Work Text:
Because they were dicks, Natsuki’s four best friends rushed up to the signup sheet for the class trip, crowding everyone else out, then refused to get out of Natsuki’s way as everyone else took their turn, pushing and harassing him playfully. Most of the class had already picked their roommate for the class trip. When his friends saw who he got stuck with, they were merciless: “That four-eyed nerd?? Aw, man, I figured it’d be bad, but not that bad!”
They were like this on the train on the way to the beach, too, only worse, imagining various anime-style romantic feelings developing between the nerd and Natsuki, sexy times following in their shared room. He finally lunged at Yuu, the worst of them, their scuffle getting serious enough to attract the attention of the teacher, who proceeded to lecture them for the entire rest of the trip.
Still, they had fun once they were actually at the beach, immediately running down to the sand to wade with everyone else. Of course, it was his group of friends who got in trouble again when they all threw Yuu off a small outcropping into the ocean with his shoes on. Anyway, it was hilarious, and obviously, he deserved it.
Dinner was fun, flirting with girls was fun, sneaking around the hotel when they were supposed to be headed to bed was fun, everything was fun until he had to say goodbye to his friends and go to the room he had to share with that nerd.
He was famous or something. Natsuki had never heard of him anywhere except at school, but apparently he was really good at piano. Consequently, some of the girls were into him despite the fact that this should have been impossible. He was short, average-looking, with boring hair and ugly square glasses. There was nothing to like, particularly the way he treated everyone like they were of no consequence--probably also because he was famous, thinking he was too good for everyone else. Seriously, the only person at school he paid any mind to at all was Tsubaki, who was obviously in love with him, so where maybe Natsuki and his friends would have left him alone, the fact that Tsubaki turned down all interested parties in favor of that dweeb might also have figured in. Natsuki and his friends had definitely not been nice to Arima Kousei.
Perhaps most maddening of all was that he hardly seemed to notice. He heard them ribbing Natsuki about having to room with him. He just stared through them with those cold, empty eyes. The quintessential good boy, he never, ever got a lecture from the teacher. He was never scoffed at by disgusted girls for his bad behavior like Natsuki and his friends. When the teachers talked to him, they expected great things for his future. Natsuki and his friends were urged to look into something more vocational.
Yeah, they had not been nice to him, bumping into him in the hall and ‘accidentally’ knocking his books out of his arms, knocking him down in P.E., talking bad about him. And now Natsuki had to spend the whole night facing the consequences of their actions. This was just the best day ever.
Natsuki had hoped Arima might already be asleep when he finally went back to his room, but he was up, studying a musical score. Dweeb! Natsuki filed away this detail; his friends would laugh and laugh tomorrow when he told them that was really how Arima spent his time. Arima looked up when he came in, looked like he might be about to say hello, then just looked back down at the score, expressionless as ever.
Natsuki washed up and got in bed. During other class trips Natsuki had gone on, larger numbers of students shared a big room. Here, the rooms were tiny, so they could only fit two single futons on the wood floor, just an arm’s length between them. His friends’ teasing about romantic entanglements flashed through Natsuki’s mind. He scowled, and curled up on the far side of the futon away from Arima, his back to him.
Politely, Arima turned out the light shortly thereafter, and got under the covers himself. Not a word had been spoken.
Natsuki was consumed with angry thoughts. Why had his asshole friends stuck him with Arima?? Natsuki himself had never done much of anything to him, but surely Arima assumed he was just as bad as the rest, and he wasn’t, he really wasn’t. Natsuki and his friends had been close all through middle school. Natsuki’s mother sometimes suggested she thought they might be a bad influence. Natsuki used to get better grades. They were headed in a bad direction, Natsuki knew, but what was he supposed to do about it? So they were bullies. They were just having a little fun. Leave it to them to ruin Natsuki’s class trip, the first of his high-school years, while they must be having a ball rooming with each other.
Natsuki wasn’t going to be able to sleep until Arima was asleep, because, well, Natsuki’s friends had proven time and again that revenge would be had, even against your best friends, much less your worst enemies, the second you let your guard down. Natsuki pretended to just be rolling over in his sleep so he could check to see if Arima had drifted off yet ... only to see him playing ... air piano? The music dweeb even practiced at night, when he was supposed to be sleeping, on the class trip??
The moonlight came through the open window, illuminating all of Arima’s bizarre activities clearly, so either he was really that oblivious, or he assumed Natsuki was asleep by now, because then Arima began playing air violin.
Natsuki was most irritated. No wonder he and his friends made fun of this kid all the time. He could play the violin, too?? Quite well, from the looks of it, passionately, really getting into it. Natsuki scowled. This kid got everything he deserved.
Then Natsuki noticed something sparkling on Arima’s cheek. It couldn’t be-- but it was. He was actually crying, tears streaming silently down his face. Jeez. Natsuki closed his eyes, so as not to see more. Arima wasn’t going to get revenge. He was no danger right now. It would be best not to watch this. Natsuki wouldn’t tell his friends about this tomorrow. There was nothing funny about the pure sorrow on Arima’s usually expressionless face.
That was the thing about that kid. It was hard not to want to keep at him, because, you know, if you wanted him to suffer a little for stealing all the hot girls (and not even wanting any of them) or for being the teachers’ star pupil, it was frustrating to feel like you hadn’t even succeeded in getting his attention. He always just picked himself up off the floor and gathered his books like nothing had happened, that expressionlessness as much a part of him as his glasses, but now ... Natsuki had never seen a look like that on anyone’s face, ever.
Natsuki hoped to be able to fall asleep quickly and forget this had ever happened. Instead, he kept opening his eyes to look, unable to help himself, haunted by Arima’s expression. He couldn’t have slept, anyway, as instead of tapering off, Arima’s weeping grew audible, soft sobs in the darkness, then louder. He got out of bed and went into the bathroom, probably so as not to wake Natsuki. His sobbing got louder and louder, until finally he fled the room. Getting up to look out the window, wide-eyed, Natsuki saw Arima run onto the sand in the bright moonlight, barefoot. Staggering into the surf, he fell to his knees in the water in his pyjamas, his sobs so loud Natsuki could hear them from here.
Natsuki couldn’t watch anymore. He slid back into bed stiffly, staring at the ceiling for what seemed like hours, until he finally slipped into sleep.
In the morning, Natsuki woke to his phone alarm. The events of the previous night suddenly flooded back to him. Had all that really happened?? He looked quickly toward Arima’s futon. There was Arima, dead asleep, rumpled, his hair still a little bit damp.
Natsuki beat it out of there. His friends tried teasing him about romantic shenanigans with his roommate over breakfast, but Natsuki’s hard silence finally made them give it up and start talking about other things, picking another in their group to tease.
He couldn’t help being really relieved to see Arima smile that day, hanging around with Tsubaki and a couple of other people, laughing like ... just like all the other kids. What had happened to him, to make a high-school freshman feel something like he did last night? Was all his expressionlessness just a mask he wore to cover what was really inside him, to cover the look that would otherwise always be on his face, the look that was on his face last night? Was that laughter also such a mask? It had to be, to some extent, Natsuki figured, knowing, as apparently no one else knew, how profound and intense his sorrow really was, but he did at least look like he was having a genuinely good time today, like he sometimes got to feel good feelings, too.
Natsuki burned with shame over how cruel he and his friends had been to him after how much he’d already suffered, especially after finding out from a little asking-around he couldn’t resist doing that the poor kid’s mom had died. When his friends brought up Arima with him again over dinner, eager to ridicule, Natsuki shut them down instantly.
This time, Natsuki didn’t screw around after he hung around with his friends in the communal bath to delay going to his room. There were things he wanted to talk about with Arima ... yet when he opened the door, to find Arima studying that same musical score, and Arima lifted his eyes to his, Arima’s expression was so cold and indifferent as to make it seem impossible, as if ... as if it would never occur to Arima to talk about himself, as if it would never occur to him that someone else might show the least bit of interest in him and his real feelings.
Natsuki brushed his teeth and got in bed. He wasn’t going to be able to do it. He couldn’t breach the silence. Just as he had the night before, Arima soon politely turned off the light, and lay down to sleep.
“I saw you last night,” Natsuki blurted out. “I saw you ... playing, and crying, and then ... I saw you run out into the water.”
Arima was silent for a long minute. Finally, he said, “... Sorry.”
Natsuki sat up, throwing the covers off himself. “No, not ‘sorry’! What do you have to be sorry for?! I’m sorry.”
“For what?” Arima asked mildly.
“For ... my friends and I being dicks to you. I’m sorry. It’s true; they’re assholes. But I’m not like them, though. I’m really not.”
Again, Arima seemed to weigh his words a long time before finally saying, “... Thanks.”
Natsuki looked at him. He was right in that same shaft of moonlight again. “What ... what happened to you, to make you feel like that? I mean--oh, it’s your mom, isn’t it? I heard about your mom.”
“My mom died,” Arima said bluntly, his unadorned way of speaking the truth. “But that was years ago. Who I’m really missing now is ... someone else, someone who died more recently. Just ... just a couple months ago,” he said, and his calm voice, as expressionless as his face, suddenly broke. There it was: his mask had fallen off once more.
Natsuki settled deep into the covers, too fascinated not to ask: “Who?”
Arima started a few responses, as if there were a dozen ways he could describe this person, before finally settling on, “The girl I loved.”
Oh. Somehow, so much was explained in that one little sentence: why he wasn’t interested in any other girls, even the devoted and desirable Tsubaki, or even in any other people at all; why his sorrow was so fresh; even why he was such a good pianist, frequently described by teachers as being beyond his years, beyond mere technical perfection in the way he expressed himself musically.
“I’m sorry,” Natsuki whispered. He’d never meant those words more. There were tears on Arima’s face again. “I’m really ... really sorry that happened to you. I’ve never felt anything like that. My cat died last year, but that’s the closest.”
“I lost a cat, too,” Arima said plainly, then added softly, “Two cats.”
Jeez, this poor kid.
Natsuki suddenly sat up. “Screw this. Let’s get out of here. Let’s go look at the moon, or play some volleyball or something. I mean, it’s not like you have a mom to ... get you in trouble,” he finished at a mumble. God, what an awful thing to say, but he’d already said it; it was too late. “Oh, or is your dad really strict?”
“No, he’s almost never around.”
“Then let’s go!”
Natsuki was surprised but delighted at how easy it was to talk Arima into some mildly naughty behavior; after only a little hesitation, Arima got up and followed quite willingly, even grinning that same genuine grin he grinned today. They snuck out of the hotel, chortling quietly, and onto the beach, padding barefoot up around the outcropping, carrying their shoes, so they would be hidden from view from any prying eyes at the hotel.
After trying to fish in the tide by moonlight for a little while, Natsuki suddenly stripped off all his clothes and jumped off the outcropping with a rebel yell. Anything to make that poor kid laugh ... which he did, though he didn’t jump off himself ... until Natsuki splashed him from the water until his clothes were so wet, he might as well take them off anyway. They swam out a little ways, slipping on mossy rocks beneath the surf. Natsuki suggested various bad ideas he and his friends would have gotten up to, which Arima gently shot down. In fact, he stopped even walking on his hands underwater, trying to stay upright in the waves, after a couple of attempts, looking at his slightly scraped-up hands and remarking that his piano teacher was going to kill him for this. Apparently when you were a famous pianist, you had to take super good care of your hands. That explained the gloves he wore as he slept.
“Oh, so-- I guess I’d have thought someone as good as you wouldn’t even need a teacher anymore.”
“No. You always need a teacher. At least, if you’re at my level. Just like a skater always needs a coach. They give you tips, and keep you motivated. Mostly, she just kind of looks after me, though. I think she thinks of herself as my surrogate mom.”
Oh. Thank God he at least had that. After swimming in the waves a little more, they finally got out, found their clothes and put them back on, and headed back to the hotel, playfully shoving each other and trying to trip each other onto the soft sand all the way. They each took a quick shower once they were back in their room, then went to bed, still giggling. Yet the last words out of Natsuki’s mouth when he was on the edge of sleep were a whispered, “I’m sorry.”
They had to actually do some schoolwork today, going into town. Natsuki sat with his friends on the bus there, and Arima sat with Tsubaki, but though Natsuki had been afraid their fragile friendship would dissolve with the morning light, Arima had grinned as he told him good morning as they dragged themselves out of bed to go to breakfast.
It was a good thing that friendship was still intact, as the teacher told them upon arrival in the downtown area of this historic city that they needed to pair up with their roommates for this class project, each pair assigned one historical site or business or building to explore, research, and then prepare a presentation on. Natsuki’s friends made the usual jokes as he headed over to stand beside Arima, and Tsubaki seemed to whisper some choice words about them to Arima before he went to meet Natsuki halfway.
Natsuki was glad to learn they’d been assigned the tallest building in the city, which stood on the very edge of the downtown business district, where they’d be away from their friends, their classmates, their teachers, everyone who had assumptions about both of them that might make it hard for them to maintain this friendship, everyone who might screw up what was otherwise, Natsuki already knew, sure to be a good time. Indeed, as soon as the teacher sent them off on their assignments, Natsuki immediately took Arima to a maid café where Natsuki flirted with the maid, then even talked Arima into singing a couple of songs at karaoke, just the two of them in a room. They hung around a park and a manga store before finally deciding they’d better do a little work.
“So, Tsubaki wants in your pants bad, but you’re not ready to hit that yet?” Natsuki asked conversationally as they made their way up to the observation deck of their assigned building.
Arima chuckled softly at his phrasing. “Tsubaki and I have been friends forever. We grew up next door to each other.”
“Ah. Friend-zoned. Poor girl.”
Arima laughed outright. “I’m not saying it’s not gonna happen. Just ... because it was so recent ... with Kaori ....”
“Did Tsubaki beat her up once she figured out you were into this chick?”
“Not her ... but me, sure. Same as always.”
“Ugh. It’s starting to sound like you need some better friends.” Last night, Arima had told him how every person in his life expected something from him, every adult expecting great things from his piano career, his piano rivals expecting him to inspire and be there for them to battle it out with. “Even my friends ...,” he’d said, before trailing off. It was obvious what Tsubaki expected from him. As far as she was concerned, sooner or later, he was going to be hers, and that was all there was to it.
“Well ... kind of sounds like you do, too.”
“And now we do!” Natsuki said cheerfully, gesturing to the both of them. Arima looked dubious, but finally smiled, letting Natsuki lead him to look over the edge of observation deck, leaning far enough that a guard told them to lay off.
Natsuki could tell Arima didn’t believe him. He thought the second Natsuki was with his asshole friends again, he would go right back to bullying Arima. Arima’s doubt was no less than what Natsuki deserved, but he meant it. Arima was the coolest, most real, kindest friend he’d ever had.
Once Arima said he thought he had enough information to cobble together a decent presentation, mostly gleaned from the various placards around the observation deck, Natsuki took them down to the lobby, to patronize a famous café he’d seen on the internet because it was full of cute cats. Even if they had not one other thing in common, Natsuki knew they both liked cats.
Natsuki regretted it as he saw a shadow of the pain he’d seen on Arima’s face that first night. Ever since he found out Natsuki had seen his true self that night, Arima wasn’t so expressionless around him, even if he was still blank-faced when they were with the whole class. But then Arima picked up a black cat and cuddled it close to his chest, rocking it, and this peace came over him, and Natsuki knew he’d made the right choice. Natsuki got them both some hot chocolate, and the canele Arima asked for, and they shot the breeze while petting cats of every color, shape, and size. They especially swarmed over Arima. When one accidentally scratched his hand as it jumped from his arm to his shoulder, he briefly freaked out. There seemed to be more to it than just fear of his piano teacher giving him a hard time, but when he met Natsuki’s eye, Arima shrugged, and they laughed.
Man, to let go of ... everything. It sure was good to see Arima get to let go of all that weight of responsibility of being The Best, all those expectations. He had a reputation to uphold, or even if he refused to uphold it, it was pressed upon him. Was Natsuki the only one who had ever seen him let go like this, be a little bad, screw around while other model students were dutifully touring their assignments and writing their presentations?
Yet it was just as much a relief for Natsuki to be able to let go of his reputation. It was hard to be the bad kid all the time. There was nothing his friends would ever give him more shit for than being a proper good boy. There was nothing his friends wouldn’t give him shit for, period. Now, in the weeks since high school started, he’d already earned the disappointment of his teachers, the concern of his parents, and the ill will of most of their classmates, and he had to worry about all that, too ... the ill will of every classmate but Arima, apparently, who seemed unable to do aught but take things, and people, exactly as they were. He didn’t care about Natsuki’s reputation. After Natsuki had seen Arima’s deepest, most hidden self laid bare, Arima seemed to feel there was nothing he had any reason to try to hide from Natsuki, either. This was the funnest day Natsuki could remember having in his whole life. He was so glad now that his jerk friends had stuck him with Arima for a roommate.
When they were finally done playing with cats, they decided they should go back to a karaoke room to screw around some more and also work on their presentation before they had to meet up with the rest of the class to head back to the hotel. Dashing out of the café into the open main floor, lined with shops, laughing, they ran right into Tsubaki, who looked instantly outraged. “How can you be having fun with him?” she demanded of Arima, looking over Natsuki with disgust. Yeah ... pretty much everyone in their class thought he was nothing but trash.
As Arima fumbled for a response, both his and Natsuki’s gaze went behind her, to where the rest of Natsuki’s friends had just entered the building, also staring at Arima and Natsuki together, their expressions not unlike Tsubaki’s. Apparently everyone had heard of the cat café.
Natsuki and Arima looked at each other, and bursting out laughing, spontaneously ran away from their friends, out the opposite door exiting the building. They ran up the street until they were out of breath, where they leaned against a building to rest, still hysterical. Yeah, this was the best day ever.
In their room that night, they made plans. “I don’t actually live that far from you,” Arima said wonderingly as they compared maps of their houses online. “The high school I picked is so far from my house, I figured we’d live an hour apart at least.”
“Maybe we can commute together!” Natsuki suggested.
“Sure ... but Tsubaki would be there, and ... she’s got good aim.”
“Don’t worry; I’ll win her over,” Natsuki bragged. “In fact, if you’re not gonna hit that, maybe you could put in a good word for me ....”
“Stay away from her,” Arima growled. Natsuki collapsed on his futon, laughing. They were still here, alone in their room together, away from the rest of the world trying to make them into the things it thought they were, on this trip so much more magical than even the most optimistic manga could have promised. Tomorrow morning, they would board the train for home. The world would find them again. But they still had tonight, unshackled and free to be whatever they felt like being, here on the edge of the earth, where the surf could carry all Arima’s tears away like they’d never been shed, like there had never been a reason for them to have to be.
Natsuki got up to look out the window. The moon was just now waxing full, lowering over the ocean. “Look at that!” he said, pointing. The moon’s reflection floated on the waves all the way out to the horizon. Arima got up to look. They just sat there a while, looking out upon the beach, the sand, listening to the waves. “I’m so glad this happened,” Natsuki finally said. There was no sense hiding it. He’d seen all the way down into Arima. It only seemed fair to share what was inside of himself in return.
Arima looked at him, confused.
“I mean, that we were roommates, and ... I got to know you so well. My friends ... you know they’re such dicks because they’re jealous, right? And Tsubaki. Everybody’s just jealous because you’re awesome.”
“Not to hear them tell it,” Arima said dryly, going back to sitting on his futon, working on the presentation.
“Still, you know that has to be what it is, don’t you?”
“I don’t know what anything is,” Arima murmured, barely audible as he leaned over the page, working diligently, as he was so good at. “Things just happen, and I don’t understand any of it. I don’t really get people.”
“Then trust me when I tell you it’s true.”
Arima looked up at him and smiled, really genuinely. Natsuki felt like it was the best thing he’d ever seen in his life. A smile meant so much more, on a face that had evinced so much pain. They gazed at each other a long moment, and there was a lot exchanged in that moment, Natsuki felt: Arima seemed equally glad that they’d made friends. He seemed relieved Natsuki was there, now, to protect him from his bullies, to simply end all that (and end it Natsuki would; he’d see to it his friends never bothered Arima again) in a way Tsubaki had tried to do but didn’t have the power to fully execute. Arima even seemed glad to have been seen, for all his pain finally to have been witnessed, and ... accepted. Not judged, not rejected, not even erased, simply accepted exactly as it was.
Arima bent over the page again. “It’s better ...,” he murmured. Natsuki looked at him. Arima didn’t offer a lot of his thoughts. When he did, they were usually worth hearing. “It’s better ... to just say these kinds of things straight out, isn’t it? Better than telling someone ... after it’s too late.”
Somehow, Natsuki knew he must be referring to that girl he loved. So that was part of his pain: that they were never able to be together as they should have been while she still lived. “Yeah,” agreed Natsuki easily, still gazing out the window. “Way better.”
“You’re not like anyone else I know, in that way. So I’m glad we met, too.”
Natsuki grinned to himself. Perfect Arima, who had it all, even valued trash like Natsuki in some way, in a way he’d never been valued before. Natsuki got up and did a little dance around their room while Arima looked on, giggling, a kind of dance Natsuki’s friends would have mercilessly made fun of him for, but he couldn’t help it. He was full of the giddy joy of being worth something in this world, which was something he’d never expected to feel--worth something to someone who was definitely worthy. Natsuki wasn’t good at school, he wasn’t well-liked, he wasn’t talented, but still, somehow, just by not hiding what he really was, he had something to offer. He looked at Arima, who was still giggling, and then Arima got up and started dancing with him.
This really was the best day ever.