Short sighted
Summary A two-shot follow up to 'One Sided.' Mihashi has eyes only for the ball and the mound, which frustrates Abe. It is Christmas, and for once, Abe wants Mihashi to look away- to look at him.
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Chapter One
"Mihashi, hand."
A reflex. His hand is up before his mind registers the command, so when Abe's hand presses against his, he is taken my surprise at the sudden warmth registering in his body.
"Mihashi…!" The catcher is alarmed by the coldness of the pitcher's skin, but Mihashi isn't looking at him. His body, rigid under Abe's touch, turns ever so slightly towards the baseball field. Mihashi's eyes are locked on the mound.
Abe notices, and releases their joined hands with a sigh. The two part without another word.
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Mihashi is five minutes into his walk home when disaster strikes in the form of wet snow. His foot slides out from under him and he barely has time to fling his arms out when he lands chest first, elbows bent at an uncomfortable angle in a failed attempt to cushion his fall. His hair is blondish-white when he pulls himself upright, despite several attempts to dislodge the snow from his head. Snow falls gently on his face and clothes and Mihashi wonders what would happen if he let the snow swallow him up, if he stops moving at all. He wonders what kind of snowman his frozen body would make. Then he sees in his mind the pitching target he has at home, the nine partitions, the baseballs he keeps in the basket nearby, and he is able to stand up. With that image in mind, he walks home. He is shivering badly and one of his legs is crooked. His clothes drip with melted snow, through his clothes, and he feels the icy coldness piercing his skin. He is not only shivering now, he is shaking, his steps becoming wobbly. The pitching target becomes clearer and closer in his mind, and he feels no pain. Mihashi quickens his footsteps as the last of the light leaves the sky, eager to turn the last few corners that lead to his house.
"I can pitch when I get home," he says to himself in anticipation.
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Abe's bike veers slightly as he passes a rocky road but he settles back into his usual rhythm immediately. Water splashes on his ankles as he pedals over puddles of wet snow, and his hands and face are dewy from falling snowflakes. His hands are cold, but Abe doesn't use the gloves he keeps in his coat pocket; he likes holding the handlebars with his own bare hands.
His feet push the pedals and his arms make the right turns solely on muscle memory, leaving Abe's mind is left free to roam during the ten minute ride home on the long route. He takes long, deep breaths as he traverses the snowy streets, feeling wind tug at his hair, but his hair is too short and closely cut that it doesn't make any difference, unlike a certain blond he knew who'd failed to bring a cap to practice and had to spend the whole afternoon having tendrils of his hair blown into his flushed cheeks and forehead. The catcher pictures this in his head as other thoughts stream into his mind, random, trivial things thought of solely for the purpose of relaxation.
As Abe turns a corner, the tip of his scarf is blown into an overhanging branch, but luckily fails to catch. Abe reaches up to adjust the crimson red fabric around his neck, and recalls Mihashi for the second time with a soft, secret smile that graces his lips only where the pitcher is concerned. By coincidence, Nishiura's battery had worn the exact same color of scarf today. The scarf had been one of the few articles of warm clothing that Mihashi had with him, and the fact that it matched with his secretly made him blush almost as hard as Mihashi did, but one, he was so much better at hiding it and two, Mihashi turned red for completely different reasons that Abe did.
While Mihashi stuttered and burned red over Hajima's casual parting observation as the two were left alone in the changing room, Abe's heart pounded wildly, for reasons he couldn't completely understand. Mihashi had lowered his face, half-burying it his scarf as if trying to hide his entire being inside the soft folds of fabric, uttering something so softly that the catcher had to lean into him to hear, which caused Mihashi to clam up even more, despite Abe's gentle, but flustered attempts to glean some words, or any sort of communication from the ace. At that moment, catcher and pitcher shared an odd symmetry of red- crimson scarves concealing faces blazing red, and even underneath that, their hearts beating quickly, blood pounding against their skin as they stood before each other, their bodies close but their minds, their feelings and thoughts a mile away from meeting.
Not another word emerged from Mihashi's lips, though an occasional "Ah…" quickly lifted and let down Abe's hopes. Abe's eyes searched frantically for Mihashi's, but they failed to connect. Mihashi's things were packed, and so were his, but Abe didn't want to say goodbye like this, not without saying something. Mihashi was almost out the door when Abe called him back, and latching on to the first thing that came to his mind, he held up his hand to Mihashi…his hands were ice, but it was the ace's silence, and ignorance to Abe's feelings, that made the catcher's heart freeze over.
But Abe had known, he'd known for a long time now. Not at first, when Mihashi suddenly appeared in his life with a broken spirit and tear-filled eyes, but gradually, building up inside him day by day as he worked with the watery-eyed pitcher, encouraging, guiding, touching, until he finally admitted it to himself one day. Without warning, Mihashi had become precious to him, something so weak but heartbreakingly beautiful- Mihashi was so amazingly, annoyingly, infuriatingly dazzling, he could barely stand it. Abe was blinded, thunderstruck in his presence. Mihashi's innocence, his determination…throwing pitch after perfect pitch, still unconvinced of his own self-worth, but so sure of his place on the mound…
Abe's foot slides of the pedal and scrapes the ground, his fingers squeezing the handbrakes as he comes to an abrupt halt. He hovers a few centimeters over the seat of his bike, feet rooted to the spot even thought it is late and getting colder by the minute. His hands are still clenched over the bike's handlebars. A minute ago he was smiling, caught up in a pleasant daydream, but now he wears an expression of utmost sadness, and anger boiling just underneath. His knuckles are dead white when he releases the bike, but a second later they are colored red as he punches a nearby tree, relocating several leaves from the tree to his hair and clothes. Behind him, his bicycle tips precariously over the sidewalk before falling sideways onto the dark road. 'Thud,' the sound barely registers on Abe's ears as he tilts his head up to the sky, all other senses but sight dulled by the painful feeling that suddenly arose inside of him. He sees Mihashi, his pitcher, his friend, his ace, against the deep blue backdrop of sky as the last tinges of red disappear along with the setting of the sun. He remembers Mihashi, with the crimson scarf loosely around his neck, blue eyes staring intently. But those eyes that Abe so desperately sought could never be captured. Mihashi's hand was pressed against his, but he was staring fixedly at something else. Even though Abe was so close to him, Mihashi could only look at the mound…his mound.
"Dammit! All you ever think about is being a pitcher! Why don't you ever look at me…?"