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The bout ends. A 15-14 defeat. Seiji has lost. This may very well be a cosmic disaster, Nicholas thinks to himself. He makes a mental reminder to himself to ask Seiji what’s wrong later.
-*-*-
Seiji runs back to his and Nicholas’s shared dorm. He knows he screwed up. He thought he saw a familiar blonde in the audience, and faltered. The boy he’s fencing hits his fourth. Just like Nicholas almost did, a long time ago. If you had told Seiji Katayama that he would be dating Nicholas Cox now, he would’ve shook his head and said you had the wrong person. Now, Nicholas was his anchor. His rock. It was a home match, against a shabby fourth rate school, worse than Kings Row. It should’ve been the easiest match of the season. But somehow when he was supposed to win every match, he lost. He was supposed to score some points back. He did, and it was enough for the team to scrape a win. But it wasn’t enough for him.
-*-*-
Nicholas watched Seiji run past with a dull eyed stare. He looked… wrong. Something about his demeanor was even colder than his usual personality. He told Harvard he was going to go follow Seiji, and ran towards the dorms.
-*-*-
Seiji took off his fencing gear and put on a random shirt and ugly pajama pants that he hadn’t worn since coming to Kings Row. He sat beside his bed, and felt absolutely nothing. He felt like a matte layer of beige paint. Nicholas came running through the door, still in his fencing gear.
-*-*-
Seiji wasn’t looking good. He stared up at Nicholas with an unseeing expression in his eyes. He looked unfocused and dim.
“You can have the shower first,” Seiji said. He sounded flat. Like he wasn’t truly aware.
“Okay… are you alright?” Nicholas asked, with a worried glance over towards Seiji.
“I’m fine,” Seiji said, with no inflection in his voice. Nothing to separate him from an emotionless robot. That’s what Nick used to think of Seiji. But he knows it’s different now. It takes an effort, but Seiji has a good side.
-*-*-
Seiji knew Nicholas cared. He watched his loving boyfriend walk into the bathroom. He knew Nicholas would leave random towels on the shower rod, and puddles on the floor, but that was something he loved about him. He couldn’t feel it right now; that love. He knew it had to be there, but he didn’t have enough energy in him to search. A song quietly drifted from the bathroom. He recognized it as one of Nick’s favorite songs: New Kid In Town by the Eagles. Seiji blanked out for a minute; lost in his own thoughts. He focuses again on the song playing. A specific lyric stands out to him.
Will she still love you when you’re not around?
That connected all too deeply with Seiji. He opened his side table’s drawer. He pulled a small, yet slender and sharp knife out. His hands were shaking. He felt a tear escape his eye. And another one. And another one. He was silently sobbing when Nicholas walked out of the shower with a band shirt and basketball shorts on.
-*-*-
Nick walked out of the shower with his favorite shirt on. It was an Eagles shirt with a picture of Don Henley drumming for a live tour. He immediately saw Seiji curled up beside his bed, sobbing, with a knife right next to him. He knows how to do this right; how to talk his boyfriend out of something he’d regret. But somehow, all he can say is:
-*-*-
“Shit.” Seiji looked up at his boyfriend, who looked paler than he’d ever seen. And this was Nicholas he was talking about. His perfect, tan-skinned, sweet and loving boyfriend. Completely reduced to a pale, shocked, and slightly scared face. He immediately picked up the knife from the ground and tossed it towards the bathroom. Seiji could feel the warmth from Nick’s shower against his skin as he held him.
“Would you still love me if I wasn’t around?” Seiji asked this question with his voice shaking, trembling. Like a little kid clinging to a stuffed animal.
“Of course I will. But I don’t want you to go. I never want to let you go, okay? Tell me you won’t try to leave me too early, please,” Nicholas asked Seiji; an anchor for a boat on a rolling sea of pain.
“Okay,” Seiji said, quietly. “I will.”
-*-*-
Roughly 2 Months Later
It had been a while since The Incident, but Nick still watched Seiji closely after matches. Held him close at night. Knew to ask how Seiji was feeling, rather than waiting for a statement that would never come.
He loved Seiji, and wouldn’t let him go. He would make sure he was always around.