As the vessel bobs atop the waves of the sea, so too does Henry’s gaze upon Kenji. The tan skin of the fisherman’s bare arm glistens gold in the rising sun’s rays, rippling like the ocean as his muscles flex. 

Henry bites back a yawn as his gaze flits to the floor of the boat. Another wave rolls beneath and Henry’s eyes rise again. Kenji’s calves flex as he crouches down at the tackle box, fingers picking up a jelly-like silicone squid lure and massaging it. 

Seabirds call from overhead and Henry’s eyes shift to the open button-up donning Kenji’s torso as its hem blows back in the salty breeze. He never would have imagined a Kenji who wears teal blue let alone hibiscus prints. The man he knew was always dressed in dark colors, black suits specifically in the last two decades—as if always in mourning. Henry wondered if this was the degree of potential change when you erase all your memories. If the child saw him, would she tease or be stunned silent? 

“Too early for you?” 

Startled, Henry’s eyes meet Kenji’s. Seeing the man’s mouth in a soft smirk he only now realizes that his is frozen open in the midst of a yawn. He doesn’t know when the motor was turned off nor how long he was caught gazing in awkward silence. Quickly closing his mouth, he clears his throat and replies. 

“No! Not… too early.” He scans Kenji’s face, ready to read any changes. “I told you yesterday. This time is fine.” Having been sat on the boat’s hard bench with his arms folded and calves crossed, Henry’s pose only becomes more rigid. 

The either amused or mocking glint in Kenji’s gaze remains. “Really? That’s good. I actually set out later than normal to accommodate you.” 

Stunned, Henry blinks far too many times. “Oh, really?”  Hoping to compose himself, he looks away, turning his head towards the ocean. “You didn’t have to do that.” 

Just as he finishes speaking, something rough yet malleable slaps him across the face. Stunned, he looks down at his lap to see a straw sun hat.

“Oh—“

His eyes shoot over to Kenji whose expression stuns him even more. With slightly raised eyebrows and narrowed eyes, his emotion is hard to read. And then the corners of his mouth tilt down almost imperceptibly.

“Not very good reflexes, huh?” 

Disgust, Henry determines. The emotion on Kenji’s face is undoubtedly restrained disgust. Picking up the hat, Henry tries to mask the crisis embarking in his mind.  

“You’ll need it for when the sun gets higher in the sky.”

His mind’s journey begins with, What happened to the smiles from yesterday? That talk of fate?

“It gets hot quick out here on the ocean.” 

Perhaps it was the fact that Henry yawned. Or maybe the issue lies in that Kenji had delayed his daily fishing for a tourist and that tourist had the nerve to yawn. 

“Are you alright with live bait?” 

This really isn’t too early for Henry. It’s just that nerves made last night’s sleep difficult, and he still isn’t used to needing nightly rest. 

“Henry?”

That familiar voice calling his old name snaps Henry out of his spiral. Unfortunately, when he raises his eyes, the view of Kenji’s face is half obscured with a small, snapping crab. 

“I can’t say I’ve ever felt so ignored. Are you that tired? Should we head back?” 

“I’m sorry,” Henry blurts, eager to mitigate any hostility. The letter had said ‘if you’re curious what we’d become’ and enemies had never been factored into the possibilities. 

Kenji only reacted with a chuckle before fastening the crab to the line. 

“I was only teasing. Is it your first time fishing?”

“In saltwater, yes. But not otherwise. Though, that was many years ago.” 

“You seem like a quick learner, so I have no doubt you’ll fill in the gaps. Still, live bait is better to start.” 

Kenji grabs a fishing pole and steps over to Henry, takes Henry’s hand in his own then places the fishing rod on his palm. With his now free hand, he guides Henry’s fingers to close around the handle then squeezes. It’s a brief yet deliberate motion and Henry instantly interprets the signal. 

“My reflexes aren’t bad,” Henry explains, adding in his mind that Kenji should’ve noticed he was distracted. “But thank you.” He lifts his hand gripped on the pole, signifying what the thanks is for, then casts the line. 

Kenji only shifts his smirk to the other side then casts his own. 

Henry watches then ventures, “It’s easy to get lost in thought out here. The water is beautiful but there’s something about being surrounded by the same scenery on all sides that makes one retreat into their minds.” 

“It’s not the same, though.”

Henry glances over questioningly.

Casually, Kenji gestures. “The waves are shaped different from that direction compared to that direction. The color of the sky in the east is different from the west. Not to mention, you can see the boardwalk shops from here. 

Henry can’t hide the surprise from his expression and, noticing it, Kenji jerks his chin to behind the boat. 

Once Henry turns to look, in the distance, the outline of the brightly colored shops indeed comes into view. 

Henry looks back at Kenji who holds the fishing rod with a posture so leisurely it seems like the breeze could blow it out of his hand. His gaze is turned towards their lines in the ocean. 

It feels to Henry that, for some reason, Kenji is making fun of him and perhaps has been all morning. 

“Were you a professor?” Kenji asks. 

Shocked by the supposed stranger’s accuracy, Henry can’t help but stare dumbfounded for some moments. “How did you know?” Indeed, it was his day job of the last decade, and his cover job for a decade prior. 

“Good first guess. You seem like someone whose work benefitted from saying pretty words and who can afford to speak a lot.” 

Henry makes a note to later ask Azalea if Kenji speaks so brazenly to everyone. 

“I taught chemistry, though,” Henry grumbles. “How about you? What was your former job?” he asks, because it’d be the next logical follow-up for two strangers in this conversation.

Kenji is silent for a while, jaw tense as he gazes out at the sea. Suddenly, he smiles with a laugh. “Professional douchebag?” His eyes slide to Henry. “Probably.”

Henry can’t help but smile back. “Why would you say that?” There had been times Kenji was an ass, but never as the lead of The Project nor as The Company’s president. He quickly adds, “Debt collector, then?“

He waits for a response but there’s only silence. Kenji is staring back out at the sea with that thoughtful gaze again. There’s a soft smile on his lips but it sits like it doesn’t belong, like he forgot to take it off. 

Henry muses to himself that now would be a good time to toss something at Kenji’s face. But before Henry can decide his next move, the rod in his hand jerks forward, pulling him with it. 

Henry tightens his grip as the pole bends and he grabs the spinning reel to wind the line back, placing his foot on the side of the boat for leverage. Whatever caught is large and Henry understands how Kenji bulked up so fast. 

The fish breaks the surface and seeing its size doubles how strong it feels. 

“Need help?” Kenji asks, that leisurely smirk on his face again. 

“I know I’m not paying you,” Henry grunts as he plays tug o’ war with the fish, “but I will if it gets you to stop taking the piss out of me.”

Kenji lets out an uproarious laugh, sending Henry flashbacks of their first meeting, though this laugh is much more boisterous and reminiscent of their years at Cambridge where Kenji experienced freedom for his first time. 

Kenji turns on the motor and sets the boat’s course towards the fish, then grabs the middle of Henry’s rod with one hand and pauses Henry’s grip on the reel with the other. 

“Let’s let this one go. Catch it and we’ll have no reason to stay out here any longer.” Though Kenji’s half an arm’s length away, his low voice feels like a suggestive whisper in Henry’s ear. 

As Kenji’s voice guides him in keeping the fish on the line ‘so assertively that it can’t escape but only so gently that the hook doesn’t cause it irreparable wounds,’ Henry finds his focus slipping.

He doesn’t hear what type of fish it is as Kenji pulls it from the water. He only registers Kenji’s eyes admiring it and lips calling it beautiful.  

The fish’s mouth gapes and gills flutter while it suffocates on air, and its blue scales sparkle as Kenji’s wet, roughened hands cradle it while gingerly removing the hook lodged in its flesh. 

Kenji lowers the fish back into free waters to watch it glide away, and Henry now knows the reason for the sudden heaviness in his chest. In too many ways, he was that fish.