Watanuki has never smoked in his life.
He doesn't like the habit - it's one that leeches the life from you and he knows all too well how preciously delicate life is.
So he's a little surprised when he finds himself standing in front of a vending machine filled with boxes of the deadly white sticks, his hand poised over a lit button.
Beside him, a young man gives him a quizzical look.
"Are you buying something or what?"
Watanuki blinks then backs away apologetically.
"No, no - I'm not."
The young man looks at him a moment longer, then proceeds to buy a pack. He taps one out of the box, deftly lights it and puffs. He looks directly at Watanuki.
"It's a filthy habit, you know. Don't start."
With that, he turns on his heel and leaves.
Watanuki stands there quietly for a moment. Then he steps up to the machine and inserts a few coins into the slot. Slowly, very slowly, he presses a button, and his pick of poison lands with a soft thud. Watanuki reaches for it and almost guilty, tucks it into his jacket.
The acrid heady smell of tobacco lingers on after the young man has left.
Doumeki gives him a strange sidelong glance.
Watanuki tries to look nonchalant, as he shoves a bento in the other boy's face.
"Leftovers from Youko's dinner. Don't get the wrong idea!"
Doumeki doesn't immediately reach for the bento. That in itself, is telling.
"Have you been-"
Sensing the imminent question, Watanuki exclaims as loudly as possible.
"Himawari-chan!" You look so radiant today!"
The girl smiles sweetly in greeting, and settles down beside the pair of them, and the three friends begin eating together as always.
"Oei."
Watanuki can't help being arrested by that firm, steady voice that he hears all the time - even in his dreams. He turns and Doumeki's eyes are steely as they catch and hold Watanuki's gaze.
"Have you been dreaming lately?"
For a moment, he sees someone else, a strapping figure, warm, kind and quick to advise in Doumeki's stead.
He blinks and the vision is gone. There is only Doumeki, with a hint of a frown on his forehead.
Not nearly enough he doesn't say.
Watanuki doesn't know when his feelings of affection turned into something else entirely.
Into what he isn't sure. But he knows lighting a cigarette and staring at it while it burns itself out into ashes isn't normal. In fact, if he's willing to admit it to himself (and he is not, thank you very much), it is just bordering on the verge of psychotic. And somewhat detrimental to his health, to actually want to catch a whiff of the one smell he has previously always avoided.
He hasn't dreamt in a while and the absence is starting to hurt.
"Oei."
"Do-Doumeki!
Watanuki pitches the glowing cylinder as far out into the distance as he can and hurriedly crams the incriminating box into his book bag.
"What are you doing sneaking up on me like that?!" Watanuki demands hotly. He can feel his ears turning red. It's not really anger that's making him flush, more embarrassment of being caught in the act.
Doumeki doesn't look at him. He's staring into the distance where the cigarette landed, his expression perfectly blank as always.
He was wrong when he had said that the reason Watanuki hadn't quite literally gone into the light was because of his resemblance to Doumeki. Watanuki had said it before, Doumeki looked like him. It wasn't the other way around.
Watanuki slowly let his eyes slide shut, and let his head fall forward onto the broad shoulders of the boy in front of him.
"Oei."
Watanuki doesn't say anything. He just stands perfectly still, his forehead pressed against the warmth in front of him.
"Watanuki."
In the dark of the night, with no one around but the two of them, Watanuki doesn't need to bother about pretenses, doesn't need to be the Watanuki that despises Doumeki or the Watanuki that adores Himawari. There is only them. And.
"I'm not him."
The words have an edge that cuts through him like a jagged shard of glass. Watanuki stiffens and lifts his head slowly.
Doumeki turns and Watanuki's breath catches as he is once again faced with the splitting likeness of the other one.
There is only one thing missing.
Doumeki reaches out, and suddenly Watanuki's legs literally give way, as he finds himself pinned against one of the trees in Doumeki's courtyard.
Then the acrid smell of smoke hits his lungs, and his eyes widen as Doumeki lifts the white cylinder to his lips and inhales deeply.
"Forget me."
Watanuki's gasp of surprise is cut off as the other boy closes the distance between them and crushes their lips. It is not delicate. It is not gentle. It simply is.
Watanuki clenches his fist in Doumeki's shirt as he hungrily eagerly tastes the other's lips, his tongue, all that he has to offer. He arches upwards into the other's embrace, not knowing or caring who exists in the here and now or the in-between. The two are indistinguishable, they are one, they are both his in this most fleeting of moments that Watanuki knows will not last.
Forget me.
Watanuki doesn't know whether or laugh or cry as Doumeki pulls away from him suddenly. The lighted butt falls from his fingers sending a shower of sparks against the ground.
"I'm sorry."
Watanuki is too.
The End.