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“Hello, can I help you with anything?”
“Ya! I’m--” Bokuto turned to the employee, relieved to pass his trying search onto someone else, even for a few minutes. That relief turned to clammy palms and a dry throat when the employee turned out to be one of the most beautiful men Bokuto had ever set eyes on in real life.
“Yes?” The man asked, disinterested resting expression not changing. The look suited his fine dark-gray eyes and the sharp angles of his high cheekbones in his heart-shaped face.
“I’m Bokuto!” Bokuto just refrained from offering his hand for a shake, because this was a customer-employee interaction, and that would be weird. It didn’t stop him from looking down for a moment and noticing how long the man’s fingers were. A somewhat predictable questioning lift of an eyebrow rewarded his offering.
“Hello, Bokuto-san. I’m Akaashi. Can I help you with anything?” Heat trickled up Bokuto’s neck, conquering his cheeks with an ease that only made the color redder.
“Right, sorry. Do you guys have, um, The Crying of Lot 49 by… Tho-mas Py-nc-hon.” Bokuto’s ability to use ordinary language had already degenerated in the face of Akaashi’s… well, face, so he was sure his English came out mangled beyond any recognizability. Despite that, Akaashi’s expression lifted both in recognition and interest.
“We do, actually. Right this way.” Akaashi turned, making a ‘follow me’ gesture. Bokuto wasn’t sure the context had anything to do with Bokuto obeying the command. “Have you read any of Pynchon’s other books?” Akaashi asked while leading them through a narrow aisle filled with mystery thrillers. He pronounced the foreign family name with the ease of habit.
“No… are they good?”
“Excellent. Though I have to admit Lot 49 is my personal favorite. I’m working up to reading it in the original language, but I don’t think I’ll ever be proficient enough in English to do it,”
“That’s cool! Reading in English is interesting,”
“Oh, are you fluent? I’m afraid we don’t have an English-language copy,”
“I’m pretty good, but that’s okay; a normal one works! … So what other books do you like?” Bokuto asked, hands in his pocket with an attempt at casualness. Walking behind Akaashi, it was easy to see that his frame, though thin, was sturdy with lean muscle, forming an elegant figure.
“I enjoy the postmodernist movement immensely. Signs Preceding the End of the World is another excellent one, though I’ll certainly never be able to read the original Spanish.” Akaashi wasn’t looking at him, but Bokuto nodded along anyway. “As far as works I can enjoy in their native language and context, Sayonara, Gangsters by Gen’ichirō Takahashi is fascinating, and, of course, almost anything by Yoko Tawada. Her presentation of the human relationship with language and culture is beyond compare. Have you read any of them?”
“No, not really...”
“Well, Lot 49 is an excellent place to start. Here we are.” Akaashi stopped and gestured to a wall of paperbacks, nodding his head specifically at a teal novel with an image of a horn on it.
“That’s it! Thank you, I’ve been looking all over for a copy!” Bokuto said, grabbing it off the shelf and quickly flipping through the pages.
“My pleasure. I hope you enjoy it.” Akaashi shifted, and it filled Bokuto with dread that he might move away, so he quickly grabbed onto the loose tendrils of the conversation.
“So why do you like…--” he panicked for a moment before remembering the right term--“the postmodernist movement so much?”
Any sign of disengaging from the interaction left Akaashi’s frame.
“The focus on exposing the ultimately empty nature of symbolism speaks to the undue weight placed on fulfilling social constructs,” Akaashi explained, his features staying mostly flat, but the words introducing a brightness to his eyes and a strong bass to his voice that made Bokuto’s heart knock around in his chest. “The interplay of language and culture and metaphor is so intrinsic to human understanding the world, and this movement completely confuses our understanding of these things to the point of utter meaninglessness, you know?” he looked to Bokuto.
“Yes,” Bokuto lied.
“Lot 49 especially asks us to consider what culture even is without context, while simultaneously turning a mirror back to its own movement. It’s a postmodernist breakdown of postmodernism, and--”
“Akaashi,” called a woman in the same uniform as Akaashi from a few shelves over. “Sorry, Ogata is having trouble with the shelving... again.” All at once, Akaashi’s demeanor settled back into something disinterested.
“I’ll see what I can do,” he replied, before turning back to Bokuto. A small smile tugged the corner of his lips up, and he looked at Bokuto from under his long lashes as he tapped the paperback in Bokuto’s hand. “We have a few other of my favorites here, so you’ll have to come back and tell me what you think, alright?”
“Of course!” Bokuto answered, delighted at being provided with an excuse to talk to Akaashi again. With one last smile, Akaashi turned and left.
As Bokuto paid and left the store, his phone rang.
“Bo, did you pick it up? Kiyoko is going to want her copy back today,” Tendou asked with a laugh from the other end of the line.
“I got it!” Personally, Bokuto thought the brand new book in his hand felt too light for all the trouble its twin had caused him. After a mishap with the blender, Bokuto had managed to ruin his roommate’s copy of the novel, and though Tendou had found the whole thing more funny than annoying, he then revealed he had borrowed it from Kiyoko, and would need to replace it for her. The whole thing was Bokuto’s fault, and he would feel super bad if he didn’t even try to take responsibility. Little did he know that no online retailer shipped it in less than a month, and it would take three bookstores before Bokuto found one that sold it.
On the sidewalk outside, Bokuto stopped in his tracks.
“Hello?” Tendou asked.
“I didn’t tell him it wasn’t mine!” Bokuto realized.
“Huh?”
“When do you see Kiyoko?” he asked, thinking fast.
“Umm, our class, around seven?” Bokuto looked at the time, two pm. That gave him plenty of time. “Why?”
“I have to read it first!”
“... Ya know, you really really don’t,”
“I do!”
“Why?”
“There was this guy at the bookstore--”
“Ooooh, true love. Say no more!... Although seriously reconsider dating anyone who enjoys this stuff,”
“But you like it,”
“That’s my point, Boku-chan. Guy’s for sure a weirdo,”
"He's not a weirdo. I'm going to read it!"
…:::*:::...
If it had been an outright junkyard, probably he could have stuck things out, made a career: the violence that had caused each wreck being infrequent enough, far enough away from him, to be miraculous, as each death, up till the moment of our own, is miraculous. But the endless rituals of trade-in, week after week, never got as far as violence or blood, and so were too plausible for the impressionable Mucho to take for long. Even if enough exposure to the unvarying gray sickness had somehow managed to immunize him, he could still never accept the way each owner, each shadow, filed in only to exchange a dented, malfunctioning version of himself for another, just as futureless, automotive projection of somebody else's life. As if it were the most natural thing. To Mucho it was horrible.
...
"But our beauty lies," explained Metzger, "in this extended capacity for convolution. A lawyer in a courtroom, in front of any jury, becomes an actor, right? Raymond Burrisan actor, impersonating a lawyer, who in front of a jury becomes an actor. Me, I'm a former actor who became a lawyer. They've done the pilot film of a TV series, in fact, based loosely on my career, starring my friend Manny Di Presso, a one-time lawyer who quit his firm to become an actor. Who in this pilot plays me, an actor become a lawyer reverting periodically to being an actor.”
...
"But that sounds," objected Metzger, "like he was against industrial capitalism. Wouldn't that disqualify him as any kind of anti-Communist figure?"
"You think like a Bircher," Fallopian said. "Good guys and bad guys. You never get to any of the underlying truth. Sure he was against industrial capitalism. So are we. Didn't it lead, inevitably, to Marxism? Underneath, both are part of the same creeping horror."
"Industrial anything," hazarded Metzger.
"There you go," nodded Fallopian.
...
“...I'm not going to read this,” Bokuto said after picking up, reading, and putting down the book for a total of three separate times.
"There, there." Tendou, passing by, offered Bokuto a few slaps on the back in consolation. Bokuto groaned, tossing the book onto the coffee table and slumping in his seat. “It only gets worse,” Tendou continued in a tone of consolement that contrasted heavily with his actual words.
“I don’t get this. I’m too dumb to read it, and if I go back, Akaashi’s gonna figure out I’m stupid,”
“Hey now, don’t talk about yourself like that. Ya ain’t stupid. Remember, the whole point of this book is to make words confusing and meaningless… I think.” Tendou shrugged and patted Bokuto on the head. Bokuto perked up.
“I know! Why don’t you explain it to me?”
Tendou laughed, head thrown back, and cackle bouncing untethered around the room. The longer the noise continued, the more Bokuto’s shoulders dropped.
“Listen, I couldn’t if I tried. I mean, I could tell you the plot, but it won’t help. That’s not what it’s about,”
“Oh.”
Tendou cooed and leaned over the back of the couch to pinch Bokuto’s pouting cheeks.
“Plus, I think you’ve got a shot with or without an appreciation of postmodernism. You’re still cute as a button!”
“...You think so?”
“For sure!”
…:::*:::...
Even with Tendou building his confidence, Bokuto didn’t end up back at the bookshop until he found himself fulfilling another promise to Tendou. This time he needed to pick up a copy of the latest Shonen Jump, which he’d only just decided to purchase because it had the final chapter of a story he’d been following for years. Despite being warned, Bokuto had waited too long, only to find it sold out in the closer bookshops.
Telling himself he’d be in and out before being spotted, Bokuto rushed into the store and straight to the manga aisle. Magazine in hand, Bokuto joined the line to pay. Three people from the front, the cashier looked down the line, his eyes catching on Bokuto for a longer second then the rest. Two people from the front, the cashier asked the current customer to excuse him, and left the counter. Less than a minute later, none other than Akaashi appeared to take over, looking straight at Bokuto as he did. Bokuto squeaked but considered himself trapped now that he had already been spotted.
The customer in front was quickly taken care of, and Bokuto moved forward.
“Hello, Bokuto-san,”
“You know my name!”
“Oh, um, yes. We’ve met. It’s fine if you don’t remember me, I’m--”
“Akaashi! I remember. You told me about why you liked postmodernism,” Bokuto pronounced carefully.
“Right.” Akaashi gave him a small smile, and despite the hum of conversation and shuffling of customers behind him, it felt like it was just Akaashi and Bokuto in the whole store… “Ah, can I take your purchase?”… Akaashi, Bokuto, and a copy of a comic book magazine targeted at tween boys… not exactly impressive, Bokuto realized.
“Oh, um…” Bokuto realized this was a good thing. He should probably come clean about the last book anyway. "It was for my roommate! I mean…” Akaashi pulled the book across the table and flipped it over for the barcode.
“It’s okay, you know. Not everything you read needs to be high literature.” The magazine beeped under the scanner. “That’ll be twelve hundred yen,”
“No, I mean… Oh, uh here.” He pulled out his wallet and paid. Before accepting the money, Akaashi slightly rolled up his sleeves. After he put the coins in the register and bagged the magazine, he leaned in further than necessary to give Bokuto his purchase.
“Can I show you something?” he asked.
“Sure.” The word came out strained as Bokuto watched the shape Akaashi’s perfect bow lips made around his breathy words. He followed Akaashi’s gaze down to the bag Akaashi was holding out, left arm tilted in its grasp to flash the underside of his wrist. It exposed a minimalist black line tattoo in the shape of a horn.
“From Lot 49, of course,” Akaashi explained, “It’s nothing in comparison to your tattoos--” Bokuto had the start of a blackout sleeve and a few feathers that peaked out above the collar of most t-shirts, including the one he was wearing now--“But I thought you might appreciate it. On the other hand, I haven’t even asked you if you liked the book at all--”
“Excuse me, can I check out?” the man in line behind Bokuto interrupted.
“Oh, sorry!” Bokuto jumped out of the way at the same time Akaashi turned his completely unbothered looking gaze on the man.
“Thank you for your patience, sir. Someone will be right with you.” He closed the transaction on the register and turned to walk straight off, though not before giving wide-eyed Bokuto one last small smile.
It wasn’t until that exact moment that Bokuto Koutarou discovered that bordering rudeness was one of his turn-ons.
…:::*:::...
“You don’t understand! He has a tattoo from the book! How can I say anything now?”
“Wait, really? Wow. Not gonna lie, he sounds a bit pretentious, Bo. I’d walk away now if I were you,”
“Hey! He is not. Anyway, that’s what everyone says about Ushijima, and we both know he’s actually super nice!”
“True. But he’s also super nice if you get what I mean, so I’d say it’s only worth staying invested if you know the sex is going to be just as good,”
“Tendou! It’s not like that!... I mean, I just wanna ask him out once, for now. I just admire how passionate he is about reading!”
“And you admire that he’s hot,”
“... He’s so hot,” Bokuto acknowledged with a nod; it was the truth, after all.
“Well, I guess if you want a chance, you’re going to hafta fess up. Just do it real quick next time you see him, and see where things go from there,”
“I guess you’re right.”
…:::*:::...
Next time turned out to be sooner than Bokuto was expecting. He was walking Kiyoko back to her place after lunch when he noticed Akaashi standing up from a café table. He was engrossed in a book, and might not have seen Bokuto passing by.
“Hey hey, Akaashi!” Bokuto called out. After all, what was Bokuto supposed to do, ignore him? Kiyoko sighed but patted him on the arm he’d linked with hers.
Akaashi looked up from his book, eyes landing quickly on Bokuto as he approached.
“Hello, Bokuto-san.” Bokuto was a little disappointed Akaashi was using ‘san’ even outside of his job. On the other hand, though, Akaashi’s posture and even expression were noticeably more open in this setting. “Hello.” Akaashi nodded at Kiyoko. There was still something a bit tense about his eyes, though, somewhat hidden by his cute reading glasses. Bokuto wondered if he’d done something wrong. Maybe he messed up somehow, and Akaashi already figured out that he kinda sorta lied. It kinda felt like when a professor had figured out he didn’t do the required reading.
“Hello,” Kiyoko replied. “I’m Kiyoko Shimizu. I’ve heard a lot about you,”
“Kiyoko,” Bokuto whined, realizing for the first time what a high percentage of the lunch they just had was dedicated to Bokuto trying to figure out how to tell Akaashi the truth and ask him out.
“Akaashi Keiji. A pleasure.” His eyes moved, not for the first time, to their arms and then back to Bokuto’s face. “It’s nice to see you, Bokuto-san, but I don’t want to interrupt your…” There was a question there, Bokuto was almost certain.
“Walk,” Kiyoko answered in his place. “Bokuto was just walking home with me, but I think I can manage from here,” she said, disengaging from Bokuto’s arm.
“Huh? Are you sure,”
“Quite, thank you,” Kiyoko replied, giving Bokuto that look people gave him when he was failing to ‘read the atmosphere.’ She turned back to Akaashi with a nod of her head. “Nice to meet you,”
“Likewise,”
“See you later!” Bokuto let her go with a hug, and she even reciprocated with a few pats to his back, which Bokuto thought was proof she wasn’t anywhere near as cold as people made her out to be.
“I’ll see you in class.”
After Kiyoko continued on the sidewalk, Bokuto turned back to find Akaashi studying him with a downward quirk of his lips.
“She’s very pretty,” he said.
“Kiyoko? Ya! She’s gorgeous!” Bokuto agreed before realizing the implications. Was Akaashi into her instead? Bokuto’s excitement waned. Then he realized it made perfect sense. The book that got them talking was hers to begin with anyway. “I guess… I should tell you the book I bought, The Crying of Lot 49, was for her,” he admitted, kicking at the ground.
“Oh. I see.” The sound of rustling had Bokuto looking back up. Akaashi was looking away, shuffling papers into his over-the-shoulder bag. “Well, it was charming of you to look so hard for her.” He stood up straight, prepared to leave, without Bokuto ever getting to see that appealing passionate sparkle in his eye. “You’re a cute couple.”
Caught up in the possibility of missing out, it took a moment for Bokuto’s head to catch up.
“Hah?! Me and Kiyoko? We’re not dating at all!”
“...Really?” Under the shade of the table’s umbrella, Bokuto could make out how Akaashi’s tight expression relaxed. He walked around his seat, and motioned with an incline of his head for Bokuto to walk with him. They stepped onto the sparsely crowded sidewalk side by side.
“Uh-uh.” He shook his head, hands in his pockets.
“I’m sorry for assuming. You called her gorgeous so easily…”
“Because it’s the truth! I’d say the same thing about you, and we’re not dating.”
…
....
Oh no.
“Ah! I’m so--”
“I suppose I should thank you for the compliment, Bokuto,” Akaashi said, voice light.
“No, I mean, yes, I mean--”
“How does a dinner sound?” Akaashi asked, not taking his gaze off the horizon ahead.
“I--” Bokuto stopped. “Wait. Are you… asking me on a date?!”
“It’s alright if it’s a no. If you’re not into men, I don’t mean to make you uncomf--”
“It’s a yes! It’s a super yes!... But the book wasn’t mine, I tried to read it, but I didn’t really get it,” Bokuto admitted. Akaashi turned to face him.
“That’s more than alright. I didn’t exactly approach you for your taste in books, anyway,”
“What? You didn’t?”
“Not particularly.” Akaashi gave Bokuto’s bare arms a sidelong look, and Bokuto preened for a second before drooping again.
“Wait, but you showed me your tattoo and everything,”
“Ah…. The truth is, I got the tattoo in my first year of undergrad. I was on a bit of a freedom binge, and very big on seeming ‘intellectual’ and such,” he chuckled a bit, face turning a warm dark color. “And I thought since you had a few…”
The dangling pieces brushed past each other in Bokuto’s mind.
“Akaaaashi, were you trying to impress me?” he asked with a bright delight. Akaashi averted his eyes, and Bokuto squawked. “You were!”
“Oh, shush. You tried to do the same.”
Bokuto laughed to the sky. They walked a block with idle chatter.
“So,” Akaashi began after a few minutes, “pretense lifted, I do still love Lot 49 and postmodernist literature. What about you, what kind of things do you truly like to read? Not that you have to like reading,”
“Oh, no, I do! If we’re talking English, Frankenstein by M-ary Shelley is pretty cool, especially in the original language! But Kokoro by Natsume Soseki is super emotional, and probably my favorite. Oh! But Higuchi Ichiyo’s Takekurabe is super insightful and emotional too!... Ah, but my favorites are all just regular classic stuff. Not like the things you read,” he shrugged in embarrassment. It took a few strides for him to realize Akaashi was no longer beside him. He turned to see Akaashi had paused, looking at Bokuto with wide eyes.
“Wait…” his face closed off in concentration. “Your friend said she’d ‘see you in class.’ You’re a student?”
“Oh, yup!”
“What… do you study, Bokuto?”
“Hmm, oh! Classic canonical literature, with an emphasis on the early Meiji periods and the extent of Western influence on the modernization of pre-war Japan. Why?”
Akaashi blinked. The dark blush from before returned, but this time accompanied by direct eye contact. Akaashi took a few steps forward, Bokuto trapped in the arresting gaze of his sharp eyes and cool heart-pounding features.
“Bokuto?” Akaashi started, close enough that it was almost a whisper.
“Ya?”
“After our date, do you want to go back to my place?”
“Huh?... Ehhh!?” Bokuto processed. Akaashi stared, that spark in his eyes back in place. “Um, yes, for sure,” Bokuto managed.
“Good. Let’s go on that date,”
“Ah, didn’t you invite me to dinner? It’s still afternoon.”
“We’re moving it up,” Akaashi said with confidence.
The long fingers Bokuto had earlier admired found a way to intertwine with Bokuto’s own, and he really couldn’t find it in himself to complain.
“Okay.”