Tanuma watched silently as the faint shadows of koi fish and rippples moved across the ceiling. If he focused enough, he could almost make out the shape of a lotus flower.
The summer heat made every movement seem like a bother. Everything was slow and sticky.
Tanuma stole a glance at the boy next to him and sighed. Sensing the look, Natsume turned to face him.
"I was just thinking..." Tanuma replied to the questioning eyebrows. "Here we are, looking at the same thing. But I'm staring at the ceiling, and you're staring at the garden. Isn't that weird?" He let his back fall on the floor and relaxed his muscles. The bigger fish shadow disappeared in the far right corner.
"Weird huh..." Natsume lied down on his elbows next to his friend, and raised his chin to look up.
"I can only see shadows. But you see light, colours, all sorts of wonderful things."
"For me... Just getting to look at these shadows with someone... it makes them more beautiful than anything I could look at on my own," Natsume explained sincerely, and gave him a soft smile before returning his attention to the slow-dancing shadows and harmonious ripples above them.
Tanuma tracked the remaining fish's course around the ceiling lamp with his eyes, thinking to himself.
Nishimura and Kitamoto often teased Natsume about his very blatant honesty and bold expression that came as a surprise every now and then, considering how he mostly kept from telling his opinion, or nodded along politely in other cases. Natsume hadn't really thought how what he said had come across as quite cheesy. He didn't feel ashamed to tell the truth. And that was something that Tanuma admired greatly in his friend. He knew that Natsume was genuine at all times when expressing himself. It made Tanuma feel at ease around him. Like he could tell the other boy anything and not be embarassed at all. Except some things, things that he himself was afraid of and made him scared of his own self.
"Natsume."
"Yeah?"
"I've got orange juice in the fridge, do you want some?"
"Sure. Thanks."
Natsume. Watching the shadows with you makes it feel less lonely.
Natsume. Watching you makes me feel less lonely.
But at the same time, I feel like there's something I can't touch or see or feel. I don't know what to do about it. I don't know what I want to do about it. If I could only...
Tanuma threw in a couple of ice cubes into the two glasses and poured in the orange liquid. For now, this is what he could do. For now, watching he shadows and drinking orange juice was all he needed. And it would be alright if he were to watch the shadows and drink orange juice with him every day, for years and years to come.
"Taki should be here any minute, so can you start the movie on my computer?"
"No problem!" Natsume shouted back from the other room.
It's alright. This is alright as it is.
Another small chapter. I remember Nishimura and Kitamoto commenting on how Natsume is cheesy some tiems because of his honesty when he expresses himself, "like a manga-character". So I put it in here.
See you next chapter!
Hope you enjoyed it!