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Satoru was dead asleep when it happened. The café across the street, the one with the 80s-style decor, had caught fire. He didn’t wake until the smell of smoke and ash drifting through the air made him bolt upright, heart pounding. For a second, he thought their apartment was burning.
But the silence stopped him. The fire alarms weren’t blaring. A cigarette would’ve set them off in a second, let alone a fire. His pulse eased, but not by much. He knew he had no sense of self-preservation—it wouldn’t be out of character for him to sleep through a fire.
Throwing off the covers, Satoru rushed to Suguru’s room, still groggy, heart hammering in his chest. He shoved the door open to find it empty. The queen-sized bed was a mess, sheets twisted, pillows on the floor.
Well, at least Suguru wasn’t burning to death.
Satoru ran a hand through his disheveled hair, blinking sleep from his eyes. The apartment was eerily quiet except for the hum of distant fire trucks. And the sound of clock, which showed 4 A.M. He let out a breath, relieved that help had already arrived.
Still, where the hell was Suguru?
He padded down the hall, passing through the kitchen, then the bathroom. Empty. The house looked like two college students in the middle of midterms had lived there—because they had. And now there were ashes blowing in from somewhere, adding to the chaos.
A breeze caught his attention. Satoru glanced at the terrace door. It was slightly ajar, letting in more ash. Of course. Suguru.
Pulling the curtain aside, he stepped onto the terrace. There Suguru sat, sipping his coffee, staring at the smoldering remains of the café across the street. His face was only illuminated by the flames.
“So, you’re not dead,” Satoru muttered, feeling some of the tension leave his body.
Suguru turned to him, wide awake despite his usual tendency to sleep until noon. His hair was a mess, bangs sticking to his forehead, and Satoru could tell he hadn’t slept much either.
Without a word, Satoru disappeared back into the apartment, returning a few minutes later with coffee in one hand. Suguru, as if anticipating him, had already pulled over another chair.
He already figured he wouldn’t get sleep after this.
Satoru sat, dragging a hand down his face. Every breath had the faint stench of smoke. “You’re gross,” he muttered, glancing sideways at Suguru, “I’m gross too. And why are you even awake at this hour?”
A distant crackle echoed from across the street. Suguru shrugged, his eyes catching the flicker of orange light. “Woke up to the noise. Couldn’t go back to sleep.”
“I freaked out, thinking the apartment was on fire” he said, then taking a sip of that coffee.”ahh…why are you sitting at the terrace watching a house burning down to ashes?”
With that, Suguru giggled and then sank deeper to his seat. “I think I’m going crazy, bear with me please.”
“It’s okay, I think this could be a bit romantic,” Satoru said, half to himself, glancing over at Suguru. He yawned, rubbing at his face. “I kinda want to kiss you right now.” The words fell out casually, like he was stating the weather.
Suguru didn't react immediately, just kept staring at the fire. Satoru raised an eyebrow, then took a sip of his coffee. “You’re supposed to say something, y’know. Not leave me hanging”
Finally, Suguru replied, “Maybe I’m giving you time to reconsider.”
“Nah,” Satoru mumbled, “Pretty sure the smoke’s getting to my brain.”
“Or has the stress finally got to you?”
“Says the person who woke up at 4 in the morning to watch a house burn. Anyway they’ll get a huge insurance check,” Satoru said, his grin lazy, “And yeah, maybe the stress has caught up with me. Like it obviously has with you.”
Suguru sighed, sipping his own coffee. “They still have shit ton to go through and I have dried saliva on my mouth, so no kissing” he then let out a sigh “For some reason I’m enjoying this too much. I just think it’s doing something to my soul”
“That’s crazy. But fair, I guess.” Satoru leaned back, exhaustion weighing on him. He was freaked out a bit. This whole setup, what Suguru was doing, was freaking him out. “We finished midterms yesterday. Everything feels relaxing.” he said, trying his best to stay nonchalant.
“Yeah.” Suguru replied.
Silence settled between them, the distant crackle of the fire and the murmur of firefighters the only sounds.
Satoru broke the stillness. “Next time there’s a fire, wake me up before you disappear from your room.”
“My room”
Satoru frowned, shifting in his chair. “yeah. What else is it? you chose this didn’t you?”
He opened his mouth, but closed it again, “Sure”
Satoru hesitated. “you know…I’m sorry. I don’t want that to be your room. But you kicked me out, how else should I say it?”
Suguru blinked, his heart sank a bit, in guilt. He knew this. “It’s fine”
Satoru finally met his eyes. “Can I say something?”
“Always.”
“Why are you watching a house burning down to ashes at 4 a.m?” Satoru murmured. He seemed scared, it was a bit funny.
“I couldn’t sleep”
“I don’t think that’s all”
“It’s not”
Satoru turned a 90 degree in his chair to fully face Suguru, his left arm on the back of the chair, coffee on the other hand.
“I’m sorry if it’s about the room. Or…anything I’ve done,” Satoru fumbled, running a hand through his hair. He didn’t want to sound whiny, but damn, this was frustrating. “You wouldn’t tell me if it was anyway, would you?”
Suguru didn’t look at him, his gaze fixed on the flames. “It’s not you. I don’t want you to feel that way.”
Satoru let out a heavy breath, hands tightening around his coffee mug. “You say that, but how am I supposed to know? You don’t actually tell me anything, so I’m left here guessing.” He paused, then added, “And if it’s not about me, I can be a better listener, y’know. I’m not just here to mess around. I can… help, or fight someone if that’s what you need.”
Suguru snorted, glancing the other way. “Fight someone?”
“Yeah, I’m serious,” Satoru shot back with a grin. “But it’s killing me, sitting here and doing nothing while you’re…” He trailed off, the words sticking in his throat. Suguru didn’t need to hear all that.
“why are you so sure that something is wrong?”
“So you’re just playing mind games with me?”
“I would never”
With that, a silence settled again, while the sound of fire extinguishers gradually slowed down in the background.
Satoru opened his mouth to talk but Suguru started first. “I’m so proud of you these day, I wanted you to know that”
Satoru has his mouth open in disbelief, “Are you fucking dying or some shit?”
This made the other boy giggle, no, probably not, he wasn’t dying, he didn’t want or plan on dying, but it dawned on him that what he said might have that sort of implication, since they never talked like this.
“No, c’mon, I don’t have to be on the verge of death to be proud of you” he said, with a smile still tugging at his lips.
Satoru shook his head and turned away to sit straight at his chair, a bit embarrassed and entirely confused.
“I’m just a bit lost these days, that’s all” he said, trying to pull Satoru into the conversation again.
“lost, as in lost in purpose?” Satoru replied quietly.
“Something like that.”
“For me, it’s like, I’m free of my family, we’re finally living together,” pointing his finger between the two of them, “And I’m living my life, I don’t think you need a reason to live, you just do, it’s the matter of waking up everyday”
“yeah”
“This is not the case for you is it?”
“I don’t know, sometimes it feels like I’m making rules for myself, that I need a reason to carry on, you know?” Satoru nodded. He continued“ Maybe it is enough and I’m just making things up in my head, all I know is that I’ve been having this strange feeling for a while”
“Please don’t break up with me at four in the morning.” Satoru deadpanned, he seemed half serious, Suguru thanked god for the other half.
“Yeah that’s exactly what I’m doing, now fuck off” He said with a bored expression, side eyeing Satoru.
“Okay I was just making sure”
“You’re extremely dumb”
“Shut the fuck up”
“Let’s go inside, the fire is out anyways”
Satoru didn’t move, it felt like he was hesitating to do something. It also felt a bit weird to see him like this, trying to be thoughtful and giving himself time to choose the right words. He was never like that in high school. His way of caring used to be louder, more possessive, more centered around his own ways, this quiet consideration was new.
“can you, like, elaborate on that, on what you said earlier,”
Suguru took a steadying breath. “My mental health hasn’t been great lately. I thought moving into separate rooms was just for sleep, but it turns out I needed the space more than I realized. It’s not about you, though. I’m… working through it. Some days it just feels like too much. I didn’t want to lash out at you. that’s all, sorry”
Satoru’s eyes softened. “You don’t have to apologize for that. I want to help.”
“No, now I feel like an asshole,” Suguru muttered.
Satoru chuckled. “That’s because you are. It sometimes feels like you would rather die than let me help you”
“You are helping me,”
“But I want to really help you, like, hear all of it, you were there through all of my bullshit, there’s basically nothing about me that you don’t already know about.”
“I’m not hiding anything, we spend every waking hour together, how can I even possibly do that.”
Satoru seemed to be deep in thought. “Okay yeah, you’re right” he finally said, his tone heavy with something Suguru couldn’t fully point on.
It was a minute later that Suguru figured out what he might’ve implied, that Satoru was there, know everything and couldn’t do anything in practice.
He felt awful, like, really fucking awful. Maybe a few years back this might have been true, not in a bad way, not in a way that made him question if Satoru really cared, but in how they were, how sometimes even doing what you know is best isn’t enough. They were kids then, but now this wasn’t the case. He didn’t want Satoru to feel like what he was doing wasn’t enough because it was, he had learned so much since high school, they both did.
“I’m going to tell you something, and you have to accept that, or we won’t get anywhere” Suguru said, and gazed up at the ceiling. “You can’t make everything right no matter how much you try, do you get that?”
“kind of”
“ ‘kind of’ won’t cut it, I need you to understand this. I could’ve been more vocal, I get that, but none of this is your fault, sometimes our brains work in strange ways, maybe there is something wrong with my body, there are a hundred possibilities why I don’t feel better no matter what I do, and that’s only, like, ten percent of times” he looked down, and then at Satoru “ what I’m saying is, you can’t escape your body no matter where you go”
“I think what you’re doing is giving it some sort of deeper explanation. And I won’t have anything to say back” Satoru knew he tends to get lost in his own life, maybe overlook some stuff, but he couldn’t deliberately overlook this, he couldn’t live with himself if he did.
“No, you have to trust me, I shouldn’t be relying on you for everything. you only see yourself as the blame, like if you did something, if you did the right thing, said the right words, there would be no problem and everything would be perfect. I want you to understand how ridiculous it sounds”
Satoru went quiet with that, holding his coffee with both hands, for a second Suguru thought maybe he was dreaming, this didn’t feel real. They are really having this conversation at 4 a.m in their terrace. Sun was starting to come up and it seemed like the firefighters were done with their job.
The sky above them was really beautiful, maybe they should wake up everyday at this hour just to watch the sun come up.
After a few minutes, Satoru put his cup on the table, then dragged his chair with one hand, without fully getting up, to put it next to his chair. Then sat down and hugged him from the side.
Suguru chuckled, “Okay, Come on, let’s take this inside.”
“No, I’m tired”
They stood up anyway, heading back toward the kitchen. Suguru growned at the sight of the counter. “Fuck. Ashes everywhere.”
Satoru handed him a paper towel. “You clean the ashes. I’ll make breakfast.”
By the time they sat down to scrambled eggs, a sense of calm had settled between them.
“I can’t believe we survived midterms,” Suguru said, while tying his hair back.
Satoru groaned. “We didn’t appreciate high school enough. College is hell.”
“Yeah.”
While they were eating, the silence from outside seemed heavier. Suguru glanced toward the window, and his eyes lingered on the scene across the street. The café, which had once been bright with neon lights and soft music, now stood as a charred skeleton. The walls were black, parts of the roof caved in. The street was quiet again, save for the low hum of an engine from one of the last fire trucks.
“It’s really gone now”
Satoru’s gaze followed his, eyes settling on the remains. “Yeah, I hope the check is massive”
“You think they’ll rebuild it?” Suguru asked, his voice low.
Satoru leaned back, fingers running through his hair, deep in thought. “Maybe,” he replied. “But it won’t be the same. And I don’t mean in a bad way, maybe even the owners hated the old version and put the fire themselves”
Suguru nodded. “Yeah, I get that. But It’s hard to shake off the feeling of loss. It once burned down to ashes, how can you forget something like that?”
“It adds to the history though”
"It does"