Chapter 55
That evening Fujiwara had a nightmare.
Ogata had always been a light sleeper, so the sound of muffled sobs roused him awake and drew him to Fujiwara's bedroom door. He hesitated when his hand was on the doorknob, not wanting to invade the other man's privacy. On the other hand, Fujiwara was crying so hard that his breathing sounded ragged, and it wasn't as if Ogata would be able to go back to sleep while wondering what was wrong.
"May I come in?" Ogata called out, rapping on the door. There was a garbled noise that Ogata interpreted as assent, so he pushed the door open gingerly.
The bedside lamp was on. Fujiwara was hunched over on the edge of his bed, his face covered by his hands. Every now and then his body shuddered.
"Are you sick?" Ogata offered politely, in case Fujiwara didn't want to explain the real problem.
Fujiwara raised his head at the question, but stared blankly at Ogata, his vision unfocused as tears slipped down his face.
Ogata moved closer. "I said, do you feel ill?"
Fujiwara suddenly reached out, latching onto Ogata's wrist, and Ogata blinked in surprise. Fujiwara had a strong grip, even though his hand was trembling.
"Don't leave," Fujiwara whispered hoarsely, then dropped his head down again.
"I won't," Ogata promised. Even though he was completely out of his comfort zone. People just didn't come to Ogata when they needed a shoulder to cry on; even his girlfriends had seemed to prefer their own friends when they needed emotional support. Which had always suited Ogata; if he'd wanted to play shrink he would have gone into counseling instead of go. But Fujiwara didn't have anyone else, so he was stuck with Ogata. Lucky guy.
A few long moments passed, but Fujiwara kept crying, although more quietly than before. Deciding that Fujiwara wasn't likely to stop anytime soon, Ogata sat down next to Fujiwara, his wrist still firmly ensnared by Fujiwara's long, damp fingers. Ogata felt awkward sitting there doing nothing, so he put his free right hand over the back of Fujiwara's hand and started patting it, simply because of a vague memory of his mother doing the same for him when he was small and confused.
Ogata lost track of time as he continued the patting, lulled by the dim lamplight and his lingering sleepiness into drifting, but gradually Fujiwara's breathing evened out and the shaking ceased, although tears still streaked down his face.
"Do you want to want to talk about it?" Under normal circumstances, Ogata would not ask. But Ogata wouldn't be patting someone's hand under normal circumstances either, so he supposed that asking personal questions could hardly be breaking any worse taboos.
Fujiwara bit at his lip. "I... think so. But I don't understand it."
"That doesn't matter, if you think you'd feel better sharing."
Fujiwara started to turn his head as if to look at Ogata, but then he dropped it again, fixing his gaze on their hands instead. "I... had a dream, but I don't remember all of it. I know that I was with my friend. We were playing go. I remember the game, we didn't get very far... I think because my friend was so tired. I realized he was falling asleep, so I tried to speak to him." Fujiwara gave a sharp sob then, his eyes brimming with fresh tears. "But he didn't answer. He didn't answer! I called and called, but he couldn't hear me anymore! Why didn't he answer?!"
Ogata furrowed his brows together, trying to puzzle out exactly why the dream had upset Fujiwara so much. So he'd been playing go with his friend, and his friend had fallen asleep: perhaps an annoying memory, but not nightmare quality. Unless, Ogata realized with a sensation of dread -
"I just wanted to say goodbye. I remember... I just wanted to say goodbye."
-Fujiwara's friend had died. He had died, so he couldn't hear Fujiwara calling him anymore.
Fujiwara's grasp on Ogata tightened and Ogata winced, but he couldn't bring himself to mention it.
"I think we were very close. Because it hurts so much even though I can't remember his face."
People were supposed to say something in situations like this, weren't they? Ogata's tongue felt heavy in his mouth. "He was playing go with you. I'm sure he was happy."
Fujiwara wiped at his eyes with his sleeve. "Do you really think so?"
"Yes. If I had to... pass on myself, I can't think of a better way to leave than while playing a talented opponent. Especially a friend."
Fujiwara let a shaky breath out. "That doesn't sound too bad, when you phrase it like that. But I wish I could remember him better. I wondered why he... passed on. He was very young."
"How do you know? Do you remember his voice?"
"No, he didn't speak in the dream. But I saw his hands; they were small. He was playing Black."
Ogata nodded. After hearing the description of the nightmare, he had a very good idea about what had triggered it. The neurologist had suggested that exploring Fujiwara's interests might help his memories surface, and obviously the neurologist had been quite correct. Fujiwara's sympathy for that whale's isolation had triggered his memory of his friend's death. Somehow it seemed terribly unfair that the most complete memory Fujiwara had recovered was such a tragic one. Yet, it was perhaps the best lead Fujiwara would get. "Do you remember anything else?" Ogata asked gently.
Fujiwara shook his head. "Not right now." Then Fujiwara's eyes went round as he apparently finally registered that he was indeed gripping Ogata's hand, and he hastily withdrew his hand. "Oh, please excuse me! I didn't mean to grab you like that!"
Fujiwara's apologies only became more profuse when he saw that he had left red marks on Ogata's wrist, and then he started apologizing over having awoken Ogata at such an inconvenient hour. Ogata cut Fujiwara off after he began repeating himself. "I don't have a match or a commitment tomorrow, and I'm hardly a delicate flower. So I give you permission to stop obsessing about it," Ogata said dryly.
"I'm just glad I didn't bruise you," Fujiwara said, embarrassed. "But I suppose you must want to get back to sleep, now..."
Ogata did not miss the note of hesitation in Fujiwara's voice. Fujiwara did not want him to leave, although Ogata knew Fujiwara wouldn't ask him to stay again, thinking he'd already imposed too much on Ogata. "No, I'm mostly awake now. Maybe I'll just take this opportunity to commandeer that book you've been hogging and read in here for awhile."
"It's a very interesting book," Fujiwara said as he retrieved it from his nightstand. "I'm actually rereading it."
"Like I said, hogging it," Ogata said, settling down into the chair near the window.
Fujiwara handed him the book. "You don't need your glasses? I've never seen you not wearing them."
"I'm near-sighted, but I'm perfectly capable of reading a book or a computer screen or a goban without them. It's just inconvenient to need to look at something far away and not have them on, so I usually don't take them off." Ogata hadn't thought about putting them on when he'd been woken up.
"Oh, I see," Fujiwara said, his gaze flickering over Ogata's face with interest.
Ogata flipped the book open to Chapter 6, which was as far as he'd read before he had forgotten the book on the counter and Fujiwara had gleefully made off with it.
He was almost finished with Chapter 6 when he heard the bed covers rustle as Fujiwara slid back under them. Ogata noticed that Fujiwara had chosen to lie on his right side so he was facing Ogata.
By Chapter 9, Fujiwara's eyelids were fluttering shut.
Ogata was puzzling over a passage in Chapter 10 when Fujiwara's voice drifted in, faint and sleep-slurred. "I'll try to not be so weak. I don't want to be a burden."
Ogata looked up sharply over the top of the book. Fujiwara's eyes were closed, and he seemed more asleep than awake. Still, Ogata took time to consider his response. Before he'd met Fujiwara, Ogata would have thought it disdainful for a man to be so openly emotional, willing to laugh or cry easily without reservation. Ogata would have found it especially foolish to expose oneself in a moment of vulnerability like a nightmare. But then there was Fujiwara – Fujiwara, who lacked the knowledge and discernment that his damaged memory couldn't provide. Yet Fujiwara still anticipated new experiences with eagerness instead of dread, and he was also comfortable enough with himself that he didn't find it necessary to censor his emotions. And perhaps there was a strength in being capable of deep trust as well, to have that much faith in another person.
"The only kind of person who's truly weak is a coward who runs from his problems or obligations instead of facing them," Ogata said. "You are neither weak nor a burden. Although you are a shameless book thief and you placed my bookmark God knows where, and some of us don't have an eidetic memory and actually need bookmarks."
The only response Ogata received was the sound of Fujiwara's steady breathing: he'd finally fallen asleep. Ogata shut the book and moved to turn the bedside lamp off, but almost stepped on Fujiwara's hair. Fujiwara was lying too close to the edge of the bed and his hair trailed off the bed, falling onto the floor in long loops. Your hair might be too long if it presents a roadblock to foot traffic, Ogata thought, amused. He'd wanted to ask Fujiwara why he wore his hair so long, but he hadn't, assuming Fujiwara probably wouldn't recall the reason. Maybe Fujiwara simply liked the way his hair looked on him, enough to spend the time required to maintain it. He probably wouldn't be happy if he woke up in the morning and realized that his hair had been on the floor all night.
Ogata decided to be considerate and move Fujiwara's hair. So he could actually reach the table to turn off the lamp, of course. He crouched down and carefully slid his hands through the hair, gathering it up into a bunch to make it easy to pick up. It was soft and felt like silk against Ogata's skin. No wonder Fujiwara wore it long, if it felt that nice against his neck and face. There was enough of it, though, that the hair had some heft, like hair a model would have, Ogata decided, running his fingers through it.
Ogata's ears suddenly grew hot as he realized he was more or less playing with his sleeping roommate's hair, and it would be somewhat awkward to explain if said roommate happened to wake up. He hastily draped the hair over Fujiwara's bed covers, then clicked the lamp off and left the room.
So much for his resolve to eschew attachments.
###
Credits to: Ontogenesis (Desynchronization)
