"And...Daichi Akiyama? Do you have your presentation ready?"

A young gentleman in the fourth row of the lecture hall stood from his chair. His white hair stuck out in the crowd, but many students were surprised by his appearance.

"Woah, is that Yukio Akiyama's kid?" one student whispered to another, while Daichi made his way to the front of the classroom with his laptop.

"I thought he fell off the grid once his dad got arrested!" a young woman replied.

"Guess not."

Daichi plugged in his laptop to the adapter, smiling as the large projector behind him showed the presentation on his laptop. He straightened his collar—a worn, sun-faded simple light blue with gold buckles.

"M-my name...is Daich-chi Akiyama."

He took a deep breath, ignoring the faces of all but one in the lecture hall. By the west-side door was a tall figure dressed in a blue sweater and khakis, his glasses resting on the bridge of his nose. He smiled, and Daichi smiled back.

"W-when I was...younger, my father...h-he gave me a tr-tr-tramautic brain inj-jury."

There were a few gasps and sounds of pity in the ground, and Daichi laughed a little nervously.

"M-maybe you noticed?" No one seemed quite sure how to respond. "D-don't worry. Y-you can la-a-augh. Ironic, huh? I p-probably shouldn't be in public speech." He rushed out the last couple words but was able to say them without stuttering. "My st-stutter will never go aw-way c-completely. I'm h-here cause—" he caught himself "—because there are still things I w-want to say, and I-I need to l-lear—to learn how to say them."

He clicked a button on his laptop, and the first slide popped up. It was a scene of a young man giving a speech to a group of smartly dressed adults in a meeting room of sorts.

"I want to t-talk to m-my coworkers by myself."

He clicked the button again, and the image was replaced with a picture of a son sitting across from a woman, presumably his mother, on a front porch.

"I w-want to tell my mom th-the st—the stories she m-missed."

The image changed again. This time it was a selfie.

The person holding the camera was the tallest member in the photo, a dark-haired boy with a slight smile. A smaller blond boy sat on his shoulders, a wide grin to contrast his teary eyes.

Two identical twins with orange hair were on either side of a young woman with glasses, who was just smiling pleasantly at the camera. Like a normal person.

There was a tall blond standing just behind this girl, one of his arms looped around her shoulders. He smirked at the camera and flashed a peace sign.

There were two figures sitting on the ground, a dark-haired boy with glasses and his white-haired boyfriend. The boy with glasses gave a slight smile, but the smaller boy was flashing all his teeth and waving at the camera.

"I wany to c-call my friends wh-while we're far away."

Finally, the scene changed one last time. This time, it was just a picture of a heart with an arrow through it. Daichi glanced at the image and blushed.

"I want to tell my 'yoya—" He cleared his throat as his voice cracked. "I want to tell my Kyoya how much he means to me."

Daichi spared a second look at the boy in the doorway to find that he was still looking on with pride.

"I d-didn't have words f-f—words for a long time, s-so I know how important they are. I can't wait to learn how to use them more and say what's on my mind."

There was a round of applause. A couple of young women squealed, and, for a moment, Daichi was back in the third music room—lying on a couch, his head in Kyoya's lap, young princesses sitting across from them, cups of tea on the coffee table.

The professor's voice, jolted him out of his thoughts. "Excellent job, Mr. Akiyama. I'm so sorry, but you do have to take your seat since we're running out of time. Really great job though. I think everyone agrees."

After class, Daichi walked to his apartment with Kyoya, their hands clasped loosely together. Daichi adjusted the strap of his book bag and brought Kyoya's hand to his mouth, kissing it with a slight giggle.

"I am so incredibly proud of you," Kyoya told him. "Even how far you've come since the accident happened—It's amazing. You're amazing."

Daichi shook his head, not in denial, but mostly because he didn't know how else to express the utter bashfulness and admiration he was feeling in that moment.

"D-do you wanna—" Daichi paused and took a deep breath. "Wanna watch movies? Or you h-have homework?"

"I've got homework, but I can multitask," Kyoya replied smoothly.

"Nuh-uh," Daichi responded with a playful poke to Kyoya's side. "Not if I c-cuddle you."

"That's not fair. You didn't mention cuddling," Kyoya whined with a rolling of the eyes that indicated to Daichi he wasn't actually offended.

Daichi just shrugged as Kyoya tugged him closer. "Always cuddle with you."

"And I couldn't be more grateful."