- Title: Atari
- Fandom: Hikaru no Go
- Author: Tofumalfoy (tofumalfoy-at-yahoo)
- Rating: PG-13 for mild language
- Category: general/romance
- Warnings: mild language (mostly on the part of the narrator), relationships of the homosexual persuasion (i.e. boys who like other boys. . .and I mean like, not just "like")
- Pairings: Kaga x Mitani
- Archive: Ask and ye shall receive
- Disclaimer: The story's mine, the characters aren't. How depressing.
- Feedback: I have much want of
- Notes: text (emphasis)

It should be noted that Kaga and Mitani are the characters' family names, and that their full names are Kaga Tetsuo and Mitani Yuuki.

- Vocabulary: Goban: Go board
nigiri: the process by which players in an even game determine who will play which color
Insei: an elite student at the National Go Institute studying to become a professional Go player
Shougi: a Japanese board game similar to chess

--

"Ooooooi, Tet-chan!" Shige called from the desk.

Only Shige would have the nerve to call him "Tet-chan" even 4 months after they'd stopped dating. Tetsuo sighed into the novel he'd been reading – Oscar Wilde's Picture of Dorian Gray – and looked up to see what old coot had come in intent on cutting his break short. He was surprised to see a deliciously almond-eyed man probably a few years younger than himself fairly scowling in his direction. Unable to resist the temptation, he grinned in a manner he guessed would irritate the man and was pleased to catch a quick twitching of said man's left eyebrow.

"This kid asked to play the strongest guy in the house," Shige said. "I figured you'd had enough of that weird book and were ready for some real fun."

"Who're you calling a kid?!"

Ignoring the protesting newcomer, Tetsuo turned to Shige, his grin changing to reflect the horrors he planned to inflict on his friend for interrupting his quiet reading corner. "Sure thing, Shige," he said, stretching in his folding chair and shoving both the novel and the English-Japanese dictionary that was lying on the table beside the Goban into his beat-up messenger bag and gestured for his opponent to sit.

"You kids have fun, alright?" Shige called airily as he returned to the front of the salon.

The other man, still scowling, dropped his own school bag and roughly pulled himself into the chair opposite Tetsuo.

"Handicap?" Tetsuo asked, accurately predicting the man's reaction even as he asked. His opponent's face changed briefly to an expression of outraged disbelief before quickly flickering back to its sullen frown. Tetsuo, on the other hand, grinned broadly.

"Just nigiri, okay?"

"I'm surprised to see someone as young as you in here," Tetsuo said, feeling like some cliché-spouting lech. He continued nevertheless. "Even though we're near the university, most of the students stick to the university's own Go club. You look too old to be an Insei . . ."

Disbelief returned to the man's face. "You don't remember me?"

blink.

". . . should I?"

His opponent appeared to live in a perpetual state of irritation. Tetsuo shrugged, and the game commenced. It occurred to him that the man's face might be somewhat familiar, but he didn't bother trying to remember from where. The man obviously hadn't been attractive or interesting enough to catch his attention before, so he didn't consider the memory important. Now, however . . .

"So what brought you into this old Go salon anyway?" Tetsuo suspected his opponent was the type who resented casual conversation during matches, which was the main reason he did it. Or at least one of the reasons. A contributing factor, at least.

Those catlike eyes met his briefly over the board, but broke the connection almost immediately and seemed to focus even more intently on the game.

How cute.

"Okay, I see, you want this to be a 'serious game,' right? Trying to recapture those nostalgic grade school days?"

At the return of the eyebrow's twitch of irritation, Tetsuo finally relented.

"Fine, I'll be quiet, alright?" He shrugged again and shut the hell up. It turned out to be a good idea anyway – the guy was actually pretty good, so it helped to just focus on the game.

Some twenty minutes later they were both startled by a pulsing, whirring sound. Tetsuo watched as his opponent pulled a cell phone, obviously ser on "vibrate," from his pocket, cursed under his breath and pushed his chair out from under him. Pulling his bag over his shoulder he muttered a quick "sorry" and left Tetsuo alone at their unfinished game.

"Hey!" Tetsuo cried, albeit a bit belatedly – the jangle of the front bell indicated his opponent's exit from the salon – and Shige returned at the noise.

"What was up with that?" he asked. "You didn't hit on him or anything, did you?"

"What? No! I mean –"Tetsuo paused a second to collect himself. "No, I did not hit on him! The brat's phone rang and he raced outta here! Like I'd make a pass at a jerk like that, anyway."

"He was cute, though, wasn't he?" Shige grinned the grin that would simultaneously quicken Tetsuo's pulse and piss him the hell off in the days of their own romantic interlude. The man was an asshole, but somehow he managed to make himself impossible to dislike.

"He's just darling I'm sure," Tetsuo replied, clearing off the goban, pretending he hadn't noticed the man's almost exotically shaped eyes, so large as to be almost disproportionate to the cute stub of a nose and the small mouth below them.

Which Shige knew was absolute bullshit, and Tetsuo knew he knew. After a quick staring contest, Tetsuo gave.

"Okay, so he's cute. He also left in the middle of our game. I've got no interest in someone like that. You, on the other hand . . . well, you're welcome to him, as far as I'm concerned."

Had he been so inclined, Shige could have easily turned the conversation into a teasing attack of Tetsuo's tendency to take on boyfriends for the simple reason that he thought their character could use improving. But it was an age-old argument and by this point they both knew Shige was right, so instead he smiled affectionately and dropped into the chair that had until recently been occupied by "that jerk."

"I think I should be insulted that you've just offered me a piece of meat you yourself won't go anywhere near," he opted to say.

Tetsuo, though, took it the wrong way. If he'd been thinking clearly he would have immediately recognized the laughter in his friend's voice, but he was distracted and seemed to be taking his opponent's flight as a personal offense. It took him several minutes of alternatingly sniping and apologizing to realize the comment had been a joke, and then he switched entirely to apologizing. After a while the conversation slipped into more easy territory. Shige eventually had to return to the front, and Tetsuo entertained himself by leafing through a newspaper.

It wasn't like Tetsuo was even scheduled to work today, but it was a kind of tradition that they would hang around 'til the end of the shift if the other was closing on a Friday.

The next time Shige got a chance to return to the back with Tetsuo for a few minutes, he said, "Hey, Tet-chan, you don't have to stick around, you know? You can go ahead and take off."

In lieu of bringing up the unspoken understanding they had about closing as a perfectly good reason to feel obligated to stay (thereby making himself feel stupid for saying anything) Tetsuo merely replied, "Nah, I'm alright. It's not long to closing anyway."

In response to which Shige looked around almost nervously and seemed sheepish when he said, "Um, actually, I'm meeting someone here after work and I didn't want anything, you know, awkward to come up."

"What, you mean like a date?"

Shige shrugged. "Well, I guess it could be a kind of friendly, date-type thing . . ."

"Little nervous, are we?" Tetsuo prodded.

"I am not!"

Tetsuo just grinned and collected his things. "You coulda just said that in the first place, you know. See you later, Shi-chan."

He didn't actually get much chance to return to the little salon in the following weeks, except for his own meager hours, which were enough to keep him fed, but little more. Classes had picked up, as they always did, and he'd spent the majority of what might have been his free time in the library or holed up in his room with textbooks surrounding his computer. Taking Shakespeare and Milton was turning out to be more of a strain than he'd thought, but he didn't figure it was anything he couldn't handle. He liked a challenge, after all.

He was able to catch up with Shige here and there, but between the two jobs his friend was working and the new and possibly more permanent than he'd originally been led to believe romantic interest that Shige seemed intent on keeping secret, when they saw each other it was only briefly, grabbing a quick lunch at McDonald's or something.

He'd all but put the incident out of his mind when Shige brought it up over their Big Macs.

"I told that kid you were really insulted," Shige said. "He came back in a few days ago."

"Good," said Tetsuo, nodding. "I hope he feels miserable about it."

"So I told him that to make it up to you," Shige continued, not appearing to have heard his friend's interjection at all. "He should take you out to dinner."

At which point Tetsuo choked on a pickle.

"You- What?"

Shige grinned that damn grin again. "Well, if he feels that bad about it, maybe he's not such a jerk, right?"

Tetsuo swallowed a mouthful of iced green tea and began viciously picking the sesame seeds off his sandwich.

"You're trying to set me up," he said. "Why?"

His friend shrugged with such nonchalance that it was obviously fake. "I just figured it wouldn't hurt to—"

"Who's your boyfriend, Shige?" Tetsuo interrupted.

Indignant, Shige began a protest. "Tet-chan, what-"

"Your boyfriend, Shige. You won't give me any idea what he's like, you're evasive every time he comes up in conversation, and now you're trying to distract me by setting me up with this kid you've seen all of twice. Are you afraid I'll get jealous or something?"

Shige had shut his mouth and was looking uncomfortable in his skin.

"One of your exes? Or one of mine, maybe?"

At which point Shige pointed past Tetsuo's shoulder and yelled, "Oh my God!! It's an Evangelion(1)!" Which distracted Tetsuo long enough for Shige to dash out the door, so when his friend looked back, feeling stupid, he had enough of a lead that Tetsuo wouldn't likely be able to catch up to him.

Tetsuo sighed, finished his tea, then tossed the rest of their lunch out and headed home.

It was not until January that Tetsuo was able to return for a casual game of Go at the salon. Shige wasn't working – it was Takai, the owner – so he just waved as he entered and approached one of the regulars, who was watching the only other game in the salon with passing interest, for a game.

They were counting territory when the man Tetsuo had played several weeks before entered and made a beeline for his table.

He was wearing a bright rust-colored sweater under his jacket which, as Tetsuo watched him approach, was a perfect complement to the eyes he recalled as being a dark periwinkle.

Bastard was sexy as hell, bundled against the cold as he was.

He watched them put away their stones and then motioned to Tetsuo with a stiff jerk of his head. "Come on."

Tetsuo, curious and fairly certain he could hold his own if the younger man intended to lure him into an alley to beat the shit out of him, shrugged with a grin at the man he'd just made a respectable win against, collected his belongings and followed the cold boy out into the colder afternoon. After a couple blocks he figured they'd be outside a while, so he lit a cigarette. Shortly after the butt had been discarded his guide stopped abruptly on a block Tetsuo was unfamiliar with.

"Um . . .?" was as concise a question as he could manage in the face of the cold and his rising confusion.

"Indian OK?" The man pointed at the sign about the door – "Bombay Taste" – and Tetsuo's jaw dropped open.

Then he recalled what Shige said several months before: that he had told the boy to buy Tetsuo dinner to make up for running out on their game.

And Tetsuo started laughing. The scene was so absurd he couldn't help it. But he managed to indicate that yes, this was fine, and they entered, though his companion seemed taken aback by his laughter.

"I have to say, this is already the weirdest date I've ever been on," Tetsuo said after they had seated themselves. "I'm Tetsuo, by the way. Kaga Tetsuo."

"Mitani Yuuki," his date said, inclining his head slightly.

A waiter brought them tea and they both decided on the lunch buffet.

"Mitani Yuuki. . ." Tetsuo mused aloud, wondering why that name sounded familiar. "Waitaminute!" He slapped his palm on the tabletop. "You didn't go to Haze Jr. High, did you?"

Yuuki rolled his eyes.

"And you were in Tsutsui's Go club!"

"I was not!" Yuuki snapped, then collected himself. "I mean, I was, kind of, but . . ." He paused. "Are you really only just remembering?"

It was Tetsuo's turn to look embarrassed, speechless, then defensive. "Well, it's not like it was yesterday! Jesus! What was it, seven, eight years ago? Like I'm gonna remember everything from when I was 14.

"Come to think of it, why do you seem to have so clear a memory of it? Did someone have a little crush?" Tetsuo knew it was unkind, but the stress of having absolutely no idea what was up with this guy was getting to him, and he'd pretty much stopped caring.

"Shut up!" Yuuki said fiercely. "Noone in their right mind would have been attracted to the arrogant, selfish, hypocritical kid you were back then. What are you doing hanging out at a Go salon, anyway? Trying to recruit for the Shougi club down the street?"

That was it. This meant war.

"I could turn all those descriptors right back on you, couldn't I, Mitani-kun? I may have maligned the Go club back then, but I was at least good enough at the game that I didn't need to cheat to win."

In truth Tetsuo had more or less come to terms with his Go-related issues, which had been aggravated by the survival of the Go club and the bullheaded enthusiasm for the game displayed by the now-Pro Shindou Hikaru. He also knew that, while Mitani had taken to cheating, it wasn't out of any inadequacy in his game – Tsutsui, with whom Tetsuo had remained good friends throughout high school, had said as much on numerous occasions.

Yuuki, for his part, looked about ready to go the road of the traditional response to threatened honor and challenge his accuser to a fight to the death, when, instead, he burst out laughing. So loudly, in fact, that the occupants of the tables across the floor looked over at the disturbance.

Tetsuo almost became irritated at the attention his companion's laughter was bringing, but stopped himself with the awareness that though he was unfamiliar with being on this end of the situation, he himself often engaged in exactly the same type of behavior.

So instead he looked abashed and asked, "What's so funny?"

After a brief coughing fit brought on by Yuuki's attempting to get down a mouthful of tea while laughing, he managed to calm himself and reply, "This," motioning between the two of them. "It's exactly like your friend Shigeru said it would be."

"Shige?" Tetsuo's eyes narrowed. "What's he got to do with it?"

blink

"Didn't he tell you I'd gone back to the Go salon?"

". . . he mentioned it, yeah."

"Did he tell you what he told me you told him?"

"What?" This was getting far too weird for Tetsuo to follow.

Yuuki sighed. "He told me, in the 'strictest of confidence,' that you thought I was 'dead sexy' and that you had been moping brokenheartedly ever since that first time we played at the salon."

Tetsuo started to see where this was going, and who was responsible.

". . . and he said that unless I came back and asked you out on a date he was afraid you'd sink into a depression so deep he'd lose his friend forever."

"You can't honestly say you believed him, I hope."

"Of course not!" Yuuki snorted as if insulted by the idea.

Well, that was a relief. Tetsuo knew Shige well; he knew that he'd get so wrapped up weaving an impossible tale that he'd forget it was supposed to sound at least remotely feasible.

"Wait. . . if you didn't believe him, what the hell is this all about?"

In the fluorescent lighting of the little Indian restaurant, Yuuki's blush was only just visible. He stared at a spot on the table, unable to recover quickly enough to mask his embarrassment.

"So you did have a crush on me!" Tetsuo said triumphantly.

"Not on your personality, that's for sure!" Yuuki snapped. "I did mean it when I said you were an arrogant hypocrite." He shrugged. "But you're right: I was, too." He met Tetsuo's eyes evenly. "And anyway, who says this is a date? For all you know I just tricked you into buying us both lunch because I'm cheap."

Tetsuo snorted. "Yeah, right. I don't let my dates pay for my meals anyway."

They grinned across the table, and the conversation moved on to other things.

"So. . . Shigeru said you were studying literature?"

Tetsuo grunted. "He seems to have told you quite a lot. But yeah, I am. Mostly European. I'm hoping to go to England after I graduate, you know, experience the culture firsthand?"

Yuuki laughed. "When did you turn into such a nerd?"

"Oh, right, and what are you doing with your time?"

"University, same as you, actually."

"Oh? Yeah, I guess you'd be out of high school by now, huh."

"Two years ago, asshole." Yuuki corrected without malice.

"Got a major yet?"

"Yeah." Yuuki seemed almost surprised with himself at the admission. "I'm hoping to get into the music industry."

"What you wanna be a rock star? Like X-Japan(2)?" Tetsuo had a momentary vision of his companion made up like the Japanese glam rock stars of the early 90s and suddenly, though he had made the comment mockingly, it didn't seem like such a bad idea.

"No," Yuuki said. "I'd like to be a producer, actually. I've already got an internship lined up with a small record company in Osaka."

"Really? When's that start?"

"Next fall, hopefully."

Afterwards, as they were waking toward the train station, they fell into comfortable silence and parted, each to his own platform, with the other's phone number on a slip of paper in their pockets.

When Tetsuo saw Shige next it was simple coincidence: he was meeting Yuuki at one of the cafés near the university, and to get there he ended up passing the salon, where past the "Closed" sign he saw his friend engaged in a serious exploration of someone's tonsils.

Tetsuo rapped on the door – he figured he had enough time, especially since it meant he would finally meet this secret boyfriend.

"This is Tet-chan, er, Tetsuo. One of my closest friends," Shige said awkwardly as Tetsuo gawped. "Tetsuo, may introduce Hana. My girlfriend."

And suddenly everything made sense.

"Nice to finally meet you, Hana-san." Tetsuo grinned. "Shi-chan's been so tight-lipped, I was beginning to think he'd made up this boyfriend of his just to get rid of me."

"You told him I was your boyfriend?" Hana asked, only half mocking.

Tetsuo wasn't so unkind as to make Shige answer that. "Actually, he didn't. I just kind of assumed. . . not that Shige gave me any kind of help there."

"Well-" For once Shige was the one embarrassed and on the spot. "I didn't want-"

"It's alright, Shige, I get it," Tetsuo shrugged. Of all the crazy things, Shige had been afraid he'd be upset when he found out he was dating a girl? "I've got my own date to catch up with, though, so I'll see you later. Nice meeting you, Hana!"

He slipped out the door and down the street to the café, where Yuuki was waiting, already sipping his usual mocha with orange liqueur.

"What took you?"

Tetsuo almost couldn't speak for laughing. "I just met. . . Shige's girlfriend."

Yuuki snorted into his cup. He'd long been aware that Tetsuo and Shige had, at one time, been lovers. "You're kidding. Girlfriend??"

END

(1) I've decided, for no particular reason, that Kaga is a fan of Shinseiki Evangelion, an apocalypse-type Mech anime. Evangelion is the name of the huge fighting Mechs that, in an ordinary series, would be used to save the world. But Evangelion isn't an ordinary series, now, is it.

(2) Yay, X-Japan, arguably the most influential Japanese rock band ever!