the librarian ❆ kagehina

a week without books.

tobio does not know what's wrong with him.
okay? he scolded himself, why didn't you just kick him in the shin while you were at it, dumbass?
he hasn't gone to the library in a week, and though the triumphing matter is his longing to go back for the boy with the orange hair, he also was suffering a serious book drought. he knows that's selfish, but hey- most of his time is spent reading. a week without books is a week of time wasted. a week without shōyō is a week of time wasted.

shōyō.

everything is him. everywhere he goes, he sees him standing in the distance, just an arm's reach away, if he could just lift his fingers and touch...
     shōyō.
it's in his coffee, his classes, his walks across the quad; he's sitting in the clouds, his tears falling as the rain that pounded the sidewalks to a pulp. he's above him, beside him, before him, behind him. everywhere, everything is his best friend.
shōyō, shōyō, shōyō.

tobio knows he should've been smarter. now that it's been said, he sees it clearly. the way the librarian would light up when he walked in, how he'd sometimes reserve an extra cup of lukewarm coffee with tobio's preferred two blue sugar packets and lots of milk, the way he'd listen with his cheek pressed against his palm as tobio ranted about a story he'd read the sleepless night before. it was so visible, so tangible, yet tobio looked past it as he chased after that asshole senior who never had any intention of being with him in the first place.
damnit, tooru, such a fucking waste of space, he thought, kicking a pebble on the sidewalk.

the sky was fading from its sulking gray to a darker indigo, hinting that tobio should get to the shop and back before it's too dark to walk alone. the boy whisked himself away down the pavement towards the campus convenience store and jumped a bit when the bell above the glass door rang obnoxiously over his head. he shuffled over to the refrigerated wall, plucking a bottle of banana milk from its little section and closing the door with unintentional force. on his walk back towards the register, he swiped a bag of chips from the snack aisle and two meat buns. he made a quick transaction at the counter and left swiftly, making a stiff attempt at jogging down the path towards his dorm before the moon settled at the top of the sky.
     when he'd made his way inside and up by elevator, he stumbled into his dorm and locked the door behind him, flinging his bag and shoes down and falling onto his bed. on his back, he fished through the paper bag and pulled out one of the slightly cold meat buns, taking a generous bite and sighing sadly. for a whole week he's lived like this, passing from class to convenience store to bedroom with no change, no emotion. tobio feels numb, from the tips of his fingers to the lulled ba-dunk between his ribs. he hasn't cried, hasn't screamed, hasn't smiled. he hasn't slept. food has no taste. everything around him is dying like a plant without water, and he's withering alongside it all, just letting the days go by as he sits uncomfortably on his bed and ignores his assignments.

     shōyō, shōyō, shōyō.

     tobio does not know what could possibly be wrong, but he has to figure it out, because he cannot live like this.
     if only he could talk to his best friend. he's sure that kid would know what's happening to him.