this is a story in three parts, about three boys and a Situation. this is part one, which is about the Roots of the Situation, eventually leading up to the Situation itself, and hopefully setting the stage for the Situation proper to begin. credit where credit is due: to ~muscatlove for her excellent translations of the Rikkaidai profiles (the Yukimura one especially, if you've read it you will understand the whole Everybody Loves Seiichi thing going on below), to ~morphaileffect for getting me thoroughly obsessed with Renji, and to one or two writers of marvellous Renji*Yuki fics which I, having read and drooled over once, stupidly forgot to save and never could find again. it is nice to be fangirling in good company..
"You know, Renji, sometimes I wonder if you can see properly.."
I lower my book, look at him across a yard grey with stone squares. His fine-boned face, more beautiful than any flower, is lit most fabulously by a fading sun; does not turn to meet mine, smiles vacantly into a patch of ragged chrysanthemums.
"Why would you say that?" I ask.
Beside me, something that previously was as still as a statue unfolds its arms, makes a short, gruff bark in the back of its throat. Turn my head, and I am looking into a pair of eyes with the cold, grey stillness of the yard's stone floor. "Indeed," the statue says, "why are you asking such a question, Seiichi? I have absolutely no idea."
Laughter, gentle without being nervous, falls upon the chrysanthemums; then footsteps mark the stone yard, approaching. Beside me, the statue looks up as a shadow drops across it; it shifts to make a space in the centre of the bench, but the boy for whom the seat is intended does not sit down immediately, reaches out instead to tug at the stiff black bill of the statue's baseball cap. I do not allow a single muscle to change in my body, must not, but behind deep-dropped eyelids my eyes are free to shift focus without attracting anyone's attention. Is there something special in his smile, now, does his hand linger, is there a difference in the way he looks at that other person? How accurate is my interpretation of this data? He sits down between me and the statue, stifles a yawn; his chin, in profile, has the feeling of a robin's egg, something impossibly fine and round..
"I'm just afraid that you might not be seeing exactly how beautiful some things are," he says. "Like this garden. I mean, I do work very hard on it, you know."
"And you slack on other things, like tennis practice," the statue grumbles, "tarundoru.." But it is a joke, I look at him and see his lips creasing upwards, and I become ashamed of the thoughts in my head only a moment ago; I look at Yukimura, I see his brow slightly creased with that gentle concern for both Sanada's words and my shut eyes.
"I see very beautiful things," I admit. "I just don't speak about them."
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Even in the beginning, we met as three. First day of school, I was planning which clubs I'd join, preparing to assess the people I'd meet, but I wasn't ready for effective multi-tasking yet. Put the chain of my bicycle lock around three bars instead of one without realising it, mind drifting to the day ahead; in the evening, walking slowly back to the railings, seeing three bicycles and two boys waiting for me. One big, one small, like a comic play; I halted in my tracks, sensing that I shouldn't join them. There are only two in a pair of opposites, after all; what role could I play? But the smaller boy had a face so beautiful in both structure and emotion, it would take practice to be able to look away easily. I'd noticed it earlier in class and it had been so hard to stop staring. That had been fine because the whole class had been staring, too, but now it was just the three of us. And now he'd seen me, turned his smile towards me.
"Hey," the bigger boy said, "is this your idea of a joke?"
"No," I said. I knew from the way he was watching me, suspiciously, there was a 90% chance of him commenting on my eyes next.
He didn't disappoint me: "Are you blind or something?"
"Genichirou," the small boy said. His voice was as soft as the waves of dark hair curling about his face, and yet the other boy jerked backwards almost immediately. His mouth set in a hard and defiant line, but remained shut. It felt as though he was folding himself up, clearing the stage for the smaller boy to speak. That soft voice, once again; a sensation like that of a hand or a mouth, just barely brushing your ear. You knew there were words, but it was so hard to concentrate on them.
"You're in my class.. What's your name?"
"Yanagi. You're Yukimura. And Sanada."
"No," Yukimura had said, "I'm Seiichi, and this is Genichirou. What's your name?"
Sanada had made a gruff noise, directed it to the side and at his feet. Later I learnt to read it as a sign of mirth; Sanada, though, never learnt how to laugh. He had the sort of dark good looks that would make him a popular student, and the promise of immense strength and height that already made other boys fearfully respectful of him, as other creatures in the forest will fall silent at the approach of a tiger. "I don't really care for anyone's name," he'd said. "Look, hurry up and unlock my bike. I want to go home."
Several things happened then. I replied to Yukimura with "Renji", Yukimura smiled, Sanada stepped towards me, and Yukimura's voice rang out clean and clear as a bell through him, saying, "Genichirou, there's a virtue in being polite." He didn't even have to raise his voice. For a full moment, Sanada stood with his feet apart and shoulders heavy, head lowered like a young bull and a thoughtful look in his eyes. I looked back at him and I knew he wasn't really focusing on me. Yukimura appeared beside Sanada then, his hand thin and white like pure bone coming up and making the tiniest gesture of holding-back against Sanada's long bony shoulder. His other hand, he held out to me, palm upturned and open, blank with expectation. I found the key to my bicycle lock in my pocket and held it out, put it in his hand. Surprisingly it was warm, skin soft, nothing like the eggshell-thin bone-china Yukimura seemed to be made of. I saw Sanada looking down at Yukimura's hand against his shoulder, and I knew we were both thinking, gosh, I could break him, and then, gosh, he's broken me.
It was a good feeling, somehow; quiet and warm, like waking up from a most satisfying dream.
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We became a unit of three so naturally after that, even I can't pinpoint the exact moment it happened. Probably the transition was a different time for each of us. For me it was waking up one morning to the sound of pebbles against my window, finding my eyes hot and heavy, tongue dry in a horrid-tasting mouth. Fell over getting out of bed and stumbled to the window, fingers gone stupid and fumbling with the fastenings; pushing it open, I was surprised at how I nearly fell out, and then surprised at how the danger didn't really bother me. One look at my face and Yukimura had jumped off his bicycle, was running to my front door and pounding on it while Sanada shouted at me to lean back, don't fall. When my mother managed to unlock my room door, I couldn't understand what the fuss was about. After all, Sanada was standing beneath my window, his arms outstretched and legs braced, looking upward with his head craned far back - I remember his eyes, strained and perfectly aligned with the bill of his baseball cap - and Yukimura beside him, anxious, but somehow calm.
"I was all right," I said, when they came to visit me after school. "Really.. I don't think I would have fallen through the window."
"Oh, really," Sanada said, making his dry cough-laugh again. "I'll bet you calculated the odds of that."
"No, I am wider than the window. The odds of you catching me without hurting yourself were almost nil, though."
Sanada snorted, but he wasn't facing me and his head had angled further in the opposite direction, staring at the wall. He was always so tan, you could not read a blush off his face; you had to read it in other things, like the way he held his hands - suddenly conscious of all ten fingers, shifting his attention to them. He opened his mouth to speak, but I beat him to it, although it sounded impossibly flat in my mouth:
"Tarundoru!"
A pause; then Yukimura's laughter, lonely but somehow fitting, flowed in the silence and space between Sanada and me. He stood at the foot of my bed and looked at me, then at Sanada, then back, like a spectator at a tennis match; eventually he flopped down at the edge of the bed, giggling like a schoolgirl. I could see the fidgets leaving Sanada's hands, felt my own shoulders relaxing. Yukimura's laughter was exactly the feeling I had inside of me, but my body was not made to express such a sound.
Sanada must have felt the same.
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It took no special deduction, no meditation, to realise that something had changed. Whenever two of us were together, three of us were together. Noticing the transfiguration of Sanada's attitude towards Yukimura was as gradual and natural as falling in love with Yukimura myself - sometimes, in a weak moment, I would wonder, is that what this really is? But I'd never be sure if it was me reflecting Sanada's feelings, or the other way around. And I was very sure I didn't want to lose whatever it was I had.
It was Rikkai law, after all. You must not lose. Yukimura said it himself, drilled it into you with his soft voice piercing places in your heart so deeply that it followed you off the tennis courts, took over the way you lived your life. It was the reason why all the Rikkai regulars were famous for achievements outside of tennis (with the notable exception of Marui, whose main hobby did not allow him much to aspire to*). Without Yukimura's mantra to stand by, I would have bowed to Sanada - walked a little way ahead of them, shown up a few minutes late for our studying sessions, given him a chance to snatch some precious memories of something, some time and place where it felt like there were only two people in all the world. After all, Sanada was an important friend to me; once, he had stood with arms outstretched below a narrow window, ready to break my fall. But whenever I looked at his face, deduced that now was the moment for me to slip away and leave them alone, I found my eyes sliding, hidden, away from him, drawn to Yukimura. And almost as though he could feel my indecision, Yukimura would raise his head, eyebrows high, mouth quirking at the corners. Whatever it is, the look in his eyes said, you must not lose. I have that faith in you.
There was nothing in that look I could claim as something given only and entirely to me. Countless times, I'd seen him raise his head during practice and look at someone who was struggling, on one side of the tennis court; and, when the struggler turned the tables on his opponent, the same thing would happen, only now Yukimura's eyes would be speaking to the player who had once been winning. And I would hate him for making us destroy each other in this way - even as I stood on his right, refusing to move as long as Sanada refused to move from his left - I would hate him for fooling us into believing his love was something pure and special, when actually he gave it away so thoughtlessly on both sides of the court. But it was curious, how any kind of emotion you felt for Yukimura only served to carve a grander and bigger hollowness inside of you. I've seen this in the eyes of my teammates, sometimes tasted a bitter look thrown my way, a certain curtness stinging in the edge of an answer. I know what they have all felt, at some point. How they each must have strived, in their own way, to prove themselves in his eyes, make him look at them and only them with that soft light in his eyes, proud words on his lips.. and knowing all the while that in truth, there were so many talented players on the team, he could not choose to give any special love in that way.
All eyes turned, jealously, to his two shadows, the ones who had known him the longest, who were never far from his side. Who did not seem to know what it meant, to be where they were.
I shut my eyes, played as if I really was blind. As much as I could make it, Sanada never truly managed to spend any meaningful amount of time alone with Yukimura, although, I'm sure, he silently wished to.
As I wished, for myself.
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"Oi, Renji."
Sanada appears without ceremony or even knocking, high shoulders and narrow head invading the space of the doorway. A book in his outstretched hand; I recognise the cover, rise to my feet. "Thank you."
He shrugs. "Seiichi, not me."
"He asked you to bring it? But I told him it wasn't urgent.."
"God, Renji, are you blind or something?" Sanada says. He sounds annoyed, but it is his nature to speak aggresively; I am not surprised, I look up, ready to offer him a mute smile and accept his humour. But his head is turned away, the bill of his cap points at the floor. I find myself unwilling to move any closer to him, but too late, I have already stepped towards him, already extended my hand to take the book. Without warning he thrusts it forward, so that I must catch it; in the well of silence that follows, I run my hands over the book's corners, watch Sanada as he breathes, become a statue again. Fingers are lost, balled into fists which he suddenly thrusts into the pockets of his jacket, out of sight - he is learning, he begins to suspect that I collect data even when it is not strictly necessary. Finally he faces me, and there is a stiffness to his throat, distance in his face.
"He's sick again," he says. The words sound manufactured, as though he is reading from a script without understanding what the words mean, who they are about. "I went to see him and all he could worry about was the damn book he'd promised to pass to you. Why does he do that? How can such a person continue to exist in this kind of world?"
I speak, in answer, but my words are truly manufactured, taken from one of the many scripts I've made in my head to deal with different people in different kinds of stress. Sanada's anger is a terrible thing, but from the way he keeps facing the wall, seeking his reflection in the stone, I can tell that he is mainly angry with himself for losing his cool. I stand apart from him, hands awkward on my book. Yukimura would have put a hand on his shoulder, made him sit down, perhaps even put an arm around his shoulders; then, looking up, would have caught my blank gaze and smiled reassuringly at me, perhaps even saying that he was sure I would enjoy the book. But there are only two people here now, and in the way we hold ourselves, in the way we cannot meet each other's eyes, I see that each of us wish we were someone else. Sanada's voice still echoes around the walls of the room:
"Are you blind, or something?"
My eyes appear shut, but I see these things.
to be continued in part ii, 'deaf'
*Unless 'putting hotel restaurants out of business' counts as an achievement**.
**I'm kidding. I love Marui, his hobby is just too cute.