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The scene in front of him is an awfully familiar one. He has, in the past week, watched it unfold in variations over tens and hundreds of times. And he doesn’t hate it, no, he cannot bring himself to, not when he sees the girl’s face, right across him, blooming red like a fresh cherry, held down in lovesick embarrassment as she clutches a heart stamped envelope, gilded around the edges, to her chest and breathes in. The edge of the paper flutters as the letter heaves against her chest, rising and falling, she braces herself for an impact, as though she is not in their school corridor, but instead, on a warfront with a cannon to her face.
Yoichi huffs and bites back an empathetic smile. Next to him, Rin grunts as he slams his locker shut and fixes the zipper of his jacket, stuck to an unknown entity. The girl shifts in her step, tucks her hair behind her ear and Yoichi wonders if she’d find this whole situation easier if he were to walk away, because confessing to Itoshi Rin of all people is not something to be taken lightly, no, as a matter of fact, it might just be equivalent to or easier than facing a cannon upfront. But Rin is unrelenting beside him, grunting and grumbling as he tugs on his laces, if Yoichi was to leave his side now of all times, after he messed up a very well aligned goal mere minutes ago, he might as well thank the cannon for being gentle enough to just blow his face apart, for Rin would do something much, much worse.
However, his presence was never a part of the equation. The series of events has managed to repeat itself over and over like a prophecy, and he has no role to play here but be a bystander, or a witness in a more literal sense.
Valentine's day is an annual occurrence, Yoichi knows, he just doesn't care. He has never received a confession nor has he given one, he doesn't care because he sees himself as a passerby whose purpose is to be the witness to heartfelt confessions and then forget about them as soon as he turns to walk into his class. He is not envious, nor is he insecure, he’s just, placid, valentine's day is not for him and he is more than okay with it.
Or at least that was what he assumed, based on all seventeen years of his experience.
But this year had proved itself to be the turning point in his life, in multiple ways. He had gotten into nationals, won countless matches across the nation, he had begun dating the genius prodigy Itoshi Rin, and well, the rest kind of falters in the face of the last fact. But it was true, in all its enormity, despite how messy and urgent and aggressive it had been, Rin had grabbed him by his throat after their fourth game together and vowed to kill him over and over again on the field, reduce his entire existence to being a mere stepping stone for Rin’s inevitable glory, make him a mangled mess of blood and grime before kissing him breathless, which is as good as a confession gets for someone like Rin.
As for the situation at hand- it has, as mentioned, repeated itself like a prophecy over and over again for the past week and a half. Rin has been receiving confessional letters, multi paged not to mention, with their edges crumbling under the weight of love poems and prose, floral scent wafting off their seals, kiss marks stamping shut the envelope that flushes under these ministrations, flowers, chocolates, bite sized trinkets someone like him has no use for, even before February had begun.
Initially, Yoichi was amused. He knew Rin was popular among their peers, if not for his personality then for his face, he had managed to uphold Itoshi Sae’s legacy by drowning each crevice of their school in love confessions mumbled alongside his name and still managing to be unbothered by such reverence, such fidelity sworn to him by people who had known all bad parts of him, how he was, not Itoshi Rin, no, Sae’s little brother instead, how he was hideous on the field with soil in his mouth and grass in his teeth, tongue midair, soaring up high, dripping, warm, wet, ugly.
He eyed each letter with a sneer, a taut pull of his mouth and disdain in his eyes, with no care for anyone’s feelings, and tossed it away in the next breath, with as gentle of a no as he can bring himself to say. Yoichi had been trying to keep count, he had reached fifty three, or somewhere close to it before he eventually gave up.
The first time it had happened was almost two weeks ago when he was in the school gym with Rin, his legs sprawled across Yoichi’s lap as he ran a clumped piece of cotton down his knee. They had been trying to fix a gaping wound on Rin’s knee, a prized possession obtained after he had crashed into the goal post, which was shallow enough to not need proper medical assistance, but still deep enough to bleed. He had tried using bandages of all shapes and sizes available in the storage unit of the gymnasium, but they had fallen too short, too thin, too small, too narrow, on the abrasion, rippling and throbbing in its wake. Yoichi had offered gauze then, but Rin had scoffed and knocked it away with no regard, so he had to make do with ointment slathered over rolls of cotton, wiping away at the red streaks running down his knee.
It happened shortly after, while they were bickering. Something about Yoichi being lukewarm, about his goal being a fluke, when the doors had opened with a soft creak, resounding against the floorboards, footsteps following after, hesitant, pliant to stress with nerves chipping and twisting at each end, a girl he knew from art class had walked in, letter clutched next to a box of cookies, and Rin hadn't particularly acknowledged her presence, out of intention or not, he didn't know, it was difficult to figure out Rin at times like these. He was kind in places one wouldn't expect him to be. Regardless, she had been brave enough to walk up to him and slip the little box next to his arm on the floor and whisper a confession next to it.
The second time had followed shortly after, so had the third, and then so on and so forth.
Today however, the scene unfolds differently. He watches the girl nibble on her lip, fix her hair and slowly amble up to them. Next to him, Rin makes neat knots in his laces. The hallway loops around them, long winding routes crumble upon one another, he keeps his gaze pinned to the floor, to give the girl the privilege of some privacy.
Then, from under his lashes he sees an envelope being held out to him .
“Um, Isagi this is for you, if you’ll accept it of course.”
Next to him, Rin immediately freezes. He knows because he feels his body stiffen, his ridiculously long limbs stop mid motion, he too mimics the shutdown.
“Sorry? For me?” He laughs nervously.
The girl nods, reddens even more, her lip trembles from where it is tucked under her teeth and Yoichi feels sympathy before he feels anything else. This was never a part of the equation. One mere interaction was all it took to uproot his existence as a passerby on valentines day, suddenly, he’s not sure what to do anymore.
“Oh-um- okay. Thanks”
He takes the envelope and looks it over once, then tucks it back in his bag.
On their way back home, Rin doesn’t speak up.
______________________________________
“Doesn't this make you jealous? Or are you too good for that?”
Yoichi frowned, under his arms the table shook, Bachira tossed a card with such brute force atop the pile that the rest flew out and away from underneath.
“Bachira!”
“Yocchan wouldn't be jealous, have you seen the way Rin treats the letters?”
True, he had a point. Yoichi skimmed through his own cards, picked the worst one to toss into the pile with half a heart.
“Still, isn’t it unnerving, he keeps getting all th-”
“Cut it out Raichi, we all know what you’re trying to do here.” Reo slipped a card into the pile and everyone simultaneously groaned.
“This is the third time now, can we vote Reo out? He’s clearly cheating!”
“Hey-!”
“Do you guys think I should be jealous?” Yoichi asked.
This led to a collective silence. Immediately, Yoichi regretted voicing his query out loud. In all sincerity, he wasn't sure where it came from, sure he had felt inquisition, an unsettling kind, when he had first witnessed Rin get confessed to but in no way had that led to something bigger, he had, not once, felt the presence of something larger, crueler, no.
“You can feel jealous.” Chigiri answered.
“ Shouldn't he be jealous?”
“Otoya you-”
“He’s not wrong, I wouldn't be too happy if I had to witness Reo getting confessed to every second of the day.” Nagi chimed in.
“Nagi that’s-” Reo flushed
“You guys are different though.” Chigiri intervened.
“Totally different.” Bachira agreed as he began recollecting the cards, scattered around the desk and the floor. Around him, everyone started getting up, some to help, some to stretch. Chairs scraped loudly against the floorboards.
They weren’t wrong, is what Yoichi deduced. Nagi and Reo were different, Nagi was different and so was Reo , which is why they, together, were different. He couldn’t really expect himself to be in either of their shoes.
The bell rang over their ruckus, he took the opportunity to gather his things and dart out before his brain went haywire. He wasn’t even concerned with any of this to begin with, because after all, valentines wasn’t for him. He was fine with shared lunches and intertwined hands after school with Rin, cans of iced tea bought with his money, scribbled sheets of shared assignments, aftermath of a practice match shared together, sometimes he’d lean too close to him and they’d flush, bright red, and he would close his eyes, in his vivid dreams, he was holding Rin close by his arms, his mouth was warm against his, the air would try to crawl and creep through the barest of spaces, he wouldn't let it, no, he would kiss Rin until he was hurtling towards the surface of the sea in desperation. He would kiss Rin until he was breathless.
Then, he opens his eyes, and Rin would’ve already withdrawn.
Still, he was fine. Yoichi wasn’t a demanding... partner? Boyfriend? Lover?
The corridor ahead of him is a crowded maze. From the corner of his eye he spots a looming figure. Rin stands hunched over the pin board at the farthest end of the corridor skimming through the contents of the banners and pamphlets. Behind him, a guy of relatively smaller stature holds out a red package, and Yoichi tries to force himself to feel something akin to anger, hot, blinding, all too consuming, envy even, or anything synonymous to it. Instead he feels confusion.
Rin turns around, eyes the guy, Yoichi tries to remember his face from a common class, a team, he doesn't recall anything. The guy grins, softens around the edges, colour fills his face, he is as red as the package he holds out, oohs and aahs fill the corridor, Rin looks down at the shapeless red package mumbles out what Yoichi can only assume (expect?) to be a turn down, a no. The guy nods in acknowledgment, briefly, Yoichi squints to see his visage fall, to determine the outcome of the situation, feeling the rejection sink in. The guy sulks, frowns, his hands tremble and the package mimics his movements, his head hangs low.
Rin doesn't spare him a second glance, as though he is used to inciting this kind of a reaction. He turns around and takes a sharp turn, disappears in the blink of an eye.
The crowd dissipates and Yoichi fumbles with his belongings, uncertain.
_________________________________________
For lunch, Reo treats them to meat buns. He brings a large box full of them held against his chest, their wrappers glimmer from over the cardboard limbs of the box. Yoichi doesn't notice him until he is leering over their table, slamming the box down and throwing a packaged bun at everyone. Yoichi nearly misses it when he sees Rin take a turn and walk out of the cafeteria. The table breaks into a conversation, Reo narrates to them a story about Nagi getting confessed to, which leads to Bachira voicing out his plans for valentines, which then leads to Chigiri fussing about having to take confessions for Kunigami since he intimidated his admirers, but not enough to have them stay out of his way.
Yoichi opts to listen, gingerly he rips apart the plastic bag and pulls the bun out. Tries to break the bun apart into two equal halves with inhumane precision, ultimately he ends up with two unequal halves of the bun with meat filling spilling out from the centre. He places the larger half back into the plastic bag and turns to face everyone else.
“I got confessed to.” He admits, swallowing the bun thickly.
“ What ?!” Everyone simultaneously barks out.
Yoichi nods, places the remaining half of the bun onto the table and rummages through his bag to find the envelope, which has now been reduced to a crumpled mess thanks to his textbooks. He holds it out for everyone to see.
“Let me see.” Chigiri takes the envelope from his hands, everyone huddles around him as he breaks the seal apart.
“I haven't- read it so-” He blurts out awkwardly, as though trying to absolve himself of guilt.
The letter is torn out of its envelope with little to no care. Yoichi grimaces.
Bachira clears his throat, his eyes glitter notoriously when he snatches the letter out of Chigiri’s hand who in turn grunts in disapproval.
“My dear Isagi, lately your presence alone has been infringing upon my sanity, everywhere I go I think of you-”
“No way this is legit.” Raichi barks out a loud laugh, around him the table bursts into roar.
“That’s taken out of our literature textbook. I swear I’ve seen it before.” Reo adds wiping a stray tear from the corner of his eye.
Even Nagi cracks a leisurely grin.
“Hey, you have to appreciate the effort, you hardly see girls do that these days.”
“Yeah, the effort is commendable really.”
“Let me continue I swear I saw a poem quoted somewhere down below-”
“No! You guys cut it out!” Yoichi leaps across the table to snatch the letter away, he spends the rest of his lunch buried face first into the tabletop with the letter balled in his fist.
____________________________________
The garden buzzes and hums a tune taken from the cicadas. Overhead, the sun spreads its phantom limbs apart and blistering heat encompasses everything in its vicinity. Yoichi sits cross legged next to Rin. The damp soil sullies their trousers, later, he would have to clean the stains in the boys restroom with his pristine white handkerchief, for now, he busies himself by sifting through the contents of his bag.
Next to him, Rin goes through a thick stack of notes from his math class, endless layers of lined sheets scribbled with equations, formulas, answers circled with graphite, blotches of ink staining the edges bleeding into the pads of his fingers as he thumbs through them in a way that is amusing to Yoichi, with his brows furrowed and the corners of his eyes creasing, denting, his mouth downturned as he skims through each page.
Midday sun with its grotesque sunlit appendages looms over their lids, sometimes their knees brush and he feels a jittery warmth run through his veins, like a firecracker had detonated under his ribs.
“Here.” He holds out a meat bun, broken into half with its peer missing, wrapped in plastic.
Rin eyes him curiously.
“I know it's not what you prefer but it’s all I have, sorry.” Yoichi mumbles sheepishly as he hands him the bun. Rin turns the snack around in his hand.
“You skipped lunch right? I saw you walk out, so- well..” He trails off.
From his periphery he sees Rin contemplate, momentarily, before he gingerly unwraps the bun from its packaging and brings it to his mouth, takes a bite and doesn't react. Yoichi isn’t sure what to make of it, the situation, multiple, at hand. The bun was from almost an hour ago, so it’s definitely gone cold now, by the looks of it, the meat filling has become a mangled mess of sauce and strips of meat have begun dissolving into one another, the bun itself has long lost its vigour, it looks pale and lifeless. Still, Rin takes a second bite, he must be hungry.
He thinks of a way to indemnify Rin, for the bun mostly, so he gets up, under his palms the soil sours and the curling overgrown vines from stray plants crunch and coil into themselves, there’s a dirt patch on his rear, etched like a stain on his navy blue trousers. When he gets up, a piece of crumpled paper folded haphazardly into a square slips out of his pocket.
Rin eyes it with suspicion, mild, his eyes flicker in a sort of childish curiosity that can be sated by a far fetched answer, a promise of a tale.
“What’s that?” He asks with his mouth full of meat filling. In his hands, between his freakishly long fingers, the bun diminishes in size.
Yoichi freezes, more wary than hesitant. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the situation at hand, he hasn’t trespassed an uncharted territory, he has nothing to fear. Still, he cowers.
At his lack of response, Rin reaches out, the stack of papers now tossed to the side, to grab the crumpled sheet of paper and undo it with painstaking care. It takes him a minute too long, to straighten the edges, smooth out the surface, squint, try to make sense of the words drowning under creases and crumples and ink stains.
Yoichi waits, with bated breath. It comes too slow for his liking, a crack in Rin’s otherwise very well constructed facade of indifference. First, his brows shoot up, mouth stretches into a thin, straight line, eyes gloss over every word on the sheet with a violent sneer, a disgusted , violent sneer.
“You kept the letter?”
Yoichi frowns, fiddles with the keychain on his bag, unsure. Rin gives him a breath to answer, waits, as patiently as he can, then, frowns in a kind-of disgusted way. It's the same face he makes when undermining a nemesis on the field.
“Don’t tell me you like this lukewarm crap.” He says it a bit incredulously, like he too is struggling to face a conclusion forced upon him.
And suddenly Yoichi isn’t too sure as to why he kept the letter. Does he like it? He is not sure, not fully. He likes the notion of having an admirer, multiple even, hoards of them, singing praises to his name, swearing fidelity to his crown and drowning the stadium in chants of his name when he scours the field. But isn’t that normal? To wish for someone who isn’t obligated to have faith in him, hold their heart for his victory? He likes the letter, this, he knows. But what about the rest? Does he like the girl? The idea of someone wanting to take Rin’s place by his side? Kiss him senseless in the same way he has always wanted Rin to?
“I think it's nice. The sentiment.” He rebukes with uncertainty, mostly in defence.
It is nice to know he too can rely on blind faith that is birthed not out of obligation, no, this isn’t his parents donning his jersey before his match because their son is playing, neither is it his middle school friends sheepishly admitting to zoning out for half the game because well, they knew he was gonna win anyway. It isn’t Bachira or Chigiri cheering from the stands, grunting loud and roaring his name when he soars across the endless horizon tinted green under his feet.
Perhaps he is naive, to seek something so, so trivial. Because in front of him Rin sours, in a way he has never seen him sour before, his face falls, first he seems shocked, stunned even, but then all too soon his eyes droop and his mouth parts, he struggles, for the first time ever, to respond.
Over them, the sky changes colours, cicadas cry, concealed in the maze of overgrown grass, he wonders who was assigned to trim the garden growth this week. Whoever it was, hasn't been doing their job properly, or at all, he pities the next person who would have to do double the work.
Rin looks at him as though he has revealed something deeply twisted about himself. Momentarily, he thinks he has ruined something. Should he not have admitted to wanting the kind of reverence Rin was so accustomed to, something Rin always had in abundance? Was it too undoing for someone of his caliber to want merch and fanclubs to his name?
But the idea seems a bit too far fetched, this was, after all, just a letter. There was no possibility in which a mere letter could be a preamble to something massive, yet, he clings to the notion, just a little.
“You really are pathetic.” Rin scoffs, tosses the half eaten bun at him, it slams into his rib, the meat and the sauce sully his uniform shirt, a large brown stain is stamped on it.
“Rin!”
But Rin is already getting up, tucking his notes into his bag and walking away, as though he had stumbled into Yoichi by coincidence alone and had greater plans awaiting in his wake. That Yoichi was just a pest, a termite, chipping away at his precious time.
Yoichi frowns, thumbs at the uneven stain and picks up the discarded, now soiled, bun. The whole ordeal felt trivial, any moment now Rin could turn around and bump his fist into Yoichi’s forehead, tarnish it with a bruise and look down at him as he curls on the floor, with a sardonic smile, one that says, ‘Yoichi, you’re stupid, you’re lukewarm, tepid, pathetic and I’m eons ahead of you.’
He never comes back, Yoichi waits until the bell goes off and darts to the washroom to clean himself up.
_______________________________________
He sits in the far right corner, alone, for his last class of the day. Around him, the desks begin filling up as students filter in, books, pens, sheets clutched to their chests. They come in groups of two, three, four and hoard specified corners in the class. When the last two people walk in, a girl with auburn hair pulled back into a loose braid, and a relatively average looking guy with a bowl cut, they have no choice but to occupy the only two vacant seats in front of him. This doesn't bother him, the class is an anomaly that makes its way into his schedule once a week, he doesn't have the privilege of sharing it with anyone known to him so he opts to spend the hour alone in isolation.
Today, however, seems to be the exception. The guy seems to be insistently chatty, striking up vague, pointless conversation every time the teacher turns out to scribble something on the board. He seems absurdly nervous with the way he talks, hands flying around animatedly, words slipping, rushing, tumbling one atop the other, sometimes, he pauses to tug on the stained collar of his uniform shirt before continuing. When he looks up, Yoichi notices a bead of sweat rolling down his forehead and sinking into the fabric, disappearing.
For the first twenty minutes, he manages to tune out their conversation and focus on his work, draws neat lines and curves in his notebook. He jots down bulletin points. Something about world history, wars, their economic impact on nations, he mindlessly takes note of whatever the teacher recites out of their textbook.
Then, when he pauses to take a breath, the duo breach his otherwise quiet bubble.
“Hey- hey, hey hey!” The girl pokes him in the head with the rounded, soft end of her pencil.
When Yoichi looks up, she continues,
“You- I know you, you’re Rin’s friend right?”
Yoichi holds back a sneer because he isn’t just Rin’s friend, no- he is Rin’s rival, he’s the striker, the sole star of the football team who scored the winning goal in their last match- and well, something a bit more than just Rin’s ‘friend .’
Still, he dignifies her with a response.
“Yeah.”
“Great!” She brings her hands together in glee, the clap is a ripple through the silence of the class, a few people turn to face them, the teacher frowns in disappointment. Yoichi apologetically averts his gaze.
“My friend here really, really likes Rin Itoshi, like really likes him y’know?” She nudges the said friend with her elbow, the boy seated next to her, who in turn reddens just enough for Yoichi to put two and two together. Something burns at the back of his throat, he swallows and tries to down the bitter feeling rising like bile.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah! So- I know this is a bit of an inconvenience, but we’re going all out this Valentines. I’m getting my boyfriend an autograph from his favourite idol! Y’know it took me months to even get a spot for the meet and greet, not to mention I spent all my savings on it- ah-” She pauses upon getting a sharp look from her friend, then, clears her throat before continuing,
“So- obviously my friend here wants to go all out and confess to his crush too y’know? And we were hoping if you could please help us by giving his letter to Rin.”
Yoichi frowns, tilts his head in mock confusion,
“Look please!” She interrupts him before he can even voice his opinion out loud,
“It has got to be you, no one else is as close to Rin as you are and you know how he has a habit of turning down every confession he gets before even giving them a chance. If you give the letter to him, he’ll at least read it, and maybe-”
She too, Yoichi notes, has a very animated way of speaking. The way she moves around, arms flailing one over the other, words hurried, not thought over, not once, not twice before she spews them out, yet she manages to put emphasis on what she needs to. As though she knows what she wants, what she needs to have and is determined to get it by conviction and force alone. He isn’t so sure of her line of reasoning though, she gets her point across, in a very convincing way but Yoichi fails to find logic in it.
What correlation did Valentines have with ‘going all out?’ So far he had seen the event as an excuse, to confess, lay bare everything one had, and not go through the toil of having to mull it over if faced with rejection. Wasn’t that the purpose of Valentine's Day? In all practicality, he too, could see himself opening his heart up then, because there would be people around him, mimicking him, undoing the seams and ripping open their torsos, letting the red thrum and pulse next to a confession, they would be comrades in a lost war, the burden would become shared, then, with time, nulled.
“I don’t know,” He says, mostly to himself.
“Please! Just to give it to him, we’re sure he’ll at least read through it.”
“There’s no way of telling that-”
“Please!”
He ends up taking the letter under the mutual agreement that he was never to be bothered by the two again, not about the letter, not about Rin, not about anything.
________________________________________
The class ends shortly after, he stuffs the letter into his bag and waltzes out without a second thought, the day has already been overbearing and bothersome; he cannot indulge in an idle thought lest he wants to lose his sanity. Practice is scheduled immediately after school hours come to an end, he reaches the courtyard a bit earlier than he had intended to. The field is empty, mostly. In the corner, just beside the goalpost, he spots Reo and Chigiri sprawled on the grass with a large tablet perched between them.
He approaches them with caution,
“What’re you guys doing?”
“Going through reviews.”
He tilts his head in confusion and drops down to sit across them, cross legged.
“Reviews? What for?”
Chigri and Reo look up from the tablet, glance at each other, then at him, in discontent. He wonders if they’re sharing a joke he doesn't know of, he hasn't been let on, and that, becomes his crime.
Reo opens his mouth to respond, then contemplates before shutting it. Chigiri takes it upon himself to answer.
“Do you know what day it is today?”
In a breath, he answers.
“Wednesday.” Yoichi says, mouthing a mocking accent.
“No, the date, do you know what today's date is?”
“February twelfth?”
Chigiri shrugs, almost exasperated.
“It’s valentine’s in two days Yoichi, we’re helping a friend set up a date.” Reo answers this time around.
“You could’ve begun with that.” He says, mostly to Chigiri, who huffs and rakes a hand through his hair.
“Well forgive me for expecting you of all people to be aware of valentines and its customs”
Yoichi scoffs and takes the tablet from where it's perched on the ground against a nameless water bottle and skims through the content on screen. It's a long list of restaurants, arcades, shopping centres, some of them have a star marked against them, some on the other hand have a large, daunting red cross hovering over their names.
“Oh, this one’s good we went bowling here right, with Aiku and his team?” He points to an arcade and turns the tablet to them.
“Yeah, but it's too crowded. We were trying to find someplace quieter, so far we’ve shortlisted four.” Reo toggles through a few options, when he hands the device back to Yoichi there’s a new window on display.
He scrolls through the reviews and the photos, all of them seem relatively new to him.
“Who is it for?”
“A girl from art class, I think you know her, she’s the captain of the girls basketball team.” Chigiri taps around a few more times and the tablet jumps between him and Reo.
He does know her, which is why he finds the whole ordeal even more interesting.
“Is she asking someone out?”
“Zantetsu. But it's more of a mutual thing.” Reo answers.
“He means they’ve been talking, and glasses is too stupid to take hints so she’s asking him. Taking the initiative y’know? You could learn a lot from her, Isagi.” Chigiri chimes in, he nudges Reo in the rib and the tablet slips down from their shared grasp and lands onto the grass with a dull thud. Reo bites his lip, holds back a smile, as though he cannot give away the shared existence of an inside joke that Yoichi is very clearly not a part of.
Between them, he’s used to not catching up on cues as often as he would like to, but there’s been a slow descent of the world around him, towards something shallow, fickle, short lived, like everyone that bumps into him, or shares a space with him is onto a big cosmic secret that Yoichi alone is somehow unaware of. It wouldn't even matter to him, not really, not usually, he wouldn’t take something so meagre to be so personal. But then Rin had boarded the train of people slipping past his grasp, crawling down lanes his very restricted knowledge and dating pool forbid him from even peeping into, this had been compounded with Reo and Chigiri’s newfound, and very obvious, interest in something seemingly fleeting and insignificant, something he couldn't even place a finger on to correctly identify, had managed to push him to the brink of bitterness.
“What is that supposed to mean.” He says, harsh and cold cut, and it sounds ruder, more bitter than he had intended for it to, its closer to a threat than a question.
It seems to do the trick though, immediately Chigiri straightens up upon noticing the shift in his tone, Reo too eyes him with caution, slipping the tablet into a nearby duffle bag and turning to face him. They exchange hesitant glances, as though unsure of how to breach the subject at hand, as though they’re aware of something Yoichi isn’t, when he should be.
“Well, I don’t mean anything bad. I’m just saying you can take the hint too, y’know? Do something for valentines, take the initiative.” Chigiri clarifies with a huff.
“Am I supposed to?” Yoichi frowns. The question isn’t as much directed to Chigiri as it is to Yoichi himself, he had known of the customs and the practices surrounding the day, he had taken the chance to delve into indulgence of these said practices too, but was he also supposed to do something? And if so, was Rin supposed to do something too? The question looms over his head like a blinking siren, hollering a cacophony on top of its lungs and he is left to figure things out amidst the miasmic red haze in the aftermath of the siren song. Its daunting and uncomfortable, he knows what he has with Rin teeters on the edge of romance and rivalry, it's uncommon and unorthodox, to want to take someone's life in one moment and to place plasters with poor doodles on his wounds in the next.
“Only if you want to.” Chigiri answers, seemingly unaware of his sudden distress.
Yoichi makes a face in turn, it's a sour, confused and a pained look, and it seems to get the message across. Reo shifts in his place, fiddles with the drawstrings of the bag resting on his lap and he exchanges a wary glance with Chigiri before ushering him to speak up, as though he’s worried that if the silence stretches out any longer, he’ll have to witness Yoichi’s head detonate and his innards spill out, make a goopy mess of the field.
“It’s not an obligation, I said it as a joke y’know?” Chigiri laughs, but it's dry and stiff, forced.
“That’s not-” Yoichi shakes his head, animatedly, he moves his hand around, that wasn’t what he had been trying to say at all. He knows it's not an obligation, nothing is, really. What he has with Rin is an exceptional case, it doesn't require traditional means of resolution when faced with a qualm, nor does it require any over the top gestures to solidify its existence, its presence, what he has with Rin, is more often than not, something fluid, shifting shapes, structures, accommodating and fitting where it needs to, spilling over the brim somedays and sloshing and splashing around the edges. What he needs to know is what he should be doing, even when he’s not obligated to.
“Should I- be doing something?” He croaks around with a desperate hand ranking itself through his hair.
The question feels absurd, to ask, to even voice out loud. He knows he would do something if he felt compelled to, if it was the right thing. Sometimes, when he’s tossing the ball back and forth between him and Kurona on the field, stuck amidst a hoard of players with hulking statutes and predatory eyes, he does what he feels, ducks and slips and turns, uses who he needs to his convenience, then and there, he is aware of what his role is, what he needs to do to have something he desperately wants, needs, desires. Yoichi, so used to this feeling, had naturally thought that this line of reasoning, of observing and noticing and understanding would aid his future romantic endeavours too, but he had the opportunity to date Rin and well, his imaginary love life had become something shapeless.
Sometimes, Yoichi felt like he was running laps in an endless field, and somewhere, far, far away, at a point close to the edge of everything, he would find Rin, crouched with his head tucked close to his knees, waiting. There, he would find the resolve too, to name, to define, to give shape and structure to what they had. Until then, all he had to do was keep running.
“You don’t have to, Isagi.” Reo says with a heavy hand down his shoulder, his fingers curl into the joint and Yoichi shifts uncomfortably.
“You don’t have to.” He repeats, softer, firmer,
“But-” Reo’s fingers curl in tighter as he continues,
“You should . You’re dating Rin yeah? Or you have something going on with him- not judging or anything, trust me I’ve been there.” Reo huffs out an amused laugh when he sees Yoichi frown in response to his words. Then, he continues,
“What I’m saying is that- you should do something, it’s weird to not know where you stand with your partner, but valentines isn’t about him. It's about you , and your feelings for that person.”
“What?” Yoichi asks, dumbfounded.
Reo grins, wicked and wide this time.
“Say Isagi, didn’t you just get confessed to?”
“Yeah, a few days back.”
“And did you accept the confession?” Reo asks, shifting closer to him.
Yoichi shakes his head in a firm no.
“See! Everyone knows you have something going on with Rin, but the person still dared to come forward and confess to you, it's because valentines- Isagi- is about your feelings. So you don’t really have to do something, but it's still a nice gesture y’know?”
Yoichi nods, a whistle blows across the field, and the three look up to find their team hurtling in.
Reo leaves before he can thank him.
________________________________________
Yoichi spends the entire ninety minutes of the match being ruthlessly ignored by Rin.
He’s not even sure why . Rin doesn't even look mad, he looks, well, focused is one way to put it. He’s focused, he doesn't turn around to spare Yoichi a glance, he doesn't look over his shoulder to spot his sprout popping up amidst the hoard of players circling him, when he steals the ball and skitters across the field, he doesn't even glance up to mock Yoichi. Its absurd and it grates his nerves in ways he didn’t expect it to, when Rin scours the field with no regard for him, just a single thing in sight, no need for vengeance or vindication, bridled by pure need to score, for himself.
Unsurprisingly, it's Rin’s team- or Rin- to be exact, who scores the winning goal for himself and bunches up in a half hearted group hug, leaving Yoichi to dust.
From thereon, it only gets worse, and Yoichi isn’t even sure why . Rin leaves the field as soon as the referee blows the whistle, strides into the locker room, showers, changes, and leaves before Yoichi can even make an attempt to catch up to him. They don’t walk home together, they don’t stop by the general store to have an ice cream and do dramatic reveals of the words etched onto the wood stick, when Yoichi ritualistically texts Rin sometime before nightfall, something about a shared program, Rin doesn't even open his text. For someone so dutifully devoted to ensuring Yoichi’s downfall, it’s unnatural for Rin to suddenly put on an act that absolves him of his past promises, narrows down his goal to the post and leaves room for no one in the way.
Rivalry doesn’t just end on terms like these, even if Rin doesn’t consider him to be his rival anymore, Yoichi would fight him to death the second he slips his cleats on. But there’s the fear of something bigger, something larger and more tender, unnaturally so, ending. He isn’t sure if he should even be worried, aren’t breakups, if this could even be considered one, supposed to be vocal? Shouldn’t both parties be aware of it? But again, that’s how things traditionally work, he isn’t even sure of what he has with Rin, so it wouldn’t be too out of the ordinary for Rin to just, get up one day, out of some arcane realisation, and leave .
The notion is heavy and daunting. Yoichi, now curled up in the corner of his dimly lit room, feels something sour and sickening pass over his nose, venomous tendrils unfurl their limbs across the vast expanse of his chest and he feels his lungs constrict under their weight. He knows it’s not a big deal, people leave all the time, Rin is a person who abides by his own ideals, he has no real control over him, so he can leave, theoretically.
He can leave and Yoichi can go back to his own issues, his own life, devoid of Rin. But the thing is, he doesn’t want him to leave. The first thought alone induces something noxious and suffocating in him, as though his nose has been stuffed full of radium, and each inhale is infecting his lungs, his arteries, his veins, his very blood runs black and loses its glimmer, it’s choking, constricting, it's a looming threat to his life, his needs, his want. It’s not a good thought, he doesn’t want Rin to leave because of something he isn’t even aware of.
He can’t let that happen. So he does the first thing that comes to his mind, even when his head is tornado swivelling around with thoughts, he hurls himself across the room to his door where he has hung his uniform pants after haphazardly shrugging them off in exchange for football shorts earlier today, and shoves his hand into the pockets fishing around for the crumpled confession letter he had stuffed in. It reveals itself in an indiscernible form, balled up and crumpled, when he takes it to his desk and slowly opens it up, straightens it with painstaking care, even then it doesn't retain anything close to its original form, and reads through.
There’s praise, there’s singsong poetry of love, there’s something about his games, his playstyle, he skims through the content with a trembling heart. Rin must’ve been getting stuff like this too, considering the bulk of letters he has to turn down, bow and walk away, each one of them sealed into a thick envelope with heart shaped stamps. It's a weird realisation to have, and the feeling that succeeding it is an even weirder one. In the silence of the night, Yoichi hears the first stutter of his heart. He recalls vaguely, Nagi saying something along the lines of being unhappy upon seeing Reo’s confessions, was this how he felt? This deep tremor resounding against his ribs, a hot wire coiling around his neck, taking the shape of his trachea, slipping into his mouth, rendering him senseless.
He tosses the letter away, and buries his head in his arms.
The night passes.
_____________________________
There’s no practice scheduled on the following day, so he skips school. Hovers around the crevices and corners of his house with the pen stuck between his fingers like an open wound. It makes its way to his mouth, nestles itself between his teeth, he chews so hard on it that the plastic body grates and chips and hug dents mark its end.
There’s a single sheet torn off his notebook resting on the top of his desk. Blank. He doesn’t enter his room all day in fear of facing it. Rin doesn’t call, nor does he text, Yoichi tries not to think about him.
He thinks of the purpose of writing, the intent behind it. There’s this innate need within him, to stand where the victor does, to make his way there, lick clean the path if he must, there’s a single goal he must make his way to when he’s on the field. With Rin, there’s a labyrinth awaiting a dead end. He’s not sure what to write, he wants to write Rin a confessional letter, stand out, stand tall, he is meant to his and vice versa, he has known since before can remember, then why’s it taking him everything to just conjure up a few words? It couldn’t be because he hasn’t heard from Rin all day, it couldn’t be because he is fearing the loss of something he couldn’t fully have, like being pulled away from a feast after only tasting the appetizers on a ravenous stomach.
Ah, this must be it.
The letter is a futile device. He can’t hold Rin back for himself, no matter how hard he tries. So he stumbles to the table and writes, like he’s writing to someone he’ll lose by the time dawn comes, stumbling and stuttering on a particularly bad day and one sheet turns to two, two to three, three to four. In the end, he has to staple together a seven paged letter in a worn out yellow envelope, and stamp it close with a heart shaped stamp.
_______________________________
He is late for school. On valentine's day of all days.
The road is crowded and every store has opened up earlier than usual today. There’s an onslaught of pamphlets for cafes and newly opened arcades, restaurants, places for a perfect date circled in pink ink and large hearts floating around. He has to dash his way past the large stores with decorative chocolate and ribboned boxes on display, girls and boys of all ages crowding the storefronts with their wallets clutched in their hands. He has to force himself to look away, to swallow the thick lump in his neck, feel the thicker envelope resting in his breast pocket, and hop past the school gates shutting close.
The inside of the school isn’t any better. Corridors are filled with masses, distinct chatter is drowned by tearing of wrapping paper, similar confessions mouthed out like a chant, loud squealing echoing across the length of the hallways that are drenched in confetti and ribbons half ripped apart, pristine bows dirtied and squished into the linoleum floor, remains of wrapping paper flying around.
By the time Yoichi finds his way to his class, he is a bit too overwhelmed to notice his classmates looming around his desk with their hands pressed to their mouths, eyes searching around keenly for something he doesn’t know of yet but is clearly interesting enough to keep their, otherwise restless, heads preoccupied, like a colour shifting screen with imaginative elements to a toddler.
He pushes his way past the crowd that turns with each step he takes. It's unnatural at best, it's not something he’s too used to, it grates his nerves.
“Look! It’s Isagi.” Someone whispers from across the room, someone close to the writing board.
“Do you think he knows? Is he aware? Doesn’t look like it.”
“Shh, you’re gonna ruin the surprise.”
Frowning, he stops in his step to look over to where the noise came from.
“What?”
“On your desk, there’s something.” A girl speaks up from behind him, she’s tall with long hair braided into two neat rows, on closer inspection he realises he doesn’t recognise her, someone from a different class maybe, or a different grade altogether, he can’t be sure.
True to her words, there is something on his desk. A single chocolate flavoured protein bar he buys every time he stops by the general store on his way home with Rin, he’s not choosy with the flavours but well, he hasn’t bought a chocolate one before. Around the bar is a neat red ribbon, tied into a small bow sitting in the centre. Next to it is a bottle of iced tea, now lukewarm. He turns to the girl standing next to the desk.
“Who left this?”
“The younger Itoshi.”
Yoichi frowns, he grabs the bar, turns it around in his hand.
“For me?”
The girl nods. Their conversation is cut short by the sharp ringing of the bell overhead, begrudgingly everyone makes their way to their seats. The ruckus dies down.
Yoichi clutches the bar close to his chest and tries to calm down his beating heart.