Work Text:
Hey. This day SUCKS. Wanna hang out after?
I have plans…
For real?!
You skipped out on me all week!
What gives?
Yeah, I get it.
Sorry…I c
“SAKAMOTO.”
Ryuji jerked in his seat and dropped his phone, swearing when it hit the ground screen first. Whispers erupted around him. ‘Hahaha, busted.’ ‘Wow, the teacher’s pissed.’ ‘Figures.’ ‘What a loser.’
Ryuji felt his face go red. He froze between picking up the phone and facing Ushimaru.
“Pick it up, Sakamoto.” More students snickered as Ushimaru spoke. Ryuji swallowed and snatched his phone from the ground. “Good. Now pick up your books.” Someone laughed out loud at that; the teacher turned his focus back to the class. “QUIET!”
Ryuji cleared his throat. “Sensei, I—”
“Your books, Sakamoto.”
Ryuji jammed his phone into his pocket and grabbed all his books, dumping them into his bag.
“I’ll speak with you after class.” Ushimaru crossed his arms. “I believe you’re familiar with what to do.” The class erupted into more snickers. Ryuji shoved up from his desk, grabbed his bag, and stormed out of the classroom. He closed the door as Ushimaru barked out another “QUIET!”
Ryuji stepped into the hallway and turned to face the wall, pressing his forehead against it. He shut his eyes against a wave of humiliation. This day truly, deeply, sucked. It was raining and he was still damp from the morning (not his fault—his mom had needed his umbrella so he’d lied about having another) ; he’d gotten no sleep (ok that was his fault) ; he’d overslept and missed Akira at the train (“Sorry, Sojiro’ll kill me if I get a tardy...”) ; no one had been around for lunch (seriously, not even Mishima) ; and his leg was killing him (it always complained for a few days after a treasure run). All he wanted to do was go home, curl up on his futon, and scroll through the Phansite on his phone.
Aw crap, the phone. He rolled his head to glance at the door; Ushimaru definitely had a sense for these things. The coast seemed clear. He pulled his phone out—
“SHIT!” A crack snaked across the screen, winding diagonally from the top all the way to the bottom. Something caught in his throat. He squeezed his eyes shut as hard as he could and put the phone back in his pocket. He was NOT going to cry at school. What was he, a kid? He pressed harder into the wall. It was fine. FINE. It was all fine.
But…his mom had JUST gotten him that phone a few months ago, for his birthday. She’d been proud of him for making new friends, had told him he was growing up so well. She’d gotten him an expensive model after taking on extra hours at work. “You’re so responsible these days,” she’d said. “I know you’ll take good care of it.”
Ryuji took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It was fine. He’d scrape some cash together, get a screen repair kit. If he did it quick his mom would never know, even if it voided the warrantee. It was—
The chime rang, and the classroom door slid open. Students filed out, snickering and muttering as they passed him. ‘Typical.’ ‘I’m so embarrassed he’s in my class.’ ‘He’s going to flunk for sure.’ ‘Ugh, seriously.’ ‘Why doesn’t he drop out?’
The vague need to cry was surpassed by an immediate need to start cussing everyone out. He squeezed his hands into fists. He only needed to make it a few more minutes. He could do this.
“Sakamoto.”
Ryuji took another deep breath and went back into the classroom. He stood in front of Ushimaru, but kept his eyes down. The teacher sighed. “I don’t even know why I bother with you. You clearly don’t care about doing well.”
Ryuji opened his mouth to apologize, but something was caught in his throat. He snapped his mouth shut and swallowed.
“What do you even want to do with your life? Anything?”
Ryuji clamped his teeth together. Whatever was caught in his throat wanted out.
Ushimaru sighed again. “Useless. I’ll be speaking with your homeroom teacher, not that it will do any good. Get out of here.”
Ryuji walked out of the classroom, the walk turning into a lopsided jog as he moved past the students in the hall. He could hear them all whispering. He was burning up—he could feel how red he was. He tore down the stairs—a familiar pain shot up his leg. His eyes went wet—he needed out, now.
He slammed through the front door, ignoring the students yelling at him as he crashed out into the light rain. He ran down the street as fast as he could painfully manage before ducking into the alley and crouching down out of sight.
“Stop it.” It came out as a sob. He drew in a deep breath and pushed his hands against his eyes. “STOP it. You’re fine.” It was true. He just needed a minute. He took another deep breath and let it out; it came out all shaky. Cold water dripped down the back of his neck; he shivered and another sob came out. “Just, stop it.”
He had to think of the bright-sides, as his mom called them. He took another breath; at least he wasn’t getting too rained on. Another; at least the damn phone still turned on. Another; at least he had friends, now. He didn’t need to be alone. Akira even—
Right. Ryuji stood and pulled the phone out again—shit, the crack was pretty big—and finished reading Akira’s message.
Sorry…I can meet you in Shibuya later?
Ryuji took another deep breath, even as his heart did that stupid flutter thing it had started doing recently. He pounded a fist against his chest; he was vaguely convinced he had some weird disease.
Cool! Catch ya at the arcade!
See you there.
Okay. Things were okay. He leaned down and rubbed his leg. Shit, it HURT. He slouched a bit more to get the weight off of it and took one last deep breath. At least—at least he could walk at all. Bright-sides, right?
Yeah, some bright-side. The rain picked up as he walked to the station so he ended up soaked through again. The subway car was jammed with people. Some lady stepped on his foot—his good foot, too—with her pointy shoe and then yelled at him about it. He had finally found a nice place at Shibuya station to stretch his leg and rest when an old lady asked for directions—she looked pretty wobbly so he walked with her to her train platform and waited with her until she was seated on the train. When he came back up his resting spot was gone, so he headed to the arcade. He spent a bunch of yen on games until he remembered he was saving money to fix his phone.
It was also at that exact moment he remembered he had an essay due the next day. He didn’t even have an internal excuse for forgetting. They’d finished the palace days ago and were just waiting for Okumura’s response. No, it was no one’s fault but his. As though to emphasize this, the game he was playing flashed him a large YOU LOSE before demanding more yen.
Seriously, this day SUCKED. He went outside and stared up at the sky, letting the rain—yep, still raining—fall on his face. Maybe he’d get a cold. Maybe his mom would take his temperature and demand he stay home the rest of the week. Hell, maybe she’d stay home for a day. A whole day home together, for the first time in years…plenty of time for her to get a chance to see his cracked phone and realize how disappointing he was.
He could feel himself tearing up again. Seriously, what was with this day?
“Where’s your umbrella?”
His heart fluttered—yep, he definitely had some weird illness. “Pfft, it’s not raining that hard.” He looked down and beamed at Akira. The guy stood neatly under his umbrella, his other hand in his pocket.
Akira narrowed his eyes. “Your face is all blotchy.”
“Rude?” Ryuji shrugged into an easy lie. “I ate some chili snacks—sorry, they’re all gone.”
Akira chuckled and approached until Ryuji was under the umbrella. “How are you always eating?”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re jealous of my iron stomach.” Another flutter bounced around his chest, so he poked Akira in the ribs. “You have fun?” He noticed Mona wasn’t in the bag.
“Yeah, but, uh…” Akira glanced down behind himself, craning his neck to do so. Ryuji stared at the incredible way Akira’s neck flexed when—wait, whoa, what? He shook his head—haha, weird, whatever—and leaned to see what Akira was looking at.
It was a kid. Like, an entire child. The kid was glaring at Ryuji from under a tilted hat that said something in English—why was everyone so obsessed with friggen English—and was basically standing on Akira’s heels to stay under the umbrella.
Ryuji looked back to Akira. “Uh, dude?”
Akira gave Ryuji his ‘sorry’ smile. “This is Shinya-kun. He’s going to join us for dinner.”
“Uh…okay…Hi. I’m Sakamoto.”
“…hi.” The kid crossed his arms and looked away.
Ryuji scratched the back of his head. How was he supposed to talk to a kid? “Uh, cool.”
Akira placed his hand on Ryuji’s shoulder, looking directly into his eyes while Ryuji proceeded to have a small heart attack. “I need a huge favor from you.”
Those were some gray eyes. Like, GRAY gray. Like storm clouds…but warmer, like—ugh, stop it. “Uh…”
“I need you to take Shinya to the diner and get started without me. I have to meet with Iwai real quick.”
“DUDE—no, come on, we’ll just go with you!”
Akira leaned close to speak quietly. “Iwai will be furious if I bring a kid into his shop. Please, Ryuji? I’ll be fast.”
Akira smelled like coffee, and a bit like the same detergent Ryuji’s mom used on their laundry. Ryuji shivered; it was definitely because he was cold from the rain.
“Please, Ryuji—I’ll treat you for dinner. He’s having a hard day…”
Shit. “Shit.” Ryuji glanced back to the kid. The little guy was slumped casually with his head turned away, though it was clear enough that he was no happier about it than Ryuji was.
Ryuji sighed, though he tried to keep it quiet. “Fine…just, be fast, ok?”
“Thank you.” Akira squeezed Ryuji’s shoulder. “I really mean it.”
“Yeah, yeah. Alright, kid. Let’s head.”
The kid looked back and forth between Ryuji and Akira. “He looks…” The kid pointed his chin up. “Is he…sketchy?”
“You little—”
Akira gave Ryuji a (stern, yet) playful shove, handed the kid the umbrella, and opened his spare. “It’s okay. He’s my best friend.”
Well, at least Ryuji was no longer cold.
The kid held the umbrella with an iron grip. “Ugh…ok…” He looked up at Ryuji again, seemingly caught somewhere between solemn and likely to cuss him out. “I’ll go with you.”
“Uh, great. Let’s go.”
The kid was quiet during the walk, and during the short wait for a table. Akira still hadn’t shown up by the time they sat down and got their sodas, so Ryuji started daydreaming about punishing training sessions to put their leader through.
Aw crap, there was that essay too. What was it on again? Could he just write about space? Wait…was it actually about space? How did the stuff they always learned at school always line up with the palaces they went into? Was it part of that cognitive stuff Mona was always on about?
“Why do you walk all weird?”
“Huh?” Ryuji drank some of his soda and looked at the kid; the kid flicked his eyes away.
“You just walk weird, is all.”
“Oh.” Was the kid being an asshole? Was this just how kids were? Were…were kids assholes? “Yeah, I busted my leg a bit ago.”
For whatever reason that seemed to catch the kid’s interest. “Really? How?”
Ryuji leaned back and shrugged; he felt legit all the sudden. “A shitty teacher. He broke my leg to prove a point.”
“OH!” The kid—crap what was his name—leaned forward, almost knocking into his drink. “That’s right, you go to the same school! Was it the same teacher that the Phantom Thieves took down?”
“Yep, that asshole.”
If the kid’s eyes could have turned into stars, they would have. “That SO COOL. I can’t believe they came and solved your problem. They’re awesome.”
Shinya, that was his name. “Yeah? You like the Thieves?”
“Yeah, they’re incredible.” He stared down at the table. “I wish they would come to my school.”
Ryuji’s phone buzzed in his pocket, but he ignored it. “Yeah? Someone giving you a hard time?”
Shinya glanced up at him. It seemed crazy, but Ryuji could feel the kid measuring him out. “No.”
Ryuji shrugged and finished his soda. He pressed the button for another—it wasn’t like Shinya was his problem, at least not directly. The kid would tell Akira who it was, and Ryuji would help stomp their ass in Mementos. Done and done.
Hmm…was it a science essay? That sounded right. Something about watermelons…in space…or was it watermelons in Europe? Nah, that seemed wrong.
Shinya piped up to ask for another soda when the waitress came by, even though his glass was still mostly full. Ryuji snorted; he remembered doing the same thing as a kid. They waited quietly for their sodas; Ryuji pulled out his (ugh so cracked, seriously, this sucks) phone.
Sorry sorry sorry Iwai needed me to deliver something.
Please don’t hate me.
I’ll be back in twenty minutes I promise.
You are so effing dead
Seriously
I am not joking
Friendship
Over
Death
Vowed
“—work?”
Ryuji glanced up. “Huh?”
Shinya looked annoyed; Ryuji put away his phone. “I said, how do you think the Phantom Thieves work?”
“Uhhhhh…” Shinya stared at him expectantly, flanked by soda. Ryuji became acutely aware of being the, well, least subtle Phantom Thief. “Uh, I think they need a name? Then they…do something…to the person…with that name.”
“Ugh, everyone knows that.” The kid slid down in the booth and looked away.
Ryuji shrugged. “If we knew how they worked it wouldn’t, uh, work.”
“Whatever.”
Ryuji moved to ease his leg. The kid was pointedly not looking at him; Ryuji began wondering whether he could pull out his books and start on the essay. He was pretty sure it was about watermelons in space.
“But what if…” Ryuji glanced back at the kid. Shinya’s voice was quiet, almost lost to the noise of the diner. “What if they needed to stop a war? How would they get all the names of the people on the bad side?” He shook his head and sank lower in his seat. “No, it’s impossible.”
“A war?” Ryuji shook his head. What did a kid care about—oh. “Wait, at your school?”
Shinya fixed him with a calculating look before giving a small nod.
Yeah, he got it now. Aw, crap. “A war declared on you?”
Shinya looked away but gave another nod.
“That sucks.”
“Yeah.”
Ryuji shifted in his seat; his wet clothes had entered the gross clammy stage. “Why’d they go after you?”
Ryuji sat through another critical assessment—jeeze. Was this what adults felt like around him? Eh, whatever, the adults deserved it. “It’s because of my mom.”
That got Ryuji’s entire attention. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah…she’s not bad or anything but…my parents are…”
Ryuji hurried the assessment up. “Divorced?” The kid’s eyes snapped up. He looked ready to fight. Ryuji waved a hand; he felt cool, like Boss. “Mine too.”
The kid sat up and leaned forward again, this time knocking into one of his glasses only to catch it before it went over. “Wait, seriously?”
“Yep.”
“Whoa. I’ve never met another one before.”
Ryuji shrugged, shifting again to place his elbows on the table. “Yeah. You live with your mom?”
Shinya nodded.
Ryuji sipped his soda. “Me too. She work a lot?”
Now the kid looked down at the table.
“Yeah, mine too.” Ryuji sighed. “Sucks, huh.”
“Yeah.” Shinya twisted his glass in his hands. “Kids give me a hard time for her, or whatever.”
“Yep. I get shit at school for it too.”
Shinya’s face fell. “Oh. I guess…I guess I hoped it was gonna be better in high school.”
Ryuji sipped his soda. How was he supposed to tell this kid that high school was one of the worst places in the history of humanity? But shit…it would have been a whole different game if Ryuji had had someone to talk to at that age. He needed to tell the kid something.
“Well, most of the students still suck…but you can stay out at arcades later. And you can even pick up jobs to help out at home if you want to, buy manga, and go eat cool places in the city. And sometimes…” Ryuji shrugged. “I don’t know, sometimes you make friends with people in your school you never talked to before, or meet new ones. It’s easier to make friends with people in other schools too, when you’re older.”
Shinya leaned back. “I don’t think any kids in my school like me…”
Ryuji smirked. “Yeah, I get that too. But sometimes people come around. You just have to give them a chance when they want it. And I guess, try not to be a total jerk to everyone all the time.” He winced. “That’s kinda hard, though, when everyone is hauling ass on you. Worth it, though.”
“Yeah. I guess when I was nice I did meet Akira-san…”
“Yeah, exactly.” Ryuji scratched at a drop of water running down his scalp. “The more good people you can be around, the less shitty things get. It gets…” For whatever reason the memory of Futaba chucking a carrot—a carrot, seriously—at Ryuji’s head a few days ago popped into his mind and made him smile. “It gets easier, even if things don’t completely change. You have to look at the bright side of it all, you know? I mean, damn—I think life’s always going to be a bit shitty, you just need friends to talk it out with. You’ll totally fail if you try to go it alone.”
“Fail?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh.” The kid looked down at the table again. “I don’t want to lose…”
“Well you’re not losing if you’re friends with Akira. And I mean...if you ever want to talk about your mom and the divorce and whatever, uh. I know we just met but…” Ryuji heaved a sigh and glanced up just in time to see Akira—the traitor himself—make his way into the diner. “Yeah. I just mean I’m happy to chat with you any time, if it helps. I’m kinda a pro at that shit, haha.”
Shinya smiled. “Haha—yeah. Yeah, that’d be cool I guess.”
“Cool. One sec. AKIRA! Over here, you traitor!” Ryuji could feel people glaring at him—even Shinya looked surprised—but Akira grinned as he made his way over. That was all that mattered.
Akira’s grin downgraded to a sheepish smile. “Sorry—”
Ryuji shoved at Akira as he slid into the booth. “Nah, too late dude! We’ve decided to cut you loose.”
Shinya nodded. “Yep, we don’t need losers that ditch their friends.”
Akira hung his head. “I gravely apologize and vow to pay for both your meals.”
Ryuji fixed Shinya with a calculating look of his own. “I don’t know, Shinya-kun. Can we trust him?”
“Hmm…only if he buys us THE GOOD SHIT.”
“YES.” Ryuji pointed at Shinya. “HE HAS A GOOD POINT. Akira, you have to buy us the good shit!”
Akira nodded solemnly. “I shall buy you…the good shit.”
They all burst into laughter just in time for the waitress to come over and ask them to PLEASE stop yelling and swearing. They fell over themselves apologizing and placed a huge order to placate her—though it was hard not to laugh every time she looked their way to see whether they had left yet.
At the end of it all Shinya asked for Ryuji’s contact info. Ryuji gave it to him and told him to text any time—Shinya seemed like a good kid. Ryuji stuck with Akira to drop the kid off; even though it was late Shinya’s mom wasn’t home yet. That hurt a bit. Ryuji got how much it sucked being alone like that. He sent Shinya a Gun About meme and smiled when the kid spammed him back.
The subway car on the way home was calm at least, and they were able to get seats next to each other. Ryuji’s leg was feeling a bit better, he wasn’t lonely, and his clothes had started to dry out and would stay that way; Akira had loaned Ryuji the spare umbrella for his walk home later. Ryuji had a whole bunch of good leftovers to bring his mom, and his own stomach felt like it would explode in a good way. Also, he’d helped some kid. That was a pretty solid feeling, too.
It was a good end to a shitty day.
“Hey.”
Ryuji glanced over; Akira was looking at him. “Yo.”
“Thanks. I didn’t mean to ditch you like that…”
“Yeah, I know. It’s fine, dude.”
“I mean all week, really. I know I’ve been…” Ryuji felt as much as heard Akira sigh. “I’m sorry we’re not hanging out much.”
“Yeah. Yeah, me too, man.”
“Yeah.”
They sat in silence for a while. Ryuji could almost feel the minutes slipping away as the train took them closer to their separate destinations.
“Hey, Ryuji?”
“Hm?”
“You hate chili snacks.”
Ryuji blinked. What was this about? He didn’t hate all chili snacks, just the weird gummy ones Akira loved. They were truly gross.
Akira chuckled, though it sounded a bit sad. “Why were you so upset earlier? At the arcade.”
Oh. OH. “Hah, just a shitty day.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I…” He sighed. He didn’t want to spend their last moments bitching about his day start to finish. “I cracked my phone screen at school.”
“Shit.”
Ryuji shrugged. “Yeah.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. It sucks.”
Akira put an arm over Ryuji’s shoulders. “We’ll get it fixed. We can go to Akihabara tomorrow—if we get it repaired by the distributor the warrantee will still be good. Your mom will never know.”
“Haha, right, I’ll just win the lottery first—”
Akira squeezed Ryuji’s shoulders. “Nah, it’s a working expense. We need these phones to get in and do our best, right?”
Ryuji opened his mouth to reply—and a sob slipped out. Wow, he was going to outdo Ann at this rate. “R-really? T-tha-that’d-b’awesome.”
Akira didn’t say anything else, just sat there with his arm tight around Ryuji’s shoulders. Ryuji scrubbed at his eyes and sat there, crying and not giving a shit. His heart was doing that flutter thing again, but he didn’t care about that either.
The doors opened, and the station’s song started playing. “Aw man, my stop.” Ryuji wiped his arm across his face and reluctantly scrambled up, careful not to drop the leftovers while hurrying to the door. He glanced at Akira—the guy was kind of red, like he’d been upset too. Probably because it was embarrassing to watch another dude bust out crying. “Thanks, man.”
Akira tilted his head and smiled at him—and it didn’t matter how many other people the guy met, or how busy he was. Ryuji knew no one else in the world got that same smile. That one was just for him. “Just us, tomorrow. I promise.”
Soon Ryuji lay staring at his ceiling. He breathed in and felt that dumb grin on his face again. The day had truly sucked, but at least he had a bright-side like Akira. At least Akira was the last (non-mom) person he got to see. At least he could have Akira’s arm tight around him, while he blubbered and had all sorts of weird emotions. At least Akira missed Ryuji as much as Ryuji missed Akira.
And maybe—
Ryuji closed his eyes. He could do this. He could—would—think this through.
Maybe…maybe what he felt for Akira was something. Maybe he actually—
Sudden, stark realization struck him full force. His eyes snapped open and he bolted upright, his heart pounding. He jumped up and turned on the light, feeling dizzy and vaguely sick.
HE STILL HAD TO WRITE THAT ENTIRE ESSAY FOR SCHOOL TOMORROW.
Shit.