[AO3 Crosspost] Post-it sized Tadabi Stories

[terresdebrume]

Rating: Gen for the most part. One story is Teen & Up
Fandom: Big Hero 6
Character(s): Wasabi No Ginger, Tadashi Hamada, Cameos by Hiro, Baymax, and various others
Pairing(s): Tadashi x Wasabi
Other relationship(s): Tadashi & Hiro, plus others
Genre: Fluff, romance, tiny bit of angst
Wordcount: 3 449
Trigger warning(s): Offscreen amputation, very light references to deep burns
Additional tag(s): amputee!Tadashi
Summary: Fourteen snippets of Tadashi and Wasabi's life as a couple
Note: So I played a game on tumblr where people could send me a pair of characters + an opening sentence, and I'd write the next five. My friend Tim sent me a ton of Wasabi/Tadashi prompts, and this series was born... Hope you'll enjoy it :)

“Why do we keep running into each other everywhere,” the man says, both hands tuggng at his dreadlocks and making Tadashi smile, “Are you following me?”

“No,” Tadashi says with the most innocent smile he can muster–he’s saying the absolute truth here, but somehow he still feel like laughing, like he’s pulled a particularly satisfying prank, “But we do have a lot of classes in common.”

“I know that,” the other says with a slight shrugs, hands coming to clutch a thin tablet in front of him, “I saw you in professor Callaghan’s lecture yesterday–I liked what you had to say about Aasimov, by the way.”

Before Tadashi knows it, he gets engrossed in a long, positively delightful conversation about the three laws of robotics, and the debates about them that crossed the late 21st century, back when viable artificial intelligences started to see the day…Aunt Cass is furious after him for not coming home until midnight, and Tadashi apologizes profusely, but goes to bed with a contented grin.

Hiro teases Tadashi about the encounter for the next three weeks, and Tadashi’s seriously considering dying the little devil’s underwear orange to teach him a lesson when he bumps into the other guy at the cafeteria–Tadashi ends up sitting with him and his friends: two girls named Honey and Gogo, and a guy in a mascott costume who introduces himself as Fred.

“And he’s Wasabi!” Fred exclaims in lieu of a conclusion, causing the man in question to groan:

“It happened one time!”

Tadashi smiles at the name, extends a hand to introduce himself, and smiles again when Wasabi pleads: “do me a favor and ignore the nickname–its ridiculous and Fred’s trying to rename me!”

“Tell you what,” Tadashi says, “If I get it wrong, you get to call me Dadashi–no way I’ll keep using Wasabi if you call me like that in return!”

Tadashi turns out to be wrong but, in the long run, he’d be lying if he said he minded.


*****

“So you’re a liar and a thief.”

It takes effort not to giggle at the panicked look that appears on Wasabi’s face–not that there’s anything wrong with giggling, but Tadashi is a bad, bad person who’s enjoying Wasabi’s flustered face way more than he should.

“I didn’t–I’m not–what the heck, Tadashi!” Wasabi flusters, and this time Tadashi just can’t restrain a smirk before he explains:

“You keep saying you’re not a very interestign person, which makes you a liar… and you definitely did steal my heart.”

Wasabi’s skin goes about four shades darker on the brown spectrum and he groans, muttering something about stupid cheesy friends as he strides out of the lab–Tadashi slaps himself in the forehead and vows never to take Fred’s relationship advice ever again.


*****

“This is not happening."

That‘s the only thing he can think of–This is not happening–as if somehow, thinking it is going to douse the flames and save everyone–as if it made the truth any more bearable, any less terrifying.

This is not happening, Wasabi thinks, and falls to his knees while the heat and smoke burn his eyes, hands grappling for the sky, for a friend, for anything to hold onto–but Tadashi’s cap is in Hiro’s hands already, and if this is to be the last of him left, who’s Wasabi to take it away from Tadashi’s own little brother?

This is not happening, except it is, and it rings so lound in Wasabi’s head it’s almost like everything around felt silent–like there’s nothing left to him but fear and denial.

Fred and Gogo, Honey, Tadashi’s aunt all fuss around Hiro, who just fainted, and Wasabi stands here, thinks of all the things he tried to put into words, all the mangled sentences he could never start out loud because he never knew the end of them–thinks of how utterly laughable his fears seem now, how he’ll give anything right now, anything at all just to know he’ll be able to get the first word out, Hell, even the first syllable!

He thinks of all the ways he could have said it–I’ll help you with Baymax tonight–I like you–how long has it been since we went for coffee again?–will you go on a date with me?–thinks of all the times he stopped befor he even tried, and thinks this isn’t happening.

But it is.


*****

“You got a little something on your shirt,” Tadashi points out with a throaty little chuckle.

If you’d told Wasabi that out of all people, it would be Tadashi Hamada who’d end up making him want to scream in frustration until the whole hospital personel came to stop him, he would never have believed you–and yet, here he is.

“You didn’t listen to a single thing I said, did you? Do you even give a fig about me talking or are you just so far gone you–”

“I am listening,” Tadashi protests, face flushed with anger–and that, too, ranked pretty high on the list of things Wasabi never thought he’d see–“But all you–all anyone ever does these days is act like I’m going to crawl out of bed and throw myself on the motorway or something, and I don’t know if anyone has noticed it but I’m the one with the third-degree burns and the missing leg here, I know I was stupid, so if everyone could give me a bloody break and just, I don’t know, be happy I’m alive, I’d actually be bloody grateful!”

Tadashi breaks off with a hard breath, and Wasabi can only watch as the wave of anger and frustration–and maybe fear, too–grows and grows and grows until Tadashi’s heaving with it, coughing up a storm in his own lungs while sea water spills onto the planes of his hands and wrists.

Wasabi snaps out of it, eventually–sits next to Tadashi on the bed and hugs him to his chest with a hand in his hair and breathes in and out, slowly, until he can feel Tadashi’s inspirations slow down to the same rythm.

“I don’t think you were stupid” Wasabi whispers after a while, when silence has done its work and run its course, “I think you’re the bravest person I’ve met, and not just because of the fire.” A pause. “I also think it’s time for you to stop being brave for a while, and let someone else take up the job.”

Tadashi sniffles in Wasabi’s neck, fingers loosening just a fraction and Wasabi hugs him a little tighter, just close enough to reach for Tadashi’s hand and squeeze it in support.

“You don’t have to be brave with me,” he promises, “You don’t have to pick me up this time. I’m here to support you, not the other way around.”

“Is that why you freaked out at me?” Tadashi asks, and Wasabi blushes and mumbles:

“I never said I was very good at it yet.”

Tadashi snorts, but when he slumps against Wasabi again he feels more relaxed, and he’s asleep in minutes. Wasabi sighs in relief, and smiles… one more day on the healing path.


*****

“I didn’t do it,” Hiro says with his hands raised as if in protection, “And it wasn’t my fault!”

“You had that robot one day,” Tadashi protests, almost choking on it, “One, and you managed to sneak out of the house to get yourself nearly killed and get it drunk!”

Hiro gives him an apologetic smile, one hand buried in the hair at the nap of his neck while he slouches under Tadashi’s glare—and that’s just as well, honestly, because Tadashi is barely a breath away from throttling him.

“We’re fine,” Hiro insists while Baymax looks around the room and pokes at the instruments while his lullaby program drifts through the air in a broken voice: “I can fix the vinyl, and he’ll be as good as new!”

“I don’t care about Baymax, Hiro!” Tadashi yells, ignoring Hiro’s panicked look toward the door—that’ll teach the brat to sneak into the hospital past visiting time— “I care about you not getting into situations you can’t handle! I nearly died, dumbass, I don’t want the same to happen to you!”

Hiro looks angry at first—angry enough he doesn’t seem to care about the annoyed yelling from the room next door, and angry enough for Tadashi to brace himself for an impromptu shouting match in the middle of the night—until something clicks and he deflates all at once, straight into Tadashi’s arms, who catches his brother in the strongest hug he’s ever given anyone.

“There, all better,” says Baymax’s tired voice, and Tadashi nods.


*****

“Your hair looks funny.”

Tadashi struggles not to look to his left, where Wasabi managed to wedge himself betwen the bed and the bookshelf, barely hidden behind a flimsy blanket–if Hiro only looks too far down…

“I did just wake up,” Tadashi says wit a shrug, surprised at how stable his words come out, “Invent me a combing pillow and I won’t have funky hair anymore.”

“It’s three in the afternoon,” Hiro points out, leaning toward Tadashi with a suspicious squint, “It’s a bit late to wake up, isn’t it?”

Tadashi shrugs, struggling to maintain composure even as about half his brain is busy cursing whatever managed to drive his brother out of the lab that early–with their aunt gone, Tadashi thought he and Wasabi would get at least two more hours of peace!

“Well, I’m up now so if you could let me dress up…”

“Alright,” Hiro shrugs, walking toward the door, “I’ve got to text Wasabi anyway, he’s late for his suit fitting.”

Tadashi doesn’t think he’s ever hated Wasabi’s loud text alert more than he does when it tears through the air seconds after the door closed on Hiro’s back.


*****

“How about this?”

Tadashi can almost see Wasabi’s mental picture of their in-progress living room rearrange itself to include the green lava lamp in his hand and figure out the best place for it, how it’ll look and feel against the walls—he smiles.

He knew from the start that moving in with Wasabi wouldn’t be a quick or simple process—for a while after the fire, Wasabi fussed so badly they nearly fought about it, which they’d never done before—but in the long run he knows he couldn’t have picked a better flatmate.

It’s getting too hard, having to deal with Hiro’s recklessness and his aunt’s unconscious but stubborn refusal to even glance at the ground when he’s in the same room, as if it’ll change anything—Wasabi is anxious about pretty much everything in the world, and he still does fuss over Tadashi, but at least he fusses in a normal way, so to speak, and he doesn’t freak out every time Tadashi leaves the house.

Besides—and this has to be the weirdest part of it—Wasabi’s tendency to worry over everything has oddly calming properties: Tadashi doesn’t get half as many nightmares when he knows his friend is on the other side of the wall with chocolate at hand, and the gas stove doesn’t feel quite as scary with a friend ready to grab the nearest extinguisher at a moment’s notice.

Mostly though, it’s the panic attacks that make a difference—Hiro and aunt Cass tend to freak out alongside him when they happen, but Wasabi’s supply of coping tricks and soothing exercises doesn’t seem to have an end, to the point where sometimes all he has to do is smile and everything feels okay again.


*****

“What the hell happened?”

Tadashi surveys the damage to the living room—scratched chair legs, shed hair on every surface available and more soapy water than is entirely warranted on an appartment floor.

“I… got us a dog?” He admits with a sheepish hand in his hair.

Wasabi goes from dark brown to an even darker shade, hesitates a minute, frowns, and goes to speak, but Tadashi cuts him:

“I’ll get it trained and vaxxed and everything,” he promises, “You’ll hardly notice it’s here!”

“Oh, I know that,” Wasabi smiles, “Though I guess the ‘not noticing’ part is going to take a bit of time. No, I just wanted to say you’ve got a paw print on your face.”


*****

“Are you even listening to me?”

“Not really,” Tadashi admits without taking his eyes off his aunt, “I’m trying to pay attention to the priest right now.”

“I know,” Wasabi apologizes, hissing through his teeth and shrinking further down when Hiro glares at him, “But this is important—”

“Wasabi, we can discuss religious versus civil unions later,” Tadashi hisses, hunching in on himself to escape his aunt’s glare, and Wasabi protests:

“No we can’t—I’m proposing later!”

In hindsight, even Wasabi will have to admit Tadashi’s loud “What the fuck?!” in the middle of his aunt’s vows was pretty funny.


*****

“I like the other ones better.”

Tadashi twists on himself to look at his reflection, craning his neck to catch a glimpse of the back.

The shorts fit him well, loose enough to allow for some air to circulate, which will be a huge benefit to his leg—replacement limbs are marvels of robotics, but they do still require careful maintenance to function, and proper ventilation is part of that… Tadashi sighs.

“I think I’ll have to go for those though,” he tells Wasabi, smiling at his pout, “It’s better for the leg.”

“Alright,” Wasabi agrees as he stretches off the rickety stool the shop assistant left for him, “So long as we take the step, we can do it buck naked for all I care… even if the other ones are more flattering to your butt.”

“I’m not marrying naked,” Tadashi protests with a snort, “Or picking my outfit according to what my ass looks like in it! Aunt Cass is freaking out over the lack of tuxes already, there’s no need to fuel that fire.”

(Wasabi laughs and kisses him and says ‘it’s fine’ between bouts of vaguely hysterical chuckles—nerves, Tadashi assumes—but there’s a definite air of preening about him when Tadashi comes out of the shop with the butt-flattering pants in hands.)


*****

“Don’t be jealous of my genius,” Tadashi says with a sly grin, “I know you want to.”

Wasabi tries–and fails–to keep his face stern and his posture confident as he looks Tadashi in the eyes, Honey, Fred and Gogo waiting behind him to see what’s going to happen next.

“I really woudn’t call that ‘genius’–more like reckless irresponsibility.”

“It’s the spare one,” Tadashi shrugs, “I can deal.”

“It’s still stupid.”

This time, Tadashi frowns.

“It worked,” he says, leaning forward in his seat so he can stare Wasabi down, “That’s all that counts.”

“Really? Why don’t you tell that to the neighbors when they come back?”

Tadashi’s plan worked, it’s true, and there’s no risk the labrador from next door will try to attack Inu this time around…still, Wasabi is not looking forward to Mrs. Knickerbocker finding her dog running around with Tadashi’s prosthetic leg in his mouth.


*****

“There are so many things wrong with this picture I don’t even know where to start,” Wasabi whines, causing Tadashi’s eyebrows to fall into one of his rare frowns.

“Why would you say that?” he protests, crossing his arms as a hurt look settles on his features, “Why would you say we’re not allowed—”

“I don’t mean because we’re men!” Wasabi cuts off as soon as he gets where this is going, “I swear it’s not! It’s just… I mean, have you met me? Give me a baby and I’ll have twenty aneurysms in a day!”

At this point Tadashi’s conflicted expression doesn’t even sting anymore—Wasabi’s perfectly aware his need for control and safety extend beyond the average requirements: just one look at his lab will prove it—but that doesn’t mean it’s enough to placate Wasabi’s heartbeat.

“It’s not that I don’t like the idea,” he says, wrapping his hand around Tadashi’s fingers, “But I’m clearly not ready to deal with the variables attached to a baby—not without getting some… er… counseling or something first.”

“Alright,” Tadashi sighs after a long pause, bringing a hand up to caress Wasabi’s cheek, “We’ll look into that first… in the meantime,” He adds with a tentative smile, “I have an idea that may help you practice letting go…” Wasabi shoots him a curious glance, sighing in happiness when Tadashi kisses him with more than a little tongue: “Don’t put your pencils back in their case.”

To Wasabi’s credit, he does manage to wait for at least ten minutes after they’re done having sex before he goes to rearrange his desk.


*****

“You shouldn’t be trusted with small children, should you?”

Wasabi puts a hand in front of his mouth to hide a smile at Tadashi’s insulted expression, Wasabi’s niece dangling from the improvised harness at Tadashi's waist… to be fair, it does provide support in all necessary places, it’s just that Wasabi’s fairly sure you’re not supposed to tie a baby to yourself with old scarves and T-Shirts.

“I don’t see what you’re talking about, Aunt Cass used to do that to Hiro all the time, he turned out alright… mostly.”

“He turned out acceptable,” Wasabi points out without bite–he doesn’t hink he’s the best person to tell if someone turned out alright or not, considering his brain doesn’t exactly function the way it should, “Which is all I’ll say because I like your aunt and I don’t want her to ban me from your house.”

“If it make you feel better,” Tadashi chuckles, “I’ll be a lot more obsessive about proper carrying protocol when it’s ours.”

Wasabi is pleasantly surprised to find out the image makes him want to smile rather than panic.


*****

“You can’t control everything, you know, and not everything is your responsibility anyway.”

Wasabi’s shoulders still feel tense under Tadashi’s cheek, the fabric of his shirt stained with sweat.

“I was supposed to be watching him,” Wasabi says after a long stretch of silence, “And now he’s hurt!”

“And alive! Kids get hurt. It’s unpleasant but it’s not the end of the world, and it’s not your fault either…Plus, I bet you everything you want Juan’s going to be completely delighted that he gets to look like a pirate.”

Wasabi huffs a nervous laugh and tightens Tadashi’s arms around his waist–it makes Tadashi smile and kiss the back of his neck–before he sighs:

“He could have lost an eye!”

“And it still wouldn’t have been your fault,” Tadashi insists, “You told him not to climb that tree over a dozen time–what were you going to do? Put tennis balls on all the branches? Come on. It’s not like you left him alone all afternoon.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” Wasabi mumbles, drawing further in on himself, You’re like. The perfect dad already–I mean, you did fine with Hiro.”

“Yeah, and half of his front teeth are fake because he snuck on the baseball field when I was in my High School club and got hit in the face within five seconds. And one time he almost busted his knee while we were roller-skating. And that’s before I even get to the time I tried to climb on the roof and nearly cracked my skull open. Kids do dumb stuff–and kids like Juan and Hiro, they do dumb stuff fast. It’s not like you can literally keep your eyes on them twenty-four seven. Accidents happen. So long as they don’t die or lose an eye, well. There’s no need to dwell on it forever.”

Wasabi twists on his chair to look at Tadashi like he’s lost his mind…still, it’s the first time he takes his eyes away from the road since Honey and Pablo took Juan to the Hospital. That’s progress, if nothing else.

"You really don’t mind, do you?”

“I do!” Tadashi protests, “There’s just no use dwelling on it forever. We all freaked out, but now Juan’s good, and they told Honey he wouldn’t have any sequel. Best thing to do is to prepare his favorite cake and get ready to tell him ‘that’s what you get for not listening’ until his ears fall off.”

Wasabi snorts in laughter, almost shaking Tadashi off the garden table, before he rises to his feet and sets out for the kitchen.

Tadashi didn’t intend for the cake thing to be taken literally but all in all, he can’t truthfully say he’s unhappy about it.