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Kirishima always comes back to this beach when he’s feeling sad.
He likes to sit there, watching the sun bleed out colors against the ocean, and sit with his arms clasped around his knees, staring at where the sand meets the water. Watching the waves crash, the foam travel up the bluff and back down, smoothing out the pebbles and leaving little rivulets in the grains.
He likes thinking here, smiling and remembering sandals filled with seaweed, the crunch of sand in his teeth, a laugh as the wave catches him off guard and knocks him to his butt in the shallows. Melted candy stuck in bags, lunchmeat and cheese sandwiches with the crusts removed, chips shoved in each bite by grubby fingers.
The beach hasn’t changed much, but Kirishima is nearly unrecognizable to that little child, carefree and excited.
A wave crashes onto the sand. The foam washes up over his toes, and he watches as it retreats. The tide should be going out soon, if he remembers right. High tide never made it up this far before, anyways.
The colors of the sun dip a little darker as more of the burning ball of gas disappears behind the horizon, glaring in Kirishima’s eyes. He won’t be able to last too much longer — he left his jacket in the car. He’s usually alright when it comes to the weather, he can get away with shorts and a t-shirt wherever he goes, but he always finds himself getting cold on this beach. Maybe it’s just the absence of the arms to wrap around his shoulders, the warm smile that should be there when he turns around.
But there’s nothing but the cliff-face when he turns.
He pushes himself off of the ground, kicking some of the sand at the place he been sitting, obscuring how long he had been there. It’s stupid, but he never wants to leave any trace of this Kirishima here. He just wants to remember how it used to be.
Grief does some weird things to you sometimes.
The cliff-face is still warm and chips away underneath Kirishima’s fingers, turning to rubble and little shards of stone. He pulls away a small slab of rock, turning it over in his fingers as his eyes read across the words again, the graffiti that’s been there since he was still running down the beach in nothing but a diaper.
I miss her so much.
Just five words, drawn out there with paint, obviously finger-painted. It’s fading now, the years getting to it, but it still sticks out. It doesn’t make sense that it should still be there, after all this time, but it feels uncomfortably appropriate. That it’s this place - this beach in particular, where Kirishima has so many memories of her - that has those words.
It’s been a year to the day.
It hadn’t been fast, which is almost worse. They had spent too long trying to figure out how to say goodbye, leaving her in that bed each night with a smile and a kiss on her hand, telling her a goodnight that was really a goodbye. Each time, they had come back to find out that it had only been a goodnight.
Until one day it was the goodbye, too.
The words don’t rub away beneath his fingertips. The memories don’t, either. The tear down his cheek cleans away some of the sunscreen, though.
He wipes his face with the back of his hand and smiles. That’s what he’s supposed to do. Keep smiling, she had said, her loose grip on his hand. Her smiles weren’t as strong at the end, but they had always been just as warm. Keep smiling to make everybody else smile.
There’s no one here to make smile, but Kirishima does anyway. He likes to think that she’s watching, and he wants to make her smile.
“Are you going to stand there for the rest of the night?”
Kirishima jumps, turning to see who has spoken and scrubbing his face on his hand again. He had been so sure there was nobody else on the beach — besides, who scrambles down a cliff trail as the sun is going down? Most people want to be cleared out before it’s dark, especially with all the pricker bushes along the edge of the trail.
“Uh,” he says, clearing his throat. He really hopes that he doesn’t look like he’s been crying. The newcomer is standing a bit from him, one hand in his pocket, the other one holding his shoes. He doesn’t really look dressed for the beach, nice black jeans and a t-shirt, sleeves and pant legs both cuffed once. The sun has gone all the way down at this point, but there’s still enough light to see that his hair is ashy blond, and he’s looking at Kirishima like he’s taking him apart, piece by piece.
“You looked like you were having a moment,” the guy says in a gravelly voice. “So I didn’t want to interrupt whatever weird shit you got going on. But you’ve been standing there for ten minutes and you’re right in front of my favorite rock.”
Kirishima blinks and looks down — there’s a little outcropping underneath the graffiti, almost resembling a chair. He takes a step back. “Oh.” He clears his throat again. “Sorry, man. I didn’t notice you there. No offense but… isn’t it a bit late to just be getting to the beach?”
Even though Kirishima had said no offense, the guy appears to take offense. He stalks past Kirishima and sits down like it’s a challenge. “I like to watch the moon come out over the waves. Besides, this is when nobody is here.” He turns his head, looks Kirishima up and down. “Usually.”
A smile washes onto Kirishima’s face like the waves on the sand behind him. “Sorry, man. Wasn’t aware you booked the beach out for the night.”
The guy narrows his eyes and pulls the little pack off of his back. Kirishima hadn’t even noticed it before, that’s how small it is. He studiously ignores Kirishima, and pulls out a little pad, and then some glasses.
“Are you an artist?” Kirishima asks. He’s not sure why, maybe it’s because the guy is sitting right below I miss her so much and all he can think about is the way his glasses slide down his nose, the way he holds his pencil like it’s going to try to run away. Maybe it’s because he’s afraid if he turns away, he’s going to start crying again. Maybe it’s because he just wants a distraction.
The pad drifts down towards the guy’s lap as he looks up at Kirishima over his glasses. “Yeah. I’m Da Vinci. Are you going to leave soon?”
“That’s the Starry Night guy, right?” Kirishima asks, just for the pleasure of watching a frustrated look hit this guy between the eyes.
“No, that’s Van Gogh, you idiot. Da Vinci is Mona Lisa.”
Kirishima just shrugs a shoulder, smile getting wider as the glower gets hotter. “Yeah yeah, potato tomato.”
The guy’s face goes red, and Kirishima has to bite down on the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing. “Do you mean tomato tomah-”
He cuts himself off as Kirishima laughs, unable to hold it back. “Sorry, man,” he says, covering his mouth and bending over at the waist. “Oh my god. You should see your face.”
“I see it enough. Are you going to stay here for a while?”
“I think I might,” Kirishima says, grinning and plopping down next to the blond. “I like you, man.”
“You don’t know a single thing about me.”
Kirishima motions to the pad, which the guy pulls away, out of Kirishima’s line of sight. “I know you’re an artist. And that you’re not really a people person.”
Narrowing his eyes, the guy turns his shoulders a little bit more away from Kirishima. “I’m a people person. I’m just not an idiot person.”
With a shit-eating grin, Kirishima leans back against the rock behind him. “Oh, well then you shouldn’t have any problem with me. I’ve got a degree in engineering.”
The pad drifts down slightly, and Kirishima can see some of the tenseness leak out of him. “An engineering degree?”
“Yep! Industrial engineering.”
The guy regards him carefully. “You don’t really look like somebody who would have a engineering degree.”
“I’m going to take that as a compliment,” Kirishima says decidedly, pulling out his phone. “And to be fair, you don’t really look the part of ‘artist.’ Where are your paint-stained pants? Your paintbrushes lost in your hair? Your-”
“I get it,” he snaps. The pad has traveled all the way down to sit in the guy’s lap, now, as he’s distracted by the conversation, but when Kirishima takes a peek, he sees that the page is blank. “The fuck are you doing with your phone?”
“Huh? Oh, I was going to show you a picture of my degree.”
“You don’t have to. I believe you.”
Smiling, Kirishima locks his phone and puts it away. “So, what about you? Do you have a degree in art?”
The guy looks down at the pad. “No. You don’t have to have a degree to create. I’m good at what I do, and I don’t need some dumbass teacher who thinks they know better than me to tell me they don’t like my shit. Plenty of other people like my shit. I should be the one teaching people.”
“Ooh, and he’s confident too,” Kirishima says, leaning his chin onto his fist and sighing dreamily. The guy snorts and shoves his arm, and Kirishima laughs. “Seriously, though. You know people like it?”
“Statistically,” the guy says, “I’ve gotten good responses.”
“What, ‘statistically?’ Do people like your art? Do they buy it?”
“Yes,” the guy snaps back. “A lot.”
The smile returns. “Well, there you go. You’ve broken the schooling system. Start telling kids they don’t have to go to college.”
The guy stares at him for a long moment, and then scribbles something down in his notebook. Kirishima cranes his neck to see, but the guy leans so it’s out of sight. “Oh, come on, lemme see!” Kirishima protests, grabbing for his arm, but the guy just shakes him off, continuing to scribble. “At least tell me what you’re doing!”
“I’m making a note, I don’t want to forget something. Fuck off, quit. Quit!”
“Just let me see!”
The guy snorts a laugh, ducks out of the way of Kirishima’s grabby hands. “You don’t get to see, you don’t get that privilege.”
Kirishima huffs out a breath, giving up on trying to snatch the notebook. The guy has a death grip, and he’s actually got really good reflexes, dodging easily and keeping the book just out of reach. “How do I earn that privilege?”
Red eyes drag down him, and then slowly wander back up. Kirishima suddenly feels very exposed, even in the fading glow of twilight. “We’ll see.”
Kirishima has no idea what that means, but he grins anyways, watches the guy look at down his mouth, watches him glare, cheeks flushing. He likes this guy. He’s not sure what it is, but something about him just clicks. Like Kirishima has known him for years.
“Why were you crying?”
Kirishima flinches, but the raw, open-wound pain doesn’t return full-force. It’s just the dull ache, the normal pain of grief that sits there every day. Despite himself, he finds a smile on his face. He had managed to forget for just a moment, managed to be here with this stranger, even sitting right below I miss her so much, even on this beach. It’s brought back now, but it’s just not… not as horrible.
“Just missing somebody,” Kirishima murmurs, looking down at his hands. The smile doesn’t fade. He feels hurt, but he feels okay. He looks back up at his companion, sees the way he studies Kirishima. “I come here to miss her. You know…” He gestures up, watches the guy turn his neck to read the words painted on chipping rock.
“Did you put that there?”
“No. I just found it. Pretty appropriate, huh?”
“Guess so.”
They sit in silence for a moment, and Kirishima looks out over the water. The memories play there, little feet in the water, boogie boards flipped by the waves. But they don’t drag him away to a different time like they had before. They just linger.
“An ex, or something?” the guy asks quietly. Kirishima can hear the pencil scratching against the pad, but he doesn’t ask to see this time. Maybe the guy is drawing him. Kirishima wouldn’t really mind.
“No,” Kirishima hums. “My mom.”
Silence encases them, the scratching stops. They sit there for a moment, the crashing of the waves rolling past. Kirishima wishes the sadness hadn’t fallen over them, but he’s powerless against it. He’s never been great at burying his feelings.
“She always told me to smile,” he tells the guy. He’s not sure why, he hasn’t shared anything about his mom since she died with anybody. Not his friends, not anyone. But something about this here, this beach, this guy, the purple sky, it just pulls the words out of Kirishima like they cost nothing. Like they don’t ache and burn and try to hold on, tearing away pieces of his flesh as he rips them free. “She told me to keep smiling, to make other people smile.”
The guy hums in response. He hasn’t started scratching on his pad again, and Kirishima thinks out of the corner of his eye he can see the guy watching the water. It’s nice, it’s just… soft. It’s a moment of exposure without being afraid of embarrassment.
And then the guy huffs out a breath, and leans back against the rock. “Well, there’s nobody here to make smile.”
Kirishima smiles anyways, turns his head to look at him. He’s watching Kirishima carefully, like he’s trying to figure out if he’s pushed it too far. “There’s you,” Kirishima murmurs.
Red eyes narrow slightly, and arms fold across a chest. God, he’s really got nice arms. His biceps are really toned. Kirishima kind of wants to put his hands on them. Or ask what he can bench. Maybe ask if he can spot for him. He just wants to watch those muscles flex as he uses them.
Wow, Jesus. Get a hold of yourself.
“You gonna try to make me smile?”
The grin spreads wider on Kirishima’s face. “Should I be trying?”
The guy flushes, and his arms uncross so he can punch Kirishima in the shoulder. Kirishima laughs and holds his hands up in surrender, leaning out of punching range. He likes this. It’s weird, the anonymity, the easy feeling that it brings. But he likes it. He doesn’t want to leave.
“Why’d you come down here?” Kirishima asks, leaning back against the rock too, looking out over the ocean, the soft smile still playing on his lips. “Just to put stuff down in your little notepad?”
The notebook gets pulled away again as Kirishima tries to sneak a peek. “Yeah. I thought there’d be nobody here.”
“Usually after dark there isn’t.” Kirishima lets his gaze wash over the sandy beach, copying the water. “Only crazy people and stupid high school kids come here after dark.”
“Are you calling me crazy?”
“I was calling myself crazy, but if the shoe fits…”
Kirishima laughs and dodges another punch, leaning out of reach again. The guy drops the notebook into his lap as he tries to smack Kirishima. “I’ll show you crazy-”
“Sorry, sorry. I had to. You did come to a beach after dark, dude. And you’re not even here to do something illegal. That’s a little weird, if you ask me.”
“Yeah, whatever.” He stops his assault, picks up his notebook, and flips it closed, like he’s resigning himself to not getting anything drawn. “I meant to get the sunset, anyways. I just got lost.”
“You got lost?” Kirishima asks. “There’s only one road. How do you get lost?”
“There’s more than one road. Besides, I didn’t get lost on the road, I got lost on the trail down. There’s a split off that takes you way down the bluff. I was like, a couple kilometers down before I decided I should probably turn around.”
“You were a couple kilometers down?”
The guy rolls his eyes, shoving himself to his feet. “I knew it was wrong really fast, but I was enjoying the walk. So I just kept going.”
“For more than one kilometer?”
“Yeah, shut up.” The guy pulls his pack back on, and Kirishima feels a shot of disappointment through him. It’s stupid to think that the guy would stay, but Kirishima had wanted him to. He had been enjoying talking to him. But the guy jerks his head. “Come on. I wanna see the caves.”
Kirishima blinks. “You… want to…”
“Yeah I want you to come. Don’t be stupid, it’s basically dark now, I’m not going alone. Come on, get up.”
Kirishima doesn’t need to be told again. He jumps up, checking his pockets for his phone, wallet, keys. He’s got everything, he’s not leaving anything here. The guy nods, and turns to head down the beach, and Kirishima hurries after him.
Something tugs at his mind.
Pausing, Kirishima glances back at the rock behind him. I miss her so much.
He doesn’t want to leave her, doesn’t want to stop thinking about her. Today was supposed to be about coming here to remember her, to tell her that he’s always thinking about her, to talk to the empty beach like he would talk to her. To miss her.
That doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy yourself, Kirishima tells himself. He turns back, watches the blond’s retreating back. You can smile, you can live your life. You can be happy, and still be sad and miss her.
So with one last smile, he takes off after the guy, towards the sea caves.
“I can’t believe you let me fall into the water,” the guy gripes, shaking sand out of his hair. Kirishima hasn’t been able to stop laughing since the guy had fallen in, which only serves to make him annoyed. But Kirishima can’t help it. With his spiky hair all pressed down, he looks like a drowned cat. “Oi, stop laughing, asshole.”
“Sorry, sorry,” Kirishima says. “At least you saved your notebook, though?”
It had been fucking hilarious, actually, turning to see the wave just moments from slamming into him, yelling out a warning, and getting a good look at his wide eyes before the wave washed over him. He had crashed down into the sand with the force of it, only one arm sticking out, holding his pack out of the water. The image of just his hand and the bag sticking up out of the wave is something that Kirishima isn’t going to forget any time soon.
The guy sends him another angry look, but he really does just look like a cat that’s just finished going through a bath that it hadn’t wanted to take. Kirishima can’t help but dissolve into another fit of laughter, and Mr. Drowned Cat tries to punch him again.
They hike up the beach as Kirishima laughs, the guy leaving a trail of water from his sopping clothes behind them like a bread crumb trail. He lets the bag hang at his side rather than put it back onto his wet back, and he’s got his shoes — also sopping — in his other hand. Kirishima reaches out and grabs the bag, pulling it onto his own back. The guy gives him a side-eye, but doesn’t try to get the bag back. Kirishima lets his face warm and lets himself feel the softness in his chest.
There’s nothing wrong with growing a little crush on the stranger you met on the beach. The stranger that you spent a couple hours with, hopping around sea caves and laughing with. The one who pulled you out of the sadness of life.
There’s nothing wrong with that.
The sand is cold beneath Kirishima’s toes, and he smiles up at the sky, holding the straps of the pack. “This is nice,” he says. “It’s a nice night. I’m… glad that I met you.”
Giving him a look, the guy lets out a breath through his nose. “Yeah,” he grunts. “Me too, or whatever.”
Kirishima laughs again, tipping his head back. This guy just makes him laugh. Something about him, it just clicks. There’s something about the way he growls, the way he snaps and the way he is. Kirishima just likes it.
But all good things have to come to an end — Kirishima knows this too well, people that you like, people that you love, sometimes they have to leave — and they get up to the parking lot. There’s only Kirishima’s car and another car parked way down. The little dirt lot is empty besides that.
They pause at the back of Kirishima’s Subaru, and Kirishima pulls the bag off of his back. He doesn’t want to say goodbye. He wants to ask for a phone number, a name — he still hasn’t learned the guy’s name — a twitter handle, anything. But his words get stuck in his throat as he holds the bag out.
The blond takes it, and unzips it, digs around for a minute. Kirishima watches silently as he pulls out the notebook, flips through the pages, and then pulls out a Sharpie. Without looking at Kirishima he bites down on the cap to pull the pen free, and scribbles something out on the page, cap still held between his teeth.
Kirishima can’t help it anymore. “What are you-”
“Hangon,” he mumbles around the cap. So Kirishima does, he stands there and waits. Is he writing down his phone number? Or something else? It’s certainly pretty long, if it’s a phone number. Maybe his name. Maybe a meetup place and time, maybe it’s-
The guy recaps the pen and rips the page out. Then he shoves the notebook and pen haphazardly back into the bag, and pulls it onto his bag again.
Laughing nervously, Kirishima says, “Uh, what did you-”
But then the guy is taking a step closer, he’s in Kirishima’s space, he’s grabbing him by the front of the shirt. Kirishima’s breath stalls in his throat and blood pools in his cheeks as the guy stops, just inches from his face.
“I’m gonna kiss you,” he says, and Kirishima’s heart beats out of his chest. His ears ring. He just manages a nod, and the guy leans forward the rest of the way and does.
Kirishima’s brain stops working.
The guy’s lips are soft. They’re nothing like his words, his sharp tongue, his angry glares. Kirishima’s eyes slip closed and he snakes an arm around his waist, even though he’s still wet, Kirishima doesn’t mind. He’s chilly and feels like rough sand under Kirishima’s fingertips, but he likes it. He loves it. He’s willing to stand here for the rest of his life with this stranger, kissing under the stars with the soft sound of the ocean down at the bottom of the cliff.
But he doesn’t get the rest of his life, he barely gets a half minute, and then the guy is pulling away, putting a hand on Kirishima’s chest as he tries to follow him. He folds the paper in half and gives it to Kirishima, who holds it between his fingers, confused.
“U-um,” Kirishima stammers, trying to swallow and wet his dry throat. “My name is K-”
“Don’t,” the guy interrupts him. He leans forward again and kisses him, once, twice, a third time. Just chaste and soft. “You’ll ruin it,” he whispers against Kirishima’s lips.
Kirishima isn’t sure he agrees, but the guy doesn’t give him time to argue. He just kisses him once more, and then he’s turning, leaving and walking down the parking lot, hands in his pockets. Kirishima shivers, his shirt now wet from being pressed up against him, his soul shaking from being pressed up against another one. He wants to chase after the guy, demand his name, ask for his phone number, some way to contact him. There’s no way Kirishima can just lose this.
But he doesn’t. He just lets the guy get into his car, peel out of the parking lot and disappear into the night. Kirishima hasn’t had a drop of alcohol all night, but he feels a bit too tipsy to drive. Drunk on something else.
Only when the taillights have disappeared into the darkness does Kirishima remember he’s holding the little notebook sheet, pinched between his fingers. Carefully, reverently, he unfolds it, careful not to damage it.
There’s no name, no number, no contact. Instead, there’s something better. In nice handwriting, written out across the lines they weren’t even there, there’s a three-line poem. A haiku.
I miss her so much
Red hair, moonlight and sea caves
I will remember
“Hey I’m going to eat your leftover noodles.” Kaminari sticks his head through the door, hair pulled up into a half-ponytail. Kirishima hadn’t even heard him come into the apartment. But that’s not really a big deal, Kaminari is always in his apartment anyways.
It hadn’t been a question, but - “Sure, I’m not going to eat them.”
“Hell yeah!” Kaminari shouts, disappearing back out of the door. A minute later he comes back, holding the take-out container and shoveling noodles into his mouth with a pair of Kirishima’s chopsticks. “Bro it’s October and work’s already playing Christmas songs. I’ve had fucking Sleigh Ride stuck in my head on loop for six hours. Oh, you’re on the computer — what are you doing, dude?”
Kirishima leans back in his chair, gesturing to his computer screen. “He posted again.”
“Oh, nice, you’re talking about your writer crush right? Mr. Only-Writes-About-Death-and-Destruction-Yet-Kirishima-Still-has-a-Boner-for-Him?”
“I do not have a boner for him,” Kirishima snaps. “And he doesn’t only write about death and destruction. His stuff is all just about universes with wars and magic and stuff. I swear, he’s the best world-builder I’ve ever come across. His magic systems are beautiful and amazing and…”
He trails off as the post finally loads on his screen. The author has posted a short little announcement about his signing, and then there’s a cut that says Read More.
Hey, the post reads. I’ll be at the Memorial Library for my signing at two exactly. There won’t be a Q&A, I have things to do. Don’t expect to get comfortable.
Beneath the cut, short story - “Where the Sand Meets the Water”
“What’s his name again?” Kaminari asks absently, slurping noodles.
“He doesn’t ever have one posted,” Kirishima says absently, hovering over the read break, looking for the stats. “He just signs his work and his books and his posts with five Xs.” 570 words. That’s not much, but he doesn’t really want to read it with Kaminari here.
“That’s fucking weird,” Kaminari notes, and Kirishima rolls his eyes. And there it is, at the bottom of the post.
-XXXXX.
Kirishima has always wanted to know his name, but he kind of likes this. He thinks it’s mysterious, interesting. Plus the guy — well, Kirishima supposes it could be a girl, but the main characters are always dudes and it just feels… somehow it just feels like a guy — he probably just wants to be left alone in his regular life.
Frankly, Kirishima is really surprised he’s doing a public book signing. But he’s not going to pass the opportunity up.
“Are you done with your freakish stalking?” Kaminari asks, holding up some noodles in between the chopsticks. Eyes still on the screen, Kirishima absently opens his mouth so his friend can feed him. “I thought we were going to go out tonight.”
“We are,” Kirishima mumbles around the noodles. “Get dressed.”
“I am dressed.”
Kirishima looks him up and down and raises an eyebrow. Squawking, Kaminari swats at him, flinging little noodle pieces everywhere.
“I’m kidding I’m kidding!” Kirishima laughs, ducking out of the way in an attempt to not be impaled by a chopstick. “God, pick up all those stupid noodles before I find them in my bed tonight. Let me get dressed.”
He takes his clothes to the bathroom so he can do his hair too, eyes absently flicking to the little piece of notebook paper taped up in the top corner of the mirror. I will remember…
It’s been a month since his little adventure on the beach with Mr. Drowned Cat, and he’s been completely unable to find any trace of the guy. He’s checked artist communities online, he’s looked through thousands of facebook profiles, twitter handles, instagrams. He searched the tag of the location of the beach they had been at to try to find him.
All to come up with absolutely nothing.
It’s good, it’s nice that the memory is untainted, unharmed by any way that it could have gone badly if they kept in contact. It’s this perfect night, stored forever in Kirishima’s brain. But it sucks that Kirishima wants to feel those lips again, hear that voice, and he doesn’t think that he’s ever going to be able to.
“The signing is next week?” Kaminari shouts from the other room, and Kirishima shimmies into his jeans.
“Yeah. Tuesday.”
“You excited about finally meeting your idol?”
Kirishima sticks his head out the door, pulling his shirt on over it. “He is not my idol. I just really like his work.”
“Boooonnneeeerrrrr,” Kaminari sings, and Kirishima grabs a bottle of hair gel and throws it at him. He dodges, laughing, and Kirishima discovers immediately that he needs that bottle to get ready so he has to Walk of Shame across the room to retrieve it as Kaminari laughs at him. “Come on, hurry up! If we get there and Shinsou has already left I’m gonna blame you.”
Obliging him, Kirishima hurries to do his hair and grabs a jacket. He hesitates by the computer, and then minimizes the tab, closes the laptop and heads out.
He can read the story later.
Kirishima has a long week.
Work sucks, and it rains a couple times - which Kirishima would usually love, because, you know, puddles - but his boots are old and let the water in so not only can he not step purposely in puddles, now he’s got wet socks too. His coat isn’t heavy enough. The key to his apartment gets stuck in the lock, and he has to call maintenance and stand there for forty-five minutes to get it fixed, get somebody to come and get it out, and then he doesn’t have a key for a day and a half. He’s not sure what he’s supposed to do about that, so he just does his best not to leave the place during that time, and he jams a chair up underneath the doorknob while he’s sleeping.
Plus, every day just feels like ten days, especially with Tuesday looming in the future.
But as time tends to do, it all passes. And then Kirishima is waking up with anticipation in his gut, feeling like a kid waking up on the morning of a field trip. That kind of excitement that you get when you lay out your clothes for the next day at the edge of your bed, when you pack your lunch and fold your fingers into the edge of the paper bag so much it goes soft.
Kirishima gets ready in a haze, music playing quietly from the TV. Suddenly it doesn’t matter what kind of week he’s had, suddenly the day is here, suddenly it’s good, it’s great, it’s awesome, it’s the moment he’s been waiting for since he bought his ticket for the signing.
And it’s ridiculous, really, he shouldn’t be so excited. It certainly won’t matter to his author — Kirishima will be forgotten in a sea of faces there for a signature and to tell him that his work changed my life!
Nonetheless, Kirishima is excited. He wants to let himself be excited. He’ll get to meet the guy, at least. He’ll be able to put a face to those words that have been spinning through his head for so long. He’s a damn fanboy and he knows it, but he doesn’t have any problem with that. He’ll just have to remind himself to rein it in while he’s actually standing in front of the author.
His alarm goes off — he’s gotta leave or he’ll be late. So he grabs his stuff, puts on his favorite shirt, checks his hair one more time, and hurries out the door.
The drive isn’t long; Kirishima would have driven for hours for this, but he got lucky enough that it’s happening pretty close to his house. It gives him just enough time to realize that he had totally forgotten to read the short story that he had posted.
“Shit,” Kirishima hisses. He had been able to claim, up until now, that he had read every one of the guy’s published or posted works. (Unless he’s got a secret fanfiction handle, in which case Kirishima will be demanding a handle.) Kirishima had been intending on telling him as the author signed his book. But that would be a lie if he hasn’t read that story. And Kirishima doesn’t lie.
So he finds a parking spot and finds the line — it’s fucking long — and saves his spot. He’s in between two middle aged white women and an acne-addled teenaged boy, and Kirishima takes a moment to appreciate how wide the audience of the work is. Knowing that the same words that moved him had moved that younger girl, and that lady with the pearl necklace, and that old dude at the front of the line… Something about it just makes Kirishima feel so warm and fuzzy.
The line is already moving, but Kirishima frantically pulls his phone out and finds the website. The post is a couple down, and Kirishima clicks on the reading break. It’s under six hundred words — he can just tear right through that.
~
There’s something his mouth aches to say.
There’s a moment trapped between glances, there’s a breath caught there, like someone pressed pause. There’s a feeling he’s never known about, there’s a gaze he wasn’t sure he’d ever find.
He dwells on it at times, just to keep the world at bay.
It goes with him everywhere he goes, following around, a raincloud on his shoulder. People notice, but it’s not fair, he can’t just tell it to go away. It’s unreasonably large, it’s unreasonably important, it’s unreasonably… good.
He doesn’t want to forget it.
And he won’t.
Some days he goes back, chasing a feeling, chasing a shadow, a memory, a smile.
Some days he thinks about going back, but he doesn’t, instead he stares at the distant horizon like he might be able to be there.
Some days he wonders if it’s fair, how often he thinks of the place where the sand meets the water.
Some days he tells himself it’s not something he should be thinking about, it’s not important, it’s not special, it’s just a memory.
Some days he wishes he hadn’t been such a coward.
Some days he just sits and remembers, he grieves for a thing he never had, a touch he never felt, words he never heard, a look he’d never get. Remembers stars that hadn’t seen what was actually happening, water that touched but didn’t feel, not the way he had felt. Remembers the smell, the smell of salt and cold air, and warmth and cinnamon. Remembers the things that he doesn’t have to remember — since they’ll be carved into his very bones until the day that his bones turn to dust. They’re not going anywhere.
Still, he thinks on them. He remembers.
He goes back more often than he’d care to admit.
He stands there in that spot, feeling things that he had felt before, feeling nothing at all. It’s not fair how much he doesn’t feel, it’s not fair to watch children run by, to watch kites twirling lazily in the sky. It’s beautiful, it’s lovely, it’s a picture to paint, a story to write. But it’s not what he wants to see. It’s not the story that he wants to write.
He was born to come to this spot. He was born for this. But it appears that even though he was born for this, it doesn’t mean that the place where the sand meets the water calls to everyone. Calls to…
And how unreasonable, thinking he might be able to spend his days so close, a hairbreadth away, a whisper apart, an aching gap that can be closed so easily. It’s unreasonable to think that, he has no reason, no rhyme. He has no words, not when it comes to this spot. Not when it comes to the place where the sand meets the water. He can only describe it with those few words, and they fall short of the things he wants to express.
And every time he leaves, he turns back to look at that spot, that place, at those words, and he breathes the laugh into the air. It always falls short, it’s never the one he wants to hear. It’s never bell tones, bright colors, red and red and red.
And every time, he smiles, he remembers. And then he goes.
He tells himself he’s not going to come back this time. And every time, he does.
~
Kirishima is at the doors now, staring hazily at the little ending of the story. There’s bustle inside, people giving the new book to the guests passing, but Kirishima feels strange.
The story had been different than things that his author usually writes, a lot more like… like it’s on the edge of a love story. But just vague enough that it might not have been…
And something about it tugs at Kirishima’s mind, tells him he should be thinking of something. Tells him he’s missing something. Was there some kind of message he had missed? Some kind of underlying…
A woman hands him the new book. It’s thick and heavy in Kirishima’s hands, and the cover is glossy and smooth, but he’s distracted, tucking it under his arm and pulling his phone back out as he shuffles along behind the women in front of him. He starts reading again, trying to catch it, trying to figure out what he’s missing, where the hidden meaning is. He wishes he could be doing this at home, he really wishes he hadn’t forgotten, but it’s too late for that, now.
Somebody stops him as the women get up to the table. Kirishima keeps scanning. He just wants to know, just wants too…
Where the sand meets the water… red and red and red…
“Oi, next. Oi. Hey, idiot, can’t you-”
With incredible violence, everything comes together at the same time, and Kirishima tips his head up from his phone to lock eyes with another set of red ones.
They just exist for a moment, several feet apart, Kirishima clutching his phone and the book, his heart pounding right out of his chest. The guy at the table is ash-blond, devastatingly handsome, in a button up and a light jacket, glasses slipping down his nose. And he’s sitting there, a pen in his hand, the same hand that had scribbled out a haiku on a piece of notebook paper.
Kirishima still doesn’t have a name for his favorite author, but now he has memories. He has conversations and laughs and smiles.
He has a kiss.
Kirishima ascends into the seventh dimension, soul splintering away from his body and igniting, burning to a crisp and incinerating everything too close. He’s trying to process, so he thinks he can forgive himself for the way he lifts his arm and points, and gasps out, “You!”
The guy flushes, and Kirishima is reminded of the way that his face had looked right after they kissed. Kirishima is sure that his face is red, also. He wants to rush forward and demand what the hell. He wants to rush forward and kiss him again.
Numb legs help him stumble forward until he’s standing there, in front of his favorite author, in front of this guy that he’s been thinking about non-stop for a month. Well, for much more than that — though at the time he hadn’t known that it was the same guy.
He had been expecting some middle aged dude, maybe unshaven, maybe a little sweaty, the kind of guy you expect to see sitting at his computer all day, typing away at his stories. He hadn’t been expecting somebody hot. He hadn’t been expecting this.
The guy looks up at him, eyes wide, brows furrowed. Like he hadn’t ever been expecting Kirishima to show up here, at his very first public book signing. Kirishima has no idea what to say, and it appears that neither does his author. They hadn’t run out of things to talk about on the beach — where the sand meets the water and fuck, that whole story was about me? — but now, standing here in the light of day, in the fluorescents of a library, in the gaze of his author, not a single word comes to mind.
“Please don’t hold up the line,” the attendant says, and his author awkwardly holds out his hand. Kirishima puts the book in it. He wants to grab onto it, but he doesn’t.
His author opens the book to the title page and scribbles a signature, and Kirishima takes the opportunity to look again at the curve of his face, the sharp line of his jaw, the expression painted onto his brow with a careful hand. He’s somehow even prettier than Kirishima had remembered him being, even though he had gotten such an up-close-and-personal view. It’s not something that can ever stay in Kirishima’s mind, he’s not worthy.
The book thuds shut softly, and his author slides the book across the table to him. Kirishima stands there for a moment, feeling strange. Here he is, standing right in front of him, but his mind is spiraling so badly he can’t even say anything. He needs to say something. He needs to say anything.
“I’ve read all of your stuff.”
Anything but that.
There’s a short moment where Kirishima is graced by wide red eyes, and then his author snorts, rolls his eyes, leans back in his chair. “You don’t say.”
“You’re holding up the line,” the attendant says, and someone touches Kirishima’s arm, ushering him on. Wait. Wait!
“You — you — I don’t even know your name,” Kirishima says, even as he’s corralled towards the exit. The guy watches him, eyes narrowed.
“No,” he says back. It feels like a goodbye, the second goodbye. “You don’t.”
It’s not fair, Kirishima hadn’t thought he’d get a second hello, he shouldn’t have to go through a second goodbye. He wants to scream, he wants to shove past the attendant that nearly has him through the door. “You can’t!” Kirishima cries, even as the attendant steps in his way. He makes eye contact with the blond, seeing the expression trapped there, and hating it. “I don’t want to lose you again,” he croaks, and those eyes narrow a little bit more.
“Then don’t,” he murmurs.
And then the attendant has him out the door and Kirishima loses sight of the ash-blond stranger once again.
Kirishima gets to his car and sits for a while before he even thinks to open the book. His heart jams its way up his throat, threatening to suffocate him, but he pulls the novel into his lap, traces his fingers over the cover. He blinks, seeing red eyes focused on this book, a careful hand writing in it.
He opens it up, and reads what’s pressed into the page, inked by a steady hand.
Hope you remember
Come back to the in between
The stars shine crimson
The sun bleeds out colors onto the ocean as Kirishima climbs out of his car, holding onto the door for a moment. The dirt crunches beneath his feet, and a wave of sadness passes through him.
He can only hope that he’s read it right, that he’s doing what his author wants him to do. The day had been excruciatingly long, sitting on his bed and staring at that haiku scribbled out on the page, handwriting perfect, precise and beautiful. He had intended on reading the whole book as soon as he had gotten it — he actually took the next two days off work just in case — but he hasn’t been able to start reading. He hasn’t been able to turn past the title page, staring at those words written there instead.
The in between, the time between when they had been strangers. Strangers meet in the night, share one moment, and go back to strangers forever. Kirishima wants to go back to that in between, wants to live there, trapped in a breath, in a thought. He’s okay with that.
So he’s come back here, the only place he can imagine might be the right place to go. Where the sand meets the water. Where the character in his author’s story has come back, time and time again, chasing the same thing that Kirishima wants to chase.
The trail down to the beach is much harder as it’s starting to get dark, so Kirishima takes it slow, all of the bad things that could happen running through his head.
He’s probably not even going to be here.
Kirishima doesn’t want to lose him again. If he gets the opportunity for a third hello, he’s not ever going to let it turn into a third goodbye. He’s already ruined two chances. This time, he’s grabbing on and not letting go.
That is, of course, if he’s here.
Kirishima makes it down to the bottom of the cliff and pulls off his shoes, letting his toes sink into the sand. It’s still warm, the setting sun just behind the horizon. It has yet to leak away that heat that’s been trapped there over the day. It holds onto the feeling, and Kirishima holds onto the feeling as well.
He walks across the beach, scans, finds the wall.
I miss her so much.
Kirishima feels a pang go through him. He thinks about his mother every day, he misses her in every passing moment. But he had finally understood keep smiling. He had finally been able to smile for someone, and see it make a difference, see himself change someone’s day.
He misses his mom, but he misses his ash-blond author right now, too.
The beach is empty. Their rock sits there, the same as it had been, but it’s missing its occupant. Kirishima finds numb legs taking him over there, stopping him in front of the makeshift bench. He had been ridiculous to think that he knew what the author meant. Of course he hadn’t actually wanted to see Kirishima again. He had just wanted to get rid of him, tell him what he wanted to hear, get him to move on. He hadn’t signed with his name.
He hadn’t wanted a third hello. He hadn’t even wanted the second.
Kirishima sits and leans his head back against the rock. He smiles despite himself, because this is going to be something he’s never going to get over. He’s probably still going to read the guy’s stuff, going to consume all of his books and posts and all of his work, but he’s never going to be able to think of it the same. He’s never going to be able to see the main characters like he’s supposed to. He’s only going to be able to see light hair and red eyes. Sand along his arms, a shirt dripping wet. Glasses slipping down his nose.
But he has to keep smiling. He promised he would keep smiling. Kirishima just has someone else to miss now. And that’s okay. He can deal with that. He’s dealt with it before.
So he does, he lifts his head towards the sky and smiles. “See me, ma? Still smiling. That smile is unbreakable. Just for you.”
There’s no response from the sky, but that’s okay. He knows she’s smiling back from wherever she is.
I miss her so much.
A new face joins the sadness.
I miss him so much.
It’s not fair — missing someone that Kirishima only barely knows. But that’s not true. It’s not. He knows the blond. He knows his chuckle, the way his eyes roll, he knows the way he stands and shoves his hands in his pockets when it’s quiet for a long time. He knows the way he looks with his hair pressed to his head, and the way he looks with it brushed back out of his face. He knows those glasses, slipping down his nose, and he knows the random, trivial things they had talked about while traipsing through sea caves. Plants they own, and how he feels about his mother, and the most interesting beach he’s ever been to. And he knows the feel of his lips, his cheeks, his hair. He knows the sound he makes through his nose as Kirishima winds an arm around his waist.
And he knows him better than that, too, he knows his writing.
He knows his voice, he knows the products of his brain, he knows the timbre of his soul. The way it dips and rises, like the waves in front of Kirishima. He knows the things important to him, the things that mean the most. He knows that. You can’t read somebody’s entire work base and not have some idea of what they’re like.
You won’t have to miss him in the same way, Kirishima reminds himself. He has the book, he has everything the guy has ever written. He can still hear him, he can still… he can still have that, at least. He won’t lose his favorite author, not in the writing.
Where the Sand Meets the Water.
Kirishima looks back to that spot, the inspiration of his author’s short story, what had meant the most to him.
And he blinks.
And blinks again.
He’s standing right there.
Kirishima is on his feet before he even means to be, accidentally slamming his heel on the rock. He barely even registers it. He’s not alone on the beach. The blond — his author — is standing there, pant legs rolled up, letting the waves wash over his feet. He’s not looking at Kirishima, he’s facing the waves, face tilted towards the sky.
Kirishima puts his shoes down and dumps his keys and stuff with them, and then carefully walks down the beach. It’s dark now, every drop of light from the sunset completely gone, drained out of the sky like a sink with a leak. Like paint poured from a bucket, leaving a dark husk behind. Stars twinkle there instead, tiny points of light millions of kilometers away.
The water washes over his toes, ice cold, and Kirishima tries not to flinch. His author stands there, perfectly still, hands in his pockets. If he hears Kirishima come up, he doesn’t acknowledge it. Kirishima doesn’t stop inching forward until he’s standing right by the blond’s side.
He stands there for a moment, tipping his head towards the sky as well. The guy has to have noticed him, Kirishima can see his eyes open out of the corner of his eye, but he doesn’t say anything. So instead of starting the conversation, Kirishima just stands there, pushes his hands into his pockets as well, stares up at the sky. It’s oddly serene, standing there with foam trickling past his ankles, the stars twinkling above, just a foot from this guy, this guy he’s got so much knowledge about, but he doesn’t even have a name for.
It’s not Kirishima who breaks the silence.
“I came every night,” the guy says. Kirishima blinks and looks over to the blond. He continues to stare at the sky, red eyes narrowed, shoulders pulled up slightly. Kirishima doesn’t respond, so apparently after a moment, the guy thinks he needs to fill the silence. He adds, “After we met. I came here every night. For two weeks.”
This is effectively the worst news Kirishima has ever heard. He had considered coming out to the beach so many times, but he had never done it. It had felt desperate, like he was going to be the only one holding on, like he was just going to be missing somebody else.
But he feels stupid knowing that the blond had come back.
“I’m sorry,” Kirishima says, turning back to the waves. “I was afraid to. I was afraid you wouldn’t be here.”
The blond snorts, and Kirishima spares another glance at him, and then can’t look away. He’s looking back, and his eyes hold an expression that Kirishima hasn’t seen there before. He looks… soft. Warm. He looks like someone that Kirishima would pull into his arms, run his fingers through their hair.
He looks like somebody that Kirishima could love.
“Well, I was here. But it doesn’t matter now.”
Kirishima stares at him, admiring all of that in the moonlight. He looks like a painting, like an artist’s perfect touch. A smile tugs on Kirishima’s lips. “You knew I thought you were an artist. Why didn’t you correct me?”
“You kidding?” The guy rolls his eyes. “You saw how many people were at my signing. You think I should just go around telling people who I am? There’s a reason that I don’t put my real name on anything I write.”
Kirishima chuckles, and turns his body towards his author. He pulls his hand from his pocket and holds it out between them, not wavering even as the blond narrows his eyes down at it.
“Well. I’m Kirishima Eijirou. It’s nice to meet you.”
Red eyes narrow further, flicking up to Kirishima’s face, like he’s aligning the name to the planes of his cheeks. Like he’s fitting it into the puzzle, locking that final piece in to look at the picture.
Kirishima wants to see the full picture of his author. Of his… of his…
“Bakugou Katsuki,” he says, his hand coming forward and wrapping around Kirishima’s. He gives a solid, firm shake.
Of his Bakugou.
Kirishima grins wide, tightens his grip, and yanks his author — yanks Bakugou — forward, tucking his face into the blond’s shoulder and hugging him tight, hiding the smile there. His shirt is soft, and smells like his cologne, smells like ocean breeze and warmth. He feels like the right size shoe, the perfect fit of a glove, coming up to rest against Kirishima’s chest, wrapped up in his arms. He just feels like he’s right.
And he snorts against Kirishima’s ear, wraps his arms around Kirishima as well. Heartbeats align, beating in tandem, waves sloshing over their feet. Kirishima doesn’t even feel the cold anymore.
“You’ve read all my work, huh?”
Going red, Kirishima laughs into a strong shoulder, rests his forehead there. “Maybe I have.”
“You can’t take it back now. You have or you haven’t.”
Kirishima pulls back, smiles. Bakugou looks exasperated, just the slightest ghost of a smile along his lips. Kirishima lifts his hand and runs it through strands of blond hair. “I have.”
Bakugou tilts his head ever so slightly into Kirishima’s hand, eliciting another smile. “Damn fanboy.”
“Maybe I am. What are you going to do about it?”
“Maybe I’ll just have to write something for you,” Bakugou muses.
The thought threatens to give Kirishima a literal heart attack, but he reins in the excited and panicked response, knowing Bakugou can already feel the pounding of his heart pressed up against him. “I have to warn you,” he whispers. “If you do that, I’m not going to be able to let you go.”
A challenging smile warms Bakugou’s face, and he pulls Kirishima in a little bit closer. He leans in slightly, brushing his lips against Kirishima’s. It’s soft, warm, the idea of more to come. Kirishima warms, chasing after his lips as he leans away. He wants forever like this, smiling at this author. Holding him and being reminded that things can be okay, even if things aren’t the best. Even missing someone, you can still be happy. There are still reasons to smile. Bakugou runs a thumb along Kirishima’s lip, tracing his grin, and asks, “Promise?”
“Promise,” Kirishima breathes, leaning back in to kiss him again. Bakugou sighs against his mouth, holds him tight, and murmurs his response into Kirishima’s skin.
“Then I’ll get to writing.”