He left me

By the fourth day, Shohei was convinced Kyourin must live in the building. No matter what time of day he arrived or left, the man was always somewhere. In the lab space, at his desk, in the break room, walking the greenhouse… There was never a time he didn’t encounter him somewhere or other, sometimes in conversation with people he did not yet know, but mostly alone.

That afternoon, Shohei familiarised himself with the running experiments he’d be able to contribute to, what had been finished in recent times and what was still on the horizon. The information onslaught made him exhausted and he filled pages upon pages of his little notebook. It was only 3PM, but Shohei already considered calling it a day. Behind him, the jungle was calling and he followed it. Shrugging out of the lab coat to be able to endure the heat of the greenhouse, Shohei went into the greenhouse to observe the miraculous termites.

Even though he had been to the Philippines during his PhD times, observing the termite mounds in their natural habitat, every time he laid eyes on the colonies of Kyourin Laboratories, it felt like seeing them for the first time. He hoped the wonder would never cease. After reading through some of the documentation on how they got the termites settled enough to produce fungi from a healthy hive, he was even more in awe of the wonders this lab produced.

What else would he find here? How wasn’t everyone talking about Kyourin? Sure, he wasn’t disliked, but there also wasn’t much of a buzz around him. Maybe this was it—the thing that would put them on the map for good, and Shohei would be there to help them. The thought made him giddy.

The mushrooms in front of him didn’t look like anything special. White, long stems, elegant. Yet he knew the secrets they held, the possibilities. For years and years, he’d devoted his life to them. His single-minded focus had cost him relationships, friends and even the goodwill of his parents. Everything seemed worth it when he clutched his notebook, kneeling in front of the termite mound.

“Beautiful, aren’t they?”

“Sensei…”

Shohei looked up to see Kyourin standing directly behind him. He was still wearing his lab coat. When a hand was offered, Shohei took it, rising to his feet. Oh. There it was again. That sickly, sweet smell. It reminded Shohei of a Durian, but it was less pungent, more rotten. He wondered what plants or chemicals Kyourin was working on.

“Here, take this,” Kyourin said and handed him a juice packet from his lab coat pocket. It was cold. “You’ve been thinking too much. You need sugar.”

“That obvious?”

“The first weeks are always overwhelming. I won’t fire you for taking off earlier today. If you’re anything like me, you’ll be thinking about what you saw all day and night, and that counts as work time in my book.”

Shohei laughed softly. “That would mean a lot of overtime.”

“That’s the nature of this profession. Are you worried anyone will miss you back home?”

Usually, Shohei didn’t answer questions regarding his personal life. But that was just because he had no desire to share details with the bastards back at university. He looked at Kyourin, who stared ahead at the termite mound and saw someone he wanted to be. Someone who wasn’t unlike himself already. Someone… who looked very handsome in glasses. He swallowed.

“There’s no one back home. I once entertained the idea of a pet, but it would’ve been alone for most of its life. That’s no way to live.”

“And yet we do,” Kyourin said.

Shohei let the words sink for a moment, feeling the weight on his heart.

“Do you have anyone at home?” he asked, and immediately berated himself for it. What was he doing? Asking his new boss things like that…

Kyourin just smiled. “I had someone. He left me.”

He.

Shohei glanced at him. So he too…

“If it makes you feel any better, there are fish in the greenhouse water features, who help fertilise the plants. We consider them pets around here,” Kyourin said. “Some of the bigger ones even have names. Come on, I’ll show you.”

——

Shohei dropped his keys on the sideboard after letting the door fall close behind him. His apartment was silent, like it always was. The clutter, decoration and wear made it feel lived in, in a way that sometimes felt like a lie to himself. Especially after the conversation that afternoon.

“He left me,” he echoed Kyourin’s words. “He…”

No. He couldn’t do that. His last crush had ended in disaster. Every single one had. He couldn’t endanger his job for something as silly as a crush. These thoughts had to be eliminated immediately.

Shohei flopped down on his bed and reached for the bento and can of beer he had picked up in the Konbini on his way home, settling in to watch a silly video.

——

He spotted the picture immediately. Always interested in Kyourin’s work, he had looked at his desk too many times during the week to not see the change. The man himself was nowhere to be seen as Shohei arrived the next morning, but his experiments were still strewn about the room. Having been instructed not to touch anything, even if it looked like one of the samples was rotting in its dish, Shohei set down his things and looked closer at the picture.

Two men in casual clothes, feeding koi together. Shohei recognised the location and the fish immediately. It was the pond Kyourin had showed him yesterday. One of the men was Kyourin himself, beaming as he dropped pellets into the water. The other was about his age, but with more delicate features and a soft smile, which was directed at Kyourin rather than the koi.

Was that… him?

“Matsumoto!”

Shohei jumped like he’d been caught stealing something. He turned to see Ito on the other side of the room.

“Grab your coat, we’re going over the team’s running experiments today, so you know what’s happening along the chain.”

“Okay, be right there,” Shohei replied.