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You feel the cold thrum against your fingers. You tilt the glass to your lips and find that the whiskey doesn’t burn you anymore. Actually, it has an almost playful bite. Your friends huddle around the table with food and glasses of their own. The bar lights shimmer around their heads.
Ryuji orders more karaage while Ann delicately sips at her third fruity cocktail. They’re having a friendly debate about something meaningless. Yusuke picks at the complimentary edamame. He hasn’t changed a bit. You have another taste of whiskey and let yourself get lost in the noise and the smell of fried food. The front door chimes as another group walks in.
A familiar melody plays over the bar speakers. It’s a new rendition of a classic that you used to know. The name is on the tip of your tongue, tucked away in some long-unused corner of your mouth. It aches in a sly smile you haven’t seen in a while.
You can see him standing there like he never left, grinning and in control with a clear drink in his hand. His slim fit shirt buttoned all the way up in a deep red. He always looks good in red. Then his dark eyes scan the bar and eventually fall on you, and time stops.
Your brain jolts. He’s right there. He’s watching you come to this realization on the other side of the room. Music and crowd noise return like a wall of sound. Your eyes drop down to stare into your half-empty glass of whiskey. After all this time, you could never forget that face. Those eyes. The slope of his neck. The curve of his waist. There was a time you could trace his every outline from memory. It’s been too long now. Would he even fit in your arms the same way? Your mouth silently shapes his name. Goro. It still tastes the same. That same bitter aftertaste.
Someone, some other guy, leans in to his ear to say something. He snickers into his drink and you feel sick. That was your laugh. Those teeth used to rip into your heart like a starved beast. They left marks on your shoulders and chest that you can still feel. Memories line up in your mind like they’re attending a wake.
So you sit there, insides roiling and twisting. The ghost of your highschool self is clambering out of his grave, clawing up your throat with blood in his teeth. Suave. Capable. Confident. Broken. He’s as good as a stranger to you.
But that voice is screaming. Your hands ache to reach out and grab him again. To feel the same as you did back then. Anything to stave off this crushing weight on your chest.
And now his moves have changed. It’s a performance now. He knows that you’re watching. He stands a little straighter. He’s grinning deeper and gesturing wider. He brushes his hair from his face, perfect from the angles that matter. All of that stage for such a small audience. You can’t look away. You don’t recognize the people in the front row. You’d like to tear them apart.
You have to rip your eyes away. You look back into your now empty whiskey glass, but your mind still conjures up images of him. His fingertips pinching the straw of his drink, hands wrapped around the glass like a weapon. The way a pool cue rests perfectly at the base of his thumb. How a pistol dances light as air in his grip. How his fingers drum thoughtfully against your chest as he contemplates what to do with you. The ice melts and settles with a clink as he decides, and a hungry smirk takes over his face. In your mind’s eye, nothing has changed a bit.
You excuse yourself from the table and flee to the restroom. Coward. Everything is crumbling at the edges now. You’re three steps from the bathroom door when it unlocks and opens and Goro steps out. You stop dead in your tracks. Those eyes find you like an oncoming train.
“Oh, Akira. So that was you.”
You nod a small bow out of nothing but habit. “Yeah… It’s been a while.”
His voice is mild as he tucks a bit of hair behind his ear and asks: “Have you been well?”
Your mask is a second skin. If anyone would see through it, it would be him. He’s the only one who ever could. But you’re not the same people anymore. You wonder if he’ll still be able to see you. You’re not sure if you want him to.
So you shrug, and lie: “Can’t complain.” But your tongue betrays you, just a bit. The alcohol leaves it loose and clumsy. It tries to stumble over the words.
There’s a change in his face. He noticed. “I see… I shouldn’t have expected anything less.”
“What about you?”
“That is… complicated,” he mumbles. “Though I suppose it’s better than the alternative.” There was a time when you could parse every bit of that statement. Would it be worth the attempt now?
You meet his eyes and all at once he’s real again. He’s alive and moving and breathing and standing right there with a drink in his hand that he’s clutching like a lifeline. Suddenly you can taste him. You can feel his skin beneath your hands, between your teeth. Stubborn and molten hot. Soft and arching into every touch. You fit together perfectly.
Your mouth is dry. You swallow some pathetic words that refuse to surface. His cologne tickles your nose and you’d give anything to breathe deep from the crook of his neck. To feel the knife against your back.
But you don’t. You don’t move an inch. You can’t bear it. “That’s good,” you croak. “I’m glad.”
He nods, and hesitates. He’s waiting for something. For you, maybe. But your voice is strangled into nothing. You’re a coward. An untrusting, broken shell. If you open your mouth again you’re afraid you might scream. Devour him. Keep him this time. Just hold on to him this time before he’s gone forever.
His eyes look past you. “Well, then… I must be getting back now. Have a good night.” And he walks away, your shoulders brushing past each other just enough to disturb the fabric of your shirt.
You step into the bathroom and your head is swimming. You splash your face with cold water from the sink, letting it drip down slowly as you try to breathe. One minute. Maybe two. Stop shaking. Don’t be selfish. You slowly untangle your throat. You scrub your face dry and march back to your table with your friends who only wonder what took you so long.
You brush it off. “It’s fine,” you say. “There was a line.” And they believe you. Of course they do. You don’t lie to them. Only about one thing. Only things related to one person.
There’s the sound of the door chime, and your eyes start to wander. He’s there with that man you’ve never seen before. He takes another glance around the bar, and you lock eyes. He makes sure you see him leave without you. He’s taunting you. Or goading you. Or begging you. The crowd is too loud in your ears. You don’t know.
You can’t read his expression as he ducks through the door. You’d like to smash your drink against the wall. You’d like to crawl over to him and bury your face in his chest. Smooth over every last inch of him until you know him again. Every scar and freckle. Every soft spot to press your lips. Every plane to sink your teeth.
But you don’t know. Was he running or beckoning? Your brain is too hazy to read into all the subtleties. The crowd booms in shared laughter that you don’t understand. The bar lights are bright and your friends’ smiles are blinding. The conversation has turned down several different avenues while you were lost in your own head and the bear trap of his eyes. The whiskey burns down your throat.
An arm comes down across your shoulders. Ryuji frowns at you. “Yo, man, you good? You look like you’ve seen a ghost or somethin’.”
By all accounts, you’d say yes. A literal ghost, or at least someone who’s haunted you for what feels like a lifetime.
And now you have to know. You have to see.
Voices and hands try to pull you back but you don’t stop. Fingers fall away from your shirt. You throw out a fist and it connects with something soft. Shouts fade into the noise of the bar. Your feet stay beneath you. The door chimes.
You don’t care what happened. You don’t care what he’s going to say. Even if he takes one look at you and sneers and calls you pathetic. Even if he laughs at you, or calls you brainless, or sentimental, or reckless, or anything. Even if he tears your heart out of your chest and spits on it. Even if he rips you apart. You don’t care. You could never care. Anything would be better than not knowing anything.
Better than a fizzled non-ending with a boy you maybe never knew in the first place.
The lines of reality have long since blurred. Anything—the time, the words, a snowy January morning, or a freezing February night. Coffee and music and skin. What’s real, and what’s not?
Well, that’s all a matter of perception, isn’t it?
You’re running. You’re spinning. You’re crawling. You’re leaning against a streetlight, holding on with all your strength. You think you might be sick. Lights blur as the towering Shinjuku buildings twirl into a vibrant, dizzying cacophony. Colorful origami skyscrapers folding in on themselves. Crashing and twisting and screaming.
The streetlight bows beneath your weight.
He’s not here.
He’s not here.
He’s gone.
Maybe he was never here at all.
You feel the cold thrum against your fingers.