Chapter Two: In which Akira questions
Well. Ashiwara-san certainly had interesting…books. Some were clearly some kind of medical manuals. Some were labeled as "romance" novels. Others were magazines that he insisted belonged to his roommate. I wasted a lot of time just trying to figure out why magazines of naked women were made before I turned my attention to the more useful material. After about three hours of flipping through everything I'd been given I was going through some kind of information overload.
So, people dated because they wanted to. That much I gathered from all the books. People were supposed to get…urges… and they were supposed to fall in love.
It was actually incredibly distressing. Because I was thinking about what Ashiwara-san had told me before he gave the hasty retreat away from my table. About not being a normal kid for my age. I was beginning to realize just how true that was. What had I been missing, all those years devoting my life to Go? Furthermore, why wasn't I like other people? Not to mention that I still wasn't clear on the whole "boys dating boys" thing. Some of the medical books talked about… various things… that "homosexuals" did for…pleasure. But I was still lost on what that all meant.
I sat at a table in the backroom of my father's Go salon. I politely refused offers to games and just stared accusingly at the Go board. What had it taken from me?
"Oi! Touya!" My head whipped forward at the familiar voice as Shindou bounced into the room and sat in the chair across from me. "I stopped by for a game. Do you want to?"
I stared intently at my rival. Attraction. That's what Ashiwara-san mentioned, and what the books all talked about. Was I attracted to Shindou? He was good-looking, that was true. But then, I supposed Tomoko had been good looking to, in her own way. And I clearly wasn't in love with her so..
"Touya? Hello? Earth to Touya?"
I snapped back to attention. "What? Oh… sorry. Sure, we can play a game." Absently I Nigired and then took the white stones. Shindou played into the lower hoshi but I wasn't really paying attention. "Shindou… have you ever dated someone?"
"What?" Shindou exclaimed. He looked at me funny. "Where did that come from?"
I was getting that question a lot lately. "It's just a question." What I really wanted to know was if he ever got "urges" but since that wasn't really something one asked his eternal rival I had to settle for the other question.
He scratched his head. "Err… not exactly. I go out sometimes with Akari, but that's more friend stuff. I don't really have the time to date. Why, have you?"
I shrugged. "I suppose so. I had a girlfriend."
"What?!" Shindou exclaimed. "How did you get a girlfriend before me?"
I scowled at him. "And what's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing. It's just Waya's dating Morishita-Sensei's daughter, and Isumi-san is dating some girl he met. I just assumed you never had time either." He frowned. "Man, maybe I should find a girlfriend, if everyone else has one."
"No!" I exclaimed involuntarily. "I mean, I don't have a girlfriend either. And we weren't really dating, I don't think. I didn't even like her much. She thinks I spend too much time thinking about y-, Go. I spend too much time on Go. As I should. As you should." I stopped myself before I started babbling too badly. For some reason the thought of Shindou with a girlfriend really bothered me. Especially if he were to do some of the things that they talked about in the books.
It hit me suddenly that maybe I was jealous of whoever Shindou would date. If that was the case… then I guess I really was in love with him.
He looked pacified by my ramblings. "Yeah, that's true. Go takes up a lot of time. I don't know how the others handle it. I guess it's because Waya doesn't go to school."
I nodded absently, and stared at the other boy. "Do you want to date someone?" I asked, extremely tense. For some reason my nerves were on fire, like I was about to play someone really strong in Go. I wanted to know the answer, but at the same time I was scared of it.
Shindou tilted his head. "Yeah… I guess so. Sometimes. It would be nice to go out with someone and enjoy the kinds of things that couples do. Eat ramen together, hold hands, tell your secrets to, that kind of thing." He blushed a little then, and I got the random thought that he looked very cute when he blushed. "Why are you asking these things, Touya?"
I sighed. "I'm just trying to answer some things about myself, that's all."
"Oh? Do you want to date someone?"
I opened my mouth to answer "No, of course not" when I realized that I was only basing that off of the "dates" that I had gone on with Tomoko. I thought about what Shindou had mentioned. Eating together. Well, Tomoko and I had done that, but it wasn't really fun. But those few times I ate with Shindou in the middle of our pro games were really enjoyable. Holding hands? That might be nice too. We didn't do a lot of physical contact in my family, so that might be a really nice change. Especially with another Go player who wouldn't complain about the calluses on my fingers. Tell my secrets to? It would be nice to trust someone like that. And it would be nice to be trusted like that. I still wanted to know all of Shindou's secrets. Heck, I might even date him just so I could learn them all.
"Yeah." I answered, surprising myself. "I guess I would like to date someone. That is, as long as it was someone that I liked."
"Well, duh." Shindou answered. "Why would you date someone you didn't like?"
"Because," I said defensively, "it's proper."
Shindou shrugged. "Screw proper. It doesn't have any place in dating. Are you going to play or not?"
"What? Oh." I looked back at our neglected game. "Right." I placed a stone down.
Author's Note: Wee! Hikaru was in this one! This was a short chapter, but whatever. I'm not even sure I'm connecting everything very smoothly. Oh well. This is actually more or less my first stab at writing Fanfiction, I usually can't write someone else's characters very well. I umm… hope I'm doing OK? I also kinda hope I finish. I'm only going to keep writing for as long as inspiration for the story keeps coming. And who knows when that stuff runs out.
To Reviewers: (I always get annoyed at this part when I'm reading Fanfiction, but then when I comment and the author answers back I feel all special so… bear with me)
Mystic Wolf: I'm glad you think so! Truthfully, I wanted to put it in Romance/Comedy, but I was to self-confident to consider my work "humorous." I thought it might be presumptuous of me. But I'll change it now I guess…if I can figure out how…
Tian: Hmm. Now you have me all worried about making him seem stupid… I guess I'll try and work on that. I'm just kinda going with the flow.
Kaori-Chan: Eh heh… I know my summery sucks. I hate writing summaries, but I didn't want to be one of those people who writes "I hate writing summaries so just read it" so I just wrote what was on the top of my head.
Anyway, thank you all for reviewing! I hope you liked this chapter.
