Balance

BALANCE
A Hikaru no Go Sekkushiaru Roman Series
By Sailor Mac

PART FIVE: EMOTIONAL (4/4)

“Wow . . . this building is even nicer than I thought it was going to be!” Waya said as they walked up the path of Hikaru and Akira’s building.

“I’ve been in this neighborhood before,” Isumi said. “I had a student who lived here. It’s all stockbrokers, high executives, people who made money off inventions . . .”

“Geez,” Waya said, as he pulled the door open. “Never thought I’d see Shindou living in a place like this!”

As they headed for the elevator, tirstirst thing they saw was a little old lady in a sweatsuit that was so intensely pink it nearly gave everything around her a rosy hue.

“Oh, hello there,” she said to the boys. “I don’t think I’ve seen you around here before. I’m Okawa-san -- are you new tenants?”

“No,” Isumi said, bowing politely. “We’re here visiting a friend, Shindou Hikaru.”

“Oh, yes, Shindou-san!” she said. “What a lovely boy he is -- he lives on my floor with his cousin, or maybe he’s a half-brother?”

Waya and Isumi exchanged a look. Did she *really* not know?”

“Well, anyway,” she said, “I just took Shindou-san a jug of my homemade peach tea yesterday. He loves my peach tea. I developed the recipe for my granddaughter, you know. She loves sweet things -- my, you should see her put away mochi cakes at a festival! Oh, and red bean ice m. Sm. She just *loves* red bean ice cream. Well, she got that from my son, he l red red bean ice cream, too. And obanyaki. Oh, does he love obanyaki. Why, when he was a child, I once caught him with half a dozen of them stashed in his bedroom -- I wouldn’t mind him having that many, mind you, but trying to eat them *all at once*?”

Finally, the woman stopped to take a breath -- and Waya and Isumi bolted for the open elevator car. “We have to go!” Waya said. “Shindou is expecting us!”

“Nice meeting you!” Isumi added as the door closed behind them.

They both sagged against the wall, drawing a deep breath. Just listening to that woman prattle was exhausting.

“You were saying about the kind of people who live in this neighborhood?” Waya said.

The elevator stopped, and the boys got out, to see a burly, nearly-bald man who had grown a bushy black mustache to make up for the lack of hair on his head. “Watch where you’re going, idiots!” he barked. “You nearly ran me over!”

“S-s-sorry,” Isumi stammered.

“Hey!” Waya said. “We didn’t run you over!”

“You’re just like everyone else in this building,” the man growled as he got in the elevator. “Rude!”

They watched him go, jaws nearly down to their chests.

“Okay, I won’t say anything else about this neighborhood,” Isumi said.

A quick search for Hikaru’s apartment confirmed they had gotten off at the wrong floor. They got back on the elevator, praying that they wouldn’t encounter any more looney neighbors -- which they didn’t.

Finally, they knocked on Hikaru’s door -- only to see it answered by a woman in her late 20s, willowy with wavy red hair just past her shoulders, wearing a green dress pantsuit.

“Oh, sorry, we have the wrong apartment!” Waya said, wondering what else could possibly go wrong with this trip. “I was looking for Shindou Hikaru.”

“You have the right apartment,” she said.

Now Waya nearly fell on the floor. *Shindou’s *straight* now?* he thought. *And with *an older woman*? Is this damn apartment house in the *Twilight Zone*?*

“I’m his neighbor, Suzuhara Kyoko,” she said. “I’m helping Shindou-san and Touya-san with the cooking. Come in -- the boys are in the kitchen right now, they’ll be out in a moment.”

The two Go pros followed her into the living room. “Won’t you please sit down?” she said, gesturing to the couch. When the boys did so, she said, “So, are the two of you a couple?”

Isumi nearly choked. Waya almost shouted, “I have a girlfriend!”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Kyoko said, bowing. “I just thought that since you came together, and you’re friends of Shindou . . .”

“No, we knew him *before* . . . that,” Waya said.

Hikaru, hearing his old friend’s voice, poked his head out of the kitchen. “Waya-kun! Isumi-san!” he said. *Great, they’re early,* he thought. *We’re not even ready with the sushi yet.* “Um, can I get you something to drink?”

“Just Coke for me,” Waya said, and Isumi added that he wanted one also.

Silently thanking all that’s holy he had remembered to stock up on soda, Hikaru got the drinks and brought them into the living room. “So, did you find this place okay?” he said.

“Considering that you gave the directions, yes,” Waya said.

Hikaru frowned. “Hey! There’s nothing wrong with my directions!”

“Um, Shindou, are you forgetting the time you tried to help us find your cousin’s concert?” Isumi said.

“What? You just got off the wrong stop, right?”

“The wrong stop *and* the wrong line,” Waya said. “We ended up halfway across Tokyo!”

“Hey, you still made it to the concert in time!” Hikaru said, folding his arms.

“That’s because we called you, and you called your cousin, and he sent that scary gaijin manager of his to pick us up. You know what it’s like to find an AK-47 next to you in a car?”

In the kitchen, Akira finished slicing a sushi roll, silently listening to the banter.

*They’re getting along well,* he thought, which pleased him, since he knew Hikaru was attaining his main objective for the evening.

He knew, howeverat iat if he walked into that room, all that easy conversation would come to a screeching halt, because they would instantly be reminded that Hikaru was in a relationship with someone they disliked.

He thought of the party celebrating Hikaru’s entrance into the Honinbou League, where he’d gone outside because he felt so out-of-place.

*I know I’m going to have to go out there eventually,* he thought. *His friends are just going to have to accept that he and I are together, because it’s a fact and it’s not going to change. But for now, I’ll let them have a few minutes.*

He started arranging the sushi slices on a platter -- just as he heard another voice enter the room. This one he couldn’t quite place, he knew it wasn’t one of the insei . . .

Then, he heard Hikaru introduce the newcomer to the others as “Kaga Tetsuo.” Now that was a name he knew from a long, long time ago, but he couldn’t quite place it. The son of one of his father’s students, maybe? Someone who was a grade or two ahead of him in elementary school?

Akira leaned over just far enough that he could peer into the living room without being seen. There was a guy with bushy red hair sitting in one of the easy chairs, leaning over to talk to Waya -- and the memory clicked into place like a piece finally fitting into a puzzle.

He remembered himself at the Go school his father had sent him to when his little fingers could barely hold the stones, saying to the boy opposite him, “You want me to lose?”

Akira wondered if Kaga Tetsuo still remembered his experiences in Go school and how much he’d resented Akira. *If so,* he thought, *it could make for an unpleasant night.*

But Akira just clenched his fist, a look of steely determination in his eyes. He was going to go out there and face any teasing, jeering and resentment, and he was going to make them see how important he was to Hikaru, that they were a unit now, and if they wanted Hikaru’s friendship . . . well, he came with the package now, too.

He whipped off his cook’s apron and picked up the sushi platter, ready to serve -- and to face anything that came with it.

* * *

“You knew Touya?” Waya said to Kaga, swirling his remaining soda around in the glass.

“Please,” Kaga said. “Touya *lost* to me.”

Waya and Isumi both leaned over, eyes nearly popping out of their heads. “You . . . *beat* him?” Waya said.

“Yep, in Go school,” Kaga said, reaching for the dish of wasabi peas Hikaru had put on the coffee table and popping a few in his mouth. “He deserved it, too. He was as smug as a kid as he is now.”

A worried look crossed Kyoko’s face. She looked around for Hikaru, but he had gone into the bedroom to make a call on his cell phone. *Thank the gods,* she thought. *I don’t think he’d want to hear .*
“Oh, yeah,” Waya said. “I knew what he was about as soon as I saw him at the pro exam. Do you know he skipped the first day to play some guy on the Internet? He was *that* sure he was going to win every other game.”

At that moment, Akira walked into the room, bearing his sushi platter, which he set down on the table without a word. He went into the kitchen again to get soy sauce, chopsticks and plates.

Kaga and Waya looked at each other, a glint passing between them -- one that made Kyoko very nervous. She cast a look in the direction of the bedroom.

“So,” Kaga said, “think Touya’s seen any of the world that isn’t the inside of a Go salon?”

“Or a beauty parlor?” Waya added.

Isumi looked alarmed. “Waya!”

“Nah, they don’t have combination Go salons and beauty parlors,” Kaga said. “You think he’d go anywhere where they didn’t play Go?”

“Hey, they have Game Boys now for that, you know,” Waya said. “It’s possible to play Go anywhere!”

“Ah, so they knew that Touya was going to come around,” Kaga said. “So they had to invent Game Boy Go for him.”

Isumi, looking really uncomfortable, said to Kyoko, “Um, this is just good-natured kidding, I’m sure.”

“Well, of course they did,” Waya said. “You think Touya could take two steps out the door without . . .”

Hikaru poked his head out the bedroom door. He’d heard the whole thing, and his heart sank. He had so wanted them to get to like Akira, but their old prejudices were still there.

“Hikaru?” Akari said at the other end of the phone. “What’s going on?”

“Other than Kaga and Waya trying to drive Akira to seppuku?”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. You’re only a couple of blocks away from it, turn left at the next corner, then walk up to the light and turn right, and we’re half a block in. Seeya in a few!”

Hikaru walked back into the living room just in time to see Akira reenter with his tray, all conversation coming to a stop. He put it down next to the sushi, sat down in one of the folding chairs they’d borrowed from the Go Institute and said, calmly, “I overheard a conversation about where I might have traveled. I get to travel a lot. Sometimes, it doesn’t even involve Go.”

The rest of the group was quiet for a moment. Hikaru smiled to himself. Akira was handling the situation much better than he thought he would.

“So!” Hikaru said. “Akari-chan and Mitani-kun will be here in a few minutes, they got lost. Um, Kaga-san, you were going to tell me about you being a shougi insei?”

“You know, we have plenty of room in the program for you,” Kaga said, reaching over for a set of chopsticks and a plate. “You’d make a hell of a shougi player. And you’d have more fun than with Go.”

“No thanks,” Hikaru said, picking up a plate of his own. “I like Go just fine.”

“Hey, if you were good at Go, why’d you switch to shougi?” Waya said.

Kaga seemed to stiffen a little, but he said, calmly, “Eh, I got bored with it.” He looked up at Hikaru and added, quickly, “I take the pro exam starting next month!”

“How many games do you have to play for that?” Isumi said, remembering his own experiences playing in endless, grueling pro exams year after year, never quite making it.

“Works a lot like your Go pro exam, actually,” Kaga said. “There’s a preliminary round, then a final . . .”

A knock came on the door, and Hikaru rushed to answer it. There was Akari, holding a cooler in her hand and wearing a light blue party dress. Next to her was Mitani, wearing a plain white shirt and his usual suspenders, his one concession to the occasion a pair of black dress pants.

“Hi, Hikaru!” she said, handing him the cooler. “I know you’re usually supposed to bring wine or sake to a dinner party, but since, well, we’re not old enough to get that stuff . . . this is full of cold tea and soda.”

“Thanks,” Hikaru said, taking it from her.

Kaga spotted her, and waved. “Akari-chan!” he said. “Haven’t seen you in a long time!”

“Hello, Kaga-san!” she said.

“Everyone, this is my oldest friend, Fujisaki Akari,” Hikaru said, “and this is Mitani Yuuki, from the Go Club.”

“Your friend here became an insei because this guy and I played three-on-one Go with him,” Kaga said.

Waya frowned. “Three games at once?”

“I didn’t think Shindou could handle that,” Isumi said, as Mitani and Akari settled into seats. “Not the way he was playing then.”

Akira listened to the conversation, quietly. Again, he had a sense of looking into a world he’d never fully be a part of. He certainly hadn’t had the positive experiences with the Kaio Go Club that Hikaru seemed to have had with the Haze one -- quite the opposite.

*What would my life have been like,* he thought, *if *I* had gone to Haze?* But he knew the answer. He might have been in a different school, but he’d still be *Touya Akira*.

*So what?* he thought. *I’m proud of who I am. I’m proud of what I’d accomplished then, and what I’ve accomplished now. I don’t care what they think of me.*

And then, a truth hit him that he’d wanted to avoid thinking of. *If I hadn’t met Hikaru,* he thought, *I would have ended up alone. Completely, utterly alone. I probably wouldn’t have missed having love in my life if I’d never experienced it, but just the thought . . .*

He stood up, quickly, and said, “I’ll get the table ready.” He needed the distraction -- he didn’t want to have that thought anym


* * *

“You’re kidding,” Waya said. “The guy resigned over *that*?”

“It surprised me, too,” Isumi said, picking up noodles with his chopsticks. “I thought the game could have gone on for another hour.”

“If it were me, I probably would have done the same thing,” Akari said, picking up her glass of iced tea.

“I *told* you that you panic too much in those situations,” Mitani nearly grumbled, pouring more soy sauce onto his food.

Hikaru looked across the table at Kyoko and Hiromi -- he had joined them right before they sat down to eat. His friends had talked about nothing but Go. Even Kaga had offered some commentary on Akari’s description of the last tournament she’d played in.

*They must be bored out of their minds,* he thought. *Maybe I should try to steer the conversation toward something that’s *not* Go.*

“By the way,” he said, “Kyoko-san took us to a great Mitsuwa Mega-Mart today to get the food for this dinner.”

“It’s brand-new,” she said. “It only opened a couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh, yeah?” Waya said, looking interested. “I need a new place to get food. The one near my apartment is going to be closing in a few weeks.”

“How come?” Isumi said, picking up another piece of meat.

“Whole block got condemned,” Waya said. “They’re putting up a big office building.”

“Really?” Hiromi said. &;Whe;Where is that? That may be the one my company is thinking of moving into!”

Hikaru breathed a sigh of relief. He’d gotten the conversation onto more even ground. He looked over at Akira, who’d said hardly a word throughout the whole meal, and was now just eating quietly.

*Maybe I shouldn’t have done this to him,* he thought. *He’s not comfortable . . . and I know he heard what Kaga and Waya were saying. From now on, I think I’m just going to meet with my friends on neutral turf -- the Go Institute or a restaurant.*

“So what do they have at this Mega-Mart, anyway?” he heard Kaga say.

“Oh, everything you need,” Kyoko said. “Every kind of meat or fish. Lots and lots of produce. There’s a whole aisle of just teas. And across from the grocery store, there’s a strip mall with a lot of little shops -- a stationery store, a computer store, a Kinokuniya . . .”

“Hope it’s better than the Kinokuniya I go to,” Waya said. “They have *no* Go books whatsoever. Just basic stuff.”

“Must be the same one I went to,” Akari sighed. “I couldn’t find *anything*!

“You know, you should go to the one by the Nine Stars Club,” Isumi said, pointing his chopsticks aimlessly for emphasis. “They have *all kinds* of Go books. I even found ‘Twenty Five Steps to Flawless Joseki.’”

“You’re kidding!” Waya said. “I can’t find that anywhere!”

Hikaru sighed. *Even when the conversation’s about *stores*, he thought, *it finds its way back to Go.* He shot the Suzuharas an apologetic look, but Kyoko just smiled and shrugged.

*But at least the atmosphere is good,* Hikaru thought. *At least they’re not ragging on Akira anymore, and nobody seems uncomfortable.*

And to him, that was definitely a step in the right direction.

* * *

After dinner, the group headed back into the living room. Kaga and the Suzuharas headed off toward the couch -- Kaga had found out that Hiromi was a Haze graduate as well, and the two were enthusiastically swapping teacher horror stories.

“Hey, can you show us that Go room you were talking about?” Waya said to Hikaru.

“Sure,” Hikaru said, leading the way down the hall. He noticed that Waya and Isumi were the only two that followed -- he imagined Akari and Mitani had joined in the conversation about their old school.

*And Akira is probably out in the kitchen, starting to clean up,* he thought. He had a sudden urge to run back and get his lover, dragging him to the Go room with them.

*I can’t force him, though,* he thought.

He opened the door and turned on the light. “Okay, this is our main goban, it’s the one Touya used to have in his bedroom. The one I used to have is in the closet, it’s not as nice as his.” Walking over to the shelf, he picked up the portable board and supressed a blush as he instantly thought of the game in bed and its aftermath. “This is the full-sized portable, we also have a little magnetic board.”

Isumi wandered over to the shelves. “Wow! Nice book collection!” He pulled one volume from the shelf and started flipping through it.

“Oh, yeah, well, Touya brought most of those, too,” Hikaru said, sitting cross-legged at the goban. *Great,* he thought. *I must solikelike a slutboy living with his rich sugar daddy. Just what I *didn’t* want to sound like.*

Waya sat on the other side of the board. “You play him on this thing every night?”

“Just about,” Hikaru said. “Hey, it’s paid off, I’ve only lost one pro game since moving in with him!”

*And now I sound like I’m using him to further my career,* Hikaru thought. *I’m just bringing up *every single rumor* that went around about me.*

Waya looked away. “You . . . really *do* like living here with him, don’t you?”

There was a pause. Then, Hikaru leaned over and said, “Waya-kun . . .I heard what you and Kaga-san were saying when I was on the phone.”

Isumi suddenly turned around and looked at them, the book clutched in his hands, with a look on his face like a farmer watching a tornado approach his property.

Waya waved a hand. “We were just kidding.”

“I know you don’t like Touya, Waya-kun,” Hikaru said. “Hey, if I didn’t know him like I do, I wouldn’t like him, either. But you have to understand -- I see things in him that nobody else sees, because he won’t show them to anyone else. The Touya I know isn’t the Touya you know.”

Waya folded his arms. “How can you be so sure that what you’re talking about is the *real* To Bec Because the one I know is cold enough to . . .”

“I *know*,” Hikaru said, picking up one of the go kes and slamming it on the board for emphasis. “I just *do*, okay? When he and I are together -- it’s like it’s the only time he’s *relaxed*. You can see it in the way he sits, and walks -- heck, even in the way he *eats*.” He smiled softly, his fingers tracing the top of the lid. “He doesn’t hold his chopsticks as tightly when it’s just him and me.”

Hikaru noticed that Isumi was looking away now, putting the book he’d been holding back on the shelf and fiddling with the spines of a couple of others. *He’s probably not comfortable with the idea of two guys together,* he thought. *The way I was just talking . . . maybe I gave away too much.*

The silence that followed went on for so long that Hikaru began to feel uncomfortable. He stood up, ready to go back into the living room, proclaim his efforts to reach them a failure and admit they’d never be friends again.

Then Waya said, quietly, “Look . . . I’m still not entirely convinced. But if *you* think you’ve made the right choice, then I’m willing to accept it.” He looked up at Hikaru. “I’ll kill him if he does anything to hurt you, but I’m willing to accept it.”


ou wou won’t have to kill him, Waya-kun,” Hikaru said. He then turned to Isumi, who was still fiddling with the books. “Isumi-san, I know you don’t think I made the right choice, either . . .”

Isumi suddenly turned to face Hikaru, pushing the books back on the shelf, turning a bright red. “No, I didn’t say that.”

“I can tell,” Hikaru said.

Isumi went back to fiddling with the books. “It’s just that, well . . . I’ve never known anyone who, um . . .”

Hikaru went over and put a hand on his shoulder, then quickly pulled it back -- touching someone who wasn’t comfortable about gays, he realized, was *not* a smart thing to do. “Hey, I’m still the same person I always was. Nothing changed. I just found out more about myself, that’s all. Just like when you came to see me after you got back from China -- you helped me find things in my Go I didn’t know were there.”

*Damn,* Waya thought. *Shindou’s grown up a *lot* over the past few months. Is that from living with Touya? Could that actually be doing him some *good*?*

“Speaking of your Go,” Waya said, “neither one of us has played you in an eternity, you know.”

Hikaru whirled around. “Hey, we can take care of that right here, right now.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” Waya said. “How about we go to a Go salon and play a team match like we used to next time we all have a free day?”

“Waya!” Isumi said. “We can’t do that! We’re pros now!”

“Oh?” Waya said, standing up. “They don’t have to know that. We’ll go to a salon we haven’t been to before. We’ll give them a big handicap.”

“Yes, but . . .” Isumi said.

“I like the idea!” Hikaru said, rushing over to Waya. “Hey, I heard from one of the kids in my insei class about this one salon where everyone who plays there is just about as strong as a pro! It’s mostly guys who *just missed* passing the pro exam.”

“Yeah!” Waya said, clenching a fist in excitement. “Now you’re talking!”

Hikaru turned toward Isumi. “Well, are you in, Isumi-san?”

Isumi looked at the two of them, and then heaved a deep sigh. “Okay, I’m in,” he said. “But we give them the biggest handicap we can!”

“And then,” Waya said, “we’ll go out for sushi afterwards!”

“No, no,” Hikaru said. “Ramen!”

“You go for ramen all the time!” Waya said, frowning and folding his arms.

“Yeah, well, I don’t get to eat it every day anymore!” Hikaru said. “So I say ramen!”

“Sushi!”

“Ramen!”

Isumi just stood off to the side, watching the argument with a hand pressed to his head. In a strange way, he knew he’d missed this kind of thing like hell.

He didn’t know if he’d ever be a hundred percent comfortable in this apartment, or hearing Hikaru discuss his relationship with Akira -- but Hikaru was his friend, and Isumi knew he had missed that terribly. Finally closing up the gap that had opened between them was a huge relief.

Doing things together as a group made it feel like everything was *right* again.

Even if what Waya and Hikaru had planned was not exactly on the level.

* * *

Akari wandered over to where Akira was sitting alone, seemingly half-listening to the conversation amongst the other Haze alumns. She was getting a bit bored of the talk of pranks and which teacher was the most sadistic.

Besides, she genuinely wanted to talk to Akira.

“Hi,” she said. “This is the first time I’ve had a chance to talk to you all evening. I’m sorry we arrived so late.”

Akira was a bit surprised to be approached -- but he was glad that the person who did so was Akari. He knew she was the only one there who had no pre-formed opinions of him.

“It’s all right,” Akira said, turning toward her with a small smile. “I’ve kind of wanted to talk with you, too. You *are* the person who always knew Shindou best.”

She looked down, fiddling with her hair a bit. “The Hikaru I knew best was another person -- the one he was before he started playing Go, and met you.” Raising her head, she added, “We know two different people, it seems.”

“Do you wish Go hadn’t come into his life?” Akira said.

Akari smiled, gently. “you you mean, do I wish *you* hadn’t come into his life?” She noticed Akira looking away, seeming a bit uncomfortable. “I don’t. Not at all. Before he started playing, he was just -- well, aimless. Kind of a brat, actually.”

Akira turned back toward her. “He still is, sometimes. Kind of a brat, I mean.”

“But he’s happy now,” he said. “I don’t think he would have been if he hadn’t found his purpose in life.”

“And what about you?
AkirAkira said, reaching up and slowly fiddling with his collar.

“Well, I got a lot out of it, too -- I would never have played Go if not for Hikaru. And I met a lot of people through the Go Club who are very dear to me now.” She looked over at Mitani, who was quietly listening to a long monologue by Hiromi, with tender eyes. “Including him,” she said, softly.

“You do seem happy,” Akira said.

“Oh, yes, I have no regrets,” said Akari, brushing back a strand of long, red-brown hair. “I do admit that there’s times when I wonder what life would have been like otherwise, but I’m glad things worked out like they did.” She looked up at Akira. “Besides, there’s no way I could hate you. I admire you too much.”

Now Akira was completely taken aback. “You . . . do?”

“Yes. I followed your career through Weekly Go all along. I was curious about you, ever since you showed up at our club meetdemademanding a game with Hikaru. And then, you played *third board* in the tournament, when you could have been a pro, just so you could play him.”

Akira winced at that memory, which was painful all around. “I thought it was the right thing to do at the time,” he said, a bit stiffly.

“But that’s why I admire you,” she said. “You always knew exactly what you wanted, and you went for it. You didn’et aet anyone or anything stand in your way.”

*I have something standing in my way now,* he thought. *My father.*

At thatent,ent, the door of the Go room opened, and Hikaru came out with Waya and Isumi, all of them laughing. That is, Waya and Hikaru were laughing -- Isumi was just looking at them a bit nervously.

“Akari-chan!” Hikaru said. “Come play a quick game with me! I need to practice playing a game with a heavy handicap!”

“Hikaru!” she said, jumping up. “I don’t need that heavy a handicap anymore! I can play you with five stones!”

“A *five-stone* handicap?” he said. “I’ll *kill* you with that!”

“You haven’t seen me play in awhile, have you?” she said, a bit primly, following him to the Go room.

Akira paused, considering whether he wanted to go in the kitchen and start cleaning up, or goingwatcwatch the game. Watching the game won.

But as he headed for the Go room, her words echoed in his head again -- “You knew exactly what you wanted . . . you didn’t let anyone or anything stand in your way . . .”

* * *

Hikaru put the last of the dishes into the cabinet and heaved a sigh of relief. “Gods, I didn’t think we *owned* so many dishes!” he said. He headed back into the living room, where Akira was folding the last of the borrowed chairs and adding it to the pile by the door.

“Hey,” Hikaru said, wrapping his arms around his lover’s waist from behind. “Wanna play a game before bed?”

Akira ran his fingers over the back of a chair. A game? He knew he wasn’t up for that right now. He was still deep in thought, Akari’s words replaying themselves in his mind.

“What’s wrong?” Hikaru said. “Is it because of my friends?”

“No,” Akira said, still looking down at the chair. “Not at all. It’s . . .”

Akari’s face flashed into his mind again, smiling, saying, “I’ve always admired you. You knew what you wanted . . . you didn’t let anything stand in your way . . .”

*What I want is a life with Hikaru, without worrying about what my father thinks and having him interfere,* Akira thought. *Until now . . . I’ve let him stand in my way. If I don’t do something, he’ll continue to stand in my way.*

He turned around, gently wriggled out of Hikaru’s embrace and said, “I’m going out.”

“Now?” Hikaru said. “It’s after 10 o’clock!
BR> BR>
*And my father doesn’t go to bed until at least 11,* Akira thought. *I can still catch him.*

“I’ll tell you about it in the morning,” Akira said, kissing Hikaru’s forehead. “Don’t wait up.”

Hikaru just stood there staring as the door closed behind him.

*Geez, I wonder what that’s about?* he thought. *It sure as hell isn’t a game, or a lesson -- who’d do that at this time of night?*

Part of him wanted to follow Akira and grill him -- butwas was tired. *I’ll probably hear him come in, and I’ll wake up,* he thought, heading to the bedroom with a yawn.

* * *

Akira walked up to the traditional-style gates of the Touya estate, thinking about the times he’d run up this path eagerly as a child, knowing that once he was inside, he and his father would be playing Go.

He was feeling something entirely different now -- something akin to bitterness.

*And there’s someone else I want to play Go with in the evenings,* he thought.

He considered knocking on the door -- after all, this wasn’t his home anymore -- but decided to just turn the knob and walk in. He *was* still the only child of this family, after all.

His mother was sitting in the living room, her head lowered over a book. As usual, the television was dark and silent. She raised her head quickly, a startled expression in her eyes, and said, “Akira! You’re home!”

Akira smiled, softly. “Hello, Mother.”

“What happened?” she said, rushing over to him. “Are you moving back in with us? Did something . . . go wrong?”

Akira shook his head. “Everything’s fine,” he said. “Please -- I need to speak with Father.”

“He’s in the Go room,” she said. “He spends so much time there -- even more than when you were living with us.”

“Thanks,” he said. He gave his mother’s hand a squeeze, and then headed to what was always his favorite room in the house.

There was his father, in a black yukata, seated alone at the board, laying out stones. Akira recognized the pattern right away -- it was a game they’d played against each other shortly before the outing.

"Hello, Father,” he said, quietly.

Touya Koyou looked up, and narrowed his eyes at his son. "Akira . . . have you come home?"

"No, I haven't. I have my own home now."

His father looked back at the board, his face darkening. "So, you're still confused about your life."

“I am *not* confused, Father,” Akira said, walking over to the board and settling in the familiar position of his father’s opponent. Only thme tme they were engaged in now wasn’t played with stones.

“I know exactly what I want out of life,” he added, fixing his father with a steady, steely gaze. “Isn't that what *you* encouraged me to do, ever since I was small?"

The older pro raised his eyes to meet his son’s, his own expression just as icy. "That was to do with your Go. Not with life."

"You're wrong, Father,” Akira said, one hand coming up to rest on the board, but the rest of him fixed and unmoving. “Go *is* life. It's a mirror of life. I've always been in perfect control of my Go, and I'm in control of my life as well."

“You *lost* control of your life. To mistake a rivalry for a love affair . . .”

“It is *not* a mistake, Father,” Akira said. “You always told me I should know my own mind, be in touch with my own feelings. That is exactly what I was doing. I have always *known* what I felt.”

His father looked away, and there was a long pause. Finally, he said, "You're so young . . ."

“I’ve had a career and an income since I was 13,” Akira replied. “I’ve interacted with adults as long as I can remember. You know as well as I do that I am *not* a typical teenager, Father.”

The Meijin looked back at his son. "But Shindou . . .”

"He knows what he's doing as well,” Akira said. “We didn't just decide to run away together because of some romantic dream. We *thought* about this. A lot."

"I *still* say that you are both confusing rivalry with love!" Touya Koyou said, his voice rising, becoming a commanding, booming tone designed to intimidate whoever was across from him.

But Akira was not easily intimidated. “That is *not true*, Father. I can’t say that enough. I know what it feels like to want to defeat someone, and what it feels like to want to be close to someone. I’ve felt both emotions for Shindou, and I know the difference between them.”

His father looked away again. "That's your decision.”

"You're right, Father,&q Aki Akira said. "This is *my* decision."

He reached across to the two Go kes, grabbed a black stone and slammed it to the board with a loud *pachi*, leaving his hand atop it. "When you take your hand away from the stone,” he said, “you can't take your move back. With this relationship . . ." He removed his hand. "I've taken my hand from the stone."

His father sat quietly for a moment. Then, he said, in a voice much softer than before, “You really *have* committed yourself to this relationship, haven’t you?”

“Yes,” Akira said. “I’ve made a double commitment to him -- to be his life partner and to reach the Hand of God with him.”

Touya Koyou just sat at the board, hands tucked into the sleeves of his yukata, head lowered as if he were studying the stones and plotting his next move.

Then, he said, "I do not necessarily like your choice, but I will respect it. You have to make your own decisions, and you will make your own mistakes."

"And I am ready for that," Akira said.

“You know, son . . . our home is always open to you if you need it.”

“I know, Father,” Akira said, getting up. “But, as I said before, I have my own home now. And I have to get back to it now.”

His father just nodded silently, and went back to contemplating the patterns of stones on the board.

Akira bowed and said, “Good night,” then left the room. The living room was empty; his mother had gone to bed during their discussion.

He opened the door and stepped out, breathing the night air deeply. He felt like a huge burden had been lifted from his back, one that has been there since they were outed.

*I feel like an *adult* now,* he thought, as he started back down the path. *And now, for the first time, I think I’ve convinced my father to see me as an adult as well.*

* * *

Hikaru was dreaming.

He was standing in the park near the house where he grew up, by the swings, watching two figures approach him. One was himself, around age 13. The other was a tall man wearing the conical hat and robes of the Heian period. They seemed completely oblivious to him, and were talking amongst themselves.

"He came to my school looking for me, wanting me to play a game with him," the younger Hikaru said, kicking at a clod of dirt. "I just don't understand Touya sometimes."

Sai looked thoughtful. "You think about Touya a lot, don't you?" he said.

"Saa, I have to,” the young Hikaru said, folding his hands behind his head and stretching. “I'm gonna catch up to him. I'm gonna be face to face with him someday, and he's gonna be *my* rival."

*That’s definitely me back then,* the older Hikaru thought. *I didn’t think about anything but getting stronger so I could beat Touya. I didn’t realize at that point how far I still had to go.*

Suddenly, a broad smile broke across Sai’s face. "Hikaru . . . I think you may be in love with him."

The younger Hikaru’s face froze in shock. "WHAT?" He spun around to face the ghost. "He is my RIVAL! We're NOT in love! And in case you haven't noticed . . . we're both BOYS!"

A mischievous twinkle came into Sai’s eyes. "Well, in my day, it wasn't at all uncommon for . . ."

"I'M NOT HEARING THIS!" The younger Hikaru put his hands over his ears, as if that would block out the voice of the ghost, and ran several lengths ahead of him.

“Hikaru!” Sai said, running after him. They both vanished from sight, leaving the older Hikaru still standing there.

*I'd forgotten that conversation,* he thought. *Sai, you knew all along, didn't you? Is that why you left? Because you knew it was time for him and me to be together?*

And then, he remembered the strange circumstances under which his romantic relationship with Akira began -- the series of dreams Akira had, all with Sai in them.

He knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Sai had been directly responsible for them, and that he had been their matchmaker, from wherever he was now.

*You’re looking out for me even now, Sai,* Hikaru thought, tears welling up in his eyes.

* * *

Akira walked into the living room to find a single light on. It didn’t surprise him -- he’d figured Hikaru would have gone to bed.

He went into the bathroom and prepared for bed himself, going back out to shut off the living room light on his way to the bedroom.

Sure enough, Hikaru was fast asleep . . . but he seemed a bit restless. As Akira got in the bed with him, he noticed the other boy had tears on his face.

“Sai,” Hikaru whispered in his sleep.

Akira knew exactly what the boy must be dreaming. He reached over and gathered the sleeping Hikaru into his arms. Hikaru didn’t wake up, but instinctively snuggled next to his lover.

Tenderly, Akira kissed Hikaru’s tears away, then brought his lips to his ear.

“*I* will never leave you,” he whispered.

* THE END*



AUTHOR’S NOTES

And finally, “Balance” comes to an end. This project has actually been in the works almost from the moment I got interested in Hikaru no Go in April of 2003 -- I have Lady Cosmos to thank for showing me the first 12 episodes of the series and getting me hooked. I began to get all kinds of unconnected ideas -- Akira’s dreams, the Internet sex research, the painful forced outing -- and it was Aishuu, who I met through this fandom, who helped me sort out the ideas and organize them into a series. (Well, it was initially going to be one story. Then two. Then three. And before you knew it, I was looking at a five-part series.) Aishuu was also the one who named the series and its individual chapters -- I am forever in her debt for all her help with this.

Thanks also go to Steve Savage, who helped shape the final version, to Sonya and the other members of the Nekos and to everyone who commented on the series. I am eternally grateful for the feedback I got on this!

Hikaru no Go roperoperty of Yumi Hotta, Takeshi Obata and Shueisha. These characters ain't mine, I'm just borrowing them for a little while.