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“Nah, dude,” Josuke says. He doesn’t move a muscle, but somewhere up in the nebulous space above their heads Crazy Diamond’s palm comes to rest on top of The Hand’s, currently making a hesitant journey up its thigh. “You have to, like—firmly.”
Below them, Okuyasu clears his throat and flexes his fingers.
When they'd hatched this plan, after a few solid hours of the newest Killer Instinct but before they felt tired enough to crash, it’d seemed brilliant. Now that Okuyasu is for all intents and purposes touching his best friend’s thigh in his darkened living room in the middle of the night, the whole thing feels too weird, too intimate, more than he can pull off without seeming like a loser.
The way Josuke’s looking at him doesn't help much. He’s sitting face-to-face with Okuyasu on the couch in front of the TV, illuminated only by the moonlight falling through the window shutters and the pink-blue glow of their respective Stands. His hair is down from when they’d showered, and when he moves a certain way it falls into his eyes.
Okuyasu wishes he were smooth enough to push it back off his forehead using The Hand, but ultimately decides that would be too close to a swiping motion for comfort.
“Gotta set a mood,” Josuke continues, voice clear but quiet, eyes trained on Okuyasu’s face.
Firmly, Okuyasu reminds himself, and dares to hold on tighter when Crazy Diamond lets go. Both his real hands are balled into fists on his lap, but Okuyasu can still feel his fingers sinking into the fabric of Josuke’s Ferragamo sweats, the ones he saved up for a month to buy so he could relax in luxury on the weekends.
“Yeah, nice,” says Josuke. He shifts closer, with his real body, and then Crazy Diamond does too, and suddenly Okuyasu doesn’t know where to look.
He ends up just staring at the mostly-eaten bowl of popcorn they’d pushed out of the way before this started, letting out a sort of grunt in response to Josuke’s comment. He hopes Josuke won’t notice how flustered he’s getting, but that’s probably not realistic. Even if he somehow managed to miss it, The Hand is practically trembling up above him, the traitor.
Okuyasu exhales, tries to hype himself up. Any minute now the right answer will come to him. He’ll think of some awesome move that’ll knock Josuke’s socks off and resettle the balance of the coolness scale between them, tipped way too far into Josuke’s favor at the moment.
As it is now, though, all he can really think about is the shrinking distance between them and how crazy good Josuke looks up close, the dramatic downward sweep of his eyelashes every time he blinks.
Silence stretches out between them until Okuyasu realizes Josuke is waiting on him to make the next move. If The Hand goes up any higher they’ll get into territory that Okuyasu is definitely not ready for, so instead he just scrambles for something to say.
“Um,” he hedges. “So then what?”
“What do you think, man?”
Josuke is smiling. Even with his eyes fixed on the popcorn bowl, Okuyasu can hear it in his voice. It might piss Okuyasu off under different circumstances, but somehow he gets the sense that Josuke isn’t trying to make fun of him.
With this in mind, Okuyasu gathers his thoughts, pulls a deep breath in through his nose, and turns his gaze from the popcorn bowl back to Josuke’s face.
“You go in for the kiss, yeah?”
Okuyasu barely has time to be embarrassed about the totally uncool way his voice cracks in the middle of the sentence before Josuke nods.
He’s fidgeting a little, like maybe he can’t sit still, one hand spread flat between them on the couch cushion. Okuyasu wants to reach out independently of his Stand and cover that hand with his own, but he has no idea how Josuke will react.
Instead, he leans forward in his mind, and both of them flick their eyes upward in time to see The Hand carefully press its downturned mouth against Crazy Diamond’s.
Crazy Diamond kisses back, bright eyes falling shut underneath the shadow of its helmet, and Okuyasu has to fight down a gasp at the sensation of it. The Hand copies his body language, stiff at first and then relaxing by increments, head bowing forward a little when Crazy Diamond’s hand comes to rest on the back of its neck.
Watching them together like this isn’t weird at all, Okuyasu is surprised to discover. It’s almost kinda sweet, even, and Okuyasu’s heart beats faster when he thinks about how much more intense this is than all the times he and Josuke have shared an ice cream cone or a bottle of soda.
The Hand angles its head and presses forward, the kiss more firm this time, and Okuyasu is jolted from his observations. The kiss feels more immediate now, Josuke’s mouth pressed tight against his, slightly off-center because The Hand’s precision accuracy needs some work.
He definitely should have been prepared for this, considering that it’s the entire point of what they’re doing, but Josuke’s lips are way too soft. When Okuyasu gets up the courage to glance over, he sees that Josuke’s closed his eyes. He looks really cute, mouth pushed out into an almost-pout, brows furrowed as he concentrates on directing Crazy Diamond.
Okuyasu blinks hard, trying to calm down, to relax into this and treat it like the experiment that it is, but somehow he can’t. It’s possible he may be freaking out.
He feels the hand that’d been on the back of his neck move to the side of his face, fitting against the curve of his jaw, and sees it mirrored up above their heads as Crazy Diamond pulls back from The Hand.
Josuke opens his eyes. Even like this, Okuyasu has to admit his control is impressive.
“You alright?” he asks, tilting his head to the side in an attempt to maintain eye contact even as Okuyasu looks away, embarrassed. “We can stop if you want, but—”
“No!” Okuyasu interrupts. His face burns. He’s sure The Hand’s would, too, if that was possible. “It’s just, uh— my brain’s gettin’ kinda scrambled. Like I can’t concentrate on who’s doing what, you know?”
For some reason, that makes Josuke smile. Crazy Diamond is still touching The Hand’s face, and the feeling of it is really distracting. Especially when it uses the touch to guide The Hand closer, so smooth that The Hand just kind of tips forward into it, so that Okuyasu barely has to do anything.
Josuke is definitely being way cooler than he is right now, but there’s not a single thing Okuyasu can do about it. Especially not when the real Josuke leans in close enough for their noses to almost bump.
“So don’t worry about it,” he says. That’s all the advance warning Okuyasu gets before Josuke leans in the rest of the way.
Okuyasu’s eyes slide shut on instinct, and then all of a sudden he and Josuke are actually kissing with their actual mouths.
It feels so good Okuyasu can’t even be embarrassed about it; he can’t feel anything except for Josuke all around him, clean-smelling from the shower, loose hair brushing against Okuyasu’s face. His lips are soft and then insistent and then so soft again, until Okuyasu feels dazed.
Josuke’s palm slips down to rest against the side of his neck as they pull back to breathe. Okuyasu shakes his head a little, trying to bring himself back to reality, but Josuke doesn’t let up. They’ve barely been apart for a second before Crazy Diamond reaches out above them, armored knuckles bumping up against the ridge of one of The Hand’s blinders.
The Hand grips Crazy Diamond’s shoulders in a way that’s almost pure reflex; those two must really like each other, Okuyasu thinks dizzily. There’s no way this would be so easy with anyone else.
“So?” Josuke asks, eyes glittering in the dim light. “Which way’s better?”
When Okuyasu opens his mouth to answer, he can feel the warm phantom pressure of Josuke’s thumb against his bottom lip, just barely pressing down. He takes a deep breath in that shudders through him, stomach doing flips even as he opens his mouth to speak.
“Not sure if I can decide yet, man. M-might need to try ‘em both again.”
Surprise flashes across Josuke’s face, followed immediately by another pout, and Okuyasu wants to laugh.
“You’re on,” he says, recovering quickly, reaching out to pull Okuyasu close across what little distance remains between them.