Chapter Text
Eiichiro has been fussy lately, and he tells Wakana that over the phone once he gets off the subway. Eijun knows she’s getting ready for a date, and he’s happy for her, wants her to achieve happiness with someone, especially since it’s not something that he can give her, but he’s worried about their son and how he’s become recalcitrant and moody since she has started dating again. Eiichiro is an excitable child with no qualms with letting anyone know when he’s happy and when he’s not.
Except he doesn’t now. He goes oddly quiet during dinner, eyes straying to the other end of the table where he thinks Wakana should be.
They’ve been divorced for two years and Eiichiro has been living with him since their separation, but Wakana hasn’t been dating anyone with long-term prospects, until now. Eijun suspects Eiichiro has always hoped that he and Wakana would get back together, that their family would look like his friends’ families; one mom, one dad, a shared home, days spent together and not apart.
“Eijun…” Wakana says, voice quiet and unsure. “I can cancel the date with Tanaka-kun. It’s still early and the reservation isn’t until eight-thirty.”
If the reservation is so late, it’s because they have plans before dinner, and Tanaka is a man who woos , a man who shows up at his date’s apartment for a night in and dinner with a bottle of wine and flowers, ready for a good movie and holding hands on the couch. He’s a good man who treats Wakana like she is a goddess, like every moment with her is a treasure, and Eijun doesn’t want to get between that, not when that’s exactly what Wakana is and what she deserves. But, his paternal instincts whisper, this is about Eiichiro .
He chews on his lower lip, just as uncertain as Wakana. “No, there’s no need for that. I think he’d like to spend some time with his mother and father this weekend, though. How does a trip to the zoo sound this Sunday?”
He can hear her hesitation -he is, too.
“Alright, Eijun.” He hears the clinking of something ringing in the background; it’s a familiar sound. She’s putting on makeup. “Call me,” she says. “If anything comes up, call me.”
“I will, Wakana,” he says, rounding a corner. Three minutes away from the aftercare. He’ll feel more grounded once he has picked up Eiichiro, he tells himself. “Hey,” he begins when she’s about to hang up. “Have a nice date, Wakana. Relax. Enjoy it.”
He means it. She knows he does. He can hear her smile over the crackling static of his absolutely shitty mobile. “I will, Eijun.”
The dial tone is like a wake up call. He’s outside the kindergarten and he doesn’t remember passing the convenience store that sits two blocks away from the kindergarten. Sighing, he scrubs his hand over his face. Get a hold of yourself, Eijun . Even now, two years later, the guilt hasn’t abated a bit.
“Sawamura-san,” a teacher says when she sees him. “Eichiiro-kun, your father is here.”
It’s late, well after six, and he is usually the last parent to pick up his kid, especially since aftercare officially ends at half past five. They only stay open because he managed to find the only facility that is run by actual saints who pity his schedule as a single father and a pro baseball player. That is why it surprises him when he follows her into the back room, where they keep Eiichiro occupied with paper and crayons while they set about clearing up the place and doing some light prep work for the next day’s snacks, and doesn’t find him alone.
Eiichiro isn’t busy scribbling on paper, large crayons gripped tightly in both his chubby fists as he drags them haphazardly across the paper, more delighted by their colors than the shapes he makes. He’s red-faced and puffy-cheeked, arms crossed imperiously across his chest as a man squats in front of him, smile amused, a little girl behind him, her tiny hands clinging to the fabric of his overcoat.
The man looks up, the ceiling lights reflecting off his black-rimmed spectacles, and he laughs.
“You’re Sawa-kun’s dad, huh? Small world.” Miyuki Kazuya rises, the little girl automatically letting go of his jacket for the warmth of his large hand instead. “Haven’t seen you in years, Sa-wa-mu-ra.”
Eiichiro takes after his dad and Eijun after his father; it’s rare that either of them are ever speechless. Eijun can’t seem to find words, though, finds himself staring at a man he hasn’t seen anywhere except from the television screen or from the distance of the stands for nearly eight years, and he finds himself without anything worth saying.
“I heard you went pro right out of high school,” Miyuki continues as if the silence isn’t unusual at all, as if Eijun often went quiet around Miyuki-fucking-Kazuya. “How’s life treating you?”
He doesn’t want to say he got scouted right out of high school, but has since spent his days warming the benches and not his pitching arm. He doesn’t want to say he’s been third string every day of every year since signing on, that he hasn’t seen the pitching mound aside from the nights when he drags a makeshift catching box onto home plate and practices pitching for the sake of pitching, to keep himself from falling apart at the seams.
He’s bitter with broken dreams and resentment, because Miyuki isn’t just playing under that endless, blue sky, he’s a star, a household name.
Everyone knows Miyuki Kazuya.
The little girl makes a small noise, tugging at the leg of Miyuki’s pants. He scoops her up with graceful ease, and she settles easily, nestled in the crook of his arm.
Eiichiro looks utterly unhappy about the turn of events and Eijun recognizes that face, it’s the face right before a truly terrible temper tantrum, so Eijun preemptively blocks it at the pass by picking up his own, cranky tot and pressing Eiichiro’s face into his shoulder, hand gentle but firm in his son’s unruly hair.
“Yeah, the Giants. Good -it’s been...good,” he says, because he has his pride, even if his voice catches on the ugly truth of his lie. “You too, Miyuki Kazuya. The Swallows won the pennant last year.”
Miyuki grins, wide and knowing, and it’s the same fucking smirk that Eijun has wanted to punch off Miyuki’s face hundreds, thousands, of times before. It’s like nothing has changed for Miyuki, and Eijun burns with envy, resentment.
Miyuki Kazuya, one of Japanese baseball’s darlings, one-half of the all-star battery on the Japanese international baseball team. Miyuki Kazuya, skilled, talented, confident . Still standing tall and sure.
Sawamura Eijun, once a boy who won Koushien with his teammates, now a man who sits and watches as other people bring victory to his team. Sawamura Eijun, lost, frustrated, confused. Scrambling to salvage the shattered shards of his confidence, his dreams of standing under that wide, blue sky again, the stands chanting his name.
Miyuki Kazuya has achieved all his dreams before the age of thirty and Sawamura Eijun finds himself sleepless most nights, contemplating the ceiling of his tiny Tokyo apartment, terrified that he will have to give up his before he even turns twenty-six.
Eiichiro disrupts his thoughts with a low whine, stomach rumbling something fierce as he wriggles unhappily in Eijun’s hold, nearly tumbling out of it with a particularly sharp full-body flail.
“Eiichiro,” he says as sternly as he can, calling upon all the fatherly powers that reside in him, “sit still, or no dessert tonight.” Eiichiro stills and Eijun breathes again. “We should get going. There won’t be anything good at the convenience store if we don’t get there soon.”
Miyuki laughs. “That’s fine,” he says, eyes twinkling with amusement. “I need to get home to start on dinner anyways, right Misaki?” The little girl nods enthusiastically with her father.
Misaki? Miyuki Misaki? Eijun thinks bleakly. What a name.
They part at the the street, Eijun setting Eiichiro down, his son’s hand tightly clasped in his own, and making a beeline for the convenience store, while Miyuki, still carrying Misaki, pauses by the entrance, one hand digging into his pocket for a set of car keys.
The late autumn chill is a welcome relief, a revitalizing jolt, and he focuses on Eiichiro’s hot hand in his, grounds himself with his son and the promise he made to himself that he’d never, ever let this tiny heart in his hands down.
“What would you like to eat tonight, Eiichiro?”
“Ramen!”
“FamilyMart doesn’t sell ramen,” he says, squeezing his son’s hand. At least, not the kind that isn't instant, he thinks to himself. “I have to go back to practice after dinner, so we can’t stay out too late tonight. No ramen tonight, buddy.”
“Tonkotsu, then,” Eiichiro decides after a moment. “I want tonkotsu!”
“Let’s see if they still have tonkotsu.”
It’s late, and he’s alone, pitching to his makeshift catcher’s box on home plate.
He throws one pitch -ball, too far out of the strike zone -and tries to bring forth the memories of highschool, of how the ball felt leaving his fingertips, the way it just fell good and right , the sound of it thudding solidly into a catcher’s mitt.
Another pitch, this time, just barely missing the batter.
He thinks of Eiichiro and the way he declares, “My dad’s a pitcher for the Yomiuri Giants!”, smiling so deep and wide the entire world can see his missing baby teeth and how proud he is of his father.
It’s well after 11 pm and Sawamura Eijun tells himself, twenty more pitches , and winds up for another.