Seven Weeks: A Seven Days Fanfiction

WEEK THREE: Tuesday (Touji)

My alarm hadn't gone off yet, but it was finally only fifteen minutes from the set time and I figured that was good enough. I threw my blankets off and sat up, rubbing my temples. I'd been lying there for the past seven hours, trying to trick my body into believing it was asleep while thoughts raced noisily behind my closed eyelids.

I stumbled over to my desk and shut off the music that had been playing all night. It had helped the night before, but seemed the magic had worn off because last night my rebellious brain was back to its old tricks. My head was pounding and my mouth tasted like old socks.

I went to the bathroom, splashing water on my face and cringing at the bags under my eyes. What was I expecting, though? Natsuki still wouldn't give me the time of day, my parents were angry with me, and Yuzuru— My heart cramped up in my chest.

Yuzuru was running from me again.

Of course he was, I'd taken things too far. He'd said he needed time to think, and I had to allow him that. It wasn't his fault that my stomach felt like it was full of rocks that got heavier and sharper the longer he held this distance between us.

He was going to be at school early today for morning detention. Should I still meet up with him at the station? Or was that too needy? He was making it clear he wanted space, so following him around at school was probably not the best idea.

I sighed and got dressed, gathered up my books and homework, then checked my laptop. He hadn't sent any more messages after the one last night saying he was going to study. It was morning—could I send him a good morning email? I hadn't missed one yet. I opened up a new thread and typed up a quick two-word message. The same one I sent every day. That wasn't too pushy, was it?

I hit send and then closed the laptop. There were two choices: I could hang around at home trying to find things to occupy myself until it was time to leave for school, or I could leave now and go to morning club practice.

Practice it was, because idling aimlessly around here was going to drive me crazy. Grabbing my bag, I headed downstairs.

"Good morning, Touji-san," Umeki greeted me, and she handed me my phone. I pocketed it without comment. "Would you like breakfast?"

"No, thank you, Umeki-san. I'm going to go to club practice before school."

"All right then. Here, take this." She handed me a bag filled with bento boxes. "There's enough for you to share with your friends if you want." She gave me a smile, as if she was trying to make up for the fact that I was grounded away from the whole world for the foreseeable future.

A pang ran through me as I thought of Yuzuru. Could I tempt him to spend time with me by offering him some of Umeki's cooking? Right now I wasn't above trying. I gave her a grateful nod. "Thank you."

XXX

As soon as I walked through the door of the dojo, Tajiri cornered me. "Seryou-kun, thank god you came this morning. Come with me, I have to show you something." She pulled me into the dojo's workroom and closed the door behind us.

"What's this about?"

"I asked you, didn't I? If you were dating a guy. But I never in a million years thought—" She thrust her phone in front of my nose. "Explain this."

I looked at the website that she had pulled up. There was a photo of me and Yuzuru from the ice skating rink, where he was lying on top of me after I'd fallen and our noses were almost touching. "Oh. Yuzuru-san came to my class skating party. We fell on the ice."

"Keep scrolling," she said, so I flicked up on the screen. Now I was looking at a picture of us standing just outside the school gates, where he was tugging that lumpy black hat of his down over my ears. Apparently I'd been staring at him with a lot of fascination.