[fic] Maps (No Matter the Road) [Gokusen 2, Hayato/Ryu]
Well, that only took three years.
I started this for mananeh's birthday in 2007; I'm finishing it, finally, for her birthday in 2010. mananeh takes me to secondhand bookstores without prompting, listens to me talk endlessly about my cat, did most of the work co-modding kizuna_exchange, and encouraged the last spurts of effort on this fic even though I'd purposely misled her into thinking it was something about footballers. (Hee.) So, you know - it's the least I could do. Happy (late) birthday, Moo. ♥ ♥ ♥
Maps (No Matter the Road)
Hayato/Ryu
8,736 words
Notes: AU, directly following the last part of Five Things That Never Happened to Hayato and Ryu. (Executive summary: Ryu doesn't attend Kurogin.) Many thanks for proofreading and cheerleading to matchynishi, my favorite Akamerar. ♥
"Yabuki," Ryu still said at first, and Yabuki would insist, "Hayato, call me Hayato."
"Hayato," Ryu repeated awkwardly and privately resolved to avoid names altogether.
Hayato, Ryu discovered, was apprenticed to a builder. "To learn the basics, until I can save a little money," he said hurriedly. "I'm thinking - I want to build houses and apartments and shops, things like that. Places people can actually use." He was looking half at Ryu, half away; he couldn't seem to decide whether or not he wanted to know what Ryu thought.
"So you're planning to set up your own business?" Ryu said, raising an eyebrow. "That's pretty quick, isn't it?"
Hayato shrugged casually, but his shoulders had straightened. "No big deal," he said in a tone that obviously indicated otherwise. "I like the work. You know."
Ryu, who supposed that since he had entered the university's law division he would end up a lawyer, didn't know. He nodded anyway.
It had been maybe two weeks - two weeks in which Ryu had gone out with Takeda and his friends almost half a dozen times. Sometimes someone was missing because of work (Hyuga) or night class (Tsuchiya) or a date (Takeda), but Hayato was there every time, with a loud, enthusiastic greeting for Ryu.
Tonight they were in a smoky pool hall the boys had apparently frequented since high school. "It's okay," Hayato had said with a wink, "I'll go easy on you."
Ryu's spine stiffened. The assumption rankled, perhaps irrationally so.
"Thanks," he said, expressionless, and took his first shot.
Half an hour later, Hayato was staring at the pool table with his mouth hanging open as the rest of the boys whooped and pounded Ryu on the back.
"We'll pay for you every time," Hyuga said, grinning widely, "as long as you promise to keep Hayato humble."
"Yeah," Tsuchiya chimed in, “you have to come now, you have a responsibility."
A smile crept up the corners of Ryu's mouth. His gaze flicked over to where Hayato was still staring at the table, mouth moving silently, and he felt a conflicting urge to both ratchet it up to a full-blown smirk and stop smiling altogether.
Nothing could keep Hayato down for long, however. Rousing himself from his dumbfounded stupor, he shot a glower at Ryu and demanded, "Rematch!"
Ryu shrugged. "If you want," he said.
"Uh-oh," Takeda teased, "better be careful. Can the great Hayato-sama handle two defeats in a row?"
"Hayato-sama never loses twice in a row," Hayato growled, seizing up the cue with somewhat more vigor than necessary.
Ryu pressed his lips together so he wouldn’t smile. "You can break," he said indifferently.
"It's fine," Hayato said from between clenched teeth. "You go ahead."
"It's the same to me."
"Me too. You do it."
"I don't care."
"Just do it already!"
Ryu let the smirk bloom. "If you insist," he said, and broke expertly. Hayato scowled and said something inaudible.
The great Hayato-sama avoided losing twice in a row by a hair's breadth. Reactions from the others were mixed; while they professed great disappointment in seeing Hayato escape further defeat, it was clear they were not-so-secretly proud of their champion.
Hayato leaned against the pool table, tapping his cue against the floor and wearing the most irritating smirk Ryu had ever seen. "See," he declared to the room at large, "I said I'd go easy on him, after all."
Ryu narrowed his eyes. "Rematch," he said brusquely.
The crowd of three whistled and catcalled. It was Hayato's turn to smirk. "Want to break again?" he said sweetly.
Ryu ground his teeth and with great self-control said nothing.
When the score was three-three, Takeda called it a night. What he actually said was something along the lines of, "You can stay here all night if you want but I'm going home," to which Hyuga and Tsuchiya hastily agreed. Hayato and Ryu put up their cues reluctantly and, even more reluctantly, shook hands.
The night air was warm and heavy. The sound of boisterous roughousing echoed in the stillness; Tsuchiya, Ryu identified automatically as he emerged last from the grimy stairway, and Takeda and Hyuga. Hayato was quiet.
Common sense came rushing back to Ryu like a freight train. He had never quite assimilated the rules of casual friendship, but surely he hadn't known Hayato long enough that such a thing could endear Ryu to him. It took a minute before he could school his expression to neutrality and turn his head to look over at Hayato. Hayato, who was grinning at him.
"You're not bad for a rich kid," Hayato said.
Ryu, limp with relief, almost stumbled as Hyuga slung an arm around his neck. "Not bad?" Hyuga scoffed. "Ryu's awesome. No one's ever beaten Hayato that many times before," he told Ryu confidentially.
"Hey," Hayato cut in, cuffing Hyuga on the shoulder. "I was going easy on him, stupid."
Hyuga rolled his eyes and said nothing, instead giving Ryu a significant look. Ryu was smiling again - he couldn’t remember the last time he’d smiled so often, at such trivial things.
They reached the intersection where they parted ways. "See you, Ryu!" Tsuchiya called. "Come back next time and show Hayato his place!"
Hayato's return volley was drowned in a chorus of goodbyes. Ryu waved and made to turn off toward the subway station. A hand on his sleeve stopped him. "Wait," Hayato's voice said in his ear, and Ryu obediently fell back.
Hayato waited until the voices of the others faded to echoes floating up the empty street. "Give me your phone," he said.
Ryu handed it over automatically, and then wondered at himself. He watched as Hayato, biting his lip in concentration, pressed buttons rapidly. When he seemed to be finished, he paused, hit one more button, and a tinny ring came from his own pants pocket
"There," he said, satisfied, and handed Ryu's phone back. "Call me if you're bored."
"Okay," said Ryu, puzzled and secretly pleased. They said goodbye, and Ryu waited until he was all the way home, until he was lying awake in the darkness of his bedroom, to flip the phone open and scroll down the list of contacts.
The screen glowed. Yabuki Hayato. Ryu curled his fingers tightly around the phone and fell into a dreamless sleep.
***
The messages began the next day and came in floods thereafter. There seemed to be no filter between Hayato's brain and his mobile phone. The weather, his delicious curry bread, proposed plans for the weekend, the black kitten he saw on the sidewalk, all seemed to merit a message to Ryu, accompanied by strings of character faces Ryu could barely begin to decipher.
new guy at work, quiet like you
take says yr school festival this weekend
on break bored tell me something interesting
His phone rang just as he was getting out of class. He glanced at the screen, and fumbled just a little flipping the phone open; it was the first time Hayato had actually called.
"Hey," Hayato said. "It's my day off. You free?"
"I just got out of class," Ryu said, hitching his bag up on one shoulder. He felt light inside. "Where do you want to meet?"
"I'm - there you are! Over here, Ryu!" Ryu winced and held the phone away from his ear. What was he -
There, over by the gates. Several heads turned in the direction, doubtless wondering who knew the broad-shouldered guy leaning against the brick gatepost, hands cupped to yell again.
Ryu was smiling now, he realized, and didn't try to stop.
"So," Hayato said, grinning, when Ryu reached the gates. "Where to?"
***
"You've been out late recently," his father observed at dinner.
Ryu had just taken a mouthful of crab. He chewed very thoroughly, swallowed, and said, "Exams are coming up. I've been studying with a classmate."
"A girl?" his father asked with deceptive calm.
Ryu looked up, honestly startled. "No," he said slowly. "Another boy in my class. Takeda."
His father leaned back in his chair. A minute amount of tension left his shoulders. "It's very commendable that you're spending so much time studying, Ryu. I expect you to do well on your exams."
Ryu nodded and applied himself to his crab leg. His mother watched, silent.
***
Having said that he was studying with Takeda - Take - Ryu felt obliged to actually do so. It was true, anyway, what he'd told his father - midterm exams were the following week. At the next macroeconomics lecture he said as much.
Take took the cue. "I'm free over the weekend," he said. "Want to study together?"
Ryu wasn't actually used to studying with someone else. Group work was an evil to be endured at best. Take, however, was sharper and more focused than Ryu had secretly expected. Ryu still wasn't entirely sure it was more beneficial than studying alone but the comfortable atmosphere and the sly comments interspersed among formula recitations - not to mention Take's liberal snack offerings - were almost enough to convince him.
"So," Take said after several hours had passed, setting a can of Asahi in front of Ryu. "You don't regret coming over after all?"
Ryu looked up sharply. Take gave him a bright smile and winked. After a second, Ryu let an anwering smile curve up one corner of his mouth.
"I don't," he said.
At that moment, his cell phone buzzed.
"You're not busy tonight, right?" Hayato had to raise his voice to be heard over the staticky connection as Ryu made an apologetic motion to Take. "Tsucchi just called and they gave him the night off, so we should go out."
"Okay," said Ryu, smiling. "I'm free."
"Great!" Hayato sounded unaccountably pleased. "Same place as usual. Hyuga's not off work but Take's a careless student like you, so - "
"I'll tell him," Ryu said. "I'm over at his place right now."
There was a long pause.
"Oh," said Hayato. "Okay. Later." A click, followed by a dial tone.
Ryu, more than a little confused, relayed the message to Take.
"That was Hayato?" Take said, surprised. Ryu nodded.
"Huh." Take looked thoughtful, and with difficulty Ryu quashed the urge to ask why. "Great," Take continued, "we'll head over there after we've finished up with bond markets, sound good? Unless Hayato remembers he didn't give you a particular time and calls back before then."
"How did you know," Ryu started to say, and Take answered, "Hayato never changes. Where were we, present value?"
The izakaya was no more than half full when Take and Ryu showed up around seven. There was no sign of Hayato.
"Don't frown like that," Take said, at Ryu's furrowed brow. "Your face will get stuck that way."
"Are you sure he's - " Ryu stopped as Hayato ducked under the curtain.
His gaze immediately settled on Ryu and Take, sitting cross-legged at a table across the room, and his expression changed, just a little. Take waved. Hayato gave them a brief nod and seemed, to Ryu's eyes, to drag his feet as he came over.
"Sorry," he said gruffly to Ryu as he slid in across the tatami. "Forgot to tell you the time. Guess Take figured."
"Hayato never changes," Take repeated, with a knowing smile, and Hayato visibly bristled.
"Says who?"
"Says everyone," a deep voice boomed from above, and the three looked up to see Tsuchiya towering over them.
Hayato was scowling. "Shows what you know," he muttered. His eyes slid quickly over to Ryu and away again. Ryu hastily averted his gaze.
"All right, all right," Tsuchiya said placatingly. "You're as changeable as the wind. Or the lightning, that sounds cooler."
"A man of many faces," added Take.
"A butterfly!"
"Don't you mean a caterpillar?"
With a noise of compounded frustration and irritation, Hayato stood up with such force that the table rattled. "Have fun," he growled. "I'm tired." He turned on his heel and stalked across the room and out the door.
For a minute, no one spoke. Take and Tsuchiya exchanged a glance Ryu couldn't interpret. Then,
"You go get him, Odagiri," said Tsuchiya.
Ryu's mouth fell open.
He looked to Take for confirmation. Take nodded encouragingly. "Yeah, Ryu, go ahead. I bet he'll listen to you."
"I don't think," Ryu said, or tried to, but somehow the words didn't quite emerge from his throat. Instead he heard himself saying, "All right," and got up from the low table.
Anyone with the barest shreds of common sense could see that it was a fool's errand to approach Hayato in such a mood. He was probably long gone, anyway. None of which explained why Ryu was outside blinking several times to adjust his eyes to the darkness.
Hayato was sitting on the curb, glaring fiercely at a plastic bottle lying in the gutter. As Ryu watched, he dropped his head and scrubbed both hands roughly through his hair, then threw his head back and burst out, "Man, come on!"
"You'll disturb the neighbors," Ryu said, and Hayato's head snapped around.
His eyes were almost comically wide. "Ryu?"
"No trains for a while?" Ryu said, nodding at the station steps down the street.
Hayato looked lost for a split second before comprehension dawned. "Yeah," he said, nodding a shade too quickly. "Just waiting outside. It's too stuffy underground."
Ryu walked over and lowered himself to the curb beside Hayato. He thought from the sound of cloth rustling Hayato was turning to look at him. He kept his eyes firmly on the storefront (Maeda Dental) across the street. Neither of them spoke.
"Take's known me since kindergarten," Hayato said after a minute.
Ryu made a non-committal noise.
"He should know better. Unless." Hayato's voice sounded peculiarly subdued. "I really haven't changed."
Ryu leaned back on his hands. Pavement grit dug into his palms. When he tilted his head back, he could just barely make out a faint light through the smoggy darkness that might have been a star.
"It's not like I'm an expert or anything," he said to the sky. "But. What I think is, if there's something different enough that you can notice it yourself, then something's changed. Because usually you don't notice things inside your own head. You know?"
"You think so?" Hayato said, in a tone Ryu had never heard before.
Ryu shrugged. For some reason, his heart was pounding. "No one can see inside your head but you."
"I wonder," said Hayato, and Ryu finally looked over. Hayato was watching him. When their eyes met he looked away and heaved himself to his feet, brushing his hands off on the front of his jeans.
"I'm hungry," he said. "Think they've ordered yet?" Ryu's eyebrows rose as Hayato headed back to the restaurant, and he hurried to catch up.
"Hayato!" Take greeted the prodigal, with a wide smile. "You're just in time for the karaage."
A platter of fried chicken was indeed approaching their table from the direction of the kitchen. Hayato's eyes lit up. "Karaage," he sighed with all the blissful passion of a lover, and sank down to the floor.
No one would have guessed he hadn't just arrived for the first time. Ryu knew he was staring. He quickly sat down himself, and couldn't keep his eyes from darting from Take to Tsuchiya to Hayato and back. "Mm," Hayato said dreamily as the platter was set on their table and the delicious gingery aroma wafted toward his nose. "You guys are the best. The best."
When Hayato wasn't looking, Tsuchiya dropped Ryu a wink.
The chicken was very good.
***
Ryu's midterm grades were satisfactory, with the exception of English conversation.
"Don't worry," Take said, with an encouraging smile. "You've got half the term left. Anyways, it's high enough you won't fail, right?"
Ryu shrugged. His father probably wouldn't ask to see midterm results, but Ryu's final grades would be a matter of course.
Hayato texted him again that evening. so???
Fine, Ryu wrote back.
really?
Yes, mostly.
say what you mean, odagiri
Only when you do.
whats that supposed to mean?! hayato-sama always gives a straight answer, college kid
I did fine, except in English.
whatever the teacher probably cant speak english himself. take told me you did really good so stop moping.
If Take already told you then why did you ask?
cause i wanted to hear it from you
Ryu put a hand to the side of his face. It was warm. Hastily he put his phone down and went downstairs for dinner.
***
"You still live at home?" Hayato said over a bowl of ramen, peering at him across the little table.
Ryu shrugged, to disguise his discomfort. "My parents told me to save money while I'm still in school, and campus is nearby."
It wasn't that he'd been encouraged to attend the university because it was close to home, it was more that it was the type of school that would be surrounded by the type of neighborhoods people like his parents lived in. For the first time, it occurred to him to wonder how exactly Take had ended up in his class.
"Huh." Hayato rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "My old man said I only got a roof over my head as long as I was in school. Kicked me out as soon as I graduated, said if I managed to get through high school I knew enough to look after myself."
To Ryu's ears, it sounded like Yabuki senior had been extraordinarily proud of his son.
"You don't mind?" Hayato was asking.
Ryu shrugged again. "There's nothing I could do on my own that I can't do at home."
"Huh," Hayato repeated. "Well. That's good. If you ever change your mind, just say the word - I know who to talk to." He dropped Ryu a wink.
"Thanks," Ryu said with a tongue suddenly thick and clumsy. "I will."
"So." Hayato's grin turned mischievous. "I guess Tsucchi manned up and asked Yuki-chan on a Christmas date."
Ryu raised an eyebrow. "Did he." Hayato seemed pleased, which was a good sign. When Take, the first to seriously fall prey to feminine wiles, began seeing not just any girl but the same girl over and over, the ex-ruling elite of Class 3-D couldn't seem to decide whether it was a matter of amusement, betrayal, or pride. Now it was a mere hairsbreadth from a competition and remained there only by virtue of Hayato's non-participation.
The abstainer in question was smirking. "Bet you when Hyuga hears he'll ask Chiyo-chan by the end of the day." Harada Chiyo had been rebuffing Hyuga's half-terrified advances for several weeks. Ryu privately thought she was biding her time for just such an opportunity.
"I don't take losing bets." Ryu considered. "Bet you she has to put him out of his misery."
Hayato snorted. "Neither do I. You think she'll say yes?"
"I think she'll make him take her somewhere very expensive." Hayato burst into snickers. A vague and uncomfortable urge compelled Ryu to ask, "What about you?"
"Huh? Me?" Hayato looked more taken aback than Ryu thought the situation warranted. "What about you?"
"I asked first."
Hayato crossed his arms over his chest, looking about as yielding as a brick wall. "I asked second."
Ryu mirrored his pose and raised an eyebrow. Hayato's mouth flattened in a stubborn line. They held each other's gazes for a minute, equally obstinate, until Ryu felt the corners of his mouth twitching.
"Not that it matters," he said, "but I don't have any plans."
Hayato looked unsure whether he should appear triumphant or commiserating. He settled on teasing, as he usually did. "No time for girls, huh? Busy student like you?" Hayato made as if to reach over and muss Ryu's hair and Ryu jerked backward so quickly his chair scraped across the slick floor with an earsplitting screech.
Heads turned. Ryu, ears burning, moved his chair back to the table and kept his gaze fixed across the table, where Hayato was burying an explosion of laughter in his sleeve.
"Very funny," Ryu said in the driest tone he could summon. "You never answered my question."
Hayato's capacity for distraction was a thing of marvel. "Huh?"
"Christmas."
" - Oh." Hayato wasn't laughing any more. He shrugged with inimitable Yabuki bravado. "Nah. I mean. I don't really want one. Girls always want you to talk on dates, and then they keep calling you and pestering you to keep doing things with them. I don't have time for that." The expression of disgust on Hayato's face nearly made Ryu lose his composure again. He managed to nod with a perfectly straight face.
"So - " Hayato said, and paused. He'd picked up his spoon, and appeared to be absorbed in stirring his ramen broth (meat, noodles, and vegetables long since gone) in counter-clockwise circles. "Since they're all going to be busy. If you want. We could hang out."
Ryu opened his mouth to say, "On Christmas?" and closed it again. It didn't take a college student to tell that Hayato didn't want to emphasize the date. "Sure," he said instead. "Let's."
Hayato's grin flashed into being so quickly that it felt like it sucked out Ryu's breath along with it. "Awesome," he said. "See, who needs girls."
Not me, Ryu thought, light-headed.
***
They'd paid another visit to the pool hall, and Ryu had won four out of six against Hayato, the first time he'd come out unequivocally ahead. The smile just wouldn't go away, even as he let himself into the house as quietly as he could.
He'd barely caught the last train home; his parents had probably gone to sleep hours before. Careful of every movement, Ryu slipped off his shoes and stepped up into the house, down the hall and past the living room -
The light switched on. "Ryu?"
When Ryu's heart had stopped trying to beat itself out of his chest, he took a long, calming breath and said, "Mother."
His mother was perched on the edge of one of the finely crafted wooden chairs, hands folded in her lap, as neat and still as a porcelain statue. "I'm sorry to startle you."
"No, I wasn't paying attention. I'm sorry." There was another chair sitting at an angle to hers. In the Odagiri household no more needed to be said. Ryu took a seat.
"I hope you enjoyed your evening," she began.
Ryu nodded.
"With friends?"
Ryu nodded again.
His mother wet her lips. "Ryu," she started, and stopped. She reached up to touch one pearl earring, stilled her hand, and returned it to her lap. A sense of trepidation was growing in Ryu's chest. His mother was not prone to nervous gestures.
"Ryu," she said again, "you're not - in trouble, are you?"
Ryu's jaw dropped.
She held his gaze and spoke rapidly. "You remember Mrs. Ozaki, from the next street over. Her son was in your junior high school class. She said she saw you last week with some boys who - she said they were, well, rough-looking."
Mrs. Ozaki's son hadn't been able to move on to the affiliated senior high with the majority of the class. Ryu could just imagine what she'd said.
"No," Ryu said, shaking his head. "No, it's - we're classmates." He avoided specifying exactly who constituted "we".
His mother put a hand to her mouth. "Oh!" she exclaimed softly. "Oh. In that case, of course - "
Thank you so much for your concern, Ozaki-san, as a matter of fact the boys are Ryu's classmates. Yes, that's the one. He seems to like it very much. Oh yes, of course - now tell me, how is Yuichiro doing at - where was it again?
His mother was saying his name. "Ryu." She leaned forward and touched his hand. "I'm glad you're all right."
Ryu stared after her as she left the room. Her slippers made no noise on the wooden floor.
***
Christmas Eve dawned clear and cold. By the time evening fell the temperature had dropped almost to freezing.
Ryu arrived at the cafe ten minutes early, hands tucked in the pockets of his jacket. He debated whether to wait inside or out for thirty seconds at most, before he heard, "Ryu!"
Ryu turned. Hayato was bundled in a puffy down coat that made Ryu want to poke him to see if he'd burst. Ryu's lips twitched.
"What," Hayato said belligerently as he came to a stop, breath steaming white.
"Nothing."
Hayato eyed him before electing to take the high road. "So? Where are we going?"
"There's always the lights," Ryu said, mostly to see how Hayato would react. "Around the park."
Hayato narrowed his eyes. "Sounds great," he said, and unzipped his jacket several inches with a show of nonchalance. Ryu's face hurt with the effort of not laughing.
They got coffee to go and warmed their hands on the flimsy cups as they reached the wide street bordering the park: lined with tall chestnuts, it was the scene each Christmas of elaborate illuminated displays. Hayato passed the crossing that would lead them to the park side, however, and continued on to a small side street. It curved sharply away and then rose in a steep climb, switching back and forth as it did so, until Ryu was was warm and breathing hard by the time Hayato finally stopped.
It was a small grassy clearing on the other side of the guardrail, looking down over the crowded terraced slope to the lighted avenue below. "There," Hayato said. "Less people." He flopped on the grass without further ado. After a moment, Ryu followed suit, lowering himself to the ground more carefully so as not to spill his coffee.
He bent his knees and cradled the steaming cup in his hands. Below, soaring branches illuminated in cool blues and whites stabbed the dark sky. From their vantage point Ryu could just make out the steady flow of couples that streamed underneath, miniaturized by both the distance and the trees' height.
There was a huff of laughter beside him. "Wonder if Tsucchi and the rest will run into each other down there."
"Take won't," Ryu said. "He told me he's taking Miyabe-san to Le Corsaire."
"Oh yeah?" Ryu could imagine Hayato's raised eyebrows even in the dark. "Smooth."
Ryu drained the last dregs of his coffee and set the cardboard cup aside, then lay back against the cold grass. Above the glow of the city lights, the night sky was unexpectedly clear. Then Ryu noticed.
"Hey," he said. "You can see the stars tonight."
"Really?" Hayato fell backward with a soft thump. His shoulder brushed Ryu's. For no particular reason at all, Ryu's cheeks flared with warmth.
"You can!" Hayato sounded as delighted as a child. "Wow. Pretty."
"Mm," Ryu agreed.
"I wonder what would happen if I made a wish," Hayato said. His voice sounded almost dreamy. Ryu wondered if he even realized he was speaking aloud.
"Try it and see," he said.
Hayato made a wordless noise of assent. Ryu raised himself on his elbows and looked over. Hayato's eyes were closed, and he was just barely smiling.
Ryu lay back down. His chest was warm with more than the coffee. They watched the stars in silence.
***
January seemed greyer when classes resumed after the New Year's break. It seemed like midterms had been only days ago, and Ryu's teachers were already talking about finals.
It was time to face facts. Ryu was never going to be a fluent English speaker. He knew every syntactic rule and convention backward and forward, and was one of the first to turn in his paper for any written exam. In conversational waters, with no rules to guide the path of dialogue and nowhere to look up what might come out of his partner's mouth next, he floundered. No, floundering implied the sort of thrashing desperation he hated - what Ryu did was plummet like a stone.
"Find someone to practice with," Kanda-sensei suggested. "One of the visiting students."
Ryu would have more cheerfully slit his own wrists.
It must not have shown on his face, because Kanda-sensei nodded, satisfied, and said, "Do your best, Odagiri-kun. The final can help you."
Ryu was already dreading the final with the roiling, gut-deep sensation he'd only felt once before in his life. It wasn't entirely surprising that the pack picked up on it, and with some effort, teased the source out of him.
"Don't worry so much, Ryu," Take said, brows drawn with concern. "It's only English."
"Ryu," his father had said a week before. "I ran into my old classmate Kanda the other day. I didn't realize he was your English professor."
"Pardon," Ryu had said through a mouth gone dry. "Yes, Kanda-sensei. He's very - very helpful."
"He said you're a promising student," his father continued. He looked, for once, approving. "I'm glad to hear it."
"You're smart," Hyuga added, back in the present. "I bet you'll do fine."
Ryu made some sort of assenting noise. Hayato didn't say anything except, "Your turn," and tapped the table with his cue.
"So," Hyuga said meaningfully. "Valentine's Day coming up soon."
"Nothing to do with us," Tsuchiya said gloomily, meaning himself, Hayato, and Ryu. His Christmas date had not gone well, and he'd been prone since to mournful sighs when he wasn't distracted by food, games, or alcohol.
Hayato slung an arm over Tsuchiya's shoulders with only mild difficulty, given the height differential. "Cheer up," he said. "Those guys'll get special chocolate and they'll share if it's handmade. Right?" he added with a pointed look at Take and Hyuga.
"Hayato," Take said with a good-natured laugh, just as Hyuga said, "Sure, why not?"
After a brief silence as everyone looked at Hyuga, Take ventured, "Are you sure your girlfriend would like that?"
Hyuga went three shades of red. "She's - we're not - I mean, it's - "
"Chiyo-chan's got a job, anyway, she wouldn't waste time slaving away in a kitchen for that guy," Hayato said. "Bet you she makes Hyuga treat her to something nice instead."
"Hey," Hyuga said, "until you can do better, you - " He was interrupted by the arrival of a fresh platter of drinks, for which Ryu was grateful. If there was one thing Hayato couldn't avoid, it was a challenge.
***
Three weeks passed in a nervous daze. Ryu took more notes than he'd ever taken in his life, scribbling through every lecture with a feverish desperation as if enough ink would shape a life raft.
There was a three day study break between the end of lectures and the beginning of the examination period. Ryu went to Take's the first day, and spent the remaining two holed up in his room. He emerged to eat and shower and, at one hazy point, to watch the NHK children's English conversation program on television. He placed his phone on the uppermost shelf in his closet and steadfastly ignored the buzz of incoming text messages. He couldn't quite bring himself to turn it off.
The morning before the final, his ringtone buzzed tinnily from the closet at eight in the morning. Ryu, at his desk, ignored it. It rang again, and a third time, and a fourth, until Ryu flung open the closet door and grabbed for it with the intention of smothering it under a pillow, and somehow ended up holding it up to his ear instead.
"Meet me at the cafe," Hayato said. "Three o'clock."
"What? No," Ryu said helplessly, knowing already how it was going to end. "I have to study, I have - "
"Don't pretend like you've even left your house since classes ended," Hayato said over him, like a steamroller. "I'll be fast. See you there."
Ryu rubbed his eyes and considered, just for a minute - but only for a minute.
It was fifteen minutes past three when Hayato burst through the door and over to Ryu's table, where he bent over to catch his breath, hands braced against his knees. He was wearing his puffy winter coat over a bright orange jumpsuit, and his hair was blown into wild disarray.
"Sorry," Hayato said between heaving breaths. "Boss - late - couldn't get off - "
Ryu said, "Are you on break?"
"Yeah," Hayato said. He took one long, controlled breath and then another, straightening up. "Yeah," he repeated. "Sorry, I've only got a couple minutes. This place isn't as close as I thought. Can I have a drink of that?"
Ryu pushed his soda over. He didn't even know where to start. What's so important? he wanted to say, and somehow couldn't. Hayato was not forthcoming, instead running a hand over his hair, shifting from one foot to the other. If Ryu didn't know better -
"Here," Hayato said abruptly, and shoved something into Ryu's hand. "Good luck." Ryu's hand closed around the small object automatically and Hayato was out the door before Ryu could do more than stare in his wake.
He opened his hand. It was a padded rectangle of shiny red cloth, with a gold cord dangling from one end. Embroidered on the flat surface was the word Success.
Ryu was smiling. He knew he was smiling. He was smiling too much. He ducked his head and got up to leave.
Something crackled underfoot. He bent over. It was a crumpled envelope of thin paper, stamped with the image of a large torii gate and below it, in old-fashioned script, the name Miyazu.
Miyazu Shrine was just under an hour away, on the outskirts of town. Its charms were said to be the best in the area for examinees.
Ryu's heart was beating too fast again. He had to get out of there before someone noticed. Outside, his hand slipped into his pocket and closed around the charm. It stayed there until, safely home, he hung his coat in the closet, retrieved the charm, and gripped it in one hand while his lips moved silently over a list of English phrases until late into the night.
***
When it came down to it, the exam was over in minutes, in much the same way a nuclear holocaust would have been.
***
The economics final was the same afternoon. At the sight of Ryu's face, Take tactfully said nothing but "Good luck," and held up a clenched fist. Ryu nodded tersely and took his seat.
There was no sense in letting one ruined grade wreck the rest. That was economic theory, appropriately enough: sunk costs. The small association reassured Ryu, and he stared straight ahead at the blackboard until the examination paper was in front of him. Then he began to write.
He'd done well, he thought dispassionately when he turned his paper in three hours later. He would almost certainly get the highest mark possible, for what (little) that was worth.
His phone was buzzing with new message notifications as soon as he turned it on.
well???????????
Ryu typed, Better get a refund on that charm, and deleted the sentence as soon as it was complete. He replaced it with, Aren't you supposed to be at work?
am at work, gotta hurry, call you when im off tsucchi cn pay dont worry make sure you wont remember anything abt this mrning sry gotta go bye
Ryu wondered if Hayato had sneaked his phone out on the job, was typing by touch memory in one of his pockets, or had simply made an excuse and dashed to the toilet to harass Ryu. All possibilities seemed equally likely.
He suddenly found himself fervently wishing it were evening.
***
A few weeks earlier, Ryu had incautiously told his father when grades would be released. Now, seeing the envelope embossed with his university logo lying on the table, he could do nothing but hope desperately that his father would be overcome with a sudden and uncharacteristic bout of forgetfulness. He picked up the envelope and slit it open.
He wasn't surprised, he reminded himself as the hard black print glared up from the paper. He wasn't surprised, so there was no reason to feel as if he'd been hit in the gut.
He took both the letter and envelope up to his room and did his best to distract himself for the rest of the afternoon. He wasn't very successful.
They had grilled mackerel for dinner. Ryu chewed without tasting. Afterwards, his parents spoke about something to do with municipal politics, until his mother began to clear the dishes from the table. Ryu stood up carefully.
"Well," his father said, turning Ryu's hopes to ashes, and looked to Ryu expectantly. He wasn't quite smiling, but it was a near thing. "I understand you have something to share, haven't you."
"Yes," Ryu said, dry-mouthed, and went to retrieve his grade report.
When he returned, one hand fisted and the other pressed against his thigh so the paper wouldn't shake, he didn't sit down. Instead, he held himself very straight and slid the paper across the table.
In the unbearable silence, he watched his father's eyes move down the page. Macroeconomics. Introductory civil law. International politics. English - He jerked his eyes away, just as his father drew in a sharp breath.
The silence held for a long, long moment. Ryu willed his breathing to stay steady.
"What does this mean?" his father asked quietly.
Ryu couldn't speak.
"I said, what does this mean?" After a moment of further silence, his father said, "I don't ask for very much from my son. I thought I had made it clear that - "
Ryu said, "I'm no good at it."
As the words hung in the sudden, suffocating stillness, Ryu felt a surge of horror, and then on its heels, one of relief.
His father said, very quietly, "What did you say?"
"I'm no good at it." Now that the dam had cracked, the words crowded up to the tip of his tongue. "I never have been. I tried, but I'm just not."
"Ryu," his father said ominously.
"I'll never be any good at it." It was like Ryu was in a rattling cart careening around the corner of a mountainside, high on adrenaline, equal parts terrified and thrilled. His father stood up. "I studied for days - weeks - and it was useless. I'm just not good at English."
"Ryu," his father said again, heavy with fury, and Ryu's mouth said, "Look at the other grades. Every other class. It's not even something important, it's just English - "
He heard the crack before he felt the gash of pain, just before he registered that his head had whipped to the side.
The room was utterly still. As the pain steadily built to a throb, Ryu refused to put a hand to his cheek. From the kitchen, he could hear the wall clock ticking.
"Get your head up," his father said, in a very low voice.
Slowly, Ryu raised his head. He carefully fixed his gaze just to the left of his father's ear. His mother was standing against the wall, still. Her eyes were wide and perfectly round. One white hand was pressed to her mouth, and her nails shone in the light of the chandelier.
"I will never hear you say that again," said his father, barely above a whisper. "I will never see a grade like this again. Do you understand."
Ryu nodded.
"You will retake this course immediately, and you will pass at the top of your class."
Ryu couldn't help himself. His head jerked, and he felt the protest rising to his lips. Involuntarily, he met his father's eyes.
An iron band wrapped around his throat, and the words crumbled in his mouth.
"Do you understand," his father repeated, a steel knell.
Ryu said, in a dry rasp, "Yes, sir."
His father sat back. "I think you have studying to do. Go."
Ryu took one step backward, then another. He turned. Then, before he was fully aware what he was doing, he pivoted and went for the front hall.
He snatched up a jacket as he went, without bothering to look, already fumbling for his phone. "Ryu!" his father's voice boiled out into the hall as the door slammed behind him.
He kept hitting the wrong buttons, because his hands were shaking. There was the name. With effort he hit "Call". The line rang once, twice -
"Yeah?"
Ryu tried to steady his breath and said, "Hayato?"
There was a loud crash on the other end. "Ryu!" Muffled thumps. "Sorry, just a - ouch!" Muffled cursing. Ryu almost smiled. "Sorry," Hayato finally said breathlessly. "What's up?"
"You're not at work tonight?"
"Switched shifts. Asato kept going on about his girlfriend's birthday, I don't know. I agreed to trade so he'd shut up."
Hayato would have offered to switch shifts with the hapless Asato the moment he'd mentioned a girlfriend. "I see," Ryu said. "So you're not - busy?"
"No," Hayato said quickly. "Not busy. Not at all. What do you - "
"Can I meet you somewhere," Ryu said, in a rush.
"Sure. Sure. Anywhere. Uh - you know the park by Takada station, right? By the river?"
"Yeah," Ryu said, washed with relief. "Meet you at the entrance?"
"I'll be there in ten." A click, and a dial tone.
Ryu had already turned in the direction of the nearest station.
It was considerably less than ten, because when Ryu emerged from the ticket gate Hayato was standing just ahead, hands thrust in his pockets, rocking forward on the balls of his feet. The moment he saw Ryu, he straightened, and his eyes flicked rapidly over Ryu himself from head to toe, presumably assessing the damage. For the first time it occurred to Ryu that maybe he should have been more forthcoming over the phone. Hayato's gaze lingered on Ryu's face, and the spot where Ryu's father had slapped him suddenly flared. Ryu's steps slowed.
But all Hayato said as Ryu approached was, "You all right, Odagiri?"
Ryu nodded.
"Come on." As they fell in step, Hayato swung an elbow out and bumped Ryu's arm, roughly.
The park wasn't so much a park as a stretch of sloping grassy riverbank too steep for development. As Ryu dropped to the ground next to Hayato, he was suddenly and sharply reminded of Christmas Eve.
There were no stars tonight. Ryu rested his elbows on his knees and stared down at the sluggish river without particularly seeing it. The faint trickle of water mingled with the distant noise of traffic and the sound of Hayato's even breathing, punctuated by the intermittent bark of a dog and, once, a far-away siren.
"My father," Ryu said, and stopped.
There was a rustle of cloth as Hayato shifted. Ryu dropped a hand to the ground and fisted it in the dead grass. He knew, without looking, that Hayato's eyes were on him.
"My father," Ryu said, "wanted to send me abroad in high school. To Canada. He wanted me to learn English." His teeth hurt. "He thinks English is one of - no, the most important skill for young Japanese to learn. He - you wouldn't believe it unless you heard him."
Hayato made an incredulous huffing sound. "Geez," he said. "Your father must really like foreigners."
Ryu laughed shakily, with no amusement. "He hates them. He hates America. He wants more Japanese to know English so we can beat them all at their own game. That's what I'm supposed to do. When I graduate."
Hayato was silent for a minute. Then he said, "But you're still here."
"My mother wouldn't let him." Ryu licked his lips. "It's the only time I've ever seen her disagree with him."
Hayato whistled. Neither spoke.
A low voice, too far away to make out, drifted toward them and then away. Ryu tugged at the fistful of grass until it tore from the ground, and then scattered it at his side. A few dry blades stuck to his palm and he shook his wrist until they floated free.
"So," he said eventually, a croak. He cleared his throat. "That's why. I was worried."
"Yeah," Hayato said. "Yeah. I see. Hey, Ryu."
"Mm?"
"You're the smartest person I've ever met."
The jolt was almost physical. Ryu let out a surprised half-laugh and managed not to stutter as he said, "What?"
When he turned, Hayato's face was serious, and Hayato's dark eyes intent on him. "I'm saying," said Hayato, "you can figure out what to do. Whatever it is. Whatever it is, you can do it. You just - you can."
Ryu's mouth opened, and closed again. "Oh," Ryu said, unsteadily. His cheeks were burning. "Oh. Thanks."
Hayato made an abortive movement, as if to look away. "Just the truth," he said. His eyes held Ryu's. Ryu was distantly aware his heart was pounding very quickly, and his mouth was dry. He couldn't - Hayato's gaze moved to fix on something just past Ryu's shoulder, and his mouth formed a round 'o' of surprise.
"Hey, look," he said, and Ryu, who should have known better, turned his head.
There was something warm and soft against his mouth, and it took a moment to sink in that Hayato was kissing him.
He was too stunned to respond. When Hayato pulled away, Ryu saw that his eyes were closed, and it was a few seconds before they fluttered open.
Under Ryu's speechless gaze a flush rose on Hayato's cheeks. He cleared his throat, then didn't speak.
"I - " Ryu had no idea what he was going to say. He shook his head. A succession of thoughts whirled through his head, too fast to catch hold of - his father, his university course, the red and gold charm that remained tucked in his bag.
As Ryu continued to stare, mute, Hayato grew redder and redder, and finally averted his eyes. "Anyway," he said gruffly, "you're going to be fine. Sorry, I didn't mean - " He ran a hand through his hair and didn't look at Ryu. Then he got to his feet. "Sorry. I'll see you later. If you want."
"Wait," Ryu said quickly. His heart hammered. "Hayato, wait."
Hayato looked down. Everything about the way he held himself, his braced shoulders, spoke of wariness, but there was something in the set of his mouth that said to Ryu, hope.
Ryu stood up. He took one deliberate step closer, and Hayato's eyes widened. It looked like it was taking all his willpower not to back away.
Ryu took hold of Hayato's collar with one clammy palm and pulled him forward.
Hayato's mouth was surprisingly soft, and surprisingly hesitant. Frustrated, Ryu tugged him closer, pushing forward - there. No hesitation now; only the fearless, reckless challenge he always got from Hayato. Ryu's thoughts scattered. A hand, large and clumsy, was sliding through Ryu's hair, down to cup the top of his spine; another was on his hip, holding him in place. Ryu heard, as if from far away, a helpless, wanting noise. A second later, he realized it was his own.
They had to break apart. Ryu took a gulp of cold air. More than his face was burning. Hayato's breathing was fast and uneven, and his hand was slow to fall away from the back of Ryu's neck. His eyes were wide, and Ryu, for all his so-called intelligence, couldn't figure out what to say.
"So," Hayato said after a minute. He licked his lips. "Was that, um." His eyes met Ryu's, and skipped away.
In that moment it hit Ryu, like a blow to the chest, that Hayato - stubborn, blunt, rough, proud Hayato - had already placed himself in the palm of Ryu's hand.
He had to take a deep breath to steady himself. Then he said carefully, "I think you've been calling the wrong one of us the smart one."
It was a minute before Hayato understood. As Ryu watched, he started, and his eyes grew wider and wider. The corner of his mouth turned up incredulously, and Ryu couldn't have looked away if he'd tried.
"Oh," was all Hayato said aloud, quietly, but Ryu heard the rest.
***
Ryu saw that the lights were on from halfway down the block. Even the foreboding silence of the entryway couldn't quash the giddy fluttering in his chest. He slipped off his shoes and smiled at the tiled floor.
The smile slipped away when his mother appeared at the end of the hall.
"Your father's waiting," she said.
He was sitting in his customary armchair, jaw grimly set. He stood as Ryu entered the room and they faced each other, ramrod-straight, as Ryu's father slowly looked him over, inch by inch.
Ryu neither averted his eyes nor broke the silence. Finally, his father made a contemptuous noise and said in a voice heavy with displeasure, "Well? What have you got to say?"
Until the moment he opened his mouth, Ryu didn't know he was going to say, "I'm moving out."
For the first time in his life Ryu saw his father shocked into silence.
Now that he knew, the words came to him as if by instinct. "I'm very grateful for the support of this household for the past nineteen years, but," - only an imperceptible hesitation - "I've taken advantage of your kindness for too long."
"Really," said his father, voice rising. His face was rigid with anger. "And your education? Have you taken advantage of that for too long? Maybe you'd prefer to work in a construction yard for the rest of your life, or do you expect that to be an exception?"
He'd take a semester off or go part-time. Take might know about scholarships. Ryu held fast to those thoughts to keep his voice steady as he said, "I don't intend to make any further demands on your generosity."
Ryu's father slammed a fist against the wall. Ryu heard a sound behind him - his mother - but didn't dare turn. The room was silent but for his father's heavy breathing. They remained there, a rigid, unmoving tableau, as the seconds ticked inexorably away.
"All right," his father said at last. He turned, and his eyes were hard as ice. "All right. I'll arrange to stop your tuition tomorrow. You may leave tonight."
Before Ryu could remember if the trains were still running, his mother said, "Hadn't we better assist our son at first, on his own?"
Ryu turned so quickly he nearly lost his balance. His mouth, he was dimly aware, was open in an unflattering mask of surprise. But his mother wasn't looking at him, she was looking at Ryu's father.
Ryu glanced at him. His face, slack with shock, hardened, and he inhaled heavily through his nose. Ryu looked back at his mother. Her delicate features were as composed as always, but for the set of her mouth.
Ryu's father clenched his jaw, so tightly the muscles in his cheek stood out white. "Fine," he said through stiff lips. "We'll discuss it tomorrow."
Ryu's mother turned. "It's getting late," she said. "You should probably go to bed soon, don't you think?"
"I," said Ryu. "Yes. Of course. Good night."
"Good night," his mother said, and gave him a faint smile.
***
"Well?" Hayato said impatiently when Ryu met him at the end of the street, the next day. "What's so important you couldn't text me?"
"I'm moving out," Ryu said. Hayato's jaw dropped. Seeing him, the dizzying lightness that had sprouted yesterday pushed upward to fill Ryu's chest. "I'm going to have to find an apartment. And a job. And - I - " A giddy laugh spilled over.
Hayato was grinning now, the characteristic Hayato grin that brightened his whole face. "Are you serious? Do you know where you want to go?"
"I have absolutely no idea," Ryu said. He was grinning now, too. "You're going to have to help me. You said you knew who to talk to, remember?"
"Sure," said Hayato, and leaned in and kissed Ryu on the cheek. "I bet Tsucchi can help, too," he continued as if he'd done something perfectly ordinary. "You should call him anyway, we've got to celebrate. Do you know..."
Ryu smiled as they fell in step, and side by side, they walked away together.
I started this for mananeh's birthday in 2007; I'm finishing it, finally, for her birthday in 2010. mananeh takes me to secondhand bookstores without prompting, listens to me talk endlessly about my cat, did most of the work co-modding kizuna_exchange, and encouraged the last spurts of effort on this fic even though I'd purposely misled her into thinking it was something about footballers. (Hee.) So, you know - it's the least I could do. Happy (late) birthday, Moo. ♥ ♥ ♥
Maps (No Matter the Road)
Hayato/Ryu
8,736 words
Notes: AU, directly following the last part of Five Things That Never Happened to Hayato and Ryu. (Executive summary: Ryu doesn't attend Kurogin.) Many thanks for proofreading and cheerleading to matchynishi, my favorite Akamerar. ♥
"Yabuki," Ryu still said at first, and Yabuki would insist, "Hayato, call me Hayato."
"Hayato," Ryu repeated awkwardly and privately resolved to avoid names altogether.
Hayato, Ryu discovered, was apprenticed to a builder. "To learn the basics, until I can save a little money," he said hurriedly. "I'm thinking - I want to build houses and apartments and shops, things like that. Places people can actually use." He was looking half at Ryu, half away; he couldn't seem to decide whether or not he wanted to know what Ryu thought.
"So you're planning to set up your own business?" Ryu said, raising an eyebrow. "That's pretty quick, isn't it?"
Hayato shrugged casually, but his shoulders had straightened. "No big deal," he said in a tone that obviously indicated otherwise. "I like the work. You know."
Ryu, who supposed that since he had entered the university's law division he would end up a lawyer, didn't know. He nodded anyway.
It had been maybe two weeks - two weeks in which Ryu had gone out with Takeda and his friends almost half a dozen times. Sometimes someone was missing because of work (Hyuga) or night class (Tsuchiya) or a date (Takeda), but Hayato was there every time, with a loud, enthusiastic greeting for Ryu.
Tonight they were in a smoky pool hall the boys had apparently frequented since high school. "It's okay," Hayato had said with a wink, "I'll go easy on you."
Ryu's spine stiffened. The assumption rankled, perhaps irrationally so.
"Thanks," he said, expressionless, and took his first shot.
Half an hour later, Hayato was staring at the pool table with his mouth hanging open as the rest of the boys whooped and pounded Ryu on the back.
"We'll pay for you every time," Hyuga said, grinning widely, "as long as you promise to keep Hayato humble."
"Yeah," Tsuchiya chimed in, “you have to come now, you have a responsibility."
A smile crept up the corners of Ryu's mouth. His gaze flicked over to where Hayato was still staring at the table, mouth moving silently, and he felt a conflicting urge to both ratchet it up to a full-blown smirk and stop smiling altogether.
Nothing could keep Hayato down for long, however. Rousing himself from his dumbfounded stupor, he shot a glower at Ryu and demanded, "Rematch!"
Ryu shrugged. "If you want," he said.
"Uh-oh," Takeda teased, "better be careful. Can the great Hayato-sama handle two defeats in a row?"
"Hayato-sama never loses twice in a row," Hayato growled, seizing up the cue with somewhat more vigor than necessary.
Ryu pressed his lips together so he wouldn’t smile. "You can break," he said indifferently.
"It's fine," Hayato said from between clenched teeth. "You go ahead."
"It's the same to me."
"Me too. You do it."
"I don't care."
"Just do it already!"
Ryu let the smirk bloom. "If you insist," he said, and broke expertly. Hayato scowled and said something inaudible.
The great Hayato-sama avoided losing twice in a row by a hair's breadth. Reactions from the others were mixed; while they professed great disappointment in seeing Hayato escape further defeat, it was clear they were not-so-secretly proud of their champion.
Hayato leaned against the pool table, tapping his cue against the floor and wearing the most irritating smirk Ryu had ever seen. "See," he declared to the room at large, "I said I'd go easy on him, after all."
Ryu narrowed his eyes. "Rematch," he said brusquely.
The crowd of three whistled and catcalled. It was Hayato's turn to smirk. "Want to break again?" he said sweetly.
Ryu ground his teeth and with great self-control said nothing.
When the score was three-three, Takeda called it a night. What he actually said was something along the lines of, "You can stay here all night if you want but I'm going home," to which Hyuga and Tsuchiya hastily agreed. Hayato and Ryu put up their cues reluctantly and, even more reluctantly, shook hands.
The night air was warm and heavy. The sound of boisterous roughousing echoed in the stillness; Tsuchiya, Ryu identified automatically as he emerged last from the grimy stairway, and Takeda and Hyuga. Hayato was quiet.
Common sense came rushing back to Ryu like a freight train. He had never quite assimilated the rules of casual friendship, but surely he hadn't known Hayato long enough that such a thing could endear Ryu to him. It took a minute before he could school his expression to neutrality and turn his head to look over at Hayato. Hayato, who was grinning at him.
"You're not bad for a rich kid," Hayato said.
Ryu, limp with relief, almost stumbled as Hyuga slung an arm around his neck. "Not bad?" Hyuga scoffed. "Ryu's awesome. No one's ever beaten Hayato that many times before," he told Ryu confidentially.
"Hey," Hayato cut in, cuffing Hyuga on the shoulder. "I was going easy on him, stupid."
Hyuga rolled his eyes and said nothing, instead giving Ryu a significant look. Ryu was smiling again - he couldn’t remember the last time he’d smiled so often, at such trivial things.
They reached the intersection where they parted ways. "See you, Ryu!" Tsuchiya called. "Come back next time and show Hayato his place!"
Hayato's return volley was drowned in a chorus of goodbyes. Ryu waved and made to turn off toward the subway station. A hand on his sleeve stopped him. "Wait," Hayato's voice said in his ear, and Ryu obediently fell back.
Hayato waited until the voices of the others faded to echoes floating up the empty street. "Give me your phone," he said.
Ryu handed it over automatically, and then wondered at himself. He watched as Hayato, biting his lip in concentration, pressed buttons rapidly. When he seemed to be finished, he paused, hit one more button, and a tinny ring came from his own pants pocket
"There," he said, satisfied, and handed Ryu's phone back. "Call me if you're bored."
"Okay," said Ryu, puzzled and secretly pleased. They said goodbye, and Ryu waited until he was all the way home, until he was lying awake in the darkness of his bedroom, to flip the phone open and scroll down the list of contacts.
The screen glowed. Yabuki Hayato. Ryu curled his fingers tightly around the phone and fell into a dreamless sleep.
***
The messages began the next day and came in floods thereafter. There seemed to be no filter between Hayato's brain and his mobile phone. The weather, his delicious curry bread, proposed plans for the weekend, the black kitten he saw on the sidewalk, all seemed to merit a message to Ryu, accompanied by strings of character faces Ryu could barely begin to decipher.
new guy at work, quiet like you
take says yr school festival this weekend
on break bored tell me something interesting
His phone rang just as he was getting out of class. He glanced at the screen, and fumbled just a little flipping the phone open; it was the first time Hayato had actually called.
"Hey," Hayato said. "It's my day off. You free?"
"I just got out of class," Ryu said, hitching his bag up on one shoulder. He felt light inside. "Where do you want to meet?"
"I'm - there you are! Over here, Ryu!" Ryu winced and held the phone away from his ear. What was he -
There, over by the gates. Several heads turned in the direction, doubtless wondering who knew the broad-shouldered guy leaning against the brick gatepost, hands cupped to yell again.
Ryu was smiling now, he realized, and didn't try to stop.
"So," Hayato said, grinning, when Ryu reached the gates. "Where to?"
***
"You've been out late recently," his father observed at dinner.
Ryu had just taken a mouthful of crab. He chewed very thoroughly, swallowed, and said, "Exams are coming up. I've been studying with a classmate."
"A girl?" his father asked with deceptive calm.
Ryu looked up, honestly startled. "No," he said slowly. "Another boy in my class. Takeda."
His father leaned back in his chair. A minute amount of tension left his shoulders. "It's very commendable that you're spending so much time studying, Ryu. I expect you to do well on your exams."
Ryu nodded and applied himself to his crab leg. His mother watched, silent.
***
Having said that he was studying with Takeda - Take - Ryu felt obliged to actually do so. It was true, anyway, what he'd told his father - midterm exams were the following week. At the next macroeconomics lecture he said as much.
Take took the cue. "I'm free over the weekend," he said. "Want to study together?"
Ryu wasn't actually used to studying with someone else. Group work was an evil to be endured at best. Take, however, was sharper and more focused than Ryu had secretly expected. Ryu still wasn't entirely sure it was more beneficial than studying alone but the comfortable atmosphere and the sly comments interspersed among formula recitations - not to mention Take's liberal snack offerings - were almost enough to convince him.
"So," Take said after several hours had passed, setting a can of Asahi in front of Ryu. "You don't regret coming over after all?"
Ryu looked up sharply. Take gave him a bright smile and winked. After a second, Ryu let an anwering smile curve up one corner of his mouth.
"I don't," he said.
At that moment, his cell phone buzzed.
"You're not busy tonight, right?" Hayato had to raise his voice to be heard over the staticky connection as Ryu made an apologetic motion to Take. "Tsucchi just called and they gave him the night off, so we should go out."
"Okay," said Ryu, smiling. "I'm free."
"Great!" Hayato sounded unaccountably pleased. "Same place as usual. Hyuga's not off work but Take's a careless student like you, so - "
"I'll tell him," Ryu said. "I'm over at his place right now."
There was a long pause.
"Oh," said Hayato. "Okay. Later." A click, followed by a dial tone.
Ryu, more than a little confused, relayed the message to Take.
"That was Hayato?" Take said, surprised. Ryu nodded.
"Huh." Take looked thoughtful, and with difficulty Ryu quashed the urge to ask why. "Great," Take continued, "we'll head over there after we've finished up with bond markets, sound good? Unless Hayato remembers he didn't give you a particular time and calls back before then."
"How did you know," Ryu started to say, and Take answered, "Hayato never changes. Where were we, present value?"
The izakaya was no more than half full when Take and Ryu showed up around seven. There was no sign of Hayato.
"Don't frown like that," Take said, at Ryu's furrowed brow. "Your face will get stuck that way."
"Are you sure he's - " Ryu stopped as Hayato ducked under the curtain.
His gaze immediately settled on Ryu and Take, sitting cross-legged at a table across the room, and his expression changed, just a little. Take waved. Hayato gave them a brief nod and seemed, to Ryu's eyes, to drag his feet as he came over.
"Sorry," he said gruffly to Ryu as he slid in across the tatami. "Forgot to tell you the time. Guess Take figured."
"Hayato never changes," Take repeated, with a knowing smile, and Hayato visibly bristled.
"Says who?"
"Says everyone," a deep voice boomed from above, and the three looked up to see Tsuchiya towering over them.
Hayato was scowling. "Shows what you know," he muttered. His eyes slid quickly over to Ryu and away again. Ryu hastily averted his gaze.
"All right, all right," Tsuchiya said placatingly. "You're as changeable as the wind. Or the lightning, that sounds cooler."
"A man of many faces," added Take.
"A butterfly!"
"Don't you mean a caterpillar?"
With a noise of compounded frustration and irritation, Hayato stood up with such force that the table rattled. "Have fun," he growled. "I'm tired." He turned on his heel and stalked across the room and out the door.
For a minute, no one spoke. Take and Tsuchiya exchanged a glance Ryu couldn't interpret. Then,
"You go get him, Odagiri," said Tsuchiya.
Ryu's mouth fell open.
He looked to Take for confirmation. Take nodded encouragingly. "Yeah, Ryu, go ahead. I bet he'll listen to you."
"I don't think," Ryu said, or tried to, but somehow the words didn't quite emerge from his throat. Instead he heard himself saying, "All right," and got up from the low table.
Anyone with the barest shreds of common sense could see that it was a fool's errand to approach Hayato in such a mood. He was probably long gone, anyway. None of which explained why Ryu was outside blinking several times to adjust his eyes to the darkness.
Hayato was sitting on the curb, glaring fiercely at a plastic bottle lying in the gutter. As Ryu watched, he dropped his head and scrubbed both hands roughly through his hair, then threw his head back and burst out, "Man, come on!"
"You'll disturb the neighbors," Ryu said, and Hayato's head snapped around.
His eyes were almost comically wide. "Ryu?"
"No trains for a while?" Ryu said, nodding at the station steps down the street.
Hayato looked lost for a split second before comprehension dawned. "Yeah," he said, nodding a shade too quickly. "Just waiting outside. It's too stuffy underground."
Ryu walked over and lowered himself to the curb beside Hayato. He thought from the sound of cloth rustling Hayato was turning to look at him. He kept his eyes firmly on the storefront (Maeda Dental) across the street. Neither of them spoke.
"Take's known me since kindergarten," Hayato said after a minute.
Ryu made a non-committal noise.
"He should know better. Unless." Hayato's voice sounded peculiarly subdued. "I really haven't changed."
Ryu leaned back on his hands. Pavement grit dug into his palms. When he tilted his head back, he could just barely make out a faint light through the smoggy darkness that might have been a star.
"It's not like I'm an expert or anything," he said to the sky. "But. What I think is, if there's something different enough that you can notice it yourself, then something's changed. Because usually you don't notice things inside your own head. You know?"
"You think so?" Hayato said, in a tone Ryu had never heard before.
Ryu shrugged. For some reason, his heart was pounding. "No one can see inside your head but you."
"I wonder," said Hayato, and Ryu finally looked over. Hayato was watching him. When their eyes met he looked away and heaved himself to his feet, brushing his hands off on the front of his jeans.
"I'm hungry," he said. "Think they've ordered yet?" Ryu's eyebrows rose as Hayato headed back to the restaurant, and he hurried to catch up.
"Hayato!" Take greeted the prodigal, with a wide smile. "You're just in time for the karaage."
A platter of fried chicken was indeed approaching their table from the direction of the kitchen. Hayato's eyes lit up. "Karaage," he sighed with all the blissful passion of a lover, and sank down to the floor.
No one would have guessed he hadn't just arrived for the first time. Ryu knew he was staring. He quickly sat down himself, and couldn't keep his eyes from darting from Take to Tsuchiya to Hayato and back. "Mm," Hayato said dreamily as the platter was set on their table and the delicious gingery aroma wafted toward his nose. "You guys are the best. The best."
When Hayato wasn't looking, Tsuchiya dropped Ryu a wink.
The chicken was very good.
***
Ryu's midterm grades were satisfactory, with the exception of English conversation.
"Don't worry," Take said, with an encouraging smile. "You've got half the term left. Anyways, it's high enough you won't fail, right?"
Ryu shrugged. His father probably wouldn't ask to see midterm results, but Ryu's final grades would be a matter of course.
Hayato texted him again that evening. so???
Fine, Ryu wrote back.
really?
Yes, mostly.
say what you mean, odagiri
Only when you do.
whats that supposed to mean?! hayato-sama always gives a straight answer, college kid
I did fine, except in English.
whatever the teacher probably cant speak english himself. take told me you did really good so stop moping.
If Take already told you then why did you ask?
cause i wanted to hear it from you
Ryu put a hand to the side of his face. It was warm. Hastily he put his phone down and went downstairs for dinner.
***
"You still live at home?" Hayato said over a bowl of ramen, peering at him across the little table.
Ryu shrugged, to disguise his discomfort. "My parents told me to save money while I'm still in school, and campus is nearby."
It wasn't that he'd been encouraged to attend the university because it was close to home, it was more that it was the type of school that would be surrounded by the type of neighborhoods people like his parents lived in. For the first time, it occurred to him to wonder how exactly Take had ended up in his class.
"Huh." Hayato rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "My old man said I only got a roof over my head as long as I was in school. Kicked me out as soon as I graduated, said if I managed to get through high school I knew enough to look after myself."
To Ryu's ears, it sounded like Yabuki senior had been extraordinarily proud of his son.
"You don't mind?" Hayato was asking.
Ryu shrugged again. "There's nothing I could do on my own that I can't do at home."
"Huh," Hayato repeated. "Well. That's good. If you ever change your mind, just say the word - I know who to talk to." He dropped Ryu a wink.
"Thanks," Ryu said with a tongue suddenly thick and clumsy. "I will."
"So." Hayato's grin turned mischievous. "I guess Tsucchi manned up and asked Yuki-chan on a Christmas date."
Ryu raised an eyebrow. "Did he." Hayato seemed pleased, which was a good sign. When Take, the first to seriously fall prey to feminine wiles, began seeing not just any girl but the same girl over and over, the ex-ruling elite of Class 3-D couldn't seem to decide whether it was a matter of amusement, betrayal, or pride. Now it was a mere hairsbreadth from a competition and remained there only by virtue of Hayato's non-participation.
The abstainer in question was smirking. "Bet you when Hyuga hears he'll ask Chiyo-chan by the end of the day." Harada Chiyo had been rebuffing Hyuga's half-terrified advances for several weeks. Ryu privately thought she was biding her time for just such an opportunity.
"I don't take losing bets." Ryu considered. "Bet you she has to put him out of his misery."
Hayato snorted. "Neither do I. You think she'll say yes?"
"I think she'll make him take her somewhere very expensive." Hayato burst into snickers. A vague and uncomfortable urge compelled Ryu to ask, "What about you?"
"Huh? Me?" Hayato looked more taken aback than Ryu thought the situation warranted. "What about you?"
"I asked first."
Hayato crossed his arms over his chest, looking about as yielding as a brick wall. "I asked second."
Ryu mirrored his pose and raised an eyebrow. Hayato's mouth flattened in a stubborn line. They held each other's gazes for a minute, equally obstinate, until Ryu felt the corners of his mouth twitching.
"Not that it matters," he said, "but I don't have any plans."
Hayato looked unsure whether he should appear triumphant or commiserating. He settled on teasing, as he usually did. "No time for girls, huh? Busy student like you?" Hayato made as if to reach over and muss Ryu's hair and Ryu jerked backward so quickly his chair scraped across the slick floor with an earsplitting screech.
Heads turned. Ryu, ears burning, moved his chair back to the table and kept his gaze fixed across the table, where Hayato was burying an explosion of laughter in his sleeve.
"Very funny," Ryu said in the driest tone he could summon. "You never answered my question."
Hayato's capacity for distraction was a thing of marvel. "Huh?"
"Christmas."
" - Oh." Hayato wasn't laughing any more. He shrugged with inimitable Yabuki bravado. "Nah. I mean. I don't really want one. Girls always want you to talk on dates, and then they keep calling you and pestering you to keep doing things with them. I don't have time for that." The expression of disgust on Hayato's face nearly made Ryu lose his composure again. He managed to nod with a perfectly straight face.
"So - " Hayato said, and paused. He'd picked up his spoon, and appeared to be absorbed in stirring his ramen broth (meat, noodles, and vegetables long since gone) in counter-clockwise circles. "Since they're all going to be busy. If you want. We could hang out."
Ryu opened his mouth to say, "On Christmas?" and closed it again. It didn't take a college student to tell that Hayato didn't want to emphasize the date. "Sure," he said instead. "Let's."
Hayato's grin flashed into being so quickly that it felt like it sucked out Ryu's breath along with it. "Awesome," he said. "See, who needs girls."
Not me, Ryu thought, light-headed.
***
They'd paid another visit to the pool hall, and Ryu had won four out of six against Hayato, the first time he'd come out unequivocally ahead. The smile just wouldn't go away, even as he let himself into the house as quietly as he could.
He'd barely caught the last train home; his parents had probably gone to sleep hours before. Careful of every movement, Ryu slipped off his shoes and stepped up into the house, down the hall and past the living room -
The light switched on. "Ryu?"
When Ryu's heart had stopped trying to beat itself out of his chest, he took a long, calming breath and said, "Mother."
His mother was perched on the edge of one of the finely crafted wooden chairs, hands folded in her lap, as neat and still as a porcelain statue. "I'm sorry to startle you."
"No, I wasn't paying attention. I'm sorry." There was another chair sitting at an angle to hers. In the Odagiri household no more needed to be said. Ryu took a seat.
"I hope you enjoyed your evening," she began.
Ryu nodded.
"With friends?"
Ryu nodded again.
His mother wet her lips. "Ryu," she started, and stopped. She reached up to touch one pearl earring, stilled her hand, and returned it to her lap. A sense of trepidation was growing in Ryu's chest. His mother was not prone to nervous gestures.
"Ryu," she said again, "you're not - in trouble, are you?"
Ryu's jaw dropped.
She held his gaze and spoke rapidly. "You remember Mrs. Ozaki, from the next street over. Her son was in your junior high school class. She said she saw you last week with some boys who - she said they were, well, rough-looking."
Mrs. Ozaki's son hadn't been able to move on to the affiliated senior high with the majority of the class. Ryu could just imagine what she'd said.
"No," Ryu said, shaking his head. "No, it's - we're classmates." He avoided specifying exactly who constituted "we".
His mother put a hand to her mouth. "Oh!" she exclaimed softly. "Oh. In that case, of course - "
Thank you so much for your concern, Ozaki-san, as a matter of fact the boys are Ryu's classmates. Yes, that's the one. He seems to like it very much. Oh yes, of course - now tell me, how is Yuichiro doing at - where was it again?
His mother was saying his name. "Ryu." She leaned forward and touched his hand. "I'm glad you're all right."
Ryu stared after her as she left the room. Her slippers made no noise on the wooden floor.
***
Christmas Eve dawned clear and cold. By the time evening fell the temperature had dropped almost to freezing.
Ryu arrived at the cafe ten minutes early, hands tucked in the pockets of his jacket. He debated whether to wait inside or out for thirty seconds at most, before he heard, "Ryu!"
Ryu turned. Hayato was bundled in a puffy down coat that made Ryu want to poke him to see if he'd burst. Ryu's lips twitched.
"What," Hayato said belligerently as he came to a stop, breath steaming white.
"Nothing."
Hayato eyed him before electing to take the high road. "So? Where are we going?"
"There's always the lights," Ryu said, mostly to see how Hayato would react. "Around the park."
Hayato narrowed his eyes. "Sounds great," he said, and unzipped his jacket several inches with a show of nonchalance. Ryu's face hurt with the effort of not laughing.
They got coffee to go and warmed their hands on the flimsy cups as they reached the wide street bordering the park: lined with tall chestnuts, it was the scene each Christmas of elaborate illuminated displays. Hayato passed the crossing that would lead them to the park side, however, and continued on to a small side street. It curved sharply away and then rose in a steep climb, switching back and forth as it did so, until Ryu was was warm and breathing hard by the time Hayato finally stopped.
It was a small grassy clearing on the other side of the guardrail, looking down over the crowded terraced slope to the lighted avenue below. "There," Hayato said. "Less people." He flopped on the grass without further ado. After a moment, Ryu followed suit, lowering himself to the ground more carefully so as not to spill his coffee.
He bent his knees and cradled the steaming cup in his hands. Below, soaring branches illuminated in cool blues and whites stabbed the dark sky. From their vantage point Ryu could just make out the steady flow of couples that streamed underneath, miniaturized by both the distance and the trees' height.
There was a huff of laughter beside him. "Wonder if Tsucchi and the rest will run into each other down there."
"Take won't," Ryu said. "He told me he's taking Miyabe-san to Le Corsaire."
"Oh yeah?" Ryu could imagine Hayato's raised eyebrows even in the dark. "Smooth."
Ryu drained the last dregs of his coffee and set the cardboard cup aside, then lay back against the cold grass. Above the glow of the city lights, the night sky was unexpectedly clear. Then Ryu noticed.
"Hey," he said. "You can see the stars tonight."
"Really?" Hayato fell backward with a soft thump. His shoulder brushed Ryu's. For no particular reason at all, Ryu's cheeks flared with warmth.
"You can!" Hayato sounded as delighted as a child. "Wow. Pretty."
"Mm," Ryu agreed.
"I wonder what would happen if I made a wish," Hayato said. His voice sounded almost dreamy. Ryu wondered if he even realized he was speaking aloud.
"Try it and see," he said.
Hayato made a wordless noise of assent. Ryu raised himself on his elbows and looked over. Hayato's eyes were closed, and he was just barely smiling.
Ryu lay back down. His chest was warm with more than the coffee. They watched the stars in silence.
***
January seemed greyer when classes resumed after the New Year's break. It seemed like midterms had been only days ago, and Ryu's teachers were already talking about finals.
It was time to face facts. Ryu was never going to be a fluent English speaker. He knew every syntactic rule and convention backward and forward, and was one of the first to turn in his paper for any written exam. In conversational waters, with no rules to guide the path of dialogue and nowhere to look up what might come out of his partner's mouth next, he floundered. No, floundering implied the sort of thrashing desperation he hated - what Ryu did was plummet like a stone.
"Find someone to practice with," Kanda-sensei suggested. "One of the visiting students."
Ryu would have more cheerfully slit his own wrists.
It must not have shown on his face, because Kanda-sensei nodded, satisfied, and said, "Do your best, Odagiri-kun. The final can help you."
Ryu was already dreading the final with the roiling, gut-deep sensation he'd only felt once before in his life. It wasn't entirely surprising that the pack picked up on it, and with some effort, teased the source out of him.
"Don't worry so much, Ryu," Take said, brows drawn with concern. "It's only English."
"Ryu," his father had said a week before. "I ran into my old classmate Kanda the other day. I didn't realize he was your English professor."
"Pardon," Ryu had said through a mouth gone dry. "Yes, Kanda-sensei. He's very - very helpful."
"He said you're a promising student," his father continued. He looked, for once, approving. "I'm glad to hear it."
"You're smart," Hyuga added, back in the present. "I bet you'll do fine."
Ryu made some sort of assenting noise. Hayato didn't say anything except, "Your turn," and tapped the table with his cue.
"So," Hyuga said meaningfully. "Valentine's Day coming up soon."
"Nothing to do with us," Tsuchiya said gloomily, meaning himself, Hayato, and Ryu. His Christmas date had not gone well, and he'd been prone since to mournful sighs when he wasn't distracted by food, games, or alcohol.
Hayato slung an arm over Tsuchiya's shoulders with only mild difficulty, given the height differential. "Cheer up," he said. "Those guys'll get special chocolate and they'll share if it's handmade. Right?" he added with a pointed look at Take and Hyuga.
"Hayato," Take said with a good-natured laugh, just as Hyuga said, "Sure, why not?"
After a brief silence as everyone looked at Hyuga, Take ventured, "Are you sure your girlfriend would like that?"
Hyuga went three shades of red. "She's - we're not - I mean, it's - "
"Chiyo-chan's got a job, anyway, she wouldn't waste time slaving away in a kitchen for that guy," Hayato said. "Bet you she makes Hyuga treat her to something nice instead."
"Hey," Hyuga said, "until you can do better, you - " He was interrupted by the arrival of a fresh platter of drinks, for which Ryu was grateful. If there was one thing Hayato couldn't avoid, it was a challenge.
***
Three weeks passed in a nervous daze. Ryu took more notes than he'd ever taken in his life, scribbling through every lecture with a feverish desperation as if enough ink would shape a life raft.
There was a three day study break between the end of lectures and the beginning of the examination period. Ryu went to Take's the first day, and spent the remaining two holed up in his room. He emerged to eat and shower and, at one hazy point, to watch the NHK children's English conversation program on television. He placed his phone on the uppermost shelf in his closet and steadfastly ignored the buzz of incoming text messages. He couldn't quite bring himself to turn it off.
The morning before the final, his ringtone buzzed tinnily from the closet at eight in the morning. Ryu, at his desk, ignored it. It rang again, and a third time, and a fourth, until Ryu flung open the closet door and grabbed for it with the intention of smothering it under a pillow, and somehow ended up holding it up to his ear instead.
"Meet me at the cafe," Hayato said. "Three o'clock."
"What? No," Ryu said helplessly, knowing already how it was going to end. "I have to study, I have - "
"Don't pretend like you've even left your house since classes ended," Hayato said over him, like a steamroller. "I'll be fast. See you there."
Ryu rubbed his eyes and considered, just for a minute - but only for a minute.
It was fifteen minutes past three when Hayato burst through the door and over to Ryu's table, where he bent over to catch his breath, hands braced against his knees. He was wearing his puffy winter coat over a bright orange jumpsuit, and his hair was blown into wild disarray.
"Sorry," Hayato said between heaving breaths. "Boss - late - couldn't get off - "
Ryu said, "Are you on break?"
"Yeah," Hayato said. He took one long, controlled breath and then another, straightening up. "Yeah," he repeated. "Sorry, I've only got a couple minutes. This place isn't as close as I thought. Can I have a drink of that?"
Ryu pushed his soda over. He didn't even know where to start. What's so important? he wanted to say, and somehow couldn't. Hayato was not forthcoming, instead running a hand over his hair, shifting from one foot to the other. If Ryu didn't know better -
"Here," Hayato said abruptly, and shoved something into Ryu's hand. "Good luck." Ryu's hand closed around the small object automatically and Hayato was out the door before Ryu could do more than stare in his wake.
He opened his hand. It was a padded rectangle of shiny red cloth, with a gold cord dangling from one end. Embroidered on the flat surface was the word Success.
Ryu was smiling. He knew he was smiling. He was smiling too much. He ducked his head and got up to leave.
Something crackled underfoot. He bent over. It was a crumpled envelope of thin paper, stamped with the image of a large torii gate and below it, in old-fashioned script, the name Miyazu.
Miyazu Shrine was just under an hour away, on the outskirts of town. Its charms were said to be the best in the area for examinees.
Ryu's heart was beating too fast again. He had to get out of there before someone noticed. Outside, his hand slipped into his pocket and closed around the charm. It stayed there until, safely home, he hung his coat in the closet, retrieved the charm, and gripped it in one hand while his lips moved silently over a list of English phrases until late into the night.
***
When it came down to it, the exam was over in minutes, in much the same way a nuclear holocaust would have been.
***
The economics final was the same afternoon. At the sight of Ryu's face, Take tactfully said nothing but "Good luck," and held up a clenched fist. Ryu nodded tersely and took his seat.
There was no sense in letting one ruined grade wreck the rest. That was economic theory, appropriately enough: sunk costs. The small association reassured Ryu, and he stared straight ahead at the blackboard until the examination paper was in front of him. Then he began to write.
He'd done well, he thought dispassionately when he turned his paper in three hours later. He would almost certainly get the highest mark possible, for what (little) that was worth.
His phone was buzzing with new message notifications as soon as he turned it on.
well???????????
Ryu typed, Better get a refund on that charm, and deleted the sentence as soon as it was complete. He replaced it with, Aren't you supposed to be at work?
am at work, gotta hurry, call you when im off tsucchi cn pay dont worry make sure you wont remember anything abt this mrning sry gotta go bye
Ryu wondered if Hayato had sneaked his phone out on the job, was typing by touch memory in one of his pockets, or had simply made an excuse and dashed to the toilet to harass Ryu. All possibilities seemed equally likely.
He suddenly found himself fervently wishing it were evening.
***
A few weeks earlier, Ryu had incautiously told his father when grades would be released. Now, seeing the envelope embossed with his university logo lying on the table, he could do nothing but hope desperately that his father would be overcome with a sudden and uncharacteristic bout of forgetfulness. He picked up the envelope and slit it open.
He wasn't surprised, he reminded himself as the hard black print glared up from the paper. He wasn't surprised, so there was no reason to feel as if he'd been hit in the gut.
He took both the letter and envelope up to his room and did his best to distract himself for the rest of the afternoon. He wasn't very successful.
They had grilled mackerel for dinner. Ryu chewed without tasting. Afterwards, his parents spoke about something to do with municipal politics, until his mother began to clear the dishes from the table. Ryu stood up carefully.
"Well," his father said, turning Ryu's hopes to ashes, and looked to Ryu expectantly. He wasn't quite smiling, but it was a near thing. "I understand you have something to share, haven't you."
"Yes," Ryu said, dry-mouthed, and went to retrieve his grade report.
When he returned, one hand fisted and the other pressed against his thigh so the paper wouldn't shake, he didn't sit down. Instead, he held himself very straight and slid the paper across the table.
In the unbearable silence, he watched his father's eyes move down the page. Macroeconomics. Introductory civil law. International politics. English - He jerked his eyes away, just as his father drew in a sharp breath.
The silence held for a long, long moment. Ryu willed his breathing to stay steady.
"What does this mean?" his father asked quietly.
Ryu couldn't speak.
"I said, what does this mean?" After a moment of further silence, his father said, "I don't ask for very much from my son. I thought I had made it clear that - "
Ryu said, "I'm no good at it."
As the words hung in the sudden, suffocating stillness, Ryu felt a surge of horror, and then on its heels, one of relief.
His father said, very quietly, "What did you say?"
"I'm no good at it." Now that the dam had cracked, the words crowded up to the tip of his tongue. "I never have been. I tried, but I'm just not."
"Ryu," his father said ominously.
"I'll never be any good at it." It was like Ryu was in a rattling cart careening around the corner of a mountainside, high on adrenaline, equal parts terrified and thrilled. His father stood up. "I studied for days - weeks - and it was useless. I'm just not good at English."
"Ryu," his father said again, heavy with fury, and Ryu's mouth said, "Look at the other grades. Every other class. It's not even something important, it's just English - "
He heard the crack before he felt the gash of pain, just before he registered that his head had whipped to the side.
The room was utterly still. As the pain steadily built to a throb, Ryu refused to put a hand to his cheek. From the kitchen, he could hear the wall clock ticking.
"Get your head up," his father said, in a very low voice.
Slowly, Ryu raised his head. He carefully fixed his gaze just to the left of his father's ear. His mother was standing against the wall, still. Her eyes were wide and perfectly round. One white hand was pressed to her mouth, and her nails shone in the light of the chandelier.
"I will never hear you say that again," said his father, barely above a whisper. "I will never see a grade like this again. Do you understand."
Ryu nodded.
"You will retake this course immediately, and you will pass at the top of your class."
Ryu couldn't help himself. His head jerked, and he felt the protest rising to his lips. Involuntarily, he met his father's eyes.
An iron band wrapped around his throat, and the words crumbled in his mouth.
"Do you understand," his father repeated, a steel knell.
Ryu said, in a dry rasp, "Yes, sir."
His father sat back. "I think you have studying to do. Go."
Ryu took one step backward, then another. He turned. Then, before he was fully aware what he was doing, he pivoted and went for the front hall.
He snatched up a jacket as he went, without bothering to look, already fumbling for his phone. "Ryu!" his father's voice boiled out into the hall as the door slammed behind him.
He kept hitting the wrong buttons, because his hands were shaking. There was the name. With effort he hit "Call". The line rang once, twice -
"Yeah?"
Ryu tried to steady his breath and said, "Hayato?"
There was a loud crash on the other end. "Ryu!" Muffled thumps. "Sorry, just a - ouch!" Muffled cursing. Ryu almost smiled. "Sorry," Hayato finally said breathlessly. "What's up?"
"You're not at work tonight?"
"Switched shifts. Asato kept going on about his girlfriend's birthday, I don't know. I agreed to trade so he'd shut up."
Hayato would have offered to switch shifts with the hapless Asato the moment he'd mentioned a girlfriend. "I see," Ryu said. "So you're not - busy?"
"No," Hayato said quickly. "Not busy. Not at all. What do you - "
"Can I meet you somewhere," Ryu said, in a rush.
"Sure. Sure. Anywhere. Uh - you know the park by Takada station, right? By the river?"
"Yeah," Ryu said, washed with relief. "Meet you at the entrance?"
"I'll be there in ten." A click, and a dial tone.
Ryu had already turned in the direction of the nearest station.
It was considerably less than ten, because when Ryu emerged from the ticket gate Hayato was standing just ahead, hands thrust in his pockets, rocking forward on the balls of his feet. The moment he saw Ryu, he straightened, and his eyes flicked rapidly over Ryu himself from head to toe, presumably assessing the damage. For the first time it occurred to Ryu that maybe he should have been more forthcoming over the phone. Hayato's gaze lingered on Ryu's face, and the spot where Ryu's father had slapped him suddenly flared. Ryu's steps slowed.
But all Hayato said as Ryu approached was, "You all right, Odagiri?"
Ryu nodded.
"Come on." As they fell in step, Hayato swung an elbow out and bumped Ryu's arm, roughly.
The park wasn't so much a park as a stretch of sloping grassy riverbank too steep for development. As Ryu dropped to the ground next to Hayato, he was suddenly and sharply reminded of Christmas Eve.
There were no stars tonight. Ryu rested his elbows on his knees and stared down at the sluggish river without particularly seeing it. The faint trickle of water mingled with the distant noise of traffic and the sound of Hayato's even breathing, punctuated by the intermittent bark of a dog and, once, a far-away siren.
"My father," Ryu said, and stopped.
There was a rustle of cloth as Hayato shifted. Ryu dropped a hand to the ground and fisted it in the dead grass. He knew, without looking, that Hayato's eyes were on him.
"My father," Ryu said, "wanted to send me abroad in high school. To Canada. He wanted me to learn English." His teeth hurt. "He thinks English is one of - no, the most important skill for young Japanese to learn. He - you wouldn't believe it unless you heard him."
Hayato made an incredulous huffing sound. "Geez," he said. "Your father must really like foreigners."
Ryu laughed shakily, with no amusement. "He hates them. He hates America. He wants more Japanese to know English so we can beat them all at their own game. That's what I'm supposed to do. When I graduate."
Hayato was silent for a minute. Then he said, "But you're still here."
"My mother wouldn't let him." Ryu licked his lips. "It's the only time I've ever seen her disagree with him."
Hayato whistled. Neither spoke.
A low voice, too far away to make out, drifted toward them and then away. Ryu tugged at the fistful of grass until it tore from the ground, and then scattered it at his side. A few dry blades stuck to his palm and he shook his wrist until they floated free.
"So," he said eventually, a croak. He cleared his throat. "That's why. I was worried."
"Yeah," Hayato said. "Yeah. I see. Hey, Ryu."
"Mm?"
"You're the smartest person I've ever met."
The jolt was almost physical. Ryu let out a surprised half-laugh and managed not to stutter as he said, "What?"
When he turned, Hayato's face was serious, and Hayato's dark eyes intent on him. "I'm saying," said Hayato, "you can figure out what to do. Whatever it is. Whatever it is, you can do it. You just - you can."
Ryu's mouth opened, and closed again. "Oh," Ryu said, unsteadily. His cheeks were burning. "Oh. Thanks."
Hayato made an abortive movement, as if to look away. "Just the truth," he said. His eyes held Ryu's. Ryu was distantly aware his heart was pounding very quickly, and his mouth was dry. He couldn't - Hayato's gaze moved to fix on something just past Ryu's shoulder, and his mouth formed a round 'o' of surprise.
"Hey, look," he said, and Ryu, who should have known better, turned his head.
There was something warm and soft against his mouth, and it took a moment to sink in that Hayato was kissing him.
He was too stunned to respond. When Hayato pulled away, Ryu saw that his eyes were closed, and it was a few seconds before they fluttered open.
Under Ryu's speechless gaze a flush rose on Hayato's cheeks. He cleared his throat, then didn't speak.
"I - " Ryu had no idea what he was going to say. He shook his head. A succession of thoughts whirled through his head, too fast to catch hold of - his father, his university course, the red and gold charm that remained tucked in his bag.
As Ryu continued to stare, mute, Hayato grew redder and redder, and finally averted his eyes. "Anyway," he said gruffly, "you're going to be fine. Sorry, I didn't mean - " He ran a hand through his hair and didn't look at Ryu. Then he got to his feet. "Sorry. I'll see you later. If you want."
"Wait," Ryu said quickly. His heart hammered. "Hayato, wait."
Hayato looked down. Everything about the way he held himself, his braced shoulders, spoke of wariness, but there was something in the set of his mouth that said to Ryu, hope.
Ryu stood up. He took one deliberate step closer, and Hayato's eyes widened. It looked like it was taking all his willpower not to back away.
Ryu took hold of Hayato's collar with one clammy palm and pulled him forward.
Hayato's mouth was surprisingly soft, and surprisingly hesitant. Frustrated, Ryu tugged him closer, pushing forward - there. No hesitation now; only the fearless, reckless challenge he always got from Hayato. Ryu's thoughts scattered. A hand, large and clumsy, was sliding through Ryu's hair, down to cup the top of his spine; another was on his hip, holding him in place. Ryu heard, as if from far away, a helpless, wanting noise. A second later, he realized it was his own.
They had to break apart. Ryu took a gulp of cold air. More than his face was burning. Hayato's breathing was fast and uneven, and his hand was slow to fall away from the back of Ryu's neck. His eyes were wide, and Ryu, for all his so-called intelligence, couldn't figure out what to say.
"So," Hayato said after a minute. He licked his lips. "Was that, um." His eyes met Ryu's, and skipped away.
In that moment it hit Ryu, like a blow to the chest, that Hayato - stubborn, blunt, rough, proud Hayato - had already placed himself in the palm of Ryu's hand.
He had to take a deep breath to steady himself. Then he said carefully, "I think you've been calling the wrong one of us the smart one."
It was a minute before Hayato understood. As Ryu watched, he started, and his eyes grew wider and wider. The corner of his mouth turned up incredulously, and Ryu couldn't have looked away if he'd tried.
"Oh," was all Hayato said aloud, quietly, but Ryu heard the rest.
***
Ryu saw that the lights were on from halfway down the block. Even the foreboding silence of the entryway couldn't quash the giddy fluttering in his chest. He slipped off his shoes and smiled at the tiled floor.
The smile slipped away when his mother appeared at the end of the hall.
"Your father's waiting," she said.
He was sitting in his customary armchair, jaw grimly set. He stood as Ryu entered the room and they faced each other, ramrod-straight, as Ryu's father slowly looked him over, inch by inch.
Ryu neither averted his eyes nor broke the silence. Finally, his father made a contemptuous noise and said in a voice heavy with displeasure, "Well? What have you got to say?"
Until the moment he opened his mouth, Ryu didn't know he was going to say, "I'm moving out."
For the first time in his life Ryu saw his father shocked into silence.
Now that he knew, the words came to him as if by instinct. "I'm very grateful for the support of this household for the past nineteen years, but," - only an imperceptible hesitation - "I've taken advantage of your kindness for too long."
"Really," said his father, voice rising. His face was rigid with anger. "And your education? Have you taken advantage of that for too long? Maybe you'd prefer to work in a construction yard for the rest of your life, or do you expect that to be an exception?"
He'd take a semester off or go part-time. Take might know about scholarships. Ryu held fast to those thoughts to keep his voice steady as he said, "I don't intend to make any further demands on your generosity."
Ryu's father slammed a fist against the wall. Ryu heard a sound behind him - his mother - but didn't dare turn. The room was silent but for his father's heavy breathing. They remained there, a rigid, unmoving tableau, as the seconds ticked inexorably away.
"All right," his father said at last. He turned, and his eyes were hard as ice. "All right. I'll arrange to stop your tuition tomorrow. You may leave tonight."
Before Ryu could remember if the trains were still running, his mother said, "Hadn't we better assist our son at first, on his own?"
Ryu turned so quickly he nearly lost his balance. His mouth, he was dimly aware, was open in an unflattering mask of surprise. But his mother wasn't looking at him, she was looking at Ryu's father.
Ryu glanced at him. His face, slack with shock, hardened, and he inhaled heavily through his nose. Ryu looked back at his mother. Her delicate features were as composed as always, but for the set of her mouth.
Ryu's father clenched his jaw, so tightly the muscles in his cheek stood out white. "Fine," he said through stiff lips. "We'll discuss it tomorrow."
Ryu's mother turned. "It's getting late," she said. "You should probably go to bed soon, don't you think?"
"I," said Ryu. "Yes. Of course. Good night."
"Good night," his mother said, and gave him a faint smile.
***
"Well?" Hayato said impatiently when Ryu met him at the end of the street, the next day. "What's so important you couldn't text me?"
"I'm moving out," Ryu said. Hayato's jaw dropped. Seeing him, the dizzying lightness that had sprouted yesterday pushed upward to fill Ryu's chest. "I'm going to have to find an apartment. And a job. And - I - " A giddy laugh spilled over.
Hayato was grinning now, the characteristic Hayato grin that brightened his whole face. "Are you serious? Do you know where you want to go?"
"I have absolutely no idea," Ryu said. He was grinning now, too. "You're going to have to help me. You said you knew who to talk to, remember?"
"Sure," said Hayato, and leaned in and kissed Ryu on the cheek. "I bet Tsucchi can help, too," he continued as if he'd done something perfectly ordinary. "You should call him anyway, we've got to celebrate. Do you know..."
Ryu smiled as they fell in step, and side by side, they walked away together.