Archive of Our Own ^beta

[March 26, 21:13]

Reki hasn’t really indulged in festivals since he was in secondary school. He wouldn’t have shown up to this one if not for Mari.

She’s a nice girl, practically the only friend he’s kept in touch with since graduating high school, but her enthusiasm rivals Reki’s on her most excitable days. She had called him out of the blue a couple of days ago to ask him to come to the Ryukyu Festival because her other friends had plans. It was kind of a low blow to be an afterthought, but Reki honestly hasn’t gotten out of the house much besides his occasional skating with Miya and the nights he hangs out to watch matches at S, so he agreed.

Mari was persistent about partaking in all of the festivities. They’d already gathered around in a group of mostly children, crafting paper lanterns out of bamboo and washi paper. Reki holds his creation in his hands still, cradling the fragile thing in almost a shield of protectiveness. He’d finished constructing his long before Mari, so it’s covered in black marker doodles he’d drawn out of boredom. Grasping it delicately against his chest, they weave through crowds of families and preteens on awkward dates, trying to find a spot to set them free.

Mari’s bleach-blonde hair comes in handy for following meekly behind her, standing out in a crowd as usual. That's not even mentioning the bright orange and pink kimono that probably costs more than all of Reki’s old traditional wear combined. When they start to pass by stalls emitting savory mixed scents of food, Reki’s stomach grumbles.

He reaches out to grab the back of her obi without a second thought.

“Miura-chan.”

She turns and greets his interruption with a bright grin, completely unaware of the groups of people that nearly run into them at the stop. A family with two small children sidesteps around her and continues walking, and Reki meekly bows toward them in apology.

“We should grab something to snack on. I’ll pay,” he says.

Mari shrugs, always easygoing, and Reki tries not to get too flustered looking her straight in the eye.

He’s not particularly into her or anything, but he can’t quite wrap his mind around being here with someone so… out of his league, so to speak. She was always popular in school, the type that everyone wanted to be around, and somehow, they had clicked while forced together with the task of creating a set design for a school play.

They have nearly nothing in common except for their shared love for drawing and other creative pursuits.

She’s here, though, staring at Reki with round, brown eyes and a dimple carved into her otherwise spotless skin. Weird. Miya would never believe him.

Mari hands over her lantern without a word and slides her purse off her shoulder.

“Don’t be dumb. First of all, stop with the honorifics. Second, I forced you to come here with me. Yakitori?”

Reki wants to argue, but a flash of blue hair slides past his peripheral vision and he gets distracted. His eyes snap over to the distant color before trailing back.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll pay you back somehow.”

While they wait in line, Reki holds onto both of the lanterns as gingerly as possible while Mari is distracted by something on her phone.

Theirs aren’t lit up yet, but the sky is already littered with yellow lights that float around like ghosts, something to keep his eyes busy so he doesn’t disturb Mari by talking too much. She’s usually on his wavelength when it comes to energy levels, but she’s been a bit more reserved all evening. She might just be missing her other friends.

Reki glances down at his creation, covered in motifs from former and future skateboard designs, a few scattered kanji here and there, and then his ‘wish’ written in tiny characters at the main bottom.

It’s silly.

He’s never truly believed in superstitions like that, even if he always used to hang tanzuku wishes and pray at the shrines with his family as a child. It’s nice to think that even if it’s not answered by any higher entities, there’s still a shred of hopefulness out in the universe that he’s left behind.

This one is simple.

楽しみたいです. I want to have fun.

Mari has almost reached the front of the booth’s line when Reki’s head turns at another flash of blue. It’s not like it’s incredibly uncommon to have unnaturally dyed hair, but he usually only sees that at S, where the general population is a little less…proper. Even Mari’s yellowish blonde is stark in this sea of brown and black hair, so Reki has to inspect further.

It leads him to staring down someone a few booths away, one with a much longer line as the soba stall is seemingly the more popular choice. Reki is immediately curious. The stranger looks to be around his and Mari’s age, but Reki’s never seen them in his life, he would definitely remember. Their hair is such a light, muted blue that it reminds him of the sky in the morning, all tied up in a low bun with a few stray strands falling over their forehead.

Reki almost assumes it’s a girl based on distant facial features alone. It’s the clothes that throw him completely off-kilter. The person is wearing a set similar to his, only in a sleek navy blue instead of Reki’s black ensemble – there’s the pants-like hakama disrupting the flow of a traditional kimono, and a simple haori that hangs over the person’s shoulders. They’re standing next to an older woman who dons more feminine attire with a mature floral pattern.

Reki doesn’t realize he’s reached the front of the booth until Mari grabs him by the arm and pulls him forward.

“Earth to Kyan, how many do you want?” she asks, pulling out a wad of cash.

Reki blinks down at it, suddenly not feeling guilty at all about letting her pay. His stomach grumbles again.

“Two?”

“Four skewers, please,” she confirms, spinning back to the attendant.

The music Reki had previously been drowning out bursts to life again in his eardrums as they walk away from the booth. It’s loud. The people are loud. Normally he would do just fine in this environment, but the closer it gets to nightfall, the more he feels his excitement draining away.

Mari leads them over to a wooden bench so that they can sit and eat, their lanterns sitting snugly in between their bodies. She passes over his yakitori wordlessly.

“Hey Miura-chan. What’d you wish for?” Reki asks.

It’s at that moment that he spots a group a few meters away, catching his attention with loud laughter and theatrics. He knows them.

They’re from his school, mostly members of the track and field team, and they seem to catch Mari’s attention too. She takes a long time to answer.

“Drop the chan already! You’re so…” she trails off before addressing his question. “I thought you weren’t supposed to tell anyone. It won’t come true.”

“Do you believe in that stuff?”

“Yes,” she says, this time instantly.

Reki didn’t expect that. He glances over at her, right in time to witness her sliding a piece of chicken off the skewer almost ravenously. He laughs and takes a bite of his own. He can’t tell if the pinkness of her cheeks is from embarrassment or if it’s a part of her makeup.

“Fine, be secretive then. Is it about a boy?” He teases, mostly based on the fact that her gaze has quickly drifted back over to their former schoolmates.

She sends him a withering look. “You’re pushing it, Kyan. Was yours about a boy?”

Reki frowns, shoving another piece of chicken into his mouth. He probably was asking for that one, but he’s still not used to people talking about it so brazenly. He hadn’t ‘come out’ until after leaving school, and only then it was a simple Instagram post with a caption consisting of pink, purple, and blue hearts. Leave it to chronically online Mari to dissect it accurately and without question.

Deciding not to dignify the question either, he leans back against the bench and lets the music ring in his ears.

“Do you know anyone with blue hair?”

“What?” Mari laughs.

“Do you?”

“Um, no. Does that have something to do with your wish?”

Mari leans over to try to get a peek at his lantern, but he’s faster and situates it safely on the opposite side of his body. There’s nothing even close to incriminating written on it. He just likes to mess with her sometimes.

She starts to say something before the group from before suddenly grows louder, so Reki’s head snaps over to them at the same time as hers. Mari’s free hand pauses on her phone screen when one of them waves a hand at them.

“Shit, that is Taichi. Reki, is this real?” she hisses.

Reki is too confused to question the use of his first name, so he blinks back towards the group. It is Taichi who’s seemingly gesturing either Mari or both of them over, enthusiastically backed by the others.

“What do you mean?” he asks.

Mari smacks his leg excitedly, switching her phone off and tucking it back into her purse. “Oh my god. I’ve been texting him all evening, I didn’t expect to see him here for real. Shit, Kyan, what do I do? He’s so cute. Should I go see what he wants?”

Reki watches her cheeks darken even further, indicating that whatever was there before was definitely just makeup. She’s actually flustered. Over Taichi.

Reki squints his eyes to get a better look at the guy, but he looks exactly like he did in high school, and he’s never considered him to be particularly attractive before. He’s rather plain. Mari doesn’t seem to think so, though, so Reki tries to shrug in nonchalance.

He has a feeling he’s about to be abandoned.

“Go talk to him. Don’t sit here like a weirdo,” he encourages.

Mari is skipping over without a second thought. Once she’s gone, Reki’s shoulders slump further. He ignores the scene in front of him entirely until Mari runs back, her bright smile shocking him back into the present. She still has a half-eaten skewer in her hand that threatens to spill its contents when she bows nearly in half.

“Don’t hate me, don’t hate me,” she pleads, slapping the palms of her hands together like a prayer.

Yep. For sure abandoned. Nice.

“I don’t hate you, have fun.”

“You could join us…” she says, peeking up at him with a furrowed brow.

It’s wordlessly implied that neither of them actually wants that. Reki barely knows the track and field guys, and Mari probably doesn’t want to look like she has some random admirer hanging onto her kimono like a lost little kid when she’s trying to hang out with her crush. He shakes his head with a forced smile.

“It’s okay, I promise. It’s getting late anyway.”

“Thank you, Kyan! You’re the best! I’ll make it up to you!” Her words are so fast they’re almost incomprehensible.

She goes to speed away again and Reki calls out to her.

“What about your lantern?”

Mari barely glances over her shoulder. “Send it up for me if you want!”

He does end up loitering around long enough to get both of the lanterns lit. Standing in front of an old fountain no longer filled with water, he lets his go first. Hoping for it to feel significant, he’s only mildly disappointed when it floats away and immediately blends in with the others. A sea of wishes in the sky with no one to answer them.

It’s difficult to cling to the wish for fun when he ended up being a second choice twice in one night. He isn’t upset with Mari at all, but it makes him want to leave as soon as possible, especially now that he doesn’t have anyone to navigate the suffocating crowd with.

He picks up Mari’s lantern next.

Reki knows he shouldn’t look. It's rude. He should just light it and let it go. However, he picks it up at just the right angle for the words to be in his line of sight and it's too late to pretend he hadn't read it.

美術学校に入学したいです. I want to be accepted into art school.

The sentence is written in such pretty, neat characters that he finds himself smiling as he lights the small candle inside. If there’s no hope for his own wish, maybe he can hope that hers comes true. She’s super smart and talented, and he thinks she deserves it.

When he releases it, he follows the movement of it all the way up to where it slowly drifts to the others. The sky has grown dark enough that the yellow lights are brighter than before, hovering over the people milling the streets beautifully.

The last time Reki was here, he wished to be the best skater in the entire world (he was thirteen, okay?) - and though it didn’t come true, he never stopped trying. He really wishes he had his board with him now. The walk to the train station is going to be hell in these geta sandals, which is exactly why he doesn’t do traditional wear. His feet are already aching, and the additional height makes him feel like he sticks out even more.

Giving the sea of light one more lingering stare, he pulls out his phone to look up the train schedule. He’s barely started to type into the search bar when something barrels into his ribs and has him stumbling back with a gasp – the stupid heel of his shoe gets caught on the border of the fountain, sending him flailing ass-first toward the inside of it.

He closes his eyes and braces for impact, but then he’s abruptly yanked upright until he’s back on his feet again.

Reki thoughtlessly reaches out for the person in front of him for purchase, blinking wide eyes open to be met with startled blue ones.

Blue eyes, blue hair – shit, it’s the person from before.

Reki gapes at them, searching his frazzled brain for words. Unfortunately, the only ones he’s supplied with are pretty and handsome, the two thoughts strung together into one confusing tangle. They’re just so…androgynous.

Now that he’s closer to them, he’s rendered into idiocy at the fact. He lets go of their arm as if he’s been burned by the pale skin there, pulling his own hand to his side. The two of them try to bow forward at the same time and Reki flies back with a squeak to avoid bumping their heads together.

This is a grade-A disaster.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” The person says, reaching out to hurriedly smooth Reki’s kimono collar from the previous rough grasp.

Reki is sure that his heart is going to burst out of his chest. The stranger’s voice is no help in determining their gender, masked further by a lilt that denotes an unfamiliar accent. Their face is starkly pale and almost expressionless despite the rush of their words, desperate to apologize for nearly sending him to an untimely end via jagged, cracked stone.

Reki can’t find his voice as he’s too busy taking in soft pink lips, thin hands, the reflection of the damn lanterns’ glow in sparkling blue eyes. He stares helplessly instead.

“I am very sorry. I wasn’t paying attention. Enjoy your evening,” they keep speaking, filling the silence with choppy sentences that are entirely too formal, the kind of stiff vocabulary you’d expect in a business meeting or something.

Reki hates that it flusters him all over again, and he hates even more that the stranger gives him one final look up and down before turning to walk away.

He stands still long enough to shake off his shock and then jogs to catch up with them without thinking. Thankfully the odd hair color makes it effortless, and soon he’s right by their side with a nervous smile.

What are you doing?! is what his brain is screaming. Reki is grateful he’s well-versed in ignoring that little voice and all of its well-intentioned rationality. It goes quiet when he finally gathers his own voice.

“Hey! Um, please tell me to go away if you want, but – I wanted to say it’s okay. I’m totally fine. I’m Reki. Are you from here?”

The stranger doesn’t appear too freaked out about being approached again. The only change to their expression is a muted smile and a shake of their head that sends long bangs swinging across their face. God, so pretty.

“No. Is it obvious?” they ask.

Reki huffs out a laugh. “A little. Your accent gave it away.”

“I’m from Canada.”

“Canada…that’s in America?”

“Right above the states.”

Reki nods, trying to picture it in his mind. Geography was never his strong suit, but that sounds about right to him. It also explains the person’s features, which he had tried to be subtle about studying. Maybe he shouldn’t be so invested in a stranger’s entire backstory. He’s been left to his own devices without Mari, though, and he might have a bit of an infatuation with them already.

It’s dangerous and exciting. He wants to know more.

“What’s your name?”

“Langa.”

They continue to weave through people as they talk, narrowly avoiding running into others.

Reki pauses to think, but he can’t remember ever hearing that name before. He’s almost afraid to say it aloud to confirm with the definite 'L' sound it was pronounced with. Not a Japanese name, then. He can’t even use it to draw any more conclusions, because it doesn’t sound particularly masculine or feminine. Not like it really matters that much.

As pointed out rather astutely before, Reki isn’t counting anyone out on that basis. He snorts quietly at that line of thought.

As if he has a chance with this stunning, mysterious entity. He’s being weird already just by following along with them to an unknown destination.

“It’s nice to meet you, Langa,” he says, extending the first consonant of the name for emphasis, “am I bothering you? I’m not trying to be too forward. I just didn’t recognize you and that’s rare around here.”

Not exactly true, but handsome-pretty Langa doesn’t need to know that.

Langa slows down, almost to a stop, and sends Reki another one of those smiles that makes his stomach erupt in butterflies. He’s so delusional it’s unreal.

“You’re not bothering me. I was actually looking for my mom, but she’ll be okay for a while. I think she went to make one of the lantern things.”

“Are you sure? If you need to go, I won’t hold you up.”

“I promise it’s fine. You’re not here with friends?”

Reki huffs, finally finding a shred of humility at the reminder that he was, and now he’s pathetically trying to drag someone else into his mess. He tries to shove his hands into his hoodie pockets only to realize he has none, making his face grow even warmer.

“Eh, the girl I came here with ran off with some guy she has a crush on. That’s my luck today."

Langa raises an eyebrow at the admission. “Her loss, then. Hang out with me instead. I don’t know anyone here, obviously.”

“Really? You want to hang out with me?” Reki internally winces at the way his voice goes higher pitched.

He needs to get himself under control and fast before Langa changes their mind. They’ve circled back around to the food booths, where he had first spotted Langa – and the mom in question, he supposes – and back towards the music he can practically feel vibrating under his feet.

Langa nods firmly.

“Food first. And then maybe we can find somewhere with fewer people?”

Reki’s face breaks into another wide grin. He decides not to mention that he’s already seen Langa in line for soba not even thirty minutes ago. The food is the best part of any festival, after all, and he can definitely agree to escape the crowd. He guides Langa by the arm to the stand selling steamed pork buns to hide the heat spreading across his cheekbones. The simple point of contact is enough to make him feel sparks of electricity dancing beneath his skin.

An apartment rooftop isn’t the worst place they could’ve ended up.

It required some careful climbing up a rusty ladder and a cautious holding of his sandals underneath the food packages, and Reki’s one-handed maneuvering had made Langa let out frantically muttered English words from behind him more than once, but they survived.

And it was worth the danger. As Reki tiredly collapses onto the cold roof, throwing his sandals off to the side, some of the invisible weight on his shoulders disappears. He hadn’t realized just how mentally exhausting the festival was until now.

The steamed buns sitting on his chest do a fair job keeping him warm until Langa follows behind him and snatches them away.

“You’re crazy. You should’ve let me carry something,” they say, instantly plopping down next to him.

Reki stares up at the stars, fighting back a smile as the package crinkles open and a bun is placed in his waiting hand.

“I’ve done worse. I wouldn’t have kept going if I thought I’d fall, because I’d probably bring you down with me. I’m not a murderer.”

“I’m pretty sure I saw your feet slip more than once. Do you know how hard it is to do the sign of the cross when you’re two stories up in the air?” Langa’s voice is muffled by food.

Reki has to look up at them while they talk to try to read their lips instead, but he still doesn’t understand. Sign of the cross?

He at least has enough context clues to assume it’s some Western religion thing, which makes him chuckle.

“Again, I wouldn’t let you fall. Murder is bad enough, killing a pretty foreigner is worse,” Reki dares to say.

He has to sit up as well to eat properly, bringing him to eye level with Langa. Their face is twisted up in a confusing expression, and the compliment hangs in the air until they manage to swallow down the food.

“My mom is Okinawan.”

“So, half foreigner,” Reki shrugs.

It’s somehow more awkward that the comment on appearance went unaddressed than if it were. He should know better than to pretend he’s some suave Casanova capable of flirting just because he’s finally met someone who doesn’t know his history of social ineptness. It probably radiates from him like a warning written above his head.

Langa stretches out their long legs with a sigh.

“This is the first time I’ve been here that I remember, I guess. That’s why I got dragged here tonight, I’m supposed to be learning more about the culture.”

“Did you make a lantern?” Reki asks.

“No. I’ve mostly just sampled all the food. I’m not good with my hands,” Langa responds with a frown.

That could one hundred percent be turned into another shitty flirty joke that tries to squeeze right past Reki’s teeth; he snaps his mouth shut before it can. He does look at Langa’s hands, though, drawn to them once more in a way that makes him want to reach out and touch. He didn’t know hands could be attractive.

Clearing his throat, he blinks back toward the shoreline shimmering like an inky blob in the distance. It’s not easy to make out between the lanterns floating right at the edge of the rooftop but it brings some peace to his mind. He forces down the rest of his bun in order to get it out of the way for conversation.

“If you could make one, what would you wish for?” he quietly asks.

Anything to keep Langa talking. Their voice is so nice to hear. He doesn’t remember the last time he wanted to savor the sound of someone else so badly.

For some reason, the question has the opposite effect. Too personal, maybe? Reki searches their face for a sign that he made a mistake, but Langa’s head is turned in the other direction, so all he gets is a view of their hair. It’s messier up close with little strands sticking out all over the place.

“I don’t know,” Langa eventually says.

“That’s okay. You don’t have to tell me. I’m just some random guy.”

At that, Langa looks back at him and gives him a small smile. It’s almost a sad one if the barely-there moisture in their eyes isn’t a trick of the light.

“I’m glad I ran into you, though. You’re the first person I’ve really talked to on this island that isn’t my mom.”

Reki doesn’t know what his face does with that information, but he definitely feels a tug at his heartstrings. If there’s some cosmic reason that he felt so compelled to bother a stranger in a place crammed full of them, all he can do is hope that it means something. Something tells him Langa might need the company just as much.

At some point, Reki drags a fearful Langa over to the edge of the building to sit and watch the lanterns float off. A few of them are so high up that they’re tiny and hard to follow. Some of them have already blown over toward the shoreline, reflecting off of the water’s surface where they’ll inevitably end up in the ocean or littering the sand. He sees one or two die out midflight and sputter to the ground behind buildings or in areas with more trees where they disappear into nothing.

He knows that his lantern is probably already trashed somewhere. Not in a pessimistic way, though. The longer he sits with Langa, both of their legs dangling from the edge of a building, the more he realizes that the wish could have come true already. Because it’s fun.

They talk about nothing and everything, from how much they hated school to the fact that Langa’s never swam in an ocean before, even to the inevitable ramblings about skateboarding from Reki. And Langa listens. They both do, taking turns disclosing information that tumbles back and forth between basic facts (Langa’s favorite food is something called poutine) to well-guarded secrets (Reki is terrified of the supernatural) until the majority of the lanterns have fallen out of the sky.

He never wants the night to come to an end, but of course, it has to eventually. Langa gets a frantic call from their mom right when Reki is in the middle of a story about the time he got chased by the cops and had to hide behind his neighbor’s bushes so they wouldn’t find out where he lived. The phone ringing startles him so badly that Langa has to push back on his chest at the sudden movement.

“Don’t fall,” they say in a strained tone before accepting the call.

Reki’s heart threatens to kill him, anyway, pounding wildly beneath those outstretched fingers that press into his sternum long after they need to. His top row of teeth dig into his lip.

“Hey. Don’t freak out, please. I’m with a friend. No. Yeah, really. I’m – uh, I don’t know. Where are you? Okay. Yeah. I’ll be there soon. Love you.”

The one-sided conversation that Reki hears is relatively quick, ending with a sigh after Langa hangs up. They scoot back far enough from the edge to stand up. Reki doesn’t realize he’s frowning until he feels a gentle hand pulling him backward by the shoulder, urging him to do the same.

A friend. That’s what Langa had said.

Reki fixates on it the entire time he pulls himself up to his feet, still covered only by thin socks. Jeez, it’s cold as hell on the rooftop.

Is he Langa’s friend? Or is that just something said to placate a worried mother?

He doesn’t understand why he’s so preoccupied about the latter being true; surely it takes most people more than a couple hours to actually consider someone as much.

“I have to go. Thank you for keeping me company, Reki. Will you come down the ladder with me, so I know you got down safe?”

Reki walks to gather his shoes with a flushed face, carefully hiding it while he slips the sandals back on. For someone so ready to flee the festival earlier, he now has a lump in his throat at the thought of going home. Alone on the train.

He has to carefully map his features into indifference before rejoining Langa near the ladder.

“Yeah, sure. I should get going too, or else I’m gonna get lectured. The joys of being an adult who still has a curfew,” he jokes lamely.

At the bottom of the building, Langa doesn’t immediately run off. They linger by the apartment in apprehension until Reki is suddenly swooped in for a bone-crushing hug, pulled into the chest of a stranger in a tight embrace. It knocks the wind out of him, mostly due to the emotional whiplash of it all, and all he can do is gasp and belatedly wrap his arms around Langa as well.

His forehead fits nicely into the crook of Langa’s shoulder, and he can feel nothing except lean muscle and a nose pressed into his hair.

It ends just as quickly as it begins. When Langa pulls away, he’s swayed a bit further into the conviction that they’re a boy, given the new intimate hints of a broad chest and a sweet, musky scent. He’s dazed staring back at them.

“Really, thank you, Reki. I’ll wish for us to meet again.”

Reki is halfway home on the train, dangerously close to nodding off to sleep when he shoots up straight with a terrible realization.

He didn’t even try to get Langa’s number.

And late that night when he’s finally tucked into bed, he has nothing to prove the reality of their meeting except for the foggy memory of a stranger saying his name so sweetly, so oddly familiar.

⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙∘☽༓☾∘∙•⋅⋅⋅•⋅⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•

[July 18, 14:05]

The five of them at a shrine is akin to a hoard of bulls barreling through a China shop, or however that saying goes.

They almost make it past the steps of purifying themselves at the spring and saying a quick prayer without incident, except Miya keeps making snide comments under his breath. It’s a domino effect from there.

Cherry slaps Miya with a fan, Joe tries to placate Cherry, and Shadow is just all around a big meaty buffoon, laughing at all of them in a voice too boisterous for the serious atmosphere.

Reki normally doesn’t mind that they’re chaotic and loud, but his ears burn throughout all the steps. His mother would have his hide if she saw the scene. He can hear her imagined chastising as he plants himself closer to Cherry, the more rational adult around, and gets in line to draw his omikuji.

They’d fled to Miyakojima for the weekend.

A quick getaway from their standard routines, the first time they’ve all congregated together without the forced proximity that S provides. The island has been great so far from the bits and pieces Reki has seen, and he’s grateful to have grown closer with the skaters over the summer…however. They’re here under the guise of healing his dumb, stupid sprained wrist.

It’s no longer in a constricting sling that made him want to gnaw his own arm off, but the thin cast it’s wrapped in instead is annoying and sweaty and gross under the summer sun.

Cherry turns, sensing Reki’s presence with his scary motherly instinct. He’s in a flowy yukata and a pair of thin rectangular sunglasses that he stares menacingly over the top of.

“Are you ready to receive your fortune?” he asks.

Something about the question gives Reki a chill of intimidation. The four other skaters have been ganging up on him the entire trip, trying to scare him with legends of ghosts and otherworldly creatures that supposedly inhabit the island. He sticks his chin out in a guise of defiance.

“Yup. No bad luck for me. I’ve already had it all, all that’s left can be good.”

Cherry raises an eyebrow darkly.

“Don’t be so sure. It is all based on chance, in the end, and Carla predicts approximately a seventy to thirty ratio of positive fortunes to negative ones. Thirty isn’t zero.”

“We’ll see.”

“Yeah, Kaoru, give the kid a break. Red deserves a good sign from the universe, especially after getting his ass handed to him by Shadow and Adam,” Joe chimes in unhelpfully.

Reki grumbles under his breath as the line moves forward. One by one, the five of them lay their hundred yen in a small box and retrieve their omikuji from another. The small slip of paper is rolled up in a tube, which Reki practically rips open as he wanders away from his friends. He unrolls it swiftly before any of them can catch a glimpse of it over his shoulder.

The main characters at the top of the page cause a sigh of relief to fall from his lips. 大吉, Great Fortune.

Oh hell yeah, he thinks, spinning around in search of Cherry specifically. He’ll show that sucker just how wrong his little robot wife can be.

“Cherryyy! Read it and weep! I got the best one you can get!” He sings, running over and holding it high in the air.

Cherry simply holds up his own in retaliation, showing off the exact same characters. “Twenty percent chance of that.”

“Ugh, whatever,” Reki scowls.

Figures.

Miya turns his around next with an unimpressed expression. “Small Fortune.”

“Ha, a small fortune for the pipsqueak! I got middle fortune, that's better,” Shadow taunts, attempting and failing to catch Miya in a headlock.

The two of them scuffle in the background as Joe struggles to unroll his own slip of paper. He frowns down at it in disdain. “Come on, half fortune? What does that even mean?”

Cherry snatches it from his grasp to read further and Reki can see the way a rare smile curls onto his lips, though his eyes are now covered by his weird transition lenses.

“Half fortune in romance, gorilla. Sounds like a testament to your commitment issues.”

“Oh, I’ve got commitment issues?” Joe retaliates, grabbing the omikuji back and shoving it into his pocket.

Reki grows tired of their squabbles, though a strange fondness remains lodged in his chest, and he decides to leave them on their own once more. He takes care in re-rolling his own fortune and stashing it away in a small crossbody bag he’d carried for the trip. Much like wishes on lanterns, he isn’t sure how much faith to put into it, even if it’s good news.

The shrine is only a little crowded today with both locals and tourists, and there isn’t much going on in means of entertainment. Reki considers strolling into the small shop to look at the souvenirs, thinking he might pick up some cute charms for his sisters, but he finds himself walking away from the building altogether. Further away from his friends now, he stutters to a halt next to the spring where folks are still quietly and peacefully scooping the water out onto their hands.

Shit.

“You’re joking,” Reki says to himself, eyes squinting.

He blinks a couple of times, but his vision isn’t playing tricks. It’s Langa, standing underneath a tree up against a fence surrounding the shrine. It’s one hundred percent Langa.

They’re too far away to see in detail, but Reki recognizes them instantly just from their hair and their height, a good head above the rest of the poor saps tying bad fortunes onto the tree’s branches. His body moves without permission, running up to them at a speed that causes not one but three bystanders to scuttle out of his path.

Reki’s heart is racing by the time he gets there and skids to a stop, calling out Langa’s name. They react with a jump, spinning around to face him with an open mouth and a hand thrown to their chest.

“What?”

“Langa, it is you! What are you doing here?”

Langa seems frozen in place. Reki swallows, feeling bad for scaring them. He takes the opportunity to glance over their frame, having a much better view of it now than at the festival. Light wash skinny jeans, a plain white t-shirt, and an open baby pink button-up.

Langa’s hair is let down this time. It’s shorter than Reki would’ve imagined, only shoulder-length and with a slight waviness that could just be from the humidity. Their eyes look even more blue than they had in Reki’s fading memory, with hints of emerald around the edges. The biggest difference is that now, Reki is immediately reading boy written all over. From the way Langa holds their awkward posture to the more defined muscles of their exposed forearms.

He feels a bead of sweat roll down his back taking it all in.

“I’m…what are you doing here?” They ask.

“I’m on a trip with my friends.”

“Oh.”

The single syllable makes Reki’s shoulders drop. Is that the extent of the reaction he’s going to get? Did Langa forget about him in four short months?

Reki thinks about them at least twice a week, more when he’s particularly lonely and sad.

“Are you here with your mom?” Reki pries.

“I’m alone. My mom booked the trip for us, but she got called in for work at the last minute. She said I needed to get out of the house,” Langa mumbles.

“Ah, more culture stuff. Are you having fun?”

Langa’s head shake is immediate. They hold up their own slip of paper, and Reki belatedly realizes that they must be over by the tree for a reason. When he takes it and reads it, the suspicion is confirmed.

小凶, Sho-kyo. Damn.

“At least it’s not the worst curse?” He tries.

“It’s still a curse. I don’t want it.”

Langa’s face goes all pouty, which is more adorable than it should be. They won’t take it back when Reki tries to return it, holding up their hands at the side of their head. Reki stifles a laugh.

“Dude, don’t be like that, you’re gonna get punished by the Gods for rejecting their fortune.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“There aren’t any takebacks! Just hang it on the tree like a normal person,” Reki gripes, betrayed by the uncontrollable grin he feels spreading across his face.

Nonetheless, he decides to leave Langa be and tie it onto a branch himself. There’s hardly any room, with all the other fortunes hanging onto it like bad omens, whipping around in the light breeze coming through. Reki’s fingers tremble as he secures the knot and takes a step back to watch and make sure it’s not going anywhere.

“There, it’s out of your hands. Now, to seal the curse, you have to spin around three times and clap five times,” he says.

“You’re making that up.”

“Do you want to be free from the curse or not?”

Reki watches with a completely straight face as Langa considers the options and then slowly spins around and quietly claps their hands. And then he bursts into laughter, instinctually curling forward to mask his giggles into Langa’s shoulder.

Langa tenses almost imperceptibly but then a soft huff of breath hits Reki’s ear and he jerks away, not expecting that to make him blush like an idiot.

“I totally made that up.”

“I knew that.”

It's suspiciously easily accepted within the group when Reki inevitably drags Langa over, introducing them like an old friend. The other skaters don’t ask many questions of Reki or Langa, probably due to the way Reki is clinging on like a leech and it’s clear that there’s no room for arguments.

He isn’t going to let go so thoughtlessly this time. The universe has gifted him twice with a person that he’s unfairly drawn to, someone that makes his breath catch with a simple look despite having only shared one chance meeting together.

A person full of contradictions waiting to be discovered.

Sincere and sarcastic. Cold and warm. Reserved and careless. He could go on.

⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙∘☽༓☾∘∙•⋅⋅⋅•⋅⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•

He invites Langa to join them in their activities without asking the others for permission. It makes the car ride back to the main part of the island a bit cramped and awkward, but he gets to watch with rapt fascination as Miya and Langa bicker like children about who gets to sit next to the window.

With all the commotion of picking up a stray and the consequences, Reki doesn’t notice Cherry’s quiet staring from the passenger seat until he’s pulled aside mid-stretch after exiting the vehicle.

Cherry’s grasp on the back of his shirt collar has him yelping until he’s hushed into silence. They’re next to the shoreline of the beach now and the sun blinds Reki momentarily, shining right into his eyes as he’s dragged behind a nondescript stone statue.

“Explain,” the man says.

“Explain what?”

“Did you plan this meet-up? How do you know each other?”

Reki stares stupidly into sharp hazel eyes, watching the way Cherry slides his glasses up onto his hairline to glare with more intensity.

“We met at a festival once?”

“I thought I recognized him. Thankfully Carla stores data from all of my past meetings. I interviewed him for a position in my studio two months ago.”

That’s interesting and all, but Reki still doesn’t understand the urgency of Cherry’s tone. He tries to glance around the statue to the others in hopes that someone will come save him only to be reprimanded further with a folded fan slapped across his shoulder.

“Reki, I’m trying to understand why I’ve acquired another child under my care. A practical stranger even to you, at that. Are you…involved with him?”

“Ew, don’t ask me about that! And we’re not children!”

“Not the point. The ape is too oblivious and nice to care, but I don’t need the headache when I have an important client meeting tomorrow. So spill it now. Did you plan for him to be here?”

“No, I didn’t. I think it’s more like fate?” Reki squeaks out.

He sees Cherry’s eyes narrow and decides to interrupt before he can be made fun of for that. It sounds stupid said aloud, but he kind of believes it.

He doesn’t want the even bigger cynic shooting it down when he’d just begun to accept it.

“How do you know Langa’s a…him?”

That earns another exasperated look.

“I just said he applied to my studio. He filled out the paperwork, marked male. Can you stop distracting me with nonsense? Promise that you won’t cause me to go prematurely gray this weekend. And don’t bring him back to the hotel. It sounds as though he has his own.”

Reki can’t say anything in rebuttal, folding like a piece of paper and stammering out idiotic sounds at the implication being made. He heaves a relieved sigh when Joe leads the others closer, their voices growing louder.

Cherry’s mouth presses into a line.

“I promise.”

⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙∘☽༓☾∘∙•⋅⋅⋅•⋅⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•

The day is spent on the beach; Reki doesn’t give in to his baser impulses to throw himself straight into the water due to his decidedly not waterproof cast, but he spends a good amount of time wading in the shallow waves and watching Langa do the same with his jeans rolled over skinny calves.

Joe and Shadow hang around them and talk for a good while and then Joe meets Reki’s eyes with a flash of understanding. Two minutes later he’s convincing Shadow that they need to go rent out surfboarding equipment if they want to impress any hot chicks. It’s an unsurprisingly nice gesture.

Miya and Cherry stay stubbornly planted beneath an umbrella, playing games and napping respectively. That leaves Reki alone with Langa again.

They – he – God, Reki feels dumb for not realizing at the festival, too caught up on the concept of prettiness to accept it – is more of a marvel than the lapping water. His eyes come alight the second there’s no one else to see it except for Reki, leaning down to inspect every little plant or fish or shell with unbridled interest. Reki teaches him how to hop over the waves when they venture a few steps further from the shore, and at one point they’re holding hands so that neither of them falls.

Reki nearly trips over a gross glob of seaweed only to be saved with an arm wrapped around his torso. He can’t help but lean into the touch, to dedicate it to memory.

All evening he’s battling between being present to enjoy the day and drifting off into daydreams about cosmic forces pushing the two of them together. He goes quiet when that happens, taken to staring at the back of Langa’s head when he’s not looking and wondering how he can feel so at ease with someone he barely knows. He wonders if Langa feels the same pull, or if it will all simply vanish as they spend more time together and the mystery fades.

It seems unlikely. Each time he learns something new, the fondness only grows.

They eat a quick packed lunch.

Reki shares half of a bento with Langa and ends up pushing a good portion of his own half over when he feels hungry eyes lingering on it. They collapse under an umbrella to annoy Miya and force the boy to socialize with them. They even get part of Cherry’s legs buried beneath the sand before he awakes with a jolt, miraculously sparing them and taking out the anger on Joe even though he had little to do with the scheme.

It’s a fun day. Reki barely notices the pain in his arm.

But then evening comes and the adults begin to pack up the scarce belongings into the trunk of the car, causing Reki’s stomach to drop. Langa seems to catch onto his panic before he can articulate it. A hand slides over his wrist and grasps loosely, a motion that has Miya curling his lip in curious distaste from where he’s kneeled across the two of them.

“Stay a while longer?” Langa asks.

Reki can't tell if it’s the harsh sun catching up to his nervous system and making him weak or if it’s something he’s hesitant to acknowledge to himself. He makes the mistake of looking into Langa’s eyes. They’re soft and vulnerable, shining like paper lanterns.

He has no choice.

“Yeah.”

“Uh, slime, our hotel is across the damn island. You gonna skate back alone in the dark?” Miya says.

“Don’t worry about me. Worry about being stuck alone with Shadow until I’m back.”

“Traitor. I’m telling Mom.” Scampering away from the scene, Miya clutches his Switch in one hand and an abandoned hoodie in the other.

Reki winces. Another lecture is not what he needs right now. He throws his body backward, landing unceremoniously in Langa’s lap. The boy’s swim shorts are still damp but it’s okay because so is Reki’s hair – victim to a childish splash war that Shadow took too far.

Langa doesn’t react to the development; his face is weirdly pensive as he watches Miya run off to tattle. Reki takes the opportunity to get an eye full of his arm muscles up close, to sink into the warmth of the body below. The nape of his neck is cradled by a firm thigh, and he can’t tell whose hair is making him ticklish there.

“Your friends are really weird,” Langa eventually says.

“You get used to it. They’re, um, my skating friends. I might’ve told you about them last time. They somehow became my weird, dysfunctional family over the summer.”

“That must be nice.”

“It is. They’re good people beneath all the strange.”

“They might not want you abandoning them for me. Should I let you go? I’m kind of scared of the little one.” Langa looks down at him with a smile.

He raises his arm – hesitating visibly – and slowly moves it to push Reki’s hair off his forehead. His hand is warm and Reki kind of wants to grab it and kiss his fingers. He’s got some sense left, though. He tilts his head back to encourage the movement, receiving a calm petting of sorts that makes his body go slack.

“I don’t care. You don’t ever have to let me go,” he says dopily.

It’s too honest. Langa’s hand stops moving and settles limply over the crown of his head. Reki swallows, trying to find an out in the form of a joke, but he’s interrupted by a firm clearing of a throat from up above.

“Reki. What’s this about you staying behind?”

God. Cherry. One glance tells Reki what he already suspects: daggers of hazel piercing right into his soul.

“I didn’t forget what you said. I’ll be good, promise.”

Cherry’s arms are crossed over his yukata, and he looks as though he isn’t going to budge without a fight. They stay locked in a staring match until surprisingly, Cherry picks up one final towel and swiftly folds his portable umbrella up, hoisting it over his shoulder. Reki can see the others waiting by the car impatiently.

“You have our phone numbers if you need help. Langa, it’s been nice to meet you again. Not a single hair on his head is to be harmed, or else I’ll be in the know about it. Reki, you’re to be in the lobby to meet for breakfast at eight in the morning sharp. Don’t make me look for you.” And just like that, the older man is stalking away gracefully before either of them can respond.

Reki’s body relaxes as soon as he’s out of sight, shutting the passenger seat door loud enough for it to be heard from across the way. He watches the car, a shitty rental that they’d scored for the weekend, shrink into a small blue dot and disappear down the road as it fades in with the rest of the dimming sky.

Langa’s silence is interrupted as he abruptly shakes Reki’s shoulder, jolting him in his lap. Realization glitters across his pretty features.

“Now I know why I recognize him! I bombed his interview. He’s the one with the robot thing, right?”

Reki nods. “Yeah, it’s AI. Something with calligraphy. You – do you live near his studio?”

The conclusion should’ve been drawn much sooner. It hadn’t clicked until now, however, and Reki wants to smack himself for it. Langa’s affirmative hum makes Reki’s heart soar, suddenly hoisted awake with it from where he’d gotten so comfortable that tiredness had begun to settle. He sits straight up before he can mourn the loss of Langa’s hand in his hair.

“Right around the corner, why?”

“Dude, I’m like, ten minutes away by board! You live in my neighborhood! What the hell?”

Having been slightly slow on the uptake, it’s Langa’s turn to react. His lips part in belated surprise.

“Why haven’t we seen each other?”

“I don’t know, but holy shit. That’s crazy, right? I could’ve hung out with you this summer,” Reki says, breathier than intended.

He kind of hates that the word fate keeps rolling through his mind. There’s no other easy explanation, or at least not one that has the same romantic ring to it. Langa’s minuscule smirk snaps him out of it in an instant.

“Did you miss me or something?”

Instead of doing the normal thing, insisting that it wouldn’t make sense to miss a stranger, Reki exposes all of his cards by nodding again. That seems to disarm the other boy. Good.

“Sometimes I thought I dreamed the whole festival. That you were like, an apparition, or a spirit or something. I didn’t even have proof you were real.”

“And now that I am…?”

“I- that sounds like a trick question. Or vaguely suggestive.”

Langa scoots closer, then, overlapping their knees from where they’re both sat with them folded. Reki pointedly ignores his stare and clasps his hands together in his lap. The others left not even five minutes ago. He can’t act like the dumb teen that he is and make a move on this rapidly growing crush just because there’s no adult supervision now. That is precisely what Cherry warned him against.

Langa starts to speak, so Reki interrupts him out of fear of the juvenile flirting continuing. In typical fashion, he’s too scared to finish what he started.

“You know, when I first saw you, I wasn’t sure if you were a girl or boy,” he sputters out right as a tentative hand slides onto his knee.

It’s hard to tell if the resulting embarrassment is from the admission or the casual touch. Langa doesn’t laugh at him like he expects.

“I get that sometimes.”

“Does it bother you?”

“Not anymore. I’ve found that the better I pass, the less I care about occasionally looking more feminine,” Langa says easily.

It throws Reki for a loop. He’s getting used to not comprehending what the other boy says, but with this one, he truly is drawing a blank.

Passing what? Exams? What does that have to do with being feminine?

Even though Langa grew up away from the island, his Japanese is nearly fluent, and it has noticeably improved since the time they talked in March, so it’s not a language barrier problem. Reki tries to examine his face for some kind of clue – he’s disarmed immediately with the sweetest smile he’s ever seen.

He’s torn between wanting to shake Langa until the cuteness aggression is satisfied and wanting to kiss it right off his face. Fortunately, he has no time to do either. Langa nudges their knees together again with a short laugh.

“It’s cute when you don’t know what to say.”

“You can’t just say stuff like that.”

“Why? It’s true.”

The sincerity brings about another internal struggle, this time externalized by a frustrated babbling of noises as Reki leans forward, far enough to bury his face against his own legs. He can almost imagine the rush of blood through his body at the posture change, pooling at his cheeks as he stares down at the sand. It’s becoming a reoccurring theme, Langa touching him when he’s unguarded and unprepared. The finger tracing along the curve of his spine sends a shiver along its path.

“Reki, let’s get back in the water.”

“It’s probably colder now,” Reki grumbles.

Most of the other visitors on the beach had vacated the ocean over an hour ago. The ones left on the sand now are few and far between, dotted down the shoreline at a great enough distance that they’re hard to make out. The cars in the lot they had parked in earlier are gone. Even if Langa’s equipped to deal with the cold from living in Canada, it’s not the same. The sun that dried them off earlier is beginning to duck behind the edge of the water.

“Please?”

“You can’t get everything you want just by turning on the puppy dog eyes. I’m not looking at you.”

“Then how do you know what face I’m making?”

“I can hear it.”

“Pretty please?” Langa’s hand slides into his hair once again at the back of Reki’s head, smoothing over the wind-blown mess of it with a sickening sweetness.

Reki shudders involuntarily.

That’s how he finds himself standing next to the ocean five minutes later. Unlike the last time they waded in the shallow parts, he takes it upon himself to slide his shirt off and throw it back out toward the beach, putting all of his strength towards making sure it doesn’t land close enough to get pulled into the water.

It’s for practical reasons. If it gets wet, he’ll have to wear it afterward and suffer. This at least ensures that he’ll be able to cover up in dry clothes when they're out. It has nothing to do with the fact that he can feel Langa’s eyes boring into his back the entire time.

He’d kicked his shoes off where they were sitting on the sand, so he’s left only in his shorts. Reki remains facing the beach until another wad of clothing flies right over his head, landing with a quiet thud next to his own. He spins around comically fast.

Langa is standing there, arms crossed over his bare chest. Yup. There’s no hope for Reki.

His heart quickens, eyes flickering between tussled blue hair, toned stomach muscles, and mile-long legs covered by jeans. That might be the safest place to pay attention to.

“Don’t forget to roll up your pants again, you’ve already got the ends wet,” he says.

Langa looks down toward his feet and hums, lifting one leg up to inspect the darkened edges of denim.

“Man. Hold on. I really wanna go out farther this time.”

“Wha-“ It’s too late.

Reki only has the wherewithal to turn around with a squeak when Langa hooks two thumbs beneath those stupid jeans and pulls. He hears the rustling behind him of them being hurriedly kicked off. No no no no. Jesus on a frickin’ bike. This can’t be real. The jeans hit the sand right next to their shirts.

“Okay, there. Ready?”

“I can’t.”

“Huh?”

“I can’t,” Reki whines, shoving his face into his palms. If he never looks, it won’t be real.

He’s not ready to die at such a tender age, he has his whole life ahead of him! What would his parents think? What will his gravestone say?

Victim of bisexual panic? Here lies Reki, he passed away after seeing too much flesh?!

He hears Langa laugh before a splash of water sounds from behind. It barely grazes the back of his calves, but it makes his hands drop with another noise of complaint.

“I’m not naked, Reki. Please come with me, it’ll be fun. We don’t have to go too far out,” Langa pleads.

“I can’t get my arm wet; it’ll fuck up the cast.”

“You can get on my back? I’ll make sure you stay above the water.”

“Absolutely not. I’m too hea-“ The denial is swiftly cut off by the ground being knocked out from under Reki’s feet.

He’s swept up by the back of his knees, another strong arm lodged behind his upper back. All he can do is gasp and struggle to get reoriented to the changing view, blurring from white sand to shaky palm trees to his eyes’ final destination beneath Langa’s chin. From there he belatedly pulls his own arm free from where it’s trapped between bodies to wrap it around Langa’s neck.

“You can’t just pick people up! Oh my god. You’re like, actually insane, you’re going to drop me you freak!” Reki can barely talk through his own laughter, catching up to the absurdity of it all.

He’s pressed against Langa’s torso, lifted as easily as he lifts his little sisters, and behind his choice of words is a silent acknowledgment of how strong the other boy must be. Langa’s already pushing past the waves to get deeper into the water, letting out a quiet hiss as it rises higher on his legs.

Reki internally debates where to place his other hand still hovering in a protective stance – he figures they’re well past personal boundaries at this point – and settles it carefully on Langa’s chest.

“Cold?”

“Nope.”

“You’re a bad liar.”

“And you’re heavier than you look.”

The trip out into the ocean is short-lived. Langa gets to waist-deep waters before he gets spooked by a larger wave, one that skims across Reki’s back and makes him shiver, and promptly half-jogs back to the shore.

Reki is counting down the seconds until he’s placed back on solid ground, still hanging on like a spider monkey and hoping he’s imagining the way Langa’s arms start to shake under the weight.

“Put me down,” he asks for approximately the fifth time in a row.

“We’re almost there, one sec-“ The very next second, Reki is eating sand.

Not literally. Well, kind of literally. Some of it gets in his mouth with the way he shrieks, but what he registers most between the fall and the resulting blooming pain is the crash of Langa’s body against his back. They land in a heap right on the edge of the beach, all tangled limbs and groans of discomfort. Langa makes no move to remove himself, so Reki pulls himself out from under him while trying to ignore the way sand is sticking to his now-damp skin.

“I knew you were going to drop me, dude!”

“Sorry!”

Reki pulls himself up to sit with another chuckle once he can tell he’s not actually injured. Thankfully his shoulder took the brunt of the drop, and he hadn’t caught himself at the wrist. The pain is already beginning to fade into nothing.

On the other hand, he’s forced now to acknowledge that Langa is a person with a very real, tangible body that he very much enjoys looking at.

Barely noticing how the boy is sitting clutching at his nose (spoiler: he should have noticed more), he busies himself with mentally cataloging tantalizing deltoid and bicep muscles and feeling his own throat go dry.

Langa is…nice. To look at. And talk to. And be around. And Reki is stunned into silence, strictly avoiding his gaze falling lower to black briefs but allowing it to travel across pretty collarbones and a dark mole on his right pec, and – oh.

Odd.

The lines are faint. A silvery pink that fades into milky white, present nonetheless and running along the divide between Langa’s chest and abdomen. They’re scars. Reki tilts his head in confusion.

“Did you have some kind of operation?”

Langa’s face is bathed in soft pink when he blinks up and focuses his eyes on Reki.

“Reki, my nose is bleeding.”

“What?”

“My nose is bleeding.”

“Why didn’t you say something?!”

“Because you were checking me out!” Langa says, barely getting it out between laughs.

Reki can see it now, a weak dribbling of red that spills between Langa’s fingers as he points his chin to the sky to try to stop the flow.

“Jesus Christ, you are so-“

Instinctive protectiveness kicks in at the hopelessness of Langa’s actions, so all the thoughts of scars and mortification of being caught out fly out the window. Reki is by his side in an instant and pinching the bridge of his nose, forcing him to look down instead of up with a firm hand at the base of his neck. A few drops sprinkle onto the sand below but the effects of the pressure kick in shortly after and cut it off for the most part.

Carefully easing off some of the pressure, Reki stares in waiting to see if it restarts. Langa peeks up at him through unfairly long lashes.

“Do you think it’s the curse?”

Reki laughs, backing away slightly. The nosebleed seems to be over almost as quickly as it began, and the only evidence is the line of blood smeared across Langa’s knuckles and above his cupid’s bow. It shouldn’t be cute at all. It should be gross.

“It could be. It was a small curse. How did you even do that?”

“When I dropped you, I kind of landed face-first against your back. Which, by the way, was not my fault. A wave pulled my foot right out from under me,” Langa gripes.

He’s holding his hands straight in front of himself like a surgeon trying to keep them sterile, and then seems to remember he’s right by a body of water. Reki scrunches his own nose watching the halfhearted hand scrubbing that follows.

“I think you might just be clumsy, don’t blame the ocean.”

“I’m a thousand percent blaming the ocean. Are you alright?”

“Yeah, man, I’m good. We should probably call it a day, though, right? I mean, I’m sure you want to get back to your hotel and shower. No offense.”

“I’m taking offense,” Langa replies with a grin, sniffling one final time as he pulls himself up from the sand.

It’s stuck to both of their bodies in exorbitant amounts and Reki’s pretty sure the grittiness in his mouth isn’t going to go away any time soon. He catches one last glimpse at Langa’s body, watching as the discarded clothes are pulled back on piece by piece. That’s when he finds the strength to do the same, wringing out his damp shorts before wrestling his shirt into place.

There are so many questions sitting impatiently at the tip of his tongue.

Langa wipes all of them away with a simple brush of a hand near his lower back.

“Do you think we could catch a taxi?” Langa asks.

“Um, I don’t know. I was thinking of taking the shuttle. Can’t afford to dish out that much to go halfway across the island by taxi.”

“Then don’t go halfway across the island.”

“What do you mean?” Reki asks.

He makes the mistake of turning his head, meeting Langa’s gaze that holds its own burning questions. Langa gives him a tiny shove to start walking away from the beach, and back out toward the main roads, leaving Reki to stumble over his feet on the way there. He can practically feel Cherry’s threatening aura hovering around the two of them.

Langa pulls him to the edge of the street, lined with fluorescent lights that illuminate how unkempt they both are. Reki doesn’t want passersby to think they’re total delinquents, so he makes the executive decision to lick the pad of his thumb and use the spit to clean Langa’s face where the dried blood had begun to crust over. This time it is gross, but he wipes his hands on his shorts after and staunchly ignores the surprise in Langa’s eyes.

“I’ll pay for the taxi. Why don’t you just come back to my hotel for the night? It’s closer, and you can clean up, too. I’ll make sure you’re back with your friends first thing in the morning.” Langa’s voice comes out soft, so quiet that it’s difficult to make out the words.

However, Reki couldn’t have imagined all of that on his own. An open invitation to go back with him. Just the two of them. In a hotel room. Cherry is going to skin him tomorrow.

“You trust me, don’t you?” Langa asks, tilting his head.

Reki presses his lips together to hold back a laugh. To break some of the tension of the truth he’s about to spill, he pulls out his phone to type while he speaks.

“Yeah, I do. So I’m going to be really pissed if you murder me in my sleep.”

20:47
Text to: Cherry🌸
don’t be weird. i’ll be back in the morning (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

20:54
Text from: Cherry🌸
I predicted as such. Don’t do anything stupid.

21:03
Text from: miya ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ
Shadow is already drunk and crying. You owe me, slime boy

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Reki is antsy, sitting alone on a stiff mattress, a professionally made bed that he ruins with sandy shorts and endless fidgeting. Something about hotels has always given him a weird feeling.

They’re all the same; generic artwork hanging on the walls, a mint lying on the pillow, an old television, and an even older mini fridge. There’s one bed in Langa’s room. Makes sense, for a party of one.

It’s okay, though, right? There’s no way on Earth Langa could have predicted that he’d be sharing the space with someone else. Reki had kind of been the first one to kidnap him, back at the shrine.

If anything, it was his choices that led to this outcome.

God, it’s so weird to be here, though.

Langa had jumped straight into the shower, leaving him alone with thoughts moving so fast they became a tangled mess. Falling victim to the restless energy, Reki eventually stands and paces over to the window. Langa’s bags are shoved into the corner of the room near it, spilling over with clothes and toiletries, and he has to physically restrain himself from being nosey about it.

He peers down at the street below instead, pressing his forehead to the glass. There are still people milling about, tourists and families.

The shower cuts off in the bathroom as he watches them.

Two stories up in the air, much like when they’d climbed onto the roof, except now he’s crammed into a tiny room instead of feeling the open air kissing his skin. Maybe that’s the reason he didn’t freak out then – there was a means to escape if things got weird.

Reki is reminiscing that night with a vague threat of suffocation lodged in his throat when he hears the bathroom door open from behind. He pulls the blinds shut.

“Should I be here?” He asks the blinds.

“What?”

“It’s…fast, right? Staying the night like this. I’ve known you for all of two days, really, and I keep acting like I know you.” Reki’s words spew out in an incomprehensible mess, aided by his breaths coming shorter and shorter, and God, this is not how he wanted this day to end.

The anxiety was simply waiting for this moment to strike, and it rushed in so suddenly, all of the doubt he’d been blindly ignoring in favor of budding feelings and romantic ideals of fate and destiny. Cherry’s talk couldn’t have helped, nor could Langa’s question of trust as they waited for the taxi. The twisted part is that he still doesn’t believe the trust is in vain, he just doesn’t understand why it’s there. And he really cannot stop talking once he starts.

“I mean, think about it. I don’t even know your last name. We ran into each other twice on accident and now I’m about to sleep in your bed. I don’t do things like that! Don’t get me wrong, it’s okay for other people to do things like that, I’m not trying to shame anyone here, but Jesus Christ! I feel stupid because I like you so much with so little to go on, and I have no earthly idea what I am to you-“

“Reki-“

“And on top of all of that, I’m so delusional that I started to believe that we were meant to meet like this is a fairy tale-“

“Reki.”

At the second calling of his name, he forces himself to turn around out of fear of looking crazier than he already does. In a sick twist of luck, Langa is standing there dripping water onto the carpet, barefoot and shirtless with a white towel piled sloppily onto his head. At least he’s wearing pajama bottoms, but those are riding low enough to show the tops of his boxers, and Reki is going to lose his mind for real.

He gets minutely distracted by those scars again – Langa crosses his arms self-consciously and he tears his eyes away with a stab of guilt.

Right. Not very polite.

“Reki, you’re…different from anyone I’ve ever met.”

“Thanks,” he snorts in reply.

“Listen to me. You’re different in a good way. A fantastic way. If it wasn’t fate, I don’t know what the hell else it could be. I like you, too. A lot. I like spending time with you, and I want to keep spending time with you.”

“Langa…”

Langa shakes his head adamantly. “I mean it. I promise you don’t have to freak out about being here, I want you here, and I’m not like – trying to get in your pants for the night and then never speak to you again. Okay? I’ll sleep on the floor if it makes you feel better. No expectations.”

Langa’s expression is genuine, only disrupted by a slight downward pout of his lips as he keeps talking. It’s the most Reki’s ever heard him say in one go, and he kind of wants to keep him talking forever. It’s a nice voice. And it calms some of the worries, though he’s yet to fully steel himself against the jumpiness shaking his frame from the initial onslaught of it.

He tries really hard to let the reassurances sink in.

No expectations.

Langa doesn’t think he’s crazy. He might even be on the same wavelength from the sound of it.

It surpasses all of Reki’s outlandish hopes that he tried to bury moments before, and he’s left floundering for a way to express that. In the end, he settles on running to Langa and wrapping him in a crushing hug; it’s met with the same fervor, and he finds that Langa’s skin is still warm and pink from the shower. Soft yet firm, continuously full of contradictions.

Reki tucks his head against Langa’s collarbone and lets out a shaky breath. There are arms squeezing around his middle and a gentle lift upward has his heels leaving the ground for half a second – he’s weightless, even as he’s lowered back down to the carpet.

“You’re not sleeping on the floor,” Reki mumbles.

“Whatever you’re comfortable with. I’m serious. Anything you’re comfortable with, you’ve got it.”

Langa pulls back far enough for them to make eye contact, leaving his palms situated on Reki’s sides. Even though the caring statement effectively stomps out the last dredges of doubt, Reki can’t stay serious enough to show his actual gratitude. He’ll try for that later. For now, he only traces a single finger from beneath Langa’s ear, trailing over a sharp jawline to land at the tender flesh beneath his chin. He gives an exaggerated wink.

“Be careful with the word ‘anything.’ You’ll put thoughts in my head.”

Surprisingly Langa falters at the lame line, batting his eyes up toward the ceiling with a stuttered laugh. His cheeks go a rosy pink the longer he takes to process it, which is the greatest ego boost Reki’s ever had.

Who knew he had the power to break someone so pretty?

“Go shower, please, before I have to take back everything I said. I’m gonna order us a pizza,” Langa eventually replies, shuffling out of the hold.

“There’s pizza here?”

“One single pizza place on the whole island, a block away. Why do you think I picked this hotel?”

“Ugh. You’re a gem. I’ll try to be quick.”

Reki scampers off toward the bathroom, only to stop in the doorway and glance down at his dirtied clothes. Shit. His shirt is relatively fine but his shorts smell like salt water and have dried all wrinkly and stiff – he’d rather not sleep in the clean bed with them on.

“Um. On second thought, do you have any clothes I can borrow until the morning?”

Langa nods, not looking up from scrolling through his phone to make the order. “Yeah, of course. Go ahead and get started, I’ll find you something.”

The rest of the night is nothing short of a dream. Pizza in bed, a low-budget action movie they’d found after surfing through the TV channels, and lots of talking over said movie until they’ve completely lost the plot. Reki is much more comfortable after his shower, helped by the fact that his borrowed clothes have the sweet, musky scent he’s quickly growing to adore.

And the fact that Langa had put on a shirt while he was in the bathroom. It’s far less distracting that way, even if he’s disproportionately sad about it at first.

It’s nice.

He learns Langa’s last name, his past with snowboarding (Reki had wanted to squeal in excitement, but it sounded like a touchy subject), and his fruitless attempts at working part-time jobs that he either gets rejected from or fired from after a handful of days. Reki even jokes about getting him a gig at DopeSketch despite his lack of skateboarding knowledge and recoils when Langa takes it completely seriously. Dude must really need a job.

By the end of the movie neither of them could recall if asked, Reki is more than stuffed from the pizza and ready to pass out from the carb overload. He expresses as much by throwing himself back onto the bed with a groan, holding his hands over his stomach.

“I don’t think humans are supposed to ingest that much cheese. It’s food coma time.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Langa fold up the pizza box and toss it to a nearby table, not unlike a frisbee. An additional thump against the mattress brings their heads lying next to each other.

“I’m wiped out too. Not from the pizza, that’s on par for me. Sleepy, though.”

“Aw, is Langa-kun sleepy? Do you need to be tucked into bed?”

Langa huffs a quiet laugh. Reki may be tired, but the weight of another body so close to his is enough to keep him unfairly awake. He reaches his hand out to brush it against the other boy’s, dragging his fingers over knobby knuckles. Langa flips his hand over to slot their fingers together, and it’s – it’s sweet. Too sweet for Reki, who has not even a shred of a clue of what to do with easy affection when it’s directed at him.

“Are you going to be tucked into bed with me?”

“Maybe.”

“Then yes, please.”

“Since you asked so nicely…” Reki finds the strength to sit up halfway.

He lifts his lower body to drag the blankets down past where he was sitting, and insistently tugs until Langa lifts himself up as well to wrangle it free. The bedside lamp gets turned off before he urges Langa to lie down. There’s a burst of warmth in his chest, watching as the boy snuggles down into his side of the bed and wraps his arms around a big fluffy pillow. Reki pulls the blanket over them both and settles in next to him.

Underneath the duvet, he can feel their shared heat trapped inside. A cozy oasis keeping out the frigid hotel AC air circulating outside.

Reki fluffs his own pillow and rests his head on it, facing Langa with a tired smile.

“I’m sorry for freaking out earlier.”

Langa laughs, a muffled, melodic thing exhaled onto the pillow sheet. He scoots closer, squinting past the darkness separating their faces.

“Don’t apologize for that. It is weird, I understand. I don’t… I don’t really know how to open up to people. But you make me feel so comfortable. It feels like we’ve known each other for a long time.”

Reki’s eyes widen at the declaration, and he nods at break-neck speed, instantly agreeing.

“Exactly! I mean, I’m kind of a loudmouth. And I annoy strangers, and I say stupid stuff all the time, but…where was I going with that? Shit, uh – what I’m trying to say is that people don’t usually stick around to get to know me beyond that stuff. You make me want to slow down, though, like I want you to know all the shit that’s going on underneath. Does that make sense?”

Langa presses his lips together, clearly masking a grin.

“I think so? When you talk so fast, it's hard to keep up sometimes. My listening skills aren’t as good as my speaking,” he says sheepishly.

“Ah, damn. Sorry. My point is,” Reki exhales, searching for a thread of bravery, “you’re different. I like you.”

“I like you too. We actually established that earlier.”

“Shut up,” Reki whines.

He tries to kick at Langa’s shins, but he ends up sliding his foot down the length of the boy’s leg given the fact that he would never actually do anything to hurt him. That only makes him blush, completely derailing the initial intent. Dumb, stupid, angelic idiot.

A moment of silence passes, and drags on while Reki’s eyes threaten to close – he's brought barreling back into wakefulness at the movement of Langa’s arm. It reaches out, a thoughtless lift between their bodies that stalls midair. It drops down unceremoniously.

Reki remembers the discussion earlier and his heart twists in some fruitlessly longing emotion. Whatever you’re comfortable with.

“Langa?”

“Mm?”

“Do you want to cuddle?”

“Yes, please.”

“You really don’t have to say please after everything.”

“I like the way you get shy about it,” is the muffled response he gets. Poor dude is half asleep as it is.

Figuring that he can save it for tomorrow to be thoroughly embarrassed, Reki shuffles closer to end the conversation. It takes some readjusting and tangling and untangling of long limbs, but eventually, they’re able to squeeze into the same space in a way that works for everyone. Reki’s head pressed to a soft chest, an arm slung around Langa’s slim waist. His calf tucked between Langa’s legs. A hand in the back of his hair, scratching at his scalp in lazy motions.

It’s perfect.

The last thing he remembers is a brush of lips on the crown of his head and a muttered phrase in sweetly accented English before he’s out like a light.

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The taxi driver is an older man who pays the two of them in the backseat no mind. Reki wishes he could be less aware of him – it’s difficult when the guy is weaving them around small, rural roads at speeds that sling his body back and forth – and he really wishes he could appreciate Langa’s hand on his thigh for all its worth instead of being hypervigilant.

He’s never really cared too genuinely about the opinions of others before. However, his chronic singleness hasn’t helped him get used to being visibly queer in public. Langa seems to recognize this at least enough to keep it hidden behind the barrier of the driver's seat.

Reki watches every palm tree passing by the window with a stab of sadness. He just wants Langa to come to breakfast with them. Having woken up with a face full of blue hair and a cold hand tucked under his shirt like it belonged there, it’s cruel now to have to separate.

Langa’s all booked up with typical touristy destinations (put in place by a well-intentioned mother) and then he’s headed back home hours before the ferry the group is scheduled to board. Cruel, ugly, fate. Reki is a big enough man to admit he’s been pouting about it all morning, and it isn’t even eight o'clock. Langa was serious about getting him to the hotel on time, whether out of fear or respect, Reki has yet to determine.

They’re passing by the area that holds the shrine from yesterday when Langa breaks the quiet in the car.

“Reki.”

“Wha’?”

“Come on, wake up. I have a question.”

“I’m awake, what’s up?”

The blur of trees and sand outside is replaced with Langa’s mirrored pout when he turns his head.

“We’re almost there, do you want to exchange numbers?”

“Oh my god, yes, I hated myself last time because I didn’t think of it. Hold up.”

Reki scrambles to get his phone out and unlock it, opening his contact list with newfound energy; the only silver lining to being torn away from Langa so early in the morning is the thought that they’ll definitely see each other again. It’s a whole frickin’ revelation, discovering that the guy lives so close. He’d been at Reki’s fingertips the whole time and neither of them had known better.

Four months of grieving the loss of a stranger who was practically right around the corner. It would be funny if it wasn’t mildly infuriating.

Reki shoves the phone right into Langa’s chest with the new contact screen open. The other boy’s is passed to him in a much gentler manner, and the two of them type out their information in sync. Reki giggles, giving himself the contact name of ‘☆super cool sk8r guy☆' and handing it back when his is offered in return.

“I’m so excited for when we’re in Uruma. I’m going to annoy you all the time. You better be ready to hop on a board.”

Langa’s hand squeezes the side of his thigh with a breathy laugh.

“I’ll hold you to that. It can’t be that different from snowboarding, besides the wheels. As long as I don’t end up in a cast like you, I’m down.”

Reki snorts, flopping his useless casted arm out onto his lap. The activities of yesterday thankfully hadn’t fucked it up too severely.

“The wheels are vastly different, my guy. But don’t worry, I’ll hold your hand if you get scared.”

The fact that he’d just flirted in front of the cab driver kicked in a second too late, but with a glance at the rearview mirror, it wasn’t even registered. The man has the damn radio turned up on a boring news station so loud that he probably can’t even hear. Reki slumps against the seat and pretends his face isn’t red anyway.

Reki’s legs are stiff when they unceremoniously climb out of the taxi; stretching them out is a moment of bliss he doesn’t take for granted, lifting his arms so high that his shirt rides up while he’s in the middle of the sidewalk. His back pops in at least three different places.

He’s so caught up in drinking up the sun’s early rays that a squeal leaves his lips upon being lifted from the ground in a hug. Again. Langa must have a thing for that, the show-off.

They’re right at the entrance of the hotel, right in front of the unbothered taxi driver who’s waiting for Langa’s return. That doesn’t stop them from acting like idiots apparently. When his feet hit the sidewalk Reki spins around and takes a second to hug Langa properly, struck with envy of his height when he has to lean down slightly to meet it.

“Back home, I swear I’ll repay you for all the shit you’ve spent money on because of me. Cab fares aren’t cheap, dummy.”

Langa pokes at his ribs.

“Shush. I don’t care. You would’ve had your board if I didn’t kidnap you, it’s the least I could do.”

“Well…still. I could pay for us to have dinner or something.”

“Are you asking me on a date, Reki?” Langa teases, shimmying out of the tight grasp to meet Reki’s eyes.

Eyes that are downturned and trained on the pavement because – shit. This guy makes him lose all of his inhibitions when it comes to words. He nods.

“I guess I am. That okay with you?”

“More than okay. I’ll see you then, I guess.”

“Yeah. I’ll message you to figure out a good time.”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” Reki repeats dumbly.

He pulls away from the hug, fidgeting in place. He should say goodbye and get on with his day before Cherry starts plotting up ways to make his life hell. He should let Langa go so that the taxi doesn’t drive off and leave him stranded. That’s what a normal person would do.

Reki stands statue still and watches Langa’s expression morph from relaxed to confused, watches him hesitate to leave as well.

“I’ll see you around, Re-“

“Wait!”

He grabs his wrist without thinking, always without thinking. Surging forward in another clumsy embrace, this one unfolds as a bruising kiss that Langa reciprocates instantly – like he could read Reki’s mind. It’s the reassurance he needs not to lose his mind, hovering on tiptoes to slide his lips over sweet, yielding ones until the urgency is extinguished with fluttering butterflies taking its place.

Reki bounces back on his heels and Langa stares at him with wide, sparkling blue eyes. That’s when the reality of the situation sets in and Reki grows embarrassed, choking out a short goodbye and fleeing to the building. Langa lets him go and Reki can hear his laughter for the entire jog to the heavy double doors.

He makes it right beyond them and leans against their steadiness, burying his burning cheeks into his palms. There’s no way he’s going to be able to face the others with a straight expression.

He waits until it’s too close to 8:30 to waste any more time before squaring his shoulders with a false sense of bravery and marching on.

08:48

Text from: langa❅

I miss you already. Text me when you’re leaving the island :) P.S. the taxi driver told me my ‘boyfriend is very cute’

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Reki’s feet keep hitting another pair of shoes beneath the table. At first, it was accidental, a result of needing to stretch his legs out from sitting in a stiff booth for over an hour. Every time thereafter was on purpose now that he knows it makes Langa smile and give a gentle kick in return.

Their bowls have been emptied for a while, but he doesn’t want to get up and leave just yet, too full of salt broth ramen and infatuation to feel any inclination to be anywhere else.

It’s too dark outside to get a start on introducing Langa to the old board Reki had fixed up for him to try; maybe tomorrow will be the day for it. There’s no work, no obligations in their way tomorrow, and he can’t imagine anywhere he’d rather be than holding the other boy’s hand and teaching him about the thing he loves most in the world.

They don’t leave until the restaurant staff starts to give them impatient glances for lingering at the best seats in the house, and that’s when Reki has to physically tackle Langa on the way to the counter for the crime of trying to pay again. He beats him to the register by a hair’s breadth, using his shoulders to push forward and dig into his crossbody bag.

It’s well past his turn to pay – and on their first official date, no less.

Reki’s fingers brush across something paper and he pulls it out, half expecting it to be loose bills shoved in there as a byproduct of his inability to organize his things. Except it isn’t money at all. It’s the omikuji, halfway unrolled to reveal the characters for Great Fortune.

He can feel Langa staring at it from where he’s standing behind him, so he shoves it back down with a bashful grin and tries again to find his wallet in the mess. The irony of it doesn’t leave him for the rest of the night, however.

When he walks Langa home and they part ways with a soft kiss that makes the hairs on his arms raise from chills, Reki figures that there might be a smidgen of truth behind things like fate and fortunes.