Chapter 7

Kento had had to put weight on his right leg in order to protect his freshly-injured left leg, which meant by the time Kento crawled into bed, the pain had gotten utterly unbearable.
What if I have to amputate my leg? There was no stopping his imagination now. Tomoya noticed Kento’s ashen colour and propped himself up in his bed across.
“What’s wrong?” he said. “Does your leg hurt?”
“No.” Kento maintained his bravado and pulled the covers over his head. In the dark, he gritted his teeth against the pain and clenched a fistful of his sheets.
Mom.
He called the name of the person he wanted most by his side. He felt a stinging at the back of his nose. He rubbed his nose against his pillow to distract himself from the pain. He could not let the tears spill. Not at any cost, even if no one was looking.
I’m not a kid anymore.
That was what he had said to his worried mother when he had decided to live in the dormitory alone. I’m not a kid anymore, he had reassured her.
He didn’t want to worry his mother in London, nor his father in New York. Both of them were chasing their dreams; that was why he had convinced them that he wanted to chase his dreams too, since he wasn’t a child anymore.
But… what if there’s a disease in my right leg?
Both of his legs throbbed painfully, along with the beating of his heart. When he realized it, he was groaning in pain.
“Kento! Kento, your leg hurts, doesn’t it?” He lifted his covers to see Tomoya peering at him with concern.
“I’m fine… go back to sleep.” With that, Kento rolled over. Suddenly, a fierce pain shot through his legs, and a groan escaped through his gritted teeth. He managed to swallow it before he turned to the wall. He pulled the covers over his head again.
The pain grew worse, and tears pried his eyelids apart. Kento bit his lip.
Damnit, I will not cry.
He wasn’t sure how long he had endured the pain like that.
“Are you alright?” he heard a low voice suddenly whisper at his ear. “Look this way, Kento.”
As he lethargically opened his eyes and twisted his neck, he saw Orihara looking down at him.
“…It’s you.”
“I’m sorry. If the pain was that bad, I should have prescribed you painkillers.”
Orihara was wearing a collared shirt and pants instead of his lab coat. A large black bag was sitting at his feet. Orihara opened the bag and took out a medicine pouch.
“Are you up for taking some medication?” He looked around. “I’ll go get some juice for you,” and left the room. After some moments, he returned, out of breath and a can of orange juice in hand.
“Ah, that was a long way to the vending machine,” he laughed as he pulled the tab and handed the can to Kento.
“Can you get up?”
“Yeah.”
Kento managed to prop half of his body up. He took the medicine capsule from Orihara and washed it down with orange juice.
While he was busy with that, Orihara examined both of Kento’s legs and changed his poultice.
The cool compress made the pain fade away, and Kento’s head finally cleared enough for him to think. He was still a little dazed, but he managed to thank Orihara.
“How did you know?” he then asked.
Orihara smiled gently. “Tomoya contacted Mrs. Fujimoto to tell her you were in pain. Mrs. Fujimoto asked me to make a house call here.”
Fujimoto, the school nurse, lived in this dorm. Tomoya had probably gone running to her room.
“Where’s Tomoya?”
“He said he would stay over at Mrs. Fujimoto’s room tonight.”
Kento looked at the bedside clock and saw that it was two in the morning. He whipped back to look at Orihara in surprise.
“You came all the way here at this hour?”
Orihara shook his head as if to say it was of no consequence.
“Just to let you know, Mrs. Fujimoto used to work as a nurse long time ago at my uncle’s clinic. That’s why she often asks me to make house calls, and I usually can’t say no. Besides, after I heard you were in pain, there was no way I could leave you like that.”
Orihara suddenly lowered his head with an apologetic look on his face.
“I’m sorry. I should have prescribed you pain medication. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize…”
Kento crawled under the covers again and looked steadily at Orihara. For a fleeting moment, he remembered how the man had been panting after hurrying to get him juice. The weight lifted from his heart, which had been heavy with anxiety. He felt a warm glow.
“Hey…” he mustered the courage to say what came next. “Can you stay with me a little longer?”
Orihara smiled and nodded. He took a handkerchief out of his pants pocket and wiped Kento’s sweaty forehead.
“Um...” Kento mustered the courage to open his mouth again. “Would I have to amputate my right leg?”
Orihara widened his eyes and hastily removed his glasses.
“Not at all! Don’t tell me that’s what you were worried about?”
Kento began to think his concerns were immature, and blushed from the embarrassment.
“No, I just thought I’d ask,” he mumbled brusquely.
The apologetic look crossed Orihara’s face again, and he bobbed his head down in apology.
“I’m sorry. I should have filled you in properly. Instead I made you worry about needless things.”
Kento realized he was the one causing Orihara trouble.
“Don’t apologize,” he raised his voice in a hurried tone. “My imagination was just getting carried away.”
Orihara shook his head silently. Suddenly, he lifted his face and looked somewhere far away.
“You’re right. If you thought you were going to have to amputate your leg, you’d be surprised… and probably devastated.”
He reached out to take Kento’s hand.
“That won’t happen to you. I promise. You can rest easy. I’ll make you better.”
“Okay.”
Orihara’s hand was surprisingly smaller than Kento’s, but it was soft, and he could almost feel the man’s body heat flowing into him.
The painkiller seemed to have worked, for the throbbing in his leg gradually ebbed away. At last, Kento closed his eyes in peace.
When he opened his eyes next, the dazzling sunlight was streaming in through the window.
His leg still ached occasionally, but it wasn’t unbearable.
“Was that a dream?”
He saw the can of orange juice and the medicine pouch on his bedside table.
“It wasn’t. He really did come for me.”