Archive of Our Own

It is a brisk autumn day, maybe halfway through his shift for Alban, when the world screeches to a halt.

At 11:08 in the morning, (if he’s on his phone while the place is empty, then that’s nobody’s business but his own) the door opens for that rare kind of customer who is neither part of the early commuter rush, seeking coffee and the scant pastry, nor the late and hurried lunch type, who tend to favour scarfing down a sandwich with one hand while the other’s busy scrolling through emails. The door opens and though it takes a fraught second to register, that’s definitely Shu Yamino who’s appeared from the other side, his frame bundled up in a big grey jacket.

Fuck, man. Luca smiles as he walks up to the counter, which is easy, it has always been easy, but internally he is panicking.

His desire to see him again was matched only by his burgeoning desire to hide, to make sure their meeting is a proper one with flowers and pretty words and everything instead of some kind of cosmic accident. 

Why is he even in a place like this?

Alban would kill him if he left his post, however, so instead of ducking into the back, Luca faced forward with a much calmer smile than he reasonably thought he’d be able to manage.

“Hi,” Shu says, eyes flicking up at the menu and staying there. Why isn't he looking at him? “I’d like a latte, please.”

“Sure thing, Shu,” he replies with a squeak, scribbling his name before Shu can even offer it up. Maybe he's revealing too much of his hand. 

His hair is shorter, much shorter than it was when they were still in school. It's short and somewhat uniform, bangs slightly slicked down like he just went through a very fashionable rainstorm.

He looks good.

He looks very good. More than good. Great, even.

Shu finally looks up at him as he rings him up and he’s even wearing the mandated name tag that he now mentally thanks Alban for (though still unnecessary for a week’s work as a favour if you ask him), so he must know even if he makes no indication of knowing. Sure, it’s normal for a barista to know your name, but he isn't just any old barista. And Shu isn't any old customer.

So why isn't he saying his name? Why isn't he doing anything?

One time he got so drunk and stayed out so late that his newfound friend at the bar gave him his phone to use to call a friend. Payment for the Moscow mules, he said, laughing when Luca’s clumsy attempts to revive his own yielded no results.

The only number his fingers seemed to remember was Shu's though, Shu's from back when they were still together every single day. Shu’s from back when they were still in school. Every time he tried, the same set of numbers would get punched in over and over again. 

He didn't want their first call in forever to be for something like this though, if he even had his number saved anymore, so that night Luca elected to take the long walk home instead, one hand tightly clutching his chest.

“I thought you preferred drip, Shu.” Luca tries again, spending an extra second stressing his name. Shu just continued wrestling with his wallet like he hadn’t heard a thing. “Or coffee in jelly form.”

This isn't some weird exhaustion-fuelled dream, is it? Sure, he’s been picking up a lot of hours this week, the normal ones plus the café’s on his off time as a favour to Alban, but it’s never spread into his dreams like this. 

This is more like a nightmare anyway, so it’s a pretty shitty dream. 

We finally meet again, but you don’t seem to care or remember. 

Shu accepts his drink with both hands and their fingers don’t quite touch, but they’re not that distant either. He really wished they did, though, which is the worst part. It’s the closest they've been in what feels like aeons.

Luca lets his hopes skim the top of his mind for a second longer until Shu’s back finally walks out the door, a door which slams with a heavy thunk.

It would have been better if he ran out. At least that way Luca could pretend he was running away too.

The next customer comes in, so Luca pastes on a smile and goes on with his day.

-

To better understand his devastation, it’s imperative to understand the illogical beginning of it all. Luca did not expect to ever like Shu Yamino when they were first forced together. 

Luca is barely 8 when they first meet, an 8 year old who wants nothing to do with other similar 8 year old boys that are forced to do silly things like guide traffic.

There’s this program the school established early on, getting the older kids to help the younger ones and learn a sense of responsibility. In retrospect, it was probably a cover for the general lack of staff, but it made everyone feel valued and important, so maybe it was a good kind of program to force kids to do. They only did the smallest and silliest things anyway, simply opening car doors and walking the youngest kids to class every morning.

Luca did not know Shu, has never even heard his name before, but he’s already decided that he isn’t going to like him from the moment he saw his name.

They're assigned to work together in a twist of fate, two little names printed next to each other on a series of printer papers tacked to the front doors. He was hoping for one of his friends or maybe even his brother, honestly, but at least a stranger will be easier to ignore. He's always fancied himself to be a bit of a rebel, so he doesn't expect to like him and even hopes for the opposite. 

As a general rule, you shouldn't always play nice with the people that authority assigns to you. It’s like accepting a handcuff with a smile. 

He can’t become the next Jesse James if he just rolls over and takes whatever people ask, so he isn't going to make friends with someone bound to him like that.

Luca’s dreams of criminal infamy began in the library of all places, shoulders crammed between the creaking shelves. He’s never been subtle, but ambition isn’t supposed to be subtle, and he is nothing without his ambition. None of the greats were very subtle either, so in that sense he's already off to a good start.

Luca alternated interests to make it seem less suspicious. 

First, he would take out a book on groundhogs, admiring the little pictures that make them seem much more present than they really are. Has anyone ever seen a real one before? He tried searching for one last summer, digging his fingers into little holes, but it didn’t yield any results. 

Then, hiding the cover with one of his little hands, he would go after his real treasure, grabbing a book about the greatest criminals alive. The cool ones, of course. The Bonnie and Clyde's of the world, not the ones whose entire legacy was just about hurting people. 

When you have a hard life and no one seems to love you right, sometimes it's fun to imagine being so revered that it doesn't matter. No one remembers if Capone's parents cursed him out for stepping two centimetres out of line or arriving two minutes too late. 

That's not his legacy and it won't be Luca's either. 

His classmates laugh a little when yearbooks come out that year and he proudly declares that he'll be a mafioso one day, but their words are proof that it's real enough to someone, so he lets them laugh. They play cops and robbers (he's one of the robbers, obviously) and freeze tag and the laughter is like sugared medicine. Luca does not check out these books, does not leave any possible trace that he wanted them, so this much is enough for him. 

It is proof.

His imagination is a comfort. In his version of history, he is fierce and cool and fierce and cool people do not shy away from duty just because it doesn't quite fit their image. So Luca, with all his mustered fierceness, showed up ten minutes early on the first day of class so he could scope out his prospective partner and be the best safety officer that he possibly could. 

Shu, as it turns out, was just as wary, having turned up five minutes before he did.

They should not work well together, but somehow they do. 

At school, Luca is loud. He is loud and unforgettable. It is partially because things that demand attention are so much harder to leave behind, but mostly just because he likes it. It's nice to live an unrestrained life sometimes. His partner doesn't really mind, though his loudness is more of the sudden and quiet type. It bursts out of him when you least expect it and Luca finds that he likes the surprise.

When you’re so small, an entire person can be bigger than the world. 

They could even become the whole waking universe.

Shu is slightly shorter than him, but he walks just as fast. His scuffed shoes squeak a little against the floors when it rains and he entertains all of Luca’s stories. Sometimes he even shares his own. 

His sister once jumped into a fountain trying to rescue his hat and shield him from the rain, apparently, though it was all in vain because he hopped in right after her to try to pull her out. 

More importantly, there was one time when they got a van with manual doors after a string of automatic ones. Shu saw him standing there, hands lifting off the door just waiting for something to happen. Then, after an embarrassingly long minute, Luca scrambled to pull the door open himself in realisation, rushing to get in before the next car pulled up. Shu saw it all, but he didn’t laugh or tire and try to do it for him. He just let him figure it out without drawing any extra attention his way.

Other people have laughed at a lot less.

That was the first brick of respect in the landmark of their friendship. The cornerstone.

Morning duties are much smoother, much less painful than he expected, and it turns out Shu’s class is in the room right next to his. Shu even accepts the large part of him that wants to live on the lamb one day. 

He does more than accept it too. Sometimes he gives his own suggestions over shared lunches, getaway vehicles and elaborate disguises sewn in the lining of bags and the like, his input a creative tributary that feeds brilliantly into the bigger picture. Begrudgingly, he must admit that Shu is a worthy opponent and even a possible friend.

Luca has never been quick to give up on his convictions though, so when he finds himself liking Shu a lot more than he expected or wanted, he finds a way to accept it without giving up on his childhood dreams. 

Sometimes being a infamous rebel means breaking any and all rules, including your own. With thoughts like that, it’s easy to accept Shu as a new fixture in his little life.

-

The year after that they’re put in the same class, time together no longer limited to tiny moments before or after the day starts. At first he was annoyed, the merging of everyone meaning he had to be stuck with all those people he didn’t really care to see, but then he remembered Shu and suddenly it felt like no big deal. Now they will have all these new common things to talk about, which is quite the triumph.

Luca started doing sports around then too, training on his own. Soccer and team sports were out of the picture. It was not always easy to work with others, but more importantly he couldn’t guarantee that he’d be able to regularly go to practice, so he had to pick something he could do anywhere and any time. There’s no point joining the team if you can’t put in the effort. 

Running was good and fun and free. Plus, when they saw how fast he was, people started picking him for their teams in gym class. Not first, but certainly not last either, which means he got just the right amount of attention. It was a win-win.

Shu was not as much of a runner, but he’d still go out with him when he could, trips largely confined to the 100 meters around his house while his mother was still asleep, the long grassy fronds tickling their ankles.

“How about today?” Shu inevitably asks him. Tomorrow wouldn’t work because he’s taking music lessons then. Luca’s never heard him play, but he knows Shu must be amazing. He gave up on piano a few months in, which is only a shame because it means he can't be Shu’s accompanist one day.

“Probably not. Family’s coming over, so I have to help out.”

“Oh. Okay. Do you want some?”

Inside his proffered plastic container are carrots and berries and slices of cheese all cut into stars. Who mixes those things together for fun? Luca gratefully accepts a couple, chomping down with a grin, but not before upturning his own lunch and offering some little anchovies or a slice of mandarin orange in return.

Shu is a weird kid, it turns out, obsessed with card games and computers and a million things that’ll make your eyes spin just thinking about them. Luca likes spinning though. He adored that feeling of losing touch with gravity as they just roll faster and faster down the big grassy hill behind the school. One time he turned out a box of LEGOs and made something entirely his own and it was even cooler than the picture on the box. 

That was just the kind of person he was. Shu was good at everything but boasted nothing, content to dip his toes whenever the mood strikes.

He doesn’t mind that Luca is a little weird too, even if it’s not the same exact kind of weird that he is, so in that way their friendship is inevitable. They spend some days digging in the dirt looking for shiny rocks to add to burgeoning collections and others discussing the finer merits of life, arguing that lions are in fact the coolest animal and deserve their well-earned title as king. Shu throws his hat in for penguins of all things (they’re emperors!) so they eventually agree to disagree.

In fact, it seems like Shu takes their separations and turns them into new chances to be together, running together through the fields or travelling to nearby orchards just to try picking fruit with little searching hands. 

That’s probably why it worked so well between them. 

His most treasured friendship.

-

The first time Luca ever steps foot into the city, a city, any city, really, is because of their class’s graduation trip. It’s supposed to be a celebration of some kind and he was excited to experience something new. They’re made to leave extra early, groups of little kids wearing identical little hats, before piling onto the train and filling most of its cars.

Their town is a woefully small one, though some of the adults like to say that makes it cosy. Luca can’t quite decide if he thinks it’s cosy or not, but he likes the forest and running along the river, so the smallness is a bit of a blessing. It means there’s more room for the things he loves. 

The only feasible way out of town is by train, although there are some roads and even a singular traffic light watching over the busiest one. Even then, their train station is not much of a station at all, a fact he knows well from all these old movies set in the city. It is nothing but a wooden platform with a set of stairs leading out into a field, thin chains blocking it off from the normal walkable ones. It’s an hour’s ride away to get to another train that can actually go somewhere, but it’s the closest they have to something like that, so that’s the route all outriders must take.

Their town couldn't afford a more expensive train either, so sometimes it goes and leaves in opposite directions, coming in from the right just to twist around and embark back to the left after manually turning on rotating rails.

There are so many yellow flowers, canola flowers he’s heard, that they streak by in a golden wash at the speed they're going. There are lakes too, lakes with sparkling water and giant sunflowers dotting the shore. He’s certain they’d still be just as pretty under a torrent of rain.

It is altogether a great day. For breakfast, he eats an egg and a few pieces of cut fruit, and he gets to spend an enormous lot of time with all of his friends.

It takes no time at all to eventually reach their final destination. It’s like one second he’s talking to Shu about the merits of running out to see the wild mushrooms grow and delighting in the wilderness, the pair cracking up just by seeing each other’s faces, and the next they’re reminiscing about the year’s swift passing as the second train finally comes to a halt.

“What you said earlier,” Luca said, words like a hum, “about the trees. What’s that?” 

He needed to know every little detail he could grasp. What does Shu like? What should they do tomorrow? Can they do it together?

“Huh? Oh, just that I heard it’s good luck if you can catch the leaves as they fall directly from the tree.”

“We should try it then.” Luca rifled through his bag for a pencil and a copy of their worksheets. Shu handed him one of his to save him the trouble. “Maybe next fall.”

The city is brilliant and beautiful, shiny like water or the ice that sometimes glazes the trees after really chilly winter nights. It’s a bit of a metal monster, huge buildings and lights with traffic on every corner. 

His classmates are all buzzing with excitement, though whether that’s because of graduation or the trip, he isn’t really sure. Even Shu gets in on the action, pointing out everything that catches his eye with a wave of his arms.

“I saw that building in a book,” he says in awe, and Luca’s eyes follow the arc of his pointed finger until they land on what looks like a theatre or auditorium of some kind, a big sloping roof hugging a round glassy building. “It holds hundreds of people inside. Pretty cool, right?”

Luca remembers that book, too. Books are lame, but reading off of Shu’s books makes it feel like they’re sharing a secret, so he likes doing that. He watched Shu trace images of steel beams with such fondness that he decided to get boastfully good at reading upside down. Boastful because he wanted Shu to know that he could so he could decide when he wanted to keep something private, but also because he was proud of learning it altogether. Shu never seemed to mind anyway, always keeping his hands off the pictures and words so there was always room for his eyes.

Who would have thought all it takes to learn a new skill is making a friend.

Soon it’s Luca’s turn to guide them with stars in his eyes, pointing out birds and blossoming trees. It should be scary because it is so large compared to anything at home, but everything is rather large when you’re young, so instead of scary, it’s all so wonderful and interesting and new. These are sights he’s only ever seen in books and on flickering screens and now they're right in front of his eyes.

They are sights he may not see again for a very long time. Maybe not till high school or later, who knows.

“That building looks like a banana.” Luca points with his arm stretched as wide as it can go and Shu laughs so easily and freely that it tickles his ears.

“That one looks like swiss cheese.”

Soon it’s a competition. Instead of iron and steel, there are avocadoes and folded sweaters and a box of CDs haphazardly slung on a concrete counter. Their imaginations transform the entire landscape into a bowl of fruit and he just laughs and laughs and laughs until their classmate beckons them to hurry along and keep pace with the others lest they get left behind.

When they go back home, there’s a second where Luca takes off his seatbelt to get a better look at the flying trees and though the teacher yells at him, Shu soon follows, pressing his hands against the yellowing glass. 

That sight makes him smile even wider.

-

The next year, they go to the same middle school, and that fact alone makes him happy. The last day before graduation, they spent an hour mapping out who lived where and what school they will have to go to, middle schools split into two tiny buildings on either side of a grand field. It was easier to repurpose old buildings and sheds than worry about making a bigger one, so suddenly everyone had to deal with the burden of separation. 

As a graduation present, the school gifts them all with a little sapling, each barely the height of two of his hands. He and Shu plant theirs together, two little bushy heads poking out of a strip of soil across the street. They give them names too, though not very creative ones, and make an effort to stop by every week or two until one day a neighbour accidentally runs them over with his lawnmower.

After that, they find new ways to spend vacation together, invariably recruiting other friends to join them for their long adventure. Sometimes they refuse, which is okay too. Some adventures are more fun with only two people there to tackle them.

Some of his friends will spend the next couple years at the other school, so he comforts himself with the knowledge that Shu will still be with him and that they will still see each other when they all run around outside at the end of the day.

There is only enough space in town for one high school too, so it will not be a very long separation. Their reunion will be a welcome inevitability.

Plus, Luca soon makes new friends too, pushing back against useless bullies or joining classmates for their morning lap around the school. 

Middle school is a little more serious, a little more focused on studies and sports and being good at something instead of trying out a million shoes to see what fits well and what pinches your toes the moment you try it on for size. Because he’s old enough to be seen as slightly responsible and stay for an hour away from home after the school day ends, Luca finally gets to join the track team, which is its own fun milestone.

Shu joins clubs of his own, but they both make time for each other. They delight in walking from room to room to go to class instead of sitting at the same desks all day. It makes them feel more adult-like, which is all you want to be at that age.

On warm nights they sometimes watch old movies at the library. There’s an old projector set up against a hanging sheet where families like to bring blankets and sit on the grass. 

“True story or fictional?” Shu had asked when he asked if he wouldn’t mind watching a movie about marathoners next week. The library said they’d get the tape from a nearby town by then, so he could take it out then and bring it home.

“Does it matter?”

Shu shrugged. “Not really. Why don’t you watch it with Sonny?”

He supposes he could, but Sonny is more like his running friend. One of his club friends. And then he eventually got closer to Alban than he was to him, or maybe it’s just close in a different way, so mentally he is his brother’s friend before his own. 

Besides, Shu lets him share snacks whenever they watch something together and he likes snacks.

“Just felt like asking you.” Luca’s pout lasts all of 6 seconds until Shu quickly agrees.

He likes Shu too. That was certainly part of it too.

Sonny is a running friend, and a fun one at that, but Shu is his everything friend. He can easily imagine doing anything with him, so he’s often and always his first choice.

Luca knows he isn’t subtle, but he doesn’t know a single kid that is, so it's not like he's committing a crime by asking Shu first. He can't help it if he needs it, whatever little connection they have. Time doesn't seem to pass when they have to be apart. Weekends, for example, sometimes blur into one amorphous blob of empty time if they’re not doing anything. 

It can be a slower crawl than fire ants over dewy sycamore trees, red specks heaving up proportional mountains. Shu used to laugh at how early he slept sometimes, eager for the next day to start anew, but the first sleepover they’re allowed to have sees him falling asleep before Luca does, so he takes it as a little personal victory.

The first year passes easily just like that, a time filled with beautiful new discoveries.

-

The newness wears off after a while, maybe some time between the second and third year. The fun, however, does not. 

If it’s even possible, Luca finds himself caught up in even more fun than ever before. He still feels that rush of excitement in the afternoons, scrolling on his computer as he waits for Shu to be done for the day. The librarian usually lets him stay late because he is supposedly such a good kid, though he thinks it’s just because he’s one of the few people who regularly shows up and that fact alone has endeared him to her.

The bell rang a couple minutes ago, so Shu should be on his way out soon. He likes enjoying his time if he’s not in a rush, so it always takes a few minutes extra before he pops his head out the door. In the meantime, Luca busies himself by clicking on and off of whatever shows up.

The picture of a pretty girl is what eventually settles on his screen in a moment of distraction, head tipped back in what was probably a laugh. It makes him wonder what kind of joke she heard. He’s always on the hunt for a good joke.

Then suddenly there was Shu interrupting his internal comedy show, his steady weight a familiar comfort behind him. 

“Do you like her?” he hears, Shu’s thumbs brushing against his shoulder. 

Did he? She seemed nice enough, he supposed. Looking up at Shu’s face though, he was struck at once by the thought that perhaps he might like to be her should she be Shu’s type, but that isn't really the same kind of like. 

That was another set of new discoveries lately. Random bouts of unexplainable envy.

“Not really. Do you?” 

There are many pretty boys and girls that he found himself wanting to be sometimes, but he supposes that none of them will have the privilege of knowing Shu until much, much later in their lives, if at all, so he contents himself with what he’s got. He doesn’t like wasting time on envy.

Luca goes to Shu’s house every week or so, mouth full of excuses about how they need to study together for placement exams next year. And, to be fair, sometimes they really do study, so he’s not exactly untruthful when he says it.

One night after one of Shu’s concerts, he mustered up the courage to hold his hand just to see how it felt, and instead of asking what he was doing, Shu just readjusted their hands, intertwining their fingers in a stronger grip. 

Luca is the one with the privilege right now. Not any of them. There's no need to be envious.

Sometimes it feels like he could do anything and everything and Shu would still like him just the same, which is the most dangerous feeling in the world.

It's hard to put a name to feelings sometimes. Is it love because he starves for any crumb of his affection or is it just some defect built inside him, some jealous petulant part that never grew up? 

They're both going to have to grow up soon and it’s more fun to focus on the good parts, so he doesn’t really look for the answer. 

Time is ticking and if they want to get a good spot by the lake, then they have to leave soon, so Luca busies himself with that instead, hauling Shu’s bag onto his shoulder so he can go a little faster.

-

High school is like one big reunion and they become even more themselves than ever before, if that makes any sense. 

There's a board in his bedroom, a literal slab of wood just propped against the wall with the edge burnt off, where he hangs up little knick-knacks and mementos, printed photos and dried up grass, the empty space slowly vanishing as he finds more and more to add to it. There’s a picture of him next to Shu, their paint-covered fingers grasping each other’s squishy cheeks. 

It’s a little crazy, honestly, looking back. His fingers will never be that small again.

Beside that is a group shot of the lot of them sitting in the park, cake and balloons hidden behind bushes and trees as Luca leads a blindfolded Alban to the centre of it. He smiles as he traces over their little bugged out faces, spending extra time scolding that version of Shu for not ducking low enough, the tips of his upturned bangs visible through a gap in the leaves.

They’re exactly the same in the ways that count, but it’s like their bond has boiled down over the years, now a syrupy thing that fondly lines the inside of his veins. He is the same person fundamentally, but older and freer and just as excited as ever. 

With freedom comes the power to show more of yourself than you ever could before.

Shu is the same, too, so in many ways high school is just a hundred ways of reimagining and reexperiencing a familiar flavour. 

It’s just like blue salt and shaved ice melting into little pools under the summer sun. And mangoes, he decides. They have just the right amount of sweetness to them, so they fit right in.

-

Okay, maybe that’s an overly sentimental way of looking at things. Classes are boring sometimes. The weather isn’t always great. During their second year of high school, he hurt his ankle and then his knee, so he doesn't get to compete in any meets. Luca is still happy though, so it’s largely unimportant. It’s nice that simply living like normal can bring him so close to so many people.

Not even rumours of his romantic entanglement with Petra can capsize his mood (and they are just that, rumours) because honestly, if there was anyone he was remotely interested in, why would it be Shu’s sister? People let sightings of the three of them get to their heads too much, eager to spin it into some kind of twisted conspiracy. 

It’s not like they do the same to Alban, after all, so the comparison always leaves him a little annoyed.

Luca always imagined that time would reveal all the fractured incompatibilities between himself and Shu that youth lets you simply gloss over, but nothing really made itself apparent. Sometimes they stay out late at night or see each other in places that aren't just each other’s houses and bedrooms, two chairs perpetually gathered around their creaky wooden desks, but other than location, nothing is all that different. 

High school comes with an entire new circle of unconnected friends and both find happiness with many of them. 

On a bright day with round clouds scattered like popcorn in the sky, Shu grabs his hand and tugs it as they run onto the beach, news of a passing ship bubbling up between them. The sand is greyish white and warm beneath his feet and the air tastes like summer. Someone, Elira he thinks based on the pitch and volume, cheers when he finally smashes the watermelon on his second round with the bat and they all let out a louder one when the speck of a boat finally whizzes past somewhere near the horizon.

Luca realised afterward that maybe he should have been a little more shameful before joining Shu and all of his non-mutual friends for an outing like that, but Shu simply invited him again and again until he reached such a comfortable familiarity with all of them that his nerves slowly vanished. 

And he supposed the reverse also happened, so in a way they’re mostly even.

Luca’s notes are filled with drawings in the margins, doodles of trees labelled log x and y and comics detailing moments they've shared during class. During one of their physics labs, for example, he almost broke a window while hitting a baseball, so there’s a caricature of him and a bat the size of his enormous head. Then, beside that, there is a crude drawing of a bat with dripping fangs. Beneath that is Shu’s corpse, courtesy of the bat and its fangs.

Getting older also meant less hand holding during lessons, so they get to talk more without being scolded for doing so. 

There is so much green in the gold, hues that are so gallant and grand that they seem they should be eternal.

It’s a relative rarity that summer and school are both so fun though, so sometimes they're not.

It’s a humid afternoon when he’s filling out a little table asking what he’ll do when he graduates because suddenly their teacher wants to pivot from talking about Shakespeare to talking about real dreams, crossing out and scribbling down the safe answers, doctor, engineer, lawyer? (no, that's too unbelievable, better cross that one out) while peeking up at the entries before him. Luca realised a long time ago that real criminal life is probably not like what children dream of, but nothing else really struck him the same way that did.

There are some safe answers written down, but some fun ones too. Novelist, for example. Not just a writer, but a novelist. The term implies an air of grandiosity to it that he likes. Surely he could find some fun way to spin what he’s thinking about too. 

Astronaut, maybe? Explorer. 

Shu is beside him and he does not want to pass that paper yet because he does not know what he wants to do and does not want to reveal his fraudulence quite so early. Shu wouldn't laugh at the sight though. No, he’d probably just insist they run space drills together because it’s less fun to do it alone and space will be lonely enough as is. 

That begs the question though. What does Shu want to do? 

He probably knows. His pen is already in his hand. He’s smiling and it’s one of his good, relaxed smiles, not the terse kind that sometimes appears when he’s lost in thought. 

He definitely knows. 

Luca is good at running, but that's all he’s really got going for him. He is no one’s future groundbreaking academic and sure, for a while people will like that he’s fast. They will applaud him for it, even. He just set a PR last week and the cheers were enormous, but gone just as fast.

It’s just, well, when they both grow up from being little weedy children in cracked pots, cheeks and nails always coated in a fine misting of dirt, when Shu sets off for the stratosphere building rockets or whatever the hell it is that people on his level actually will do, will Luca be able to catch up just because he was a bit skilled at running? 

Probably not. 

Not even the Olympian version of Luca could run that far through the atmosphere and dream of catching up to him.

Suddenly Luca doesn't want to pass it over for a new set of reasons. Shu is incredible. A veritable magician at times, even. He can make whatever he wants happen. And Luca? 

The teacher looks back towards them for a second time and someone nearby coughs rather pointedly, so he reluctantly hands it off, paper slightly crinkled from his grip. 

Shu takes a second to glance at it before turning away, jotting his future reality down with ease because that's what it is. The future. His pen is an immediate fountain and he hands it off once more with little ceremony.

That day the bell sounds like an old train’s whistle, long and drawn out. He looks at Shu, walking backwards ahead of him so they can still talk face to face, and steers him a little to avoid any unfortunate crashes. There’s a close call as they pass by the gym, a pair of girls taking up more than half the width of the hallway with cellos strapped to their backs.

There’s another whistle as they get to their designated spots (across from each other again, a move made so they can read off each other’s notes without looking suspicious) and that's when he finally remembers. 

There’s only one train out of here and not enough seats to take him along with it. 

His lips clam up whenever they briefly consider letting thoughts of the future spill forth, so Luca has never brought  it up, and in consequence they've never talked about it. Shu seems to know what he has never been able to, nothing really filling the gap left by the unrealism of criminal life. 

Shu has all of the world’s marketable skills crammed inside a friend-shaped package. His ticket out of here is basically an inevitability.

Maybe his lips knew it before he did. Maybe his mouth was doing him a favour.

Soon it becomes a purposeful exercise. Not talking about it.

Shu smiles and Luca sends one back, barely uttering a single word.

-

The future is an unwelcome weight on his shoulders, but he tries his best to shrug it off whenever they are together. It doesn’t really bother him until he spends so long thinking about it that it bubbles and festers, so he mostly avoids thinking about it all together. 

Alban corners him as he softly slips into his shoes, insistent that something has been wrong. 

It hasn’t. There’s nothing wrong, but denial makes it more real, so he opts to deflect it all instead. 

“See you later,” he calls out, and the crickets answer him with little chirps as they hop among the grass. 

Shu is waiting exactly where they promised, body slightly hidden between the trees and their elongated shadows.

Their footsteps are muddled by all the other small forest sounds as they sneak into the car. There is nowhere much to drive to around town, but sometimes going nowhere is its own journey. 

When you drive around at night it's like you’re going to slip right past the horizon of swollen stars. And Luca always liked that. He always liked the thought that the stars can show you something that happened years ago because it's like the sky always remembers something.

Maybe those same stars will see little feathery pictograms of the two of them years after they’ve been wrenched apart. To them, to someone out there, they could still be together just like this. 

That's the power that distance has.

Shu passes by no less than three fields before finally settling on one that they both like. The first looked too much like the one that spawned ghost stories of haunted wheat, he argued, so it would be better to pick another since they have yet to replace their salt after that unfortunate popcorn incident. The second was too close to the lake. Too many mosquitoes.

By the time they’ve reached a good spot to rest, the fireflies have already come out. Luca tips into the grass face first before changing his mind and flipping himself over with a big heaving motion.

“Sometimes I feel like I’m going crazy.” Shu’s voice is like the wind above him. 

“I think you’re just tired.” Luca lets the tension gradually seep out of himself, practically melting into the ground. “We’d definitely know if you’ve gone crazy.”

“You think so?”

“Mmm. You can just sleep if you want to though.“

Shu looms above him, barely outlined by the moonlight. He nods along haphazardly and Luca drops his anchoring hold of the grass to offer up one of his hands. 

“Luca.”

“Yeah?”

Their calves are touching. He can't see it, eyes still trained on the sky, but he can feel it. His skin fizzes with anticipation.

“Did you bring them?”

The sparklers dig into his ribs a little, long fronds of carbon and steel. They were supposed to watch the fireworks last week, but the monsoon postponed it for a couple weeks longer, and they're both a little too excited to wait. Luca fishes one out, letting half of it burn between them in silence. 

“It’s so dark out here sometimes, isn’t it?” Shu tosses a burnt stump into their jug of water, pretty fingers curled around the edge. “But I think it’s prettier that way too.”

Luca’s not so sure. The way Shu’s face lights up ephemerally from the flickering light seems a little prettier than the sparklers ever could be alone. Prettier than the night sky too.

“Maybe you need to get glasses.”

That gets a huff of laughter out of him and they steep in the muted starlight, just watching their little lights burn up and then out again and again. 

It’s like seeing hundreds of stars go through their whole life cycle.

In his daze, he briefly wonders what it would feel like to swallow one of the stars. Maybe that’s how your wishes can finally be granted. Maybe it takes something that crazy and grand to truly deserve it.

“We could just sleep out here tonight.” Luca lets out a big yawn before flopping back in the grass. He pats the spot next to him and Shu leans down too, warm around the edges.

He could probably do it if he tried. All he has to do is run up to the sky and open his mouth as wide as it goes. It really could be that easy.

“You’ve got practice early tomorrow,” Shu urges, but he says it in the most nurturing way. Despite his words, he makes no sudden moves to get up, so they sit for a while longer in peace.

“Okay,” is all he can muster in response, agreement wrapping its silken petals around his lips.

It gets harder and harder to forget about the future after that year ends. Soon they’ll be third years and graduation feels a lot more real with a year left to go. 

Graduation means change, and unlike all the other times before, this time change will truly mean separation.

Luca has no plans to force anything though. It’s naive to assume youth is something you keep forever. 

-

The morning before they leave, Luca takes a few minutes longer to stare up at the cracks in the ceiling above his bed, blinking in and out until the haze begins to blur. The house is so old that blisters like that are only natural. 

Shu is timely, but generally not too early, so he can afford a few minutes of stillness before heading out.

They’ve been planning it out for a long time. Their great escape.

On this early Friday morning, their excuses and history of club trips and morning practice will finally pay off. Shu supposedly has a night rehearsal for the upcoming concert while Luca’s been trying to get another PR. That’s what they told everyone. Instead of running off to school, however, a race that Luca always wins, they will hop in the car and slip into the train station, going hand in hand into its vastness. There are other times they could have gone, a vacation or long weekend perhaps, but there’s an electric undercurrent that comes with knowing they’re breaking the rules together for no real reason at all except that they can.

“I might have overcooked the rice,” Luca barely manages to say, face crimson in shame as he slides a steaming packet across the table.

“You just stick it in a microwave. I’m pretty sure it’s impossible to overcook.”

It's a squishy, steamy mess, and a bit of rice clings to his hands when he’s done eating, but it's a fine breakfast for a more than fine day.

The aquarium is their first destination once they mesh into the sea of people, a place filled with fish and all these oceanic things that are impossible to spot from their rocky little beach at home. He likes watching all the strong swimmers with covetous eyes, just copying their wild strokes in the air, but when they finally reach the penguins, he forces Shu to stop and take a picture with them. 

“It’s like a family portrait,” Luca argues, snapping an extra one of Shu’s face caught in a laugh. 

He’ll save that one for later, a little memory kept just for himself.

Shu scolds him when he tries to high five all the starfish plastered to the glimmering tanks, but Luca catches him giving it a try once he’s got his back turned, so he makes sure to call him out on his double standards. It all leads to a bit of a play fight that Luca is in no real hurry to try to win, so when he falls to the ground, he does his best to fall gently.

Shu’s hands are soft when they help him up.

They’re not due back home till the end of the evening at the earliest, so lunch is still a largely unhurried affair. Luca gets some barbeque while Shu tries some grilled fish and they both eat about half of each, occasionally mocking out sword fights with their spoons. 

Luca likes to think he won the bulk of those battles. 

And sure, he doesn’t really like eating fish that much, but it’s more about the sharing than it is about the taste.

Shu didn’t even need to ask where they should go next, the answer obviously being karaoke while they have a chance to do it in a real designated building, so they quickly file out, frowning a little at the sound of distant thunder.

For a brief moment, he considered suggesting the nearby planetarium instead, staring at the twinkling lights up ahead, but if he sits in a dark room like that, he might just fall asleep, and it would be supremely uncool to waste their rebellious adventure sleeping to the sound of singing planets, so Luca keeps his mouth dutifully shut.

Another raindrop falls on his head as they duck beneath a café’s awning, which makes it the thirteenth time in the last few minutes. Maybe they've gone a bit off course, but they simply take it as an opportunity.

As if the universe is punishing them for their hubris and gluttony, however, in the time it takes them to polish off an unplanned dessert, the sprinkle has progressed into a veritable shower.

“I’ll go buy us an umbrella,” Shu says, starting exactly when he opened his mouth to suggest the same. 

“I can run faster. I’ll do it.”

They stare each other down for a while, before deciding to settle things the fair way. 

Luca loses at rock paper scissors, however, so he’s the one that has to stay, grumbling as he hunkers down on a plastic chair. Shu’s sneakers squeak a little as he scurries away, water making the soles slick against the tiles.

The city is a place full of boxes, glassy shimmering boxes arranged in impossible ways with windows that brush the tips of the sky. The lights drown everything out.

There are windows that reach from floor to ceiling too, impossible structures to even consider back home. It's all a little unnerving. No matter where you look, you'll see at least ten people walking on the crosswalk or passing by each other, heads down as they meander down the streets, doing all these things cityfolk are apt to do. 

It's not to say he thinks they're so vastly different, all the people floating beyond the window and himself, though they're not exactly the same either. He’s pretty sure the last time something as big as a crane ever graced their town was at least 20 years ago when they added a wing to the high school. 

Well, it’s more of a room than a wing, but the point still stands.

Even while biking or running, rather than walking, Luca is lucky to see more than a couple people walking their dogs the whole time he steps outside. Here there is a sea of pink and yellow and clear umbrellas, each buoyed by the hand of a glimmering person who lives in one of those shiny metal buildings covered in frosted glass. 

The sea parts at each of the winding boulevards, but the waves are constantly flowing, and Shu is hidden somewhere inside the seafoam.

This is probably how it will be soon, Shu running out into a bigger world than the one they have grown to know together. He’s just not the kind of person who will live and die in their little town and between the two of them, it is definitely Shu who will be the one to make it past the current and beyond the riptide.

Luca looks away after a while, unable to stomach the reminder of how insignificantly small he really is. 

Why does growing up need to occasionally imply growing apart as we grow into the people we were always meant to be? 

Is it really so bad to grow upwards, not outwards? 

He is happy about the trip, but a little sad about what it implies. This is only his third time ever seeing the city and it already feels like it may be his last. 

He didn't ask Shu how many times he’s gone, content to let him lead the way through their joint plans.

It is altogether a little too disheartening a thought for such a beautiful day and Shu soon returns, vinyl and plastic bounty in hand, so he files the thought away for later, shrugging off his sweater to wrap it around Shu’s damp shoulders. 

He better not catch a cold from all this running around.

Shu beams at him as he passes the umbrella into Luca’s hands, telling him that they’re only about half a kilometre away from their destination.

Luca opens up the canopy above them, hopping around the little pools and puddles with an arm around Shu to keep them closer together, and thus better protected from the rain coming down.

Yes, it’s a worry that can be saved for later, for some amorphous time when they’re back at home with nothing better to think about, but preferably never.

-

Sometimes time is a boulder. It’s like that pitch drop experiment he heard about once, all slow and thick and ticking forward once every couple years. Sometimes it’s loose though. Sometimes it’s a river that he flops and flails against, just trying to spare a second or two on a busy day. 

Sometimes the world just loves to conspire against him. He got caught up in the rush of kids running home from school, forcing him to bob and weave around all of the implied stop signs. 

There’s only one real light in town, even for pedestrians, and that was miraculously red too.

“I’m sorry I’m late!”

Luca is mortified. By the time he finally reaches him, Shu is deep into listening to a song of some kind, fingers drumming repeatedly against his thighs.

He should just give up and move to Antarctica to live with the penguins and– shit, no, not Antcartica actually. Maybe the Arctic instead. It’s just as cold and empty and remote, but there aren't any penguins, so he won't have to remember how much he embarrassed himself whenever he decides to walk around outside.

It took way too long to run to the florist and back, a mini crowd forming around the new batch of giant sunflowers that came in. He liked sunflowers too, but thought that freshly cut tulips might suit Shu a little better, so that’s what he went with instead. 

They remind him of the spring.

There was a brief moment where he considered getting seeds instead, offering them up as a promise to keep checking in on them week after week, but their last few endeavours with gardening have yielded little success and he didn't want to imagine what would have to them after they both left. 

Okay, maybe his indecision was what took up the bulk of the time. You can hardly blame him though. Even if it’s not exactly officially a date, getting flowers makes it feel a bit more like one, so the sight of their stems in Shu’s curled hands makes him grin. It makes something warm wrap around his heart.

“You’re not late, Luca. You’re the one who told me to wait by the back after school today.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t mean for you to actually do any waiting.”

Shu tucks his headphones into his bag, taking care to cushion the flowers loosely with the other arm. “Shall we go then?”

For Marine Day, they were both too busy to make it back to the beach, so they vaguely promised to make up for it in advance for Mountain Day by climbing a mountain a week or two early. Or at least they would if there were any mountains nearby, which is funny because you would think that with so much nothingness there’s plenty of room to keep a mountain somewhere, so instead of that they’re aiming for the tallest hill they can reach. They still need to test out those theories about throwing coins off of tall buildings, so the not-quite-a-mountain is their best bet on such short notice.

If you’re spending time together and you sometimes even brush hands as you scramble over the grassy terrain, then it’s kinda like a date, isn’t it? 

Their mountain of choice is a pretty one at least, and Shu has the brilliant idea to stop for some water and snacks beforehand so they can do a mini picnic on the summit. It’s probably only around 600 or 700 metres up anyway, even if the path is at least twice as long, so it takes less than two hours to make it up altogether.

It probably would have been much faster if they didn’t stop at every bird sighting trying to come up with a ridiculous name for each one. 

When they saw the hint of something that could be an owl, Luca began chanting “when? when? when?” and Shu lept in with a chorus of why’s, their cacophony soon drowning everything else out.

The whole climb up, Luca keeps honing in on the sound of his pockets jingling and he’s eager to finally try it when they’re done with their snacks. When he stands a bit below the crest, urging Shu to perch on top of a rock and rain them down on his head, he’s a little disappointed to see them bounce off like acorns against frozen ground. It doesn’t even hurt.

Sure, maybe they’re supposed to travel a long long way before they get fast enough to hurt, but he was still expecting a little more out of it.

“We should climb a real mountain next year,” Luca promises, flushing when he catches his mistake. 

They still haven’t really talked about it. Exam results don’t get released for another week, and he’s not looking forward to it.

“I don’t think they can go very fast anyway. They’re too flat, so they’d probably float too much. Kinda like this.”

Shu rummages through his pocket for a bit before tossing up his flowers all at once. They’re like a group of comets, fluttering heads attached to thinner trails that twist around the clouds.

“Why did you do that?” Luca whined, watching the purple petals flail around in the wind. “I thought we were just doing coins and stuff.”

Shu shrugs beside him, keeping one in his pocket before tucking the final flower behind Luca’s ear. “I dunno. Just felt right, I guess. See? Now we can both enjoy them.”

Luca laughs even though it’s not very funny and the motion jostles it out of his hair, tulip eventually carried away in the breeze like the rest of its brethren. He briefly considers chasing after it, but eventually decides to just stand there with Shu looking out at the trees. There will always be other flowers, but not more moments to just exist together.

There will always be more shooting stars.

It's fine.

They were right to go when they did, too. 

When Mountain Day actually comes around, he only catches a brief moment to run to the phone, but Shu doesn’t pick up and he’s too busy to try again until much later in the day. With no time for holidays, there’s definitely no space to fit thoughts of anything else, which is both a blessing and a curse.

They never did get to go on a real date too, so Luca was only left with these half real, mostly fake dates that only count as such because that’s what he called them in his head. 

That’s probably the worst part of it all.

-

After all of his downright angst-filled and dramatic thoughts leading up to it, Luca is remarkably happy when graduation is finally around the corner. Everyone else seemed happy, caught up in the celebratory mood with loud voices and louder cheers, and that joy swiftly diffused into his skin.

It’s both a blessing and a curse, his ability to cast off all thoughts of anything that isn’t demanding his attention.

He feels happy enough, anyway, much more tilted towards the side of being happy than not, so that’s good enough for him. When someone that sounds suspiciously like Ike jumps on his back, he grabs onto their arms and twirls and twirls, moving them both around in circles with a whooping laugh.

“Put me down!” he shrieks, fist pounding against his shoulder.

Luca waits another ten seconds before suddenly coming to a stop and Ike sways a bit when he’s finally back on his feet, almost taking him down to the ground as he staggers forwards.

“You two look like you’re having fun over there.”

And just like that, whatever happiness he felt has now seemingly doubled.

“Shu!” His voice is a little rough from all the cheering. “I was just looking for you!”

When they finally hug, Luca immediately lifts Shu off his feet with gusto, already a little hopped up on adrenaline from all that spinning around. He pauses for a moment as he catches it though. There is something different about Shu today, and it’s not just the hat and the neater hair, but something deeper. He smells different and sure, maybe he’s just added a dash of cologne for such an important day, but that difference engulfs him when they’re so close. 

That slight difference is enough that it almost feels like being hugged by a different man entirely, and his nose crinkles at the thought. Shu usually smells like sunshowers in the spring and melting sunshine, a hint of sky and sugar underlying something profoundly natural. 

Now it’s a bit more like honey and grapefruit rinds, the smell of twilight and a summer storm and the earth’s awakening. It’s still good. It’s just a bit unexpected. 

“I’m so proud of you,” Shu murmurs, still holding on once his feet hit the ground. “We made it.”

Luca’s heart stutters a little in his chest. 

For a moment they’re 8 years old again and tiny Shu is telling tiny Luca that they have to be even prouder of their dreams if no one else is going to support them. You have to believe in yourself because that’s most important. Then, with all the fierceness and coolness stored up in his chest, he proudly declared that he would support Shu’s dreams too, so he’d always have someone.

He teared up a little at the encouragement back then. Now too. At the praise, obviously. Not because of anything else.

They have not made it.

In a month’s time, Shu’s going off in the opposite direction as he is, their chosen schools a good train or two (or even three) apart. He’s never been one for the city, always a little too afraid of suffocating, so he picked a nice middle ground. Their interests have always been just slightly too different, so they were never going to end up in the same place anyway

And sure, it’s not like he’s not going to try. 

It’s just that it's not going to be the same, no longer two peas so crammed together in their pod that they practically lie on top of each other in every room. No matter how many times he writes it on his calendar and tries to make a habit of it, he knows he will eventually slip up and pay the price.

Luca dropped his arms and for a second Shu stepped closer, his face so close to his own, but he’s gone before he could even blink. 

And that was the last time they ever truly spoke, but at least their parting was a beautiful one.

It was as beautiful as it was inevitable, rosy against the backdrop of the setting sun.

-

“You doing okay? You don’t look too good.”

He shouldn't be surprised to see Alban, weathered key in hand, ready to close up shop for the day. He wished he wouldn't come in the first place, but at least he waited until the day was over.

Luca does not feel sad, but Alban is insistent, so he even pats his face a few times just to check. Everything still feels normal. There still is that slight divot in his nose from a rather boldly adventurous midnight outing through the woods. That scar from that time when he fell out of a chair, surprised to see Shu and Vox lifting it off the ground with his body still on it? Yep, it's all still there.

Nothing has changed.

“It’s fine.” Luca waves his hand, heading to the sink to wash up. “You can just give me the keys, you know. How are you supposed to take a real break if you keep coming to work every day?”

It takes more than a bit of cajoling, but Alban eventually relents when he promises he’ll take his own break as soon as the week is up. He’s so stubborn. Even on his supposed vacation, he’s still so eager to check in on how the café’s doing. 

The next morning, Luca jogs around the corner to open up the shop when he spots a familiar figure waiting by the door, long grey coat pooling around his knees.

“I missed you, Luca,” he says, sunshine dripping from his lips.

Now this, this might be a dream for real this time.

Shu is still technically a customer, and as his former best friend he supposes he can bend a few rules and let him in early. It wouldn’t do to leave him out in the cold, after all. 

Luca takes a second to duck in the back and fix his hair a little before starting on a pot of coffee. The mug is still steaming as he slides it across the table and he shakes his head when Shu tries to pull out his wallet. Instead of payment, he just hops in the other side of the booth, suddenly face to face after so long.

With more time to stare at him, he can see some other ways Shu has changed. His ears are pierced now, for one. The scarf wrapped around his neck is the same yellowish one from their second year of middle school, but there’s a necklace beneath it and a few new fraying bits on the edges.

“I missed you too,” he finally says.

“What happened?”

“Dropped my phone in a lake,” is what he starts with, going through the whole wretched affair. First it was the lake, but worse was the long stretch after when he was too busy training to take the train out. Then the train’s malfunction. The wallet he left on his dresser at home. “It had already been so long that I got too embarrassed to say something. I didn’t want to be, like, a mushroom on your tree trunk that’s sucking up all your nutrients and stuff.”

“You are not a mushroom.”

“I’m sorry.” Luca crumples a little at his easy dismissal. “I thought you wouldn’t want to hear from me after I practically ghosted you.”

Shu interrupts his self-pity session with a monumental sigh, hiding a bit behind his big purple mug. “I wanted you to kiss me that day, you know. During graduation.”

“What? I– You… you what?”

“Yeah, well, sometimes the guy you fall in love with moves away and you never hear from him again, so you start thinking you were misinterpreting all the signs. Then you finally see him again and it’s like ‘wow, what if he’s mocking me right now.’”

Luca leans closer across the table, grabbing his hands as soon as Shu lets go of his cup.

“We held hands and everything too,” Shu continued unbidden, listing off their transgressions one by one. “You got me flowers? We danced together at the dance? I thought it was all pretty obvious.”

“It was not obvious!” Luca argues, swinging their connected hands up and down. He squeezes and Shu squeezes back. “If it was obvious, then I definitely would have kissed you!”

Their laughter is interrupted by the chime of his phone, the chilling reminder that he still has to finish prep for the day. He reluctantly slides out his seat with an apology, rushing to get the last of it done.

“Think you’d be willing to try a do over?” Luca asks, head craning as he tops up the milk. “We could finally go on a real date or something. Kissing included.”

That day, after the tide of the early morning rush has finally broken, Shu drops two things into the tip jar after another order. Drip this time, no longer eager to flaunt how much he’s supposedly grown and changed in Luca’s absence.

The first is enough money to cover more than three drinks, a favour he plans to repay very soon. 

The second is a folded note with a single word inside. 

Yes.