"King look ! Hey ! Are you watching ?!"

"Yeah."

He was not watching. Too invested in tearing the icy wrapping off a pink popsicle with his teeth.

"I promise this is really cool."

Mikoto gracefully spit out a mouthful of plastic.

"I'm going to do a flip.."

The swing's metal links creaked on their way back and forth, even under Totsuka's light weight standing on the seat.

"..over the top bar."

The wind seemed to be on his side. A gust tore by in the wake of his gliding past again.

Mikoto let his own swing move gently with a push of his heels. Popsicle hanging from his mouth, he finally gave the little middle schooler the half invested glance he'd been begging after.

Totsuka was entering a phase where he'd begun to realize anything vaguely dangerous had a high success rate of getting King's attention. Both already had an extreme disregard for their own self preservation in common.

Whether he was playing on sheer curiosity or something more or what, this quest was a constant one.

And then sometimes – the luckiest times – he could even get Mikoto to participate.

"Can you push me? I'll get more air faster !" Totsuka called. He was already getting pretty high up. "Please please please please please."

Mikoto's brow wrinkled. At the same time he couldn't find anything unreasonable about this request.

Somehow it registered.

And he would get up and offer all his muscle to push the kid off once he swung back down again.

Totsuka got more air faster alright.

Up and over the bar he went. But coming around full circle wasn't in the cards.

At some point, upside down in mid air, Totsuka realized he'd exceeded the limits of his own bravery. The only sensible thing to do in that moment of terror was to let go.

The swing sent him flying back into the thick row of bushes close behind them.

Mikoto chewed the popsicle stick and took his time contemplating the lack of sound or movement after Totsuka landed.

Was that not supposed to happen?

This was taking too long.

Digging around in the brush yielded some movement. Enough to tell him where to reach down and pull Totsuka out by the scruff – the back of his collar, rather – shaking him out from all the sticks and leaves he was covered with. Expecting him to be able to stand already, Mikoto tried to prop him up on his feet.

Totsuka's knees wobbled.

He yelped at the sharp pain in one ankle and grabbed on to the closest thing to catch his balance : strong, steady arms meant for holding, protecting him for sure. They felt better than he'd imagined so many times over. With a grunt Mikoto seemed lost on what to do, but lent Totsuka the crook of his arm for clinging as long as he needed to stop trembling and get stable.

No one had ever looked happier after losing the use of their legs.

It must have been the first time Mikoto held him tight around his chest... and pulled him out of the hedges with his heels dragging.

That look meant Izumo was getting tired of this line.

"Did you let him hit his head again?"

Mikoto shrugged and looked off. It could've happened.

"This can't keep happening. It'll mess the kid up for life and you're gonna' have to deal with that."

"Tch. What's it you think I signed up for?"

That question went wisely unanswered. Every time.

Since, as expected, this kept happening. From wrangling stray cats to improvised parkour, dodging traffic to bicycle stunts to picking fights with guys three or four times his size

Totsuka succeeded in upping the game for his audience of one – on the off chance his eldest friend wasn't around to supply common sense. People could say lots of things but no one could say Mikoto wasn't supportive.

Often in the afternoons he could be found lazing against the wall outside the nurse's office.

They were regulars; Totsuka didn't even go to this school but he was always pitiful enough to be admitted.
As long as it took, Mikoto would always wait.

It was easy to tell when the kid was done getting fixed up. The senior girls from Mikoto's class would flock by the door to watch him emerge under Izumo's protective wing.

"Poor thing, he's so little it's a shame he's so accident prone"

"Feeling any better?"

"Have some of my sponge cake, Tatara. I saved the rest for you"

"If you need someone to help you carry things-"

On and on like this.

"Heyy don't worry, I'll look out for him better from now on," Izumo turned on the charm and patted Totsuka gingerly on the shoulder that held one arm in a sling.

None of them seemed interested in his attempt to profit from all the sympathy in the air.

One girl went far enough to threaten him into keeping their precious, helpless angel safe with a promising fist...

His stressed-out frown always fell back to Mikoto – pissed off at all the commotion and waiting further down the hall. Totsuka had been peeking around on his toes looking for him the entire time until the crowd dispersed and there was King! at last. They had been apart for approximately 20 minutes.

You'd think the kid hadn't recently sustained a 3-point fracture the way Totsuka took off after him. Izumo did offer out a reflex reach, as if there were some way of stopping a guy who had no breaks from colliding with one that seemed to break everything he touched.

This phase had to end eventually, right?