Chapter Text
“Want me to go in with you?” Dojima-san asked as he pulled to a stop in a parking space outside Junes.
Yosuke shook his head. “It’s fine. You don’t have to stay or anything, he just wants to talk. I’ll be okay.”
Dojima-san shifted his car into park and shut the engine off. “Remember what we talked about. You know what you want to say, right?”
“Yeah.” He even had a notecard in his pocket. Dojima-san had helped him practice what to say to his father, just in case the conversation didn’t go well. If he needed to, he could just read his lines off the card. “You don’t have to wait on me,” he added.
“I’m not going anywhere. Take your time, kid. I’ll be out here when you’re done.”
He nodded. “Yeah...okay.” Yosuke sat awkwardly for a few seconds, feeling Dojima-san’s eyes on him. He felt like he wanted to say something, but any more words seemed stuck in the back of his throat.
Steeling himself, Yosuke pushed the door open and climbed out of the car. He glanced back in before he shut it, trying to smile when Dojima-san nodded to him, then turned to face Junes.
Of course his dad had to have asked to meet him here. Not that Yosuke wanted to see the man at home or anything, but couldn’t he have picked anywhere else? Sure, Inaba was small; but everyone was going to know their business anyway, so what did it matter if they met somewhere more private?
He trudged into the store, thankful that it was at least still early enough that things were quiet. It would still be a couple of hours before the housewives starting showing up to claim the first deals, and hopefully Yosuke would be gone by then.
The food court was empty, except for a handful of employees getting breakfast before their shifts (or, for the overnight stock team, after their shifts). And in the corner, Yosuke’s dad, sitting alone at one of the tables.
Yosuke shuffled up to the table, feeling even more awkward than he had in the car. “Hi, Dad.”
His dad stood up. “Yosuke!” The man’s arms twitched, like he couldn’t figure out what to do with them, and his face flinched through a couple of expressions before he settled on his usual customer service smile. “Thank you for meeting with me, son.”
“Yeah.” He stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and stared at the table (empty except for his father’s coffee cup), letting the silence between them build. “So...did you want to order something?”
“Oh, no, I already had breakfast. Just enjoying some coffee before my day starts. You know how it is.”
“Right.” He should have taken Nanako-chan up on her offer of breakfast before he came over here, rather than thinking his father wanted to eat with him. Not that he had any appetite now that they were face-to-face. “You, uh, wanted to talk?”
“Yes! Yes, of course. Please, sit down, son.”
He dropped into the chair across from his father, letting himself slump forward a little as the man stared at him. He started counting down in his head, waiting for the inevitable….
“Don’t slouch, Yosuke.”
“I’m tired.” He didn’t try to hide it—he looked like shit and he knew it. He’d been sick for the last three days, and he didn’t even want to think about the weeks before that. Even with everything Dojima-san had already done for him—the clothes, the food, the medicine, the place to stay—he still felt like something had broken inside of him and he’d never really be himself ever again.
“I...I see.” His dad nodded, then cleared his throat. “So...you’ve been staying with the detective?”
“Dojima-san,” Yosuke nodded. “He’s Yu’s uncle—you remember Yu, right?”
“Yes, I think he sounds familiar. He’s the delinquent, right? The biker kid?”
“No, Dad.” Yosuke sighed. “He’s the tall one who was here last year. And Kanji’s not a biker, for the record.” He couldn’t really dispute the delinquent description, even if he thought Kanji didn’t really fit that anymore. Not with friends like Naoto and Rise keeping him on track.
His dad tried to laugh. “Well, you know how it is, Yosuke. You have so many friends that it’s hard for an old man to tell them apart.”
“Sure.” He felt his shoulders slump even more. “That’s me, Mr. Popular.”
Silence stretched between them. Yosuke stared at the table, waiting for the man to speak again. His father wanted him here, so it was up to him to keep the conversation going. That wasn’t Yosuke’s job.
His father cleared his throat, pulling Yosuke’s attention back to his face. “A-anyway, are you sure it’s okay for you to be living with that man?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you know things are,” the man said with a shrug. “Living with a teenager isn’t exactly a walk in the park. Are you sure you want to burden Detective Dojima like this?”
Yosuke swallowed. “So I’m a burden?” he managed to ask, though his throat was so tight he could barely get the words out.
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it,” his father replied.
“That’s what you said.”
“Yosuke.”
“But...it is,” he added lamely.
His father sighed and shook his head. “ You always take things the wrong way, I wish you weren’t so sensitive.”
H e opened his mouth to reply, then shut it and looked away. He didn’t have the energy to fight with his dad today; he just wanted to get this over with and go back to Dojima-san’s house. It was quiet there. And safe . He could breathe in that house, and not worry that someone was about to tear into him for something he’d supposedly done wrong.
“Is that what you wanted to say?” Yosuke finally asked, once he’d pulled himself together enough to look at his dad again.
“Of course not,” his father replied with another sigh. “You know...why didn’t you tell me things had gotten this bad, Yosuke?”
“What?” He wasn’t even sure his heart was beating anymore. Everything around him seemed to fall silent, like he and his father were suddenly alone in an empty tunnel. Yosuke could have sworn that the world went gray around them, even. The TV world was gone, right? They hadn’t accidentally fallen inside?
“Don’t you think you took things a little far? We could have talked about this. I may be a busy man, but I’d like to think I still have time for my only son. We could have worked this out before you let it get this far. I mean, you know how it is, I have a lot on my plate, but I’ve always tried to have time for you.”
Yosuke blinked furiously. He didn’t want to cry in front of this man, especially not after the things he said. “So...so you’re saying this is my fault?” His voice broke on the question, and he clenched his hands into fists inside his pockets to try to keep himself steady.
“You ran away from home, Yosuke,” his father said blandly. “If you had stayed, we could have worked things out before they got this bad. Now...I’m not sure how we’re going to salvage this situation. The whole town probably knows about this by now—publicity for the store is bad enough; we don’t need to add something like this on top of that.”
“When?” Yosuke demanded, breaking up his father’s lecture when the man stopped for a breath.
He paused. “Excuse me?”
“When was I supposed to talk to you?” He knew he was getting louder, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care at this point. “When you and Mom were fighting? When you pissed each other off and took it out on me? When you came home drunk and took a swing at me if I left my room?”
“I never hit you!” his dad hissed furiously.
“Yeah, because I ducked!” Yosuke stared at the man, chest tight as he tried to breathe through his anger. He still wasn’t fully recovered from his sickness, and the last thing he wanted was to trigger a coughing fit right now. “I tried to talk to you, Dad. I really did.”
“Yosuke, please.” The man held his hand up, his expression suddenly troubled.
“I talked to you about my grades and you told me to do better,” Yosuke continued, ignoring his father’s interruption. “I talked to you about Mom and you said you didn’t want to hear about her. You two could yell and scream and break everything in the house, but the moment I put a toe out of line you’d say everything was my fault.”
“Yosuke!”
He slammed his mouth shut, staring across the table at his father. “I tried,” he said lamely, feeling his energy suddenly drop. The anger flooded away, replaced by a deep weariness he couldn’t shake away anymore.
The man nodded. His lips were pressed together in a thin line. He took a few breaths, opening his mouth to say something but changing his mind. “Did I really try to hit you?” he finally asked.
Yosuke shrugged. He’d been drunk, and it wasn’t like Yosuke hadn’t seen worse during the investigations last year. Or in the past few weeks, come to think of it.
“I’m so sorry.”
H e didn’t know what to say in answer to that. “I’m pretty good at ducking,” he offered. The bruises on his face said otherwise...but he hadn’t really been in a good frame of mind when Saki-senpai’s dad had cornered him.
His father sighed. He rested his elbows on the table to bury his head in his hands, exposing the balding spot on top of his head.
After a few uncomfortable moments, the man looked up again. His eyes were reddened and his expression was sorrowful as he studied Yosuke from across the table. “Do you feel safe there? At the detec—ah, at Dojima-san’s house?”
“I’m sorry, Dad.”
“Yosuke, no.” His dad shook his head. “That’s all that’s important now. You need to feel safe. If that’s not under my roof then I’m the one who failed. I’m the one who should be sorry.”
Yosuke swallowed. “Dad….”
“I swore I would never raise a hand to you, but I…” his voice trailed off and he shook his head. “I could never live with myself if I hurt you. You know that, right?”
He dropped his gaze and nodded. “ I know.” He didn’t mention that his dad didn’t have to lift a hand to hurt him. That he’d done more damage with his words and neglect than if his drunken punches had landed.
“And Dojima-san is okay with you staying there.”
“It was his idea,” Yosuke explained. “He said...maybe if we had some distance, things could get better? If we had time and space to, to work through things...um….” His hand tightened around the notecard in his pocket while he talked. He didn’t want to pull it out now, but all of Dojima-san’s careful arguments were falling out of his head while he tried to talk.
But his father was already nodding. “Of course, Yosuke. Whatever you need. Don’t worry about your mother; I’ll explain everything to her.”
“Thanks, Dad.” Yosuke stood up to leave, waiting a second to see if the man tried to stop him. He turned to go, but remembered the last line on his notecard before he left. “Oh, Dad? About my job?”
“I can lift your suspension,” he replied. “I never should have done that in the first place. I didn’t think that through—you know how it is.”
“Yeah.” Yosuke managed a quick smile. “Actually, uh, I was hoping to quit?” His voice broke over the words, but he tried to stay calm. “I just, um…kinda wanted to make a fresh start. You know, somewhere else.”
His dad looked up at him. His normal bluster had all but vanished during their conversation, and the man facing Yosuke now looked more weary and aged than he’d ever seen. “Whatever you need, son.”
Yosuke nodded. He hesitated, then ducked around the table to wrap his arms around his dad. “Thanks, Dad,” he said again. The man patted his arm and cleared his throat.
“I’ll see you around, Yosuke.”
“Yeah...see you.”
…
He found Dojima-san waiting outside the Junes entrance, surrounded by cigarette butts and ash. “You okay?” he asked as soon as Yosuke stopped in front of him.
“Maybe.”
Dojima-san nodded. He dropped the cigarette he’d been smoking and ground it out with the tip of his shoe. “Come on. Let’s get you something to eat.”
He let Dojima-san wrap an arm around his shoulders as they walked to the car. When he looked back, Yosuke couldn’t see anything through the windows on the top floor, but he wondered if his dad was watching. He settled into Dojima-san’s car and barely listened to the man talk as they drove away from Junes.
They pulled up in front of the new coffee shop, and Dojima-san ushered Yosuke inside. “I know you didn’t eat this morning, so pick something out. The sandwiches are pretty good.” He picked up a copy of the local paper and settled in at one of the tables to read it while Yosuke placed his order.
There was a little “help wanted” sign next to the register. Yosuke stared at it while the barista made his drink and grabbed his sandwich. “Um...are you hiring?” he asked when she came back.
“Totally!” She beamed at him. She had blue hair, which wasn’t a common sight in a place like Inaba, and Yosuke thought he saw a bit of a tattoo peeking up from under the neckline of her shirt. “We’ve got a couple of evening shifts during the week that opened up, and we could definitely use the help. Want to fill out an application?”
She held the paper up temptingly. Yosuke twisted to catch Dojima-san’s eye.
The man barely looked up from his newspaper. “Take all the time you need, kid. We’re not in a hurry.”
“Thanks.” He turned back to the barista with a smile, feeling like something in his future was finally opening up again. “Can I borrow a pen?”