Prompt: They're best friends, close as possible without being in a romantic relationship, yet they both have to deny rumors they've gone that far by everyone and it ticks them off, as no matter what both of them don't see the other that way. What happens when they accidentally kiss during the biggest party of the year; will they vehemently (and pointlessly) deny everything, or give into the pressure of a forced relationship?

Pairing: Yuuma/Gumi.

Requested by: Zephyrius29.

To Yuuma — and perhaps Yuuma is alone in thinking this, which would not be surprising, his genius considered — it is a very strange and very foreign concept for people to believe that he and Gumi are an item. Really. It is.

They have been friends for as long as he can remember, and his memory is... deceptively extensive. He traces back frequently to when they were toddlers, forced together by the bond of their over-eager parents, and later, to when they were scuffed up elementary schoolers, and Gumi chose to leap off swings and face-plant into mulch while Yuuma preferred reading books in her shadow, idly fixated on her easy, sloppy gracelessness.

Not much has changed since then, not really. They're eighteen, in senior year, and have a few months left before graduation. Everything is moving in slow motion, delirious, like liquid gold passing through a grate.

The only thing that's changed is that everyone — literally everyone, from the student body to the staff — thinks that Gumi is Yuuma's girlfriend. And that's ridiculous, and impossible, because he has been with Gumi since they were in diapers, and thinking of her as his girlfriend is... weird. She's a constant presence at his side, the valiant knight that defends him from the darkness of his melancholy, but she is not, nor will she ever be, his girlfriend.

Unfortunately for him — for them, he reminds himself, because Gumi is as disconcerted by the rumors as he is — he somehow manages to screw over his sentiments at the biggest party of the year. A party that Gumi drags him to, claiming, "I'm not going to be responsible for letting you die a suppressed introvert, dude."

Yuuma isn't so easily persuaded, but something about the way she looks at him when she says it has his tongue twisted in knots and his mind pinpointed solely on having her cut out that stupid puppy face, like she's some kicked, abandoned dog he has to take care of.

So they go, and, as far as ideas go, it is probably one of the most moronic.

Yuuma is immediately overwhelmed and unimpressed. He isn't quite a fan of parties, or loud noises, or Fukase, the jerk that's hosting this thing in his stupid mansion while his stupid parents are out doing whatever the fuck adults do. To think, soon he'll be one of those, too, fresh out of school and splayed on the streets job-hunting, or... college-hunting. How do people have time for parties? It's stupid. This is all really stupid.

And, yeah, okay, Yuuma may be a genius, but he does not, by any means, have to use descriptive vocabulary words to describe his feelings, because he sure as fucking hell doesn't have much of a handle on those, either.

"You look like you're constipated," Gumi says as she leads him through a sweaty crowd of familiar, gross faces, fidgeting with the bangles around her too thin wrists. She lofts a dark green eyebrow at him that he sees just out of the corner of his peripheral. "C'mon, you're not scared of a party, are you?"

Yuuma scoffs, shoving her with his shoulder. "The only thing I'm scared of is death by nuclear warfare," he tells her. She retaliates by jamming him up into the doorway leading into the basement, and he rolls his eyes. "Fine," Yuuma relents. "Parties, too. But can you blame me?" He stops and turns, a flippant hand gesturing to the mass of grinding bodies lit up by shuddering green strobe lights. "It's migraine-inducing. The music doesn't help."

"Yes, I can." Gumi shakes out her hair, now hacked crookedly due to, as she calls it, a sudden urge to come off as dangerous. With the mascara melting beneath her eyes, she comes off more as a raccoon, but Yuuma is kind enough not to tell her that. "'Cause I'm getting you outta this clusterfuck. You won't freak so much downstairs."

"Downstairs?" Yuuma echoes. He swipes a foot across the top step of the stairs. "You mean... these stairs? It smells like weed and body odor. I'd rather not."

"Don't be a baby," Gumi snorts, cuffing him on the back of his head. Before he can form a coherent retort, Gumi pivots on her heel and begins descending the stairs backwards, sticking her tongue out at him. "C'mon, loser! It'll be fun."

Something about the situation tells Yuuma it will not be fun... but Gumi is giving him that unruly look of hers again, the one that kind of makes his knees shake, makes words thick and gritty on his tongue. "Alright," he finally manages to splutter. He casts a single glance over his shoulder, then hurries down the steps after her, feeling them creak with age beneath his weight.

When he pokes out from around the stairwell corner, he's surprised to find that the basement isn't so much a basement as it is a den. It's cozy. Warm. Quiet. He sees Gumi already making herself welcome, accepting two Solo cups from a girl Yuuma recognizes as Yukari — of whom is in his AP Algebra II class and of whom is very, very rude.

Gumi raises one of the Solo cups in the air and waves it at Yuuma, her way of beckoning him over. There is a snarky grin plastered to her lips, the perfect stain of blood across her face.

He analyzes his surroundings — the beige of the walls, the couches and lounge chairs shoved against them, the grey of the carpet, the TV cycling through what appears to be Naruto reruns, of all things, propped up on a wooden desk. A pool table rests by a door with peeling paint that likely hasn't been opened in ages. Currently, Meiko from the volleyball team and Teto from the flower shop appear to be refraining from stabbing each other with their cue sticks.

Fukase is sprawled on one of the couches, his legs kicked into Mayu Shinozaki's lap, and he grins this devastatingly shit-eating grin Yuuma's way, without any mercy. "Hey, hey!" he croons, the red of eyes glinting in the dusty artificial lights strewn from the ceiling. "Don't keep your girlfriend waiting, Yuuma! Give her company for the party."

"Oh, bug off, Two-Face," Gumi snarls, but her expression is calm. Teasing. As Yuuma approaches her, a mess of lanky, awkward limbs, he thinks that he will never understand how she's so... exuberant. How she carries herself with such confidence, such vigor. "Least I have a better chance than you at getting laid," she adds in afterthought, and passes a Solo cup into Yuuma's hand.

"Lies," he says nonchalantly, taking a sip of the Solo cup's contents and wincing when it tastes like rat's ass. He sniffs and flicks Gumi in the temple. "I'd lay a dog before I'd ever lay you."

"Really?" Gumi huffs, amusement flashing in her eyes. She jabs her thumb over her shoulder at Fukase. "Well, in that case, there's one right there. Be my guest."

Yukari drapes herself on Mayu's other side, cuddling up to her side with brazen enthusiasm. "Christ," she snorts, "you two bicker like an old married couple."

In lieu of this, to Fukase, Yuuma says, "Why are you all down here? Isn't the... well, more exciting part of this upstairs? Not... in a basement?" He flicks his gaze around the room, baffled. "I'm sort of confused. I mean, you're the host. This is your house. Aren't you worried about the people upstairs ruining it?"

"Pssh, nah," Fukase muses, flapping a hand dismissively. "I do this all the time. It's to keep my sister off my back. She's always nagging for me to stop being such a prick, to let loose." He laughs. "This is how we compensate."

"If anything breaks, then his parents have the money to replace it," Mayu comments.

Yuuma doesn't respond, too busy staring into the depths of his Solo cup and hesitantly drinking what tastes like chlorine and cinnamon. Once he starts getting it down, it isn't the taste that's so bad; it's more that it burns his throat and sends a rampant tingling into his sinuses.

Eventually, after Yuuma has settled himself on the sofa nearest the TV with Gumi tucked under his arm, nestled into his chest, a few more people stumble downstairs, all of which Yuuma knows, half of which are hammered to the point they're speaking Gibberish: Len and Piko from the robotics team take up as much of Fukase's space as possible; Rin, Miku and Luka from the chorus rile Meiko and Teto up even further in another pool match; Kaito and Ia from Yuuma's Japanese Lit. class make pointed arguments about the English dub of Naruto that Fukase is forcing them to watch; and Dex and Kyo from, most often, detention coddle Fukase's dog and talk politics with Yukari and Mayu.

And, oddly... Yuuma doesn't hate it.

Once he gets as drunk as his peers, he actually enjoys it. Enjoys being here, surrounded by other people, without feeling like he's too smart, like he's soaring too high above them for them to ever understand. Things make sense, sort of, enough that Yukari says something so blunt it has him laughing over the brink of tears.

"I swear to fucking God," Gumi mumbles into his shirt, "Naruto and Sasuke are fucking — they're into each other, you can't tell me otherwise."

Yuuma smirks against her hair. "But, dude," he protests, "what about Naruto and Gaara?"

"Don't!" Piko cries from across the room, and he whips an empty Solo cup at the side of Yuuma's head. "Stop, she's not going to shut up now—"

"Naruto and Sasuke are meant for each other, Yuu, they are — perfect, together, I thought you knew me better than this, I could have sworn that you—" Gumi cuts herself off abruptly to gasp for breath. "I forgot where I was going with this but they are in love."

There have been few times when Yuuma has witnessed an intoxicated Gumi. More often than not, he's dealt with the aftermath; Gumi barging into his house at inappropriate hours, collapsing on the floor of his bedroom without heed and demanding Aspirin and a glass of water. He knows better than to deject her, and has always given her careful care, through both her hangovers and her temper.

But it's different, now, with him here beside her, as drunk as she is and fluttering with tepid warmth, cautious but deliberate. His memories of her are so much better when he's a part of them.

So, it's... good. It's all really good, and Yuuma doesn't know why he's been putting off parties for so long if they have the ability to be this good, this alleviating.

Then, minutes before midnight, shit hits the fan and the unthinkable happens.

Well, okay, no. No, maybe not the unthinkable — but certainly the unwanted, in Yuuma's case, because Gumi leads a pack of them upstairs to dance for awhile, and through the haze of his thoughts and the blur of everything that's going on around him (the thrum of the music, bass heavy in his bones, heart beat-beat-beating out his chest), she kisses him.

She leans toward him while they're dancing, her eyes lucid and heathered, and she mumbles words he can't hear; she fists the collar of his jacket, pulls him close, and then she just — she kisses him, and Yuuma may be smart but in that moment, his mind shuts off. He becomes as stupid as he claims everyone else to be and he kisses her back until there is Gumi written all over his lips.

He doesn't know who pulls away first; all he knows is that he feels vaguely like he's going to throw up on either his or Gumi's shoes, and that nearly everyone — everyone, why is it always everyone? — is staring at them. Especially Fukase, and what Yuuma wouldn't give to just deck him, right now.

"Uh," Gumi says, backing up with her palms raised in a mock surrender. Her cheeks are flushed, and she seems sobered, as if a single kiss has ripped the night's fervor directly out of her. "I don't — I really don't know why I just... did that."

"Dude!" someone says from somewhere, pitching out of Yuuma's line of sight, "I told you!"

Yuuma feels the need to revoke that statement, and so he snaps at no one in particular, "We're not dating, for fuck's sake," but it roams, lost in the crowd, reverberating between people who care too much and too little.

When he turns back to address Gumi, she's gone.

.

The rest of that week is miserable.

Gumi is aware that she has made a mistake. Some part of her blames it on being drunk, but another, larger part of her... doesn't. It wants to blame something else, although she has no single, clear idea of what. It's just... There has been this wall between she and Yuuma since they were kids. A wall that separates platonic from romantic. A wall she's taken a mallet to and toppled.

Through all of the rumors and exams and nerves of that week, she and Yuuma don't get to see each other much; he's off studying every day after school at his place as she's running track to improve her shape and form for the next meet. Their schedules don't match up and she can't, she can't get into contact with him.

But she knows as well as he does that people are talking. The kiss and what it means is leaking through the cracks, and Gumi isn't fast enough to patch them. Gossip can go anywhere when you're eighteen and have nothing else to do with your time. It's a fucking shame.

"So, you two going to senior prom together?" Rin asks her on Monday, grinning cheekily with her chopsticks brushing her rice. "You and Yuuma, that is. That kiss was super cute, by the way. Had you guys never kissed before that?"

"I wouldn't've thought Yuuma was into, like, anyone," Kyo remarks on Tuesday at track, stretching his arms above his head with a loud, angry pop. Gumi tries to interject, to say that Yuuma has already said he's about as uninterested in the prospect of relationships as humanly possible, but Kyo is already blurting, "But, I mean, I guess it makes sense that it's you."

Wednesday has Mayu popping up over her shoulder to say, "Yukari and I are trying this new fancy restaurant together this weekend. You and Yuuma wanna tag along?"

On Thursday, Piko furrows his brow at her and mumbles, "If you and Yuuma aren't dating then where the hell does that leave me with Len...? Dude. Dude."

"How did you start dating in the first place?" Ia hums on Friday in the art room, seconds after someone has uttered Yuuma's name. She's wiping her paint-smeared fingers on her apron, and the curious aim of her stare doesn't shift in the slightest when Gumi hip-checks her to shut her up.

By Saturday, she's exhausted and witless. There's no use in denying anything anymore — her endeavors are all futile, because the world is so caught up in what everyone that isn't them is doing that they can't even let two friends be at ease with each other. The pressure is overbearing on Gumi's shoulders, this weight that's digging her grave for her. She feels like she has to date Yuuma now, like if she doesn't she's only going to let everyone down.

And on Sunday, early in the morning, she gives up, reaches for her phone, and dials his number.

"Hey, Yuu?" she says. "You there?"

"Barely," his voice mutters, bleary with sleep and tinged in his annoyance. She hears him rolling over in his sheets, hears the rustle of paper, then: "Wait, what the fuck? It's 6 am. What the hell do you want?"

"Articulate," Gumi snorts, and she slips an arm behind her head. "D'you wanna hang out today? We can meet at the library or at my place. Wherever."

Yuuma chokes on what sounds like a yawn. He recovers, says, "Sure. Your place. I'll be there at noon," and promptly hangs up; but, true to his word, at noon, he lets himself in and wanders into the kitchen, where she's dancing to cheesy pop music, clad in a pair of shorts and a tank top that hugs her chest a bit too tight.

"I'm not intruding, am I?" he scoffs, and Gumi wheels around to face him, smile splitting her face in half.

"No," she says, "not at all." She waves a spatula at him. "I'm making crepes. Sit."

He obliges, lazily stooping into one of the chairs by the aisle table, his chartreuse eyes sweeping across the kitchen in idle registration. "You can't cook," he notes.

"Nope," Gumi agrees. She goes back to stirring around the slop that's in her pan, unsure of what it is anymore but making it nonetheless.

"Okay," Yuuma says slowly, "so what's the occasion? You wouldn't risk burning your house to the ground for my sake. I hope not, at least."

Gumi reaches toward her to radio to quiet the volume, swinging around and dumping crepe excess onto two plates. The goop is stark brown and matted — certainly not edible — and she delivers a contemplative face before dumping it in the trash, coughing. "Well," she says, already bounding for the fridge, "whatever. I just — you know. Wanted to talk."

"About the fact you kissed me?" Yuuma asks.

Gumi flinches as if she's been struck and delicately draws open the door of the fridge. "No," she retorts, "but, since you brought it up…"

He sighs, tousling his powder pink hair, elbows resting quaint and tethered on the counter. "I don't really care about what everyone's saying," he mutters. "It doesn't bother me."

"It bothers me," Gumi says, retrieving a carton of eggs and setting them next to the stove. Even if she sucks at cooking, it's stress-relieving when she doesn't know what to say and ordering when what she has to say is immense.

Yuuma cocks his head at her. "We'll be going off to college in a couple of months, Gumi. No one will remember us. No one will give a damn that we kissed at one party and maybe dated, maybe didn't. It won't be a big deal. Relax. And stop trying to make make an omelette. I'm not hungry."

Gumi tenses. She looks at an egg as she cracks it into the pan and pinches her eyebrows together. "You kissed me back," she mumbles.

"Pardon?"

"I said," Gumi snaps, glaring at him over her shoulder, "you kissed me back!"

"I was drunk," Yuuma says, measured. Knowing. When Gumi ignores him in favor of angrily stabbing at her melting egg, he adds, "Did... Do you want us to date, or something?"

"No! No, no way. You're — you're ace and I'm... you're more like my brother, and it's just—" Gumi slumps in defeat. "I don't know. I'm mad at myself for changing the dynamic."

Yuuma huffs. "What dynamic?"

"The — the best friend dynamic!" Gumi shrills, frantically jabbing the spatula at him again. "I fucked it up because I kissed you! I was confused and drunk and you were there, and — doesn't this change everything — ?"

"Gumi," Yuuma reassures, "you will always, always be my best friend. Always. You know that. I know that. This fad that's going around won't change that unless you want it to. Do you?"

"Of course not," Gumi relents, her shoulders drooping. That's the last thing she wants. Losing him. Losing this part of herself that belongs to him, and the memories of herself that are attached to his, one and the same.

"Good." The legs of his chair scrape against the wooden floor. "Now, watch and learn, dweeb. I'm teaching you how to cook."

.

Graduation is overall an awe-inspiring albeit debilitating process that involves Gumi's parents and Yuuma's sister taking far more pictures than necessary of them in their uniforms with their badges clipped to the blazers. The summer heat beats down on them no matter how hard they try to hide from it, and at the end of the day — once all the ceremonies are over and the sun is starting to set — Yuuma and Gumi find themselves seated on the edge of the school's roof.

She leans her head on his shoulder and threads her fingers through his, left palm clasped in his right, the wind whipping a storm of sakura petals up around them. Yuuma sifts through his bag for a minute, then withdraws two bottles of ramune and slips one into Gumi's free hand.

"Ew," she says, scrunching her nose, "you gave me the melon one."

"Yeah," Yuuma says distractedly, "and this one's strawberry. Green and pink. Us."

Gumi blinks. "Oh," she says, and Yuuma laughs in her ear.

They open their ramune on a three count, letting the fizz drip along their wrists and dampen their sleeves, and Gumi profusely chants, "Chug!" when Yuuma lifts his to his mouth. He dumps some on her skirt for kicks; she pours some in his hair, and they snort and snicker and giggle like kids until Gumi almost tumbles off the roof and Yuuma has to catch her.

So they toss their chins back and look at the stars in the silence of evening, smiling despite themselves.

"Hey," Yuuma murmurs, nudging her. "I love you a lot."

"Yeah, I know," Gumi says softly. She taps his ankle with her foot. "I love you, too, man."

Yuuma nods, his grin contagious, and he glances across the courtyard, toward the city. "Can't believe we're going off to different colleges."

"We'll keep in touch," Gumi says.

"Of course we will," Yuuma says, and he pecks her on the cheek and Gumi cuddles up to him again and they don't ask why.

People can say whatever they want, but at heart, the thing that really matters is that they know what they are, when no one else does. They're best friends, bound by the red string of fate, she the valiant knight at his side, he her book-reading shadow, and that is the way it's always meant to be. They'll meet new people and hear bullshit rumors, and they'll make good fun out of it, and they'll be connected, like this, the way that they are.

Loving each other without being in love.

Because love is what you make of it, so make of it what you will.

hi and I love YuumaGumi almost as much as I love life itself th an k you for requesting. I took some liberties with this prompt that I'm not sure I should have, but. well. what can I say... it was fun. lovey dovey best friends that don't let drama get the best of them. friendly reminder, also, that platonic affection is really a common thing.

I hope you enjoyed, and I apologize for any grammatical/spelling errors, as per usual!

and? if anyone would... could I get maybe possibly some m/m lui or f/f miki rarepair prompts? thanks ahead of time, if you so choose to offer!

Next up: Kaito/Luka.