The Losers Circle
Waya is familiar with loss, as all Go players must be, and he's even familiar with terrible, undignified losses, as most but not all players are, but he's not familiar with this.
"I could lose," says his opponent, Mr. Old Man 7-dan, "if you make it worth my while."
At first Waya thinks he's asking for money—something Waya doesn't have—but Mr. Old Man 7-dan has been giving him this hungry, assessing look throughout their game and suddenly that look makes sense. He feels his skin crawl. He knows he should be saying no no no, should be sickened and disgusted and righteous with indignation, and he is all that; but he's also hungry, assessing, and he can't help but calculate the gains and losses of this proposal like a true Go player. What would it be like to make it to the third round of the Meijin preliminaries, he wonders briefly before recoiling at the images that come to mind.
But his opponent doesn't seem to sense his revulsion. "I should play a hane here," the man says, pointing at a spot in the lower left corner. "But I've been known to overlook that hand." And his eyes scan Waya's body, up and down, until Waya puts down a stone with an unsteady hand, a wavering pachi his only answer.
When Waya gets home he wants more than anything to throw up, but all he can manage is nausea and a bit of a headache, which probably have more to do with lack of sleep than with being propositioned by a disgusting loser of an old man who is better than him at Go.
It isn't until the next day at his study group—before Shindou gets there, thank god—when he sees his sensei's weathered hands hovering above the goban, lovingly, that Waya needs to excuse himself to throw up in the toilet.
After a few minutes of misery he hears a knock on the door of his stall and it's Shindou, finally, asking in a halting voice if he's still alive. It's your fault Waya wants to say, except he's too good a friend to say what he really feels and too busy puking his guts out to talk anyway.
"Are you sick?" asks Shindou through the door.
"No," Waya manages to say between retches.
"Are you upset about...yesterday?"
"It was just a game."
"But Waya..."
"You're going on to the third round of the Meijin, right? Congrats."
"Thank you. Isumi-san made it too," says Shindou, and this awkwardness between them is a new thing. He doesn't bother saying that Touya has also won his way into the third round; that goes without saying.
"Listen, Waya..." Shindou begins, then gives up. "I'm sorry, I just came by to say I'm gonna go meet Touya at his dad's go salon right now. I'm not leaving our study group," he adds hastily. "It's just this once."
"I thought you were having a fight with Touya."
"I was. I mean, I am. But he says he wants to talk."
"Okay. Then go."
"Waya—"
"Just go."
When Waya emerges from the bathroom there's only a little spot of vomit on his shirt and none in his hair, and Shindou is already gone.
"Are you all right, Waya?" asks his sensei.
"Yeah," he replies. "I'm okay."
And he sits down to play Go.
End
Aaaaand there's also a crack version of this fic on my livejournal at http/flonnebonne. Bigger, longer, and uncut. And that's just referring to the yaoi sex (which is why I'm not posting it on But please read the serious version first.