you don’t need an invitation to come home.

[ughhh]

[Maybe it should be weird to see it like this, written out like this, but...]

Link?

[It's just one more secret for them to keep. That's all.]

You there?

Comments

[depthless]

[The answer at first would be no; his phone is on the floor near his futon, while he's sitting at his desk reading a little book about the solar system. But Yoshiki's messages have a special ring now--just a little bell instead of the default sound--so only a moment later, Link can answer,]

Im here!

[And then, and then, because he can,]

Link reporting in 🫡

[ughhh]

[No immediate response. Probably asleep, then. Figures. Most people would be, at this hour. It's late. They need to get back into the rhythm for school, right? That's what they should be doing, right? And maybe Link doesn't need to sleep, technically speaking, but that doesn't mean he doesn't want to sleep-- It's not like Yoshiki can expect him to be awake at all hours, ready to chat, on the spot, at a moment's notice, whatever.

No more than ten seconds in and Yoshiki is ready to turn back over and die. Get a fucking grip.

But then--relief of reliefs--there's a sound, like a flute. Not the default sound. This one is bright and cheery. Musical. Just the one note, which is just enough.]

Hey

[...]

Just wondering if you'd be awake or not still

[depthless]

Hey yeah
I was just reading a book
Sometimes if im restless at night a book makes me go to sleep
But sometimes I get a headache...lol
So I was gna take a break

[Ready to chat, on the spot. He messages like they've been doing so all evening, just conversational. Just ready to continue being together, at a moment's notice.]

Are you awake cuz you're thinking about being awake?

[ughhh]

Not exactly

[He's awake because he's thinking about Link, and being with Link, and what it means to be together with Link. It's getting to be more than a little ridiculous.

Even so,]

What's the book about?

[depthless]

The planets in space
Like...WOAH‼️
lol

[He's on his belly, now, lying on his futon, the book well-enjoyed but now thoroughly discarded. He can't help but kick his feet back and forth. Well, it's Yoshiki, that's why.]

Then are you awake cuz youre thinking of...........
Morning?

[ughhh]

[Yoshiki laughs out loud. Not too loud, not when his mom's been on a warpath lately, not like he wants to get grounded or anything, but he is laughing and that much is its own relief.

Like woah, indeed.]

Sounds pretty cool

[Curious and irrepressible. It can be annoying, and it can be everything.]

Nope... like you can keep asking but
I don't think you're going to get it
You're so far off right now it's not even funny tbh

[depthless]

[So now it's a goal and a game. Now it's goading. Now it's Yoshiki saying, come here, come here. I have something for you. Come and get what I have for you.

Link rolls over onto his back, holding his phone up in the air and squinting at its bright face. Yoshiki's words, even brighter...]

So if it's not morning.......
It's night?!
...too easy...

[...]

Maybe youre thinking about what all the other critters do at night?
Kubitachi's night life scene

[ughhh]

[Yoshiki, for his part, only curls up tighter in his bed. He's lying on his side, with his phone balanced between both hands, a soft blanket mostly pulled over his head. Didn't mean for this to turn into a guessing game, he thinks. But some yawning part of him likes to have Link try and try and try and keep trying to understand what he's thinking. No cheating, either. Can't just press himself into the folds of Yoshiki's brain and figure out what's what. Link has to do this the old-fashioned way...]

Might be getting a little closer
But only the tiniest bit

[A critter, yeah. Link could qualify.]

You want a hint?

[depthless]

No not yet!!!!!

[Immediate. He likes it, too--maybe the same yawning part of him likes it, too, this means of being close with Yoshiki--this very human means. It's what people do when they can't just swallow up somebody's essence. They have to suss it out.

Link didn't know he could do it like this. He didn't know there was another way. He likes it, he's thankful for it, it's a relief--he can have Yoshiki even if Yoshiki is outside of him.

He wants to try.]

Thinkin about if bugs dream?? Or if they just go about their business and they dont even know what a dream is?
Wait
Now IM thinking about that...

[ughhh]

[...]

Definitely not
But now you've got me thinking about it.....

[Not long after that, the game temporarily forgotten, Yoshiki sends along a machine-translated article about an experiment done to determine if honeybees do, in fact, dream. The results weren't super conclusive, but there's some evidence that they've got something similar going on.

Humans and honeybees, and mammals, and monsters... they've all got things in common, no matter how far apart they might seem. Thinking about that makes Yoshiki feel softer, and warmer. He might be smiling, too.]

I really had no idea

Crazy stuff

[depthless]

[The uwahs and woahs and ohhhs bubble out of Link even though Yoshiki isn't nearby to hear them. Isn't that part of being mixed up with each other? That Yoshiki can make him think and feel so much when they're apart? Maybe not, thinks Link. Maybe that's not quite it.]

Scientists must have fun
They get to just learn new stuff

I guess we just did too though

[ughhh]

If I go to school for bugs then maybe I'd get to do experiments like that one
And I could come and tell you all about it

[It still feels almost forbidden to talk about the future like this. Impossible, even. Those couple days and nights they spent in Tokyo, visiting, getting a feel for the place--they couldn't have happened, couldn't have offered a glimpse. But they did, and it was just that, just a real glimpse of the future, and...

And Yoshiki might be smiling more.]

I think I'd like that a lot

[depthless]

I'd like that SO much

[He means it with all his heart, all his being, with everything in and outside reality. He means it so completely that Yoshiki might just be able to hear it: SO much! Like the chime of the bell, like the note from the flute. The sounds they mean to each other.]

Hey is that what you're thinking about?
What to do

[What's the furthest thing from morning? Maybe not night; that's just right nearby, if you think about it. Maybe the furthest thing is a lot of time.]

[ughhh]

[A chill goes straight down Yoshiki's spine. His heart plummets. Inside his chest one moment, pooling in his heels the next. His vision, oh god, now that's doubling, threatening to triple, before he squeezes his eyes shut. He can hear something too strange to understand. He feels like he's going to faint. And this sort of thing, as described--this sort of thing should be terrible. It should be awful and unpleasant, being haunted. No one should want the vertigo of knowing too much. No one should crave the unimaginable in colors and connection. He waits until he can breathe again and then opens his eyes. Mostly back to normal. Mostly.

Link isn't lying about liking it SO much!, apparently.

His thumbs might be trembling, but he does reply:]

Getting closer
Got something to do with what I want to do
Not about school though

[depthless]

I said no hints yet‼️
But

[Link rolls back onto his stomach. He squirms, elbowing the futon as though it's in his way simply by not being Yoshiki.]

That means you reeeally want me to know, right?
Ok
So im gna think about it real careful

[ughhh]

[One of Yoshiki's legs has gone completely numb. He's only noticing it now, taking stock of himself, in the aftermath of holy-shit-what-the-fuck. It's his left leg, the same leg that got a bruise most recently--they might've gotten a little carried away in Tokyo. With one hand, he tries rubbing some life back into it. Not like Link understands his own strength, really. Yoshiki can't be mad at him for it. These episodes just kind of have to happen...

He sighs at his lowest register.]

Still don't know if you're going to get it

[But he does want Link to know. He wants to be known.

If I'm thinking about you, then I don't have to think about anything else.]

Give it your best shot

[depthless]

[Want is like a little song. Just the feeling itself, not even a word. When want is real, the bow touches the strings--or the mouth to the reed--the fingers to the ivory--a sound that's bright and clear. Yoshiki wants to be known, and it's like a little song.

Link thinks about it real careful. How familiar he is with Yoshiki's song of want--how well he knows it now.

...]

Hey
Is it
Me
?

[ughhh]

[Yoshiki wants so very badly to be known all the way up until the moment when Link's guess comes in.

Then he just wants to die of embarrassment.]

Stupid, [he whispers to himself.] Just, really... [Too late to deny it.

Not for the first time, he wonders if these episodes aren't more of a two-way street, in a manner of speaking. If when he's feeling the neuron-stripping brilliance of what Link is feeling, that means Link is feeling what he's feeling too. Hopefully it's not as much of a stressful affair. He's really hoping it's sweet and gentle, without the trappings of a seizure. Honeybees having their dreams.]

Is that your final ansewr
*Anwer

***Answer

[depthless]

[The answer comes, too, from the image of Yoshiki in Link's mind's eye, and not just from how Yoshiki is stitched in with the very fibers of Link's being. It actually is the answer, when Link reasons through it. Yoshiki watches him. When they walk in the halls of the school, there's a magnetic force between their hands--Yoshiki is so close, sometimes, to reaching out, even though he doesn't. But he thinks about doing it. He thinks about...]

Wait!
Do i get something if im right?

[Yeah, Link has learned about fluttering his eyelashes and all.]

[ughhh]

[Pins and needles, finally. They poke and stab their way up the length of his leg, making it feel like it's pulsating, pressure without pressure. Probably should be grateful he hasn't lost the use of it. He takes his hand away and uses it to rub at his eyes for a second or two. The colors of his vision still aren't quite right.]

Maybe

[...]

There something you want?

[depthless]

Me?
Something i want...

[How would he begin to write it? What is the character for the shape and sensation of Yoshiki's soul? What is the character for feeling whole?]

If I get it right
Praise me a little! 👏👏👏 lol

[ughhh]

[The chromatic aberration burns a little hotter, a little brighter, before fading away. Yoshiki is left with a faint afterimage that also fades away. Back to normal. Somehow, he's dissatisfied...]

You don't have to hold back

[Uh,]

But if that's what you want that's fine with me

Ready?

[depthless]

Ready
Final answer
You better not hold back either!!

[In the movies, love makes people dance. In the wilderness, hunger makes predators arch low to the ground and then lunge. Link must be somewhere in between. He's on his knees, now, too tense to lie flat, but still pressed to his futon, bracing himself against his forearms while he holds his phone. It might as well be an altar and he the prostrate pilgrim, even as he's asking to be praised.]

So
Me???

[ughhh]

[Not only the confirmation, but also--]

Yeah

[...]

I think about you all the time

[...]

Sometimes it's like I don't know how to stop

[..........]

So you're going and going around in my head and then it's like
How in the world am I supposed to sleep
When I've got all this stuff I'm thinking about
All the time

[At this point, just kill him.]

Drives me crazy you know!!

[depthless]

[Are these the characters for the shape of Yoshiki's soul? They evoke much of what Link feels when he sees that shape, at least. Being buoyant and swaddled at the same time--and a pressure at the back of his eyes, or somewhere.]

Woahh
That means we're the same
Yeah it's the same for me too
Definitely definitely definitely the same
About thinking of you

[ughhh]

[Yoshiki takes some time to reply--but only because he's afraid to look at Link's own reply. Queasy, uneasy, he's convinced that Link is going to laugh it off. Maybe not make fun of him, but, you know, he'll laugh about it. Crow about it. It resembles praise, kind of, more or less? Yoshiki, infamously selfish, thinking of somebody else all the damn time...

Finally, he does have himself a peek.]

Is that why
The book?

[The restlessness. The reading, to make him to go to sleep. Yoshiki wants to know, even when his face is on fire.]

You can't sleep either?

[depthless]

[It's not like Link doesn't find cause to blush, and it's not like he doesn't feel shame. By now, he's definitely learned all of that. But it doesn't apply here. He knows that shame is supposed to have a place here, and that it matters to Yoshiki. It matters to Yoshiki a lot. Another thing Link probably isn't meant to understand...

So he texts, without shame, without guile,]

Yep
Cant help thinking of you all the damn time

[Is it from Yoshiki, or from himself? Do they share the sentiment separately, or as one? Is there any use discerning at this point?]

I think of you even when im not thinking
I think if I started walking i would just come to you without realizing it
So if im gna think about something else it has to be a pretty big and amazing distraction...

[And it has to be bigger and more amazing each time. All awe fades with time and familiarity, like paper yellowing in the sun--and the awe Link feels toward Yoshiki, that brilliant, overwhelming sunlight. It outshines everything else.]

If it drives you crazy...
I dont even know what to call me!

[ughhh]

[...For better or worse, it's Link's unwillingness to lie that sets him apart from everyone else. Yoshiki doesn't have to ask if he's fucking around. Doesn't have to wonder if he's being serious. There's no reason to assume a smidgen of hyperbole or exaggeration. All the damn time feels like a blast of cosmic radiation across time and space. The deepest sunburn, primordial. Yoshiki's skin is definitely going to peel away, no stronger than tissue paper.

All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time. All the damn time.

He has to be careful, by the way. If he thinks too hard about Link, and where he is, and where he could be, right this instant, then that's where Link is going to end up. He'll be up and out of his room, out the front door, before either of them realizes where he's going. That sort of thing has happened more than once already. Such is the life of a lodestar.

Yoshiki writes,]

The planets are pretty big and amazing

How do I measure up??

[It's meant to be a joke, surely, for the sake of his scorched nerves--but the planet Venus is the hottest object in the solar system, and it's the brightest, too, after the sun and the moon. Jupiter offers its size and its many moons for one's unrelenting hunger, and Neptune has all the beautiful colors of an ocean, just blue after blue. Not to mention, there's Mars, which is...

Yoshiki didn't expect to suddenly be in competition with the known fucking universe.]

KIDDING btw you don't have to answer that

[So lame and stupid and really pathetic.]