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Rui’s goal for the school semester was to get through without drawing attention to himself. He didn’t sign up for any clubs, didn’t socialize with classmates outside of school, or raise his hand in class. Not being perceived brought him comfort, and he was determined to uphold his lack of reputation for the whole semester. That was until he met Tsukasa.
Like a grenade dropped at his feet, Rui had little time to react before the confession.
“I love you, please go out with me!”
It hadn’t even been given at the back of the school or in a courtyard, like in a shoujo manga. No, Tenma Tsukasa gave his confession in the middle of the entire class. Rui stared at him with a horrified expression. Tsukasa was bowing low enough for it to look like a business proposal, and Rui felt everyone in their class staring at the two of them. His neck grew warm and he furrowed his eyebrows,
“No.”
Some classmates snickered while others groaned in disappointment, but Rui didn’t stick around. He fled the class to the washroom, pressing the back of his hand over his mouth. What the hell was that? Who just confesses their love in the middle of class? And without any sense of shame? The words continued ringing inside Rui’s mind,
“I love you,”
“I love you,”
“I love you!”
Tenma hadn’t even used the term “like”. He used “love”. Did he even understand what that word meant? Rui doubted the boy knew enough about him to already like him to that extent.
Like…Love… The terms floated around Rui’s head like clouds, and he rushed to the sink to rinse his face until it grew numb from the cold water. Surely, that one rejection was enough to deter Tenma, right? No sane person would continue their pursuit after such an embarrassing reaction.
But Rui should have realized that Tenma was far from sane.
“I love you, Rui!” Tsukasa called from his place on the tree. He was hugging it like a monkey, and Rui stared at him with wide eyes from the sixth floor of the building.
“You-!” Rui was at a loss for words as he watched Tsukasa smile at him without even an ounce of worry.
“Go out with me!”
Tsukasa quickly gained an audience as Rui’s classmates stopped what they were doing to gather by the window and marvel at the way Tsukasa had climbed hundreds of feet off the ground. Rui squeezed between them to take a peek and his heart nearly stopped when he saw Tsukasa take a hand off the tree.
“What are you doing?!” Rui cried. Tsukasa’s eyes glistened and he swung his body off the tree and towards the ledge of the window. Rui had reached out by pure instinct. Surely. He grabbed Tsukasa’s hand and leaned against the edge of the window, groaning from the effort of keeping Tsukasa from falling to his much-too-early death. His classmates joined in, each lending a hand to reach down and grab a part of Tsukasa’s sleeve to pull him up.
“What is your answer, Rui?” Tsukasa demanded to know.
“You’re seriously asking that now?!” Rui grunted and pulled with his eyes shut, “Of course it’s still no!”
There was a second of quiet before Rui peeked one eye open to see Tsukasa give a two-finger salute, “Until next time then, my love,” and he kicked his feet off the wall, tearing his arm away from Rui and the others to pummel down to the floor. Everyone screamed, and Rui wondered if his own voice was in the mix, as he scrambled to lean over the edge of the window and look down.
At the bottom, Tsukasa laid sprawled on a tarp that was held open by other classmates. Tsukasa winked, and Rui cursed at him.
The next confession came from a large confetti ball that exploded as Rui walked into the room. A banner fell open from the ball, spelling out, “I LOVE YOU RUI, PLEASE GO OUT WITH ME!!!” painted in calligraphy ink. Tsukasa stood beside the banner, confetti all over his hair and shoulders while he grinned with his hands on his hips. Rui spit out a confetti piece.
“You can’t be serious,” Rui thought out loud.
“I wholeheartedly am!” Tsukasa replied immediately.
“You can’t love someone you barely even know.”
“I’ve known you since middle school!”
The memory of his middle school days sent a painful jolt through Rui’s body, and his expression darkened, “Then you have even less reason to like me.”
“I don’t like you, I love you! I love you and want to date with marriage in mind!”
Rui didn’t know how Tsukasa still figured out new ways to surprise him, “…Marriage?”
Tsukasa nodded enthusiastically, “Yes! I’ve already got it all planned out, we will have our wedding in Kyoto, and live there with our children and-“
“Oh my God, you really are crazy…” Rui mumbled under his breath. Tsukasa shrugged as if he wasn’t offended by that notion. Rui paused in thought before taking a deep breath, “Listen…I do not like you. In fact, I hate you.” The words sounded harsh coming from Rui’s cold tone, but Tsukasa’s glow didn’t diminish for a second.
“That’s okay, because I love you!” Tsukasa responded. Rui dragged his hands down his face.
Next, Rui tried ignoring Tsukasa. He figured the boy would grow bored and give up after a while, so he resisted giving any sort of reaction. Even when Tsukasa hung upside down outside his classroom window; wrote his confession on the baseball field for the entire school to see; exploded a science lab to make a perfume for him; and yelled over the bridge of the city lake when he saw Rui passing by underneath. He ignored all of that, and yet, Tenma persisted. No matter how many times he was scolded by the teachers for it, or gotten injured from his theatric proposals, he still came back every day.
Rui didn’t hate love. In fact, he had a deep rooted desire for it. To hold someone else’s hand, share secrets, and feel like home with that person. But Rui always thought that wasn’t for it. Love was for people who put themselves out there, people who were kind. Not for people like him.
Rui wanted to love and be loved. But he didn’t think he deserved it.
The next day, Rui wondered what new and inventive way Tsukasa was going to confess his love that day. He wasn’t even aware that he was smiling to himself. Engrossed in his thoughts, Rui ended up bumping into a group of boys walking past.
“Sorry-oh? Rui, is that you?” One of them stopped to turn to him.
Rui met his eyes and felt his body grow cold.
“No way! It really is you, Rui! How come I never saw you around sooner?” The boy with hair over his eyes continued rambling on, and he nudged his friends beside him, “This was the boy at my middle school who made all those weird sex toys.” Rui almost protested, but bit his tongue to hold back, tasting blood in his mouth.
“You mean the robots?” One of his friends concurred and they cackled, “Maybe I should have shoved one up your ass when I had the chance!”
Their laughter was a grating sound, and Rui wanted to box his ears as he kept his gaze fixed on the floor. The boys moved to pass him, and his old classmate brushed shoulders with Rui before whispering in his ear, “I’m just kidding. Besides, I like you better now as a nobody.”
Rui wasn’t sure how long he stood in the halls without moving, but he registered the sound of the school bell signaling class was starting soon. He didn’t want to go to class. He went upstairs to the rooftop instead. As always, Rui felt better when he was secluded from everyone else. The wind blew through Rui’s purple hair and he stared out at the city landscape across the railing. Overhead, there was the sound of a helicopter getting closer.
“Rui!”
The tall boy looked up to see Tsukasa standing on the edge of the pilot’s door, and Rui saw that familiar glint in Tsukasa’s eyes.
“No-“ but his protest came too late. With one grand gesture, Tsukasa jumped from the helicopter and towards Rui. Rui opened his arms without thinking and they both tumbled to the ground in a heap of tangled limbs.
“…Ow.” The both of them groaned out. Tsukasa was the first to sit up.
“You caught me!” He said with that blinding smile. Rui looked away.
“…Why do you love me?” Rui asked. It was a question he should have asked earlier, but Rui had to first struggle with the concept of anyone actually liking him.
“I don’t know!” Tsukasa’s answer was immediate as usual.
“Huh?”
“I can’t explain it either. Love is just a feeling, right? It’s like a fire is lit inside me, and it grows stronger every time I’m around you. And I never want it to go out,” Tsukasa explained with a surprisingly serious expression. It caught Rui off guard and he looked away and tried to ignore the way his heart leapt in his chest.
“You’re weird…” Rui mumbled.
“I get that a lot!” Tsukasa laughed loudly.
It wouldn’t be truthful to say that Rui still hated Tsukasa. But it wasn’t like, either. No…Definitely, not love. He tried not to think about something so suffocating. And how being with Tsukasa made his chest feel lighter.
Despite how much Rui hated attention, he adored the theatre. The performance, the spectacle, it all catered to Rui’s likes and fantasies. When you’re on the stage, you could become whatever you wanted. Whoever you wanted. When he was younger, Rui dreamed of becoming a troupe director. Working behind the scenes to create magic on the stage for people. And so, he still went to see school plays. He was preparing to go into the auditorium when he noticed a short girl with pink hair standing next to the doors, cupping her mouth and yelling, “Please! Could anybody help out? Anyone at all?” She scanned the room and locked eyes with Rui, who quickly tried to look away. But the girl zoned in on her target like a bull, and ran over to him with eyes full of hope, “Hello! I’m Emu, and I know this is our first meeting, but our troupe needs any help we can get, please!”
Rui wanted to protest, but Emu looked like she was about to burst into tears in that moment. He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, “I’m not sure how I can help…”
Emu’s face brightened and she took Rui’s arm and drag him behind her to the back stage, “Our troupe director stormed out at the last minute and our main star is refusing to act in the play at all.” Rui’s head started to hurt when he realized the gravity of the situation and what he had just willed himself into. He was about to say that he really wasn’t the right person to help them, when he saw a girl with pale green hair talking to a boy who was seated at the furthest corner of the room.
“Tsukasa, this is not the time for your superiority complex to kick in. We need you out there,” the girl said in a stern voice.
“It’s not that!” Tsukasa looked up at her with a hurt expression, “I just…We can do better than this-“ he waved the script in her face, “the audience won’t be entertained with such a boring storyline!”
Rui watched the two bicker before glancing down as Emu slid a copy of the script into his hands, “Here. This is the play the director had written, and we were planning to perform it today.” Rui looked over the script. It was the classic version of Romeo and Juliet. Tsukasa was right, it was incredibly boring. The story and characters were all ones everyone knew already, and nothing was changed or added into the plot. New ideas touched the edge of Rui’s mind, but he hesitated.
“Rui!”
Tsukasa finally noticed him, and rose up to go to him but was stopped by the green-haired girl who demanded Tsukasa take proper responsibility for his role.
“Nene. I can’t purposefully give a performance that I know won’t touch people’s hearts. It would be like I’m betraying their trust in us. Without trust, no one will come back to watch our next show.”
Tsukasa’s words resonated with Rui. All this time, he thought the boy was a stubborn airhead. But he had a deep passion for theatre, just like him.
“…I have some ideas,” Rui spoke up, and the three others in the room all turned to look at him. They only had twenty minutes before the curtains would go up, but in that time, Rui rewrote the entire script to turn the story of Romeo and Juliet into a fusion of the classic, mixed with elements of Battle Royale. Emu ran around the school to gather new props for the play, and Nene made last minute adjustments to their costumes.
“You guys are on in five!” One of the school staff members called from the curtains. Rui looked back at Tsukasa and the others, “Ready?” He asked. They nodded. Rui let out a shaky breath,
“Let’s blow them away.”
Those in the audience had gotten a copy of the original script, and Nene had asked Rui if he wanted to replace them all with the new ones. But Rui refused. It would add to the surprise element. And boy, were people surprised. The addition of guns to a Romeo and Juliet story took everyone off guard, and some were nervous in the beginning, but once the main star, Tsukasa, came onstage, it was like the stage came alive. His performance was more than outstanding, it was absolutely show-stopping. The audience grew quiet whenever Tsukasa spoke, and eyes marveled at the sword versus gun fight between Romeo and the antagonist. When the final scene ended and all the players gathered at the front of the stage, Tsukasa and the others were sweaty and panting to catch their breaths. Their eyes nervously scanned the audience who were deathly quiet. Then, one student rose up and clapped as loud as she could. Then, row by row, until everyone in the large auditorium stood and applauded in a nearly deafening volume. Some even cheered and hollered in excitement. Seeing the joyous expression on Tsukasa’s face brought a smile to Rui’s lips as he watched from backstage. After the cast bowed and the curtains were lowered again, Tsukasa immediately ran over to Rui and threw his arms around the boy’s neck, hugging him tightly, “You saved us, Rui! You were amazing!” Rui nearly argued that he wasn’t the only amazing one, but came to his senses and peeled the blond off his shoulders, “I just did what had to be done. Anyone else could have done it.”
“No. No one else could have done what you did,” Nene said with a soft smile, and Rui realized she wasn’t as scary as he initially thought. “Rui! Rui!” Emu was practically bouncing beside him, “Would you like to join our troupe and be our director? Please? You’re the important piece we’ve been missing all this time!”
Rui paused in thought. He had sworn he wouldn’t get involved in anything outside of what was necessary for him to graduate peacefully. But then again…When had he felt this alive?
“…I’ll think about it.”
After that incident, Rui saw Tsukasa more often during school. But the discomfort he had felt before melted away seemingly overnight. And Rui had also gotten on friendlier terms with Nene and Emu. Rui never thought he would have a friend group like all his other classmates at school. But he supposed Tsukasa was the one who made that happen, right?
Rui still couldn’t stand him. And sometimes he really couldn’t stand him. But there were also times his heart beat a little faster around him, and times when Tsukasa would make him laugh until his stomach hurt.
I hate you. Well, those words wouldn’t be true anymore, right?
The two of them were sitting together for lunch on the rooftop. Rui wasn’t sure when that had become their routine. There was a brief silence, before Tsukasa broke it-as was his expertise.
“I love you, Rui.”
Rui looked at him. Tsukasa had gone back to eating his bento with a carefree smile.
“…I love you too,” Rui spoke softly. The words made his heart soar. Tsukasa’s chopsticks clattered onto the cement floor. The boy turned to Rui, and his face was beet red. Rui had never seen Tsukasa flustered or bothered by anything. The boy looked like he was about to cry and scream all at once.
“You…You do?” Tsukasa’s voice was thick as large tears fell down his cheeks. Ah, he was an ugly crier. Rui put down his food and turned his body to face Tsukasa. He cupped the boy’s cheeks and felt him trembling under him,
“I hate you,” Rui mumbled, “but I love you more.”
When he kissed Tsukasa, he also kissed away the rest of his peaceful high school life.
But Rui was beginning to believe that love wasn’t so scary. And maybe he deserved it, a little.
Maybe we all deserve love.
One year ago…
Tsukasa slumped into his seat at his desk. He had visited his sister at the hospital before class, and she asked him to bring her his notes next time, so she could see what they were learning at school. But Tsukasa couldn’t even bring himself to make even an ounce of effort to write down the notes in class. What was the point? Why should he get the privilege to hang with his friends, play sports, while his sister stayed confined in that hospital bed that smelled like medicine and dead dreams.
His classmates murmured around him, pretending like he couldn’t hear them. It was nothing but gossip laced with fake-pity. If they really cared about Saki, they would visit her. But nobody ever visited his sister except him.
Tsukasa rose up from his seat and left the class, not wanting to stay in that suffocating environment for a second longer.
He went up to the rooftop and simply sat there. Simmering in his own anger. At his classmates who can do nothing but gossip, at the world who left Saki behind, at the doctors and their vain efforts, but most of all, at himself. For being able to offer nothing more than some silly kid stories and stupid plays from when they were children.
A tear slid down Tsukasa’s cheek just as the door opened, and he angrily wiped it away.
“Oh? My secret spot has been compromised.”
Tsukasa looked up to see a tall boy with uneven purple hair standing by the door, holding what looked like an unfinished robot in his hands.
“…Go away,” Tsukasa mumbled and hugged his knees close to his chest.
“Can’t. This is the only place I can finish making this,” the strange boy put down the pieces of the robot to begin tinkering away at it.
“…Then don’t talk to me,” Tsukasa huffed.
“I didn’t, you’re the one who chose to respond,” the boy chided back, and Tsukasa was embarrassingly irritated.
Tsukasa watched the boy continue working away at the robot, and couldn’t resist asking, “What are you building, anyways? A Gundam?”
“A robot that can retrieve coins that get stuck under the vending machines.”
Tsukasa blinked.
“…You’re weird,” he mumbled. The boy looked up from behind his thick bangs and smiled, “I get that a lot.”