Life in Transit
Disclaimer: I don't own SD boys, Inoue does. The events that follow are not included in the original plot but enjoy anyway.
As Mitsui and Rukawa would learn the hard way, all roads lead to one. MitRuMit. One shot.
A/N: Pointless. This is pointless. You have to be on drugs to appreciate this, but since I'm not legally in the right to encourage you to engage in anything that may send you behind bars, just consider yourself warned.
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For some reasons he knew and many he didn't, there was a time in his life when messing up was the rule and hiding behind violence was the answer. That phase when defense mechanism had to be replaced every so often was also, in retrospect, the toughest he had to undergo. But now he fancied himself to be in love, and the only way around it was to let it go. Without a fight, let alone anything breaking; that was the idea. While this wasn't a comfort in itself, it was all at once a convenience: To be in love in silence.
He rubbed his chin as if to nurse a string of thoughts, feeling a slight elevation on the surface of his skin which, of course, could only be that suture scar. His trademark. He wondered now if he'd always be known for his imperfections. Nobody's perfect, that's true, but there are those assholes who come close to it. Too bad he wasn't counted among them, asshole or not.
He was.
Rukawa Kaede was. And to top it all off, he was a major asshole.
**
If he could avoid all the furtive attention, all the sneaky glances, all the unspoken words bursting to be said, he no doubt would. But these were no less than the things that sent all the blood rushing to his brain, and much as he wanted to dispel them, they could not be missed. Mitsui Hisashi too, the one cause of it all, could not be missed. He was easily six-feet tall, princely, ridiculously eye-catching...
Two days ago he had managed to stop himself in midsentence before he could take Mitsui up on his offer to walk (with) him home.
"... I can't." Rukawa finished softly. Before he wheeled around to the other direction, he thought he saw Mitsui shoot back a mildly confused glance, probably just on the verge of shaking his head. Did it sound so much like a downright refusal? He really didn't have an answer to that.
In life, people have always expected a genius to stray off the beaten path even just for once. Rukawa Kaede had known better. As he carted his bicycle along the pavement he had imagined the road ahead of him to fork out. He took the one to the right, the one he had taken a thousand times prior to this, but he wasn't so sure if in the bigger picture he had to do the same. He didn't want to spend the remainder of his life thinking what could have happened if he chose the other one. Yet, that's just what he did that afternoon.
When he turned around, from yards off, Mitsui was already gone. What was left were particles of dust springing up in the air.
***
"... cunt."
Mitsui couldn't make out clearly what went out of Rukawa's lips that afternoon two days ago after a failed attempt to accompany the latter on a homebound journey. But maybe, just maybe, Rukawa thought Mitsui was being an aggressive jerk, which could have elicited the unpleasant response. "Cunt." Disappointed and insulted, Mitsui did a quick about-face and marched homeward. What an asshole, he muttered to himself.
Growing up, he knew what it was like to second guess every step of the way as a result of the many lessons he missed deliberately. When it comes down to it, he just couldn't really stand all these efforts of straightening him up until he was as good and polite as the bow-tied, collared nerd next door. They wanted him to change in proportion to his growth: Lots of things did change, though not one of them for the better. Listening to people's sermons was never his strong point; washing them off himself in rebellion was.
Taking this shortcut, the one he had taken a thousand times prior to this, he wondered now if he was missing anything by not trying out the long routes, the other ones--which could be a whole different world for all he knew. Did bypassing them cause him to skip important phases? Were those roads like the lessons he missed? Perhaps one of those lessons teaches one not to fall for his own kind; perhaps, too, it teaches one to know that it's okay. There was no other way to find out.
And at the back of his mind, this was constant: What was he in a hurry for all along?
***
The next day, Rukawa Kaede had made up his mind amidst fast and furious thoughts. He took the path to the left, after convincing himself a great deal that no harm shall come out of it. Adding a little adventure to the recipe couldn't hurt too much, at least, not as much as a first heartbreak. The sun was at full tilt, the atmosphere heat-infused. The road was smooth and free of dirt; overall, the feeling was a lot better than he'd anticipated. Was this how to take on an unfamiliar territory? At that instant, he was reassured that he made the right decision that day.
He drifted his bicycle down the road, hitting top speed until he felt he would crash skull-first on the ground. He had promptly forgotten the speed limit at the tempting sight of the road stretching ahead. Its clear coast, its solitude; things couldn't have been any better. He pedaled faster, felt the wind fan hard against his face until there wasn't enough air in him to breathe out. He needed to brake; he didn't want to, but he needed to all the same.
"Hmph." There was a grudging tenor in the sound he let out.
Then, he caught himself standing still in the middle of an un-traversed crossroad, the bar of his bike still in his clutch. The asphalt beneath him seemed to harden, preventing him any more movement. Not so far up north, he saw a guy clinging for support to a wall. He seemed short of breath, beads of sweat rolling down his skin.
Rukawa edged closer in realization and mumbled, "Mitsui-sempai."
***
Not knowing what could've been, not allowing himself to know what could've been, was exactly what left Mitsui Hisashi feeling empty, if not feeling utterly sorry for himself.
The next day, with grim resolve, he settled to bail out on the detour. He had nothing more to lose; he had experienced humiliation and disappointments on all levels. What could hurt him now? Certainly not something as shallow as taking another path home, which, incidentally, isn't much. But it was a start all the same.
He peeled away to the right, then to the left, then to the right again. In a few seconds he found himself sifting through a line of houses he had never before seen in his life. Their dull facade would take some getting used to, Mitsui thought and grimaced. The blocks on either side of him were remarkably empty, making the whole scenario more like a ghost town tour than the major discovery he was idealistic enough to expect. He began to half-run, hoping to be over with this particular bridge he had never before crossed. The distance seemed endless, and the more he ran the more he felt he couldn't hold out any longer. At that instant, he was sure he made the wrong decision that day. He needed to stop; he didn't want to, but he needed to all the same.
He was panting by the time he found a corner to lean to. He should've read the signs on the street poles but it was too late for that now. He was lost and his body felt like it busted several bones in the process. He continued resting on the sidewalk, trying to concentrate getting air in his lungs, until he heard rubber screeching to a halt just from a few meters off.
"Mitsui-sempai."
Mitsui lifted his head up. Rukawa Kaede was standing smack in front of him, his pink bike straddled at his side, trickles of sweat on his otherwise spotless face.
"What are you doing here, Rukawa?"
There was a pause and, "I don't know."
Mitsui stared at him, refusing to let his foul mood that was already threatening to take over. A minor opposition group among his brain cells wanted to ask Rukawa for a ride on his bike; exhaustion does that much to you. In the end, it had to slowly dawn on him that things like that, getting a seat on the back of one's bike for instance, are something the other person HAS to voluntarily offer to another. Besides, there was no way in hell he'd risk disgracing his own ego for something as superficial as being tired.
"I see. So you're in the same clueless boat I'm in." Mitsui finally managed to say amidst deep breaths. "Isn't this great?" There was sarcasm in the last bit.
"It is." To Mitsui's surprise, Rukawa agreed.
"Indeed?"
"I've never taken this road before, sempai." Rukawa said rather blankly, though Mitsui was almost sure the freshman meant something more.
"Neither have I. It sucks, though; sucks worse than one hundred laps in fact." The moment Mitsui said it he realized that his words traced along the very same fault lines he'd taken that afternoon. There was disappointment in Rukawa's eyes, one that could only be seen through months of playing basketball games with him. It was an empty face, but it nonetheless told a lot. "I... never mind. I'm going this way. I guess I'll see you at practice." Mitsui stammered and began swerving to the left track, opposite of Rukawa's.
"Sempai... would you like a ride?"
Mitsui stopped in his tracks. "Are you sure?"
"You look spent."
"That, I do." Mitsui admitted, never thinking twice of denying it.
In a while, both guys were zooming down the thoroughfare, plowing through the breeze and switching lanes like there was never going to be tomorrow. They took left and right turns, regardless of their destination. It didn't matter. Right and wrong decisions, on that day, didn't matter as well as they realized, each on his own, that every now and then lines do get blurred. Mitsui thought of all the questions he once asked to no one in particular and was all at once shocked to know that all their answers were found on this day, along these long untrodden routes.
And maybe, just maybe, this was what he was in a hurry for all along: In love in silence. It was a joke, if he ever heard of one.
END