Chapter 11

Chapter 11

One Saturday in April, long after the cherry blossoms had faded, Kento was waiting for Ishizaka on the platform of Tokyo Station. When he saw Ishizaka come running up the stairs, he took off his baseball cap and waved it wildly.
     “Hurry up, Mr. Ishizaka! Over here!”
     Kento pounced onto the nearest train door and used his body to hold the door open until Ishizaka came tumbling in.
     “Man, I think I put more effort into that run than I do for races.” Ishizaka took off his wrinkled suit jacket and dabbed at his sweaty forehead with his handkerchief.
     “I thought thirty minutes would be enough to get me here, but it was really crowded at Big Sight. They were doing some kind of comic show or whatever. I couldn’t flag a taxi for the life of me, and the buses were at a standstill. It was hell.”
     They checked their seat numbers, sat down, and finally let the tension leave them.
     “I’m sorry for making you come out like this,” Kento apologized.
     “Don’t mind it. I had errands to run in Tokyo, anyway.”
     Ishizaka had come to Tokyo from Kochi for a medical equipment trade show held at the Big Sight venue in the Tokyo Bay area. The two had planned to meet on Saturday afternoon to visit the hospital in Shimizu where Orihara had been dispatched.
     Kento put his baseball cap back on, pulled it low over his eyes, and also fished out a pair of sunglasses to put on. Ishizaka gave him a questioning look.
     “Aren’t you hot? Why don’t you take that hat off?”
     “No, it’s…”
     “Oh, right, you’re a celebrity. I totally forgot,” Ishizaka began loudly, then quickly lowered his voice. “Sorry about that. I have a big voice.” As he spoke he pulled a Discman out of his bag. Kento watched as he took a Beatles CD out of it.
     “I’m a Beatles fan,” Ishizaka said, winking.
     “Wait a minute…”
     Kento decided to throw the question out there.
     “Mr. Ishizaka, did you ever play guitar with Yuri?”
     “Yeah,” Ishizaka nodded. Kento knew his guess was right. These two had shared a connection deeper than that between teammates on the same track team. He remembered Orihara’s somewhat forlorn eyes when he taught Kento the guitar. Although he had felt a little jealous at the time, he had assumed Orihara was just reminiscing about an old friend he used to play music with.
     He said he quit guitar and running at the same time.
     Kento reckoned that Orihara must have harboured feelings for Ishizaka that were more than friendship. He gazed at Ishizaka’s profile and his pronounced features, a little intimidating but memorable nonetheless.
     “I learned how to play the guitar from Yuri. Especially Beatles songs.”
     “That’s great,” Ishizaka said, oblivious to Kento’s mixed feelings. “It’s nice to see the Beatles’ greatness passed onto young’uns like you.”
     Kento took out a CD from his own backpack to show the man.
     “Oh, is this your group’s CD?” Ishizaka asked.
     “Yup. It’s our first album. Will you give it a listen?”
     Ishizaka took the CD from Kento and put it into his Discman.
     “I wrote the lyrics for ‘Sand Glass’, you know.”
     Shortly after, Ishizaka took off his earphones, took out the CD and gave it back to Kento.
     “It doesn’t really speak to me. I think I prefer the Beatles.”
     “No need to be so mean,” Kento said in exaggerated disappointment. “It’s not fair to compare us to the Beatles. We’re doing our best, too, you know.”
     “That you are,” Ishizaka gave a booming laugh and lowered his head in apology. “So, what time are we supposed to get there? What time have you promised to meet with Orihara? I’d like to get back within the day, if we can.” Ishizaka looked at his watch. Kento didn’t know what to say.
     “Um… I actually haven’t told him that we’re coming.”
     “What? Are you serious? What if we don’t get to see him?”
     Kento had never thought of that. What if they went to visit Orihara out of the blue, and he turned out to be on a day off from his hospital duties? Kento had been too excited about seeing him to think of backup plans.
     “Why haven’t you told him we’re coming?” Ishizaka’s eyes bulged as they looked at him. Kento decided to explain the details.
     “I thought he wouldn’t want to see us if I mentioned my name.” He left out the part where they had had sex in the spur of the moment (though Kento didn’t think so), but Kento told him everything else ? about how he loved Orihara, and how Orihara had dismissed it as a childish infatuation.
     Ishizaka folded his arms as he listened in, and once Kento finished speaking, he lapsed into thought. After a while, he sighed and glanced sideways at Kento.
     “Which means you must be gay.”
     Kento shook his head. “I’m not sure. All I know is one thing, and it’s that I love Yuri.”
     Ishizaka hummed in thought. “To me, it seems like Orihara’s got the right mindset. But, well, any adult in his right mind would reject your confession, anyway.”
     When Kento glared at him, Ishizaka waved his hand hastily. “No, that’s not what I meant. A year ago, you were still a kid, right? You can’t blame him for not taking you seriously. But what’s also true is that no one can negate what you’re feeling in your heart. This is a problem that you two have to discuss with each other.”
     Ishizaka carried on, thinking as he spoke.
     “I don’t know about giving my name, either. He feels guilt towards me. He might pretend he’s not there, just like he did to his brother.”
     “You’re right, come to think of it.” Kento had thought of using Ishizaka’s name when asking to meet with Orihara, but he realized it wasn’t such a good idea after all. “What should we do, then?”
     “Let’s see. We should say we’re just classmates from high school and gloss over the names. He might come out to meet us, wondering who we might be.”
     The feeling of uncertainty still swelled inside Kento as he wondered if Orihara would still agree to listen to their story after meeting face-to-face.
     “What if he sees us and gets angry and leaves?” Kento said with a gloomy face. Ishizaka laughed brightly and clapped his shoulder.
     “Leave it to me. I have more life experience than you. Though I don’t have much to say when it comes to male relationships, if it’s between a man and a woman, I’ve got more experience under my belt. I’ve played the matchmaker more than a couple of times, you know. I think I can lend a guy a helping hand.”

     Orihara had been dispatched to a rather large hospital in Shimizu City, with its own emergency center. Kento and Ishizaka put in an appointment at the front desk, claiming the visitor was “Suzuki from Shonan Private School”, just like they’d rehearsed. Of course, Suzuki was a fictional persona.
     “Kind of like how a spy would sign his name as John Smith,” Ishizaka whispered to him.
     However, Orihara appeared not to have any suspicions, and immediately answered the internal telephone line after being put through by the receptionist. The sharp-looking woman with short hair spoke a few words into the phone before smiling at the two.
     “He’s in a meeting right now. Will you have a seat and wait in the lobby?”
     The two decided to wait on the lobby sofa as they had been told to do. Ishizaka watched the receptionist from afar and nudged Kento with his elbow.
     “Don’t you feel your heart race when you see a beautiful woman like her?”
     “Not at all,” Kento replied promptly. It was the truth. Ishizaka shook his head in exasperation.
     “Well, if you really love him, I’m not going to complain, but…”
     “Yuri is the only one for me,” Kento said firmly. Ishizaka gave him a sidelong look.
     “He did have a pretty face, now that I think about it. Our upperclassmen used to try to make moves on him. I thought they were being stupid,” he reminisced. Kento looked at him sharply as soon as the words were out of his mouth.

     Once consultation hours ended, quite past five, the elevator doors opened to let out a crowd of doctors in white coats. One broke away from the group and came to the lobby. It was Orihara.
     Orihara saw the two of them and stopped dead in his tracks.
     “Hey,” Ishizaka said, getting up from the sofa. For a moment, Orihara almost turned on his heel, but sighed before striding towards them.
     “Kento. What in the world is going on?” Orihara looked at him critically. “Ishizaka, what are you doing here with him?”
     Ishizaka slid an arm around Kento’s shoulder and drew him close. Orihara’s face tensed for a split second.
     “We’re friends now. Kento came to interview me.”
     “Interview you?”
     “Yeah. It was part of a series on athletes with prosthetic limbs.”
     Orihara’s shoulders tensed at the words “prosthetic limbs.” Ishizaka paid no mind to him as he rolled up the right leg of his pants.
     “Look at this baby. I made it. I’m aiming to enter the next Paralympic Games.” He then rolled up the sleeves of his dress shirt and displayed his muscular arms. “Go on. Touch it.”
     Orihara hesitantly touched his arm. His eyes widened in surprise.
     “See that? Pretty impressive muscle, huh?” Ishizaka laughed jovially and looked at Orihara from head to toe. “You, on the other hand, were right to stop running. You haven’t grown a bit since high school. Look at how scrawny you are.”
     “How rude,” Orihara said with a wry smile.
     “I’m only stating the obvious. I train every day. I’m even more serious about it than I was in high school. If I hadn’t lost my leg, I wouldn’t have come this far.”
     Suddenly, his tone softened.
     “That’s what I’m trying to say. I came to show you me. To show you what I’ve become.” Ishizaka told Orihara the very words which Kento had asked him to say.
     “Orihara, I’m no Mother Theresa. I won’t say that I’ve never hated you for this. But right now, I have no grudges.” He grinned and stuck his thumb up. “If I’d led a normal life as an athlete, I might never make the Olympics. I’m proud of my leg.”
     “Ishizaka, I?“
     “I have a favour to ask of you,” Ishizaka interrupted. “Let go of the baggage you have because of what happened to me. Do it for him.”
     Ishizaka grabbed Kento’s arm and pushed him out in front of Orihara.
     “You two haven’t seen each other in a while, right? I’m sure you have lots to talk about. I’ll leave him with you.”
     He then glanced at his watch and picked up his bag and suit jacket from the sofa.
     “The bullet trains will be running for a while still. I’m going home. I have work tomorrow.”
     Orihara stood still for a while after seeing Ishizaka off. After a long stretch of time, Orihara sighed and turned back to Kento. He took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes, and put them back on.
     “Kento, what about you?”
     “I have the day off tomorrow,” Kento managed to reply gloomily. He hadn’t been able to take part in their conversation at all. Even after all these years, the air between Orihara and Ishizaka still implied that they had a strong bond. Kento felt completely dwarfed.
     Orihara approached him, oblivious of his diminished spirits.
     “Why don’t you stay the night at my place, then?” He then looked up at Kento with an exclamation of surprise. “You’ve gotten so tall!”
     “Uh, yeah,” Kento replied.

     Orihara lived in a condominium next to the hospital. He invited Kento inside a simple one-bedroom unit with a living/dining room and kitchen. Kento had planned to say so many things once they were alone, but he was so choked up with emotion he had trouble opening his mouth.
     “I thought I’d take you to a nice sushi restaurant since you’ve come all the way to Shimizu, but I thought it might cause a commotion if people recognized you,” Orihara apologized as he ordered off a delivery menu. “I’m sorry. Next time, I’ll try to find a restaurant where we can go without you being found out.”
     “You don’t have to worry about that.” Kento inwardly gave a wry smile at Orihara’s overly concerned tendencies. He hasn’t changed at all. He had wondered what he would do if Orihara had changed over the past year.
     The apartment was clean but barren-looking. There were no floral-patterned cushions or lace curtains. It looked very much like a man’s apartment.
     It doesn’t seem like he has any girls coming over, but….
     Kento also kept a sharp eye out as he inspected the bathroom. There was no extra toothbrush as far as he could tell. Good. That means he hasn’t found a new girlfriend. But he was still worried. When Orihara came into the bathroom as he was leaving, he decided to make sure.
     “Doctor, are you going out with anyone right now?”
     Orihara blushed furiously. “No,” he said.
     Good, Kento thought.

     Once he got out of his bath, Orihara went to the kitchen and came back with a can of beer. He offered one to Kento, but Kento declined, saying he was still underage.
     “Oh, right, you’re still seventeen. You’re so tall, I sometimes forget.”
     “Stop treating me like a kid,” Kento protested as he toweled off his freshly-shampooed hair. “I might not be able to drink or smoke yet, but in two weeks I’m turning eighteen. I’ll be able to gamble.”
     Orihara smiled slightly before bringing the beer to his lips. He came to sit down beside Kento on the sofa.
     “Thank you,” he said. “I can’t thank you enough for… what you did. I wanted to see Ishizaka for so long… but I thought I never could. I thought I had no right to.”
     The care he felt for Ishizaka was evident in his voice, which made Kento feel a prick in his chest.
     “Were you in love with Mr. Ishizaka?” Orihara snapped his head up at Kento’s slightly sharp tone. He nodded his head almost unnoticeably.
     “I could never tell him. I mean, after all, I was the one who…”
     Kento hurriedly scooted beside Orihara and put a hand on his shoulder.
     “I’m sorry,” he said.
     “It doesn’t matter now,” Orihara said. “But the same doesn’t go for what I did to you. I left without saying a word.” He sighed, taking off his glasses and putting them on the table. “I was… happy when you used to come over to my uncle’s house to visit. Before I knew it, I was looking forward to it.”
     Kento’s eyes widened at the unexpected confession. Orihara continued sheepishly.
     “About that night… I was so ashamed that I took advantage of your kindness, and… that’s why I said what I did. And if I stayed there, I knew I would end up relying on you, so I put a stop to it.”
     He rubbed his fingertips together as he squeezed the words out painfully.
     “I always thought I should never have been born.”
     “You’re wrong!”
     Orihara choked at Kento’s loud outburst.
     “Thank you,” he said. “That’s why I left without saying anything to you. And when I got back to the university’s medical office, I signed up for a relocation. I was trying to distance myself. You hated me for it, didn’t you?”
     It had been hard to say goodbye a year ago, but Kento shook his head.
     “It doesn’t matter now. I was able to see you again. That’s good enough.”
     Orihara lifted his face in surprise and stared at Kento. A blush rose in his cheeks as he averted his eyes.
     “You’ve become a lot more mature.”
     “You think so?”
     Kento slid his hand on Orihara’s shoulder and gently held him closer. Orihara twitched, but didn’t resist.
     “Doctor…” Kento whispered as he held Orihara close. “You were wrong.”
     “What?” Orihara said in a startled way, looking up in his arms.
     “You said I would forget about you, but I never stopped loving you.”
     Orihara was looking up at him with a slightly troubled expression. Kento hooked a finger under his chin.
     “Will you accept me now?”
     When their lips overlapped, Orihara still did not resist.

     Orihara walked ahead as he led Kento to the bedroom.
     “Doctor, are you sure?” Kento asked while he took Orihara’s pajamas off. “I don’t want you to say that it’s a mistake again.”
     Orihara flushed and shook his head. Once they were naked and on top of each other, Orihara’s body seemed so fragile in comparison to his own body, which had grown a lot over their time apart. Kento hesitated for a moment. I have to make sure it doesn’t hurt.
     He lay down on his side facing Orihara so he wouldn’t put any weight on the other man.
     “Hold onto me,” he said, as he wound Orihara’s arms around his neck. He held the man close as they both lay on their sides, and lifted one of Orihara’s legs so that he was straddling Kento’s leg, and entered him that way. Orihara gasped a little from the tight squeeze, but eventually loosened up as he grew accustomed.
     It had been a year since their last time in bed, but for Kento, the feeling of being inside Orihara was exactly as he’d remembered it. He hasn’t changed at all. He’s warm, soft, and gentle. Orihara filled him with so much pleasure, so much happiness.
     “Doctor, I love you… I’ve always loved you,” he whispered to the man who desperately clung to him. Orihara’s face was buried in Kento’s neck, but he nodded in response.
     Kento let go of the leg he was hoisting up and reached down to Orihara’s lower regions and stroked him. Ragged breaths burst at his ear, just as they had that night. The breaths turned to sweet moans and were sucked into his own feverish heat.

     As their intimacy reached its peak, the man’s slender arms tightened around Kento’s neck.
     “Doctor…”
     Orihara let out a short cry as his soft body bucked. Kento held him tightly. After climaxing, Orihara’s strength left his body and he was no longer able to hold onto Kento. Kento laid Orihara down on the sheets and decided to make love to him face-to-face this time.
     “I can see you better like this,” he whispered. “Doctor, you’re beautiful.”
     Orihara hid his face from embarrassment.
     “No, don’t do that. Show me your face,” Kento said, gently prying his hands away. “I missed you. I wanted to see your face. You were all I was thinking about.”

     As he slowly and reluctantly detached his body from Orihara’s, Kento gently took him back into his arms. He brushed up the man’s damp hair and kissed his sweating forehead.
     “Doctor, did you sleep with me as a way to say thanks?” he asked.
     “No, I didn’t,” Orihara said, looking up at Kento with reddened cheeks.
     “Oh. Good.” Relieved, Kento buried his face in Orihara’s hair. “Did you see me on TV?”
     Orihara nodded silently. After a pause, he began to speak in a low voice.
     “I was… happy that you debuted. I watched as much of you as I could… though I was busy with work and I couldn’t always. But I recorded the shows so I could watch them later.”
     “Really? So did you watch that episode of Music Map?”
     Orihara nodded.
     “Did you get the message that I love you?”
     Orihara blushed again, but nodded and continued to speak.
     “I was filled with so much happiness to see you singing and dancing again.”
     Kento ran his fingers through Orihara’s soft hair. “Does that mean I was the one to bring you happiness?”
     “Yes.”
     It was everything Kento had wished for. Satisfied, he buried his face in Orihara’s hair again. He decided to take a leap of faith with his next question.
     “Hey, Doctor, do you love me?” he asked.
     There was a brief silence, after which came his answer in a dubious voice.
     “I think so.”
     “Honest. That’s just like you, Doctor,” Kento chuckled as he stole Orihara’s lips again. ‘I think so’ was enough. His biggest wish had already come true ? to bring happiness to the person he loved most. Now, they had all the time in the world to spend together. He would take his time to make the man fall in love with him.
     Kento sighed in contentment as he released Orihara from their kiss. He felt like his whole body had been filled to the brim with something hot and sweet. He laid a finger on Orihara’s chin and turned his face towards him, and gazed at his beloved’s face.
     “There’s a song I wrote ? will you listen to it together with me? I thought of you when I was writing the lyrics.”
     Orihara slowly opened his eyes and tilted his head. “You wrote a song?”
     “Yeah. I wrote the lyrics to one of the songs in our first album. I’m kind of like Paul or John, don’t you think?”
     Kento crawled out of bed and went to grab his backpack. He pulled out a Chronos CD and showed it to him.
     “See? It’s this song ? ‘Sand Glass’.”
     “Did you really write the lyrics?”
     Orihara looked astonished, which made Kento feel a little proud. He sat down on the bed and cupped Orihara’s face with his hands.
     “Yeah. I wrote it with all my love,” he whispered, as he bent forward to kiss him.
     I wrote it to send it to you.