42. Boot (1/1)

-boot-

tsuna sees them the next time he visits her.

a momentary lapse in concentration leads to his eyes wandering and spying them in the corner of the room. small, worn football boots lie there, far too tiny for kahiro's feet (which are currently swinging about as she animatedly tells him about the time she kicked a tennis ball into a teacher's face accidentally).

"why do you have those?" he asks in honest curiosity and she cuts off her story to follow his gaze, a noise of realization leaving her mouth.

"oh, those. they're my first football boots!" she jumps out of bed to fetch them, picking them up with care and a fond smile on her face. "god, that's a wave of nostalgia i'm getting." kahiro shows them to him, the mismatching laces standing out to him against the faded black material. "i think i got them when i was eight or something? maybe younger?"

tsuna's fingers ghost the football boots that kahiro is holding so delicately; it's as if they're worth millions to her when they're simply shoes. "why do you keep them?"

a short, sheepish laugh. "its a weird reason."

he raises an eye

ow. "you don't usually have normal reasons for things, kahiro."

she huffs dramatically before continuing, staring lovingly down at the football boots in her hands. "okay, so one of my clearest memories from when i was younger was running around in the finals of this football tournament wearing these things and thinking 'i could do this for the rest of my life'." her eyes glitter as she speaks, as if remembering the event in real time. "the adrenaline rush was just incredible and i felt on top of the world. like i could do anything. it wasn't even the football part that i liked so much, i think it was just the moving around and- it was just great." she finishes lamely, looking back at him with a slightly hesitant smile.

"that's not weird." tsuna replies almost without thinking, struggling to find the words to come after that once he's realized what he's done. "i-i mean, it's a memory you want to keep, right?"

the smile becomes

ighter. "yeah. you...you get things, tsunayoshi." she then adds after a moment of thought.

his eye

ows furrow in slight confusion. "what did i get?"

a real, honestly happy laugh escapes her lips and suddenly she's encased him in a hug, only laughing harder at his squawks of surprise at her sudden action. "i forget sometimes how fantastic you are, tsunayoshi." kahiro sighs happily into his neck and her

eath on his skin automatically makes him turn red, patting her awkwardly on the back.

"thanks…" a pause. "kahiro, are you going to let go of me?"

"nope."

"ah."