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The phone rings at a quarter past three in the morning. For a moment, Makoto considers ignoring it. Seeing as he is already awake, however, he reaches out to pick it up off his bedside table, groaning when he sees the caller id: come to think of it, there really is only one person who can get away with calling Makoto so early (so late?), and he makes the most of his ability to do so.
“You’re such a fucking loser, senpai,” Makoto sits up, swinging his legs over the side of his bed. There is a part of his brain – the part that is also a fucking loser, just like Imayoshi-senpai – that is the slightest bit worried, because the last time Imayoshi-senpai called him out – Makoto cuts off that train of thought, focusing on sounding contemptuous, instead. “What is it this time?”
“Hana-chaan,” Imayoshi-senpai says, dragging the syllables out in the way Makoto finds most irritating. His voice is slurred, like his tongue can’t quite form words. “s’if ya don’ know. Always liked that ‘bout you – ”
Makoto tries very hard not to throw his phone at the wall, and tunes him out. He slots the phone between his shoulder and ear, pulling on his discarded jeans and grabbing his wallet off the table. The part of his brain that isn’t a fucking loser wonders at him, getting up without a second thought, as if he cares, or something.
Sometimes, Makoto thinks he might have a split personality disorder, for real.
Out on the landing, he shoves his arms through his jacket sleeves: first the right, then the left. “Give the phone to the barkeep, senpai,” he says, interrupting Imayoshi-senpai’s monologue as he snags his mother’s car keys from the hook near the front door.
Be right there, he says, in his head, and adds you pathetic bastard almost too late.
***
The izakaya, as it turns out, is one Imayoshi-senpai frequently habits – a ten minute drive down from the apartment Makoto shares with his mother. If he wasn’t afraid of giving himself too much credit, he’d entertain the idea of it being very convenient for Imayoshi-senpai to get himself trashed in such close proximity to his eventual ride. Thinking about it, Makoto hates himself, a little.
Pulling up outside the izakaya, Makoto turns the key in the ignition, and sits in the seat for several moments. Squeezing his eyes shut, he exhales, and steeling his shoulders, walks into the bar. Despite the lateness of the hour – or perhaps because of it – the noise (and commotion) inside is deafening. Makoto picks his way through the crowd (of distinctly inebriated salary-men), approaching the counter, where Imayoshi-senpai is seated on one of the barstools, having a distinctly one-sided conversation with the bartender.
“And then,” Imayoshi-senpai is saying, pressing his – presumably ice-cold – glass to his forehead, “he had the gall to say no other profession is as important with regard to people’s lives – it’s like he’s not even listening to himself – ” he stops when Makoto steps into his line of sight, changes tracks. “Oh hey, Mako-chan,” and proceeds to introduce Makoto to the barkeep, “my favorite kouhai – he’s such a handful,” upholding his tradition of forgetting how long Makoto’s acquaintance with the izakaya’s staff really is.
The things I put up with, Makoto thinks, sourly, to himself, thumbing his wallet open. “How much does he owe you?” he asks the bartender, taking out a five-thousand yen bill, and, “keep the change,”– not out of any kind of open-heartedness, but because he can’t stand to be in the izakaya any longer.
He can feel a headache building behind his eyes as he hauls Imayoshi-senpai upright, and sets Imayoshi-senpai’s arm across his shoulders. Imayoshi-senpai leans, heavily, into him, fingers closing around Makoto’s bicep. Makoto tries not to breathe in the smell of him: cheap beer and cigarettes.
Imayoshi-senpai is, Makoto thinks as he walks him out, a clingy drunk. It isn’t something Makoto would’ve expected, back in middle school when Imayoshi-senpai was the brightest star in his sky. He wouldn’t have pegged Imayoshi-senpai to be the sort of drinker-till-he-got-drunk, either, but nevertheless, he is. He’s barefacedly brazen about the habit, too, which infuriates Makoto more than the clinginess.
“Do I want to know how much you drank?” Makoto says before he’s really thought about it, as he bundles Imayoshi-senpai into the car, ducking to avoid clipping his head against the door as he buckles the seatbelt across Imayoshi-senpai’s lap. He tries to keep the accusation to a minimum. Imayoshi-senpai winces at the thud of the door as Makoto, getting into the driver’s seat, pulls it shut, harder than (strictly) necessary.
The roar of the engine starting up is too-loud in the resulting silence.
“Probably not,” he says, braced against the window, head bent towards the glass. The frame of his glasses glint in the faint, periodic glow of the streetlamps speeding past the window, lenses flashing white. Makoto wonders if he imagined the note of finality in his voice.
He sounds as though Makoto is overstepping his boundaries – as if it isn’t perfectly well within his rights to ask. Inadvertently, Makoto tightens his hands around the steering wheel, letting a fresh wave of self-loathing wash over him. He bites back the retort that springs to his lips, and resolves to spend the rest of the drive back in silence.
It occurs to him, briefly, to drop Imayoshi-senpai off at his own apartment. The advantages are clear: a night spent free of Imayoshi-senpai taking up space, a routinely serene morning, and less responsibility, all around. The disadvantages, however, are: a longer drive – back and forth, and the assailing guilt that will inevitably follow, courtesy of the part of his brain that is (wait for it) an absolute fucking loser.
“Sorry,” Imayoshi-senpai says, unconsciously interrupting Makoto’s raging internal monologue and derailing all thoughts of leaving him in the middle of the street. He taps his fingers against the windowsill, catching Makoto’s eye. He isn’t smiling.
Makoto is glad it is dark.
“Lost count,” Imayoshi-senpai continues, hoarse. He holds Makoto’s gaze, “to be honest. Wasn’t sure you wanted to hear that.”
Makoto makes a show of fixing his eyes on the road, face traitorously hot. “Okay,” he says, proud his voice is steady.
“Not gonna lecture me ‘bout the futility of drowning my sorrows?” Imayoshi-senpai’s fingers close around Makoto’s hand, resting on the gearshift. Makoto isn’t sure the gesture is entirely deliberate. He also isn’t sure how he feels about that. Imayoshi-senpai’s thumb brushes the inside of Makoto’s wrist. Makoto swallows. His throat is suddenly dry.
“You never listen to me, anyway,” he says, as lightly as he can through a mouthful of figurative cotton, “why waste breath? Besides: you know better than I do – what is it you were talking about the last time we met like this: alcohol related liver diseases? Have I got that right – biology has never been my ‘thing’ – ”
Imayoshi-senpai’s thumb stills. “I’m not sure I remember,” he says, suddenly very lucid and very cold, “was that the time I told you I hate what I’m studying and want nothing to do with it?”
“I don’t know,” Makoto says, startled into a hasty response. He immediately kicks himself, mentally. “You’ve said so on too many occasions to count.” He leaves the how could I possibly forget? unsaid.
“Right,” Imayoshi-senpai says, voice thick, grip on Makoto’s wrist tightening, “how could you possibly forget?”
***
end.