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Even before the show ends, Keiji is already out back.
They’ve played better venues— although that is a slight exaggeration, because the best venue they’ve ever played was at a dusty dive bar sandwiched between an ancient McDonald’s and an even more ancient pawnshop. Keiji remembers, it was almost impossible to find; he was up and down that block for a good twenty minutes that night, until Kuroo had spotted him while taking a smoke, with his bass guitar still slung across his shoulder.
This one, tonight, is at one of their usual haunts. Somebody’s (Keiji can’t be sure who, exactly. Kuroo has many, many friends) extra room in their basement that really, should only comfortably fit three or four people for teatime. Tonight, Keiji counted at least twenty, rubbing up against each other while they danced to the noise, hot.
He lights a new stick with the faltering end of his previous one. He can hear the bass from out on the street, and he’s positive he’d still be able to hear them down the block. It’s a wonder they haven’t got any enraged noise complaints, Keiji idly wonders to himself. Or maybe they have, and they just don’t care enough to address it, or do anything about it.
Staying until the end of the band’s sets is never something Keiji has particularly enjoyed doing. Mostly because everyone always got a bit effusive, with the intimate venues, and all. It suffocated him a bit, and besides, Kuroo always found him lingering around outside the building in virtually the same arrangement: leaning against the wall, having a smoke, sometimes with a cheap premade onigiri or iced coffee from whatever convenience store was nearest. Tonight, though, he treats himself to a soft serve.
Keiji swallows around the knot in his throat as he watches Kuroo emerge from the metal door.
“I sold my guitar to Mika-chan,” he says in lieu of a greeting. “She’s always hinted at how she’s been wanting to learn, so I thought, might as well. It was an easy sell, and besides, the look Daishou gave me was priceless.”
“Hey.”
“Hey, Akaashi.”
He’s sweaty, and Keiji knows his stupid studded leather jacket and his stupid gelled up hair, and his stupid, stupid eyeliner is all just spectacle. Especially in this brutal heat; it seems to get hotter and hotter every year. Sometimes his cockiness is surprising, even to Keiji who has known him for years and years.
“I liked the set,” he says simply, with a miniscule smile.
“You would’ve liked the end of it, too, y’know.”
“Tetsurou, you know how I get.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. But since tonight was the last one, I’d have thought—” Kuroo sighs with a quick chuckle, already shrugging it off.
Keiji crushes the butt of his cigarette under his boot, and pushes himself off of the wall. He likes to poke fun at Kuroo’s ostentation, but here he is in a button up and an unravelling knit cardigan. In turn, Kuroo likes to poke fun at him back, at how he looks the part of whatever he’s trying to play, too.
“How’s Bokuto?” Keiji offers, changing the subject. He tucks his damp hands into the pockets of his jeans.
“Would not stop crying. I kept telling him, it’s really not a big deal. And it isn't!”
“It kind of is. You’re—”
“It’s not like I’m fucking off to some other country. I can barely speak English.”
Keiji’s eyebrows knit together, sceptical at the other man’s nonchalance.
Kuroo’s business school, some private, for-profit institution, wasn't far from where they were. He had woken up one day, and decided to get his shit together, for real this time.
“To a lot of people, it might as well be some other country.”
“And to you?”
“Me? I’m as much as a sellout to them, too. Look at me, in a button up and slacks. C’mon, Tetsurou.”
“Uh-uh. Sure. A master’s degree in contemporary East Asian poetry? At least when you said you wanted to go back to school your fall from grace wasn’t as high as mine,” Kuroo says, with a twinge of spite.
He was correct, on an objective level, of course. Kuroo would still be in Tokyo, running down the same streets and underpasses as them. Just— maybe not in the same world anymore. Keiji would keep going to the shows, of course; Bokuto didn’t care about much else outside of playing the drums, Tsukishima liked playing so he could destress from his classical training, and Yukie was always roping him into manning merch booths, anyways. He had no reason to just stop going.
“Now you’re just intentionally being austere for no reason. Everyone wants you to stick around— it’s not mutually exclusive.”
“I need to get serious about shit,” Kuroo groans, tilting his head back.
“What shit?”
“Do you want to grab a drink? Your dorm doesn’t have a curfew anymore, right?”
Keiji rolls his eyes at the non-sequitur, but he lets it go. “Fine. No. Lead the way.”
There’s some electronica band busking under the underpass they walk through, and it’s almost hilarious how better they are than Kuroo’s band. Really— Kuroo’s band was just a whole lot of noise, half-baked lyrics. Almost always offbeat (despite Bokuto’s enthusiasm and energy).
It’s a longer walk than Keiji expects, to wherever the other man is leading them. He knows the city, born and raised here and all, but arguably Kuroo knows it better. He’s the one who introduced Keiji to this scene, after all, and to nightlife. To his parents, Kuroo had been the responsible, mature friend, the one good at math and public speaking. But then the joint study sessions started to grow stale, and eventually the dips in the public pools to escape those study sessions did too. So one late afternoon Kuroo got both of them on a train to the actual city, telling Keiji to swear not to squeal, and his world opened up, just like that. They’d continue to see shitty shows at least twice a week, and on the weekends they could get away from family and chores and cram school.
He leads them through tunnels and alleyways, down side streets and up stairs. At some point, he sheds his leather jacket and drapes it over his shoulder haphazardly, almost distractedly.
And— Keiji gets it. He gets what abstract, vague shit Kuroo feels he needs to get serious about. He had been in the same boat a few years ago, after all, when the magic of being a fresh university graduate had worn off, and working as a part-time clerk at the corner secondhand book store was no longer giving him the freedom he thought he would get. His first real job, a copy editor at some men’s lifestyle magazine was unfulfilling, and his subsequent ones even more so: private English tutor, newsroom fact checker, VHS salesperson, personal assistant to a bestselling (but growingly irrelevant) author.
That whole time, Kuroo had been playing in his band. So Keiji retaliated against his own bitterness by straightening himself out, asking his parents to send him back to school. He’d do better, he’d find his place, he wouldn’t stay stuck.
“Where exactly are we going?” he can’t help but ask. They’ve been walking for nearly half an hour. Kuroo’s route seemed incredibly winding and ill-defined. “I’ve been on my feet all day, can we just duck into one of these izakayas?”
Kuroo turns to face him on the sidewalk, and a few salary men collide into him with a sneer and a cuss. His expression is— unreadable, and Keiji hasn’t been able to not read him in a long, long time.
“Tetsurou— God, I need a drink for this conversation. I’ll get us something from the convenience store, just stay there.”
*
In truth, he needs several more drinks for this conversation.
They’re sitting on some nondescript sidewalk underneath a broken neon sign, supposedly pointing into a massage parlor or something like that. The street is empty, which isn’t surprising considering Kuroo led them into a dead part of town. Keiji just hopes that the trains are still running by the time they’re done here.
He opens his and Kuroo’s beer cans, and the sizzle of compressed air cuts the relative silence. Kuroo’s probably already had a few drinks at the show, he always does, but he accepts the beer graciously, anyways.
“Are we going to try and justify why walking right into the belly of the beast is a good decision again? Or do you want to debate about the merit of private schools again? I could invite Tsukishima, he goes to one, too.”
Kuroo doesn’t find him very funny, so he stays quiet.
More gently, then. Keiji takes a long sip. “It’s fine, Tetsurou. You do what you have to do.”
“You think—”
“I never thought that you, of all people, would be twisted up over this.”
“Life comes at you fast, et cetera, et cetera.”
“Tetsurou—” he cuts himself off. He doesn’t know what he could say to comfort the other man; he’s never been much of the comforting type, anyways. “Where are you moving to? I’m assuming you’re giving up the room you rent in Koenji.”
A real shame, because Keiji had always liked that place. It was right beside a quaint second wave coffee shop and a jazz bar. Across the street was a second hand shop for homewares, and the two of them frequented it on the weekends, never failing to find hidden, dusty treasures. The landlady of the squat building was a carefree and boyish old woman, full of vigour. Her teeth were widely spaced apart, cavity-riddled, and she had a shrill laugh that showed them off. Keiji had shared a drink or two with her once, on a night he volunteered to help Kuroo haul some amps and wires across the city. She liked Kuroo a lot too; she was never strict about rent, noise, or his long, long string of rowdy guests.
Keiji wonders if he can grab a drink with her one more time, before Kuroo packs up.
“My scholarship is a full ride,” he replies, a bit sheepishly. “I’ll be set up in the student housing. It’ll have a kitchenette and everything, an actual burner. Plus, my own bathroom.”
“Better than mine. I have to live with the shitty common area kitchen in my dorms.”
“You still haven’t found a better place?”
“No. Fuck no. With my dissertation and all, it’s just— a lot. My adviser is close to tearing me a new one. I also have to look for a job, though an internship will do, really. A dorm mate of mine keeps suggesting this writer’s workshop in the US that she’s applying to and she said I should too, but that’s just like going to school again, isn’t it—”
“Wait,” Kuroo interrupts him, noisily putting down his can of beer. It sloshes and almost tips over on the uneven sidewalk. “Wait, wait, you little fuckin’ schemer, here you are watching me mope around about everyone feeling bitter about me going to some uppity business school and not having time to fuck around anymore, while all this time you’ve been thinking of leaving us all in the dust? And to go to America, no less.”
“I haven’t planned shit, Tetsurou,” Keiji laughs, elbowing him.
“You should stay, y’know.”
He buries his head in his hands, and peers at the other man through his dark bangs. “To reiterate: I haven’t planned shit.”
“Economy is booming, Japan is the centre of the world, baby! I’m sure there are plenty of— what did you say it was? Writer’s workshops! I’m sure there are tons of those here. Preserve our precious, dying language, Keiji.”
“Hey. It’s hardly dying. Besides,” he exhales. “I hardly have work experience. I haven’t written anything of substance in a year and a half. It’s not really worth a shot to shoot higher right now.”
“Do you think this is, though?” Kuroo’s slanted smile neutralises. The crease between his eyebrows returns. “I haven’t drunk the kool-aid, don’t worry— at least not completely— I know despite the university’s hardsell it’s not exactly a straight shot, getting a job and a good income. But like, this has to be better, right? Everyone’s giving me shit because suddenly I’m the uncool guy that got bored of playing the guitar and sleeping around and waking up at noon. I realised I needed discipline and structure, and I was given this opportunity, God knows how I got it.”
“I feel like there’s a but at the end of that thought.”
“Can you hand me another can?”
“Sure.”
Kuroo opens it. It’s lukewarm now. “But the thing is, I don’t know if that’s me talking. I mean, I’ll probably do it. God, I start next week. But after I’m done? And after that ?”
Keiji bites the warm, metallic edge of his beer can. He doesn’t know if Kuroo wants to be placated, or to be told the truth. He’s been trying to figure out his angle for months, ever since he came to him with the news that he was applying to the programme (which really, at the time was nothing more than an impulsive decision). But then he passed the interviews and the tests. Not long after, he was offered a placement and a scholarship. It had been almost world-ending, watching Kuroo run around the city for all kinds of documents and papers, when just a week prior he and the band were setting fire to an old drum set in some abandoned Yokohama field and asked Keiji to tag along to help them take some artful shots, y’know, cinematic and all .
“You’re the only one who would understand this, I think,” he continues. A few shops are closing up, pulling down the metal accordion doors on the storefronts, and turning off the lights in the signages. “You went through the whole rigmarole. You’re playing the game: university, then post-grad, then job hunting. You must have some kind of advice for me, you’ve got everything going for you.”
Despite Keiji’s affections for Kuroo (which have always gone a long, long way), he feels a pang of hurt at his words. Playing the game. He knows their situations are wildly different— he had been into books and words long before he realised he could study it and pursue it seriously. So it had almost been a non-issue. Kuroo was into everything and everything; in highschool he would always talk himself up, proclaiming he’d be some audacious chemist or physicist, but then, that was dropped the second he got into music. He was also into literature for a few short months, and he pestered Keiji a lot, begging him to let him borrow his novels. But that, again, was dropped when he grew more interested in taking girls to the secluded baseball field at their highschool after hours to make out.
It’s not like Keiji can say if not for this or if not for that , he’d be on a different path. No— playing the game or not, he’d still be right here, regardless. Exactly where he is now.
“You think less of me, then.”
“No, Akaashi, you know it’s not that. You’re not less to me because you… partake.”
“Partake in what, exactly?”
Kuroo stares at him. He’s frowning, and Keiji can tell he’s hurt, too. It gives him an odd feeling of satisfaction, that despite his exhaustion and frustration with himself, with this seemingly dead-end path, he can retaliate.
“With— fuck. I don’t know. The world? Real life? Whatever you want to call it.”
In Keiji’s real life, there are no job prospects. Keiji was just wondering earlier in the day, if he was still in good enough graces with his old boss at the newsroom to reapply as a fact checker, after he graduates. Maybe the salary would be better too, given he’s ostensibly more educated than before. He had spent his whole morning looking for her business card between his novels and pile of papers.
The animosity grips at him for a few seconds more— how could he be expected to know any more than Kuroo does, when despite doing everything right, despite the so-called booming economy and exploding job market he sees both in local and foreign news outlets, this just all feels like a long, winding road to nowhere? He wants to tell Kuroo, no, you’re making a mistake, this is all just a ruse. They gave you the hardsell. You know how many people are getting their MBAs now, only to end up as some nobody at a faceless company? Only to uphold values they were simply hired to uphold, values that have no bearing on the way he himself should live? No, he wants to say. But the thing is, he knows he already knows all this. He wants to say: stay in your band, set more drum sets and guitars on fire, and I’ll take all the pictures, I’ll play the game for both of us and I’ll tell you what I thought of it all, in the end.
Then it seeps out of him. They’re out of beer, and he has no more money on him to splurge anything else aside from his ticket back home.
“I’m your friend, and I’m glad you trust me. But I don’t have the heart to tell you what you should and shouldn’t do. It could work out for you, it really could. That’s one thing I do believe in.”
*
It’s with great self-control and mercy that Keiji doesn’t say anything more about it. They talk about more things, like about Tsukishima’s vulture of a music theory professor, about how Kuroo’s landlady and how she even offered to shave a thousand yen off his rent to convince him to stay. About the collection of short stories Keiji has been stuck writing. About the newest Fukusaku— have you seen it, Akaashi, oh God, we need to see it. About what they think will happen next year, and the next, and how they can’t believe this impossible decade is ending already. How that in about another decade, it’ll be a new century all together. It all seems almost unfathomable, to be thrust into this world.
He doubts that Kuroo’s little tantrum (because to him, that’s really what it seems most like) will be nothing more than that. It’s not like he’ll just stop going to the shows and the parties. And everyone who gave him shit will probably forget about their bitterness over the whole thing anyways. He’ll show up one night, in his crisp button up and lanyard, and everyone will have a good laugh about it as they force a guitar on him.
Keiji feeds the ticket into the turnstile and Kuroo hurries to squeeze behind him, not bothering to pay the fare.
The train is empty, being the last one of the night. Neither of them say much on the ride back to Keiji’s dorm, but Kuroo does look awfully awake for someone who played a show in a crowded, stuffy basement, and had a heart-to-heart almost immediately after. Never mind the alcohol in his system.
He remembers that first secret train ride into the city— if Keiji isn’t mistaken, they had taken one straight into Shinjuku. His parents had always been on a strict, cautious side, only allowing him to go into the city if they were with him, or if it had something to do with school. He had been a curious teenager, but his curiosity never blossomed into a rebellious streak. He knew that his friends, Bokuto and Kuroo especially, had developed a penchant for skirting the rules and the prying eyes of parents and teachers pretty early on; it was always a simple fact that by the time all the other kids were allowed to venture out into the city independently, the two already knew it like the back of their hand.
Kuroo had taken Keiji to some kind of punk gig, the kind that staged hobbyist musicians and university students, which really was a shot in the dark on Kuroo’s part. He almost had an apologetic look on his face when the crowd got even rowdier than usual, and when Keiji nearly slipped on a spilled drink on the floor. But he had enjoyed it, really enjoyed it. He had smoked his first cigarette that night, and they laughed about trying to mask the smell the whole train ride home. Kuroo’s first idea was smothering him with perfumes and colognes at the nearest department store, but Keiji was sceptical about it, claiming that that would just make the smell more obvious. He ended up just staying the night at Kuroo’s house, where he lived with his nearly deaf grandmother and father who always worked late into the night, anyways; he remembers the cloying and long-winded phone call Kuroo made to his mother, apologising about how Keiji had fallen asleep and how he didn’t want to wake up to go home anymore. But, he swore, they got a lot of studying and homework done. Every sentence was sandwiched between a sorry he missed dinner and that we didn’t let you know.
He can hardly remember a time in his life that was more fun than that moment. Sure, the shows now were excessively enjoyable, and he loved the people he saw at them. He was free to do whatever he wanted, and he was free to spend the night in strange beds without having to have an excuse ready.
Keiji can put words into the feeling: it felt like they were on the cusp of something great, something big. It was as if the world were opening up, this remarkable, wide place.
He quietly tries not to give into the nagging feeling that he’s losing Kuroo.
The announcer’s voice rings out, robotically, through the train car’s tinny speakers. They’re two short stops away from Keiji’s place, so he blinks the sleep and fatigue out of his eyes.
“You’re really sure about the taxi home? I can lend you money for your trouble,” Keiji says, above a whisper. “You could stay over. I have people over all the time.”
“Oh? Secret boyfriend?”
“No,” he retaliates, a bit too quickly. “Just— friends. Just friends. Classmates.”
“Nah, I’m fine. I’ve walked longer distances, I’m good. Besides, I can just pass out at the back of a taxi comfortably and not impose on you, so it’s a win-win situation.”
“Gosh, Tetsurou, you’re not imposing. I have an extra futon for this exact scenario. Do you know how many times Bokuto has woken me up at two in the morning just because he needed a place to crash? Only God knows how— or why the receptionist let him up.”
“Oh, you too? I’m a generous, benevolent angel and all, but I’ve given him a limit of crashing only twice a month because that boy snores like a freight train, and I like to sleep in.”
“I have no idea why. He easily has the nicest apartment amongst us all.”
On the dot, the train pulls up to the platform. Again, Kuroo squeezes behind Keiji at the gate.
He can’t help the bursts of laughter he lets out as Kuroo remains stuck to his back as they exit the station. It’s an effort to shrug him off: Keiji tries to wiggle out of it, he tries to push. But the other man is insistent, even as passerbys give them strange looks.
A surge of affection swells in his chest as Kuroo laughs in his ear, as they walk down the rotunda and the closed down corner stores. His feet are killing him, and he pretty sure he has some nasty blisters already, just from today (and the weight of his friend on his shoulders and back) aren’t helping one bit but— Kuroo will be busy next week with moving into his new dorm room, with getting his schedule and attending his classes. He fully expects the frequency of their communication to simmer down, at least just for a bit, while he gets his new life in order.
Maybe he’ll use the time to look for something better than the monotonous drudge of the newsroom. He could do that. He could even finish writing the last parts of the dissertation he’s been putting off for weeks, so he can finally go to his adviser with something more than half-meant apologies.
The receptionist hardly looks up from his novel when he waves them past the front desk.
“C’mon, Tetsurou,” Keiji laughs, as he struggles to dig his keys out of his pocket. “At least let me unlock the door.”
“Fine, fine. But I’m still leaning against you, though.”
“Just move your arm out of the way, this is harder than it looks.”
It’s as he’s trying to force the key into the lock that Kuroo suddenly grasps Keiji’s wrist with his right hand, and tilts his head to the side with his left— it’s a wildly uncomfortable and awkward pose to be twisted into, but then— they’re kissing. It’s so unromantic and out of the blue that not even seconds later they’re both laughing.
The key turns in its lock. “It’s okay, I won’t be too torn up if you tell me to fuck off. I’m still a bit drunk,” Kuroo murmurs. When Keiji turns around to face him it’s like his face is glowing red. But it’s not like he isn’t, himself.
“So that was just nothing?”
“Well, not exactly. It was… something. ”
“I’ve had a lot of dates run off because I want them to be straightforward and candid about their feelings, or at the very least about what they want, but somehow, that scares them away.”
“Good thing I’m not like them, then,” Kuroo says, seriously. “Good thing that—”
Keiji leans forward to kiss him again. Their teeth knock together, and it’s not any less disjointed than their previous kiss.
“Please don’t be doing this just because you’re drunk.”
“I’m sober. You sober me right up.”
“Do you want to come in?”
Kuroo smiles and lets go of Keiji’s wrist. Shakes his head. “Sleep on it, Akaashi. Don’t be making big decisions like this when you’re lacking sleep and sustenance, those guys and girls at our shows might excommunicate you too for fraternising with the bad guy.”
“Oh, come on. Don’t tell me after all that, that’s the thing you’re still most hung up over. They’ll get over it.”
“I’m not—”
“I’ll sleep on it, if you want me to, though.”
This time, it’s Kuroo that leans forward. Their third kiss is chaste and slow.
“Good, that’s good. I’ll call you. Your landline is still running, right? I’ll call you.”
“Don’t forget to actually enrol,” Keiji laughs, incredulously. He almost can’t believe it, that this is happening.
At that, Kuroo falters a bit, but it slowly morphs into an earnest smile. Even as Keiji shuts the door behind him, he can still see it in his mind’s eye. He sleeps on it.
*