The sound of Yuka Iroha's voice was like a bucket of ice water being dumped over Yasuo's head. One second, he was pinned against his own headboard by a muscular, shirtless teacher, and the next, he was scrambling to find his dignity.
Daisetsu didn't move immediately. He stayed hovering over Yasuo for a heartbeat longer than necessary, his dark eyes fixed on Yasuo's trembling lips. The Stoic Protector looked genuinely annoyed. His thumb traced the line of Yasuo's jaw one last time before he pulled back, his metallic strength leaving a cold void where his heat had just been.
"Yasuo! I know you're in there!" Yuka shouted from downstairs, her voice getting closer to the apartment door.
"I—I have to go!" Yasuo hissed, his voice a total wreck. He pushed Daisetsu away, his face a catastrophic shade of red. The shame of the bookstore discovery was crashing back into him, mixed with the shock of that intense, spicy kiss.
Yasuo did what he did best: he panicked. He practically shoved Daisetsu toward the window—the same way heroes in his BL stories escaped—and then dove toward his bedroom door. He didn't just lock it; he dragged his heavy desk chair in front of it. He was officially starting his Systematic Avoidance Campaign.
"I'm sick, Yuka! It's a... a super-flu! Don't come in!" Yasuo yelled through the wood, his internal monologue treating the situation like the literal end of the world.
Outside, he heard Daisetsu let out a low, rough chuckle. Then, the sound of a window sliding shut. Daisetsu was gone, leaving only the wrapped BL book on the nightstand as proof that the last ten minutes weren't a hallucination.
Yasuo slumped against the door, sliding down to the floor. He was a Secretive Reader who had been caught red-handed, kissed breathless, and then almost busted by his childhood friend all in the span of an hour.
"Go away, Yuka!" Yasuo cried out when he heard her hand on the doorknob.
"You sound weird, Yasuo," Yuka said, her voice suspicious. "Is that sensei still hanging around? Grandma said he came up here to return something, am I right."
"He left! He's gone! Just leave the tea by the door!" Yasuo was barricaded in, convinced that if he saw another human being, he would actually burst into flames from the embarrassment.
Inside his room, Yasuo's eyes landed on the book Daisetsu had returned. The note was still there: You shouldn't be ashamed of what makes your heart race. He felt a surge of relief that Daisetsu didn't judge him, but it was immediately swallowed by a fresh wave of shame. Daisetsu was being so calm and rational, treating Yasuo like a fragile child who needed his dirty secret protected.
"He probably thinks I'm pathetic," Yasuo whispered. He impulsively grabbed the book and threw it into the far corner of his closet, burying it under a pile of old aprons. He refused to even look at the object of his shame.
For the next two days, Yasuo lived like a ghost. He barricaded himself in the apartment, making up elaborate excuses for Grandma Mayonaka. Every time the bakery bell chimed downstairs, his heart stopped, thinking it was Daisetsu coming back to finish that intense lesson.
But Daisetsu didn't just give up. Downstairs, the teacher was confronting Grandma Mayonaka, his face full of nonchalant frustration as he asked why Yasuo was acting like a hermit.
"The ones with the purest hearts fear judgment the most, Daisetsu-san," Mayonaka-obaasan said, her energy on full display. She slipped Daisetsu a small bag of Yasuo's favorite cookies—a silent instruction to try harder.
Yasuo watched from the upstairs window as Daisetsu left the shop, looking up at the apartment with an intense, protective gaze. The teacher looked tired, like he hadn't been sleeping, thinking only of Yasuo's horrified face at the bookstore.
Yasuo pulled the curtains shut. He too soft for this kind of drama. But deep down, under the barricades and the bad excuses, he could still feel the phantom pressure of Daisetsu's hands on his waist. He missed the shared warmth. He missed the Anpan routine.
He was falling harder, just like the tagline promised. But he was too busy blushing to realize that Daisetsu was falling just as fast.
Later that night, Yasuo's phone buzzed with a notification. It was a long, polite, and incredibly professional email from Daisetsu's school account. It detailed exactly why hobbies are personal and why personal interests should never cause embarrassment in a professional or social setting. Yasuo read the cold, formal words and felt a lump in his throat. Daisetsu was back to being the "Sensei," and the distance between them felt wider than ever.