Work Text:
Outside the classroom window, threads of rain wove themselves into a slanting net. Simeon sat by the window, chin propped on one hand, his gaze drifting past the curtain of rain toward the distant, blurred gray sky. The bell had rung ten minutes ago. Every other student had long since left. Only he remained—and Bronco, who had walked in at some point without his noticing.
"Are you waiting for the rain to stop?" Bronco stood before the desk, his voice carrying a careful, tentative note.
Simeon's gaze still hadn't returned. "What are you waiting for?" he asked in turn, his voice so faint the rain nearly swallowed it.
Ever since Carmelo Gusto had been arrested for intentional homicide, Simeon's situation at school had grown even more tangled. Rumors swirled—about his father, and about him. To make matters worse, the incident a week ago, when Simeon had been found standing at the edge of the rooftop on a rainy day, had—though no one but Miles Edgeworth had witnessed it firsthand—spread through the campus in every distorted shape imaginable.
The story was about his childhood friend, yet the person in those stories sounded nothing like the friend he knew. Even Simeon himself seemed shrouded in some strange fog, his face sometimes wearing expressions Bronco had never seen before.
When Bronco had rushed over that day, what he saw was Simeon and Miles walking down from the school building together, an odd atmosphere hanging between them. From the very beginning, Simeon's figure had been branded into Bronco's eyes. After what had happened, Simeon became the only vivid color in an otherwise black-and-white world.
Bronco mustered his spirits and put on a casual front:
"What else? Waiting for you to finish spacing out. Want to see a movie on Saturday? The one with the car chases."
Simeon raised his eyes to look at him. "Why?"
"Why what?"
"Asking me to a movie out of nowhere… that's not like you at all. Are you afraid I'll do something stupid if I'm left alone? Or are you worried Miles Edgeworth will beat you to it?"
That deliberately provoking tone, jabbing straight into the soft spot he least wanted to acknowledge—on any normal day, Bronco would have swung a fist at his friend's face. But things were different now. He swallowed that impulse and backed down:
"Yeah. I'm worried about you. I said the wrong thing that day. I'm… sorry."
Simeon laughed—suddenly—the kind of hollow, heartbreaking laugh that made something ache. "You didn't say the wrong thing. When you told me on the phone that Carmelo Gusto was scum, that getting rid of him was a good thing—you were right. I just couldn't accept it at the time."
Bronco felt his throat tighten. That day, the news of Carmelo Gusto's arrest had been everywhere. The man in the photographs—fierce-eyed and brutal—matched perfectly the violent father Bronco had always known about. He had thought he was offering comfort, never imagining that to Simeon, Carmelo Gusto was still his only family.
"I'm sorry." Bronco's voice was low. He brought his fist down softly against the desktop. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do."
Simeon's expression softened. He reached out and lightly touched Bronco's clenched fist, the gesture carrying a rare tenderness. "It's okay," he said, his voice more real than before. "I don't know either."
"I shouldn't have said those things. No matter what, the man's still your father. But then again, you're you, Simeon. You don't have to carry his—"
"Forget it. Let's go see that movie on Saturday." Simeon cut off Bronco's fumbling honesty. "I've thought it through."
Before Bronco could respond, Simeon grabbed his bag, brushed past him, and headed for the classroom door. At the doorway, he paused and turned his head.
"You know something, Bronco?" His voice held a thread of genuine bewilderment. "Sometimes even I can't tell—whether I really wanted to jump, or whether I just wanted to see who'd come looking for me."
Miles stood by the window of the student council office. Through the veil of rain, he watched Simeon walk out of the school building—no umbrella, letting the rain soak his clothes and hair. Not far behind, Bronco emerged too, umbrella raised, as if to chase after him. But after a few steps Bronco stopped and simply stood there, watching Simeon's silhouette dissolve into the rain.
All week, Miles had noticed the atmosphere between Bronco and Simeon growing more strained, as though an invisible wall had risen between them. And whenever he himself appeared, that wall seemed to grow more solid still.
Miles knew what Bronco was thinking. That day, when he had found Simeon on the rooftop and pulled him back inside the railing without a second thought, holding him tight—he had assumed that was the end of it. He hadn't expected to run into Bronco on the way downstairs. From that moment on, the look in that delinquent's eyes had changed—laced with a subtle hostility.
What Bronco didn't understand was that after what happened on the rooftop, the distance between Miles and Simeon had only grown.
The next day, Miles ran into Simeon in the hallway. Simeon greeted him with a smile, as if the rain, the railing, the embrace that had lasted so long—all of it had been neatly folded and tucked away into a drawer. Miles played along, though he couldn't say why.
Keeping an appropriate distance. Being considerate. Staying just right—maybe that was his role in Simeon's life.
He returned to his desk and quietly resumed sorting through the sports festival application forms. Work, duty, obligation—these were his shelter, letting him set aside those complicated feelings for the time being. When he finally locked the office door and walked down the corridor toward the school gate, he spotted Simeon again—crouched in front of the vending machine, alone.
He couldn't say why, but it felt as though Simeon had been waiting for him.
"Why haven't you left yet?" Miles walked over.
Simeon turned his head, unsurprised, as if he'd known Miles would appear. "Trying to decide what to drink."
"You only ever drink iced lattes."
"Felt like something different today." Simeon pressed the button for a can of oolong tea, crouched to retrieve it from the slot, and stood up without opening it. He leaned against the machine and looked at Miles.
A few seconds of silence. The corridor was empty now. On a rainy evening, the sky along the horizon was brighter than usual, its faint glow tracing the shapes of mountains and trees.
"Miles," Simeon said.
"Hm."
"Why did you hold me on the rooftop that day?"
Miles didn't answer right away. It wasn't that he was choosing his words—it was the question itself that stopped him. He'd expected Simeon might ask, but he hadn't expected this timing, this tone—laying everything bare so simply.
"I don't know. I just did." That was the truth.
Simeon tilted his head. "And then the next day you acted like nothing happened."
"You were the one who acted like nothing happened first."
After that, they were both quiet. Simeon looked down at the can of oolong tea in his hand, his thumb rubbing the pull tab. Miles watched his fingers and remembered how, on the rooftop, through a wet shirt, he'd felt ribs and a thin, slight back.
Simeon gave a short laugh—as if conceding something. "Fair enough." He paused. "Do you want something to drink?"
"Is this how you repay someone for saving your life?"
"Not exactly."
Without giving him a chance to refuse, Simeon pressed another button and a can of black tea dropped out. Miles glanced at it—the flavor he usually bought.
Then Simeon asked: "Are you free Saturday afternoon?"
Miles knew he should ask what for, but he didn't. "Yes."
"Two o'clock. The café next to the station." Simeon popped open the oolong tea and took a sip, then made a face. "Should've stuck with the iced latte."
He slung his bag over his shoulder and left. Miles stood holding the can of black tea, listening to Simeon's footsteps fade at the end of the corridor. The cold of the can seeped into his palm, as if he were reaching through a curtain to touch the rain.
Saturday afternoon, one forty. Bronco arrived at the cinema, collected the tickets from the kiosk, then bought two drinks at the counter. Simeon's: light ice, extra sugar. He remembered so many things about Simeon that sometimes his brain felt like a warehouse dedicated entirely to storing them, a jumbled heap—Simeon liked sweet things; Simeon wrote with his left hand; when Simeon smiled and only the corners of his mouth moved but his eyes didn't, it was a fake smile.
He'd imagined the possibility of Simeon standing him up. If it actually happened, there wouldn't be a thing he could do. But at five minutes to two, Simeon appeared. He wore a red jacket over a black T-shirt, his hair looking like it had been blow-dried but not quite all the way—a few strands curling up at the ends.
Bronco handed over the drink. Simeon took it, bent his head for a sip through the straw, and didn't say thank you—but his mood seemed considerably lighter.
They went in. Bronco had chosen seats in the center toward the back. He'd checked the theater layout on the app beforehand and deliberately picked two seats with no one beside them. When the lights dimmed, his elbow bumped against Simeon's. Simeon didn't pull away.
The movie started. Bronco couldn't take in a single frame. His entire awareness was locked on the person to his right; he could even hear, through the gunfire and explosions blasting from the speakers, the sound of Simeon's straw hitting the ice at the bottom of his cup. He felt like a radio tuned to the wrong frequency—every signal aimed at one person.
A person who wandered wherever the wind blew.
No sense of territory. No marks left behind, no traces. Sometimes Bronco thought Simeon was kind to everyone—so kind it was impossible to tell whether it was tenderness or indifference.
They took turns reaching into the bucket for popcorn, their hands never once touching—an unspoken understanding. The movie was apparently terrible, because every now and then Simeon would lean over and whisper some quip. Each time that faint, clean breath reached him, Bronco's ears would twitch, and a thin film of sweat would prickle along his collarbones.
Fifty minutes in: "I need to use the bathroom," Simeon murmured suddenly, right against his ear. Without thinking, Bronco shifted aside. Simeon rose lightly, and as he squeezed past Bronco's knees, his fingers touched down briefly on Bronco's shoulder for balance.
Then the shadow vanished into the dim light of the aisle.
Bronco stared at the screen. Someone was tearing down a highway, tires plowing through standing water, sending up a white spray of mist. He reached over and held Simeon's cup; the condensation on its surface dampened his palm.
Five minutes. On screen, the car flipped, caught fire. Someone crawled out of the wreckage.
Ten minutes. Bronco set both cups back in their holders. He pulled out his phone, turned the brightness to its lowest, and sent Simeon a message: "you okay?"
Read.
No reply.
He placed the phone face-down on his thigh and waited for the vibration. On screen the fire died; the scene cut to a hospital, someone was crying. The story seemed to have reached its climax. Fifteen minutes now. He picked up his phone and checked again. In the chat window there was only his own gray bubble, solitary.
He didn't stand up.
Not because he didn't want to. His body was making the decision for him. If he stood up now, pushed open the bathroom door, and found it empty, then this would become a fact he'd have to face. As long as he stayed in his seat, Simeon might still come back. Maybe the line was long. Maybe he'd stepped out to take a call. Maybe—
He knew that wasn't it.
He watched the rest of the movie. When the credits rolled, the audience began rising to their feet, blocking the light from the screen. Bronco sat motionless until every light in the theater came on and a staff member peered in and glanced at him.
On Simeon's seat lay the red jacket, folded carelessly, one sleeve draped over the armrest like a person from whom all the bones had been drawn.
Bronco picked it up. The fabric was thin, almost weightless.
A bird had flown away, leaving behind its plumage.
Having forgotten to take its plumage, the bird had flown away all the same.
Two fifteen. Miles turned his coffee cup so the handle faced right. He'd brought a pocket-sized paperback—a collection of Dazai Osamu's short stories. He'd gotten to the third page of "Villon's Wife" and stopped turning.
He'd chosen a window seat—not because he was waiting for anyone, but because he liked watching the street through the glass. Different people hurrying past, headed for places he would never know.
Two thirty. The sunlight was taken away; rain began to fall. Water beads gathered on the glass, and the street scene beyond turned blurry. Miles watched a person walk by under a red umbrella. Not Simeon. Another, in a red jacket. Not Simeon either.
He thought of the conversation by the vending machine after school. Simeon had asked why he'd held him on the rooftop, and he'd said he didn't know. That was the truth—but not the whole truth.
The whole truth was this: the moment he pushed open the rooftop door and saw Simeon standing at the edge of the railing, his mind went blank. His body moved before thought could catch up, and by the time awareness returned, Simeon was already in his arms—impossibly thin, ribs pressing against his forearm. Rainwater seeped out from the space between their clothes, and he couldn't tell whose body heat was draining away.
What Simeon had said was: "You'll get your clothes wet." Not "let go of me." Not "thank you." "You'll get your clothes wet." When Miles replayed it later, he decided this was simply Simeon's instinct: at any moment that might expose his own vulnerability, deflect attention onto someone else.
Like a small animal—head bowed, eyes averted, murmuring softly, "You'll get your clothes wet." In Miles's eyes, Simeon was not someone perpetually ready to die. He was someone perpetually ready to flee.
Two forty-five. The coffee was finished. Miles flagged down the server and ordered the same thing again. The server passed politely without asking any questions.
Three o'clock. He began to consider the possibility that Simeon wasn't coming. The thought didn't surprise him; there was even a strange sense of logic to it—this was exactly the kind of thing Simeon would do. Make plans with someone and not show up. Not because he'd forgotten, but because he wanted someone to wait for him. Miles also began to consider whether he should leave, but in the end he didn't get up.
He didn't send a message. He turned to the next page and this time actually read a few lines. Dazai wrote about a woman whose husband drank and ran up debts, so she went to work at the bar to pay them off, and in the end she said: "The very fact of being alive is sinful in itself." He closed the book.
Three oh seven.
The door chime rang; footsteps approached. Miles didn't look up right away—he didn't want to look like someone who'd been waiting. He set the book down on the table first, then raised his eyes.
Simeon was in his black T-shirt, no jacket. His hair was damp but not drenched, which meant the rain had eased or he'd only walked a short distance. He saw Miles and smiled.
Miles had seen many kinds of smiles from Simeon. The one for teachers was one kind; the one for classmates, another; the one for Bronco, yet another. This smile belonged to none of those categories. In the curve of his lips there was apology, but in his eyes there was none. If he had to put a name to it, it was something brazen—clearly, Simeon had drawn a quiet pleasure from the fact that Miles had waited.
Simeon walked over and sat down, placing his phone face-down on the table. "The police had some questions for me. Sorry, I left the house late."
Miles studied him. Near the collar of Simeon's T-shirt, barely visible unless you looked closely, was a faint mark on the black cotton near his collarbone—butter. Popcorn butter.
Miles didn't ask.
"How's the latte here?" Simeon opened the menu.
"Not bad."
Simeon ordered an iced latte, closed the menu, and looked out the window. "Looks like the rain's almost done."
"Mm."
The server brought the latte. Simeon stirred it with the straw; the ice clinked, the sound crisp in the silence between them. He took a sip and asked, curious: "How long did you wait?"
"Not long," Miles said. On the table lay a paperback open to its middle and one empty cup beside another still mostly full—making the lie thoroughly unconvincing.
Simeon's lie was equally unconvincing—and he never bothered to make it more so.
They began to talk, trading small talk, things that didn't sting but still flowed naturally. Course selections for next semester. Plans for the culture festival. The Dazai paperback… Carmelo Gusto's case.
When the conversation turned to Carmelo Gusto, Simeon began tearing open sugar packets on the table, pouring the granules onto the surface, pushing them into a thin line with his fingertip, scattering them, then pushing again. His attention seemed entirely absorbed by this, but Miles knew it wasn't.
Miles's arm ached faintly—there had been a bruise there once, though he couldn't say whether it was from the railing or from catching hold of Simeon. It hadn't bothered him before; now, nearly faded, it produced a pain that had arrived far too late.
"Simeon."
Simeon looked up.
"Next time, you don't have to force yourself to come."
Miles thought he had administered a small act of retaliation, but Simeon smiled again—gently—and even let out a soft laugh. Unlike the one before, it seemed genuine, laced with a helpless, disarmed sort of trouble.
"Nothing gets past you, does it…"
Simeon walked out of the café and drifted along the street.
The rain had stopped, but the city lights filtered through lingering droplets in the air, casting a phantasmagoric, forest-like iridescence.
He opened his phone. Three missed calls. Bronco. Timed at 3:47 p.m., 4:14 p.m., and 4:19 p.m. One unread message: "Your jacket's with me."
And another, from Miles: "Get home early."
Simeon stared at the screen. The streetlamp cast its light from above; half his face was bright, half in shadow, his expression unreadable. His thumb hovered over the screen for a second or two.
Then he turned the phone over, screen down, and slipped it into his pocket.
He walked toward the station. His pace was neither fast nor slow, his sneakers making no sound on the dry pavement. The station's signboard glowed ahead, white light, the numbers on the timetable board flickering.
He didn't call back.
But he didn't delete anything either.