Let's spread some indies love <3
Name: A Friendly Gaze
Author: Yuugi (
tsuki_no_yuugi)
Band: Arc
Paring: Ko~Ji/Yuki
Rating: PG/PG-13
Genre: Romance, drama, RPS, fluff, oneshot, slash
Warnings: Slash, bad English
Disclaimer: I do not, in any state, own Arc or any of it's members, even though I love Ko~Ji alot <3
Summary: How did Yuki enter Arc? Yuki is already used to be the carpet of the other people, to be the one who the others walk over. But even he has a dream, a dream to be someone like his idol. His idol is a beauty always living far away from Yuki, but what happens, when the distant beauty comes really close to Yuki’s life?
Yuki watched. Yuki always just watched. He never did, or said, he just watched. Yuki was those boys who did well in school, but in life they never got what they dreamed of, because they were there to be stepped over by others. Yuki was one of those living carpets. People walked over them and they never said anything to change it.
Persons like Yuki always admired older students in high-school. Persons like Yuki had a dream of becoming and growing up into something like their idols were. But also persons like Yuki never became. They were too submissive to become something they wanted, so they became something someone else wanted them to become.
Sometimes it lasted for few years. Sometimes it took the whole life. Yuki were one of them who were born to grow up what his parents and friends wanted him to. Yuki was exposed to influences, because he just couldn’t stand against someone else’s opinion. Inside of his precisely guarded mind, which he never revealed to the public eyes, Yuki dreamed about a free life where he could decide what he did, with who he did and when he did.
Just like Ko~Ji.
Even though Yuki was not in high-school anymore, but in university school, he still had that older student to be admired. And the one holding the honour in Yuki’s heart was Ko~Ji.
Ko~Ji was a one year older than Yuki, good looking and smart young man. Yuki thought Ko~Ji and his bright pink hair didn’t fit in the atmosphere of the university; Ko~Ji looked like he knew what he wanted from life, and he should have been already carrying it out.
But there he stood, on the yard of the school, surrounded by a large amount of worshipers and fans. Both of the genders admired Ko~Ji: Girls were competing over his heart which belonged to no one, and each and everyone of them wanted to be the first one to win that man’s love. Then again, boys wanted to know the secret of his coolness and self-confidence, and how did he get all those chicks around him without paying attention in doing it.
Ko~Ji loved being the centre of attention, but he gave no personal notice to anyone. He hardly bothered looking at someone more than once, and if he did, that someone should have been really proud of himself to get that much attention from him.
Even though Ko~Ji held a bunch of so-called “followers” under his name, there were only few ones who dared to call themselves Ko~Ji’s friends. Two of those few ones were his bandmates, Toshiya and Shun. They were on the same class with Ko~Ji, in the same age with him, and both very popular and wanted in the girls’ minds. But not as much as Ko~Ji was. Ko~Ji seduced the girls like a light of a lamp seduces moths. He didn’t have to say or do anything, and anyway they swarmed around him.
Yuki dreamed he could be like Ko~Ji one day.
The day when the exact story starts did not begin in a very unusual way. It was a sunny day in may and half of the students had decided to study outside because of the rising heat. The “studying outside” meant sitting under cherry trees and enjoying the fine weather.
Yuki was the only one inside reading for the next course to pass it. He admitted it was hot even when the windows were wide open, but he didn’t want to know what his parents thought if they knew he was cutting a class. They would not be proud, Yuki knew that, and what he most wanted to do was to please his parents. And everyone dear to him. He wanted to graduate with good grades to get a good job and live a good life. His parents wanted that too. A good life. Sometimes Yuki mistook to think maybe he didn’t want the good life which his parents were planning for him. He mistook to think maybe he wanted a life of his own. But it went away quite quickly as he saw the happy smiles of his mother and father as he brought home a test with a good grade and not a single mistake. Just one after another.
Yuki heard sound from outside, happy laughing and talking, and he turned his head to look out of the open window. In less than a second he found the familiar group in the middle of the yard: Ko~Ji and his followers. The pink-haired boy stood out in a crowd like a single flower in the middle of the grass.
Yuki stared at him, forgetting the open book on the desk in front of him.
“Yuki-kun, shouldn’t you go out too?”
The black-haired wrenched his eyes away from the crowd outside as his teacher talked to him. Yuki smiled slightly for a moment, gathered his items and arranged them neatly inside of his simple, black bag. He bowed to his teacher and left the class.
Yuki walked through the doors leading outside thinking about the possibility of reading off of the class. It was not such a bad idea, he guessed, and headed his steps under the most distant cherry tree of the whole yard. Yuki had no friends in this school and he wasn’t too eager of making a one. He was felt comfortable as long as he could avoid the contact with other students as well as they avoided him.
This is the point where the usual day starts to turn unusual.
Yuki hadn’t taken much of steps before two older students picked him up as a victim of not so friendly attention.
The black-haired noticed those two walking towards him, and tried to escape from them. Yuki’s try of avoiding contact failed, and the two older ones pushed him against the wall of the school building.
Yuki was a skinny young boy and he had no strength to refuse the strong push on him. He hit the back of his head against the wall and slid down along it to the ground. He couldn’t believe these things still happened to him. Yuki had always been the opponent of bullying because he was weak and never said anything against it: he was everybody’s carpet, able to be walked over, and he didn’t even whine. He never whined. Never. But at least he had thought in university it would stop. These students were grown ups, not children anymore. Guess he was wrong, and he was right about to learn it painfully.
“We just thought a bit here… we are kinda out of money, and because we have lots of dues we thought maybe you could… borrow as a bit?” The other one said, sadistic smile decorating his lips. Yuki shivered under that smile, for he didn’t want to know what kind of ideas swan under it. It could be anything. Still he wasn’t able to make any sound against them.
Few head had turned towards them, but Yuki didn’t see it. He had to concentrate on getting the horrible feeling of a panic attack out. He already sensed the fastening heart-beat pulsating in his ears and the corners of his vision getting blurry.
“You looked like a one eager to help us.”
Yuki swallowed loudly and opened his mouth, feeling it too dry to say anything sensible. “I… I…”
“Do we have a problem here?” Yuki hardly heard it, and if he did he didn’t understand it or see who caused the sentence. Although the speaker didn’t seem too happy.
Without Yuki or the bullies noticing it they had gathered a lot of attention with their little conflict. Also that kind of attention the bullies wouldn’t want to get. They turned to face the one who dared to disturb them, but backed up after seeing the most popular boy of the whole school.
Ko~Ji stared at the bullies, glancing at both of then alternately, hands on his hips and demanding sparkle in his eyes.
“No”, the other one said, backing up even more, out of Yuki’s sight. Not that Yuki would see anything anyway, he was blind at the shock. He didn’t see anything, neither did he hear. The only sense he still had left was the feeling, so someone had to slap him to get him back in this world.
Ko~Ji moved forward, passing the bullies who willingly stepped further away and soon walked off. The pink-haired knelt before Yuki, tilting his head to the side as the younger student didn’t respond in any way. Yuki laid on the ground staring forward and breathing like a one who had just run for miles.
“Oi, are you alright?” Ko~Ji waved his hand in front of Yuki’s sight. Still no respond. The pink-haired student noticed a slight glisten in the younger one’s eyes, but he wasn’t sure what was it.
Shun and Toshiya, Ko~Ji’s long-timed friends joined him in looking at the black-haired boy. They stood in both sided of him and stared down on those two.
“I think he’s dead”, the shorter one, Toshiya, answered without the asked question.
“He’s not dead. He’s just a bit shocked.” Shun responded. Of course he was smarter than the stupid bassist.
“A bit? Do you call that ‘a bit’? He does not respond in any of our tries. He has fallen into coma.”
“Please, some sympathy here. You would be like that too after that kind of a treatment.”
“I would not”, Toshiya snorted and hit the drummer to the arm. “Stupid drummer.”
“Shut up you brainless bassist.”
“Shut up you both!” Ko~Ji’s yell woke up the arguers and they paid attention to the dead-like boy on the ground again. The pink-haired leader thought they should soon wake the younger one up before he would get a heart attack. The boy’s pulsation had not gotten any calmer by this point and Ko~Ji was concerned of the younger one’s health.
The pink-haired slapped his hands together once in front of Yuki’s eyes. This seemed to wake the younger one up for he jumped almost back to his feet from the ground.
Almost, but not quite. He just managed to hit his head again to the wall while trying to get farther away from Ko~Ji who glanced at him curiously.
“Are you alright?” Ko~Ji repeated his question which he had asked before and hadn’t got any answer. Yuki was still shocked and seeing the pink-haired, popular boy in front of him, taking care of him, didn’t help at all.
Yuki felt himself blushing and he lowered his head to hide it from the others around him. Something inside of his stomach made the red colour rise upon his cheeks, maybe it was the tickling feeling there. Yuki didn’t know what it was, but he nodded. “Y-yes.”
Yuki couldn’t see it in his embarrassment, but Ko~Ji wore a one-sided, rare smile just for him. Soon the pink-haired stood up and gave his hand towards Yuki, encouraging the younger one to grab on it.
When Yuki was sure the red shade on his cheeks had disappeared completely, he dared to take a hold on Ko~Ji’s hand and pull himself up with a little help of Ko~Ji’s.
Yuki had never realised it, but Ko~Ji was smaller than he had expected. The pink-haired boy was almost ten centimetres shorter than he, and he also looked quite more feminine at a short distance. Yuki found himself glaring at Ko~Ji’s hands: they were slender and girlish, not like man’s hands at all. Even though Yuki’s face wasn’t too willing to fulfil the command in his thoughts, Yuki still smiled inside of his own mind.
Soon Ko~Ji let go of the younger one’s hand. The other felt his palm empty and cold after the warm contact with another of the same kind. He already missed the feeling of holding the pink-haired boy’s hand in his own. Yuki didn’t even notice when Ko~Ji disappeared from his sight as soon as he had appeared in it.
He was soon awaken from this day dream by Toshiya, who tapped him on his chest. Also Toshiya was shorter than he, but not as much as Ko~Ji. Yuki was amazed by that.
“What’s your name?” the bassist asked, Shun staring at Yuki behind him. Yuki lowered his gaze one more, for he thought he had no right to face the older students.
“Yu-Yuki”, the younger student answered and bowed politely.
Both Toshiya and Shun smiled to him. They both wore a friendly grin, like knowing something he didn’t, but willingly tell him soon about it.
“Well, Yuki-kun, you must know Ko~Ji doesn’t save people he doesn’t like”, Toshiya started, smirking at himself and glancing over his shoulder at Shun, who continued: “So we might meet soon again.”
They left Yuki thinking about their words. The younger student didn’t understand what had just happened. He stood there for minutes, for plenty of them. Not until people again started to pay attention to him he finally realised to move, and decided to walk home instead of reading anymore today.
***
Next morning Yuki tried to convince himself the episode the day before hadn’t happened and it had just been a bad dream. Or a good one. The black-haired didn’t know which. He didn’t want to think about it, but the repetition in his head forced him to.
“It didn’t happen. It didn’t happen. Today is a day just like the other days before this. Please let it be true. Let this be an usual day.” Yuki begged and prayed, face lifted up towards the blue sky, but the morning sun dazzled him so he had to turn his eyes back down.
Like this he always walked: taking an eye contact more with the ground he stepped on than giving a look at the others in the yard. Yuki feared if he looked at the others, they would look at him. He saw no friendliness in people’s eyes when they glanced at him, and it was just fine as long as Yuki didn’t know it. But as soon as he lifted his eyes… then, a bunch of disliking eyes were already on him, criticising his appearance, his behaviour. And once again he ended up to be a carpet for the others, the fabric to step on with no regrets or any bad feelings.
Like this he had always been, and like this he would always be.
“Yuki!”
As soon as the black-haired heard his name being called he tried to locate the shouter, find it in the middle of a large group of boys and girls. And who was in the middle? No other than Ko~Ji.
Yuki opened his mouth surprised but poor boy forgot to watch his steps. Sooner than he realised he already lay on the dirty ground, face as well as hands scratched by the small rocks on the yard.
“I begged for a normal day”, he whispered and bit his lower lip, hearing laughter around him. That’s what it had always been. They made fun of him. When the others fell, their friends came immediately to help them. But when he fell… the others just laughed. Because he had no friends. He had no one to ask if he was alright. He had no one to give a hand to him, to help him back up and smile to him.
Yuki felt bitter tears in his eyes but didn’t want to show them. There were still others in the yard, and he sure wasn’t going to show them his disappointment at his life.
“Are you alright?”
The question bewildered him and seized him with a feeling of déjà-vu. This had happened before. He had heard that question before. Something in him, something in the familiar voice made him do something he would have never done in this situation. Normally he would have just gotten up and walked away.
Now he looked at the one who had talked to him.
He met pink hair and cat-like, almost black eyes. Those eyes stunned him. They perforated him completely, penetrated into his innermost, examined his thoughts, found the most secret ones. Yuki had never let anyone look at him that long, but it seemed the time around him and Ko~Ji had stopped suddenly. He wanted to stay in this moment, under those almond shaped eyes. More than forever.
“Does he do that often?” Toshiya had appeared behind Ko~Ji and glanced at stunned Yuki who had left his mouth open in surprise. Toshiya almost waited for drool starting to flow. “I think he fell into coma again.”
“Shut up, Toshiya”, now also Shun had joined the group staring at Yuki, but the drummer was clearly more aware of what was going on in Yuki’s head. He even smiled at him, even though Yuki couldn’t see it. His eyes were fixed on Ko~Ji’s, and right now he felt there was nothing else what he should bother to look at than the pink-haired boy’s eyes.
Ko~Ji did exactly what he had done just a day before: he waved his hand in front of Yuki’s eyes to check out if the younger student was still conscious.
This time Yuki responded. He blinked few times and threw furtive looks around like he had just found himself in a totally unknown place.
As soon as he seemed to remember where he was Yuki grabbed on his schoolbag, starting to collect items flung onto the ground when he had fallen.
Soon a feminine hand joined him in the gathering of stuff. Yuki stopped just to stare at the hand, and just a moment later it’s owner.
Ko~Ji had picked up one of his books and was now holding it out for him, waiting him to take it.
Yuki swallowed hard and loudly but took the book, nodding to the one holding it before him.
Suddenly, like in a bad romance movie, Yuki’s and Ko~Ji’s hands touched each other when the younger gripped on the book.
Yuki held his breath daring not to draw his hand away from the connection between him and the pink haired one. Every hundredth of a second in that touch sent a new trembling electric shock through his hand - causing it to shiver uncontrollable - all the way down to the bottom of his stomach.
He remembered reading about this from a book; yes, of course from a book, which told about love and romance between a man and a woman. They held each other’s hands and suddenly every mistake in the world felt so right and correct, and not a mistake anymore at all. That moment caressed and stroked, it gazed lovingly. And when they were in that moment, completely in it, they wanted it to continue forever. Shudders ran through their bodies, making a warm feeling rise up from their stomach. After that even the cold winter night felt the most comfortable place ever as long as they were able to hold each other.
They called it “love”.
But there was no man or woman: there was only he and Ko~Ji. So what was it then, for all love had to be between the man and the woman.
Yuki didn’t know and he didn’t want to stay to find out. His world, the world of lonely studying, the world of the others who had just given this life, this world, to him, and he just lived it for them, would be shot down if he ever found out there was other kind of love: Not love between man and woman, but love between him and Ko~Ji.
His life was too familiar and too safe to be killed like that. It kept him safe, it kept him unharmed. Love hurts, he had heard, and Yuki never got hurt. And if he did, so he had decided, it wouldn’t be by Ko~Ji.
Yuki took the book from Ko~Ji’s hand, thrusting it carelessly back into the bag. Refusing to meet the seducing eyes the younger student rose up, taking a hold on the ground to support the movement, and left. He felt the eyes following him curiously, confused, but Yuki had no will to turn and meet them. It would just end up in another coma -like fixation.
The bag in his arms he fled from the situation, escaped from explaining, found himself in the middle of desks in an empty classroom. Curtains were pulled in front of the windows to avoid sunlight getting into the room to heat it up. The room was dark and looked cooler than the air outside.
Yuki sighed, dropped the bag of his on one of the desks and fell on his knees onto the cold floor. There he sat for a moment before moving himself sitting back against the wall behind him.
Finding his own toes very interesting Yuki stared at them and thought about all the things happened during these two days. However he thought about it, past two days still felt unnatural and like a dream.
He had always contented to look at Ko~Ji with a distance between him and the pink haired one, distance like the one between a human and God. He had contented to admire Ko~Ji’s beauty from far away, like the moon in the sky. He had never believed he could touch the moon. He never had never thought about it, so he didn’t know what he was missing. But the God had decided to take a contact with those who believed in him, and the moon had gotten down to be touched.
Suddenly Yuki felt humiliated and paranoid. The thing Ko~Ji was doing to him was not because the older student suddenly felt a need to help him, but because he wanted to make Yuki look ridiculous in front of the whole school as he thought Ko~Ji might like him.
And what Ko~Ji was doing to him already. Yuki stared at the clock on the wall, realising he was again cutting a class. And because of what? Ko~Ji! The younger student made the decision not to take any contact with Ko~Ji anymore today. He didn’t even want to see the pink haired one.
Taking a hold on the wall Yuki rose up, grabbed on his bag and ran out to search the next class and next lesson.
He walked in the middle of the other students talking and laughing all over the hallway. Yuki seemed to be the only one walking alone. Even the ugly ones had found theirselves in a group of the other ugly ones. And Yuki wasn’t even ugly! Actually, even though he was skinny and not very muscular - or not muscular at all - he had to admit he was not ugly. He was more like feminine. He just happened to own long legs and a flat stomach.
Still he had to walk alone, separated from the other students. There was no possibility of getting inside of one of the groups. Except…
“Ko~Ji!” Yuki gasped as he saw the older student walking around the corner and heading his steps right towards the place where Yuki was. The younger one felt a sudden need to change the direction where he was going. Quickly, hoping he was not seen yet, he jumped behind another corner, pressed his back against the cold wall just like moments before and closed his eyes.
“Please go away, please go away”, Yuki’s heart was pouncing in his chest like a frog on a trampoline. It hurt, but the younger one couldn’t let even the most silent whimper out of his throat. He heard his rapid pulsation in his ears, louder than ever before, and thought about the possibility of Ko~Ji to hear it.
He dared to glance around the corner to the hallway, seeing Ko~Ji, Toshiya and Shun behind him, standing there just few meters distance between him and the black haired student in panic. Ko~Ji’s eyes mistook to look at the direction of Yuki’s, and the younger one disappeared soon back on the other side of the corner.
“I’m fucking going to lock myself up in a cellar and grow a beard”, he panted and searched for a place to hide. He wouldn’t take a change for Ko~Ji to find him standing there, looking like a paranoid rat. Once again he glanced at the hallway and almost vomited his heart out after seeing Ko~Ji moving again and coming closer with his two fellows. “Yes! A beard! Ko~Ji won’t recognize me if I have a beard!”
After whispering that aloud Yuki run straight to the door of the boy’s rest room, thrusting inside and hiding himself in one of the cubicles. Adrenaline ran through his veins, causing him to pant and stupid ideas pop in his mind carelessly.
He leaned against the locked door, holding a hand on his chest. Why did his heart bounce like this? Why was he so afraid of facing Ko~Ji? Yuki groaned and hit his head once against the pure white wall. Somewhere far he heard a sound of a door opening and closing, but it was toned down by the sound of his own heart beating his ears. His pulse was now calmer, but Yuki was positive his heart was closer to his throat than his chest.
“I’m going to be late”, he whispered, noticing that after he had met Ko~Ji he had started to talk to himself. Normally he talked to no one, not even himself. But truly, if he planed to manage arriving the lesson early he had to leave the rest room right now. “And I really must consider locking myself up in the cellar…”
He opened the cubicle door slightly, just to close it quickly again. The first sight he had seen was the bright pink hair in front of the mirror on the opposite wall, the owner of them washing his hands.
“..If I ever get there!” The black haired boy cursed. He should have known better. It was always his luck, this kind of episodes. Sometimes he felt lonely and wanted company, but later on he had gotten used to the fact there was no one who wanted to spend time with him. He was boring. He always just studied, read, read more, studied more, did homework, talked about school and read even more.
And sometimes he played guitar. His parents had tried to explain him that music is not healthy, music didn’t help him to get a good job, music didn’t help him studying. Music did nothing for his future. With a verbal pressure they had tried to force him to give up the guitar, but Yuki hadn’t agreed with it.
Maybe his guitar didn’t do any good for his life, but it was his life.
Maybe he wasn’t going to be a rock star, but a boring salesman, when he’d grow up, but at least he could sometimes forget all the hurry and reading and concentrate in the music he made. The sound caused by the meeting of his fingers and the guitar’s strings relaxed him, and sucked all the stress out of him. The stress was replaced by the feeling of peace and calmness. After playing a while, few notes, Yuki could take all the pressure of work and school things again without collapsing under them.
Again Yuki heard how the door opened and closed, and the rest room was once again quiet, holding no one else in but the black haired one only. He sighed in relief and for once dared to open the door. Feeling quite jumpy Yuki left the rest room, glancing rapidly around the hallway which was empty. Lessons had already started, and he was late again. Already three classes missed because of Ko~Ji. Now he really didn’t want to meet the other boy, for he wasn’t good for his plans of future.
Yuki wandered around the corridors, searching for the class of the next lesson. He was sure there was no others on the corridor, until he tried to turn off around the corner and literally bumped into Toshiya.
“Oi, Yuki-kun!” Toshiya laughed and tapped Yuki onto his shoulder. Yuki wanted to scream and run away, for where Toshiya was, there was also Shun, and where both Shun and Toshiya were, there was Ko~Ji.
But he only managed to open his mouth to scream before Toshiya spoke: “Ko~Ji searched you everywhere! He wants you to come to our training apartment tonight. You knew we have a band?”
Yuki closed his mouth but cursed again in his mind. He couldn’t go near to Ko~Ji, it was just unbearable torturing, watching those beautiful shapes and seductive eyes. Yuki wanted to scream again that he didn’t want to see those three ever again. But Toshiya didn’t give him time to do that either.
“I give you the address”, the bassist said with a happy tone of voice. Toshiya always seemed to be happy. It was sometimes bothering the people around him, and those who didn’t know Toshiya thought he was just a pretender. But it was not true: Toshiya really was always happy. His mind was so simple that it didn’t notice the difference between the bad day and the good day, and everything was just butterflies, flowers, sunshine and puppy dogs for him.
Now the shorter boy was searching for a paper from his school bag, as well as a pen too, finding them after digging under the books. He wrote the address to the paper and gave it to Yuki, who politely took it.
“Ko~Ji will be very disappointed if you don’t come”, Toshiya informed and waved his hand to the black haired boy. “so, see you tonight!”
The bassist was gone sooner than Yuki realised what he had said. Of course he didn’t want Ko~Ji to get disappointed, especially not because of him. But he still couldn’t face the older student. What would it become? When would his mind give up? When would he collapse under the secret and shout what he felt when Ko~Ji was around?
Hope it wasn’t tonight…
***
Yuki swallowed in front of the wooden door. He knew he should knock, but in a fear of facing Ko~Ji he just couldn’t force his hand to rise and touch the surface. The shivering hand held a piece of paper in front of him and even though he knew this was the right address he still hoped it wouldn’t be. If he knocked and someone totally stranger to him would come and open the door, he could just say “Sorry, I got lost”, and go back home. That way he could avoid meeting the pink haired boy again.
But of course he was too nice and too curious to do that. He wanted to know why Ko~Ji wanted him there so badly, that when he hadn’t met him personally he had sent Toshiya to get him there.
So Yuki knocked with a trembling hand, hoping the door would get opened by an old woman who had never seen him before and didn’t know anything about Ko~Ji.
Poor boy got disappointed in that thing, but he really didn’t know if he truly was disappointed when he met the calm eyes of his idol.
An arrogant smile soon decorated Ko~Ji’s lips as he saw Yuki behind the door. That smile was so hot and intensive that Yuki felt his face burning, his blood boiling and his legs melting. Though he refused to admit it.
“I thought you were coming. You didn’t want to let me down. Come on inside.” Ko~Ji stepped aside to let the younger student in. It took a while from Yuki to realise what the movement meant, but under the pink haired boy’s curious eyes he soon found out and walked - hardly - in. All the way from the outside to inside he was afraid his legs would fail him and he would fall in front of Ko~Ji. That would be humiliating and embarrassing, even though Yuki thought it might be just what Ko~Ji wanted.
Bitterly he bit his lower lip and tried to banish the bad thoughts from his mind. Ko~Ji had treated him so well, better than anyone in a long time, so he had no right to throw doubt on the older boy.
Yuki and Ko~Ji, together, reached the room where Shun and Toshiya were already practising. They both waved at him, treated him like he was their friend, even though they didn’t know him and he didn’t know them. What made them so friendly?
The black haired boy soon noticed Toshiya held a bass in his hands and tuned up it’s strings and Toshiya were twirling drumsticks in his hands. Toshiya were the bassist and Shun the drummer.
A guitar lay against the wall away from the other instruments and as Ko~Ji got amongst the others he didn’t grab on it. Yuki concluded they were missing a guitarist. What a nice coincidence.
Soon Shun came to him and first time after he had gotten there the younger boy dared to speak: “Where’s your guitarist?”
“That part is still a bit incomplete”, Shun said within a laughter, looking a bit uneasy with the given question.
“He means we have no guitarist”, Ko~Ji informed, standing next to Toshiya but glancing at Shun and Yuki. Yuki couldn’t tell what was that look in the older boy’s almond eyes, but it wasn’t happy. Maybe… jealousy? After all, Ko~Ji was the only one who Yuki didn’t dare to speak to. He had spoken to both Toshiya and Shun, and even found Shun a very nice person.
Yuki transferred his eyes to stare at his toes and with a lots of self-pressuring he managed to say: “I… I can play guitar… a bit.” As soon as he had said it, he regretted it. For again he felt those almond-shaped eyes on him, and heard a soft, encouraging and friendly voice saying: “Yuki-kun, come here.”
Yuki had no will nor want to refuse the invitation, but he stared at the floor the whole way he walked next to Ko~Ji. When being so interested in the carpet he didn’t even saw how Ko~Ji picked up the guitar lying against the wall and lifted the band of it over his head.
Yuki shivered and shuddered more than ever as he felt Ko~Ji bustle around him, tuning up the strings and adjust the band matching for him. Few times the pink haired one’s hand touched some part of Yuki’s body and the younger one had to use all his willpower to stay still and keep silent when he just wanted to fall on the floor and sigh in a strange kind of pleasure.
Then Ko~Ji left, but just to get a music stand and the music in front of him. For Yuki’s bad the other had decided to guide him from behind his back.
“So you can play guitar, eh? There… I assume you can read notes.” Ko~Ji turned few papers from the music book, hand moving right next to Yuki’s shoulder. Every time the other shifted his hand from previous page to the next one he was afraid that the hand might touch him in some point. And what would he do after so many touches?
Yuki was too afraid to breath normally, but he gasped and panted whenever he remembered as important operation as breathing.
He missed most of the things going on around him, like Ko~Ji’s explanation where he should start to play and Shun’s pitying gaze towards him. He even missed Toshiya’s “He looks like he’s going to be sick.” He just stared forward with widened eyes and concentrated in keeping himself sane.
When Ko~Ji had finished Yuki woke up from his coma and looked embarrassed after not listening to his idol.
“I’m sorry, could I play something from my memory?” He tried, because there was no way he could admit he wasn’t listening to Ko~Ji at all. He was just a man, he couldn’t concentrate in two things at the same time: Listening to someone and keeping himself from going crazy. So he had decided to stay somewhat calm and abandon the listening, that was the best for all of them.
“Sure”, Ko~Ji responded, though Yuki heard from his voice the older one was wondering his behaviour.
So Yuki played. Played a familiar song to him which he knew he could play in any kind of situation, anytime, anywhere. He played it well, as always, but this time he had to close his eyes from the audience. He was afraid he might play wrong if he saw Ko~Ji looking at him. And he wanted to do his best in front of the pink haired boy. But he just always got so nervous near him, hundreds of stupid butterflies flying in his stomach and tickling him so nicely. Always, when Ko~Ji was near him, looking at him.
He let the music take over his mind, moving all the other things aside. When Yuki played, everything else but the notes he played were unimportant. The music floated, it flied, it hovered. It was in him, on him, next to him, under him, behind him, around him, within him. Right after he had played the first notes he had felt how his body had relaxed and given up all the tension.
And when the song was over, the feeling lasted, making Yuki for once self-confident and relaxed no matter what fellowship he was in.
He opened his eyes and saw Ko~Ji’s impressed expression, and soon, started by the pink haired one, all three started to applaud to his performance. Soon the self-confidence was gone, and Yuki felt shy again, though he tried to hide it with his hand.
“You are good!” Ko~Ji praised and Yuki felt he was blushing all over from face to toes. He had never imagined he could be praised, not by Ko~Ji. Not by someone he though was so much better than him. He nodded but kept sure no one saw his flushed face and without answering he headed his steps towards the near couch, falling on it and taking a deep breath when he was able to do it.
“I’ll go get something to drink. You look exhausted.” Ko~Ji nodded to Yuki and smiled a wide, pleased smile. Because of that smile Yuki was about to lose his self-control totally and just kneel down to the floor and whimper like a hungry puppy dog. He had been so many times on the edge of loosing his mind in front of Ko~Ji, so there was no way he was going to last for long anymore.
But the pink haired was gone before Yuki had time to loose his mind. And it was good, Yuki thought.
Shun found his way next to Yuki and sat on the couch. He glanced at the younger one for a moment, guessing the other one had something to tell him.
And so he had.
“Shun-san… I… my friend has a problem”, Yuki stammered, trying to find the right words to tell his own problem without revealing it was him who was in trouble.
“Tell me”, the drummer encouraged.
“Uh… my friend… he…” the black haired youngster knew he sounded desperate, but he had to go on. “He told me about a strange feeling. Every time he’s near someone… a special one… he feels something strange. It’s like… a thousand sparkles in his stomach, and they tickle nicely. So he told me. The tickling spreads all over his body, causing him to feel warm and secured, but then again, really vulnerable and shy around that special one. What is that feeling?”
Shun smiled in an understanding way, nodding towards Toshiya who had bent down over a table to make some coffee.
“Oi, Toshiya, what is the strange feeling in a stomach?”
“Vomiting?”
“No! The other one!”
“Ah! Love!”
Shun turned again towards Yuki and smiled. “This feeling of your friend’s is called ‘love’.”
Toshiya soon joined them, holding a cup of fresh coffee in his hands. “Your friend didn’t know what is love?” The bassist laughed and took a sip of his drink, laughing even more after that. “I mean… how someone can be that stupid?”
Yuki smiled awkwardly and looked at the drummer beside him, who stared murderously towards the bassist. Yuki was positive Shun had understood the problem wasn’t about his friend, but Yuki himself.
“Where did your friend live? In a shoebox?”
“Probably in the same shoebox as you do”, Shun responded instead of Yuki and gave the final warning gaze towards the bassist, who finally saw it and understood to quiet down even though he didn’t understand what he had done wrong.
Soon Ko~Ji came back, holding a tray with a four glasses and a can of water on it. Yuki had already got rid of the red colour on his cheeks, but it returned as Ko~Ji poured some cold water in one of the glasses, giving it to Yuki with a wide smile. The younger boy had followed Ko~Ji in the school so intensively, that he knew Ko~Ji had never smiled that much during one day. And now he had seen it plenty of times. That divine smile.
Yuki drank the whole glass empty within a one swallow, standing up from the couch. He walked to the table where the coffee-pot stood silently, filling his glass with the dark brown liquid. He just needed to get away from Ko~Ji.
At the same time the pink-haired had stolen his place and was no sitting next to Shun, who looked at him, knowing something he didn’t.
“Do you like him?”
“What?” Ko~Ji had missed the question when following Yuki’s moves in front of the table.
“Do you like him?” The drummer repeated.
“He’s nice”, the vocalist shrugged his shoulders in respond and drank some of the water he had brought.
“Don’t lie to me, Ko~Ji. I’ve known you a long time and I know you’re not telling me everything.”
“I told you he’s nice.”
“You’re doing it again.”
“What?”
“Lying to me. I keep asking you until you answer me what I want to hear and what I know is true.”
“He’s really nice, and a good guitarist.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Ko~Ji started to lose his temper. He hated when people were pressuring him and telling him what he should do. Even when it was one of his best friends.
“What do you want to hear then?”
“Ko~Ji, do you like him?”
That was the last drop in the full bucket of irritation, and now it was flowing over.
“Yes! Yes, for God’s sake! I like Yuki!” When the whole room, all others in there were staring at him, Ko~Ji realised he had said his thoughts too loud. Suddenly there was embarrassed Shun, laughing Toshiya and horrified Yuki. Especially he was irritated by the laughing bassist, who was soon silenced by the drummer who took the spoon from Toshiya’s cup and thrust it in the bassist’s nose.
Yuki was really shocked. He didn’t know what to think, but he did know he wanted away from here.
“I… I must go…” he stuttered and as quickly as he just could he ran out of the house, leaving the atmosphere more than awkward.
For a moment the three left behind stood in a silence, Shun because of embarrassment, Toshiya because he was trying to get the spoon out of his nose and Ko~Ji because he didn’t want to admit he had done or said something wrong.
Shun broke the silence.
“Go after him.” The sentence was pointed at the pink haired vocalist, who stared at Shun in confusion.
“What?”
“Go after him, now.” The drummer looked really demanding, and pointed at the door. Ko~Ji was the leader of their band, but if Shun wanted something really badly, he always got what he wanted.
“But I can’t…”
“Ko~Ji, I’m sick of this!” Shun stood up and suddenly he looked so much taller than he truly was. “You never accept anyone of our guitarists! You always turn them back with your cold attitude! And there goes a fucking perfect guitarist who even you like! So start running now or I’m going to push my drumsticks into a place where the sun does not shine in!”
Ko~Ji had no other options but to obey and leave the apartment. He didn’t want to find out where Shun was going to thrust his drumsticks if Ko~Ji didn’t get Yuki back. For his own health he had to.
…and because he had really meant what he had said: he liked the younger one.
Glad Yuki had not gone too far and Ko~Ji could still see where the black haired one was walking. He started running, to reach the other.
“Yuki!”
Yuki turned around and saw Ko~Ji moving towards him with an amazing speed.
“No, no no no, don’t follow me”, he whispered and followed his idol’s example: started running to get away from Ko~Ji.
He ran the whole way to the first traffic lights and cursed the red light shining above his head. He stood in front of the crossing and stared intensively at the lights.
“Come on, come on… turn already!” He had no time to stand there! Ko~Ji would soon reach him.
For a moment he reconsidered he could try to talk with the older one, but the idea was soon gone. He could never really talk to Ko~Ji. It was the same as trying to talk to a God! Yuki was not worth it, he didn’t deserve it.
“You know, normal people just walk ahead without caring about the red light.”
Yuki’s heart jumped from his chest to his mouth and he had to swallow it back. A familiar voice next to him almost caused a heart attach.
Ko~Ji stood there, looking at him, without even panting after the running. He really was in a good shape and condition.
“Don’t run, Yuki-chan. We really need to talk.”
***
Yuki followed Ko~Ji into a close park, and when the pink haired sat on the bench he did too. He trembled carelessly, swallowing once in a while his heard from his throat back to his chest. It tried to escape, leave him behind. His heart wanted to suffer alone without the suffering body. This was too much for it.
“Yuki-chan, why do you run?” Ko~Ji bent forwards, leaning his elbows against his knees and glancing at Yuki, who hoped the older one would turn his eyes away from him. He couldn’t stand the stare of the older student, he couldn’t take the glare of the divine eyes. He melted under it, he melted under the heavenly look. And the look always made him shiver, shiver from coldness, shiver from hotness. Shiver from the feeling of perfection. “You have never talked to me, not even when I tried. Do I scare you? I assure you, I’m not that bad person…”
“No, Ko~Ji-san”, even though Yuki had to admit he was scared of Ko~Ji, scared like hell, it wasn’t that kind of fear he knew Ko~Ji was talking about.
“Is it because you don’t like me? I’m sorry if I shocked you by saying…”
“No, definitely not.” He knew he should explain. Ko~Ji sounded really desperate, not as arrogant and self-confident anymore. Yuki started to sense some human features in him, which made his heart beat even faster.
“Ko~Ji-san… I don’t know what it is. I really don’t know. But every time you are close to me, every time you talk to me, I feel strange. That strange feeling makes me run. Makes me avoid you, because I can’t face it. That strange feeling is a mixture of fear and pleasure. I’m used to look at you from far, and suddenly you are there, talking to me and taking contact. I’ve never even dared to wish for that!” Yuki sighed and leaned his back against the wooden bench. He felt tears in his eyes, but didn’t know why he was crying. He sensed Ko~Ji was still keeping the unbreakable, earnest stare on him. It gave him more energy to continue. “Shun-san told it was love. But it can’t be love! I’ve read a book about love! Love is between a man and a woman. But there is no woman here. There’s just you and me. So it is not love, is it?”
For now Yuki turned his eyes from the night sky to the older student and saw a gentle smile floating on his lips.
“Yuki-chan, you read way too much. You should stop it.” After saying that Ko~Ji stood up from the bench, giving a signal to Yuki to rise up too. “We should go back. Shun and Toshiya are waiting for us, Shun hopefully not with the drumsticks.”
Yuki didn’t completely understand the last sentence, but he stood up anyway, stepping next to the shorter boy.
For a while they walked next to each other, without even looking at the one beside. Yuki almost fainted when he felt Ko~Ji’s hand in his, the older one thrusting his fingers through Yuki’s.
Yuki blushed, glancing at Ko~Ji carefully.
And he got something from Ko~Ji what he had never gotten before:
A friendly gaze.
***
The end. Comments and criticism would be nice <3 Although I apologize my bad English. English is not my native, you must understand that when reading this.
Author: Yuugi (
tsuki_no_yuugi)
Band: Arc
Paring: Ko~Ji/Yuki
Rating: PG/PG-13
Genre: Romance, drama, RPS, fluff, oneshot, slash
Warnings: Slash, bad English
Disclaimer: I do not, in any state, own Arc or any of it's members, even though I love Ko~Ji alot <3
Summary: How did Yuki enter Arc? Yuki is already used to be the carpet of the other people, to be the one who the others walk over. But even he has a dream, a dream to be someone like his idol. His idol is a beauty always living far away from Yuki, but what happens, when the distant beauty comes really close to Yuki’s life?
Yuki watched. Yuki always just watched. He never did, or said, he just watched. Yuki was those boys who did well in school, but in life they never got what they dreamed of, because they were there to be stepped over by others. Yuki was one of those living carpets. People walked over them and they never said anything to change it.
Persons like Yuki always admired older students in high-school. Persons like Yuki had a dream of becoming and growing up into something like their idols were. But also persons like Yuki never became. They were too submissive to become something they wanted, so they became something someone else wanted them to become.
Sometimes it lasted for few years. Sometimes it took the whole life. Yuki were one of them who were born to grow up what his parents and friends wanted him to. Yuki was exposed to influences, because he just couldn’t stand against someone else’s opinion. Inside of his precisely guarded mind, which he never revealed to the public eyes, Yuki dreamed about a free life where he could decide what he did, with who he did and when he did.
Just like Ko~Ji.
Even though Yuki was not in high-school anymore, but in university school, he still had that older student to be admired. And the one holding the honour in Yuki’s heart was Ko~Ji.
Ko~Ji was a one year older than Yuki, good looking and smart young man. Yuki thought Ko~Ji and his bright pink hair didn’t fit in the atmosphere of the university; Ko~Ji looked like he knew what he wanted from life, and he should have been already carrying it out.
But there he stood, on the yard of the school, surrounded by a large amount of worshipers and fans. Both of the genders admired Ko~Ji: Girls were competing over his heart which belonged to no one, and each and everyone of them wanted to be the first one to win that man’s love. Then again, boys wanted to know the secret of his coolness and self-confidence, and how did he get all those chicks around him without paying attention in doing it.
Ko~Ji loved being the centre of attention, but he gave no personal notice to anyone. He hardly bothered looking at someone more than once, and if he did, that someone should have been really proud of himself to get that much attention from him.
Even though Ko~Ji held a bunch of so-called “followers” under his name, there were only few ones who dared to call themselves Ko~Ji’s friends. Two of those few ones were his bandmates, Toshiya and Shun. They were on the same class with Ko~Ji, in the same age with him, and both very popular and wanted in the girls’ minds. But not as much as Ko~Ji was. Ko~Ji seduced the girls like a light of a lamp seduces moths. He didn’t have to say or do anything, and anyway they swarmed around him.
Yuki dreamed he could be like Ko~Ji one day.
The day when the exact story starts did not begin in a very unusual way. It was a sunny day in may and half of the students had decided to study outside because of the rising heat. The “studying outside” meant sitting under cherry trees and enjoying the fine weather.
Yuki was the only one inside reading for the next course to pass it. He admitted it was hot even when the windows were wide open, but he didn’t want to know what his parents thought if they knew he was cutting a class. They would not be proud, Yuki knew that, and what he most wanted to do was to please his parents. And everyone dear to him. He wanted to graduate with good grades to get a good job and live a good life. His parents wanted that too. A good life. Sometimes Yuki mistook to think maybe he didn’t want the good life which his parents were planning for him. He mistook to think maybe he wanted a life of his own. But it went away quite quickly as he saw the happy smiles of his mother and father as he brought home a test with a good grade and not a single mistake. Just one after another.
Yuki heard sound from outside, happy laughing and talking, and he turned his head to look out of the open window. In less than a second he found the familiar group in the middle of the yard: Ko~Ji and his followers. The pink-haired boy stood out in a crowd like a single flower in the middle of the grass.
Yuki stared at him, forgetting the open book on the desk in front of him.
“Yuki-kun, shouldn’t you go out too?”
The black-haired wrenched his eyes away from the crowd outside as his teacher talked to him. Yuki smiled slightly for a moment, gathered his items and arranged them neatly inside of his simple, black bag. He bowed to his teacher and left the class.
Yuki walked through the doors leading outside thinking about the possibility of reading off of the class. It was not such a bad idea, he guessed, and headed his steps under the most distant cherry tree of the whole yard. Yuki had no friends in this school and he wasn’t too eager of making a one. He was felt comfortable as long as he could avoid the contact with other students as well as they avoided him.
This is the point where the usual day starts to turn unusual.
Yuki hadn’t taken much of steps before two older students picked him up as a victim of not so friendly attention.
The black-haired noticed those two walking towards him, and tried to escape from them. Yuki’s try of avoiding contact failed, and the two older ones pushed him against the wall of the school building.
Yuki was a skinny young boy and he had no strength to refuse the strong push on him. He hit the back of his head against the wall and slid down along it to the ground. He couldn’t believe these things still happened to him. Yuki had always been the opponent of bullying because he was weak and never said anything against it: he was everybody’s carpet, able to be walked over, and he didn’t even whine. He never whined. Never. But at least he had thought in university it would stop. These students were grown ups, not children anymore. Guess he was wrong, and he was right about to learn it painfully.
“We just thought a bit here… we are kinda out of money, and because we have lots of dues we thought maybe you could… borrow as a bit?” The other one said, sadistic smile decorating his lips. Yuki shivered under that smile, for he didn’t want to know what kind of ideas swan under it. It could be anything. Still he wasn’t able to make any sound against them.
Few head had turned towards them, but Yuki didn’t see it. He had to concentrate on getting the horrible feeling of a panic attack out. He already sensed the fastening heart-beat pulsating in his ears and the corners of his vision getting blurry.
“You looked like a one eager to help us.”
Yuki swallowed loudly and opened his mouth, feeling it too dry to say anything sensible. “I… I…”
“Do we have a problem here?” Yuki hardly heard it, and if he did he didn’t understand it or see who caused the sentence. Although the speaker didn’t seem too happy.
Without Yuki or the bullies noticing it they had gathered a lot of attention with their little conflict. Also that kind of attention the bullies wouldn’t want to get. They turned to face the one who dared to disturb them, but backed up after seeing the most popular boy of the whole school.
Ko~Ji stared at the bullies, glancing at both of then alternately, hands on his hips and demanding sparkle in his eyes.
“No”, the other one said, backing up even more, out of Yuki’s sight. Not that Yuki would see anything anyway, he was blind at the shock. He didn’t see anything, neither did he hear. The only sense he still had left was the feeling, so someone had to slap him to get him back in this world.
Ko~Ji moved forward, passing the bullies who willingly stepped further away and soon walked off. The pink-haired knelt before Yuki, tilting his head to the side as the younger student didn’t respond in any way. Yuki laid on the ground staring forward and breathing like a one who had just run for miles.
“Oi, are you alright?” Ko~Ji waved his hand in front of Yuki’s sight. Still no respond. The pink-haired student noticed a slight glisten in the younger one’s eyes, but he wasn’t sure what was it.
Shun and Toshiya, Ko~Ji’s long-timed friends joined him in looking at the black-haired boy. They stood in both sided of him and stared down on those two.
“I think he’s dead”, the shorter one, Toshiya, answered without the asked question.
“He’s not dead. He’s just a bit shocked.” Shun responded. Of course he was smarter than the stupid bassist.
“A bit? Do you call that ‘a bit’? He does not respond in any of our tries. He has fallen into coma.”
“Please, some sympathy here. You would be like that too after that kind of a treatment.”
“I would not”, Toshiya snorted and hit the drummer to the arm. “Stupid drummer.”
“Shut up you brainless bassist.”
“Shut up you both!” Ko~Ji’s yell woke up the arguers and they paid attention to the dead-like boy on the ground again. The pink-haired leader thought they should soon wake the younger one up before he would get a heart attack. The boy’s pulsation had not gotten any calmer by this point and Ko~Ji was concerned of the younger one’s health.
The pink-haired slapped his hands together once in front of Yuki’s eyes. This seemed to wake the younger one up for he jumped almost back to his feet from the ground.
Almost, but not quite. He just managed to hit his head again to the wall while trying to get farther away from Ko~Ji who glanced at him curiously.
“Are you alright?” Ko~Ji repeated his question which he had asked before and hadn’t got any answer. Yuki was still shocked and seeing the pink-haired, popular boy in front of him, taking care of him, didn’t help at all.
Yuki felt himself blushing and he lowered his head to hide it from the others around him. Something inside of his stomach made the red colour rise upon his cheeks, maybe it was the tickling feeling there. Yuki didn’t know what it was, but he nodded. “Y-yes.”
Yuki couldn’t see it in his embarrassment, but Ko~Ji wore a one-sided, rare smile just for him. Soon the pink-haired stood up and gave his hand towards Yuki, encouraging the younger one to grab on it.
When Yuki was sure the red shade on his cheeks had disappeared completely, he dared to take a hold on Ko~Ji’s hand and pull himself up with a little help of Ko~Ji’s.
Yuki had never realised it, but Ko~Ji was smaller than he had expected. The pink-haired boy was almost ten centimetres shorter than he, and he also looked quite more feminine at a short distance. Yuki found himself glaring at Ko~Ji’s hands: they were slender and girlish, not like man’s hands at all. Even though Yuki’s face wasn’t too willing to fulfil the command in his thoughts, Yuki still smiled inside of his own mind.
Soon Ko~Ji let go of the younger one’s hand. The other felt his palm empty and cold after the warm contact with another of the same kind. He already missed the feeling of holding the pink-haired boy’s hand in his own. Yuki didn’t even notice when Ko~Ji disappeared from his sight as soon as he had appeared in it.
He was soon awaken from this day dream by Toshiya, who tapped him on his chest. Also Toshiya was shorter than he, but not as much as Ko~Ji. Yuki was amazed by that.
“What’s your name?” the bassist asked, Shun staring at Yuki behind him. Yuki lowered his gaze one more, for he thought he had no right to face the older students.
“Yu-Yuki”, the younger student answered and bowed politely.
Both Toshiya and Shun smiled to him. They both wore a friendly grin, like knowing something he didn’t, but willingly tell him soon about it.
“Well, Yuki-kun, you must know Ko~Ji doesn’t save people he doesn’t like”, Toshiya started, smirking at himself and glancing over his shoulder at Shun, who continued: “So we might meet soon again.”
They left Yuki thinking about their words. The younger student didn’t understand what had just happened. He stood there for minutes, for plenty of them. Not until people again started to pay attention to him he finally realised to move, and decided to walk home instead of reading anymore today.
***
Next morning Yuki tried to convince himself the episode the day before hadn’t happened and it had just been a bad dream. Or a good one. The black-haired didn’t know which. He didn’t want to think about it, but the repetition in his head forced him to.
“It didn’t happen. It didn’t happen. Today is a day just like the other days before this. Please let it be true. Let this be an usual day.” Yuki begged and prayed, face lifted up towards the blue sky, but the morning sun dazzled him so he had to turn his eyes back down.
Like this he always walked: taking an eye contact more with the ground he stepped on than giving a look at the others in the yard. Yuki feared if he looked at the others, they would look at him. He saw no friendliness in people’s eyes when they glanced at him, and it was just fine as long as Yuki didn’t know it. But as soon as he lifted his eyes… then, a bunch of disliking eyes were already on him, criticising his appearance, his behaviour. And once again he ended up to be a carpet for the others, the fabric to step on with no regrets or any bad feelings.
Like this he had always been, and like this he would always be.
“Yuki!”
As soon as the black-haired heard his name being called he tried to locate the shouter, find it in the middle of a large group of boys and girls. And who was in the middle? No other than Ko~Ji.
Yuki opened his mouth surprised but poor boy forgot to watch his steps. Sooner than he realised he already lay on the dirty ground, face as well as hands scratched by the small rocks on the yard.
“I begged for a normal day”, he whispered and bit his lower lip, hearing laughter around him. That’s what it had always been. They made fun of him. When the others fell, their friends came immediately to help them. But when he fell… the others just laughed. Because he had no friends. He had no one to ask if he was alright. He had no one to give a hand to him, to help him back up and smile to him.
Yuki felt bitter tears in his eyes but didn’t want to show them. There were still others in the yard, and he sure wasn’t going to show them his disappointment at his life.
“Are you alright?”
The question bewildered him and seized him with a feeling of déjà-vu. This had happened before. He had heard that question before. Something in him, something in the familiar voice made him do something he would have never done in this situation. Normally he would have just gotten up and walked away.
Now he looked at the one who had talked to him.
He met pink hair and cat-like, almost black eyes. Those eyes stunned him. They perforated him completely, penetrated into his innermost, examined his thoughts, found the most secret ones. Yuki had never let anyone look at him that long, but it seemed the time around him and Ko~Ji had stopped suddenly. He wanted to stay in this moment, under those almond shaped eyes. More than forever.
“Does he do that often?” Toshiya had appeared behind Ko~Ji and glanced at stunned Yuki who had left his mouth open in surprise. Toshiya almost waited for drool starting to flow. “I think he fell into coma again.”
“Shut up, Toshiya”, now also Shun had joined the group staring at Yuki, but the drummer was clearly more aware of what was going on in Yuki’s head. He even smiled at him, even though Yuki couldn’t see it. His eyes were fixed on Ko~Ji’s, and right now he felt there was nothing else what he should bother to look at than the pink-haired boy’s eyes.
Ko~Ji did exactly what he had done just a day before: he waved his hand in front of Yuki’s eyes to check out if the younger student was still conscious.
This time Yuki responded. He blinked few times and threw furtive looks around like he had just found himself in a totally unknown place.
As soon as he seemed to remember where he was Yuki grabbed on his schoolbag, starting to collect items flung onto the ground when he had fallen.
Soon a feminine hand joined him in the gathering of stuff. Yuki stopped just to stare at the hand, and just a moment later it’s owner.
Ko~Ji had picked up one of his books and was now holding it out for him, waiting him to take it.
Yuki swallowed hard and loudly but took the book, nodding to the one holding it before him.
Suddenly, like in a bad romance movie, Yuki’s and Ko~Ji’s hands touched each other when the younger gripped on the book.
Yuki held his breath daring not to draw his hand away from the connection between him and the pink haired one. Every hundredth of a second in that touch sent a new trembling electric shock through his hand - causing it to shiver uncontrollable - all the way down to the bottom of his stomach.
He remembered reading about this from a book; yes, of course from a book, which told about love and romance between a man and a woman. They held each other’s hands and suddenly every mistake in the world felt so right and correct, and not a mistake anymore at all. That moment caressed and stroked, it gazed lovingly. And when they were in that moment, completely in it, they wanted it to continue forever. Shudders ran through their bodies, making a warm feeling rise up from their stomach. After that even the cold winter night felt the most comfortable place ever as long as they were able to hold each other.
They called it “love”.
But there was no man or woman: there was only he and Ko~Ji. So what was it then, for all love had to be between the man and the woman.
Yuki didn’t know and he didn’t want to stay to find out. His world, the world of lonely studying, the world of the others who had just given this life, this world, to him, and he just lived it for them, would be shot down if he ever found out there was other kind of love: Not love between man and woman, but love between him and Ko~Ji.
His life was too familiar and too safe to be killed like that. It kept him safe, it kept him unharmed. Love hurts, he had heard, and Yuki never got hurt. And if he did, so he had decided, it wouldn’t be by Ko~Ji.
Yuki took the book from Ko~Ji’s hand, thrusting it carelessly back into the bag. Refusing to meet the seducing eyes the younger student rose up, taking a hold on the ground to support the movement, and left. He felt the eyes following him curiously, confused, but Yuki had no will to turn and meet them. It would just end up in another coma -like fixation.
The bag in his arms he fled from the situation, escaped from explaining, found himself in the middle of desks in an empty classroom. Curtains were pulled in front of the windows to avoid sunlight getting into the room to heat it up. The room was dark and looked cooler than the air outside.
Yuki sighed, dropped the bag of his on one of the desks and fell on his knees onto the cold floor. There he sat for a moment before moving himself sitting back against the wall behind him.
Finding his own toes very interesting Yuki stared at them and thought about all the things happened during these two days. However he thought about it, past two days still felt unnatural and like a dream.
He had always contented to look at Ko~Ji with a distance between him and the pink haired one, distance like the one between a human and God. He had contented to admire Ko~Ji’s beauty from far away, like the moon in the sky. He had never believed he could touch the moon. He never had never thought about it, so he didn’t know what he was missing. But the God had decided to take a contact with those who believed in him, and the moon had gotten down to be touched.
Suddenly Yuki felt humiliated and paranoid. The thing Ko~Ji was doing to him was not because the older student suddenly felt a need to help him, but because he wanted to make Yuki look ridiculous in front of the whole school as he thought Ko~Ji might like him.
And what Ko~Ji was doing to him already. Yuki stared at the clock on the wall, realising he was again cutting a class. And because of what? Ko~Ji! The younger student made the decision not to take any contact with Ko~Ji anymore today. He didn’t even want to see the pink haired one.
Taking a hold on the wall Yuki rose up, grabbed on his bag and ran out to search the next class and next lesson.
He walked in the middle of the other students talking and laughing all over the hallway. Yuki seemed to be the only one walking alone. Even the ugly ones had found theirselves in a group of the other ugly ones. And Yuki wasn’t even ugly! Actually, even though he was skinny and not very muscular - or not muscular at all - he had to admit he was not ugly. He was more like feminine. He just happened to own long legs and a flat stomach.
Still he had to walk alone, separated from the other students. There was no possibility of getting inside of one of the groups. Except…
“Ko~Ji!” Yuki gasped as he saw the older student walking around the corner and heading his steps right towards the place where Yuki was. The younger one felt a sudden need to change the direction where he was going. Quickly, hoping he was not seen yet, he jumped behind another corner, pressed his back against the cold wall just like moments before and closed his eyes.
“Please go away, please go away”, Yuki’s heart was pouncing in his chest like a frog on a trampoline. It hurt, but the younger one couldn’t let even the most silent whimper out of his throat. He heard his rapid pulsation in his ears, louder than ever before, and thought about the possibility of Ko~Ji to hear it.
He dared to glance around the corner to the hallway, seeing Ko~Ji, Toshiya and Shun behind him, standing there just few meters distance between him and the black haired student in panic. Ko~Ji’s eyes mistook to look at the direction of Yuki’s, and the younger one disappeared soon back on the other side of the corner.
“I’m fucking going to lock myself up in a cellar and grow a beard”, he panted and searched for a place to hide. He wouldn’t take a change for Ko~Ji to find him standing there, looking like a paranoid rat. Once again he glanced at the hallway and almost vomited his heart out after seeing Ko~Ji moving again and coming closer with his two fellows. “Yes! A beard! Ko~Ji won’t recognize me if I have a beard!”
After whispering that aloud Yuki run straight to the door of the boy’s rest room, thrusting inside and hiding himself in one of the cubicles. Adrenaline ran through his veins, causing him to pant and stupid ideas pop in his mind carelessly.
He leaned against the locked door, holding a hand on his chest. Why did his heart bounce like this? Why was he so afraid of facing Ko~Ji? Yuki groaned and hit his head once against the pure white wall. Somewhere far he heard a sound of a door opening and closing, but it was toned down by the sound of his own heart beating his ears. His pulse was now calmer, but Yuki was positive his heart was closer to his throat than his chest.
“I’m going to be late”, he whispered, noticing that after he had met Ko~Ji he had started to talk to himself. Normally he talked to no one, not even himself. But truly, if he planed to manage arriving the lesson early he had to leave the rest room right now. “And I really must consider locking myself up in the cellar…”
He opened the cubicle door slightly, just to close it quickly again. The first sight he had seen was the bright pink hair in front of the mirror on the opposite wall, the owner of them washing his hands.
“..If I ever get there!” The black haired boy cursed. He should have known better. It was always his luck, this kind of episodes. Sometimes he felt lonely and wanted company, but later on he had gotten used to the fact there was no one who wanted to spend time with him. He was boring. He always just studied, read, read more, studied more, did homework, talked about school and read even more.
And sometimes he played guitar. His parents had tried to explain him that music is not healthy, music didn’t help him to get a good job, music didn’t help him studying. Music did nothing for his future. With a verbal pressure they had tried to force him to give up the guitar, but Yuki hadn’t agreed with it.
Maybe his guitar didn’t do any good for his life, but it was his life.
Maybe he wasn’t going to be a rock star, but a boring salesman, when he’d grow up, but at least he could sometimes forget all the hurry and reading and concentrate in the music he made. The sound caused by the meeting of his fingers and the guitar’s strings relaxed him, and sucked all the stress out of him. The stress was replaced by the feeling of peace and calmness. After playing a while, few notes, Yuki could take all the pressure of work and school things again without collapsing under them.
Again Yuki heard how the door opened and closed, and the rest room was once again quiet, holding no one else in but the black haired one only. He sighed in relief and for once dared to open the door. Feeling quite jumpy Yuki left the rest room, glancing rapidly around the hallway which was empty. Lessons had already started, and he was late again. Already three classes missed because of Ko~Ji. Now he really didn’t want to meet the other boy, for he wasn’t good for his plans of future.
Yuki wandered around the corridors, searching for the class of the next lesson. He was sure there was no others on the corridor, until he tried to turn off around the corner and literally bumped into Toshiya.
“Oi, Yuki-kun!” Toshiya laughed and tapped Yuki onto his shoulder. Yuki wanted to scream and run away, for where Toshiya was, there was also Shun, and where both Shun and Toshiya were, there was Ko~Ji.
But he only managed to open his mouth to scream before Toshiya spoke: “Ko~Ji searched you everywhere! He wants you to come to our training apartment tonight. You knew we have a band?”
Yuki closed his mouth but cursed again in his mind. He couldn’t go near to Ko~Ji, it was just unbearable torturing, watching those beautiful shapes and seductive eyes. Yuki wanted to scream again that he didn’t want to see those three ever again. But Toshiya didn’t give him time to do that either.
“I give you the address”, the bassist said with a happy tone of voice. Toshiya always seemed to be happy. It was sometimes bothering the people around him, and those who didn’t know Toshiya thought he was just a pretender. But it was not true: Toshiya really was always happy. His mind was so simple that it didn’t notice the difference between the bad day and the good day, and everything was just butterflies, flowers, sunshine and puppy dogs for him.
Now the shorter boy was searching for a paper from his school bag, as well as a pen too, finding them after digging under the books. He wrote the address to the paper and gave it to Yuki, who politely took it.
“Ko~Ji will be very disappointed if you don’t come”, Toshiya informed and waved his hand to the black haired boy. “so, see you tonight!”
The bassist was gone sooner than Yuki realised what he had said. Of course he didn’t want Ko~Ji to get disappointed, especially not because of him. But he still couldn’t face the older student. What would it become? When would his mind give up? When would he collapse under the secret and shout what he felt when Ko~Ji was around?
Hope it wasn’t tonight…
***
Yuki swallowed in front of the wooden door. He knew he should knock, but in a fear of facing Ko~Ji he just couldn’t force his hand to rise and touch the surface. The shivering hand held a piece of paper in front of him and even though he knew this was the right address he still hoped it wouldn’t be. If he knocked and someone totally stranger to him would come and open the door, he could just say “Sorry, I got lost”, and go back home. That way he could avoid meeting the pink haired boy again.
But of course he was too nice and too curious to do that. He wanted to know why Ko~Ji wanted him there so badly, that when he hadn’t met him personally he had sent Toshiya to get him there.
So Yuki knocked with a trembling hand, hoping the door would get opened by an old woman who had never seen him before and didn’t know anything about Ko~Ji.
Poor boy got disappointed in that thing, but he really didn’t know if he truly was disappointed when he met the calm eyes of his idol.
An arrogant smile soon decorated Ko~Ji’s lips as he saw Yuki behind the door. That smile was so hot and intensive that Yuki felt his face burning, his blood boiling and his legs melting. Though he refused to admit it.
“I thought you were coming. You didn’t want to let me down. Come on inside.” Ko~Ji stepped aside to let the younger student in. It took a while from Yuki to realise what the movement meant, but under the pink haired boy’s curious eyes he soon found out and walked - hardly - in. All the way from the outside to inside he was afraid his legs would fail him and he would fall in front of Ko~Ji. That would be humiliating and embarrassing, even though Yuki thought it might be just what Ko~Ji wanted.
Bitterly he bit his lower lip and tried to banish the bad thoughts from his mind. Ko~Ji had treated him so well, better than anyone in a long time, so he had no right to throw doubt on the older boy.
Yuki and Ko~Ji, together, reached the room where Shun and Toshiya were already practising. They both waved at him, treated him like he was their friend, even though they didn’t know him and he didn’t know them. What made them so friendly?
The black haired boy soon noticed Toshiya held a bass in his hands and tuned up it’s strings and Toshiya were twirling drumsticks in his hands. Toshiya were the bassist and Shun the drummer.
A guitar lay against the wall away from the other instruments and as Ko~Ji got amongst the others he didn’t grab on it. Yuki concluded they were missing a guitarist. What a nice coincidence.
Soon Shun came to him and first time after he had gotten there the younger boy dared to speak: “Where’s your guitarist?”
“That part is still a bit incomplete”, Shun said within a laughter, looking a bit uneasy with the given question.
“He means we have no guitarist”, Ko~Ji informed, standing next to Toshiya but glancing at Shun and Yuki. Yuki couldn’t tell what was that look in the older boy’s almond eyes, but it wasn’t happy. Maybe… jealousy? After all, Ko~Ji was the only one who Yuki didn’t dare to speak to. He had spoken to both Toshiya and Shun, and even found Shun a very nice person.
Yuki transferred his eyes to stare at his toes and with a lots of self-pressuring he managed to say: “I… I can play guitar… a bit.” As soon as he had said it, he regretted it. For again he felt those almond-shaped eyes on him, and heard a soft, encouraging and friendly voice saying: “Yuki-kun, come here.”
Yuki had no will nor want to refuse the invitation, but he stared at the floor the whole way he walked next to Ko~Ji. When being so interested in the carpet he didn’t even saw how Ko~Ji picked up the guitar lying against the wall and lifted the band of it over his head.
Yuki shivered and shuddered more than ever as he felt Ko~Ji bustle around him, tuning up the strings and adjust the band matching for him. Few times the pink haired one’s hand touched some part of Yuki’s body and the younger one had to use all his willpower to stay still and keep silent when he just wanted to fall on the floor and sigh in a strange kind of pleasure.
Then Ko~Ji left, but just to get a music stand and the music in front of him. For Yuki’s bad the other had decided to guide him from behind his back.
“So you can play guitar, eh? There… I assume you can read notes.” Ko~Ji turned few papers from the music book, hand moving right next to Yuki’s shoulder. Every time the other shifted his hand from previous page to the next one he was afraid that the hand might touch him in some point. And what would he do after so many touches?
Yuki was too afraid to breath normally, but he gasped and panted whenever he remembered as important operation as breathing.
He missed most of the things going on around him, like Ko~Ji’s explanation where he should start to play and Shun’s pitying gaze towards him. He even missed Toshiya’s “He looks like he’s going to be sick.” He just stared forward with widened eyes and concentrated in keeping himself sane.
When Ko~Ji had finished Yuki woke up from his coma and looked embarrassed after not listening to his idol.
“I’m sorry, could I play something from my memory?” He tried, because there was no way he could admit he wasn’t listening to Ko~Ji at all. He was just a man, he couldn’t concentrate in two things at the same time: Listening to someone and keeping himself from going crazy. So he had decided to stay somewhat calm and abandon the listening, that was the best for all of them.
“Sure”, Ko~Ji responded, though Yuki heard from his voice the older one was wondering his behaviour.
So Yuki played. Played a familiar song to him which he knew he could play in any kind of situation, anytime, anywhere. He played it well, as always, but this time he had to close his eyes from the audience. He was afraid he might play wrong if he saw Ko~Ji looking at him. And he wanted to do his best in front of the pink haired boy. But he just always got so nervous near him, hundreds of stupid butterflies flying in his stomach and tickling him so nicely. Always, when Ko~Ji was near him, looking at him.
He let the music take over his mind, moving all the other things aside. When Yuki played, everything else but the notes he played were unimportant. The music floated, it flied, it hovered. It was in him, on him, next to him, under him, behind him, around him, within him. Right after he had played the first notes he had felt how his body had relaxed and given up all the tension.
And when the song was over, the feeling lasted, making Yuki for once self-confident and relaxed no matter what fellowship he was in.
He opened his eyes and saw Ko~Ji’s impressed expression, and soon, started by the pink haired one, all three started to applaud to his performance. Soon the self-confidence was gone, and Yuki felt shy again, though he tried to hide it with his hand.
“You are good!” Ko~Ji praised and Yuki felt he was blushing all over from face to toes. He had never imagined he could be praised, not by Ko~Ji. Not by someone he though was so much better than him. He nodded but kept sure no one saw his flushed face and without answering he headed his steps towards the near couch, falling on it and taking a deep breath when he was able to do it.
“I’ll go get something to drink. You look exhausted.” Ko~Ji nodded to Yuki and smiled a wide, pleased smile. Because of that smile Yuki was about to lose his self-control totally and just kneel down to the floor and whimper like a hungry puppy dog. He had been so many times on the edge of loosing his mind in front of Ko~Ji, so there was no way he was going to last for long anymore.
But the pink haired was gone before Yuki had time to loose his mind. And it was good, Yuki thought.
Shun found his way next to Yuki and sat on the couch. He glanced at the younger one for a moment, guessing the other one had something to tell him.
And so he had.
“Shun-san… I… my friend has a problem”, Yuki stammered, trying to find the right words to tell his own problem without revealing it was him who was in trouble.
“Tell me”, the drummer encouraged.
“Uh… my friend… he…” the black haired youngster knew he sounded desperate, but he had to go on. “He told me about a strange feeling. Every time he’s near someone… a special one… he feels something strange. It’s like… a thousand sparkles in his stomach, and they tickle nicely. So he told me. The tickling spreads all over his body, causing him to feel warm and secured, but then again, really vulnerable and shy around that special one. What is that feeling?”
Shun smiled in an understanding way, nodding towards Toshiya who had bent down over a table to make some coffee.
“Oi, Toshiya, what is the strange feeling in a stomach?”
“Vomiting?”
“No! The other one!”
“Ah! Love!”
Shun turned again towards Yuki and smiled. “This feeling of your friend’s is called ‘love’.”
Toshiya soon joined them, holding a cup of fresh coffee in his hands. “Your friend didn’t know what is love?” The bassist laughed and took a sip of his drink, laughing even more after that. “I mean… how someone can be that stupid?”
Yuki smiled awkwardly and looked at the drummer beside him, who stared murderously towards the bassist. Yuki was positive Shun had understood the problem wasn’t about his friend, but Yuki himself.
“Where did your friend live? In a shoebox?”
“Probably in the same shoebox as you do”, Shun responded instead of Yuki and gave the final warning gaze towards the bassist, who finally saw it and understood to quiet down even though he didn’t understand what he had done wrong.
Soon Ko~Ji came back, holding a tray with a four glasses and a can of water on it. Yuki had already got rid of the red colour on his cheeks, but it returned as Ko~Ji poured some cold water in one of the glasses, giving it to Yuki with a wide smile. The younger boy had followed Ko~Ji in the school so intensively, that he knew Ko~Ji had never smiled that much during one day. And now he had seen it plenty of times. That divine smile.
Yuki drank the whole glass empty within a one swallow, standing up from the couch. He walked to the table where the coffee-pot stood silently, filling his glass with the dark brown liquid. He just needed to get away from Ko~Ji.
At the same time the pink-haired had stolen his place and was no sitting next to Shun, who looked at him, knowing something he didn’t.
“Do you like him?”
“What?” Ko~Ji had missed the question when following Yuki’s moves in front of the table.
“Do you like him?” The drummer repeated.
“He’s nice”, the vocalist shrugged his shoulders in respond and drank some of the water he had brought.
“Don’t lie to me, Ko~Ji. I’ve known you a long time and I know you’re not telling me everything.”
“I told you he’s nice.”
“You’re doing it again.”
“What?”
“Lying to me. I keep asking you until you answer me what I want to hear and what I know is true.”
“He’s really nice, and a good guitarist.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Ko~Ji started to lose his temper. He hated when people were pressuring him and telling him what he should do. Even when it was one of his best friends.
“What do you want to hear then?”
“Ko~Ji, do you like him?”
That was the last drop in the full bucket of irritation, and now it was flowing over.
“Yes! Yes, for God’s sake! I like Yuki!” When the whole room, all others in there were staring at him, Ko~Ji realised he had said his thoughts too loud. Suddenly there was embarrassed Shun, laughing Toshiya and horrified Yuki. Especially he was irritated by the laughing bassist, who was soon silenced by the drummer who took the spoon from Toshiya’s cup and thrust it in the bassist’s nose.
Yuki was really shocked. He didn’t know what to think, but he did know he wanted away from here.
“I… I must go…” he stuttered and as quickly as he just could he ran out of the house, leaving the atmosphere more than awkward.
For a moment the three left behind stood in a silence, Shun because of embarrassment, Toshiya because he was trying to get the spoon out of his nose and Ko~Ji because he didn’t want to admit he had done or said something wrong.
Shun broke the silence.
“Go after him.” The sentence was pointed at the pink haired vocalist, who stared at Shun in confusion.
“What?”
“Go after him, now.” The drummer looked really demanding, and pointed at the door. Ko~Ji was the leader of their band, but if Shun wanted something really badly, he always got what he wanted.
“But I can’t…”
“Ko~Ji, I’m sick of this!” Shun stood up and suddenly he looked so much taller than he truly was. “You never accept anyone of our guitarists! You always turn them back with your cold attitude! And there goes a fucking perfect guitarist who even you like! So start running now or I’m going to push my drumsticks into a place where the sun does not shine in!”
Ko~Ji had no other options but to obey and leave the apartment. He didn’t want to find out where Shun was going to thrust his drumsticks if Ko~Ji didn’t get Yuki back. For his own health he had to.
…and because he had really meant what he had said: he liked the younger one.
Glad Yuki had not gone too far and Ko~Ji could still see where the black haired one was walking. He started running, to reach the other.
“Yuki!”
Yuki turned around and saw Ko~Ji moving towards him with an amazing speed.
“No, no no no, don’t follow me”, he whispered and followed his idol’s example: started running to get away from Ko~Ji.
He ran the whole way to the first traffic lights and cursed the red light shining above his head. He stood in front of the crossing and stared intensively at the lights.
“Come on, come on… turn already!” He had no time to stand there! Ko~Ji would soon reach him.
For a moment he reconsidered he could try to talk with the older one, but the idea was soon gone. He could never really talk to Ko~Ji. It was the same as trying to talk to a God! Yuki was not worth it, he didn’t deserve it.
“You know, normal people just walk ahead without caring about the red light.”
Yuki’s heart jumped from his chest to his mouth and he had to swallow it back. A familiar voice next to him almost caused a heart attach.
Ko~Ji stood there, looking at him, without even panting after the running. He really was in a good shape and condition.
“Don’t run, Yuki-chan. We really need to talk.”
***
Yuki followed Ko~Ji into a close park, and when the pink haired sat on the bench he did too. He trembled carelessly, swallowing once in a while his heard from his throat back to his chest. It tried to escape, leave him behind. His heart wanted to suffer alone without the suffering body. This was too much for it.
“Yuki-chan, why do you run?” Ko~Ji bent forwards, leaning his elbows against his knees and glancing at Yuki, who hoped the older one would turn his eyes away from him. He couldn’t stand the stare of the older student, he couldn’t take the glare of the divine eyes. He melted under it, he melted under the heavenly look. And the look always made him shiver, shiver from coldness, shiver from hotness. Shiver from the feeling of perfection. “You have never talked to me, not even when I tried. Do I scare you? I assure you, I’m not that bad person…”
“No, Ko~Ji-san”, even though Yuki had to admit he was scared of Ko~Ji, scared like hell, it wasn’t that kind of fear he knew Ko~Ji was talking about.
“Is it because you don’t like me? I’m sorry if I shocked you by saying…”
“No, definitely not.” He knew he should explain. Ko~Ji sounded really desperate, not as arrogant and self-confident anymore. Yuki started to sense some human features in him, which made his heart beat even faster.
“Ko~Ji-san… I don’t know what it is. I really don’t know. But every time you are close to me, every time you talk to me, I feel strange. That strange feeling makes me run. Makes me avoid you, because I can’t face it. That strange feeling is a mixture of fear and pleasure. I’m used to look at you from far, and suddenly you are there, talking to me and taking contact. I’ve never even dared to wish for that!” Yuki sighed and leaned his back against the wooden bench. He felt tears in his eyes, but didn’t know why he was crying. He sensed Ko~Ji was still keeping the unbreakable, earnest stare on him. It gave him more energy to continue. “Shun-san told it was love. But it can’t be love! I’ve read a book about love! Love is between a man and a woman. But there is no woman here. There’s just you and me. So it is not love, is it?”
For now Yuki turned his eyes from the night sky to the older student and saw a gentle smile floating on his lips.
“Yuki-chan, you read way too much. You should stop it.” After saying that Ko~Ji stood up from the bench, giving a signal to Yuki to rise up too. “We should go back. Shun and Toshiya are waiting for us, Shun hopefully not with the drumsticks.”
Yuki didn’t completely understand the last sentence, but he stood up anyway, stepping next to the shorter boy.
For a while they walked next to each other, without even looking at the one beside. Yuki almost fainted when he felt Ko~Ji’s hand in his, the older one thrusting his fingers through Yuki’s.
Yuki blushed, glancing at Ko~Ji carefully.
And he got something from Ko~Ji what he had never gotten before:
A friendly gaze.
***
The end. Comments and criticism would be nice <3 Although I apologize my bad English. English is not my native, you must understand that when reading this.