From the beginning the trip seemed to have been cursed. First the jealous pros, and now the train tracks along their route were being replaced. Instead of a faster and quieter train, they were going to travel instead by way of chartered taxi. Hikaru had hoped that Kawai might end up as their driver so at least it would be a fun ride. The thought of Touya's reaction to the boisterous cab driver was something he would have loved to see. He was disappointed however, when a rather quiet, dull-looking man emerged from the taxi to open the doors for them. He looked more like he should be driving some wealthy man around in a limousine, not running two kids around in the country. Hikaru sighed loudly and wondered if somehow Touya had managed to personally pick the most boring man in the northern hemisphere to drive them.
Inside the taxi all was quiet. Touya had immediately set to work ignoring Hikaru, burying himself in a rather large, and to Hikaru, uninteresting book. Hikaru had at first put on his headphones, but Touya insisted that even the smallest sound interfered with his reading.
"Touya! It's all the way down to three! I can hardly hear it!"
"But I still can," Touya glared back at the agitated Shindo.
Hikaru spun the wheel down with one angry movement. "There! Now it's down to one!"
"Good. I can't hear it anymore."
"Neither can I!" Hikaru threw the headset down onto the open pages of Akira's book.
"Damn it Shindo, grow up!" Akira said, raising his voice for the first time.
"Me?! There's no way you could have heard it playing at that volume!"
"I'm sorry that I can't concentrate when there's that much noise. Most people have manners enough to be considerate of the people they are traveling with," the anger in his voice was obvious, but he hadn't yelled as loudly as Hikaru had.
"Urrghhhhh…" Hikaru couldn't begin to hide the disgust in his voice as he shoved his CD player back into his backpack. "Now that I can't offend your super human hearing powers any more I'm going to take a nap."
"Do what you want," Touya was already tired of the argument and looked back down to find his place.
"Oh! And don't for get to wake me up if I start to snore, Superman! I might stop you from saving the world!" Hikaru laughed loudly, laying his head done on his backpack.
Touya merely glared at him, muttering something like, "Damned Shindo," under his breath. Akira sighed inwardly. Shindo looked innocent enough when he was sleeping, but he was a holy terror while he was awake.
"No," he thought, "he was being kind of quiet today. I'm the one who's been antagonizing him. Why can't I get along with him for just a little while?" He sighed audibly this time, "I can't lie to myself. I'm afraid if he found out how I really feel he might despise me. We might fight now, but I still get to see him."
Touya paused to watch Hikaru--he'd moved as if to pull an imaginary blanket close around him. It was all he could do to restrain himself from wrapping his arms around Hikaru. "Even if it's all I can do, Hikaru, I want to see you."
The road grew noticeably rougher and Akira put away the book he'd held little interest in. The road would be a long one, and Touya wouldn't be able to do anything as long as he was so near. At the time it seemed the only reasonable thing to do was sleep. If Akira had known how close he'd come to never waking up he might have chosen another option.