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Eijun was getting desperate.
His wretched crush on the genius catcher of Waseda’s illustrious baseball team, one that Haruichi detested and hoped Eijun would eventually get over with, has been a saga for years.
Now, on his second year of university, Eijun decided it was his final stand.
It had been more than twenty-one long arduous months of alternating between giddy, enraptured doodling of 'Miyuki Eijun' on his notebook and miserable crying on angsty fanfiction about unrequited love to effectively vent his feelings.
He was just tired and sick of pining.
Miyuki Kazuya had always been rather out of reach.
He’s cocky, infuriating, and brilliant and Eijun had hoped the jerk would somehow have the decency to hold his hand. But whenever he gets the invisible nudge to finally step-up and confess his feelings, he’s reminded of the one-night conquests, the long-string of ephemeral partners that notched the bastard’s bedposts.
He would also remember their first meeting (which was pretty damning evidence that Eijun should cease his mindless fixation), when Haruichi and the gang brought him to a popular college hang-out (his very first bar experience), only to find the hottest guy in school talking behind his back and essentially calling him a waste of time.
(“I’m getting bored with the same old people.” The bastard had said.
His yankee friend (who Eijun later befriends and worships as one of his best senpai Kuramochi) nudged him towards their direction. “How about them? Looks like fresh blood, the brunette looks like your type.”
Eijun’s cheeks suffused with warmth, heart-beating vigorously. He sipped his cocktail demurely, feeling a bit shaky in subtle delight until the hot guy wrinkled his noise, voice coming out a little too loudly, “I’m not particularly interested in someone that ordinary.”
Eijun had felt chilled the whole night.”)
He had despised him after that, tried consigning him to the depths of hell but he actually turned out to be a pretty decent partner on the diamond.
They had a rocky start but in the months of being forced together in the field as pitcher-catcher, Eijun grew to respect him and follow his lead even if his spurting blood pressure would rather have him chopping the guy’s head off with a guillotine.
Beneath the whole shitty persona, Miyuki Kazuya was just so easy to admire. He was prickly and annoying as fuck but he had his moments of kindness (although not enough to suppress his real identity as the spawn of Satan).
He was blunt and pretty neglectful when Eijun had his yips but when he attempted to return to the mound, Miyuki Kazuya had placed his mitt inside without hesitation, challenging him to make his pitch (the jerk!) with a familiar smirk. It touched and showed him that despite being no help, he was still waiting for him—still trusted that he would come back.
So, it was pretty hard to get over him.
But this… this was his last attempt at making anything happen.
Since Eijun was on the brink of losing his sanity and no earthly power would get the catcher to like him back, he had turned to the spiritual (and ridiculous, Haruichi emphasized).
There’s a replica of two animal statues near the Department of Architecture, inspired from the real ones situated in the temples in Myanmar. In the real statues, there’s a legend that if you placed the photo of the one you loved in its mouth, your wish will come true. The girl needs to place the guy’s picture inside the mouth of the tiger whereas the boy needs to place it in the lion’s mouth.
There was a catch in their version of the legend though. Because the statues in Waseda were only replicas, the term for having your wish was a bit harder. You need to place it on the statue’s mouth when no one was looking or risk cursing your love life for a hundred years.
The terms weren’t very LGBT+ friendly and the consequence for getting caught was a tad excessive but he decided to roll with it.
The picture he decided on was one of Miyuki wearing the scarf Eijun knitted for his birthday.
It was a bit awkward when he had given that. He had realized too late that it was a couple-ish gift so Eijun had kissed his free time goodbye and decided to make everyone scarves on their birthday to make it seem uncouple-ish and not awkward. It had been taxing and Haruichi had taken particular pleasure at his plight.
Classes at the Department of Architecture start at 8 am so seeing someone at 6 am was next to impossible. Since Eijun wanted to be certain, he had reached the area at 4:45 am.
The sun started to rise ten minutes ago so the area is lit with soft sunlight.
Clutching the holy photo of Miyuki, he breathed deeply and placed it gingerly in the holy mouth of the tiger (he decided to follow the girl's route since he kind of wanted to be the bottom in the relationship). He clapped his hands, touched it with his forehead and prayed.
'Please, I'm desperate and lonely and should probably not do this but if there's even a tiny chance let Miyuki Kazuya love me. He's way too handsome and talented, if there's justice on earth he's due for one so let him end up with me I promise not to kill him.'
He poured all those months of longing and anguish into his prayer, conveying the raw pain of his pitiful one-sided love.
He was finishing it with a 'thank you Kamisama' when a loud bang startled him from his reverent worship.
His head whipped towards the sound so fast and his rapidly heart sank.
No. No. No.
If it wasn't enough that he'd been seen (thus invoking the century-long curse), he'd been seen by none other than Miyuki Kazuya himself.
"Eijun?" The fucker croaked in disbelief.
They stared at each other for a bit, jarred until the elder of the two picked the fallen tumbler of coffee (without taking his eyes off Eijun) off the floor and morphed his lips into a teasing smirk. "So you believe in this shit, huh? You need some love?"
That did it.
Angry tears burned at his eyes and humiliation clawed at his chest. This was the second time Eijun felt so defeated.
That was it, his last attempt. The universe was sending him signs all along and since Eijun had been stubborn and refused to see the writing on the wall, they made the man himself bear the message.
Well, message sent and read universe.
He stared at the tiger statue and glared in bitterness.
He can see it vividly now.
He wasn't in love, he was possessed.
He was also weary and done.
Love was exhausting and futile, he decided.
The smirk quickly faded from Miyuki's lips and he stepped forward to ask what was wrong but Eijun was too enraged and mortified to notice.
"Screw you! I don't need love, I need an exorcism!" Eijun yelled indignantly before fleeing from the scene, leaving Miyuki dumbfounded.
+
Kuramochi groaned in despair.
That asshole Miyuki had woken him up with his anxious puttering in their dorm.
It was ass o'clock in the morning and no matter how hard he tried, sleep refused to come to him again.
"Fucking fucker waking me up with his shit."
He stood up, rubbing his eyes and walking towards the counter where their old coffee maker was sitting nicely. He poured himself a cup and blinked repeatedly before spotting a photo on the table.
He picked it up and saw it was of Sawamoron sleeping, open-mouthed and drooling.
He snorted, "That asshole forgot to carry the picture, must have been too nervous. Hyahahaha! Serves him right!"