Based on the imagery of The Star's Your Ex-Lover is Dead.
Even five years later, Sanada did not need to look twice.
It was at the funeral, of all places – something he later would attribute to the universe's pleasant sense of humour. He was across the aisle and five rows to the right. He contemplated making his way over, but by then it was too late.
To his dismay, the hour-long service gave him time to think. It gave him time to agonize over the distance between them, over the consequences of widened or closing in on that distance. It gave him time to inspect the back of Seiichi's head, and to scrutinize the smallest gestures. The familiarity of it was unbearable.
When the man in front of him shifted, so did Sanada. When they were asked to rise, Sanada's heart raced, and his breath came a little too loudly for his liking, because Yukimura's slight figure was lost behind the sea of bowed heads between them. That only made his heart go faster.
When Yukimura brought a hand up to his collar to adjust it, Sanada clenched his. He suddenly found the years that separated them became as small as the distance that did now.
He thought he'd reached his limit when the procession finally came down the isle and people began to file out. His body ached, and the tension was overwhelming. His heart had not slowed.
They reached the exit at the same time. He was there already, offering condolences – Sanada wondered at the nature of his relationship with the family. He remembered he himself had contemplated not going at all – the association was a distant one, and he wondered if his name would actually ring any bells with the family.
He wondered if his face would ring any bells with Yukimura.
The man who'd been speaking to Yukimura now turned to him. He looked as if the last thing he should have be doing was offering strained smiles to strangers. He offered his hand to Sanada.
"Genichiro. It's been a very long time." Sanada would later cringe when he thought of how rude it was that his eyes barely met the other man's, but it didn't seem have mattered at the time. What mattered was the five years condensed into one hour of memories he thought he'd never have to relive.
The man was speaking before Sanada could think again. "Seiichi, this is Sanada Genichiro. His father ran the dojo that our family..."
Sanada lost the rest.
It could have been no time at all, he thought. It could've been yesterday, it could've been the day of their graduation, the day he walked out of the hospital – but no, not quite, because this Yukimura was a little bit taller, with shorter hair, and healthy looking - healthy; Sanada marveled at this new word association he always thought would be impossible. But this Yukimura still had that delicate chin, those rose lips – that sorrowfully beautiful face that Sanada could never look away from because some things were just meant to be looked at, he thought. And when he held out his hand this Yukimura had just as strong a grip, but slightly softer hands, he noticed – but after a moment he could feel them just below the surface, the familiar calluses that belonged to those deceptively graceful but rough hands.
Yukimura's smile was the most physical thing he'd felt in a long time.
"Yes, I think we've met before."
The doors of the church were open, and in that instant it started to pour.
When the car came around Sanada followed, because at that point he wasn't sure what to do anymore. His non-existant plan had extended as far as the two of them recognizing each other; after that, he couldn't begin to predict what would happen, or understand what he wanted to happen. So when a uniformed man came around the front of the car and held a door open for him, he climbed in after Yukimura.
The other man said something quietly and the partition rose with a hum.
There was silence for the first few minutes. They sat across from each other, neither avoiding nor confronting. Sanada's eyes searched for change – he found little, except for eyes that had gained a few more years but lost none of their beauty. He could not describe any obvious transformation from child to adult – Yukimura had never been a child in the time that Sanada had known him. The disease that was supposed to turn Yukimura into a frail boy never succeeded, and he had the same exquisite agelessness that he always had.
"It's been a while, Genichiro."
Some part of Sanada's mind knew this was obviously the time to ask those millions of questions that had plagued him for the last five years.
Instead, he managed, "Where are we going?"
The rain pounding on the windows muted the sounds from outside and made it hard to see. The effect was an acute feeling of boundaries, containment and nothingness: time that had stopped.
"Where would you like to go?"
He didn't know of any other place in the world except there. His breath was coming fast.
"I don't know."
Was Yukimura smiling? Sanada couldn't tell anymore. He wanted to see those lips move again.
"We should be over the bridge by now. If you're going downtown, we can take you until –"
"Damn it, Seiichi."
Sanada was up from his seat, and he'd crossed the small distance between them - hard, he thought, he didn't realize how incredibly far and excruciating that distance was – and now he was half on the other seat, half on Yukimura himself, and the other man's face was in his hands - what am I doing - but when his movement finally ceased, he found that the pressure in his chest had subsided a little as well.
Yukimura was motionless, and his eyes were fixed on Sanada until suddenly they weren't anymore, because Sanada had angled his face upwards and was kissing him. His hands moved from Yukimura's cheeks and slid into his wet hair, combing it back. He felt a sudden wave of dismay during a few terrifying seconds of a deathly still, unresponsive Yukimura, until finally his hands moved too, sliding slowly up Sanada's arms and gripping the sleeves of his suit. Sanada wanted desperately to remember what an earnest Yukimura felt like, but five years was a long time. Yet the hands crawling up his arms and back, shifting occasionally into his hair and even his face was enough in the moment. When they separated to catch their breath, Sanada found familiarity in the fact that Yukimura was the less breathless of the two.
He shifted but did not take his hands off Yukimura. "You knew I was going to be there today."
Less question, more statement.
"No. I didn't."
The lie was too perfect. "Why now?"
Yukimura shook his head. "Genichiro, this isn't –"
"Where have you been for the last five years, Seiichi?"
Yukimura's grip on Sanada sleeve lessened, but his gaze remained level.
"It was necessary."
"Necessary?" Sanada pulled him closer, harder than he'd intended to. His urge to get angry and his urge to kiss Yukimura began to wage war over his will.
The other man smiled, and for a strange moment Sanada thought that smile should have been a bitter one. But he knew they never were. "You couldn't stand guard over me forever, Genichiro."
Looking back, he wished ahead of time he would've known those five years of not hearing his name in that voice were fatal. Their lips met again with a new urgency this time, hands moving too quickly or two slowly, exploring everything new and old with a mix of curiosity and unrestrained need. Yukimura tasted of the rain, and Sanada thought it was the most incredible thing in the world.
When they paused again, Yukimura pressed his forehead against Sanada's and a small laugh escaped his lips.
"You haven't changed after all."
Sanada wondered if this could wait, because as much as he loved Yukimura's voice on his lips, he preferred his own lips on them instead. He stopped anyway.
"You still play."
Sanada frowned. "How do you know?"
A tinkling laughter. "I've always loved those rough hands."
end.