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Akira watches carefully, cautiously.
He was caught once, his second year of junior high – a boy on the basketball team, an upperclassman. Someone must have seen him staring and said something to someone who said something to someone who said something to someone until the entire school had been set ablaze with the scandal, Akira and his abnormal affections at its centre. It was his first and last experience of popularity. In a city of this size it wouldn’t be such an issue, he supposes, but the heat of the hell he went through back home is enough to remind him that only a fool allows themselves to be burnt twice by the same flame.
Still, something about Akechi – Goro? – seems off. Is it the short sleeves? His arms are thinner than Akira would have thought. Is that it? He peeks out from beneath his bangs to see the boy in question lower himself level with the table, free hand on the cloth, long fingers splayed, cue caught between flat thumb and rounded index finger, miniscule movements to make a shot he couldn't possibly miss even if he tried. A striking expression, soft but stern, on sweet features. Rethinking now, readjusting his grip – wait, could it be…?
He hears the ball sink into the pocket before it registers in his sight.
“I win,” Akechi says with a chuckle, straightening again and setting his sharp eyes on Akira. “That was a close one, though. I suppose it would have been embarrassing to lose as your senior, huh?”
Could he be mistaken? He holds the cue close to his chest, left hand on the shaft, right hand on the wrap. He looks comfortable, but at the station the other day, didn’t he hold out his left hand? Wasn’t it that that threw Akira off? He was flustered and took his hand with too much force, he remembers, because he hadn’t been expecting it – well, he hadn’t been expecting any hand, to be fair, or any other part of Akechi for that matter, but it was made all the more strange for it being his left and not his right.
“Is something the matter?”
Ah…he’ll be caught at this rate. “Aren’t you left handed?”
“Huh?” Akechi’s eyes widen, his face falling slightly, though only for a split second – his polite smile returns in an instant. “I’m honestly impressed you noticed. That’s right, this one’s my dominant hand. I switched hands during the game. It’s nothing against you. Going all-out against a junior just seems a bit gauche…”
Akira had almost forgotten that Akechi is an upperclassman too, as that basketball boy had been. Funny, that fate would repeat itself in such a way. He has to bite back a self-deprecating scoff. “I see.”
“But I confess you’ve surprised me. I’m rather dextrous with my right hand. I can even use chopsticks with it,” he continues. “Frankly, I didn’t expect you to see through it.”
“I see a lot of things.”
“Oh, so those glasses are just for the aesthetic, then? Or were you being metaphorical? You’re a hard one to read sometimes.” Akechi laughs. He sounds uneasy, but Akira can hardly press it. “In any case, you truly are interesting. You never cease to intrigue me.”
Better to say nothing than risk saying something strange; he offers a shrug and a shy smile, and listens absent-mindedly to whatever else is said to him. He knows better now than he did then. He knows to look and only look, to look with no thought of touching. He lets himself look and be overlooked. He doesn’t mind, most of the time. And – and besides, he can’t get too close to Akechi anyway. The others are depending on him. They don’t know that side of his heart, and they don’t need to.
This is reconnaissance, really, and if he happens to enjoy the view then it’s only a happy coincidence.