So, who's paying?

Fic: Aubade - Chapter Two

Fandom: Mob Psycho 100 Rating: M Relationship(s): Kageyama Ritsu/Suzuki Shou Word Count: 4828

Ao3 Link

Spirits and Such hasn’t changed much. It’s never, in Ritsu’s memory, been dirty, per-se. Well, alright, it’s been battered, wrecked, and burnt to the ground, but it’s never been grimy. Just… a little run-down. The walls are a shade of beige that Ritsu thinks might have been white once, the laminate tiles of the floor are uneven and scuffed all to hell, and there’s always something that’s jury-rigged, a bedsheet functioning as a curtain, or a dictionary shoved under an uneven table leg. A faint smell of smoke lingers in the air, despite Reigen kicking his habit for the most part. The building has its fair share of dings and dents as well. “Did you know there’s a hole in that wall?” He can’t really stop himself from asking. He’s been staring at it for about the last seven minutes, seeing as that’s about the only direction that Teru is allowing him to look. It’s not huge–probably only about the size of a golf ball, if you were to measure it. He keeps finding himself zoning out in its direction, though, a miniature black hole marring the otherwise uniform plaster. Teru makes a noncommittal hmm noise close to his ear as he leans down to snip at some stray hairs. He’s entered into a mode of pure concentration, one that Ritsu can only equate to when he’s reading a good book. In other words, Teru is more or less lost to the world. Mob, on the other hand, looks up from his phone in the direction that Ritsu is facing. “Oh, right,” he nods when he notices it. “A client was angry with Shishou, so he threw a stapler.” Ritsu moves to look fully at Mob, but a sharp tap on the side of his head reminds him to keep looking straight ahead, so he ends up directing his incredulous look at the hole in the wall. “He threw a stapler… at the wall? Not at Reigen?”

“Well, he was standing over there at the time. He was performing an exorcism.”

Ah, well that explains it. Teru, rummaging through his little hairdressing kit balanced on a nearby stool, glances over at Mob. “Speaking of that hole, when’s it getting fixed? Reigen said he was going to plaster it up months ago.” He finally comes up with a little black piece of plastic, which he fits to the head of the cordless clippers. He tilts Ritsu’s head forward, ordering, “Look down, please.” The ground is a welcome reprieve from the hole. Ritsu follows the path of a spider across the floor with his eyes while Teru takes the clippers to the back of his head.  

“He’s going to fix it,” Mob says earnestly, “He bought the plaster and everything! He just hasn’t had the time.” “Sure,” Teru says airily, “Just like he’s already bought oil for the door and a new latch for the window. All we’ve got now is a hardware store in our desk drawers, a hole in the wall, a door that sounds like the screams of the dying, and a window that’s held closed with duct tape, rope, and prayer.” He dusts some stray clippings off of the back of Ritsu’s neck and runs his fingers through the long hair at the top of his head. He grabs a few strands and starts to play around with them, flipping his bangs from one side to the other, pulling them back from his forehead altogether.  “Are you sure you won’t let me do anything different? I swear, Ritsu, half a decade` I’ve known you and you’ve never had any fun with this mop.” Ritsu sighs, batting Teru’s hand away. “You mean I’ve never let you have any fun with it?” Teru comes around to stand in front of him, crossing his arms and scrunching his face into a ridiculous pout. “Exactly! There’s only so much that I can do to myself, and Mob won’t let me do anything with his either. I swear, you two really are brothers.”

Well, he’s certainly pushed the limits of what he can do to his own hair, Ritsu thinks, glancing over Teru’s haircut. It’s longer than Ritsu remembers, with the blonde strands braided along his head and pulled into a bun at the top of his head, but the entire lower half seems to have been shaved close to the scalp, and there are little designs and patterns buzzed into the undercut. It’s certainly not the weirdest that Ritsu’s seen out of him, but it’s probably the most elaborate. “I liked the haircut you gave me,” Mob volunteers hesitantly, “I just… prefer this one. It’s simpler.” It had actually barely been different, Ritsu remembers, Teru had just shaved his undercut a little closer and changed his parting so that it was less of a uniform line down his forehead. Ritsu suspects that at least part of Mob’s discomfort with it had to do with the fact that people kept mistaking him for Ritsu when he forgot to brush it down. “Exactly,” Ritsu agrees. “This is easy to maintain.” He’s spent most of his life being able to roll out of bed without touching his hair, moreso now that he’s not living with a mother telling him to comb his hair all the time, and it’s a lifestyle he’d like to be able to continue. Life is hard enough without having to spend energy on styling that nonsense every morning. Teru rolls his eyes and mutters something as he turns to pack up his clippers, but it’s good-natured, the fond sort of grumbling that he adopts around Ritsu and Mob. When Reigen arrives, they’re all cleaning up the office, shoving the stool and the hair kit back into their rightful places and dragging out the ancient, barely functional vacuum cleaner in order to hoover up the piles of black hair scattered around the floor. They’ve been bickering about lunch for about the last three minutes, which is about enough time for Ritsu and Teru to have turned it into a full-on friendly shouting match, half to match the volume of the vacuum cleaner, and half because Ritsu has a deep moral objection to eating at any establishment that’s calling its food ‘experimental’.

Ritsu actually doesn’t notice him entering until he loudly clears his throat, making the room fall silent for just a moment before there’s a discordant mixture of greetings, a bright “Shishou!” from Mob, a slightly sheepish “Hey, Dad,” from Teru, and Ritsu gets caught somewhere in between, a weird mixture of ‘Reigen’ and ‘Dad that comes out as more of a general greeting sound that’s lost in the noise of the room.

Reigen just sighs as he strolls into the room, one hand in his pocket and the other ready to reach up and pull Ritsu into a one-armed hug. It’s a little awkwardly positioned, due to Ritsu being a bit taller than Reigen, but he still leans into it, letting Reigen reach up to ruffle his hair as he says, “Hey, looking good, kid! Not too shabby at all.” Ritsu steps out of the hug, before Reigen ends up sending any stray hair clippings flying. “Wow, thanks, I look exactly the same as I always do” he says, and it’s meant to be deadpan but he can’t stop himself from laughing just a little. Reigen claps a hand on his shoulder, saying, “Nah, I mean you don’t look very dead inside for someone who just took finals. I remember college, kiddo. It’s not a fun time.” Ritsu bites back any number of retorts ranging from Didn’t you drop out of college in your first semester? To I always look dead inside, instead settling on, “Dad, tell Teru that we’re going for Ramen.” He’s long gotten over the embarrassment of accidentally calling Reigen ‘dad’. It was inevitable, considering how often they’ve all being doing it since they were in middle school. By this point, he’s learned the strategic advantages of doing it on purpose. Case in point: it’s a surefire way to get him on your side in an argument. Reigen squints at Teru. “As opposed to?” Teru gets about three sentences into his explanation of his strange, obscure, trendy restaurant before Reigen cuts him off. “Mob, is the food there any good?” Teru’s taste in food famously cannot be trusted, whereas Mob has proven to be decent, though he’s pretty easy to please. He’s usually the deciding factor in these decisions, and any argument beforehand is just for the sake of routine. Mob hesitates, clearly caught between being honest with Reigen and not hurting Teru’s feelings. He eventually seems to decide on, “Their milk was nice…” and Ritsu’s guessing it’s probably the only neutral statement he can actually make about the place without lying. Reigen claps his hands with the air of authority and finality that’s basically the only thing that puts him in charge of this business, and says, “Alright, ramen it is!”

-

Something is up, and Mob is in on it. Ritsu’s not sure it’s a bad thing, but it’s definitely a secret from him specifically, because Teru keeps shooting him these knowing looks, and he’s trying to send conspiratorial grins in Mob’s direction, but his brother has stuck to Reigen’s other side, half hiding behind him, clearly trying to avoid eye contact. Reigen seems oblivious to the whole thing, but then again, you could never really tell with him.

Still, if it were something negative, Mob would probably look a lot more stressed, so Ritsu decides to leave it be. Despite how reserved he can be with his emotions, in many respects Mob does and always has worn his heart on his sleeve, and even if Ritsu hadn’t been able to read his brother’s emotions easily, it would probably be a simple matter to tell if he were upset or guilty. They probably make an odd group, walking down the street. Ritsu and Mob are on either side of Reigen, taking up most of the sidewalk, so the obvious solution for Teru is apparently to take a few steps forward and walk backwards so that he’s facing them. Reigen and Mob have warned him every time he’s almost bumped into poles, boxes, assorted street junk, or a dog, but Ritsu is keeping quiet, mainly because the pure comedy factor of Teru falling flat on his ass would be a beautiful, beautiful thing. Also, if he were on the ground, Ritsu wouldn’t have to look at that shirt anymore.

It’s a decently styled shirt, sure, loose and wavy where it’s tucked into his high-waisted jeans and hanging off of one shoulder, and Ritsu thinks it might look like soft material, or at least, it would if it wasn’t neon fucking yellow. The glare of the sun off of the damn thing is enough to make them all squint at Teru as he talks, telling some story about one client or another, throwing his arms out as he trots backwards (and almost hitting a streetlight with his hands about every ten seconds) and messing with the brim of his cap about as much as Reigen plays with his tie.

It’s a quick walk, since they’re just going to the nearest ramen place to the office, and it’s a relief to step out of the rapidly warming morning sun and into the cool shade of the building. Teru immediately slides into the booth next to Mob, so Ritsu ends up elbow to elbow with Reigen, once more staring Teru’s atrocity of a shirt right in the face.

Once they’ve ordered, Reigen says, “‘Fraid I can’t stay too long, I’ve got an exorcism in an hour or so.” Teru’s been typing on his phone since they sat down, with Mob resting his chin on his shoulder in order to read off of his screen. “That’s fine,” he says lightly, not looking up from the screen, “we were just going to take a walk around town anyways.” Ritsu raises an eyebrow at him. “We were?” “Yep! You need a new shirt.” Ritsu looks down at the shirt he’s wearing. He’d grabbed a white, kind of blue-ish button-up from his closet, basically the kind of thing that he could throw on comfortably and still technically be dressing like an ‘adult’. It wasn’t exactly a new shirt, but it wasn’t dirty or in disrepair, so he doesn’t really see why he’d need a new one… and knowing Teru, he’ll probably try to stick Ritsu in something neon, florally patterned, or both. Mob glances up to smile at Reigen. “Be careful, Shishou. Call us if you need any help.” Ritsu snorts quietly. You mean if it turns out to actually be a spiritual thing? Reigen nods, putting on his air of adult authority as he says, “Of course! I’ll probably be fine, though. It didn’t seem like something particularly dangerous.” Because you’re such a brilliant judge of that.

He feels his phone buzzing in his back pocket, and shuffles around in the booth until he can pull it out to look at it. FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) WHY ARE CHILDREN LOUD THIS KID HAS BEEN SCREAMING FOR LIKE AN HOUR RITSU WHY

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) Same

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) I MEAN ME TOO BUT I USUALLY KEEP IT TO MYSELF

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) No you dont Everyone within a 5 mile radius knows your problems FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) SHHHHHHH LET ME COMPLAIN

TO: YOUR FAVORITE ;) STOP SCREAMING

FROM: YOUR FAVORITE ;) NO AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA Teru snaps his fingers under Ritsu’s eyes. “Oi, stop smiling at your phone and agree with me already!” Ritsu narrows his eyes. “About?” “Kale.” “No.”

-

“No!”

Ritsu shoves the hanger, shirt and all, back into Teru’s arms. Teru fruitlessly tries to push it on him again. “Come on, Ritsu, it suits you perfectly!” Ritsu pinches the bridge of his nose, reaching out to lean on the clothes rack for support. “Okay, one: yellow. Two: elbow patches.”

They’ve been in this store for about half an hour and they’ve already had this exchange upwards of ten times. Ritsu had learned after the first time not to try on everything Teru handed to him, but Mob is somehow still falling for the “We won’t know until you put it on!” speil, and well. Ritsu has a few moral standards, but he isn’t above taking pictures. He’s sent a few of the choice ones, including one shirt that seemed to be made out of woven strips of plastic bag, and a pair of pants that were just straight up bell-bottoms, to Shou, and has received various levels of incoherent gibberish in response.

Mob, helping to sift through the clearance rack, holds up another hanger. “Oh… this is nice?” Teru glances over. “Let’s see it, then!” He brings it over to them, holding the sweater up for Teru’s inspection. It looks… not too bad, actually. It’s a light, faded shade of green, nothing like the abrasive primary colors that Teru has been shoving in his face all day, and it looks comfortable. Teru reaches out and pinches the hem between his fingers. “Is this…? Oooh, cashmere! This is clearance?” He takes the hanger from Mob and hands it to Ritsu. “Put this on.” For once, Ritsu actually agrees, so he starts towards the changing rooms, but only makes it a couple of steps before Teru snags him by the elbow. “No no no,” he corrects, “I mean over your shirt.” Ritsu raises an eyebrow, but complies. “Alright…?” It’s soft as sin, and it looks warm, but it’s thin and light enough that even in the middle of summer, the heat isn’t overbearing or too uncomfortable. Teru walks around him slowly, scanning him up and down with a thoughtful expression. He steps into Ritsu’s space and starts fussing with the him, pulling the collar of his dress shirt out to the front and reaching under to untuck his shirt so that it pokes out from under the hem of the sweater. He smooths the fabric over Ritsu’s shoulders and takes a few steps back, looking over him again before scrunching the sleeves of the sweater up to his elbows and rolling up the sleeves of the dress shirt over them. It actually makes the heat quite a bit better. Teru gives a satisfied nod. Mob smiles at him. “That suits you, Ritsu.” Teru walks around him, and Ritsu feels him tugging on the price tag at the back of his neck. “Oooh, cheap too.” Ritsu pulls it over his head, agreeing, “Yeah, I like it. It’s the only thing I’m buying though, alright? I’m not exactly made of money here.” His parents still send him a monthly allowance for meals and such, and he still has some money saved from the last time he’d helped out at Spirits and Such on a job, but he still prefers to be careful with his spending. Mob and Teru stay over by the clearance rack while he’s in the checkout line, and he can see them both hunched over Teru’s phone, talking to each other hurriedly. Teru grabs the phone from Mob’s hands and starts to make a call, but Ritsu can’t try to catch any more of what’s going on before he’s reached the front of the line. It takes probably less than two minutes to finish buying the sweater, but by the time he walks back over, Teru’s already hung up. “Who was that?” “Nobody important,” Teru says, far too hurriedly. “Really.” Ritsu raises an eyebrow, unimpressed. Apropos of absolutely nothing, Mob comments, “We should get ice cream.” Teru pounces on the idea with an enthusiasm that makes Ritsu think that something is definitely about to happen. He manages to sweep the three of them out of the door, get Ritsu to put his new sweater back on, offer to pay for everyone’s cones, and get them walking towards the nearby ice cream place before Ritsu can even register that it’s happening.

The conversation drifts around as they walk, from some of the weirder clients Mob and Teru have gotten at Spirits and Such, to the most annoying little shits Ritsu has ever had the displeasure to sit next to during a lecture, but as the ice cream place comes into view, they switch to flavors.

Mob is, with dairy products, by and large without a flavor preference and almost always chooses vanilla, so he’s mostly excluded from this discussion. Well, less discussion, more Teru telling Ritsu about unusual flavors and Ritsu being boring and judging him for it. “Kiwi.” “Eugh, what? Why? Who took a look at a fucking kiwi and decided to make it into ice cream? That’s so unnecessary.” “It’s good, though.” Ritsu doesn’t even dignify that with a response, just gives him a look. They’ve been in the ‘obscure fruits’ vein for a while now. “I’ve got to say, I’m with Ritsu on this one,” Shou says as he falls into step on Ritsu’s other side, “Kiwis look like balls, dude.” Ritsu stops dead in his tracks, and the other three stop with him. About a thousand and one thoughts cycle through his head, and he wants to say how long have you been following us and wow I didn’t realize that I missed you until literally this exact moment and he wants to punch Teru in the fucking face because that smug grin says that this is what’s been going on all morning, and his brother’s little smile only corroborates, but he only manages to grit out, “You asshole,” before he grabs Shou into a hug and squeezes. Shou’s laughing at him, but he also immediately reciprocates, wrapping his arms around Ritsu’s waist and pressing his face into his chest. Come high school, Ritsu had grown. Shou… well, less so, enough that Ritsu can rest his chin on Shou’s head. It’s. Well, it’s a lot of things, almost tight enough to be uncomfortable and definitely a little too warm, and Shou’s hands, fisted in the back of his sweater, are definitely going to leave some crumples, but god, it’s nice, just to stay there. Mob says, “Ah, Teruki, they’re…” Teru laughs, saying, “Yeah, they sure are. Alright, you two, let’s go before your auras start being indecent.” Ritsu starts to say what’s that supposed to mean? But he gets distracted by Shou stepping out of his space quickly enough to leave Ritsu feeling unbalanced, but oh, and then he gets it because he can actually feel Shou’s aura clinging to him, indescribably warm in the way it sits on his shoulders, trails down his arms and threads through his fingers. It’s withdrawing fast though, following Shou as he steps back, running fingers through his hair and grumbling about gel and ruining his style. It leaves Ritsu feeling oddly cold, considering that the sun is beating down on them relentlessly. Ritsu’s pretty sure Shou’s hair was a hot mess even before the hug, and the rest of him is looking a little dishevelled as well, just something about the vaguely blurry way Shou’s blinking at them and the rumpled look of his clothes makes him think… “Did you just come straight from the airport?” It probably sounds more accusatory than he intended, but Shou looks dead-walking, with the beginnings of bags under his eyes and a slight sway to the way he’s standing. Ritsu doesn’t even know where he’s just come from, didn’t even know that he was coming. His face is tinged an angry pink, making the freckles on his cheeks stand out in stark contrast, and he’s wearing a red tank top that shows that the light sunburn trails down his shoulders as well.

Shou crosses his arms, laughing a little sheepishly. “Well, yeah. The plan was, I’d have time to go back to the house before we met up, but I got laid over big time in LAX, so I basically just got here.” Shou, who seems to have a deep seated moral objection to staying still for any length of time, starts to walk in the direction of the ice cream place again, and the rest of the group automatically starts to follow. He doesn’t so much walk in a straight line as he weaves, vaguely between Mob and Teru and then in front and behind them, but manages to end up back at Ritsu’s side, falling into step beside him easily for the rest of the short walk. As predicted, Mob gets vanilla. Shou gets one scoop of chocolate and one of vanilla, and Ritsu gets mint chocolate chip. Teru gets kiwi purely to spite him. They sit at a little white table outside of the shop, with a bright pink umbrella shading them. Teru had told off Shou for putting his feet up on the table, so he’s got them resting on Ritsu’s knee as he tells them all about the storms in New York, falling asleep in some other gate in LA, sprinting halfway across the airport to catch his flight.

Ritsu knows that all of this was probably pretty stressful at the time, and that travelling is kind of hell, but Shou always tells airport stories in this ridiculous way that leaves them all doubled over laughing, Teru’s loud snickering almost drowning out Mob’s giggles, muffled into the sleeve of his shirt. By the time Shou’s halfway through retelling his layover in LAX, Ritsu’s laughing so hard that all that’s coming out are near-silent wheezes, and he’s bent over at the waist, gripping at his burning stomach. When he can breathe again, he notices that Shou’s fallen silent, and looks up to see that he’s staring at him, this kind of soft, open smile that makes Ritsu grin back at him even as he’s asking, “What? Is there ice cream on my face?” Shou shakes his head slightly, says, “Nah, but look! I made you laugh!” He almost says These stories always make me laugh but Shou wouldn’t know that, would he? He wouldn’t really know that Ritsu always snorts every time Shou sends him a picture of something gross he found in an airport bathroom at three in the morning, or that he has to bite the back of his hand to stifle his laughter when he’s in lectures, staring down at his phone as Shou sends paragraph after paragraph complaining about the weird German guy he met in customs who kept offering him various and dubiously legal meat products.

Mob’s phone rings before Ritsu can say anything, and he gives a quiet “oh,” before putting it to his ear and saying, “Is everything alright, Shishou?” He’s silent for a few moments, listening, before he says, “Ah, I see. I can come. Yes, I’ll be there soon, text me the address. Please be careful.” Ritsu raises an eyebrow. “Spirit?” “Yeah.” Teru nods thoughtfully. “Well, that puts a bit of a wrench in our plans. Hmm…” He fiddles with his cap for a moment, considering. “Here’s the new plan: Mob and I go help Reigen with the exorcism, you two hang out, we all meet up for dinner. Sound good?” Ritsu shrugs, nodding in agreement. “Sure.” Everyone else follows suit, and as soon as Reigen texts them the address, Teru threads his fingers through Mob’s and the two set off at a brisk walk, with Shou shouting, “Tell Pops hi for me!” at their backs. Ritsu finally sucks up and asks the question that’s been eating at the back of his mind. “You’ll be able to tell him yourself, won’t you? I mean, depending on how long you’re in town.” Shou blinks at him once, twice, then says, “Oh! Right, no, yeah,” and it’s hard to tell because the umbrella has washed Shou in pink, but he looks almost embarrassed, and he thinks he might be blushing, “I’m back for good. There’s other business, and stuff, but I can do pretty much all of it online now.” He tries for a laugh and makes it most of the way, but it’s just a little shaky. “Modern technology, it’s pretty cool.” Ritsu finds himself breathing a sigh of relief and realizes that he’d been worried, that Shou was going to disappear again, show up in the country again and then go on another year-long trip, slipping out of his life like the threads of his aura slipping through Ritsu’s fingers. Because, it’s, well, it’s not like the texting and the calling and the Skyping wasn’t nice, but, well. They’d been practically attached at the hip since middle school, and this past year hasn’t been fun without him. He’ll still be a ten hour train ride away once Ritsu goes back to Grain City in a couple of weeks, but having him staying, living, in the country makes something nervous settle in Ritsu’s chest. “Oh, cool. So, you’re moving back into your mom’s old house?” Shou nods. “Yeah. I haven’t been back there, but it’s probably kinda gross now. It was never the nicest place to start with.” “It’s huge. Shou, it’s practically its own estate.” Shou’s eyebrows shoot up along with his arms, and he stands up, pacing as he answers. “Exactly!” There’s no way to fill up that many rooms! It always feels empty and weird, like there’s ghosts everywhere!” “You’re psychic, Shou, you would be able to see any ghosts.” Ritsu is leaning on the table, resting his chin on his palm and watching Shou bounce around with a bemused smile. Eventually he comes to a standstill, thumbs hooked in the belt loops of his washed out grey jeans. Somehow he’s managed to put away two scoops of ice cream and about half of Ritsu’s in less than half an hour, whereas Ritsu is still munching on the cone of his. “Wanna walk?” Shou says, and he’s been still for all of three seconds but he’s already bouncing on his toes. Ritsu stands as he shoves the last of his cone into his mouth. “Mhm,” he says, fixing his sweater and readjusting the sleeves. They start down a random street, without a real sense of direction, just like they’d done in school. Shou’s tempo only matches Ritsu for steps at a time before he’ll suddenly trot a few steps ahead, or get distracted staring at a shop window and drag behind, but it’s a comfortable rhythm, well established and easy to fall into. They walk in silence for a block or so, and Ritsu would usually wait for Shou to start the conversation, knowing he’ll take them down some strange, arbitrary philosophical track like ‘How scared shitless must the caveman who accidentally made the first fire have been? Wild,’ that’ll last them most, if not all, of their walk, but Ritsu has a jab he’s been meaning to make. “So, screaming children on planes, huh?” Shou stops dead on the sidewalk, burying his face in his hands and groaning from between his fingers. “Please, god, no, never again.”