For the wonderful @daiyascenes! Happy Holidays! I hope you like it!!
I spent most of my time looking at holiday AU’s and when this pop up, I was like YES THIS IS MISAWA GOTTA WRITE SO HERE I AM!!
And special thanks to @kuroyaku for beta reading! I would be embarrassed to post this without you.
you were the cashier giving me weird looks when i bought a ton of ugly christmas jumpers so i told you they were for my grandma but you happened to be at a party i wore one to and you saw me au
“Harucchi, come on!” Eijun excitedly dragged his reluctant friend through the mall, his eyes scanning the window displays with a pace that would put cheetahs to shame.
“Eijun-kun, slow down,” The smaller boy huffed. “The sweaters aren’t going to run away from you.”
“Of course not, Harucchi,” The other boy gave his friend a strange look. “But there might be other people buying them and stealing them from their rightful owner. Me.”
“No one likes the same type of sweaters as you,” Haruichi reassured. Then under his breath, he added, “They’re way too ugly.”
Not convinced, Eijun shouldered his way through the crowd and kept a firm hand on Haruichi’s heavy winter jacket. The brunette was blinded by his excitement, unceremoniously bumping into people as he walked past the brightly-decorated shops and ignored the dirty looks and occasional curses thrown his way. Stumbling after his friend, Haruichi mumbled apologies as fast as his tongue would allow.
“T-This is why I hate coming to the mall,” The pink-haired boy panted as Sawamura finally slowed to a stop.
Eijun had paused right in front of the most seasonal shop in the whole mall; Haruichi cringed at the glaring lights, the god awful sparkles that littered the floor, and even worse, the dozens of Santa cutouts that creeped at every corner.
“Eijun-kun,” Haruichi started his sentence, but never finished since Sawamura had already ran into the store gleefully, not unlike a child dashing downstairs on Christmas day, and made a beeline for the sweaters in the back corner. His friend shook his head and sighed, resignedly walking in with much less enthusiasm, the scent of artificial cinnamon assaulting his nose. Sighing deeply, Haruichi braced himself for an agonizing afternoon.
“I don’t understand,” Haruichi said for the fiftieth time as Eijun rummaged through the racks, humming We Wish You A Merry Christmas. “You already have boxes of Christmas sweaters, why do you need more? You’re even wearing one right now!” He gestured towards the absolutely hideous sweater Eijun had on (Haruichi wasn’t even sure it could be called that).
The jet black sweater had a brown gingerbread man with a fixed smile and a santa hat, which of course had to have the cotton puff on the end of the hat sewed too close to the vicinity of one’s nipple. And all this was topped off by the groan worthy pun made by the cookie, “Oh snap!”. The pink haired boy grimaced in embarrassment as he saw the sweater in all its glory.
“I’m just getting in the Christmas spirit!” Eijun said impatiently while sorting through a rack of awful sweaters. “And they come out with better ones every year!” He waved one in Haruichi’s face. “Look!”
“Please get that away from me,” The boy shied away from the terrible piece of attire, which featured a fake hairy chest for the wearer and a huge creepy santa smile in the middle. Haruichi glanced longingly to the outside of the store, which was calm, normal, and most importantly, not filled with horrid clothing, wishing he could be done with the trip.
“Party pooper,” Eijun pouted and added the sweater to his ever growing pile. Even as his friend shook his head, Sawamura wouldn’t give up his conquest of making Haruichi accept the sweaters. “Here, this one isn’t as bad. There are little reindeers on it!” Shoving the top into Haruichi’s hand, he pushed the pink haired boy towards the fitting room. “Go try it on!”
“No!” The boy blushed and fought back. “Eijun, not this one!”
“Why? It’s cute, isn’t it?” Eijun frowned, confused as he scanned his friend’s face..
A delighted peal of laughter cut through the Jingle Bell Rock playing through the store. Both boys whipped their head towards the source of the sound, finding the cashier doubled over with mirth at his station.
“Hey! What are you laughing about?” Eijun scowled, squaring his shoulders as if getting ready for a fight.
“Cute reindeers,” The cashier stood back up, holding his stomach with one arm and wiped his tears of laughter from behind his glasses with another. A huge smile hung off of his face. (Eijun refused to admit it was handsome, but his heart said otherwise. Not only that, his body seemed to be more than happy seeing the cashier in the black and white uniform.)“They are very cute.”
“What? They are!” The boy turned to his friend for back up. Unfortunately for him, Haruichi had been vigorously shaking his head, trying to tell Eijun to shut up.
“Very cute, when they’re fucking each other,” The cashier snorted with another round of laughter, his bright eyes crinkling.
“They are not!” Sawamura had a hurt expression on his face as if he had been lied to by the sweater. “They’re just giving each other piggyback rides!”
“Oh, they’reriding each other, alright,” The cashier raised an eyebrow, an irritating smile hanging off his lips.
“Shut up,” Eijun snapped, not wanting to be anywhere near the (attractive) employee any longer. “Harucchi, let’s go.”
The pink haired boy nodded meekly and turned to follow his friend out the door, but he hesitated when he saw the heap of clothing in Eijun’s arms. “Eijun-kun, I think you don’t think you’re allowed to take the sweaters home without paying.”
Eijun looked down into his arms just as he was about to step out of the door of the store and drew back, as if surprised by the pile of sweaters that he had previously set there.
“Yeah,” The cashier smirked from behind the counter, merriment pooling in his chocolate eyes. “Better come back here to me.”
Scowling, Eijun debated his choices: he could either leave with his pride (what little that’s left of it anyways) or his Christmas sweaters, not both.
In the end, he chose the sweaters; Eijun wasn’t about to let one asshole ruin his Christmas tradition. He gritted his teeth, held his head high, and stalked to the the counter. Eijun angrily dumped all of the sweaters in front of the smiling cashier and refused to look him in the eye.
“You really do have awful taste in sweaters,” The cashier- Miyuki, as his name tag said- made a face as he folded up a sweater featuring a dinosaur in a santa hat.
“That’s for my grandpa,” Eijun blurted before he could stop himself. He flushed red, but continued to ramble on under Miyuki’s questioning gaze. “He used to work in the museum and he did stuff with dinosaurs. You know, just things.”
“Just things, huh,” Miyuki flashed a smirk (No, Eijun’s heart did not just stutter a little. And no, the smirk did not look so much more attractive close up.) and continued to bag the sweaters. “Sure.”
“Just take my money,” Suddenly wanting to disappear Eijun didn’t wait for Miyuki to ring everything up. The brown haired boy just shoved a couple bills at the cashier and fled the store, the bag in one hand and pulling Haruichi along with another, who was mouthing the word “sorry” to the startled cashier.
“That wasn’t polite, Eijun-kun,” The pink haired boy frowned at his friend as they got into their car.
“It was all his fault,” His friend pouted. “He was the one who started it.”
“Well, you were the one who thought the reindeers were being cute when they were-,”
“Yeah, yeah,” Eijun ducked inside his bag in embarrassment. A pause followed. “Harucchi?”
“Yeah?” Haruichi put the keys into the ignition and backed up the car.
“Are you taking after Ryou-san or something? Has my Harucchi been polluted?” Sawamura’s head popped out. “Because the Harucchi I know wouldn’t do this.”
“Do what?” Haruichi dared to glance sideways at his friend as he drove back to their apartment.
“Slipping this into my pile of precious sweaters,” Eijun displayed the reindeer sweater with a grim face. As he lifted the piece of clothing up, a note fluttered out.
Picking it up, he read the note once, twice, and thrice; his temper rose each time.
One the back side of the paper, a formal scrawl spread out across the Post-It note:
This one’s on the house, since you like it so much. Call me and you’ll know so much more about fucking reindeers. Mostly about fucking.
Eijun could only guess that the numbers on the side were Miyuki’s number.
“This asshole!” Sawamura seethed and made a move to rip the piece of paper apart.
Even now, the boy couldn’t say what made him keep that note, but he did. His fingers went limp as the paper was pinched between them. Folding it carefully, he quietly slipped the note into his pocket.
Miyuki maneuvered through the sea of people, grimacing at the loud Christmas music. Spotting the host through the crowd, he made a beeline for his friend.
“So you finally showed up, bastard,” A familiar banter started between them as Miyuki approached.
“Wouldn’t be a party without me, Kuramochi,” Miyuki smirked.
“Right,” Kuramochi rolled his eyes as he took a sip out of his red party cup. “Because your social skills are, of course, top notch.” Sarcasm dripped from his words.
“Hey,” The cashier feigned hurt. “My socialization is very much sought after.”
The host’s eyebrows rose, “Whatever helps you sleep at night.” He held out a bottle of beer for Miyuki.
Accepting it gladly, Miyuki took a sip. Tried to, anyway. A dancing couple (Grinding would be a more appropriate word, Miyuki grimaced at the sight.) had bumped straight into him and caused the whole bottle to spill on his dark blue t-shirt and some even made it to his jeans. Cursing like there was no tomorrow, Miyuki scowled at the apologizing couple and stormed to the bathroom, ignoring Kuramochi’s delighted cackle. Thanks to his rotten luck, he barrelled into a boy just as he was walking in.
“Fuck,” He growled as he recovered.
“Ow,” A familiar voice said irritatedly. “Not you again!”
“What do you mean me again?” Miyuki’s eyes focused on the boy in front of him. Realization dawned on him as he saw the golden eyes and feather soft hair. “Oh, hello.”
“It’s me,” The boy frowned as he took in all of Miyuki. “What happened to you?”
“Beer and a sickenly sweet dancing couple,” The bespectacled boy made a face. “Not a good mix.”
“Bet you’re just saying that because you’re single,” With that, Miyuki was pulled into the bathroom, accompanied with an eye roll. (Is everyone doing that these days? Miyuki thought.) “Let’s make you look at least presentable.”
“I told you my name, isn’t it courtesy to tell me yours?” Miyuki tried to fill up the space between them as the boy dabbed at his shirt with toilet paper, his eyes roaming the slopes and lines of the boy’s face.
“I am not obligated to tell you anything, especially after you rammed into me,” He snapped and continued to uselessly dab at Miyuki’s shirt, punctuated by the Christmas music from the living room that leaked through the walls and floated in between the two. After a chorus of the Silent Night, he said softly. “It’s Sawamura. Sawamura Eijun.”
“Well, nice to meet you Sawamura,” Miyuki smiled charmingly.
“I would say the same if I felt that way,” Eijun grumbled and threw his hands up. “This shirt is hopeless!”
“You only realized it now?” Miyuki chuckled.
“Then why didn’t you stop me?”
“It’s always nice to be pulled in a bathroom by a guy. Especially a cute one, even if he never called me” He added. “And plus, it’s not that hopeless compared to your sweater. I thought it was for your grandpa?”
“Shut up!” Eijun shoved a sweater that he had pulled out of thin air at Miyuki, blushing. “Just put this on.”
“Not this,” The other boy grimaced. “I am sure as hell not wearing this.”
“You were the one who bought me this, you might as well,” The smile on Eijun’s face as he
turned around was too smug for Miyuki’s liking.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Miyuki mumbled as he took off his soaked shirt and slipped on the Christmas sweater. “But now I have to walk around with reindeers fucking on my shirt.”
“If you bought me something else, then maybe you wouldn’t have to,” Sawamura shook his head as he opened the bathroom door, walking back out to the party.
“Wait!” Miyuki lunged forward and caught his hand. “If I bought you nothing, can I also wear nothing?” He grinned.
“Get your mind out of the gutter!” Eijun groaned but didn’t pull his hand out of Miyuki’s grip.
Taking the chance, Miyuki intertwined their fingers and smirked when he met no resistance. Sawamura scowled, but the edges of his mouth were soft and was curved up in an almost smile. The older boy led them towards the kitchen, pushing through the sea of people. He knew that he saw it here when he came in…
Stopping in the archway of the kitchen, Miyuki turned to face Sawamura.
“And if I got you mistletoe, would you kiss me?” He pointed up, where said plant hung there.
“No! I mean, yes!” Eijun pulled back, his face slowing flushing red and his neck was taken over by a pink wave as his tongue stumbled. “I wouldn’t want to kiss you, but y-you know, mistletoe traditions. So I would be forced to kiss you.”
“Force?” Miyuki feigned a concerned expression. “Why then, I’ll just leave. I don’t want to use force.” He turned on his feet to walk away, but felt a small tug on his sleeve before he could take a step.
“Just shut up and do it,” Eijiun grumbled, but a smile broke out on his face and his hand, still fisted in Miyuki’s sweater, pulled Miyuki closer.