Speed was the first thing Seiji had ever noticed about Nicholas: the way he moved, and how there was a certain faint promise to his tactics. It wasn’t like seeing Seiji’s own skill brightly reflected, the way it was with Jesse, but more like glimpsing light catching faraway water. Seiji respected Coach, so he considered this idea of hers in the context of what he’d learned from Eugene.
Technique is learned.
Good training, like pajamas, cost money. Nicholas didn’t have any. Nicholas hadn’t been trained properly, and it wasn’t his fault. Jesse always said that being inadequately trained meant the fencer, not the fencing, was inadequate, but Jesse was wrong. Nicholas fenced like a Jesse who hadn’t been trained. His flaws weren’t from being lazy or arrogant, though Nicholas was occasionally both those things. It was as though Nicholas was fencing with a stick while the rest of them used épées.
“I’d love to see your flunge, Nicholas,” Coach Williams mused, pining for sabers, as always. Seiji didn’t feel the need to introduce sabers to Nicholas yet. Nicholas had enough problems with the épée.
Attacking with opposition meant pushing against an opponent’s blade. Nicholas had been living his whole life moving in opposition.
It wasn’t fair, Seiji thought with sudden decision. Something must be done. Nothing should get in the way of people being as excellent at fencing as they could be.
Nicholas didn’t look downcast by the injustice of the world. In fact, he was preening. “Did you come to tell us how skilled we are, Coach?”
“Nope. The story of how you achieved your current ranking isn’t an intimate personal insight, Seiji,” said Coach, thwapping Seiji playfully over the head.
Seiji self-consciously readjusted his hair. “It was personal to me.”
“If it was, think about why,” Coach told him. “In fact, tell me—or anyone else—something that is personal to you. And, Nicholas, at least Seiji wrote something. Where’s your essay?”
“Seiji ate it,” Nicholas told her earnestly.
Seiji and Coach reached out and shoved him sideways, one hand on each shoulder, so Nicholas actually stayed right where he was. He grinned at them both, as though he was enjoying being reproached for delinquency.
“Go write your essays,” ordered Coach. “Correctly this time!”
Seiji and Nicholas hastily departed the salle.
“You need to be trained,” Seiji mused as they walked out under the oak trees. “It needs to be one-on-one, and it needs to be intense.”
Nicholas cleared his throat. “Does it?”
“Yes, of course it does!” Seiji said severely. “You are years behind where you should be. There is no choice. I am taking charge of you.”
“Uh,” said Nicholas. “But is that fair?”
“I think it’s fair,” said Seiji. “Coach Williams can’t do everything.”
“Coach Williams is the coolest!”
“Her methods are peculiar but surprisingly effective.”
Seiji’d had many coaches through the years, and received the indirect coaching of Jesse’s father. Seiji had never had a coach like Coach Williams before, any more than he’d had a fencing partner like Nicholas. He wasn’t sure how to feel about her not seeming to take pride in him for being advanced, nor wanting to hold on to his shoulder like a trophy. All he could think to do was to listen to her carefully so he might understand her better, and follow her unorthodox suggestions.
“She’s the greatest, but that’s not what I meant,” Nicholas continued. “If you’re going to be training with me… I know I’m not exactly what you’re used to.”
Oh. Nicholas was worried about this being fair to Seiji. That was odd. Seiji didn’t think anyone had ever done that before.
“It’s sometimes… somewhat helpful for me to train with you.”
It was a massive concession, but for some reason, it didn’t satisfy Nicholas. He was still frowning. Seiji didn’t know what Nicholas wanted from him. Did he want Seiji to ask him for something?
“What if,” Seiji suggested slowly, “you helped me with team bonding? The social aspect, I mean. Since you’re extremely popular.”
Nicholas blinked several times. “Sorry, what?”
“You have breakfast with multiple people every morning,” Seiji pointed out. “So you can indicate to me if I’m accidentally offending people.”
There was a thoughtful pause. Above their heads, bright leaves sighed as the wind changed.
“Is it chill if you’re offending people totally on purpose?” asked Nicholas.
“If you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to!”
Seiji stalked off with cold dignity, but Nicholas just jogged faster and caught up with him on the stairs to the dormitory.
“No, I do want to!” Nicholas said. “Deal. Deal?”
He gave Seiji an expectant look. Seiji watched him warily.
“If you spit in your hand and expect me to shake it,” he warned, “I’m making you sleep outside. Deal.”
He nodded to seal the deal. Seiji felt good about nodding.
“Hey, Coach thought we were good,” Nicholas said smugly as they returned to their dormitory. “Because we’re awesome rivals. We rock!”
Nicholas had probably never had a proper coach before, Seiji reflected. He didn’t even know Coach Williams was unusual.
“You’re not my rival,” Seiji snapped.
He expected Nicholas to snap back “Not yet,” as he always did. When Nicholas didn’t, Seiji glanced up sharply to see what was wrong. Nicholas was still in Seiji’s half of the room. He’d pulled the curtain back to step into his side, but now he stood in the shadow of the curtain with his head bowed.
Nicholas said, “I know you’d rather be fencing with someone else. I get that must suck. I’m starting to see that you and Jesse Coste were, like… best friends?”
He seemed about to say something else, but Seiji interrupted.
“Best friends,” he scoffed. “We weren’t best friends.”
That was a childish concept. But they’d been children when they first met, he and Jesse. Seiji’s coach had warned that Seiji was too advanced to fence against kids his own age, but Jesse’s confidence hadn’t wavered. He’d smiled and said he hoped they’d have a good match, and they had. Seiji had been so relieved to find someone who could really fence, and someone who wasn’t put off by him. Jesse made life easier, on and off the piste. Jesse had enough social grace for them both.
If Jesse had suggested being best friends when they were young, Seiji would have agreed. But they hadn’t been about that. They had been about skill.
Tell me—or anyone else—something that is personal to you, Coach had said.
Seiji couldn’t talk to just anyone, but Nicholas had said they were friends.
“I was… Jesse’s mirror,” said Seiji slowly. “I reflected his—glow, his glories and his victories. I used to think it was an honor. We were similar, I told myself, in all the ways that really mattered.”
Jesse was left-handed like Nicholas, so facing him sometimes felt like looking into a mirror. Like seeing yourself through the glass, a better, golden self in a different world. A self who fenced just as well but didn’t have to work as hard for it. A Seiji who did everything in life with the same skill as he fenced.