Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I never expected you to actually finish anything. You were always leaving. I always picture you with a suitcase in your hand.” - Margarita Karapanou

After spending his first day off from Blue Lock walking the streets and gazing at the rippling waters of Sagami Bay, Rin returns to an empty house. 

He walks swiftly up the steps to the entrance, unlocking the door with a practiced twist of his wrist. The lights hum as he turns them on, and the white walls greet him with characteristic stillness as he takes off his shoes. His parents are still out, and so is Sae, by the looks of the genkan. 

Rin doesn't know why Sae came back. Just for a day, he'd said earlier, to see mom and dad. And once he'd dumped his things in his old room, he had slept and was gone when the morning came. He'll return, Rin supposes, seeing the suitcase still next to Sae's bed, but as of right now it's like he barely exists. It’s no different from all those years he was on the other side of the world.

There's still rice in the rice cooker, so Rin starts on a quick dinner for himself, seasoning fish and washing vegetables in the sink. The routine calms him; he lets his focus go to his hands and away from the turbulent churning of his mind. 

All his nights are nights like these, after all. Rin and Sae's parents have always been career-oriented; it was that single-minded determination of theirs that had funded the boys’ soccer dreams. As a result, however, they were— are —never home, and Rin had mostly been raised by Sae instead. When Sae went to Spain, he got used to cooking his own simple dinners and going to sleep in a house that was silent like the dead. 

(At Blue Lock, it’d been much the same—solitary dinners late at night and lonely bedtime routine; only once had he had company. Damn Isagi.)

Rin’s head drifts back to the waves he’d seen today, the gentle rocking of the boats just beyond the docks, the glint of sun on distant trees. He gets to work sautéing and stirring. He’s about to plate the food when he hears the turning of the doorknob and jumps.

Mom and dad are never home this early. It must be Sae.

“Oh.” There’s something comical in Sae’s blank stare as he registers Rin standing by the stove, or maybe it’s the way he stops short in the doorway, plastic bag dangling pathetically from his hand. “I’m back.”

“Welcome back,” Rin says. 

They regard each other awkwardly until Rin speaks again.

“Do you need… are you hungry?”

Sae shakes his head. “Don’t bother. I bought a sandwich from the corner store.”

Something in Rin’s chest chafes at the hollowness of whatever this is between them, like it’s a bird bone, brittle and bleak, with thin air at the heart of it. The part that hurts is that there was something there once, but there’s no point in pausing to zoom in on all the ways they don’t need each other anymore. 

That’s no longer his point of concern. Everything in him needs to be reborn; he has to leave the past, his regrets, his pain, all of it behind. That's what the U-20 match taught him.

He turns back to his dinner and finishes sliding the fish onto his plate. His hands move slowly, despite the familiarity of the action.

It’s odd, sitting next to Sae. The kitchen table is populated with the click of Rin’s chopsticks and the sound of Sae’s careful, methodical bites of his sandwich, and it rings. It’s as if Sae’s presence here has somehow displaced the air that used to sit in his chair and the ripples are pricking at Rin’s face.

He must not be thinking, when he breaks the silence. It must be that this tortured existence has finally driven him mad, because even before the thought enters his head, his mouth is open and he’s asking, “Where were you?”

“Why do you care?” 

Rin’s heart drops, but Sae swallows and keeps going. “Took a walk, then stopped by the field for some casual practice. Got a call I couldn’t decline halfway through, so it took longer than I planned.”

Rin snorts in disgust. There’s only one person Sae would allow to interrupt him during soccer. “Shidou?” When Sae doesn’t respond, he takes it as an affirmation. “Your good-for-nothing flirting is going to bite you in the ass someday.”

“Does it bother you?” Sae asks, raising an eyebrow.

“I don’t care. It’s just stupid; I would never let someone mess with my focus like that.”

Sae’s eyes narrow. “I’ve never been distracted when it counts. You of all people should know that.”

Rin feels his mouth fill with a sour aftertaste like rotten apples. “Sorry for not knowing you as well as you want me to,” he says coldly. “But you’re the one who chose to disappear for years and come back a complete dickface. And considering that you lost yesterday, I’d think you need all the practice you can get.”

“Don’t get complacent,” Sae warns. “You won a single one-on-one, but when it came down to it, it was Isagi who scored the last goal, wasn’t it? You’re still not good enough to call yourself a decent striker.”

“Fuck you,” Rin snarls.

“See? I’m right.” Sae’s face twists inscrutably, and he returns to eating. 

Rin stares at his brother’s face, chopsticks forgotten, consumed by the tightening of his ribs and the unidentifiable pain in his throat. Sae just keeps on chewing, abstaining from eye contact, aloof and heavy-lidded and better than Rin as always, and Rin is a boiling pot, steam and pressure building and building and building and building and building until he’s had enough.

Fuck it.

His chair screeches against the floor in protest as he bolts up abruptly. He doesn’t see Sae’s expression as he storms out, and he doesn’t care to. All he cares about is getting on the soccer field to blow off this too-big, too-sharp feeling, doing his yoga routine uninterrupted and alone, and letting sleep swallow him whole so that for a few blessed hours, nothing will exist at all.

His hopes, few as they are, are dashed. Instead of sinking into blank nothingness that night, Rin dreams.

He’s back on the field at Blue Lock, fighting with Shidou. Somehow, through a blur of moving arms, Rin manages to pin him down, hands around his neck as the bastard laughs maniacally. He doesn’t remember what they’re fighting about, only that he needs Shidou to stop moving, stop talking, stop fucking laughing . 

Your own brother likes me more than you, Shidou’s triumphant grin seems to say. Give up.

Just as Rin’s grip falters, Isagi appears. His mouth is moving, but Rin scarcely hears a thing, too focused on the jersey he’s wearing, on the jerseys both his adversaries are wearing. They’re the national team’s jerseys, and is that one of Sae’s medals hanging around Isagi’s neck? Rin would know, given all the hours he’s spent staring at them, and when he looks down to check his own kit he’s horrified to realize he’s a child again, in his little wool sweater and tiny sneakers and chubby hands, and how is he supposed to beat his rivals like this? and then—

He turns over in his sleep.

—And then cold hits him like a cresting wave, and snow is falling, the flakes damp on his cheek, and it’s not Shidou beneath him anymore but Sae, eyes cold and arrogant as they’ve always been, and Rin must be choking the life out of him but it elicits no reaction in the same way nothing Rin ever does manages to make an impression on him.

“Your efforts are so lukewarm I could puke,” Sae says, and Rin’s crying, hot tears spilling down his cheeks and icing over. 

“Where’s my brother?” Rin demands, but Sae doesn’t answer, so Rin shakes him, once, twice, harder and harder. “Where’s my brother? Who are you? Where is nii-chan? ”

The last thing he sees before he wakes up is his brother with his back turned, suitcase in hand.

Rin opens his eyes to a dark ceiling. His ceiling fan whirs quietly, and the sound of his breathing is harsh and jagged in the stillness of his room.

He blinks a few times and squints at his clock. It’s 4 A.M.—more than an hour before his alarm goes off. It must have been the turbulence of the dream that startled him out of sleep, or so he thinks until he hears soft footsteps from the other room.

When he opens his door, he shuts his eyes instinctively against the harsh light and opens them again to the sight of Sae, fully dressed with his suitcase by his side. He’s leaving, it seems, to some hotel in Tokyo or wherever he’s going next.

Sae turns when he hears him, and in the near-empty, yawning space of the hallway, he looks small, tired. “Rin.”

Rin doesn’t answer. 

Sae opens the front door, then says, “Don’t waste any more of your time. See you.”

And he’s gone.

Back in the darkness of his room, Rin gives up on sleeping, feeling his skin tugged this way and that by the knowledge that once again, he’s been left behind. 

Fuck this, Rin thinks. Why do I even still care? 

He knows the answer. He remembers the way his breath caught when Sae had walked up to him on that field and said, “I was wrong.” For a moment, he’d thought he’d finally gotten what he’d been after for so long, and it had been golden. It was like finally coming home to the days when Sae was the brother he knew, like seeing the snow melt and knowing spring had come.

But he hadn’t. He hadn’t gotten it. He hadn’t gotten anything at all.

Isn’t this how it always goes, with them? Sae leaves, and he comes back different. He goes to Spain and comes back a stranger, abandoning their dream, crushing everything Rin worked for. Leaves again and comes back a coldhearted judge, looking at anyone, anyone but Rin. 

And tonight he shows up like a fleeting apparition just to disappear once again into the dark. 

You’re not necessary in my life anymore.

Rin might have learned something in that U-20 match, might have realized searching for an answer in another person had been chains he needed to shake off, but old habits die hard, and the words that shattered his world that day have been echoing in his head every night since they were spoken.

Maybe he should be thankful Sae had come home at all. With a heavy, tired heart, Rin closes his eyes and waits for the morning.

Chapter Text

“Any fear, any memory will do; and if you’ve got a heart at all, someday it will kill you.” - Rita Dove

Sae closes the door behind him and exhales, watching his breath turn to mist in the icy January air. Then he starts walking. He has a train to catch.

Once he reaches the station and boards, he finds himself a window seat and puts his earbuds in, preparing for an hour of just watching the darkness blur. Train rides are hit-or-miss for him; they can be oppressively boring or strangely relaxing. 

He sighs. A touch of hunger has started curling around his stomach, which doesn’t bode well for the trip ahead, and definitely not afterward. His manager has been delayed on his way to Tokyo, and Sae has never been the best at getting food for himself. He doesn’t cook anything but the simplest of meals, mostly eating what his dietitian decides for him or buying something from the store down the street from his apartment in Spain, so the prospect of having to fend for himself tonight isn’t pleasant. What he tells the interviewers— I don’t know anything besides soccer— it’s true. It’s a wonder he and Rin survived for so long with such busy parents.

Rin must’ve thought him some sort of guardian angel, and in his youth Sae had enjoyed feeling like one, but in reality they had just been two boys. Boy brings his brother home and microwaves the food their mother left in the fridge. Boy plays soccer and brings his brother along for the ride. 

Boy becomes genius, learns that he hadn’t known anything at all about the world, and is born again into some sort of tepid hell.

Before he realizes, Sae starts to doze off, lulled by the gentle motion of the train and the dark blues and grays outside. He’d slept a little before this, but waking up at three in the morning didn’t do him any favors. The world fades, the gentle motion of the train being all he registers as his head droops against his shoulder.

Then a tinny voice blares through the train car and startles him awake. Next stop, Shinagawa station, it says. All passengers getting off at this stop should be prepared to exit. 

Nothing nice ever lasts, does it?

The chill hits Sae in the face as soon as he’s out in the open air again. He takes a few resigned steps in the direction of the hotel before something occurs to him: Shidou lives in this city. 

He shouldn’t, hypothetically. It’s so early. It would be unimaginably rude to come calling at this ridiculous hour on such little notice, but if anyone’s familiar with being unimaginably rude, it’s Sae.

what’s your address? he texts. 

Nearly three minutes pass, and Sae figures Shidou’s probably asleep until a reply pops up.

Ohoho how forward!! We havent even been on a date yet ;) Really desperate for me, arent you Sae-chan?

Sae rolls his eyes. 

Shidou’s address appears not even three seconds later.

“Sae-chan! I missed you so much! It’s such a blessing to see your beautiful face again!” Shidou exclaims, opening his arms wide and reaching for Sae, who pushes past him brusquely. 

“It’s only been one day; don’t be so dramatic.”

Shidou’s smile doesn’t falter at all. “Can you blame me? You make my heart explode so hard, everything else feels so dull in comparison.”

Sae toes off his shoes as he enters, allowing Shidou to close the door behind him. It’s a modest, comfortable apartment, furnished here and there with pops of color and lively plants. If Sae’s being honest with himself, it looks much more home-y, much more lived in, than his own house, which at this point is just a collection of rooms holding mementos and piled with dust. 

“So what brings you to my humble enclosure?” Shidou asks, slinging an arm around Sae’s shoulders and guiding him into the living room.

“Just passing by. Thought you’d like to see me.” Not entirely a lie.

“Wow, did the Itoshi Sae decide to do something nice for little old me?! I must be the luckiest guy on Earth!” Shidou says. 

Sae knows Shidou is smarter than he lets on. Shidou probably—definitely—knows Sae isn’t just here out of the kindness of his heart, that Sae is egocentric and selfish and unbearably cold, but that also means he can sense that Sae wouldn’t come to just anybody for what he wants or needs. So he accepts it unflinchingly, just like Sae knew he would, and he guides Sae to the kitchen with a warmth that is inexplicably unlike the way Sae’s had doors opened for him in the past. 

“Any requests?” he asks. “Even geniuses must need to eat something once in a while, right?”

“Tea,” Sae says. “Rice, if you have it.”

“That all? Who do you take me for?” Shidou gives Sae a mock put-upon look. “Ah, well. Coming right up!”

He’s heading to the cabinets above the microwave when a voice cuts him off.

“Oh, who’s this? Ryuu, you didn’t tell me you had a guest over.”

A woman wearing pastel purple pajamas stands in the doorway rubbing her eyes. She looks to be in her early forties, with gentle, downturned eyes and straight brown hair, and notably, she stands about as tall as Sae, who despite being shorter than most of his peers is still taller than most Japanese women. 

“Hey, mom. This is Sae, and I would’ve told you he was coming, but he surprised me, like he always does. Were we too loud?” Shidou addresses his mother with a softness Sae hasn’t seen yet from him. Somehow Shidou is always surprising him.

“Not at all,” she assures him. 

When she turns to Sae, Shidou gives him a look. I get it, Sae thinks, and before anyone says another word, he gives her a slight bow. “Itoshi Sae. Pleasure to meet you.”

“Shidou Tsubame, and the pleasure’s mine. I’m very happy to see that Ryuu has such a close friend that you can visit each other just like this.” Tsubame gives him a smile, and something in Sae’s brain is knocked askew by the friendliness in her gaze. He looks at her, at Shidou, and at the plants adorning the space, and he becomes aware of some unexplainable pain in his chest. 

“Do you need anything?” she asks.

Shidou cuts in. “He needs breakfast, but I’ll take care of—” 

“Nonsense,” Tsubame says, waving a hand. “You boys just sit down and make yourselves comfortable, and I’ll make you both something.” 

When Shidou looks like he’s about to protest, she tilts her head and gives him that same look he’d just given Sae, and Shidou huffs and sits at the table. Sae follows, feeling vaguely uncomfortable until Shidou coos quietly at him. 

“Aww, look at you, turns out you can be polite. You’re so adorable, Sae-chan.”

Sae bristles. “Watch it.”

Shidou smiles and waves a finger. “You’re in my house now, so between you and me, I make the rules here.”

“I can always just leave —”

“Well actually, I pay the rent for this apartment, and Ryuu may be right but that’s nothing to be ashamed about, Sae-kun,” Tsubame interrupts, her voice airy and bright. “Good manners will always be welcome in this household. Don’t tease, Ryuu.” 

“You should’ve seen his face, mom,” Shidou whines playfully. “It was priceless, if you’d have seen it you’d tease him too.”

“Can it,” she responds, just as playful.

Meanwhile, Sae retreats into himself, lets his face shutter; he’s out of his element here, a stray day of barren, frigid wind in a blaze of warm spring. He feels as if he’s watching a TV show—distant, unreal. He has nothing to offer in this situation, and he’s starting to wonder why he came here.

Unlike a TV show, however, Shidou is real and he takes notice of the change; a feat, considering Sae’s eternal resting bitch face. “Hey, why the long face, genius? Something wrong?”

Nobody has really asked Sae that question in a long time. Sae hasn’t answered that question truthfully in a long time either, though, and he’s not about to break that habit. 

“Yeah,” he says. “There’s a loud, annoying demon in my ear. You’d do well to learn how to keep your mouth shut.”

“Pshhh, you know you love me!”

“In your dreams.” 

Before Shidou can retort, Tsubame’s hand slides two bowls onto the table, rice and fried eggs topped with soy sauce, sprinkled nori, and a bit of pepper. “How about you use that mouth for eating some nice, hot food instead of chatting your friend’s ear off, huh?” she suggests, sly smile gracing her gentle features. She also places a steaming mug of tea in front of Sae. “I eavesdropped a little and heard you asking for this, hope you don’t mind.”

“It’s alright. Thanks, Shidou-san,” Sae says, while the younger Shidou cheers a similar sentiment.

Sae looks warily at his serving. It’s more food than he’s used to eating so early in the morning, and more filling too, so he supposes he’ll just do his best, and whatever he doesn’t eat Shidou will probably steal. 

It turns out that having hot, fresh, home cooked food in the morning across from a boisterous soccer demon isn't terrible at all.

Sae ends up texting his manager that, due to an unexpected detour, he’ll also be late to their meeting at the hotel, and his manager, though exasperated, seems to have gotten used to Sae’s odd, spontaneous decisions enough to be able to shrug it off. This buys a couple of days with Shidou, the first of which they spend on the soccer field in a nearby park, buffeted by fierce winds, hearts racing in time with each other as they sweep past imaginary defenders and send one rocket after another into the goal. 

They come back sweaty and breathing hard, and after Tsubame opens the door for them, Shidou insists on letting Sae shower first. Then, as Shidou showers, Tsubame invites Sae to the kitchen for tea.

They sit in silence for a few moments, drinking from their respective cups, before Tsubame addresses him quietly. 

“Y’know, Sae-kun, I meant what I said earlier. I really am very happy you’re here. Ryuu hasn’t brought any friends over in a very long time, and even though he never seemed like it, I was scared he was lonely. And he kept getting in trouble at school. Starting fights, they said.” She smiles sheepishly, pushing her hair back with a hand. “But then he played that match with you, and he came home, and every other word out of his mouth was about you. He said you made his heart explode.”

She takes a sip from her tea. Sae wonders if he should respond, but she continues.

“I saw the two of you play together, and it really looked like he was having the time of his life. So I ought to thank you, Sae-kun. I really do appreciate it.”

“It’s nothing,” Sae says. “He was the most interesting player at Blue Lock. I wanted to bring that talent out of him, so I did.”

Tsubame laughs softly. “You say that, being so talented yourself. And your brother was on that field too, right? I heard the commentators talking about it. Two brilliant sons—your parents must be so proud.”

“Ah.” Sae abstains from answering this time, bringing his cup back to his lips. His parents are always a touchy subject for him; when asked about his family by interviewers, he normally bullies them into changing the topic, but this is Shidou’s mother and not some random stranger.

Sensing his discomfort, she changes the subject anyway. “So when did you start playing soccer?”

This, he can answer easily. “I’ve been playing ever since I can remember.”

“You certainly have the skill to show for it. You must have worked hard.”

“You don’t have to flatter me, Shidou-san.”

Tsubame squints at him. “Oh, take the compliment, will you? It’s honest praise.”

Sae dips his head in acceptance, and she smiles, in a good-enough kind of way.

“I’ve been wondering something, you know,” she says. “If it weren’t for Ryuusei, you probably would’ve scored more than half the goals for that U-20 team. What made you decide to become a midfielder? I’m sure you could’ve been a brilliant forward, and Japan sure is in need of brilliant forwards, aren’t we? Not judging, just curious.”

“I wanted to be the best in the world,” he answers simply, before he has time to second-guess himself. “There was no room for me on that stage as a striker.”

Tsubame's face softens. “I’m sorry.” she says. When Sae shakes his head, trying to tell her there’s nothing she could possibly be sorry for, she holds out a hand to stop him. “You just sound so sad. I touched a nerve, didn’t I?”

“Hey mom?” Shidou’s voice rings out from the hallway all of a sudden, startling them both. “Did you move the moisturizer? I can’t find it.” A dramatic gasp. “Sae! You didn’t steal my moisturizer, did you, you pampered little prodigy?!”

Tsubame sighs, exasperated but fond. “Be there in a minute,” she calls. As she stands and passes by Sae’s chair, she asks, “Will you be okay?”

He nods. 

A smile creases her kind eyes, and she reaches out to ruffle his hair. Then, with one last concerned glance back at him, she leaves Sae sitting there stock-still, borne back forcefully into the past like a ship on stormy waters.

3 YEARS AGO:

Spain is everything and nothing Sae thought it would be. Yes, it is brilliant, fast-paced soccer. Yes, it is strange, it is new. Yes, the hot sun beats down on him here with the strength of a lion.

No, he does not love it like he thought he would.

The whirlwind of an unfamiliar language dancing around him, buffeting him, a climate he’s not used to, that makes him ill, and a soccer that is, for the very first time, too fast, too brilliant for him to keep up with—all of it leads him here, to his coach’s office, two years after he arrived.

“You keep saying I’m doing the best I can, but I’m not. This isn’t good enough to be the best in the world. Tell me how to beat Luna. And Kaiser. And all the others, everyone in every country. Why can’t I score as much as them?”

Coach Delgado looks like he was expecting this. “We’ve been talking about this a lot, haven’t we? Your playing… it’s not aggressive enough. Your weapons aren’t specialized enough for an international level of playing. Your dribbling and kicks are genius-level, but at the end of the day… it feels like something about your style, your foundation, something isn’t fully developed for it.”

Sae grits his teeth. He’s gotten better at English over the years, but it still takes him a moment to find the words. “I’ve surpassed myself a dozen times since coming here, and you’re telling me it’s still not enough?”

“The numbers speak for themselves, don’t they?”

A lesser boy would need to fight back tears at this, but Sae doesn’t. He shakes his head. “Don’t give me this again. Tell me how to get better. Tell me, and I’ll do it.”

There’s a sadness in Delgado’s eyes, a resigned sort of sorrow that Sae resents. “I’m your coach, Sae, but I’m not a miracle worker.”

“I’ve been playing soccer my whole life with the sole intention of becoming the best striker in the world. I won’t settle for a soccer that’s less than that.”

“You could always quit.” 

“I can’t. ” Soccer is all he has. It’s all he knows. There’s nothing else in the world he could turn to.

Delgado hums, looking pensive. “Best in the world,” he mutters, stroking his chin. He does this for such a long time that Sae nearly turns around to leave, then he sighs and says, “You could switch to midfield. Your passes are good, your dribbling, and your smarts… you could do very well as a midfielder. In fact, I’d say you’re probably better suited to it than being a striker.”

Sae looks at him incredulously. “You can’t be serious.”

Delgado just sets his jaw and doesn’t say anything.

“Don’t give me that bullshit. I’m going to be the best striker in the world. Tell me how to do it,” Sae demands, anger beginning to bubble. 

“At this point, I’m starting to think you can’t,” Delgado says. “If you had been in a training environment like this from the start, maybe, but…”

“So you’re saying I can’t achieve my goals because I was born in Japan? ”

Delgado sighs. “You have to master ‘nature’ and ‘nurture’ in order to make good soccer players. It seems to me you were not nurtured well in your youth. I'm sorry.”

Sae just stares at him wordlessly, throat and ribs and brain and heart all mashed up in his mouth, everything he’s ever known crumpling to ash in his hands. 

He can do it if he tries, surely. Maybe it’s a little harder here without Rin to read his mind and carry out his plays without even blinking, maybe he’s not as naturally gifted or as tall as some of the other players, but he’s Itoshi Sae. He was born to be the best in the world. He was. He’s worthless otherwise.

“I know you’re working hard, but all the others are doing just as much, and they had an advantage from the start. But if you’re aiming to be number one at something, this is your best bet,” Delgado says. “Think about it, yeah? I’ll talk to you again tomorrow.”

Sae turns and leaves without a second glance, knuckles white on the hard metal doorknob as he exits. He stares at the floor on the way to the locker room, collects his things without thinking, letting his hands detach from his brain and grab, zip, hoist. He watches his feet as he makes the journey home.

All the while, internally he’s fuming, he’s breaking, he’s panicked out of his fucking mind. Who does this guy think he is? he rages, knowing that it’s not just his coach’s word—the results speak for themselves—but wanting to believe he’s wrong anyway. What should I do? What about everything I’ve done for my whole life? What about my dream? I’m nothing without my dream.

What am I going to tell Rin?

Sae finds himself back at his apartment, sitting at his kitchen table, staring at the cold, sad dinner he’s bought for himself, and he’s so goddamn tired of all of it, so tired of feeling so lonely that sometimes he’s sure he’d rather die than stay here. In a moment of weakness, he thinks, I want to go home.

But he can never go home. Home was the thrill of brilliant goals, ice cream by the bay, and believing that he could, in time, be the best striker on the planet.

He doesn’t sleep that night. The sheets are too rough, the air too warm, the beating of his heart too damn loud.

Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. 

When the morning dawns, not quite gray but not quite blue, Sae has made up his mind. If he can’t be the best striker in the world, then he can at least be the best in the world as a midfielder. Fuck anyone who says that Itoshi Sae can’t be the champion of the Earth.

He goes to practice. He tells his coach. He starts training to play midfield.

Quietly, quietly, his heart says goodbye.

Chapter Text

“How many nights your name appeared on my lips like an incantation, how many times you’ve arrived in a dream pale as a prayer at dawn—your absence burns a hole through my waking.” - Leila Chatti

Rin buckles down for two weeks of lonely training and horror games. He does consider, briefly, the possibility of heading back to his old team to practice with them, just for a bit, but it would be useless. There’s no worth in that team; after being in Blue Lock and fighting his older brother again, he’s realized running around on that field of ants was a waste of time. He’d much rather spend his days off conditioning and immersing himself in the thrill of dark, abandoned hallways and scuttling creatures in the night. 

So the sun rises and sets with little fanfare day after day, letting Rin fold himself back into the soft fabric of routine. Training. Games. Movies. It’s peaceful, feels odd as much as it does comfortable, and he should have known the monotony wouldn’t last.

The wrinkle in the fabric comes as Rin’s walking home from the store. The afternoon is a calm one; there’s a light wind and a few gulls squawking along the sand. He lets his feet carry him on autopilot, drifting as he usually does into distant contemplation. My stamina is coming along well, but I have to work on kick accuracy today. I missed too many shots in the U-20 match. I need to improve my footwork and speed too, but I don’t have defenders to practice against, so that’ll—

And then he stops short. Standing on the shore is someone he never thought he’d see in Kamakura.

Lean, well-balanced build. Faraway look in his eyes. Purple hair swaying in the breeze.

That’s Mikage Reo from Blue Lock. 

For a single embarrassing moment, Rin short-circuits, uncomprehending. It feels like some crazy trick of fate, a traveler from another universe making an appearance in Rin’s hometown. But he recovers quick, and incredulity replaces his shock as Reo looks over, recognizes him, and waves.

Ah, fuck. Rin had been hoping to just walk past and ignore Reo like he hadn’t seen him, but that’s no longer an option, so he strides up to him and says the first thing that pops into his head.

“What the fuck? You don’t live here.”

Reo cocks an eyebrow. “Who says I don’t?”

“The enormous building in Tokyo that has your name on it,” Rin deadpans. “Don’t be stupid, rich boy. Why are you here? Are you stalking me or something?”

“Bold of you to assume I’m interested in you enough to stalk you,” Reo replies, the smartass. Under Rin’s glare, he relents and says, “I came for a little vacation. My attendant Ba-Ya says there’s nice temples here, and a good view of the water.”

Rin snorts. A personal attendant. 

“Something funny?”

“So you’re a spoiled brat looking to slack off, is what you’re telling me.” Spoiled. You and my brother both, Rin thinks with a pang. Rich people and their stupid managers and stupid chauffeurs and whatnot.

“You’ll be changing that tune the second you want something bought for you,” Reo says, challenging. 

“Don’t bother. I don’t take charity.”

“That’s what they all say.” 

Rin lets the conversation grind to a halt as Reo turns back toward the bay, expression turning thoughtful. It almost feels like they’re done and Rin can walk away when Reo opens his mouth again and spoils it. 

“Rin, are you busy today?”

“Why?”

Reo looks him in the eye then, and his mouth twitches up into a small smile. “Play soccer with me.”

Rin caves fairly easily. This is because he’d been needing a partner to practice against anyway and Reo just happened to present a good opportunity, that’s it. It is not at all because Reo has the connections and money to get him access to horror games that haven’t even come out yet; that’s just a bonus. Itoshi Rin is not a man who can be bribed with such miniscule offerings. He’s merely making a smart investment.

(Incidentally, Reo seems quite practiced at cajoling stubborn bastards into playing soccer with him.)

“We can just walk, the field’s fifteen minutes away,” Rin says, once he’s finished dragging his heels, but Reo insists on having Ba-Ya drive them.

“Come on, you’ve never wondered what the inside of a Mercedes looks like? Sae may be rich, but he doesn’t look like the type of brother who’d treat you to stuff like that,” Reo says. 

“It’s a miracle you’re still in shape,” Rin snarks. “Brat.”

“Okay, peasant,” Reo replies, playing along. “Guess I’ll never end up getting any of those games for you.”

So Rin greets Reo’s elderly chauffeur with mild discomfort, entering the car and sliding onto the plushest seats he’s ever encountered. The inside is spotless, the smell fresh, the space large. Reo offers him his choice of beverage with a casual, friendly air and Rin turns him down as stiffly as humanly possible.

Rin folds his hands together in his lap, staring at nothing, intent on keeping silent. Meanwhile, Ba-Ya starts up a conversation with Reo.

“A new friend, Reo-sama?”

“Sort of,” Reo says, at the same time Rin says, “No.”

Reo laughs. “We met in Blue Lock; he was my teammate and captain in the match against the U-20 team.”

“Captain… oh, the number 10 jersey? An impressive young man, if I do recall. You have quite the talent for finding these gems, Reo-sama.”

“Aren’t I lucky?”

Rin’s eye twitches. He’s two seconds away from hurling himself out of the car, risk of injury be damned, when they come smoothly to a stop at the local soccer field. Luckily, it’s deserted. To Rin, it’s just the same old pitch he remembers from childhood, but Reo scans the rusting goalposts and fraying netting with something that looks like disappointment. It’s almost funny. 

Reo produces a ball from seemingly nowhere, then waves Ba-Ya off. “Ready to get started?”

Rin just grunts.

They stretch, and they begin warming up by passing the ball back and forth, moving down the pitch, increasing in speed and intensity. Reo plays around a little bit, a quiet, focused expression on his face as he dribbles a moment and maneuvers the ball this way and that, while Rin minimizes his own movements, efficiency his foremost goal. After perhaps his tenth or eleventh touch, Rin wheels the ball to a stop under his heel.

“We’ll play a 1v1. First to three wins.”

Reo nods, walking up to the center line. “Let’s go, then.”

Reo is a competent defender, but he can only copy what he’s seen, and he’s a striker first, like everyone else in Blue Lock. He presses Rin with ferocity enough to be an annoyance, sure. His feet, though, aren’t quick enough to interfere with Rin’s dribbles, his mind not seasoned enough to outsmart him. And his presence on the field, though a threat, cannot close off all of Rin’s options. Rin scores his first goal thinking, Oh, that’s it, huh.

When Reo gets possession and goes on the offense, however, Rin lowers his stance in preparation and watches to see what kind of attacker Mikage Reo will be. Reo handles the ball with what looks to be effortless skill, pressing forward methodically, and Rin backs up, conceding ground, until Reo whips around in a quick roulette turn and he’s chasing to keep pace. He hooks out a foot to see if he might be able to steal, but Reo knocks the ball away from him and shoots, accurate and neat. 

I see. I’ll deal with you quickly. 

Rin scores his next goal even quicker than the first, and when Reo takes the ball, Rin darts in quick to steal and then starts a counter before Reo can breathe. In his haste to finish the match, to appease his pride, Rin’s shot is a tad shoddy, and Reo manages to dart in with a rapid deflection. Shit. That was stupid. There’s something casually dextrous about Reo’s next move, a grace in the way he snatches the ball that reminds Rin of that lazy shithead Nagi, and Rin races to plant himself in front of Reo and stop his advance. 

Reo pauses a moment, eyes calculating. He steps onto his left foot, and Rin recognizes the movement a half-second too late. He lashes out with a foot, but he doesn’t reach in time to stop it from happening.

Quick as a hare, Reo crosses his right leg back and drives the ball straight through Rin’s legs.

What the fuck—

Rin loses hold of himself, then. 

Later, he remembers retaking possession, rapidly putting the ball in the back of the net, but all of that is a background whirlwind; at the center, once he’s breathing again, seeing again, he’s holding Reo by the front of his jacket and snarling at him. 

“Is this a joke? Are you mocking me?”

“That’s not what this is.” Reo’s voice is hard and even, but Rin sees the look of uneasiness in his eyes. 

“What is it, then, rich boy?” Rin asks, malice coursing through his veins. “A challenge? An insult? If you just came here to be an annoyance, you can fuck right off back to your fancy skyscrapers in the city.” 

In other words: Why did you copy Sae’s move and use it against me? Did you know what would happen when it worked?

Reo sighs. The tension goes out of him, and he sags in Rin’s grip. “Last week, when I saw you and your brother play against each other, I was… awestruck. The nutmeg that got past you in the first half… I just wanted to see if I could do it. I’ve been watching videos of him for hours just to figure it out.”

Rin loosens his fingers. “It wasn’t a coincidence that you met me here, was it?”

“Not really. I figured if I was going to play soccer during my break, it might as well be against one of the best I know.”

Rin scoffs and turns away. He doesn’t even know what to say to that. 

Before the two of them, peach-pink clouds are beginning to streak the sky, cornflower blue fading to indigo. The breeze rustles the grass. The ball lays forgotten in the back of the goal. 

“How did you find out where I live?” Rin says, still irritated, when it occurs to him to ask. He has a guess as to the answer, but he wants to hear it from Reo’s mouth.

“I have connections. It wasn’t hard to find Itoshi Sae’s hometown. Downsides of being famous, I guess,” Reo says. “And Nagi’s birthplace is also in this prefecture. I just wanted to catch a glimpse of the neighborhood where he grew up, and I thought while I was in the area, I could head over to Kamakura and maybe be lucky enough to run into you.”

It’s the stupidest thing Rin’s ever heard. He believes it, though. Reo’s the Mikage heir; of course he came running over the moment he had that idea. Gets everything he wants, doesn’t he?

Rin sits down on the grass, suddenly winded, then immediately regrets it because of how weak it must make him look, but instead of making fun of him like he deserves or giving him a judgemental look, Reo just follows suit. 

Eyes on the sunset, Reo says, “What did Sae say to you after the U-20 match?”

Rin flinches. “ What? ”

Reo winces as well but soldiers on anyway. “He came up to you afterward and said something nasty to you. I saw.”

“None of your business. Fuck off.”

Strangely, Reo smiles, plucking grass from the ground and shredding it in his fingertips. The torn blades scatter across his gloves, flecks of fresh green on solid black.

“The way you looked then… it reminded me of something. Well, for a second, you looked so hopeful I had to do a double take, like, Itoshi Rin can make that face? Like a kid on Christmas. But then he kept talking, and your head dropped, and you were just slumped there on the field like you were a torn puppet and someone had just left you there.”

His words itch at Rin. Is that really how he’d looked? Pathetic.

The sun melts into a band of magma at the horizon. Rin waits, still tense. After a heavy minute or two or five, he bites. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Just saying that I know the feeling, that’s all. If you figure out a way to deal with it, I wouldn’t mind hearing about it.”

Rin hates this entire situation, and he hates Reo being a prying bastard, and he hates talking to people about Sae, because they don’t ever get it. But there’s a weight to Reo’s confession, and the truth is the truth. Rin is not a coward.

“He said that Isagi might be the striker to birth a revolution in Japanese football. Isagi, not me. I’ll get better, though. I’ll show him. I’ll be reborn, and I’ll defeat both of them.”

Reo hums in sad agreement, ignoring Rin’s declarations. “Isagi, huh? It’s always him. Nagi was the same.”

Rin makes a vague noise that could be interpreted as confusion if you tried hard enough. He doesn’t really care about Reo’s business with Nagi.

Tragically, Reo explains anyway. “It’s complicated,” he says. “Nagi chose Isagi over me in the second selection and I’ve been fighting to get back at him ever since. Or get him back. I don’t know.” He sighs. “He broke my heart, but I still miss him. Isn’t that stupid?”

“Yes,” says Rin. “Being good at soccer is the only thing that matters.”

“Of course you’d say that,” Reo chuckles. “Soccer moron.”

“Soft rich kid.”

So they sit, quietly meditating on their respective heartbreaks, a stupid pair of stupid wounds united in the stupid act of missing their knives. They shiver as the wind turns cold. They watch as the sky fades to black.