Work Text:
It’s not like Shinji isn’t happy to be graduating from high school. After all, graduating is better than not graduating, if only because his parents would never have got off his back about the latter. Just… sometimes you can’t get yourself into the party spirit, is all. So, right now, while his friends are engaging in alleged dancing in the middle of Izumi Kanai’s living room, he’s sitting out on the verandah in the dark drinking whisky and Coke just for something to do. It’s not really a good look. On the other hand, neither is the dancing.
He’s kind of hoping no one will notice him there – after all, Yoshi and Yutaka are busy committing crimes against freedom of physical expression, Sugimura and Kayoko have probably gone off to make out and be socially awkward, and he’s already dated pretty much every girl here (or dated their friend who then warned them off him). So he’s not expecting it when someone sinks into the wicker chaise-longue-thing next to him and blows smoke into the air.
Even less was he expecting it to be Shou Tsukioka. Actually, he’s not expecting Shou still to be here. Shou’s interests are sex with men and casual delinquency. Options for the first are thin on the ground in Shiroiwa’s graduating class, and Shinji happens to know Mitsuru’s threatened all his acquaintances with yakuza-style violence if his girlfriend’s house gets trashed. Shou should’ve cleared out ages ago.
“Not the life and soul of the party tonight, Mimura?”
Whatever. This is not the conversation Shinji’s looking for. He shrugs. “Needed some fresh air. So, I mean, you could blow the smoke away from me. I gotta keep the old lungs clean for college b-ball.”
“Ooh.” He can hear Shou’s pout and wink. “Now, a little bird told me where you’re going… Sendai, is it? Up to the frozen north?”
“It’s hardly a big secret.” Except that Yutaka and Yoshi and Sugi had all kind of looked at him like Wow… that’s kind of far away, isn’t it? Okay, they were all staying living under their parents’ (or foster parents’) roofs and commuting, but he wasn’t the only one in the class moving out of the nest. It was only Yutaka who’d said, later, Mim… you okay?
“Can’t wait to get away from Mummy and Daddy?”
Okay, this is getting a little too on the nose. Shinji looks round, hoping the dislike he’s always felt for Shou is plain on his face. He’s out of energy to be charming, especially to a sex-crazed –
“Faggot?” Shou says, resting his chin on his hand and smirking. “Fairy? Oh, go on, say it, I can see you want to. It’s okay, I’ve heard it all before.”
“What do you want?” Okay, dumb question. “Apart from my godlike body, I know, can we skip the gay bullshit and get to the point?”
“Mimura darling, where I come from, the gay bullshit is the point. The thrill of the chase and all that. But since you’re being so tetchy… this is a graduation party. I’m doing the rounds, saying goodbye to old faces.”
“All your friends quit school after junior high, who do you have to say goodbye to?” Apart from Kiriyama, who continued to be ridiculously skilled at everything he put his hand to right up until something happened with Mitsuru, and cops, and people getting killed, and then he left school too. That’s something else Shinji doesn’t feel like rehashing.
“Mimura, please, I know your modus operandi is love ‘em and leave ‘em, but some of us have some class. Besides, I don’t think we ever really talked, did we?”
“We talked a lot. You’d say, fancy a date? and I’d say, No, give it a rest. Rinse and repeat.”
Shou takes another drag, breathes out, and then, leaning back in the chair, says, “True… but that was before all the unpleasantness. With Mitsuru and Kazuo. And with dear Shuuya.”
Shinji’s got pretty good at not feeling anything when someone mentions Shuuya. “And? Are you looking to bond over how our friends made bad choices? I mean, not that I’m denying it, but...”
“No, no.” Shou leans closer to him. He smells of booze and cigarettes and perfume (or maybe it’s cologne and he’s making it smell like perfume through auto-suggestion). “Oh, don’t worry, I’m not going to grope you. Just wanted to say how interesting it’s been, watching you quietly self-destruct.”
Silence except for the pulse of the music and some traffic far away and Shou taking another breath. Shinji rides it out while he thinks about how to answer. In the end he goes with, “Doesn’t that involve, I don’t know, motorbikes and heroin and dropping out of school?”
“Only if you’re ridiculously obvious. Which you’re not. What are you studying up in snow country, by the way?”
Fuck him, but Shinji manages to answer like it was just a regular question, “Economics.” Only maybe the drink is getting to him, or maybe he feels like he’s got an image to maintain, because he adds, “I’d have picked Computer Science, but my dad was all my cash, my rules, so… here we are.”
“Here we are indeed. Learning to become a tool of the establishment after all that youthful rebellion?”
“Again, I’m not the one who gets into gang fights and took up smoking at fourteen.” He gulps the remainder of his drink. It mostly tastes of melted ice. “And, again, is there a point to this? Because if there is, get to it. I’m going to head back inside in a minute.”
“All right,” Shou says, pouting. “The thing is, Mimura, I like watching –”
“Guys? Yeah, I know –”
“People who’re empty inside, is what I was going to say.” Shou’s watching him now, watching for a reaction. “Dear Kazuo was the ultimate example of that, but he wasn’t the only one, and you’ve been an admirable side project. I mean, the chronic intimacy and commitment issues, for a start. Or the way you’ve been kidding yourself you didn’t give a damn about Nanahara getting shot for protesting about human rights a little too much. Or how Seto’s your best friend just so he can be your comedy sidekick, because heaven forbid anyone get close who could put a strain on that perfection thing you’ve got going. I mean, I could look at you for hours.”
Shinji doesn’t say go to hell but maybe it shows on his face, because Shou blinks, looks a little surprised as if he didn’t expect that much of a reaction. Shinji didn’t intend to give him a reaction. This is kids’ stuff.
“Well, if you want to look,” he says, making like he’s going to stand up (why the hell isn’t he just walking away after that little speech?) “you can do it back inside. Hell, I’ll even join Yutaka on the dance floor if it means that much to you.”
“You don’t think that’s all I want,” Shou says, like Shinji’s that stupid.
“Well, if you’ve been watching my intimacy and commitment issues, you’ll know I don’t swing your way.”
“Oh, Mimura. I don’t think you care which way it is as long as it’s a chance to show how good you are at it. Like everything else you do.”
This is the part where he should walk away.
This is the part where he should walk away, but he’s kind of drunk, and kind of pissed off, and kind of – numb to everything that’s just been said, because –
“Just a show of power with you, isn’t it?” Shou says, leaning over to stub out his cigarette on the fence. “Doesn’t matter who’s on the other side of it. So why not make an old classmate happy? It won’t mean anything to you either way. And you won’t need to buy me dinner first.”
If he weren’t drunk (though he’s not that drunk) he would have walked away at this point. If it wasn’t the end of high school. If he didn’t already pretty much believe that nothing means anything very much. If it wasn’t that it’d make him look like Shou’s got him rattled. Not like he’s ever bailed on a dare. Not like he’s ever not pulled it off and looked good doing it.
He shrugs, and instead of walking back towards the music, he heads over to the steps down into the garden, where the light doesn’t reach. “Okay,” he says. Looks back. “Come if you’re coming.”