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“Hello?” Chifuyu asks as he picks up the phone.
“Hey,” Baji breathes.
There’s shuffling in the background, and Baji assumes it’s Chifuyu sitting up in his bed. “Something wrong?” He says with a partial yawn.
“Nah,” Baji answers, “I just wanted to hear your voice.”
The line goes silent for a moment, and when Chifuyu speaks again, he sounds more alert than before. “Oh, uh, do you want me to talk or something?”
“Yeah.”
Chifuyu makes a humming sound like he’s thinking, then he says, “Go outside.”
“Huh?”
“Outside. On your balcony.”
Baji has an eyebrow raised, but he listens to his instructions. Without putting on shoes or a jacket, he opens the door and steps out. The cold nips at the parts of his skin that are left unclothed, but Baji brushes it off, leaning forward onto the metal railing.
“I’m outside. Now what?”
“Look at the stars.”
His gaze flickers up at the night sky, peppered with dots of light. It was a nice view, sure, not something you’d typically see in Tokyo but Baji didn’t care about things as trivial as stars. It seems like the kind of things that’d be shown in cliche romance movies, a couple looking admiringly at a star-filled sky while holding hands. Then again, Chifuyu’s into that kinda thing, so maybe that’s his point to this.
“What does this have to do with you talking my ear off?” He questions, a toothy grin spreading without meaning it.
Chifuyu sighs in a way that makes Baji imagine him rolling his eyes, and he can’t help but laugh.
“You know how kids have those unattainable dreams? Like wanting to be a singer or the president?”
Baji nods, forgetting the fact Chifuyu can’t see him. “I wanted to be a ninja.”
Chifuyu lets out a staticky chuckle. It seeps into Baji’s bones and warms them, greater than any jacket could.
“Yeah, well, I wanted to be an astronaut. Something about the stars, the way they shined, made me wanna reach out and touch them. But then I watched Alien and that scared me shitless, so I decided a pilot was the next best thing.”
“Wait till I tell you about Final Destination.”
“Shut up!” Chifuyu yells into the speaker, but his tone is filled with amusement.
It’s silent for a while, not an awkward silence, never that, but the type where they know they don’t need to talk. The mere knowledge that the other one is there is more than enough.
“You know,” Chifuyu speaks after a bit, “my dad was a bit of a nerd.”
“Like father like son.”
That pulls a giggle out of Chifuyu, but he continues, “He was the first person to take me stargazing—the only person actually. He taught me how to use a telescope, and while he pointed to each constellation, he went on and on about them. But it was such a waste, you know, cause I can’t remember a single thing he said.”
There’s a hint of sadness in his voice, maybe fatigue too, and Baji can only imagine what kind of face he’s making right now. His mind pictures Chifuyu smiling with dewy eyes, like he always did when talking about his late father. Memories of him were always muddled by time and majority of the tales were ones told by his mother, to which Chifuyu passed on to Baji.
“Let’s go stargazing,” Baji says.
“What?”
“Lemme take you stargazing, but you gotta wait a while. Until I can remember all the constellations, and then I’ll tell you everything I know about ‘em.”
Chifuyu chuckles, the kind done out of slight embarrassment, and Baji thinks of him smiling and blushing, looking off to the side or twiddling with his bangs. “Dumbass, you can’t remember them all.”
“Do you know who you’re talking to right now?” His grin is back, more teeth, less lip.
“What you should be memorizing is the notes for next week’s test.”
“Shit, I forgot about that.” Baji says, facepalming, then with a wry smile, he says, “Lend me your notes?”
“Nope.” Chifuyu says, popping the ‘p’.
Baji pleads, “Chifuyu,”
“Don’t know about you, Kei,” he dramatically yawns, “But I’m really tired.”
“Don’t you fucking dare,”
“Sweet dreams.”
The call ends abruptly, and Baji clenches his fists, groaning. He can’t be too mad, though, because he hears laughter two stories down, and it sounds like all things happy. Like wind chimes, and songbirds, and rain on a day where the sun refuses to set.