HIS PRIDE ⇀ Manjiro Sano

Part 20

A/N |Before I start, I just wanted to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for 20k. It might not be the biggest number on Wattpad or anything but that doesn't matter. I started this book after watching the first few eps of Tokyo Revengers. I thought Mikey was rad so I figured why not, It's now officially passed my AOT book as my most popular book in under two months. I never ever would've guessed that before I started it. So, thank you all so much. This is just the beginning and I hope I can keep you all interested and exceed your expectations with this chapter alongside all the other ones. It's September 13th as I write this and I'm about to start writing this chapter, I fully intend for it to be the longest chapter of any book I've written so let's see how long this takes. Okay, enjoy everyone... and get some tissues ready ;)|

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"Aki?" A voice asked out, waking the boy from his nap. His blue eyes fluttered open, the boy looking around the bottom of the shrine stairs, finally finding the owner of the voice.

"Hmm? Oh, all done?" Akira asked Mikey who looked at the boy in confusion. He'd seen him slumped against the stairs, his head resting on his knee. The black-haired boy yawned as he ran a hand over his face, seemingly still waking up.

"You waited up for me? You coulda told me, I would've gone faster." Mikey spoke, bending down and sitting on the stair next to the boy. Akira shrugged, the events of the ceremony flooding back to him. He sighed before running a hand through his hair.

"Are you upset with me? I know I kinda snapped at Asahi and then all the stuff with your old friends-" Mikey was asking, not looking at the boy before a hand fell onto his own.

"I'm not happy, but it doesn't have anything to do with you. I just- I'm happy I'm in Toman now, it's nice. But I don't want anything to change between us, ya know? Like, I don't wanna be some other member of Toman, or even another captain. Maybe that's selfish, I don't know." Akira rambled before sighing as he felt Mikey get closer to the boy and lean his head on his arm.

"If you're selfish then I am too." Mikey simply put causing Akira's heart to slightly liven up as he smiled, lightly exhaling an amused breath.

"Yeah? How's that, fun-sized?" Akira asked, looking up to the stars.

"I wanted to rip that guy's head off when he touched you. I wanted to send my foot through the other one's face when he touched you in the hospital- I don't want anyone else to look at you. You're definitely not just another Toman member, Aki." Mikey spoke, Akira's smile growing more and more with each word.

"Yeah? What're you insinuating here, Ash?" Akira mumbled, his heart speeding up as he pushed the conversation more and more to where he wanted- where he needed this to go.

"I want things between us to change, I guess. I want another date, and another after that. It's not even that I just like to look at you, I don't care about that. It's- I feel like I can be myself around you. Not the Invincible Mikey, but Manjiro." Mikey spoke causing Akira to nod, understanding the feeling exactly.

"I'd like that... I'd like that a lot. But we do have responsibilities now, don't we? Once we get through this fight, how about we have Asahi cook us something and go on another picnic? I promise not to cry this time." Akira asked, a smile evident in his words causing Mikey to lightly giggle.

"Sure, I'll hold you to that, Azure," Mikey spoke as he snuggled into Akira's side, the boy wrapping his arm around his torso before lightly chuckling.