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“Shut up, Yamaguchi,” Kei snips, sitting on the chair at his desk.
Taking off his glasses, he leans his head back, pinching the bridge of nose as he sighs.
“Today, was not a good day, and I don’t want to hear it from you,” he adds.
Slowly turning his chair to peek at Yamaguchi through the corner of his eye, he grumbles something incoherent.
“I didn’t say anything,” Yamaguchi says from the corner of the room, sitting on his usual stool as he stares back at Kei.
“I can hear you thinking,” Kei quips back, scowling at the innocent face Yamaguchi makes at him. “You think too loud.”
Turning back to stare at his wall full of photos and old magazine clippings, he sighs a different kind of sigh.
“How is it I’m stuck with you, even when the world has gone to shit?” He asks out loud.
“I’m always going to be with you, Tsukki,” Yamaguchi smiles at his back. “Always.”
Kei can feel the warmth of his smile beaming at the back of his head as if he’s the sun itself. The feeling washes over him, spreading over his skin like blanket on a cold winter night. It’s a familiar feeling, one that has Kei shivering.
Staring down at the papers and maps under his arms that line his desk, cities circled in red, water sources in blue, he watches a drop falls onto the pages. They keep falling, splattering across the maps like rainfall on a summer day. Hot and moist.
“Don’t,” Yamaguchi begs from behind him.
“I can’t,” Kei grits through his clenched teeth, trying with all of his might to hold back his anger, his hatred, his fear.
“You have to,” Yamaguchi shushes.
“It should have been me!” Kei cries, sobbing as he thrashes his arms, pushing the papers and pens off his desk.
The clatter echoes in his small basement. His sobs, lost in the sounds vibrating off the walls.
“I should have been the one,” he whimpers into his hands as he covers his face, hiding his puffy eyes and running nose from his companion.
“I’m glad it wasn’t you,” Yamaguchi smiles at him, reaching to pat his head, but Kei never feels the weight of his hand on him.
“It should have been me,” he sobs, staring at the empty stool where Yamaguchi always sat.