#never mind what I said earlier this IS breezeblocks

[beewolfwrites]

Do you write requests? I mean... chishiya getting his hair washed by his s/o... and it's so intimate that he really struggles with his emotions... dunno if you'd write that, tots fine if you don't. Just saying... would be cute wouldn't it...

Hello! I'm always happy to write requests, though this is the first one I've ever had :)

I wasn't sure if this managed to get across enough emotion on Chishiya's end (because that boy is like an emotional breezeblock) but I hope you like it all the same!

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You were never worried whenever Chishiya left for a game. Well, that’s not entirely true. He was smart enough to wriggle his way through almost any situation, you knew that. Rationally and logically, Chishiya would survive. But there was always that tiny voice whispering, ‘What if’.

What if he ends up in a Spades game and isn’t athletic enough?

What if he’s ambushed by other players during a Hearts game?

What if there can only be one survivor, and by chance, it isn’t him?

Interestingly, ‘What if he gets so covered in blood, it forces him to finally wash his hair properly?’ never once crossed your mind.

Half-asleep, you heard the door to your shared room creak open as someone shuffled inside. At any other time it could have been an intruder, or even one of the militants, if not for the beam of light from the hall slicing through the darkness. Chishiya’s features were briefly illuminated, then he shut the door.

You dreamily watched his silhouette as he rummaged through the drawers, dragging them open one by one until the noise woke you up completely.

‘Chishiya?’

‘Go back to sleep.’ He shut another drawer.

By now, sleep was too far gone. Sitting up with a yawn, you switched on the bedside lamp, but when the yellow glow filled the room, it became horribly apparent why Chishiya was turning out all your clothes drawers.

His white hoodie, sweatpants, and even his skin were all spattered with blood. And within an instant, there was only one question pressing on your mind.

‘Is it yours?’

‘I told you to go back to sleep.’

The side-glance he gave you as he reached for a towel revealed that he wasn’t in the mood for this, probably because his favourite white hoodie was stained. But neither were you.

‘Is it yours?’

‘Does it look like it’s mine?’

Eyebrow raised, he turned to face you fully, letting the light accentuate every stain in his clothes. On closer inspection, no. It couldn’t possibly have been his. The speckled pattern of the blood suggested that it must’ve come from someone several feet away. Realising that he was unharmed, you instantly relaxed.

‘Was it those collars again?’

‘Yes, actually.’ He paused, smiling curiously. ‘But the players weren’t the ones wearing them.’

Ah. It was one of those games where one of the others hunted the players down. You’d survived them before, and their lives were almost always pitted against yours.

If Chishiya had any intention of telling you about his game, it certainly wasn’t right now, because he suddenly turned towards the bathroom, giving you a full view of the back of his head.

‘Wait!’ You threw back the covers, managing to catch him by the elbow just in the nick of time. ‘Wait a second.’

‘What is it now?’

You lifted up locks of his hair, inspecting the dry, tangled mess. Aside from a couple of specks at the front, he’d somehow managed to avoid getting blood in it. However, that didn’t mean the overall state of his hair wasn’t nasty as hell.

‘I thought I told you to brush it properly after you shower,’ you said, feeling the damaged stands between your fingertips. ‘And we have conditioner. Don’t you use it?’

He looked at you tiredly, as though he couldn’t believe he was even having this conversation. ‘Conditioner is waste of time and money,’ he said. ’Now go back to bed.’

He tried to shut the bathroom door between you, but there was no way you could let hair like that pass. The moment the door closed, you yanked it open again before he could lock it, catching him by surprise.

‘Nope. You’re not getting away that easily.’ You pushed your way into the bathroom. ‘There’s no money in this place, and no excuses.’

He leaned against the bathroom counter, watching impassively as you started to run a bath. ‘I don’t take baths.’

‘Well, you do now.’

Opening the bathroom cupboards, you pulled out some of the nicer hair products that you’d collected from abandoned salons in the city. Since the only currency in the Borderlands was human life, luxury hair products were free game.

You could feel Chishiya growing more and more irritated. ‘Pull the plug, or I’ll do it myself.’

Ignoring the comment, you pulled gently at his hoodie in a signal to remove it, only he shifted away from you and muttered that he wasn’t a child. Despite his small, reluctant comments, it was surprising how easily he’d given in. Perhaps he was simply too tired to argue, though you knew you’d get an earful about this tomorrow.

Once his bloodied clothes were in a pile on the floor, he uncomfortably climbed in the bath. Neither of you were particularly bothered by nudity, and it was hardly the first time you’d seen him like this. There was just something about baths that he hated, and seeing him sitting grumpily in the water, it was impossible to keep from smiling.

‘I’m sorry,’ you said. ‘If it’d been a shower, I would’ve had to get in too.’

‘And that’s a bad thing?’

‘Pff, stop trying to distract me,’ you snickered. ‘I’ve got so much work to do if I’m going to rescue this mess.’

Tilting his head back, you used your hand to pour water over his hair, taking your time to dampen it thoroughly before squeezing in shampoo. You had never been very good at massage, but you tried your best, rubbing the lather in to make sure every strand was coated, and every drop of blood washed away.

Chishiya didn’t seem to protest. It was a stroke of luck to catch him while he was too tired to put up a fight. You snuck a glance at his face while shampooing his hair, only to find his eyes closed, expression peaceful.

‘Chishiya?’

One eye cracked open. ‘I’m awake. Don’t get any ideas.’

Smirking, you started washing the suds away. ‘I guess my plan to attack you when you were sleeping has been foiled.’

‘What a coincidence,’ he mumbled. ‘I had the same plan earlier.’

Once the shampoo had melted into the bathwater, you pooled conditioner into the palm of your hand and started combing your fingers through his hair, coating the locks while gently easing out the tangles.The silence was comfortable, and neither of you spoke until Chishiya let out a small sigh.

‘I preferred what you were doing before.’

Your hands stilled in surprise. ‘You actually like this?’

‘I wasn’t convinced at first,’ he replied. ‘This is the first time someone’s washed my hair like this. I suppose it’s not too bad.’

Chishiya’s words opened up a lot of doors, and you couldn’t help but ask, ‘Didn’t your mother wash your hair for you? When you were small, I mean.’

‘Ah…’ He smiled wryly. ‘We had a nanny.’

Your hands slowed as you mulled over this new information. Chishiya had only vaguely told you about his parents. He barely spoke with his father, and his mother was no different. But that was all you really knew. Maybe he was raised entirely by staff.

‘Was the nanny nice?’

He hummed under his breath. ‘She was underpaid, and she let me know it.’

Did he mean to say, his nanny took her frustration out on him? The more he spoke, the more unsettled you felt learning about this. ‘She helped during bath times, right?’

‘She supervised.’

It wasn’t difficult to read between the lines. He must’ve been washing his own hair from the moment he was able to, and even then, it would’ve been impossible to remember what the experience was like before. No wonder he was terrible at looking after it now.

Bad habits die hard.

You leaned forward and wrapped your arms around his neck and shoulders, pressing your cheek against his damp skin. To your surprise, he leaned into the embrace. It was a small slip that he would never show anybody else, a fracture in his apathetic facade, and there were no words shared between the two of you. Just understanding.

That was, until the silence was ruined.

‘Hurry up. The faster you finish messing with my hair, the faster I can get out.’

Chishiya really didn’t like baths.

#alice in borderland #aib chishiya #chishiya #imawa no kuni no alice #aib #chishiya shuntaro