[Fic] like falling asleep and waking up again
Title: like falling asleep and waking up again
Author: analineblue
Fandom: No. 6
Pairing/Characters: Nezumi/Shion
Warnings/Spoilers: none
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~4,180
Summary: AU. The one where they meet as college students in a club.
Notes: I have no idea what came over me with this. I never write AUs. Ever. O_o And probably since I never write AU’s, this one is fairly canon-based, despite the setting. Or at least there are a lot of common elements. Because I couldn’t write fic for them without including certain things that felt essential like...an open window. And mice. And Shion going on about Nezumi’s eyes. And Nezumi's journey of love and youth. Yes. ;) Anyway... I really hope you enjoy it! Comments are always greatly appreciated. ^_^
I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember because the transitions from life to death and back are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it.
- Jack Kerouac, On the Road
**
It’s the shock of brilliant white hair that he notices first.
That, and the fact that watching the boy swivel his hips back and forth to the beat of the music, under the soft blue glow of the club’s lights is pretty damn entrancing.
So much so, in fact, that Nezumi forgets all about how he’d been planning to make his way to the bar, and just shoves his hands into his pockets, and fades into the brick wall at the far end of the room, watching.
He’s got decent rhythm, Nezumi thinks, as he watches the kid’s legs bend and sway as the music takes shape a little, and the lights change from blue to purple, and then back again, as the music picks up.
Nezumi can feel the bass thumping in his chest - steady, rhythmic, alive.
He watches the kid with white-hair as he moves through the crowd, nodding once or twice to what must be familiar faces. He dances alone though - if you could even really call this dancing, because it’s really just moving, he realizes now. He’s on his way somewhere. Nezumi can’t help but wonder who he is, what brought him to this particular club on this particular night, in this particular city.
He’s not sure he can answer those questions for himself, really, but he wonders all the same.
It’s not uncommon to notice things like this, he reminds himself--he doesn’t know anyone here. It’s natural to people-watch. To notice things that stand out, that break the mold. Like a boy with bright white hair who moves across the dance floor like he belongs there, but is somehow completely out of place at the same time. It makes him feel like something unexpected could happen.
These are the sorts of things one notices on a city-a-week trip like this, especially when for the past few weeks, everything has seemed so mundane, steeped in the same dull shade of grey, murky and opaque.
As the music slows a bit, Nezumi decides that what he likes best about this place is the DJ. The music here is really something to write home about, if writing home happens to be your thing--not too mellow, just enough edge. It’s not easy to get the mood exactly right like this.
Nezumi closes his eyes, lets the bass knock around in his chest a bit, just listening, just feeling it, and when he opens them again, the kid with the white hair is standing directly in front of him. Staring at him.
His eyes are a deep crimson, and there’s a scar under his right eye, a long swath of pink that stretches a border all the way from his hairline to the very top of his cheekbone. Nezumi’s brain immediately cycles through any number of injuries that could have caused something like that, but he can’t come up with a single thing that makes sense. It rattles him a little.
“Hi,” the boy says, and then he smiles, and Nezumi feels as if the whole room must be looking at them, it’s so damn bright. For a second he thinks the boy is about to extend his hand, but he doesn’t - he just folds his arms over his chest, and looks down at his feet for a second.
“Hey,” Nezumi acknowledges. He gives the boy a quick nod, and then raises his eyebrows in a “can I help you” sort of gesture, though he’s sure… Well, he’s not sure of anything right now, except the fact that this kid has an incredibly infectious smile. And he thought he had a knack for charm.
“Do I know you?” the-boy-with-the-hair asks. The music is just loud enough so that he can hear the boy’s voice over the din, but none of the nuance, if there is any present.
He swallows, wondering if he’s being called out, if he’s picked a fight, though that hardly seems possible with that smile.
“I don’t think so, I’m just--"
“I noticed,” the boy interrupts, as if he hasn’t heard him, and maybe he hasn’t; the music is getting louder by the minute.
“You were watching me,” the boy says, and then he leans in, so close that Nezumi can feel the warmth seeping out from underneath his collar.
“You were watching me,” the boy repeats, raising his voice, and while he heard him the first time, now the words resonate right down to Nezumi’s toes. The kid is smiling again.
“Sorry,” white-hair says, and then again, “Sorry! It’s so loud in here!”
Nezumi just stares at him for a moment, trying to figure out exactly what this is, if this is a pick-up line, or something else. It’s not like he hasn’t had experience either way. He gets hit on a lot, and gender isn’t always a barrier; it is 2013, after all, and he’s in a strange club in a strange town - he has no idea what the usual crowd here is up to. This, though… He can’t put his finger on it; it’s strange. Even more strange is the fact that he’s not walking away, that this kid, this stranger, has his full and complete attention.
And that’s how he finds himself being steered by the elbow, around the bar and into another, much-smaller, much-quieter room.
The walls are lined with comfortable looking couches and huge, oversized bean bag chairs. There’s a red glow over all of it that filters down through large domed sconces on the walls. And there’s a bar in here, too. Nezumi watches the kid walk up to it, and nod to the bartender. A second later, he’s walking toward Nezumi with a tall glass of what looks like fruit punch.
“Sorry,” the kid says. “Did you want one? It’s seltzer. With a splash of cranberry.”
Nezumi shakes his head. “I’m okay.”
He follows the kid to small table in the corner-it’s one of those tall, circular, high-top deals, and Nezumi perches himself on a chair across from his newly acquired acquaintance.
“So why were you watching me?” the kid asks, as his lips close around the straw of his drink.
He looks up at Nezumi over long lashes. His eyes are jarring, but the completely un-censored ease with which he speaks is what really gets him. Nezumi feels a bit like a foreigner in strange, undeveloped country. Where the natives are, apparently, extremely forthright. And friendly.
“Thought you were someone else, that’s all,” Nezumi says, which is ridiculous, because how on earth could that be possible, with that look.
White hair is frowning, but then his eyes brighten.
“I haven’t seen you here before,” he says. “That’s I was thinking when I saw you standing there.”
Nezumi just stares at him, not quite sure how to respond to that.
“I’m Shion, by the way,” he continues, and this time he does extend his hand. It’s a little awkward over the table, but Nezumi takes it - the boy has a surprisingly firm grip.
The boy--Shion--is waiting, Nezumi realizes, for him to return the favor.
“Nezumi,” he offers, and Shion frowns.
“Nezumi?”
“Yeah. My name.”
“Oh. Huh. Seems a bit strange.”
“You’re one to talk,” Nezumi says, and when the boy looks confused, he gestures to his hair. “That hair. Those eyes.”
Shion just smiles. “Still, you’ve never been to this club before, right?” he asks, and his voice is confident. It’s not really a question.
Nezumi bristles. “How the hell would you know that?”
Shion shrugs, and takes a sip of his drink. “I come here all the time. I would have noticed.”
“So what, do you live around here or something?”
“I’m a student,” he says, as if this is the most normal conversation in the world. As if he converses with strangers on an everyday basis. Maybe he does. Looking at him, Nezumi can see this as being a real possibility. “My dorm is a few blocks from here,” the kid continues.
“What are you studying?”
“Ecology,” Shion says. “I’m in my second year.”
Nezumi nods even though he has no idea what an Ecology student would have to fill up an entire course load with. He entertains thoughts of the huge books that might line this kid’s bookshelves - The Encyclopedia of Trees, maybe, twelve full volumes of roots and leaves and life cycles.
“What about you?” Shion asks.
“I’m just passing through,” Nezumi says. It’s a well-rehearsed line, delivered with ease. “Road trip.”
“I knew it!”
Nezumi’s eyes widen. He watches the boy across the small table. He can hear the bass bleeding in through the walls of the other room. It must be picking up in there now - he could get up, walk over there, lose himself in the crowd, and--
“You didn’t think I was someone else, you just thought I looked strange. It was the hair, right?” Shion is saying, and he’s leaning across the table - Nezumi has to crane his head around to figure out how he’s managed that, and then realizes that he’s up on his knees on the chair.
The table wobbles precariously, and without thinking, Nezumi reaches his arm out to steady him. Shion’s arm is warm through the cotton of his button up, and under Nezumi’s fingers, the muscles of his arm tighten.
“Sorry, it’s just-- this happened, the hair; it’s a long story, but…” Shion runs a hand over his head, tugging at the edges of his hair for a moment before he settles back in his chair. “I know I kind of stand out now.”
“Just a bit,” Nezumi agrees.
“You could have just said that, you know,” Shion says, finishing off his drink, and staring up over his glass at Nezumi. “About the hair. I’ve been getting it a lot lately.”
“I’ll bet you have,” Nezumi says.
He’s trying to just go with the flow, but there’s something completely disarming about the way this conversation has gone so far. It’s almost made Nezumi forget the first rule of his trip. Which is pretty much - don’t get dragged into strange conversations in clubs. It’s been a good rule and has served him well up until now, so he’s not so keen to give up on it just yet.
“How long are you in town?” Shion asks.
Nezumi shrugs. “Just a few days.”
“Are you visiting someone?”
“No.”
“Where do you go to school?”
“I don’t,” Nezumi says, listening to the sound of the bass again. It’s distracting.
“Are you taking the semester off?”
“I quit,” Nezumi says, and he’s not sure why he’s telling this kid something that he hasn’t even fully admitted to himself yet. “I mean, I might go back, someday, but…”
“Did you run away from home?” Shion asks, looking worried. His eyes are ridiculously expressive; Nezumi imagines he’d be horrible at poker, giving everything away like that all the time.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Well, I know my mom would be furious at me if I quit school…”
Nezumi sighs. He hazards a glance at Shion’s eyes again. He wonders if the red becomes less jarring, over time. It must.
“I didn’t run away from home,” he says, and at this, surprisingly, Shion is silent.
**
“My dorm is just around the corner here.”
Somehow Nezumi finds himself following his new friend down the unfamiliar streets that lead away from the club.
“Hang on,” Nezumi tries to say for at least the third time in the past five minutes.
“What? You don’t have a place to stay tonight, right?”
Shion is beaming at him, and his hair shines under the soft orange-yellow glow of the streetlamps, picking up the colors of the lights. They’re not far from the club, which had been in the city center, but the streets have narrowed considerably, taking on a residential feel the closer they get to their apparent destination.
“It’s just over here,” Shion says, and then he grabs Nezumi by the elbow, and leans in. “Wait here,” he instructs. “My roommate is at his girlfriend’s tonight, but we’re not supposed to have guests.”
Nezumi is about to state the obvious, is about to suggest, again, that he head over to the local youth hostel instead, but Shion is already on his way to the main entrance.
“I’m on the first floor, that window there.” He points, and Nezumi looks up, and when he glances back over to the entrance, the street is empty.
He should take this opportunity and get out of here. Pick up his things from where he’d stashed them in a coin locker back at the station, and find a decent place to sleep, instead of relying on some stranger he‘s met in a club, no matter how maddeningly trustworthy this stranger may appear to be.
But instead, Nezumi finds himself staring up the building in front of him, at its sea of windows that stretch up into the night. Some are lit, some dark. Some are ringed by multicolored lights, and some glow with strange colors that pulse back and forth in tiny waves from within. Nezumi’s stomach churns with the familiarity of it. College life, huh, he thinks, and just as he’s about to turn on his heel and make his exit, the window closest to street level swings open wide.
Shion’s head pops around the corner a moment later. He’s smiling, and making a pretty obvious show of things for someone trying to be discreet about having guests. Nezumi sighs. There’s a large recycling bin resting conveniently on the curb, just under the window’s ledge.
“What an idiot,” he whispers under his breath, as he takes a step forward.
**
“Are you always this defenseless?”
Nezumi’s hands are warm from the mug of cocoa that Shion has just handed him. They’re sitting cross-legged on the floor next to a set of bunk beds. There are books everywhere, stacked up next to the bed and leaning up against the walls in squat little piles. He can make out the corner of a large bookshelf adjacent to the room’s kitchen, too. He doesn’t have to get any closer to know that it’s overflowing. The image of another room, miles and miles away, floats to the surface of his memory. He wonders if all dorm rooms, everywhere, are essentially the same.
There’s a soft glow from a lamp in the corner that casts the room in fuzzy shades of light and dark, like an old photograph. He wonders what it looks like outside, down on the street; if it looks like anything at all, or if it’s just another room, shrouded in darkness.
He watches Shion blow on his mug, and then take a sip.
“What do you mean, defenseless?” he asks. His eyes are curious and completely unguarded.
“I could be anyone,” Nezumi says, taking a sip from his cup. The warmth spreads quickly down his throat. He wonders when the last time was that someone had served him hot cocoa in a mug like this - warm fingers and steam that rises up around his nose when he brings it close.
Shion’s sense of calm is wearing off on him. He’s getting drawn into it, despite himself, though obviously, what he should be is suspicious. No one is this clueless, after all. He narrows his eyes.
“Like who?” Shion asks, staring at him calmly.
“I don’t know, anyone,” he says. He searches for an example. “A serial killer. Someone dangerous.”
At this, Shion lets out a soft laugh. The sound catches somewhere in Nezumi’s chest and just sits there, warm and bubbling with energy. Then Shion sets his mug on the floor and jumps to his feet.
“I almost forgot!” he says, before he crosses the room, and starts fiddling in one of the small kitchenette cabinets.
“What are you doing?”
He can hear Shion talking to someone (or something) in a low voice, though he can’t understand a word he’s saying.
“Oh, sorry,” Shion says, turning back to Nezumi. “You should meet them!”
**
Three tiny mice stare up at Nezumi from a glass enclosure. They’re surprisingly adorable. (For mice.)
“Technically, they’re my roommate’s,” Shion says, smiling down at them. “But I’m their favorite. I’m the one that named them.”
“Really,” Nezumi says, watching him for a moment, and then he stares down into the cage. The white one on the far left stares up at him, and squeaks.
“This is Hamlet,” Shion says. He picks Hamlet up, and places him on his shoulder. Then he points to the others. “That’s Cravat, and the darker one is Tsukiyo.”
“Did you rescue them from an experiment or something?” Nezumi asks, as he leans over and touches the soft fur of Hamlet’s back. The tiny mouse seems pleased by the attention. “Nice name, by the way. Shakespeare fan?”
“Last semester we read the tragedies,” Shion tells him. “Hamlet was my favorite.”
Nezumi, sensing an opportunity, clears his throat.
“What a piece of work is a man,” he starts. “How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable,” he pauses, and Shion is staring at him, mouth open. He looks entirely enthralled.
“Amazing! Keep going,” Shion says eagerly.
“In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?”
He finishes with an entirely un-modest bow, adrenaline pumping through his veins like a freight train. The thrill of the performance. He’d almost forgotten how alive he used to feel, like this.
“That’s amazing,” Shion says earnestly, his eyes shining. Nezumi half expects him to start clapping. “You should be on stage!”
“Who says I haven’t been?”
“Are you an actor?” Shion’s eyes widen.
“I was trying to be,” Nezumi says, and lets out a breath. “I was a theatre major. Before I left.”
Shion frowns. “But you’re so good. Why would you leave?”
“I fucked up,” he says. He has no idea what compels him to boil down the past year of his life to such a small, generic statement, but there you have it. “It was complicated.”
Shion just nods, and after a moment, he sets Hamlet back into the cage.
He’s expecting questions after they return to their cocoa, but Shion is quiet. Nezumi wonders what he’s thinking. He’s probably never screwed up a single thing in his life.
“I’d love to have the chance to watch you on stage,” Shion says, and when he looks up at Nezumi, his eyes are sad. “It doesn’t seem right.”
“What doesn’t?”
“You quitting,” Shion says. “Do think you’ll go back?”
Nezumi is quiet for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he says. “I hope so.”
**
When Nezumi returns from his shower across the hall, he’s surprised to find Shion still awake.
“What happened to class in the morning?” he asks, and he’s even more surprised when Shion responds by leaping to his feet to stand in front of him.
“I was lying here,” Shion says, his voice low and serious, “listening to the water running across the hall, and then it just hit me. What it was.”
Nezumi runs a hand over his wet hair. Shion is standing in front of him at his full height, and like this, his face is close. Really close. He wishes he’d thought to brush his teeth. He swallows, and then raises his eyebrows at Shion. He holds his breath. Waits.
“Your eyes,” Shion says, and he’s staring up into Nezumi’s face with such intensity that it makes Nezumi squirm in his skin. “I’ve never seen that shade of grey before.”
“Well,” Nezumi starts, as he navigates around Shion to sit on the edge of the bottom bunk. “I could say the same for you.”
His eyes fall on the pile of blankets opposite his feet. This idiot kid has given up his bed to a complete stranger, and then agrees to sleep on the floor, as opposed to using his roommate’s bed. He really has no idea why he’s listening to a word he says.
Shion is shaking his head as he sits down next to him.
“In the club,” he says. “I think that’s what drew me to you. Your eyes.”
And there is it again. This kid… None of this makes any sense; why he’s here, why this ridiculous stranger has him completely unnerved like this.
“Sorry,” Shion says after a moment with a laugh. “I know I have no room to talk.”
Nezumi watches Shion rummage around at his feet for a moment, before he hands him an oversized flannel shirt. Nezumi stares at it for a moment, until the reds and blacks and greys start to blur and blend together in front of him.
“You can wear this,” Shion says, but his eyes don’t leave Nezumi’s face.
“Thanks,” he says. “But…” I don’t need it, he wants to say. I don’t need any of this.
But Shion is still staring at him, and the words just seem to stick in his throat. His heart thumps, as his hand clenches around the soft fabric in his lap.
“Thank you,” he says again, his resolve deflating.
He should leave, should just get out of here before he racks up any other debts to some airheaded kid he doesn’t even know, but instead, he finds himself wondering if maybe the shirt in his lap might be more comfortable to sleep in than his well-traveled henley and cargo pants. He finds himself wondering what the fabric will feel like against his skin - in his hands, it feels impossibly soft.
When Shion gets up and moves to the floor, Nezumi pulls back the covers without a second thought. This should bother him, right? It should feel strange, at least, crawling into this stranger’s bed, but it doesn’t - it isn’t.
Shion turns off the light and the room plunges into darkness.
“Goodnight, Nezumi,” Shion says from the floor. “I really hope you find what you’re looking for on your trip.”
“Who says I’m looking for anything?”
He can practically hear Shion’s smile in the darkness.
“Lucky guess.”
Nezumi mumbles his disapproval under his breath as he turns over. The bed is soft, and warm. It smells familiar, somehow, though Nezumi is sure that’s impossible.
In the darkness, Shion’s voice floats up to his ears.
“What do you think you’ll do… in the end? You can’t keep traveling forever, right?”
“Says who?”
“Well, I just mean you’ll have to settle down somewhere, eventually.”
Nezumi is quiet. The darkness feels vast, endless.
“You could come back here, you know,” Shion says, and Nezumi’s stomach clenches uncomfortably.
He takes a deep breath, and then another. He exhales, slowly, just like he’s been taught.
“Would’ve thought you’d tell me to go back home.”
Shion is quiet for a moment, and then sighs.
“Sometimes I’m not sure I know what that means. The place I grew up… After I left, I started to wonder. Part of me feels like this is my home now. It may sound silly, but I wonder if something like that might be possible for you, too.”
Nezumi lies there in the darkness for a long time without speaking, so long that he’s sure Shion has already fallen asleep.
“For an airhead, you say some pretty remarkable things,” he says quietly, rolling over onto his side to face the wall. He closes his eyes.
**
On the train, with his bag safely secured on the overhead rack, Nezumi stares out the window as they pull away from the station. His eyes dart over blank, grey concrete barriers that give way to trees, and then sunlight, and then vast green fields, stretching as far as he can see.
The train whirs along, always in motion under his feet. Idly, Nezumi’s fingers close over the fabric of the shirt poking out of his jacket, just above his wrist. It’s not to his taste at all, the red hardly matches anything in his wardrobe, but it’s soft, and the fibers are well-worn, warm, and familiar. He smiles.
end
Author: analineblue
Fandom: No. 6
Pairing/Characters: Nezumi/Shion
Warnings/Spoilers: none
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~4,180
Summary: AU. The one where they meet as college students in a club.
Notes: I have no idea what came over me with this. I never write AUs. Ever. O_o And probably since I never write AU’s, this one is fairly canon-based, despite the setting. Or at least there are a lot of common elements. Because I couldn’t write fic for them without including certain things that felt essential like...an open window. And mice. And Shion going on about Nezumi’s eyes. And Nezumi's journey of love and youth. Yes. ;) Anyway... I really hope you enjoy it! Comments are always greatly appreciated. ^_^
I realized that I had died and been reborn numberless times but just didn't remember because the transitions from life to death and back are so ghostly easy, a magical action for naught, like falling asleep and waking up again a million times, the utter casualness and deep ignorance of it.
- Jack Kerouac, On the Road
**
It’s the shock of brilliant white hair that he notices first.
That, and the fact that watching the boy swivel his hips back and forth to the beat of the music, under the soft blue glow of the club’s lights is pretty damn entrancing.
So much so, in fact, that Nezumi forgets all about how he’d been planning to make his way to the bar, and just shoves his hands into his pockets, and fades into the brick wall at the far end of the room, watching.
He’s got decent rhythm, Nezumi thinks, as he watches the kid’s legs bend and sway as the music takes shape a little, and the lights change from blue to purple, and then back again, as the music picks up.
Nezumi can feel the bass thumping in his chest - steady, rhythmic, alive.
He watches the kid with white-hair as he moves through the crowd, nodding once or twice to what must be familiar faces. He dances alone though - if you could even really call this dancing, because it’s really just moving, he realizes now. He’s on his way somewhere. Nezumi can’t help but wonder who he is, what brought him to this particular club on this particular night, in this particular city.
He’s not sure he can answer those questions for himself, really, but he wonders all the same.
It’s not uncommon to notice things like this, he reminds himself--he doesn’t know anyone here. It’s natural to people-watch. To notice things that stand out, that break the mold. Like a boy with bright white hair who moves across the dance floor like he belongs there, but is somehow completely out of place at the same time. It makes him feel like something unexpected could happen.
These are the sorts of things one notices on a city-a-week trip like this, especially when for the past few weeks, everything has seemed so mundane, steeped in the same dull shade of grey, murky and opaque.
As the music slows a bit, Nezumi decides that what he likes best about this place is the DJ. The music here is really something to write home about, if writing home happens to be your thing--not too mellow, just enough edge. It’s not easy to get the mood exactly right like this.
Nezumi closes his eyes, lets the bass knock around in his chest a bit, just listening, just feeling it, and when he opens them again, the kid with the white hair is standing directly in front of him. Staring at him.
His eyes are a deep crimson, and there’s a scar under his right eye, a long swath of pink that stretches a border all the way from his hairline to the very top of his cheekbone. Nezumi’s brain immediately cycles through any number of injuries that could have caused something like that, but he can’t come up with a single thing that makes sense. It rattles him a little.
“Hi,” the boy says, and then he smiles, and Nezumi feels as if the whole room must be looking at them, it’s so damn bright. For a second he thinks the boy is about to extend his hand, but he doesn’t - he just folds his arms over his chest, and looks down at his feet for a second.
“Hey,” Nezumi acknowledges. He gives the boy a quick nod, and then raises his eyebrows in a “can I help you” sort of gesture, though he’s sure… Well, he’s not sure of anything right now, except the fact that this kid has an incredibly infectious smile. And he thought he had a knack for charm.
“Do I know you?” the-boy-with-the-hair asks. The music is just loud enough so that he can hear the boy’s voice over the din, but none of the nuance, if there is any present.
He swallows, wondering if he’s being called out, if he’s picked a fight, though that hardly seems possible with that smile.
“I don’t think so, I’m just--"
“I noticed,” the boy interrupts, as if he hasn’t heard him, and maybe he hasn’t; the music is getting louder by the minute.
“You were watching me,” the boy says, and then he leans in, so close that Nezumi can feel the warmth seeping out from underneath his collar.
“You were watching me,” the boy repeats, raising his voice, and while he heard him the first time, now the words resonate right down to Nezumi’s toes. The kid is smiling again.
“Sorry,” white-hair says, and then again, “Sorry! It’s so loud in here!”
Nezumi just stares at him for a moment, trying to figure out exactly what this is, if this is a pick-up line, or something else. It’s not like he hasn’t had experience either way. He gets hit on a lot, and gender isn’t always a barrier; it is 2013, after all, and he’s in a strange club in a strange town - he has no idea what the usual crowd here is up to. This, though… He can’t put his finger on it; it’s strange. Even more strange is the fact that he’s not walking away, that this kid, this stranger, has his full and complete attention.
And that’s how he finds himself being steered by the elbow, around the bar and into another, much-smaller, much-quieter room.
The walls are lined with comfortable looking couches and huge, oversized bean bag chairs. There’s a red glow over all of it that filters down through large domed sconces on the walls. And there’s a bar in here, too. Nezumi watches the kid walk up to it, and nod to the bartender. A second later, he’s walking toward Nezumi with a tall glass of what looks like fruit punch.
“Sorry,” the kid says. “Did you want one? It’s seltzer. With a splash of cranberry.”
Nezumi shakes his head. “I’m okay.”
He follows the kid to small table in the corner-it’s one of those tall, circular, high-top deals, and Nezumi perches himself on a chair across from his newly acquired acquaintance.
“So why were you watching me?” the kid asks, as his lips close around the straw of his drink.
He looks up at Nezumi over long lashes. His eyes are jarring, but the completely un-censored ease with which he speaks is what really gets him. Nezumi feels a bit like a foreigner in strange, undeveloped country. Where the natives are, apparently, extremely forthright. And friendly.
“Thought you were someone else, that’s all,” Nezumi says, which is ridiculous, because how on earth could that be possible, with that look.
White hair is frowning, but then his eyes brighten.
“I haven’t seen you here before,” he says. “That’s I was thinking when I saw you standing there.”
Nezumi just stares at him, not quite sure how to respond to that.
“I’m Shion, by the way,” he continues, and this time he does extend his hand. It’s a little awkward over the table, but Nezumi takes it - the boy has a surprisingly firm grip.
The boy--Shion--is waiting, Nezumi realizes, for him to return the favor.
“Nezumi,” he offers, and Shion frowns.
“Nezumi?”
“Yeah. My name.”
“Oh. Huh. Seems a bit strange.”
“You’re one to talk,” Nezumi says, and when the boy looks confused, he gestures to his hair. “That hair. Those eyes.”
Shion just smiles. “Still, you’ve never been to this club before, right?” he asks, and his voice is confident. It’s not really a question.
Nezumi bristles. “How the hell would you know that?”
Shion shrugs, and takes a sip of his drink. “I come here all the time. I would have noticed.”
“So what, do you live around here or something?”
“I’m a student,” he says, as if this is the most normal conversation in the world. As if he converses with strangers on an everyday basis. Maybe he does. Looking at him, Nezumi can see this as being a real possibility. “My dorm is a few blocks from here,” the kid continues.
“What are you studying?”
“Ecology,” Shion says. “I’m in my second year.”
Nezumi nods even though he has no idea what an Ecology student would have to fill up an entire course load with. He entertains thoughts of the huge books that might line this kid’s bookshelves - The Encyclopedia of Trees, maybe, twelve full volumes of roots and leaves and life cycles.
“What about you?” Shion asks.
“I’m just passing through,” Nezumi says. It’s a well-rehearsed line, delivered with ease. “Road trip.”
“I knew it!”
Nezumi’s eyes widen. He watches the boy across the small table. He can hear the bass bleeding in through the walls of the other room. It must be picking up in there now - he could get up, walk over there, lose himself in the crowd, and--
“You didn’t think I was someone else, you just thought I looked strange. It was the hair, right?” Shion is saying, and he’s leaning across the table - Nezumi has to crane his head around to figure out how he’s managed that, and then realizes that he’s up on his knees on the chair.
The table wobbles precariously, and without thinking, Nezumi reaches his arm out to steady him. Shion’s arm is warm through the cotton of his button up, and under Nezumi’s fingers, the muscles of his arm tighten.
“Sorry, it’s just-- this happened, the hair; it’s a long story, but…” Shion runs a hand over his head, tugging at the edges of his hair for a moment before he settles back in his chair. “I know I kind of stand out now.”
“Just a bit,” Nezumi agrees.
“You could have just said that, you know,” Shion says, finishing off his drink, and staring up over his glass at Nezumi. “About the hair. I’ve been getting it a lot lately.”
“I’ll bet you have,” Nezumi says.
He’s trying to just go with the flow, but there’s something completely disarming about the way this conversation has gone so far. It’s almost made Nezumi forget the first rule of his trip. Which is pretty much - don’t get dragged into strange conversations in clubs. It’s been a good rule and has served him well up until now, so he’s not so keen to give up on it just yet.
“How long are you in town?” Shion asks.
Nezumi shrugs. “Just a few days.”
“Are you visiting someone?”
“No.”
“Where do you go to school?”
“I don’t,” Nezumi says, listening to the sound of the bass again. It’s distracting.
“Are you taking the semester off?”
“I quit,” Nezumi says, and he’s not sure why he’s telling this kid something that he hasn’t even fully admitted to himself yet. “I mean, I might go back, someday, but…”
“Did you run away from home?” Shion asks, looking worried. His eyes are ridiculously expressive; Nezumi imagines he’d be horrible at poker, giving everything away like that all the time.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Well, I know my mom would be furious at me if I quit school…”
Nezumi sighs. He hazards a glance at Shion’s eyes again. He wonders if the red becomes less jarring, over time. It must.
“I didn’t run away from home,” he says, and at this, surprisingly, Shion is silent.
**
“My dorm is just around the corner here.”
Somehow Nezumi finds himself following his new friend down the unfamiliar streets that lead away from the club.
“Hang on,” Nezumi tries to say for at least the third time in the past five minutes.
“What? You don’t have a place to stay tonight, right?”
Shion is beaming at him, and his hair shines under the soft orange-yellow glow of the streetlamps, picking up the colors of the lights. They’re not far from the club, which had been in the city center, but the streets have narrowed considerably, taking on a residential feel the closer they get to their apparent destination.
“It’s just over here,” Shion says, and then he grabs Nezumi by the elbow, and leans in. “Wait here,” he instructs. “My roommate is at his girlfriend’s tonight, but we’re not supposed to have guests.”
Nezumi is about to state the obvious, is about to suggest, again, that he head over to the local youth hostel instead, but Shion is already on his way to the main entrance.
“I’m on the first floor, that window there.” He points, and Nezumi looks up, and when he glances back over to the entrance, the street is empty.
He should take this opportunity and get out of here. Pick up his things from where he’d stashed them in a coin locker back at the station, and find a decent place to sleep, instead of relying on some stranger he‘s met in a club, no matter how maddeningly trustworthy this stranger may appear to be.
But instead, Nezumi finds himself staring up the building in front of him, at its sea of windows that stretch up into the night. Some are lit, some dark. Some are ringed by multicolored lights, and some glow with strange colors that pulse back and forth in tiny waves from within. Nezumi’s stomach churns with the familiarity of it. College life, huh, he thinks, and just as he’s about to turn on his heel and make his exit, the window closest to street level swings open wide.
Shion’s head pops around the corner a moment later. He’s smiling, and making a pretty obvious show of things for someone trying to be discreet about having guests. Nezumi sighs. There’s a large recycling bin resting conveniently on the curb, just under the window’s ledge.
“What an idiot,” he whispers under his breath, as he takes a step forward.
**
“Are you always this defenseless?”
Nezumi’s hands are warm from the mug of cocoa that Shion has just handed him. They’re sitting cross-legged on the floor next to a set of bunk beds. There are books everywhere, stacked up next to the bed and leaning up against the walls in squat little piles. He can make out the corner of a large bookshelf adjacent to the room’s kitchen, too. He doesn’t have to get any closer to know that it’s overflowing. The image of another room, miles and miles away, floats to the surface of his memory. He wonders if all dorm rooms, everywhere, are essentially the same.
There’s a soft glow from a lamp in the corner that casts the room in fuzzy shades of light and dark, like an old photograph. He wonders what it looks like outside, down on the street; if it looks like anything at all, or if it’s just another room, shrouded in darkness.
He watches Shion blow on his mug, and then take a sip.
“What do you mean, defenseless?” he asks. His eyes are curious and completely unguarded.
“I could be anyone,” Nezumi says, taking a sip from his cup. The warmth spreads quickly down his throat. He wonders when the last time was that someone had served him hot cocoa in a mug like this - warm fingers and steam that rises up around his nose when he brings it close.
Shion’s sense of calm is wearing off on him. He’s getting drawn into it, despite himself, though obviously, what he should be is suspicious. No one is this clueless, after all. He narrows his eyes.
“Like who?” Shion asks, staring at him calmly.
“I don’t know, anyone,” he says. He searches for an example. “A serial killer. Someone dangerous.”
At this, Shion lets out a soft laugh. The sound catches somewhere in Nezumi’s chest and just sits there, warm and bubbling with energy. Then Shion sets his mug on the floor and jumps to his feet.
“I almost forgot!” he says, before he crosses the room, and starts fiddling in one of the small kitchenette cabinets.
“What are you doing?”
He can hear Shion talking to someone (or something) in a low voice, though he can’t understand a word he’s saying.
“Oh, sorry,” Shion says, turning back to Nezumi. “You should meet them!”
**
Three tiny mice stare up at Nezumi from a glass enclosure. They’re surprisingly adorable. (For mice.)
“Technically, they’re my roommate’s,” Shion says, smiling down at them. “But I’m their favorite. I’m the one that named them.”
“Really,” Nezumi says, watching him for a moment, and then he stares down into the cage. The white one on the far left stares up at him, and squeaks.
“This is Hamlet,” Shion says. He picks Hamlet up, and places him on his shoulder. Then he points to the others. “That’s Cravat, and the darker one is Tsukiyo.”
“Did you rescue them from an experiment or something?” Nezumi asks, as he leans over and touches the soft fur of Hamlet’s back. The tiny mouse seems pleased by the attention. “Nice name, by the way. Shakespeare fan?”
“Last semester we read the tragedies,” Shion tells him. “Hamlet was my favorite.”
Nezumi, sensing an opportunity, clears his throat.
“What a piece of work is a man,” he starts. “How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable,” he pauses, and Shion is staring at him, mouth open. He looks entirely enthralled.
“Amazing! Keep going,” Shion says eagerly.
“In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?”
He finishes with an entirely un-modest bow, adrenaline pumping through his veins like a freight train. The thrill of the performance. He’d almost forgotten how alive he used to feel, like this.
“That’s amazing,” Shion says earnestly, his eyes shining. Nezumi half expects him to start clapping. “You should be on stage!”
“Who says I haven’t been?”
“Are you an actor?” Shion’s eyes widen.
“I was trying to be,” Nezumi says, and lets out a breath. “I was a theatre major. Before I left.”
Shion frowns. “But you’re so good. Why would you leave?”
“I fucked up,” he says. He has no idea what compels him to boil down the past year of his life to such a small, generic statement, but there you have it. “It was complicated.”
Shion just nods, and after a moment, he sets Hamlet back into the cage.
He’s expecting questions after they return to their cocoa, but Shion is quiet. Nezumi wonders what he’s thinking. He’s probably never screwed up a single thing in his life.
“I’d love to have the chance to watch you on stage,” Shion says, and when he looks up at Nezumi, his eyes are sad. “It doesn’t seem right.”
“What doesn’t?”
“You quitting,” Shion says. “Do think you’ll go back?”
Nezumi is quiet for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he says. “I hope so.”
**
When Nezumi returns from his shower across the hall, he’s surprised to find Shion still awake.
“What happened to class in the morning?” he asks, and he’s even more surprised when Shion responds by leaping to his feet to stand in front of him.
“I was lying here,” Shion says, his voice low and serious, “listening to the water running across the hall, and then it just hit me. What it was.”
Nezumi runs a hand over his wet hair. Shion is standing in front of him at his full height, and like this, his face is close. Really close. He wishes he’d thought to brush his teeth. He swallows, and then raises his eyebrows at Shion. He holds his breath. Waits.
“Your eyes,” Shion says, and he’s staring up into Nezumi’s face with such intensity that it makes Nezumi squirm in his skin. “I’ve never seen that shade of grey before.”
“Well,” Nezumi starts, as he navigates around Shion to sit on the edge of the bottom bunk. “I could say the same for you.”
His eyes fall on the pile of blankets opposite his feet. This idiot kid has given up his bed to a complete stranger, and then agrees to sleep on the floor, as opposed to using his roommate’s bed. He really has no idea why he’s listening to a word he says.
Shion is shaking his head as he sits down next to him.
“In the club,” he says. “I think that’s what drew me to you. Your eyes.”
And there is it again. This kid… None of this makes any sense; why he’s here, why this ridiculous stranger has him completely unnerved like this.
“Sorry,” Shion says after a moment with a laugh. “I know I have no room to talk.”
Nezumi watches Shion rummage around at his feet for a moment, before he hands him an oversized flannel shirt. Nezumi stares at it for a moment, until the reds and blacks and greys start to blur and blend together in front of him.
“You can wear this,” Shion says, but his eyes don’t leave Nezumi’s face.
“Thanks,” he says. “But…” I don’t need it, he wants to say. I don’t need any of this.
But Shion is still staring at him, and the words just seem to stick in his throat. His heart thumps, as his hand clenches around the soft fabric in his lap.
“Thank you,” he says again, his resolve deflating.
He should leave, should just get out of here before he racks up any other debts to some airheaded kid he doesn’t even know, but instead, he finds himself wondering if maybe the shirt in his lap might be more comfortable to sleep in than his well-traveled henley and cargo pants. He finds himself wondering what the fabric will feel like against his skin - in his hands, it feels impossibly soft.
When Shion gets up and moves to the floor, Nezumi pulls back the covers without a second thought. This should bother him, right? It should feel strange, at least, crawling into this stranger’s bed, but it doesn’t - it isn’t.
Shion turns off the light and the room plunges into darkness.
“Goodnight, Nezumi,” Shion says from the floor. “I really hope you find what you’re looking for on your trip.”
“Who says I’m looking for anything?”
He can practically hear Shion’s smile in the darkness.
“Lucky guess.”
Nezumi mumbles his disapproval under his breath as he turns over. The bed is soft, and warm. It smells familiar, somehow, though Nezumi is sure that’s impossible.
In the darkness, Shion’s voice floats up to his ears.
“What do you think you’ll do… in the end? You can’t keep traveling forever, right?”
“Says who?”
“Well, I just mean you’ll have to settle down somewhere, eventually.”
Nezumi is quiet. The darkness feels vast, endless.
“You could come back here, you know,” Shion says, and Nezumi’s stomach clenches uncomfortably.
He takes a deep breath, and then another. He exhales, slowly, just like he’s been taught.
“Would’ve thought you’d tell me to go back home.”
Shion is quiet for a moment, and then sighs.
“Sometimes I’m not sure I know what that means. The place I grew up… After I left, I started to wonder. Part of me feels like this is my home now. It may sound silly, but I wonder if something like that might be possible for you, too.”
Nezumi lies there in the darkness for a long time without speaking, so long that he’s sure Shion has already fallen asleep.
“For an airhead, you say some pretty remarkable things,” he says quietly, rolling over onto his side to face the wall. He closes his eyes.
**
On the train, with his bag safely secured on the overhead rack, Nezumi stares out the window as they pull away from the station. His eyes dart over blank, grey concrete barriers that give way to trees, and then sunlight, and then vast green fields, stretching as far as he can see.
The train whirs along, always in motion under his feet. Idly, Nezumi’s fingers close over the fabric of the shirt poking out of his jacket, just above his wrist. It’s not to his taste at all, the red hardly matches anything in his wardrobe, but it’s soft, and the fibers are well-worn, warm, and familiar. He smiles.
end