Without Destiny
Chapter One
"Sensei", the boy is saying now. His eyes are clear and cool and piercing.
There are days when Miyagi Yoh thinks he's going to be just fine, but this is not one of those days.
That's rather out of the ordinary, since he has always begun every semester refreshed as best he can be—refreshed to the point of being ridiculously determined, in fact. Determined that the next few months will be it. Determined to work his way through his melancholy, determined to forget.
He's been determined enough in the past that after the occasional late night, he would find himself thinking, forget what exactly? Not that it doesn't return to him in moments, leaving his body shaking and eyes stinging.
Not that anything has ever actually helped him forget. He's close to accepting that nostalgia is an incurable disease.
Perhaps that is the reason this is not one of those days…nostalgia is never stronger than it is when he gazes absently at the freshmen spilling into their new classrooms, filling out new lives. Maybe there's a reason the year begins in spring, when everything's green and young.
I don't really fit into that green, young picture anymore. He has felt weary and beaten all too many times, but this realization makes him feel old too.
He feels even older as he faces his class of students and delivers the one little speech he's perfected over the years. "Literature is an art, as much for the students as for the creator. If you feel that it can be taken lightly, or if you are not here because you really want to be…"
A small sigh escapes him, unheard.
"Do all of us a favor and leave the class now."
The usual tight silence, the eager and yet intimidated faces, and then a new reaction to the old line: for the first time in Yoh's memory, a boy sitting in one of the front rows picks up his bag and gets to his feet.
It takes some time for the professor's already rutted brain to register what is going on. By the time he has done so—by the time his eyes have fully absorbed the scattered boredom on the student's face—he has a second surprise to grasp; the boy stops halfway to the door. After a motionless moment of what appears to be deliberation, he's returning to his place with a shrug.
Yoh is too disinterested to feel offended or even curious.
"Made a decision yet, Mister…?" he asks. Even in the middle of his question his eyes have drifted away.
"Takatsuki", says the boy. "And yes." If he hears the faint giggles around him, he shows no sign of it as he unzips his bag, pulling out a new notebook and a pen. He gives Yoh a somewhat quizzical look as though wondering why he isn't getting on with the class.
Takatsuki…
Isn't that the Dean of Economics?
"Let's begin, then", he says briefly, and the spell is broken; he completes the class with no further event. He has all but forgotten that anything unusual even happened as he dismisses the students fifteen minutes early and leans heavily on his desk, regarding his battered textbook with a listless eye.
What's wrong with me?
"Miyagi-sensei?"
His head snaps up just slowly enough for him to compose himself; he hadn't thought there would be anyone left in the class by now. Sure enough, it's deserted except for the boy from before. His hair, brown and gold like desert sand, flops around his face as he cocks his head to one side.
"Takatsuki-kun", Yoh nods, not knowing what to say. The boy has no book with him and it's clear, from his behavior during the class, that he has no question about what was taught.
Takatsuki opens his mouth, then closes it again. What an indecisive person, Yoh thinks, as yet another surprise is thrown his way. "You don't look very well, Sensei."
The professor straightens up immediately, willing his cheeks not to burn. "If I have arrived to take a class, I am healthy enough. What is it that you wanted to say?"
"Well", the student mutters, his expression incongruously fierce. "I had a question about what you told us at the start of the class, actually."
"And what about it?" Yoh's voice is strained.
"I was wondering—how do you expect students to make a decision if they haven't sat through a single session yet? It would make more sense to ask if we wanted to leave at the start of the second class."
The caustic retort is halfway to the older man's tongue when it freezes; stiffly, he raises his head to meet Takatsuki's eyes head-on and nods. "Thank you for pointing that out", he says. His voice is almost sincere. "I'll keep it in mind." He is not one of those teachers who despise being proven wrong, but the ease with which he accepts the mistake that he's made for years makes him feel older than ever before.
By way of rectification, he asks, trying to keep the indulgent tone out of his voice, "And you felt so strongly about this that you had to tell your professor about it after the very first day of class?" Spunk is one thing, but if it were Kamijou in his place…
Takatsuki does not look amused. "Sensei", the boy is saying now. His gray-blue eyes are cool and clear and piercing.
"I respect that you are teaching me, but I don't have to respect what is taught wrong, even coming from the teacher."
And by the time Yoh has finished processing this, the door has swung shut behind a retreating back. The man's gaze rests lightly on the doorknob before flitting back to his desk and the textbook on it.
Even coming from the teacher, he thinks idly. A long, papercut-scarred finger traces the spine of the book with intimate reverence. That's not the way I was taught, though.
But I had a teacher who could make us believe that the sun rose in the west, if she chose to.
Am I still not as good as that?
Another sigh and his knees give way gracefully as he sits. It's not bad enough that I can't forget her, that I now begin comparing myself to her?
But wasn't that how it had started? With him saying that he wanted to be like her, to devote himself to what she had loved so dearly, to be as great as she was? Just when did becoming like her turn into equaling her?
The sweetness of his love is long past, but while the dregs are bitter, they are also deep.
And now a chit of a boy reminds me that even after all this time, I'm not enough.
And that I'm proving myself to a memory. How can I compete with someone who's dead? A shiver ripples through him; a small shoot of fear burgeons in his chest. He has never felt so old, so aware that death is just as inevitable for him too.
There truly are times when Yoh feels that he's going to be just fine, though. Such a time is right around the corner, but for now he cradles his Sensei's old textbook in the crook of a practiced arm and gets up to leave for his next class.
