Purple Ink (SatoGou)

Chapter 9

When I leave my room at ten to six, Goh is waiting there for me, hands stuck in the pockets of his pants. We hurry down to the Uber, and ride to the arena in silence. It doesn't really fully sink in that this is happening until we pull up and get out, and see the queue already starting to wrap around the side of the building. We're an hour early, and we're still at least two hundred people back.

"Maybe we should have come earlier," I comment as we drift to the back of the queue. Goh shakes his head, smiling.

"It's okay. I don't really like being right at the front."

Fair enough, then. Nerves start to eat away at me as I realise we have an hour of standing before we even get inside, and while I don't usually have any issue with filling silences, Goh makes me a little lost for words.

"I haven't listened to Fall Out Boy in a while," I admit.

"Why not?" Goh asks, shivering a bit.

I debate whether to answer the question honestly or not. "They remind me of someone," I say, deciding to go for the truth. Goh's eyes widen slightly, his eyebrows raising.

"Me too," he says. "But I figured I shouldn't let that keep me from seeing them, if I have the chance."

"An ex?" I ask cautiously, not wanting to overstep.

He shakes his head, crossing his arms. "Just a friend. My best friend. We used to listen to them together a lot when we were teenagers."

"We're still teenagers," I say, teasing him, laughing when he rolls his eyes. "Sorry. What happened? If you don't mind me asking."

He kicks slightly at the ground, staring down at his shoes now, biting his cheek. I wonder if I've pushed it too far and upset him, but then he twists his face. "We just fell apart. Things weren't... ideal. Anyway, that's in the past."

I can't stop the frown. He looks so... heartbroken, really. I know exactly how that feels. I want to touch him, but I don't know how he'd react, so I don't. "I guess sometimes you can't stop it from falling apart." I shrug. "I know that all too well."

Goh shoots me a curious look, but doesn't ask. He considers me for a moment. "I guess."

I pray it doesn't upset him and decide to ask what I've been wondering for the last few hours. "Do you get bothered a lot? For the way you look, I mean."

He seems shocked at the question, and I worry maybe I've been too forward, too pushy. But I'm not asking because I'm nosey, I'm asking because I want to understand him. He reads my face for a second, and maybe he sees that somehow, because he decides to answer. "It happens from time to time. I think..." He trails off, absently reaching for his hair, his eyes going distant. "I think I've always struggled to understand myself, so of course other people don't understand. To me I was still a boy, even if I wanted to wear a skirt or have long hair or whatever else but..."

I frown down at him. We barely know each other, and he seems so closed off that I'm surprised he decided to answer at all. Maybe after today, he really just needed to tell someone. "Those things should never matter, and they're no one's business but yours anyway."

His eyes sparkle when he looks back up at me. "Thanks, Ash. It hasn't bothered me for a while, not for years really, until... Well, my friend, they-" His eyes shutter, and I can almost see the mental barrier going back up, the walls slamming down again as he closes himself off. In a split second, he becomes distant again. "I'm talking too much. Sorry."

"No, it's okay," I say, but I can tell he's done with talking about this, so I ask something else instead, a question about his music taste, and he seems to light up a little. We launch into a conversation that lasts almost the entire hour, about music and TV and other little things, but nothing deep. I'm shocked by how much we have in common, and how easy it is to listen to him as he talks. It's like the sound of his voice is mesmerising to me.