HEART TO HEART. blue lock

05. IVORY THINKS OF HIM

AT FIRST, IT WAS OUT OF IMPULSE.

"ah, i'm sorry, i didn't mean to peek." a voice creeps from behind seishirou. languid, he thinks, but duller than mine.

seishirou stares at the owner of the voice. he can't help but notice how some of his h/c strands were astray. just a bit.

but he also can't care less. besides, he doesn't even brush his own hair, so why bother with someone else's?

he blinks at the stranger before turning his head back to restart on his new, three point eight stars of average rating, zombie-shooting download. "it's fine, you can stay."

"...thank you." stranger, unkempt stranger, said. seishirou doesn't know where the gratitude came from. or for what. whatever.

as unkempt stranger walks past him, seishirou can smell a saccharine fragrance. was it his cologne? maybe unkempt stranger isn't so unkempt after all. the mild earthy and buckwheat scent of cold soba, and oh, was that the umami of tsuyu permeating his nostrils too? what a col-

grumble.

seishirou continues shooting away zombies in his game. and if unkempt stranger was shooting him a glance in his peripheral vision, no, he was not.

now that seishirou thinks about it, unkempt stranger kinda resembles the zombies he's shooting. tousled (seishirou doesn't care if the stray hair isn't even a handful anymore) and weird-smelling.

"you haven't had lunch?" damn it.

"not really, it's too much work." seishirou responds, a beat too late. somehow. whatever that means. the direction his thoughts are going makes him lean further into the railing.

"then you can have some of my cold soba."

seishirou's fingers come to a halt. with the speed his head snaps towards unkempt stranger, he swears he is seeing stars when his grey eyes stare back at e/cs. by the way, the stray hair of unkempt stranger was still there.

unkempt stranger seems to be startled by it. seishirou briefly thinks the former's impassive exterior must be false. "only if you-"

"sure."

"huh?"

"...it's a bother to eat later, so i'll accept your offer." seishirou averts his gaze from unkempt stranger (and his equally unkempt strands) back to his device.

he doesn't know what came over him when he says that, but when unkempt stranger scoots closer with some of his noodles atop the lid of a lunch box along with a pair of chopsticks, seishirou chooses to not dwell on it further.

"...thank you." seishirou thanked him, and was quick to find that he didn't mind this new camaraderie. he guesses that unkempt stranger feels the same, too. hopefully.

"it's no problem."

at least he thought so. but the drumming of unkempt stranger's fingers may imply otherwise. or another thing. whatever it was.

some of the hair framing his face was still astray, though.

seishirou briefly wonders if he should lean in to count the strands of them.

"why aren't you eating?" unkempt stranger's voice breaks him out of his daze, making him blink owlishly. "you're not eating either."

seishirou watches as unkempt stranger's eyes mildly widen before immediately going back to their impassive look. huh. "well... i was just wondering... if you..." 

the fringes of his hair fell beside the stray hair, and seishirou could feel his fingers twitch against his will.

"if... you'd like my grandfather to pack one more lunch to school since you find it a bother to find lunch. so..." unkempt stranger trails off.