#spent the last two days driving to florida and then unpacking five million boxes

[shercockadoodledoo]

ballet shoes and ice skates (3)

part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5

also on ao3

Nezumi was exhausted in the morning, but he was used to working in exhaustion, preferred it that way, and was no less focused as Shion took his hands from the small of Nezumi’s back and the space between Nezumi’s shoulder blades.

           Without the figure skater’s hands, Nezumi promptly fell onto his back on the ice, his breath knocked from his lungs not for the first time that morning.

           “Maybe we should take a break,” Shion said, standing above him with his hand in his hair.

           Nezumi waited until he could breathe again, then shoved himself off the ice. “We just started.”

           “We’ve been at this for two hours.”

           “We never break after two hours. I can do it. Show me again.”

           Shion shook his head, but he skated away, and Nezumi watched him carefully. The figure skater was incredibly graceful on ice. Moved as if he was a part of the ice itself. Nezumi could have watched him for hours, demanded demonstration after demonstration without practicing any of the positions himself and been content to do so.

           It was no surprise that Shion had gold medals. He was something to watch, something that it almost hurt to look away from.

           Shion skated in a large curve. His knees bent, and he lowered down, his back arching as it had the night before, but instead of a bed beneath him there was nothing but a foot of air and then ice. He spread his arms out, his head lifted to the ceiling of the rink, and while Nezumi could not see exactly, he had a feeling Shion’s eyes were closed.

           He held the position – the cantilever, Shion had called it – then straightened up again, kept skating away as if he’d forgotten Nezumi entirely, and Nezumi wouldn’t have minded being forgotten, wouldn’t have minded watching Shion skate on his own for hours. But then Shion was looping back, stopping gracefully in front of Nezumi, who pushed his bangs up from his face.

           They kept escaping his clip.

           “You hold your upper body up entirely with your legs and core,” Shion said, not for the first time.

           Nezumi skated back, then forward again, giving himself momentum as he bent his knees, arched his back.

           “You have to bend your knees more!” Shion called.

           Nezumi did as he was told, but he knew his balance was off, was falling back before he could right himself, this time curling onto his side to avoid having the wind knocked out of him again.

           He pushed himself up and listened to Shion’s skates on the ice, approaching him.

           “I saw you do a position like this at Swan Lake. I know you have the core strength for it,” Shion said, extending a hand that Nezumi didn’t take.

           He stood up on his own and rubbed his right elbow. He kept falling on it. He’d have to remember to fall on his other side every once in a while.

           “It’s different on ice,” he said.

           “I know that,” Shion replied, reaching out and touching Nezumi’s arm.

           Nezumi pulled away, skating backwards from him.

           Shion could touch him to place his body into position. Shion could touch him to feel his skin, move his hair aside from his neck in order to press his lips to the space he’d cleared.

           But Nezumi didn’t need Shion touching him to check if he was bruised. Nezumi already knew he was bruised. A bruise was nothing. A bruise would heal.

           “Let’s try it again, then. Lower yourself slowly, I’ll do the same thing beside you, watch me,” Shion said, and so they tried it again.

           Again and again. Hours passed until afternoon appeared, stretched out, settled on the rink in bright streaks of sunlight that nearly made Shion’s hair glow.

           Nezumi liked to look at where the patches of sunlight settled on Shion’s skin. He was looking at a square of light on Shion’s neck as Shion placed his hand on the flat of Nezumi’s stomach, above his t-shirt.

           “Lower down more, your torso should be parallel with the ice.”

           Nezumi’s legs shook. He pressed a hand to the ice below him to prop himself up.

           “Sometimes skaters do the cantilever with a hand on the ice. You don’t have to do it with arms extended. It’s not like you’re in competition, you don’t have to master any of this,” Shion was saying, even though a second before he’d been insisting on getting parallel with the ice, but Nezumi chose not to argue.

           He understood that Shion was used to perfection. That when he coached, he expected the mastery that he himself possessed.

           Nezumi wasn’t going to let himself disappoint the man.

           “Can you lower just an inch more?” Shion asked, and Nezumi did as he was told until he was falling again onto his back.

           Nezumi laid on the ice and looked up at Shion’s face hovering above his, not surprised entirely to see that the figure skater was smiling lightly.

           He smiled easily. All the time. It was so simple to earn his smiles that it wasn’t as if they’d been earned at all, but Nezumi still felt some satisfaction, that odd warmth in his chest.

           “Hi,” Shion said, from above him.

           “Hey,” Nezumi breathed. He closed his eyes. He was exhausted. Should have gotten more sleep the night before, but he’d been kept awake.

           Even after they’d had sex, then once more, Nezumi had trouble sleeping with such a warm body beside his. Shion radiated heat. He was like a furnace, and Nezumi wondered if all people were like him, or if it was just him alone. He seemed like the kind of person to be a rarity. An oddity. An exception.

           “Are you okay?” Shion asked.

           “Great.”

           “We haven’t taken a break today.”

           “I don’t need a break.” Nezumi opened his eyes. Saw that Shion was still watching him. This didn’t surprise him. He had a feeling Shion had watched him the night before as well long after they’d unraveled their bodies from each other, choosing to watch rather than to fall asleep.

           “Okay. Let’s try again,” Shion said, so Nezumi pushed himself back up, stood up and skated away from Shion to shake himself out, returned beside the man to try again.

           Shion gave another demonstration, and Nezumi enjoyed looking at the arch of his back.

           “What about the World Championships?” Nezumi asked, a    question that had been on his mind for some time, as Shion straightened up.

           Shion blinked at him. “What about them?”

           “Aren’t they in March?” Nezumi had done some loose Googling on figure skating competition schedules back when he had only known Shion from the videos his agent had given him. He knew there was some controversy around the World Championship, but hadn’t bothered to look more into it.

           The internet search had bored him quickly. He’d preferred to look at the videos of the figure skater, pause them at certain moments, play them again.

           “They were. There haven’t been World Championships in figure skating since I was a little kid. There was an upswing of skating injuries because the season was so long, and after a few more serious incidents, the FSU decided that the Grand Prix Final would be the culmination championship of each season, and they got rid of Worlds. Standards of figure skating have changed too, since there’s a longer off season. Quads are expected now. They changed the required elements of short and free programs to accommodate the new standards.”

           While Shion spoke, Nezumi skated forward and back then forward again, gliding into the cantilever, lowering himself with each of Shion’s words, tilting his head up to face the roof, watching the ceiling slide by.

           He had a hand on the ice, and contemplated extending it as Shion had, but when he tried he was falling again.

           He got up again. Skated back towards Shion.

           “But like I said, I was a little kid when all of this happened, hardly two years old. There was some controversy, of course, it was a big change in the history of figure skating competitions, but it was done to allow skaters more time to excel without having to worry about practicing their same programs or overworking themselves into injury by trying to do too much in a shorter off season. It didn’t really affect me, since I didn’t know much about figure skating beforehand.”

           “So your mother was in one of the last World Championships,” Nezumi said. He did not actually care about Shion’s mother. He liked when Shion talked. He suspected the man was full of words. He spoke in a straightforward manner, as if he were in a classroom, giving a lesson. As if he were full of facts, full of truths, things Nezumi might never have known existed in his own universe.

           Nezumi wasn’t interested in the history of figure skating, but he could see easily that Shion was. He could see that Shion enjoyed talking about it, or maybe it was that he enjoyed talking about anything at all.

           “No. The one time she qualified for the World Championship after she won gold at the Grand Prix Final, she was a few months pregnant with me, and chose not to compete. She never competed again after I was born.”

           Nezumi had done another cantilever. Lifted his arms again, nearly had them extended, felt himself losing his balance and lowered his hand quickly enough to catch himself, then straightened up without falling.

           “Do you feel guilty?” Nezumi asked, not looking at Shion, skating away from him, practicing other positions – the lunge, the catchfoot with his leg both behind and then in front of him, the spread eagle, and then again the cantilever, this time extending his arms for several seconds before having to stand up again.

           “I have nothing to do with my mother’s decision. It was hers to make.”

           Nezumi had skated back to Shion, who stood where Nezumi had left him, had not moved an inch.

           “Do you think she regrets it?” Nezumi asked, and Shion tilted his head.

           “No, I don’t. Why are you asking all of this?”

           “Maybe I want to get to know you,” Nezumi said, feeling his lips quirk up.

           Shion raised an eyebrow, his hands rising to rest on his hips. “Then you should ask me about me, not my mother. You looked good, by the way. You should still be lower in the cantilever position, but you’ve nearly got it. I think you earned yourself a break. Also, I’m starving.”

           Nezumi felt his smirk widen and shook his head. “Fine, we’ll take a break. I figured you’d have a bit more stamina, you’re not even the one doing most of the work.”

           “Coaching is a lot of work. And it’s good to know when to take breaks. You’re not doing any favors to your body by overworking yourself. You should know when to stop,” Shion replied, using his lecture voice as he led Nezumi off the ice. “Sushi at my apartment?”

           It was a loose routine from the previous five days that Nezumi broke after he checked his phone, found a text from his agent.

           Meet me at the hotel asap.

           Nezumi fully intended to blow her off, to return to Shion’s apartment, forgo the sushi and fuck him instead, but his phone started ringing as he was about to lower it into his pocket.

           “What?” Nezumi asked, snapping it to his ear.

           “What are you doing?”

           “Talking to you on the phone. What do you want?”

           “Aren’t you supposed to have breaks?” Kiyoko’s voice asked, sounding irritated, as if Nezumi was the one to call her unannounced and ruin her plans to fuck a figure skater.

           “I’m on it right now.”

           “Then get to the hotel, didn’t you get my text?”

           “I’ll be there in five,” Nezumi snapped, hanging up before he could get more annoyed. He glanced at Shion, who was staring at him. “My agent wants to see me.”

           “Oh, all right. I’ll see you back here in an hour then.”

           Nezumi nodded, and they changed out of their skates before heading out, parting ways at the exit of the rink. Nezumi thought about glancing back over his shoulder to watch Shion walk out of view, but decided against it. He tucked his hands into his pockets instead and walked quickly to the hotel where he found his agent instantly, sitting at the bar.

           He slid into a stool next to her.

           “You reek of sweat,” Kiyoko said in greeting, glancing at him quickly.

           “What do you want?”

           “Want a drink?”

           “I’ve still got to get back to training. What do you want?” Nezumi asked again, undoing his clip and pushing his bangs back up, reclipping them.

           “How’s training going?”

           “Was there a point to making me come here?” Nezumi sighed, leaning his elbow on the bar and his hand on his palm.        

           His agent took a sip of her martini from a thin straw. Nezumi glanced at the time on her watch, noted that it was only four in the afternoon.

           “I came to your room last night, and you weren’t there.”

           “So?” Nezumi asked, bored, thinking he should have ignored his agent’s request to meet her, wondering if Shion was at his apartment yet or making small talk with the guy who worked at the sushi place.

           “I told you to find out if Shion was signing the contract.”

           “He is.”

           “You didn’t tell me that.” Kiyoko replaced her glass on the bar and leaned forward.

           “I’m telling you now.”

           His agent leaned even closer, and Nezumi leaned back, unfazed by her calculating stare. “Where were you last night?”

           “Don’t see how it’s your business.”

           “Don’t tell me you were having sex with Shion.”

           Nezumi sighed. It continued to astound him how his agent assumed his personal life was any of her concern.

           “You did!” she shouted, so loudly that a couple at the bar – the only other people there – stared at her.

           “Is there a reason you’re shouting?” Nezumi asked mildly.

           “I cannot believe you had sex with the figure skater in order to get him to sign your contract!” Kiyoko hissed, though she appeared rather delighted.

           “I didn’t.”

           “Not that I’m upset,” Kiyoko said quickly, straightening up and pushing her glasses up her nose. “This is great for your career, trust me, you did the right thing. He signed the contract already? You saw him do it? We’ll have to send for your stuff, and mine as well, though I’ll be going back and forth between here and Tokyo, I have some work to sort out in the city.”

           Nezumi didn’t bother correcting his agent’s ridiculous assumption that he’d bother having sex for a signature. It hardly mattered to him what she thought, and at least now she wasn’t yelling at him for something or another.

           “You know,” Kiyoko said, tracing the rim of her margarita glass, “you could do it again.”

           “Do what again?”

           “Sleep with him. That would be great publicity for the film, you having an affair with the world’s greatest figure skater right before your own figure skating movie. The film would shatter the charts, Nezumi, it’s something to consider.”

           Nezumi lifted his cheek from his palm to stare at his agent fully. “Are you drunk?”

           His agent waved her hand. “Just a little. Just think about it, that’s all. I’m not telling you to fall in love or anything, just an affair, let the tabloids pick it up. It’s even a little scandalous, you’re both men, you know how the country still is with that. Really, I wish I’d thought of this myself, this is genius, your film will blow up before you even start shooting.”

           “You did think of this yourself,” Nezumi reminded slowly. “And I’m not fucking the guy for press, try to get that out of your head.”

           His agent frowned. “What, suddenly you’re Mr. Morality? Give me a break, Nezumi. I know you care about the bottom line, and the bottom line is they won’t even be able to fit the entire figure on your paycheck when word gets out of your affair. This is your chance, kid. You’re going to be huge.”

           “There is no affair. Did you really manage to convince yourself that your ramblings are true in one minute? Maybe you shouldn’t drink the rest of that,” Nezumi advised, reaching out to move his agent’s glass away from her.  

           “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of the press. That’s my job, I’ll make sure they get some good photos – ”

           “Hey, Kiyoko. Listen to me. Stop spewing this nonsense, it’s getting a little irritating,” Nezumi snapped.

           His agent pointed at him. “You’re the one who slept with the guy. I didn’t tell you to do that.”

           “You made that up, remember? When did I say anything like that?”

           “So you didn’t sleep with him?” Kiyoko demanded, squinting at Nezumi, who raised an eyebrow back at her.

           “I have to get back to the rink. And I think it’s time for you to go to bed, you’re being a little neurotic. It’s unbecoming.” Nezumi slid off his stool, wondered if he should help his agent up to her room, but she didn’t appear all that drunk.

           She certainly was acting completely out of her senses, but her gaze was sharp on his when he looked at her.

           “Keep up the good work. This is your shot, Nezumi. I know you like your theater, but film is where the money is. You’ve got talent, and I believe that, I do, I’ve seen your shows. But the big screen is not just talent like the theater is. It’s all publicity and press, and you’ve got the face for it. If you use it right, you’ll be fine.”

           Her words were too sincere, and Nezumi didn’t particularly like the sound of them. He took a step away from her, watched her finally tear her gaze from his. When she reached for the martini Nezumi had moved out of her reach, Nezumi finally turned away from her, left her without turning back.

           Nezumi didn’t care about publicity and press. He didn’t want it. He knew Shion was used to it, had to be used to it, but it wasn’t what Nezumi had ever considered for himself.

           He trusted his agent. She knew more about the film industry than he did. She was probably right about what sold tickets, but that only made Nezumi dread the making of this film even more.

           He felt right in the theater, he felt at ease on stage. Nezumi didn’t know anything about being behind a camera, didn’t know if it was for him, but he didn’t give himself the luxury to choose.

           Film was the better deal, and Nezumi would take it just for that.

*

After practice, Shion followed Nezumi to the ballet studio again, though this time, he walked beside the man.

           Nezumi’s demeanor had changed after he’d come back from meeting his agent for the rest of his lesson, though Shion couldn’t pinpoint how. He contemplated asking Nezumi if something was wrong, was still contemplating when they reached the studio, greeted Nagisa, then let themselves in the back room.

           Shion leaned against the bar and watched Nezumi change his sneakers to ballet flats. The motions of tying them up his leg were quick and graceful as if he’d been doing it for years – and he had, Shion remembered, he’d been doing it since he was seven.

           Nezumi stretched first, sitting with his long legs extended, reaching out past his toes, wrapping his entire hand around the arch of his foot. He bent so low his forehead touched his knees, his spine exposed to Shion but for the thin fabric of t-shirt over it.

           He had a scar on his back. A burn scar, Shion recognized it the night before from Safu’s textbooks he’d borrowed to read. It was large and rigid underneath Shion’s fingertips, and Nezumi had shivered as Shion had touched it, a quick jolt of his body over Shion’s.

           He didn’t offer an explanation, and Shion didn’t ask, just as he didn’t ask about the words Nezumi spoke – shouted, really – once he was asleep.

           Nezumi stood up after five minutes of stretching, approached the bar that Shion leant back against, his arms extended at his sides with his elbows resting on the bar behind him.

           “Want to learn something?” Nezumi asked, and Shion shook his head, dropped his arms from the bar.

           He had always loved to learn, always craved knowledge, but now he felt oddly content being in the dark.

           It was new, for him, but Shion welcomed new things. Welcomed Nezumi, the newest thing in his life, thrilling and incredible, addicting and intoxicating.

           “Then why are you here?” Nezumi asked, lifting his leg so that it was at a straight angle in front of him, resting his calf on the bar where Shion’s elbow had only just been, leaning his body forward so that his chest was against his knee.

           “To watch you,” Shion replied.

           Nezumi exhaled through his smirk, a silent laugh that he offered Shion often. “Already obsessed?”

           “Yes.” Shion didn’t see a reason to lie. He wanted Nezumi to know how deeply he’d fallen. How beautiful the man was, how content Shion was to watch him.

           Nezumi just shook his head. Dropped his leg and lifted the other. His flexibility was familiar to Shion now on an intimate level. Shion knew many positions into which Nezumi could fold himself. Wanted to learn more.

           “Will you sleep over at my place again?” he asked, while Nezumi curved his arms over his head, bent to each side in a slow and lovely arch of movement.

           “Hasn’t anyone taught you the merits of being aloof? Playing hard to get?”

           “Do you want me to pretend not to be interested in you?” Shion asked, and this time Nezumi’s laugh was audible.

           “It’d certainly be a change.”

           “I don’t see the point in pretending not to want what I do.”

           Nezumi glanced at him then, a quick look, indiscernible but enough to shower lightning over Shion’s skin. “I suppose you don’t.”

           “So will you come over?”

           “If you’re going to beg,” Nezumi replied, looking away from him again.

           Shion contemplated the actor. Nezumi, clearly, preferred to be aloof. Hard to get. Uninterested, when Shion knew he was quite the opposite, had the evidence bitten into him, soft marks on his skin that he was eager to add to.

           Nezumi’s behavior interested Shion. He wanted to speculate over it with Safu, break down this man, understand every single thought he had, every action he displayed and even more so, everything he hid.

           Maybe he had a reason to be wary, but Shion didn’t. Shion was glad to be open, give Nezumi everything of himself, show Nezumi that it didn’t have to be hard, it didn’t have to be a bad thing, it didn’t have to be the wrong choice to offer someone everything – even if it felt reckless and rash and much too fast, much too drastic, much too dangerous to be right.

*

Nezumi woke alone in Shion’s bed on Saturday as he had the morning before.

           When he rolled onto his back, the clock on the nightstand said it was half past seven. Nezumi pressed his groan into Shion’s pillow. Shion had light blue sheets. They smelled like him, a smell unidentifiable but that it was undeniably Shion.

           Nezumi pushed himself up from the mattress after he watched three minutes go by on the clock. He dragged himself from the sheets, found his boxers on Shion’s floor and pulled them on, then left the room.

           There were sounds from the kitchen, but Nezumi went to the bathroom. He peed with his eyes closed, washed his face at the sink, stared up at the mirror to watch drops of water fall from his eyelashes and the tips of his bangs. He stole a glob of toothpaste from the tube curled on the sink and pressed it to his teeth with the tip of his uninjured forefinger while he examined his arms and legs, lifting the waistband of his boxers to look at the bruise coloring his hip the purple of a thick sunset.

           Nezumi spat in the sink, rinsed his mouth, left the bathroom, and tied up his hair while he walked into Shion’s kitchen, where the figure skater was at the stove, his back to Nezumi.

           Nezumi liked Shion’s kitchen. It was filled with tiny potted plants. They sat on the stools so that Nezumi could not sit, they cluttered the counter so that a plate could hardly fit, they surrounded the stove and teetered on the edge of the sink and perched on top of the toaster. There were ones with thick leaves, others with small flowers, others like cacti that had been shrunk down when Nezumi hadn’t known cacti to grow anywhere but the desert.

           Shion was humming under his breath, as he had been the morning before. The morning before, he’d made scrambled eggs. It wasn’t eggs today, but something that smelled syrupy, and Nezumi hovered over to the stove to stand beside him, peered over Shion’s shoulder to see that he was making French toast.

           “It’s like a bed and breakfast here,” Nezumi noted, and Shion looked at him, his eyes wide, his smile immediate.

           That easy smile. Instantaneous, like Shion had a store of them prepared, like he slipped them on just for Nezumi.

           Nezumi blinked. What a stupid thought.

           “I didn’t hear you come in here. Hi, good morning.”

           “Morning.”

           “Do you like French toast? I started making them before I remembered you don’t really like sweet things. You can have regular toast if you want, there’s butter and jams in the fridge.”

           Nezumi shrugged. “French toast is fine.”

           Shion just stared at Nezumi, in such an intense way that Nezumi vaguely wondered if the guy was about to suggest having sex again, which Nezumi was fully prepared for despite still feeling half asleep, but then Shion was pointing at his eye.

           “You have eye goop.”

           Nezumi stepped back, rubbed at his eyes. “No, I don’t,” he muttered, turning away from Shion, but he still heard Shion’s laugh, could still picture Shion’s smile – that goddamn smile.  

           “Do you know that you kick in your sleep? I’ll be as covered in bruises as you are if you keep that up,” Shion was saying, as Nezumi rubbed the crust from the corners of his eyes.

           Nezumi glared back at him. “I don’t kick in my sleep.” He had not known this. He’d had no basis to know this, nobody to have told him this.

           He turned away from Shion again, narrowed his eyes instead at the potted plant on one of the stools. It was short and stout with leaves that were fat, but they didn’t look like leaves at all, really.

           Nezumi picked it up and sat down, but there was nowhere to put it. He held it in his hand and scrutinized it.

           “You talk, too,” Shion was saying, turning from the stove and handing Nezumi a plate of French toast that Nezumi took with the hand not holding the plant.

           “What?” Nezumi asked, not having any idea how he was going to eat with his hands full of a plate and a plant.

           “You talk in your sleep,” Shion said, leaning against the stove with his own plate and a fork.

           Nezumi watched him cut his toast with the side of his fork and chew his bite.

           “No, I don’t,” Nezumi said slowly, waiting until Shion had finished chewing to say it.

           Shion just looked at him, then nodded. “Okay. You don’t,” he conceded, and Nezumi narrowed his eyes.

           He had not known he talked in his sleep. He didn’t know what he would have said. He thought he had dreams sometimes, but was never sure what they were on waking, always immediately forgot the moment his eyes opened, though most nights he woke sweating and tangled in his blanket.

           Nezumi thought to ask what he’d said, then decided not to. Shion, clearly, was willing to let it drop, and Nezumi felt grateful for this, unsure why he was grateful, unsure why the thought of his own sleeptalking and of Shion hearing what he’d said was so jarring to begin with in the first place.

           Nezumi looked away from Shion. At his plate in one hand and the potted plant in the other.

           “You don’t have to hold that plant,” Shion said.

           “And where do you suggest I put it?” Nezumi countered.

           “I’ll take it.” Shion held out his hand, and Nezumi gave him the plant, watched Shion look quickly around before placing it on top of his fridge beside three others. “Aren’t you going to ask about them?”

           Nezumi leaned over to take a fork from the drawer beside Shion’s hip and prodded his French toast tentatively. He’d never had French toast before. “Do you want me to?”

           “Only if you’re curious.”

           Nezumi glanced up at the man, who smiled his easy smile around his fork. “What’s with the plants, Shion?”

           Shion lowered his fork and chewed before answering. “A year ago I said in an interview that I liked plants, and people have been sending me succulents ever since.”

           “Succulents,” Nezumi repeated, just to try out the word.

           “Yeah. Succulents. I have to keep them all in here because the window offers the best light in the apartment. Would you like one? I have so many, and I keep getting more. I’m running out of room.”

           “You want to give me one of these plants?” Nezumi asked, staring around at them all. There was a cactus right in front of him. It was fat and round with yellowish spikes. Kind of ugly, in Nezumi’s opinion.

           “It’d honestly be a favor to me. I keep trying to give a few to Safu, but she doesn’t like clutter. I think they’re really cute, but I just don’t have room.”

           Nezumi reached out, picked up the ugly cactus. It looked like a growth rather than a plant.

           “They don’t need much water. It might make your hotel room feel more like home.”

           “A cactus wouldn’t remind me of home,” Nezumi replied, examining the plant closely. He lifted a finger, touched a spike tentatively, was surprised that it was sharp without knowing why he was surprised.

           “What would?”

           Nezumi looked up from the cactus. “What would what?”

           “What would remind you of home?” Shion asked, leaning forward, and Nezumi shrugged the question from his shoulders.

           “Pollution. Noise. Cars. Bright lights,” Nezumi listed, thinking of Tokyo from an outsider’s point of view, from a point of view Shion would accept.

           “Were you born in the city?”

           Nezumi replaced the plant on Shion’s counter. Cut a square out of his French toast with the side of his fork and tried it. Sickly sweet. He didn’t know how Shion, an athlete, could eat something like this for breakfast.

           “We’re sleeping together, it’d be nice to have a little bit of personal information about you, you know,” Shion mumbled after a minute of silence had passed, and Nezumi glanced at him, surprised.

           “We’re not sleeping together.”

           Shion squinted at him. “We’ve had sex two nights in a row.”

           “So?”

           “So we’re sleeping together.”

           Nezumi shook his head, exhaled through his laugh. “Two nights doesn’t mean anything.” He took another bite of his toast before remembering he didn’t like it.

           “How many nights means something?” Shion asked, and Nezumi stared at him.

           “Don’t know,” Nezumi said slowly, watching Shion’s expression carefully and receiving nothing but open curiosity. “But it’s not two. And it’s probably not three either.”

           “How about four?” Shion asked, his smile tugging at his lips, back again, maybe it hadn’t left, Nezumi couldn’t figure out what was making the guy so happy.

           “Doubtful.”

           “Five?”

           Nezumi took another bite of French toast instead of answering, chewed it carefully, thought maybe it wasn’t so terrible after all.

           “Six?” Shion asked, placing his own plate – empty by now – in the sink and stepping towards Nezumi, leaning against the counter and looking down at him.

           “It’s a relief to know you can count, but you can stop at any time now,” Nezumi said, after he took another bite of French toast.

           “What about seven? If I sleep with you for seven nights, what does that mean?” Shion asked, leaning closer still, he was going to prick himself on his cactus if he kept that up.

           Nezumi licked his fork, smirked at the man. “Means you had a pretty good week.”

           Shion’s laugh was open-mouthed. His breath smelled of maple syrup. Nezumi had a strong feeling that his lips would taste like French toast, and he looked down at his plate, saw that he’d finished his toast, thought he still craved the taste that maybe he loved after all, one more bite would do it, nothing more than that.

           “I think I should tell you just so you don’t think it’s just sex. I like you, Nezumi,” Shion said, his eyes still crinkled from his laughter even though the sound had stopped.

           Nezumi licked his lips. Hadn’t kissed the man and couldn’t now.

           Instead, he stood up. Walked around Shion and placed his plate in the sink. Ran the water and let his hands linger under it, accidentally soaking the Band-Aids around his fingers, but he needed to change them anyway.

           “Has it occurred to you that you shouldn’t say everything you feel all the time?” Nezumi asked the sponge in his hands, sudsy when he squeezed it.

           “Why shouldn’t I?”

           “If you go around handing everyone every truth you’ve got, you’ll have nothing left for yourself. You might get hurt, being so careless.”

           “By you?” Shion asked, and Nezumi glanced at him. “Are you going to hurt me?”

           Nezumi listened to the sink running. Didn’t look away from Shion. “At the rate you’re going, it’s seeming a little inevitable.”

           Shion didn’t smile. He just looked at Nezumi like Nezumi was the one to be scrutinized, to be analyzed, like Nezumi was the one saying things that had no business being said. “I don’t think I’d mind that so much,” he finally said.

           Nezumi shook his head. Turned back to the dishes. “You’re pretty stupid, you know.”

           “I disagree,” Shion said, as if it were an argument, but it wasn’t.

           It was the truth. The figure skater was an idiot. Careless and rash. Naïve and trusting. But Nezumi had warned him, and if Shion wasn’t going to take a hint, Nezumi couldn’t be to blame.

           If Shion got hurt, it’d be his own fault, and Nezumi would have nothing at all to do with it.

           After they did the dishes, they showered together to save time and fucked because there wasn’t a reason not to. Maybe now Nezumi knew that to Shion it wasn’t just sex, but Shion knew that to Nezumi it was – he had to know, of course he knew, he was an idiot but had some sense, and it wasn’t like Nezumi told him anything otherwise, it wasn’t like Nezumi gave up some ridiculous confession in reply to Shion’s.

           If Shion still wanted to have sex, Nezumi wasn’t going to object. The guy was a grown man. He could make his own bad decisions, and Nezumi wasn’t about to step in and stop him.

           They dressed and were leaving Shion’s apartment when Shion stopped Nezumi at the door with a hand on Nezumi’s sleeve.

           “Did you want the cactus?”

           “Why would I want that?” Nezumi asked.

           “You can have it if you do.”

           “I don’t.”

           “Are you sure?” Shion asked, like Nezumi was on the fence about an ugly plant.

           “Yeah, I’m sure,” Nezumi said, trying not to roll his eyes.

           “If you change your mind, it’s yours,” Shion said, too earnestly, like he was talking about something other than a plant, but there was nothing else to talk about, nothing else Nezumi could change his mind about.

           Nezumi chose not to reply, freed his sleeve from Shion’s loose grip and led him out of his apartment building and down a block to the rink, where they changed into their skates silently before stepping onto the ice.

           It was Nezumi’s seventh day on ice, but as he glided around the rink to warm up, he felt as though he’d been skating for years. And when Shion shouted to him from across the rink to pay attention to his demonstration, Nezumi felt as though he’d been listening to the figure skater call out his name for no less than a lifetime.

*

Sunday made a full week since Shion had first met Nezumi in his mother’s bakery. After waking up at Shion’s apartment that morning, the actor had returned to Tokyo to collect more of his belongings. Shion had spent the morning meeting with Nezumi’s agent to submit a copy of the signed contract, binding him as Nezumi’s coach for the following five months.

           “The contract stipulates that you’ll only be training Nezumi three days a week from now on,” Safu said, flipping a page of Shion’s stapled copy from her perch on the edge of Shion’s bed.

           Shion had not seen or spoken to his best friend in the week since Nezumi had been in town. He didn’t think he’d ever gone such a long span of time out of contact with her, and felt guilty for it. His friendship with Safu was more important than any other relationship – or lack of relationship, as it would be.

           “I know. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday,” Shion replied, looking up from the book on leg injuries Safu had brought him from her clinic. He was sitting on the floor, leaning back against his dresser with clean clothes beside him he was meant to be folding. “Did you see this photo of the snapped Achilles’ heel? Look,” Shion said, holding the book open and up to his friend, who did not look.

           “Saw one in person on Tuesday. I would have texted you to come in and see it, but I knew you’d be with the actor,” Safu said, and Shion didn’t miss the inflection of her tone.

           He closed the clinic book. “I know I’ve been an awful friend since he’s been here. I’m sorry.”

           “You’re not allowed to teach him jumps either,” Safu continued, flipping another page of the contract as if Shion hadn’t spoken.

           Shion stood up, joined his friend on the bed, sitting so close to her their sides touched until Safu scooched away from him, but he just closed the gap she made.

           “Forgive me, forgive me,” he insisted.

           “Apparently, the actor could be injured, and it’s not worth the risk. So there won’t be jumps in this film? That won’t be accurate if the movie is going to feature programs approved by the standards of the FSU. I suppose they could have a stunt double.”

           “If you forgive me, I’ll tell you a secret,” Shion said, nearly on top of his friend at this point.

           Safu finally looked up from the contract. “You’re sitting on me.”

           “I’ve been away from you for so long, I can’t get close enough,” Shion replied, a grin pulling at the edges of his lips.

           Safu shook her head, but she was smiling when she pushed Shion away from her.

           Shion allowed it, lifted his legs onto the bed completely and sat cross-legged, pivoting to face his friend fully.

           “You don’t have secrets from me.”

           “I know. I hate it. I wanted to tell you, but I wanted to tell you in person, and I didn’t get a chance to see you all week.”

           “If I recall, you were only coaching the actor ten hours a day, and there’s twenty-four hours in a day. Take eight to sleep, though I knew you never sleep more than six, and there’s still six hours left over. Does it take six hours to tell a secret, Shion?” Safu asked, leaning closer to Shion, who bit his lip.

           “The thing is, I haven’t really had six hours a day to myself, or any hours, really, since Thursday.”

           “What does that mean?”

           “It’s part of the secret,” Shion whispered, his heart beating quickly, his skin a little electrified, and Nezumi wasn’t even in the room, he wasn’t even close by.

           Safu’s expression shifted, more serious now, a little concerned in the narrow of her eyes, and she pivoted to face Shion as well. “What’s the secret, Shion?”

           Shion took a breath. He felt like a child admitting a crush, but he was twenty-five years old, and it was more than a crush. “I’m falling for Nezumi,” he said slowly, unsure how to word what he felt – which was everything.

           Safu made no reaction but to ask – “Romantically?”

           Shion nodded. He wasn’t sure that there was another way to fall. “And we’re having sex.”

           At this, Safu leaned back. “You and Nezumi?”

           “Yes.”

           “You’re having sex with Nezumi?”

           Shion chewed on the inside of his cheek, released the thick flesh to speak. “Yeah. Yes.”

           “As in, not just in your fantasies?”

           Shion laughed and groaned, pitching forward to hide his face, rising up slowly. “Yes, Safu. On this very bed. Since Thursday. He’s been sleeping over.”

           Safu held out a hand. “Just to clarify. You have been having sex with the actor you’re training to figure skate for,” Safu paused, and Shion watched her count on her fingers, “three nights.”

           “That is correct,” Shion replied, almost preferring the clinical way in which Safu questioned him, like he was a patient at her clinic and she was asking him to confirm the symptoms she listed.

           He wouldn’t mind a diagnosis. He wouldn’t mind a cure.

           “And you’re falling in love with him.”

           Shion nodded. “Yes.”

           “But…” Safu shook her head, and Shion could see her confusion in the crease between her eyes. “Are you dating?”

           “No, I don’t think so. It’s just physical.”

           “Other than your romantic feelings.”

           “Right. We don’t even kiss during the day, or anything like that, relationship things like that. I don’t think he wants anything more,” Shion said, and he heard the drop of his own voice, watched Safu’s confusion soften.

           “Realistically, Shion, you’ve only known him for a week.”

           Shion nodded. Pressed his hand over his eyes. “I know. I know it doesn’t make sense. But, Safu,” he dropped his hand, looked at his friend closely, wanted her to understand with the clarity he did, “I know what I feel. I’ve never been so drawn to anyone, I’ve never felt the need to be near someone the way I do Nezumi. It’s not just a physical attraction. That would make sense, that I could rationalize, but it’s more than that. There’s this – warmth, when I’m near him. I love to talk to him. I love when he laughs. I love when he looks at me, or even just says my name. I know I don’t know him, but I feel as if I do, this week has felt like a lifetime to me, longer than that. How does that make sense? How can I feel this way?”

           He wanted answers. Here was his best friend, the smartest person Shion knew. She would have answers, she had to have answers.

           She watched Shion carefully, and he was glad for her scrutiny. Wanted her to treat him like a patient at her clinic. Something to be dissected, examined, solved.

           When Safu spoke, it wasn’t a diagnosis. It was a question. “What is he like?”

           Shion blinked. “What?”

           “The actor. Nezumi. I don’t know him, I only met him that one time last Sunday. What is he like?”

           Shion tried to think. Shook his head, running through a list of adjectives and thinking none could come close to describing the actor. “He’s…He’s indescribable.”

           Safu smiled lightly. “Try, for my sake.”

           Shion looked at his lap. Picked at a thread unraveling from his sock. “He’s like the night sky. He’s beautiful, and quiet. And he has secrets, a lot of them, I think, but he’s good at hiding them, prefers to hide them. And there’s a darkness there, too. It’s not that he’s mean, but I don’t think he’d hesitate to be cruel. I don’t think he’d find it difficult to be cold.”

           Shion peeked up at Safu, who watched him without expression, who never made Shion feel foolish for what he thought or said, and he was so grateful for this.

            “And I could look at him for hours and forget that time has passed at all. I want to reach out and touch him, but sometimes it feels like I’ll never reach him, and if I ever do, that I’ll burn myself on his stars.”

           Safu didn’t say anything for several seconds, and then she spoke quietly. “That was really beautiful, Shion.”

           Shion shook his head, pressed his fingers to his temples. “I know it doesn’t make sense.”

           Safu shrugged. “Maybe I can’t understand it, but I don’t think I’ve ever been in love. But can I ask you something? Does he make you happy?”

           Shion dropped his hand from his temples. Looked at his friend. “I don’t know if it’s happiness, really. It’s like, it’s like he makes me full, like when I’m near him I feel like I’m overflowing.”

           “With what?” Safu asked, watching Shion carefully.

           “I don’t know. It’s a warm feeling, though, whatever it is. It’s something good, I know it. It has to be.”

           They sat in silence for several seconds, maybe a minute, before Safu spoke again. “But your relationship is just physical.”

           Shion exhaled deeply. “Nezumi won’t be clear about it – he’s rarely clear about his own feelings – but I don’t think he’s interested at all in relationships. And it almost feels safer this way. I’m worried I’m feeling too much too quickly. It can’t be normal. Can it?”

           Safu smiled wanly. “I wouldn’t know.”

           “I suppose I have nothing to feel upset about. I get to see him every day. Well, three days a week now, we’re contractually obliged. And I know he enjoys having sex with me. That’s enough. More than enough. Especially when I’ve only known him a week. If anything, I’m probably overwhelming him,” Shion rationalized.

           “You told him how you feel?”

           “Not in terms of a night sky,” Shion said, smiling slightly, “but he knows that I like him.”

           “But he hasn’t reciprocated your sentiments.”

           “Not exactly, no,” Shion said, thinking of Nezumi in his kitchen telling him not to be so careless with his words.

           “But you’re not sad about that,” Safu was saying, and Shion was taken out of his kitchen, out from under Nezumi’s gaze.

           “What?”

           “You’re smiling,” Safu accused. “Isn’t unrequited love supposed to be painful?”

           Shion did not feel as if anything hurt. He wasn’t upset. He hadn’t expected Nezumi to respond in kind when he’d admitted his own feelings.

           Who fell in love after a week? Nobody was that foolish. Nobody had that reckless of a heart.

           “I guess I don’t mind so much. It’s not like we don’t have time. He doesn’t have to fall in love with me right now.”

           Safu laughed. “Just at some point in the future.”

           Shion felt himself laughing as well. “The near future would be nice,” he agreed.

           Safu slid closer to Shion until she was no longer across from him, but beside him. She leaned against his shoulder. Shion could feel her movements when she shifted, when she spoke. “You know, you’re a catch. Nezumi would be lucky to fall in love with you.”

           Shion leaned his head on top of his friend’s, the soft of her hair familiar against the side of his cheek. He closed his eyes and thought about what it might feel like, if Nezumi fell in love with him.

           The thought was so incredible Shion almost forgot to breathe.

*

Nezumi did not go to his apartment when he got into the city.

           He went straight to his ballet studio, open only for the cast of The New National Theatre, and was relieved to find very few people in it – no one from any of his productions.

           He changed into leggings and a t-shirt, laced up his ballet shoes, stretched, then stood in front of a mirrored wall and lifted himself slowly onto the flats of his toes in a pointe position.

           He held the pose for as long as he could until it hurt, then held it still. He examined his form in the mirror, couldn’t find a flaw in it. It was impossible to tell from his own features that he was in pain. It was impossible to see that he struggled to balance on the tips of his toes for a minute, then two minutes, then three.

           Nezumi breathed slowly. Watched his expression. Watched his chest rise and fall evenly with his breaths.

           He had spent the train ride thinking of Shion. He spent more time than he preferred to admit thinking of Shion. At that moment, he wondered where Shion was, what he was doing, whom he was with.

           When Nezumi closed his eyes, he imagined Shion was at the rink. Skating in slow figure eights, nothing else, just a pattern of curves over and over. Nezumi wanted to be in that rink with him. Waiting for Shion to stop skating. Waiting for Shion to call over to him, tell him what they were going to work on next.

           Nezumi was not used to thinking of other people, of anyone, really, but himself. To have his head so full of someone else was a startling thing, a strange thing. He didn’t want these thoughts, but he didn’t know where to put them. He tried to exhale them out of him. Thought if he could get every inch of air out of his lungs, Shion would leave along with his breaths, and he’d be free of the man who terrified him.

           There was the benefit in that Nezumi knew better than to act on his thoughts. Better than to spew them at any whim, confess them in the early morning with maple syrup on his lips. Nezumi knew the best course of action was to rid himself of them, and if he couldn’t, then to ignore them. He knew that they were temporary, had no doubt that they were temporary because everything was temporary.

           There were no thoughts that stayed, and no people that stayed, and for these reasons Nezumi reminded himself he had no reason to worry.

           Now, in this moment, there was Shion, a lot of Shion, an overflowing amount of Shion, and Nezumi would be victim to that, would think about the figure skater when he couldn’t fathom the reason for it, couldn’t figure out the cause.

           Now, Nezumi would want to be beside him, would count down the hours until the next day when he would be in Shion’s town again, in Shion’s rink again, by Shion’s side again.

           Now, Nezumi would crave the man like he was some sort of necessary thing, when he wasn’t, Nezumi knew better than that, knew so much more than that.

           Now, Nezumi would want him, but it would fade. He had never wanted the way he did now, and Nezumi was unused to want, had lived a life of need and satisfaction of that need and to want was something else entirely, a luxury he’d never thought he’d have the time to feel.

           Now, Nezumi would endure this luxury, let it fill him if it refused to be exhaled out of him, let it warm him if it wouldn’t budge from the lines of his pulse.

           But later – soon, Nezumi was certain, it couldn’t last long – this strange draw to the figure skater would lessen, more and more until it wasn’t anything at all, and Nezumi was relieved that there was at least this one certainty, this promise of his want diminishing, dissipating, disappearing.

           After four minutes in the pointe position, Nezumi nearly fell, his feet numb, his toes protesting, but he stumbled and caught himself, resisted the urge to rip off his ballet shoes and examine the damage he’d done to his feet.

           He lowered himself slowly to the floor, peered up at himself in the mirror, and found that his face was pale, his eyes wide, and for a moment, Nezumi could not recognize himself at all.

*