Note: This crosses over with "Hands" a little. You MIGHT want to read
that one beforehand.
Selfishness
A week had passed since the end of the pro exams, and at the end of lot of other things. It wasn't so bad at first, not having Isumi around, but gradually it seemed as if the gaping hole at my back grew larger. He'd occupied that space at my back for so long that I expected him to be there just because he had always been there. I'd have the strangest feeling of being watched when he was around - but it was a good thing to have someone watch my back like that, as if he was a shieldmate back in the olden times or something. And so I found it very strange and very uncomfortable when I turned around now and there was no one there. Unsettling, like I'd forgotten something very, very important.
In the past week I hadn't seen hide nor hair of him. He seemed to have abandoned all of his old hideouts - the thought occurred to me that he might be avoiding the rest of us from the old Insei study group, and that particularly wrenched at me. The rational good-Samaritan in me danced on my right shoulder, telling me to just go up to his apartment and knock until the door falls down - and the little self-protective side of me delicately reasoned that he would figure things out on his own by the next pro exams anyway. Guilty conscious reminded me that by the end of a year, I wouldn't HAVE a best friend anymore - and so the war continued. The fear stayed me, though; I still couldn't do anything but call and call and call his house, listening every time with a sort of sinking feeling to those three rings, then the soft-spoken message at the end that sounded so false now.
I guess I had just been always accustomed to the nice side of him - and really, that was the only side he ever showed in public anyway, that near-perfect courtesy and friendly demeanor that all the children liked to be around and all the grownups adored. That side I could still see, sometimes - the welcome smile in place, the lines in his body never betraying any sort of anger or even dislike. Sometimes I could still remember his voice and his hands, how when he was describing things they always seemed to go together perfectly, as if he had complete control over his actions and knew just what he wanted to say. He was quick to give a smile but slow to real laughter and never angry. It wasn't in him to be that way. I wasn't sure if people were supposed to notice all the little quirks about their best friends when they weren't there, but that was certainly the case. The bottom line was that I missed him - everyone missed him. He represented security and understanding that paralleled with our situations. To not have him there was - strange, since he'd always seemed to be there before, in his almost-melancholy way.
I walked past the coffee shop where he used to work and ducked my head down. I cursed myself for thinking of him now; I imagined he'd probably quit that too. Regretfully I cast a glance at the glass windows. No, the world hadn't ended when Isumi quit the world of G - but I got the distinct feeling that somehow there was a double meaning to Shinoba- sensei's words. It felt as if he wasn't avoiding Go as much as he was trying to avoid us, and especially me. Was it shame? While part of me told me that Isumi probably had felt that before but probably not on this scale (if shame really WAS the reason), the other side of me debated that Isumi was still human. Sometimes he seemed more than human, being able to keep up with all of us younger Insei with a open ears and a vacant shoulder. If there had ever been a parent in our little group, it would have been him - the one with the most experience, the one that represented a link between the adult world of authority and also the not-so-forgotten liveliness of childhood. Certainly, he'd done things for us, treated us out for snacks if we happened to go somewhere, playing chaperone if somehow we needed one, answered homework questions. So, certainly, all of us found it hard to keep up with this suddenly angry, almost bitter Isumi. Everyone had practically forgotten he still WAS human, that maybe if he were a little more withdrawn he wouldn't have been the friend we had, maybe that he was angry at some of us. And we, on the other hand, couldn't really think out of the box at the time or spare any attention to him, though we did notice the distinct shift in mood.
I frowned, then turned back and opened the door. For old times sake, I promised myself, I'd come back here now and I'll pretend that it was just like it was before except that there was no Isumi. I shoved my hands in my pockets to make sure I had enough for a sandwich and a soda and then waved to the girl behind the counter; I recognized her from some of the previous visits before, and she smiled to see they hadn't lost me yet. I sat down, mentally repeating my order in my head so that I wouldn't mess up to the waitress -
"May I take your order?", Isumi said quite clearly over me. I looked up to see him there, his characteristic clean-cut Gap commercial form-and- figure, polite and courteous as always. He seemed no different, but I could see a hardness in his eyes that booked no argument. I mumbled my order and looked down at the table. Those eyes were downright HOSTILE. He'd never been so guarded before, at least not to me, and my shame came back to me in a rush of blood to my face. I could have burned a hole through the mahogany table at the moment - without a match.
He came back too soon with my order and then slid into the seat opposite the table, facing me with that impassive face again. I scarfed down the sandwich and the drink - I knew he only had a fifteen minute break. I owed him to at least listen to him. When I was finally done, I managed to croak out over the remains of my sandwich, "I'm listening."
"Why did you come back here?", he asked tonelessly.
I murmured a reply and looked down again; I didn't even need to look at him to feel him burning a hole through my head with a implant laser gun - like Touya Akira's gaze, I supposed, the look that told everyone that when that look shifted to you that you couldn't lie to him, that he knew your story and everything about you and he wanted a straight answer now. I tore myself away from that terribly human impulse to lie under intimidation and forced myself to tell the truth. He WAS Isumi. He WAS my friend - or maybe I was just a page in his book.
"I called[1]", I said lamely, "but you weren't home." I snuck a glance at him and his smooth, expressionless face. So that's how you want it, I sighed mentally. That's how you feel about it, eh?
He looked away and I breathed a sigh of relief. "You wouldn't have reached me", he replied, "I was over at my parents' house." At least that answer hadn't complicated matters yet.
The question came up before I could stop it. "Did you do it to throw me off? Or maybe to spite me?"
"I had other things to do", came the evasive reply. I wanted to say something derogatory in response to that - before my good, right-shoulder angel came down and reminded me I wasn't in the position to say anything.
But it came out anyway. "This is about ME. Do you hate me now or something?"
"No", he said, and I was surprised to hear the sudden change of tone. He'd been startled by that question. He turned back to face me, the light playing over the frown on his face. "No, it wouldn't be fair if I hated you for something like that, because you still succeeded where I failed." Ah, Isumi's chivalristic tendencies.
"But you're still avoiding me", I said matter-of-factly, and his eyes turned harsh.
"Yes", he said in reply.
I frowned, the way he said I didn't understand. "Why? Are you scared of me, or maybe everyone else for that matter?"
Now I could see the Isumi before the pro exams, the one I thought I knew, that shy generous Isumi who was too far ingrained into my system. He looked away again (shame, I thought), and said quietly, "I shouldn't be, I know that, and though you're just a part of the problem, it's not all about you." That part stung a little, that I wasn't what mattered. "It's mostly about Go - and maybe myself and some of my more. . .pressing concerns. I just want to get away from Go for a little while."
"But why kick us out of your life?", I pressed. "And specifically, why did you cut ME out of your life?" I saw the manager look at me and lowered my tone a notch. "I understand you're bitter about not passing the exams, but there's always next year - you'll make it next year, there's no way you CAN'T do it next year, is there -"
"-but there's no guarantee I'll succeed. And because my parents want me to go to college, or maybe to a university because I've failed to pass another year. My parents are worried about me - and what kind of future I might procure while I still have time." His eyes seemed to clear suddenly, and he said distinctly, "I would do just as well in medical school, Waya."
I felt an irritating flash of anger and pinned it down quickly. This was NOT the time. "And your love for Go? Don't tell me that's changed too?"
His eyes narrowed and I knew I'd stepped over one sacred line. "No, that hasn't. But my goban is in my closet - I have orthodontics[2] textbooks on my desk - and there's nothing similar between Go and orthodontics except for both involve white stones of some sort. Maybe one day I'll get back to it - but that will be a long time."
I shook my head in disbelief. He really WAS buying into this medical school stuff! Shinoba-sensei was wrong - he really did believe he could get away from Go like this! He wasn't lying about leaving the world of Go permanently - that word struck me as ominous - and everything had been deliberate, all the times I had called to find only his answering machine replying, all the hangouts that he didn't visit anymore, all the times I went around, hoping I'd somehow find him, all of it had been on purpose. I felt betrayed, abandoned, deceived - the anger swelled up in me, unchecked, red slipping before my eyes so that suddenly all I could see was him, him with his ashamed face turned away from me, not even able to look me in the eye. The sounds of the café echoed in my ears, unintelligible, and it wasn't until I was finally thrown bodily out of the shop that I finally woke up. I stalked to the nearest bookstore, bought a manga, and stalked to the bus stop that he would take to go home - unless he decided to walk another six blocks uptown to the next one. I sat down and read, determined to wait it out for another two hours.
When his shift was finally over it was already dark. He was a dark, navy-uniformed figure under the streetlamp with his hair over his unreadable eyes, and when he sat on the bench a little ways from me he seemed close to getting up and actually walking six blocks uptown. For a little while we didn't say anything, trying to pretend that there wasn't any argument between us, that in some irrational way we were still friends, best friends.
But he was patient, and I was.not so patient. "I'm sorry", I apologized first, suddenly remember quite clearly every word I'd shouted at him in the café. "For shouting at you."
"I got fired", he said quietly. I blinked and looked at him, appalled. He noticed my look and answered, "But I can get another job. That's not the point. You meant it, every word you said, and most of them are probably true in your eyes - I probably am a damned coward, a traitor and a bastard too." I squirmed under the direct quoting. Ah, the typical Isumi retort, sharp enough to sting, using the tone in his voice, the "I- wish-you-were-anywhere-but-here" tone to convey his words more clearly.
I was sorely tempted to say 'no' to that, but it would be lying and it would expose that I was trying to find that comfort again. Instead, I opted to ask him, the question that had plagued me for two hours. "But why did you really leave - it's not just your parents who want you to go to this. . .medical school, you want to go to. Why would you give up now, though - it's not like your career's over or anything, you know that Go will never really leave you, you said that yourself earlier - why not keep going?" I licked my lips before continuing, my nervousness showing, "I mean, weren't we - me, Shindou, the others - weren't we enough to keep you with us? To keep you grounded in the world of Go?"
At this he stood quickly. Another sacred line had been crossed. Every part of him seemed sharp in contrast to the soft, almost childishly round Isumi I thought I knew. Suddenly he seemed every inch the adult, no child in him, with his eyes burning with something like anger - and Isumi never got angry, not seriously, and never at me, now I was seeing why. "You?", he spat mockingly at me, and I flinched from the malice, "you think you were enough to keep me by your side, always ready to listen to your troubles and to your problems - why would I want to listen forever? I'm not a psychologist, and I'm sure as hell not YOUR psychologist, so why are you here?" He looked away, his knuckles set white as he gripped his backpack. "Why can't I just do something for myself for once? Be something and do something because I just want to?"
Something twisted painfully in my gut. "Maybe I was the only one who saw it and maybe I'm thinking too highly of myself, but I don't think any of you saw what I gave up for the rest of you - I could have had friends my age, I could have just given up and gone to live a normal life like the rest of my schoolmates - instead I raised you as if", he looked away as if he wasn't sure if he was saying the right words, "as if you were MY students, irrationally. I think only I saw the multitude of what I've done to support you all as you become strong, maybe stronger than I'll ever be, I'm not used to giving all that much to other people. Before go, there were just people that passed in and out of my life that didn't try to understand me. I let you and the others - and especially allowed you - to get close to me, hoping all the time maybe one of you might see past your. . .", he looked up, and his eyes almost seemed to see me through the light from the dim streetlamp, strangely sad and very lost, "your kind, generous, gentle Isumi-san and see me inside." He ran a hasty sleeve over his eyes, I could see the pain in that action, signifying he didn't want me to see his weakness, letting me know there was still a very thick wall between us. "You're right", he said so softly I thought I hadn't heard correctly, "it hasn't all been Go that I've been running from - it's you, all of you. I thought it was time I gave up, not only on Go, but on everything I might have learned from it. I left all of my closed heart back behind when I became an Insei, and now I want it back! I was right there - I belonged to no one but myself back then - and I understand that now that's the only way I should have lived! I'm going back there right now - watch me -"
"-then you're wrong, Isumi", I said in defiance, "because now you've got us, and we're the ones who understand you. Now that you've had people who understood your drive for Go, you're going to want that again very soon because you'll be playing that game as a pro a year from now! You'll come back because we're the ones who know you best, we're the ones that will ever understand you even minimally, and now that you've had us as your friends once, you can't go back to that solitary life because you won't be able to live it anymore." I held out my hand to him suddenly, daringly, and he shied away. It only made me angrier. "So", I said humorlessly, "I'm not even allowed to touch you anymore, am I? I can't cross that sacred line anymore, can I? One more boundary that I can't cross! One more side of Isumi that I can't see anymore! Are you trying to say that your generosity and your love for all of us - saying it was all a fake? I hardly believe you were able to keep that creed inside of you for all those years we've been friends, thinking that you could, in the very end, use me to find yourself. In the end, you WERE doing the one thing you swore not to do, and you lost yourself while you were so-called 'raising' us with your damned wisecrack advice. You DIDN'T care anymore in the end whether or not you might be able to ever find yourself or let someone see the real you - you got enough of life from watching us grow up and be happy and all that. Don't say it's otherwise", I said, trying to swallow my tears and halt my sobbing breath, "because you know better that friends don't lie to each other, Isumi."
The bus came and he got on, sitting in the back seat. He did not look back. But before the bus disappeared I saw him throw his face into his hands, his back hunched over his knees.
It took three months before he quietly rejoined the Kyuseikai[3] again, and this time he had to start from the bottom again - it didn't take him more than a week before he was one of the regular players again[4]. It took him half a year before he appeared before me again, and smiled that soft, sad smile only he could ever smile, and patted my shoulder affectionately before leaving the bookshop. And a week after that, he happened upon the rest of us while we were getting kicked out of McDonalds, and intervened on our behalf with some of his old acquaintances at the store to spare enough time for us to stuff our food into our bags and leave. He was a little nervous, I could see that, and maybe the others noticed it too, but they were too happy to see him to say anything about it. I, on the other hand, didn't have anything to say to him. He was grateful enough to me already, I could see it in his eyes - and I guess I shouldn't rub it in his face anymore than I had to. And though the regular story ending should have ended with the cliché "Friends don't do that to each other", I guess it would have been better if I'd just ended it with "Not the End" - his career wasn't over yet, of course. We haven't even started yet.
/ \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ Author's note:
Yes, I know, long-winded and pointless and I haven't read even up to #13 yet, so I don't know how Isumi manages to reenter the manga. If this is completely different from what really happened, I apologize, I didn't know, the episodes take forever to load and my Chinese isn't very good. And if Waya and Isumi are out of character, I apologize for that too. I always make Waya the drama queen, somehow. I know he's got a reflective side. . .I just haven't found a suitable plot to make him express that yet. And also for the really long paragraphs - sorry for that too, I couldn't find a suitable place to cut their Martin-Luther-King-size speeches short. And the ending was stupid. Gomen, and thanks for reading. If there's anything wrong with this one - tell me, I'd like to know (I get the distinct feeling I was a bit skimpy time-wise on this one, schoolwork's been on my back, so I can't really help it).
Andrea Weiling
[1] In the manga, Waya calls Isumi over and over again but no one answers the phone. In the anime, Waya can't bring himself to call Isumi.
[2] Dude, I hope you peoples know orthodontics is the study of correction of teeth (braces)! Had a friend who thought it was ophthalmology.
[3] Not sure if I'm spelling this right. I would say it's the Nine Stars League, but I'm not sure if that title's right or not either.
[4] If this isn't correct politics of the Kyuseikai, I'm sorry, I just guessed on how people joined it. If anyone knows, I'd like to know.
Selfishness
A week had passed since the end of the pro exams, and at the end of lot of other things. It wasn't so bad at first, not having Isumi around, but gradually it seemed as if the gaping hole at my back grew larger. He'd occupied that space at my back for so long that I expected him to be there just because he had always been there. I'd have the strangest feeling of being watched when he was around - but it was a good thing to have someone watch my back like that, as if he was a shieldmate back in the olden times or something. And so I found it very strange and very uncomfortable when I turned around now and there was no one there. Unsettling, like I'd forgotten something very, very important.
In the past week I hadn't seen hide nor hair of him. He seemed to have abandoned all of his old hideouts - the thought occurred to me that he might be avoiding the rest of us from the old Insei study group, and that particularly wrenched at me. The rational good-Samaritan in me danced on my right shoulder, telling me to just go up to his apartment and knock until the door falls down - and the little self-protective side of me delicately reasoned that he would figure things out on his own by the next pro exams anyway. Guilty conscious reminded me that by the end of a year, I wouldn't HAVE a best friend anymore - and so the war continued. The fear stayed me, though; I still couldn't do anything but call and call and call his house, listening every time with a sort of sinking feeling to those three rings, then the soft-spoken message at the end that sounded so false now.
I guess I had just been always accustomed to the nice side of him - and really, that was the only side he ever showed in public anyway, that near-perfect courtesy and friendly demeanor that all the children liked to be around and all the grownups adored. That side I could still see, sometimes - the welcome smile in place, the lines in his body never betraying any sort of anger or even dislike. Sometimes I could still remember his voice and his hands, how when he was describing things they always seemed to go together perfectly, as if he had complete control over his actions and knew just what he wanted to say. He was quick to give a smile but slow to real laughter and never angry. It wasn't in him to be that way. I wasn't sure if people were supposed to notice all the little quirks about their best friends when they weren't there, but that was certainly the case. The bottom line was that I missed him - everyone missed him. He represented security and understanding that paralleled with our situations. To not have him there was - strange, since he'd always seemed to be there before, in his almost-melancholy way.
I walked past the coffee shop where he used to work and ducked my head down. I cursed myself for thinking of him now; I imagined he'd probably quit that too. Regretfully I cast a glance at the glass windows. No, the world hadn't ended when Isumi quit the world of G - but I got the distinct feeling that somehow there was a double meaning to Shinoba- sensei's words. It felt as if he wasn't avoiding Go as much as he was trying to avoid us, and especially me. Was it shame? While part of me told me that Isumi probably had felt that before but probably not on this scale (if shame really WAS the reason), the other side of me debated that Isumi was still human. Sometimes he seemed more than human, being able to keep up with all of us younger Insei with a open ears and a vacant shoulder. If there had ever been a parent in our little group, it would have been him - the one with the most experience, the one that represented a link between the adult world of authority and also the not-so-forgotten liveliness of childhood. Certainly, he'd done things for us, treated us out for snacks if we happened to go somewhere, playing chaperone if somehow we needed one, answered homework questions. So, certainly, all of us found it hard to keep up with this suddenly angry, almost bitter Isumi. Everyone had practically forgotten he still WAS human, that maybe if he were a little more withdrawn he wouldn't have been the friend we had, maybe that he was angry at some of us. And we, on the other hand, couldn't really think out of the box at the time or spare any attention to him, though we did notice the distinct shift in mood.
I frowned, then turned back and opened the door. For old times sake, I promised myself, I'd come back here now and I'll pretend that it was just like it was before except that there was no Isumi. I shoved my hands in my pockets to make sure I had enough for a sandwich and a soda and then waved to the girl behind the counter; I recognized her from some of the previous visits before, and she smiled to see they hadn't lost me yet. I sat down, mentally repeating my order in my head so that I wouldn't mess up to the waitress -
"May I take your order?", Isumi said quite clearly over me. I looked up to see him there, his characteristic clean-cut Gap commercial form-and- figure, polite and courteous as always. He seemed no different, but I could see a hardness in his eyes that booked no argument. I mumbled my order and looked down at the table. Those eyes were downright HOSTILE. He'd never been so guarded before, at least not to me, and my shame came back to me in a rush of blood to my face. I could have burned a hole through the mahogany table at the moment - without a match.
He came back too soon with my order and then slid into the seat opposite the table, facing me with that impassive face again. I scarfed down the sandwich and the drink - I knew he only had a fifteen minute break. I owed him to at least listen to him. When I was finally done, I managed to croak out over the remains of my sandwich, "I'm listening."
"Why did you come back here?", he asked tonelessly.
I murmured a reply and looked down again; I didn't even need to look at him to feel him burning a hole through my head with a implant laser gun - like Touya Akira's gaze, I supposed, the look that told everyone that when that look shifted to you that you couldn't lie to him, that he knew your story and everything about you and he wanted a straight answer now. I tore myself away from that terribly human impulse to lie under intimidation and forced myself to tell the truth. He WAS Isumi. He WAS my friend - or maybe I was just a page in his book.
"I called[1]", I said lamely, "but you weren't home." I snuck a glance at him and his smooth, expressionless face. So that's how you want it, I sighed mentally. That's how you feel about it, eh?
He looked away and I breathed a sigh of relief. "You wouldn't have reached me", he replied, "I was over at my parents' house." At least that answer hadn't complicated matters yet.
The question came up before I could stop it. "Did you do it to throw me off? Or maybe to spite me?"
"I had other things to do", came the evasive reply. I wanted to say something derogatory in response to that - before my good, right-shoulder angel came down and reminded me I wasn't in the position to say anything.
But it came out anyway. "This is about ME. Do you hate me now or something?"
"No", he said, and I was surprised to hear the sudden change of tone. He'd been startled by that question. He turned back to face me, the light playing over the frown on his face. "No, it wouldn't be fair if I hated you for something like that, because you still succeeded where I failed." Ah, Isumi's chivalristic tendencies.
"But you're still avoiding me", I said matter-of-factly, and his eyes turned harsh.
"Yes", he said in reply.
I frowned, the way he said I didn't understand. "Why? Are you scared of me, or maybe everyone else for that matter?"
Now I could see the Isumi before the pro exams, the one I thought I knew, that shy generous Isumi who was too far ingrained into my system. He looked away again (shame, I thought), and said quietly, "I shouldn't be, I know that, and though you're just a part of the problem, it's not all about you." That part stung a little, that I wasn't what mattered. "It's mostly about Go - and maybe myself and some of my more. . .pressing concerns. I just want to get away from Go for a little while."
"But why kick us out of your life?", I pressed. "And specifically, why did you cut ME out of your life?" I saw the manager look at me and lowered my tone a notch. "I understand you're bitter about not passing the exams, but there's always next year - you'll make it next year, there's no way you CAN'T do it next year, is there -"
"-but there's no guarantee I'll succeed. And because my parents want me to go to college, or maybe to a university because I've failed to pass another year. My parents are worried about me - and what kind of future I might procure while I still have time." His eyes seemed to clear suddenly, and he said distinctly, "I would do just as well in medical school, Waya."
I felt an irritating flash of anger and pinned it down quickly. This was NOT the time. "And your love for Go? Don't tell me that's changed too?"
His eyes narrowed and I knew I'd stepped over one sacred line. "No, that hasn't. But my goban is in my closet - I have orthodontics[2] textbooks on my desk - and there's nothing similar between Go and orthodontics except for both involve white stones of some sort. Maybe one day I'll get back to it - but that will be a long time."
I shook my head in disbelief. He really WAS buying into this medical school stuff! Shinoba-sensei was wrong - he really did believe he could get away from Go like this! He wasn't lying about leaving the world of Go permanently - that word struck me as ominous - and everything had been deliberate, all the times I had called to find only his answering machine replying, all the hangouts that he didn't visit anymore, all the times I went around, hoping I'd somehow find him, all of it had been on purpose. I felt betrayed, abandoned, deceived - the anger swelled up in me, unchecked, red slipping before my eyes so that suddenly all I could see was him, him with his ashamed face turned away from me, not even able to look me in the eye. The sounds of the café echoed in my ears, unintelligible, and it wasn't until I was finally thrown bodily out of the shop that I finally woke up. I stalked to the nearest bookstore, bought a manga, and stalked to the bus stop that he would take to go home - unless he decided to walk another six blocks uptown to the next one. I sat down and read, determined to wait it out for another two hours.
When his shift was finally over it was already dark. He was a dark, navy-uniformed figure under the streetlamp with his hair over his unreadable eyes, and when he sat on the bench a little ways from me he seemed close to getting up and actually walking six blocks uptown. For a little while we didn't say anything, trying to pretend that there wasn't any argument between us, that in some irrational way we were still friends, best friends.
But he was patient, and I was.not so patient. "I'm sorry", I apologized first, suddenly remember quite clearly every word I'd shouted at him in the café. "For shouting at you."
"I got fired", he said quietly. I blinked and looked at him, appalled. He noticed my look and answered, "But I can get another job. That's not the point. You meant it, every word you said, and most of them are probably true in your eyes - I probably am a damned coward, a traitor and a bastard too." I squirmed under the direct quoting. Ah, the typical Isumi retort, sharp enough to sting, using the tone in his voice, the "I- wish-you-were-anywhere-but-here" tone to convey his words more clearly.
I was sorely tempted to say 'no' to that, but it would be lying and it would expose that I was trying to find that comfort again. Instead, I opted to ask him, the question that had plagued me for two hours. "But why did you really leave - it's not just your parents who want you to go to this. . .medical school, you want to go to. Why would you give up now, though - it's not like your career's over or anything, you know that Go will never really leave you, you said that yourself earlier - why not keep going?" I licked my lips before continuing, my nervousness showing, "I mean, weren't we - me, Shindou, the others - weren't we enough to keep you with us? To keep you grounded in the world of Go?"
At this he stood quickly. Another sacred line had been crossed. Every part of him seemed sharp in contrast to the soft, almost childishly round Isumi I thought I knew. Suddenly he seemed every inch the adult, no child in him, with his eyes burning with something like anger - and Isumi never got angry, not seriously, and never at me, now I was seeing why. "You?", he spat mockingly at me, and I flinched from the malice, "you think you were enough to keep me by your side, always ready to listen to your troubles and to your problems - why would I want to listen forever? I'm not a psychologist, and I'm sure as hell not YOUR psychologist, so why are you here?" He looked away, his knuckles set white as he gripped his backpack. "Why can't I just do something for myself for once? Be something and do something because I just want to?"
Something twisted painfully in my gut. "Maybe I was the only one who saw it and maybe I'm thinking too highly of myself, but I don't think any of you saw what I gave up for the rest of you - I could have had friends my age, I could have just given up and gone to live a normal life like the rest of my schoolmates - instead I raised you as if", he looked away as if he wasn't sure if he was saying the right words, "as if you were MY students, irrationally. I think only I saw the multitude of what I've done to support you all as you become strong, maybe stronger than I'll ever be, I'm not used to giving all that much to other people. Before go, there were just people that passed in and out of my life that didn't try to understand me. I let you and the others - and especially allowed you - to get close to me, hoping all the time maybe one of you might see past your. . .", he looked up, and his eyes almost seemed to see me through the light from the dim streetlamp, strangely sad and very lost, "your kind, generous, gentle Isumi-san and see me inside." He ran a hasty sleeve over his eyes, I could see the pain in that action, signifying he didn't want me to see his weakness, letting me know there was still a very thick wall between us. "You're right", he said so softly I thought I hadn't heard correctly, "it hasn't all been Go that I've been running from - it's you, all of you. I thought it was time I gave up, not only on Go, but on everything I might have learned from it. I left all of my closed heart back behind when I became an Insei, and now I want it back! I was right there - I belonged to no one but myself back then - and I understand that now that's the only way I should have lived! I'm going back there right now - watch me -"
"-then you're wrong, Isumi", I said in defiance, "because now you've got us, and we're the ones who understand you. Now that you've had people who understood your drive for Go, you're going to want that again very soon because you'll be playing that game as a pro a year from now! You'll come back because we're the ones who know you best, we're the ones that will ever understand you even minimally, and now that you've had us as your friends once, you can't go back to that solitary life because you won't be able to live it anymore." I held out my hand to him suddenly, daringly, and he shied away. It only made me angrier. "So", I said humorlessly, "I'm not even allowed to touch you anymore, am I? I can't cross that sacred line anymore, can I? One more boundary that I can't cross! One more side of Isumi that I can't see anymore! Are you trying to say that your generosity and your love for all of us - saying it was all a fake? I hardly believe you were able to keep that creed inside of you for all those years we've been friends, thinking that you could, in the very end, use me to find yourself. In the end, you WERE doing the one thing you swore not to do, and you lost yourself while you were so-called 'raising' us with your damned wisecrack advice. You DIDN'T care anymore in the end whether or not you might be able to ever find yourself or let someone see the real you - you got enough of life from watching us grow up and be happy and all that. Don't say it's otherwise", I said, trying to swallow my tears and halt my sobbing breath, "because you know better that friends don't lie to each other, Isumi."
The bus came and he got on, sitting in the back seat. He did not look back. But before the bus disappeared I saw him throw his face into his hands, his back hunched over his knees.
It took three months before he quietly rejoined the Kyuseikai[3] again, and this time he had to start from the bottom again - it didn't take him more than a week before he was one of the regular players again[4]. It took him half a year before he appeared before me again, and smiled that soft, sad smile only he could ever smile, and patted my shoulder affectionately before leaving the bookshop. And a week after that, he happened upon the rest of us while we were getting kicked out of McDonalds, and intervened on our behalf with some of his old acquaintances at the store to spare enough time for us to stuff our food into our bags and leave. He was a little nervous, I could see that, and maybe the others noticed it too, but they were too happy to see him to say anything about it. I, on the other hand, didn't have anything to say to him. He was grateful enough to me already, I could see it in his eyes - and I guess I shouldn't rub it in his face anymore than I had to. And though the regular story ending should have ended with the cliché "Friends don't do that to each other", I guess it would have been better if I'd just ended it with "Not the End" - his career wasn't over yet, of course. We haven't even started yet.
/ \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ / \ Author's note:
Yes, I know, long-winded and pointless and I haven't read even up to #13 yet, so I don't know how Isumi manages to reenter the manga. If this is completely different from what really happened, I apologize, I didn't know, the episodes take forever to load and my Chinese isn't very good. And if Waya and Isumi are out of character, I apologize for that too. I always make Waya the drama queen, somehow. I know he's got a reflective side. . .I just haven't found a suitable plot to make him express that yet. And also for the really long paragraphs - sorry for that too, I couldn't find a suitable place to cut their Martin-Luther-King-size speeches short. And the ending was stupid. Gomen, and thanks for reading. If there's anything wrong with this one - tell me, I'd like to know (I get the distinct feeling I was a bit skimpy time-wise on this one, schoolwork's been on my back, so I can't really help it).
Andrea Weiling
[1] In the manga, Waya calls Isumi over and over again but no one answers the phone. In the anime, Waya can't bring himself to call Isumi.
[2] Dude, I hope you peoples know orthodontics is the study of correction of teeth (braces)! Had a friend who thought it was ophthalmology.
[3] Not sure if I'm spelling this right. I would say it's the Nine Stars League, but I'm not sure if that title's right or not either.
[4] If this isn't correct politics of the Kyuseikai, I'm sorry, I just guessed on how people joined it. If anyone knows, I'd like to know.