1. The next morning we realized we didn't speak the same language... I guess I subconsciously did learn a little German last semester. 3. I will feel awake by 6 pm 4. The best part was that he forgave you. 5. I'm setting goals and achieving them. I'd say I'm quite mature for my age. 6. And how does this always happen to you? 7. (Text him!)
Any compliment from Touya is like a really expensive piece of candy. Hikaru wants to savor it, even though he knows he doesn't deserve the luxury. He won't deserve anything resembling goodness until he stops being a colossal fuckup.]
i don't know where i'm going to be in a week from now much less a month or six months or a year or whatever the hell
Well, that's the way it's supposed to be, you know. You make plans.
[For all of Akira's insistence of self-awareness and maturity, he's a little... Look, he did have everything planned out. He did. He'd just never prepared for the contingency of Shindou Hikaru.]
A year isn't a very long time. And there's always a point in thinking. Why are you acting like it's so far beyond you?
[If it's still in compliment, it's also in frustration.]
[But he knows that doesn't convey what he actually wants to say. Every time, he's thinking. Always, every time, this sort of thing...]
Obviously there are matches to play a year from now
And I'm not asking you to do what's easy
This isn't even supposed to be easy
For anyone
And yeah, I do know
And if you think I'm doing the easier way for me, then
[... Like this, churning, the intervals between Akira's texts are whittled down to frantic. It's seconds stretched taut and thin like cat's skin over the body of a shamisen, instead of his voice doing exactly the same. Think - tap - send — think - tap - send — think - boil over, hiss into the flame on the stove...
Likewise, when he finally pauses, it's much in the way he might clear his throat.]
Well, you're going to do the thing you like to do, right?
[There's something undeniably aggravating about Touya's latest flurry of texts. Hikaru is guilty of doing this kind of stuff, too, erratic and obstinate in equal measure, but it's really... Tonight, at least, it's just getting on his nerves and he doesn't know why he's bothering to read any of it. (He does know why, actually.) (He won't squander even a second of Touya's attention, positive or negative or otherwise.)
Amazingly enough, he doesn't respond right away for once. Maybe he's trying to take the time to think...
[For an instant, a knee-jerk rush of nerves, Akira wishes Shindou were right here so Akira could yell at him properly and for real. He's glad, right away, that he actually can't. There's something humiliating about flying off the handle at Shindou: he's distressed, perhaps, by Shindou or anyone nearby having even a glimpse of how Akira has been frazzled and frenetic for years now. Every freakout, no matter how frequent, grants smugness to the quieter agony of Akira toiling, alone, over Shindou and all his mysteries.
And yet, somehow, the twinge in his throat isn't as satisfying when he settles for groaning bitterly into his pillow, right now.]
Shindou
[He's typing. Then he stops typing. Shindou—it hangs. Just as the hanging is about to be too long, he's typing again. And:]
[Sudden, destructive, bubbling up from below like a tar pit--that's the reality of anger. It's enough to break through the thick crust of Hikaru's own apathy, pushing him to sit up straight, then hunch over, glaring at the bright length of his screen. He can feel the heat of it in his face, shifting under his skin, even filling up his stomach with so much sludge. I told you I'd play hundreds of games, thousands of games, with you. That's what I told you. But even as he thinks that, he can't help but also think this: Nothing lasts forever, Touya.]
so that's why you've been going on about plans and shit recently
asking me what i'm doing on this or that day
inviting me to study sessions with literally anyone
i bet it's the only reason you're talking to me right now
[Akira thinks, You're so... He breathes even through a too-clenched jaw; he pinches his brow; he kneads at his forehead with the heel of his palm. You're so... You're so... Shindou, you're so...
Touya Akira was a very nice boy for a very long time. Sweet-natured, all said. He can look back at himself and see that, too. Being earnest, being hopeful. He wouldn't have said anything like this:]
You think I want to sit here and listen to you make a fool of yourself by saying that stuff? You think I want to watch you get mad at me for trying to pull things together?
[And he wouldn't have said it, when he was younger and sweeter, because he didn't have crazed and crushing fears like this:]
You think I want to listen to you over and over talk like you might not be here next year? Or next month? Or however far ahead you don't want to think?
Do you think I even want to think about that?
But you obviously want me to hear it because you keep saying stuff like that
And even if I don't want to hear it I'm listening
[Despite the ice it brings to his gut. If he doesn't boil over, he'll be resigning himself to frostbite. He's rapid fire again, no pauses in between Sent and Now typing.]
[To be honest, Hikaru doesn't know who he's angry at, exactly. He thought he was angry at Touya, especially with how Touya is laying into him, but Touya isn't saying anything that isn't well-deserved. Of course Touya isn't here to be his personal therapist or whatever. Touya wants to play a fucking board game in peace. That's all Touya ever wanted to do, right? Hikaru covers his mouth with one hand, then, maybe to hold back the threat of vomit, as the messages keep coming and coming in. Each one feels like a battering ram to his gut.]
you're the only person who will listen to me
[The only person who can look at his kifu and know something isn't right. That something is just plain fucked. It's almost a psychic connection, more intimate than any stolen kiss, and...]
but if you don't want to do it then fine
you don't have to
i'll figure things out on my own
[Retreat. Running away again. Despite his aggressive tendencies on the board, he's pretty awful when it comes to real-life confrontation; he's always the first to leave when they're fighting about something.]
I'm saying I'm listening. I just told you I'm listening.
[But Shindou is never actually saying anything, and that's the problem; that's been the problem this whole time. Something isn't right—you know, something is just plain fucked—but Shindou never talks about what that something is. Akira wonders, not for the first time, if Shindou will ever realize how long he's been trying to listen.]
There's no way you'll figure things out on your own.
[And that sounds callous, faithless, but it's much more faithful than that, and this is what Akira means by it:]
You think I want you to have to do that, Shindou?
[An ice pack, maybe, for the tenderness left behind by his battering rams.]
[It does feel like an ice pack, like a luxury, which is why Hikaru wants to reject it before it's too late. There's just so much familiar misery in being alone that he doesn't know what to do when Touya tells him he doesn't have to be alone. At least, that's what it sounds like Touya is telling him. Hikaru doesn't know how else to interpret those words, and he's too scared to ask directly. He could have sworn he was angry a few seconds ago, all inundated with rage, but maybe he was scared out of his mind all along...]
i wouldn't blame you if you did want that
[Somehow, he's reminded of when... oh, it's a recent development, and not a bad one, now that he thinks (!) about it. When Hikaru storms out of the go salon for whatever reason, it might take thirty minutes, or an hour, or a few hours max, before Touya will message him and just carry on like things aren't broken beyond repair. Like things can be normal even when they aren't. Hikaru appreciates that more than he's ever bothered to let on. Another example of his selfishness.
But maybe it's okay if he exposes this much of himself:]
hey touya
have you ever set any impossible goals for yourself?
[Understanding you, is Akira's most immediate answer, remaining safely as no more than a quiet thought. And he isn't angry for it; just tired. He rubs his face, and once he starts that, he finds himself unable to stop for a good few seconds. It's halfway between a miniature massage and an attempt at grabbing his own brain and squeezing it into submission. At times like this, he wonders how hard Shindou needs to be squeezed, but he can't (or won't) imagine either of them allowing such a thing.]
You mean, setting myself up for failure?
[Unbidden but inevitable, Shindou's at the forefront of his mind again. It's a little unfair of Akira, but it's a little unfair to him, too.]
I think so. When I was younger.
[How to explain this...]
Past a point, it's not really acceptable for goals to be impossible. You [I] just achieve them, and if not, that's on you. [Me.] You're supposed to tell yourself that nothing's impossible and you're capable of accomplishing anything you put your mind to.
Well, I'm just telling you what I've heard, anyway.
[And he's telling Shindou that instead of asking—heart in throat—Then what would you blame me for? It sounds like a responsible thing to ask. It sounds like something he should know. He's too afraid to ask it, though.]
[With a long, long, deliberately long sigh that leaves his lungs aching, Hikaru flops over and back against his pillow again. He even covers himself with his blanket for good measure, hoping it'll ward off the cold front that's moving into his heart. He doesn't want to hear stuff like failure is not an option, but it's that perfect platitude any athlete would agree with. Some of the time, he's able to sustain himself with clichés straight out of a sports manga, his sheer force of will propelling him forward...]
that's pretty much what i've heard too
[The rest of the time, he feels like drowning himself.]
for the longest time the only goal i had was catching up to you
[Akira, secretly, quietly, doesn't want to hear that failure isn't an option, either. It's what he's needed to hear in order to come as far as he has, and he wants to go further, to keep going further, to go so far. But, there's something...]
Did you know, Shindou, there's something else, too... Sort of. I didn't hear it from anybody, but I've been thinking it.
Failing at something doesn't mean you need to stop it. It doesn't mean that anything has ended.
You keep talking like there's an end. I can't tell if that's what you want or if it's just what you think.
[It's best to be patient with Shindou. Right? The man is infuriating, somehow whipping Akira into a frenzy more than anything or anyone else—it's hard to understand what he's doing to Akira's heart. It feels like assault, to be honest. And it feels like Akira isn't doing half as much to him, which in turn just feels vulnerable... Sometimes, Akira has this faint thought, half-formed and scared of its formation—Do you have any idea?
But it's not like Akira has any idea, either. So it's best to be patient, even if it's the same as trying to be calm when you're standing on train tracks.]
[At times like this, when Touya is trying so hard to counsel him, saying things that would be soothing to anyone else... At times like this, Hikaru just feels bad for him. Hikaru feel bad for himself, too, but he feels a lot worse for Touya, who doesn't have even a fraction of the grisly context he needs here. It's like picking up a game that's already halfway over and he can't see the state of the board first. Futile, in other words. Even a genius like Touya Akira couldn't work with that.
If Touya knew about Sai, maybe he wouldn't say stuff like there isn't an end. Maybe he'd understand why Hikaru is convinced the universe is indifferent to his goals, his pain, his everything.]
i do have more than one goal
that's the whole problem
when i was just focused on you i didn't have to think about anything else
but then i had to go and fuck it up
[He's never going to catch up to Sai. He's never going to play the Divine Move for Sai--at best, he'll be another easily forgotten link in the chain to infinity. It'd take another round of divine intervention to do it by his own hand, he thinks. If he killed himself, maybe he'd end up haunting a goban, too, and he'd have more time to...
This is unfair to Touya. Extremely unfair. It makes Hikaru loathe himself more than ever before for the fact he can't stop finding ways to hurt Touya. Misery loves company, they say, or something like that. Another stupid cliché. But when you become a Go player, you end up giving up a part of yourself to your opponents, and this is the kind of shit that happens.]
[Stop that. Stop it right there. Desist. Either clean it up by saying something else, or just abandon the train of thought altogether.
And yet.]
You're never telling me what your goals are
[That has to be it. Stop it, Akira.]
You said, someday
[Don't push it. This isn't the time.
So when is it going to be time? When Shindou doesn't know where he is, a year or a month or a week from now? If Akira's hands are shaking from the effort of restraint, can't he just say what he needs to say, and steady them?]
No, it was never just you and me, because you won't let me be a part of it.
I'm trying to do the things I need to do to have you here
[Messages by text really are a curse, drawing words like that out of him—if he were looking at Shindou's face, he could stop himself from saying it. If he had to listen to his own voice gone hoarse under strain, he could refrain from speaking. But here, this way, his hands are almost numb, and he can nearly pretend he's not the one typing and sending these words. He can nearly remove himself from the responsibility of it.
But once the words are submitted into the conversation, Akira reads them back to himself, stares at their glow and how it strains his eyes. This is not what he wanted to say. Maybe it is what he needed to say, and maybe that's why he said it, but he didn't want to do it. He wants to shut up, and he wants Shindou to shut up, but he's afraid that if they both do, it will stay that way. Sometimes Shindou is frightening like that. He has these moments of... finality... like he's in the throes of ending. It incites a weird paranoia in Akira himself, as if an ending will jump out and surprise him, and ultimately gut him clean.]
No, never mind that, more importantly
You're stressing yourself out by staying up so late all the time. That's what I think.
[... Hikaru is so tired of being this much of a failure. This isn't the first time he's failed at something, of course. Not even the second, or the third. He was a failure of a son from the very beginning, just a delinquent with awful grades and a bad attitude, causing his parents endless grief. He failed the members of the Go club when he abandoned them to be an insei. He failed Isumi when he was looking for the easy win during the pro exam. He failed Sai by refusing to let him play, and he failed Touya's dad by not setting up another game between them. He failed everyone who ever believed in him by skipping his matches. And the Hokuto Cup was just failure after failure, all of them of his own making, earning him a reputation that will take a lifetime to erase. He didn't used to care about what other people thought of him, as long as Touya knew that he existed. As long as Touya looked at him with more than scorn in his eyes. But someday its its own cruel deadline--there's a point where Touya is going to lose patience with him. No one can wait forever for something. No one can do that.]
maybe you're right about that
i can't remember the last time i slept all night
[It's a good thing he's in between matches right now, or else he'd really be setting himself up for failure. He's just too afraid to fall asleep. His dreams, when he does sleep, have been mostly colorless blobs that dissolve by the time he wakes up. Still, there's always a chance he could see those sparkling blue-green skies again. There's always a chance he could see Sai again. He doesn't think he could handle having another dream about Sai. Just thinking about it makes his eyes sticky with exhausted tears.
He can't tell Touya about any of that ridiculous nonsense. Despite the promise--god, Touya would think he's fucking crazy. Touya would probably want him committed to a hospital for crazy people. Hikaru has wondered if he's going crazy, if he's delusional or manic-depressive, but that doesn't mean he wants to be told he's crazy.
But he's pretty sure he sounds demented when he replies with this:]
touya, i don't want to quit
i don't want to quit playing go
i didn't want to quit the first time either
i just thought i had to
because i couldn't
i still can't
i'm not that good
[Text messages are a dangerous tool. They have this element of unreality to them that makes them dangerous to use. If Hikaru could see Touya's face right now, he wouldn't have the courage to keep typing out his private agony. He wouldn't be willing to say anything like this. The lack of immediate feedback to what he's saying is like touching a hot stove and not feeling any pain. It just makes him want to touch the stove more, searching for the pain, even though he's burning himself in the process.]
[Akira has to think. He's trying hard to think—he tells Shindou to do this same thing, so he had better practice it himself. He's been—it's a recent development. He doesn't know whether it's a bad one; he doesn't know if Shindou has even noticed it. But he sends messages to Shindou, after bad spats, as if the bad spats never happened. As if things can be normal, even when Akira knows, with frayed nerves, that they aren't. He can't tell whether it's been the right thing to do. He can't tell if there is any right thing to do, at this point.
But he does feel pretty sure he isn't supposed to stop trying yet.]
So, Shindou
[What is it that you want to be? Why will you never be it? Who do you want to be it for? What do you want to show them, and how come?]
An acquaintance of my father's is holding a study session this coming Tuesday
You should come to it.
But he's a stickler for punctuality. He wants everybody to be exactly on time, and anyone who's late isn't allowed inside. You can't be even a little bit late. I've seen it happen.
Of course, it's at exactly 7:05AM.
If you're going, you'd better get your sleep schedule back on track.
[He wants this to be the right thing to do for Shindou. And he wants to feel safer treading here instead.]
[Hikaru blinks at the screen once, then twice, reading through this series of messages about some psychopath with a fetish for early mornings. He doesn't know how to feel about a response like that. He was expecting, like... He doesn't know what he was expecting to hear. That was the closest he's come to a full and honest confession, to exposing his brittle insides--he said a few things he's never said to anyone else. Some part of him was hoping Touya would press the advantage, asking more questions, even if they were questions that couldn't be answered. A small but more distinct part of him wanted Touya to be dismissive of what he said, just straight up telling him to get over himself already. This middle path, this abrupt change in subject, is just...
I'm trying to do the things I need to do to have you here.
Most professional players are nothing more than selfish pricks. They're not looking to make friends--they're here to compete, and if a rival is sleepless and therefore unreliable for it, that's a chance to move past them. That's a chance to gain the upper hand. Touya is different, though. Touya couldn't be more different from them. Hikaru is starting to wonder just what Touya would be willing to do to keep him around. He's never thought about it before, but now that he is, his mind grinding forward, it seems like it's been... like it's been a lot, already, and...]
that guy sounds like a real piece of work
[Irreverent in tone, as always, more out of habit than not, but that doesn't mean he's rejecting the offer. He spends a moment just pinching the bridge of his nose, hoping that twinge behind his eyes isn't the root of a migraine. He's been doing too much thinking for his own good, thanks to Touya.]
but if you're going to be there then i think i can make it
[No matter how shitty he feels, Touya's Go is still one of the most beautiful things he's ever seen. He can't be that fucked up, comparatively speaking, if he can still appreciate its beauty. (That's what he tells himself, anyway.) Instead of watching the sunrise, he'll get to watch Touya's fingers placing stones for a while...
[The breath here is short, tight, and doesn't feel like enough; the exhale is too far a reach, an overdraft of his lungs, lengthy but thin. He closes his eyes, and his head dips to the side, falling to settle near his raised shoulder and all its tension. Akira rests this way, somewhere between revelry (Shindou is cooperating at least this much) and anxious anticipation (how long a pause before it gets bad again?)—reprieve, maybe. In this moment, it's more or less fine. In this breath, exhale, and tired angle, things are more or less fine.]
There's a good bakery nearby.
There. Plans for Tuesday morning.
[See, he means, it wasn't so hard. Can't you keep doing that on through next week? And then on and on some more?]
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toastysocks) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
bakerstreet2017-10-13 01:48 pm
Akira Touya | Hikaru no Go
3. I will feel awake by 6 pm
4. The best part was that he forgave you.
5. I'm setting goals and achieving them. I'd say I'm quite mature for my age.
6. And how does this always happen to you?
7. (Text him!)
5.
i really needed that laugh
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introspection is a waste of time in general
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Thinking is a really good thing, and I know you're really good at it.
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Any compliment from Touya is like a really expensive piece of candy. Hikaru wants to savor it, even though he knows he doesn't deserve the luxury. He won't deserve anything resembling goodness until he stops being a colossal fuckup.]
i don't know where i'm going to be in a week from now much less a month or six months or a year or whatever the hell
no point in thinking that far ahead
but i'm sure you have everything planned out
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[For all of Akira's insistence of self-awareness and maturity, he's a little... Look, he did have everything planned out. He did. He'd just never prepared for the contingency of Shindou Hikaru.]
A year isn't a very long time. And there's always a point in thinking. Why are you acting like it's so far beyond you?
[If it's still in compliment, it's also in frustration.]
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i like it that way
it's easier that way
you have no idea how much things can change in a year
[...]
well maybe you do know.... so you should understand where i'm coming from!
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[But he knows that doesn't convey what he actually wants to say. Every time, he's thinking. Always, every time, this sort of thing...]
Obviously there are matches to play a year from now
And I'm not asking you to do what's easy
This isn't even supposed to be easy
For anyone
And yeah, I do know
And if you think I'm doing the easier way for me, then
[... Like this, churning, the intervals between Akira's texts are whittled down to frantic. It's seconds stretched taut and thin like cat's skin over the body of a shamisen, instead of his voice doing exactly the same. Think - tap - send — think - tap - send — think - boil over, hiss into the flame on the stove...
Likewise, when he finally pauses, it's much in the way he might clear his throat.]
Well, you're going to do the thing you like to do, right?
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Amazingly enough, he doesn't respond right away for once. Maybe he's trying to take the time to think...
...]
you're worried i'm going to quit again
[Not quite an accusation, but getting there.]
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And yet, somehow, the twinge in his throat isn't as satisfying when he settles for groaning bitterly into his pillow, right now.]
Shindou
[He's typing. Then he stops typing. Shindou—it hangs. Just as the hanging is about to be too long, he's typing again. And:]
You are so not self-aware.
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so that's why you've been going on about plans and shit recently
asking me what i'm doing on this or that day
inviting me to study sessions with literally anyone
i bet it's the only reason you're talking to me right now
you want to know if i'm planning to quit
no subject
Touya Akira was a very nice boy for a very long time. Sweet-natured, all said. He can look back at himself and see that, too. Being earnest, being hopeful. He wouldn't have said anything like this:]
You think I want to sit here and listen to you make a fool of yourself by saying that stuff? You think I want to watch you get mad at me for trying to pull things together?
[And he wouldn't have said it, when he was younger and sweeter, because he didn't have crazed and crushing fears like this:]
You think I want to listen to you over and over talk like you might not be here next year? Or next month? Or however far ahead you don't want to think?
Do you think I even want to think about that?
But you obviously want me to hear it because you keep saying stuff like that
And even if I don't want to hear it I'm listening
[Despite the ice it brings to his gut. If he doesn't boil over, he'll be resigning himself to frostbite. He's rapid fire again, no pauses in between Sent and Now typing.]
You could try listening too
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you're the only person who will listen to me
[The only person who can look at his kifu and know something isn't right. That something is just plain fucked. It's almost a psychic connection, more intimate than any stolen kiss, and...]
but if you don't want to do it then fine
you don't have to
i'll figure things out on my own
[Retreat. Running away again. Despite his aggressive tendencies on the board, he's pretty awful when it comes to real-life confrontation; he's always the first to leave when they're fighting about something.]
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[But Shindou is never actually saying anything, and that's the problem; that's been the problem this whole time. Something isn't right—you know, something is just plain fucked—but Shindou never talks about what that something is. Akira wonders, not for the first time, if Shindou will ever realize how long he's been trying to listen.]
There's no way you'll figure things out on your own.
[And that sounds callous, faithless, but it's much more faithful than that, and this is what Akira means by it:]
You think I want you to have to do that, Shindou?
[An ice pack, maybe, for the tenderness left behind by his battering rams.]
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i wouldn't blame you if you did want that
[Somehow, he's reminded of when... oh, it's a recent development, and not a bad one, now that he thinks (!) about it. When Hikaru storms out of the go salon for whatever reason, it might take thirty minutes, or an hour, or a few hours max, before Touya will message him and just carry on like things aren't broken beyond repair. Like things can be normal even when they aren't. Hikaru appreciates that more than he's ever bothered to let on. Another example of his selfishness.
But maybe it's okay if he exposes this much of himself:]
hey touya
have you ever set any impossible goals for yourself?
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You mean, setting myself up for failure?
[Unbidden but inevitable, Shindou's at the forefront of his mind again. It's a little unfair of Akira, but it's a little unfair to him, too.]
I think so. When I was younger.
[How to explain this...]
Past a point, it's not really acceptable for goals to be impossible. You [I] just achieve them, and if not, that's on you. [Me.] You're supposed to tell yourself that nothing's impossible and you're capable of accomplishing anything you put your mind to.
Well, I'm just telling you what I've heard, anyway.
[And he's telling Shindou that instead of asking—heart in throat—Then what would you blame me for? It sounds like a responsible thing to ask. It sounds like something he should know. He's too afraid to ask it, though.]
no subject
that's pretty much what i've heard too
[The rest of the time, he feels like drowning himself.]
for the longest time the only goal i had was catching up to you
there were points when it did feel impossible
beyond impossible
but it didn't matter if it felt that way or not
but now
[...]
i'm just a fucking idiot
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Did you know, Shindou, there's something else, too... Sort of. I didn't hear it from anybody, but I've been thinking it.
Failing at something doesn't mean you need to stop it. It doesn't mean that anything has ended.
You keep talking like there's an end. I can't tell if that's what you want or if it's just what you think.
[It's best to be patient with Shindou. Right? The man is infuriating, somehow whipping Akira into a frenzy more than anything or anyone else—it's hard to understand what he's doing to Akira's heart. It feels like assault, to be honest. And it feels like Akira isn't doing half as much to him, which in turn just feels vulnerable... Sometimes, Akira has this faint thought, half-formed and scared of its formation—Do you have any idea?
But it's not like Akira has any idea, either. So it's best to be patient, even if it's the same as trying to be calm when you're standing on train tracks.]
Also, you can have more than one goal, you know.
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If Touya knew about Sai, maybe he wouldn't say stuff like there isn't an end. Maybe he'd understand why Hikaru is convinced the universe is indifferent to his goals, his pain, his everything.]
i do have more than one goal
that's the whole problem
when i was just focused on you i didn't have to think about anything else
but then i had to go and fuck it up
[He's never going to catch up to Sai. He's never going to play the Divine Move for Sai--at best, he'll be another easily forgotten link in the chain to infinity. It'd take another round of divine intervention to do it by his own hand, he thinks. If he killed himself, maybe he'd end up haunting a goban, too, and he'd have more time to...
This is unfair to Touya. Extremely unfair. It makes Hikaru loathe himself more than ever before for the fact he can't stop finding ways to hurt Touya. Misery loves company, they say, or something like that. Another stupid cliché. But when you become a Go player, you end up giving up a part of yourself to your opponents, and this is the kind of shit that happens.]
i want to go back to when it was just me and you
no subject
[Stop that. Stop it right there. Desist. Either clean it up by saying something else, or just abandon the train of thought altogether.
And yet.]
You're never telling me what your goals are
[That has to be it. Stop it, Akira.]
You said, someday
[Don't push it. This isn't the time.
So when is it going to be time? When Shindou doesn't know where he is, a year or a month or a week from now? If Akira's hands are shaking from the effort of restraint, can't he just say what he needs to say, and steady them?]
No, it was never just you and me, because you won't let me be a part of it.
I'm trying to do the things I need to do to have you here
[Messages by text really are a curse, drawing words like that out of him—if he were looking at Shindou's face, he could stop himself from saying it. If he had to listen to his own voice gone hoarse under strain, he could refrain from speaking. But here, this way, his hands are almost numb, and he can nearly pretend he's not the one typing and sending these words. He can nearly remove himself from the responsibility of it.
But once the words are submitted into the conversation, Akira reads them back to himself, stares at their glow and how it strains his eyes. This is not what he wanted to say. Maybe it is what he needed to say, and maybe that's why he said it, but he didn't want to do it. He wants to shut up, and he wants Shindou to shut up, but he's afraid that if they both do, it will stay that way. Sometimes Shindou is frightening like that. He has these moments of... finality... like he's in the throes of ending. It incites a weird paranoia in Akira himself, as if an ending will jump out and surprise him, and ultimately gut him clean.]
No, never mind that, more importantly
You're stressing yourself out by staying up so late all the time. That's what I think.
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maybe you're right about that
i can't remember the last time i slept all night
[It's a good thing he's in between matches right now, or else he'd really be setting himself up for failure. He's just too afraid to fall asleep. His dreams, when he does sleep, have been mostly colorless blobs that dissolve by the time he wakes up. Still, there's always a chance he could see those sparkling blue-green skies again. There's always a chance he could see Sai again. He doesn't think he could handle having another dream about Sai. Just thinking about it makes his eyes sticky with exhausted tears.
He can't tell Touya about any of that ridiculous nonsense. Despite the promise--god, Touya would think he's fucking crazy. Touya would probably want him committed to a hospital for crazy people. Hikaru has wondered if he's going crazy, if he's delusional or manic-depressive, but that doesn't mean he wants to be told he's crazy.
But he's pretty sure he sounds demented when he replies with this:]
touya, i don't want to quit
i don't want to quit playing go
i didn't want to quit the first time either
i just thought i had to
because i couldn't
i still can't
i'm not that good
[Text messages are a dangerous tool. They have this element of unreality to them that makes them dangerous to use. If Hikaru could see Touya's face right now, he wouldn't have the courage to keep typing out his private agony. He wouldn't be willing to say anything like this. The lack of immediate feedback to what he's saying is like touching a hot stove and not feeling any pain. It just makes him want to touch the stove more, searching for the pain, even though he's burning himself in the process.]
i just want to be something i'm never going to be
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But he does feel pretty sure he isn't supposed to stop trying yet.]
So, Shindou
[What is it that you want to be? Why will you never be it? Who do you want to be it for? What do you want to show them, and how come?]
An acquaintance of my father's is holding a study session this coming Tuesday
You should come to it.
But he's a stickler for punctuality. He wants everybody to be exactly on time, and anyone who's late isn't allowed inside. You can't be even a little bit late. I've seen it happen.
Of course, it's at exactly 7:05AM.
If you're going, you'd better get your sleep schedule back on track.
[He wants this to be the right thing to do for Shindou. And he wants to feel safer treading here instead.]
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I'm trying to do the things I need to do to have you here.
Most professional players are nothing more than selfish pricks. They're not looking to make friends--they're here to compete, and if a rival is sleepless and therefore unreliable for it, that's a chance to move past them. That's a chance to gain the upper hand. Touya is different, though. Touya couldn't be more different from them. Hikaru is starting to wonder just what Touya would be willing to do to keep him around. He's never thought about it before, but now that he is, his mind grinding forward, it seems like it's been... like it's been a lot, already, and...]
that guy sounds like a real piece of work
[Irreverent in tone, as always, more out of habit than not, but that doesn't mean he's rejecting the offer. He spends a moment just pinching the bridge of his nose, hoping that twinge behind his eyes isn't the root of a migraine. He's been doing too much thinking for his own good, thanks to Touya.]
but if you're going to be there then i think i can make it
[No matter how shitty he feels, Touya's Go is still one of the most beautiful things he's ever seen. He can't be that fucked up, comparatively speaking, if he can still appreciate its beauty. (That's what he tells himself, anyway.) Instead of watching the sunrise, he'll get to watch Touya's fingers placing stones for a while...
Not to mention:]
we can go get breakfast afterward
if you want
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There's a good bakery nearby.
There. Plans for Tuesday morning.
[See, he means, it wasn't so hard. Can't you keep doing that on through next week? And then on and on some more?]
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