"Button pushing" by Hydrophobia (part 1)sunset_raysFebruary 22 2019, 06:38:17 UTC
Neo ( hydr0phobia) wrote, 2005-09-18 14:29:00 Previous Share Next Mood: weird Music: The Impression That I Get - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones "I'd better knock on wood, 'cause I'm sure it isn't good." Title: Button Pushing Author: Neo Genre: Humor/Romance Rating: K+ Summary: Doumeki buys cellphones. Everyone is a comic book wizard. Neo shoots herself in the foot. Fun for the whole family! [doumekiwatanuki]
________________________________________
Author’s Notes: Characterization? What characterization?
Seriously, such crack I want to cry. I am so, so, so sorry. Thirty lashes for lapses in judgment, woah-ho! ________________________________________
In exchange for a small pile of books Yuuko assures him he will never find the need for, Doumeki gets two cell phones. Watanuki does not quite understand why, seeing as how he never figured Yuuko the type to retail such devices, and seeing as how Doumeki doesn’t seem like a cellphone sort of person, so. He gets a little frightened when Doumeki shows up at school and thrusts a phone in his face.
“Here,” Doumeki deadpans.
“What?” Watanuki asks, utterly dumbfounded and, of course, annoyed, but hey.
He can’t help it.
It’s Doumeki.
Doumeki waves it a bit in his hand. “My number’s already on there.”
“I-WHAT. I DON’T WANT YOUR NUMBER. AND I DON’T WANT YOUR PHONE.”
“You need my number.”
“I DON’T NEED YOUR NUMBER.”
“If you need help figuring out how to use it, ask me,” Doumeki says and completely ignores the rest of Watanuki, instead shoving the phone in Watanuki’s bag.
“WHAT THE HELL. I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP IN FIGURING OUT HOW TO USE A STUPID PHONE.”
“Maybe you don’t,” Doumeki says agreeably. “But you either ask me or Yuuko-san.”
“WHY WOULD I ASK YUUKO-SAN.”
“Exactly,” Doumeki says, and leaves Watanuki completely dumbfounded a little ways away from the school gate. • • •
The phone stares at him from the counter.
He imagines it’s Doumeki watching him, as usual, with those hawkish, over-freaking-bearing eyes, except it’s not, which is really disturbing, because he’s always been a jumpy kind of guy, but. Come on. Doumeki usually lurks around some corner or other, but this is just ridiculous. It’s a cellphone. Cellphones should not inspire any brand of paranoia.
“You know, you could stop staring,” he tells it.
Predictably, it doesn’t listen.
“Predictably,” he shrugs, and it sounds like a fact of the universe, which it so totally is. • • •
The next day, Doumeki accosts him.
Accosting, Watanuki thinks, is something Doumeki dearly loves.
If there was a book of everything Doumeki acknowledged as a part of his special, sealed off, yellow-caution-tape corner of the universe-AKA “The Admittedly Rather Thin Book Of What Doumeki Gives A Damn About”-why, accosting would be right up there with pissing people off, pissing Watanuki off, and. Chestnuts.
It would probably be a page and a half, Watanuki reasons.
Big font and everything.
“I thought I told you you needed that,” Doumeki says.
“Need what.”
“You know what.”
“What do you think I am, some kind of mind-reader?”
“The phone,” Doumeki insists.
“Oh. That,” Watanuki says. Does his very best not to not look smug. “I left it.”
“Predictably,” Doumeki says.
“That’s exactly what I told it,” Watanuki declares sagely.
Doumeki apparently decides it is best not to ask. • • •
“It’s not like you’re not benefiting from this,” Yuuko points out.
“Well, I. He certainly isn’t.”
Yuuko arches an elegant eyebrow, smiles. “Isn’t he?”
“The money,” Watanuki insists, putting the cover on the pan. • • •
Watanuki does not watch television. He studies, he cooks, and now he works. His life flashes before his eyes every six and a half minutes and in spite of the fact he hasn’t ever consensually done much apart from study or cook, it still manages to be moderately interesting.
Watanuki is fairly certain he is the only person on the living Earth that has ever consciously hunted down commercials to watch.
Re: "Button pushing" by Hydrophobia (part 2)sunset_raysFebruary 22 2019, 06:40:37 UTC
“Um,” Watanuki says.
“What?” Doumeki asks. Attentive. A for effort, Watanuki decides.
“So I was thinking,” Watanuki says.
“You never fail to surprise me.”
“YOU NEVER FAIL TO BE A,” and then he stops and sighs and massages his forehead and tries again. “So anyway.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“I watched this…thing yesterday.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And, well,“ Watanuki huffs. “Money.”
“What about it?”
“I mean, like,” he says, and waves his hands a little for good measure, “monthly service charges.”
“Is that what this is about?”
“And-and the adjustments.”
“…”
“Usage charges.”
“…”
“One-time charges?”
“…”
“Local airtime, long distance, and international charges…”
“…”
“And messaging charges and-”
“All taken care of,” Doumeki says abruptly.
“They-what.”
“Yuuko-san’s phones,” Doumeki points out.
“Oh,” Watanuki says, a little dazed and more than a little confused. “Right.” • • •
“It’s like that one American comic,” Yuuko says.
“What American comic,” Watanuki asks, annoyed, dusting the flats of his palms on his knees. “And you could take it back, you know.”
“Priority,” Yuuko points out, and then: “When the city was being terrorized, the people would summon their local superhero by shining a light into the sky.”
“Oh. Yeah.” Watanuki blinks, and remembers, and then he says, “The problem with that is,” and Watanuki stops to check the roast.
“The problem with that is,” he says when he comes back, “uh.” He folds his arms. “Well, actually, I don’t know what the problem with that is. Apart from, you know, everything.”
“There are a lot of things wrong with that analogy,” Yuuko agrees.
Watanuki beams.
“For one, I’m not sure how Doumeki-kun would look in tights,” Yuuko says thoughtfully.
Watanuki stuffs soft objects behind his glasses, then takes them out and is mildly surprised at the lack of blood. • • •
He pulls the last cotton fiber out of his eyes and the cellphone is waiting for him at the counter.
“This is all your fault,” he tells it, huffing.
The timepiece winks at him.
“Don’t do that,” he says, “it doesn’t suit you,” and stomps off to put the leftovers in the fridge. • • •
“Bring it tomorrow, okay?” Doumeki says the next school day.
Watanuki gawks.
“How did you-”
“Your pockets.”
“But-what about my-”
“Only has homework.”
“How do you-”
“I know these things,” Doumeki says, and the sage tone fits him better, so Watanuki lets him borrow it. • • •
“He was watching your pockets,” Yuuko repeats slowly.
“Yes,” Watanuki says, genuinely frazzled. “I mean… What if he wanted money? Or something. I don’t have money. You don’t pay me.”
“Your pockets,” Yuuko repeats, slower still and a bit bland.
“And that tone means what, exactly.”
“Exactly what you think it means,” Yuuko says, almost cheerfully, and the burnt dinner?
Re: "Button pushing" by Hydrophobia (part 3)sunset_raysFebruary 22 2019, 06:42:49 UTC
The screen is glowing when he arrives at his apartment.
It’s never done that before.
Shizuka Calling, it says.
“Who’s Shizuka,” Watanuki wonders, except wondering, when you are a teenage boy who attracts all manner of tentacle monsters, is usually a Very Bad Idea. • • •
“Um. Hi.” Phone etiquette, phone etiquette. When was the last time he even touched a phone, anyway? Much less a cellular. “…Who’s calling, again?”
“…Guess.”
“DOUMEKI.”
“For the win.”
“…What did I win?”
Doumeki ignores him quite imperiously. “I have archery tomorrow.”
“…And?”
“So, bring the phone.”
“…What does that have to do with anything?”
“Because,” Doumeki says calmly, like he is explaining a base concept to a six-year-old, “I won’t be able to walk you home. Or to Yuuko-san’s.”
“…Do I have to repeat myself?”
“And so,” Doumeki says calmly, like Watanuki has not just rudely interrupted him, “if something happens to you…”
Watanuki momentarily pulls the phone from his ear to quirk a brow at it.
Not falling for that one again.
“…You can call. And I’ll be there. Got it?”
Watanuki blinks.
“…Anyway, you not bringing it anywhere defeats the whole purpose. …If you understand what I’m saying.”
“Of course I understand,” Watanuki snaps.
Because.
It’s easy.
“I’m not an idiot,” Watanuki insists.
“Mm-hmm.”
“DON’T PATRONIZE ME, CRETIN.”
“Never,” the voice says agreeably. Watanuki honestly cannot comprehend whether or not that is sarcasm.
“If that’s what it takes,” the voice says suddenly.
“I-what.”
“Grayish, you said?”
“I WAS JUST KIDDING.”
“I’ll ask Kunogi for a pair.”
“OH GOD MAKE IT STOP.”
“Heh.”
“…I think I’ve had enough jokes for the night,” Watanuki mutters, reclining again.
“Oh?”
“…I’m going to sleep.”
“Uh-huh. Don’t forget to bring it tomorrow.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Watanuki says, and then. “So, like, what. If I call you’ll just drop all your stuff and make a break for it? That’s not very rational.”
“Of course I won’t.”
“Oh,” Watanuki says, dumbly, and something inside him twinges.
“I’ll bring the bow.”
“…Oh.” Watanuki stares at the ceiling. “You really are an idiot,” he says, a bit weaker than he’d like.
“I know,” the voice says, amused and more than a bit deprecating-and Watanuki’s not sure at whom the deprecation is aimed. “Good night.”
“Yeah, yeah. Good night. Shizuka.”
There’s a long pause.
“G-” the voice begins, and then stops with a quick exhale. “Good night.”
There’s a click, and Watanuki pulls the phone from his ear to stare at it.
It really is Doumeki’s phone, he thinks, if only on the basis of the staring.
And-hell, he thinks, sliding the phone underneath a lamp, feeling the edge of his lip twitch.
Staring back.
I can do that, he thinks, watching the miniature screen reading Shizuka: Call Ended flicker with disuse, and then die out altogether, the last light in the apartment fading with an inaudible beep. I can do that. Tags: fanfiction (xxxholic)
2005-09-18 14:29:00
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Mood: weird
Music: The Impression That I Get - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
"I'd better knock on wood, 'cause I'm sure it isn't good."
Title: Button Pushing
Author: Neo
Genre: Humor/Romance
Rating: K+
Summary: Doumeki buys cellphones. Everyone is a comic book wizard. Neo shoots herself in the foot. Fun for the whole family! [doumekiwatanuki]
________________________________________
Author’s Notes: Characterization? What characterization?
Seriously, such crack I want to cry. I am so, so, so sorry. Thirty lashes for lapses in judgment, woah-ho!
________________________________________
In exchange for a small pile of books Yuuko assures him he will never find the need for, Doumeki gets two cell phones. Watanuki does not quite understand why, seeing as how he never figured Yuuko the type to retail such devices, and seeing as how Doumeki doesn’t seem like a cellphone sort of person, so. He gets a little frightened when Doumeki shows up at school and thrusts a phone in his face.
“Here,” Doumeki deadpans.
“What?” Watanuki asks, utterly dumbfounded and, of course, annoyed, but hey.
He can’t help it.
It’s Doumeki.
Doumeki waves it a bit in his hand. “My number’s already on there.”
“I-WHAT. I DON’T WANT YOUR NUMBER. AND I DON’T WANT YOUR PHONE.”
“You need my number.”
“I DON’T NEED YOUR NUMBER.”
“If you need help figuring out how to use it, ask me,” Doumeki says and completely ignores the rest of Watanuki, instead shoving the phone in Watanuki’s bag.
“WHAT THE HELL. I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP IN FIGURING OUT HOW TO USE A STUPID PHONE.”
“Maybe you don’t,” Doumeki says agreeably. “But you either ask me or Yuuko-san.”
“WHY WOULD I ASK YUUKO-SAN.”
“Exactly,” Doumeki says, and leaves Watanuki completely dumbfounded a little ways away from the school gate.
• • •
The phone stares at him from the counter.
He imagines it’s Doumeki watching him, as usual, with those hawkish, over-freaking-bearing eyes, except it’s not, which is really disturbing, because he’s always been a jumpy kind of guy, but. Come on. Doumeki usually lurks around some corner or other, but this is just ridiculous. It’s a cellphone. Cellphones should not inspire any brand of paranoia.
“You know, you could stop staring,” he tells it.
Predictably, it doesn’t listen.
“Predictably,” he shrugs, and it sounds like a fact of the universe, which it so totally is.
• • •
The next day, Doumeki accosts him.
Accosting, Watanuki thinks, is something Doumeki dearly loves.
If there was a book of everything Doumeki acknowledged as a part of his special, sealed off, yellow-caution-tape corner of the universe-AKA “The Admittedly Rather Thin Book Of What Doumeki Gives A Damn About”-why, accosting would be right up there with pissing people off, pissing Watanuki off, and. Chestnuts.
It would probably be a page and a half, Watanuki reasons.
Big font and everything.
“I thought I told you you needed that,” Doumeki says.
“Need what.”
“You know what.”
“What do you think I am, some kind of mind-reader?”
“The phone,” Doumeki insists.
“Oh. That,” Watanuki says. Does his very best not to not look smug. “I left it.”
“Predictably,” Doumeki says.
“That’s exactly what I told it,” Watanuki declares sagely.
Doumeki apparently decides it is best not to ask.
• • •
“Well first,” Watanuki says, “it’s. It’s ridiculous.”
“It’s not like you’re not benefiting from this,” Yuuko points out.
“Well, I. He certainly isn’t.”
Yuuko arches an elegant eyebrow, smiles. “Isn’t he?”
“The money,” Watanuki insists, putting the cover on the pan.
• • •
Watanuki does not watch television. He studies, he cooks, and now he works. His life flashes before his eyes every six and a half minutes and in spite of the fact he hasn’t ever consensually done much apart from study or cook, it still manages to be moderately interesting.
Watanuki is fairly certain he is the only person on the living Earth that has ever consciously hunted down commercials to watch.
Reply
“Um,” Watanuki says.
“What?” Doumeki asks. Attentive. A for effort, Watanuki decides.
“So I was thinking,” Watanuki says.
“You never fail to surprise me.”
“YOU NEVER FAIL TO BE A,” and then he stops and sighs and massages his forehead and tries again. “So anyway.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“I watched this…thing yesterday.”
“Uh-huh.”
“And, well,“ Watanuki huffs. “Money.”
“What about it?”
“I mean, like,” he says, and waves his hands a little for good measure, “monthly service charges.”
“Is that what this is about?”
“And-and the adjustments.”
“…”
“Usage charges.”
“…”
“One-time charges?”
“…”
“Local airtime, long distance, and international charges…”
“…”
“And messaging charges and-”
“All taken care of,” Doumeki says abruptly.
“They-what.”
“Yuuko-san’s phones,” Doumeki points out.
“Oh,” Watanuki says, a little dazed and more than a little confused. “Right.”
• • •
“It’s like that one American comic,” Yuuko says.
“What American comic,” Watanuki asks, annoyed, dusting the flats of his palms on his knees. “And you could take it back, you know.”
“Priority,” Yuuko points out, and then: “When the city was being terrorized, the people would summon their local superhero by shining a light into the sky.”
“Oh. Yeah.” Watanuki blinks, and remembers, and then he says, “The problem with that is,” and Watanuki stops to check the roast.
“The problem with that is,” he says when he comes back, “uh.” He folds his arms. “Well, actually, I don’t know what the problem with that is. Apart from, you know, everything.”
“There are a lot of things wrong with that analogy,” Yuuko agrees.
Watanuki beams.
“For one, I’m not sure how Doumeki-kun would look in tights,” Yuuko says thoughtfully.
Watanuki stuffs soft objects behind his glasses, then takes them out and is mildly surprised at the lack of blood.
• • •
He pulls the last cotton fiber out of his eyes and the cellphone is waiting for him at the counter.
“This is all your fault,” he tells it, huffing.
The timepiece winks at him.
“Don’t do that,” he says, “it doesn’t suit you,” and stomps off to put the leftovers in the fridge.
• • •
“Bring it tomorrow, okay?” Doumeki says the next school day.
Watanuki gawks.
“How did you-”
“Your pockets.”
“But-what about my-”
“Only has homework.”
“How do you-”
“I know these things,” Doumeki says, and the sage tone fits him better, so Watanuki lets him borrow it.
• • •
“He was watching your pockets,” Yuuko repeats slowly.
“Yes,” Watanuki says, genuinely frazzled. “I mean… What if he wanted money? Or something. I don’t have money. You don’t pay me.”
“Your pockets,” Yuuko repeats, slower still and a bit bland.
“And that tone means what, exactly.”
“Exactly what you think it means,” Yuuko says, almost cheerfully, and the burnt dinner?
So deducted from his paycheck.
• • •
Reply
The screen is glowing when he arrives at his apartment.
It’s never done that before.
Shizuka Calling, it says.
“Who’s Shizuka,” Watanuki wonders, except wondering, when you are a teenage boy who attracts all manner of tentacle monsters, is usually a Very Bad Idea.
• • •
“Um. Hi.” Phone etiquette, phone etiquette. When was the last time he even touched a phone, anyway? Much less a cellular. “…Who’s calling, again?”
“…Guess.”
“DOUMEKI.”
“For the win.”
“…What did I win?”
Doumeki ignores him quite imperiously. “I have archery tomorrow.”
“…And?”
“So, bring the phone.”
“…What does that have to do with anything?”
“Because,” Doumeki says calmly, like he is explaining a base concept to a six-year-old, “I won’t be able to walk you home. Or to Yuuko-san’s.”
“…Do I have to repeat myself?”
“And so,” Doumeki says calmly, like Watanuki has not just rudely interrupted him, “if something happens to you…”
Watanuki momentarily pulls the phone from his ear to quirk a brow at it.
Not falling for that one again.
“…You can call. And I’ll be there. Got it?”
Watanuki blinks.
“…Anyway, you not bringing it anywhere defeats the whole purpose. …If you understand what I’m saying.”
“Of course I understand,” Watanuki snaps.
Because.
It’s easy.
“I’m not an idiot,” Watanuki insists.
“Mm-hmm.”
“DON’T PATRONIZE ME, CRETIN.”
“Never,” the voice says agreeably. Watanuki honestly cannot comprehend whether or not that is sarcasm.
Silence.
Reply
“You know,” Watanuki informs him, “Yuuko-san was right.”
“About what?” and he sounds almost amused.
“Batman. Is that it? With-” and Watanuki makes hand gestures that Doumeki can probably visualize “-the swooping, and-and the cape, and. The tights.”
“Two out of three.”
“What.”
“We’ll have to arrive at some sort of compromise for the tights. The cape I can do. Maybe.”
“Uh. I’m fine. With no tights.”
“No tights?”
“I’M PERFECTLY FINE,” Watanuki half-yells, because his brain is having a meltdown, code red, evacuate the neurons, “WITH NO TIGHTS.”
“Okay,” Doumeki says agreeably, and, yes, definitely amused now.
“So,” Watanuki huffs, and reclines on the counter, “knight of darkness? Yes?”
“No ‘darkness’.”
“So,“ Watanuki says, resting a palm on his knee, “just ‘knight,’ then.”
“If that.”
“Ordinary knights don’t get Bat-Signals.”
“Just cellphones.”
And then Watanuki remembers.
“Shizuka,” he says, and his fingers loosen on the phone.
“Yes?”
Watanuki hesitates, and suddenly every little second of silence is palpable, and there’s a whoosh of blood beneath his ears that isn’t standard anger.
“Um,” he manages.
“…Um,” he manages.
Palpable silences that fold out into minutes, and then Doumeki speaks and he sounds honestly amused:
“You didn’t know.”
“I forgot, s’all,” Watanuki mutters, and wonders why the counter’s so cool and dry or maybe his hands are just not.
“That’s uncharacteristic of you.”
“Are you calling me forgetful?”
“No, I’m calling you rude.”
Watanuki flushes hotly, fingers folding on the counter, a strangled sound tumbling from his throat.
“Just kidding,” the voice says, a bit more quickly.
Watanuki sputters.
“That-”
Watanuki hesitates, and swallows, and frowns and clenches his fist.
“-was not funny,” he mutters.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Not funny at all.”
“I know.”
“…”
“Sorry.”
“…W-whatever.”
“Mm. I’m forgiven, then?”
“The hell you are.”
“Anything I can do?”
“…Tights.”
Silence. A completely dead (but not altogether different from the other boy’s usual tone) voice says: “…What.”
“Tights,” Watanuki says, gathering his bearings and forcing the shakiness from his voice. “You know. Batman wore grayish ones.”
“…”
“…Leotard?”
“…”
“…Well?”
“…”
“…Okay then,” Watanuki says, shrugging despite the fact Doumeki can’t see.
“If that’s what it takes,” the voice says suddenly.
“I-what.”
“Grayish, you said?”
“I WAS JUST KIDDING.”
“I’ll ask Kunogi for a pair.”
“OH GOD MAKE IT STOP.”
“Heh.”
“…I think I’ve had enough jokes for the night,” Watanuki mutters, reclining again.
“Oh?”
“…I’m going to sleep.”
“Uh-huh. Don’t forget to bring it tomorrow.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Watanuki says, and then. “So, like, what. If I call you’ll just drop all your stuff and make a break for it? That’s not very rational.”
“Of course I won’t.”
“Oh,” Watanuki says, dumbly, and something inside him twinges.
“I’ll bring the bow.”
“…Oh.” Watanuki stares at the ceiling. “You really are an idiot,” he says, a bit weaker than he’d like.
“I know,” the voice says, amused and more than a bit deprecating-and Watanuki’s not sure at whom the deprecation is aimed. “Good night.”
“Yeah, yeah. Good night. Shizuka.”
There’s a long pause.
“G-” the voice begins, and then stops with a quick exhale. “Good night.”
There’s a click, and Watanuki pulls the phone from his ear to stare at it.
It really is Doumeki’s phone, he thinks, if only on the basis of the staring.
And-hell, he thinks, sliding the phone underneath a lamp, feeling the edge of his lip twitch.
Staring back.
I can do that, he thinks, watching the miniature screen reading Shizuka: Call Ended flicker with disuse, and then die out altogether, the last light in the apartment fading with an inaudible beep. I can do that.
Tags: fanfiction (xxxholic)
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