One Step at a time: 18th Chapter
Pairings: tetsu x hyde
Rating: n-17
Disclaimer: You're kidding, right? Don't own. As in, at all.
Summary: A (hopefully) enormously long story of L'Arc~en~Ciel as seen from the perspective of a Tetsuhai fan
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Chapter 18
Forced out of character
“And you didn’t think of, oh I don’t know, calling to tell me about this yesterday?” Ken was obviously not amused not only by the news, but by the lateness of them getting to him as well.
It struck Tetsu that it might be the first time that Hyde witnessed Ken being actually annoyed. To be honest, he was not sure how to deal with it either - that’s just how rare it was for Ken to get like this. So, in an uncharacteristic for him manner, he just bet on their appearance (tired, pale, bags under their eyes - outright pitiful) garnering enough sympathy from him so that Ken would feel bad enough about yelling to stop. Sure enough, as their guilty silence stretched, Ken’s gaze softened and he let out a big sigh, all his steam leaving him as suddenly as it came.
“Oh never mind, you two idiots,” he muttered, giving up and sitting down in front of the other two, predictably fixating his gaze on the leader. “So, Pero’s not even coming in today anymore?”
They were in a practice studio, having scheduled this meeting long before Pero dropped the bombshell on them. As Ken pointed out, they were only three in the room though.
“He said he’d give us time to figure things out, but he’d still be willing to help out for a while, were we to need it,” Tetsu muttered tiredly. Even keeping his eyelids from falling was requiring concentration from him. His mind had been at work all through the night. It almost seemed it did not even stop the very few times he fell asleep for a few minutes last night. After spending a lot of time musing about how he could have done things better, he had moved on and spent the rest of the night making plans for the future, figuring things out. He did not get very far as that went, unfortunately.
Suddenly realizing everyone had been quiet for quite a bit of time, he raised his head and saw both others looking at him silently, as if knowing he was thinking and waiting for him to speak up.
“We’re in a little bit more of a bind than you guys know, actually,” he finally said with a sigh and was relieved when his bandmates did not immediately start demanding explanations about the statement and patiently waited for them instead, letting him continue at his own pace.
“Remember those demo tapes we’ve sent out?" he asked, getting nods in reply. "I got some replies in the last week or so. Didn’t like the attitudes of most of those, sounded like they just wanted to use us, offering deals that were rather ridiculous. But with one… wait a second…” he stopped for a few second to ruffle through his bag until he took out some papers and passed them to the others, “I kept in contact with this one. Urm, Danger Crue, I think it’s pronounced that way, damn those fancy names.” He did not notice the other two hiding their smiles at that rather hypocritical remark, “Anyway, they seemed really interested and when I negotiated, they gave me pretty good conditions on the contract. At any rate, the bottom line is that they agreed to help us release an album.”
“I know this label, heard a few of the bands that are on it. This is pretty big. Why didn’t you mention this before?” Ken asked, both him and Hyde still skimming through the letters and other papers given to them and not noticing Tetsu grimace guiltily in response.
“It was still all very uncertain, I didn’t want to get your hopes up if it didn’t work out. I kept writing and calling them to straighten things out… Even spoke with their president - he seems like a very nice guy, actually, and seems to be genuinely interested in getting us signed up. Anyhow, I only got that last letter this morning and read it on the way here. It seems that they’re now only waiting for a final okay from us. I would have told you about this today anyway, so we could discuss it and decide. And it’s a really good offer, I think we really should agree…”
“This all sounds great,” Hyde spoke, finally, but his face immediately contrasted with his words as he frowned a little. “But those other demo tapes they mention? Which songs are they of?”
“Some of them are partially Pero’s,” Tetsu admitted with a cringe. “We negotiated with an understanding that these would be the songs recorded, that’s why I said we’re in a bit of a bind. I guess they wouldn’t mind if we rewrote those parts to avoid having to deal with the author rights issues… provided we still have a drummer to record them with. Which we don’t,” he gave up keeping his emotions in check then and just buried his face in his hands. “Damn it, I hope all of this won’t go to waste.”
Sinking into thought, they all lapsed into silence all trying to absorb their situation. Tetsu did not raise his head again, slightly afraid to look at the others. When Ken finally talked again though, his voice did not sound annoyed at him.
“How much time do we have until they expect us to begin recording?”
“Probably a month or so. The label is in Tokyo though, so we’d have to move there, at least temporarily. And since there are many preparations, it’d be better to find a drummer far earlier than that… And I have no idea how to do that. Maybe I should look into drummers from Tokyo?” Tetsu was largely muttering to himself by now. “I sure haven’t seen anyone good enough and free in Osaka… I should probably start searching.” He suddenly shot his head up, “I should go, don’t wait for me to come back.” And just as suddenly, he stood up and went for the door. The other two barely had time to react.
“Wait, what about the practice?” Ken hurried to ask, flustered. Tetsu hardly even paused.
“It was shot to hell without Pero anyway.”
And just like that, he was gone.
*-*-*-*-*-*
“You really should have called me yesterday,” Ken muttered to a mutely sitting Hyde as he packed up his instruments, having set them up in vain as he had come to the studio first that day. The guitarist had no idea it would get canceled, after all.
“Sorry,” Hyde muttered, absentmindedly tugging on the ends of his jeans as he sat loosely hugging his knees to his chest. Noticing the vocalist's mood Ken sighed, feeling like he was not suited for this at all.
“So what’s the excuse?” He asked, surprised himself when his voice accidentally came out rather harshly and regretting his tone immediately when Hyde started and looked up at him with wide eyes, as if thinking the tone was directed at him.
“Huh?” he asked almost fearfully and Ken was tempted to change his question into ‘What’s going on in that head of yours’, but refrained.
“What’s Pero’s excuse for leaving?” He elaborated and tension seemed to dissipate slightly from the vocalist’s shoulders.
“He said he never intended to stay in Laruku too long in the first place,” the petite man explained in a dull tone, looking back down at his hands. “He’ll be going back into family business some day, so he said he'd rather quit before we went too far and it became impossible for him to do so without causing too much fuss.”
“I see,” Ken answered wryly, wondering if it was worth it to restrain himself from giving their ex-drummer some of his thoughts on his neglecting to inform them of such details much earlier. Reminding himself that they would still need the drummer for the live they had scheduled two weeks in the future, he concluded that he had no choice. They would never find another drummer in time for that.
“It’s my fault though,” Hyde mumbled suddenly, snapping the guitarist out of his thoughts. It took him a second to figure out what the younger man said and he could only look at him uncomprehendingly once he did.
“How did you figure that?” He asked finally, letting his skepticism of the idea seep into his voice.
“I let myself grow distant from him," Hyde explained, but Ken still was not convinced. "I shouldn’t have. He probably no longer felt comfortable in the band."
Ken really thought he was not suited for dealing with this, especially since he was in a rather annoyed mood even beforehand.
“Hyde, you said he had this decided for a long time now. I really don’t think your adding another hug into his weekly diet would have done any good."
“Don’t make this out to be a joke, Ken," the younger man snapped, looking up to look at the guitarist for the first time during his 'confession', "Had I been a good enough friend I would have been able to talk him out of leaving.”
“That’s stupid,” Ken answered, not softening his words or tone, “It was his decision, Hyde, he’s not a child. He wouldn’t quit just because of something ridiculous and petty like that.”
To be honest, he was feeling rather irritated. At Pero, for starting the whole mess, at Tetsu, for withholding things from them and at Hyde, for being such a drama queen when they needed that the least. He needed a beer and a good night’s sleep. It was not in his nature to dwell on such things long, after all.
He left the studio throwing a careless goodbye over his shoulder, his sureness that Hideto would surely not dwell on such silly thoughts either shaken a little when his eyes caught the vocalist’s troubled face on his way out. He just hoped Hyde was not serious about this blaming himself thing.
*-*-*-*-*-*-*
Tetsu seemed to be determined not to rest at all and find them a new drummer in record time, taking the whole search entirely onto himself. Both Ken and Hyde could do nothing to help as the leader went through all his connections to scout out somebody who would be both available and good enough. Neither of them saw the bassist much outside the practices they still had with Pero in preparation of the Goodbye Live, for the drummer this time. There was somehow less tension in these practices than when Hiro had left, but Ken wondered if it was not just because Tetsu (and others, for that matter) were far too lost in their own thoughts for the tension between them to appear. It almost did not feel like an improvement from the time when Hiro left
Uncharacteristically, the youngest of them now showed up for the practices exactly on time (as opposed to being early) and he always left as fast as he could. Hyde even mentioned that he always came home late, just to sleep, and would always be gone before the vocalist woke himself.
This continued for five long days before one evening Ken got a call from the leader to come to the next practice a half an hour early for a meeting. Curious if this did not mean that his old friend finally found someone, Ken ended up coming even earlier than told and was surprised to find Tetsu there already, but without Hyde yet. He was putting a cassette into a player and whirled around when he heard Ken enter. The guitarist was relieved when he was welcomed with a small smile, having not seen that expression on his friend's face for what seemed like a very long time. The bassist seemed more relaxed than he had ever been over the last few days.
"I take it from your expression that you found a candidate for our drummer position?" He asked instead of a greeting, going in further into the room and reached out with the intention of letting what he supposed had to be a demo tape play. But Tetsu stopped him, grabbing his wrist.
"Let's wait for Hyde," he said, smiling up to the taller man before letting go. Ken just shrugged in an agreeing manner and watched as the bassist went back to pick up his bag that he had left near the entrance.
"Just Hyde? Pero's not coming for this?" Ken asked absentmindedly and then cursed his own words as the bassist tensed up again. He could bet he just made the leader lose his smile again.
"I figured he won't be interested since it's not really his business anymore," the bassist answered and the turned around to look at the guitarist. Ken was right, he was no longer smiling, a frown occupying his face instead. Tetsu was so lost in his thoughts he did not even realize the door opened behind him and just went on talking.
"Listen, Ken, about this whole business... I'm sorry, I think it's my fault Pero left."
Ken felt an unwelcome sense of deja vu and stifled a groan.
"How's that?" he asked restraining himself from rolling his eyes.
"I should have been a better leader, but I made a lot of mistakes. Hiro saw that so I'm sure Pero did as well. Having acted as a leader himself before, it must have been obvious to him. He must have gotten frustrated with it or something."
Hearing this, Ken just groaned and gave up
"Can't we just all agree that Pero left because of that horrible joke I made about his drumsticks a couple of weeks ago and move on?" He asked, almost in desperation and could have almost laughed at the flabbergasted look on Tetsu's face had he not felt so exasperated about the situation.
"What are you talking about?" The bassist finally got out and Ken just nodded towards the entrance of the room.
"Look behind you," he said and the leader did as told only to see Hyde frozen at the door, his face looking dumbstruck at the conversation he just inadvertently walked in on.
"That idiot over there confessed to me it was all his fault that Pero quit just a few days ago. You two should form a club. Or just quit hogging all the blame and admit that it was his own decision to make. Whatever you dumbasses managed to think up to figure it's your blame is not true. Get over it." This might as well have been the most unforgiving speech Ken ever made in his life, but he wanted to get it across just how ridiculous the whole idea seemed to him.
"Now can we please listen to that tape you brought and get this meeting moving along?" he asked, snapping the other two out of their stand-down. Exchanging a couple of strange looks between them, they both walked towards Ken, Tetsu finally hitting the play button once they all sat down. An unfamiliar song filled the room capturing their attention immediately.
"His name is Sakurazawa Yasunori, but everyone calls him just Sakura," Tetsu spoke when the final notes ended, going back into his leader mode, "He's a freelance drummer and has worked with a lot of bands in the last few years. He also lives in Tokyo, but that suits us well since we'll have to go there anyway."
"And he's free right now?" Hyde asked, speaking for the first time that day, clearly impressed with what he just heard.
"Yeah, or at least that's what one of my acquaintances that know him told me. And he's really good, as you just heard. That same acquaintance got me this demo tape of a band he played for before. I don't know if we'd be able to get him to join us altogether, but I was assured he'll most likely not be against helping us with the album. I already sent out our own demo tape with an offer to him today, we should get an answer soon."
"But you did ask him to join the band for real, didn't you?" Ken asked, interested as well.
"I hinted at it, yes. We'd have to meet and try playing together first, of course, but I'd rather have him as our permanent drummer. I've heard he's easy to get along, at least. Well, we'll just have to see." Tetsu told them, taking out the tape and putting it into its case. Now that the business he had asked them to come here for was over, it seemed they were about to sink into an uncomfortable silence and Ken could not let that happen. Time to end this awkwardness once and for all.
"Look, back to that blaming yourselves thing," he muttered with a sigh, gathering all attention back to him. "Maybe the whole problem is that you believe that what you did (or not do) was enough of a cause for Pero to leave. If they bother you so much, well then, work on correcting these things. As long as Hyde doesn't slobber over my face with kisses to show his friendship, I think I'll be able to deal. If it makes you feel better. And really, just start talking with each other again. Had you figured out what the other thought first, maybe you wouldn't be in this mess in the first place."
The other two stared at him, but Ken just took out a cigarette and dragged a smoke in, ignoring the unwritten rule of refraining from smoking when Tetsu was in the room. When did he become the advice giver in this band, anyway? Just because he was the oldest did not make him qualified for the job, far from it. He just wasn't that mature.
"How old is this Sakura, anyway?" He asked suddenly as the thought struck him and Tetsu blinked at the unexpectedness.
"A little bit younger than me. Why do you ask?"
Ken just groaned. Fortunately or not, Pero chose that moment to come to practice, immediately stopping as he registered the weird atmosphere of the room and the cigarette in Ken's hand.
"Is something wrong?" He asked hesitantly.
"Just peachy," Ken answered wryly, reluctant to give up his only half smoked cigarette, but knowing he had to, "Let's start the practice, shall we? We have a live to get ready for."
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I admit I might have rushed this chapter a bit, but I have a reason: I'm going away from home for a while, and will have limited access to computer (and I won't be watching the L'7 DVD soon either! That's just not fair! I swear I'll burn up with jealousy once everyone starts posting about it. And I've held off watching the previews too...). It doesn't mean I won't be getting any access, but writing is pretty much out of the question. So the next chapter might be... delayed.
I really wanted to have an update with Sakura in it, this time. Would have posted two chapters at once if it went to that, but as I said - no time. So, no Sakura for a while yet, unless I force myself to an all-nighter, writing XD Hope you guys aren't too disappointed.
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Chapters: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19, Chapter 20