Chapter Text
The prodigal son has returned.
Your phone is now filled with reminders of him, thoughtfully given to you by your friends. It starts with Makoto, though the ones who usually meddle in your personal life are Ryuji and Ann. Her sister tells her that Goro Akechi is back in Japan; she tells the groupchat that they should invite him out for drinks. You decide that Japan is a large country and, God willing, you will not have to look at Akechi’s face ever again.
Ann says, poking around at her tapioca pearls with a spoon, “You’re just scared he wont hook-up with you if you run into each other.
You scowl at her. “It’s been seven years.”
She blows her straw-wrapper at your face and smiles. “He was- is my friend, you know. I don’t remember him ever mentioning a lover after you.”
“Do you know why he’s back?” you ask, and pretend the curiosity isn’t killing you. Ann is used to this game and doesn’t acknowledge all the things you’ve left unsaid.
She gazes into your eyes with seriousness. She attempts to affect a lighthearted tone, but the solemn line of her mouth gives her away. “I think you should ask him that yourself.”
You have no intention of contacting him, after that conversation. His number burns holes into your phone screen where it sits innocuously and you wonder whether he’s changed it. You visit Shujin Academy, one month after the day Makoto informs you Akechi is in Japan, for no particular reason. The school is cordoned-off with fencing and the windows are boarded shut; the building is almost completely dilapidated, but you force open the gate and the front entrance. You’re not fond of this place; it would be more accurate to say you loathed the place whilst you were in it. You were made and unmade within these halls.
You make your way up to the rooftop, where you, Ann, and Ryuji would eat lunch and play truant. Footsteps echo off the walls, cobweb filled and dusty. Making this journey through Ayoma-Ichitome and Shujin Academy has been a regular endeavour for you since they announced the school’s closure. Your friends would call this habit concerning, but your feet inevitably bring you to this same building; this same rooftop; the same person.
The door to the rooftop makes way for you, rusty metal hinges shrieking into the night. A figure is sitting cross-legged at the edge, his back leaning into the metal railing (installed only after Shiho’s incident). There is a faint plume of smoking rising from their face, obscuring it from view. You start harshly and shine your phone flashlight at their face.
“It’s you,” you breathe, so low that you barely hear yourself over the thunderous heartbeat in your ears.
Akechi is staring at you, wide-eyed, frozen. He rises to his feet and drops the cigarette dangling between his fingers, crushing it under his trainers. He’s in Japan; on Shujin’s roof; he’s staring at you. For the first time in lifetimes, your eyes meet, and there’s palpable electricity between you. The space between you, before, thousands of miles with a yawning ocean, has been reduced to mere footsteps. Your surprise is mirrored in his expression, thrown into sharp relief by the pale winter moonlight. His hair is longer than you remember it ever being, his clothes are more casual.
“Akira,” he says, smooth and low in an unfamiliar way. A smoker's gentle rasp. “It’s been a while.”
You laugh, a little hysterical, a little euphoric. High on something you haven’t felt since he left. “This feels like fate,” you say.
“You… knew I was back?” he says.
“Sae-san,” you reply as an explanation.
“Ah.” He runs his hands through his hair, pushing his bangs back in a nervous tick you think he picked up from you.
You clear your throat. “Hey, uh, how long are you in Japan for?”
“Indefinitely,” he replies.
Startled, you blink once, twice, thrice. “No kidding?”
“Handed in my two-weeks and everything.”
“Oh.”
There’s a lull in the conversation while you assess him. The great love of your life, the one who got away. He smells like nicotine and the spring of your youth.
“Are you seeing anyone right now?” you blurt, unthinking. You regret it immediately when Akechi winces.
“Jesus Christ,” he says. He doesn't meet your eyes.
“Sorry, if you are, that's fine. It’s just that you're back and…” you trail off. You're torn between being apologetic and the writhing, tar-like mess in your stomach.
Akechi sighs. “You don't know?”
“Know what?”
He meets your eyes for the first time tonight. Crimson like freshly spilt blood and deadly serious; rimmed red and puffy. “I’m in Japan because my father is dead.”
You reach out as if to embrace him, the gesture returning you as smoothly as it did a decade ago. You seize up, though, because a chasm stretches between the two of you now. The last time you saw him was before his flight. “Shit, Goro, I'm sorry.”
He waves his hand. “It was long overdue. I don't hate him any less than before.”
“Still, he was your father and now he's dead.”
“Yeah,” he laughs. “Next time I see him will be in hell.”
“If there's anything you need, I'm available,” you insist. “You know that, right?”
Akechi smirks. It's sardonic and jaded, not like the wild, teenaged thing he'd flash before. “Helpful as always, Akira,” he says. “So, what do you do these days?”
You play along with his attempt to divert the topic, because this is still Akechi who is chronically averse to discussing himself. “I’m a psychiatrist. You worked for the government?”
“Yes. I should've expected you'd be a doctor. You were always such a busybody,” he says. He tries to sound neutral, you can tell. In reality the words are almost achingly fond and cloyingly sweet, edges tinged with age-old envy.
You smile. “Where in government? PubSec?”
A silver bangle glints prettily as he tucks his hair behind his ear. “Yeah, intelligence. You can imagine the amount of travel involved.”
“It suits you,” you says sincerely.
“How have you been?” Akechi asks.
He’s standing in front of you. It’s deep into the nighttime. The lingering smoke makes him look like the memory of a dream.
Amazing. I’ve never been worse. I think of you everyday. Nothing is real. I feel like god. I wish you stayed. I’ve moved on. I’ve found peace.
“Same as always,” you say.
...
Akechi calls you, days later, and tells you to meet him at the cemetery. It’s four in the morning so instead of going back to sleep or telling him off, you cancel your appointments for the day and rush to put your clothes on. You see him loitering by the entrance and follow him wordlessly.
Masayoshi Shido’s grave is an understated thing. He was in the national cabinet but he died a dirty criminal. Akechi dips his head, swishes saliva in his mouth, once, twice, thrice, and delicately spits it onto his tombstone. His smile is vindictive but his eyes are unfeeling. You aren’t put off; you’ve always known how rotten his insides were.
“The funeral was three weeks ago,” he says. “He left me all his money. I'm swimming in it now.”
You hum. “That hardly matters. You haven't been wanting for money since highschool.”
Akechi grins at you. “Naturally, I can't fall behind,” he agrees.
You reach into your bag and produce a bottle of rum. “I brought your usual,” you say. You screw open the bottle and extend it towards him. He simply opens his mouth and moves his head toward the bottle.
You bring the bottle his mouth, the rim sitting delicately against his pale pink lips. You tip it into his mouth, careful not to push against teeth. His eyes are half-lidded, amused, taunting as if to say we've been apart a lifetime but I still own you. You meet him in the middle without flinching.
“Akira,” he breathes, breath now tinged with bitterness. “Why am I upset that he's gone?”
“It's normal.”
Snapping, “We were never normal. I hate him.”
“I know.”
“He was everything,” Akechi says. “When we were young, he was like the sun. Every aspect of my life was set in his context.”
You tilt your head, assessing him. “When did that change?”
“Isn't it obvious?” he asks, and he’s right. You take his wrist into your group and smile at the silver bracelet; it's a trinket, a piece of shit, truthfully, in comparison to his van cleef necklace and three karat earrings. You won him that bracelet at a festival when he was 18 and you were 17.
...
He texts you again and asks you to meet him at Shujin. He's already drinking by the time you arrive, sitting cross-legged on the floor of the roof, leaning against that same railing. You're not sure why he's so fond of this place; he went to a highschool halfway across the city.
“This city is suffocating,” he says once you sit down next to him. “I feel like someone's always following me.”
You raise an eyebrow. “Are you going to leave again?”
He hesitates. “No. I don't know. I don't have any plans.”
You don't reply – there's a million things you want to say to him. Why did you come back? Why won't you stay? I missed you. Please don't leave me. I hate looking at you like this. You want to take his neck into your hands and press it into the broken tiling, make him understand that you need him to stay.
Akechi continues. “The things I've done to this city, I can't take them back. There's blood on my hands, Akira, and it'll never go away.”
“We were kids,” you say.
“I've spent every waking hour atoning for what I did as a kid,” he replies sardonically and closes his eyes.
You remember Goro Akechi, back then, so young and so beautiful. Papers and evidence he'd bring back to your crapbox of a shared apartment to burn. Nights he'd spend having panic attacks after going to court. The first time he came home covered in someone else's blood, he cried silently into your arms. The next time, he said tadaima and you said okaeri and it was normal, and you knew he was headed to a place you couldn't reach.
“Is that what you wanted to do when you left? Atone?” you bite.
Akechi smiles mirthlessly. “In another lifetime, I could've loved you better.”.
“I didn’t want better,” you confess quietly.
“I couldn't stay,” he says.
“No.” You sigh. “You couldn't.”
...
He's sitting on the windowsill of your study, swinging his legs back and forth. Airy, light, he's dressed in a white shirt and maroon leather gloves. It's odd seeing him in broad daylight because it makes him look more real. The moonlight hid his dark circles and smoothed out the sharp lines of his face. His face is severe now, with no baby fat to camouflage his jagged edges.
“I never told you where I lived,” you say lightly.
“I put a tracker on your car.”
“You own a tracker?”
He gazes at you placidly, radiating disappointment. “I wouldn't use someone else's, would I?”
“Okay,” you reply.
“I’ve come into free time today, so I decided to bother you,” he explains brightly. He's in a good mood today – rare even when he was young. He jabs a thumb over his shoulder towards a black motorcycle parked outside your residence. You know less than nothing about bikes but that one looks sleek yet heavy. All black with blue accents, visibly brand new.
“We're going on a joyride,” he says.
“Okay,” you reply.
And later, when the sun is setting and it’s dusk, the sky a canvas painted in pink watercolor, you push him against a wall. The headlights are still on, some distance away from the alley you dragged him into. He’s flush against the bricks, every part of his body not covered by you pressing against the rough building. Get to it. Stop talking. He’s panting hard, breaths cloudy in the wintertime chill. You bite up his neck and leave purple bruises in your wake. You don’t kiss him.
Akechi shoves you off and fixes his collar. “My hotel is nearby,” he says.
“Let’s get dinner,” you say, effectively shutting him down.
He glowers at you with his glass-shard eyes, eyes you could drown in. His ego is evidently smarting. “Dinner?” he asks, incredulous.
You sigh. “Let’s not do this right now.”
Akechi presses his lips together and walks toward his bike. He won’t look at you. “Fine. Dinner.”