It's 4:30 in the morning, Japan Standard Time, and Kit's still squinting at his mobile screen—a small beacon of jarring blue light in an otherwise completely inky dark room—waiting for his dad's latest text response. Theo's a pile of motionless limbs and quiet breaths just to his left, burrowed deep in a mess of their covers and taking up most of their shared hotel bed with his sprawl and Kit's slightly underneath him because he has no other choice, their room had come equipped with a queen bed instead of a king though neither one of them were all too bothered enough to complain. They slept tangled up like an indecipherable mass of body parts anyway, and Kit's only concern right then is startling Theo awake with his frenzied phone activity, the way he keeps tapping his screen back to life with a little too much aggression, willing any notifications to manifest other than a swarm of muted calendar alarms every ten minutes forcefully reminding him that today is Their Six Month Anniversary.

It takes herculean effort on Kit's part not to burst into a fit of surprised—horrified—laughter when his dad's response finally comes, but he does full body shudder to fight back the mental imagery of his parents paging eagerly through some mass marketed suburban mommy 50 Shades-inspired erotic coupon book. One that veers as wild as [1] Free Oral Sex! or [1] Naughty Spanking! or [1] Sensual Oil Massage! And he doesn't want to think about that for all the usual reasons but also because he'd hate to doom his parents even mentally to the boring sex life plaguing anyone who'd willingly buy and drive a minivan.

Still, he's grateful. His dad's been on the phone with him for going on forty-five minutes tirelessly offering him gift ideas for Theo's birthday because Kit is almost physically sick with nerves, an essential facet of his personality that he's the biggest absolute fuckhead when it comes to picking out anything more complex or intuitive than an Amazon gift card for birthdays or assorted religious holidays. And granted, he's given Theo presents before. He's cultivated some really fruitful business relationships with a variety of Etsy stores catering to their... uh, unique interests, some have Theo's measurements on record and don't even ask anymore, just make polite inquiries as to minor fluctuations that can happen if Theo's done more biking or wall-crawling than usual.

But that's different, Kit tells himself as he's browsing his list of Etsy bookmarks with frustrated scrutiny, only looking up after a moment or two when Theo's breathing becomes abruptly irregular but he's just squirming, adjusting, sleepily nestling into Kit's trapped shoulder and muttering something incoherent before stilling again. Kit can't help himself, he lowers his phone to lean into his boyfriend's warm sleeping body, breathing in the clean faintly fruity scent of his hair, the traces of minty toothpaste, the lingering spice from some stolen snack he'd stuffed hastily into his mouth before Kit could catch him and make him share. He decides to risk stirring Theo awake by pressing a kiss to whatever upturned planes of Theo's face he can reach—his temple, the high curve of a cheekbone—and feels his roiling stomach start to settle with the first hint of stability he's managed since waking up two hours ago, breath short and panic skittering up and down his spine.