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"If you came back to work for me, you could afford a much nicer car, you know."Mob felt a spike of shame; his car was pretty gross. He took care to keep it clean, but the engine knocked and the passenger door didn't open all the way. Reigen glanced over at him, and gave him a little slap on the shoulder."Oh, come on. I'm just ribbing you. Having any car is better than none." Mob looked over for a moment, and caught a glimpse of his grin before looking back to traffic. "I tried to clean it before I drove back..."Reigen laughed and Mob heard the flick of a lighter. "That's alright. If it were totally clean, I'd feel bad about smoking in it."If it were anyone else, Mob would have been annoyed. But he had missed the smell of tobacco and cheap aftershave in his life, and inevitably the smell would get into his laundry in the backseat. It would be nice to fall asleep in a pile of it in his dorm room on his rather uncomfortable mattress. "I told my parents and Ritsu I wouldn't be getting in until tomorrow, so I thought maybe we could get soba again.""Soba?" Reigen sat forward in his seat a little. "Nah, it's not every day you come back to town. Let's go back to the office, I'll make you dinner."Mob felt a little heat rise in his face. "Eh, well--""Don't worry, I just got some groceries." Reigen put a hand on his shoulder again. "You can't be eating much, you're skinnier than before you left."Mob knew the directions by heart, and the small unlit sign brought a sense of ease over him. Walking through the building late at night should have been creepy, but it felt good to run his fingertips over the textured bits of wall that were still marked by moving furniture and fingerprints. The inside of the office still hadn't changed, even though Reigen said over and over that he thought about moving the furniture around. He sat down on a broken-in chair, and Reigen disappeared into the kitchen only to reappear with two drinks. Mob only sipped at his. "It'll be ready in a while, I just had to put it in the oven."Did he prepare for this? Or--no, it was freezer food, then. Mob smiled a little to himself. Soba would have been better tasting. He didn't intend to make extra work for him."Uhm, I'm sorry Shishou--""Hey, I thought we came to an agreement?" Reigen bumped his leg with the tip of his shoe under the table. Mob put his hands in his lap. "Oh, well... Ara-Arataka-sama..." Reigen put his head in his hand and sighed. "What's wrong with just 'Arataka'?"Mob's face flushed a crimson red. "I couldn't--""Look at you, you're a big kid now." He gestured above his head. "You're like six feet tall. You can drop the titles.""Shi--I mean, erm..."Reigen took a long drink of his wine. Mob watched the way the muscles in his neck moved as he did. "Is it because I'm old now?" Mob frowned and shook his head fervently. "No! Of course not!" His master laughed, reaching over the table and touching Mob's face. "I'm kidding. I look damn good for 38."He still looked 25 to Mob. The occasional wrinkle appeared around his eyes when he smiled, and it made Mob's fingers tingle with energy that he didn't know what to do with. "The key is to moisturize--hey, are you okay?"Mob blinked and realized a few tears were spilling down his cheeks, blurring his vision and falling onto his hands in his lap. He was getting better about letting his emotions leak out without wreaking havoc, but they still snuck up on him on occasion. He quickly wiped away the wetness."I'm okay." Reigen leaned forward, taking Mob's face in both his hands. "You don't have to be okay, you know. You can tell me if something is wrong."The feeling of warm palms on his cheeks made it too easy for tears to well up in his eyes again, and he didn't bother wiping them away. He had been away too long. "You also don't have to tell me if you don't want to," he said quietly.Mob stood to his feet and crossed the gap between them, enclosing the other man in an embrace, tears silently soaking into his suit jacket. He thought idly that he would have to offer to clean it for him. Reigen didn't hesitate to wrap his arms around him, patting his back gently. Mob swallowed a lump in his throat. He didn't know why he even went to college. To impress someone? To keep up with Ritsu? Every time he talked about dropping out, Shishou convinced him otherwise. He wanted to come home. He wanted to spend lazy afternoons in the office, napping on the sofa that smelled like tobacco and cheap aftershave. He wanted Reigen's suit jacket thrown over his shoulders when the sun dipped below the horizon and the building they were investigating was drafty. He wanted to eat soba late on a school night. He wanted hands in his hair and a kiss on his jaw for an exorcism well done. He wanted to come home. He wanted to come home. He wanted to come home.He didn't remember falling asleep, but he found himself in bed, still wearing his mild-colored button-down shirt and slacks from the night before. His stomach grumbled. He hadn't eaten. There was a clatter of dishes outside the door. Mob elected to pull the sheets over his face, and drown himself in the scent of home.