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Asahi loves love.
He loves good prevailing over evil, loves a Happy Ending. He’s just not naive enough to believe they happen like that in real life.
Good and evil are more complex than the script of his favourite action movie makes them out to be, and love takes time to develop. Happy Endings are not a given; They have to be worked towards without any guarantee of ever achieving it. Faith is what keeps them all going.
Faith and curiosity for what is yet to come.
Asahi has always been excited about what’s to come. No setback could ever be big enough to keep him from getting back up so he can see what’s next.
Life’s a climb and Asahi is determined to plant his flag at the top. He’ll be the first man on his very own personal moon. It won’t be televised but it’s personal growth he’s after, not public acknowledgment.
The path uphill isn’t easy and he gets thrown back down all the time, but it just forces him to get creative. No matter the roadblock, it can be overcome. Some things just take a little longer than expected. He’s got time, even if patience isn’t one of his strengths.
One day, Asahi will have his name in the sky, as bright as the stars.
Nobody can stop him.
*.*.*
Ikuya’s life is a swamp.
He drudges through it day in, day out. The mud sticks to his shoes and drags him ever deeper, until it’s nigh impossible to move.
It’s dark and damp, so people don’t like to visit, and even when they do they don’t like to stick around.
A fitting metaphor for the daily battle Ikuya has to fight himself through. Blinding, deafening darkness in the midst of other people’s light. Their ‘it gets better’ encouragements reach him through thick, dirtied water, where the words crumble to pieces and gather at the slick bottom of the swamp, like every other good thing that has ever lost its way into his life.
It’s hard to believe in Happy Endings when even just happy seems like such a foreign concept.
Roadblocks and red lights are all he sees, no matter where he turns, so he’s just stuck there, wading through the muddy waters of his life.
When he was younger he used to wish on shooting stars, wish for things to look up, to get easier. Maybe if he found someone to keep him from sinking, this swamp wouldn’t be so bad.
He really used to think wishing on a star could solve his problems, that if he just wanted something bad enough it would come true, but it’s hopeless.
Shooting stars die long before their light ever reaches the earth and his wishes sink into the void the same way his body slowly but surely drowns in thick, dirty water.
The night sky is black and Ikuya hasn’t seen the stars in years.
*.*.*
The first time Asahi sees Ikuya is in a coffee shop.
He’s right behind him in the queue, staring at a shock of teal hair. After Ikuya orders a pistachio latte he gives the barista his name, and Asahi might not be much of a music guy, but this voice is his new favourite instrument.
Ikuya moves gracefully, like a drop of water rippling waves into the surface of the ocean. He is gentle but impactful.
Slender fingers wrap around a paper cup and close around Asahi’s heart, and just like that all his views on love and Happy Endings change.
Who is to say that you can’t recognise the love of your life the second you lay eyes on them? Nobody can tell him it’s wrong to lose himself in honeyed amber and the sheepish tilt of chapped lips. The stars spell out a name in the sky but it isn’t Asahi’s.
It’s bright and unmistakable.
Ikuya, Ikuya, Ikuya.
It’s what he says when the barista asks for his order and he can’t even get himself to feel silly when she tells him they don’t have that on the menu. It’s all he wants, more than anything. One more word out of that mouth, Asahi’s name spoken in that voice, painting his soul with all the colours of the universe.
He leaves the queue without a coffee because no scalding hot, caffeinated beverage in the world could ever make him feel as alive as the sight of Ikuya’s eyelashes, long and dark, fluttering against the condensed steam wafting from his cup.
Pistachio.
He wonders if that is what Ikuya would taste like, if Asahi opened him up, laid him out on silk and treated every inch of pale skin with more adoration than he has ever felt in his life.
His mind is spinning myths about the Gods that must have assembled to craft the perfect human being out of marble. He wants to say so, to declare to the world that he has found perfection. The words form on his lips, he inhales the vast beauty of galaxies that could never match such artistry.
Declarations of love lie heavy on his tongue, but as he turns to release them he finds that Ikuya is walking through the door, out of Asahi’s life.
And with him leave the stars.
*.*.*
The first time Ikuya sees Asahi is on the train.
He has made a commitment to visit his family for special occasions, and while he finds his uncle’s cousin’s name day to be a bit of a stretch, he still agrees to travel from Tokyo to Iwatobi right after his morning classes.
He fails to book a private compartment because a few hours of solitude don’t seem to be worth all that extra money. Only someone’s loud voice talking about a party they have been to the weekend before makes him reconsider. Peace and quiet are invaluable.
It’s an important lesson learned.
The voice accompanies pink hair and the energy of an ant crawling across the remnants of someone’s sticky drink spilled on wood. Frantic and indestructible. It gives Ikuya as much of a headache as pink-haired guy’s friend seems to be sporting.
Asahi is less loud, less shrill. He spreads out on his seat like he has booked two of them and leans his head against the window pane like the distraught male lead in a romantic comedy just after a break up. Ikuya watches him tap on his phone, calloused fingertips swiping from side to side and twitching every so often.
Amethyst eyes reflect the light from outside, brighter than anything in Ikuya’s life has been in a while. He turns his head to the side and avoids the sight before his heart can start believing in shooting stars again.
Seconds draw into minutes, draw into hours, and Ikuya likes to think he is immune to the gentle rumble of Asahi’s voice, but he is known for lying to himself more often than not. It dances up his spine and settles in his neck, spreads warmth across his shoulder blades and replaces the ringing in his ears with his favourite music.
Love and Happy Endings are not meant for people like him, but to dwell in the illusion of it for at least the duration of a train ride back to his hometown is a temptation he cannot resist. Asahi is a fantasy, passionate flames around the peaceful sparkle of gemstones at dawn, and Ikuya cannot help indulging in it. Not when his reality is so drab.
Four and a half hours on the same train tell him that Asahi is kind, because he responds to his friend’s stories with enthusiastic support and gentle encouragement. He is funny, in that improvised way in which some people just manage to make others laugh without even meaning to. He is loving, because he talks about his family with so much reverence in his voice, it blankets Ikuya’s soul.
Four and a half hours on the same train also make him painfully aware of the fact that fantasy and reality are not meant to cross paths. Asahi and his friend leave just a station before Iwatobi, dragging duffle bags with them and laughing on their way out.
In the absence of Asahi’s brightly sparkling gemstone eyes, Ikuya’s sky remains black.
*.*.*
Asahi loves love.
He loves watching movies where the guy gets the girl and they live happily ever after, loves singing along to the cheesy lyrics of whatever 80’s soft rock ballad plays on the radio. Love is a beautiful thing, but it won’t come to those who wait around for it.
After spending a few weeks with his family in the outskirts of Tottori, he decides that fate won’t do all the work for him, that if he wants something he needs to go and get it. This is no exception.
The coffee shop he fell in love in is not far away and making a habit of frequenting it in his breaks isn’t hard. Papers write themselves so much easier with caffeine and the anticipation of a Happy Ending running through his veins. Every chime of the bell when the door opens sends sparks of adrenaline through his body.
None of the customers shine with effortless beauty, none of them flick their bangs out of their face with innate grace. None of them are Ikuya.
Patience is not one of Asahi’s strong traits but he keeps coming back. The barista knows him by name, calls out his order before he gets a chance to hand it in. It becomes a routine, but in his experience routines don’t offer anything new. He doesn’t want to be stuck in the endless cycle of coffee beans and bell chimes announcing another disappointment walking through the door.
He takes a break from the coffee shop after two months.
Shooting stars flicker across the night sky all the time, and his will come back as long as he doesn’t shut his eyes.
*.*.*
Ikuya is sick of love stories.
They are unrealistic and he is anything but an idealist. The best of relationships get muddied in the dirty waters of reality and no amount of catchy love songs underlying a scene can change that. His latest relationship proved it once and for all.
Glimpses of light had pulled him from his swamp for a few months, dragged him out where the wind mussed up his hair and breathed fresh life into him. Movies and books romanticise the ephemerality of a moment, paint a picture of fleeting touches filling a life well lived and well loved.
It’s a lie and ephemerality fucking sucks.
Everything is tainted and he can’t even go back to his favourite coffee shop without being reminded of those moments in the sun and the subsequent downfall. Mud drags itself across his skin like vines, smearing the remnants of purity in the blood of a failed relationship. How foolish of him to have thought that his days in the dark might come to an end.
He leaves his studio apartment only because he is tired of answering his brother’s calls and having to explain why he isn’t cherishing his youth by drowning it in alcohol. Instead he spends time in the park, brings a book and buries his nose in it the whole time.
People are moving around him, rushing from one place to the next. They talk and laugh while Ikuya shuts his eyes to it all. The weight of the world is only half as heavy when he doesn’t need to look at it.
Only the familiarity of a stranger’s warm voice lifts his gaze, too late. He catches a glimpse of red hair, and broad shoulders moving beneath an orange hoodie. The alluring twinkle of cut amethyst fills his mind and lungs, washes the mud off his skin long enough for the wind to paint his cheeks crimson with vitality.
A single star forces its way through the darkness of Ikuya’s constant night sky, and it stays there.
Its guidance keeps him afloat.
*.*.*
It’s winter when Asahi returns to the coffee shop. It’s cold and he’s tired, and a nice cup of hot coffee sounds like it might lift his spirits again. The new barista knows neither his name nor his order, so he gives her both and adds a small tip because she went through the effort of asking if she used the right spelling.
He sits because going back outside isn’t in the cards with how aggressively the wind has reddened his cheeks and how soaked through his old sneakers are. Near the speakers is where he finds a small table for two. He sets his bag down on the chair and spreads out on the bench.
The music is slow, just loud enough to be heard but not so loud that it would disturb the people talking among themselves. It offers a nice atmosphere that Asahi has always enjoyed. He would regret not coming here for so long but absence makes the heart grow fonder and he doesn’t think he would appreciate it so much right now had he not taken a break from it.
The familiar chime of bells by the door announce new arrivals and even that is comforting.
He shuts his eyes, takes in the rustling of papers, the cackling of the speakers, inhales the scent of coffee and baked goods. It’s like coming home, except his parents don’t charge him for a cappuccino. Yet.
The air tricks his senses into smelling pistachio, and he opens his eyes just in time.
Chapped lips curl around the name that has been flooding Asahi’s brain for months, warm amber sparkles under the dim lights by the counter. The barista repeats his name to him like a prayer, nods and gets to work.
All the while Ikuya holds himself with a grace belonging in the world’s finest art museums.
Asahi’s skies light up, twinkling playfully above him.
Ikuya, Ikuya, Ikuya the stars seem to sing.
It’s cold outside so when Ikuya reaches for his cup he doesn’t turn towards the door. Instead he moves closer, orange chucks carrying him towards the back where Asahi has moved his bag off the chair, just in case.
Watching his body manoeuvre across the floor is like watching a ballet, beautifully coordinated, elegant even in the way he hooks his ankle around the leg of a chair to move it out of the way.
The stars in Asahi’s sky burn until their light streaks its entirety.
It’s his shooting star, so he makes a wish.
*.*.*
Ikuya returns to his favourite coffee shop in winter. There are no more excuses to be made. It has been months since his last relationship ended and it’s time to reclaim parts of his life, no matter how small.
It’s why he put on the shoes his ex hated so much, and the cardigan he was told doesn’t suit him. Reality may be bleak and his life like a swamp he can’t escape from, but he still makes his own decisions. Getting a pistachio latte in his favourite coffee shop while wearing clothes he feels good in is a choice he gets to make without the shadows of other people looming over him.
He lets the warmth of the cup revive his senses, considers drinking while on his way back to his place, but thinks better of it. Something has woven through his ribcage, tied itself around his heart, and is tugging him in the opposite direction.
The music draws him in, pulls him closer to where he can see a few empty chairs around otherwise occupied tables. He could sit with a mother and her squalling newborn, or a student frantically typing on his computer, but something keeps him moving.
All the way, right by the speakers, is one more table for two, occupied only by one, and Ikuya almost drops his coffee.
Warmth floods his soul, a gemstone sparkle filters through the darkness.
He sits without asking if it’s okay to. The heat of his coffee cup grows too much against his palm, so he sets it down on the table and holds his hand out like they aren’t two strangers drinking coffee by themselves at the same table.
“Ikuya,” Asahi says, and he doesn’t question how he knows his name. It sounds like treasure said in that voice, like there is nothing of greater value than them knowing each other.
And just like that his night sky doesn’t seem quite so dark anymore.
*.*.*
The first time Asahi touches Ikuya’s skin is across the table in the coffee shop he fell in love in. It’s just a handshake, nothing more, but it feels monumental.
His lungs expand, his soul paints his insides with all the sparks that have lit up his sky. Fate has come through for him, all his wishes have been answered, and Ikuya’s skin is soft and warm against his own. Fingers curl around his hand and close around his heart, and nobody else could ever have such a hold on him.
The stars spell out Ikuya’s name in capital letters, brighter than anything else, so Asahi says it out loud without hesitation. He isn’t asked to justify himself, so instead he repeats the word and inhales the sound of perfection when his own name falls from Ikuya’s lips in return.
They know each other, in this lifetime and the next, in every universe, across all the galaxies. Every step, every day has brought them to this table, across from each other, warm amber meeting sparkling amethyst and painting the skies with fireworks that put the stars to shame.
Asahi takes in the sight, the chapped lips, the impossibly long eyelashes. He bathes in the soft light that radiates from Ikuya’s body and longs for more.
“I’ve been looking for you,” he says, and Ikuya smiles like he has been, too.
*.*.*
Ikuya loves love.
He loves the cheesy songs Asahi sings while doing the most mundane things, loves staying out all night to watch the stars, loves the ephemerality of every touch and every kiss, loves knowing that it will all return, each time a little brighter, a little better.
It’s not a movie, not a silly, unrealistic love story. It’s midnight talks and working things out, moving in together too soon and refusing to regret it.
It’s knowing that Asahi will drudge through the mud with him and tell him how well he’s doing the whole time. It’s kicking down roadblocks and running red lights to pave roads for the two of them, leading towards the new and unexpected.
It’s pointing at shooting stars and telling each other that their wish has come true already.
It’s Asahi’s laughter when he tells him to make a wish anyway.
*.*.*
Asahi loves Ikuya.
The stars always knew.