Uh Huh, Honey

A little bit dangerous

The library is almost empty when Sanemi walks in. This one's quieter than the rest on campus, which is why it's his favorite, but today more so than usual.

Despite this, Masachika has booked out a private room for them, knowing full well how much Sanemi hates working out in the open. Sometimes Sanemi appreciates him.

On his way up the stairs, Sanemi passes exactly one person, who takes one look at his face and moves as far off to the side as she can without melding into the wall. Arriving on the second floor, he finds the third room to his right and, sighing, turns the handle to let himself in.

Masachika perks up at the sound of the door. "Oh, hey! That was fast."

Sanemi grunts, flinging his stuff down to the floor and himself into the seat next to Masachika. "Sorry I'm late."

"Don't worry about it," Masachika says, waving it off. He's already got his lecture notes spread out over the table, laptop open, empty PowerPoint slides ready to go. Sanemi leans over to grab his own notes out of his bag, tugging them between the zipper a little too hard.

"Also, I stopped by the café on the way here and got us something to drink. I hope I got your order right." Masachika reaches across the table for the drinks in question, picking one up and offering it to Sanemi.

"Sorry if it's cold," he adds.

Sanemi takes a sip, tentative. It's lukewarm, but coffee's coffee and at the current stage of his life Sanemi could care less about the temperature so long as it gets into his system.

Masachika's still looking at him expectantly, though, so Sanemi pulls the cup away and mutters, "It's good. Thanks."

"Awesome. Okay, so I was thinking we could divide the slides up between us; I can do materials and components, if you want to work on circuits..."

It's nothing overly complex, just a preliminary design of some hydraulics machinery they discussed in class. Fortunately, they were allowed to choose their own partners, which, considering his present frame of mind, bodes well for Sanemi and everyone else in that course. There are some people Sanemi would rather chop off his own arm than work with.

Anyway, Sanemi's already done a good deal of brainstorming on his own, so this shouldn't take long. During the first hour, they operate with near mechanical cooperation, Masachika occasionally asking for clarification on some slides, Sanemi occasionally lifting his rough sketches up for feedback. About half an hour in, he moves around to the other side of the table to use the dry erase board, jotting messy notes and calculations all over it in an attempt to organize his thoughts.

For how different they are in principle, Sanemi and Masachika are almost frighteningly productive together. Maybe it's because they've been friends since their middle school years, when Sanemi's stupid, reckless self kicked a soccer ball straight into Masachika's face. It was an accident, of course, but dealt enough damage to leave his nose dripping red and the gym teacher yelling for them to go to the nurse. Sanemi, whose tiny body was ill-suited for the anger constantly boiling inside him, became stumped when Masachika not only forgave him immediately, but grinned at him from around the tissue stuffed up his nose and asked to be his friend. Sanemi said no, then found himself sitting with Masachika during lunch and walking home with him from school almost every day. Rage turned to annoyance turned to grudging acceptance, and eventually Sanemi warmed to Masachika's optimism and closed-eye smiles. He tolerated Sanemi's tantrums, his moods, his temper—the things no one else would tolerate—and Sanemi did his best to return the favor whenever the rain came down and that optimism cracked just the tiniest bit. And over the years, he grew to become the one person outside Genya who understands Sanemi the most.