Work Text:
One beautiful April morning, walking under the patches of sunlight through the cherry blossom lined street in Nakameguro, Tokyo, Sakusa Kiyoomi walks past the 100% perfect man.
Sakusa tried to convince himself that he wasn’t that good looking, but the way his honey glazed eyes met the perfect ray of sunlight, convinced him otherwise. His blonde dyed hair made him easy to pick out, even through a crowd of tourists visiting for the Spring bloom of cherry blossoms. His clothes weren’t anything special. His hair looked as if he had just rolled out of bed from a deep night's sleep. He was in his late twenties, not too young but not quite old.
Maybe to others, with his look being quite different from the average Japanese “look”, wouldn’t appeal to all eyes, but Sakusa knew from first glance, fifty yards away that he was the 100% perfect man for him.
His stomach fills with butterflies, his cheeks turn pinker than any fallen cherry blossom petal, and his mouth goes dry.
Everyone has their type of person- maybe they have long dark hair that barely covers their shoulders, a light brush of freckles that perfectly fit their cheeks, or broad shoulders, possibly long graceful fingers…or perhaps if you’re drawn to for no good reason to people who take their sweet godforsaken time walking down the middle of the sidewalk when you’re in a hurry. Sakusa has always had his own standards.
He’s never been one to catch feelings. People honestly gross him out at times. Yeah, he’s always dreamed of wanting to find the perfect person for him. His cousin has dragged him onto blind dates he never wanted to be a part of. But, until today, no one has ever caught Sakusa Kiyoomi’s eye like this.
He isn’t quite sure what it was that drew him to look in the direction of the man with the bleached hair. He’s not even quite sure why he’s even attracted to him in the first place. His features aren’t anything out of the ordinary, so why is it that he feels as if someone is sitting on his chest? It’s weird.
“Motoya, this morning on the street I passed the 100% perfect man,” Kiyoomi tells his cousin.
“The Sakusa Kiyoomi, telling ME that he has finally found someone who catches his tastes? Where’s the camera??” Motoya spins around in his chair frantically.
“There’s no camera. I’m telling the truth.”
“Well, is he good looking?”
“I mean, I’d say so, but to others maybe not. He’s…different.”
“So he’s your type of person?”
“I don’t know. Now that I’m retelling this to you, the only thing I can seem to remember about are…” Kiyoomi gets a quick flash of those honey glazed eyes in his memory once again.
“Are?”
“His eyes.”
“Oh, strange.”
“Yeah.”
“Did you talk to him? Get his number? Follow him maybe?”
“Nope. I just passed him on the street.”
“You’re telling me, you saw the most perfect man of your dreams and you just allowed him to just continue on walking?”
“It wasn’t the right time for it…”
“Kiyoomi, you may never see him again! You may have missed your chance!”
“I didn’t. I will see him again. Tomorrow. I’m sure of it.”
He was walking east to west, and Sakusa west to east. It really was quite a memorable April morning.
All Kiyoomi wants to do is talk to him. Learn his name, tell him his name. Discover what it is he does to pass the time during rainy days. How he manages to keep his hair so nice. What Kiyoomi really wants to do, is go on and on about the complexities of fate that have led to them passing each other one beautiful morning under the sunlit cherry blossoms in Nakameguro, Tokyo one April morning in 2022.
An experience that was sure to be crammed full of warm secrets, like an antique clock built when peace filled the world.
Kiyoomi laid in his bed, staring helplessly at the ceiling, thinking of the perfect day with the 100% perfect man.
After talking, possibly at a coffee shop- no even better, on a park bench in Nakameguro, Tokyo, they would go out to lunch somewhere, maybe see a Chris Evans movie…stop at a late night bar…have some drinks. Maybe with some luck, we might end up in bed.
Kiyoomi’s stomach flips and potentiality knocks on the door of his heart.
He quickly heads out on his morning jog around the same time as the previous day.
He spots a very familiar pair of eyes on the other side of the street.
They’re closer than they were before.
How does he approach him? What does he say?
“Good morning, would you like to go sit on a bench and have a little conversation?”
No, that’s creepy.
“Hello, I’m Sakusa Kiyoomi, I thought you were perfect for me. Would you like to go out for lunch?”
As if he’d ever have the guts to say a line like that.
“Do you know where the nearest dry-cleaner is?”
No, of course not! He’s not even carrying any clothes! Ridiculous. How did he ever think he could go up to a total stranger in the street and talk to him?
Even if he were to have the guts to tell him that he was the 100% perfect man for him, it’s not like he would ever believe it.
Or…what if he did and then didn’t want to talk to him. He could say that he may be the 100% perfect man for Kiyoomi, but Kiyoomi isn’t the 100% perfect man for him. It could happen. And for that reason, Sakusa Kiyoomi could not find himself in that situation for he would crumple into pieces. He would never be able to recover from the embarrassment of exposing one his deepest realizations.
But, Sakusa Kiyoomi is only getting older. He’s twenty fucking seven for all get out.
They pass each other and Kiyoomi turns around on his heels, going against the flow of human traffic, apologizing as he accidentally bumps into people trying to spot the man again. He looks forward with determination. The sweet smell of cherry blossoms fill his senses, loose pebbles slip under his sneakers as he maneuvers his way through American tourists.
He wears a burgundy sweater and in his left hand he holds what seems like a gym bag. So: he works out. That explains the messy hair, and the tired look that carries in this honey glazed eyes.
Kiyoomi takes a few more strides, eyes locked on the 100% perfect man in front of him.
“Oh no I’m so sorry!” Sakusa falls onto the floor with a big flop as cans spill out of a bag all around him. “I got lost in the cherry blossoms, I hope you’re okay!”
The woman in front of him was short and plump with a traditional Japanese haircut, probably in her late 50s.
He quickly gathers the cans around him and pokes his head up above the crowd. He was lost among the crowd. Nowhere to be seen.
His shoulders slump and he lets out a heavy sigh. “No worries, I can always just catch the next train. I’m sure it’ll be okay.”
Now of course Kiyoomi knew what he was going to say. It would have been quite the attention grabber as well. It wouldn't have been too long at first, but if the man wanted to learn more of the story, he was going to have to go out for lunch with him of course. And that is where he would tell the story.
Well, once they’d sit in the cafe, Kiyoomi would have started out like this: “Once upon a time” and the story would have ended with “A sad story, don’t you think?”
Once upon a time, there was a training camp in the outskirts of Tokyo, welcoming volleyball players from all across Japan. In that training camp were two young men whose only thought was volleyball, that is until they met each other.
They were your average teenage boys, having just turned 16. One was quite loud and didn’t fully have a grasp of his emotions, while the other was quiet and usually only responded with blunt remarks. Clearly the two’s personalities would clash, clearly it wouldn’t be able to work out, but there is always that chance that it could.
It was a full moon. Neither of them could sleep, so they headed out to the courtyard of the training building they were staying at. And that is where they met.
The two sat in each other’s silence for a moment before the louder one spoke with a tone that was softer than usual. Could it be because he took account of the quiet boy next to him? Or could it have just been due to exhaustion? Either way, this tone made the quiet boy feel something he had never felt before.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
The quiet boy shakes his head. “I’m not used to sleeping this far from home.”
“Yeah, me too. I’m not used to being this far away from my brother. It’s too quiet without him.”
They were just two ordinary teenage boys having a conversation. Why was it that they both felt…different?
“I’m Atsumu by the way…” The louder boy trails off waiting for a response from the quieter boy.
“I’m Kiyoomi.”
“While we’re both awake, where are you from?”
“Tokyo. I go to Itachiyama.”
“Oh rich boy, huh?”
Kiyoomi tilts his head in confusion.
Atsumu clears his throat, “I’m from Hyogo. I go to Inarizarki.”
“Ah, explains the accent.”
“I don’t have no accent!” Atsumu pipes up.
“nO aCcEnT,” Kiyoomi mocks with a laugh…
A laugh that looked even brighter with the glare of the moonlight hitting his beautiful skin.
“Atsumu?”
“I think you may be the 100% perfect boy for me…” Atsumu says without hesitation.
Kiyoomi’s eyes go wide. “What?”
“No, I don’t think, I know…you may not believe it, but you’re the 100% perfect boy for me, Kiyoomi.”
“And you…” Kiyoomi clears his throat. “are the 100% perfect boy for me. It’s like I’m in a dream.”
The two boys, one who doesn’t have a grasp of his feelings, the other who speaks quite bluntly, slide close to each other on the steps of the courtyard, brushing the sides of their arms together. From there they talked all night. Hour after hour, until the full moon slowly slipped under the horizon in the west, and the sun began to peek its head up from the east.
They weren’t lonely anymore. They had each other to comfort one another at this camp for the next few days. They had found and been found by their 100% perfect other. It’s a cosmic miracle.
Every night they met out on the courtyard under the waning gibbous. They grew closer and closer, eventually interlocking their hands in each other's, leaning a head on each other's shoulders…
Then a sliver of doubt reached them on their last night under the waning gibbous. Was it really this easy for one’s 100% lover to be found? Could this last?
As Kiyoomi lays his head on Atsumu’s lap, eyes softly closed while Atsumu runs his fingers through Kiyoomi’s soft curls, he breaks the comfortable silence with the question they were both thinking.
“Hey Omi.”
“Mhm?” Kiyoomi hums at the soft touch of Atumu’s hand on his.
“After this…we won’t be able to see each other for a while.”
“Atsumu…” Kiyoomi begins.
“No, let me finish…” Kiyoomi sits up straight and looks at Atsumu with curious eyes.
“Let’s test ourselves. Just this once. Just after the training camp. If we’re really each other’s 100% perfect lovers, then sometime, somewhere, we’re bound to meet again without fail. Fate’ll bring us together. And when it happens, and we know that we’re the 100% perfect ones, we’ll marry then and there. Whaddya think?”
Kiyoomi squeezes Atsumu’s hand, “Yes. That is exactly what we should do.”
And so the next day, the two parted. The loud one going east to west, and the quiet one going west to east.
The test they had agreed upon was unnecessary. They had already found each other, they should have never undertaken it, because they were truly each other’s 100% perfect lovers, and it was a miracle they had ever met. But it was impossible for them to know this, young as they were. The cold, indifferent waves of fate proceeded to toss them unmercifully.
One volleyball season, each of the boy’s got a severe concussion. Both of them being knocked out for two days, their teammates surrounding their beds wondering if they’ll ever awake.
Eventually the two young 100% perfect lovers awoke, but with a cost. They lost all memory of their earlier years. Their heads were as empty as Takahiro Hanamaki’s bank account.
They were two bright, determined young people, being able to return back into society with the knowledge they once had that qualified them to be full fledged members of society.
Indeed they were able to experience some type of love again, sometimes as much as 75%, but none as much as that one night under the full moon in the courtyard of the training camp.
Time passed and soon the two boys were 27.
One beautiful April morning, on his morning jog, under the cherry blossom lined street of Nakameguro, Tokyo, running west to east, the other was on his way back from the gym, heading east to west walking along the same sunlit cherry blossom street.
They passed each other in the very center of the street. The faintest gleam of their lost memories glimmered for the briefest moments in their hearts. Each felt a rumbling in their chest. And they knew:
He is the 100% perfect man for me.
Sadly, the faint glow of their memories was far too weak, and their thoughts no longer had the clarity they had when they were each 16, laying under the waning moons. Without a word, they passed each other, disappearing into the crowd. Forever.
A sad story don’t you think?
Yes, that’s it. That is exactly what I would have said to him.