Chapter Text
It’s the summer after Akaashi’s thirteenth birthday when he joins his first book club.
Technically, his membership is unofficial. He never actually contributes to the concoction of ideas extracted from the book of the week; the lilting melodies of voices that drift from Akaashi’s sitting room never even acknowledge him crouching in the shadows of his staircase, eavesdropping on their conversation.
Still, Akaashi indulges greedily in the fruits of their discussion, swathing himself in the stories they magically unfurl from their recounts of every old, worn-out page. He listens raptly to the tones that break apart nuances hidden in fanatical worlds, sometimes sharp and jumbled in an amalgamation of disagreement, and other times warm and agreeable in a hum of unity.
He doesn’t really understand most of what they’re saying; terms like “anaphora,” “microcosm,” and “synecdoche” are lost on a brain that’s just learning to dissect symbolism in Kokoro, but week after week, the golden threads of text that unfold mysticality and friendship, victory and hardship, characters and their journeys, weave an inescapable net that hooks Akaashi and reels him in on the current called literature before he can even realize he’s caught.
When the days start to grow shorter and the sky darkens early, Akaashi trades a baseball card for a clippable book light through Mori Middle School’s student-run underground black market. Yamada Katsuo from Class 2-2 grabs the baseball card with an eyebrow wiggle as Akaashi takes the extended book light.
“What kinds of stuff are you looking at after dark, Akaashi?” Yamada insinuates, voice smarmy and teasing.
Akaashi grips the little bend of white plastic and ignores the question, turning to leave. But Yamada is determined to get an answer, hopping over a desk in front of Akaashi and sticking his face into Akaashi’s space.
“Naughty things?” he simpers, wiggling his eyebrows again.
Akaashi doesn’t bother to school the irritated expression on his face.
“How many times do I need to bleach this thing to cleanse it of your midnight activities, Yamada-san?” he bites back cooly.
Yamada cackles loudly and claps Akaashi on the back.
"As many times as you want, but it probably won’t kill all the gross that’s on that thing.”
Akaashi can’t stop his face from twisting in disgust as he dangles the little bulb from his fingertips. He considers maybe just writing in the dark.
But despite its questionable history, the book light manages to become more of a regular in Akaashi’s life than most of his friends that winter, clipped to the covers of his books as he attends book club meetings just after sunset. Its flickering glow is just bright enough for Akaashi to scratch a few rudimentary notes in the margins of the pages as he ducks in his corner and strains to hear the flow of conversation in the next room. Sweat sticks his curls to his forehead on warm days and his fingers turn numb on cold ones, but Akaashi doesn’t notice, enraptured by the shy narrations coaxed out from between thick leather shells by the talented minds in his sitting room. He starts to scribble down his own thoughts before the book club returns every week, and indulges in the tsunami of tingling pride that crests when someone mentions a thought Akaashi doesn’t need to scramble to write down because it’s already pressed between the pages of his book.
His birthday passes in December, and he spends it with his head buried inside of Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human, preparing notes for the next book club meeting.
Small white blossoms from the spring bloom are falling into Akaashi’s hair during lunch when Ishikawa Hayato picks up the shiny laminated hardcover of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe Akaashi borrowed from the library and flips it around in inquiry. Akaashi’s contaminated book light bounces indignantly a few times but keeps its stubborn hold.
“What’s this?”
Akaashi blinks.
“A book.”
Ishikawa throws him an exasperated look. “I know what it is. I mean, what’s it for? This isn’t anything we read in class.”
Akaashi thinks that if Ishikawa had meant “What is it for?” that’s what he should’ve asked, but he bites back his retort in favor of thinking of an acceptable answer to the question. Akaashi doesn’t really want to explain why he hides under the stairs of his own house and gives himself scoliosis and astigmatism while trying to secretly crash his mom’s book club every Tuesday, so he settles on,
“I like to read,” for the sake of both simplicity and his dignity.
Ishikawa hums to acknowledge Akaashi’s answer while flipping through his book. Colored post-its litter the pages with Akaashi's detailed notes, definitions and reactions, but Ishikawa moves through it too quickly to absorb anything.
“Is this romance?” he asks, eyes dancing over the summary printed under the book’s plastic jacket. He perks up, head swinging to look at Akaashi. “Is this why all the girls like you? Because you read the same things?”
Akaashi pulls his tupperware out of his bag and sets it on the bench in front of him. He supposes some part of Ari and Dante’s journey could be considered romantic, but their struggles to accept their culture and find individuality while navigating their relationship seem too significant to Akaashi to definitively categorize the book as a fourteen-year-old’s view on “romance.” There is a whole world of complexity in how Ari and Dante each overcome their obstacles; the juxtaposition in Ari and Dante’s approach to their socially unconventional relationship–Ari’s reserved and hesitant while Dante’s bold and unapologetic– stirs up an infrequent storm of emotions in Akaashi, and he’s unwilling to lump the book in the same category as Yamada’s pornography magazines.
It’s outdated to assume girls read romance anyway, although Akaashi gets the feeling Ishikawa might be thinking about a specific female.
But Ishikawa doesn’t really seem like he cares too much about Akaashi’s analysis, ulterior motives and all, so Akaashi decides on the simplest answer.
“No,” he replies, pulling a fork out of his bag.
"Lame," Ishikawa sighs, and as predicted, glances to look at one of their female classmates who Akaashi has the unfortunate privilege of knowing Ishikawa’s had a crush on for months now.
"Kimiko always talks about how much she likes those and this," he waves the hardcover around in the air, “would have been the perfect way to impress her.”
Akaashi forces himself not to roll his eyes, his fingers busying themselves with unpacking his lunch and picking up an onigiri. He brushes away a blossom that lands in his fruit.
"You didn't even read it, Ishikawa-san."
Ishikawa throws his head back dramatically, hands springing into the air in front of him. "Oh I know," he groans, eyeing Akaashi. "But you could explain it to me if I asked, couldn't you?"
Akaashi shoves a corner of his onigiri into his mouth. He could.
Ishikawa looks back down at Akaashi's book for a few more dejected beats before glancing at Kimiko again. His expression twists into something Akaashi has to physically repress a sigh at when he sees.
"What if I wrote her a romance novel?" he asks, eyes searching Akaashi's face a little too eagerly for his reaction.
Akaashi wrinkles his nose.
"You scored a 38 on your Writing exam. I wouldn’t."
"Akaashi!" Ishikawa cries, clutching his heart.
"No offense," Akaashi adds belatedly.
"I'll forgive you if you give me some of your food," Ishiwaka fake-sniffles, reaching for a grape without waiting for Akaashi's answer. He grants Akaashi a glorious moment of silence while he chews but then starts moaning again as soon as his mouth is empty.
"What am I supposed to do about Kimiko then?"
Akaashi swallows his second bite of onigiri.
"Accept that she's never going to love you?"
"Akaashi!" Ishikawa groans. “I really want to impress her!”
Akaashi jams another sigh back into his throat with his last piece of onigiri. The breath of air crinkles against the seaweed in his mouth and he chews slowly to stall from answering. He’s only had this conversation 50 times already. Once more is fine.
Ishikawa flips the book open to a random page, this time taking the time to read through the text, stopping at passages with Akaashi’s annotations. It’s a particularly eventful page, painted with paper rainbows marking Akaashi’s live reactions and the analyses he’d overheard from his mom’s college friends speaking in the sitting room. One sentence in the book has a note so long the chain of sticky notes dangles lower than the bottom of the page in a cascade of neon colors.
Ishikawa reads the sentence out loud. “‘I wondered what that was like, to hold someone’s hand. I bet you could sometimes find all of the mysteries of the universe in someone’s hand.’”
Akaashi freezes, his second onigiri halfway up to his mouth as he remembers the contents of his annotations on that quote. He remembers the discussion his book club had about it. He remembers his freezing toes, the pressure of the wall against his back, a voice in the next room dissecting the beauty of Dante and Ari’s relationship, and how they discovered and unraveled more about the universe through each other. He remembers the compulsion that forced his hand to continue moving after he finished writing the comments he stole from the book club. He remembers scribbling words on the page that tentatively spelled out his desires to experience that kind of connection. To have someone who uncovers parts of the world Akaashi can’t see himself in the same way that Dante and Ari do for each other.
Because there’s a reason why Akaashi renews Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe long after the book club has moved on to another story. Why Ari and Dante’s galaxy in particular is spun together with starry words and swirling emotion that grip Akaashi’s heartstrings and refuse to let go. Why he’s turned down every girl’s harmless, juvenile affection with a “Sorry, I can’t feel the same way.”
No one ever reads as much into his wording as Akaashi does, but he chooses “can’t” over “don’t” for a reason. And he wishes so badly to be Dante, unashamed of himself and who he loves, but Akaashi is so scared, terrified of the crushing pressure of society’s standards that he sees no option but to be Ari, shrouded in the shadows and struggling with self-acceptance.
And he isn’t ready for anyone to find out yet.
Akaashi watches him in horror, icy fingers stalled by his sides, but Ishikawa hasn’t even glanced at Akaashi’s notes. He just looks at Akaashi with wide eyes and whispers, “This is perfect!”
Akaashi is confused for a moment, still lightheaded and reeling from the fact that his notes almost just betrayed his newest and most difficult realization. Ishikawa barrels on, unnoticing.
“Dude, what if I could spew some sappy romantic quotes when I talked to her,” he says, stumbling over his words in excitement. “I dunno, it might seem a bit lame but I think Kimiko would be impressed since she likes them so much.”
Akaashi shrugs, still a bit too relieved to come up with a snarky remark. Kimiko does seem like she would like it, considering she’d confessed to Akaashi a few months back on the basis that she’d caught him reading one of her favorite romance novels.
“Dude, maybe this could work!” Ishikawa says, voice rising as his eyes light up in excitement. “Maybe you can lend me this book–”
Oh no. That is absolutely not happening.
“It’s not a romantic novel,” Akaashi interjects, trying to take the book back casually even though he wants nothing more than to rip it out of Ishikawa’s hands and bury it at the bottom of his gym bag. Ishikawa doesn’t seem to suspect anything odd, just wilts a little in disappointment, his smile dimming a notch. Akaashi curses himself for noticing.
“I can lend you an actual romance with my annotations tomorrow,” he offers. The other books in his collection of book club novels don’t have any obviously incriminating material.
Ishikawa’s smile brightens again. “Yeah, that’d be great thanks!”
Akaashi stuffs Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe back into his gym bag as quickly as he can, shoving his volleyball aside to make room. He’s relieved that he’s got some more time to figure himself out before anyone else knows, but he uses more force than normal when he’s packing his clothes back into place, squashing the fabric down with vigor and yanking it over the book. His nail bangs against a metal zipper and he pulls it back quickly, finger smarting as he grips it hard to stop the pain. He doesn’t want to or even know how to deal with people finding out about his sexuality, he can’t pinpoint how they’d react, but a part of him wants so desperately to come out and be proud of who he is. Why can’t he let it overcome his fear?
“Akaashi,” Ishikawa’s voice interrupts Akaashi’s self-destructive thoughts.
Akaashi straightens to look at him, zipping up his bag. Ishikawa’s smile is gone now, replaced by an inquisitive twist of his lips that prickles the back of Akaashi’s neck.
“You think you’d ever write a romance for anyone? Or recite poetry, or quote books for them?” Ishikawa asks, his gaze curious. “Cuz I know you definitely can with all those books you read.”
Akaashi huffs out a laugh. He could. He doesn’t have an eidetic memory, but it feels like he does when he wraps himself in the comfort of a book’s creation and absorbs the tales it tells until the words are burned into his skin like a tattoo. He imagines a life where he lays with someone in a twist of cool sheets and warm blankets and shares with them all the worlds that are mapped in the lines and colors on his skin. But he can never see a face when he looks over. He’s never had anyone he wants to be there.
“No,” Akaashi replies, almost immediately.
Ishikawa looks at him for a long second and Akaashi starts to feel a twinge of fear creep up his fingertips. He twists them, fidgeting, trying to drive away the cold that’s threatening to rush up his hands again.
But Ishikawa just smiles widely again, flashing Akaashi a row of clean white teeth and declares earnestly, “I hope you meet someone that changes your mind.”
Though his face doesn’t change, Akaashi is surprised. He had let himself believe it was impossible, and imprisoned the idea in shackles of fear. But Ishikawa’s smile is heartfelt and strong, and it promises Akaashi his support, uncaring of his preferences. Akaashi ducks his head, hiding the ghost of his smile.
For the first time, he allows himself to hope for the same.
Summer rolls around a few months later and Ishikawa returns Akaashi’s worn copy of The Tale of Genji, pages thick with marks and notations. He flashes Akaashi the same toothy smile as he always does, but this time it’s accompanied by the shy grin of a pretty girl standing next to him, arm looped through his.
Akaashi visits his opthamologist at the end of the summer when his mom catches him squinting to read a road sign in the car. Glasses and contacts for volleyball are added to his daily wardrobe. He considers asking Yamada for his baseball card back because his diseased book light made Akaashi sick and blind, but decides against it at the end. He’s way more of a volleyball guy anyway.