sketches of a firefly

Kanazawa station is enveloped in darkness when Kiyoomi’s train pulls in after his seven-hour journey. He’s still damp from the Tokyo rain. He’s still wired with anxiety from what happened…yesterday?

Does it count as yesterday if it's three in the morning and he hasn’t slept since he got on the train?

Kiyoomi contemplates the philosophy of time passing in an attempt to distract himself while he gets off the train. The train car door closing behind him cuts the final tether between him and his life in Tokyo. Wheels screech forward and the train chugs away, leaving Kiyoomi alone beside the tracks.

The station is empty and dark aside from one dimly lit bulb centered just below the station roof. Moths dance around the soft yellow light, casting flickering shadows. His wet clothes stick to him uncomfortably as he sways idly on the concrete platform he used to arrive at once a summer.

Three a.m. in Kanazawa is darker than the Tokyo three a.m. he’s grown accustomed to. Kiyoomi glances over his shoulder left and right, unable to shake the feeling that he’s being watched. He looks down at his phone that’s been at 2% for the past hour. It drops down to 1% and a text from Motoya flashes across the screen.

Motoya: Here! 3:23 a.m.

Headlights flash, confirming the announcement as Motoya’s car drives out of the darkness and pulls in beside the station.

Kiyoomi bolts to the car, slamming the door shut to keep out any figments of his imagination that may have followed him.

“Is my baby cousin scared of the boonies now? Not enough light pollution for you Tokyo boy?” Motoya laughs light-heartedly at his expense. 

The teasing is a hello, and a welcomed one. He smiles weakly and sets his stuff down on the floor of Motoya’s car. Kiyoomi hasn’t seen his cousin since the wake. The only contact they’ve had since then has been Motoya following him on Instagram, commenting on the sketches he posts, and mutually exchanged birthday texts.

The years they’ve spent apart has done nothing to weaken the bond Kiyoomi feels with Motoya, an older cousin he’s always looked up to.

Kiyoomi turns to face him and looks for signs of how he’s changed in the past 10 years. His hair is shorter now, a little mussed from sleep. But it’s still the same light brown Kiyoomi grew up knowing.

“That’s all you brought?” Motoya glances down at the floor while Kiyoomi buckles his seatbelt.

Kiyoomi hesitates, missing the buckle, and checks the items at his feet. Cell phone, wallet, and…that stupid children's book. He must’ve grabbed it when he ran out of there.

“I guess,” Kiyoomi says quietly. His mood drops considerably when he realizes everything he left behind. His clothes and books are one thing. But his sketchbooks. His pencils. His iPad with all of his storyboards.

What has he done? Was this a mistake? It was. Of course, it was! His life, his job, his-

“Kiyo,” Motya says gently, putting the car into drive and pulling out of the parking lot. He breaks for a moment and inhales deeply. “I kind of can’t believe you wanted to come back here. What happened?”

There’s a lump in Kiyoomi’s throat. He can’t answer. He can’t speak. He just focuses on breathing and watching as they pass unfamiliar buildings that have sprouted up since he last came here. The drive to Kurami is 45 minutes of bumbling down backroads and veering around mountain corners.

It’s enough time for Kiyoomi to collect his thoughts, and organize them in a way that won’t sound like they’re being told at 3 a.m. by someone approaching peak exhaustion.

When they finally pull into the driveway of the old family house Kiyoomi feels the familiar bend of the gravel path. Their headlights flash across the street into the neighboring property as Motoya parks. A blonde head pokes out from one of the bottom floor windows and a hand reaches up to wave at them.

“Shit,” Motoya mutters, fumbling to shut the lights off. “Why don’t you go to the porch so we can talk? I’ll be right there, I’m just going to talk to Atsumu real quick.”

“Atsumu?” The name sounds familiar but feels foreign coming from Kiyoomi’s voice.

Motoya frowns a little and forces a smile. “He’s one of the kids you and that girl Yachi used to play with growing up. He’s watching over his grandma’s house right now—she’s Uncle’s neighbor.”

Kiyoomi shudders at the mention of his agent and tries to ignore work, glancing past Motoya’s shoulder to the waving figure. Motoya moves his head into Kiyoomi’s line of vision and frowns slightly.

“I’ll meet you on the porch okay Kiyo?”

He nods and turns away, not wanting to stress out Motoya more than he already has, showing up here with no notice and palpable emotional baggage. He steps out of the truck and wanders to the front porch. His feet walk on muscle memory, making up for the limited sight Kiyoomi has in the dark yard.

Kiyoomi steps up three short stone steps at the edge of the house and sits on one of two white rocking chairs. He tries to ignore how everything has stayed the same in the past ten years since he’s been here.

“Okay, sorry about that.” Motoya settles down in the rocking chair beside him. Kiyoomi’s eyes have adjusted enough to see the bags under his cousin’s eyes. “What happened Kiyo?”

Eight hours earlier

“We won’t be there for that long okay? Stop scowling.”

Kiyoomi glances away from the surrounding traffic and shifts in the passenger seat to look at his fiance. Her tone sounds light-hearted, but the way she’s white-knuckling the steering wheel alerts Kiyoomi to her underlying feelings of discomfort.

“I’m fine,” he lies, adjusting in the seat to lean his head against the car window, letting the cool glass give reprieve to the late July heat. Kiyoomi angles his face slightly down to avoid the setting sun rays hitting his eyes and stares back at the traffic.

He and Yasu have been engaged for three months and together for two years—though the engagement was more of a perfunctory ask on Kiyoomi’s part. He was just going through the motions expected of a 25-year-old.

Job. Dating. Engagement. Marriage.

Check. Check. Check.

There’s no love from Kiyoomi in this relationship, but that’s not Yasu’s fault. He’s just not capable of it. He is, however, capable of enjoying the company of a smart adult who holds interesting conversations.

Job. Dating. Engagement. Marriage. Kiyoomi scans through the checklist in his head as the traffic thins. Clouds churn above them and raindrops start to trickle down the window. He sighs in an attempt to flush out the anxiety building in his chest. The window fogs up beside him but the weight on his lungs persists.

Kiyoomi hates these visits to Yasu’s family. Her brother and parents always poke at the one thing Kiyoomi purposefully leaves off his conventional life checklist.

“You know I don’t want kids, right?”

The car swerves erratically from left to right, still staying in the far lane. Kiyoomi groans when his head smacks against the side window.

“What are you talking about,” Yasu yelps. The braids holding red hair out of her face whip back and forth as she glances between Kiyoomi and the road. “Of course I know that. We’ve talked about it, what? Twice?”

The speedometer fluctuations between 40 and 55 kph as Yasu’s foot lifts up and down on the accelerator. Kiyoomi’s seatbelt digs into his stomach each time they speed forward.

“No, I just…was thinking about something else. Childhood adventures,” Kiyoomi lies for the second time in the span of five minutes, leaning down to pick up the picture book he made for his soon-to-be-nephews.

On the cover drawn in oil pastels, two kids traipse through a jungle with a treasure map in hand and a cat in tow. Kiyoomi runs his hand over the glossy cover he had printed in a rush order. The scene was pulled from the murky swamp where all of Kiyoomi’s memories go to sink further into his subconscious.

If he focuses hard he can still see this memory in particular. He’s about five, trotting through the woods behind a group of kids his age. They all step up a large log but Kiyoomi’s little legs can’t quite get him up there. He slips on the moss and a dirt-covered hand reaches out to help him up.

“Omi.” The small voice from his past whispers.

Kiyoomi can’t quite place where he was, or recall the face of the kid he was with, but the voice rings through his eardrums like he’s traveled back 20 years.

What was his name? It started with an…N? No. M…Mi-something–

“We’re here,” Yasu shouts with a sigh like they’d driven 15 hours instead of 15 minutes. 

The bright woods from his memories fade to the dark parking garage they’ve pulled into. Kiyoomi steps out of the car and inhales deeply. The air is musty with the sharp punch of gasoline but it’s the last bit of fresh air he’ll have before entering into the suffocating atmosphere fostered by Yasu’s family.

He takes another deep breath before they step into the elevator and slowly releases it as the elevator climbs to the fourth floor.

“It’s going to be fine,” Yasu whispers.

Kiyoomi glances toward her. An unsettling feeling weighs on his shoulders when he realizes those words weren’t meant for him. Yasu’s looking at the ground, gripping their gift bags with the same hold she had on the steering wheel.

“It will be.” Kyioomi smiles and takes her left hand, leading her to the apartment he’s only been to once.

* * *

“And so I SAID, YOU get a life.”

Kiyoomi forces a bout of laughter matching the volume of Yasu’s parents and her brother Akio as he laughs at his own joke.

Yasu and her sister-in-law are showing the gifts she and Kiyoomi brought for her nephews. Along with the book – which they seem to have no interest in – Yasu bought red and blue fire trucks. Both boys are fighting over the red one.

Kiyoomi winces at the screams of the kids and tries to focus on the conversation. “He should get a life,” he comments to appease his in-laws without any idea who the subject of the story is.

Akio slaps his hand across Kiyoomi’s back a couple of times and grins wide. “Can’t wait for you to join the family Sakusa.”

In an instant the air changes around them. All eyes seem to be on Kiyoomi except for Yasu’s father, who often looks at the floor when he’s uncomfortable, just like his daughter. Yasu’s mother opens and shuts her mouth, lips quirked to the side with irritation.

“Do you still hate your mother?” She asks outright, words laced with judgment. Her piercing eyes framed with crow's feet fixate on him.

“Do I- what?” Kiyoomi takes a shallow breath and longs for the musty gasoline air. The mention of his mom sends a series of banging knocks through his head. The sound of someone trying to break into a room. He exhales and tries to focus on staying anchored to where he is, which is difficult given how much he wants to leave.

“I think what Mom means,” Akio says with a laugh, “is, do you still not want kids?”

Kiyoomi’s feet feel bolted to the floor. He glances desperately toward Yasu who refuses to meet his gaze. Instead, she’s staring down at the small blue fire truck, pushing it back and forth. “Well?” She asks softly, still not looking up.

It’s an intervention. Kiyommi walked right into a freaking intervention.

“I’m leaving.” Kiyoomi slurs the words as he rushes to grab his coat and tug his shoes on.

“Kiyoomi,” Yasu calls out desperately. “Kiyoomi wait–”

“Let him go,” her mother says.

That’s the last thing he hears. 

BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG. He can’t get the slamming sound out of his head. It drowns out the rumble of the elevator, as well as the rain pounding into the ground when he gets outside. He hails a cab and can’t even hear the address he gives to the driver. Anywhere but home.

He glances down at his phone and fails to hide the onslaught of text messages, fingers slipping on his rain-covered screen. There’s one message from his agent that puts that small beach town back in his head.

“That’s a f— -o— -ve,” the cabbie says, shaking his head.

“What?” Kiyoomi shouts. The cabbie jumps back at his volume and Kiyoomi breathes slowly until the banging subsides. “What?” he repeats.

“Kurami? In Kanazawa? That’s a seven-hour drive from Tokyo. It’s too far.”

“Kurami,” Kiyoomi repeats. Forests. Water. Fresh air. His uncle’s old house beckons him.

He stares out the window to see Yasu running outside. He ducks out of view and screws his eyes shut so tight he starts to see stars.

“Then take me to the nearest train station.”

* * *

“And then you picked me up,” Kiyoomi mumbles. Retelling what happened makes him feel more numb than outwardly upset, which is a bit of a relief. He’s too tired to cry more tonight.

A branch snaps from somewhere in the yard and Kiyoomi jumps.

“Toya m’ drivin' Samu to the station in a few hours. Can ya keep it down?’” The blonde stranger—Atsumu, emerges from the darkness, walking up two of the three stone steps.

Kiyoomi can see now that his hair is dyed, with a darker brown undercut hiding beneath the wavy hair. He glances at Motoya silently when Atsumu’s comment registers. Was he being loud? He looks back toward Atsumu and immediately wishes he hadn’t. The sheer anger in his eyes makes Kiyoomi flinch.

“Do we know each other?” Kiyoomi can’t help but ask. All his self-preservation skills fled the moment he stepped off the train at 3 a.m.

The anger deepens on Atsumu’s face, boiling over to rage. “Fuck no.”

In the light of day, confusion and worry pulse through Kiyoomi when he wakes up and realizes where his adrenalin-fueled decisions brought him last night. 

His feet are hanging off his childhood futon and resting on tatami mats that floor the closed-off room he’s in. He’s wearing Motoya’s high school volleyball pants which, like the futon, are a little too short.

Kiyoomi grimaces at how his skin is sticky with sweat borne from anxiety dreams and the high summer heat. He coughs, his throat is scratchy. He needs water, and a shower, and maybe a giant red restart button he can hit that sends him back to Tokyo. 

His fiance. His job. His sketchbooks. His life. Kiyoomi left his whole life behind in one night.

He thinks about all his stuff, packed away and ready to be moved into Yasu’s apartment. At least it’s easy to move right now but who could he ask to move it for him? And where? Here? He rubs his temples to ease the migraine aching in his head. There’s still a full week left on his lease. He can worry about this tomorrow with his stuff safe for now.

Kiyoomi slides the door open and a mixture of familiar smells rush to his nose. He can’t place them individually, but together they smell like childhood summers in Kurami. The scent carries a melancholy feeling, which he tries not to dwell on.

His brother and his mom briefly come to mind and Kiyoomi shuts them out, like he always does. But the memories of the last time he was here are inescapable.

He was fifteen and had just grown out of his suit. It was meant for a dance he went to two years ago and now his shoulders feel too tight and his ankles are exposed much more than should be appropriate for this setting.

His mom was going to buy a new one for that year’s dance, but she died, and suddenly he was wearing that too-small suit to her funeral. Kiyoomi’s brother Kousei was standing beside him in a suit that fit just right. He was crying and Kiyoomi couldn’t bring himself to, even with all the people around him expecting tears.

How could he cry for the person he spent most of his life crying because of?

Kiyoomi doesn’t remember the specific moments of torment, but he has the fear and the scars to prove it. Looking through his childhood sketchbooks the tattered pages are basically illustrated diary entries of the feelings he was burdened with back then.

He thinks about the funeral and the wake as he walks through the bedroom. The only thing he remembers about that day was the pinch of his suit and how his brother cried. At 15 his mother’s death was a life-altering shift in reality. At 25 it’s just something that happened.

Maybe if he had a better mother the shift would have been perpetual. But he didn’t so it wasn’t.

He hasn’t seen Kousei since he left for college, and he’d like to keep it that way. He hasn’t talked to him since…

Kiyoomi takes a deep breath to bring himself back to the present where his clothes are still too tight but they were given to him with love and not neglect.

The traditional style home his uncle owns is vastly different from his modern Tokyo apartment with an open floor plan. The tatami mats creak under him as he steps across the flooring he used to know how to silently walk across. But his stride has changed and so has the urgency for staying silent. Kiyoomi peers around the first two corners he comes across before finding his way to the kitchen.

“Is that Kiyo I hear?” Motoya calls out in an oddly high voice one might use on their pet or a child.

He steps into the kitchen and groans. “Motoya, I need water. Then alcohol. Lots of it. Whatever your plans are today, please cancel them because we’re getting wasted.”

“What’s wasted?” A small voice asks.

Kiyoomi has to glance down to find the speaker hugging his cousin’s leg. She has a short light brown bowl cut and flowery overalls on. Kiyoomi’s mouth drops at the sight of the young girl who couldn’t be more than six. Or…two? Kiyoomi isn’t great with kid’s ages.

“Who’s child is this?” Kiyoomi asks slowly.

“That’s my sister,” a second voice pipes up from the other side of the kitchen, though it sounds more like ‘lat’s my thither.’ Kiyoomi must’ve walked past the young boy who is somewhere between five and twelve years old. He has a similar bowl cut and a green Godzilla t-shirt on.

“Yes Haru, th-a-ts, your sister,” Motoya says enunciating the word.

“I’m four!” The girl shouts over Motoya without prompting

“I’m nine!” Haru says to copy his sister.

“Motoya,” Kiyoomi says with new urgency.

“Haru, Fumi, why don’t you go play outside while I clean up?” Motoya asks hastily. His suggestion is met with cheers, pattering footsteps, and the door slamming open and shut.

“They’re Ema’s,” Motoya says, wiping down the counter. “I said I’d watch them while she and her husband went on this cruise they won tickets for.”

Kiyoomi glances out the large kitchen window to Motoya’s sister's kids and starts to see the resemblance in their round eyebrows and soft faces.

“I didn’t realize…” Kiyoomi trails off, not sure what to say. Once again he’s wrought with a feeling of needing to leave and undo all his decisions in the past 24 hours.

“Kiyo?”

Kiyoomi’s attention is brought back to Motoya when he hears glass sliding across the marble countertops. He turns to find a very full bottle of tequila.

Motoya has a mischievous sparkle in his eyes that always shines when he’s about to do something he shouldn’t for Kiyoomi. Last he saw those eyes, Motoya was 15 and sneaking cookies for five-year-old Kiyoomi.

“You can drink all you want,” he winks. “I’m already babysitting two kids. What’s one more?”

Kiyoomi swipes the bottle up and breaks the seal of the cap. “I’m not a kid,” he pouts before chugging from the bottle.

“Sure you aren’t Kiyo,” Motoya tuts.

* * *

Thirty minutes and half a bottle of tequila later Kiyoomi is, well, sloshed. He’s lying on his back, craning his neck to look up at Motoya while he tells Kiyoomi about what it’s like being a speech pathologist for a younger age group. Even though he’s the one who asked, Kiyoomi is half-listening. He can’t focus, not with the same three thoughts swimming around in his head.

Fiance. Job. Sketchbooks.

Sketchbooks sketchbooks sketchbooks. He wants his sketchbooks. And those kids—he can’t remember their names— they’re playing tag right now. Plus there’s a bird crowing. A crow. A crow crowing. A sparrow sparrowing?

He can feel his neurons dying with each new sip of tequila, taking his sanity with them.

“Oh, that old lighthouse was re-painted-”

“Motoyaaaaaaaaa,” Kiyoomi whines. “How can I possibly have so many issues in my life right now?”

Motoya leans forward in his rocking chair, face popping into Kiyoomi’s view. “So many issues?” He asks with a slight smirk at the state Kiyoomi is in.

“I ended my engagement.”

“That’s true.”

“And I don’t have any of my things.”

“Also true.”

“And I’m between contracts with my agent right now.”

“AND you’re a virgin,” Motoya adds.

“What? No I’m not.” Kiyoomi kicks at his cousin but misses and gets laughed at instead.

“Just keep drinking your problems away Kiyo, that’s a healthy first step,” he says sarcastically.  “Tomorrow we can be more grown up about it…Oh! Why don’t you go look for the Shrine?” Motoya asks with a thoughtful tone, like that’s a genuine answer to his problems.

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes but internally mulls the suggestion over. The shrine Motoya is talking about isn’t a standard Shinto shrine, and finding one isn’t something he can just do —like drinking this tequila. He takes another swig.

“You don’t go looking for the Shrine Motoya, it doesn’t work like that.” In the 15 years Kiyoomi spent coming here he was never able to test the powers of the local myth. He did see it once though, flashing in the dark woods like a SOS beacon. Small bursts of light blinking like dancing fireflies—but blue.

If he hadn’t heard similar accounts from other locals he would’ve thought he made it up. When Kiyoomi was 11 a big Tokyo paper wrote an article about the rural folklore. It sent boatloads of tourists to the area. The one thing the article left out was you can’t search for the Shrine—at least that’s what the people of Kurami know. It finds you.

“Do people still come around here for it?” Kiyoomi asks, glancing toward the moss-covered forest he and Yachi used to explore behind the house.

“Not as much, but last year I had to kick two teenagers out of our yard for trying to go into the woods that way.

“Stupid,” Kiyoomi comments to himself.

“Then someone started a rumor that it was actually a Hinnagami and that seemed to scare everyone away.”

Kiyoomi might have spent the last 10 years in Tokyo but he knows very few people would try to chase after the evil doll that haunts those who dare to make a wish. Even mentioning it sends a chill down his spine.

He shakes the feeling away. The Shrine has only done good here. Rewarding a farmer with fertile soil in a rocky sandy environment. Helping a young woman find the engagement ring she’d lost in the ocean. One family even claimed it restored their daughter’s sight.

What would he wish for right now, if he had the chance? Even with all of the issues tangled up in his life Kiyoomi can’t think of a specific thing to wish for. Maybe that’s why he’s never had the opportunity.

He glances away from the treeline when he sees a red pickup truck turn off the main road into the driveway across the street. Blonde hair comes in and out of view between the porch railings as Atsumu walks into his house.

He leans up to get a better look and spills tequila in the process. “What did you mean last night? That Yachi and I used to play with him?”

“You really don’t remember?” Motoya asks the question with genuine concern that Kiyoomi is often met with when he says he doesn’t remember his childhood, or really anything that happened in his life before he left home for college.

He’s read that it’s a trauma response but has no interest in getting it formally assessed.

Even here at the summer home he visited the first 15 years of his life. He remembers the small details, but not living them. He remembers the sand in his shoes, but not standing on the beach. He remembers running in this yard but not the games or the people he played them with.

The one person he does remember is Motoya. He was like the older brother Kiyoomi always wished for. 

“Kiyo?”

“No,” Kiyoomi answers Motoya’s question matter-of-factly, punctuating it with another shot’s worth of tequila. “But maybe that’s a good thing given how much of a jerk he is.”

Motoya’s eyes drop at the alluded mention of last night.

“Fuck no.” That’s what Atsumu said about knowing Kiyoomi.

“Clearly he doesn’t remember me either.”

Motoya looks toward Atsumu’s house and shakes his head. “He does,” he whispers.

He says it quietly enough for Kiyoomi to pretend he didn’t hear. Instead, he staggers upwards and hands Motoya the bottle. “Well, then I’m going to go fix one of my problems.”

Kiyoomi stumbles toward the shoji door that leads into the house, almost puncturing the translucent paper when he misses the frame. For a second he feels like he might hurl…but then it goes away and he feels fine. He’s fine.

“Kiyoomi I was joking about the babysitting earlier but I will put you in a timeout if you try to confront Atsumu right now,” Motoya sounds upset but he doesn’t need to be.

“Reeeelax,” Kiyoomi slurs. “Miya? That’s his name, right? Miya is not a problem, he is a nothing. I have real problems, like not having any CLOTHES.” Kiyoomi cackles and pulls at the borrowed t-shirt he’s wearing, lifting it up away from his stomach to read the text on the shirt. “Fish fear me? What does that even mean?”

Motoya leans forward in the rocking chair to swipe up the almost finished bottle of tequila Kiyoomi left on the floor of the porch, twisting the cap back on. He settles back in the chair looking slightly more relieved than he did when he thought Kiyoomi was going to go yell at Miya.

“Do you need a ride into town? Maybe I can take Haru and Fumi in for lunch at that old beachside restaurant.”

“No no,” Kiyoomi tuts. “I’m going to walk. Clear my mindddd.”

Motoya looks him up and down and cracks a grin while shaking his head. “Okay have it your way. Call me if you get arrested but know I can’t pick you up until Haru and Fumi take their nap.”

Kiyoomi bellows out a forced ha ha ha and steps back into the house to grab his wallet and shoes. The shoes he brought with him would create a tragic ensemble of high school volleyball shorts, a strange graphic t-shirt, and fancy dress shoes. It’s too hot to put on the clothes he came here in so he steals Toya’s sneakers instead to fully complete his disguise of townie on laundry day. Or really, just townie.

He slides open the back door and walks toward the path in the backyard that leads to the road. Small dew drops on the grass wet the toe of his shoes and kiss at his bare ankles. His face momentarily wrinkles in disgust when he realizes he forgot socks, but he’s drunk enough not to want to turn back and find some.

“Bye, uncle!!!” The two kids shout at him, waving their arms wildly from the porch. They’re sitting by Motoya who is most definitely laughing at him right now. Kiyoomi never thought he’d be one of the drunk uncles stumbling around the yard like he’d seen in TV shows.  But here he is.

He sets out on the road that runs parallel to the front yard and heads toward town, looking into the neighboring properties as he makes his way down the road. The various house designs match an eclectic string of lawn furniture and fake pink flamingos with signs about fresh eggs for sale at every other house. For a moment his eye catches something neon blue flit by in the woods. He blinks slowly, eyelids heavy from the alcohol, but whatever it was is gone. Maybe a bird or a butterfly.

After a few minutes, he hears the sound of tires digging against gravel and a small biker’s bell chimes as two middle school-age kids ride past him.

“We’re almost to town! A girl in pigtails shouts to her friend.

“Race you!” The girl with a long ponytail shouts back

Kiyoomi smiles as they ride past, the sight of two kids much younger than him making the same trek is reassuring. This shouldn’t be that far of a walk.

* * *

Correction– maybe just a clarification actually. It turns out riding a bike somewhere makes the distance go by much faster than when one is inebriated and has to walk. It takes Kiyoomi an hour to get to town. Which is maybe a good thing. The time sobered him up which will keep him from making a fool of himself in the stores.

Kiyoomi arrives at the town center with dirt from the road sticking to his sweat-covered legs. His hair is mostly certainly a giant puffball of frizz right now and there are blisters surrounding his feet. 

Had he been in Tokyo he would have taken the train for such a long distance. He never thought he’d long for those overcrowded cars as much as he is right now.

The town center itself hasn’t changed much since he was last here. Cobblestone sidewalks you have to be careful not to trip over create paths between the buildings. Various shops and stands line just one block with goods that appeal more to locals than they would tourists. For a brief period, there was a store run by the town that sold various maps for known Shrine appearances, but after creating too much chaos for the residents the shop closed down.

It wasn’t helpful information anyway.

In the center of the town, the old konbini still stands. Its hanging sign is still just a smidge crooked from the different-length hooks. The four sidewalks on both sides of the street converge and the cobblestones come together to make one giant circle surrounded by Ginko trees.

Kiyoomi feels the itch to sit and draw, a feeling he hasn’t had in a long while.

There are some new additions as well. A bike shop surrounded by Koinobori carp flags. A small grocery store which is great because when Kiyoomi was a child they had to drive to the next town. And, to Kiyoomi’s greatest delight, a clothing store.

He’s so excited by the find that when a red pickup truck passes and pulls over to park, Kiyoomi doesn’t reflect on why the car is familiar.

He heads straight into the clothes store and reflects on the limited options. He didn’t expect much so he tries not to get hung up on the abundance of more “Fish Fear Me,” shirts, focusing instead on the plain white and black t-shirts that are available.

The cashier looks a little startled when he dumps four white shirts, four black shirts, and six pairs of black shorts.

“Will that be all,” she asks and Kiyoomi can’t tell if she’s joking or not.

“Yes, thank you.”

He pulls out his wallet and thinks about how this would have cost triple in Tokyo. Maybe he should have gotten another pair of shorts. The large plastic bags crinkle obnoxiously as he squeezes through the door and steps back outside.

Next is essentials: toothbrush, curl cream, face wash, and moisturizer. He doesn’t hold out hope for curl cream and his hesitancy is proven wise when the only thing in the konbini is hair gel circa 1990.

He’s about to ask the store manager if they could order some styling products when his phone starts to ring.

Worry spikes, but only for a few seconds. He blocked Yasu and her family members, they couldn’t be calling him. He fishes his phone out of the deep volleyball short pockets and a new worry settles over him. But he definitely can’t ignore this call

“Hello…?”

“WHAT DID YOU DO KIYO?”

He winces and turns the volume down, returning back to browsing the different toothbrushes. “Hello to you too Yachi.”

“Nope, don’t be funny with me right now. I’m calling as your editor, not your friend.”

“Okay, good afternoon Hitoka-san,” Kiyoomi quips. There must still be a little tequila in his system.

“Ha ha very funny Kiyo. And scratch what I just said—what happened?! Are you okay?!”

“What do you know?” He runs through the very short list of people he and Yachi both know and can’t imagine any of them telling her.

“I talked to your landlord when I was banging on your door this morning. He said he needed to end your lease early so he put your stuff in the hallway outside the apartment.

“Oh my god WHAT?!” Kiyoomi shouts, accidentally knocking some toothbrushes on the floor.

“Don’t worry I got all your stuff, it’s in my apartment right now.”

Kiyoomi’s heart rate slows and he tries to imagine what Yachi’s small studio must look like surrounded by his stuff. He bends down to pick up the toothbrushes and tries to calm down. He should’ve expected something like this. His landlord is the reason he and Yasu were going to live in her place, and not Kiyoomi’s.

“Yachi, thank you. Thank you so much.”

“Thank me with an explanation and some kind of reassurance that you will make this upcoming portfolio submission.”

Kiyoomi stays silent, the plastic packaging of a toothbrush crinkling in his hand when his fist clenches. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that without any of my stuff.”

“What do you mean? Where are you?”

“Kurami.”

“WHAT?!”

They go back and forth as Kiyoomi debriefs Yachi on what happened and how he ended up here. Throughout the one-sided conversation, he continues to wander the packed aisles of the konbini, still on the hunt for moisturizer. He limps slightly across the dust-covered floor—the blisters are getting to him.

“Wow, I can’t believe you decided to go back there,” Yachi murmurs. She follows her worried statement with a short laugh. “Oh, remember the Miya twins?”

Kiyoomi frowns a little at the way Yachi just brushes past the fact that his engagement is over. She’s probably working out a hundred different ‘right ways’ to respond to that in her head and landed on ‘completely ignore it.’

“Miya twins ?” Kiyoomi repeats as he rounds the corner of another aisle, walking right into none other than Miya Atsumu.

“Yeah, they were always playing with that kid–”

“I’ve gotta go Yachi.”

“Wait we didn’t talk about your deadline–”

Kiyoomi hangs up the phone and stares cautiously at Miya, trying to figure out if he heard him.

Miya looks him over with a calm curiosity that breaks into a smirk when his eyes reach Kiyoomi’s face. “Nice hair,” he comments.

Kiyoomi frowns and the tips of his ears grow hot with embarrassment. “There isn’t any curl cream in this stupid town.”

Miya frowns at this, reaching past Kiyoomi’s shoulder and pulling a cup of ramen off the shelf behind him. “Then maybe you shouldn’t have come back.” He leaves after this comment, paying for the ramen and slipping out of the shop.

Right, it’s Kiyoomi’s fault that the store doesn’t carry basic hair care. A heavy cloud of frustration follows him to the cash register. The cashier doesn’t even try to ask him if he wants a bag, that’s how angry he must appear.

He steps outside and it dawns on him that he has to walk all the way back to the house now. Another hour of blister-filled travel. He doesn’t want to call Motoya. It would be like admitting he’s an idiot: which he is.

Kiyoomi is stubborn if anything, setting off on another dirt road journey. Just as the cobblestone sidewalk breaks down to nothing at the edge of the town center, a truck pulls in beside Kiyoomi.

“Get in.”

He looks up to find Miya staring straight ahead like he’s still driving and not stopped to offer Kiyoomi a ride.

“Sorry, I’m not supposed to get in a stranger’s van,” Kiyoomi comments snidely.

“Hurry up or I’ll leave.”

Kiyoomi scrambles at this threat, hopping onto the passenger side, and hugging his overstuffed shopping bags to his chest so he fits in the seat.

Miya briefly raises an eyebrow at him before turning back to the road and putting the truck back into drive. He doesn’t say anything and Kiyoomi doesn’t either, not wanting to be the first one to break their silence.

He looks Miya over in the corner of his eye. He has a strong jawline that’s currently clenched with discomfort. His eyes are focused and turn from dark brown to bright amber when the sun shines through the windshield. Miya pulls the sun visor down before Kiyoomi can get too fixated on the change in colors. 

The drive is bumpy but it would be worse if Motoya was driving. Miya makes every effort to avoid potholes and weird dips in the road. They make it to their two houses in about 15 minutes and Miya starts to pull into Kiyoomi’s driveway before he can suggest otherwise.

“Uh- thanks.”

“S’fine, I needed ta drop something off with Toya.”

Hearing Miya call his cousin the nickname he grew up using feels weird. That’s his cousin. And his nickname.

“I’ll let you in,” Kiyoomi mumbles,  grabbing his stuff and stepping out of the truck. He winces when his feet hit the ground. The blisters sting and pinch with each hobbling step.

“What’s the matter with you,” Miya grumbles. He’s carrying a package wrapped in white paper.

“Nothing,” Kiyoomi grumbles back. He groans as he pulls off his shoes, sinking into the small reprieve his feet feel when they hit the open air. He should’ve worn socks. He steps through the workshop/mudroom their back room is and slides open the door to the kitchen.

“I’m home,” Kiyoomi calls out, still lugging his shopping bags. He steps forward and nearly slips on…a freaking marble?

The kitchen is a disaster. Coloring pages on every available surface. Marbles litter the floor and a box of dress-up jewelry has been dumped out all over the play mat in the center of the kitchen. “Kiyo! Glad you’re here, come taste this.”

Motoya hurries over to Kiyoomi with a wooden spoon holding some kind of salsa, masterfully avoiding all of the stray marbles.

“What happened in here?” Kiyoomi asks before Motoya shoves the spoon in his mouth. The salsa starts off sweet with a kick strong enough to make Kiyoomi cough. “UGH Motoya why?”

“Good hangover cure little cousin.

“I’m not hungover,” he deadpans.

In the corner of his eyes he sees Miya smirking. “Did ya turn out to be a day drinker Omi? That’s no good,” He whispers.

“Miya is here,” he announces plainly, moving toward the sink to grab a glass of water. His brow furrows with puzzlement at the nickname Miya so casually addressed him with.

“Atsumuuuu, hello,” Motoya steps over to Miya and reaches up to ruffle his hair like he’s Miya’s older cousin and not Kiyoomi’s.

“Here ya go Toya, fresh from the boat.”

“Amazing! Just what I needed tonight.” Motoya turns around to Kiyoomi and winks. “I’m making fish tacos.”

Kiyoomi glances at the fresh salsa and guacamole his cousin has cheffed up on the counter and ponders when his cousin grew up and became such a homemaker. When Kiyoomi was little Motoya refused to eat anything other than ramen and croquettes.

“You should stay for dinner, Atsumu.”

“Oh I wish I coul–

“What?” Kiyoomi can’t help but ask just a tad too loudly, cutting Miya off.

Miya glares at him before directing a sickeningly sweet smile back toward Motoya. “Actually Toya I’d love to stay. Thank you for inviting me.”

In the time it takes for the rest of the meal to be made, the table to be set, and Kiyoomi to shower, he has begged Motoya to cancel the dinner at least 20 times.

“Just tell him the fish gave you food poisoning and we can’t have it for dinner anymore,” Kiyoomi says in his twenty-first attempt. He tugs at the black t-shirt he put on after his shower and the matching shorts. They fit fine but could have used a wash to get rid of that store-ready starchy feeling.

Haru and Fumi are sprawled out over their playmat writing name cards for each table setting. They started with Miya because apparently everyone in this house likes the insufferable neighbor.

“No chance Kiyo, plus Atsumu’s brother caught this fish, there’s no way it’d be bad.”

Motoya adjusts his “don’t blame the cook,” apron and gets back to pressing fresh tortilla with homemade masa dough. Apparently the skill is from a former college girlfriend studying abroad from Mexico who left Motoya a much better cook than he was when they started dating.

“Come help me cook these Kiyo,” Motoya calls.

Kiyoomi stays still on the far corner of the room, glowering at how Miya is seated at the head of the table with Kiyoomi’s placement to his right.

“Kiyo come help me and I’ll listen to you gripe about Atsumu some more.”

He sighs and mopes over to his cousin, knowing the offer he was just given really meant “please don’t make me ask you a third time to help me make dinner.”

“He’s rude,” Kiyoomi comments, flipping the raw tortilla onto the hot pan, frowning at how he smooshed the edge with his thumb.

“Mhm.” Motoya has moved on to cooking the fish in a host of spices that make Kiyoomi’s mouth water. “Oh Kiyo flip the tortilla now that it’s puffed up like that. No- don’t use the spatula, just use your hands.”

“I don’t want to burn my hand Motoya,” Kiyoomi grumbles.

“It’s easy, just–OUCH.”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and digs the spatula out of their cooking appliance drawer. It’s the same one his grandmother used to wack his uncles over the head with when they snuck bites of the food she was cooking.

“Is Uncle okay?” Haru asks from the other side of the room.

“Yes, he just got a little carried away with pretending he knows what he’s doing,” Kiyoomi says calmly to reassure Haru, but Haru looks back at him with a mix of confusion and disinterest. Yes, Kiyoomi is great with kids.

“Hey I know what I’m doing, look at all this food I made!”

Kiyoomi doesn’t look at the food, instead glancing out at the kitchen window toward the driveway that Miya is now walking down. He went home to change and do whatever else he spends his time on while Motoya and Kiyoomi got the house ready—and Haru and Fumi if Kiyoomi counts the Crayola nameplates.

He could lock the door right now. Maybe Miya would leave.

“Home,” Miya’s voice floats through the back entrance.

Kiyoomi stomps over to the door and scowls. “This is not your home.”

“Oh Omi-kun, lovely to see ya. I wasn’t expecting your company.” Miya brushes past Kiyoomi and steps into the kitchen. “Toya this smells great; even better than last time.” He’s wearing a white button-up and gray slacks. Kiyoomi thought the uniform of the sticks was cargo shorts and ripped t-shirts. He tugs at his own t-shirt feeling slightly underdressed.

“Uncle Atsumu!” Haru and Fumi shout, running over to hug the intruder. In a matter of seconds, Kiyoomi feels like he’s replaced Miya as the outsider of this gathering.

He busies himself with cooking the rest of the tortilla while Miya helps Haru and Fumi to their seats, buckling Fumi into the booster seat she still uses without any prompting. How often does Miya come over here? He asks the question under his breath to Motoya.

“Hm, about once a week since his grandmother died a few months ago. Back in May,” Motoya whispers back.

“Oh.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t know how to respond to that. It’s not that he can’t relate to the loss of a relative, but his experience is pretty different from what most other people go through. It’s why he never brings it up.

“What are you two whispering about over there,” Miya asks. He’s sitting in his seat with his cocky, crooked grin on full display.

“Just asking Kiyo if he wants a margarita,” Motoya says with a wink toward Kiyoomi.

“I do not.” Kiyoomi might throw up if he has any more tequila today, or for the rest of his life.

“Aw Omi-kun, don't hold back on my account,” Miya taunts.

“Yeah Uncle Omi don’t hold back,” Fumi shouts with no idea of what they’re talking about.

Kiyoomi frowns at how Omi has been upgraded to Omi-kun, and that his niece is now calling him by it. Why does a guy who claims to hate him have such a stupid cutesy nickname for Kiyoomi if not to annoy him with said cutesy nickname?

“Oh, looks like we’re out of tequila anyways,” Motoya says with feigned remorse. He shoots Kiyoomi another wink and Miya cackles.

Maybe Kiyoomi would be less embarrassed if drinking was a normal habit of his, but it’s not, so his ears are red and his eyes refuse to meet Motoya’s. He finishes with the tortilla and sets them down on the table beside all of the other food Motoya made.

“Looks like we’re seat buddies Omi,” Miya smirks.

“Goody,” Kiyoomi comments, trying his best to fit sarcasm into every syllable of the short word. He just needs to get through this dinner and then he can spend the rest of his time in Kurami avoiding Miya Atsumu. It shouldn’t be too hard with the guy’s fake blonde hair acting as a giant shiny beacon. Kind of like how poisonous animals are always brightly colored.

Motoya sits on the other side of Kiyoomi, across from Haru and Fumi, and starts plating the kids' food on smaller plastic plates shaped like the head of a cat. “Dig in guys.”

Kiyoomi and Miya both reach for the refried beans. Kiyoomi pulls his hand away and Miya shoots him a triumphant that's what I thought look. Kiyoomi wants to stuff the beans in his face, but he reaches for the guacamole instead.

To Motoya’s credit, the food is great. If anything the only thing off about the meal is the slight char on some of the tortilla. Next time Kiyoomi will do a better job with them. Both because Kiyoomi wants to be a good cousin, and because he’ll make sure Miya isn’t attending next time.

“So when do you take the bar Atsumu?” Motoya asks with a mouthful of taco.

The bar? As in the bar exam? Kiyoomi glances at Miya who looks a little off for the first time tonight. He’s pushing the beans around on his plate with the serving spoon, lost in thought.

“Not for another year or two,” he says. “But we’ll see.”

Kiyoomi knows that we’ll see. He’s used it countless times when someone’s asked him if he got the assignment he applied for. We’ll see if it actually happens.

“ Right, you still need to go back to law school right,” Motoya asks, this time clearly enunciating, sans mouthful of food. Kiyoomi gets the sinking feeling these questions are being asked for his edification on Miya Atsumu, and not because Motoya wants to know the answer.

“You’re a lawyer.” Kiyoomi makes his comment more of a statement than a question.

“I’d be a pretty bad one if I had to go back to law school,” Miya says instead of a simple no .

“You know what I meant.”

“In law school they teach us not to assume anything.”

“I thought you weren’t in law school.”

Miya opens and shuts his mouth seemingly at a loss for a snappy comeback. He takes a bite of taco instead. 

Haru and Fumi take over the conversation after this, clearly bored of whatever the adults are talking about. They talk about the treasure map they found – that Motoya hid – and the treasure they dug up—that Motoya buried.

Kiyoomi isn’t too interested in their games but he’s relieved to have the pressure of conversation lifted away from him. Miya on the other hand seems to be enthralled by the kids’ adventures, asking them follow-up questions to everything they say.

The kids eat it up. Kiyoomi is less than impressed.

He’s mid-bite through his third taco when his phone starts to vibrate in his pocket. To his relief, it’s Yachi calling again.

“I’m sorry it’s my agent, I have to take this.” He is a little sorry to leave the table, mostly because Yachi wants to talk to him about deadlines and portfolio submissions he hasn’t done.

“What are you, a movie star?” Miya snarks into his plate of beans.

“Tell Yachi-chan I said hi.”

Miya glances up at the mention of Yachi and looks startled.“Yachi?”

Kiyoomi ignores him, pushing back from the table and sliding open the side door to step onto the porch.

“You couldn’t have called at a better time,” Kiyoomi murmurs into his phone. He sits down on the far rocking chair and turns it towards the street, away from the kitchen window. Far past the road is the view of the ocean and the sun that’s not quite setting yet.

“Really? That’s good to hear because we have a lot to talk about.”

Kiyoomi can hear the pop and click of Yachi snapping her ballpoint pen on and off. It’s a nervous habit he used to be annoyed by when it was constantly in his ear. Now it’s reassuring. He misses Yachi. “What’s first?”

Yachi runs him through the list of new publications up for bid that require an illustrator. Most are book covers which Kiyoomi typically steers away from. He’s never given enough time to read the book so he always doubts how his illustration can actually represent it.

“Any more movie posters?” He asks hopefully. These coveted assignments are what he’s been living off of since graduation three years ago. Plus he likes to get access to newly released films. It’s not that he’s a cinephile, he’d just rather watch them for free in his home than to pay to sit in a crowded theater where people talk over the movie.

Yachi sighs and Kiyoomi knows the endless poster assignments have dried up. What worries him is that she seems to be beating herself up about it.

“Don’t worry about it Yachi.”

“No, it’s just my contact no longer works in the studio anymore so they’ve started outsourcing to a larger artist.”

Kiyoomi nods. It’s how this industry goes. Though he can’t help but feel a little defensive. Wasn’t his work good enough for all the past posters they’ve paid him for? Why are they moving on to someone else?

“Kiyo?”

“Oh, sorry. It’s fine, really don’t worry about it.”

“Well…” Yachi says slowly. She’s building up to make the same offer he’s been turning down since they graduated and entered this agent-illustrator partnership.

“You know I don’t want to.”

“They pay well, and so many of these established authors love your style. They would recommend you for good projects! Well-paying projects!”

Kiyoomi can’t ignore the stake Yachi has in this too. She gets a cut of all his assignments, that’s how their working relationship functions. Yachi had been quiet about pushing him to this…less than desirable work when he was bringing in the bigger movie checks, but now that door is closed.

“I know you might feel like it’s too beneath you–”

“I don’t,” Kiyoomi cuts her off. “Really, I just…I don’t think I could do it. I have no connection to that field.”

The field being children's books. Kiyoomi knows he’s got the style for it. His penchant for vibrant colors, explorable backgrounds, and huggable character designs – according to Yachi – is exactly what many children's book authors are looking for.

“Everyone was a child once Kiyoomi. You have just as much connection as anyone else.”

But he doesn’t. It’s frustrating how many times he has to explain this, especially to Yachi. It’s not about forgetting names or faces. When Kiyoomi looks back on his childhood for specific memories all he sees is black, spare for the occasional moment that slips through. Kiyoomi could count them all on one hand. “You know I don’t remember anything.”

“What about this book you made? The Swamp Adventures?”

Kiyoomi hears Yachi waving the loose pages around on the other end of the phone. He sighs, remembering Yachi has his stuff and therefore the illustrations he made for Yasu’s nephews. “That was a one-off Yachi. I just happened to remember being in the woods of Kurami.”

“And you’re there now!”

“Yes?” Kiyoomi isn’t sure where she’s going with this.

“What if being there helps jog the rest of your memory.”

Kiyoomi chuckles dryly at Yachi’s optimism. “Isn’t that a pretty big ‘what if’ to gamble a new contract on?”

Yachi takes a breath and a more serious tone. “Listen, one of the agents at my agency is on maternity leave right now, so I’ve taken over her illustrators until August.”

She pauses for a moment and Kiyoomi waits for her to continue.

“I know things are shitty for you right now, and I’m sorry. Why don’t you take until August to clear your head, maybe even let Kurami bring you back to when we were kids?”

Kiyoomi wants to say no but knows that he would just be acting difficult if he did. 

Yachi continues. “If, at the end of August, you still feel like you can’t do anything for children's books… I don’t know Kiyo,” she sighs. “Then I can help you find an agent who’s more suited in finding the work you want.”

It’s beyond reasonable. An agent-illustrator relationship is supposed to be compatible and mutually beneficial. The only reason he and Yachi have worked together this long is because neither wanted to lose touch with their college best friend. Kiyoomi still doesn’t want to lose that. Back in school, they spent most of their time making zines together with Kiyoomi as the illustrator and Yachi as the brains behind the operation that got the zines to the publishing stage. They were partners in crime, with their crimes being office supply theft from the school store Yachi worked in.

“End of August?” He asks.

“End of August,” she repeats with a lighter tone.

“Okay, I’m going to try. I mean it.”

“I know you do Kiyo,” she says softly. “I’ll talk to you later.”

“Wait- do you think you could send me my sketchbooks?” He asks the question with a tone he hopes conveys how big of an ask he knows that is.

“They’re already in the mail Kiyo don’t worry.”

Kiyoomi can’t see Yachi right now but he knows she’s smiling.

The call ends and Kiyoomi considers the deal he just made with Yachi. He really will try his best, but should he? If the reason he can’t remember anything about his childhood is his brain protecting itself, shouldn’t he abide by that?

He could just have fun here in the relaxing slow-living that rural Japan offers. Away from the chaos and constant demand of Tokyo…yes. That sounds good. And when his vacation ends? Well, he’s not going to think about that right now.

On the far side of the porch, Kiyoomi hears the door creak open. “Hey,” Miya says. “Can we talk?”

“You’re ruining my moment of self-reflection Miya,” Kiyoomi snarks.

Miya rolls his eyes and moves to lean against the porch railing beside him. “I’ll make it quick so you can get back to reflecting, maybe on how much of an asshole you are.”

“Did you come out here just to insult me?”

“Yes, and to get some answers from you.”

Kiyomi pauses and studies Miya. He looks serious in whatever he wants to talk about. “Well?”

“Why are you pretending not to know me when you clearly remember Yachi. Don’t you thin-”

“I don’t,” Kiyoomi says, cutting him off. “Or, I didn’t. Not in the way you mean at least.”

Miya looks puzzled. Kiyoomi can tell he already made up his mind about how this conversation was going to go. Clearly, Kiyoomi has just uprooted whatever argument Miya had played out in his head.

“What do you mean?” Miya asks cautiously.

Kiyoomi shifts in the rocking chair, letting it rock back and forth. Maybe he should have expected to have to repeat himself like this every day after coming back here. But that doesn’t make it any less annoying.

“I don’t remember you. I didn’t remember Yachi either. We re-met in college and she told me we used to play together as kids. Unlike you, she didn’t take it so personally that I didn’t remember my five-year-old playmate.

Miya opens his mouth at this but Kiyoomi speaks before he can interject. “Look. We don’t need to be around each other okay? I’ll leave you alone if you leave me alone.”

It’s a fair peace offering if Kiyoomi ever heard one. Miya doesn’t seem as impressed, but he doesn’t argue either. He steps away from the railing he was leaning on, walks down the short stone steps, and passes through the yard toward his house.

The habitual call of goodnight sits on Kiyoomi’s tongue. But he won’t wish that for Miya.

“And don’t get the coffee from the grocery store, the konbini has better coffee,” Motoya says for the third time this morning. His request crackles through the Bluetooth of the minivan Kiyoomi borrowed for the morning errands he was sent on.

The car, belonging to Motoya’s sister – his other cousin – smells like old crackers and mildew. Just as one would expect any car to smell when its main purpose is to chauffeur around two young children. Kiyoomi has all the windows down to cut the musty smell with fresh pine from the surrounding forest.

The itch to deep clean the interior with bleach wipes twitches through Kiyoomi’s fingers.

“What is that noise? I can barely hear you,” Motoya asks.

“It’s the wind and I didn’t say anything,” Kiyoomi says plainly. “In what world does a konbini have better coffee than a grocery store.”

“This world!” Motoya shouts. “Don’t get the grocery coffee or you’re going to be in charge of the kids’ bedtime routine.”

The drive into town is much shorter than walking or when he’s at the mercy of keeping awkward company with Miya in his van. Kiyoomi pulls into the main street and drops down to the 3 kph speed limit, inching forward toward the singular parking lot behind the grocery store.

“I won’t I won’t and I have your list for everything else so stop worrying.”

“Okay then I’ll let you go byeeee.” Motoya hangs up and the Bluetooth makes a short beeping sign off sound.

Kiyoomi pulls into one of the many empty parking spaces and parks the van. It rolls back slightly when he takes his foot off the break and gives him a small scare. He hasn’t driven a car since Yachi needed to be driven home from her wisdom teeth removal six years ago. Though driving through the Tokyo traffic was much worse than bumbling down the desolate roads of Kurami.

Stepping out of the car, Kiyoomi shudders and rubs at the goose bumps popping up on his bare arms. The morning chill will be overwhelmed by afternoon heat in a few hours but right now he can nearly see his breath.

Straight ahead the grocery store is in clear view, but a small building beside it catches Kiyoomi’s eye. It’s a studio space with an artfully crafted wooden sign that has Kiyoomi intrigued. He grabs Motoya’s list written on a faded pink post-it note and walks over to peek through the windows when he sees Miya’s red truck pull into the grocery store parking lot.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” He mutters under his breath.

He considers telling Miya to go and come back to grocery shop later but it’ll just be another annoying confrontation and more hassle. Kiyoomi can wait out in the studio instead. He steps through the open doorway, his footsteps echoing slightly around the space that’s void of any furniture—save for a few pedestals holding sculptures.

Natural light pours through a large skylight and bounces off the white walls covered in artwork, so much so that the color of the walls is barely visible. For a small space the studio holds more artwork than three average Tokyo galleries combined.

Kiyoomi loves how eclectic it is despite the chaos. It’s less about the prestige of earning a coveted gallery space, and more about the love of local art.

He steps through the space giving each piece a proper look. The frames and the mediums of the artwork are a smorgasbord of materials and style. Oil, water color, acrylic, charcoal, and more surround each other among differing palettes and subjects.

The pieces carry similar themes common to Kurami art with the ocean and the forest ever-present. One piece stands out to Kiyoomi among the masses: his yard set in a gold painted frame. He pauses in front of the watercolor landscape capturing the grass Haru and Fumi now play in, and the impressive treeline behind it.

“Like that one?” A scratchy voice asks behind Kiyoomi.

He jumps a little and the woman laughs.

“Sorry about that dear, didn’t mean to scare you.” She smiles wide, her lips defined with a thick red lipstick – a stark contrast to her short white hair. Her skin is more wrinkles than anything else and Kiyoomi is overcome with the urge to draw her.

“Sweetheart?” She asks at Kiyoomi’s continued silence. “Do you like it?”

“Oh- yes sorry. I was just surprised to see it here. This is my yard.”

“Oh it is, is it? Then you have to have it!”

“No, what? I’m okay.”

“That’s all right, just a moment. I actually have someone on the line who was asking about this same piece.” She holds up a phone to her ear that Kiyoomi hadn’t noticed in her hand until now. The chord of it snakes around the studio space like the vines of an overgrown tree.

“Really I’m not interested,” Kiyoomi tries to interject.

The woman waves him off and Kiyoomi tries to stay patient. She can’t make him pay for it, and he’s not one to do things just to be polite.

She continues to talk into the phone, knotting the chord even further as she paces around the studio. “Well I’ve got someone here interested in the piece right now. This isn’t a storage locker. Yes, Mei’s piece.”

Kiyoomi tenses at the sound of his mother’s name.

“Yes Sakusa Mei, oh- okay one second. Here sweetheart, he wants to talk to you.”

If only Kiyoomi had decided to start his morning arguing with Miya. He shakes his head no but the woman gestures for him to come over with exaggerated arm waves. He swallows his annoyance and steps over, holding out his hand for the phone.

“Hello,” he asks, ready to tell the stranger they can have their painting.

There’s a short laugh on the other end of the phone. It’s a sound that sends a chill down his spine. “Kiyoomi?” His brother says slowly. “What are you doing there?”

The last time Kiyoomi heard Kousei’s voice was over that stupid voicemail.

“Sorry you’ve got the wrong person,” Kiyoomi says before thrusting the phone back at the woman and hurrying out of the gallery.

Frustration and a little bit of worry start to take over him, but he needs to calm down. He’s 25 now. Kousei can’t get to him like he did when Kiyoomi was just starting college. This was just a misfortune crossing of paths. He shouldn’t let it get to him.

The sun is blinding when Kiyoomi steps back outside. Miya’s truck is still freaking parked there, three spots down from his cousin’s van. The frustration he just felt from his brother immediately gets channeled toward Miya. He tries to clear his head, walking down the sidewalk toward the bike shop surrounded by carp flags.

He really should just go into the grocery store and get what he needs, but then that disaster in the gallery would have been for nothing. Kiyoomi will wait Miya out.

This time bells jingle when Kiyoomi steps into the bike shop, alerting the staff that someone has walked in. The entrance leads into a small set of stairs with the railings covered in different types of bike locks. It seems most stores around here are going for the chaotic aesthetic.

The walls are a mix of road signs and black and white photographs, but not the kind some shops might purchase just for the sake of having something to hang. There’s an artistic eye in these shots. Most are capturing scenes of a boat and the crew on board.

Bikes hang from racks on the ceiling and are lined up creating a small maze to the cash register at the back of the store–not that Kiyoomi plans on going there. He turns to the front and parks himself by the window, a perfect vantage point for keeping eyes on Miya’s truck.

“Need help finding anything?”

Kiyoomi turns to find a guy his age with sharp green eyes and piercings decorating his ears. The guy’s eyes widen when he gets a look at Kiyoomi but after blinking his face reverts to a passive, unreadable expression.

Aren’t customer service people supposed to smile?

“Oh, no thank you I’m just looking.”

“Right,” the guy says with a bit of sarcasm. “Well I can see you’re enjoying looking out that window but this store is for paying customers, not bird watchers.”

“I’m not a bird watcher,” Kiyoomi says when he should just leave.

“Stalker then?”

“I’m not a-” he cuts himself off when he sees Miya exit the grocery store. Finally.

“Rightttt,” the guy says cooly. “God you haven’t changed. Still staring after Tsumu huh?”

Kiyoomi turns away from the window at this comment. He ignores the jaded bait and asks his own question instead. “Do we know each other?”

The guy studies him for a moment, leaning expertly against one of the bikes. If Kiyoomi tried to do that he’d send the whole row toppling over like a stack of dominos. “It’s Suna,” he says slowly. “Remember? From when we were kids?

Kiyoomi continues to stare, too tired to have this same conversation again.

“I guess you knew me before I transitioned,” Suna says. “My hair’s basically the same though. You should recognize me.”

He pauses waiting for Kiyoomi’s reaction but he isn’t quite sure what to say. He doesn’t remember Suna either way.

“Well,” Suna continues. “Some things have stayed the same. I still can’t stand you.”

“Great,” Kiyoomi says dismissively. He’s not going to subject himself to whatever this is. And the grocery store is finally free. He can get Motoya his stupid coffee.

“Isn’t it?” Suna laughs.

Downstairs the bells chime to alert a new customer, pulling his and Suna’s attention toward the stairs.

“Any customers here,” a voice says in Kansai-ben. Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and storms past Suna.

“Yes, I am here Miya. If you had just waited one more minute we wouldn’t need to be in here together. In fact, give me your calendar. We’re picking out different days to buy groceries.

He glares up at Miya and his mouth drops open a little at the sight of his hair. “What? Got sick of the blonde?”

“Sakusa?” Miya asks slowly. The brown hair looks good but it's a little off brand for the cocky bastard impression Miya has earned in Kiyoomi’s eyes. The blonde suits him better. It’s easier to spot a mile away.

“What happened to Omi,” he taunts. “Done with your nickname?”

“Never in my life have I called ya that. Tsumu would have me murdered.”

Kiyoomi tries to puzzle out the weird game Miya is trying to play today. Is this because Kiyoomi told Miya to leave him alone last night? “Do they teach you to talk about yourself in third person in law school?” He takes a breath and wrinkles his nose. “Also you smell like low tide.”

Miya glances past Kiyoomi with nervous eyes. “Rin, a little help here?”

“He thinks you’re Atsumu,” Suna laughs. 

Kiyoomi turns around at this comment. “What?”

Downstairs the bell rings once again. Footsteps stomp up the stairs and blonde hair comes into view. “Sunarin did I see Samu come in–oh.” He pauses to take in the scene in front of him and smirks at his brother and Suna. “What? I don’t get invited to the reunion?” He turns toward Kiyoomi and makes direct eye contact. “Thought ya were gonna leave me alone Omi-kun.”

Miya Atsumu doesn’t just have a brother. He has a twin. An identical twin–save for their drastically different hairstyles. Kiyoomi looks between Miya and his brother, truly dumbfounded.

“I am,” he mutters. “And I was. You're just everywhere.” He shoves past Miya before he can respond and hurries down the stairs. The bells chime in his wake.

Kiyoomi considers everything that just happened and the way he handled himself as he pours two separate pots of coffee. One is brewed from the grocery store coffee that he bought first. The second is from the konbini coffee he remembered to get right before he left town.

“That stuff is a waste of water,” Motoya teases, sipping his preferred brand of coffee. The mug he’s using has small blue handprints on it and a wonky handle most likely made in a children’s art class.

“Are there any other childhood playmates I’m going to run into here?” Kiyoomi continues to stare down at the coffee cup, facing away from Motoya. His reflection shakes in the dark drink. What happened back there was embarrassing. Kiyoomi made a fool of himself. He’s sick of being caught off guard by everyone.

“Oh? Who did you see?” Motoya takes an exaggerated sip of his coffee, slurping loudly, and sighs happily.

In the living room Haru and Fumi are putting together a large puzzle that’s a little past their difficulty level. Kiyoomi turns to look at them, trying to imagine himself in their role, putting the puzzle together with four other kids.

Yachi was probably still a nervous wreck back then, before she calmed down during her third year in college. Kiyoomi can imagine her panicking and trying to get the Miya’s to stop fighting over who gets to put the puzzle piece down. They seem like the kind of siblings who would argue out of love. He can see Suna sitting on the edge watching everything. He doesn’t seem like someone to get in the middle of a fight.

He can’t see himself with them though.

“Was it Suna?” Motoya asks when Kiyoomi doesn’t respond.

“Yes,” he says slowly, coming out of his daydream. “And the other Miya.”

“Osamu,” Motoya laughs. He pauses to take another sip. “Hm, no that should be everyone. Suna and Osamu, you and Atsumu, and Yachi in tow. That was your little gang.” Motoya laughs again, more fondly this time. “You guys were so cute back then bumbling around the yard for treasure hunts—I made those for you too you know.”

He doesn’t know, but he smiles anyway.

Kiyoomi glances back toward Haru and Fumi, hoping they’re able to hold on to these happy memories.

“Kiyo we’re going to go to the B - E - A - C -H later if you want to come.”

“Why are you spelling out beach?”

“BEACH!” Haru and Fumi scream in unison nearly seconds later. They come barreling into the kitchen clinging to Motoya. “Can we go now?!”

Motoya’s eyes look like they’ve grown bags in an instant. “I spelled it out so I could finish my coffee first,” he comments tiredly to Kiyoomi.

“Uncle Kiyo, will you come too?” Fumi asks, tugging at the hem of his shorts to get his attention. Kiyoomi hadn’t even seen her walk over to him.

“Um, sure I’ll come.”

“YAY-”

“First clean up that puzzle in the living room,” Motoya says sternly.

His strict expression breaks into a smile a second later when the kids run back into the living room and dump all the puzzle pieces back into the box.

The next thirty minutes are spent on getting Haru and Fumi ready for the beach, 20 of which are dedicated to searching for Haru’s goggles that he insists he needs. Motoya finds them in the bathtub and they’re out of the house a few minutes later.

Plastic buckets and shovels clink together, tied to Haru and Fumi’s backpacks. Kiyoomi shifts uncomfortably as he walks. Motoya’s yellow bathing suit is a bit too short for his liking, but it’s better than nothing.

They cross the street with Haru and Fumi insisting on holding Kiyoomi’s hands instead of Motoya’s. Kiyoomi is 60% touched and 40% worried about all the germs they’re transferring over to him. He should have brought hand sanitizer with him.

The rest of the walk is down a private gravel road that runs parallel to a huge sunflower field about two soccer fields long. In the late July days the flowers are fully open, each one pointed toward the sun to soak in its warm rays. In the center of the field Kiyoomi notices a circle void of any sunflowers, but the surrounding tall flowers make it impossible to see what’s filling the space instead.

“Is it safe to walk down this road Uncle Toya?” Haru asks as they continue down the middle of the street. He bends down to pick up a rock and Fumi nearly collides with him.

“Yes this is a private road, only us and one other family can come here,” Motoya says. “So don’t worry.”

Haru seems relaxed by this but now Kiyoomi is becoming worried. “Who’s the other family Toya?”

Motoya stares straight ahead which makes everything more suspicious.

“Motoya?”

“The Miya’s,” he says with a hint of guilt.

Kiyoomi groans which gets Fumi’s attention. 

“Don’t worry Uncle Omi, we’ll get there soon.”

Kiyoomi straightens up and tries to act like an adult, a nervous smile creeping across his face at how he was just consoled by a child. He should be the one doing the consoling.

But they do get there soon, reaching the end of the dead end street that drops off on a small cliff with cement stairs that ascend to the rocky beach below. The beach extends about 200 yards in each direction with the shoreline cut off by right and left points that jut out into the water. Pine trees border the far points of the beach and the rocks on the beach go from small pebbles to larger boulders the closer it gets to the water.

A layer of orange seaweed covers everything at the shoreline. Looking straight forward is a tide pool the size of their front yard.

“OCEAN!” Haru and Fumi shout, and internally Kiyoomi shouts it too. This is just as exciting for him after being stuck in the concrete jungle of central Tokyo.

He glances past the shoreline toward Mt. Fuji which looks spectacularly large. Small sailboats dot the large body of water sprawling in front of them. Black-tailed seagulls fly overhead, some swooping down to grab at crabs and small fish in the water.

Kiyoomi turns to Motoya and grins ear to ear. For the first time in ages, he’s filled with excitement. “Come on,” he says with urgency.

Motoya laughs and follows after him and the kids.

It’s too rocky for them to build sand castles to the kids’ dismay. Not so much Kiyoomi’s as he didn’t look forward to getting sand stuck under his fingernails. With the sun beating down on them now Kiyoomi lets Haru and Fumi tug him toward the water.

“Careful Kiyo, it's pretty cold,” Motoya warns from the shore. He’s sprawled out on a towel with an umbrella stuck in the ground beside him, sporting a shirt that reads “wine mom.” Motoya insisted the shirt belonged to his sister Ema but Kiyoomi has his doubts.

“I’ll be fine,” Kiyoomi says petulantly. He steps into the water, careful to not lose his balance on the rocks, and fuck is it cold. He feels a shiver run up his feet to his spine and withholds the urge to shriek. Needing to prove he’s fine, Kiyoomi continues to step in – very slowly – until he’s at waist level.

“Having fun out there?” Motoya shouts from the beach.

“Loads!” Kiyoomi shouts back. It comes off sarcastic but he is. He watches light bounce off the water around him creating mesmerizing shimmering patterns. The urge to draw starts to overcome him. He looks around the area at how he’d frame the beach.

Mt. Fuji is begging to be included in the frame but Kiyoomi is more interested in the scene he’s looking at right now: Motoya relaxing while Fumi chases Haru around with a crab on the beach.

It’s peaceful and fun.

So why, the hell, does Kiyoomi see blonde hair coming out of the treeline?

Even from 50 yards away Kiyoomi can see the smirk on Miya’s face.

He considers going further into the water and hiding among the rippled waves until Miya leaves. It would be cold but worth it.

“Kiyo look who’s here!” Motoya shouts, waving widely.

Curse Motoya. Kiyoomi’s going to hide his special coffee when they get back.

Miya waves and starts to head toward the shore, unbuttoning a white shirt he has on and placing it on a dry rock. His swim trunks are an obnoxious red that goes perfect with his awful hair.

“How’s the water in there Omi?”

“Terrible!” Kiyoomi shouts back. “You’ll hate it.”

All this does is get a laugh out of Miya. He takes one step into the water and seems unaffected by the icy chill. “Feels great to me Omi!”

“Miya you said you would leave me alone.” His voice picks up urgency as Miya takes another step into the water, now standing ankle deep.

“Actually Omi I never said that.” He’s at his knees now, continuing to step toward Kiyoomi.

“Then say it now!” Kiyoomi shouts, partly in desperation but mostly because he’s stepping deeper into the freezing water. His legs are starting to feel a little numb at the change in temperature the further he gets from shore.

Miya pauses to glance at the beach behind him and turns back toward Kiyoomi. “Hmm, no.” With that, he dives head first into the water.

Kiyoomi searches for the bright red swim shorts among the shimmery slits of water. It’s hard to see past the top barrier until something is close to breaking the surface. Like Miya is now. He pops up right beside Kiyoomi, splashing obnoxiously and making Kiyoomi shout and squirm at icy droplets hitting his still dry chest and shoulders.

“Fuck, fuck you,” he seethes, squirming as the droplets trail down his skin.

Miya laughs and runs his hand through his hair, pushing it back away from his face. Kiyoomi watches the water slide off of Miya. He’s almost sparkling with how the sun reflects off his wet body. He takes in Miya’s broad shoulders and muscular upper body, snapping his eyes away when he sees what he’s doing.

“Like what ya see Omi?”

“You look like a wet dog,” Kiyoomi lies.

He feels Miya eyeing him now, catching the way his eyes drag over his body. Kiyoomi crosses his arms to cover himself and to huddle in for warmth.

“It’s less cold if ya duck under Omi.”

“How does that make any sense?”

Miya grins at this. A wavy strand of hair falls back onto his forehead, twisting in a slight curl. “It was sad how ya ran out on our little reunion earlier,” he says, moving the conversation along.

“Maybe for you,” he grumbles. “Suna did not seem to want me in his store for another second.” Kiyoomi hates how he’s getting swept up into talking with Miya. He should just leave. He takes a step toward shore and a slight breeze hits the wet parts of his skin sending him back to the water.

“Ha! Yeah Sunarin pretty much hates yer guts, but don’t worry about him.”

Right, that’s a very normal thing to not worry about. But Kiyoomi doesn’t plan on being around Suna – or any of them – again. So he won’t worry about it. He won’t even ask why, because it doesn’t matter. He does have one question though.

When he got here Miya was fuming, like he couldn’t even stand to look at Kiyoomi. Now he’s chasing after him in the water and showing up to his house for dinner and driving him home from town.

“I don’t get you Miya.”

“I know ya don’t Omi.”

His response feels heavy with years of emotions Kiyooomi can’t begin to understand. He brushes past it, uncomfortable with the vulnerability Miya is showing him. “Seriously, what’s your deal? One minute you’re yelling at me, the next you’re trying to have idle chat at the beach.”

“Yelling?”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes. “When I got here.”

“Oh.”

“The first thing you said to me-”

“I know I know.” Miya cuts him off. Water ripples around him when he moves his arms out to get Kiyoomi to stop talking. “I was in a bad mood.”

“That’s an understatement.”

“Well I was,” Miya says with a bit of a sheepish grin. “Toya told me you were coming and-”

“He told you?” Kiyoomi turns toward where Motoya is playing with Haru and Fumi on the beach. He waves toward Kiyoomi like nothing is the matter.

“Yeah we were havin’ dinner when ya texted him that you were comin’. And we hadn’t seen each other in years and…whatever.”

Miya trails off and Kiyoomi lets the sentence dissipate.

“Anyways m’ sorry.”

“I don't accept your apology,” Kiyoomi says plainly. He frowns and thinks it over, but he doesn’t. Miya was an asshole. And he doesn’t need to accept his apology. He doesn’t want to.

Miya laughs. “God yer a piece of work.”

“Likewise.” Kiyoomi sneers with a nasty smile he’d curated for god-awful customers when he worked in a restaurant his freshman year of college.

He starts to take a few steps towards shore when Osamu and Suna step out of the treeline. Kiyoomi huffs in annoyance and turns around to face Mt. Fuji. It really is one thing after another. In the corner of his eyes he sees Miya wave at them.

“Don’t worry they’re going further down shore,” Miya comments.

Kiyoomi glances back and sure enough Suna and Osamu are heading further right. They each have a large net and what looks like a snorkel mask in hand.

“They’re catchin’ some crabs for dinner,” Miya says, filling in the gaps. “If there’s enough we might give some to you and Toya.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t say anything, still following Suna and Osamu. They walk near the shore about 50 yards away and start walking into the water with their masks and nets in hand. Just like Miya they seem to have no issue with the freezing temperature. They go out much further than Kiyoomi and Miya and in an instant they’ve disappeared under the water. They pop back up a few moments later. Kiyoomi abruptly turns away when he sees them come together to kiss.

Miya blows a raspberry and rolls his eyes. “Get a room ya idiots!” He shouts across the water.

“Look away ya idiot!” Osamu shouts back

Kiyoomi glowers at how he’s between their shouting match about PDA. “I’m getting out,” he says to give Miya at least that much courtesy before he leaves him here.

He doesn’t respond and Kiyoomi doesn’t look back to see why.

He winces as he walks over the rocks on the beach, dropping down on the towel next to Motoya. Haru and Fumi are on the other side of him trying to make a castle out of the pebbles.

“Did you have fun out there?” Motoya teases.

Kiyoomi turns like a cat in a patch of sunlight, soaking up the warmth. “I was before it got too crowded.”

“Yes, definitely not enough room in the entire ocean for you and Atsumu.” Motoya’s being sarcastic but Kiyoomi takes his words to heart.

“Nope, definitely not.”

“Maybe you can make up with them tonight.”

Kiyoomi rolls on his side and squints at Motoya, the sun blinding his eyes. “Please no.” His eyes adjust to his smug and smiling cousin.

“You don’t have to go, Kiyo.”

“Then I won’t.”

“Okay.” Motoya’s tone fluctuates, like he doesn’t actually believe Kiyoomi.

“I mean it.”

“I said okayyy.”

“I am not going.”

He said he wasn’t going. He said it multiple times actually, and yet here he is standing in Miya’s backyard.

Kiyoomi doesn’t know why he came. He doesn’t need to be here. He’s 25 and he can make his own decisions— Motoya’s words when Kiyoomi followed him and the kids over here. But after the beach he thought about how Miya acted. He really seemed to want to reconcile with Kiyoomi.

He also seems to be hiding something. Or maybe it's just that Kiyoomi hasn’t allowed him to actually explain what he’s so hung up on. But tonight Kiyoomi will find out. Then he can be at peace with avoiding Miya the rest of the time he’s here.

There’s a large Ginkgo tree looming over them with golden leaves almost glowing against the light of the bonfire Osamu set up. Tiny embers float up every few minutes and seaweed that Motoya dropped in the pit is heating up and bursting with satisfying pops.

Beyond the yard is the sunflower field, the flowers of which are still turned up to the sky, waiting for the morning sun to come, even after it set a while ago. While they wait the night sky is speckled with stars. Kiyoomi can see a few blinking through the gaps in the Gingko leaves.

Haru and Fumi are sitting by the fire roasting hot dogs while Motoya watches over them. Close to the house Osamu is finishing up the crab he’s made. He and Suna caught enough for all five adults with more to spare for tomorrow. Suna is hanging off Osamu’s shoulder with the latter sneaking kisses every few minutes.

And Miya is, oddly enough, on the far end of the yard staring up at the stars. He’s decided to give Kiyoomi space the one time Kiyoomi wants to talk to him. He truly is infuriating.

Kiyoomi shifts in the yard chair he claimed by the fire to avoid an ember that floats out of the pit. He tried sitting further away when he got here but with the sun gone the temperature has dropped back down to cold.

He glances back to where Miya was standing and finds the space empty.

“Here, looked like ya were cold,” Miya says, appearing out of nowhere, thrusting a gray sweatshirt toward Kiyoomi.

He stares at the ground and frowns. “I don’t want your sweatshirt Miya.”

“It’s yours.”

Kiyoomi looks up at this, accepting the offer in shock. He unfolds it and finds himself facing his high school emblem. He must have left it the last time he was here. Why does Miya have it?

“Did Motoya give this to you?”

Miya stares at him for a long minute and a flicker of sadness blinks in his eyes. Almost instantly it’s replaced with a grin. “Yeah, matter fact that’s probably too small for ya. One second.” He grabs the sweatshirt back from Kiyoomi and heads back into the house before Kiyoomi can stop him.

Kiyoomi was a lanky kid. There’s no way Miya would fit into that sweatshirt. And why is Motoya giving his clothes away?

“Crab’s ready!” Osamu shouts.

“Crab’s ready!” Haru and Fumi repeat, despite them both being very adamant that they did not like crab and they only wanted hot dogs.

Kiyoomi walks over, following after Motoya and the kids, joining in as everyone looks over the spread. On a table covered in newspaper are four large plates with various crab meat, lemon slices and small bowls of garlic butter. Kiyoomi’s mouth waters at the sight.

He sits in an empty seat at the very end of the table, making sure to sit as far away from Suna as possible.

The back door slides open and Miya pops back out of the house carrying a light blue sweatshirt. He throws it at Kiyoomi before he can refuse and sits down across from him. “Hey kids are you gonna help dig out my crab meat,” Miya asks, holding up a large leg.

“YES!” Haru shouts. Fumi seems more apprehensive, looking to Motoya for advice. He nods silently and she repeats her brother’s chant.

Kiyoomi hasn’t had crab in a long time. He grimaces slightly at how he has to pick it all out to eat it. Suna seems to sense his hesitancy.

“There’s a bowl of free meat in the center of the table for those…less capable,” he says with a smirk.

Kiyoomi straights up and reaches for a leg, ignoring the comment.

“Thanks for letting everyone know Sunarin, let me know if ya need me to pass it to ya,” Miya quips. His comment earns him a sharp jab in the ribs for Osamu.

“No fighting at the table,” Motoya says sternly. Haru and Fumi straighten up immediately on instinct.

The chaos of the dinner is a lot, but in a good way. Since graduating college Kiyoomi has eaten most of his meals alone with a show playing in the background to fill the silence. His meals weren’t long affairs either. Just short breaks between drawing sessions. Even when he and Yasu ate together their dinner conversation was limited to current events or a gallery they’d been to.

So this rowdiness is different.

Kiyoomi’s pulled out of his thoughts when Miya lifts up their two plates and switches them, trading Kiyoomi’s singular unpicked crab leg for one full of empty crab shells and a pile of meat.

“I don’t need your help Miya,” he whispers.

“Is that how they say ‘thank you’ in Tokyo these days?” Miya asks.

“It is actually,” Motoya jumps in.

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and switches his plate out for Motoya’s. “Thank you for the crab Toya,” he says before taking a bite. It’s still steamy from the pot and god is it delicious.

“This is amazing Osamu…san,” Kiyoomi says after half a second of thought on how to address him. The decision to add an honorific gets Suna and Miya to cough.

Osamu holds up his hands before either can say anything. Kiyoomi’s eyes linger on the missing pinkie finger on Osamu’s left hand. “I’m glad you like it, Sakusa. Try it with the lemon” He smiles wide and Kiyoomi shares the genuine reaction.

In the corner of his eye he can feel Miya glowering at him. Between bites of crab meat he reflects on the decisions he’s made tonight and how they all effectively flipped the bird to Miya. Refusing his sweatshirt. Refusing his crab meat. Addressing his twin as something other than Miya. If he wants to get some answers from Miya he should at least try to curry his favor.

He lets a round of inner turmoil spin around in his head for a moment before deciding to put on the sweatshirt Miya gave to him. It smells like pine and sea salt and warms him up quickly. He looks up to mouth ‘thank you’ to Miya who in turn looks 60% less butthurt than he did a few minutes ago.

They all stay at the table until the crab meat is long picked and the newspaper is too blurry with grease to read. Empty beer bottles from the Miya twins and Suna litter the table. Kiyoomi opted not to drink so he could avoid throwing up at the expense of his brain still getting over his tequila antics. Motoya didn’t drink any either, he doesn’t like to when he’s watching Haru and Fumi.

As they clean up Kiyoomi sneaks a couple peeks at Miya who unfortunately looks just as sober as he did before they started dinner. He hoped he might be able to get some answers from Miya without having to embarrass himself through another round of their treacherous conversations.

“Stalker,” Suna whispers in his ear as he walks by with the empty plates.

Kiyoomi blushes at this and busies himself with balling up the newspaper.

“S’cuse me,” Miya says quietly, placing his hand on Kiyoomi waist as he slips by.

The touch burns to his core and he shies away from the contact.

“Oh sorry,” Miya says, like he’s surprised with himself. He pulls his hand back like he’s the one who’s been burned and moves to the end of the table to push in the chairs.

When everything is straightened up, Motoya and the kids go sit back by the fire. Suna and Osamu are inside doing the dishes. Kiyoomi knows he would be an unwanted help in there so he just stands by the table, unsure of what to do with himself.

“Want to go see something?” Miya asks. He proposes the question like he’s sure Kiyoomi will say yes.

Kiyoomi is apprehensive of the vague offer, glancing around the yard at what there could be to see here.

“Come on, you’ll like it.” He holds out his hand and drops it back to his side in the same motion. “Uh, it’s just on the other side of the house.”

“Okay,” Kiyoomi says, still wanting to ask Miya the questions he’s been wondering.

Miya grins and turns to walk, going slow enough for Kiyoomi to follow close behind. He heads all the way past the side of the house everyone is on and turns the corner into the dark part of the yard.

Kiyoomi hesitates for half a step, but continues to follow.

“Are you going to murder me?”

“Not with this many witnesses around.”

For the first time since he’s been here, Kiyoomi laughs.

Miya turns around at the sound but Kiyoomi can’t read his face in the dark. He assumes it’s some kind of prideful smirk.

“Come on, over here.” Miya sounds eager now as he leads Kiyoomi a little further and pulls out his phone, shining a light on two lawn chairs.

Kiyoomi huffs out a sigh and regrets the brewing excitement he had at whatever Miya was going to show him. “Chairs. Like the ones you have on the other side of the yard, just in the dark with no fire.”

Miya snorts. “Yes, and…” he trails off and points his finger upward. “A better view of those.”

Kiyoomi follows Miya’s finger and can’t help but gasp at the sky bursting with stars. Far more than he’s seen in Tokyo, or the two cloudy nights he’s been here. He drops down into the chair and cranes his neck all the way back to fully take in the stars.

There are so many stars it’s almost like the sky is half black and half glowing white. The clusters differ in size and shape. Kiyoomi struggles to find a single spot to focus on.

“I do like this,” he says softly.

“Knew ya would,” Miya says in an equally quiet tone.

They stare in silence for a few minutes before Kiyoomi decides to break it.

“So you…how long have Osamu and Suna been together?” He bails on a question for Miya and jumps to one about his brother and friend instead. His eyes have adjusted enough to see the puzzled expression on Miya’s face.

He seems to relax after a second, leaning back into the chair to mull the question over with an exaggerated hmmm . “Let's see. Well, those two idiots have been in love with each other since they were about 13, but, since they’re idiots, they didn’t figure it out till a lot later.”

“How much later?”

“Almost too late,” Miya chuckles. “I’m laughing now but back then it wasn’t as funny. Samu realized he liked Suna the day he was supposed to head off on a three month run with a distant-water charter boat. Sunarin had always known but kept quiet about it. They actually realized at the dock when we were seein’ him off. It was…messy.”

“Why? Three months isn’t that long.” Kiyoomi leans back further in his chair and turns to face Miya while he talks.

“It wasn’t so much the length of time versus what he was doin. 19 n’ signing up for a pretty dangerous job. Long-lining isn’t a joke. People die doin’ it. Thankfully Samu just lost a finger, could’ve been a lot worse with that shoddy captain he was workin’ under.”

Kiyoomi listens very carefully, taking in everything Miya has to say about the intricacies of the fishing world, getting swept up in how he talks about things.

“Plus we couldn’t contact him the whole trip. So like I said, Sunarin was a wreck.”

Kiyoomi shifts uncomfortably, unsure of how to respond to unsolicited details of someone else's pain.“At least he had you.”

Miya laughs again, turning to Kiyoomi with a sparkle in his eyes. “I wasn’t much better. Course I was cryin’ over LSAT practice tests. God, that summer was awful.”

Kiyoomi latches on to the first thing Miya has said about himself in 20 minutes. “Did you always know you wanted to be a lawyer?”

“Thought I did,” Miya says quietly. “Still pretty sure I do. Samu did too,” he says, diverting the subject back to his brother.

“Osamu wanted to be a lawyer?”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Sort of. Samu just sort of did it because that’s the path I was on and I dragged him with me. That bastard scored a 178 on the first and only practice LSAT he took too. Then he left and I spent all summer trying to beat him.

Kiyoomi doesn’t know anything about law school admissions tests to understand what a 178 is outside of context clues from Miya. “Did you?”

“You bet I did. 179 got me into Tokyo Law.”

“You lived in Tokyo?”

“Mhm.”

Kiyoomi stares at a satellite passing overhead, focusing on the green and red blinking lights. He and Miya were in the same city. He wonders if they ever crossed paths unknowingly. Had they ever traveled in the same packed train car? Or walked past each other in Shinjuku?

“Are you going back to law school in the fall?”

The space around grows silent except for a few chirping crickets.

“Why are ya askin’ me so many questions Omi?”

He stirs a little in his seat, uncomfortable under the scrutiny. “Is that not how a conversation goes?”

“Not one with you.”

Kiyoomi folds. “Maybe I decided I wanted to get to know you a little before I fully rejected your apology.”

“Or consider acceptin,” Miya teases.

“On the off chance that happens, yes, knowing you would play a role in my forgiving you.

“You really talk in circles.”

“I don’t see you getting to the point.”

Another round of cricket chirps breaks up their repartee.

“If you really want me to get to the point you’ll need to hold back from cutting me off every time I try to get serious.”

Kiyoomi gulps. He has been doing that, even if it was subconscious. “Okay,” he whispers.

Miya sighs and looks up at the sky. His jaw is clenches and his hands wrap tightly around the armrests of the chair. He shuts his eyes and opens his mouth. “We were more than just five-year-old playmates, Omi.”

Any response Kiyoomi has dies in his throat when something rustles through the sunflowers in front of them. Kiyoomi jumps straight out of the chair and Miya stands next to him, holding out his arm in front of Kiyoomi.

The sunflower stalks rustle again and a middle school aged boy runs out with four other kids in tow. Kiyoomi stares frozen at the kids and how they glow in the dark, like they’ve been drawn into the air with a neon blue pen he’d use in digital art.

His mouth dries up when his eyes fall on the last kid running and smiling. Standing among the four children he sees himself at 12 years old.

In Kiyoomi’s pre-teen years his hair was one giant poof with not a single defined curl in sight. His clothes are uncharacteristically covered in dirt, likely a byproduct of the kids young-Kiyoomi is playing with. The kids being Yachi, Osamu, Suna, and Miya.

They’re chasing after Osamu right now who’s running circles around adult-Kiyoomi and Miya.

“Holy shit,” Miya whispers, and Kiyoomi starts to realize this isn’t his imagination.

Then everything is engulfed in the same blue that coats these kids and Miya disappears from his side. Kiyoomi blinks and the sun is back out with no trace of a night sky. The blue has faded too with the normal colors of a summer day surrounding Kiyoomi.

“Hello?” He calls out, too scared to move. He cranes his neck to look around the house. Motoya and the kids are gone, but what’s more startling is the Ginkgo tree. It’s shorter.

“Samu give it back!” He hears a small voice yell.

The kids are back in the field now. Kiyoomi can see them clearer than before with fewer flowers filling the plot of land. 12-year-old Osamu comes running out holding out some kind of playing card. “Let me have a turn!” He shouts.

“Samu!” The other kid says again. It’s 12-year-old Miya. His hair is dark brown here. He’s matching his twin in every way except how his hair is parted and the amount of dirt all over his clothes.

The kids skip and giggle as they run around the yard. At the very end of the pack Kiyoomi watches his younger self tag along. He’s smiling wide but seems to be purposefully lagging one step behind everyone. “Osamu give the card back to Tsumu,” his younger self says.

Osamu stops at this, handing the card back to his brother. All five kids gather around to look at it with Yachi standing on her toes to get a good view. Suna towers over the other four who haven’t hit their growth spurts yet.

“Yeah this is mine! Grandma gave it to me!” Miya shouts, blowing a raspberry and running off into the field. The kids all chase after him with young Kiyoomi last again. He pauses right before he slips back among the tall flowers and turns to look directly at Kiyoomi.

“Stop looking,” his younger self whispers to him. It sends a chill down Kiyoomi’s spine. He wants to run away but his feet are frozen in place.

“Kiyo!” A familiar voice shouts, pulling his younger self’s gaze away from where he’s standing in the yard.

Kiyoomi watches as Motoya walks into view. He’s around 22 here and Kiyoomi can see the differences between him and his 35-year-old self that he didn’t catch before. “Your mom is looking for you.”

His younger self goes pale at this, disappearing back into the flower field.

Kiyoomi blinks and it’s night time again. He feels the cold air and a strong grip on his arm before he realizes what happened. He blinks and his vision goes a little blurry with tears he didn’t know he was crying.

“Kiyoomi,” Miya calls with urgency, shaking him slightly.

He sucks in a deep breath and coughs with short gasps. “Oh my god,” he wheezes, keeling over onto the ground. “W-what was that? What the fuck was that?” The grass feels wet in his hands and he grips onto it for dear life. His head is pulsing and his stomach lurches like he’s in the front seat of a car that just hit the breaks.

“I don’t know I mean well I do know but I’ve never seen them before and then you just went completely unresponsive for a minute there and it scared the shit out of me but-”

“Miya,” Kiyoomi coughs, grabbing the hand that’s still wrapped around his arm and peeling it off of him. “Breathe. And tell me what the hell just happened.”

Miya glances down at this hand as Kiyoomi lets go of it and looks back toward the field, clenching his fist. He takes a deep breath breathing in through his nose and exhaling through his mouth. “That was a Glimmer. Have you heard of them?”

Kiyoomi’s immediate response is to say no but he racks his brain and realizes he has. “Glimmer,” he repeats, testing out the word. Its meaning is just out of reach. “I don’t remember what that is.”

“They’re like a memory. A flicker of your past.”

“That you can SEE?!” Kiyoomi balks.

Miya’s eyes are trained on the field like they might reappear. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “They’re not nearly as common as appearances of the Shrine. My grandma used to tell us about them. She said you have to be raised here to see them but I didn’t think they were fucking real , I thought it was just a bedtime story.”

Kiyoomi stands up on shaky legs and takes some more deep breaths. “It brought me back there,” he whispers. He feels Miya’s eyes snap toward him.

“What? Like time travel?”

“I don’t know. It just- I was there.” He drops back on the ground when his legs still feel too shaky to stand on, lying down on his back in the grass. His need to feel grounded is so strong he doesn’t even care about all the bugs he’s inviting to crawl on him. “Did your grandma say anything about that?”

Miya lays down beside him and shakes his head. “No, she didn’t.”

“That was us,” Kiyoomi says. “How old were we? Middle school? We knew each other in middle school?” He rolls over to look at Miya who has that sad expression in his eyes again. “Miya.”

“Yeah,” Miya admits after a deep breath. “But we were just kids like ya said. Older than five but still kids. Yer never gonna remember. It doesn’t matter, okay?”

Kiyoomi doesn’t speak for a few minutes after that. He thinks about how he’s viewed his childhood with memories captured on dud film that won’t develop. He thinks about what he can remember from his more recent past. College. His first job. Reconnecting with Yachi.

Then everything flickers. Not like what just happened. He’s still here, lying on the grass in the dark with Miya. But his brain is playing a different scene in his head. A memory. He’s stuck in the back of the car with three large duffle bags stacked on top of one another shoved in the middle seat between him and Kousei. It’s dark out. He remembers his dad always liked to drive up to Karumi at night to avoid the traffic.

His mom is irritated about something, directing her frustrations to Kiyoomi while his brother smirks beside him. He has his head ducked down trying his best to get through the harsh words.

The memory slides by like a film strip rotating quickly for an old movie and he’s standing in the backyard of his Uncle’s house. It’s daytime now and the cicadas are buzzing in the woods. He’s still in his middle school uniform. It was the only clean clothes he had ready for the drive. He remembers feeling embarrassed. Worried he would be teased.

“Omi! Ya made it!”

It’s Miya. He came running across the street, hopping over the fence Kiyoomi’s uncle had along their front yard. Even back then it was old and fraying. The bleached wood is covered in lichen. He remembers running his hands along it, picking at the green algae.

“Do you want to watch the stars again tonight?”

The film strip flies by some more and he’s standing in Miya’s backyard staring up at the stars. He remembers feeling lonely, even while he stood beside his four friends. There was something he couldn’t tell them. He was too scared to.

Miya clears his throat and Kiyoomi snaps out of it. He just had a memory about Miya. How? Was it being here with him? Was it the Glimmer? This is crazy. He looks up at the sky full of stars that map the universe and begs it for answers.

“Okay?” Miya repeats. “Ya know what, let's just…do what we said. Leave each other alone.”

“I thought you never said that,” Kiyoomi tries to tease but it comes out sounding more nervous than he intended. He’s becoming unsettled by where this conversation is heading. He remembered Miya. Should he tell him? Or would that make it worse?

If a person’s reality is defined by their memories Kiyoomi’s is shifting right now. It terrifies him. Will he have more memories surface if he continues to be around Miya, or was this a one-time only change?

Miya said Glimmers are more rare than the Shrine which is already impossible to find. But what if he tried to find them? The promise he made to Yachi pops into his head for a second but he shakes it right back out when his younger self’s demand comes through.

Stop looking. In every horror movie Kiyoomi has ever seen the protagonists die when they ignore something like that. This is ridiculous. Kiyoomi doesn’t even know how to find these Glimmers. He’s not going to waste his time looking for elusive visions that he still hasn’t fully ruled out as a figment of his imagination.

“Then I’ll say it now,” Miya says, interrupting Kiyoomi’s inner turmoil. “I’ll leave ya alone.” His sad smile lingers for a few more seconds before he breaks through it with that stupid grin. “Bein with ya is no fun when yer always runnin’ away.”

“I thought you enjoyed tormenting me,” Kiyoomi cracks back.

“Oh more than anythin’ Omi. I just love pissin’ you off.” He says sarcastically.

“Well, you’re great at it.”

“I’m great at most things.”

Kiyoomi stands and rolls his eyes at how Miya winks. “You’re great at being full of yourself.”

“I’m great at picking crab,” Miya throws back.

Kiyoomi starts to walk away. If Miya wants him to leave then he’ll leave. “You’re fine at picking crab.”

“You didn’t even eat it ya gave it to Toya!” Miya laughs. “Next time-”

“There’s no next time,” Kiyoomi says firmly from a few feet away. “You’re going to leave me alone, remember?” He turns before he can see the realization on Miya’s face and starts to walk back to the other side of the house.

* * *

Kiyoomi helps carry Haru back while Motoya holds Fumi, both of the kids are completely conked out from the long day. They cross the street silently to avoid waking up the kids. Kiyoomi’s eyes linger on the layer of lichen growing on the fence, illuminated by the nearby street light.

When they get in the house Haru wakes up and Motoya puts them both to bed. Kiyoomi stays in the kitchen with his head lying against the countertop. He lingers on his newfound memory. Maybe he should have told Miya about it.

He squashes the thought. All that would have led to is more of Miya asking him if he remembers things. Just when they finally got past that. He forces Miya out of his head and focuses on everything else.

1. Glimmers exist
2. He was pulled back in time
3. His past self spoke to him, told him to stop looking
4. He had a memory come back

Stop looking. What did he mean? Stop looking at him? Maybe the kids didn’t like how a weird adult was staring at them. That must have been it. Any other explanation would be too much.

“Looked like you and Atsumu were having fun tonight,” Motoya says quietly. He must have gotten Haru to fall back to sleep.

“Looks can be deceiving.”

Motoya rubs his back with a comforting hand and walks to the far left cabinet on the other side of the kitchen, pulling out a crinkling bag.

“Potato chips,” he whispers. “Don’t tell the kids.”

Kiyoomi nods solemnly and declines with an upheld hand when Motoya offers his secret snack.

He stuffs his hand back in the bag and pulls out a singular, large, chip. “Seriously though, what’s going on with you guys? There’s a lot of…tension.”

If Kiyoomi had any doubts about the question Motoya was really asking, they were washed away by the smirk he has on his face and how he pumps his eyebrows up and down with a wink. He shifts uncomfortably in the chair at the question, too caught up in his own thoughts to say no.

For a moment, he humors the idea. That moment grows uncomfortable as he thinks about Yasu. They aren’t together by any means but the conversation still feels wrong. He wonders if that feeling will go away, or if the feeling is because of Yasu at all—and not because Miya is a guy.

He bites his nail and lets the thought linger a little longer. Miya is handsome but he drives Kiyoomi up the wall. Theoretically, he pisses him off the perfect amount for good hate sex, not that Kiyoomi has ever had any. He tries to actually avoid the people he hates.

But as the thoughts of sex with Miya ruminate, his last phone call with his brother comes to mind. Kiyoomi’s stomach fills with anxiety. He shakes the thoughts away and focuses back on Miya. Petulant, annoying, Miya.

If he were to do something with someone new, it wouldn't be with Miya freaking Atsumu.

“Was that too much?” Motoya says. He drops his smirk and looks intently at Kiyoomi. “I mean I don’t know if you’re, uh, you know…”

“Do you know what a Glimmer is Toya?” Kiyoomi steers the conversation away from Motoya’s verbal stumble over the subject of Kiyoomi’s sexuality.

His cousin visibly relaxes at the change in subject and then furrows his eyebrows. “Like something shiny?”

“More like something magic.”

He shakes his head at this and his hand dives back into the chip bag. “Hm, no. I don’t think I know what you mean.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t really know what he means either. At least not enough to explain it to someone else. He folds his arms against the table and drops his face into them, inhaling a deep breath to calm his nerves. When pine and sea salt fill his senses he remembers he’s wearing Miya’s sweatshirt.

“There’s a lot of magic in Karumi,” Motoya says. He folds the large potato chip bag up and sticks it back in the cabinet. “A lot of different words for it too. Voices. Spirits. Ripples.”

Kiyoomi nods and continues to breathe in pine and sea salt. The smell is relaxing if he doesn’t think too hard about who it’s tied to.

“You know you can talk to me Kiyo.”

Motoya’s words come through like an echo and in the corner of his eye Kiyoomi sees 22-year-old blue and glowing Motoya standing by the kitchen table giving the same advice to his twelve-year-old self. Kiyoomi snaps his eyes back to 35-year-old Motoya who’s still staring at him, smiling gently. He doesn’t look like someone who’s seeing a ghost of his past self.

“Do you see that?” Kiyoomi says quietly in case they can hear him.

“See what?” Motoya frowns. “Ugh, was it another mouse? I’ve been trying to get rid of this one trickster that manages to get all the food out of the traps without getting caught. Then he eats it and poops on the counter. He’s taunting me Kiyo!” Motoya walks over to the kitchen table where his past self is. Neither of them take notice of each other.

Kiyoomi’s eyes wander to his younger self, staring at his glowing face in the reflection of the kitchen window. He’s ignoring 22-year-old Motoya’s offer to help with whatever is bothering him. What’s wrong? Kiyoomi watches his younger self’s eyes wander and meet Kiyoomi’s gaze in the reflection. Out of fear of being caught Kiyoomi shuts his eyes tight.

“I’m not looking,” he promises. “I’ll stop.”

“What are you doing in here?” It’s Kousei’s voice this time. Kiyoomi clenches his eyes tighter at the sound, willing the memories to go away.

“Kiyo?” Motoya says, and Kiyoomi can’t tell which one it is. “I know you’re scared of mice Kiyo but it would be a big help if you could look.”

Kiyoomi cracks his eyes open. Motoya is crawling around on the floor now and the Glimmer is gone.

Motoya can’t see the Glimmers.

Why can Miya?

The coffee maker is beeping. Bacon is sizzling on the stove. At the kitchen table Haru and Fumi are fighting over the first batch of pancakes Motoya made. The sink is rushing water as Motoya cleans a mixing bowl. All the sounds come together like white noise as Kiyoomi looks down at the package Yachi sent him.

His sketchbooks. They’re finally here. So are some of his t-shirts Yachi used to pad the box, his markers, gouache set, and his iPad. He wants to cry. He didn’t know how much he missed his supplies until now. He takes everything out and inspects each item, making sure they got here okay. Yachi refused to mail his colored pencils fearing the cores would break and Kiyoomi’s glad he listened.

 “Got your stuff Kiyo?” Motoya says. He’s at the counter patting the bacon with a paper towel. Kiyoomi’s mouth waters at the smell.

“Yes.” His eyes have started to tear up slightly. His whole life might be a disaster right now but at least he can finally draw.

There’s a note in the box on cat stationery Yachi got Kiyoomi for his birthday last year. This particular page is a pale orange covered in calicos.

“I hope you’re enjoying your break so far. I’m sure there’s a lot in Kurami to inspire you. Try to remember what it felt like to just draw .”

He holds the note carefully and reads it over a couple of times. His time here has been a swinging pendulum of enjoyment and general unease. Last night his dreams were laced with glowing blue strings that tied him down. It was scary enough to have him checking his back every few minutes this morning, but he’s yet to see any Glimmers. Hopefully it stays that way.

Kiyoomi reflects on the latter part of Yachi’s message. Try to remember what it feels like to just draw . He thinks he knows what she’s getting at. Back when creating art was for himself, not someone’s approval or a stingy paycheck. Back when it was fun.

It’s not that he hates art now. He just has a different relationship with it. Once the workday is over art has become something he turns away from, as opposed to turning toward. That feeling probably started in the latter half of college, somewhere between the assignment to draw 200 different logos or when he had to make a thirty-second animation entirely from hand-drawn charcoal.

But he’s been wanting to capture so many scenes this week. It makes getting this package all the better.

“Are you doing work today?” Motoya asks. He sets a plate of bacon, eggs, and some of the refried beans they had the other night beside Kiyoomi.

He takes a bite of the glorious food and shakes his head. “No, but I am going to draw.”

He just needs a subject. The sky is overcast today and not the lighting he wants to capture for some kind of beach piece. He could go to the forest, but the carp flags outside Suna’s bike shop are still pulling at his interest. The initial concept will need to be different now that he has so much unease tied to the building after interacting with Suna. But it’s a feeling he wants to explore, especially with the building as the subject.

“I think I’ll go into town,” he says after another mouthful of food.

“You can take the car this time, the kids and I are going to go on a hike down the road later.”

Kiyoomi nods with thanks and eats the rest of his food in large bites. The energy to draw is bursting inside of him right now and he doesn’t want to lose a single spark of it. He hurries to clean his plate and pack his things. Yachi included his canvas tote bag in the box—one that he had specially made to fit all of his different supplies. He slips in his most recent black sketchbook and grabs an assortment of markers.

“Bye!” He shouts, running out the door. His farewell is answered by Haru and Fumi shouting “come back soon” at an ear-splitting volume. 

He slips sneakers on – with socks this time – and runs out the back door. It’s warmer this morning than it has been lately which means this afternoon will probably be exceptionally hot. It’s good that Kiyoomi is getting out now. He starts the car and pulls out of the driveway, making a special effort not to look toward Miya’s house as he passes by.

Fiance. Job. Sketchbooks. He runs the list over in his head as he drives into town.

Fiance. He and Yasu are very much over. He hasn’t heard from her and doesn’t plan on reaching out. He’s not sad about it, which in turn makes him sad. They were together for two years but his heart doesn’t seem to care that it’s over. Yes, Yasu was the only person he’s been in a long-term relationship with, but she wasn’t his first love. Kiyoomi hasn’t had that yet.

Job. He doesn’t really have one right now? But he doesn’t not have one either. It’s just on pause, like a vacation. A much-needed one.

Sketchbooks. He finally has his sketchbooks.

He smiles wide the rest of the drive trying and failing to avoid the bumps in the road as he goes in. The jostling doesn’t do much to damper his mood. He’s too excited right now. He pulls into the parking lot just as slow as he did last time and walks over to the bike shop.

The sign on the door is flipped out to display “open” which adds to the uneasiness Kiyoomi is feeling. He leans into the urge to walk away with how he sketches the building, giving sharp edges to the spots rounded corners are occupying on the actual building.

When the base sketch starts to come together Kiyoomi breaks out his markers, grabbing the light blue-gray one first and uncapping it with a satisfying snap.

People are passing him by on the sidewalk now making their way through their errands and window shopping. Kiyoomi doesn’t pay the commotion any mind until a soft blue glow slips by in the corner of his eye. He can’t help but follow the motion, turning to catch the figure disappearing into an unidentified storefront wedged between an artist studio filled with driftwood and a kitchen supply store.

No one seemed to notice the glowing blue figure. It should have at least earned a double-take from someone. But nothing.

The question Kiyoomi did his best to ignore last night resurfaces. Why can only he and Miya see the Glimmers?

He looks back down at his sketchbook and frowns at the gray mark seeping from where he left the tip sitting on the page. He recaps his marker and tries to decide what to do. He doesn’t want to be pulled into the memory again. Just thinking about it makes him feel overcome with the need to lie down. That was awful. What if he gets stuck there?

In all the movies he’s watched in the past few years that was a very real consequence in any plot line involving other worlds. He even illustrated a scene for a poster where the character gets stuck. They’re banging on an invisible wall trying to get out but they can't break through. Last night Kiyoomi didn’t feel stuck. It happened too fast for him to consider whether or not he was trapped. He mostly felt lost, but even that was unsettling.

He glances at the storefront again. For him to go after that thing right now he needs the benefits to outweigh the detriments. The only benefit he can think of right now is getting more of his memories back, and with them, the inspiration to take on these assignments Yachi is trying to get him to do.

Detriments? Some kind of horrifying magical consequence he doesn’t know that he’s messing with. Or what if his memories are bad? What would that do to him?

For just a moment, he wishes Miya were here.

“Are you coming?”

Kiyoomi jumps, startled by the young voice. A blue glowing hand is beckoning him from the doorway. Horror movie 101 is telling Kiyoomi to get the hell away from whatever this is, but his gut is oddly reassured. He grabs his stuff and goes forward, walking to the storefront and discovering a brightly lit bookstore instead of some creepy child waiting to pull him into a different reality.

“How are you doing?” Someone calls out. The voice is deep and jovial. A large man pops his balding head out from behind a large stack of books on the counter and smiles wide at Kiyoomi. “Let me know if you need anything!”

The desk he’s behind is filled with collectible pins and bookmarks. The shelf below holds Kiyoomi’s attention for a minute, showcasing a series of art books. He shakes his head and looks away. He’s not here to shop.

“Did you see someone come in here before me? A kid?” Blue? Glowing? Kiyoomi adds in his head.

“You’re the first person in here this morning,” the owner says with the same smile. His cheerful attitude gets Kiyoomi to share the happy expression, albeit a little constipated with emotion. He’s not much of a smiler.

“Good stuff is in the back.” The man winks and goes back to whatever he’s doing on the old computer by the desk.

Kiyoomi glances around for the kid to no avail but obliges the owner in a courtesy look-through. It would be too awkward to leave now. Pale hardwood floors creak as he steps through the space eyeing the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that line the walls. In the middle of the room is a table with a sign for new releases in bright pink font. Briefly, he wonders if he knows any of the cover artists.

Walking to the back the floors start to creak more. The foundation on this part of the building must be older. The strip of visible wall between the two bookshelves is covered in a thin, chipping blue paint. Underneath the cracked paint is a faded yellow wallpaper that probably shouldn’t have been painted over.

He runs his hand against the wall and immediately retracts it when it cracks further. A piece the size of a postcard peels off and floats to the ground. He winces at the damage he just caused and considers leaving it there for a moment. It could have ripped at any time. No one has to know he’s the reason it did.

The image of the smiling shop owner breaks through his selfish resolve and Kiyoomi bends down to pick up the giant chip of paint. He lifts it up and his eyes widen when he realizes it's not just paint. Turning it over he finds a small postcard-sized piece of yellowing paper with faded black ink preserving some words.

“The rules” is printed in a stretched serif font at the top, but it’s not what first catches Kiyoomi’s attention. No, among the bulleted list is the word “Glimmer.”

His heart pounds at the find and adrenaline kicks in before he considers his actions, slipping the piece of paper in his bag and running out the door.

“Come back soon!” The shop owner calls out, but Kiyoomi’s running down the sidewalk before he can respond.

* * *

Kiyoomi’s out of breath when he gets to Miya’s doorstep, which definitely isn’t helping him make his case as Miya stares at him with a hard, judgemental expression.

“Who’s the one who can’t leave the other alone now?” Miya says. His hand is gripping the door frame, holding it open enough for Kiyoomi to see him but closed enough to make Kiyoomi know he isn’t welcome.

He takes another deep breath to try to get some words out. “I-”

“Last night. Literally last night ya said to leave ya alone. It hasn’t even been 24 hours Omi are ya really that desperate to see me? Why don’t we stop playing this game and just-”

“LOOK,” Kiyoomi shouts, thrusting the piece of paper in Miya’s face “at what I found.”

Miya stops his obnoxious commentary and takes the piece of paper, eyes flicking back and forth as he scans it. Kiyoomi buckles over and takes a few more breaths. He flat out sprinted over here once he parked the car back in his driveway. Kiyoomi is an illustrator, not an athlete. And his lung capacity has been long marred by inhaling paint fumes over the years.

“I need your help.”

“What am I looking at?”

“I found that,” Kiyoomi says after another deep breath. He takes a step forward and leans over to read it with Miya. “It was in that bookshop in town. 

“Okay well thank you for showing me your wrinkly piece of paper Omi.”

“God aren’t lawyers supposed to have good reading comprehension? Read the list Miya. It’s about those stupid Glimmers,” he hisses.

At the mention of the final word, Miya’s face grows more serious. He squints his eyes and looks back at the print. Kiyoomi does too, still having not read the full list.

The Rules:

• A Shrine wish can only be used for good.
• Glimmers appear to guide those who are lost
• Magic does not stray from Kurami

“Seriously what is this?” Miya flips the paper over to the side covered in paint and back again. “Did you make this?”

Kiyoomi scowls and takes the paperback. “No, I told you I found it. At that bookshop in town.”

Miya pauses and looks Kiyoomi up and down with a high level of scrutiny. “So you went to the bookstore and bought a wrinkly paint-covered piece of paper. Great find, was it on sale,” he mocks.

“I didn’t buy it,” Kiyoomi mumbles.

“Oh, you STOLE it!” Miya laughs in disbelief. “You stole from the poor old man?”

“That’s not the point, Miya,” he snaps. “Did you read it? It’s about Glimmers.”

He waits for Miya to have some kind of perspective shift that gets him to where Kiyoomi is now: freaking out. But he just stares blankly at Kiyoomi. “So?”

“What do you mean, so ?” Kiyoomi can’t believe this. “We- we saw GLOWING visions of our past selves and-”

“And what?” Miya says firmly. “It was just a- I don’t even know. And I was drunk! I could have imagined it.”

“You had three beers. And I wasn’t drunk.”

Miya sighs and grips the door tighter. “Why are you breaking the agreement now?”

“Why are you acting like we didn’t see what we saw last night?”

“You said there was no next time.”

Kiyoomi groans and throws his head back in frustration. “This isn’t about that. This isn’t…” He exhales slowly and stares Miya in the eyes. “I said there was no next time, and then I went home and saw another Glimmer.”

Miya’s eyes widen slightly at this, finally starting to understand what Kiyoomi is saying. But then he frowns and looks at the ground.

“Again, so what?”

“So??”

What is he supposed to say to get Miya to listen to him? This is insane. He never should have come over here.

“Yeah. So what? Huh? Do you want to use this probably fake list of directions to venture around Kurami looking for Glimmers like we’re in the Goonies?”

Kiyoomi hadn’t thought that far ahead but yeah something like that.

“Why are you here Kiyoomi?” Miya says again, and Kiyoomi starts to get what he’s asking. Why me?

“I saw the Glimmer in the kitchen with Motoya. But he didn’t see it. And again in town today. No one else can see it…but you.”

Surprise fills Miya’s eyes again and so does that lingering sadness. Kiyoomi is sick of that expression, always covered by a fake laugh or a forced grin. Does Miya want there to be a bigger reason for Kiyoomi showing up at his doorstep?

Words Miya shared yesterday pop back into his head.

“You said we were more than just five-year-old playmates,” Kiyoomi says slowly.

Miya’s still looking at the ground but Kiyoomi knows he heard him. Cicadas are buzzing somewhere in the trees around them.

“I did say that,” Miya says after his pause.

“Then…what were we?”

Miya opens and shuts his mouth. The longer he takes to respond the more uneasy Kiyoomi becomes. Why is he hesitating so much?

“Look, we grew up together. Not just at five. Every year ya were here. Till we– till ya…stopped coming.” He says the last part quietly. “N’ then four days ago ya just show up here and…”

“I didn’t remember you,” Kiyoomi finishes and frowns to himself. That small piece that came back to him last night is all he has in his memories of Miya. “Why don’t I remember you?”

Miya smiles sadly. “I don’t know.”

They stand there silently for a moment. Kiyoomi feels the afternoon sun start to warm the back of his neck that the shade from the door awning doesn’t reach. A few cars whizz by on the road.

“I had one memory come back,” he whispers. “After seeing the Glimmer with you. We- we watched those stars before, didn’t we?”

Miya smiles and nods and then snaps his head back up. “Wait it came back? Your memory came back?”

“Just that one moment,” Kiyoomi says quickly as Miya grabs him by the wrist and pulls him inside “The moment the glimmer was showing.”

He stumbles forward and Miya slides the door shut behind him, falling into a silent pace walking back and forth across the entryway. He’s muttering to himself with his hand on his chin like a wanna-be Sherlock Holmes.

“Miya.’

“Just a second.”

He continues to pace about and Kiyoomi stares at him. He’s wearing another white button-up that looks very wrinkled and slept in. His pants are gray sweatshirt material and look way too warm to be comfortable to wear right now.

“What if we tried to get your memories back?”

“How?”

“I don’t know,” Miya admits. “But if you’re open to it, say so and I’ll try to make a plan. If you’re not…just leave. I don’t want to waste my time on this.”

It’s an ultimatum, but Kiyoomi finds the terms fair enough for the situation they’re in. He’s sick of being a stranger to his own life. “Okay, what do you have in mind?”

It’s a good thing they’re planning this out at Miya’s house. Kiyoomi wouldn’t know how to explain himself to Motoya if this serial-killer-style whiteboard was in his living room when he and the kids came home. But no, they’re in Miya’s room now.

Ten minutes ago he dragged Kiyoomi upstairs and wheeled out a giant whiteboard from behind his bed and got to writing immediately. Since then Kiyoomi has been staring around the room, taking in the stacks of law books, messy light green bedspread, and uncomfortably blank walls. On the far side of the room are two small windows. The view is mostly taken over by the large Ginkgo tree but small slivers of Mt. Fuji peak through.

The red expo marker squeaks wildly as Miya continues his feverish writing. There are lots of circles and lines involved in whatever plan he’s writing out. Kiyoomi can’t make out a single word of it.

“Where did you get this whiteboard?” Kiyoomi asks, popping his head beside Miya’s.

Miya waves Kiyoomi away and continues to mutter to himself. He steps to the only free space on the far left side of the board and writes “The Rules” in all caps, proceeding it with three bullet points.

“Can ya get me that list again?” His sleeves are rolled up now and he bites his lip as he writes.

“The stolen one,” Kiyoomi asks sarcastically while he ruffles through his bag. His markers spilled out of their side pouch when he ran over here and the piece of paper is buried beneath them.

“God don’t remind me.”

He hands Miya the paper and steps back to watch him copy the contents onto the board. “It wasn’t some kind of item for sale. It peeled off the wall.”

The marker squeaks to a stop and Miya looks over his shoulder at Kiyoomi. “Then I’d try you with property damage instead of theft.” 

“Your fingerprints are all over the evidence too. The jury would never buy it.”

Miya rolls his eyes and resumes his note-taking.

Kiyoomi shifts uneasily at the attitude Miya has been directing at him since he got here. He must have upset him last night, but he can’t think of how their dynamic was any different last night than it has been the other times they were forced to interact. If anything they were a little closer.

“Oh,” Kiyoomi says when he remembers.

“What?” Miya continues to face the board, now looking over his notes and capping the marker.

“I still have your sweatshirt.”

Miya turns at this and frowns at Kiyoomi. “Can you focus?”

He scoffs and folds his arms. “Excuse me for worrying about your stuff.”

“You’re excused.”

“Miya,” he warns. Why did he ever think this could work? Miya is impossible to talk to.

His inner gripes are interrupted by the sound of hard plastic tapping the whiteboard. Miya smiles when he grabs Kiyoomi’s attention and points to bullet #2. 

“Glimmers appear to guide those who are lost.”

“Why did you come here Omi?”

“Do we really need to go over this again, you’re the only one who can–”

“No,” Miya interrupts. He runs a frustrated hand through his hair and tussles his bedhead. “Why did you come to Kurami?”

Oh.

Yasu and the night he left pops back into his head. The rain. How her family looked at him with disgust. So does his empty apartment probably being rented out to someone else now. He hated his landlord but that place was his home for three years and he misses it a little. He misses Yachi too. Especially their Friday dessert dates where they’d plan out which projects they’d submit a bid for.

His homesickness has been coming in waves since he got here. Just now it hit him like a truck.

“I…don’t want to talk about it.”

Miya huffs in annoyance and gestures to the board. “This won’t work unless we know why we’re… lost .” He grimaces at the last word like it’s painful to play along with the rules on this list.

We. Right, Miya must have some kind of issue too. Probably related to why he dodges the subject of law school whenever it's brought up. Can law students just take time off? Kiyoomi sits down on the blue circular rug filling the floor they’re standing on. It’s the scratchy kind that he wouldn’t want his bare skin to touch. “Then why are you lost?” 

Miya looks around his room like he’s the one in a new space and not Kiyoomi. He shifts the weight between his feet and exhales slowly. “Fine, we don’t have to talk about it. These rules might not even be true.”

Kiyoomi wants to call him out on his hypocrisy but he lets it slide. “Well, then what should we do?”

“Can’t you read the board I just spent 30 minutes working on?”

“No, your handwriting is atrocious.”

“You’re infuriating,” Miya huffs. He stomps back to the board and brings the marker to the top line and starts to read.

As far as plans go, Miya’s is pretty simple on paper—his messy handwriting aside. They are, however, difficult in theory, as it requires him and Miya to spend time together. Six proposed sites to visit, all of which have some kind of tie to when they grew up together. Miya has circled each site so many times Kiyoomi can’t make out a single character of the initial text.

“We don’t have to go to them in this order, I just wrote em’ as I remembered them,” Miya says with his back turned to Kiyoomi. “The fort, the hideout, the boat, treasure island, the lighthouse, and the cave.”

“Cave?”

“Mhm.”

A headline about two cave explorers getting trapped underground and dying pops into Kiyoomi’s mind. “No cave.”

“Really?” Miya lifts an eyebrow and stares between Kiyoomi and his list. “Aren’t illustrators supposed to be adventurous? Ya know, to get good inspiration?”

“Aren’t lawyers supposed to be smart and ya know, not die?” Kiyoomi asks, mimicking Miya’s Kansai-ben. And no, he isn’t some adventurous illustrator. His references are gathered through hours of digging through Pinterest like most other artists he knows.

He earns the nth eye-roll of the morning. “Fine, no cave. Ya didn’t like going there back then either.”

Kiyoomi relaxes a little and processes the rest of the list. “Where is all of this?” He can assume the lighthouse is somewhere near the coastline, and that the boat would be somewhere at the marina, but the other three sites are too vague.

“If ya don’t remember em’ then what’s the point in me describing them to ya? Let's just go see em.”

“Right now?” Kiyoomi didn’t expect this to be so immediate. And what would they even do?

“We’ve got five sites, why not knock em’ out once a day? They should each take a couple of hours. Today’s Monday so we would finish on….Friday,” Miya says as he counts the days out in his head.

A week of having to spend all day with Miya when the past 30 minutes here have been exhausting. Kiyoomi opens his mouth to argue and realizes the other option would be spreading it out over the next month, which really would just mean more time with Miya. He should just rip the bandaid off.

Though ripping this band-aid off means exposing himself to more unsettling interactions with his past self and possibly getting the bends if he’s pulled into the memory again.

“Fine, we can start today, but I need to get ready for it.”

“Are you gonna be this fussy the whole time? Your hair looks fine.”

“Fussy?” Kiyoomi splutters, standing up. “I’m not talking about my hair Miya.” He reaches up to touch it on instinct. He still hasn’t been able to find any product here but his curls are mostly intact today. “I need to be mentally ready.”

“For what?” Miya’s lounging on the carpet now and Kiyoomi’s the one pacing around the room. 

“For what ?! Miya. We’re about to go around chasing projections…images…I don’t know what to call them but glowing freaking memories that have a propensity for time travel.”

Miya snaps his fingers with a smile. “Propensity, nice word,”

Kiyoomi holds in a shout and directs his frustration to his curls, pulling his fingers through them and most definitely ruining any kind of definition they had. “You’re telling me you aren’t worried after what we saw?”

“What's there to worry about? I thought it was kind of cool. We already did all the worrying we needed. Now we have a plan so we can stop worrying.”

“If the goal was to get to water and the plan was to jump off a bridge would you still not be worried?”

Goal. What is their goal in all of this? Just to get Kiyoomi’s memories back? If so, how many of them? He just came over here to show Miya the piece of paper and everything got away from him. Kiyoomi squints at the chicken scratch writing on the board to see if Miya outlined that as well.

Miya laughs and cocks his head to the side, cracking a blinding smile. If he weren’t laughing at Kiyoomi’s frustrations right now he might be a little handsome. The kind of handsome Kiyoomi used to envy in college but now he just finds interesting to look at.

“You’ve changed,” he says through his smile. His brown eyes are wide and searching, like he’s trying to learn more about Kiyoomi through sight alone.

“How?” Kiyoomi can’t help but ask.

Unlike the past times Kiyoomi has asked Miya a question like this, his smile doesn’t waver. Instead, he stands up and his grin melts into a soft smile. He walks over to Kiyoomi – who resists the urge to step back – and reaches his hand out, twisting one of Kiyoomi’s curls in his fingers.

“Ya argue more. I like it.”

Kiyoomi pushes his hand away and tries to calm the anxious beat his heart is thumping. “Stop messing with my hair.” He takes another step back and turns toward the door. “Give me an hour, then we’ll leave.”

He glances back toward the list and frowns when he still can’t make it out. He can’t remember any of the options either aside from Treasure Island. “Which one are we doing first?”

Miya hums and hahs over the list as he leads Kiyoomi back to the front door. They step out of Miya’s room and head down the hall past three other doors to the staircase. The final step is an inch shorter than the rest on the stairs, causing Kiyoomi to stumble a little when he steps off it.

“Sorry, forgot to remind ya,” Miya says.

Kiyoomi ignores him and continues to look around the house. The kitchen is much tidier than the one in Kiyoomi’s Uncle’s house, probably due to a lack of children running around with sticky fingers and dirt-covered feet. The drying rack by the sink is full of last night’s dishes. Kiyoomi spots the orange plate he had before he and Miya swapped.

The walls are full of maps and water charts Osamu probably uses. There are also a few medium-format prints framed in thick black wood. Black and white shots of the beach and one portrait of the twins on a boat are printed on matte paper. Osamu’s in the foreground looking into the camera with a wide smile while winding up some rope and Miya’s in the background. His back is turned as he looks out across the ocean.

The artistic style in the framing and exposure is similar to the shots covering the bike shop and it clicks with Kiyoomi.

“Suna took em’,” Miya says as he steps toward the front door.

Kiyoomi nods at the confirmation, eyes still lingering on the photo. This is how Suna sees the twins, huh. He tears his gaze away and turns back toward the front door. He needs to shower and eat something.

“Where are we going first then?” He asks like they haven’t stopped talking about their plan to find more glimmers.

Miya tilts his head back and looks up to the ceiling as he still considers. He snaps his gaze back to Kiyoomi and smiles, opening the door for him to leave. “Just make sure you’re wearing long sleeves and pants when you come back.”

“Why? Where are we going?” He steps outside and turns back to Miya for an answer.

“The hideout,” Miya says, sliding the door shut before Kiyoomi can ask any questions.

Bug spray.

Check.

Extra strength sunscreen.

Check.

First Aid kit.

Kiyoomi fumbles around his overly stuffed tote bag for his pocket-sized First Aid kit he bought his freshman year of college. He has only ever used it for splinters and minor burns from hot glue guns, but with the uncertainty of where Miya is taking him it might see some more action.

Kiyoomi always wanted to try out the gauze. Maybe Miya will trip and fall.

He shakes the thought away and checks his phone. It has been nearly 30 minutes. He should head back over there. He slings the bag over his shoulder and tiptoes through the house, not wanting to wake Haru and Fumi up during their naptime.

He also doesn’t want Motoya to know where he’s going.

“Where are you headed Kiyo?” Motoya asks just when Kiyoomi is about to step outside. Kiyoomi jumps in surprise, nearly hitting his head on one of the workshop shelves full of beach towels.

He smiles in a half-assed attempt to play off his suspicious actions. “Uh,” Kiyoomi pauses and looks up, grabbing a blue towel covered in white wavy lines. “The beach.”

Motoya shuts the cooler he’s been standing in front of with an orange popsicle in hand. It’s another one of his secret snack stashes kept away from the kids. “You’re going to the beach dressed like that?”

Kiyoomi looks down at his clothes and forces his face to maintain a smile. “Yes, I’m going to the beach in…dress pants and a long sleeved shirt. For the sun,” he adds. He might be an adult but under his older cousin's judgemental gaze Kiyoomi feels five-years-old again.

Motoya studies Kiyoomi, the popsicle wrapper crinkling in his hand as he opens it. He must know Kiyoomi is lying, but he doesn’t know why. Kiyoomi isn’t going to stick around for him to find out.

“Well, bye,” he coughs.

“Wait!”

Kiyoomi freezes and turns to find Motoya holding out a beach umbrella. “For the sun,” he smirks even more.

He gingerly accepts the red umbrella and hurries out the doorway. Kiyoomi keeps an eye on Motoya through the windows as he walks parallel to the house and makes a mad dash toward Miya’s house when he sees Motoya step into the pantry.

The last time he ran this hard it was to catch the last train after a night at the bars with Yachi. Neither of them were nearly as out of breath as Kiyoomi is now, huffing for air on Miya’s porch. He gives the door two halfhearted knocks and bends over, sucking in air. His left hand is uncomfortably sweaty with the plastic umbrella handle. So is the rest of his body under the heavy clothes.

The door slides open right before Kiyoomi starts to shout for Miya to come let him in.

Unfortunately for Kiyoomi, Miya takes one look at him and starts to laugh. “Oh my god,” he cackles with his hand on his stomach. “Where do you think we’re going?”

“Shut up,” Kiyoomi groans, pushing Miya out of the way and shoving the umbrella into his arms.

Miya looks it over, laughing more gently now. “Aw Omi you shouldn’t have. I didn’t get you anything.” He waits a beat for Kiyoomi to respond but Kiyoomi is too busy regulating his heartbeat.

“Do you want some water?” Miya turns toward the kitchen, leading Kiyoomi away from the entryway.

Kiyoomi shakes his head and lifts his bag. “I’ve got my own.” 

Miya leans his head to the side and looks over the bag. “Got enough stuff in there?”

Kiyoomi’s shoulder aches slightly at the pressure of his now-heavy tote bag digging into him. He shrugs his right shoulder up to stop the bag from sliding and ignores Miya.

“Not sure yer gonna need all that Omi-Omi.”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and follows Miya through the house, walking past Suna’s photos again. “Well you didn’t tell me where we were going.”

“You’re right,” Miya whispers with a showful voice, like he’s playing a game with Haru and Fumi. “We could be going to the Amazon Rainforest for all you know. Did you bring enough bug spray?”

“Not enough for you.” Kiyoomi’s cheeks heat up with embarrassment and he hugs his bag tighter to his side as he follows Miya through the kitchen. The dishes are put away now. Kiyoomi’s eyes linger on the empty dish rack. He didn’t picture Miya as the type to do chores.

They get to the back door and start walking to the edge of the yard toward the sunflower field. Kiyoomi glances at the chairs they had stargazed from last night. It feels like they were there weeks ago but it hasn’t even been a full day.

Miya stops at the edge of the yard and looks toward Kiyoomi expectantly.

“What?” Kiyoomi asks when Miya doesn’t say anything.

“It’s in here.”

“The hideout?” It’s in his yard?

Miya laughs with a loud cackle and takes one step into the flower field, maneuvering around the thick green stalks. “Yup! Sure ya brought enough supplies? Should we go back to your place and stock up some more?”

Kiyoomi shoves past Miya and steps further into the field. “Well if you had actually told me where we were going I would have brought less.”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

“Do you typically derive your own entertainment from the expense of others?”

“No, just at the expense of yours.”

Kiyoomi stops adding fuel to the fire and focuses on where he’s going. He takes careful steps forward, watching how his feet sink into the tilled up soil. There aren’t any footprints from last night. The Glimmers don’t leave any traces.

The surrounding sunflowers reach a foot over Kiyoomi’s head. Slivers of blue sky peak through the yellow petals and speckled shadows are cast at the ground past long green stems. Looking forward he can’t see anything but thousands of sunflowers.

The sunflower stalks are scratchy and he’s thankful he listened to Miya about wearing long sleeves and pants, even if he is sweltering. Kiyoomi walks a few yards further into the field and realizes he has no idea where he’s going. “Is this the right way?” Kiyoomi calls back.

Miya is a few feet behind him, smelling one of the flowers that bloomed lower than the others.

“Miya,” Kiyoomi says tersely.

“Yeah keep going forward, we’ll see it when we get there.”

But Miya doesn’t even look up to see where Kiyoomi is heading. He curses under his breath and tries not to let the heat get to him. The field isn’t endless, and isn’t not a true maze. If he gets fed up he can follow his footprints back to Miya’s house and leave.

As he walks further through the flowers Kiyoomi focuses on all the vibrant colors around him. He wonders if the yellow marker he has would match the deep shade of the sunflower.

“Yer veering too far to the right,” Miya calls out.

Kiyoomi sighs and corrects himself slightly. “You said to walk forward. That’s what I’m doing.”

“There’s a difference between straight and diagonal. Shouldn’t an artist know that?”

Kiyoomi turns around to make his annoyance known and his eyes fall on the trail of footprints he left behind and how they are straying to the right. It’s difficult to keep a perfectly straight path while avoiding the sunflower plants. “Then why don’t you lead the way instead of backseat driving?”

Miya grins and picks up his pace until he’s right beside Kiyoomi. “What? Did ya get lonely up here?”

“Hardly.”

They walk in silence for a few minutes. Kiyoomi watches Miya expertly weave through the flowers while he stumbles around them. Had Kiyoomi not known he was in law school he would have thought Miya did something more outdoors related. Like Osamu.

He wants to ask Miya more about why he wanted to be a lawyer. It isn’t a career someone just falls into like marketing or whatever consultants do.

“What kind of stuff do ya make for art?” Miya asks before Kiyoomi can say anything. “Is it all abstract and…what’s another other art word? Contemporary?”

Kiyoomi steps to the side to avoid a small ladybug on the ground. He laughs dryly at Miya’s attempt in art vernacular. Miya seems like the kind of person to go to a modern art museum just to comment ‘I could do that,’ about every piece he deems simple. “I did art for movie posters. Box office stuff.”

“Oh? Anything I’ve seen?”

He pauses, realizing he never actually told Miya he was an artist. For a second he considers asking him how he knows but the answer is either Motoya told him or he looked up Kiyoomi. Hopefully it’s the former. “I don’t know what kind of movies you watch, Miya.”

“Just the bad ones,” Miya says without missing a beat. He laughs at Kiyoomi’s questioning look. “What? Yer gonna judge whatever I like so might as well be honest about it.”

Kiyoomi can’t help but laugh at that. He pushes a small branch out of his face and continues to follow Miya.

As far as conversations go it’s probably his turn to reciprocate a question. Asking him why he wanted to be a lawyer seems to be too big of a question. Asking about his favorite classes seems too small and maybe a little bit of a sore subject. Would he have dropped out if he had favorite classes? Did he even drop out?

“There it is,” Miya calls out. His right hand is outstretched and pointing toward a small clearing in the middle of the field. Kiyoomi realizes it's the one that caught his eye when he and Motoya were walking toward the beach. The small memory is reassuring. He knows where he is now, and it’s not too far from the house.

They pick up the pace, still careful not to hurt the flowers as they advance. After a few more strides Kiyoomi’s final step forward feels like a breath of fresh air as he moves into the clearing. The temperature feels a little cooler, a small breeze filling the empty space that’s about the size of his bedroom.

He turns back to look at Miya who’s unbuttoning his shirt and peeling the sleeves off.

The urge to make a snide comment about Miya’s need to strip is subdued by his own need to feel the breeze on his skin. He unbuttons his two top buttons and rolls up his sleeves.

“God it’s hot,” Miya cries out. He teeters back and forth between the shade of the sunflowers where the heat is being trapped and the sunny open space where the breeze is flowing. “I don’t know where to stand.”

“Stop moving and you might cool down.”

Kiyoomi looks around the empty space filled only with dirt and the occasional weed. When the excitement of arriving wears off Kiyoomi remembers why they’re here. His nerves start to go on edge. He glances around, weary of something jumping out at them.

But the surrounding flowers remain still and the only thing he can hear is his heartbeat and Miya humming something peppy.

“So?” Miya says. “Now what?”

Kiyoomi doesn’t have any real answer for this, he knows just as little as Miya. The one thing he doesn't want to do right now is go back into the heat of the flower field. He unrolls the towel he brought and lays it on the ground, sitting on the far left side of it.

“Now we wait.”

Miya picks up his silent invitation to share the towel but opts to lie on his stomach with his legs hanging off the towel into the dirt. “Want to play a game?”

“No.”

Miya laughs. “Okay, want to talk?”

No immediately comes to mind, but he doesn’t say it. He doesn’t even really feel it either, the act of saying ‘no’ to Miya has become somewhat ingrained in him.

Miya seems to take his silence as a yes. “Did you stop doing art because there aren’t any jobs for artists?”

Wow. Okay. Kiyoomi coughs at the unexpected comment and looks down at Miya with an expression he hopes comes off as pissed. “Why would you ask me that?”

“Before ya said you did movie posters, not that you do them, past tense, like ya don’t anymore.”

It was a slip of the tongue really, and Kiyoomi is surprised Miya caught it. He hadn’t even realized he said it himself. One phone call with Yachi was all it took for him to untie himself to a sect of the career field he’d been doing for three years.

He frowns as he focuses back on Miya and the question he asked him. Just when Kiyoomi was starting to tolerate him he goes and says something that lines him up with every other asshole Kiyoomi has had the displeasure of knowing. The stupid finance majors and STEM kids from school who acted like they were making six figures when really they were failing Chem 001 and couldn’t write a simple essay.

“There are lots of jobs in the art field,” he corrects sharply. “I’m just on a break, and there’s nothing wrong with being an artist full-time.”

Miya nods his head but with a smile that says anything but I believe you.

“What? Like being a lawyer is so important? The only reason someone becomes a lawyer is so they can tell everyone they’re a lawyer.”

Miya laughs and shakes his head. “At least there’s job security in my field.”

“Well I’ve never seen a bus ad for an illustrator before but sure my career path is the desperate one.”

Miya laughs really hard at this, rolling on his side and squeezing his eyes tight. His laugh is infectious and Kiyoomi can’t help but let a grin slip through the brick wall of an expression he tries to maintain around Miya.

“Okay I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that,” he says between quiet laughs. “Ya know Omi, if ya want to be more effective with your burns they should be more toward law students, not lawyers.”

Kiyoomi lies down on his stomach beside Miya, careful to leave a solid foot of space between them, and starts to pull up the small weeds growing out of the dirt. He peels each leaf off and rolls the flowers into tight balls methodically as he moves between them.

‘I’m not the thing you keep referring to me as.’ That’s what Miya is saying. “I don’t know enough about law students to effectively insult you.”

Miya reaches out and pulls up a weed, twirling the dandelion in his hand. He rolls onto his back and holds it up to the sky. “Law students are…competitive, but in a way where even if they’re doing poorly, they only talk about how they’re succeeding.”

Kiyoomi could say the same for art students, but the competition is different. You can see everyone’s progress, and the critiques are for everyone to hear. It was a unique kind of torture to have his works dissected in front of everyone, but at least he knew where he stood.

He doesn’t know if he’d be able to cope with not knowing.

“Isn’t that a given though?” Kiyoomi asks. He rolls over on his back beside Miya, feet propped up in the dirt, knees bent.

“I mean it is and it isn’t. In undergrad most people I spoke with in class were honest about when they failed a test or got a bad grade on a project. It was like there was some kind of comradery in doing poorly. Then there’d be one kid who bragged about the A’s they got. Law school is almost exclusively those kids, and if they do poorly on something they don’t speak about it. Ever.”

“Yeah that does sound awful.” If Kiyoomi had to go through art school thinking everyone around him was succeeding all the time without any issues he probably would have lost it.

He thinks about how that must feel, the thoughts flowing through his brain in lines of charcoal. The subject is curled up in the back of the library and etched out dialog fills the frame as Miya recounts things people said to him.

“Yikes, I aced all my finals.” “I got the internship with the judge. Maybe you’ll find something.” “I’m actually doing research for that professor.” “Oh really? I got all the classes I wanted.” “That’s so awkward, I’ve never failed during a cold call.”

Kiyoomi glances over toward Miya. The weed is crushed in his hand now.

He might be obnoxious and full of himself, but there’s also a quiet honesty about Miya. “That doesn’t seem like the kind of person you are.”

Miya laughs and drops the flower back into the dirt. “Yeah.”

Kiyoomi’s eyes fall to the space between him and Miya, and how close their hands are. He retreats his hand when he sees Miya’s twitch a little. Kiyoomi forces his eyes to focus on the sunflowers around them instead of at whatever face Miya is making toward him right now.

“Well,” he sighs, dropping his heels into the dirt. “This was a big waste of ti-”

Thunk.

A deep sound of his foot hitting something metal and hollow cuts Kiyoomi off. He retracts both his feet and scrambles up and away from the towel. Miya’s instincts take him toward the sound instead of away from it. He gets on his knees and starts to brush the layer of dirt away from some kind of box and rips it out of the ground by its broken handle.

“Look!” Miya shouts. He flings his discovery around and dirt flies everywhere. He drops it onto the towel and starts to pry at the rusted clasp on the box. It’s a bento box that long lost whatever color it used to be, now covered in a deep red of dirt and rust.

“You’re going to get tetanus,” Kiyoomi lectures. He’s still standing a few feet away, leaning in to watch Miya work at opening it. “It’s probably full of decomposed food.”

“No it’s not,” Miya says. He sounds sure of himself.

“Do you have any pliers?”

“No?”

“In that ginormous bag you have no pliers?”

Kiyoomi huffs and dumps his bag out onto the towel. “No, I'm sorry I neglected to bring pliers with me. Truly an unforgivable act.”

“And yet, I still forgive you.” Miya winks and picks up the can of bug spray. “This should work.”

Then he starts to smack it against the lock like a caveman wielding a rock to open something.

“That can is going to explode in your face, Miya.”

“Then you better get back.”

Miya snaps the can against the latch four times and with a small dink each time metal hits metal. On the fifth time, the latch crunches and then the hinges squeak when Miya opens the box. He doesn’t wait for Kiyoomi to come look, laughing quietly to himself as he looks through the items that, by deduction, Kiyoomi can assume isn’t rotting food.

He takes a step forward and sees a box of trinkets.

“What is all this?”

Miya jumps a little like he forgot Kiyoomi was there and pulls a small blue card out of the box, tucking it into his back pocket. “Stuff from when we were kids,” he murmurs. “We buried it, so we’d have buried treasure. Like a time capsule.”

Kiyoomi bends down and gasps slightly when his eyes meet the baseball card the Glimmers were arguing over. It’s nestled among dried up flowers, some toy cars, and an orange Tamagotchi. Not exactly treasure, at least not for Kiyoomi.

Miya’s eyes are glowing as he marvels over the junk. He lifts the Tamagotchi up by the metal beaded chain and grins.

“What was that card you took out?”

“Don’t worry about it. Do you think this still works?” Miya sways the Tamagotchi back and forth, smiling wide.

“If it does, the pet is most certainly dead.”

Miya’s smile falls. “Aw, why do you have to say that?” He whines. He then starts to list off all the Tamagotchi pets he’s had by name, beginning with “Soup.” The rambling fills their journey back toward the house. After an hour of sitting there it was time to leave and they both knew it.

The walk back feels quicker with their trail of footprints to follow and the knowledge of where they’re going to end up.

“Neckbone,” Miya says with finality as they step out of the field back into his yard.

“What about it?” Does Kiyoomi need to take out the gauze?

“That was my last Tama’s name.”

“Neckbone.” Kiyoomi repeats dully. “What kind of name is that?”

“I went through a lot of Tamagotchi pets! It was hard to come up with names for them.”

Kiyoomi laughs and cranes his neck to look toward the clearing they just came from. From here he can see the lack of sunflowers marking the hideout, but he can’t see the dirt. If someone had been in Miya’s yard when they were out there he and Miya probably would have gone undetected. “We called that the hideout?”

“Mhm.”

“What were we hiding from?”

Miya is looking toward the clearing now too. “It was kind of a game for some of us. Me n’ Samu especially. We just thought it was cool to have a hideout.”

“And for others?”

“Well,” Miya says slowly. “Yachi would go there when she got scared of something, usually when Suna was telling some kind of scary story.” He laughs a little at the thought, his smile transitioning to a more serious expression. “Suna would go there when things were bad at home but you…you went the most.”

“Me?”

Miya nods and looks toward Kiyoomi. His expression is perplexed more than anything. “You’d just disappear sometimes n’ we’d find ya there. Or sometimes you’d go there even when we weren’t together.”

Kiyoomi focuses harder on the clearing in the field of flowers trying to force a memory to take hold, but nothing happens. Miya can ramble on about the good old days and is able to list every single Tamagotchi he’s killed off but Kiyoomi can’t come up with a single memory of a place he went to more than anyone?

He scoffs, annoyed at the world. He stares out at the empty space and a new sense of determination starts to fill him. Actually it might be spite. Either way he’s getting his damned memories back, even if today was a bust. “What’s the next place?”

Miya looks like he wants to ask Kiyoomi what’s wrong, and Kiyoomi’s thankful he doesn’t. “The lighthouse,” he says instead. “10 a.m.”

Kiyoomi nods in agreement and starts to head back to his house, crossing the road and trying to imagine what tomorrow will be like.

“What did you say?” Kiyoomi asks, hoping that when Motoya repeats himself it will be a completely different piece of information.

He sets his tote bag down on the kitchen table and the handles hang off the edge. He’s covered in dirt and sweat and was about to shower to cool down. Now a cold shower is the last thing on his mind.

“Kousei just called,” Motoya repeats. He’s still holding the receiver of the analog wall phone. Its curly red cord hangs limp and sways back and forth between where it’s hung beside the light switch and Motoya standing a few feet away. Kousei must have just hung up on him.

And he called the house phone, which can’t be screened.

“What did he say?”

“He wanted to know if you were here.”

Kiyoomi inhales sharply and leans against the table to catch his breath. If Kousei’s looking for him he must know about him and Yasu breaking things off. Kiyoomi isn’t sure how he found that out, but his brother has always found a way to keep tabs on his life. If Kousei decided to be personally offended by Kiyoomi’s broken engagement…Kiyoomi winces at the thought of what he might do.

“I said you weren’t.” Motoya says. “Weren’t here,” he clarifies before Kiyoomi can ask. “I know we’re all family but…I never liked the way he treated you.”

Kiyoomi nods weakly. He can’t speak to whatever Motoya might have witnessed in his childhood but Kousei has been a torment in Kiyoomi’s life during his adult years too. Not as much since he graduated college, but that’s because Kiyoomi stopped taking his calls.

He frowns when he remembers the call at the art studio. Kousei isn’t stupid. He’s one of the smartest people Kiyoomi knows, but his narcissistic tendencies match his deduction skills. He must know Kiyoomi’s here.

“Kiyo,” Motoya says softly. He’s staring at the ground and smiling sadly, like he doesn’t want to say whatever he’s about it.

Kiyoomi wishes he wouldn’t.

“Kousei has as much right to be here as either of us. That’s how Uncle wanted it. Anyone in the family can come here.”

He nods, already knowing the truth of this. Kiyoomi’s reaping the benefits of that right now. When his Uncle passed, the house was left to the family, not one person in particular.

“I know,” he says. He’s pleased with how calm he sounds saying it. His hands are shaking a little, but at least his voice is steady.

“He didn’t sound like he’d be coming here,” Motoya says. This time he looks more sure of what he’s saying. “He just kind of said ‘whatever’ and hung up.”

Kiyoomi’s hands start to still. It’s a long trip here from Yokohama. His brother is smart and always puts himself first. If the only thing he wanted to do in Karumi was yell at Kiyoomi he’d save the trip and call him instead. Kousei isn’t one for dinky towns and rocky beaches. There’s nothing here for him.

“I’m going to shower,” Kiyoomi announces. He’s ready for this conversation to be over and his clothes are starting to itch.

Motoya looks him up and down and cracks a grin. “I was going to ask how you got so covered in dirt.”

“Gardening,” Kiyoomi lies with a sarcastic tone.

He walks out of the kitchen, through the workshop to the shower in the back.

“Tell gardening he can come over for dinner if he wants!” Motoya shouts as Kiyoomi shuts the bathroom door.

He shakes his head with a guilty smile that fades to a frown when he imagines what Kousei would do if he heard that.

His hands start to shake again as he unbuttons his shirt.

Five things you can see. Then count down from 100 in sevens.

The advice Yachi gave him his freshman year comes back slowly. The advice was an exercise given to her by her therapist who did wonders for Yachi. Back then she was so nervous about everything she let her professor call her by the wrong name for an entire semester.

Kiyoomi glances around the room. The first thing that catches his eye is a laminated piece of paper instructing people to turn the fan on before they shower. It’s in that weird Word font with a swirl incorporated into each letter.

Above the sign are the bathroom towels, each hung under a name written in chalk on the wall—except for Kiyoomi’s towel. He arrived after Haru and Fumi left all the chalk outside in the rain.

The shower cabinet has different soaps, conditioners, and shampoos family members have forgotten over the years. Among the tolitrees is an apricot facial scrub brand Kiyoomi used religiously his freshman year of college before Yachi told him how bad it was for his skin.

He looks toward the ground at the pile his clothes have assumed. He’d worn the only pants and long sleeved shirt he had with him: the outfit he’d worn to dinner with Yasu’s family. The sight of the clothes covered in dirt makes him laugh a little. Two weeks ago he’d been brushing them over with a lint roller.

He steps over the clothes into the shower and turns on the faucet. Rust is creeping at the edges of the hardware but it still works. He gasps when cold water sputters out of the shower head and starts to count down from 100 by seven.

He makes it to 93 before needing to pause and subtract 7 from 93.

“The counting works best when you suck at math,” Kiyoomi says, recalling Yachi’s advice.

She was right. All he can think about right now is what the hell is 93 minus 7? Kiyoomi’s got colors and compositions for brains with no room for anything else.

He spends the rest of the afternoon focusing on counting and finding other means of distraction. This includes playing imaginary cafe with Haru and Fumi, cleaning up the kitchen after Motoya makes dinner, and falling asleep to a YouTube artist swatching all of her new markers.

But he can’t distract himself in his dreams. He spends the night tossing and turning trying to avoid his brother’s phone calls. When he wakes up the house is empty. He finds a note on the counter from Motoya about going on a hike with the kids. Haru and Fumi both signed it in purple and green crayon, respectively.

He feels like crap and for the first time since he’s come here he’s glad he doesn’t have a job right now. He can just sit here and eat…fruit loops. Kiyoomi looks at the lone box of cereal in the pantry. Motoya mentioned needing to buy groceries yesterday. Fruit loops for breakfast it is.

It isn’t until the doorbell rings that Kiyoomi realizes they have one. He glances from his bowl of cereal across the kitchen table. Miya is on the porch looking in through the window and waving.

“Oh,” he mumbles. He forgot about their plans. Kiyoomi walks over to unlock the door and lets Miya in begrudgingly. He’s still tired even if it is past 10:30 in the morning.

“Did ya forget?” Miya asks with a smirk.

“Just let me grab my phone.”

“What about the rest of yer supplies?” Miya teases, even this early in the day. “Maybe some rationing kits? A compass?”

“Why? Is your sense of direction impaired?” Kiyoomi walks away before Miya can respond, heading to his room and staring at the rumpled state of his bedding. His phone isn’t where he usually leaves it by his futon. It’s against the wall on the far side of the room,

He vaguely remembers sliding it across the floor last night. He was half asleep and awakened by some annoying vibrating. Probably Motoya sending him Buzzfeed quizzes at 3 a.m. again. He pickles up his phone and his mouth dries at the two notifications on the screen.

1 missed call from Kousei at 2 a.m.

1 voicemail from Kousei at 2:10 a.m.

“Omi are you coming?” Miya calls.

Kiyoomi doesn’t answer, he can’t. All he can think about is what’s on that voicemail, and how it’s probably like the last one he sent Kiyoomi.

“Omi?” Miya calls again. 

“C-coming,” he forces himself to respond. He doesn’t want Miya to come looking for him or ask him what’s wrong. He steps quietly down the hall and walks past Miya to grab his shoes from the porch.

“Yer not gonna finish your cereal?” Miya asks, peering through the window while Kiyoomi ties his laces.

“No.”

“Fruit Loops!” Miya exclaims. “I didn't picture you as a Fruit Loops kind of guy.”

“It’s what they have.” Kiyoomi clears the notifications from his screen so he doesn’t accidentally call Kousei back.

“What’s yer go-to cereal then?”

They’re walking to Miya’s truck now. Kiyoomi wants to get into it and leave before Motoya and the kids get back from their hike. His phone feels heavy in his pocket. The unopened voicemail is adding ten pounds of pressure. Should he listen to it?

It’s only going to make him feel bad – that much Kiyoomi knows – but if he listened to it, the anxiety of not knowing what it says might not make it so hard for him to breathe. He steps up into the truck and buckles his seatbelt.

“I’m more of a Reece’s Puffs kind of guy,” Miya comments. “But that’s if I had to pick a cereal for breakfast.” He starts the truck and it shudders to life, moving along the driveway slowly.

Miya continues to list his breakfast food preferences as they make their way down the main road. Kiyoomi can’t focus on a single syllable of what Miya is saying but it seems to be an endless stream of nonsense so he doesn’t worry about not being able to pay attention.

This is the third voicemail Kousei has left Kiyoomi since he moved out at 18 to go to college. There were lots of calls. For a while they were constant. But only two voicemails. The most recent voicemail was a week after his engagement with Yasu. He called under the guise of congratulating Kiyoomi; but his message was a lot more coded than that.

Congratulations on making the right choice. Kiyoomi thought of those words every time he looked at the family ring Yasu’s mother passed down to her.

And before that? The voicemail was eight minutes of screaming at Kiyoomi for making the wrong choice.

He was two weeks into his freshman year of college. It was his first time away from his family and he felt free. But he was dumb and mistook his newfound independence for invisibility from his brother’s watchful eye.

Kiyoomi was at a karaoke party, five drinks in and screaming along to the booming pop music like there was no tomorrow. There wasn’t even a ten minutes into the future. He was only focused on what was happening in that moment.

He was dancing with a boy he’d just met. The guy was cute and single and that was basically all Kiyoomi needed back then. So he made out with him. His first kiss tasted like cheap vodka and he loved it. He was having more fun than he could recall ever having at that point in his life.

But he was drunk. He didn’t notice the camera in his face, and how someone was posting a video of him to his Snapchat story, effectively outing him for having a sexuality he hadn’t even processed yet.

Kousei was furious and he let Kiyoomi know. He threatened to get Kiyoomi kicked out of his program if he ever did something like that again. Something like that wasn’t drinking or going to a party. It was who he was with.

Back then Kiyoomi believed his 20-year-old brother was capable of getting him kicked out of school. But realistically what could Kousei have done? What could he do to him now?

Kiyoomi grips his phone as he considers the possibilities. All he could really do is yell at Kiyoomi, but being yelled at feels like one of the worst things in the world.

“Omi?” Miya says. His eyes flick toward Kiyoomi and back at the road. His fingers thrum against the steering wheel in a nervous rhythm before pulling off to a dirt road and slowing the car to a stop. “What’s wrong?” He sounds awkward asking the question and Kiyoomi supposes he should be.

“Why do you think something is wrong?” He asks, dodging the question.

“Well I just told ya all my favorite breakfast foods and you didn't say anything. You haven’t said anything since we left.”

“Why do your favorite breakfast foods need to earn a reaction from me?”

“One of them is pickles and vanilla ice cream.”

Kiyoomi wrinkles his nose. “You eat that for breakfast?”

“Hangover cure!” Miya says defending his disgusting concoction. “But see! See! You weren’t even listening. What’s wrong?”

A car starts to drive around them and Miya waves them through with a forced smile.

Kiyoomi could continue to say nothing is wrong but he gets the sense Miya is going to continue to be annoying about it.

“Did you know my brother?”

Miya frowns. “What? That homophobic asshole?”

Kiyoomi’s mouth opens in surprise. “Did he say something to you?

He leans his head back against the seat and props his arm on the center console. “The two things I remember about Kousei was that he’d pour salt on the garden snails and how he’d drop ‘fag’ like all it meant was stupid.”

Kiyoomi tenses at the word, remembering how much Kousei slung it at him. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles, feeling the need to take some responsibility for his brother.

“Don’t be,” Miya says. He glances back toward Kiyoomi. “Why were you thinking of him?”

“Just was,” Kiyoomi murmurs. He doesn’t want Miya to weigh in on whether he should listen to the voicemail right now. He’d still like some time to think about that for himself. He holds down on the side button of his phone and powers it off.

He stares out the window at the pine trees lining the dirt road they’ve turned onto. “We can go now,” he mumbles.

Miya opens his door and hops out. “We’re already here.”

“What?”

Kiyoomi gets out of the car, glancing around the empty road, searching for some kind of lighthouse. His feet crunch against the dry dirt that hasn’t seen rain in awhile as he walks to the drivers side of the truck. Miya isn't there anymore.

“Come on!” Miya shouts from far away.

Kiyoomi looks across the road toward Miya standing at the edge of a trail laid down with orange-tinged wood chips.

“Wait!” Kiyoomi shouts, stepping carefully along the unfamiliar path through woods he’s never been in before. But Miya advances ahead without so much as a glance back. He’s such a jerk. Kiyoomi sighs and trudges forward.

“I’m not chasing you!” Kiyoomi huffs. The path is on a slight incline.

If Miya heard him he doesn’t show it. He’s about 50 yards ahead stepping through a clearing now. Kiyoomi can make out the blobs of bright green hills that become more clear the closer he gets. When he steps out of the woods Miya is waiting for him, standing on a rock with a large stick in his hand.

“You could have waited.”

“You could have hurried up!” Miya jokes.

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and glances around the vast cliffside. In the far distance he sees the ocean peeking out behind the edge of the cliff. He turns left and finds the lighthouse in full view. What were probably once vibrant red stripes have since faded to a soft pink, chipping off the white undercoat of the tower.

They’re about 100 yards away from the building but Kiyoomi still feels the need to crane his neck to take it all in.

“Come on,” Miya shouts again, jumping off the rock. He sounds like Haru when he thinks Motoya is taking too long. “I’ll race you!” Then he’s off without so much of a ready set go. And fine, Kiyoomi chases after him.

The race between an illustrator and a law student is not something anyone would pay money to watch. There’s an embarrassing amount of huffing from both parties as they struggle at their slow paces. Miya wins with a solid lead which Kiyoomi is quick to blame on his unfair head start.

Kiyoomi bends over to catch his breath and Miya staggers up to the building. The only entrance is protected by a black fence with metal bars that reach at least eight feet high.

“Ready?” Miya calls.

“For what?” Whatever it is, Kiyoomi is certainly not ready.

“To go in!”

Yeah he definitely isn’t ready for that. What are they going to do? Climb the fence? Even if Kiyoomi could get up there he’d get caught in the barbed wire laces along the top.

“There’s no way,” Kiyoomi gasps.

Miya winks and lifts the giant stick he brought with him. “There’s always a way Omi.” He lifts the stick with the precision of a surgeon, sliding it between the bars from the far corner to the front panels and pressing it into the pushout door that makes up one of the gate walls.

Then it just swings open.

“It can’t be that simple.” Kiyoomi balks.

“But it is.” Miya holds the gate open for Kiyoomi and shuts it behind the both of them when they step into the enclosed area.

Miya moves on to the lighthouse door and starts to fiddle with the handle. Kiyoomi remains by the gate door, opening and closing it a few times to confirm they won’t be trapped in here. The black metal is cold to the touch. A small lady bug flies off of it, disturbed by all the motion.

“It’s open,” Miya calls. He’s inside the first floor of the lighthouse now. Daylight falls through the doorway he just opened illuminating a small section of the dark space. The paint on the floor and walls is chipping away even more than the exterior. In the center of the room is the beginning of a spiral staircase that disappears into the darkness. There’s a distant glow of light at the top presumably coming through the lighthouse windows.

Kiyoomi’s jaw drops at the eerie sight of it all. “There is no way I’m going in there.”

“What? Why?” Miya asks. He sounds genuinely confused.

“Uh I don’t know, maybe because this building looks like it's about to crumble away? Or how we had to break our way in? Or- oh, perfect. How about the cameras pointed right at us right now?” Kiyoomi points toward the security camera on the far wall very clearly visible.

Miya looks back toward the camera and walks up to it, studying it thoroughly before laughing. “It’s fake. Samu buys the same brand for his boat. A lot cheaper than a real security system. Look, it doesn't even have wires.”

Kiyoomi squints his eyes but would need to step in to affirm Miya’s story. “I thought you were against breaking the law.”

“I’m pretty sure if the door can be opened then you’re allowed to go in.”

“That’s your argument? Wow, no wonder you dropped out of law school.” It was supposed to be a joke. A slight dig, like every other comment he and Miya have made toward each other. But Miya doesn’t laugh this time.

Instead, his face falls and he turns away from Kiyoomi. “I didn't drop out,” he says firmly.

Kiyoomi doesn’t know what to say. He had thought Miya dropped out, that’s how he had been acting. He also didn’t think he’d be so hurt about a jibe like that, but maybe it was too far.

In an act of apology, he takes a step forward. If he dies in this decrepit building he’ll die with a clean conscience.

Miya immediately perks up when he sees Kiyoomi step inside.

“We’re propping the door open,” Kiyoomi demands, taking Miya’s stick and placing it between the door and the doorframe.

“That’s fine, that's fine,” Miya says. He’s smiling now and swaying a little with excitement. “Let's go!” He hurries over to the stairs and Kiyoomi follows after him. They both pull out their phones and turn on their flashlights. Kiyoomi is checking for two things: missing steps and glowing versions of his past self.

He hopes he finds neither of them.

If a glimmer were to appear right now he’d probably end up falling out of fear over the railing of the spiral staircase.

As they ascend the steps the stairs become more littered with snack food wrappers and the walls more covered in sharpie and graffiti. They definitely aren’t the only people to come here in the past year. The other visitors are probably high school or college kids with nowhere else to screw around. Kiyoomi can’t imagine wanting to come here for fun when the beach is right there.

Yet here he is.

After a couple minutes of walking a soft glow of natural light starts to illuminate their path ahead. They’re getting close to the top. Kiyoomi doesn’t let his anticipation get the better of him, still focusing diligently on each step he takes and keeping his eyes peeled for any ghosts. Their footsteps have started to echo the further they get from the ground, bouncing around the giant tube of a building.

Miya starts to whisper to himself when they’re three steps away. Kiyoomi can’t quite make out what he’s saying.

“Miya? It’s really creepy to whisper like that in an abandoned lighthouse.”

Miya laughs nervously. It’s high-pitched and squeaky. “Sorry, I just- I’m trying not to look down.” He clears his throat and takes a breath. “Don’t look down, don’t look down,” he starts to whisper a little louder now that Kiyoomi has called him out.

With one step left, Kiyoomi holds his hand out to Miya who takes it with a vice grip. “If you were scared of heights you should have said so,” Kiyoomi laughs. Seeing Miya in such a pathetic state is amusing.

“I didn’t used to be,” he says in defense. “When we used to come here I’d run up the stairs no problem.”

“Yes but now your brain is fully developed,” Kiyoomi teases. He turns away from Miya and takes a step away from the staircase, moving further into the top floor space. There’s a large post coming up out of the floor and into the ceiling. It’s surrounded by a wooden table covered in empty bags of snack food and canisters of spray paint.

The floor is in a similar state with a few sets of footprints left in different colors of paint. There are three windows spaced evenly around the circular area, each big enough for Kiyoomi to fit through. He walks toward the closest one and gasps.

The view is incredible. Mt. Fuji is to the right, taking up a large portion of the composition Kiyoomi is creating in his mind. The ships in the waters below are much larger than the small sailboats at the beach he and Miya have access to.

“Fishing boats,” Miya says like he’s excited to see them. He turns toward Kiyoomi and smiles wide. “Samu and I used to come here n’ look for them. That’s how we found this place.”

“When?” Kiyoomi asks slowly. He chances a look down and regrets the view of the cliffs below them. He’s not afraid of heights but he is afraid of falling to his death. Kiyoomi takes a short step back from the window just in case. Miya is a solid two feet away from it.

“Hm, I think we were about twelve.” Miya ponders on the thought for a second and nods. “No, thirteen. First it was just me and Samu looking for Grandma’s boat before she came in for the day. Then we started bringing everyone. We’d all ride our bikes and hide them on the back side of the lighthouse.”

The mention of his grandmother gives Kiyoomi a slight pause, but Miya seems happy to talk about her. After a few days Kiyoomi has come to understand who everyone was in the little group from his past. “I can’t imagine wanting to come here,” he says while looking around the trash in the room.

“It was a lot cleaner when we came. The town had only stopped using it a year or two when we found it.”

Kiyoomi nods and continues to look out the window. He kind of wishes they came here at sunset, but walking back from this in the dark would have been terrifying. He lets his imagination paint the sky in pinks and purples that will stretch across it at the end of the day.

“Suna was also nervous about heights so he and Samu always stayed on the bottom floor. Yachi was scared of getting in trouble so she waited a solid twenty feet from the lighthouse while we went in.” Miya smiles as he reminisces. “You liked it the most. And I wasn’t scared back then so we’d come look out the windows…together.”

Miya murmurs the last word and stares toward the window on the opposite side of the room. “Yeah,” he whispers.

Kiyoomi tries to imagine him and Miya coming up here to stare out the windows, but he loses focus when one detail doesn’t sit right with Kiyoomi.

“You talk about Yachi a lot,” he pieces together out loud. “But she’s never mentioned you.” He looks away from the window toward Miya who’s picked up a can of spray paint from the table.

He tests the canister out but it spurts out a dying breath of air and nothing more. “I guess that makes sense. She stopped coming here when we were in middle school after her parents divorce.”

Kiyoomi tenses at the fact he hadn’t known before. It’s unsettling to have a stranger divulge personal information to him about his best friend. Yachi never really talked about her family before, which was something Kiyoomi really liked about their friendship. Most people in college couldn’t enter a ‘getting to know you’ conversation without asking about Kiyoomi’s family. But Yachi went straight for ‘why do you use that awful face wash,’ and they’ve been best friends since.

The thought of family sends a pulse of anxiety through him when he remembers the voicemail Kousei left him. Hi grips his phone in his pocket, wanting to chuck it out the lighthouse window. He breathes in deeply to calm down and pulls his phone out, staring the voicemail notification down.

He opens his call log and deletes Kousei's most recent call. He does the same with the voicemail, squirting his eyes to avoid reading any of the message transcription. He’s not going to let Kousei get to him. Before he shuts his phone off he considers blocking Kousei, but the cons outweigh the pros. If Kousei realizes he’s blocked from getting to Kiyoomi over the phone, he might decide to pay him a visit instead.

That’s the last thing Kiyoomi wants.

He shuts his phone off and takes some more purposeful breaths. The smell of sea salt fills his nose and birds cry out above him. The environment, and the fact that he’s 60 feet up in the air above the edge of a cliffside, makes him feel very alive. He can see why his past self wanted to be here with Miya.

But if this place was so special, shouldn’t there be some glimmers around? Is that even how it works?

Kiyoomi glances around for any traces of blue and listens hard for small whispers. All he sees is rusting walls and all he hears are waves crashing down below.

“I guess if the glimmers were going to appear it would have been when we were walking up the staircase, already scared,” he comments mostly to himself.

“You think the elusive magic visions have a sense of comedic timing?” Miya teases

Kiyoomi laughs. Maybe not. He steps toward the staircase to take a look down below and his foot slips when it lands on an empty chip bag. Before he can even curse at the situation, Miya’s arms are around him.

“Whoa,” Miya whispers. He stares at Kiyoomi wide-eyed with shock and Kiyoomi can’t tell if Miya’s surprised he almost fell or if he’s surprised he caught him. “Are you okay?”

Kiyoomi’s heart pounds. He takes a breath to gather his thoughts. He was closer to hitting the table than to falling down the stairs. The worst that could have happened was getting dirt on his hands. Miya’s arm tightens around him. Kiyoomi exhales and pushes him away.

“I’m fine Miya, I just tripped.”

“Right,” Miya says, letting go of Kiyoomi. Miya looks more flustered than Kiyoomi feels despite him being the one who almost fell on the ground.

His heart is still pounding too. It must be from the adrenalin that coursed through him when he was about to fall. “We should probably go, nothing seems to be happening…again,” he mumbles.

“Sure we can go, no worries. Don’t worry Omi, we’ll find them.”

Kiyoomi isn’t too sure of that. Now he isn’t even sure if he wants to. The only thing that’s happened since he and Miya started looking for the glimmers is Kiyoomi getting dirt all over himself and bickering with Miya. “Or maybe we won’t,” he says as they descend the stairs.

“What did you say?” Miya calls from a few stairs behind.

Kiyoomi waits to respond until they get to the bottom. The stick is still where they left it popping the door open. “Maybe we should just stop. It seems like a waste of time.”

“Who’s time?” Miya laughs. “Do you have things to do?”

Kiyoomi represses an eye roll and steps toward the gate, sighing with slight relief when the gate door opens. “No but I’m sure you have stuff to do for law school.”

Miya frowns for a moment, glancing at the ground and then flicking his smile back on. “Are you kidding? We can’t stop now! We’ve got all this momentum!”

“Momentum? What momentum?” The only thing they’ve done so far is argue with each other. Kiyoomi had better luck finding the glimmers alone than when Miya was with him. Not that he wants to start searching for them alone.

“Seriously Miya-”

“Seriously Kiyoomi,” Miya says, cutting him off. “Don’t give up yet.” The joking candor is gone from his voice. He’s walking one step behind Kiyoomi to the left. In his peripheral vision he can see Miya looking at the ground. He looks sad.

It’s not like Miya’s feelings really matter to him, but he feels a little guilty for roping the guy into this goose chase only to abandon it when it starts to get difficult. There’s only five locations. Kiyoomi can handle three more. 

“Fine,” he concedes. “What’s next? Treasure Island?” Admittedly Kiyoomi has been intrigued by that one the most. Secretly he was hoping Miya would suggest it last time. That hope is brimming inside him now too.

“Nah we’d need to prepare a little for that. And I’m not sure I want to go to Treasure Island with a guy who can barely hike up a two minute trail.”

“Fuck off,” Kiyoomi laughs.

Miya smirks. “No, next is the boat. Also, I was thinking-”

“That’s never good.”

“You wouldn’t be so scared of it if you tried it sometime.”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes with a smile. “You’ve been thinking.”

Miya smiles. “Yes, I’ve been thinking! You said you saw the glimmers with Motoya right? Like he was in the room?”

Kiyoomi can put the pieces together without Miya needing to explain. “You want to bring my cousin along?” There is no way Kiyoomi will agree to that.

“Not exactly.” He smiles wide and Kiyoomi knows nothing good can come from Miya Atsumu’s smiles.

* * *

“So when you said not exactly…” Kiyoomi stares up at the boat, clutching his tote bag close. He should just leave.

“We needed new people!” Miya shouts. “New people might mean new glimmers.” He’s wearing another one of his white button downs with none of the buttons closed. The shirt flaps around in the breeze calling attention to the giant splotch on sunscreen Miya pasted on his nose and chest.

“And one of those people is Suna,” Kiyoomi deadpans.

“What? You didn’t want to include your cousin who loves you so I went with the opposite!”

“That is?”

“An old friend who hates you.”

The wharf doc creaks and groans under Kiyoomi’s feet when another wake passes through it. This time the small wave was due to a boat full of college kids similarly large to Osamu’s—the boat he and Miya are standing in front of.

“Inari” is painted in black on the hull of the white vessel. The large serif letters could be read a mile away. Just above the letters Osamu’s face pops up with a smile. “Ready for some fun?” He shouts, waving them up.

“Always!” Miya shouts back. He climbs up a short ladder that Kiyoomi deems stable enough to follow after him. The metal rungs look freshly cleaned, as does the inside of the boat when it comes into view. Kiyoomi’s only been on a boat once in his life when Yachi convinced him they should go to Okinawa for the summer before their senior year.

She’d managed to befriend some guys who ‘had a boat’ that was more rust and holes than actual boat. Can something even be called a boat if it doesn’t float completely? Back then Yachi decided no they wern’t going to drown at sea – or ten yards from shore – and they stayed on the beach.

He steps away from the ladder and stares at the ground awkwardly when he spots Suna and Osamu. Suna’s wearing a white t-shirt cropped in a way that exposes his hip bones but nothing higher. He’s adjusting a medium format film camera right now, situating it inside a plastic bag that looks like it was made specifically for his camera to keep it safe from the water.

Osamu’s walking around the boat, seemingly more focused on getting everything situated than the fact that Kiyoomi and Miya just boarded. He’s tugging at ropes and flipping some switches by the steering wheel. He’s in a similarly comfortable boat outfit to Suna and Kiyoomi— a scrappy t-shirt and shorts. The one thing setting his outfit apart are the expensive-looking sunglasses hanging from a lanyard around his neck. A tiny red life preserver is attached to the lanyard, in case they fall in the water, Kiyoomi realizes after some thought.

Kiyoomi hasn’t been around either Suna or Osamu nearly enough to be comfortable standing on this boat with them. The dinner was different. He had Motoya and the ability to step away whenever he wanted to. Right now he wishes it were just him and Miya.

Horror unfurls in Kiyoomi at the realization. He wishes he and Miya were alone? Slowly it dawns on him. He’s comfortable around Miya Atsumu now. When the hell did that happen?

“We’ve only got three life jackets unfortunately,” Suna announces in a bored tone to no one in particular, but Kiyoomi knows the message is for him.

“Good thing you’re such a good swimmer then Sunarin,” Miya chirps. He steps over to the white cushioned bench Suna opened up, expertly balancing his weight as the boat rocks back and forth. “Ah looks like yer not so good at counting. One, two, three, four lifejackets.” He smiles and grabs two, keeping the blue one for himself and handing Kiyoomi the bright orange one.

Even as Miya argues with Suna he doesn’t seem to be the least bit mad at him.

The material of the life jacket is a little scratchy under his fingers. He fiddles with the buckles, wincing in anticipation of the loud snap when he puts the jacket on.

“We talked about this.” Kiyoomi glances up at the terse tone. The whispered lecture belongs to Osamu. He’s talking to Suna on the other side of the roofed hut covering the steering station.

Kiyoomi glances toward Miya to see if he hears them but he’s back by the life vest storage area on the other side now, switching his blue vest out for a red one. Kiyoomi can only see the backs of Suna and Osamu but their whispers aren’t as well hidden.

“I know,” Suna says back. “Atsumu is finally happy again. I’ll shut up.” He says the words about Miya in a mocking tone similar to ‘I heard you the first time.’

Kiyoomi sees Suna turn and snaps his gaze back to his life jacket that’s probably not supposed to be this loose. But what did Suna mean? Miya’s finally happy? When was he not? Law school?

“Need help with that Omi?” Miya steps in front of him with a wide smile. He’s wearing a bucket hat now and his shirt has been discarded, the red life jacket acting as his sole barrier from the sun. His shoulders are dusted with freckles that fade as they near the life jacket strap.

Miya stops waiting for Kiyoomi to answer and starts to tug the straps of his life vest tighter. “Samu won’t go until we’re all wearing life vests.”

Back at the bench Suna is tugging the blue life vest on, confirming Miya’s claim.

“Everyone ready?” Osamu shouts from the steering wheel. Suna walks over to his boyfriend’s side again, handing him a bright yellow life vest.

Kiyoomi isn’t sure if he’s supposed to respond to Osamu or if that was more of a rhetorical question. Osamu does a 360 scan of the boat and turns the key in the ignition. Kiyoomi moves to sit in a chair beside Miya right as the engine roars to start. The engine sputters and gargles in the surrounding water and they start to glide forward.

As they pull out of the wharf Miya points out all the parts of the boat to Kiyoomi, most likely to flex the terminology he’s come to know. He follows Miya’s gestures and looks around the whole boat. Stern, hull, cleat, transom, it’s all nonsense to Kiyoomi but he still finds himself drawn in to the one-sided conversation with Miya.

At first glance Kiyoomi can tell the boat is old, but extremely well cared for. There isn’t any dried sea-salt. The ropes are all clean of gunk and the seats may be yellowing but they’re free of any stains or scratches. At second glance he starts to see the pieces of the boat that are displayed as prints throughout Miya’s house and Suna’s bike shop. He glances back toward Suna and wonders how many times he’s been here to take pictures.

When his eyes meet Suna’s he snaps his gaze away.

“This was our grandma’s boat,” Miya shouts over the wind as they pick up speed. They’ve completely left the wharf now and are heading out away from the perimeter buoys. He glances back at the buildings as watches them grow smaller.

“And he uses this to fish with?”

Miya laughs lightheartedly, as if imagining what Kiyoomi suggested is silly but not a ridiculous question. “Nah. His crew wouldn’t fit on here. He just uses this for fun. His fishing boat is in a larger wharf closer to where the Segami river meets the Bay.”

Kiyoomi nods along at the explanation and remembers what Miya said about looking for the boat with Osamu when they were kids. He wonders if they could spot the Inari lettering from all the way up in that lighthouse.

“Did Osamu want to become a fisherman because of your grandma?” He tries to balance his volume so it’s loud enough for Miya to hear but quiet enough that Osamu doesn’t hear Kiyoomi talking about him. He glances toward the cockpit. Neither Osamu nor Suna seemed to hear him.

“Maybe like 2%,” Miya answers. “98% cause he loved it, and he’s great at it.”

Kiyoomi smiles. Miya may be full of himself but he isn’t shy about complimenting his brother either.

“Is that why you wanted to go to law school?”

“Maybe like 2%,” Miya repeats.

“And the other 98%?”

Miya stares off into the distance and smiles. The expression in his eyes is just out of sight for Kiyoomi. “I just felt like it.”

Kiyoomi mulls over the words and decides that’s as good a reason as any other to do something. He’s just not sure it’s Miya’s real reason.

They make their way across the water, hugging the shore  at a distance where Kiyoomi can make out the individual buildings but not the amount of windows they have. The houses on the shoreline are a lot different than the buildings inland. They are bigger and all seem to carry the same white aesthetic, save for the occasional brown or pastel outlier.

Suna and Miya seem to know exactly where Osamu is taking them. Kiyoomi tries to adopt their reassurance while internally worrying about the destination. He doesn’t know Osamu well at all but he does trust him to be responsible. He couldn’t say the same about Miya if he was the one driving the boat.

When they finally slow to a stop Kiyoomi stands to check out where he’s been taken. His knees bend a little as the boat rocks. Miya instantly reaches out to grip Kiyoomi’s hip and steady him. “Careful,” he whispers, retreating his hand.

Kiyoomi’s hip burns at the contact and his cheeks burn with embarrassment. “I’m fine,” he whispers.

“Tsumu lower the anchor,” Osamu calls.

Kiyoomi looks up and around the deck for a giant anchor similar to ones he’s seen in pirate movies, expecting Miya to pick it up and chuck it over the side of the boat. Instead he walks to the front of the boat and opens up the floor, lowering a modern looking anchor and monitoring the chain as it drops.

“Rin set up the bridle please,” Osamu calls out again.

Kiyoomi shifts uncomfortably in his seat when Suna walks over to Miya and starts to do something with a rope. It feels weird to sit here while everyone is helping out. He feels like a bad guest sitting right next to the kitchen sink while everyone does the dishes and he just watches.

His discomfort lasts about thirty seconds before Miya pops back over. “Ready?”

“For?”

Miya grins and points toward the other side of the boat where Osamu has started to line fishing rods along the edge. He starts to walk toward his brother and Suna but Kiyoomi grabs his hand and pulls him back, realizing they haven’t discussed the reason they’re here.

“Did you tell them?” Kiyoomi asks with a low whisper.

Miya rubs his hand and looks at Kiyoomi’s as he pulls it away. “Tell them what?”

“About the Glimmers.

“Oh, no.” Miya smiles now that he’s caught on to what Kiyoomi is talking about. “I figured it’d be easier to explain the magical visions after they saw them.” He turns toward the fishing polls and reaches down for the shiniest of the three.

“Fair enough.” Kiyoomi follows after him.

Within two minutes he’s set up with a rod that’s baited and cast and told what to do when he gets a bite. Miya stands to his right, hooking his own bait — a tiny fish — through the eye, and Kiyoomi silently thanks Miya for not making him do that. All he can see is the small Beta Fish Yachi got their freshman year and has managed to keep alive to this day.

To his left Suna is standing with his line also in the water, though his pole is balanced against the side of the boat while he wipes his fingers down with a lemon-smelling alcohol wipe.

“I don’t want fish guts on my camera,” Suna comments, noticing Kiyoomi’s wandering eye.

“Makes sense,” Kiyoomi says in lieu of some kind of discomfort-fueled joke that would probably land poorly.

His rod twitches a little and his eyes snap forward. “Was that a–”

“No,” Miya, Suna, and even Osamu who’s five feet away, call out at the same time.

Kiyoomi blushes furiously and focuses on looking at the water. Thankfully the sun is out and he can blame his heated complexion on a sunburn.

“It’s just the weight lifting when the boat moves,” Miya explains. He holds his hook up to Kiyoomi and points to the oblong stone attached to the hook. “This makes sure it sinks to where all the fish are hungry.”

“How do you know fish are here?”

“Oh they’re here,” Osamu calls.

Miya smiles and nods like somehow that confirms it. Osamu sounds sure enough that Kiyoomi believes it too without any further explanation. Twenty minutes pass and the fish are definitely here, but all they’ve got to show for it is a bunch of empty hooks after the fish nibble their bait away. Miya starts to grow a little antsy, clearly wanting to catch the first fish.

“Maybe we should go down a little further.”

“No need,” Osamu says resolutely.

He takes Suna’s rod from his hand which hasn’t seen a bite since they got here and reels it back in. He checks the bait over, drops the hook back in and within twenty seconds the rod starts to bend. “See,” he says pointedly toward Miya who scowls at his own rod.

Osamu reels the fish in with a short back and forth, letting the fish pull when it needs to and pulling back at the right time. He passes the rod to Suna right as the fish surfaces and lets him reel it in the large catch rest of the way.

“Thanks captain,” Suna says, kissing Osamu’s shoulder.

Osamu, who Kiyoomi had just started to write-off as an unshakable man, starts to blush. “You hooked the bait well,” he comments, kissing the side of Suna’s head and heading back toward the steering wheel.

Suna pulls the large fish in which is apparently a salmon and holds it up to gloat at Miya.

That’s how they spend the rest of the afternoon, reeling in fish and gloating at Miya. Kiyoomi’s the next one to pull a fish in, then Suna and Osamu twice more. Miya doesn’t pull one in until everyone has lost interest. His catch is the smallest among all the fish but he loves it more than anyone else loved their fish.

“Look Omi, he looks just like you.”

“Are you trying to insult me Miya?”

“No,” Miya says genuinely. “He’s got spots.” He holds the small fish up and points to the spots on the side of its body and with his non-fish hand he runs his thumb over the moles on Kiyoomi’s forehead.

Kiyoomi steps back from the touch and a bubbling feeling starts to fill his stomach. He can’t tell if it’s anxiety or something even less desirable—excitement.

“Hungry?”

Or maybe it’s that.

Kiyoomi nods and follows after Miya, briefly worried they’re going to be eating the fish they just caught. His worries are quelled by a large cooler Osamu lugs over to where they’ve all gathered by the bench that used to house the life vests. It's been returned to its bench state and Suna sits on top of it, leaning down to help Osamu unpack an array of sandwiches and different fruits.

Just like the crab Osamu made, the sandwiches are incredible. Different meats and vegetables on fresh sliced bread. Miya says they’re called wanpaku between large bites of his own sandwich. With the sun out and good food surrounding him, Kiyoomi succumbs to the comforting feeling and actually starts to feel like he’s on vacation.

Crawling through dirt and breaking into lighthouses didn’t exactly instill that feeling during his past escapades with Miya. This is better. So much so that Kiyoomi is seldom glancing around for glimmers. He’s not even sure he needs to search for them. The past three instances it was almost like the Glimmers sought him out. He couldn’t have ignored them if he wanted to.

Miya is holding a similar relaxed attitude, lying down on the deck beside Kiyoomi and fishing a pack of cards out of the cooler’s side pocket. He’s trying to get Kiyoomi to play some game called Egyptian Rat-Screw but Kiyoomi can’t follow any of the rules Miya keeps listing out.

Still, he deals Kiyoomi a hand and stares at him expectantly. “Omi come on we just went over this.”

“You explained it so poorly Atsumu,” Suna says from the bench. He isn’t even looking in their direction, face shoved in the upturned viewfinder of his camera which is pointed toward Osamu.

Kiyoomi smiles weakly at Suna, not sure how to act around him, especially now that he’s speaking in Kiyoomi’s defense. Suna’s anger is odd and hard to navigate around. Not in the passive aggressive way Kousei can be. Suna makes it pretty clear that he doesn’t like Kiyoomi, but in a way where he’s almost being…nice about it. It’s confusing.

His study of Suna is broken when a drop of rain lands on his knee. Kiyoomi swipes at the drop and looks toward Suna who’s already packing his camera back in the ziplock bag.

“It’ll pass,” Miya says with a smile and a mouthful of sandwich.

Then it starts to pour.

“Shit!” Miya shouts, scrambling to pick up the cards and protect his sandwich. Kiyoomi moves to pack the rest of the food away. It doesn’t fit together perfectly but a little smooshed and dry is better than not smooshed and soggy.

“It’s just a sunshower, nothing to worry about!” Osamu shouts.

Kiyoomi forces a smile as he gets drenched in the rain. Miya snags up the last card – a red ace of diamonds – and tugs Kiyoomi with him under the roof above the steering wheel. Just as Osamu predicted, the rain doesn’t last long, but gray clouds do start to loom in and overtake their nice weather. With the sun gone Kiyoomi starts to shiver. Before he can ask for anything Miya is unbuckling his life vest and wrapping a dry towel around him.

He leans into the warmth of the towel and falters a little at the kindness Miya is showing him. “I-I got it,” Kiyoomi says, reaching for the towel to dry himself off.

“Hm?” Miya asks, passing the towel to Kiyoomi.

“Uh, you should dry yourself off,” Kiyoomi mumbles.

Miya grins and lifts his own towel from the cupboard under the steering wheel. It’s got turtles on it similar to Kiyoomi’s towel but Miya’s is green instead of blue. “Thanks for yer concern Omi.” Miya starts with his hair, rubbing vigorously and then transitioning to a gentle pat on his shoulders and chest.

Suna clears his throat and Kiyoomi realizes he’s staring way too much on Miya’s upper body. He focuses on patting his own hair dry. Thankfully Suna’s attention falls back to his camera and away from Kiyoomi’s…curiosity.

When everything is dry and accounted for Osamu decides they should head back in. Miya pulls Kiyoomi toward the front of the boat to show him how to bring the anchor back up and Suna towels off all the seats. The trip back is a little chillier, even with the fresh towel Miya wraps around him when they start to make their way back.

The wharf starts to come back into view and Kiyoomi feels a little relief wash over him. He made it through the awkward outing. Beside him, Miya looks less than relieved. Kiyoomi can guess why. They didn’t see any glimmers. If anything Kiyoomi has the perfect reason to suggest they stop doing this again. All three of their outings have been a complete bust.

When they pull into the dock Miya and Suna help situate the boat at Osamu’s instructions. Kiyoomi winces when he remembers how those guys from Okinawa just let their boat smack against the pier when they tried to convince Yachi to get on. He’s certain Osamu wouldn’t let them anywhere near his boat.

Miya seems a little lost in thought as he ties buoys to the side of the boat. He’s not doing a bad job, but he doesn’t have his sarcastic Miya flair when Osamu instructs him to do certain things. The weird energy remains with Miya as they climb back down the ladder.

Kiyoomi turns back toward Osamu and Suna who are still doing some things on the boat and don’t look ready to leave yet.

“You guys can head out!” Osamu calls. He turns toward Kiyoomi. “Thanks for coming aboard today.”

“No thank you,” Kiyoomi says insistently. He isn’t sure if he should add anything else so he lets his sentence fall there. Osamu smiles wide and Kiyoomi feels reassured in his response. He hasn’t had to interact with strangers like this since college. With Yachi handling all the communications he needs for his assignments he seldom has to stumble through first-time interactions.

He’s not sure Osamu or Suna really count as strangers given they grew up playing together, but they feel like it for Kiyoomi. He smiles to himself a little as he thinks about the afternoon. It was fun, and it’s not so bad that they didn’t find any Glimmers. He wouldn’t have done something like this without that pretense.

Beside him Miya is dragging his feet against the dock. They’ve got about five more feet before they make it to the truck parked in the closest spot to the wharf.

“Miya?”

“What if we went to the bookstore,” Miya says immediately. “Ya know, to ask Yamada-san if he knows anything else about the Glimmers.”

“Who’s Yamada-san.”

“The bookstore owner.” Miya raises an eyebrow at him. He tuts a little at Kiyoomi. “You don’t even know the name of the man you stole from.”

“I didn't steal!” Kiyoomi groans. “And wouldn’t knowing his name make stealing from him worse?”

“Ah, you like to make sure you don’t connect with your victims,” Miya notes sarcastically. 

“The only victim here is me having to listen to your half-baked speculation.”

“But you’ll go?”

Kiyoomi stops in front of the car, letting his bag drop on top of his foot. He doesn’t want to get dirt on it. “Go where?”

“To the bookstore.”

There’s hope in Miya’s eyes again. This expression is much more endearing than his smirk or the pinched anger he had when he first saw Kiyoomi. Maybe that’s why he finds himself wanting to say yes.

“Fine.”

Miya tucks his chin down to try and face away from Kiyoomi, smiling to himself. “Good. Good good good.”

The smile disappears when they get to the store and come face to face with a closed sign. It’s hung on a small metal chain with an arrow pointed toward the store’s hours: Monday-Sunday 10 a.m to 3 p.m.”

“Three o’clock!” Miya shouts after reading the same section of the sign. “Who closes their store at 3?!”

“Yamada-san,” Kiyomi says, flexing his newfound knowledge of the owner’s name.

Looking around the town center most of the non-food storefronts display a closed sign right now, including Suna’s bike shop. Tourists decked in clothes sporting “Karumi” in different fonts, wander around like zombies looking at the menus posted outside all the restaurants, probably looking for food that’s cheap and something their kids will eat.

Miya slumps down on a bench right outside the bookstore and looks up at the gray-clouded sky. “Aghhh,” he cries out like the gods are listening to him. He shuts his eyes. “A beer would be so good right now.”

For once, Kiyoomi agrees with Miya. A cold beer and cheap bar food sounds perfect. He and Yachi used to spend their Saturday nights in college trying to find the cheapest bar crawls— it ended up being an Izakaya ten minutes from campus that specialized in something called the burger-fry. He and Yachi were never sober enough to truly understand what they were eating. “That does sound good,” he comments, lost in the thought of french fries.

“Do you want to get a drink?” Miya’s still staring up at the sky and his request is more casual than the near-begging he displayed when he wanted Kiyoomi to go to the bookstore.

Kiyoomi frowns a little at the request. When he was picturing his fries he was eating them at an empty table, not sharing them with Miya. Still…

“Sure.”

Miya smiles softly and doesn’t hide his face this time. “Okay, this way then.” He stands from the bench and pauses to make sure Kiyoomi’s following him.

One drink. Then they’ll leave.

Even as he thinks it now Kiyoomi doesn’t expect the resolution to hold true.

The bar Miya ends up dragging him to is off a side street away from the gathering hungry first-time tourists. It has a certain air about it, like it’s typically unveiled by someone who said they ‘know a spot.’ Thankfully Miya spares Kiyoomi of commentary along that line.

Fairy lights are strung up outside the brick exterior with faux wisteria plants hanging around the entrance. Through the large wooden doors heavy enough to pull a grunt from Miya when he forces them open is a bustling bar with two distinct sides. On the left is a bar large enough for 15 seats across. It’s surrounded by booth style tables that frame the storefront window back to the far corner of the building. All occupants on this side look up from their food and drink to inspect Miya and Kiyoomi.

The people on the right, however, couldn't care less that the door just opened. Tourist families who aren’t first-time travelers to Karumi and know about the local spot. They know enough not to wear Kurami merch—save for the occasional sun-bleached baseball hat that’s probably older than Kiyoomi. Though they still have the bright red complexion of out-of-towners who forget sunscreen. There’s also a gentle hope in their eyes that could only belong to someone without work responsibilities.

Kiyoomi wonders if he has that look as Miya leads him to the townie side of the bar, all the way to the one free but sadly window-less booth.

He glances around at the framed group pictures of summer staff labeled with the date of the photo and coated in years of kitchen grease. There are names carved into the shiplap walls and cobwebs in the corners. Despite the slightly grimy interior, the energy in the restaurant/bar is warm. Like everyone cares more about enjoying themselves than dusting for cobwebs.

The last restaurant Kiyoomi went to was a small omakase place in Tokyo where he was very conscious of his posture. Here he slouches comfortably against the worn seat cushions. Kiyooi smiles down at the sticky menu as he considers what food and drink combo he wants. 

Miya is a step ahead of him, flagging down a bored-looking waitress who couldn’t be older than 17. 

“The usual?” She asks, snapping pink bubble gum before speaking. Her name card is too scrawled and faded for Kiyooi to make it out. Her eyebags and heavy eye makeup fade together in a sad ombre effect. She’s probably been here all day but manages to direct a familiar smile to Miya.

“Yes please,” he nods quickly. Then, after a glance toward Kiyoomi, “and fries.”

Kiyoomi looks down at the table and mutters a quiet thanks. Miya must have been listening to him ramble about french fries when they walked over.

The waitress snaps her gum again and steps away with their menus in hand.

“What’s the usual?”

“You’ll see.”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes. “Your enjoyment in my pain is showing.”

Miya cracks a grin and leans back against the booth.

“What?”

“I was just wondering where ya went. Glad to see you’re back.”

Kiyoomi lifts an eyebrow at the vague comment.

“You were quiet on the boat,” Miya explains. 

“Quiet?” Had he been quiet? Kiyoomi thinks back on the boat and tries to replay the conversations. He hadn’t ignored anyone or physically mumbled his responses. He thought he got through the outing pretty well. Sure he hadn’t been insulting Miya as much but he didn’t feel comfortable enough to engage in their typical arguing.

Kiyoomi shrugs. “I guess I get quiet around people I don’t really know.” As soon as the thoughts are vocalized he wishes he’d phrased them better.

Miya lifts his eyebrows and beams. “Think ya know me Omi?”

“Unfortunately,” he grumbles. Though he’s not really sure to what degree. There’s a lot about Miya he still doesn’t understand, even after the lighthouse and the field and… “oh.”

“What?”

Kiyoomi opens his mouth to respond and immediately shuts it when their waitress reappears, setting down a tray with two large margaritas, a plate of pulled-pork nachos, and a basket of french fries. His mouth waters at the smell and his eyebrows furrow, confused at the sight.

“You said you wanted to get a beer ,” Kiyoomi hisses the second their waitress steps away.

Miya is happily munching on a chip and takes a sip of his margarita—pinkie up. “Figure of speech Omi.”

“To you a cold beer means–”

“Nachos and margaritas.”

While those two options have nothing to do with each other, Kiyoomi can’t argue with the fact that margaritas and nachos are so much better than beer. He pulls his glass across the table toward him, careful not to spill, and takes a sip of the citrusy drink. Refreshing lime explodes in his mouth, complemented by the salty nachos Miya pushes toward him.

“What were you going to say?” Miya asks as Kiyoomi alternates between sipping and munching at their feast—and eating the occasional fry.

“What?”

“You said oh after you said you knew me.”

His memory is blank for a second as his brain struggles to find a time in his existence before these nachos. Then it clicks. “Oh just that the last two places you picked out had some kind of shared memory. I was wondering if we’d been on the boat before.”

Miya takes another sip of his margarita and grimaces slightly like he just remembered about the tequila in the drink. “Yes,” he starts, “but not as much as the other places. Grandma’s boat was a special occasion trip.”

He takes another sip and elaborates on how the boat was mostly used for fishing but twice a summer Miya’s grandmother would take the kids out. They’d eat sandwiches and waste bait while trying to catch the first fish just like they had done today. Osamu would always be the first to catch them except when they were nine and Yachi caught one almost the size of her. After that she only put her hook in the water if it was baitless, wanting to be included but not wanting a repeat of her previous horror.

Similar to Miya’s other trips down memory lane, his eyes are sparkling and his head’s tipped back in a perpetual laugh. He recites details and details of “and then you,” or even worse “and then we .” Even though he’s the one who asked, Kiyoomi is starting to get sick of hearing about his lost memories.

He picks at the food and finishes off his first drink as he waits for Miya to finish. When that tell-tale pause, typically proceeding a “what about you” type question, finally breaches Miya’s sentences, Kiyoomi jumps in.

“What prefecture did you grow up in?”

It’s a complete non-sequitur. Miya’s lips curl in a confused smile at how Kiyoomi leans over the table and nearly shouts the question.

“Hyogo,” he answers with a hesitant smile. “What ab–”

“Where did you go to college?” Kiyoomi rushes out the question, beating Miya to the punch.

Miya cracks another smirk as he tries to figure out Kiyoomi’s game. But there is no game, he just wants to learn more about Miya. And he’s tired of talking about himself.

“Hitotsubashi University.”

“What was your first job?”

“Konbini check-out person.”

“Who’s older? You or Osamu”

“Ha, I am.”

“What’s the last movie you watched?”

“Journey to the Center of the Earth.”

Kiyoomi pauses at this. “You do have bad taste in movies.”

This pulls an excited scoff from Miya. His mouth is stretched in a comically wide smile like he can’t believe Kiyoomi just said that, but he thinks it’s funny anyways. “Excuse you! That's a great movie!”

The waitress exchanges Kiyoomi’s empty glass for a full one and Kiyoomi tugs it closer, sipping at the brim before lifting the glass and pulling a long gulp. He smacks his lips. This one has more lime than the other.

“What’s the last movie you watched,” Miya asks, pulling at the word ‘you’ accusatorially.

He racks his brain and his last project comes to mind. A tragedy romance where the main character and the romantic lead have different wants in life. When he designed the poster he tried to play with the shadows to hint at the couple’s inevitable demise. The main lead walking under the streetlights and the romantic lead stepping just out of the light. He tells Miya the title while pondering whether he liked it or not.

“That’s totally inferior to Journey to the Center of the Earth!”

“How?” Kiyoomi laughs. He doesn’t disagree, but he likes seeing Miya riled up about this.

“First of all Journey to the Center of the Earth has dinosaurs. That should be enough said. But ALSO the romantic pairing actually gets together in the end.”

“Is it important for you that characters end up together?”

Miya’s laughter dies down a little. He smiles wryly. “I guess so. Either way your movie sucks.”

Kiyoomi shrugs and takes another sip, this time chasing the drink with a fry. It’s salty and crisp and just what he needed right now. “I had to watch it for work.”

“Then that doesn’t count. What’s the last movie you watched for fun?”

He pauses at this and racks his brain. The alcohol is making it hard to recall his watchlist. So is the fact that he doesn’t really have one curated to his own tastes. For the past three years he’s spent all his time watching movies for work. “I don’t really watch movies.”

“That’s even worse!” Miya shouts with a laugh-crazed smile. He lifts his second glass and sloshes it a little when he brings it to his mouth. “Next question!”

“When did we start playing twenty-questions?”

“Just now.” Miya finishes his glass and flags the waitress down for another—for him and Kiyoomi. This one has less lime and more salt on the rim.

Kiyoomi scrunches his nose at the salty first sip and shoves the empty plate of nachos aside, switching it out for the fries and prepares for the onslaught of questions he’s called on himself. Maybe he should have prepared a little harder.

“What were your parents like?”

He fumbles a little with his sip and some drink dribbles down his chin. “What?”

“Your parents,” Miya smiles, like there’s only good things in this world associated with the word ‘parents.’ “Like my ma and dad are strangely obsessed with each other. Like they never quite grew out of their teenage selves. It gave me and Samu a diluted sense of what most relationships are like,” Miya laughs.

Kiyoomi is barely listening to Miya, trying to come up with some kind of response that treads the line of honesty and something fit to be discussed in a family bar. What were his parents like? Definitely not like Miya’s parents. He can’t remember them ever being physically close enough to exchange a handshake, let alone anything more intimate.

Maybe he can talk about what they did for work?

His dad was, and still is, a salaryman. Since Kiyoomi’s mom died he has started dating this nice woman his age who works for some kind of insurance company or a big name hotel? Kiyoomi can’t remember. He’s only met her once.

His mom didn’t work in the professional sense. But she was an artist in her free time. That’s also something Kiyoomi doesn’t want to share. The second he does anyone he’s speaking with starts to connect dots that don’t go together. He didn’t become an artist because of his mom. His love for art is his own, and he made it into a career with his own strengths.

“Omi?”

“I don’t know…” he says slowly.

“You don’t know what your parents were like?” Miya sets his drink down and looks at Kiyoomi.

He doesn’t remember enough to describe some kind of memory. He tries, shutting his eyes and all he sees is blurry figures that get swept away in fading strokes of color like some flashback scene in a murder mystery. If Miya really wanted to know what his mom was like he could bring him to Tokyo and show him his childhood sketchbooks. Force him to look at the stick figures labeled mom that were perpetually designed with frowns and black scribbles around her.

“They were…there,” Kiyoomi settles on. If he wasn’t two and a half drinks in he might call Miya out on how pushy he’s being. But his anger is subdued by tequila and the fact that for most people this is very normal conversation.

He takes another sip.

Miya seems to be processing some kind of understanding because he sits up and smiles lightly. “Okay,” he says. “They were there.” Miya barrels through another question before the heavy atmosphere brewing between them permanently kills the vibe.

“Worst snack food?”

“Wasabi chips.”

“Terrible answer,” Miya laughs. “Ever stolen anything?”

“Paint,” he admits. “Ran out of this specific shade of red I needed and couldn’t afford the $100 price tag on the small tube.” That was before he started working at the restaurant. If he could go back he would buy the cheaper option. Back then he still had the false idea that more expensive art supplies were always better.

Miya balks at the price and carries on with his questions, each more ridiculous than the last.

Kiyoomi finally breaks on question 17.

“Are you a virgin?”

“You cannot ask me that.” Kiyoomi is laughing so hard tears are in his eyes.

“I can ask, you don’t have to answer.”

Kiyoomi studies Miya. His shirt is buttoned, but it’s one button off—a fact Kiyoomi has been trying to ignore since Miya hastiled buttoned them one their way back to the car. His arms are stretched out across the back of the booth-style seats. His cheeks are red from the alcohol and his hair is tousled from the boat.

He’s drunk.

And after three and a half margaritas, Kiyoomi is too.

“Virginity is a social construct,” Kiyoomi deadpans. “But yes.”

Miya’s eyes widen like he’s been animated into some gag anime and Kiyoomi realizes he misspoke. “Wait no! I meant no!”

Miya loses it at this and descends into a coughing fit when margarita goes down the wrong pipe. He holds up his hand to signal he’s okay and takes a few deep breaths. He’s such an idiot and Kiyoomi can’t stop smiling.

“Are you okay?” A girl with wavy hair braided to one side asks, coming out of nowhere. She smiles politely at Kiyoomi to acknowledge his presence and returns her full attention to Miya, placing her hand on his shoulder.

Miya smiles and takes a big breath, lifting his shoulders and pulling away from the girl in the process. The evasion is so subtle it could be perceived as accidental. In fact, Kiyoomi’s not really sure that it wasn't accidental .

“Oh yeah I’m fine,” he says, smiling persistently. “Thanks for asking, this guy is no help.” He sends a wink to Kiyoomi.

“Well if, you know, you weren’t fine, I know mouth to mouth.” She pauses in the middle of her line but finishes it up with full confidence and a casual flip of her hair.

Miya looks like he’s rebooting for a second but his smile returns, and maybe it’s forced. Kiyoomi can’t tell if that’s just what he’s hoping. Since it’s always awkward to be in the vicinity of a person getting hit on. No other reason.

“Thanks, I'll keep that in mind.”

She attempts to exchange Line details but Miya says he doesn’t have his phone with him. Whether that’s the truth or a lie the girl accepts it gracefully and returns back to her friends who are not-so-subtly watching the interaction from the tourist side of the bar. Kiyoomi smiles fondly at how they all laugh together when she gets back.

Miya turns back to his drink and smiles a little awkwardly.

“Bet you’re used to that,” Kiyoomi says and oh god he cannot believe he just said that.

Miya chortles. “Yeah the ladies dig me.” his face falls after he makes the comment and Kiyoomi swears he sees Miya mouth ‘why did I say that?’

Now they’re two idiots in the booth regretting the words they just uttered. No-name waitress saves the day with their fifth round of margaritas.

“You’re getting water after this,” she says sternly to Miya and throws a glance at Kiyoomi to let him know he’s included in her threat of looking after them.

Invigorated by the confidence of his fifth drink, Miya leans in with heavy-lidded eyes. “What about you?” Do you date girls?”

‘Yeah I was actually engaged to a girl as of last week and just broke off my engagement because her parents tried to trick me into having kids with her even though I’ve always been very clear that I don’t want kids.’ The response could fly out so easily if Kiyoomi just opens his mouth, but even five drinks in he is aware enough to clamp his mouth shut and not share that with Miya.

He’s enjoying the giggle fits they’ve been having in this booth and if he drops something like that right now they’re both bound for sad drunk vibes.

Miya seems to take his silence to mean something else. “Do you like boys?” he whispers.

Kiyoomi coughs at the juvenile question and tries to quell his nerves with more tequila. He’s too drunk to remember how that worked out for him a few days ago. Miya’s looking at him bashfully and it’s just too intimate of a setting for him to answer. Still, he opens his mouth.

“I, uh..”

The familiar snap of bubble gum jolts Kiyoomi out of his seat. “AH!! I mean, ahhh,” he whispers, remembering he’s inside. God he’s so drunk. “I’m sorry.”

His outburst doesn’t faze her in the slightest. She’s definitely pulling a double right now. “We’re closing,” she says bluntly.

Kiyoomi’s jaw drops. “Oh my god it’s fucking two in the morning already?”

Miya snickers as he scribbles his signature on a check the waitress passed to him. “This is Kurami not Roppongi. It’s only 10.”

Oh. Well, still. They got here at 5.

Miya bids individual farewells to everyone still in the bar, calling to all the townies by name. Kiyoomi’s head swirls in circles as he walks the short distance from the booth to the door. Horror flashes over him when he realizes they have to walk home. When they step outside the cool air helps settle his stomach a little.

He glances around the sidewalks dimly lit by a line of lamposts. There are very few people walking around right now, and most of them look to be in their twenties. Kiyoomi sticks closer to the shadowy part of the sidewalk to keep his head from hurting while Miya walks chipper under the lights. “Nice night out Omi,” Miya shouts. “Omi omi omi omi.”

“Stop saying my name Miyaaaaa,” Kiyoomi whines.

But Miya continues to whisper Omi to himself. Then he gasps, like he just discovered something worth shouting eureka over. “You should call me Atsumu.”

“Miya,” Kiyoomi counters. His toes feel really heavy right now. He’s putting special effort into making sure he doesn’t trip over them. Kiyoomi laughs. “Miya,” he repeats, for no reason.

When they get to the part of the street where the sidewalk ceases to exist Miya has the hindsight to turn their phone flashlights on so they don’t get hit by a car, not that any are driving by. They’re walking closer to each other now and Kiyoomi can’t manage a straight line, bumping his hand into Miya’s four times in a row.

“Sorry,” he says after each time. On the fifth smack of their knuckles Miya grabs Kiyoomi’s hand and laces their fingers together. It’s practical really. Now their hands will stop smacking together. And when Miya squeezes his hand? He’s just making sure Kiyoomi is still there. It’s too dark out for Kiyoomi to check Miya’s face, but he doesn't need to. They’re on the same page.

They walk hand in hand back the rest of the way. On drunken legs it takes them an hour and a half, but Kiyoomi feels mostly sober when they get back.

Back to Miya’s house.

And suddenly Miya’s hand feels less practical and more purposeful. Kiyoomi’s own hand tingles as he looks down at the way it’s laced together with Miya’s when they stop in front of his front door. He watches in awe as Miya unlaces them and gently places Kiyoomi’s hand at his side.

There’s awareness in Miya’s eyes again. It had disappeared around drink three but it’s back now and looking at Kiyoomi with rapt attention.

It’s somewhere around 11:30 p.m. and Kiyoomi’s stomach is swirling with this feeling of want that he hasn’t felt before. It snakes its way through his nerves, igniting every part of his being until his fingertips are tingling and his mouth is opening.

“Can I come in?”

“Y-yeah, yes,” Miya mumbles, hurrying to open the door.

They shuck their shoes off and Kiyoomi drops his bag at the entrance, turning to face Miya. His hair is still tousled, and his shirt is still buttoned incorrectly. Kiyoomi reaches for it. “You did this wrong,” he murmurs.

“Oh,” Miya says quietly, gasping when Kiyoomi starts to unbutton his shirt to fix it. He opens up the top four buttons, exposing the upper body that Miya loves to show off. His chest is rising and falling with deep even breaths. Kiyoomi’s hand moves without his brain’s permission and grazes the side of Miya’s waist. “Can I-”

“Y-yeah,” Miya stutters again. He doesn’t seem to know what Kiyoomi means, and Kiyoomi isn’t sure either. He moves his hand across Miya’s muscles, tracing them and feeling how warm his sun-kissed skin is. He slides his hand around to Miya’s back and traces his spine.

Miya takes a step closer and brings his hand to Kiyoomi’s jaw, guiding Kiyoomi’s face toward his. He brushes his thumb over Kiyoomi’s bottom lip and Kiyoomi’s parts his lips in response.

Miya looks oddly pained. “God,” he whimpers. “Can I kiss you?”

Kiyoomi’s nerves are buzzing so loud he almost doesn’t hear Miya. He nods and Miya doesn’t waste any time, dipping in and pressing tentative lips against Kiyoomi’s. Both of his hands cradle Kiyoomi’s face and move through his hair as he kisses him deeply, exhaling with relief through the kiss.

He pulls back and stares at Kiyoomi like he’s about to disappear. But Kiyoomi doesn’t, and he wants more.

He leans back in and crashes his lips back into Miya’s. It’s less sensual and a lot more needy but with the sounds Miya is making Kiyoomi knows he wants it just as badly. He gasps through heavy, open-mouthed kisses and whines when Miya starts to move to his neck.

He bends his knees slightly and Miya knows exactly what he wants, wrapping his hands under Kiyoomi’s thighs and lifting him so Kiyoomi can wrap his thighs around Miya’s waist. Miya groans at the pressure this puts on his cock and Kiyoomi whines as Miya bites down on his neck.

Miya starts walking and crashes down into the couch, dropping Kiyoomi onto the cushions and following quickly after him. The couch creaks as they scramble together. It’s awkward and clumsy with how neither of them fully fit on the couch, but somehow that makes it more exciting. Miya’s pulling Kiyoomi’s t-shirt off and Kiyoomi’s grinding up into Miya, desperate for some kind of pressure.

“We can’t have sex,” Kiyoomi gasps as he humps against Miya’s thigh with small thrusts.

“We can’t,” Miya agrees, crying out when Kiyoomi slides his hand down to him.

“Oh my god,” Kiyoomi gasps. He clenches his eyes tight and tries to calm his breath. Miya lies down on top of him and does the same, but his heavy breathing in Kiyoomi’s ear is not helping Kiyoomi want to slow down.

Why should he stop? This is the hate sex he was pondering over a few days ago. Except now he doesn’t hate Miya as much. And Miya feels so good on top of him right now. Their bare chests are pressed together. Desire shoots to Kiyoomi’s dick when their nipples brush against each other.

“Miya,” he moans.

“Say the word and we stop,” Miya whispers. He says it like he wants Kiyoomi to be the one to pull the plug. Like he doesn’t want the responsibility of ending what’s happening right now.

“Just, just kiss me,” Kiyoomi gasps. “Let's just kiss.” Even as he says it he can’t stop the way his hips are moving against Miya’s.

Miya nods eagerly and goes back to biting and sucking at his neck in one spot that makes him keen. He kisses up Kiyoomi’s jaw and Kiyoomi’s hands slide down from Miya’s back to his ass, pulling him against Kiyoomi’s dick with short thrusts.

“Ngh ngh ngh, you’re gonna make me cum,” Miya gasps.

“Me too,” Kiyoomi whines.

Miya crashes their lips back together. It’s messy and heated. The kissing dulls the quiet whines Miya is making as Kiyoomi encourages him to grind their cocks together. As he gets closer he feels the burning urge to rip their pants off, but his deluded brain has decided their clothes are the only thing that’s keeping this from being sex. They’re just making out. Tomorrow they can pretend this never happened.

Tomorrow starts to grow smaller in Kiyoomi’s brain and Miya picks up his thrusting speed. “Mmmf fuck fuck fuck,” Miya cants, snapping his hips forward. The pressure builds and builds until Miya reaches a desperate hand between them and squeezes Kiyoomi.

Then he’s coming, and Miya is too in sharp gasps.

Blood rushes to his head and Kiyoomi’s eardrums are deadened by the overpowering white noise. Miya crashes on top of him, resting his face in the crook of Kiyoomi’s neck. He presses a few gentle kisses to Kiyoomi’s skin like he doesn’t want them to be done yet but he’s too tired for anything more. Even with Miya’s weight on him Kiyoomi feels like he’s floating.

Then the post-climax high passes and he hears Miya snoring.

The idiot fell asleep on top of him.

“Miya,” he hisses to no avail. He tries tapping his shoulder but nothing. After a frustrated exhale Kiyoomi attempts to sit up and Miya rolls off him, slamming into the floor with a bang. Somehow he still sleeps through it.

Whoever is upstairs, does not.

“Who’s there?” A voice calls from the top of the stairs.

Horror flashes over Kiyoomi at the idea of getting caught here like this after making out with Miya freaking Atsumu like he’s a teenager. He grabs his shirt and makes a mad dash for the door, snagging his shoes and bag before the footsteps make it to the bottom of the stairs. It’s either Osamu or Suna and Kiyoomi doesn’t want to face either of them.

It’s sometime after midnight. He’s half naked, running across the street with no shoes on. It’s embarrassing, sure. But what’s more embarrassing is when he throws the door open to the kitchen, half naked and still holding his shoes, and Motoya is sitting at the kitchen table with a cool glare on his face.

“I-”

“Welcome home Kiyo,” Motoya says before Kiyoomi can attempt to lie his way out of this. He’s wearing a thin robe over pajamas with his legs crossed. He cocks an eyebrow. “Were you gardening again?” He puts air quotes around ‘gardening’ and grins. He’s finally caught Kiyoomi.

“No,” Kiyoomi lies pointlessly.

Motoya stands from the kitchen table and glides over to the freezer. He looks entirely pleased with himself as he fishes an ice pack out of the bottom drawer and tosses it to Kiyoomi. “If Haru and Fumi ask about all that, tell them it’s a bug bite.” Motoya gestured toward Kiyoomi’s neck which he belatedly realizes must be covered in hickies.

“They are not going to ask,” he says defensively. And there’s no way they’d believe whatever Miya left on his neck is a bug bite. Kiyoomi winces at the feeling of cold ice on his neck and hopes the chill will bring down the flush of embarrassment in his cheeks as well.

He looks at the wall clock and grimaces. 1:02 a.m. It’s already tomorrow. There’s no way he and Miya can pretend this never happened.

Waking up is like getting sucker punched in the face by daylight. Kiyoomi immediately gets the spins and has to lie very still for an unknown amount of time that feels like years. After a few prayers and promises to never drink again he’s able to open his eyes.

He grimaces at his shoes which are for some reason in his bedroom instead of in the genkan. His dirty clothes are in a pile on the floor beside his shoes. He’s glad he at least remembered to take them off before passing out on his futon.

He staggers to the kitchen with one sock on and clean clothes. No. Wait. This is the shirt he wore last night.

A pancake aroma greets him and convinces him not to go back to bed. So do whispered hellos from Haru and Fumi.

“Uncle Toya said we have to be extra quiet this morning,” Haru whispers, holding a finger to his lips.

Kiyoomi can’t help but smile at that and mimic the shushing expression. He mouths thank you to Motoya as he brings a plate of pancakes over.

“Soak up whatever it was you drank last night with these.”  They’re stacked high and thick like the trendy pancake shops in Tokyo. These ones are just a little more lumpy.

Kiyoomi digs in and sighs at the fluffy pillows doused in syrup. What the hell happened last night? He racks his brain and recalls bubble gum and nachos. Miya was involved somehow. Kiyoomi scowls and blames his hangover on him.

“What’s on your neck Uncle Omi?” Fumi asks from across the table.

His neck? He feels around and winces at a sore spot his finger presses into. Then it clicks. Oh. God. The memories come back in sharp bursts and Kiyoomi drops his fork. A piece of pancake flies across the table and syrup splatters everywhere. “Oh my god!”

“It’s a bug bite,” Motoyoa shouts, dragging Kiyoomi away from the table into the work shed and shutting the door.

“Oh my god!” He can’t stop shouting. He’s being hit with an onslaught of memories of him and Miya on that stupid couch. What was he thinking?!

“Kiyo, breathe.” Motoya’s advice is paired with a cackle he can’t help but slip. He must be eating this up. “Just to clarify it was Atsumu right?”

“OF COURSE IT WAS MIYA!” Kiyoomi shouts. Who does his cousin think he is?
“Hey you say that as if you haven’t detested him since you got here,” Toya teases.

Kiyoomi tilts his head back and inhales very slowly. “It was a one time lapse of judgement.” Miya’s moan reverberates through his mind. Kiyoomi clenches his jaw. “It’s not happening again,’ he grits out. But Motoya isn’t the one he needs to be convincing right now.

He glances toward his cousin who is making zero effort to hide his laughter now. “I’ll be right back.”

He steals Motoya’s old slides and marches toward Miya’s house. The shoes make an obnoxious flip flopping sound with each step which is making it difficult for Kiyoomi to maintain the calm and collected demeanor he’s trying to give off. He’s not frazzled and hungover and unable to fully erase the feeling of Miya’s lips against his. He’s unbothered and well rested.

He gets to the door and knocks three times at one minute intervals. No answer and no sound of someone moving on the other side of the door.

After a moment of consideration, or lack thereof, he opens the door and lets himself in.

Walking in unannounced is extremely uncomfortable. Kiyoomi tries to keep a silent approach and stay light on his feet like someone’s going to jump out and yell for him to get out. But he came here full of adrenaline and it's carrying him steadily into the living room one step at a time.

The floor creaks slightly when he gets to the couch. One glance at it and he hates that he knows how good it feels to lie down with Miya on it.

But the couch is empty. Kiyoomi glances toward the stairs, about to sneak up them when he sees Miya, frozen in place, behind the kitchen counter with a coffee mug in his hand mid-sip.

“YOU!” Miya shouts, utterly scandalized.

“Me?!” Kiyoomi shouts like he’s in his own house. “You!!”

The stars are creaking now and Kiyoomi is horrified to see Suna walking down them.

“We had sex last night!” Miya shouts at Kiyoomi like he just remembered, right when Suna makes eye contact with Kiyoomi.

“We did not,” Kiyoomi shouts back. Suna immediately turns around and walks back up the stairs.

“And!” Miya pauses, head shifting back and forth between Kiyoomi and the couch. “You left me on the floor!”

“You fell on the floor in your sleep and you wouldn’t wake up,” he hisses, speaking faster with each passing word.

They’re both breathing heavily now after exerting the rest of the little bit of energy they had left in them from last night. Kiyoomi is overcome with the need to lie down. And food, god he’s so hungry. He wants his pancakes back.

“Pancakes,” he whimpers.

Miya sets his coffee mug down and rubs his face in his hands, sighing loudly. When he pulls them away he looks less like he was hit by a truck and more endeared. “Want to get breakfast?”

“What? No.” He came over here to make sure Miya never spoke of what happened last night again, not to spend more time with him.

Miya sighs with a smirk. “Come on.” He doesn’t turn around to see if Kiyoomi is following him, and Kiyoomi hates that he is.

* * *

The pancakes sit in an oblong white dish plated with powdered sugar. Three comically thick pancakes that jostle as Kiyoomi cuts into them and takes a mouth watering bite. Miya swore he would prefer this order to any pancakes he’s had before.

Flavor-wise they’re better than the ones Motoya made. But the feeling of discomfort Kiyoomi has from being in a restaurant right now has seeped into the pancakes and left a bad taste in his mouth. 

They're sitting at the counter of a small breakfast diner someone jammed into an old train car. It’s just down the road from their two houses. Kiyoomi had previously thought it abandoned but Miya dragged him in to prove him wrong.

He and Miya are sitting side by side at a six seat counter in the only chairs that weren’t occupied by old men. If Kiyoomi really tried, he might be able to pretend he’s here alone. It’s just him and the napkin holder with a wrinkled sticker of Betty Boop on its side.

“So–”

“No,” Kiyoomi says, cutting Miya off. His voice cracks a little; a result of how fast he tried to interrupt him.

He can’t do this. The whole ‘so we hooked up,’ conversation coded with chagrin vocabulary. The last time he had this talk with someone was Vodka-breath guy from his freshman year party. He thought he’d never see the guy again and come Monday he found they had three classes together and one group project.

Back then he had the false sense that this world was big enough that he’d never have to face his mistakes. Now he knows better.

Well…he thought he did.

“If you’re going to interrupt me you need to have something to say,” Miya smirks.

“Let’s just pretend it never happened.” His words come out sharp and after a beat Kiyoomi winces, realizing how harsh he sounded.

He glances toward Miya to gauge his reaction. To Kiyoomi’s surprise he looks completely unbothered.

“Okay,” Miya says, taking a bite of his egg sandwich. He sets his sandwich down and holds out a hand to Kiyoomi. “Deal.”

Kiyoomi obliges him in the handshake and Miya returns his attention to his breakfast. He shifts against the stool and tries to focus on his pancakes. Is Miya really fine with that? He’s never been able to hide his sadness or discomfort from Kiyoomi before so Kiyoomi feels inclined to believe him.

But Kiyoomi doesn’t feel fine. He feels awkward and unsure of himself. Suddenly he’s conscious of how he holds his utensils and is there a right way to cut pancakes?

“Did I tell you about the time Samu got stuck in a tree?”

“No,” Kiyoomi says apprehensively.

“Well it started because I bet him he couldn’t climb higher than me.”

Kiyoomi’s unease fades gradually between traded stories and bites of food. Miya talks about his parents: the high school sweethearts who got married and had kids young. One day in their 20s they looked up and realized they’d never done anything or been anywhere.

That’s when Miya and Osamu started spending their summers in Kurami while their parents went on long trips. Miya smiled as he explained how it worked out for everyone. His parents got to travel. His grandmother got to see her grandchildren who otherwise lived far away, and vice versa.

Right now they’re on some grand hiking expedition somewhere in South America, not that they are responsible for taking care of their now adult children.

On his last bite of pancake Kiyoomi feels completely relaxed. He’s propping his head up with his elbow on the counter. Miya is going down a new tangent about the konbini he worked at in high school. Kiyoomi smiles as Miya moves his hands in the air to emphasize whatever he’s saying.

He blinks and a new realization dawns on him. He and Miya have become friends. It took five margaritas and one drunken mistake for it to happen, but it did happen.

“Are you even listening to me?” Miya furrows his eyebrows in an exaggerated frown.

“Yes Miya I’m listening.”

“Then what did I just say?”

“You’re talking about your first time going blonde. Riveting.” Kiyoomi rolls his eyes and grins at how it irritates Miya.

“No! I’m telling you the reason I first dyed my hair blonde is cause Samu would pretend to be me at the konbini and sneak into the store room to unbox the limited edition snacks.

Kiyoomi cackles at the thought of Miya trying to prove his innocence of that.

“It’s not funny!”

But it is. And lately a lot of things have been. Without work, the stress of planning a marriage to someone he shouldn’t be ending up with, or a crappy landlord, he suddenly has room in his life to laugh. He feels like a kid again.

Miya slides their plates aside and pulls out a worn paper map he had folded up into a tiny square and jammed into his pocket to start planning their next adventure. They’re finally going to Treasure Island, whatever that is. Everything feels right in the world.

The map Miya has been referencing since he announced their next destination was Treasure Island has been entrusted to Kiyoomi. He grips it as a passing breeze flutters the thin and now slightly oily paper—Miya should not have laid it down on that diner counter. A couple yards away Miya is talking to some guy working at the Kayak stand: the first stop on the map.

The tourist trap was a 20 minute walk from Miya’s house, first along the road and then down some fairly steep steps in the woods that brought them to this clearing at the waterfront. The main road by the steps was lined with rental cars illegally parked, with some hanging perilously close to the small cliff the stairs went down.

Kiyoomi stands a safe distance from the rental hut, away from crying kids who want ice cream at 10 in the morning and signs boasting $50/hour kayak rentals. This however is cheap in comparison to the $100/hour tours.

He winces when he sees Miya laugh and shake hands with one of the guys who works here. He’s got bleached dreads his hair wasn’t meant for and a puka necklace with shells so big Kiyoomi can make them out from where he’s standing. He looks more suited for some tropical resort as opposed to the woods in Karumi. So do these prices.

A red sign boasting $75/hour lessons instigates another wince from Kiyoomi. He told Miya under no uncertain terms he would not be paying these prices— and neither should Miya. Two jobless 25 year olds like themselves don’t have $50 to laugh at.

The map buckles a little when another breeze passes by. He glances back down at the crude drawing in what looks like yellow highlighter, red crayon and blue pen. More than likely the contents of Miya’s junk drawer or whatever he had at the bottom of his backpack. Or do law students use briefcases…?

He shifts from one foot to the other to try to balance the weight of the giant hiker's backpack Miya strapped him with before they left. This is the time to be prepared, he had said to Kiyoomi before almost knocking him to the floor with the weight of the supplies. It’s about three times the amount of stuff Kiyoomi brought to their first search. Glancing over the map he’s not sure what he’s supposed to be prepared for.

Kiyoomi can make out their houses, the road, the ocean, and a blob of an island surrounded in blue pen. It’s more of a map you’d see at the start of a fantasy video game as opposed to something a person could navigate with. And a poorly drawn one at that. He smiles at the crude stick figures labeled “Omi” and “Atsumu,” and the X marks the spot over the island. Miya must have drawn this for Kiyoomi’s peace of mind. Though Kiyoomi could do without the major frown Miya gave his face.

“We’re all set!” Miya says with a wide smile. He’s wearing another nice button down – that seems to be the only kind of shirt he has – and his red swim shorts.

“Set how?” Kiyoomi raises his voice a little so it reaches Miya who’s already marching toward the long line of kayaks available for use.

“Set to pick our favorite color kayak and go. What’s your favorite color? You seem like someone who’d like green.”

Miya says it as if liking green makes a person pretentious, but that’s not something Kiyoomi is going to comment on right now when there is a bigger issue at stake. “Please tell me you did not pay for these insane prices.”

A few feet away a woman overhears them and starts grumbling to her husband in agreement that these are much too expensive. Kiyoomi raises his eyebrows and Miya laughs.

“Don’t worry Omi, I didn’t. Now pick a color.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t believe him for a second. “Red,” he decides.

Miya grins and starts pulling the kayak to the metal launch pad floating beside a small dock in the shallow water near the shore. The water is more muddy here compared to the beach near their houses. Kiyoomi walks over to help him, crouching awkwardly to keep the weight of his backpack from tipping over.

“We got cut a deal,” Miya whispers.

“What kind of deal?”

“A free one.”

They both huff and push the kayak toward the water. “Nothing is free in this world Miya.”

He grins and shakes his head at Kiyoomi. “What can I say? The guy liked me and my grandma used to play poker with his grandma.”

“Did she also wear puka shells?”

“Clam shells.”

Kiyoomi wrinkles his nose at the image this brings to mind. Miya laughs and leaves Kiyoomi holding the kayak a few inches from where the tide is licking the shore. He returns a moment later with a yellow kayak and two matching life vests.

Water splashes up when they push the boats in the water. After a few close calls of capsizing – both on Kiyoomi’s part – they make it to the open water.

Childish map aside Miya seems to know where he’s going.

Kiyoomi’s proud of how quickly he gets the hang of this foreign mode of transportation. He glides alongside Miya with relative ease and manages to splash water at him a couple times with his paddle.

“An accident,” Kiyoomi pleads when Miya raises his paddle in retaliation.

“Sure…” Miya drawls with a smile.

A comfortable silence settles between them. Kiyoomi takes in the passing sights and occasional birds diving down to grab at a fish in the water. He lets Miya get ahead of him slightly and takes him in too. His back muscles flex against the shirt with each row forward. His blonde hair shifts with the breeze. He can see the lineart well of the composition coming together in his mind. Soft lines carving out folds in Miya’s shirt. Bolder strokes to capture the waves coming up against the side of the kayak. He resists the urge to speed up and see how he’d capture Miya’s expression.

After today Kiyoomi has just one more scheduled outing with Miya. He isn’t sure how he feels about that. They haven’t seen any glimmers since they started this. He’s also starting to enjoy Miya’s company. He considers what it would mean to casually hang out with Miya as pulls his paddle through the rippling water. A moment of melancholy flickers through him. He speaks to chase it away.

“So you’re really a man of the people.”

“How do you mean?” Miya laughs.

Kiyoomi describes the heartfelt goodbyes to the people at the bar, how Bubble-Gum-Waitress knew him enough to call him on his bullshit, how he knew Mr. Bookstore Owner by name, and now he gets deals from Puka-Shell Guy.

“Your way of describing people is outstanding,” Miya laughs. “What’s my descriptor?”

“Annoying neighbor,” Kiyoomi says without missing a beat. He can’t help but smile at being the reason for Miya’s laughter.

Miya laughs some more and speeds up to make a circle around Kiyoomi. “I don’t know, I like to talk to people out here. They’re real.”

“As opposed to all the fake people in the world.”

“Not in the world, in law school,” Miya clarifies.

“Ah,” Kiyoomi murmurs. He drops the sarcastic comment he had loaded and lets Miya continue.

“I just like getting to know people out here. Even the tourists. It’s all genuine human connection. In law school it was like…there were only two ways to connect with someone. And usually they already made up their mind on the kind of person you were before you actually met.”

“What are the two ways?”

Miya slows his paddling and stares up at the sky. It’s a clear day with a few puffy white clouds. “Either they wanted to connect with you for post-grad professional reasons or trauma bonding over the school part of law school.”

Kiyoomi wonders if he could say the same for the art industry. So far his most important connection has been his best friend and the people she trusts. He understands the trauma bonding comment Miya made to some degree. In art school he had a set of class friends where all they did was gripe about how hard things were. When the assignments dried up they didn’t have anything to talk about. “Is there any other way?”

“Not really,” Miya laughs. “Oh,” he says after a pause. “There were also study groups.”

“Study groups don’t sound so bad.” During his junior year he and Yachi formed a study group with two burnt out stoner kids for their art history class. The four of them would hole up in the library on the weekends before their exams and talk about needing to study but not actually do it. He smiles. The guys were nice and ended up starting an indie animation studio together called Dope Sheet, an animation pun on “dope shit.”

“Not to sound like a jerk but they’re a little more intense than undergrad study groups.”

If Miya didn’t sound so sincere, and troubled by the mention of it, Kiyoomi probably would have told him he sounded exactly like a jerk. “How so?”

“Well most of them form off the grades you get. People only want to work with the smartest kids in the class. Which I can’t really fault them for. But even if you get in a group it’s always going to have guys who talk over people and refuse to admit when they're wrong. I can’t stand that shit, especially when those guys are wrong most of the time.”

Yeah that doesn’t sound like fun at all.

Miya talks more about the groups. How he wasn’t invited to join any until people knew the scores he was getting, but by then he’d started working two jobs to pay for tuition and he couldn’t make the meetings. It sounds really sad to Kiyoomi. He can’t really picture Miya being the lonely kid in the back of the class.

Suna and Osamu flash into mind. Maybe that’s why.

“Part of it was my fault,” Miya says, looking straight ahead and paddling a little faster. “I think that when Samu decided not to come to school I decided it wasn’t going to be good even before I got there.”

Kiyoomi stares at him. His face is impassive and his eyes are full, lacking the joy-filled squint he typically has.

“Ah that’s the island up there! Let’s go!”

Kiyoomi frowns a little at how Miya has returned to hiding his true feelings. He thought they were past that.

The beach, or lack thereof, is covered in seaweed and deeply rooted tall water grass leading up to a heavy treeline. It doesn’t look like a place kids would come play at safely. However neither does an abandoned lighthouse.

“We used to kayak here?”

“Not exactly.”

“How exactly then?”

“Let’s get on the island first,” Miya says. He sounds mildly worried with how the incoming tide and the knotty seaweed are affecting their approach.

After a good amount of struggle and the near loss of Kiyoomi’s paddle they make it ashore with both boats and two pairs of feet on the ground. They wander around for a bit through the trees, or at least Kiyoomi is wandering. Miya seems to have some sense of where he’s going. They make it to a small clearing and Miya relaxes, dropping his shoulders and his heavy bag on the ground. Kiyoomi does the same and Miya starts unpacking both of them.

A tent, bottles of water, freeze dried food, a giant bag of peanuts and countless other random camping tools. The stuff piles up around the two bags until they’re empty and deflated.

“And you said I overpack.” Kiyoomi snarks, looking over the obscene amount of stuff Miya brought for an afternoon.

“For a trip to the backyard, yeah,” he winks knowing it’ll bother Kiyoomi. “But we need to be prepared out here. You never know what might happen.”

Kiyoomi must have some kind of fear brewing on his face because Miya starts to walk his precautions back. “Not that you should worry. Don’t worry Omi, it's going to be fine.”

“Good because I don’t do camping.”

“City boy,” Miya says with a light hearted head shake.

Kiyoomi doesn’t even try to deny it.

They roll out two sleeping pads Miya managed to stuff in the bags and rest for a bit. Kiyoomi didn’t really feel it when he was out on the water but he is a little tired from the trip. They make it through half the peanuts, mostly because Miya tries and fails at catching them in his mouth and Kiyoomi refuses to let him eat the peanuts off the ground when they inevitably fall.

After regaining some energy Miya flips the map over revealing a large yellow circle with a smaller blue circle in the center.

“I’ve got to say Miya, your cartography skills are amazing.”

“Shut up,” Miya laughs.

They leave the clearing walking through dense woods of birch and brown bark trees covered in lichen. If Kiyoomi was dropped here from the sky he’d have no idea he was on an island right now. Growing up in central Tokyo he has always been pretty wary of wooded areas. He and Yachi went on a hiking trip their junior year and they almost had to call the forest ranger for help—turns out they got lost early on and never made it 10 minutes outside of the parking area.

But these woods feel different. They’re warm and comforting. He feels safe among these trees. He feels safe with Miya. 

Miya crosses over a fallen tree and gets up on top, holding both arms to balance as he walks a few steps forward. “Come on Omi!”

Okay maybe Kiyoomi spoke too soon. “I am not going up there and you shouldn’t either.”

“I’m just doing what the map says.”

“You wrote the map.”

“Semantics.” He holds his hand out and cocks his head to the side to gesture for Kiyoomi to come.

And fine. He does. He takes Miya’s hand and continues to hold onto it as they cross the fallen tree.  The tree fell up a hill so the further they walk the further from the ground they get. But the trunk is wide enough for Kiyoomi to walk across without his feet slipping. He and Miya might even be able to stand next to each other on the tree. They make it across and end up having to walk in the opposite direction anyway. Along the way Miya touches the trees they walk past, tapping them a few times like he’s confirming they’re really there.

Kiyoomi keeps a look out for any glowing figures peaking out in the trees but doesn’t notice anything. After their last three failures he has been beginning to feel like the point of these excursions is no longer to find the Glimmers. He glances toward Miya and smiles. Sometimes it’s nice to do something without a point to it.

It’s not until they’ve been walking for about an hour that Kiyoomi gets a little worried. “Do you know how to make it back?” He glances around and the endless trees have started to turn on him. He can’t tell where they came from.

“Don’t worry I’ve got it covered.” Miya brandishes a fat blue piece of chalk with some kind of yellow plastic wrapped around it. “Trail marking chalk,” he explains. 

“Right,” Kiyoomi says, realizing that’s what Miya must have been doing when he was touching the trees. He decides to keep that revelation to himself instead of further incriminating himself as a city boy.

“It should be just up here….ah!” He shouts and turns to Kiyoomi, eyes wide, hand to his ear. “Do you hear that?”

Kiyoomi listens carefully, not quite sure what he’s supposed to hear. “No.”

“Come on, it's up here!” Miya starts racing forward, glancing back every few feet to make sure Kiyoomi is keeping up. Then out of nowhere they come to another clearing.

“Whoa,” Kiyoomi whispers. This was definitely worth it.

“Right!?” Miya shouts with absolute glee, jumping slightly. “I’m going down!”

He starts to climb down into the enclosed pond surrounded by trees on three quarters of the sides with a wide waterfall covering the last quarter of the space. It’s like a giant took a ball and pressed it into the ground 10 feet and filled the center with water. The surrounding trees have roots sticking out along the edge making his descent quite easy. Kiyoomi tugs at each root, ensuring they’ll be able to climb back out when they leave.

In the center of the pond is a path of rocks large enough to stand on and walk across, definitely left by some other person. They lead toward the waterfall so close that the final rock is drenched in the rushing water. Miya is walking right toward it.

Kiyoomi hurries after him before Miya can shout for him to come on. He commits the image to memory: Miya standing in front of a rushing waterfall. The way the pond stirs into hundreds of different ripples that capture the blue sky and mirage of leaves above them. Miya looks small like this.

And then he steps through the waterfall and Kiyoomi is standing alone in the pond.

“Miya!!” He shouts, reaching the final rock.

A hand thrusts out of the water and Kiyoomi smacks it away in fear.

“Ow what the fuck Omi.” Even through the rushing water Miya’s laugh shines clear.

“Don’t scare me like that,” Kiyoomi groans. He can’t see Miya through the white frothy water but his laughter anchors his presence for Kiyoomi’s senses.

“Do you want to come in?”

Kiyoomi nods even though Miya can’t see him. He takes a few slow breaths and ducks his head down, stepping through the water clumsily. On the other side Miya wraps his arm around Kiyoomi and tugs him further through, helping him find his footing.

“Fuck that’s cold,” he shivers, wiping water from his face. His hair and shoulders are drenched but the rest of him is pretty dry.

He opens his eyes wide and looks around at the empty space that’s more like a giant room made from rock than a cave given the opening is the size of his yard and it only goes about 20 feet back. Every crevice of it is lit with the soft light of day pushing through the waterfall. Refracting light ripples along the rocks and across him and Miya.

Kiyoomi reaches out his hand to trace the light wrapping around Miya’s wrist. “This is amazing.” His finger runs along Miya’s wrist to his upper arm. It’s still wet and so is his hair, sticking to his forehead with the wavy tips curling ever so slightly. He glances and sees how the light travels all the way to Miya’s cheek.

“Omi,” Miya murmurs, wrapping his hand around his wrist to pause his movements. “I- oh.”

The soft white light shrouding Miya’s head suddenly becomes a secondary light source to something much brighter, and blue, illuminating Miya’s face. The mixture of surprise and worry Miya had the night they were looking up at the stars comes back to his eyes. 

Kiyoomi snaps his head around and takes a precautionary step back when his eyes find four Glimmers. Him, Miya, Osamu, and Suna. They look older here, first or second years. All four of them are wearing ratty t-shirts and shorts. On instinct Kiyoomi steps back toward Miya.

Before he can process that the glimmers are here the blue light starts to expand. “Wait!” Kiyoomi shouts, grabbing for Miya as the blue light reaches his feet and in a blink he’s in the cave. Miya is gone. It’s just Kiyoomi and the Glimmers. The soft light is gone too. Kiyomi widens his eyes until they adjust to the darkness.

Suna looks worried, pacing back and forth. His hair is styled like he has it now, but his cool demeanor isn’t present in the younger version of himself. Young Kiyoomi is standing near Suna, shivering and drenched. It’s hard to reflect on how he’s changed since he was this age. He doesn’t really feel like he’s looking at himself. It’s more like a video of himself where the screen is flipped and something feels just a little off.

Outside he hears thunder crack overhead.

“Guys this isn’t good,” Suna urges.

Miya and Osamu are fighting a few feet away, arguing about what to do, but Kiyoomi can’t distinguish what either of their plans are. An uneasy feeling creeps over him. Like somehow these kids won’t be able to make it home, even though he knows they will. Are they stuck here? Are they hurt?

He glances back toward his past self and flinches when young Kiyoomi is looking right at him. “What are you doing here?”

Kiyoomi takes a reactionary step back and the space blinks. For a second he’s standing in a house. Then he’s back in the cave. He stumbles a little like he’s walking down a set of stairs and the final step is an inch shorter. His eyes lose focus like he crossed them for too long and he can’t see what’s in his foreground.

“Don’t do that!!” His past self shouts. None of the other Glimmers take notice of his outburst. He starts walking toward Kiyoomi and Kiyoomi takes another step back out of fear. The space blinks again for a beat longer. He knows this house.

The cave returns and young Kiyoomi is a few feet away now. “You’re going too far!” He shouts. His voice is laced with anger that sends a chill down his spine. When he lurches toward Kiyoomi the space blinks and remains as a house. It’s his Uncle’s house. Kiyoomi grabs onto the stair railing like somehow that will keep him tethered here and away from the cave.

With the thunder and roaring waterfall gone Kiyoomi’s ears take a second to adjust to the deafening silence. He glances around the house. Bright warm light is coming through the windows. It must be some time in the afternoon. He feels the sticky heat of summer seeping through the old walls of the house. He hears a small sound and listens close. Someone is crying. 

The stairs beneath him are covered in a plush blue carpet his grandmother loved. He remembers digging his toes into it after running around the rocky beach all day. He remembers skipping this top step too. It had a loose board that left a nasty creak whenever someone put their weight on it.

Downstairs he hears some laughter and cheering. But the crying is close by. He lets go of the stair railing, turning right toward the bathroom that’s around the corner.

He hears harsh whispers before he sees who’s in the room. “Stop it or they’ll hear you.”

Mom, Kiyoomi mouths, thanking whatever God there is that he didn’t just speak out loud. The memory that came back of her in the car was one thing, but seeing her here like this is a completely different experience. Goosebumps run down his arms like his body knows something his mind doesn’t. He takes a final step and peers past the bathroom door that’s slightly ajar. He’s 15 here. He remembers the haircut that was too short for his ears and how he didn’t know how to style his curls with it. And he remembers that sweatshirt. The one Miya now has at his house.

His younger self is shaking right now. His eyes are red with tears. His breath comes in short gasps. He looks like he’s trying to crouch away but the grip his mom has on his shoulder and neck and she brushes his hair makes that impossible. She scoffs. “Why couldn’t you have straight hair like your brother?”

She’s brushing his dry curls out, ripping through the knots the ill-suited technique is giving his hair. Kiyomi winces, suddenly remembering the pain of this.

Young Kiyoomi lets out another sob when his mom digs the hairbrush hard into his scalp. His eyes curve toward Kiyoomi and a pleading expression pulls at his eyebrows. “Help,” he whispers.

“Stop. Crying.” She hisses. She raises the hairbrush back and quickly snaps her arm forward.

Kiyoomi turns his head away just before she smacks the hard side of the brush against his younger self’s head. He clenches his eyes shut and wishes for the pain of his boy to go away. “Please, make it stop,” he whispers.

Stop.

Smack.

Stop.

Smack.

STOP!

He flinches at the sound of another loud smack and the room blinks. He’s in the softly-lit cave again. The crash of rushing water floods his ears and he falls to his knees sucking in air just like he did the last time he was back. Except this time there’s true fear coursing through him. Miya is holding him, curling his arms around him in a hug and pulling him close like he’s trying to keep him here.

“Help!” Kiyoomi cries for his fifteen year old self.

“I’ve got you,” Miya whispers, reaching a hand up to pet his curls from his face. “I’ve got you.”

Do you miss your mom?

Ever since the funeral that question has always found a way into someone’s mouth. Typically it’s people who have no sense of tact. Because what the hell is he supposed to say to that question. If the answer was yes, why would they ask him that?

Do you miss your mom?

Yes, I miss my dead mother. Thank you for reminding me.

Yasu asked him the question once. It was around Mother’s Day. He responded honestly that no he didn’t, and he didn’t really remember her either. The first time he’d felt guilty about having that answer was when Yasu looked at him like there was something wrong with him for saying that. Like she was disgusted. Kiyoomi soon came to realize that’s how most people felt at the thought of someone not loving their parents unconditionally. Even if the conditions of that love meant forgiving the abuse they put their children through.

Up until this point he’s never known why he didn’t miss her. He thought there was something wrong with himself because how could he not miss his mom? But it’s like there’s always been a piece of his heart that remembered how she treated him. Remembered what she put him through.

The sound of hard plastic smacking a head reverberates through the cave and Kiyoomi clings to Miya harder. He’s managed to slow his breathing from hyperventilating to long inhales and exhales. Miya coached him through the breaths while murmuring things to him to keep him present. He still is.

“Red was a good choice for a kayak,” he whispers. “Not quite as good as yellow but I’ll give you second best.”

Kiyoomi stirs a little, opening his eyes to look up at Miya. He’s on his side now, laying on the cold cave floor with his head propped up on Miya’s criss-crossed legs.

“Did I tell you I like the shirt you chose today?” Miya murmurs.

He looks down at his shirt and manages a wry smile. “I have six of these shirts. I’ve worn the same black t-shirt every day.”

Miya laughs. “I know.”

The soft glow of daylight has lessened significantly since they got in here, and Kiyoomi is almost dry from when he walked under the waterfall.

“How long have we been in here?”

“Long enough that we’d probably be broke if we had to pay for these kayaks,” Miya jokes.

“Miya,” Kiyoomi repeats with urgency, sitting up.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Miya says calmly. “We’re going to be okay. It’s almost nightfall so first we’re going to walk back to our stuff. Then we’re going to set up the tent we brought and spend the night. And in the morning we have the treat of a scheduled sunrise kayak trip. Don’t worry I know the tour guide, he won’t make too many stupid jokes.”

Kiyoomi can just manage a nod at Miya’s joke and droops his shoulders a little in defeat. If he hadn’t gone through what he just did he might be more upset that they were spending the night on this island, but as far as bad experiences go he can get through one night camping with ease.

“Ready to walk back?”

“Mhm.” Kiyoomi stands on shaky legs, wincing each time his foot completes a step, praying he doesn’t travel into another alternate universe or wherever the hell he’s been going.

Miya tries to support Kiyoomi by wrapping his arm around him but Kiyoomi shys away. “I’m fine, really.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” Kiyoomi doesn’t know how to put what he just went through into words without going through another breakdown. And this is not a safe space to be having breakdowns.

Miya squeezes his forearm with a comforting grip and nods. “Okay.”

They walk back through the waterfall which is a lot colder now that the sun has almost set. Miya packed a flashlight which isn’t totally necessary with the amount of daylight still present, but it helps. He flashes it along the trees, illuminating all the blue chalk strokes he left behind.

As they travel through the woods Kiyoomi feels a memory of that day in the bathroom with his mom resurface. He forces his brain to avoid that specific moment so it carves away the time around it. He was planning on meeting someone, probably the twins and Suna, and he wanted his hair to look nice, but he had no idea how to make that happen. He remembers spending nearly two hours in the bathroom staring at his hair and wishing it was straight.

He opened his mom’s toiletries bag and was about to plug the straightener in when she found him. He remembers her getting upset. He wasn’t allowed to use her things. He remembers how alone and scared he felt. That vulnerability was a constant feeling throughout his childhood. No one took care of him.

The memory pulses and he sees the hairbrush being raised against him. He clenches his eyes shut and tries to think of something, anything, to get his mind off of it.

Miya is the first thing to come to mind. He remembers how Miya dove into the ocean water with those bright red swim trunks. The way he picked crab for Kiyoomi. The moment his eyes lit up when they looked up at the stars.

“Omi yer falling behind,” Miya says, holding his hand out in emphasis of the growing space between them.

Kiyoomi steps forward and takes his hand reflexively. “Sorry.”

“Oh, uh, no it’s okay,” Miya says quickly. He fumbles a little with Kiyoomi’s hand before grasping it firmly. “I just don’t want ya to get lost.”

They make it back to camp and their stuff is still intact. Kiyoomi has the belated realization that maybe they shouldn’t have just left it here like this, but the afterthought doesn’t matter. He drops his hand away from Miya’s and they struggle through setting up the tent. After a lot of grumbling at the directions Miya manages to get it to stand—and stay standing.

It’s orange and big enough to comfortably fit two people, and uncomfortably fit two people and their giant backpacks. Kiyoomi lays his sleeping pad down and collapses against it. This feels much better than a cold, wet cave floor.

“We should change first,” Miya says, unbuttoning his wet shirt and pulling out two dry sweatshirts. He pulls out a small hand towel too and rubs vigorously at his hair until he deems it dry enough.

He crawls over to Kiyoomi and kneels behind him, patting his hair dry gently.

“I can do it Miya,” Kiyoomi argues.

“Let me.”

Miya moves his hand to the hem of Kiyoomi’s t-shirt and pulls it over his head, moving the towel to pat his back and shoulders dry. He shifts and hums a little when he moves back to Kiyoomi’s hair, patting him gently and twirling his curls in his fingers as he moves from one side of his head to the other.

There’s a soft pressure forming in Kiyoomi’s heart, and a warm feeling accompanying it. He likes how Miya is caring for him, but he doesn’t feel like he deserves it. It’s almost too much.

“Miya really you don’t have to.”

“I want to,” he says.

So Kiyoomi lets him finish drying his hair. He lets him make the food and start the fire — mostly because he has no idea how to start a fire that isn’t the result of improper safety in Welding 101, a class he and Yachi nearly failed.

“Name your top five spots in Tokyo,” Miya says out of nowhere. His floppy grin is back. He and Kiyoomi are sitting on opposite sides of the fire. Small embers dance in the air around Miya’s eyes.

“Sekaido in Shinjuku,” Kiyoomi answers first. That’s where Yachi got him that cat stationary and where he got all his markers. He could spend hours inside that giant art supply store. Well, he has spent hours inside of it.

“I should’ve guessed,” Miya grins. “You know that store is on the same block as like, eight different konbini?”

Kiyoomi laughs. “Yeah and somehow none of them ever have peach-”

“Juice!” Miya finishes. “I know! What’s up with that?”

He laughs some more. “So you were around there too?”

“I liked going to the garden after work,” Miya nods.

Kiyoomi assumes he means the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, which he also loved. “That was number two on my list,” he smiles. He did a lot of plein air painting there. He wonders if Miya showed up in any of his compositions.

They continue to trade favorite spots. Kiyoomi’s mostly centered around art and Miya’s mostly centered around study spots and the streets surrounding his two part time jobs.

“What about here?” Miya asks.

The fire crackles a little and a burning piece of wood shifts, sending more embers up into the air. Kiyoomi has to think about this a little harder. “I like the beach,” he settles on. The open space is relaxing and so is the calm ocean water, even if it is too cold for him to jump right into.

Miya grins. “Then we’ll have to go back there.”

Kiyoomi’s smile falters a little at the implication. But this could be good. Miya wants to do things outside of searching for glimmers, which Kiyoomi is certain he doesn’t want to do anymore. This is enough fun for him. He smiles and looks back up at Miya. “Yeah we should.”

He thinks a little more as he picks through the freeze-dried food. If regaining some of his memories has taught him anything it’s that he definitely isn’t cut out to be a children's illustrator. Kids need rainbows and butterflies. Not whatever dark and sad imagery Kiyoomi is capable of conjuring up.

But that’s fine. He can find other work with a new agent. Or maybe he could freelance. There’s lots of different options. He is going to be okay.

He looks back up at Miya, watching him pick through the grass for something. “Found one,” he shouts, holding up a peanut to Kiyoomi.

“Don’t eat that Miya.” God he’s such an idiot. The kind of idiot that just makes things better.

He stands from the ground and walks toward their tent, Miya following close behind after stomping out the waning fire. “What should we do with these?” Kiyoomi asks, holding up his bag of freeze-dried food and fork.

Miya pulls out a ziplock bag and puts his empty food bag in.

“And the forks?” Kiyoomi holds his fork up

He winks and leans in. “Lick it clean,” he says, taking the fork into his mouth and slowly pulling away from it.

The sight of it sends a new image through Kiyoomi’s mind: Miya pinning him against the couch. Moaning against his neck. His face heats up and he drops the fork in the ziplock bag. “Gross.”

They shuffle around in the tent, getting situated and peeling off their pants. Miya has a set of sweatpants for each of them. Kiyoomi jumps into his pair and Miya pulls his on slowly, keeping the drawstring untied and allowing them to remain slung low at his waist, exposing the band of his black briefs.

In the past few hours Kiyoomi relived one of his life’s most traumatic moments, but Miya has him standing and smiling in warm, dry clothes. Gratitude starts to pour out of him, and he feels a dire need to direct it toward something.

“Hey Miya?” He asks, stepping toward the blonde right before he turns and pressing a quick kiss to his cheek. “Thank you, for all of this,” he says.

Miya looks shocked. The lantern hanging at the ceiling of the tent shines in a way that practically casts stars in Miya’s eyes. He brings a hand to his cheek and touches where Kiyoomi just kissed him, looking from his hand back toward Kiyoomi. He reaches for the lantern and dims the light, lifting it from where it’s hanging and placing it on the ground. He takes a step forward and wraps both his arms around Kiyoomi, pulling him into a tight hug. His arms reach across Kiyoomi’s back and pin Kiyoomi’s arms uselessly at his sides.

He lets himself just be held by Miya for a minute. Then he shifts under him, pulling his arms out to hug him back around the waist. Miya rubs circles against his back. Kiyoomi does the same, letting out an embarrassing happy sound.

“Kiyoomi,” Miya says with his head tucked over his shoulder. His voice sounds heavy with emotions Kiyoomi can’t really discern.

“Yeah?” He traces Miya’s spine which earns a soft, content sigh.

“I feel like I was kind of lying to you earlier.”

“About what?” A warm feeling rushes through him when Miya places his hand on Kiyoomi’s waist.

“Well, when I said I was fine with us pretending like it never happened.”

It goes unspoken, but Kiyoomi knows what he means.

“I mean I am fine with it,” Miya continues. “Cause we were drunk and stupid and honestly I couldn’t remember a lot of it…which is a shame.”

Kiyoomi feels like he’s about to vibrate out of his skin and turn to dust among the stars with how Miya is looking at him right now. “So what was the lie?” 

He chuckles nervously. “Well, I said I was happy to let our drunk…hookup, fade to nothing because I didn't want you to regret being with me like that.” He cups Kiyoomi’s jaw and leans in close to his ear. “But do you want to do something with me?”

“Now?”

Miya draws a light circle on his cheek with his thumb. “Whenever you want.”

Standing here hugging Miya like this, still toasty warm from the fire in fresh clothes, Kiyoomi doesn’t have the energy to be with Miya the way he really desires to. He wants something more simple. But still something.

He pulls away from the hug and waits for Miya to find him, leaning in to kiss him when he does. Miya’s gaze softens and he places a gentle hand on Kiyoomi’s cheek, leaning in to kiss his nose, then his forehead, then his lips once again. He moves slowly, whispering sweet nothings as his hands travel across gently Kiyoomi’s shoulders and back.

“I can’t believe how pretty you got,” he whispers before kissing Kiyoomi’s jaw.

“You- you’re beautiful,” Kiyoomi says. He means it too. Miya’s brown eyes light up. From this close he can see a hint of honey in them, circling around his iris. His smile wide and his eyebrows pursed with hope. For what, Kiyoomi doesn’t know. It seems bigger than this though.

They lie down on their mats, both on their sides and come together to exchange more slow, light kisses.  Their hands move with gentle touches to signal I’m here, but they don’t explore further than their waists.

Kiyoomi wants to stay like this forever, just kissing Miya. Feeling his soft lips. Giggling at how their noses bump together. Pressing their foreheads together. In all his life Kiyoomi doesn’t think he’s ever felt this way about anyone. Feelings that bloom with warmth in his chest that extends to the tips of his fingers and his toes.

He wants to keep exploring this feeling. But his eyes start to fight to stay open. A yawn escapes between their lips and Miya laughs against his mouth.

“Tired?”

“A little,” Kiyoomi laughs.

Atsumu smiles and shifts a little, holding up his arm and cocking his head to the side. “Let's sleep.”

Kiyoomi nods and turns to get closer to Miya.

Atsumu kisses the back of his neck as Kiyoomi settles into his arms looking at the wall of the tent and seeing the light of the moon glow through. The soft smile he has on his face disappears when a blue glow dashes from one side of the tent to the other.

Kiyoomi shuts his eyes tight and silently turns into Atsumu’s embrace.

He’s done with the glimmers, and his past.

Kiyoomi wakes up to the sound of birds at the literal crack of dawn. He shifts around and his tired brain struggles to understand where he is. It takes him a second to remember he’s not in Tokyo anymore, he’s at his Uncle's house in Karumi. It takes him another second to realize he isn’t there either. He’s in the woods spooning with Miya Atsumu.

His shoulders tense at the realization. All the soft warm glowy feelings evaporate as he comes to his senses. Now his tendency to feel grumpy in the morning is mixing with the unsettling feeling that he and Miya slept together again.

There may not have been sex involved this time but there was sleeping which is somehow more intimate.

He shifts a little to test if Miya is awake.

If he is, he doesn’t say anything, but the arm he has wrapped around Kiyoomi’s waist pulls him in tighter.

Shit. What’s going to happen when Miya wakes up? Is it going to be awkward? Is he going to be upset? Is Kiyoomi upset?

He takes a second to ponder and no, he isn’t upset. Everything he thought through yesterday slowly starts coming back to him like the tide returning to shore. The pain he was in. The care Miya showed him. It was so gentle and genuine it almost felt like some kind of love.

That thought sends Kiyoomi right back to panicking. He takes a breath and tries to calm down. Miya doesn’t love him. They barely know each other.

He half-smirks and thinks about the only other one night stand he’s ever had. He still can’t remember the guy's name but he does remember waking up in his cramped dorm bed in the morning and the terror on the guy's face when he asked ‘are you in love with me now?’ Kiyoomi’s answer was an easy, flat, ‘no’ to both of their reliefs.

It’s a ridiculous thought to have. Love is supposed to be built up over time. It’s a coveted feeling. And Kiyoomi isn’t easy to love.

Miya starts to stir and Kiyoomi reflexively holds his breath.

“Hi,” Miya murmurs in a drowsy morning voice, kissing Kiyoomi’s cheek. He pulls his arms away in one practiced motion and sits up, rubbing his eyes, then his hair, and looking down at Kiyoomi with a dopey smile. “Did you sleep well?”

Kiyoomi exhales his tension and nods.

They stay in the tent whispering hellos and how they slept until the magic of the early morning fades and the thin sleeping pads stop protecting them from hurting as they lay on the ground. Packing up all the stuff is a lot more difficult than unpacking. There’s a lot of shoving and a couple seams ripped before everything fits back in the bags.

“Don’t tell Samu,” Miya whispers when they hear a wince-inducing rip from Kiyoomi’s bag after putting it on. Apparently the gear belongs to him and not Miya.

There's still a little morning fog when they get out on the water, but it’s always in the distance no matter how far they travel to shore. The morning sun is far past its initial rise but there’s still some pink in its wake, filling out the horizon.

As they paddle Miya babbles about the dream he had last night where he was trying to catch a kitten. Apparently it would let him get close enough to pet him, but ran away any time Miya tried to pick him up. Then the grass around him turned into french fries and Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville started playing on repeat.

Kiyoomi isn’t really listening. He’s trying to, but he’s too focused on the heavy question neither of them have voiced: now what?

At the end of all their searches they’ve always picked out the next site to go to. It was like a built-in plan for when they were seeing each other next. But Kiyoomi doesn’t want glimmer-searching to be their “next.” He’s done with that. Now if he wants to see Miya again he needs to make more effort.

But what would they do? And when? He’s not exactly aware of what there is to do in Kurami and any suggestion he can come up with himself will just be whatever tourist traps that are easily found by any outsider. He doesn’t want to do that. He wants it to be special.

If they were in Tokyo he would take Miya to his favorite gallery, or maybe to the garden they both liked to go to. They could spend the afternoon looking for peach tea and lying in the grass staring up at the clouds. He’d show Miya his favorite places to draw. Maybe he’d draw him too.

Not a still life. No. Something with more emotion. Kiyoomi needs multiple panels to convey the feelings he has for Miya. He needs multiple pages to show how they’ve evolved.

His paddle gets caught in the water when he gets too lost in thought and he veers slightly to the right.

Right. He’s not in Tokyo right now.

He glances at Miya. He’s paddling silently now, smiling to himself. He glances back at Kiyoomi and holds eye contact when their eyes meet, smiling wider.

Maybe they could rent bikes and ride to a neighboring town to be tourists in together. Or they could go crabbing like Osamu and Suna did. He blushes, thinking about coming up for air and using his first breath to kiss Miya. The ideas whirr around in his head as they get closer to shore. In all the time they’ve spent together Miya has always been the one to suggest what they do. It’s his turn now and he wants to make it a good one.

The question of when also presses at the back of his mind. Is tomorrow too soon? Is next week too late? The last time he was in any kind of a relationship outside his engagement was college and the guy he was seeing lived in the same dorm building. In college it was normal to just completely throw your life's routine away and spend all your time together. Well maybe not normal, but it was easy.

When he dated Yasu things were different. Adults have responsibilities they can’t just combine the way students can study for different subjects together in a cramped twin bed. But he and Yasu were never that big on spending a lot of time together. Once a week was enough. Sometimes once every other week.

Things with Miya feel different. Like when a seemingly bland and dark color he’s using to paint digitally with, gets set to the “color dodge” blending mode and suddenly it’s bursting with vibrancy and color on top of the base layer of flats. Miya Atsumu is what color doge is to Kiyoomi’s flat life.

Today’s Friday. Maybe he should ask Miya if he’s free on Tuesday. Kiyoomi smiles at the ironic thought. Neither of them ever have anything going on. Of course he’ll be free.

He falters his paddle a little. Should he be so cavalier about being free? He should probably start figuring out what he’s going to do about work. First he should call Yachi and let her know his decision. Then he should…what? Kiyoomi doesn’t even know how to find a job. The most important thing about being an artist in the industry and art school doesn’t teach it.

His thoughts churn in his head as they tug the kayaks up the ramp. He needs to form some kind of plan. What are good keyword searches? Is Tokyo the best place to look? Should he look elsewhere? Does location even matter or can he work remotely?

When he got here he decided to give himself a week of reprieve before thinking about all of this but the week is almost over and every thought he’s put off is coming down on him like a hail storm.

“Thank you so much!” Miya says, shaking the puka-shell guy’s hand. He looks pretty hungover right now and Kiyoomi can’t remember if he wore those clothes yesterday or not. He probably didn’t even notice they were gone all night.

“Oh yeah thank you,” Kiyoomi says belatedly. He should probably update his portfolio. His lip curls in disgust. That will take forever.

Miya laughs as they walk away. “Dude didn’t even realize we hadn’t come back yesterday.”

Kiyoomi forces a laugh. Maybe he should make a LinkedIn profile.

They climb back up the stairs which are easier to travel on without all the late afternoon tourists clamoring around. The road is clear of any cars making their walk back very serene. Or it would be if Kiyoomi could stop worrying about his job for two seconds.

It’s not like he has no options. If he really can’t find anything he could do children's books. Yachi sent him the profile of one author she’s always talking about. But he can’t remember their name.

The sound of a plastic brush hitting a person ricochettes through his eardrums. He winces and forces his feet to keep moving. No, someone like him could never make art meant for children.

“Hey, you okay?” Miya drops his head on Kiyoomi’s shoulder as he walks beside him. “You’re being kind of quiet.”

His heart skips a little at Miya’s presence. “Huh? Oh, yeah I’m fine.”

Miya lifts his head up and takes Kiyoomi’s hand in his. Kiyoomi squeezes it back tightly.

“But about what happened yesterday…”

“I’d rather not talk about it,” Kiyoomi says. A mixture of embarrassment and shame weigh on either side of a scale inside Kiyoomi. He’s mortified that he collapsed like that in front of Miya. And thinking about why he collapsed is too much. “I just want to forget about it.” He coughs. “Like everything else I’ve forgotten.” It must all be bad. That’s why he can’t remember. It’s just trauma. Nothing more.

“Oh,” Miya says. His hand goes a little limp and it slips from Kiyoomi’s grasp. His steps fall behind for a minute but he picks up the pace and is side by side with Kiyoomi wearing a smug grin. “And last night?”

Kiyoomi smiles and thinks for a second. “I definitely don’t want to forget about that.”

Miya grins and grabs his ass, causing Kiyoomi to jump. “Hey!” He laughs, swatting Miya away.

They’re almost at their houses now. Kiyoomi doesn’t need to give Motoya more stuff to tease him about. His eyes widen a little. “Do I have any hickies?”

Miya gives him a thorough once-over. “No. Why? Want one?”

He shoves Miya away. “You’re insatiable,” he laughs. But maybe he kind of does want one. Or, he just wants Miya’s lips on him again.

Miya laughs back and reclaims Kiyoomi’s hand, pulling it close and kissing the inside of his palm gently. God Kiyoomi can’t contain how happy he feels right now. He dives in quickly to kiss Miya on the cheek and grabs his ass back. Miya yelps with glee and they stay to chase each other down the road into Kiyoomi’s yard.

“No ass grabbing in the yard,” Kiyoomi pleads through breathy laughter, backing away from Miya. He takes a step to the right and nearly falls over. The backpacks they’re wearing are not meant to be worn while someone runs around playing tag.

Miya smiles wide and holds his hands up in the air. “True, truce,” he says. “We should start planning what we’re doing next.”

Kiyoomi matches his smile. “I was thinking about that too, maybe we could-”

“It’s our final search for the glimmers!”

His happiness flickers like a lightbulb that isn’t quite turned all the way into its socket. “What?”

“We only had five, remember? Now we’re down to the last one: the fort, which I know seems very similar to the hideout but trust me they’re different. We just weren’t the best at naming things back-”

“No I’m not…looking for glimmers anymore,” Kiyoomi says slowly. The lightbulb flickers again.

Now Miya’s the one who looks hurt. “What? Why not?”

The bulb cracks. “What do you mean ‘why not?’”

“I mean…we’ve only got one more.”

It bursts. “Don’t you remember what happened to me literally yesterday?”

“Well…you said you wanted to forget about that.”

“Miya-” he grits. The immediate need to burst in anger flashes like warning bells inside of Kiyoomi, but he doesn’t want to react like that with Miya. He takes a long calming breath and still can’t shake the frown on his face. “We’re both tired, let’s just talk about this tomorrow.” He needs to get his bearings to have a conversation like this that doesn’t end in him shouting.

Miya doesn’t look like he fully agrees with Kiyoomi’s suggestion but he concedes anyways. “Let me take your backpack,” he murmurs, lifting it off Kiyoomi’s shoulders.

The physical weight disappearing gives no reprevie to how mentally weighed down Kiyoomi feels right now.

“See you later,” Miya says, smile and giddy demeanor gone.

Kiyoomi bids him a silent goodbye and makes his way into the house. Motoya and the kids are sitting at the dining room table eating breakfast. Haru and Fumi look up from their eggs and cheer when they see Kiyoomi through the window. Motoya waves with a smirk. He probably thinks Kiyoomi spent the night at Miya’s. Which he did do in a sense, but he’s no longer riding off the high of happiness that brought. He takes a deep breath before stepping inside and plasters a smile on, but his mind can’t let go of the frustrating interaction.

While Haru shows him how to play some board game he sees Miya’s face fall when he said he didn’t want to look for glimmers anymore, like it was some unexpected thing for Kiyoomi to say. When Fumi shows him her penguin stuffed animal Kiyoomi still hears the frustration in Miya’s voice. ‘Why?’

‘Why?’ What does he mean ‘why’?

He wanted to talk about this later so that he could calm down but throughout the day he just becomes angrier until he’s almost seething when the sun is setting. His brain has started playing out the conversation, filling in new pieces of dialogue from Miya, each worse than the last. None of it is anything Miya has ever said, or would ever say, but he’s convinced himself that this is how Miya feels. He almost hates him for it.

Motoya asks him what he did yesterday and Kiyoomi answers: we kayaked.

“Everything okay?”

No. “Yes.”

“Well, if things are okay can you tell me why Atsumu is standing on the porch like that?”

“What?” Kiyoomi looks up from the kitchen counter and sees Miya through the window. He looks sad but the visibility of his expression is fading as the sun sets behind him.

“Do you need me to send him away?” Motoya asks.

Kiyoomi considers the offer for a split second. It’s the first time Motoya has ever offered to send Miya away for his sake. He must look really off.  But he shakes his head. “No, it’s fine. I’ll go talk to him.” His heart feels a little less pressure when Motoya’s offer sinks in. His cousin is truly always looking out for him.

He walks over to the door and slides it open enough for him to slip in and out, shutting it behind him.

“I couldn’t sleep tonight without talking to you,” Miya says. He looks Kiyoomi straight on, eye contact unwavering.

Kiyoomi glances back toward Motoya who is definitely trying his best to look busy right now, but Kiyoomi knows his cousin’s curiosity is unparalleled. “Let’s talk in the back. I don’t want Motoya listening.”

They step down the three porch steps and walk around the house, through the driveway and into the overgrown backyard. There’s a path through grass that reaches past Kiyoomi’s head. He walks along it and finds an old sandbox someone probably used to play in. But now it’s filled with weeds that reach Kiyoomi’s hip.

The overgrown yard is surrounded by a treeline of tall pine trees that spindle up toward the darkening sky. Right now the only visible star is the north star and something blinking that looks more like a satellite.

“Think we’re far enough?” Miya jokes, scratching the back of his head like he needs to do something to occupy his hand.

Kiyoomi laughs. It’s a dry laugh. “Probably.”

They stare at each other for a long second. Kiyoomi breaks their eye contact and looks at the ground. Miya either came over here to apologize, or push Kiyoomi toward looking for more glimmers. He really hopes it isn’t the latter, but he knows that’s more likely.

“Why can’t we just spend time together?” He asks. “Why do we need to look for the glimmers?”

“Spending time together isn’t enough.”

His throat hurts a little. Why is Miya acting like this? “How is it not enough?”

“Because just spending time together won’t help you remember.” The words sound heavy coming from Miya, like he’s struggling to admit them.

After all this time that’s what Miya is worried about? Haven’t they moved past that? Another flash of anger sparks through Kiyoomi. He tries his best to stamp it out. “Miya, you saw what happens when I see those things.”

“If you’re seeing things that means we’re getting somewhere.”

“Says who? And getting where?” His voice rises a little but he manages to keep it at a talking level. “Why are you so fixated on the past? If it’s so important to you, why don’t you just tell me what it is you want me to remember?”

The crickets around them have started to wake up, testing their wings with short and sporadic chirps. Kiyoomi looks up from the ground. “Well?”

The floodlight by the driveway turns on, illuminating Miya’s face. He rolls his head back and sighs, defeated. “Because I don’t want to have to tell you! I- I just wish you would remember,” his voice cracks a little and he clenches his eyes shut tight.

He thinks about all his old sketchbooks full of the desperate scribbles of a kid in an unsafe environment that he’s now come to understand. “Well I wish you would understand why I don’t want to.”

Something in the air shifts. The crickets go silent. The temperature drops a little. Goosebumps pop up on his arms and Kiyoomi shivers. He rubs some warmth back into them and freezes when small blue orbs start to float out of the sandbox, circling around him and Miya.

“What’s happening?” He says quietly, like maybe they can hear him. One of them floats up to his face. Is it a bug? Kiyoomi closes his hands around it, peeking through a small opening between his thumb and his pointer finger. It’s a firefly.

It blinks its light once, twice, three times like a homing beacon calling a small memory out from the dark. He’s seen this blue firefly before. When he was a kid. There were a bunch of them in the woods and Kiyoomi chased after them. He can’t remember what happened with them.

“I don’t…what are these things?” Miya asks, lifting his arms up as the fireflies encircle him.

Kiyoomi looks back at the one he’s holding. It stays still on his hand, still flashing a soft blue light.

He blinks and his vision is flooded with daylight. He blinks a couple more times and finally regains focus. He’s standing in Miya’s room.

Well, a version of Miya’s room. This one isn’t filled with law books or the whiteboard capturing someone’s deranged ramblings. There are superhero posters on the walls, manga magazines strewn on the floor, a tamagotchi on the side table. The view from the windows isn’t obscured by leaves. Because outside, the ginkgo tree is shorter.

“No no no no,” Kiyoomi begs. He shuts his eyes tight and tries to will himself back to the overgrown sandbox. But no matter how hard he clenches his eyes shut, they keep opening to Miya’s room. For a moment he considers trying to hop into a different memory similar to what he triggered last time. But the memory he was sent to was awful.

He glances around for any glimmers and finds none. He didn’t see any in the yard either. And the blue didn’t expand like it had all the other times he found a glimmer.

As Kiyoomi takes stock in where he is, his breath steadies. This time feels different. He doesn’t sense any feelings of fear or worry lingering in the air. The frustration he felt moments ago toward Miya is gone too. All he feels is a small flutter in his stomach, like a nervous excitement. But it feels wrong, like the feeling doesn’t belong to him.

He taps his fingers together and recounts the events one by one. He didn’t see any glimmers because there weren’t any. There were just fireflies, flashing like small lights. Like the lights he saw as a kid. This is what he saw all those years before.

This was the shrine.

And he just made a wish.

The Shrine only does good.

The rules printed on that old faded piece of paper is what’s keeping Kiyoomi relatively calm right now. His breath is choppy and goosebumps are still running up his arms but his feet don’t feel bolted to the floor. He can move. He’s just not sure he wants to.

There’s a tattered calendar pinned to Miya’s wall with “summer” written in scrawled kanij below neatly printed “August 2014.”

It’s the month before his mom died. The last time he was in Kurami.

“Agh!” Someone’s shout floats through the hall. There’s no doubt in his mind that the shout belongs to Miya.

“Would you shut up?”

The second voice is a little familiar, but Kiyoomi can’t quite place it.

“No!” Miya shouts back. His complaining grows louder when Kiyoomi moves across the empty bedroom and pokes his head into the hall. He walks toward the neighboring door a few feet away. It’s ajar enough for Kiyoomi to look in and see the full scope of the room without having to step in.

There are two twin-sized beds filling the small space with a low angled ceiling Kiyooi would have to duck under if he wanted to look out the window on the far wall. Suna is laying on his back on the bed that faces the door. Miya is sitting upright on the bed that sits along the adjacent wall.

He’s clenching a pale blue envelope in his hand and Suna is scowling at it.

“I can’t do it,” Miya cries. His hair is a lot brassier and swept to the side, completely void of the subtle light blond waves his 25-year-old self has.

“Then don’t.” Suna’s hair is remarkably similar to how his older self styles it. His clothes are a lot baggier compared to the well-fitted outfits Kiyooi has gotten to know him in. 

Miya is also dressed differently, wearing a ratty band t-shirt as opposed to the button-downs Kiyoomi has never seen him without. Clothes litter the floor and bedspread surrounding Miya. He pulls at the bottom hem of his t-shirt and looks at the faded guitar logo. “Are you sure-”

“Yes,” Suna groans. “Just wear that.”

What is he so freaked out about? Kiyoomi leans closer to the room, making sure to keep his feet fully planted in the hallway. No one has ever been able to see him in this…world, aside from his past self. But he doesn’t want to take any chances.

“Atsumu.”

“Okay fine!” Miya launches himself off the bed and starts stomping toward the door. Toward Kiyoomi. He gets to the edge of the hallway and freezes.

But his hesitancy isn’t because of Kiyoomi. His eyes are clenched shut. He curses under his breath and ambles back to his bed, collapsing against it. “I can’t,” he whispers, rolling on his back and holding up the blue envelope.

“Then don’tttt,” Suna sighs, pulling at the short word. “You can just tell him how you-” he stops short and makes a face. “How you love him, tomorrow.” Suna forces a gag at the end of his comment.

Love?

“Don’t gag about my feelings Sunarin!”

Suna rolls his eyes and pulls a photo off the nightstand by his bed. It’s a shot of him and someone with silver hair. Kiyoomi belatedly realizes it’s Osamu. “It’s not like they’re real,” Suna says about Miya’s feelings. “We’re still in high school. We have no concept of what love really is.”

Now Miya is the one rolling his eyes and frowning. “Don’t project your issues on me.” Then, in a whisper, “I know you love Samu.”

Suna shuts up at this and rolls on his side, facing the wall away from Miya.

On the other side of the room Miya is whispering something again, too quiet for Kiyoomi to hear from the hall this time. He steps into the room slowly, but his steps don’t make any sounds and his presence doesn’t cast any shadows.

He gets close enough to Miya to read the hiragana written on the envelope. “Omi.”

“My love is everlasting,” Miya whispers.

It sends a chill down Kiyoomi’s spine.

The feeling is accompanied by giddy nerves and a swirly heat in his heart. But these aren’t Kiyoomi’s feelings. The only feelings belonging to him right now are shock and confusion. It’s like his body isn’t synced with his brain.

Are these Miya’s feelings?

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” Suna says from the other side of the room. He’s laying on his back again, staring up at the ceiling.

Kiyoomi feels Miya’s frustration and gratitude at his friend’s overbearing comment. The emotions tense inside him like a clenching fist that slowly loses its tension. “Omi would never hurt me.”

Suna says nothing in response and Miya smiles. The 15-year-old feels like he’s won the argument, but at 25 Kiyoomi has a different read on Suna’s silence. He doesn’t want to prove his friend wrong.

With newfound confidence Miya marches toward the door again. “Are you staying here?”

Suna nods and flips open his cell phone. “Samu said he’s going to take me fishing.”

Now it’s Miya’s turn to force a gag, but his smile mars the believability of his disgust. Miya runs out of the room and after a second Kiyoomi realizes he should probably follow him. He chases Miya down the stairs, remembering the short step at the top of the stairs this time.

While Miya tugs his sneakers on, Kiyoomi marvels at how different the house looks. The walls are a mixture of maps and cat portraits. The furniture is covered in doilies and dried salt covers the floor like someone is constantly walking around in shoes soaked with sea water.

Miya ties his laces. With each passing moment his excitement and love grows until it’s bursting from Kiyoomi. He laughs out loud at the feeling of being overloaded with Miya’s positive emotions. It’s overwhelming how happy he is right now.

Is this what happiness is to Miya?

They walk outside and cross the street to Kiyoomi’s family’s house. Kiyoomi feels lighter with each step. His face is pulled into a smile so wide it almost hurts but the pleasant emotions outweigh his physical pain.

In college he had an assignment where he had to paint happiness. After struggling with what happiness might look like for others, he ended up painting the soft light of the late afternoon sun  hitting the edge of his kitchen countertop. If he were assigned with painting Miya’s happiness he could probably liken it to a raging bonfire.

A short burst of anxiety pierces through Kiyoomi, stopping him from moving forward. Miya’s eyes are trained on the back door of Kiyoomi’s house. Through the window screen he sees his younger self smile at Miya and happiness overwhelms him once again, like a fresh log placed on a dying fire. No. Like a bottle of gasoline thrown into a fire pit.

Teen Kiyoomi turns around for a second to glance at something behind him and hurries toward Miya. “I don’t have a lot of time today.”

Miya’s confidence falters, but just for a second. He tucks the blue envelope back into his pocket and smiles. “That’s okay Omi, there’s always tomorrow.”

“And the day after,” Kiyoomi jokes.

“And the rest of the summer.”

The two of them laugh like it’s some old joke Kioomi isn’t clued in on.

“What did you want to tell me?” Kiyoomi asks. He tugs at the collar of his sweatshirt and pulls it off. It’s the same sweatshirt that Miya now has. His head pops out of the collar and Miya laughs, reaching for Kiyoomi’s frizzy curls.

“Your hair looks crazy today.” There’s a hint of adoration in his voice but young Kiyoomi doesn’t pick up on it.

He steps back and frowns, touching his hair. “I tried to do it differently but…I wasn’t supposed to…you think it looks bad?”

Fear spikes through Kiyoomi when Miya realizes what he just said. Anxiety comes in waves so heavy Kiyoomi holds his stomach. “Calm down damn it,” Kiyoomi groans fruitlessly at Miya.

“No! No I- I love it,” Miya stammers. “It looks really soft and nice, like you,” he adds.

Kiyoomi feels embarrassment crawl up his neck. Miya’s teenage emotions are volatile.

Young Kiyoomi laughs. “You think I look nice and soft?”

“I think you look beautiful,” Miya rushes out.

It happens in an instant. If Kiyoomi wasn’t standing here watching them like this he might have missed it, but his younger self leans in and kisses Miya. It’s chaste and clumsy but when he pulls away Miya is in a dazed state.

Young Kiyoomi touches his fingers to his lips and drops his sweatshirt to the ground in surprise. “Sorry I shouldn’t have-”

“No I- I liked it,” Miya says. He reaches out his hand toward Kiyoomi’s taking it gently. “I…um.”

“KIYOOMI!” A brash voice shouts, startling the three of them. “GET IN HERE. NOW.”

Before Miya can look to see who’s shouting, Kiyoomi is yanking his hand away.

Confusion drops down on Miya gradually like the first couple drops of rain before a storm.

But neither young Kiyoomi nor 25-year-old Kiyoomi are confused by the situation. That was Kousei.

Kiyoomi is held prisoner by Miya’s emotions. In place of the fear and worry he should be feeling for his past self, his mind is simply confused.

“You forgot your sweatshirt!” Miya shouts, lifting it off the ground and brushing a few blades of grass off of it.

“Keep it,” Kiyoomi says just before shutting the door behind him. His voice was flat. He was probably trying to mask the fear brewing inside him of what’s waiting for him inside that house.

Miya smiles at the apparent gift of the sweatshirt and hugs it close to his chest. Kiyoomi kissed him and gave him his sweatshirt.

Warmth envelopes Kiyoomi’s chest but this isn’t right. Kiyoomi shouldn’t be feeling happy right now. The more he tries to focus on what he knows he should be feeling, the further his thoughts get away from him. Like he just walked into a room to do something but he can’t remember what it was.

Instead, his mind is inundated with Miya’s thoughts.

Kiyoomi kissed him. He gave him his sweatshirt. It smells like his conditioner and the sleeves are a little too long on him. He kind of wants to text him but Kiyoomi doesn’t have a cellphone. He can wait. It’s more romantic that way. Tomorrow he’ll tell Kiyoomi how he feels. Or maybe he should ask Kiyoomi out first, before he confesses. They could go on a breakfast date at the train car diner. Or a dinner date could be more romantic, at the pub in town. They could get nachos.

Miya starts to plan out the rest of their summer and everything they’ll do together. He holes up in his room and writes it all down on little scraps of paper from sunset to sunrise. The hideout. The fort. The lighthouse. The boat. Maybe they could go back to Treasure Island. Kiyoomi gets swept away in his excitement. Time passes at an unknown rate. It’s too confusing with all the thoughts Miya is having.

He finally gets a moment of silence and uses it to refocus on where he is.

He and Miya are back at Kiyoomi’s family house, this time near the front entrance by the kitchen. Motoya answered the door. He looks worried and a little uncomfortable. His twenty-something self doesn’t have the same poker-face his thirty year old self does.

“What?” Miya asks, his voice cracking like he doesn’t want to believe whatever he just heard.

Motoya shifts his weight from his right foot to his left foot and looks into Miya’s eyes. “Kiyo went back to Tokyo.”

Kiyoomi blinks and he’s back by the overgrown sandbox. The pain Miya felt at the news of Kiyoomi leaving is still pulsing through him as his eyes refocus under the night sky.

His first kiss was with Miya Atsumu. He kissed him .

And then he left. With no notice, he left and Miya found out after he spent all night planning the rest of their summer. Miya was in love with him and he left without saying goodbye. Kiyoomi was Miya’s first love and he ghosted him for 10 years. Then he showed up here and didn’t remember anything. The realizations come one after another, each like a punch to the gut.

Horror unfurls in Kiyoomi, but a small whimper from a few feet away distracts him. His eyes adjust to the dark sky and he sees Miya collapsed on the ground. Teen Miya’s worries are immediately forgotten.

“Miya?” Kiyoomi calls, hurrying over to where he’s kneeling in the grass. His head and shoulders are slumped forward and his arms are drooping by his sides. Kiyoomi drops beside Miya and lifts his face up.

A couple fireflies float up at the movement. Kiyoomi watches them fly into the woods toward a distant blue glow that must belong to the rest of the departed shrine.

“Omi…”

Kiyoomi turns back toward Miya and almost drops his head in fright when he sees the terror on Miya’s face. His eyes are wet with tears. His mouth is slightly open but he isn’t saying anything.

“Miya?” He whispers gently, touching his arm. “What happened?” Did he also go back in time? Did he see something?

Consciousness brightens Miya’s eyes. He lifts his head from Kiyoomi’s hands and looks around at their surroundings but the fear and worry don’t disappear from his face. If anything it deepens when his eyes find Kiyoomi again. He lifts a shaky hand to Kiyoomi and holds the back of his head, petting his curls gently.

“That was awful,” he whispers like he’s too scared to speak any louder. “Why didn’t you tell me? I could’ve…I could have done something.”

“Tell you what?”

Miya gulps. Anger darkens his face. “She hurt you.”

Oh. Kiyoomi sighs and shuts his eyes. He hates that the first feeling he’s overcome with his embarrassment. He hates that Miya saw such a vulnerable moment in his life. Miya continues to pet his head and Kiyoomi allows it, letting the motion keep him present.

But the more he focuses on the present the more he starts to remember about the argument they were having before the shrine granted their wishes. Miya had wanted him to keep experiencing stuff like that. He hadn’t know, but now he does.

“Now do you see why I want to stop searching for the glimmers?” He grimaces a little. The words are true, but Kiyoomi can’t help but hear the I told you so tone in them. Maybe it’s unfair to throw this question in Miya’s face when he’s still recovering from whatever he just saw, but Kiyoomi needs Miya to truly appreciate what he’s been going through each time their glimmer search has been successful .

Miya pulls his hand away and looks at Kiyoomi. The fear is gone from his eyes. His expression is more empty now. Kiyoomi can’t quite read it. He nods ‘yes’ to Kiyoomi’s question, but Kiyoomi isn’t sure he actually means it.

“I tried to stop her,” Miya says instead of allowing the topic to fade into oblivion.

A tear slides down his cheek and Kiyoomi’s throat grows heavy at the thought of Miya doing something as futile as trying to stop a memory from happening.

“You couldn’t have done anything,” Kiyoomi mutters. “It already happened.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? Back then?”

Kiyoomi’s heart pinches and he sighs. What kind of answer does Miya want? He doesn’t remember. But even without any memories of his past reasonings he can guess why his younger self never told anyone.

“You couldn't have done anything,” Kiyoomi repeats.

Miya stares at him silently, just as teen Suna has stared silently at teen Miya when he disagreed with him.

The memory is a segue out of this conversation and Kiyoomi grabs at it tightly. “I saw…” Kiyoomi trails off, not sure how to describe it. He saw that Miya is, or, was in love with him. He saw that some past version of himself reciprocated those feelings to some extent. He saw that same version of himself leave Miya behind.

He describes the pieces to Miya, carefully crafting his account. The floodlight behind him illuminates the pain and embarrassment on Miya’s face as Kiyoomi recites his teenage decisions. Kiyoomi leaves out the parts about love and the relationship Miya was planning for their teenage selves. It doesn’t need to be spelled out for Miya to know that he knows.

“So the last time you saw me was when we k-”

“It was after the wake,” Miya interrupts. Your family invited mine.”

“The wake?”

Miya says he was too nervous to go to the wake. He was scared of how Kiyoomi would react to seeing him and didn’t want to cause a scene in front of other people. So he waited until it was over.

“I found you back here actually,’ Miya says, kicking the side of the sandbox. “And…you acted like you had no idea who I was. That was the last time I saw you.”

The clouds above them have grown thinner. They glow a light gray under the moonlight. A few bright stars poke through the hazy sky. Kiyoomi stares up at them, unsure of what to say.

But Miya won’t let them settle into silence. “Why did you do that?” The question is almost rhetorical. That’s how little Miya seems to be expecting an answer. Kiyoomi wishes he could give him one.

“I don’t know.”

Miya says nothing. Kiyoomi doesn’t expect him to. He also doesn’t know where they go from here. Miya came over here to get some kind of closure on their argument and somehow it feels like they’re further from reconciling than before.

He needs to do something to make this better. “I understand now,” Kiyoomi tries. “I understand why you wanted me to remember. I saw what you wanted me to remember…can we move past this?”  He isn’t quite sure what this is.

They don’t have infinite summers or days like they did as kids. Kiyoomi doesn’t need until the end of August to make his decision anymore. He’s knows for a fact that he’d be incapable of doing any kind of children’s book work. He needs to find a new job. He should probably just stay here another week.

Can’t they just spend one more week together having fun? Can’t they move past it? Or is he asking too much?

“It isn’t enough,” Miya says, shaking his head. “I don’t care if you think you understand. I need to know why you left like that. Like I never meant anything to you. It isn’t enough.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t know what to say about Miya needing to know an answer that Kiyoomi has no knowledge of. Instead he focuses on the part Miya repeated.

“It isn’t enough for what?”

“I don’t know.”

Kiyoomi throws his head back and lets out a dry laugh. “You are such a hypocrite.”

“I just don’t know!” His words bite, anger snapping out of them.

“You don’t get to be mad at me for this,” Kiyoomi says curtly. He’s not going to be guilted about the abuse he went through and the lasting effects it had on his life.

“I know,” he gasps, frustration seeping out. “But, I don’t know! Maybe I’m mad about something else.”

“WHAT? What are you mad about?”

“I don’t know,” he repeats.

“I think you do know Miya.” Kiyoomi winces at how easily the words he’s hated slip out of his own mouth. “I think-”

“You LEFT ME.”

Kiyoomi is stunned into silence, but Miya continues. “And spending time together… it isn’t enough for me to forgive you.”

Forgive Kiyoomi? Confusion flows in wrinkled lines on Kiyoomi’s forehead. “Why did you spend all this time with me if you haven’t forgiven me?”

A car drives past the house. Its headlights shutter through the treeline casting long shadows that nearly make it to Kiyoomi’s feet.

“I don’t know,” Miya says with a genuine groan of confused frustration. There’s nothing light hearted about the way he’s speaking. It’s like he suddenly woke up and realized he never wanted to do anything with Kiyoomi. “It’s frustrating,” Miya groans. “I can’t get rid of this feeling now. This frustration toward you. I just don’t forgive you.” He starts to mutter to himself. “When it’s Samu or Suna we just give a solid punch and we’re good.”

“So you want to hit me?” Kiyoomi deadpans.

“No.” Miya says firmly. “I just…need some time alone.”

“Alone time?”

Miya looks up and laughs dryly. “Well we’re not looking for glimmers together anymore so it’s not like we need to spend time together anyways.”

A sour taste starts to fill Kiyoomi’s mouth. Why does it feel like Miya is breaking up with him? They aren’t even together. He needs time alone? What does that mean? The question bubbles up inside of him. He wants to ask how long Miya will need but he can’t bear to be the needy one here. “I’m going to be leaving on Saturday,” he decides out loud. “A week from tomorrow.”

The flood light turns off. They’ve been standing out of bounds from the sensor for too long. Kiyoomi can’t read Miya’s expression and he isn’t saying anything in response.

“What if we don’t see each other before then?” Kiyoomi asks.

He hears Miya stepping toward him, dry grass crunching together under his feet. He sees the outline of his head a foot away. “I’m used to you not saying goodbye.” The silhouette moves toward the driveway. Miya is leaving.

Embarrassment at how he was just shut down kicks through Kiyoomi. The heat burns his earlobes and runs across his cheeks. “I guess your love wasn’t everlasting,” he says, throwing out the weird phrase 15-year-old Miya whispered with a hollow laugh.

The flood light sensor picks up Miya’s movements in the driveway, illuminating his stunned expression at what Kiyoomi just said.

“What?” Miya says, like he’s surprised Kiyoomi would say those words. He looks at the ground to avoid Kiyoomi’s gaze.

“Something you said.”

There’s some silence. Another car drives by. The shadows cast through the trees reach Kiyoomi’s feet this time.

Miya turns in the bright light and walks back toward his house. “Sorry,” he says softly before he’s too far away to be heard, “I don’t remember,”

For the first time since he got here, Kiyoomi wakes up remembering where he is. His futon is still too short. The tatami boards still smell like summer. The water stain he spotted on the ceiling a few days ago hasn’t changed from being a warped brown smudge.

He remembers, but he wishes he didn’t. Today there’s no adventuring or seeing Atsumu.

Today there is nothing.

The next morning is the same.

Kiyoomi kicks the blanket off his legs, his body getting too hot now that he’s awake, and stares at the water stain on the ceiling, wondering for a long moment if it’s gotten any bigger. It probably hasn’t.

It doesn’t matter that he’s not seeing Atsumu today. His life is so much bigger than Atsumu. He didn’t even know Atsumu existed until last week.

Miya is a non-issue. A nothing. And Kiyoomi doesn’t need to think about him.

He changes into fresh clothes, plucking a pair of shorts and a t-shirt from the folded pile of laundry Motoya left him. All he needs to think about today is updating his portfolio.

He repeats the one-item to-do list in his head as he makes his way to the kitchen, stopping in his tracks when he sees new people filling the dining table he's grown accustomed to having half-empty.

“Oh Kiyoomi! Look how big you’re grown!” A woman with bob-length light brown hair and round eyebrows gushes excited salutations, standing up from the table to greet him.

“Ema,” Kiyoomi pieces together, accepting her hug. She’s in her mid-40s now. When Kiyoomi was growing up he’s pretty sure she spent most of his childhood in college and grad school. He has even fewer memories of her than he does Motoya. His knowledge of Ema is whatever Motoya cares to share with him, which typically have been her academic accolades and how she won a hot dog eating contest a few years ago.

“This is my husband Mako,” she says, pointing to the timid man smiling weakly toward Kiyoomi. The newspaper he’s reading flops over into a bowl of Miso soup and he curses in apology.

“This is my mom!” Fumi shouts.

“She’s our mom!” Haru says possessively.

Both siblings smile with stars in their eyes as they show off their parents.

“Your mom is Kiyo’s cousin,” Motoya explains.

This makes both kids frown and look at each other. “Cousins are supposed to be little,” Haru says with Fumi nodding in agreement. “Our cousin is three!”

“And I’m four!”

Kiyoomi sits in the empty seat across from the two kids and tries to look attentive while Haru explains what a cousin really is to him and Ema goes over the details of the free cruise they went on.

“I definitely wouldn’t have paid for it,” Mako says thoughtfully, still blotting up the spilled Miso soup from the table.

“Oh god no,” Ema laughs. “But we had to take advantage of the free tickets.”

Mako nods. “Couldn’t let them go to waste.”

“Oh but now we’re talking your ear off,” Ema laughs. “How’s art school– or, no you graduated…oh! Well you know who’s your age? Well of course you know-”

“Ema,” Mako and Motoya say at the same time, causing her to laugh.

“Right, sorry. I’m just excited to talk to someone who isn’t pushing 80. But what can I say, that’s the cruise crowd. What’s his name again? Or both their names I guess…”

Kiyoomi takes a bite of the salad Motoya set in front of him and waits for Ema to finish whatever she’s trying to say.

“Atsumu!” She shouts. “The one studying to be a doctor.”

“Lawyer,” Kiyoomi corrects, though he wishes he hadn’t.

“Oh so you know him?”

“Not really.” He turns away from Ema and his eyes find Motoya’s. He shakes his head but it’s different from the lighthearted disappointment, the same way he did when Kiyoomi and Atsumu were constantly bickering with each other. This reaction seems heavy with internal conflict, which is probably why Motoya isn’t saying anything.

Ema explains to Mako who Atsumu is. Images from last night play through his head. Atsumu leaving. Saying he doesn’t forgive him. The way he cried for Kiyoomi.

“I know Atsumu!” Haru shouts.

“Me too!” Fumi says.

Then the onslaught of questions begins. With each one Kiyoomi tries to hold his emotions at bay.

No, he doesn’t know if Atsumu would want to come have breakfast.

I just…need some time alone

No, he doesn’t really remember playing with him as kids.

We were more than just five-year-old playmates.

No, he doesn’t know when Atsumu is going back to school.

I didn’t drop out.

No. No. No.

“I see,” Ema says with a sigh. She’s realized her curiosity won’t be satiated by Kiyoomi. “You really don’t know him do you?”

His fork scrapes the inside of the salad bowl. “I don’t think so, no.”

Ema apologizes and goes on a tangent about how she forgets just because people are in their 20s doesn’t mean they spend time together but Kiyoomi isn’t listening. He’s trying really hard to stay calm. He shouldn't be upset about this.

“I don’t forgive you.” “Why didn’t you tell me?” A car is driving by. Lights are shuttering. The shadows are reaching him. They want to pull him down.  

He clenches his eyes shut and bites into a cherry tomato. This is nothing to be upset over. He has experienced much worse.

Kiyoomi tries to keep this mindset going the rest of the morning until he’s waving goodbye to Haru, Fumi, Ema, and Mako. They pack up the minivan that’s still a little too sticky for Kiyoomi and drive down the driveway, making a right onto the main road.

Then it’s quiet.

He spent all morning wishing for some peace. Everyone is finally gone but now it's too silent.

Motoya trudges to his room. He collapses on his bed from exhaustion the moment he is finally freed from his childcare responsibilities. He sleeps in the next day too. With Haru and Fumi gone, shared meal times have disappeared, not that there’s any food in the pantry to cook.

At 11 a.m. on Tuesday Kiyoomi looks over the barren shelves holding a chewed open pack of graham crackers a mouse got into, a bag of chips that just holds crumbs, and an expired box of saltines the mouse wanted nothing to do with. 

He concocts a plan:

1. Go buy groceries
2. Update his portfolio

With the list Motoya gave him the last time he was sent to get groceries in hand Kiyoomi gets in Motoya’s car and heads into town. There are two cruise-themed lanyards in the passenger seat and a pair of fuzzy dice hanging from the rear-view mirror but it’s not sticky or flooded with the smell of mildew.

Pulling out of the driveway Kiyoomi’s eyes are glued to Miya’s house and the empty driveway in front of it. Is he at the grocery store? Or maybe the bike shop Suna works at? The konbini?

It’s been four days since he saw Miya. A little excitement and nerves stir inside Kiyoomi when he pulls into the grocery store parking lot, but the only other car here is a white mini truck. Miya’s red truck isn’t filling any of the spots or pulling in behind him.

The truck isn’t in Miya’s driveway when Kiyoomi returns either. Nor was it on the road driving in or out of town. He frowns as he lugs the groceries into the house. It’s not like it matters. It doesn’t matter.

At 1 p.m. Motoya is still sleeping and Kiyoomi is munching on nori sheets as he scrolls through portfolios of people in his field he’s met the past couple years. The bios range from professional introductions to descriptions Haru and Fumi might have come up with.

“This is my work. I like blue,” captions a series of images in five point perspective with immense background details in various shades of blue and the occasional pop of orange. The settings are mostly dystopian with a lot of flora and fauna filling mecha-style buildings.

“Hello! I’m Ebrah, a Pakistani artist based in Brazil working on pixel art and loop animation. I’m currently looking for work,” captions six dynamic animations with varying durations and settings all done in pixel art.

“Antoine. I work with Ink,” captions a set of multi-paneled black and white works with details that would be impressive in digital art, let alone traditional materials.

With each portfolio he reviews Kiyoomi grows less confident about his own. It’s almost embarrassing to look at the website he built when he was 19. There’s a typo in his bio that he’s pretty sure was a class assignment he got a B- on. The resolution on his first piece looks like it was exported at 60 DPI.

His work has too much breadth in it too. Graphic design logos, character design sheets, background paintings…it’s all too much and unfocused.

If he were to completely gut everything and just add his poster work he’d have a strong portfolio, but he has no connections to the movie-poster industry anymore. If there was an available job Yachi would have told him about it.

No, he needs to make new portfolio-worthy pieces. He needs to start fresh, like he has with everything else in his life.

He rolls over in his futon and grabs his sketchbook. It’s not like he’s starting with nothing. He has spent the last week sketching compositions and swatching colors of everything around him.

There are times when Kiyoomi gets this creative tunnel vision. He doesn’t feel fatigue or hunger. Typical distractions like his phone have lost all temptation. All he wants to do, all he can do, is draw.

Since he’s been here he’s had the itching feeling to draw. Now, finally, it’s the only thing he wants to focus on. He turns his brain off and starts to sketch.

The hideout, the lighthouse, the boat, Treasure Island, the pub, the train car diner, Suna’s bike shop. Kiyoomi sees it all.

He sketches first on paper. Then brings it onto his tablet and starts to do the lineart. He can’t fill his portfolio with dozens of pieces right away, but he can chronicle his process for each one of these. Colors, flats, highlights, shadows, rendering, details. It all comes together while he’s in a trance or having some kind of episode.

He only stops to make coffee and to turn the brightness down on his tablet when the sun sets and the light becomes too much of a strain on his eyes. When his tablet pencil dies he swatches colors and makes his palettes. When it’s recharged he goes right back to drawing.

He’s no longer creating for some movie he didn’t understand or like. This is all him.

Export. Upload. Caption. It all goes up on his site one after the other. Nothing is formatted. Everything is out of order but it’s there. All the feelings he’s been holding off hit him at once. Hunger. Thirst. Fatigue. He glances at the clock. It’s Thursday at 9:17 a.m.

He collapses against his futon.

* * *

“Here eat this too,” Motoya says, pushing a bowl of curry toward Kiyoomi right next to the ramen he just made for him.

“Motoya,” he groans

“And drink this water,” Motoya tuts. “Jeez I thought I was done being a caretaker around here. I let my guard down.”

“I’m fine,” Kiyoomi says between bites.

“A person who is fine doesn’t pass out surrounded by nori and cups of half drunk coffee,” Motoya says. “The bad coffee,” he adds.

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes. “I forgot to buy the konbini coffee.”

“Mhm,” Motoya says with a wry smile. He pats Kiyoomi on the head and starts to serve himself some curry. “So? Where’s Atsumu?”

Kiyoomi frowns at the sound of his name. “Don’t know.”

Motoya sighs. “Back to pretending you don’t like him?”

There’s no way for Kiyoomi to explain everything to Motoya. The glimmers, the shrine, the truth behind his childhood. It’s all wrapped together like a bunch of knotted vines, or barbed wire. So he just shrugs. “I guess.”

“Why don’t you go make up with him? With Haru and Fumi gone, our kitchen is lonely.”

“He’s not here,” Kiyoomi grumbles. Motoya probably thinks he’s playing some kind of matchmaker right now.

“His car is here,” Motoya calls from the pantry, marching back with the crumb-filled bag of chips and frowning when he opens it.

“What?” Kiyoomi looks up from the table, craning his neck to look past the porch railings. There’s Miya’s truck, parked in the driveway like it never left. He stands from the table and slides the door open. It’s still there. Miya isn’t anywhere near it. Regardless, Kiyoomi finds himself walking toward the house.

“Have fun!” Motoya calls, completely unaware of how this will be anything but fun.

Kiyoomi stands at the edge of his yard, picking at the lichen on the fence while he stares at Miya’s house. The grass tickles his ankles like it’s trying to remind him he’s just standing here looking at Miya’s house.

Magic aside, their issue boils down to a fight. Miya says he doesn’t forgive him. Kiyoomi can’t really fault him for that, but it doesn’t mean he shouldn’t do anything about it.

It’s sometime in the late afternoon on Thursday. Miya said he needed time. Kiyoomi counts a little in his head. Is six days enough? Is this one of those scenarios where Kiyoomi is supposed to come running over and beg for forgiveness? Should he have done that the moment Miya left? Or does Miya want to be left alone until he decides he’s ready to talk?

Kiyoomi’s brain is running on the fumes of nori and grocery store coffee when he decides yes, Miya would want him to go over there and apologize. He climbs over the fence and thinks about the last time he apologized to someone in a fight. As with most of his recent memories, Yachi comes to mind first.

When they were in their third year, just finishing up their first zine together,  Yachi had wanted to hang up the posters advertising the project. Kiyoomi saw it as more of a chore that needed to get done as opposed to a special milestone, so when she couldn’t do it that afternoon because she was in class he went ahead and hung them up around campus.

This was also the first time Yachi had been to therapy for a consecutive month. She was finally comfortable expressing her feelings and after what Kiyoomi did she was feeling anger. He didn’t know what to do to fix it. He tried taking the posters down to hang them up together but she got annoyed about that, saying people would just get confused. She was right. He ended up framing one of the posters for her and promising they would do it together next time.

Then everything just went back to normal.

He raises his fist to knock on Miya’s door, rapping against it twice. Will things go back to normal if he says he’s sorry? What even is normal for them?

Yasu flashes into his head. The first time they fought was about Kousei. She wanted to meet him and didn’t understand why Kiyoomi wouldn’t introduce the two of them. Yasu saw it as Kiyoomi not taking their relationship seriously. When Kiyoomi tried to explain how Kousei wasn’t a safe person for him, she didn’t want to hear it. To Yasu, family was family, and you always accept them.

Kiyoomi apologized then too and agreed to introduce Yasu to Kousei. Even now that memory leaves a sour taste in his mouth. Was he in the wrong? Should he have apologized?

The door goes unanswered. He knocks again.

There’s no right or wrong in this situation with Atsumu, it’s more about feelings. Kiyoomi hurt Atsumu back then, so much so that it’s still hurting him. He never wants to be a source of pain like that in someone's life. Especially not Atsumu.

So much time passes with the door going unanswered that he starts to count in his head. When he reaches 300 he takes a deep breath and opens the door. He and Atsumu can figure out their normal once Kiyoomi apologizes.

“Miya?” He whispers as he steps into the house. There’s no answer, but that’s probably because he was too quiet.

Walking around in this house is a lot scarier compared to the last time he let himself in. There’s a rift between him and Miya right now. With each step forward he starts to consider how Atsumu might get upset with him for coming in here.

“Miya?” He calls, louder this time. There’s still no response. No floorboards creaking. No doors opening.

He glances into the kitchen and finds it empty, just as the living room is. Nori and grocery store coffee are either great confidence boosters or sound-decision making inhibitors. Kiyoomi tries not to dwell on which it is as he walks up the stairs toward Miya’s room.

The door is open. He knocks on the door frame and steps in. “Miya?” He asks the empty room. The bed is still messy. The law books are still stacked everywhere. Everything looks the same except the white board with their plans to find a glimmer. There’s a singular wide swipe across it, like someone started to erase everything and immediately gave up.

Looking around the room Kiyoomi can’t tell if this is stuff Miya would leave behind or take with him if he left. But his truck is here. He must be too.

Downstairs he hears the door open and panic shoots through his heart. “Miya? He calls, stepping out of the room and walking down the stairs. Keep going, keep going, he urges his feet, otherwise he might turn right back up the stairs and hide in his room. “I’m sorry I-”

He shuts up when he turns toward the entrance and comes face to face with Suna, not Miya.

Suna looks a little stunned to see him. The surprise fades to a concerned look Suna has never given him, but one his teen self gave to teen Miya.

“You can’t be here.” Suna says. His tone isn’t harsh, but it is firm. Kiyoomi knows it's one he shouldn’t argue with. Suna shifts to the side, moving out of the way to the door. It’s a silent command. Leave .

“I…I’m sorry,” he says quickly, shouldering past Suna and shutting the door behind him so he doesn’t have to hear the sound of Suna shutting him out. He wants to shout Miya’s name but the only ears he knows it will fall on are Suna’s or maybe Motoya’s.

Motoya. He can’t go home right now. Motoya is just going to ask him what happened. He doesn’t want to talk about it. Where the hell is Miya? At the beach? The lighthouse? The boat? Somewhere they’ve never been before? This tiny town that only recently got its own grocery store starts to become too large for Kiyoomi to comprehend as he thinks of everywhere Miya might be.

In an effort to be anywhere but where he is now, Kiyoomi starts walking. He passes the signs about fresh eggs for sale, buoy and crab pot graveyards, and plastic yard flamingos until he comes across the diner.

It still looks abandoned but he knows better now, walking in and sitting at the same stool that was free the last time he came here. The Betty Boop sticker stares him down, but at least she can’t ask him where Atsumu is like everyone else. He orders coffee. It tastes like it's from the grocery store. He orders an egg sandwich. It smells like the one Miya got when they came here. He sits and eats and dissociates. He needs to sleep and he knows he’ll feel better but sleeping right now feels like giving up.

The longest he stayed up was his senior year of college the weekend before the senior showcase. He was awake for most of 72 hours rushing to finish his pieces. Two days is nothing.

He slumps against the counter and tries to keep his eyes open, focusing in on the conversations happening around him. Two siblings are fighting over their mom’s last piece of bacon. Three women are gushing about this new detergent they’ve been using. Two men are arguing about which one of them is older.

“You got it last time!”

“It got this ketchup stain right out.”

“I was born in ‘45.”

“I lost my glasses the other day and when I was out in the woods they just appeared on the stump beside me. The shrine is still around I guess,” someone laughs.

Kiyoomi sits upright and lurches toward the voice.

It’s an old woman whose wire framed glasses are perched neatly on top of her head. She jumps back at Kiyoomi’s movement and he freezes.

“Sorry I um, thought I needed to sneeze.” He says and winces at how bad of a liar he is. He turns back toward the counter and picks his sandwich back up, eating it to play the part of diner-customer-who-is-minding-his-own-damn-business. Then he listens in.

“They were just sitting there on the stump?” The woman’s companion asks.

“Yup! And the shrine was glowing blue! It’s funny though,” the woman laughs, “I couldn’t see without my glasses, so it just looked like a blue blob.”

“Oh that’s a shame.”

“It really is.”

“But it’s good you found your glasses.”

“Isn’t it?”

The two women move on from the shrine to their new neighbor who moved in but Kiyoomi can’t stop thinking about it. He finishes his sandwich and pays his 1000¥ bill. His feet feel sluggish now as he walks back up the road toward his house. His body is trying to force his brain to slow down. The sandwich is making him want to sleep instead of giving him energy.

He walks through his yard, past the sand box and into the woods. The land is owned by his family for a few acres back. Then it’s national forest preserves. So he doesn’t feel bad when he starts to yell.

“Shrine!” He screams. “Tell me where Miya is!” He shouts.

A few birds fly away at the disturbance but otherwise the forest around him is still.

“I want to know where he is! I- I wish! I wish I to know where he is!” He shouts.

Puffy white clouds pass above him.

“No?!” Kiyoomi shouts. “Then I wish I could go back! I wish I could undo it!” He’s crying out demands that he doesn’t even fully understand. He doesn’t know what he would undo. He just wants Miya back.

“PLEASE!” He screams. His voice is starting to hurt.

The forest doesn’t budge. The shrine doesn’t answer him.

He collapses in on himself, head dropped and arms swinging lifelessly by his side. His legs stagger forward toward the house, carrying him to his room and falling out from under him when he reaches his futon.

There’s only one person who has answers about where Miya is right now.

He’s just not sure if Suna will tell him.

The question of whether or not Suna will tell Kiyoomi about Miya is all that has filled his head for the past 12 hours. He spent 11 of those hours sleeping, but the question permeated his dreams, creating different scenarios of what Suna might say.

How he could yell at him, or laugh in his face, or pretend he has no idea who Kiyoomi is. He plays out each harrowing possibility in his head until it all starts to feel like reality.

The scenarios continue to whirr through his mind like the quick passing images of a spinning slot machine as he approaches the bike shop Suna works at. He slept through most of the day and now the sun is getting in position to set, casting a warming hue across the sky. Golden hour light hits everything around him including the art studio space that has his mom’s painting.

Kiyoomi side-eyes the lurking building and keeps a measured distance away from it as he walks past it on the sidewalk. He can only handle about one difficult thing a day and right now the quota is filled with talking to Suna.

Familiar bells jingle, pulling his gaze away from the studio toward the bike shop. Suna is locking up the store, leaning awkwardly to keep a tight grip on a giant black box while half-balancing it against his hip. The carp flags wave weakly above him, the passing breeze just strong enough to stir limited movements.

His heart chest spikes with anxiety but it propels him forward instead of back. Kiyoomi steps off the sidewalk into the car-waiting bay marked with yellow paint. His heart beats loud in his chest as he watches Suna. Is it more creepy to stand here staring or to approach him?

Suna starts to walk away from the store and Kiyoomi hurries toward him, startling Suna. He tries to smile to disarm how crazy he must look running toward Suna like this but his smile feels feverish and awkward and his legs continue their jilted movements toward the shop.

“Whoa what the fuck.” Suna says the question like a statement, lifting one hand up. His other hand is holding the giant speaker, gripping the wide handle. No wait, it’s a radio. The antenna reaches above Suna’s head and the buttons are all square. They look old enough to get stuck if someone actually pushed them in.

Kiyoomi stops now that he has Suna’s attention. They’re standing a few feet apart. Suna has some black grease on his arm that could be mistaken for one of his tattoos if Kiyoomi were further away.

He looks Kiyoomi up and down and sighs, walking away from him like he’s some random solicitor.

“Suna,” Kiyoomi says, following him into the parking lot and stopping when he sees what Suna is walking toward.

It’s Miya’s red truck.

When did that get here? Kiyoomi didn’t notice it when he drove in. Is Miya here right now?

Suna grumbles something incoherent and sets the radio down by the truck. “Look. I tried to be nice the other day, you know, when you broke into their house, but if you keep showing up I’m not going to be as nice.”

Kiyoomi opens and shuts his mouth. The only thing he can think to say is how Miya said it doesn’t count as breaking in if it’s already unlocked. He shouldn’t say that right now. He can’t stop staring at Miya’s truck. Where is he? Kiyoomi shuts his eyes and composes himself. It’s also easier to get this question out if he isn’t looking Suna in the eyes. “Please. Can you just tell me where he is?”

He opens his eyes and Suna’s pinched expression has opened up, his eyebrows lifted slightly and mouth agape. “He didn’t tell you he left?”

Left?

“Miya left?”

Suna grumbles some more things to himself and hoists the radio up, staggering back to the store.“You are all getting on my nerves.”

Left where?

“Come over here,” Suna orders. The door jingles and Suna holds it open for Kiyoomi.

Kiyoomi steps forward. His shoes make a grinding sound as he drags them against the pavement. He looks over his shoulder at Miya’s truck and turns away following Suna up the stairs.

The bells jingle behind Kiyoomi when he gets to the top of the stairs. Suna mutters something about tourists. “We’re closed!” He shouts, walking down the stairs to argue with whoever is there about what the store hours are.

They ask for his manager. Suna says he is the manager. They don’t believe him. The whole argument might be funny if Kiyoomi wasn’t crushed right now. It’s all just noise to him. Miya left. Does that mean he’s gone for good? He wanders through the store, avoiding the occasional bike wheel sticking out into the aisle. 

The radio Suna set on the counter cracks with static. The floorboards creak as Suna makes his way back up the stairs toward the purchasing counter Kiyoomi is leaning against — though he stands up straight when Suna returns and keeps his hands at his sides.

They stare at each other. Suna fidgets with a neon green carabiner clasped to his belt loop. Kiyoomi taps his fingers against the counter.

“Where did he go?” Kiyoomi asks, breaking the silence.

“Sailing,” Suna answers. “Osamu took him on a sailing trip.”

They’re with four other guys Osamu knows from around the docks. They wanted to sail to the Enoshima Sea Candle observation deck. Apparently it’s on some small island that has a fun bar and a small inn. Then they are going to go to Oshima and look at the volcano. The guys Osamu knows needed two more people. Atsumu wanted to clear his head. Osamu wanted a vacation and to spend time with his brother. At least that’s how it was all explained to Suna.

Kiyoomi didn’t know Atsumu knew how to sail.

Suna says he doesn’t really, but Osamu does and Atsumu knows how to follow directions.

The radio crackles some more.

Miya is sailing. He’s clearing his mind. He’ll come back when he’s done.

Kiyoomi tries to imagine Miya on a sailboat, smiling wide while his shirt flaps in the wind. He probably slathers his face in sunscreen and has some kind of bucket hat on. If he shuts his eyes he can feel Miya tugging him forward by the buckles of his life vest.

“Are you looking for him so you can say goodbye?”

“Goodbye?”

“It’s Friday,” Suna says. “Aren’t you leaving tomorrow?”

Kiyoomi had lost track of the days when he went down his drawing induced coma and slept like a rock all day today. Has it really been a week? And did Miya tell Suna that? If so, how did he tell him? Was he sad? Annoyed? Angry?

“What do you know?” Kiyoomi asks. What did Miya tell you?

Suna looks toward the large clock on the wall with a bike tire fixed around it and wrinkles his nose. He walks to the other side of the counter across from Kiyoomi like he’s going to sell him something, though more likely to put something between them, and fiddles with the radio. The static clears up and voices come through. Then he starts to talk.

Apparently Atsumu told him everything. Apparently he always does. Suna knows about the glimmers and their efforts to find them. He knows about the shrine and what Atsumu saw. He knows that he and Atsumu slept together. He knows Atsumu said he wanted time to think. He knows Atsumu doesn’t forgive him.

“For the record, I don’t think he’s being fair,” Suna says. He’s sorting through a bucket of keys right now, testing each one in the mechanism of a coiled blue bike lock.

“Fair about what?”

“Holding this grudge. You guys were kids. It’s been what? 10 years?” He picks up a red key and it clicks in the lock. He smiles and sets them to the side.

The sun is setting now. Dramatic shadows paint the walls covered in framed photographs as sunlight hits the bikes by the window. Kiyoomi pulls at the hem of his shirt and wishes he had something to do with his hands. It’s weird to get some kind of defense from Suna after how he’s been treating Kiyoomi since they met. The last time he was here Suna tried to kick him out.

“Why are you being nice to me?”

Suna pulls a green bike lock from under the counter and starts shuffling through the keys again. “I hated you.”

Kiyoomi laughs. No shit. “Why?”

“You left my best friend behind with a broken heart. You were the first guy he ever liked. That really fucked with him. That might seem like not big deal, first crush or whatever, but we knew each other our whole lives and then you just left after all the time he…well you know.”

Kiyoomi shifts against the counter and fights the urge to turn away. What does he say to that?

“You left me too,” Suna says. “And Samu.”

“We were close?”

“Who knows,” Suna says. “It’s been so long.” He cracks a smile and Kiyoomi reciprocates, albeit as more of a reflex. 

“Well, you don’t seem to hate me right now.”

Suna shakes his head. “Atsumu told me what he saw,” he reminds Kiyoomi. “I don't think he fully grasps how much a household like that affects a person. He and Samu grew up with the kind of parents who think their kids are nothing but a blessing. Me and you? Not so much.” He pulls another key out of the box. It doesn’t fit. “Let’s just say I get why you’d want to run away and not come back.”

Kiyoomi tries to smile at the sentiment but a frown pulls down his face instead. Because he doesn’t know why he left like that. He doesn’t get why he’d ignore Atsumu at the wake or why he’d pretend not to know him. He doesn’t know why he can’t remember anything.

“I’ve seen a glimmer before,” Suna says matter-of-factly, cutting through the somber energy settling around them. “I didn’t know what the fuck it was though. Ran away as fast as I could. Can’t believe you guys went looking for them.”

Kiyoomi laughs. “Me either.”

The radio crackles again. Suna extends the antenna and turns up the volume. A few voices come through but it’s nothing Kiyoomi can make sense of.

“What is that?”

“Coast Guard channel.”

Oh. The image of Miya he had earlier smiling on the sailboat is replaced with him struggling to make it over a giant wave without getting swallowed up.

“Do you always have that on?” Kiyoomi asks.

“Just when Samu is on the water.”

Kiyoomi must look worried because Suna starts to shake his head. “They’ll be fine. It’s not like they’re long lining or anything. And Samu would never let anything happen to Atsumu.”

That’s probably true. He tries to believe Suna, but Suna doesn’t turn the volume down. Osamu’s missing finger comes to mind.

“Seriously,” Suna says slowly. “The worst that’ll happen is one of them getting a splinter when they push off the dock. Though knowing Atsumu he’d probably pitch a fit at that.” He chuckles to himself and pulls another curled up bike lock out from below the counter.

Kiyoomi wonders if there’s one for each of the keys Suna has dumped in the bucket. “Do you know when they’re coming back?”

Suna hums to himself and lifts a stack of receipts off the counter, revealing a wrinkled wall calendar. He flips back a coffee-stained page and reads smudged date entries. “Next…Sunday.”

“Oh.” The sound escapes him, unwanted, but even if he tried to speak right now that’s probably all he could muster up. Atsumu was going to wait until Kiyoomi was gone to come back? Oh.

“Guess you won’t see him then,” Suna notes with the emotional intelligence of a brick wall.

“I’ll wait,” Kiyoomi decides instantly. It’s a gut reaction, like he’d been dwelling on what he wants up until a coin is tossed and it lands on heads instead of tails. Another week is fine. Who was he kidding? There’s no way he could leave tomorrow. He doesn’t even have anywhere to live. There definitely isn’t room for Kiyoomi and all of his stuff in Yachi’s tiny studio unless he slept on top of his boxes.

Suna studies him closely and shrugs. “Okay.”

The tone is frank and a little light, like Suna is expecting that to be the end of their conversation. But Kiyoomi has one more question.

“How do you normally wait for them? To get back?”

Suna glances back toward the clock, pouts, and busies himself with tidying all the loose papers on the counter as he thinks, or at least Kiyoomi is hoping that Suna is thinking about the question he just asked. After a few minutes of shuffling he looks up. “The first time Osamu went on a longliner was probably one of the hardest times in my life. Three months of staring at the wall while Atsumu cried over his LSAT practice tests.”

Suna says that's when he started getting into fixing bikes. Osamu had this old bike rusted over from being left out in the rain all spring. He was focused on cleaning it up. He took the entire thing apart and had no idea how to put it back together.

“Their grandma gave me this old radio their grandfather used to have when she would go out fishing,” Suna says. “I just have it on the Coast Guard channel and know that nothing bad is happening.”

Kiyoomi nods. That makes sense. The radio crackles and Suna fiddles with the antenna again.

“But this is barely a two-week trip. And they aren’t going on some dangerous charter boat. It’s a sailboat that will always have some sight of land.”

He swallows. He can’t imagine Osamu going out in the middle of the ocean without any land in sight.

“Is that all?” Suna asks. He’s glancing at the clock again. Kiyoomi expects to hear his stomach grumbling with how hungry he’s acting.

“Yeah, thanks.”

Suna grunts in response and starts to put the keys away, dropping the few he had spread out on the counter back in the bucket.

Kiyoomi heads down the stairs. This wasn’t the conversation he was expecting to have. He didn’t think Atsumu would have left Kurami. Now he has a clock ticking in his head with the timer set for Sunday.

His worries calm down on the drive home but they don’t completely disappear. They’re dormant enough that Motoya doesn’t seem to notice anything off with him when they have dinner. He’s starting work again tomorrow with an older student he’s been working with for a while on his speech impediment.

“Think you’ll be able to occupy yourself Kiyo?” Motoya jokes.

Kiyoomi forces a laugh but he’d been wondering the same thing. Can he stand to sit and wait around until Sunday?

The radio crackles in his mind and he wants to hear it beside him. That feeling doesn’t go away the next morning.With a vague memory of what the store hours were, Kiyoomi heads back into town the next day. 

The bells jingle when he opens the door and Suna’s face falls when he gets up the stairs.

“Seriously?” He groans when he sees Kiyoomi. But there’s no malice, and the radio is crackling on the counter.

A grease-covered gear slips from Kiyoomi’s fingers, falling to the bike shop’s wooden floor and rolling in a small circle. It leaves a thin orange-brown trail before it clatters to its side with a small thunk.

Kiyoomi grimaces and feels Suna looking his way.

“If that’s too much for you I can demote you back to key tester,” he calls. He’s sitting on the floor with a special-looking wrench in his hand a few feet away building a bike from a shipment of new parts he got yesterday. 

“It’s not too much,” Kiyoomi says, waving his hands around. He spent all day yesterday and the day before matching miscellaneous keys with locked bike locks. Finding the right key felt like a true victory, but the feeling of success was buried under hours of failure in picking the wrong key.

When Kiyoomi showed up on Saturday after the emotional pep talk Suna gave him, Suna was not having it. “I’m not going to sit around and listen to you talk for an hour again. If you’re staying here you’re going to work,” he said after he processed why Kiyoomi showed up at the shop.

Kiyoomi is pretty sure Suna was the one who did most of the talking but he wasn’t going to point that out and risk getting turned away. He needed some company and he’s pretty sure Suna does too.

He sets the greasy part down, carefully pinching it in his fingers and flips his phone over to check his messages. Still nothing from Yachi. He opens their messages just in case but his text from yesterday is unread and unresponded to.

Kiyoomi: “I think I’m ready to have a real talk about working with some children’s book authors.”

He worded it carefully, just in case he changed his mind after learning more of the logistics, whatever those might be. He also needed to save face a little bit. He scrolls through their past texts. The more recent ones are package tracking numbers, photos of his things in her apartment and other thoughts prompted by his escape to Kurami. But further up is quick and easy plans to get coffee, photos of funny birds or pretty buildings. He misses her.

“When is Motoya getting back?” Suna asks. Kiyoomi looks for hidden meanings where there probably are none, hearing ‘ when are you going to leave me alone?’ Though he doesn’t really need to imagine those words given Suna asked him that exact question yesterday. Kiyoomi answered with a shrug and showed up again this morning.

“Wednesday,” he says after doing some math in his head.

Suna harumphs in response.

Motoya had to go back to Osaka to work with one of his students. He’d thought they could work on proper tongue placement and swallowing virtually but as with most things, speech pathology is difficult to replicate online.

“So tomorrow,” Kiyoomi adds. After that it’s just four days until Miya returns. Kiyoomi sighs as he bends down to pick up the bike part he dropped. He still doesn’t know what he’s going to say to Miya, or when he’ll even see him. Suna will be going to the docks to pick them up. They’ll probably all hug and laugh over whatever journey they had.

He tries to imagine what kind of face Miya might make when he sees Kiyoomi. The only expressions that comes to mind are the anger Miya had when he first got here, and the hurt on his face the last time he saw him. Kiyoomi isn’t sure which would be worse.

If Kiyoomi showed up he’d probably be some kind of emotional roadblock for the three of them having their reunion. He’d rather be rejected by Miya near his own house instead of some dock 40 minutes away.

Not that he’s sure Miya will reject his apology, but it’s easier to think of things that way. There’s also the itching voice in the back of his head whispering you shouldn’t have to apologize. Miya is the one who should apologize.

As he’s gotten older Kiyoomi has learned to pick and choose when he listens to that voice. At 19 he let it dictate his life. Forgiveness was never an option. He had a friend freshman year who used his paints without his permission, using up the last of a specially-made red he cherished. The voice said to cut them off and he did without hesitation.

“I know what day of the week it is,” Suna says like Kiyoomi asked Suna if he knows what a bike is.

“What?” Kiyoomi drops the bike part again. The grease just makes it so slippery.

“Nevermind.” Suna grumbles. He stands from the floor and lifts the bike frame he just built onto some kind of special rest and starts to screw on the wheels.

Being around Suna for three days in a row has been an interesting experience. He isn’t mean like he used to be, and he’s pretty quiet. If Kiyoomi shuts his eyes he feels like he’s in an art studio after hours working at the same time as a classmate he’s never spoken to before.

Today Suna has been crabbier. Maybe it’s because Kiyoomi has been spending so much time here. Suna hasn’t told him to leave or not come back but that doesn’t mean Kiyoomi’s presence is really wanted. Kiyoomi also wonders if it’s because it’s been over a week since Osamu left.

The radio crackles on the counter beside Kiyoomi. He’s gotten used to all the noises it makes. He knows how to make the audio more clear after watching Suna fiddle with it every few hours. Not that anything ever comes through aside from the few races that have been going on the past few days.

The first time Kiyoomi heard a voice coming through the speakers his heart lept out of his chest but Suna quickly corrected him. Not every call coming through the radio is some kind of emergency, he’d said with a pinched look, annoyed Kiyoomi had startled him over nothing.

Suna sets the complete bike on the floor, rolling it in line with four other shiny red bikes. One has a wicker basket on the handles. Another has a water bottle holder at its base.

“One more,” Suna says, dragging another large box of parts over to his work area. The cardboard slides smoothly against the hardwood floors.

Kiyoomi also has one more part to clean. Then he’s supposed to dust everything in the store according to the short to-do list Suna left out for him scribbled on the back of a yellow, faded receipt. 

“How come you’re the only one who works here? Why don’t they schedule other people?”

“Who’s they ?”

“The owners.”

Suna folds up the discarded cardboard and dumps it behind the counter. “I’m the owner.”

“Oh, what?” Kiyoomi asks on reflex, surprised. “That’s cool.” He owns his own store at 25? 26? Are they the same age?

“Chiyo-san, the twin’s grandmother left it to me.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t know what to say to that besides “whoa.”

“Well not left it,” Suna amends. “That makes it sound like she gave it to me when she died.”

“She didn’t?”

Suna shakes his head. She gave him the bike shop when he was 19, after one of her many suitors – as Suna calls them – left it to her. In that case he did die and Chiyo-san said she was stuck with a bike shop she didn’t want.

“That was the same summer Samu went long hauling for the first time and I was fixing up his bike.”

“So she…”

“Saw me with a bike in the driveway and decided I was the perfect candidate.” Suna laughs. “She made a lot of decisions like that. They always seemed to work out for her.”

Kiyoomi places the final cleaned bike part down on a towel to dry. He picks up the duster and face mask Suna left out for him and moves on to his next chore. “Sounds like you two were close,” he comments absentmindedly. The mask smells a little like dust.

“Mhm.”

They go back to their individual tasks but Kiyoomi is curious enough to break their unspoken agreement of silence now. “So you just started running a bike shop at 19?”

Suna grins. No. He watched one video on Youtube about how to run a business and felt pretty confident until he saw the next video the user uploaded was announcing how saddened they were over closing their failed business.

“That scared the shit outta me,” Suna says with the fond look of someone reminiscing. “I already had all these real estate vultures trying to get me to sell them the space. It wasn’t even Chiyo-san’s store but I didn't want to disappoint her.

So he changed majors during his second year of college from photography to business. He hated his new classmates but pushed through.

Kiyoomi shudders at the thought. “That must have been hard.”

“Yeah I guess. Probably good though. I shouldn’t have been trying to make a career out of my hobby.”

Maybe it’s the tone in Suna’s voice or the way he looks at Kiyoomi when he says it, but Kiyoomi gets a little annoyed. “Art isn’t just a hobby for me.”

Suna sets down a wrench and studies Kiyoomi. “I know,” he says honestly.

The radio crackles.

“I’ve got a darkroom in the back,” Suna says, maybe to ease the tension.

“You develop your own prints?”

He smiles. “Yeah. I got sick of the print shop in town fucking up my boarders and giving me glossy when I wanted matte.”

Kiyoomi laughs. He’s had his fair share of battles with print shops, though for him spending hours printing and adjusting test strips was more frustrating.

He looks up from the row of helmets he’s dusting and Suna is gone. He reappears from the back of the shop a few moments later holding a piece of paper. “Here.”

Kiyoomi sets the duster down on the floor and accepts the paper. It’s a photo of him and Miya on the boat. Miya is touching Kiyoomi’s forehead, holding the small fish he caught in his other hand.

“I didn’t hear you take this,” he whispers.

Suna is back on the other end of the store building the bike again. He keeps his head down and shrugs. “You were too busy having a conniption over Atsumu touching you like that.”

Kiyoomi laughs in a single exhale. He was, wasn’t he?

“What is he to you?” Suna asks. He says the question slowly like he’s struggling with it a little. Like he isn’t sure if he wants to know the answer or if he should be asking the question at all.

Kiyoomi’s heart skips a beat. He runs through different ways to avoid asking the question subconsciously before considering how he’d answer it for himself. What is Atsumu to him? A friend? A crush? Something more? He frowns and realizes his brain doesn’t want to think about what Atsumu might be for him when come Sunday he might need to be nothing to Kiyoomi.

But what is he to Kiyoomi now?

His portfolio pieces flash through his head. He spent all last night looking at them, in awe with how he made something he likes so much. The hide out. Treasure Island. The lighthouse. And the single blonde subject Kiyoomi couldn't compose the pieces without—despite how hard he tried.

“Atsumu is…the reason I can draw again,” Kiyoomi decides.

Suna’s looking up at him now. He smiles slightly and shrugs. “Okay.”

It’s some kind of approval. A spike of happiness goes through Kiyoomi. He didn’t realize he was looking for Suna’s approval.

Kiyoomi sets the print down on the table and watches it as he moves on to the display bike seats. He can’t believe how happy he looks in the photo. He also can’t believe how Miya is looking at him. It's an admiration so pure Kiyoomi thought he’d imagined it on the boat. But here’s photographic evidence of it.

The radio crackles and a voice comes through. “Pan pan. Pan pan pan pan pan-”

Kiyoomi’s heart swoops. It’s Atsumu’s voice. He didn’t realize how much he missed it until just now. Even when it’s coming through a crackly radio stream. He laughs. What’s he saying? Some kind of joke? “Is that Atsumu?” He asks to confirm.

A loud crash shakes the floorboard and Kiyoomi yelps. He looks over at Suna. The bike he was building is on the floor in pieces. Suna looks fear-stricken, but he’s not looking at Kiyoomi. His eyes are trained on the radio.

“What’s wrong?”

Suna’s head snaps toward Kiyoomi in a rigid turn, like he forgot Kiyoomi was here. “That’s a distress call,” he whispers.

Kiyoomi’s smile fades. “What?”

“It’s the second worst distress call there is, right before-”

“MAYDAY! MAYDAY! MAYDAY!” the radio crackles.

“No, left!” Suna shouts as Kiyoomi turns right onto some street he’s never been near before. Anything past the town center is completely outside his comfort zone of navigation. 

“You said ‘right,’” Kiyoomi hisses. He glances in his rearview mirror for anyone behind them. There isn’t. The brakes scream as he hits them and throws the car in reverse.

“Well I meant left.”

Kiyoomi is trying to remain calm. He knows Suna is freaking out right now, but so is he and he can’t get to the fucking marina if Suna doesn’t tell him the right directions. He floors a right turn onto a bumbly dirt road surrounded on both sides by rickety fences and expansive wild fields and grits his teeth. 

“Next turn isn’t for like ten minutes,” Suna mutters. He drops his head against the passenger window and curls his knees up onto the seat. 

“Explain it again,” Kiyoomi says. He can’t handle silence right now and this is the one thing Suna seems to be able to talk about.

“What?”

“Pan.”

“Pan pan,” Suna repeats in a monotone voice. “It’s a distress call people use on the water when they are in need of emergency help but they are fine. I mean, they’re not fine , just not about to die.”

Kiyoomi’s grip tightens on the wheel. “And the other one?”

Suna is silent for a moment. Kiyoomi hears a choked breath but keeps his eyes on the road. If they weren’t trapped together in a car right now Kiyoomi knows Suna wouldn’t want him to see him crying. And Kiyoomi frankly doesn’t want to see it either.

“Mayday means there’s imminent danger to someone’s life or the preservation of their vessel — mayday is a call for rescue…from dying”

Atsumu’s cry for help plays on repeat through Kiyoomi’s head. He sounded desperate. Suna had wasted no time after they heard it, shoving Kiyoomi out the door and demanding he drive them to the marina. The radio was forgotten on the counter, or possibly purposefully left there. Suna didn’t seem to want to be anywhere near it as soon as Atsumu’s voice started breaking through it.

Kiyoomi’s mind is racing, taking in everything it sees. The low gas sign blinking on his dashboard. The pinch in his seatbelt that he buckled incorrectly. The small strip of blue ocean peaking just above the treeline at the bottom of the hill they’re racing down. He desperately wants to get there right now and he desperately wants to run away and not be anywhere near the water. He stares at the blinking gas light again and tries to do the math on how long they can hold out until the car stops. 

“We were supposed to turn right there.”

“Suna!” Kiyoomi shouts, hitting the breaks and driving in reverse again. “I can’t get us there if you don’t give me the freaking directions.

“They might not even be there,” Suna whispers.

The car stutters. Kiyoomi hits the gas harder. He knows what Suna is implying. He refuses to believe it. They were on a pleasure boat. People don’t die from something like that. People die from old age or car crashes. Not at 25 on a sailboat. Osamu wouldn’t let it happen.

“Even if they aren’t at this marina, people there will still know more than we do.” He’s not even sure if that’s true, but he has to believe it.

Suna doesn’t move from how he’s curling in the seat, head against the window still and smacking at the glass every time they hit a bump in the road.

“Left,” he whispers, this time a solid five seconds before the turn needs to be made.

Kiyoomi whips the wheel to the side. A brief warning is better than a late one. He’ll take it.

The rest of the drive is jolted turns down empty roads. Kiyoomi is beginning to worry they've gone the wrong way but the trees start to thin and boats come into view. The last stretch is down a residential street with houses on the water. The speed limit is 15 kph and Kiyoomi wants to be going 130, but he keeps his foot off the gas and tries to breathe calmly.

The final turn is into a parking lot full of people gathered in a circle. Suna gets out of the car while Kiyoomi is still driving the car into the only empty space in the lot walled on either side with boat trailers. Suna runs into the crowd and Kiyoomi does what’s probably the worst parking job in his life and runs after him.

Adrenaline rushes through Kiyoomi, pummeling his heart, demanding heaving breaths of air. His eyes search desperately for Atsumu in the crowd. Suna breaks through the ring of people who are all standing around a bearded man with a radio.

The man is in his fifties wearing a green knit beanie, large black waterproof overalls and a gray t-shirt with some kind of fish logo on it. He takes one look at Suna and passes the radio off to the guy behind him. “You’re Osamu’s boyfriend, right?”

Suna nods. He isn’t searching the crowd for Osamu. His eyes are trained on the guy and his fists are clenched, knuckles nearly white.

“Is he-”

“Come on, we’ll take you to where they’ve got him.” The man raises his hand and three other men step out of the crowd, leading Suna and Kiyoomi toward a motor boat docked by the pier.

“Did you drive here?”

Kiyoomi looks up, nodding to no one in particular. A man in yellow plastic overalls holds his hand out. “Here I’ll meet you guys there, if you’d like.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t even give it a second thought, handing over his keys to the stranger. “Gas is almost empty,” he manages to remember.

“I’ll fill it up, no problem.”

They climb onto the boat that’s about half the size of the one Osamu captained when they went fishing. No one says anything about life vests or makes any kind of conversation. They just go. It occurs to Kiyoomi somewhat belatedly that he could ask them what they know. Are the twins okay? Where are they going? But the fear of bad news is keeping his lips clamped shut. He can’t even open his mouth for a deep breath he so desperately needs. He sits and hyperventilates through his nose.

The water is rough. Each time the boat comes over a wave it smacks back down loud against the surface. Kiyoomi is soaked, sitting in the direct line of splashing but he makes no effort to move.

“20 knots,” a guy in a bright orange shirt announces over the wind. The beanie guy captaining the boat nods solemnly. Kiyoomi has no idea what they’ve talking about and he really doesn’t want to.

“Object on starboard side,” the only man wearing a life vest announces, pointing to the right and leaving his arm pointed as the captain navigates around it. Kiyoomi looks over the side as they pass around the object.

It’s a large, white shape three times the size of the motorboat. There’s some exposed wood like something was ripped away. Rope floats around it beside a large tarp-like cloth.

“Oh god,” Suna cries.

It’s then that Kiyoomi realizes it’s a sail boat turned over and sinking in the water. Violent waves rip around it. Kiyoomi can’t imagine being in the water like that. He leans over the side of the boat and throws up, the unease of everything has finally gotten to him.

One of the guys hands him a bottle of water and a towel that smells like motor oil. Kiyoomi accepts them both and cleans himself up.

They’re okay. They are going to be okay.

“Up there!” The captain shouts, pointing to the approaching dock. It’s smaller than the one he and Suna drove to but even 20 yards out Kiyoomi can see it’s much more crowded. Probably four times the amount of people all blending together in one mob.

The captain holds the radio up to his ear as they dock. The two other men grab and throw some rope around to secure the boat. Suna leaps over the side and starts running down the pier. Kiyoomi exits with less grace, struggling to get over the boat’s side while finding his footing. He chases after Suna and the crowd comes into view.

There are two ambulances, a fire truck and multiple police cars on the grass past a small parking lot. They all have their lights flashing at different intervals. The uniformed people are mixed in with all those gawking to see what is going on here. There’s a helicopter on the small hill to the right. Its propellers are still circling slowly like it’s cooling down.

Kiyoomi’s sneakers are wet, squawking as he chases after Suna through the crowd. The people are all talking over one another. Different news crews are setting up, stringing their wires across the ground. The police start flicking their sirens on and off. Someone is shouting something into a megaphone. Kiyoomi pushes further into the crowd. He doesn’t care who he bumps into. People grunt in annoyance. Suna is crying.

The first thing that cuts through all the noise is Atsumu’s voice.

“Samu I swear to god m’ gonna kill those guys. No actually first I’ll sue em’ and then I’ll kill them.”

Kiyoomi pushes through the final ring of onlookers, already disrupted in Suna’s wake and breaks into the open space the strangers are encircling

Atsumu and Osamu are in the center being tended to in some makeshift tent by a few EMTs. They’re wrapped in weird shiny blankets and huddled close together. Both their hair is whipped around and plastered to their heads, still wet. There are two piles of wet clothes at their feet and they’re both in oversized gray sweats that still hold the folds they were packed away in creasing up and down the sleeves.

Atsumu has lost all his shining, golden complexion. His skin looks blue. His lips are purple. Osamu looks the same.

The sight of it all makes Kiyoomi freeze, but Suna keeps racing forward. He tackles Osamu in a hug before the twins notice him approaching. Before Osamu can hug him back he moves to hug Atsumu. Then he wraps his arms back around Osamu.

The twins are smiling. Suna is crying still. Osamu tries to move the thermal blanket to hug Suna back but he and the EMT force Osamu to keep it on.

The reunion is just how Kiyoomi had pictured it in his head earlier today, minus the crisis. Suna greeting them with hugs and receiving wide smiles. Kiyoomi standing a measured distance away, scared that if or when Atsumu sees him, his smile will be replaced with a frown.

He takes a step back toward the crowd, not wanting that to happen.

His movement triggers Atsumu’s eyes toward him. His smile fades, but it isn’t replaced with a frown. Instead his lip trembles. His eyebrows purse with a question. “Omi?”

He’s not mad? Kiyoomi doesn't let him say anything else. He runs toward Atsumu and wraps him in a hug. He feels how weak Atsumu is right now and lightens his grip. “Atsumu.”

“Yer still here?” Atsumu asks, still surprised to see Kiyoomi.

Kiyoomi nods and separates himself from Atsumu. “Still here.”

He holds Atsumu for a long time. Long enough that he feels the chill Atsumu is carrying leech onto his own skin and hopes he’s somehow transferring some warmth over to Atsumu. His arms feel stiff around Atsumu, like he’s never hugged someone before and is just now learning how. He hates this feeling, this awkward unpracticed motion that they had down just last week. He pulls away wondering if maybe Atsumu has the same thoughts and Kiyoomi is the one prolonging an unwanted experience.

Atsumu looks at Kiyoomi, then at Osamu who nods in response.

“I’m so sorry,” Atsumu says, dropping his head.

“What? Don’t-”

“No,” Atsumu says, cutting Kiyoomi off from blocking the apology. “You were dealing with so much shit and I got upset because, what? You wanted to protect yourself? That was so shitty of me. I’m so sorry.”

Kiyoomi seldom receives apologies from people so he shifts in discomfort as he lets Atsumu finish his, fighting the urge to tell him to shut up and not to worry about something so inconsequential to him now, when he looks the way he does surrounded by paramedics.

It’s okay, is sitting on his tongue, but it feels too small to say. How can two short words accurately bear the weight of the feelings he’s carrying right now?

“I’m sorry,” Kiyoomi says instead. “I wish I knew why I don’t remember you. But I’m glad I-” he starts to choke up. He’s been thinking of what he was going to say since Atsumu said he wanted space, but it doesn’t feel right now. His rehearsed words feel stale. Atsumu’s skin is blue. He’s shivering as he listens to Kiyoomi, teeth chattering through a smile. “You almost died,” he gasps.

He glances up around the space. The police are waiting at the edge of the crowd, Kiyoomi isn’t sure why. The EMTs have moved to the side to give them some room. All these people are here because Atsumu and Osamu were almost lost at sea. 

“It would take a lot more than that to kill me, Omi,” he says with a forced laugh but there’s real fear in Atsumu’s eyes. He clenches them shut and bows his head again. “I’m so sorry Omi. Samu, Rin,” he pleads. “I- I wanted to be the one to leave this time. It was stupid and childish n’ it’s my fault Samu got hurt and you guys got so scared.

“Shut up Tsumu,” Osamu says sternly. “This wasn’t yer fault.”

“But I let out the mainsail when I fell.”

“On a boat that wasn’t properly inspected,” Osamu bellows so loud Atsumu shuts up and the EMTs jump, startled. “God m’ gonna kill those guys.” Osamu pulls Suna close with the mobility the blanket allows. of him. “They swore the boat was in good shape. A rusted keel doesn’t mean it’s in good shape.”

There’s a lot of jargon being thrown around between curses and grumbles as Osamu explains to Suna – and Kiyoomi by proximity – what happened.

“Tsumu wanted a break,” Osamu starts. He winces a little like he kind of regrets saying that and hurries to his next point. “Those guys from the dock I told you about – the ones who always offer me a beer at the end of the month – they were packin’ up for a sailing trip and said they needed one more. I asked if it could be two and they shrugged and said sure.”

They were going to the observation deck named the Enoshima Sea Candle, and afterwards the Oshima volcano. The two names spark like small beacons among the newer details that Suna didn’t include in his initial explanation to Kiyoomi. Osamu says they made it to the observation deck and things were going smoothly. But when they started sailing toward Oshima they decided to stop at a mooring buoy to have drinks with a friend who runs a service station on the water.

“Fuckin mooring buoys,” Osamu curses. “I never trust them. Never!”

“It wasn’t the mooring buoy’s fault,” Atsumu argues.

“The chain breaking and setting us adrift is the reason we capsized Tsumu.”

Atsumu’s jaw grows hard and he shakes his head ‘no’ but Osamu ignores him, turning back to Suna. “Tsumu and I had decided to stay on board while they were gettin drinks. Mostly cause I didn’t feel like being the weird stranger they have to clue into their inside jokes with their friend, but also cause I don’t fuckin trust mooring buoys.”

“But then they were gone so long,” Atsumu interjects.

“They were gone so long so we got a little bored and played a hand of cards below deck. Then the line snapped and we didn’t realize for almost 45 minutes. By then we were too far from anyone for immediate help-

“And it was windy.”

“Over 20 knotts,” Osamu nods.

The crowd of onlookers have started to disperse. The EMTs are standing awkwardly a few feet away, rocking back and forth and glancing toward them every so often like they need to do their jobs but they don’t want to interrupt the reunion their patients are having.

“But that would have been fine if I hadn’t let out the mainsail all the way,” Atsumu says, his frown growing deeper.

“Tsumu it wasn’t yer fault,” Osamu says for the nth time, genuinely each time.

Suna waits patiently for them to explain. The cold look his eyes usually take on is entirely washed away when he’s with Osamu and Atsumu and uninterested in Kiyoomi.

Osamu explains the next part with terms Kiyoomi can only loosely piece together. When a sailboat is traveling, the sails will catch air and sometimes send the boat veering almost on its side. That’s when the boom, a type of mast from what Kiyoomi can tell, jumps to one side and the sails need to be reconfigured to re-balance the boat.

When they were set adrift the mainsail was only partly let out given how high the winds were. But at the climax of the accident the side Atsumu was sitting on was so angled down he was about to fall out of the boat into the water the sailboat was taking on. Osamu was trying to steer the boat that needed at least three other people on it to successfully sail and couldn’t leave the wheel to save Atsumu from falling overboard.

Out of desperation, Atsumu grabbed without thinking and his hands latched onto the mainsail’s rope, un-pleating it when he yanked on it to pull himself up.

“Then it caught wind and became fully…unraveled giving us way more speed than they could handle, and the boat capsized,” Atsumu says.

“The boat capsized cause we hit a rock and the fuckin keel fell off.”

“We hit the rock that hard because I let the sail out.”

“The keel still shouldn’t fall off! If it hadn’t been rusted we would have flipped over in the water but the keel would have brought us right back up. That’s its job Tsumu.”

“But-”

“I’m sorry,” an EMT interrupts. She has thick curly red hair tied in a ponytail with a scrunchy and a large snake tattoo encircling her right forearm. “But I need you both to stop shouting. Conserve your energy. Stop dropping your blankets and let us come and take your vitals again.”

Atsumu and Osamu immediately shut up, nodding in agreement and giving quiet apologies to her.

Suna takes a step back to let the EMTs do their jobs, still within arms reach of Osamu.

Kiyoomi looks around. All the onlookers are gone save for a curious handful. The police and fire trucks are pulling away. A member of the Coast Guard is waiting diligently. Everyone who is remaining here has some kind of purpose. He feels whispers of an urge to leave and let them be. He takes a tentative half-step back at the thought.

“Don’t.” Atsumu says. There’s an EMT reading his pulse but he doesn’t seem to care about them hearing. “Don’t go.”

Kiyoomi’s eyes widen. “I won’t,” he promises.

A small smile finally forms on Atsumu’s face.

Then he passes out.

Atsumu doesn’t fully come to until the next morning, finally back to his warm complexion in his bed. His room is just the way he left it except for the whiteboard which Suna wordlessly wheeled out when they got back yesterday.

Kiyoomi slept on the couch last night and was in and out of sleep until 7:00 this morning when he woke up and went to watch over Atsumu. It’s been two hours since then and Atsumu is finally waking up, slowly blinking at Kiyoomi.

“Hi,” he whispers, slightly frowning.

“Hey, how are you?”

Atsumu smiles weakly. “Good. But um, who are you?”

Kiyoomi’s heart jumps with fear, but only for a second. Then it’s followed by an eye roll. “Shut up,” he grumbles through a relieved sigh.

Atsumu cracks a tired grin. “Can ya blame me? How often does a guy get to play the amnesia prank?”

Kiyoomi takes a step toward the door. “I’m leaving,” he teases.

“Nooo, don’t. Stay he- whoa,” Atsumu huffs as soon as he tries to sit up and takes a huge breath.

“Hey don’t push yourself,” Kiyoomi says, hurrying to his side and helping him lay back down. “The paramedics said it might take a few days for you to get your strength back.”

“When?”

As he does a poor job of tucking Atsumu back into bed, Kiyoomi gives him the highlights of what happened. They decided not to have the twins transported to the hospital because it’s three hours away. Suna and Kiyoomi said they could take care of Atsumu and Osamu in replacement of any long hospital trip.

That was an adrenaline-fueled promise that faded to an aspiration and finally a lie when Suna and Kiyoomi struggled to get Atsumu safely out of the car and to the second floor of the house while Osamu staggered behind them.

Had they been in Tokyo the paramedics would have never let two people who nearly drowned just go straight home in the care of amateurs. But this is Karumi, a small town where Osamu knew one of the paramedics and Suna had sold a bike for half price to the other one.

They drove home in Motoya’s car that miraculously was not stolen by the stranger and was indeed filled up with a full tank of gas.

“Ya gave some stranger the keys to Toya’s car?” Atsumu laughs. “You must have been really worried.”

“I was,” Kiyoomi says plainly. He doesn’t laugh or smile or do anything else to cloak how real his fears were yesterday. “It was terrifying.”

Atsumu keeps leaning into his defensive humor, avoiding eye contact and forcing a laugh. “So you’re gonna take care of me?”

Kiyoomi nods.

“No offense Omi but that doesn’t seem like one of yer strong suits.”

“Well I’ll practice on you,” Kiyoomi says while he tries to fluff Atsumu’s pillow. It just ends up more lumpy and mashed in than before.

“So I’m the guinea pig?”

“Do you want me to leave?”

“No,” Atsumu says the second Kiyoomi gets his question out. “Stay here.”

Kiyoomi nods and returns his attention to pillow fluffing.

The only other time he has taken care of someone was Yachi in college. Most of those instances they were both drunk or hungover or had caught whatever sickness was floating around that week on campus. In all those cases it was like two cats teaching each other how to bark. Then there was the time Yachi got her wisdom teeth taken out.

Kiyoomi was in charge of driving her home and he bought enough ice cream to fill the freezer but that was about all he could really do for her. They sat side by side with tubs of ice cream surrounding them in front of a TV cycling through reality game shows while Yachi’s anesthesia wore off.

She wasn’t physically weak the way Atsumu is now: winded from sitting up.

Kiyoomi stops fussing with the bedding and goes to heat up the soup he prepared last night after almost every google search on how to take care of a sick person included making them soup.

The soup in question is made with chicken broth from Osamu’s pantry, carrots from Osamu’s freezer and crab meat from the refrigerator. It’s disgusting but hopefully somewhat nutritional.

On his way back to the bedroom he grabs a bag of crackers from a cupboard labeled “Atsumu’s snacks keep out,” written on a tattered blue post it note.

He spends the rest of the day at Atsumu’s bedside watching Jurassic Park and subsequent franchise movies. Somewhere around the fourth or fifth movie Atsumu starts to nod off. He should have slept this afternoon but he insisted on staying up with Kiyoomi.

Kiyoomi shuts the laptop right before a dinosaur jumps out of the water, and starts to sneak out so he doesn’t wake up Atsumu.

“Yer leavin?” Atsumu asks.

Kiyoomi glaces over his shoulder and nods, pointing outside at the setting sun.

“You should sleep.”

“I- …okay,” Atsumu says. Conflict still stirs on his face but he doesn’t argue

“I’ll be back tomorrow morning.”

“Okay.”

Kiyoomi nods to reinforce the fact that he will be here tomorrow and slips out of the room, shutting the door gently behind him.

He thought about staying here on the couch again but it feels weird. Like he shouldn’t invite himself to do that.

As he walks toward the stairs he catches a glimpse of Suna and Osamu in the room down the hall from Atsumu. Suna looks like he’s fast asleep on the bed, his head resting on Osamu’s chest. Osamu is petting Suna’s hair. His eyes find Kiyoomi’s and he smiles, sending him a silent nod— the upturned kind someone sends as a hello to a person they’re familiar with.

Kiyoomi mimics the gesture and creeps down the stairs. It feels late like midnight but it’s probably closer to 8 or 9.

The next day is similar but not the same. Kiyoomi is there when Atsumu wakes up but Atsumu doesn't try any amnesia jokes. There’s more crab soup but it’s eaten while they watch a series of Ghibli movies. Kiyoomi is still sitting in the kitchen chair he brought upstairs and placed beside Atsumu’s bed, but today he’s leaning forward, placing his elbows on the free space of the mattress beside Atsumu.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?” Kiyoomi asks the question carefully. Atsumu has steered clear of any conversation having to do with the boat for the past two days.

“There’s nothing to talk about. I’m fine Omi,” Atsumu lies through a bright smile. But Kiyoomi doesn’t press.

Today Atsumu has enough strength to sit up and walk short spurts on his own. He also has enough strength to take Kiyoomi’s hand and hold it gently. But that’s a different kind of strength. 

In this aspect he’s stronger than Kiyoomi. He focuses on Atsumu’s hand when he asks “do you want to talk about this?”

“Talk about us?” Atsumu asks.

“Do you want to talk about us?” Kiyoomi confirms.

Atsumu squeezes his hand and smiles, looking toward the laptop viewing of The Secret World of Arrietty. They should plug the laptop in soon.

“Let's wait a bit.”

“Okay,” Kiyoomi says, squeezing Atsumu’s hand back.

They don’t talk about it but that doesn’t stop Kiyoomi from drawing light circles on Atsumu’s hand with his thumb.

They don’t talk about it but that doesn’t stop Kiyoomi from getting out of the kitchen chair to sit in the bed next to Atsumu.

It doesn’t stop him from putting his arm around Atsumu.

It doesn’t stop Atsumu from falling asleep against his shoulder.

They don’t talk about it.

So that’s probably why Kiyoomi ends up leaving again that night. Atsumu looks like he wants to say something more than the soft “goodnight” he bids Kiyoomi. And Kiyoomi has more to say than the “goodnight” he extends back.

On the third morning Atsumu is already awake and in the kitchen when Kiyoomi gets there. 

“Sorry Omi-kun I’m finally feeling good enough to know this tastes like crap,” Atsumu jokes as he pours the remaining soup down the garbage disposal. He’s shirtless with baggy black sweatpants on. The old kind that’s covered in fabric pills after years of being improperly washed. His shoulders are drooping a little like he’s not quite ready to be up and about, but he wants to be anyways.

“Do you want me to make you something else? Or I could go get the breakfast sandwich you like from the train car diner.”

“No, I’ll make us some eggs. You’ve done enough, really. Sit down,” Atsumu points to the mismatched barstools by the counter with a spatula while he lights the gas stove with a long match stick.

“Atsumu you-”

“I’m fine, Omi. Really.” His smile is still forced and he won’t meet Kiyoomi’s eyes, so he looks down at the match instead. It took Kiyoomi a solid hour to figure out how to get the stove to turn on when he made the soup. A lot of fruitless googling was involved before Suna found him and told him it’s broken.

“Where are Suna and your brother?” He doesn’t sit down yet. He’s not convinced Atsumu doesn’t need him.

“They fucked off to Rin’s house.”

“Suna has his own place?”

Atsumu laughs. It sounds tired, like he’s choosing to laugh instead of taking a deep breath.

“I know right? Ya never would’ve guessed with how much time he spends here.”

Kiyoomi walks up to him slowly. “Why don’t they get a place together?” He steps forward until his chest is against Atsumu’s back, giving him something to lean against if he needs to. Atsumu leans against him immediately and drops his head back on Kiyoomi’s shoulders craning his neck to look at Kiyoomi. “Because then I’d be alone,” he whispers.

“You’re not alone now,” Kiyoomi says, trying his best to stay still so Atsumu can rest against him.

“No m’ not,” Atsumu agrees. His eyelids flutter open and shut.

“Come on, you should rest.”

Kiyoomi leads to the couch and props some pillows around him. He drapes a small red knit blanket that looks like someone’s abandoned project.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, running up the stairs to Atsumu’s room and opening up the closet. It’s full of five white button downs, an ironing board, and a small assortment of blue and black slacks. There’s also a shelf stuffed with athletic shorts and one pair of brown leather dress shoes, shined and seemingly untouched.

He stares at the curious wardrobe for another indulgent second before snagging a shirt and a blanket from the bed, bringing it back down to Atsumu who is still right where he left him.

“In case you’re cold,” Kiyoomi says when he presents what he brought.

Atsumu accepts the shirt and the blanket, sitting up to put the shirt on.

Kiyoomi tries not to pry in other people’s personal lives but he can’t help but ask “what’s the deal with the button downs?”

“I don’t know Omi, what is the deal with button downs, ” Atsumu parrots at him like he’s channeling the likeness of every 80s American sitcom.

Kiyoomi waits for a moment for Atsumu to finish buttoning his shirt, not responding to his effort to divert from the subject.

Atsumu stops halfway up his shirt and collapses back against the couch. “They’re the only clothes I have.”

“Why?” Kiyoomi pushes.

Atsumu looks at the shirt and fiddles with the cuff buttons. “Before I started law school all my clothes were from high school. I never wanted to buy new clothes.” He pauses and sighs. “Because law school costs were always at the top of my mind. I didn’t really spend money on anything except bills and textbooks, and of course peach tea when I could find some,” he says with a small laugh. “I made myself this promise that if I got into Tokyo U I’d buy nice clothes just for law school.”

Kiyoomi listens intently. He may have problems with his family but tuition was never one of them.

“And your old clothes?”

“Too worn n’ old to wear. They were basically all in a worse state than these ratty sweats,” Atsumu laughs.

“They do have a hole in the butt,” Kiyoomi jokes.

“Do ya like my strawberry print boxers?”

Kiyoomi laughs and nods. “The clothes you have are really nice though.” He said it because it’s true but also to get Atsumu to smile.

Instead, he frowns a little. “Yeah they are. Too bad they’re getting wasted here.”

It’s like Atsumu is pulling the cover sheet back on the page that describes his adult life. The piece of paper that answers all of Kiyoomi’s questions is just out of reach. What happened with law school? He wants to ask but he bites his tongue and waits for Atsumu to give the information.

He doesn’t.

“Let’s watch the Pirates of the Caribbean movies today.” The smile is back on his face. The one he uses when he’s hiding his feelings.

“Breakfast first?”

“Yeah okay.”

With that the return to the routine they’ve fallen into. Around 9 p.m. Kiyoomi walks Atsumu upstairs, helping hold the blanket he brought down. He sets it on the bed and walks back toward the doorway.

“Will you stay?” Atsumu finally asks.

“Yeah. Yeah of course,” Kiyoomi says earnestly.

Atsumu smiles and rummages around in his shorts bin, pulling out the sweats he lent to Kiyoomi on Treasure Island.

Kiyoomi accepts them and they turn away from each other to change. It’s quiet. He only hears the soft shuffling of fabric and the occasional floorboard creaking. Small bubbles of excitement pop in his stomach.

He turns to find Atsumu looking away, once again shirtless and in sweats.

“Do you have a shirt I could borrow?”

Atsumu’s eyebrows shoot up and his eyes jump away from where he had started to stare at Kiyoomi. “OH! Yeah I’ll go steal one from Samu.” He hurries down the hall and comes back fisting a plain red t-shirt. “Do you want me to… I could go get one to wear if you-”

“It’s fine,” Kiyoomi says. More bubbles are popping.

“Okay,” Atsumu rushes out, hurrying to the bed. “Then we can- oh. Did you want the couch? Or Samu’s bed? Or maybe I could-”

“It’s fine,” Kiyoomi repeats, stepping toward the bed. The bubbles have spread across his body. This isn’t the first time they’ve been together like this, but it feels like they reset after the fight they had. Now everything feels new. Tingly.

He flicks off the dim lamp and gets under the covers. The mattress dips when Atsumu crawls beside him. Atsumu lays down facing away from him. Maybe to give Kiyoomi privacy? He doesn't really want privacy.

Kiyoomi gets closer, coming up against Atsumu to hold him. “Is this okay?” He whispers despite there being no one else in the house.

“Huh?” Atsumu whispers back. His voice is full of nerves. He turns in Kiyoomi’s arms a little, twisting his head and coming millimeters from Kiyoomi’s lips.

“I asked, uh, if this was okay,” Kiyoomi says. His lips brush against Atsumu’s when he asks the question. His hips are pressed against Atsumu’s ass. He feels himself growing hard, embarrassingly fast. “If it’s not I can-”

Atsumu surges forward, kissing him so intensely they gasp for air before desperately coming back together again. Atsumu tries to twist to fully face Kiyoomi but Kiyoomi has a tight grip on his hip as he grinds against him.

“Let me under ya,” Atsumu gasps.

They throw the blankets off and shuffle around until Kiyoomi is pressing Atsumu into the mattress.

Their sweatpants do nothing to constrain how hard they are. Kiyoomi moans as their dicks catch against each other with each desperate thrust. “Atsumu,” he gasps. “You- you’re so-”

“Omi,” Atsumu moans. “You don’t get how badly I’ve- Fuck mmmfuck you’re so hard.”

He shifts away from Atsumu’s lips and latches onto his neck, sucking and biting hard, fueled by Atsumu’s cries of pleasure and the way he writhes underneath Kiyoomi. Atsumu grabs the back of Kiyoomi’s head and pulls him down so he can find purchase in Kiyoomi’s neck, sucking and biting in just the right way that has Kiyoomi fucking harder against him.

Kiyoomi rips his t-shirt off and pulls both their sweatpants down until they’re just in their briefs. He rolls Atsumu on his stomach, thrusting him into the mattress practically coming at how his dick gets caught on the cleft of Atsumu’s ass.

“Are you gonna actually fuck me or are you just gonna hump me into the bed?”

Kiyoomi laughs. It’s a little crazed as he gets high off all the feelings surging through him. “Shut up,” he says between kisses to the nape of Atsumu’s neck.

“M’ not complaining.” Atsumu laughs through drawn out gasps. He wiggles his hips, arching to keep Kiyoomi’s dick from shifting away as he humps him. “I already came,” he moans.

That does it for Kiyoomi. He reaches under Atsumu and holds his softening dick through his wet boxers. “God baby,” he whimpers, unable to control himself at the state Atsumu is in. He’s so out of his element he feels like a different person.

“I’ll get hard again,” Atsumu moans when Kiyoomi squeezes his spent dick a little.

“Atsumu,” he gasps.

“Fuck me Omi, please you have no idea.” Atsumu starts to babble uncontrollably, shifting his hips back against Kiyoomi. “I’ve wanted this for so long. Fuck me. Cum in me. Wreck me.”

This is so different from the soft kisses in the tent, or the drunk stumbley hand jobs. This is desire. This is longing. This is pleasure Kiyoomi has never known.

He can’t stop thrusting against Atsumu.

“It’ll feel so much better inside me,” Atsumu begs with a gasp.

He’s right. Kiyoomi needs to hold out. He slows his hips and rips their last remaining clothes away, turning Atsumu on his back

“Bedside table,” Atsumu mutters, chest rising and falling with heavy breaths.

Kiyoomi doesn’t even need to ask, rummaging through the drawer and snatching up the small bottle and using it to open Atsumu up.

Atsumu coaches him through it, telling him where to angle his fingers and when to add another one. His dick starts to get hard again and Kiyoomi’s dick is red and weeping for friction. His hips thrust forward on instinct, begging to fuck into Atsumu despite the space between them while he opens him up.

“Let me turn over,” Atsumu says.

Kiyoomi complies, but he’s a little confused. He wants to see the faces Atsumu makes. He wants to kiss him and feel the way he gasps for air.

“It’s gonna hit good like this,” Atsumu says, his pupils blown.

And fuck, Kiyoomi is absolutely enamoured by Atsumu, complying with what he wants. Once Atsumu is laying face down on the mattress Kiyoomi starts to press into him.

They both gasp. Kiyoomi sucks in air like he’s never breathed before. Atsumu cries but pushes his hips up and back.

Kiyoomi holds him still. “Give me a second,” he says. But Atsumu is a bastard and thrusts back a little bit more.

“Miya I’m going to cum if you don’t stop.

“Oh? Am I back to Miy-ah ah ah!” Atsumu cries as Kiyoomi thrusts into him.

They’re deep, forceful thrusts. Kiyoomi gets spurred on by the loud clap of their bodies coming together and the way Atsumu cries his name

When he feels he’s on the brink he starts to jackrabbit into Atsumu. “I’m coming,” he cries. “I’m coming.”

He chases the bliss and grips onto it tight, not wanting the feeling to escape him as he cums and moans with his lips beside Atsumu’s ear. Atsumu is limp against the bed, moaning softly as Kiyoomi thrusts with his soft dick until it slips out. Then he whines at the loss and Kiyoomi wishes he could put it back in.

Kiyoomi feels like he could melt to nothing right now and be happy about it. There’s a soft calm feeling filling his nerves. He kisses Atsumu’s shoulders and rolls him over gently.

Atsumu has a soft smile on his face. He kisses Kiyoomi with familiarity. The space around them is just pleasant sighs, small bouts of giggles, and warmth.

But then a tear falls from Atsumu’s cheek.

Kiyoomi is immediately alert. “Atsumu? Are you-”

“I’m fine,” Atsumu claims as another tear falls. “I’m just- so happy. But also- ah this is so embarrassing I can’t believe m’ crying. I can’t stop thinking about the boat Omi. I was so scared.” He wipes his eyes but the silent tears don’t stop. “I thought I might- out there, on the water…”

All the emotions Atsumu has been ignoring and trying to lock away suddenly come tumbling out, even as he desperately works to shove them back inside. Kiyoomi pulls him into a tight hug, petting his hair gently. “I know,” he whispers, not wanting Atsumu to have to say it. “You’re safe now. I’ll keep you safe.”

Atsumu nods, his chin bumping against Kiyoomi’s shoulder.

There are more whispered reassurances. More kisses and gentle touches until eventually their laughter returns. After a while they’re too exhausted to make sound and their faces hurt from smiling.

“I love you,” Kiyoomi says, too tired to be afraid. “I think I did back then. And I know I do now.”

Atsumu kisses his shoulder with a sappy look in his eyes, and maybe he’s a little dumbfounded that Kiyoomi just said the words he’s been wanting to hear for the past 10 years.

“I love you too, more than I think I could ever be able to explain,” Atsumu whispers because that’s the only volume he seems to be able to speak at right now. “I’m so glad you decided to come back here.”

Atsumu falls asleep beside Kiyoomi with a smile on his face. Kiyoomi lags behind him, slowly shutting his eyes. There’s one small thing keeping him awake.

He didn’t just decide to come back there. There was a reason, one that he still hasn’t explained to Atsumu.

But it’s fine. It’s not that big of a deal and he can explain it as such.

It would be bad not to tell him, right?

Kiyoomi would want to know if Atsumu just got out of an engagement.

“Is it too soon to pull the amnesia-bit again?” Atsumu jokes after waking Kiyoomi up by petting his curls and kissing his cheek.

“The night after I tell you I love you? Yeah I’d say it’s a little too soon,” Kiyoomi teases with a little snark.

Atsumu feigns inconvenience and drops back against his pillow. “Yer putting my jokes on a time out?”

“Not all jokes, just that one.”

“That's the best one though!”

“I beg to differ.”

“You can beg but m’ still not gonna agree.”

Kiyoomi shakes his head with a toothy smile. “You’re the worst.” I love you.

“Right back at ya,” Atsumu winks. I love you too.

They stumble out of bed and around the room looking for the clothes they flung about last night. Kiyoomi finds his shirt under the bed frame and his pants tied up with the blanket they discarded and slightly regretted discarding in the slight chill of last night.

“Are you feeling okay today?” Kiyoomi asks when he remembers he’s supposed to be making sure Atsumu is resting and not fucking him to peak exhaustion. He really is unqualified for being in charge of someone’s health.

“M’ tired but in a good way,” Atsumu reassures Kiyoomi. “I think I’ll be back to normal by tomorrow. I might sleep a little more this morning.”

Kiyoomi nods and steps close to kiss Atsumu. It’s so familiar his heart warms. “I might go home for a bit to see Toya. He was supposed to get back this morning I think.” Or maybe it was yesterday?

“Perfect.”

“Want to come over after? I’m sure he would want to see you.”

“I know he’d want to see me,” Atsumu teases, picking up the attitude he had when Kiyoomi first got here. “And yes that sounds perfect.”

“Two whole perfects?” Kiyoomi teases.

“That’s just how perfect things are.” He grabs Kiyoomi’s butt and drops back against the bed. “Now go away, m’ trying to sleep. Some caregiver you are.”

“Yeah yeah,” Kiyoomi chides.

“Oh, and Omi?”

“Yeah?”

Atsumu’s eyes take on a mischievous glint. “When I feel better it’s gonna be me fuckin you into the mattress.”

Kiyoomi laughs, his smile genuine when he says “perfect.”

He feels like he’s walking on air as he makes the short trip from Atsumu’s house back to his, despite the fact that the ankles of his sweatpants are dragging against the pavement and he absolutely needs to shower.

He sees Motoya in the kitchen rushing around and laughs. Even when it’s just the two of them he needs to be the perfect homemaker. Or maybe he’s chasing that mouse he’s claimed as his enemy. Kiyoomi hopes it’s the former and that he’s making pancakes.

He opens the door to the kitchen and doesn’t think it’s possible to smile any wider than he already is, but it smells like pancakes.

“K-Kiyo!” Motoya shout-whispers, a little startled. “How was your run?”

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes at the endless endeavor his cousin has with teasing him.

“I wasn’t on a run, I was at-”

“Your brother is here,” Motoya says in a hushed tone, cutting him off

“Huh?” 

A cold voice that unearths years of trauma comes from the living room. “Hey Kiyo.”

The nickname Motoya lovingly refers to Kiyoomi with feels ruined when it comes from Kousei’s voice.

Kousei steps into the kitchen, staring straight at Kiyoomi to take in the effect he has on his younger brother. His straight hair is cropped short. His jar is square and a little more pronounced since the last time Kiyoomi saw him. His face is free of any freckles or moles. He and Kiyoomi look entirely different from each other except for their dark eyes and long lashes.

After sizing Kiyoomi up, Kousei flashes a calculating smile. “Sorry to show up unannounced. I would have called but, you know, you blocked me.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t know what to say. If he snarks something at Kousei that will probably backfire immediately. If he tries to give a fake apology it will hurt his future self and Kousei will probably see through it anyway. Think. Come on Kiyoomi, think.

Motoya smacks the side of his neck hard and Kiyoomi stumbles back. “What the hell,” he shouts, maybe a little louder than he would normally but he’s already overwhelmed. His skin pinches as the glue of the bandaid Motoya slapped on him stops his neck from fully twisting.

“Sorry,” Motoya says, moving between him and Kousei, turning around to face Kiyoomi while he claps his hands around in the air. “There was a big mosquito.” Then, silently, he mouths hickey .

Fuck. Kiyoomi is so screwed right now. Motoya has saved him twice in the span of five minutes and Kiyoomis is too out of it to catch up.

“Maybe I should go shower,” he tries.

“No, we’ve been waiting. Let’s eat now.” Kousei says sitting in the seat beside the empty placemat. He pulls out the chair beside him and gestures for Kiyoomi to sit.

Kiyoomi complies. Things are always easier with Kousei when he complies. That’s why he’s in this situation now. Because he didn't comply before.

“Looks great Motoya,” Kiyoomi says, albeit a little sarcastically because it does look great, but he’s almost annoyed at how great it looks. He knows this uncomfortable breakfast would have happened whether or not Motoya made food because it’s what Kousei wants, but why did Motoya have to make such good food for his brother?

Motoya seems to pick up on Kiyoomi’s frustrations. He feels a text buzz through his phone and glances at it.

Motoya: He got here at 7 and I had to stall him until you got home. I cook when I’m nervous.

The fruits of Motoya’s nerves are spread across the table in various mismatched bowls. Two kinds of eggs, pancakes, bacon, sausage, salad, muffins, fruit cut into fun shapes, and shokupan. It’s 10:30 now. Motoya had to stall for three and a half hours.

“How was your run Kiyo?” Kousei asks.

“Fine.”

“I didn’t know you ran.”

“Just started.”

They both know it’s a lie. Kousei doesn’t care enough about what the lie is. He only cares about why Kiyoomi is lying.

“How’s work?”

“Fine.”

Kousei’s eyes narrow but Kiyoomi doesn’t give in. When he was younger he remembers thinking that when Kousei narrowed his eyes he’d caught Kiyoomi in a lie. Now he knows it's a test Kousei uses to see how Kiyoomi reacts. Kiyoomi keeps picking at his eggs in response.

“How’s Yasu?”

“Why are you here Kousei?”

His brother smiles and takes a bite of the food. “I came to get Mom’s painting from that gallery I called. You know the one right?”

Kiyoomi doesn’t react, knowing if he does, he’ll be implicating himself as the other person on the line when Kousei called. Again they both know the lie and Kousei doesn’t care about it.

“Well that stupid woman refused to ship Mom’s painting to me so I had to come all the way out here. I fucking hate the people out here. This whole town is full of freaks and weirdos.”

Kiyoomi and Motoya stay silent. The kitchen is filled with sounds of chewing and food being scraped off of plates.

“Mom would be so disappointed in you Kiyo,” Kousei admonishes. “What a failure her second son is. He quit his job and broke off his engagement with the only woman who’d be dumb enough to marry someone like him.”

“I didn’t quit my job,” Kiyoomi snaps, anger building up at every word Kousei adds. It’s not his fault he’s out of work.

“But you did break your engagement with Yasu.” Kousei latches on, fiery eyes and a nasty grin on his face that Kiyoomi can only stand to look at from the corner of his eye.

If Kousei doesn’t already know something he always has a way of getting it out of Kiyoomi.

Motoya clears his throat. “Kousei, I think maybe you should-”

“Hold that thought Motoya, it looks like we have a guest,” Kousei says with a voice so full of joy Kiyoomi is scared.

He whips his head around to see Atsumu smiling wide, entirely oblivious to what he’s walked in on. “I’ll tell him to leave.”

“Sit down,” Kousei orders with an iron grip on Kiyoomi’s shoulder. He’s shorter than Kiyoomi by five inches but he’s always been the stronger one of the two of them. “It’s rude to turn away guests.”

Kousei stands up from the table, his chair scraping loudly against the floor. He walks to open the door with a smile of someone who’s won a prize. “Hello who might you be?”

Atsumu cocks his head to the side. He’s never been one to fall for bullshit and he immediately seems to clock Kousei for the kind of person he is. “I’m Miya Atsumu, the next door neighbor.”

“Hello Miya Atsumu the next door neighbor, I’m Sakusa Kousei, Kiyo’s older brother.” He stretches out his hand and Atsumu just looks down at it.

“We’ve met,” he says curtly after he realizes who he’s speaking to.

Kousei grips his hand in a tight fist and opens it again, dropping it gently by his side. Kiyoomi sees the gears spinning in his brother’s head. If he gets mad now he can’t catch Kiyoomi in whatever lie he’s in. “Care to join us for breakfast?”

Atsumu nods and steps in, sitting in the empty seat across from Kiyoomi but not giving him any special attention. “Mornin Omi. Mornin Toya, this looks great as always.”

“So you come here often?” Kousei asks as he sits back down.

“It’s the privilege of being the next door neighbor,” Atsumu laughs gently. There’s no smile in his eyes.

Kiyoomi is silently thanking him for being aloof instead of trying to put Kousei in his place.

Motoya rushes around to set some plates for Atsumu and sits back in his seat. Atsumu stares quizzically at him for a moment but says nothing, plating some food for himself and eating like there’s nothing wrong happening here.

“You’ve got a pretty nasty bruise there,” Kousei notes, pointing to Atsumu’s neck.

Kiyoomi is focused on his eggs. He won’t even let himself react internally. He keeps his eyes on his plate because if he looks at the hickies he left on Atsumu he knows Kousei will catch on.

Atsumu shrugs. “I’ve got lots of bruises. Got in a boating accident the other day.”

Motoya sits up straight. “What? What happened?”

“That’s a shame,” Kousei says, stopping the flow of conversation. He’s disinterested in what happened to Atsumu and Kiyoomi is trying not to let it get to him. “It’s funny, your bruises are in the same place as the bandaid Motoya slapped on Kiyo earlier.”

Atsumu bites into this pancake. “Is that funny? Maybe more coincidental?”

Kiyoomi sneaks a glance toward Motoya to shake his head. Anything he says right now will just make things worse.

“How well do you know Kiyo, Atsumu?”

“Fairly well,” Atsumu says. Kiyoomi kind of wishes he’d lied and said not well at all.

“Did you know he’s engaged?”

Atsumu freezes. And just for a second he glances at Kiyoomi. “No I didn’t.”

Kousei straightens up and puffs his chest out, smiling as he looks between Kiyoomi and Atsumu. “Yeah, to a lovely girl named Yasu from back home. They’ve been together for what? Two years now Kiyo? Time sure flies. I’m definitely looking forward to the save the date card. I’m hoping it’s mailed and not some email like lots of people are doing these days.”

Atsumu keeps chewing, nodding along every so often. He isn’t looking at Kiyoomi, just staring at Kousei as he continues on.

“What do you do for work, Kousei?” Atsumu asks.

Kousei sighs, just a little, at how Atsumu interrupted him. But Atumu asked him a question about his favorite topic: himself.

“I do contract work for the government.”

Atsumu oohs and ahhs. “Sounds important.”

“It is,” Kousei says.

If anyone else were speaking Kiyoomi would scoff, but he stays quiet.

“I have a pretty high security clearance.”

“Oh? Very nice,” Atsumu says. He takes a final bite of his bacon and sets his fork down. “Well, this was fun but I think I’m going to ask you to leave now.”

Kousei is a little taken aback. He turns his head a little to the side and stares Atsumu down. “Where do you get off talking to me like that?”

“Well you’re right, this isn’t my house and normally I wouldn’t speak on Toya’s behalf like this but for some reason he’s letting you sit here and treat Omi like this. I assume it’s some complicated family bullshit that I’m not all that interested in given how much of an asshole you are.” He smiles his biggest fuck-you smile. “I have no problem kicking you out.”

A vein pops in Kousei’s head. “You want to go?” He asks, challenging a fight.

“No,” Atsumu sighs like he’s repeating himself. “I want you to go. Don’t they have government workers take some sort of competency test? Can you hear me?”

“I don’t think you-”

“No I don’t think YOU want to mess with me,” Atsumu says, standing now. “If you don’t get out of this house right now you’re going to be served with a fat restraining order.”

“On what grounds?” Kousei laughs.

“Harassment,” Atsumu says. He sounds confident but Kiyoomi isn’t sure he fully knows what he’s talking about. Kousei isn’t someone to throw empty threats at. Restraining orders are complicated and take a while to approve.

“Easily dismissed by a judge,” Kousei says.

“I don’t think that’s what you should care about Mr. Security Clearance,” Atsumu says, and for the first time since he’s been here– no, for the first time in Kiyoomi’s life, he sees Kousei caught off guard.

Atsumu continues on. “Even the record of someone filing a restraining order against you is enough to get your clearance terminated. Isn’t that right? What would you do without your clearance, hm? You’d definitely lose your job, and good luck finding a new one after that.”

There’s a few seconds of dead air while Kousei considers what he wants to do. Kiyoomi’s heart is pounding in his chest for every single millisecond.

Then Kousei stands. “Fine.” He grabs the painting he came for out of the living room and starts walking toward the door. Motoya and Kiyoomi stay silent as Kousei leaves and Kiyoomi is glad Atsumu does too. If this were some random guy Atsumu was picking a fight with he’d probably be snarking at him for every step he took toward the door, but for Kiyoomi Atsumu stays silent. And he really loves him for it.

“We’re not done here Kiyo. You can’t get rid of family.” Kousei slams the door as he leaves, trying to leave one final lasting mark on Kiyoomi.

But Kiyoomi doesn’t care about that. The second Kousei leaves, Kiyoomi starts to talk. “I’m not engaged,” he rushes out.

Atsumu doesn’t say anything. He just sits and listens as Kiyoomi stumbles through a desperate explanation and Motoya slips out of the kitchen to give them some privacy.

“I mean, I was engaged and she was a girl, her name was Yasu and I came here after we broke it off because I had nowhere else to go. But no- we didn’t break it off. I broke it off. I ended it because of-”

“Kiyoomi,” Atsumu says calmly. “You think m’ gonna believe anything that guy says about you?”

There are tears on Kiyoomi’s face, mostly from the aftermath of dealing with Kousei but a few are from his fears of losing Atsumu over some misunderstanding. “There’s some truth to what he said though.”

“There always is with guys like that, but I only care about what you have to say. Okay?”

Kiyoomi nods. His hands are shaking a little but Atsumu’s persistence is calming him down.

Atsumu peels the wrapper off one of the muffins Motoya made and puts the muffin on Kiyoomi’s plate. “Do you remember when we first started all of this, how we both had these feelings of why we were lost?”

“Yes.” It wasn’t that long ago that they were refusing to tell each other the pieces of who they were and what their worries were.

“Want to talk about them now?”

“Here?”

Atsumu shakes his head. “Nah let's get some fresh air. I was thinking the beach. I know you want to go back there.”

He looks out the kitchen window toward the beach. Even blocked by a sunflower field and a skirting treeline, Kiyoomi can picture the warm rocky beach and its shallow, cold waves. But here in the kitchen he feels gross in sweatpants, hair still frizzy from bed and teeth in desperate need of being brushed.

“Can I shower first?”

“You can do anything you want,” Atsumu reassures him.

It usually takes Kiyoomi weeks to heal from an encounter like that with Kousei. But with Atsumu? It’s like Kousei was never here.

Seagulls cry above and Atsumu grunts by Kiyoomi’s side as they struggle to get the umbrella to stick into the rocky shore and remain standing. On the third time it falls over, Atsumu and Kiyoomi share a look and leave it there, lying beside their slightly lumpy towels.

The rocks covering the area they’ve laid their towels on are no bigger than Kiyoomi’s fingernails. Small pebbles smoothed out after being pummeled by the ocean’s current. Kiyoomi picks them up in large handfuls and lets them sift through his fingers.

Atsumu looks through them with more scrutiny, placing the ones he likes on Kiyoomi’s towel. So far there’s a pink triangle-shaped stone, a gray stone with two white bands encircling it, and a jet black one that’s so shiny it almost reflects the sunlight.

“Do you want to go first or should I?” Atsumu asks, fishing around for more pebbles he approves of.

Kiyoomi straightens out his collection and shifts to ease the slight dig of Motoya’s yellow swim trunks. “I think I would like to finish explaining first.”

“That’s fine,” Atsumu says. He’s not overly happy, but he isn’t being cold either. He just seems to want to wait for Kiyoomi to say what he needs to before he decides how to feel.

So Kiyoomi doesn’t waste any time explaining. He thought about it while he showered. The bullet points of his engagement—which is a weird thing to put into digestible bullet points.

“It’s been two weeks since I broke off my engagement with Yasu, a girl from Tokyo I met out of college at an art exhibit.”

“Can I ask questions,” Atsumu interrupts.

“Go ahead.”

“Did you love her?”

Kiyoomi smiles but it’s filled with melancholy for the life his past self was stuck in. “It wasn’t that kind of relationship.”

He explains the checkboxes he had running through his head as he tried to conform to a heteronormative life. He doesn’t think he’s really what Yasu wanted either, but in the end he didn’t know her well enough to understand what she was really looking for. They just knew each other’s surfaces. Kiyoomi’s surface was a guy willing to be engaged to a girl. Yasu’s surface was a girl who said yes to that guy’s proposal.

“I think we could have continued like that but her family got involved and then it was like the spell was broken and I realized what I was doing.”

“They knew you were gay?”

Kiyoomi laughs hard and the pink stone falls off his towel. He places it back where it was and shakes his head. “No, they tried to convince me I should have kids with Yasu.”

“You didn’t want kids with her?”

“I don’t want kids, with anyone.” He stills a little at the admission, eyes slowly finding Atsumu, scared of the face he’s going to be making.

Atsumu is nodding thoughtfully. “How about a dog?”

“I like dogs.”

Atsumu nods and Kiyoomi smiles. It’s like some kind of promise neither of them wants to vocalize.

Kiyoomi rolls over on his back and shields his eyes from the sun with his forearm. “I left Tokyo in a panic and came here because Yachi reminded me this place existed, and I felt like I had nowhere else to go.”

He tells Atsumu about how all his stuff is packed and how he doesn’t have an apartment anymore. He tells him about his job – or lack of one – and what his plan for finding a new one is.

“Do you want to go back to Tokyo?” Atsumu asks.

Kiyoomi doesn’t feel like he has enough information to answer that yet. “Can I ask why you’re here first?”

Atsumu nods and places a clear orange stone on the towel next to the jet black one.

“My grandma died at the end of April, a few weeks before my finals in May.”

Kiyoomi turns to face Atsumu and nods gently.

“M’ sure Rin or Toya told ya about it a little, you know, that it happened, but…yeah. She died and I had to choose between finishing out my law school finals or going to her funeral.”

Atsumu takes some deep breaths and Kiyoomi lets him take his time. He picks through the stones and places a red and green stone on Atsumu’s towel. Atsumu closes it in his fist and smiles tightly with his eyes shut.

“I talked to my advisor about it and he made a big deal about letting me know he wasn’t going to tell me what to do, but I could tell he thought I should stay to finish out my finals. I mean I can’t fault him for it. It was my first year at law school and I only had one semester’s worth of grades on my GPA. But…I don’t know.”

He talks about his first year. How hard it was because law school is hard.

“I wasn’t the best. And that’s the goal in law school for almost everyone: be the best. Then you get a job and you can pay off all your loans. But it was hard Omi. I didn’t expect to have to do it alone.”

The conversation they had in Atsumu’s backyard the first week he got here comes back to Kiyoomi. Osamu had thought of going to law school, and Atsumu had expected him to.

“I know it’s dumb. Everyone else is able to do it alone. But my parents were always out of the country and Samu was always at sea and Rin was running a freaking business and I was working too much to make new friends so the only person I had was my grandma, and then she just died.” Atsumu doesn’t cry, but he does take a deep breath. “And I didn’t go to her funeral.”

Kiyoomi forces his eyes to look up, trying not to cry on Atsumu’s behalf because Atsumu is being strong here.

“I should’ve gone.”

“You were in such a tough spot. There wasn’t a right choice.”

Atsumu nods and takes another deep breath. “M’ sure if I had left without taking my finals I would have hated myself for ruining my GPA and future with law school. But now I kind of hate myself for having a reason to go back when I don’t feel like I could handle it.”

“Because you’d feel alone?”

He nods and Kiyoomi has a promise sitting on his tongue that he bites down on. He can’t tell Atsumu he’d be there for him when he still doesn’t know if he’s going back to Tokyo.

“On top of everything else, now I can actually afford tuition, and all my loans, because of what she left me.”

Atsumu looks at Kiyoomi and then he starts to laugh. The dry, tired kind. “I mean what the fuck?” He laughs. He cackles. He bellows up at the sky. “What the fuck?”

Kiyoomi places another stone on his towel. This one is yellow and clear. He wants to take Atsumu in close and make everything feel better, but this is all so much bigger than him.

“ When you’re surrounded by people striving to do more than just succeed, anything else feels like you might as well quit,” Atsumu murmurs. “And what am I doing this summer? No job. No internship. I didn’t even apply for any OCIs.”

Kiyoomi ignores the unfamiliar acronym knowing this isn’t the time to ask about it, focusing on what he should really be tending to. “You spent this summer healing,” he says. He picks up the stones Atsumu picked out and holds them while he drags his towel right next to Atsumu’s, closing the gap and pulling him in close.

Atsumu lets himself be held. “I have two days to send the tuition check for next semester before I’m considered unenrolled.”

“Do you want to go back?”

The waves flick up the shore. A bird drops by them and flies away when it sees they have no food. A small crab inches back toward the water.

“I don’t know.”

Kiyoomi kisses the side of his head. “You don’t have to know right now. You’ve got two days right?”

“Right.”

“Isn’t it a thing for lawyers to take until the last minute to do something?” Kiyoomi jokes, pulling that stereotype out of something he heard in a TV show.

Atsumu laughs. “Gotta get those billable hours.”

“That’s right,” Kiyoomi says.

He has other questions. He wonders what Atsumu would do if he didn’t go back. Would he stay here? The question starts to merge with what Kiyoomi would like to do for himself and he shuts his eyes, trying to keep the two things separate.

“You’re really sweaty,” Kiyoomi says instead.

“I run hot,” Atsumu says.

“I know you do,” Kiyoomi murmurs.

Atsumu laughs and separates from him. “Should we swim?”

“Yes but don’t splash me.”

“Okay,” Atsumu concedes with his hands up. He runs into the water and dives as soon as it’s deep enough, swimming out a few yards until he’s standing in a part deep enough for his chest to be under water.

After a moment of deliberation, Kiyoomi dives in after him.

“You jumped in!” Atsumu shouted.

“And I deeply regret it,” Kiyoomi jokes, shivering slightly as he swims pathetically toward Atsumu.

Atsumu meets him halfway and lifts him so Kiyoomi’s legs wrap around his waist as he kisses him deeply. He tastes the salt water on Atsumu’s face as he kisses him, nipping his ear lobe and pecking his nose. Atsumu grabs his ass and pulls him closer.

He mouths at the spot Motoya had covered with the bandaid and sighs when Kiyoomi gropes his chest.

“HEY!” A lady starts to shout from the beach, startling Kiyoomi and Atsumu. “This is a kids beach!”

They jump away from each other and stand sheepishly side by side. But Kiyoomi looks at the shore at the woman, standing there alone shouting at them.

Then Atsumu shouts what Kiyoomi is thinking. “Where are your kids?”

“I don’t have kids!”

Atsumu shares an incredulous look with Kiyoomi and Kiyoomi laughs.

“Sorry!” He shouts, despite how ridiculous the situation is.

She seems satisfied with the situation and continues her walk along the beach, looking back every couple seconds to make sure they’re still maintaining a G-rated stance, a solid five feet apart.

As soon as she rounds the corner of the shore Atsumu grabs Kiyoomi by the arm and pulls him back in.

“This is a kids beach,” Kiyoomi jokes as Atsumu sucks his neck and grips his biceps.

“That’s why we’re getting a dog,” Atsumu mutters between kisses, and Kiyoomi melts into his embrace.

They spend the rest of the morning and early afternoon at the beach alternating between lying on their towels and splashing around in the water depending on if they need to cool down or heat up. They look for more pebbles and the occasional pieces of seaglass. They hum at the periwinkles. Atsumu tries and fails to catch a seagull.

Then they walk back to Kiyoomi’s house and take Motoya’s car to go stock up on sandwich supplies, because as Atsumu puts it, the only acceptable thing to eat after a day at the beach is a stacked up sandwich. The three of them spend the rest of the day making their version of a perfect sandwich and comparing creations.

Atsumu jams lettuce, tomatoes, onion, radish, pickles, two kinds of cheese, bacon, and some sliced meat he ordered at the butcher counter lathered with mustard between two pieces of bread.

Motoya is more careful with his creation, heating up some katsu and selecting two perfectly square pieces of bread to hold his chicken and shredded lettuce, drizzled with some special sauce.

Kiyoomi uses leftover pork belly to make banh mi on bread he slightly over-toasts and an egg that’s just the right amount of runny for him.

They eat on the porch while Motoya chronicles his harrowing journey back here describing multiple delays with his train and his seatmate — an old man — who wouldn’t stop trying to start up a conversation on the good old days, whatever those were.

The sun sets and the temperature drops a little but Kiyoomi is warmed by the slight sunburn he got today when Motoya wasn’t there to remind him to wear sunscreen—Motoya’s words, not his.

After they clean up the kitchen Motoya bids them goodnight and Kiyoomi feels so loved. The feeling carries him back to Atsumu’s house as they make the short journey to his bedroom. They come together wordlessly, kissing slowly and crawling onto the bed. Atsumu forces Kiyoomi down with a smile and Kiyoomi jerks Atsumu by the shoulders so that Atsumu is on top of him.

“I’m feeling better,” Atsumu whispers.

“I can tell,” Kiyoomi gasps as Atsumu opens him up.

This time Kiyoomi lies on his back and they gasp into each other's faces, eyes unrelenting as they look at each other. When Atsumu starts fucking into him Kiyoomi has a tendency to clench his eyes shut and Atusmu coos for him to open them, slowing down so he can watch him fully.

There’s choppy I love yous exchanged and so much kissing Kiyoomi can’t feel his lips, but they still manage to move against Atsumu’s.

It doesn’t feel desperate or rushed, or any other product of worry that they might not be able to keep doing this. Because Kiyoomi knows they’re starting something, not ending it. He isn’t sure where they’ll go from here but he knows it will be forward.

He tells Atsumu as much when he’s fast asleep, the first to fall asleep again while Kiyoomi settles against him and stares at the walls of the room that’s slowly becoming familiar. 

Sometime well into the night a soft blue glow starts to approach from the hall. He can’t tell exactly what time because Atsumu’s alarm clock needs to be reset, constantly flashing midnight. Kiyoomi stands, hoping maybe it’s Osamu or Rin and pulls his clothes on, settling the blanket back over sleeping Atsumu. He braces himself for someone other than Rin or Osamu, or rather, something other than those two. But he can handle it.

He takes in a deep breath and looks around the corner. His eyes find an old woman who smiles so gently he’s overcome with a feeling of safety.

“I have something to show you sweetheart,” she says, turning to lead the way.

And Kiyoomi follows, because he’s tired of not knowing.

“It’s up here,” the old woman says as she steps out of the house, walking through the door that Kiyoomi has to open in order to follow after her.

She’s not speaking to Kiyoomi, or at least not to adult Kiyoomi. He tries a few times to ask her questions but she can’t seem to be able to hear him. This is someone’s memory.

He’s still in his world and no blue light is trying to envelope him somewhere else. The only glow is shrouded around her. He grows more confident with each step that this woman, who Kiyoomi suspects is Atsumu’s grandmother, is trying to help him.

They are approaching the end of the yard when she starts to walk into the sunflower field. “This will be a good place for you,” she says.

Kiyoomi continues to follow her, assuming they are headed to the hideout. He does his best to weave around the sunflowers that Atsumu’s grandmother easily walks through. The sky above them is dark but the moonlight is bright enough for Kiyoomi to see where he’s going.

His bare feet dig through the dirt that’s soft and forgiving with each step.

When they finally reach the clearing she speaks again. “You can come out here whenever you want to. You don’t have to tell me and you don’t need to bring the boys if you don’t want to.”

She crouches down slightly when she turns to Kiyoomi, looking right through him. “This is a safe place.”

“You promise?” A voice behind him asks.

Kiyoomi turns and sees his younger self, blue and glowing but not quite as bright as how much Atsumu’s grandmother is glowing. That must be how he missed him. He steps away from his younger self to watch them both. His younger self flicks his eyes to Kiyoomi once but he doesn’t seem to care that he’s here. He’s more interested in the grandmother.

His younger self looks around seven here, just a little taller than Haru, not that that means much in regards to age. He’s the youngest Kiyoomi has seen of himself among all the other glimmers.

“Promise,” Atsumu’s grandmother reassures young Kiyoomi. “You can come here and then you’ll grow up big and strong like my grandsons.” She smiles, eyes squinted and upturned the same way Atsumu’s eyes do when he's happy. Then she starts to break apart into small blue orbs that float around Kiyoomi. 

The orbs fill the clearing, giving just a little more light to it than the moon is able to. His and Atsumu’s footprints are still here. So is the hole where Atsumu dug up the lunchbox he buried here. Kiyoomi’s younger self goes to inspect the hole and sits beside it, criss-crossing his legs and looking up at Kiyoomi.

“Have you ever made a wish before?” He asks older Kiyoomi.

“I have,” he answers truthfully.

“Do you want to make another one?”

Kiyoomi nods and sits on the ground across from his younger self, kneeling in the dirt and sitting on his feet.

“What’s your wish?”

“Will it come true if I tell you,” Kiyoomi asks with a slight tease he’s seen Motoya use with Haru and Fumi.

Young Kiyoomi nods.

Kiyoomi takes a deep breath and focuses on the orbs floating around them. “Then I wish I knew why I can’t remember anything.”

His younger self nods. “That’s an okay wish. I would have wished to paint the side of the Tokyo Tower.”

Kiyoomi laughs and the orbs blink a bright white light. When his sight comes back the seven year old version of himself is gone, and a few feet away are two figures. He squints, his eyes still adjusting from the bright flash. After blinking a couple times he realizes they’re both him. Two versions of his fifteen year old self. One that’s still swearing his old sweatshirt, and another that is holding the sweatshirt in his hands. He opens his mouth to say something to him but they speak first.

“Don’t do this,” the one wearing the sweatshirt says, approaching Kiyoomi slowly and stopping a few feet away, just out of the moon's light, keeping Kiyoomi from getting a good look at him. He’s able to discern his clothes and his hair. It’s what he wore the day he kissed Atsumu.

“Stop pushing him away,” the one without the sweatshirt says. His eyes are bright and he’s smiling wide, blushing a little, and touching his lips every so often.

“I’m pushing him away to protect him.”

“He’ll be fine!”

“No, he’s fine now because of what I did.”

“You stripped us away from him!” The one without the sweatshirt says. “You left him as a husk. He had no happy memories because of you,” he laughs. It’s a little unsettling. Even as he shouts he seems happy.

“Yeah well he was free of his trauma as well, which is what he wanted,” the one with the sweatshirt says, anger shown prominently on his face. “Right? That’s what you wanted right? It’s better that way, you know, life?” They both turn to Kiyoomi expectantly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kiyoomi answers, trying to speak calmly. Even after all his exposure to glimmers they still send an innate fear through him. And he’s not sure how they feel about him.

The one without the sweatshirt steps forward. “When Mom died-”

“No!” The one with the sweatshirt says. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Well I’m not going to let you just tell him the bad stuff!”

“I won’t,” his sad self says. “But let me go first.”

His happy self has no objections, sitting on the ground and wiggling his feet a little in anticipation, grinning at Kiyoomi. “Just wait,” he whispers.

“Look at me,” his sad self demands of Kiyoomi, stepping closer into the moonlight. There are bags under his eyes and his cheeks are sunken. His lips are chapped and bitten. His demeanor is almost lifeless. “I survived every moment of that abuse she put us through and crawled my way through childhood.”

Kiyoomi stares intently at this version of himself. It hurts to look at him.

“If you choose to remember, you’re going to be hit with everything that makes up who I am—who you were.

“But!” His other self interrupts. “You’ll remember the good parts too! All of them.”

“All five of them,” his hurt self snarks.

“There were more than that you just don’t remember.”

“And you don’t remember everything else.”

His younger self plays with his hair. “If you care so much about him, why not just let him remember me? And you can stay here like this.”

“You can’t just have the good,” the angry one says. “It doesn’t work like that. I wished to forget the bad stuff so we forgot everything.”

Kiyoomi knows that much as well. His two selves continue to fight with each other and the words they throw at each other start to align with an argument he and Yachi once had. They were seniors in college, a few months from graduation and Yachi was trying to convince him to go to therapy given how well it worked for her.

She couldn't understand why he was refusing. At the time the societal attitude toward therapy was shifting to something that everyone should go to, which is not something he’s necessarily opposed to, but even without what he’s learned now he knew going to therapy in college wasn’t right for him. There was nothing good a school assigned counselor with two openings a semester could do for him.

He remembers telling Yachi as much. She was going to therapy for general anxiety. She didn’t have deep traumas or years worth of memories that were missing. She didn’t consider how life altering it would be for Kiyoomi to dig those up.

He thinks about that now. His sad self is right in a sense. And while he would love to have some of his happy memories back, those aren’t the ones he’s interested in right now.

“I just want to know one thing,” Kiyoomi interrupts them, standing from the ground. He’s quite a bit taller than both of them like this.

They stop arguing and his sad self speaks directly to Kiyoomi again. “Please, don’t revert to this,” he says, gesturing with his hands to the state he’s perpetually in. “Not after everything I did to bury it all.”

“It’s your life,” his happy self says. “Don’t you want to remember it?”

Kiyoomi looks between the both of them. The downturned frown. The infectious smile. He shuts his eyes so his decision isn’t swayed when he speaks. “Can I still make any wish?”

“Yes,” the sad one answers begrudgingly.

“Anything!” The happy one shouts.

Kiyoomi taps his fingers together. He thinks of all the moments he’s seen so far and parses through them. What does he want? What does he need to know? What should he stay away from?

It all swims around in his head when he says “Take me back to that day.”

The suit that was too small. The people who expected him to cry. He pictures it in his head and clenches his eyes shut tight hoping that what he’s thinking will come across correctly. When he opens his eyes he’s back in his yard.

There’s a large white tent up.

That’s right. They decided to have the wake in the yard and they were afraid it might rain that day. Kiyoomi remembers his dad on the phone with the tent company arguing with them about what time they needed to arrive. He’d never seen his dad upset like that before.

He looks around for himself, or anyone he recognizes.

He sees Kousei stalking through the front yard, then he lifts his head and starts walking in one direction toward the back yard. Ahead of Kousei Kiyoomi sees his young self in that uncomfortable suit standing by the sandbox. Kiyoomi runs to catch up.

“Waiting for Atsumu?” Kousei asks. Kiyoomi can hear the bite in his tone from where he’s standing a few feet away, crouched beside one of the many cars filling the driveway.

Teen Kiyoomi startles at the presence of his brother. “No.”

“Don’t lie Kiyo. I can always tell.”

“I’m not lying.”

“You are.”

Kousei yanks a weed out of the ground and chucks it into the empty sandbox teen Kiyoomi is standing next to. “She died because of you,” Kousei hisses.

“Dad said you can’t say that,” Kiyoomi pleads.

“But it’s true.”

“Dad said it’s not. She got in a car acci-”

“Driving home because you wouldn’t stop crying to dad about wanting to see Atsumu. For God’s sake Kiyo you’re 15. Grow the fuck up.”

“You told her to come home! And you made us go home early anyways! We were supposed to have the rest of the summer here. Dad was going to drive me back to the train station.”

“I told her to come home so someone would put you in your place and keep you from ruining this family with how disgusting you are.”

Teen Kiyoomi tries to use the edge of his sleeve to wipe a tear from his eyes but it’s too short and slips from the grip his fingers have on it. “I’m not disgusting.”

There are some people walking around in the driveway. Kousei looks toward them and starts to back away from teen Kiyoomi. “You better not meet him back here. I’ll know if you do.”

“I’m not!” teen Kiyoomi half-shouts, looking up at the people within earshot as he tries to keep his voice down.

Kousei squints his eyes and teen Kiyoomi stares back at him. Then he turns around and walks away, leaving teen Kiyoomi alone in the back yard.

Once he’s gone, teen Kiyoomi turns and starts to run into the woods at a full sprint, his legs jolting awkwardly with the freedom the tight suit gives him.

Adult Kiyoomi chases after him, hurrying through the unfamiliar woods while teen Kiyoomi navigates them expertly until he gets to a large tree that’s fallen down. It’s propped against another fallen tree creating an enclosed space big enough for adult Kiyoomi to follow teen Kiyoomi in.

Hanging from the array of branches that walls the space in is a piece of flat bark with “The Fort” written in dark yellow paint that’s cracked but not flakey.

“I hate this,” teen Kiyoomi whispers to himself in a choked, angry voice. “It hurts.”

“I know,” Kiyoomi responds, crouching beside him. He wraps his arms around teen Kiyoomi. Even if he can’t feel it, Kiyoomi needs to do this. “It’s okay,” he whispers.

“I want it to stop hurting,” his teen self says, and blue orbs start to encircle him. “Dad doesn’t hurt like this. Why do I have to hurt so much? I’m just a teenage- I’m just a kid.”

The orbs continue to float around as teen Kiyoomi pieces together what he wants. “I want to forget everything,” he cries. “Until I’m an adult. Then it won’t hurt anymore.”

The shrine flashes and Kiyoomi watches as realization seeps from his younger self’s face. He looks down at where he’s sitting and the clothes he’s in, standing up and wiping the dirt off of himself. He doesn’t notice the tears streaking down his cheeks, which look out of place matched with the calm expression he has now.

The fireflies lead him back to the yard, stopping at the edge of the treeline and floating back into the woods when he gets there safely. Adult Kiyoomi trails behind them, watching everything in awe. The moment he completely wiped his mind. Teen Kiyoomi watches the fireflies return to the woods until a car horn from the arriving people distracts him, pulling his attention toward the yard.

That’s when his eyes land on 15 year old Atsumu. His hands are jammed in his pockets and his legs are bent, like he might bolt away at any moment.

“H-hey,” he says to teen Kiyoomi, keeping his distance like Kiyoomi might be the one to run away from him.

“Hi?” Kiyoomi says plainly, still not sure what’s going on.

“I didn’t want to bother you earlier. I know this is a hard day for you.”

“Why?” Kiyoomi asks.

Atsumu looks a little confused. “Because your mom died?”

Kiyoomi nods like he’s sort of realizing that. He tugs at the short sleeve of his suit jacket. “Right,” he answers without any emotion.

The two fifteen year olds stare at each other for a moment. Atsumu looks like he’s about to take another step to Kiyoomi when teen Kiyoomi speaks. “Do we know each other?”

Atsumu freezes, and seems more perplexed by how genuine Kiyoomi sounds than upset that Kiyoomi doesn’t know who he is. “What do you mean?”

“Are you one of Kousei’s friends?”

“What? No.”

“Why are you here then?”

Atsumu takes a step back. “Why- I came to see you.”

“Why?”

He frowns, deeply and takes another step back. “I…I guess no reason at all.” He hesitates for a moment, then he turns around and walks away, each step getting faster the further away he gets until he’s running down the driveway across the street.

Teen Kiyoomi just stands there, still not understanding what’s going on.

Then, like every other time, Kiyoomi blinks and he’s back in his world.

Adults are strong. Nothing hurts them.

Kiyoomi remembers that’s what he was thinking when he made that wish, as all the tiny pieces return to him like the last few minnows joining an immense school of fish.

He tucks this small version of his past self in his heart as he walks back through the sunflower field toward Atsumu’s house. He’s covered in sweat and the dirt is sticking to his sweat, and his clothes, and his hair because he woke up lying down in the hideout, alone, no glimmer in sight. His arms sway at his sides as he walks, his head tilted up and his breath coming heavy out of his mouth.

He processes all of his thoughts with a numb feeling in his chest, like his mind isn’t quite sure how he feels about everything yet. His emotions sway with each fact he considers. It was sad watching his past self cry for help. It was frustrating watching how he couldn’t remember Atsumu, and the way he treated him. And it’s surreal to watch his past self decide to offload all his issues onto his adult self.

This thought makes him freeze mid-step. He wonders…no. “That can’t be true,” Kiyoomi mumbles out loud, the late hours of the night making it easy to talk to himself. The rules said magic doesn’t leave Karumi. That can’t be true.

The “rules” he found on a random scrap of paper.

No, that can’t be true.

He tries to discredit the thought but the hypothesis continues to run through his head when he steps inside the house and walks straight to the shower on the other side of Atsumu’s door. He keeps the light off and fumbles with the knob, trying to figure out how to get it to turn on with hot water.

Atsumu comes in wordlessly and reaches past Kiyoomi to turn the shower on for him.

“Yer covered in dirt,” he mumbles, too tired to actually inquire why Kiyoomi is covered in dirt, but alert enough to notice it.

“Go back to bed,” Kiyoomi whispers, kissing the side of Atsumu’s head.

Atsumu leans into the touch for a moment and pulls back to shake his head. “No I wanna shower,” Atsumu grumbles, stumbling out of his clothes and stepping into the pink-tiled shower.

Kiyoomi rolls his eyes with a smile and follows after him.

“Yer covered in dirt,” Atsumu repeats as he washes Kiyoomi’s back.

“I know I am.”

“I dreamed about my grandma,” Atsumu murmurs, leaning his cheek against Kiyoomi’s back, wrapping his arms around Kiyoomi’s waist.

Kiyoomi turns around and holds him close. “Yeah?”

“Mhm,” he says, still not awake enough to emote normally. “She said she’s proud of me.”

Kiyoomi’s heart clenches. “I know she is.”

Atsumu whispers more about his dream and Kiyoomi washes his hair with some purple shampoo he’s pretty sure is meant for blonde hair. Then he tells Atsumu what he saw.

Atsumu nods sleepily to everything, sighing happily at the warm stream of water hitting him when they switch places in the shower so Kiyoomi can rinse his hair.

“I’m so sorry,” Kiyoomi whispers, brushing Atsumu’s hair out of his face from how the water pushed it down. “I’m so sorry I forgot you.”

“It’s okay Omi,” Atsumu murmurs, his eyelids shut to avoid the gentle spray of water.

They stand there soaking up the warmth from the shower and each other. When Kiyoomi’s fingers start to prune he steps out of the shower. They dry off and crawl back into bed.

Kiyoomi is finally drifting to sleep when Atsumu snaps to his senses. “Wait! What did you see?”

“In the morning,” Kiyoomi murmurs, face smooshed against his pillow.

Atsumu stares at him for a moment and pulls him in closer, tucking his chin at the crook of Kiyoomi’s neck. “Okay.”

* * *

“Hi, I’m calling regarding the status of my enrollment.”

Kiyoomi groans and rolls over, smacking around the mattress for Atsumu and finally finding him at the end of the bed. He opens his eyes and has to shut them a few times before he can focus them.

Atsumu is sitting up with his legs hanging off the edge. He has a phone to his ear and he’s holding a finger to his lips to shush Kiyoomi. He picks something off the bedside table and sticks it to Kiyoomi’s forehead before tossing him his phone.

Sunlight is coming in through the small windows pouring light into the room. Kiyoomi’s whole face wrinkles in annoyance and he pulls the sticky note off his face. “Call Yachi!” Is written with five exclamation points.

He frowns and picks up his phone. He’s got two emails and seven missed calls from Yachi, most of them from yesterday, one from last night and a text from this morning that starts with “Kiyo just making sure you know...”

Kiyoomi gestures his confusion toward Atsumu who pulls another sticky note off his bedside table and sticks it to Kiyoomi’s outstretched hand. “She called this morning and I picked up. Call her back.”

“Hi yes I’m still here,” Atsumu says, turning his attention back to the phone call and stepping out of the room.

Kiyoomi rolls around in the bedding and sits up, sliding on one of Yachi’s missed calls.

She picks up on the first ring.

“Kiyo!”

“Yachi, hello, I miss you but can I please call you in a few hours. I was literally lying in the dirt for half of last night.”

Yachi is tapping away at the special bamboo keyboard she ordered when she saw someone using it online. It’s extra loud and clicky, entirely discernible even over a phone call.

“I miss you too Kiyo but I need you to wake up because I scheduled a meeting for you that starts in 15 minutes.”

Kiyoomi groans. “What? Why-”

“There’s an author- Abe Ichika, who would be perfect for you to work with, but she’s very picky and has previously worked with only one artist. That artist is doing their own graphic novels now and she needs someone new for her next project.”

“Okay?” He fumbles around for the edge of the blanket to tug it back up above his shoulders and lie against his pillow. Atsumu is pacing in the hallway and slips back into the room to yank the blanket away from Kiyoomi. They struggle over it for a minute while their respective phone calls continue.

“Well she was available today, and you can’t be mad because I texted you yesterday and you didn't answer.”

“Can’t we reschedule?” Kiyoomi yanks hard on the blanket and almost wins it from Atsumu.

“No, she’s going to start meeting with other artists tomorrow. This is the chance we’ve got.”

Atsumu gives the blanket a final yank from Kiyoomi's grasp and drags it out of the room as he turns his attention back to the phone call. Kiyoomi frowns and sits up on the bed. “What time is it?”

“In fifteen minutes,” she says tersely and Kiyoomi realizes she said that a few minutes ago.

“Yachi!”

“You should have answered your phone! Be glad Atsumu picked up– by the way we need to talk about you and Atsumu because WHAT! Also I’ve been trying this new meditation thing between meetings that I saw online and I think it’s really helping. Oh! And I need to send you this new salad recipe, it’s got peaches in it. Anyways-”

“Yachi how much coffee have you had?”

Kiyoomi straggles out of bed and opens Atsumu’s closet, putting out one of his dress shirts and putting it on, already coming to terms with the fact that there’s no scenario where he doesn’t take this call. Even if he doesn’t end up wanting to work with this writer, which is probably very likely, he can’t give a bad impression. The publishing world isn’t big enough for bad impressions.

“No coffee, just three of those little energy bottles they used to advertise to elderly people in the early 2000s.”

“You mean before they realized they are bad for you?”

“Something like that.”

“You are going to have a literal heart attack.”

“Maybe but at least I’ll be on top of all the clients I’m watching for my coworker. Did you know she had 20 different artists? I did not know that.”

She starts babbling through another caffeinated fueled rant, firing off everything she needs Kiyoomi to do. He manages to catch ‘look at her website’ and ‘don’t be a pessimist.’ Everything else goes over his head.

“Okay I have to go!”

“No more energy drinks!” He shouts as she hangs up.

Then it’s quiet. He hears Atsumu downstairs, still on the phone and wonders if he should take the call from his room. His heart pounds a little at how fast everything is happening.

Then his phone starts to ring with an unsaved number from a Tokyo area code. And a lightning rod of panic strikes through him. He was supposed to have 15 minutes. Should he decline it? No, that would be bad.

He scrambles around the room to shut the door and compose himself, picking up on the third ring.

“Hello? Is this Sakusa Kiyoomi,” the author asks. Her voice is kind and it helps Kiyoomi relax a little.

“Yes is this….” Fuck he doesn’t even remember her name. “The author?”

She laughs. It comes out of his phone’s speaker in quiet chirps. “Yes this is Abe Ichika,” she answers.

“Nice to meet-”

“So how are you- oh I’m sorry you go ahead.”

“No please, you go,” Kiyoomi grits his teeth at the ever-embarrassing moment of talking over someone on the phone, though it’s entirely inevitable when talking to a stranger who’s conversational cues he knows nothing about.

He twists a loose string on Atsumu’s bedding and is reminded of him and what he said when he woke Kiyoomi up this morning. Atsumu was calling about his enrollment status. What does that mean? Is he unenrolling? Re-enrolling? Is there another option?

“Kiyoomi?”

Right he’s still on the phone. Did she ask him something? “Sorry I think you cut out,” he lies.

“Oh that’s okay! I asked what you thought of the book. Do you think it’s something you’d like to work on?”

“Oh- um, I thought it was- one second I’m so sorry I haven't had a chance to read it yet. He clicks through his different emails feverishly trying to figure out which one Yachi sent the materials to.

He finds it and of course the document takes forever to load.

Ichika is silent on the line and Kiyoomi can’t tell if she’s waiting patiently or if she’s pissed. “I’m so sorry,” he says, hating how he’s wasting her time.

The loading icon freezes and Kiyoomi accepts his fate, shutting his email application. “I’m so sorry,” he repeats. “I don’t think this is going to work. I’m sure you’re an amazing author I’d be lucky to work with, otherwise Yachi definitely wouldn’t have tried so hard to get this to work, but I don’t think I’d be a good fit for your work.

My childhood was- sorry I just don’t think someone like me should be illustrating for kids. I’m sorry to have wasted y-”

“Kiyoomi,” she says quickly, cutting him off. “Before you bail I’d like you to know that’s exactly why I think we should work together.”

“I’m sorry?”

Ichika laughs and it doesn’t sound like she’s upset with Kiyoomi at all. She starts to explain her book and its purpose: making stories for children who, for whatever reason, have been neglected or raised to feel unloved.

She talks about why stories like that are important for kids and with each point she makes Kiyoomi feel a little more reassured that maybe this could work.

“Think about The Ugly Duckling or The Rainbow Fish,” she says, naming two books Kiyoomi is unfamiliar with. “Both are stories about belonging and being yourself.”

“Right,” Kiyoomi answers.

“I’m an autistic author who writes about what I experienced as a kid for kids who are going through the same things today. I love your visual storytelling style. I think we could work really well together, telling hard-to-broach topics with light, beautiful worlds you illustrate.”

She pauses again and Kiyoomi realizes it’s his turn to speak. “I- yeah. I think that could work really well.”

“Would you like to talk about this more another time? Maybe after you’ve read the synopsis? Only if you think you’d be interested in working together.”

“I would definitely like that. I really am interested in working with you,” Kiyoomi says, meaning every word.

“Great! I’ll send some dates to Yachi and we can set something up with the three of us plus my editor.”

They exchange goodbyes and Kiyoomi ends the call, flopping back on the bed and opening his email. The synopsis finally loads and he starts to parse through it.

Ideas come as easily as breathing. He reads through the project summary and can’t help but feel comforted. The literal scenes are not something he entirely relates to, but the underlying themes of loneliness and othering are feelings he knows too well. He could easily illustrate this.

Loose compositions and symbols pop in and out of his head as he reads through the end. He adds big ideas to a reply to Yachi but stays away from specifics, knowing they’ll be discussing that next week.

A knock on Atsumu’s door pulls Kiyoomi out of his internal planning session. The door creaks open slightly and Atsumu pokes his head in the room. “Still on the phone?” He whispers.

“No,” Kiyoomi laughs.

“How did it go?” He asks, stepping into the room and leaving the door open behind him.

Kiyoomi shifts to one side of the bed to make room for Atsumu. “I think well.”

“Are you going back to Tokyo?”

“I think so. Are you-”

“Officially enrolled as a second-year at Tokyo-U? Yes, I am.”

“So we’re-”

“Both going back to Tokyo? Seems like it,” Atsumu grins, walking toward the bed.

“Are you going to-”

“Keep cutting you off?” Atsumu leans in and kisses him. “Yeah.”

Kiyoomi kisses him back, smiling against his lips. “I like that you know what I’m thinking.”

Atsumu hugs him close. “I like that you let me in enough to know what you’re thinking.”

They exchange lazy kisses while the morning passes. Kiyoomi briefly worries about finding an apartment but Atsumu kisses him senseless until he can’t think about it. “You can stay in Kurami till ya find one. Worry about it later,” Atsumu whispers as he pushes Kiyoomi further into the bed.

They make out languidly, and Atsumu pulls away when he has a thought, leaning on his side next to Kiyoomi. “So last night, when you were explaining everything, you said ya wished to forget the painful stuff until you were an adult?”

Kiyoomi kisses Atsumu’s knuckles and nods.

“Do you think that’s why you came back here?”

Kiyoomi’s head hurts at the thought. “Well…no? Right? Because the rules said magic doesn’t go past Karumi.”

“The wrinkly piece of paper you stole-”

“Found,” Kiyoomi interjects.

“Came in possession of,” Atsumu amends. “I don’t know. They could be wrong or just plain made up.”

“Maybe, but that would be so crazy, right?”

“It would, but so has everything else.”

Kiyoomi sighs, settling into the reality of questions that don’t have answers.

His phone buzzes and he ignores it, moving in to kiss Atsumu. It buzzes again and Atsumu picks it up.

There’s an email from Yachi labeled “YAY!!!!” And a text from Motoya.

Motoya: Osamu and Suna are over here. You and Atsumu should come over before the food is gone.

Atsumu leans over Kiyoomi's shoulder to read the message and nods. “We definitely should.”

They drag each other out of bed and exit the house. The sun is bright and the day is hot, but that’s not what Kiyoomi is focusing on. Walking back over to his house the surrounding area starts to come to life as he begins to remember bits and pieces of his summers coming here.

The cherry tree that was a “safe zone” when they played tag. The dead patch of grass that was the result of him and Suna peeling it back to see if they could, and putting it back down like nothing happened. The spot right under the living room window he and Osamu would hide under when they snuck popsicles out of the freezer.

The bed of flowers he and Yachi sat by to watch the butterflies and the occasional humming bird. The porch where Motoya would ask Kiyoomi random trivia questions from this old book he found, that Kiyoomi always got wrong. The window from which he dangled a cup with string taped to the bottom of it to see if he and Atsumu could talk at night.

All of these small memories come back like the first snow after a long summer, and Kiyoomi can’t help but stop and marvel at it all.

Three years and a few months later

"What are you smiling about over there?” Atsumu laughs and reaches across the console to blindly grab Kiyoomi’s hand while his eyes are on the road.

His red pickup truck sticks out like a sore thumb in the bustling streets of Tokyo where the roads are blocked and the sidewalks are filled with those who know better than to drive. But Atsumu wanted to drive his truck one last time before he sold it next week. They won’t be needing it anymore with Osamu and Suna moving to the city.

“Nothing,” Kiyoomi lies with a grin he can barely mask. He has been able to keep the surprise a secret this past month but his excitement is chipping away at his endurance.

“Omi ya know I catch lies for a living right?”

“No, you build arguments and do meticulous research for a living.” Kiyoomi quotes Atsumu’s words back to him from a small rant Atsumu went on last week after Kiyoomi watched one too many dramas that do a ‘shit job of portraying real law work.’ He squeezes Atsumu’s hand back and smiles, smug.

Atsumu rolls his eyes and lifts his hand away from Kiyoomi’s to grab the clutch as the traffic slows down.

“Well I catch lies too.”

“Says you.”

“Yeah says me. I passed the bar so as far as m’ concerned being a lawyer is whatever I want it to be,” Atsumu laughs, joy escaping his lungs. It’s been a week since he got his results back and he still can’t stop smiling. Kiyoomi is glad for it.

“God I love you,” Kiyoomi laughs.

Atsumu reaches out to grab his hand again and yanks it back to the clutch a second later. “Maybe we should’ve taken the train,” Atsumu mutters mostly to himself.

“Maybe,” Kiyoomi responds. Knowing they’re both thinking taking the truck was a dumb idea, but it was a nostalgic one and Kiyoomi has grown to love those types of decisions. It will also be handy to have the truck on their drive home but he can’t tell Atsumu why.

They bumble through traffic for another 20 minutes with delivery drivers on scooters zipping around them and pedestrian crosswalks stopping the flow of traffic every couple blocks. When they get to their exit they pull away from everyone else and head toward tree adjourned roads on the outer part of Tokyo.

Sun coming through yellow and orange leaves on the turning trees makes the day feel warmer. Kiyoomi rolls the window down to smell the sweet scent of fall and rolls it back up shortly after to keep the cold air out.

“Do you think Mr.Tubs is okay?” Atsumu asks thoughtfully, always worrying about leaving their cat home alone.

“He’s probably sound asleep in our bed right now, he’ll be fine.”

After Atsumu completed his 2L he and Kiyoomi decided to adopt a dog. They’d thought about it for a while and with Kiyoomi working from home, it would be easy for them to make sure the dog was taken care of. Then, when they were walking toward the dog side of the rescue center, Atsumu spotted the name tag of one “Mr. Tubs,” a pale orange tabby cat with a white belly and socks to match.

He insisted on holding Mr. Tubs, who would not let go of Atsumu, except when he was passed to Kiyoomi. They realized they would not be getting a dog that day but neither Atsumu nor Kiyoomi have ever regretted the decision, even last week when Mr. Tubs got up on the counter and ate half of a quiche Kiyoomi spent the morning making.

“It’s weird only having to drive 20 minutes to see em’ now,” Atsumu says absentmindedly.

“Yeah,” Kiyoomi echos, thinking about the twice-yearly trips they’ve made for the last three years. Once for New Years and always for a good chunk of the summer.

This past summer was one of goodbyes. Atsumu was waiting for the results of his bar. Kiyoomi was finishing up a new book he and Ichika were working on and they were both helping Osamu and Suna move out.

“Do you think Osamu misses it?”

Atsumu’s lip goes in a tight line the way it always does when he thinks about the sailing accident. “Well he says he doesn’t but he’s a liar.” He shifts the clutch as they turn down Osamu and Suna’s street. “I think he started missing it the second he went out after the– our accident, and realized being on the water wasn’t the same anymore.”

Kiyoomi responds with a gentle “yeah.” Osamu hadn’t been able to get back out on the water without imagining the worst might happen to his crew, even with how meticulous he is with captaining his boat. Suna was even worse off, but he held it together for Osamu.

He and Kiyoomi would sit on Facetime during the periods Osamu was away. Kiyoomi would draw while Suna worked in his shop and the radio would crackle every so often. But eventually it reached a point where both of them knew Osamu had to stop.

Kiyoomi shakes the solemn memories and focuses on the present. “The house is still there for the summers.”

“Mhm.”

“And Osamu got his job coordinating the Tokyo fish market.”

“Yeah.”

“And Suna’s opening his new shop.”

“True.”

“And you passed the freaking bar exam!”

“I passed the FREAKING BAR EXAM!!!” Atsumu shouts, smiling again. He parks the car in the driveway beside Motoya’s car and leans over the console to kiss Kiyoomi, unbuckling Kiyoomi’s seatbelt for him while he does so and then hopping out of the car.

Kiyoomi grins and chases after him.

His nose wrinkles when he steps outside. It’s garbage day and the passing truck has clearly been working hard. He holds his breath until they make it to the house. Atsumu opens the door and sighs when he finds it unlocked.

Kiyoomi inhales deeply when they step inside and shut the door. Osamu is making something in the kitchen. Tangy and full spice smells waft down the hall walled with all the pictures Suna has framed and hanging. There’s some of Kiyoomi catching fish while Atsumu frowns to the side. Motoya arguing with Osamu over a simmering pot. Atsumu grinning wildly with his law school diploma. Yachi surrounded by four plates of crab shells. And Mr. Tubs in a birthday hat he was patient enough to wear.

The space feels a lot more lived-in compared to the last time he was here. It was weird looking at a pile of boxes knowing they contained someone’s entire life and trying to imagine what that would look like in a new house. The style here is an odd mixture of fish, art, and bikes that somehow comes together nicely.

“Samu! I told ya, you need to lock yer doors. This isn’t Kurami!” Atsumu calls down the hall.

“It also isn’t a red light district,” Yachi yells back. She pops her head out and grins, coming to hug Atsumu and Kiyoomi. “Hi!”

Atsumu hasn’t seen Yachi since the show she helped organize for one of her artists back in August. He gives her a bigger hug and shakes his head in disagreement. “He should still lock the doors, especially with Zed.

“Their fish?” Kiyoomi deadpans.

“Someone could take him!”

Yachi nods, feigning a serious expression. “Ah yes, with all the expensive bike parts Suna has lying around, the burglar would go straight for the goldfish.”

They laugh and Atsumu hustles into the kitchen, not enjoying being ganged up on.

“Did you bring it?” Kiyoomi asks Yachi when Atsumu rounds the corner into the kitchen.

“Yeah I-”

“Bring what?” Atsumu pops his head back out, grinning the way he always does when he’s right about something.

Kiyoomi freezes up. He’s about to admit defeat but Yachi steps forward. “You passed the bar!!!”

Atsumu has a split second consideration and decides to abandon his curiosity and cheer with Yachi about him passing the bar. “I passed the bar!!!”

They follow Atsumu into the kitchen and Yachi discretely nods her head toward the package in the living room. “I’m glad they don’t lock their door otherwise I most definitely would have dropped it walking in. That and the surprise would have been ruined.”

Kiyoomi laughs and steps around some tools Suna left on the floor in the kitchen. “Did you look at it?”

“I didn’t, promise,” Yachi says, holding up her pinkie.

Kiyoomi extends his own pinkie to complete the action. He’s forever thankful Yachi is his best friend.

On the far side of the kitchen Atsumu and Osamu are arguing now. Kiyoomi looks up to take in the new space.

“We finally finished it yesterday,” Suna says about the kitchen, joining Yachi and Kiyoomi by the doorway. He’s wiping some grease off his forearms which have two newer tattoos than when Kiyoomi last saw him.

One is of the old radio done with heavy detail matching the other tattoos on his arms. The other is a carp flag exactly like the ones hanging around Suna’s old bike shop.

He left the flags at the store so the locals didn’t think it had closed down under the new management. There is however one of the flags hanging on the far wall off the kitchen beside a series of brass pots and pans hooked to a peg board.

Yachi walks to the fridge to grab some drinks and Suna takes the momentary privacy to lean in and ask Kiyoomi a question.

“So are you and Tsumu planning on getting engaged any time soon?”

If Kiyoomi had been caught off guard by the topic he probably would have choked on air at that question, but he and Atsumu have talked about it. “Not until Atsumu has been at a firm for a couple years.”

Suna nods and doesn’t add anything else.

“Why?”

He fiddles with one of the rings on his finger and looks toward Osamu. “Well I’m probably going to ask him soon. Once I finish making the ring.”

Kiyoomi grins and tries to temper his excitement so he doesn’t ruin anything. “No double wedding huh?” He whispers.

“Fat chance of that,” Suna laughs.

Yachi makes her way back over balancing three beers and setting them down on the kitchen table. The table is the same as the one they had in Kurami. It took Atsumu and Kiyoomi an hour to figure out how to get it out of the house before Suna showed them it came apart.

The table is covered in multicolored plates set for the food that’s currently filling the surrounding kitchen counters and potted on the gas stove. Various appetizers and sides to go with whatever Motoya is making right now. He arrived from Osaka earlier today and has since made himself right at home in their kitchen.

“Stop messing with my chili,” Osamu scolds Motoya from across the room.

Motoya turns and smiles when he sees Kiyoomi but keeps his focus on Osamu. “I’m just giving a little more kick to it.”

“Enough kick,” Osamu says, coming to take the peppers out of Motoya’s hand. “I want to taste all the flavors, not have my tastebuds needlessly burnt off.

The two of them continue to bicker and Atsumu comes over to talk to Suna about how his workshop is coming along. Yachi asks if that’s supposed to be where his tools are instead of all over the floor and the three of them start squabbling as they help Motoya set the table.

The table just barely fits the six of them with their elbows bumping and their stories mixing as they talk over each other. Kiyoomi wouldn’t have any of it any other way.

When the candles Yachi put out start to run out of wick to burn, Kiyoomi stands and goes to the cooler in the garage where Suna hid the cake.

There’s a pile of broken down cardboard boxes stacked in the corner and five life vests hanging from the walls. Kiyoomi can still feel how Atsumu tugged him forward by the straps to buckle him up. He smiles to himself and lifts the cake box out of the cooler, carrying it carefully back inside.

The chatter in the kitchen has died down. Atsumu asks what’s going on and they all shush him.

Osamu stands to turn the lights off. Yachi pulls out some cake candles and Suna flips open a lighter as Kiyoomi unboxes the cake and sets it down in the space Motoya cleared in front of Atsumu.

“What’s this?” Atsumu asks.

Kiyoomi kisses the side of his head. “Read it.”

Atsumu turns back to the white cake adjourned with rainbow sprinkles and words written in pink icing calligraphy. “Screw the bar…Ijichi? Who cares about becoming a lawyer?”

Everyone in the room turns to Osamu and Atsumu follows their gazes.

“Now that I think about it there was some confusion at the bakery when I asked for the bar exam cake.”

Motoya laughs first. Then the warm drum of friends arguing fills the kitchen again.

The cake slowly disappears from the box until all that’s left is “becoming a lawyer,” sans question mark that Motoya swiped off with a fork.

“So you’re going to pick up all the bills now, isn’t that right counselor?” Motoya jokes.

Atsumu laughs. “I’m an anti-discrimination lawyer for a non-profit, not someone working for an Am Law 100.”

They all blink at him and Kiyoomi shakes his head. “He’s like an associate professor.”

Yachi gasps sarcastically. “Not tenured?”

“Not tenured.”

This ensues a round of failed sugar baby jokes that has Kiyoomi blushing and shaking his head at the quips. Atsumu is loving it, smiling wider with each passing moment.

“Yer surprise failed Omi,” Atsumu says with an ‘I’m-pleased-with-myself’ face between bites of cake. Kiyoomi is leaning against him, already feeling an oncoming sugar crash.

“This wasn’t the surprise,” he murmurs.

“Tell meee,” Atsumu whispers. He tries to bribe Kiyoomi with the cake part of his cake – Atsumu is a frosting guy – but if Kiyoomi has another bite he will pass out from a sugar crash at the table.

“What’s this about a surprise?” Motoya asks.

“It’s the thing Yachi hid in our living room,” Suna answers.

“There’s something in our living room?” Osamu asks.

Kiyoomi stands up amidst all of the questions and waves them to follow him. His eyes stay focused on the floor and he feels embarrassment brewing in him the way he always does when everyone’s attention is on him for his work. He steps into the living room and stands beside the large painting the framing store wrapped up for Yachi to blindly transport.

The five of them sit crammed together on the blue sofa that could probably comfortably hold three people and wait for Kiyoomi to explain.

“My art show is coming up,” he starts with.

“It’s on our calendar,” Osamu promises.

Motoya says the same and Yachi confirms it’s on all of her calendars which makes sense given she did all the organizing for the show.

Atsumu stays silent, looking at Kiyoomi expectantly.

“Well I know you all know the theme and the pieces I’m showing. The, uh, yeah.” He skips over what he was going to say about Atsumu and the special places they went to. He can save it for the actual show. “But the focal point of the show is…this.”

He pulls the last piece of brown paper away and it gets caught on the frame. His ears burn red as he struggles to unveil his work. Atsumu stands up from the couch and lifts the paper away, dropping it to the ground when he sees the painting.

“Oh- wow.”

Everyone else hurries from the couch to look, all reacting similarly. Kiyoomi steps back to get out of the way. He doesn’t need to see his work to know what it looks like. After three months straight of working on it, it’s practically burned into his retinas.

The horizontal canvas framed in a cool silver holds a parallel scene of the six of them and their past selves.

They’re near the treeline at the edge of his backyard by the sandbox. Kiyoomi used the silhouettes of trees to create frames separating their adult selves from their glimmer versions. The figures are staring amongst their respective groups, except for Kiyoomi and his glimmer that are staring directly at each other.

Kiyoomi felt an urge to have his self looking at Atsumu, but that’s not the point of the painting.

The two groups are unaware of each other and surrounded by small blue fireflies glowing softly. In the background of the painting stands Kiyoomi’s Uncle’s house. There’s a light on in the upstairs window and two figures are backlit. The fog in the foreground makes the figures practically indistinguishable.

He slowly backs out of the room while they continue to look and comment at the painting and slips out the front door, not wanting to respond to the compliments he was already receiving. He just wanted to show them and hope his feelings get across.

The fall night air is chilly. His breath floats in front of him as he sits on the front steps leading up to the house. Gold from the cement steps seeps into his fingers so he rests his hands on his lap. Looking across the street the unfamiliar area has become completely unrecognizable with the daylight gone.

A soft blue glow shifts in the corner of his eye. Kiyoomi reacts with disinterest, watching as a night time jogger runs with the light of a blue headlamp.

He’s had enough false-scares since coming back to Tokyo to know that it’s never a glimmer. Neon Izakaya signs, car headlights, and one time a kid running around with a glow stick: there’s always some other explanation in Tokyo.

The same could even be said for Kurami. He hasn’t seen anything since going back there, neither a glimmer nor the shrine.

Atsumu went looking for the shrine on his own when they got to Kurami after he took the bar. He couldn’t find it, but he did see a glimmer of his grandmother. After that he stopped looking for the shrine. By the end of packing the house Kiyoomi was close to seeing if the shrine could just teleport all of Osamu and Suna’s things to Tokyo, but otherwise he had no urges to make a wish.

The front door creaks behind Kiyoomi. He turns to see Atsumu sneaking out, smiling at Kiyoomi and sitting beside him, pulling him in close to his side. “I think yer amazing, you know that?”

Kiyoomi smiles against him. “I think that you’re amazing.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“You passed the bar!”

“Enough about me,” Atsumu whispers, kissing the top of Kiyoomi’s head as he hugs him in closer. “I’ve never looked at an art piece before that made me feel the feelings your piece just gave me.”

“Not even the lawyer bus ads?”

“Not even those!” Atsumu laughs.

They stare up at the few stars strong enough to permeate Tokyo’s light pollution. It’s not the same as star gazing in Kurami, but it’s not bad either.

It’s better than not bad.

With Atsumu, everything is.

A satellite blips by and Kiyoomi thinks about his small life here on earth. What would his life have been like if he’d never gone back to Kurami? Would he have ever run into Atsumu here? Would they be the people they are today?

He takes Atsumu’s hand in his and traces the lines on the inside of his palm as existential thoughts run through his head.  “Do you think we know each other?” Kiyoomi murmurs without thinking.

“More than anything else,” Atsumu says with ease.

He leans up to kiss Atsumu on the cheek. “Should we go back inside?”

He feels Atsumu shake his head. “Let’s stay out here just a little longer.”

“Trying to get out of cleaning dishes?”

Atsumu laughs. “Yup.”

Kiyoomi settles further into Atsumu’s embrace and inhales deeply. Every year the sweet smell of summer turning fall fills his senses, and every year he’s reminded he exists, and he’s lived before this moment.

And he looks forward to all the future moments to come.