Greetings!
The buzzing of his cell phone which was lying next to him on the coffee table startled Okada out of his thoughts. He put his book down and picked up the small black gadget which had been quiet all evening since he’d come home from his last meeting of the day.
Looking at the received message he frowned for a moment.
“Boo~, missed the last train. Pick me up? :D??”
Receiving messages from his fellow band members wasn’t as uncommon as it had been a few years ago but this bold request was rather odd. Even if the sender was Miyake Ken.
A few quickly pressed buttons later, an answer was sent.
“Are you drunk?”
Okada stared at the dark screen for a while, wondering if this was supposed to be a joke. It surely wasn’t the first time Ken had missed the last train after staying out for drinks with some friends after work and he never had asked him for help. Why should he? He could just take a taxi home. Maybe he had lost his wallet? This really was kind of weird. And also rather inconvenient since he would have to get dressed again after having taken a shower earlier.
Again the phone buzzed in his hand.
“I thought you’d think more highly of me, Okada-san! DDD: … I only had one glass… ;P”
The next reply came only a split-second later and apparently contained his current location somewhere in Shibuya paired with a
“Now hurry up, please~! :3”
He couldn’t suppress a smirk. That guy was such an idiot sometimes. Yet it had always been hard for him to refuse his requests no matter how silly and selfish they sometimes were.
“Give me 15 minutes…”
So he got up from his favorite chair with a small sigh and shuffled over to the closet to find some clothes.
~ ~ ~
More like 20 minutes later due to still busy traffic even around this late hour, Okada maneuvered his car into one of the rare empty parking spaces close to the described address.
“I’m here.”
He didn’t have to wait long. Only a moment later, someone wrapped in a thick black coat got up from one of the benches situated on the small street between the various bars. The man had his red scarf pulled up to the tip of his nose and pushed up his glasses while he searchingly looked around himself. After recognizing the familiar vehicle, he raised his hand in an excited little wave and jogged over to the car.
A gust of cold wind entered with him as Ken opened the door and flopped down on the seat next to him.
“Hey~! You’re late! It’s freezing out there”, the new passenger exclaimed with an obvious shudder and took off his slightly fogged-up glasses to rub them on the fabric of his coat.
Okada just looked at him with a raised eyebrow for a moment before answering.
“Why am I here?”
Ken returned his look with a confused blink as if this question actually surprised him.
“Beeecause I asked you to come?”
“And because you like me”, he added with an impish grin.
His newly appointed driver just rolled his eyes while suppressing the urge to hit his forehead against the steering wheel.
“What’s the easiest way to get to your place from here? I haven’t been there in a while”
“Just drive. I’ll tell you where to go!”
So Okada started the engine with a prolonged internal sigh and did what he was supposed to do: drive.
Ken’s favorite radio station was quickly found and the k-pop blaring out of the speakers was only interrupted by his occasional singsong of directions.
For a while they just sat like this without talking but at some point Okada started to get slightly suspicious.
“Aren’t we moving away from the city center? Did you move someplace else recently?”
Ken who was tapping his feet to the beat of the music looked up, shook his head and went back into his own little world. But not before…
“Oh, and turn left there, please.”
“There better be a good reason for all of this…”, Okada muttered under his breath but of course he didn’t get any kind of response.
Thirty minutes later he didn’t even care anymore. Well, not much anyway… The road was getting smaller and more winding and the street lights around here were also more scattered than on the main roads.
“It’s just around that corner there”, Ken motioned with a casual point of his finger. Following his hand with his eyes, Okada saw nothing but a small hill - if you could even call it that - in front of them. The road also seemed to come to an end at this point. Turning the car around to get back might become a bit of a problem.
Once he stopped the car, Ken finally sprung back into action and got out of the car with an almost excited little squeak.
“We’re here~!”
After getting out himself, Okada looked around once more but still couldn’t make out what “here” actually meant.
“We’re where?”
Without any further response, Ken just grabbed his hand with his own gloved one and pulled him along as he walked further up the small path in front of them that led to pretty much… nothing it seemed. This looked like any other ordinary field of grass and Okada sincerely hoped that they wouldn’t run into some goats or anything because as much as those seemed to love him, the love wasn’t always mutual.
“Sit!”
They had stopped now and the frown on Okada’s face was starting to look like it had been carved into his forehead.
“Here? On the ground??”
Now it was Ken’s turn to roll his eyes.
“Well, if you prefer that. You could also just sit down on the blanket right there…”
Following his sideway glance Okada finally noticed the small checkered blanket that had been spread out on the grass, looking like someone had forgotten it there after their last picnic.
“Why?”
His companion gave a frustrated little huff before he looked back over at him.
“Just sit down, okay?”
They sat in silence for a while. And as much as Okada was usually fine with just being around people without talking, this felt rather uncomfortable. Mostly because he had no idea where he was and why he was here.
Ken being this quiet was also something he wasn’t used to and it made him feel slightly uneasy. Hopefully this was not a set-up for him to announce any kind of bad news. But why would he ask him to come out alone and not the whole band? Maybe he wanted to let them know separately? Still, putting all this effort into creating a scenario like this didn’t make any sense.
Or was this a prank? He tried to look around as inconspicuously as possible to see if he could spot any cameras sticking out of trees or bushes nearby but apart from the moon above them there wasn’t enough light to even see properly.
Just when he was about to open his mouth to finally ask for an explanation for all of this, Ken spoke up again.
“Lie down”
Okay, this wasn’t helping. At all…
Okada stared at him in disbelief, feeling his cheeks heat up even though he wasn’t really sure why. This was just too weird.
“Why would I-?”
“Stop asking! Just lie down on your back. … Please.”
Ken’s voice sounded unusually forced and it made Okada’s heart ache in worry a little. If that was what it took to resolve this unnerving tension, fine.
Lying down on his back, he stared up at the night sky that looked somewhat different from out here without all the lights of the city blending into its natural darkness. It had been a while since he’d been outside like this after the weather had gotten too cold for him to camp out in his sleeping bag.
His glance flicked over to the right when he felt Ken lying down next to him with a sigh.
Another stretch of silence that felt even more uncomfortable than the last if that was even possible at this point.
“I don’t even know why I’m doing this…”
It was somewhere between a murmur and a whisper but it was quiet enough around them for Okada to pick up his words.
“It’s been 5 years but for some reason this won’t stop bugging me. I’m kind of stupid I guess…”
Okada didn’t dare to fill the small pauses between Ken’s sentences but for some reason it felt like he wasn’t supposed to anyway so he stayed silent.
“The last one was actually more active than this one and it’s not on the exact date either but who cares…”
It was like handing a child one piece of a puzzle at a time so that it could put it back together as a whole. Right now he just saw fragments but no overall shape.
“I figured it might be a good thing because if it had been on that day you’d probably have gotten suspicious and wouldn’t have come out with me at all… “
“So yeah, whatever. Happy birthday…”, he added in a tone of voice that sounded like a pout but was laced with more insecurity that he probably meant to let show.
Okada blinked in confusion. His birthday wasn’t until Wednesday next week. Why would he-?
Oh…
The last piece finally clicked into place and the realization brought back blurry images of a night almost 5 years ago that he hadn’t been thinking about for quite a while.
Stars…
He stared back up at the sky and indeed it didn’t take long for him to notice the first shooting star racing across the black canvas of the sky before it disappeared into nowhere. Another one followed soon after.
It was similar. Though back then it had been two folding chairs on the rooftop of the apartment building Ken used to live in during that time instead of a blanket somewhere out in a field.
He remembered it more clearly now. The awkwardness. The silence. The disappointed look on Ken’s face. But it had been five years. Why would this still bother him?
The sky was beautiful. If he had known, he would have brought his camera. It had been beautiful back then, too. Breathtaking. Something hard to put into words, especially for someone who wasn’t particularly skilled in verbally expressing himself in general.
He had felt regret for his reaction back then (or rather the lack thereof) but he never knew how to bring it up afterwards and he didn’t think that Ken would really take this to heart. He wasn’t one to hold grudges. He was Ken. Easy going; always up for a joke; a free spirit sometimes maybe even a little too carefree in his actions but always with a cheeky grin on his lips that made it hard for anyone to stay mad at him for too long.
This Ken now felt different though. Different in a way that made Okada want to reach out and… do something to let him know that it was okay. That he appreciated this gesture as much as he did back then. Maybe even more now. Of course he couldn’t. As much as he was known as the notorious skinshipper of the group who got away with groping the other members’ butts whenever he felt like it, this was different. The moment felt more intimate. A touch would have a different meaning now. What kind exactly he didn’t know. All he knew was that he wasn’t courageous enough to find out.
“It’s beautiful. …Thank you”
Those were the words he settled on in the end. He couldn’t put every one of his feelings into it but it was more than he dared to give back last time.
He didn’t get a reply but when he glanced over to the side, he noticed a smile playing on the other’s lips. A small one but it was enough to let him know that things were okay now. That this birthday surprise - even though 5 days early - had been a success. For both sides this time. And even though their bodies were barely touching, the warm feeling that was spreading in his stomach would hopefully manage to carry over just like those shooting stars that kept jumping across the sky above them.
Looking at the received message he frowned for a moment.
“Boo~, missed the last train. Pick me up? :D??”
Receiving messages from his fellow band members wasn’t as uncommon as it had been a few years ago but this bold request was rather odd. Even if the sender was Miyake Ken.
A few quickly pressed buttons later, an answer was sent.
“Are you drunk?”
Okada stared at the dark screen for a while, wondering if this was supposed to be a joke. It surely wasn’t the first time Ken had missed the last train after staying out for drinks with some friends after work and he never had asked him for help. Why should he? He could just take a taxi home. Maybe he had lost his wallet? This really was kind of weird. And also rather inconvenient since he would have to get dressed again after having taken a shower earlier.
Again the phone buzzed in his hand.
“I thought you’d think more highly of me, Okada-san! DDD: … I only had one glass… ;P”
The next reply came only a split-second later and apparently contained his current location somewhere in Shibuya paired with a
“Now hurry up, please~! :3”
He couldn’t suppress a smirk. That guy was such an idiot sometimes. Yet it had always been hard for him to refuse his requests no matter how silly and selfish they sometimes were.
“Give me 15 minutes…”
So he got up from his favorite chair with a small sigh and shuffled over to the closet to find some clothes.
~ ~ ~
More like 20 minutes later due to still busy traffic even around this late hour, Okada maneuvered his car into one of the rare empty parking spaces close to the described address.
“I’m here.”
He didn’t have to wait long. Only a moment later, someone wrapped in a thick black coat got up from one of the benches situated on the small street between the various bars. The man had his red scarf pulled up to the tip of his nose and pushed up his glasses while he searchingly looked around himself. After recognizing the familiar vehicle, he raised his hand in an excited little wave and jogged over to the car.
A gust of cold wind entered with him as Ken opened the door and flopped down on the seat next to him.
“Hey~! You’re late! It’s freezing out there”, the new passenger exclaimed with an obvious shudder and took off his slightly fogged-up glasses to rub them on the fabric of his coat.
Okada just looked at him with a raised eyebrow for a moment before answering.
“Why am I here?”
Ken returned his look with a confused blink as if this question actually surprised him.
“Beeecause I asked you to come?”
“And because you like me”, he added with an impish grin.
His newly appointed driver just rolled his eyes while suppressing the urge to hit his forehead against the steering wheel.
“What’s the easiest way to get to your place from here? I haven’t been there in a while”
“Just drive. I’ll tell you where to go!”
So Okada started the engine with a prolonged internal sigh and did what he was supposed to do: drive.
Ken’s favorite radio station was quickly found and the k-pop blaring out of the speakers was only interrupted by his occasional singsong of directions.
For a while they just sat like this without talking but at some point Okada started to get slightly suspicious.
“Aren’t we moving away from the city center? Did you move someplace else recently?”
Ken who was tapping his feet to the beat of the music looked up, shook his head and went back into his own little world. But not before…
“Oh, and turn left there, please.”
“There better be a good reason for all of this…”, Okada muttered under his breath but of course he didn’t get any kind of response.
Thirty minutes later he didn’t even care anymore. Well, not much anyway… The road was getting smaller and more winding and the street lights around here were also more scattered than on the main roads.
“It’s just around that corner there”, Ken motioned with a casual point of his finger. Following his hand with his eyes, Okada saw nothing but a small hill - if you could even call it that - in front of them. The road also seemed to come to an end at this point. Turning the car around to get back might become a bit of a problem.
Once he stopped the car, Ken finally sprung back into action and got out of the car with an almost excited little squeak.
“We’re here~!”
After getting out himself, Okada looked around once more but still couldn’t make out what “here” actually meant.
“We’re where?”
Without any further response, Ken just grabbed his hand with his own gloved one and pulled him along as he walked further up the small path in front of them that led to pretty much… nothing it seemed. This looked like any other ordinary field of grass and Okada sincerely hoped that they wouldn’t run into some goats or anything because as much as those seemed to love him, the love wasn’t always mutual.
“Sit!”
They had stopped now and the frown on Okada’s face was starting to look like it had been carved into his forehead.
“Here? On the ground??”
Now it was Ken’s turn to roll his eyes.
“Well, if you prefer that. You could also just sit down on the blanket right there…”
Following his sideway glance Okada finally noticed the small checkered blanket that had been spread out on the grass, looking like someone had forgotten it there after their last picnic.
“Why?”
His companion gave a frustrated little huff before he looked back over at him.
“Just sit down, okay?”
They sat in silence for a while. And as much as Okada was usually fine with just being around people without talking, this felt rather uncomfortable. Mostly because he had no idea where he was and why he was here.
Ken being this quiet was also something he wasn’t used to and it made him feel slightly uneasy. Hopefully this was not a set-up for him to announce any kind of bad news. But why would he ask him to come out alone and not the whole band? Maybe he wanted to let them know separately? Still, putting all this effort into creating a scenario like this didn’t make any sense.
Or was this a prank? He tried to look around as inconspicuously as possible to see if he could spot any cameras sticking out of trees or bushes nearby but apart from the moon above them there wasn’t enough light to even see properly.
Just when he was about to open his mouth to finally ask for an explanation for all of this, Ken spoke up again.
“Lie down”
Okay, this wasn’t helping. At all…
Okada stared at him in disbelief, feeling his cheeks heat up even though he wasn’t really sure why. This was just too weird.
“Why would I-?”
“Stop asking! Just lie down on your back. … Please.”
Ken’s voice sounded unusually forced and it made Okada’s heart ache in worry a little. If that was what it took to resolve this unnerving tension, fine.
Lying down on his back, he stared up at the night sky that looked somewhat different from out here without all the lights of the city blending into its natural darkness. It had been a while since he’d been outside like this after the weather had gotten too cold for him to camp out in his sleeping bag.
His glance flicked over to the right when he felt Ken lying down next to him with a sigh.
Another stretch of silence that felt even more uncomfortable than the last if that was even possible at this point.
“I don’t even know why I’m doing this…”
It was somewhere between a murmur and a whisper but it was quiet enough around them for Okada to pick up his words.
“It’s been 5 years but for some reason this won’t stop bugging me. I’m kind of stupid I guess…”
Okada didn’t dare to fill the small pauses between Ken’s sentences but for some reason it felt like he wasn’t supposed to anyway so he stayed silent.
“The last one was actually more active than this one and it’s not on the exact date either but who cares…”
It was like handing a child one piece of a puzzle at a time so that it could put it back together as a whole. Right now he just saw fragments but no overall shape.
“I figured it might be a good thing because if it had been on that day you’d probably have gotten suspicious and wouldn’t have come out with me at all… “
“So yeah, whatever. Happy birthday…”, he added in a tone of voice that sounded like a pout but was laced with more insecurity that he probably meant to let show.
Okada blinked in confusion. His birthday wasn’t until Wednesday next week. Why would he-?
Oh…
The last piece finally clicked into place and the realization brought back blurry images of a night almost 5 years ago that he hadn’t been thinking about for quite a while.
Stars…
He stared back up at the sky and indeed it didn’t take long for him to notice the first shooting star racing across the black canvas of the sky before it disappeared into nowhere. Another one followed soon after.
It was similar. Though back then it had been two folding chairs on the rooftop of the apartment building Ken used to live in during that time instead of a blanket somewhere out in a field.
He remembered it more clearly now. The awkwardness. The silence. The disappointed look on Ken’s face. But it had been five years. Why would this still bother him?
The sky was beautiful. If he had known, he would have brought his camera. It had been beautiful back then, too. Breathtaking. Something hard to put into words, especially for someone who wasn’t particularly skilled in verbally expressing himself in general.
He had felt regret for his reaction back then (or rather the lack thereof) but he never knew how to bring it up afterwards and he didn’t think that Ken would really take this to heart. He wasn’t one to hold grudges. He was Ken. Easy going; always up for a joke; a free spirit sometimes maybe even a little too carefree in his actions but always with a cheeky grin on his lips that made it hard for anyone to stay mad at him for too long.
This Ken now felt different though. Different in a way that made Okada want to reach out and… do something to let him know that it was okay. That he appreciated this gesture as much as he did back then. Maybe even more now. Of course he couldn’t. As much as he was known as the notorious skinshipper of the group who got away with groping the other members’ butts whenever he felt like it, this was different. The moment felt more intimate. A touch would have a different meaning now. What kind exactly he didn’t know. All he knew was that he wasn’t courageous enough to find out.
“It’s beautiful. …Thank you”
Those were the words he settled on in the end. He couldn’t put every one of his feelings into it but it was more than he dared to give back last time.
He didn’t get a reply but when he glanced over to the side, he noticed a smile playing on the other’s lips. A small one but it was enough to let him know that things were okay now. That this birthday surprise - even though 5 days early - had been a success. For both sides this time. And even though their bodies were barely touching, the warm feeling that was spreading in his stomach would hopefully manage to carry over just like those shooting stars that kept jumping across the sky above them.