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Ishimaru took to motorcycles like he took to eating imported foreign food.
Wary of it, hesitant, certain amounts of fearful, and even after he was used to it he still was not quite sure the general concept was a good idea.
Mondo still wasn’t quite sure how it happened, or why it happened. Back when they were still only friends in high school, when Mondo had been in a steady relationship with their other friend Chihiro Fujiskai. How one day, without warning, Ishimaru had suddenly interrupted their conversation about the science behind combining cotton candy and yakisoba in favor of this other subject.
“Brother? Forgive my deviation from the subject, but can you teach me how to ride a motorcycle?” Ishimaru had asked.
“… hah?” came Mondo’s ever so intelligent response.
Even Chihiro, sitting comfortably on Mondo’s lap for the moment, seemed puzzled.
“You really want to ride motorcycles, Ishimaru-kun?” Chihiro asked.
“Yeah, seriously. I thought you had bikes pegged as instruments of… ah, “Screaming metal death and destruction traps” or something,” Mondo added.
He couldn’t recall the full explanation but Ishimaru’s response all boiled down to one sentence.
“Motorcycles are important to you, Brother. So I want to learn what you enjoy about driving them.”
At the time, Mondo could not see anything wrong with this. He shrugged.
“Sure thing, bro,” he said simply. He grinned then, blushing ever so slightly while he moved a hand up to ruffle Chihiro’s soft (and damn good smelling) hair. “How about you, Kid? Want in on this?”
“No thank you!” Chihiro replied with a small laugh, putting a hand up to Mondo’s wrist to save their hair from further attack. “I think I’ll stick to racing games on the computer.”
Chihiro had ridden on the back seat of Mondo’s motorcycle plenty of times before. Mondo drove them to school every morning, sometimes back home or to some place for a date if Chihiro had no plans after school. Ishimaru’s first time ever on a motorcycle was when Mondo began their lessons 2 months later. Ishimaru was incredibly busy with school activities, so it was hard to find time. In fact, Mondo had almost been convinced his friend had given up his wishes entirely. 2 months, and Ishimaru told him the block of time he had fit into his schedule for the lessons.
Their first lessons began as demonstrations. Exactly the way Daiya had taught /him/ when he was young. Mondo could almost hear Daiya’s voice in his head while he repeated his instructions and advice to Ishimaru. This is the ignition, turn this to go faster, do /this/ if you want to go /really/ fast (but keep it slow at first, bro. Don’t want to end up with a mouthful of pavement on your first ride, do ya?)
So they began, just by riding together. Mondo would take Ishimaru out on joy rides, let him get a feel for the balance and the feel of the engine under them. Especially so Ishimaru would stop shaking like a broken blender any time Mondo revved the engine up. Oh, how he laughed and smirked at the way Ishimaru went from Determined and “manly” to clinging to Mondo like any space between them would create a destructive explosion the moment the engine went on. It took a full two months of bi-weekly rides for Ishimaru to finally learn how to relax while they drove.
(Ishimaru was never good at quick transitions, was he? Unless in case of emergency, he preferred taking his sweet damn time to adjust to new experiences. Like a fine arts master looking directly and forwardly at a painting, but taking the time to taste and savor the palette and texture of the piece before forming on opinion.)
When Mondo was sure Ishimaru wouldn’t destroy his bike the moment he touched it on his own, he offered Ishimaru the next lesson. Sitting on the bike by himself, starting it up, and moving forward a meter. Ishimaru insisted he needed one more day to observe, then a second. The third time Ishimaru tried to pull that shit, Mondo told him to get his damn ass on the bike or else he was going to get “That stick shoved up your ass replaced with a motorcycle!!”
Ishimaru started trying the bike on his own. First starting at 1 meter, then 2, then 3. Slow, steady transitions.
The first time they had the “helmet argument” was mid-summer during their lessons.
Ishimaru always wore one even when he was just moving one meter forward. He had tried to instruct Mondo one day, about how /he/ should wear one as well. How it was very irresponsible for him not to do so.
Mondo said it messed with his hair. That helmets did not come in “pompadour”, they only came in “safety nerd”.
“You’d look much better with shorter hair than with your head scrapped on the road, Brother!!”
Suddenly Mondo wasn’t so aloof.
“Yes. Well, a helmet wouldn’t have done /shit/ for Daiya. Damage was too bad either way, so fuck helmets.”
He said “fuck helmets” but the true intent was laced in the tone.
So fuck you.
They didn’t talk for a week. Not until Ishimaru tracked down Mondo and kept him still long enough to offer a proper apology.
They didn’t talk about helmets after that.
The end of the summer was a month that brought about many changes for them. It was close to the beginning of their last year of school together, their third year together as classmates and friends. Mondo and Ishimaru had worked through their problems about their helmet discussion, and were back to being as close as ever. Over that last month, while they still had the freedom and time to do so, their rides grew more and more frequent. Mondo noticed that the more they rode, the more his friend would smile while approaching the motorcycle. The less he shook, the more confident he became. By mid month Ishimaru was actively asking to drive the motorcycle on his own. It pleased Mondo when he was able to sit on the back of the motorcycle while Ishimaru drove, and they got up to a speed faster than “Old lady walking across the street holding groceries”. It was almost their last week of summer when Ishimaru drove on the motorcycle for a full hour, on a peaceful and serene route for their joy ride together.
They drove together to a nice and quiet spot on top of a hill outside of the city. A place where they could park, sit in the grass and eat the food they had packed with them while idly chatting about their plans for their final year. For the first time in what seemed like years, Mondo found himself actively talking. About everything. The gang, riding, his brother, the accident, the past, the present, the future.
He had lived a hard life. The gang gave him a sense of community and relief, a family to call his own even after he lost his brother.
Presently, he was happy with his situation.
But in the future, after graduation, he’d retire as the gang leader. He never saw himself as a “smart guy”, so he figured he’d get a carpentry apprenticeship. He could build his future while building furniture… it was a comforting idea.
The air was hot. Mondo lay in the grass next to his best friend, so close that their arms pressed together. Which wasn’t very comfortable, just made his own arm hotter and sticker with the summer humidity. When he questioned it in his mind though, he found that he didn’t really give a shit. He just wanted to lie next to Ishimaru, both of them looking up at the clouds in the sky, and talk.
“What about your future with Fujisaki-kun?” Ishimaru asked.
Mondo let out a small sigh. He knew this was probably going to come up.
“Yeah, well…”
It took some time and some careful wording to explain the situation. How one day, he and Chihiro had found themselves sitting next to one another. A day like any other, talking about normal subjects, when all of a sudden Chihiro had finally said the statement that had been both of their minds recently, that both had been avoiding. ‘We’re… not really dating anymore, are we?’ they had asked. But just as the two of them had drifted comfortably into their romantic relationship, they drifted out once more. They didn’t hold hands or share kisses between one another, no longer found their hearts racing at the idea of seeing one another for lunch or after classes.
Sure, Mondo had his regrets. He regretted that it had to end. Those bubbly feelings he got in his stomach any time Chihiro smiled at him or touched his hand ever so lightly in a way that had made him so happy, so excited and so special. That was over, but at least he still had Chihiro as his friend. They made good friends.
“… I’m sorry,” Ishimaru said after Mondo’s explanation ended.
“Eh. Don’t be. Nothing sad about it,” Mondo replied. He looked aside at Ishimaru, to find that Ishimaru had already had his head turned to look at his face. He was smiling, comfortingly.
“Do not worry, Brother! ‘When one door closes, another one opens’,” Ishimaru said.
“Heh. Yeah, sure,” Mondo responded. He didn’t usually believe in those sayings. Plenty of fish in the sea, doors opening and closing… but something about the way his friend said this made him feel hopeful. “I’ll show /you/ closed doors!”
They wrestled one another on the grass under the late summer sun. Eventually they were both too hot and tired to move again, their faces and clothing were covered with sweat and dirt and tears from laughing too hard.
Their final year of high school went by quickly. There were laughs, fights, parties and very late night study periods. The group of them graduated high school, and Ishimaru graduated Mondo’s expectations and tests about riding motorcycles. Though the school year was over, their graduation did not feel like a “Goodbye”. Sure, some of them were travelling off to other countries for a year or go to study abroad. Some were going to college, some right into the work force, but their class knew that they would always be very close to one another. This was a group that would be friends for life, no matter the distance or time they went without seeing one another.
The night after their graduation, they exchanged gifts. Ishimaru had gotten Mondo a small charm, for safety and prosperity (One that Mondo always kept with him, even to this day. Left shirt pocket, close to the heart as possible.) Mondo had a significantly larger present. One he had been working on all school year. He had to save up a good sum of money, put in a significant amount of time to assemble it properly and fix it up from the discounted state he had purchased it in, but finally on that night after graduation Mondo was able to present his gift to his friend.
When Ishimaru had seen the motorcycle next to Mondo’s, customized and built just for him, he cried so hard he could barely stand on his own. He cleared his tears, thanked Mondo a thousand and one times, and the two of them went off on a drive together.
They drove through secluded streets, hillside roads and winding paths. The night air was crisp. Warm, but fresh. The stars twinkled above them like diamonds in the sky, with a bright and round moon as its bright headlight. Even as they stopped riding, miles outside of the city, the engines turned off and parked, their loud laughter and whoops of excitement did not cease. It was a special night, one to celebrate. Perhaps they knew at that moment, this was no end, but the beginning. The beginning of their next saga, a lifetime together riding under diamond skies.
The first time they kissed was on Mondo’s motorcycle, that night. Ishimaru had removed his helmet and left it on his own bike. He went to join Mondo and sit on the back of his motorcycle. Mondo wasn’t sure when it happened, how they went from sitting side by side to facing one another, to straddling the same motorcycle. To their foreheads resting together. Maybe it was the way that the silence finally fell long enough for Mondo to recognize how Ishimaru’s smile was so close to his own. His hands ended up on Ishimaru’s shoulders and his mouth on his friend’s, then suddenly they were tangled up in each other’s arms.
Ishimaru’s lips and tongue tasted like oranges. He’d never forget that. Oranges.
(He wasn’t sure what his own lips felt like to Ishimaru. Probably rough, probably tasted like cigarette smoke and whatever “fucking nervous as hell” tasted of.)
This wasn’t Mondo’s style at all. He was an old-fashioned person. It surprised people, they generally did not believe it, but it was true. Mondo preferred to go steady. He wanted to find a girl, have feelings for her, admire her from afar, ask her on a date, take her on at least 3 or 4 or 5 appropriate and friendly dates before holding hands or getting a kiss on the cheek from her. This was so unlike him, but it didn’t feel wrong. Not for a moment.
Perhaps, this was the perfect relationship. After all, (As Ishimaru would say. That guy and his damn proverbs) “Love without friendship is like a shadow without the sun”. Ishimaru and Mondo were very close friends… so this time, Mondo did not need a date or a kiss on the cheek.
That night, they decided to give a romantic relationship a try. Despite Ishimaru’s political career ahead of him, despite Mondo’s fumbling and slight lack of confidence in his abilities in a steady relationship.
They went on like that for a full year, with grand success. Ishimaru was quite busy with his first year of college, but he still found the time to visit with Mondo. Sometimes just to sit quietly together while Ishimaru studied and Mondo read some magazines. They went on regular motorcycles rides together. They slept over one another’s apartments. They argued about Mondo’s smoking habits. They stayed up later than they should have, undressed and making love until Mondo forgot what life was ever like without Kiyotaka Ishimaru by his side. As his Rival. As his friend. As his partner. As his lover.
One morning, Mondo woke up to Ishimaru already getting dressed and was heading out the door. He had forgotten that the other man had an early school meeting this morning. He blearily wiped his eyes with the heel of his wrist, sitting up and pushing his hair out of his face. He started to mumble something. Ishimaru did not need to understand to know what to respond with.
“I’m already late!! The alarm didn’t go off in time, I have to hurry out!” Ishimaru explained.
Well, so much for staying in bed cuddling this morning. Mondo would have to go the rest of the morning alone until he had to leave to get to his apprenticeship. Somewhere, in the back of his sleepy mind, a thought slithered out.
“You’re not taking the bike, are you? Heard something weird raddlin’ in it yesterday. Wanted to take a look before you get on it,” Mondo mummered.
“You can take a look after I’m back! If I take public transport, I’m going to be late for sure! If I take the bike I can still get there on time,” Ishimaru said.
Mondo should have stopped him. Mondo should have jumped out of bed, told him not to leave. He should have ran over to him and told him he wasn’t allowed to go, that if he had to go he’d have to settle for being late on public transport. He should have offered to drive Ishimaru there on his /own/ motorcycle. Instead he nodded. The only thing he did was call out when Ishimaru was almost out the door.
“Oi! Punk! You’re forgettin something!” he said.
Ishimaru stopped for a moment to think. “Oh!! You’re right!! I’m sorry!”
He ran over to Mondo, kneeling down. He kissed him on the lips. A small one, soft and caring. But he paused after, just long enough to look into Mondo’s eyes and say:
“… I love you, Mondo.”
Mondo almost was too shocked to respond. That was the first time Ishimaru had said that. With just his name, instead of a polite “Oowada-kun” tossed in at the end.
“… uh…. Yeah. Love you too, man,” Mondo said. He was too embarrassed and confused to respond with anything different.
Ishimaru ran out the door.
Three hours later, Mondo was running into a hospital.
What had happened? Something about the brakes. There was something wrong with the brakes. Or was it the exhaust pipe? Mondo didn’t know. He only had a million guesses, with no answers besides the fact that Ishimaru had rounded a corner and hit a car. He didn’t want to listen to the nurses or doctors try to explain that it was a smaller car, how fast both of them were going, how Ishimaru had a helmet on thankfully because that might have just about saved his life from instant death but he still wasn’t in a stable state.
He just had to get into that hospital room. He had to get into the hospital room without throwing up from the stress of the situation or fainting because he didn’t want to walk into it and already see his boyfriend dead on a cold hospital bed.
He wasn’t, when Mondo finally was lead to the room and walked in. But damn if he wasn’t close.
What looked to others like something out of a hospital drama, looked like something out of a horror movie to Mondo. Ishimaru was laying in a hospital bed, eyes closed. He was barely recognizable by the amount of bandages all over him, the casts and the IVs and the very large breathing mask and tube covering the lower half of his face. Mondo didn’t even have one of his hands to hold, to squeeze and let Ishimaru know (if he could even hear) that he was /sorry/ and Mondo fucked up big time but Ishimaru wasn’t allowed to die right now.
They still had so much left to do together. There was the festival in a few weeks that Ishimaru had really been looking forward to going to. There was going to be fireworks. Ishimaru loved fireworks. Almost as much as he loved trying to catch those fish with the little paper nets. They still had their vacation plans. The two of them were going to go to a small resort with the best hot springs and baths in it and go for hikes around the mountains. They were going to go to one of those “deer forests” that Mondo hated but Ishimaru loved because the deer always ended up following him around and trying to steal the food out of his pockets because they were sneaky little fuckers who knew where the food was hidden but were still dumb enough to ask Mondo for food with their beady little deer eyes insistently until Mondo ended up yelling at them and tried shouting how he didn’t have any fucking food and they needed to back off and Ishimaru would laugh that /beautiful/ and robustly deep laugh of him on and on because he loved it when Mondo and the deer would have their show downs then give the deer some more food just to be a jerk and… and…
No. Ishimaru couldn’t die. He couldn’t go.
He had to be there for the festival. For the vacation. For the deer.
Mondo wanted to tell Ishimaru all of this. Maybe hearing it would remind him that he still had shit to do, so he’d wake up with a start and yank all that shit out of his body. He’d apologize to Mondo for being so lazy when they had so much to do together and they could walk out of this dump hand in hand…
Mondo just pulled up a chair and sat next to Ishimaru’s bed. He was stable for the moment, the nurses left. Mondo hung his head and cried like a lost child.
Ishimaru couldn’t die. He couldn’t go.
Mondo really needed him.
The most he could find the strength to manage after a while was reaching up with one hand, placing it gently on Ishimaru’s shoulder. One of the only parts of his body that remained free from injury.
He tried to say, to lighten the mood, ‘If you die, I’ll kick your ass. Fucker.’
Instead, it came out as:
“I… I’m sorry. I love you, Kiyotaka…. I love you…”
And he cried.
- - - - -
In the following weeks, their friends were a godsend. Mondo refused to leave Ishimaru’s side at any point, he did not have the energy or the stamina to take care of the official matters that had to be attended to, so each took on their own role.
Togami made the necessary calls he had to, to organize a leave of absence for Mondo from his apprenticeship and Ishimaru from his studies. He could not be there in person to support them, his work was far too taxing, but he did arrange for only the best equipment and medical staff to be placed in Ishimaru’s hospital room. Chihiro was on “Mondo Support” duty, making sure the man remembered to feed himself and got a breath of fresh air from open windows or a walk down the hall to the vending machines. Hagakure did his best to brighten the mood, letting Mondo know that he had performed every fortune telling technique he could think of and all of the results promised that Ishimaru would make a full recovery. He placed some charms and small dishes of scented herbs around the room, just in case, to ward off evil spirits and bring good luck. Sakura and Asahina put in a joint effort to decorate the room where they could, with balloons and flowers and plenty of things Ishimaru liked so he’d have something nice “to wake up to”. Naegi, of course, with Kirigiri as his assistant, was there to prove to Mondo that hope was not lost. Junko and Mukuro dropped by to leave some small plush bears around the place (They looked sort of frightening, but no one had the heart to refuse the gifts). Fukawa, who was attending the same university as Ishimaru, made sure to collect all of his work from the classes he had missed and organize them in a way he’d find acceptable. Leon came back from his “round the world soul searching (which was really a foreign women searching) mission” to provide support and help where he could, visiting often with Sayaka. Yamada donated a set of his magical-girl figurines and nurse action dolls to watch over Ishimaru. Even Celestia came by the hospital room, to sit and read dramatic novels to their friend as he rested.
Without them Mondo might have lost it. Every day was still a struggle for him, but with them it was possible. He had the strength to keep going, to watch as Ishimaru’s health changed dramatically between getting very healthy to his heart stopping for half a minute.
One month later, after his bones were healed and set, after his wounds had closed and he was only left with some ragged scars to remember the accident by, Ishimaru opened his eyes.
It happened while Mondo was holding his hand, idly talking at him. Mondo did not even notice at first, too busy staring at the monitor. For once, Mondo was the one chatting away, while Ishimaru stayed silent.
“… and you know, you really ought to thank her for that when you get up. Not that I don’t think you will, or that I need to remind you. It’s just, you know, you gotta wake up some time to do it, man. And don’t give me that shit about being too tired and not getting up. You gotta … uh… work hard. All that shit you usually say. But anywho, as I was sayin’, I think there’s something going on between Naegi and Kirigiri, you know? Cause they keep visiting but it’s always together, and the other day I saw em- …”
He stopped himself short when he looked back to Ishimaru’s face. Their eyes met.
He didn’t need breathing assistance anymore, so his mouth was free. Finally able to force out, after a month of silence:
“G…. good… morning. Mondo.”
Mondo shouted. He wasn’t sure what he shouted, how loud he had said it, or what he had even meant to say. Suddenly, none of it mattered.
They had missed the festival they had been meaning to do to. That didn’t matter.
Ishimaru would be in the hospital for the next month, for observation and physical therapy. That didn’t matter.
Mondo had gotten his second chance. He sobbed and shouted and lost control of his voice and senses as he kissed Ishimaru desperately, right on the hospital bed, not giving a damn about the nurses already rushing into the room to ask what the commotion was about and to investigate the source of those noises.
One day, no time soon, but at some point in the future, Ishimaru would recover. He’d be a bit nervous about getting on a motorcycle again, so he’d just sit on the back of Mondo’s at first. They drive for hours, they’d drive for days.
One day, each on their own motorcycle again. Two motorcycles, two helmets, going miles outside of the city.
They’d kiss, and know that the path before them is long. It’s dark at some points, lighter at others, sometimes have some very sharp and unexpected turns. But no matter what, they’d be going down that path together. They’d laugh and whoop and holler at one another the whole way.
With the diamonds in the sky twinkling above them, and the headlight-shaped moon guiding them along the winding quiet roads.