his regular vampire jokes, tossing a bunch of garlic at him before running away and throwing himself into Jun's arms in mock terror. Jun had held onto Aiba for just a moment too long before the pair of them had pulled away from each other with matching pink tinted cheeks, immediately finding something important to do elsewhere, in opposite ends of the building for as long as it took for their embarrassment to subside.

"Um, hi," Nino replied as he sat down awkwardly, taking the can of cola from Sho as he did so.

Nino wanted to punch himself in the head. Usually he had no problems speaking to anyone, but with Sho it was different. The problem was that he usually talked to people in the rudest way possible, highlighting their faults and getting under their skin.

His friends Aiba and Jun understood that it was his way of showing them affection, but with Sho it was different. The one time he'd picked on Sho's tie he was sure that he'd seen Sho's bottom lip quiver and that particular tie had never been seen since.

“I have hand rolled sushi that I made last night,” Sho said with a wide smile that made his eyes scrunch shut into tiny crescents. “I kind of hoped that we would have lunch together so I deliberately made extra.”

“Really?” Nino’s heat gave an odd jump at Sho’s words. All he could do was offer an equally wide smile in return while mentally urging himself to stop acting like an idiot.

Nino’s smile soon disappeared when Sho held out a box of misshapen, lumpy looking objects that sagged in the middle. They were vaguely cylindrical, but they had mostly split on the sides causing the rice to leak out like some strange fungus. On the whole, the box contained what was possibly the most unappetising looking collection of ‘food’ Nino had ever laid eyes on even down to the tiny cocktail sausage octopus that only seemed to have five legs and one eye.

The last thing Nino wanted to do was to actually put any of the disgusting looking substances in his mouth, but Sho was looking at him with such an expression of nervous anticipation tinged with fear that he knew that he had to do it no matter the consequences. Taking a deep breath, Nino picked up the least revolting looking roll and nibbled on the very edge.

The taste was, if possible, even worse than he’d imagined. Forcing his lips into a rictus like grin Nino said, “mmm” as he tried to swallow whatever it was that was making his mouth burn.

"Too much wasabi?" Sho asked with a worried frown.

At least Nino now knew why his lips were oddly numb. "N-no, it's delicious. I'm just not a big eater. But don't let it stop you." Nino gestured towards the box, hoping that Sho would be too busy eating to notice him discretely disposing of the remainder of his sushi roll, but Sho was not to be so easily deterred, watching him with eyes that were large with happiness as he forced down each bite until it was gone.

Sho then tucked into his own piece of literally breathtaking sushi with every sign of enjoyment, saying "The flavours might be a bit unbalanced, since I've had this head cold for a few days now."

Nino noticed a face mask poking out of Sho's pocket; it explained Sho absence earlier in the week and also the overuse of wasabi. Perhaps Jun was exaggerating when he described the horrors of Sho’s cooking.

++++

There was a small blob of sauce just beside Sho’s lip that was driving Nino to distraction. He didn’t know whether to tell Sho that it was there or not. In truth what he really wanted to do was lick it off himself, or failing that, rub it off with his thumb before kissing the spot where it had been.

Sho was sitting close enough to Nino for him to be able to feel the warmth radiating from his body and when they both shifted position slightly on the bench seat their fingers brushed lightly against each other.

Nino jerked as if he’d received an electric shock, his hand flinging sideways, sending a fountain of cola over the front of Sho’s pristine white shirt.

“Ack!” Sho yelped as he jumped up and tried to shake the brown liquid off before it soaked in.

Without even thinking Nino stood up and dragged a packet of tissues out of his pocket and began to pat down Sho’s chest in a hopeless attempt to save the shirt.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Nino's frenzied dabbing slowed down as he felt hard muscle under his hands. He'd always suspected that underneath Sho's ill-fitting suits a spectacular body lurked and now he could feel the proof flexing under his fingertips.

“It’s not like you meant it,” Sho replied, looking surprisingly unflustered at his chest being so thoroughly groped by his workmate.

Nino gulped as he felt Sho’s dark eyes, perfectly framed by his black-framed glasses looking down into his own. It gave him some idea of how a mouse felt when cornered by a snake. The feeling was definitely not an unpleasant one. Perhaps Sho had even more potential that he’d hoped for.

++++

“So?” Aiba’s jiggled impatiently in front of Nino.

“What’s your problem? Apart from the usual that is?” Nino retorted, trying to push past Aiba and make it to his desk unmolested.

“What happened? How was lunch? Did he invite you out? Did you invite him out?” Aiba’s excited flow of words slowed to a trickle as he ran out of breath and collapsed onto the corner of Nino’s desk, almost knocking Nino’s coffee onto the floor as he did so.

“How are we ever going to get any gossip if you don’t let him answer?” Jun asked as he glided over to join them.

“There’s nothing to tell.” Nino was not ready to let his friends in on what had happened earlier.

“You ate Sho’s lunch? That he made himself?” Jun asked with concern. He picked up the wastepaper bin and pointedly placed it closer to the desk. Things had not been pretty when he’d once innocently accepted a piece of fried chicken from Sho when he’d first joined the firm. He’d been unable to eat chicken without flinching ever since.

“I ate. He ate. I spilled my drink. We cleaned it up.” Nino was hoping that the two of them would just give up and go away.

"Perhaps you should have cleaned your face while you were at it," Jun said, holding out a tissue. "There's some sauce on your lips."

Aiba wondered why Nino's face turned red and his eyes flickered shiftily, but there was no chance to conduct a further interrogation. Ohno shuffled past a moment later giving them a heads-up that their boss was heading their way causing everyone to scatter back to their respective desks.

++++

Three days later Nino dragged himself over to his cubicle and sat down heavily, dropping his head down onto his desk with a dull thud. His head was pounding and he’d spent most of the previous night alternating between coughing and blowing his nose.

The last thing he wanted was the attention of his friends, but Aiba and Jun seemed to have some sort of misery radar and would never miss the opportunity to tease him.

“Oh, Nino, are you sick?” Aiba asked. He rushed over and slapped his hand on Nino’s forehead to check his temperature.

Nino winced as Aiba’s hand felt like it was going to knock his head clean off his neck.

“Please can you guys just leave me alone? I feel like absolute crap,” Nino moaned before pulling out yet another tissue and blowing his nose with more force than absolutely necessary.

Jun took a large step away from Nino as he hastily retreated. Teasing Nino wasn’t worth the risk of catching whatever revolting germs he was generating at the moment.

Aiba seemed to have no such qualms as he patted Nino’s hair comfortingly and passed him some more tissues from the jumbo sized box Nino had staggered in with.

“Well, I’ll see you in about a week’s time when you aren’t contagious anymore,” Jun said.

“Wait, I’ll come too,” Aiba said. “I want to run by the supply room and grab some more tissues for Nino-chan.”

“Fine, but I’m placing you under quarantine since you touched Mr Germy over there,” Jun said, edging away from Aiba. “No visits to my office until I know you’re clear.”

“Aww, but you make the best coffee and have all the good snacks,” Aiba whined with puppy eyes.

“Tough,” Jun replied, resisting Aiba’s charms for once.

Talking had made Nino’s head throb even worse by now. He whimpered, “Go away before I lick you both.”

“Aaargh!” cried Aiba, trying to hide behind Jun in mock terror.

“You wouldn’t dare!” said Jun as he tried to avoid being touched by Aiba’s flailing hands.

“Just try me!” Nino said as went to raise himself from his chair.

“Fine,” Jun huffed. “But I’m still suspicious about what you and Sho might have been getting up to for the last few days.”

Nino’s only response was to stand up and stick out his tongue which immediately cleared the area surrounding his desk.

With a relieved sigh he returned to his previous slumped position.

++++

As the pair left they almost ran into Sho coming the other way. As one they turned to watch him head towards Nino’s cubicle. He was carrying a basket that had a scarf trailing from it and dragging on the ground. From their vantage point they could also see a soup thermos, cough lozenges and a bottle of throat gargle.

“Good morning Sho,” they chorused in unison looking pointedly at the obvious collection of medicinal supplies in his basket.

“Um, good morning,” Sho replied, looking slightly shifty as he tried to hide the basket behind his back.

“Visiting Nino-chan?” Aiba asked eagerly.

“Yes, I um...”

“So you know about him catching a cold then?” Jun asked, gesturing towards the supplies in Sho’s hands. “A cold, remarkably alike to the one you also had a few days ago?”

“Well, when we both attended the same meeting yesterday afternoon he was looking a bit peaky,” Sho replied unconvincingly.

Jun and Aiba shared a knowing look before they continued back to their own work spaces. Obviously Nino and Sho had shared more than just lunch up on that roof two days earlier.

++++

“Good morning Nino,” Sho said chirpily as he put the basket down on the desk.

“Oh, hello.”

“I had hoped you’d be feeling better than you did last night, but you actually look worse,” Sho said as he began to unload a large quantity of tissue boxes into a pyramid on the desk. He added an electric humidifier, assorted cold medications and a large thermos flask.

Nino glared at him. “Thanks for the compliment.”

“You know I don’t mean anything bad,” Sho replied as he placed his hand on Nino’s forehead.

This time, instead of trying to flinch away as he’d done with Aiba, Nino leant into Sho’s hand, enjoying the coolness against his burning skin.

“I guess that I wasn’t past the contagious stage after all,” Sho said apologetically as he draped the scarf loosely around Nino’s neck.

“Do you think?” Even when sick, Nino’s sarcasm mode was still fully functional.

“I did warn you, but you were too busy taking my clothes off at the time,” Sho protested.

“If I remember it clearly you took your own shirt off first, then you removed mine,” Nino argued, smiling at the memory.

“All right then, next time we can both get naked at the same time. That way there won’t be any arguments afterwards. Or better still, you can just be naked the whole time you’re at my place. It saves time that way.”

For once Nino was utterly speechless and it wasn’t because he was feeling sick.

Sho pressed a sneaky kiss to Nino’s forehead after checking that nobody else was in sight.

“Oh, and I’m sorry for tripping over and bumping you against the doorframe when I was carrying you to bed,” Sho said as he softly stroked Nino’s upper arm, soothing the bruise under his shirt sleeve. “Now, eat the soup I made you. It’s my own special recipe and guaranteed to work miracles. Everyone I given it to says that it works so fast that they only needed to eat one spoonful and they didn’t need to eat any more.” Sho added with pride. “The sooner you eat it, the sooner you’ll get better. Okay?”

“Okay,” Nino sighed.

Satisfied that Nino was set up for the morning, Sho took his leave.

After Sho was gone, Nino took a sniff of the soup trying to gauge if it was safe to eat or not. Unfortunately for him, his nose was completely blocked and he’d forgotten Jun’s warning of possible consequences. The sushi hadn’t caused him any problems. How bad could this be?

++++

Twenty nine hours later as he lay on the hospital bed with a drip in his arm to rehydrate him after losing what felt like every molecule of moisture from his body in the most horrible way possible, Nino wondered if eating the soup had been worth it. To make matters worse, he was still suffering from the worst cold he’d ever experienced in recent memory.

Since getting together with Sho, he’d been stricken with nothing but horrible and completely embarrassing illnesses. After what happened with Aiba, Jun, Jun’s new shoes, and his wastepaper bin in the office before he fainted he didn’t know whether he would ever be able to return to work without dying of embarrassment. Perhaps he should just find a new job once he was back in charge of his bodily functions?

A moment later he forget all about his discomfort and embarrassment as a familiar figure rushed through the door, half hidden behind a huge bunch of roses.

“Nino! I’m so sorry that you’re sick. Do you have any idea what it was that you ate that caused the food poisoning?” Sho said as he carefully sat himself down on the edge of the bed looking at Nino with concern.

There were so many possible answers dancing on the tip of Nino’s tongue. He could have mentioned that it was Sho’s soup of death that had put him in this pathetic position. Or that fact that his system had already been weakened after him being infected by the cold germs that he’d picked up from Sho as well, but…

Sho was looking at him with those large dark expressive eyes, biting nervously on his plump and pillowy bottom lip. These same lips had tasted so sweet when Nino and he had kissed up on the roof when they’d shared their first lunch together. And after that, late at night in Sho’s bed, they had explored every inch of Nino’s body first before wrapping themselves around Nino’s member in just the right way.

Nino knew that no matter how many more possible disasters awaited him from Sho’s oblivious clumsiness; he knew that it was worth every possible future hospital visit and stomach upset.

Put simply Sho made him happy; a feeling that Nino had only ever had a passing acquaintance with a few times before in his life. Happiness was something that he was prepared to share with Sho for the rest of his life – lunch not so much.

So of course Nino answered in the only way possible, he reached up and wrapped his arms tightly around Sho’s neck clinging tightly to him as if he was saving him from drowning – which in a way, he was.