Page 119 of Psync
“No. Or rather, I don’t want you tohaveto know, but I’m not going to hide it from you.”
“That’s not terribly reassuring, you know.”
Haruka hummed in agreement. Then he yawned so hard his jaw popped.
Haruka let all his weight settle on Eli, and he buried his face in Eli’s neck. “Tired.”
“Don’t fall asleep on me!”
“Haven’t slept since yesterday,” Haruka said into Eli’s neck.
It was like getting hit with a bucket of ice water.
All the warm, tingly feelings his body had been wallowing in now that he and Haruka were speaking again jettisoned from the plane without a chute. Haruka couldn’t endlessly give to Eli. He needed to be taken care of too.
Eli retrieved an arm from where it had been pinned and stroked Haruka’s soft, silky hair. “Sleep then. But not on me.”
“You’ll run away.”
“Silly. Where am I going to run off to? We’re on an airplane.”
“Stay anyway.”
“Why don’t I sleep with you? I’m tired too.”
Haruka rolled over just enough that he was no longer crushing Eli, but he kept an arm and a leg over him.
Eli wiggled until he was comfortable and allowed himself to be lulled to sleep by the sound of the plane’s engines.
***
“What are you doing?” Haruka’s sleepy voice pulled Eli’s attention from the computer screen.
“Studying.” He pointed at screen covered in kanji. “I realized when I woke up that I haven’t prepared at all for a trip to Japan. So, I’m brushing up on common phrases and—hey!”
Eli reached for the laptop Haruka had just stolen and was stopped by a hand to the face.
“You’re a language major. All you do is study.”
Eli tried to get around the giant hand blocking his view and failed. “But I might forget something.”
“You won’t.”
“But I haven’t been studying Japanese as much as other languages lately. I might be rusty.”
“You aren’t rusty.”
“How do you know?”
“Because we’ve been speaking Japanese since we got on the plane, dork.” Haruka finally let go of Eli, but only because he was too busy laughing at the poleaxed expression on his face.
“Oh.” Eli’s face went hot, and he covered his cheeks.
Haruka closed the laptop and put it behind his back. “You are just too cute.”
“Arghhhhh.” Eli tipped over on his side and buried his face in the blanket. When he did, the contact he had been maintaining with Haruka’s leg broke.
Nothing happened.
