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The night it happened
The night Adam leaves, the world comes crashing down on Kaoru.
The rubble buries him, ruins him. His legs are pinned under a sure hand on his waist. He’s struck immobile by heavy, falling touches and winks and stares. His skull is crushed by the car pulling away from their spot, their spot, their spot where they could go and skate and laugh and never have to worry about the world outside. He can feel himself die, feel the life inside him fade out as the burning fire that was Adam is doused in less then a second.
That’s what it feels like, anyway.
In reality, Kaoru sinks to his knees in the evening light as Adam’s car tires screech and leave them behind. No rubble crashes to the ground. No apocalypse comes to take him.
He can feel Kojiro kneel beside him. “That fucking bastard. I knew it. I’ll fucking rip his throat out-” He cuts himself off. Kaoru can feel his eyes on him, but doesn’t look his way. He stays staring, without blinking, at the highway where the one person who managed to make Kaoru feel alive again had left without looking back. “Kaoru. Look at me.”
I’m leaving for America.
Suddenly, the flickering streetlight and the sounds of the water and the sounds of Kojiro breathing heavily become too much. Kaoru has to leave. He has to get out of here, has to do something-
He doesn’t even realize he’s moving until a hand grabs his shoulder and pulls him back. “Kaoru, stop. Where are you going?”
“I can’t be here.”
“Where will you go? You can’t exactly tell your parents about your relationship problems, you don’t have any other places to stay-”
“Let me go, Kojiro. Please.”
Kojiro takes Kaoru’s hand in his. “You’re not going anywhere without me right now.”
And it’s that sentence, that simple sentence that causes Kaoru to break.
He drops to his knees again and cries. He curls up into a ball, face buried in his knees, back shaking with sobs, and he knows Kojiro’s trying to help and he’s so hideously embarrassed but he just doesn’t know what to say anymore, doesn’t know how to put into words the rage and hurt and guilt he feels.
Kojiro’s arms wrap around him. The pressure is comforting, but it barely registers in Kaoru’s mind as he’s half dragged, half supported to lean against the railing of the balcony looking out onto the ocean, Kojiro’s arms around him the whole time.
He doesn’t know how long they sit there, Kaoru crying while Kojiro gently whispers into his ear, squeezes his hand, does everything a friend should do and it makes everything so, so much worse, because Kaoru knows that now Adam’s gone it’s only a matter of time before Kojiro’s gone too.
The sun sinks below the horizon. Kaoru still won’t meet Kojiro’s eyes.
How long do I have with him, until he’s gone too? Weeks? Days?
“Kaoru.” Kojiro breathes. “We should go. You can stay with me.”
“No. No, I have to get out of here, I have to leave-” Kaoru’s voice is thick as he struggles in Kojiro’s grasp. Shit, this is embarrassing.
“Not right now, just hold on.”
“How?” Kaoru explodes. “How are we supposed to when he’s gone?”
He can tell Kojiro doesn’t know the answer any more than he does.
“Kaoru, one day we’re gonna get out of here.” Kaoru stops fighting and fights back more tears. He knows Kojiro’s lying, knows his time with him is a ticking clock, but it doesn’t stop him.
“Promise?”
The day after
Kaoru skips school.
He wakes up in his own bed, not Kojiro’s. The sun pours through the open window shade, and Kaoru reaches his hand to shut it.
He stays in bed like that the entire morning, ignoring his mother’s yelling, ignoring his phone buzzing. His surroundings close in on him like a cocoon until it’s just him and his mattress, fresh waves of rage washing over him as his eyes unfocus. He stops thinking about all of it.
It’s a little comforting how his hand feels a million miles away, how all the atoms in him keep on growing farther apart. The only thing he feels is the cool sheet under him. The noises around him fade into nothing.
The afternoon brings nothing different. A fly drones at the window as he stares at the ceiling. His phone rings, Kojiro’s smiling face on the screen, and he lets it go to voicemail.
As the sun goes down, Kaoru tries to time it in his mind, trying to shake himself from the monotony. He met Adam a year ago, so the maximum age for staying must be a year.
Then why had Kojiro lasted a decade?
I must be pushing my luck with him. I should get ready for it to happen.
Kaoru decides to leave first. He’ll get ahead if it’s the last thing he does. Kojiro is no anomaly, either in friendship or in skating. He just stuck around for pity.
It all comes back to him, every couple hours, doubling him over like he’s been stabbed. Adam’s gone, and he never loved you, and he isn’t coming back and things are never, ever gonna be the same and Okinawa isn’t home, it never has been and Kojiro- Kojiro-
(Those thoughts are too bright for the window shades.)
But it all goes back to static after a while, fading back into taking god knows how much time staring at the air in front of him. The seconds turn into minutes turn into hours, the texts into calls into frantic knocks on the door. The skin turns into hands turn into words and Kaoru can’t really understand them, but the black turns into nothingness. Into sleep. And the warmth beside him is- is-
The week after
Kaoru’s back to school, albeit against his will. When he got enough energy to leave his room, he found that his vision was tinged gray at the edges, like the battery on his mind had gotten low. Kojiro smiles and knocks his shoulder into Kaoru’s when he returns, and Kaoru tries to bypass his apathy and reach the feelings below, but he can’t. He can tell he’s hinging on a discovery, something he can only find out if he can find color again.
When he skates home alone, he doesn’t recognize the city. The streetlamps shed no light. The chattering people in the parks, the shifting skyline of the place he’s known his whole life- it all looks foreign.
It looks wrong. Kaoru has an uneasy feeling of recognition, but his home doesn’t look like home anymore. If he doesn’t leave soon- it doesn’t matter. He has to leave soon.
He gets back to his house. He ignores the shouts of his parents and goes to his room. He tries to think logically.
Three weeks until he leaves. I have to go.
He takes down his favorite posters and rolls them up neatly, placing them in a duffel bag under his bed. He can feel Okinawa behind him already, can feel the place he can barely remember fade into the distance, as he finally leaves it all behind. He feels no remorse whatsoever.
None at all.
One day we’re gonna get out of here.
When he forgets about him, it’ll be the last string he cuts. Kaoru will be done with this awful town, free of his parents, free of the stifling air of the skateparks- it’ll be gone just like that.
So will Kojiro.
Kaoru thinks Kojiro will forget about his promise. Maybe he already did. They aren’t used to breaking promises, especially to each other, but this one is worth it. It has to be.
Right?
Kaoru stops packing his posters momentarily and lies on the cold floor. There are glow stars on the ceiling, glowing faintly in the twilight. God, they must be at least eight years old by now.
“Kaoru! Stop moving!”
“Stop shaking around!”
Kojiro toppled over from where he was perched precariously on the chair Kaoru was supporting for him. He hit the twin bed with a thump.
“Kojiro! Are you okay?” Kaoru rushed to his side. Kojiro giggled and pointed to the ceiling. “I got it!”
Firmly placed on the ceiling was the fifth glow star they’ve managed to put up, with a group effort. It had been an exhausting afternoon.
Kojiro huffed in determination. “We are gonna get all of these stars on your ceiling by the time I turn 10. It’s only in a few months.”
Kaoru grinned at Kojiro, two front teeth missing. “Promise?”
“Promise!”
Kaoru grabbed Kojiro’s hand and pulled him off the bed. “Then I promise I’ll be better at holding the chair.”
(Three months later, on Kojiro’s birthday, all the stars were on the ceiling, methodically placed by 10 year old minds.)
Kaoru is hit with a sudden burst of color. The washed-out apathy that sits in his chest fades into a low throb. It feels, almost, as if Adam was back.
Almost.
His vision fades back to gray.
one month after
Kaoru’s ready to leave.
It took longer than he hoped it would, stealing money from his parent’s bedside table and collecting everything he needed, but he’s ready.
He leaves tonight. He has a bus ticket to Naha.
He doesn’t bother to say goodbye to his parents- they haven’t cared about him in a while anyway, not since he decided rebellion was worth rejection, that love was more than blood- and he leaves a note for his sister. He knows she’ll understand.
There’s just one last person he needs to see.
Kojiro smiles easily through the window when Kaoru arrives. He swings one leg over the frame and falls on the floor. Kojiro’s room is bright and filled with sun, posters and pictures adorning his wall, but Kaoru notices the piles of his clothes on the floor, his guitar left haphazardly in the open closet, the bags under his eyes.
Kaoru thought Kojiro never really thought much about Adam. Maybe he was wrong.
“I haven’t seen you in days.” Kojiro flops onto his bed, and then sits up again, excited. “Do you wanna go to the new skatepark?”
“No.” Kaoru says it far more harshly then he means to. He can’t stand the thought of skating with Kojiro. The color in his vision only comes when he’s there, and Kaoru doesn’t deserve to see it again.
“I just came to say goodbye.”
Kojiro pulls himself off the bed and sits up fully. There’s a focused look on his face- it’s concern. He turns to face him, and Kaoru feels something in his chest dislodge.
“Where are you going? You don’t leave for the summer for another month.”
“I-”
“Kaoru. You don’t have to say goodbye.”
Kaoru doesn’t know what to say. Why would Kojiro lie to him, especially about that? He has to say goodbye, of course he does, he doesn’t have a reason to stay anymore, he doesn’t have anyone left who cares, maybe he never did, and all he ever does is care too much too fast and-
His words catch in his throat. He can feel his thoughts swirling, racing to conclusions he shouldn’t be making right now, or ever.
He has to get out of Okinawa. He has to leave, get out of this room before he realizes-
Oh.
He’s in love with Kojiro. Probably has been for a while now.
God, he’s such a fucking idiot.
“I have to go. Goodbye, Kojiro.” He starts to climb out of the window, but a hand wraps around his wrist.
“You’re not leaving now.”
“My parents are gonna get mad-”
“That’s bullshit and you know it. Stay.”
And Kaoru can’t say no to him, not now, not when he just tied up ten years of feelings he had but didn’t recognize.
They watch skating videos for hours, and Kaoru tries not to jump out of the window when he realizes anew every so often that Kojiro’s beside him. Kojiro’s mom brings them food and tells them not to stay up too late. All the memories Kaoru has of Kojiro suddenly become clearer, as if he’s seeing them in HD, and he suddenly understands all the little things that were once nothing but now feel like rocks on his chest, weighing him down.
He hates it. This is even worse than loving Adam. At least Adam was unreliable.
But Kaoru had learned to count on Kojiro. And he can never, ever do that again.
At midnight, Kojiro dozes off. Kaoru rests his head on the pillow and reopens the window carefully, tiptoeing silently around the room.
There’s a loud creak when he steps on a floorboard. Kojiro’s eyes flutter. He moves faster.
He can hear him shout from his room as he skates away. He’s never noticed how lonely the roads are at night.
He doesn’t know how long he skates, but he finds himself at their spot. The abandoned drive-through. He can feel cool air on his neck, ocean breeze from the water. There’s a little drizzle of rain in the air. He takes a deep breath.
Almost eighteen years in this hellhole, and the only time he ever felt okay was with Kojiro. He’s never left.
He turns to the graffiti on the walls of the drive-through, and is surprised, because he can recognize it. It feels like home.
There are words, pictures, stickers. Memories. Kaoru feels a wave of nostalgia.
Nanako was here, losers
He runs his fingers on the concrete.
Adam + E 4ever
He can hear telltale wheels on the pavement behind him.
Kojiro and Kaoru 2008 Kojiro and Kaoru 2009 Joe and Cherry 2010 Joe and Cherry 2011
“Kaoru? Is that you?”
Kaoru turns, and he’s there. Eyes wide with relief, with anger. “Why did you leave?”
He can’t bear to say goodbye again.
“I’m getting out of Okinawa. We’ll see each other around, maybe back here on vacation.” Kaoru turns coolly and walks away. The rain starts falling a little harder.
“No, Kaoru please, why are you walking away now?” Kaoru can hear the pain in his voice. He knows he’s just trying to get him to stay. What’s confusing is why. He would probably only have a month or so with Kaoru until he leaves himself, packs up and abandons him to drive out of Okinawa alone. He can feel his heart shatter at the thought.
Distantly, something slots into place in his mind. But he hasn’t noticed it yet.
“Now is better than later! I don’t want to leave after you, Kojiro.” Kaoru doesn’t look behind him.
“Can you please just stay?”
“Kojiro! Leave me alone! Why won’t you listen to what I want-”
“Because I love you!”
His voice rings out through the rain, through the ocean. Kaoru stops dead.
“Kaoru, please. I love you.”
Kaoru stays silent, twists the words. Then he keeps walking with a new purpose. “I’m still not staying. Nice try. I know you’re lying.”
Kojiro’s desperate attempts to get Kaoru to stay will only make him leave faster. When he’s off in India or Egypt or America he won’t even think about him. He’ll fall in love with someone else, and he’ll get a job, maybe become an artist, and he’ll get married and have kids after a while and at the end of the day, when he comes home tired, there’ll be someone waiting for him who’ll never, ever leave, and he’ll smile and look at the face in front of him and it’ll be- it’ll be-
Kaoru realizes he hasn’t ever seen a future that wasn’t Kojiro.
Kojiro begins to run, to close the distance between them. He grabs Kaoru’s shoulder and turns him around. There’s rain on Kojiro’s face. They’re turned to each other, the rain on both of their faces trailing down their skin. It looks like tears. Kaoru tries to fight his own mind. It’s better this way. He won’t miss you after a while. You’ll find someone else, and when you do you can forget all about the idiot who can’t seem to leave you alone.
“Don’t touch me. I thought you wanted to get out of here, Kojiro. What’s keeping you? We’re both leaving soon, you said it yourself, so it’s easier if we leave separately-””
He loves me.
“It’s easier for you!” Kojiro’s voice is shockingly loud as he continues, shaking a little. Kaoru notices that he’s only wearing a t-shirt and shorts, and it’s a cold, cold night. “I run away from everything when I get scared, but I’m never going to run away from you. I don’t know why you’re doing this.”
There’s a pause. Kaoru considers it.
It’s been a month since Adam left. It’s time for Kojiro to leave.
“How long?”
The question confuses Kojiro, clearly. “What?”
“How long until you leave? If I stay, how long until you leave?”
Kojiro shocks and pulls closer to Kaoru, shaking with disbelief. He looks almost incredulous.
“God, you’re such a fucking idiot. I don’t want you to leave, Kaoru, because I never want to go anywhere if you’re not with me! That promise was for both of us. I’m never leaving you here alone. I’m never leaving you anywhere alone.”
He loves me. He loves me.
Kaoru can’t move. Suddenly, the Okinawa skyline just looks like home again. The last puzzle piece slots into place.
“Where you go, I go, Kaoru.”
And then Kaoru smiles.
“You’d even go to outer space?”
The response is instant. “Oh, would I,” Kojiro says, and then he kisses him.
The rain pours down at full force as they finally close the gap between them, and it feels right. It’s messy, but they’re leaning into each other’s touch like medicine to the ill and Kaoru can see a future with him now, can see what was a dormant dream become a reality. Kaoru can feel Kojiro’s hands on his cheeks, his lips on his, and he’s never felt a touch so solid and real and he never, ever wants to stop kissing him. He can feel every argument, every pointless letter that never got sent, every idiotic thought of it’s no use, he doesn’t love me fade away until all he knows is Kojiro’s eyes shut in front of him, lashes fluttering. He wants to stay in this moment, holding Kojiro, street light flickering, moon gently reflecting off the rain.
When they finally break apart, laughing and breathless, Kojiro presses his forehead to Kaoru’s, and Kaoru leans into the touch, speaking under his breath. “One day, we’re gonna get out of here. You and me. Together.”
Kojiro laughs into Kaoru’s mouth as he kisses him again.
“Promise?”