365 Days || Iwaoi

Day 100

May 30, 2018                                                                                                                                                            Day 100

Hajime,

It's been 100 days now. 100 nights when sleep has been nothing but a battle. 100 days of staring at the stars on my ceiling, wishing for the stars of the actual night sky, wishing I could see them twinkle in your eyes.

Do you remember when I first kissed you, at all? We were about eight years old, and you had fallen and scraped your knee. Our moms were both at the store, my dad at work, and we were alone. So I helped you inside and I cleaned up your knee before putting one of the Godzilla bandages my mom got just for you on it, and then I kissed it.

You looked at me with wide eyes, like I either disgusted you or just unlocked all of the secrets of the universe. I guess neither were true, but from that day on you always kissed me where I got hurt, and vice versa.

We got made fun of for it at first when we started at Aoba Johsai, but soon enough Mattsun and Makki did it too, and the teasing slowed.

I wish you were here to kiss my forehead, or my hairline, or my chest, or my fingertips. You always kissed one of those places when the hurt was one you couldn't bandage.

But you're not here, and I refuse to talk to anyone else. I leave our apartment only when I actually need to. All of our friends stop by some days to bring me groceries, most of which end up rotting in the fridge.

I miss you, Hajime. I miss you, the lover who was never really mine, the man that I never expressed my true self to. I only showed you what I wanted you to see, which was more than everyone else but still not the things that scare me about myself.

I'm Mr Loverman, according to you, but you are the lover that I never got to profess my love to, the only lover I'll ever miss, because this love for you will die with me. You were my first almost, and that almost will haunt me until the day I die.

Every minute I spent with you was the best minute of my life. Even when we lost games, even when we fought, even when we had financial hardships, you were the highlight of it all.

Thank you, Iwa-chan, for all of my fondest memories, the memories that I will die with but the ones that will not die with me. I'm writing as many of them down as I can, after all.

I'm writing them down, and I'm going to address this box to Shoyo and Tobio. They can share the letters with anyone they want, but I remember the way that you jokingly called Tobio-chan my son. I remember that, and I realize that maybe I was like his dad, but you were the dad who actually taught him how to be a good person.

I love you, Iwaizumi Hajime. One hundred days without you is one hundred one days too many.

Tooru.