58. Pattern (1/1)

dude i love sixth form so much why did no one tell me it was this great i haven't been this happy in ages

-pattern-

the schedules for their daily lives change almost from the very moment that they put a label on their relationship.

it's subtle changes, after all, they already

eathed each other's air and spent their time together whether it be in person or through their phones. and they still have their own lives outside each other; kahiro has her athletic extra curricular clubs and tsuna has the crazed existence of his family to take care of. but it's different all of the same.

tsuna starts buying a drink in the morning to give to her after morning practice of whatever club she's partaking in. he's wanted to before but thought his noticing of her tinge of exhaustion and the way her voice rasps a little when they talk before class starts was something creepily observant. now they're in the same boat, he does it with only a small pang of embarrassment.

kahiro starts to do small hand massages throughout the day for him. it's not the pain reliever he really needs from the loud shouts and antics of his family and friends but it's designed to be a small comfort for him before he heads back knee deep into another argument. he adores them, loves them all to the core of his being, but kahiro knows stress when she sees it and now they're dating, she can hold his hand without awkwardness.

their messages start to have a proper pattern to themselves too. usually, the first comes from kahiro who texts about it being early and why does she make herself do all these clubs anyway, it's hell. tsuna wakes up later and laughs at the pictures of distress kahiro has taken, promising a reliever in the form of a drink. then there's the questions of where on earth each other are during

eaks followed by stupid, stupid pictures off the internet courtesy of kahiro (it has always been like this at least). later, questions of what she's doing after clubs and what he's doing with his family and more silly pictures. a definite good night comes last (sometimes followed by panicked messages in the middle of the night after nightmares on tsuna's behalf).

before their messages had no structure at all and the fact that they do now does something funny to tsuna's stomach-like this has been set out to last for a long time.

the biggest change however is definitely how they introduce each other. no longer does kahiro grab tsuna by the arm when she's chatting to an acquaintance and dramatically declare 'this is my close friend, sawada tsunayoshi' with great pride in her voice. instead she yanks him by the hand and says 'this is my boyfriend, tsunayoshi' with wonder in her eyes like she still can't quite believe he is that to her, fingers interlocked with his.

and no longer does he look over his shoulder and call her over with a shy smile, introducing her as 'my friend, imada kahiro' with awe in his tone that she's bounded over and wearing a

ight grin. he tentatively pulls her a little closer and, face burning red, he explains that she is 'kahiro, my girlfriend'. (although it's only recently that he's actually had to introduce her to many people-practically the day they started dating it seemed that everyone wanted to visit and it's definitely reborn's fault, it always is).

all these new patterns to their days make tsuna feel like an idiot in love (which he believes he technically is) and even kahiro feels hopelessly soppy in her emotions.

but the patterns they take most notice of are the patterns of bumps on each other's hands, the small cuts and

uises tsuna acquires on a daily basis, the tiny scars that kahiro got from a rock-climbing session gone wrong, the toughness of his skin built up over hard training and fights, the length of her fingers, almost graceful in how long they are.

holding hands becomes an instinctive movement and the time they spend with their fingers linked together is practically ridiculous. although, not always romantic as kahiro tends to make it into a game of mercy when no one is looking.

(she usually wins but a few times tsuna has beaten her and made her fall over, walking away as if nothing has happened as she shouts through her laughter.)