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A library-café of all places… Sae thought as he walked through the automatic double doors into the library. Why did I even agree to come here? I only agreed to give him my number… Sae picked up his phone to write a short message.
(“Where are you?”) Sae wrote.
The reply was quick.
(“In the café!”) the Demon answered.
Sae sighed and made his way towards the café.
Sae glanced at the cake bar for a second. He wasn’t that interested in sweets but it never hurt just looking. Of course he didn’t find anything he liked so Sae looked out at the chairs where some people were sitting and talking. In the corner of the café he saw the familiar person and walked up to the tanned man who was looking through a few books.
“Hey.” Sae said and the man looked up.
“Sae-chan!” Shidou said with a smile. “Let’s order something now that you’re here.”
Shidou stood up and made his way to the cake bar. Sae took note of Shidou’s… peculiar clothing style.
“What are you wearing…?” Sae mumbled half for himself.
“I dressed up for today!” Shidou said as he ordered a latte for himself. “What do you want to drink?”
…I shouldn’t judge really…
“Triple espresso.” Sae said with a sigh.
Shidou confirmed their order with the person behind the desk and paid before they moved back to the chairs. Sae curiously took up one of the books on the table.
“Sueedengo.” he said reading the title of the dictionary.
Is he learning Swedish? Hadn’t expected that.
“Yep!” Shidou said and held up another book that seemingly held common phrases in Swedish. “I was considering learning Bosnian too, since he has family from there.”
“Ah. You mean Zlatan Ibrahimović.” Sae said. “You said over text he was your favourite football-player.”
“Naaw, you remembered! You actually do care.”
“No I just have a good memory.”
A waiter came up to them and put down their coffee on the table. Sae took a sip but it was too warm to be drunk right away so he put it down on the table again. Shidou continued to explain some of the Swedish grammar structure, which Sae wasn’t even slightly interested in, but it was a bit fun hearing Shidou being engaged in something like this. Something they had in common was that their whole lives were centred around football, and while Sae could speak a bit Spanish, it wasn’t something he was really interested in learning just because of a football-player. Shidou continued to explain the many swearwords in Swedish and how they could be combined.
“Swearwords are the most important thing in a language you know?” Shidou said.
“How about being able to say: I cannot speak ‘this language’?” Sae said and started drinking his coffee again.
“Nah. It’s not that important…” Shidou said and drunk out of his latte too.
Shidou then pointed at him.
“Sae-chan. Did you know that in Sweden they don’t use honorifics, even for older people and people they don’t know? And they almost always use given names.”
Of course I wouldn’t know that.
“You mean they would just say ‘Ryuusei’ instead of Shidou-san or Ryuusei-san?” Sae said to confirm.
“Yeah that’s right!” Shidou said excitedly. “And you would just be Sae.”
Is that an excuse for saying my name or something… Probably. It wasn’t really something that would bother Sae even if it wasn’t roundabout. Sae finished his drink and he and Shidou talked about football players and how they had done in the U-20 match. Sae gave some advice on how to improve his football, which Shidou seemed to greatly appreciate.
“You are so lovely.” Shidou said with a grin.
“Thanks.” Sae answered.
Shidou then smiled mischievously.
“Du är jävligt snygg.” Shidou said in another language Sae could assume was Swedish. “Ska vi ligga?”
“What?” Sae asked. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing… Just that you’re hot.” laughed Shidou with a grin.
Sae suspected that wasn’t the whole meaning of the sentence, but shrugged it off with that explanation. Even though Sae would never admit it, he certainly found Shidou interesting. That’s why he had asked for him to play football with him in the first place, but he had not expected that the guy would fall for him just because he played good football. Somehow, while Shidou himself was annoying, his affection wasn’t really, since Shidou was really a striker Sae could put his trust into. This project that Ego Jinpachi was woking on might really work. So let’s see how good you can become, Shidou Ryuusei.
Sae stayed at the café for another half-an-hour before leaving. However when Shidou then insisted on escorting him to the train station, Sae didn’t protest.