fic for hilaryscribbles (1/2)
Title: 愛してる, Mang (˘⌣˘)ε˘`)
By: neurochip
Pairing: Akanishi Jin/Kamenashi Kazuya.
Word count: 14k.
Rating: PG-13.
Genre/Warnings: Romance. Jin's crazy brain. Sap.
Notes: I hope you like this, hilaryscribbles.
Summary: If Jin's going to sort things out with Kamenashi, he's going to need the help of his BFF.
The first time Josh realises that Jin is sort of weird about that Kamenashi guy, they're sitting in Josh's living room playing Halo, and Jin's phone rings, and it's a tipsy Kamenashi Kazuya on the other end.
“I've gotta go,” Jin had said, the Xbox controller falling out of his lap as he stood, phone still clutched in his hand. “Kame needs me to pick him up.”
Josh had just blinked a little, mind still on the game. “But I thought you hated that guy...”
“What are you talking about?”
Just the week before Jin had spent two hours complaining about Kamenashi's new haircut.
“Never mind,” Josh had finally said. “Later...”
Now, a year later, after countless Kamenashi conversations, Josh still has no idea what to make of their relationship. One time Jin had taken off on some Kamenashi-related errand, and Josh had turned to Zen and said, just a little hesitantly, “He's sort of weird about that guy, huh?”
“Seriously?” Zen's stare was incredulous at best. “You just noticed that now?”
“I dunno...” Josh isn't good at noticing the details.
“He cries every time you sing Real Face at karaoke.”
“But... I just thought it was a really emotional song...”
That's why, when Jin needs to talk about his big gay love for Kamenashi Kazuya, Josh is there to listen.
--
Yamapi mails Jin a photo of a sleek black impala. Pi is stretched across the hood, wearing a dusty leather jacket and a giant grin.
“What the hell?” Jin demands when Pi answers his phone.
“Hi to you, too,” Pi just says.
“WHERE DID YOU GET THAT CAR?”
“I'm on set,” Pi says slowly. “It's my character's car... cool, huh?”
“I guess,” Jin says, just a little grudgingly. He hasn't been offered an awesome drama in ages. Especially not one with a cool car.
Pi laughs. It's kind of depressing when Jin realises how well the people in his life know him. “Listen, you should come visit the set, I haven't seen you in ages. I can mail you directions?”
“Maaaaaaaaaybe,” Jin says, all long and drawn out. He's a busy and important man.
“It's a drama about demons,” Pi offers. “It's an American remake. I bet if you showed up they'd put you in demon makeup.”
“Maybe,” Jin says again, but he's out the door five minutes later, car keys jangling loudly in his hand. He's going to look so fucking awesome as a demon.
--
The first time Jin had visited Pi on set, he'd been about seventeen, and Pi even younger than that. He'd stood there awkwardly, eyes as big as saucers as he'd looked around. It had still been sort of new to them, the whole acting thing, even though Jin had been cast in multiple roles by then.
Pi had called him the night before, voice thin and reedy on the other end of the line, just a little hesitant. “Only if you're not busy,” he'd said, after asking Jin to visit the set the following day. Pi'd been cast as this character with a heart disease, and Jin remembers holding his hand when they called cut after the first scene, the two of them huddled close together in the dressing room Pi was sharing with the other actors.
“You were really good,” Jin had said, and he'd meant it, too. Yamashita Tomohisa had been a superstar in the making. He wasn't the best actor, or the best singer, but he'd had something inside him from the very start, something bright and shining, and easy for the entire world to see.
--
Now, Jin stands in the catering tent, shoving tiny sandwiches into his mouth.
“Hey,” he says when the filming breaks for lunch and he sees Pi walking towards him, but it just comes out as a gurgle, his mouth wide open as bits of lettuce fall out onto his shirt.
“Wow, sexy Akanishi Jin is here, right here, at my filming,” Pi stares at the tiny bits of lettuce, his voice a dull monotone. “Be jealous, ladies.”
“Shut up!” Jin tries to sound offended, but he just ends up reaching out and hugging Yamapi close, smushing his body against the lettuce. “Good to see you, man.”
“You too.” Pi's eyes are warm, mouth curving into an easy grin even as he brushes the food from his shirt. He's wearing the most awesome leather jacket in the world. He looks badass. Jin adjusts his baseball cap a little self-consciously. It's been a while since he washed his hair... these things are easy to forget when you're a busy man.
“Listen,” Pi says before Jin can compliment the jacket. “Kame should be around here somewhere, you want me to find him?”
Jin blinks slowly. The amount of times he's felt behind on conversations are too many to count. He feels that old, familiar burn of anger start low in his gut.
“Did you invite him here?” he asks, voice low and casual. It's fucking unfair. This is his and Pi's thing, their special tradition. It's weird, cause he's not even angry at Kamenashi right now, but somehow even the mention of his name makes Jin's blood feel hot in his veins. Like it's bubbling under the surface. He feels like a volcano.
“No?” Pi stares at Jin like he's retarded. “He's in the drama, stupid.”
“Oh.” Jin should feel better, but he doesn't. He doesn't at all. “You never mentioned.”
“I thought you knew...” Pi looks a little awkward now. “If you don't want to see him...”
“It's not that,” Jin says. He doesn't even know how to explain himself. He hasn't seen Kame for ages and ages, not alone, anyway. He's seen Kame at events, and he saw him once on Music Station, and they even shook hands in front of a reporter and had a conversation about Jin's new album. It's not like they're in the middle of a huge fight. Kame's been perfectly nice, but that's the problem. Jin's used to bitchy Kame, or annoyed Kame, but somehow all he gets these days in their chance meetings is polite Kame.
“People are confusing,” Jin tries. He must look miserable, because Pi just claps him on the shoulder.
Later, he sees Kame across the set, laughing and joking with a bunch of extras. He looks good; happy and healthy, face rounder than it's been in a while. One time Jin had tried to compliment Kame on his weight gain, but Kame had just thought Jin was calling him fat, and the whole thing had ended in tense, angry silence. 'It's not that I think you're fat,' Jin had wanted to say, 'it's just that I don't like it when you look like you're going to break.' Somehow, when he's around Kame, all that want to escape from his mouth are the girliest, lamest sentences ever.
Jin leaves without his demon makeup, but it's okay. Demons are stupid, anyway.
--
Jin doesn't read the newspaper. He doesn't read the newspaper, and he doesn't read the news online, or watch it on the television, or pay attention to stupid tabloids. It's hard to ignore them when they're shoved in front of his face, though.
“Way to go,” Josh says when Jin opens his front door. He's holding a newspaper in one hand and holding a cup of coffee in the other. A huge, shit-eating grin stretches across his face. “You're a star.”
“I know,” Jin says automatically.
Josh rolls his eyes, but it's sort of pointless because he's wearing sunglasses. “No, I mean, your little rampage got press coverage.”
“Rampage?” Jin's always out of the loop.
“RAMPAGE,” Josh repeats, louder, in English. “Did you punch Kamenashi?”
“WHAT?” Jin steps back to let Josh in, then snatches the newspaper out of his hand. It's one of those flimsy, shitty tabloids, all rumours and no substance, but Jin's name is plastered across the headline in thick black font.
AKANISHI JIN HAS DIVA FIT ON SET OF KAMENASHI KAZUYA'S NEW DRAMA
Josh just keeps staring at him proudly. “Way to go, man!!”
“What the fuck?” Jin says dumbly.
Josh reaches out and pats him on the shoulder, pulling him into a sideways hug. “Listen, I know it's hard, but you've gotta learn to assert yourself.”
“I do assert myself.”
“You're kind of weird about that guy,” Josh says slowly, carefully, just like he'd said to Zen all that time ago.
Jin just keeps staring at the paper. It's so unfair. He hadn't even talked to Kame, but this article is all about how he'd punched a wall and screamed obscenities in Kamenashi Kazuya's face. There are all these insane details about how Yamapi's role had been offered to Jin at first and he'd turned it down, citing Kame and his tumultuous relationship as the reason.
”I can't work with him,” the stupid, lying Akanishi Jin of the tabloid has been quoted as saying. He's such an asshole, always going around sleeping with foreign chicks and talking shit about people.
“Kamenashi and I are on really good terms right now,” Jin says instead of the million insane things clambering to come out.
Josh shrugs. “Does it matter?”
“IT MATTERS.” Jin feels crazy when he yells at Josh, because Josh had been a normal guy with normal friends and a normal life, then Jin had come along and pulled him up on stage in front of thousands of fans and sort of made him a star. It's weird because Josh wasn't born for this kind of life. He doesn't know how it works. He's no johnny. He doesn't even know how to do a backflip.
“He's gonna see it,” Jin says, staring down at his hands.
“So what?”
“So nothing.” Jin shoves the paper into the bag he'd grabbed from the kitchen counter.
He's out the door before Josh even thinks to ask where he's going.
--
It turns out Jin's manager rejected the role.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jin knows his voice is high and squeaky. He sounds like a kid whining to its parents. He sounds like a girl. Jin knows all this, but he just can't make himself stop.
His manager just looks kind of harassed. He brushes Jin's complaints off with a wave of his hand and settles for rolling his eyes. “I asked you about it over six months ago.”
“You did NOT.”
“I did,” his manager says, “and during the meeting all you did was complain about Kamenashi-kun.”
“That doesn't sound like me at all,” Jin grumbles. He has no memory of any meeting.
“I floated the idea,” his manager continues. “Look, they didn't want you if the two of you were going to fight all the time. That's why they decided on Yamashita-kun.”
Jin's hands tighten on the armrests of his chair. “This is bullshit. Tomo wouldn't steal my job.”
“No one's stealing anyone's job, it's not about that. It's about the chemistry on set. Could you have played Kamenashi-kun's brother?”
“I could have,” Jin says.
“It's a shame,” his manager goes on, almost like he hasn't heard Jin, “but these things happen. Supernatural is huge right now. We're lucky we even got the green light for a Japanese remake.”
“They probably haven't even seen the show.” Jin feels all jealous and bitter inside, resentment churning in his gut. He'd watched four seasons of it with Shumpei. Sure, they might've been a little high at the time, but it was still pretty awesome.
His manager turns to face him, and he doesn't look sorry or sad or anything, just kind of resigned.
“This sucks,” Jin says, when it's obvious his manager doesn't have anything else to say. He wants to complain more, to throw his weight around, but his manager has known him since Jin was a just a kid. There's no fooling some people. When Jin meets strangers he can pretend to be this cool, suave guy, but there are far too many people in his life who have seen the real him.
Jin settles for standing up and tossing the tabloid down on the desk in front of him. His fingers are all black from the cheap paper, and they leave dark smudges on the white walls when he leaves through the front door. GOOD, he thinks viciously.
--
“Let me get this straight,” Josh says slowly. He's sitting in a beanbag on his floor, a half eaten packet of rice snacks gaping open beside him. “You and Kamenashi are cool, but everyone thinks you hate each other?”
“Yeah.” Jin picks up the packet and fiddles with it, a small pile of shredded cardboard collecting in his lap. It's such an intensely awkward conversation, and Jin doesn't even know why. Josh has seen him falling down drunk and it's been fine, but somehow the idea of, like, talking about his feelings is a million times worse.
“And you wanna fix it...”
“Yeah.”
Josh eyes him, then snatches back the packet of rice snacks and stuffs a handful into his mouth. He chews thoughtfully. “So you came to your friend Josh for a little advice.”
Jin fixes Josh with an unimpressed stare. “I can go to someone else, you know. Yuichi loves helping with this shit.” It's a lie. Whenever anyone goes to Nakamaru for help, he just looks incredibly awkward, all red in the face and flustered. He always helps in the end, though.
“Except you called ME.” Josh looks smug, like a big fat cat. “Anyway, if you wanted Nakamaru-kun's help you would have asked him. You're embarrassed, right?”
Jin flops down on Josh's couch and makes a loud, muffled sound of pain.
“Right.” Josh says, all business now, face grave. “You came to the right guy.”
“I did?” Jin squints at Josh through the tangle of his own hair.
“I know how you feel about him.” Josh looks uncomfortable, but determined, too.
“Okay......” Jin says, all drawn out and slow.
Josh smiles. “Good man.” He claps Jin on the back, even though Jin just keeps laying there, one arm dangling over the side of the couch. “I'll handle this.”
Jin feels a vague sense of apprehension.
--
A message goes out to Twitter that night, keibosite's profile picture sitting merrily beside it.
cheyyyaaa みんな i gota questoin 俺の友達Jくん havin sum relatienship truble どうしよう？？pls hlep thx
--
“Yo,” Josh says as he holds an envelope out to Kamenashi Kazuya. “These are for you...”
Kamenashi stares at him for a moment before taking the outstretched envelope with both hands, and bowing deeply. “Thank you very much,” he says, but his face just looks super confused.
“It's me... Keibo,” Josh clarifies, and when Kamenashi still looks confused, he scuffs the toe of his sneaker in the dirt and mutters, “Josh... I know Jin.”
“Oh!” Kamenashi's face brightens, but he still looks a little bewildered. “Well, thanks...”
“They're tickets. To Hokkaido. I've got connections.”
The only connection Josh has is the internet on his laptop.
“Thanks,” Kamenashi says for the third time. His fingernails rub against the front of the envelope, a nervous scratch, scratch, scratch.
Josh stares down at the envelope. He's always mocked Jin for being weird about Kamenashi, but now he's starting to understand why.
“Look,” he says at last. “There's two plane tickets to Hokkaido in there. You have to stay in a cabin, the directions are in there as well. It's all paid for... it's important you go. With a friend.”
Kamenashi just stares at him.
“A friend..........” Josh continues, sort of weakly. This had been much easier in his head. “Someone you've worked with in the past... someone we've both worked with...”
“OH,” Kamenashi says, and the understanding dawns clear on his face.
“We understand each other??” Josh asks, the relief clear in his voice.
“Sure,” Kamenashi says. The envelope is tight in his hand now, and he looks confident and happy. Josh can kind of see why he's so popular. “Thanks again.”
“No problem,” Josh manages. Damn. He's hella smooth.
--
Jin's phone rings while he's in the shower, and he has to jump out and grab for it, wet fingers sliding across the screen.
“Don't you have something to say to me?” Josh sounds impatient and jumpy on the other end.
“Uh...”
“It's been two days.”
“Uh huh,” Jin says. He grabs a towel and wraps it around his waist with his free hand.
“Well...” Josh draws the word out, then waits.
“I have no idea what you're talking about.”
The answering sigh sounds sad, and maybe a little angry, too. “A thank you wouldn't go astray. Is this cause I used your credit card?”
Jin stares at himself in the mirror. He feels like he and Josh are having two completely separate conversations. Or maybe they're both having the same conversation, only Jin doesn't understand a word of it.
“Credit card?” he knows he sounds kind of stupid, but Josh isn't making any sense. “Are you drunk?”
“It's 1pm!” Josh says, and now he just sounds injured.
“CREDIT CARD?” Jin repeats, a little more loudly this time. His heart starts beating a little faster, like it can sense the approaching doom.
“I had to use it to book the plane tickets,” Josh explains. “I knew you'd thank me in the end.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Jin says.
“Wait,” Josh says. “Kamenashi didn't contact you?”
“Why would Kamenashi contact me?” Jin's proud of himself for how reasonable he sounds, even as his body starts tensing up in horror.
“Your fans suggested you guys get away and repair your friendship! I gave him tickets to Hokkaido... there was a cabin! I told him to take you.” Josh sounds a little offended now. “He seemed so happy when I gave them to him!”
Josh is ranting about Kamenashi being a great actor and a terrible human being, but Jin's mind is reeling. He feels suddenly, inexorably hurt, for reasons he can't pinpoint.
--
Jin sits on his bed and stares down at his phone and wills it to vibrate with an incoming message. He stares so hard at it that his vision starts to blur, and that's when he realises that he's been sitting there for a good fifteen minutes, just sitting there and staring and being kind of pathetic. The thing is, Jin knows he's pathetic, but that doesn't mean he can stop staring at his phone. His brain knows. His eyes just don't want to move.
“Ughhhhhhh,” he groans, an incoherent sound of frustration, and lets the phone fall noiselessly onto the sheets under him. He flops back on the bed, all boneless, floppy limbs, and stares at the ceiling instead.
He shouldn't even care what Kame's doing.
He shouldn't care, and he's almost certain that he doesn't, but there's this niggling little thought in the back of his mind, like a stone in his shoe, constantly poking at him. It's really fucking annoying.
The thought is: 'Kame should be paying attention to me', and it's been hiding in the recesses of his mind for years.
'You're being a brat,' Jin thinks, in a vain attempt to make the stupid, no-good thought pack its bags up and leave town.
'You can think what you want,' he imagines the thought viciously saying, 'but I'm gonna live in your head forever, until you're a crazy old man with fifty cats and no one to love you.'
It's possible that Jin's going a little crazy. He rolls over and grabs for his phone, stares at the screen again. On a dumb impulse he blindly hits for Nakamaru's name in the phonebook, and presses the phone to his ear. The sun has gone behind a cloud while he's been laying there, and the room is all shadows now. It makes Jin feel even more pathetic, the way he's laying there in the dark. The phone clicks, and he hears someone pick up.
“Fix me,” Jin mews, not pathetic at all, before the person on the other end can say anything.
A long silence answers him.
“Hello?”
Jin stills, then jerks his phone away from his ear. “Shumpei?”
“Jin?”
“Hey,” Jin says, going for casual. He is the lamest person alive. The space between S and Y in his phonebook should be so much larger than it is.
“Hi,” Shumpei replies. Maybe he didn't hear Jin's opening greeting. “Did you ask me to FIX you??”
Jin counts to three, then presses his fingertips against one eyelid, rubbing tiredly. It makes spots dance behind his closed eyes, tiny little sparks jumping around. “Sorta,” he says, foregoing any sort of dignity.
“What's wrong?” Shumpei just sounds concerned now, so Jin presses on.
“It's about Kamenashi, kind of.”
“Kamenashi?” Shumpei's voice goes all weird, and Jin remembers the last time they'd spoken about Kame. Shumpei had been angry because his girlfriend thought Kame was hot. He'd called Kame the Japanese Justin Bieber, and then Jin had felt kind of annoyed, because that Bieber kid had talent. “He collaborated with KANYE,” he'd ended up drunkenly slurring at Shumpei. After that, Shumpei had just thought Jin was a massive Justin Bieber fan.
Shumpei's still talking, and Jin tunes back in. “Is he being an asshole again?”
“No,” Jin says, then stops, considering. Is Kame being an asshole? “I don't know, maybe. It's weird.”
“Look,” Shumpei says, all decisive action. “You've gotta do what I'd do. You march up to him and you give him what for.”
“What for?”
“Well, I dunno,” Shumpei just sounds confused now. “What did he do, anyway? Steal your girl?”
Jin chokes back a laugh, imagining Kame wining and dining one of Jin's ex-girlfriends in some cabin in Hokkaido. “Not exactly.”
“Well, whatever,” Shumpei says. “Can't hide from your problems forever. Do something about it and you'll feel better. Go out, have some fun.”
“I can't go out,” Jin moans. “I have no friends.” It's a lie and they both know it; Jin has more friends than he can count.
“You're a fucking social butterfly,” Shumpei says.
Jin brings his hand to his face, peering weakly at his wrist, the hands of his watch. It's late, but too early to really do anything. He could have dinner. He wonders, for a second, what Josh is doing, but he's seen Josh too much lately. If he rings Josh now, Josh is going to think he's a total loser without any other friends. He hangs up on Shumpei and rings Pi instead, but the phone just keeps ringing and ringing.
'People who ignore their phones are the worst kind of people,' Jin thinks, blatantly ignoring the fact that he does it constantly. He flops over on his bed and pulls his laptop to him, a sleek, shiny macbook pro that he's used maybe twice. He bought it a few months ago when the new models came out. He'd like to say that he lined up for it all morning, but really he just rang when Zen was lining, and had him pick it up. Zen uses his to record stuff all the time, but Jin's has been slowly gathering dust.
'I'm a musician,' Jin thinks weakly, justifying the purchase.
His facebook has amassed a worrying large number of friend requests, and he ignores them all, scrolling through his recent news instead.
Tomo Tonkatsu has checked into New Chitose Airport, Hokkaido pops up on the screen and Jin sees red.
--
For a long time Pi and Kame and Jin existed in a sort of delicate balance, like an unstable, wobbly triangle. Kame and Pi hated each other for a while, but it was okay, because they both loved Jin. Jin thinks he's maybe a little selfish, sometimes.
Jin thinks about Pi and Kame hanging out together in Hokkaido and he feels sick inside, his mind all scrambled and messed up. It's like he's drunk. Drunk on confusion. He books a flight for Hokkaido right then, with his credit card, and for a second he viciously considers calling his bank and telling them that his card was stolen and used without his permission. He could call the police or something, and give them Josh's details. He could get Josh deported from the country. He imagines the police dragging Josh out of his apartment and wrestling him the ground, smashing his face into the floor and breaking his dumb old sunglasses.
Jin is all talk, though. He's really fond of Josh, who tries really hard to speak to Jin's friends in Japanese, and tells long, boring stories about Japan, and who carries this dumb little video camera around with him when he remembers it. He's always interested in the little details, even though they seem really irrelevant to Jin. He realises, suddenly, that Josh is a lot like Kame in some ways. Josh isn't a control freak and a workaholic, but he's fiercely defensive of his friends, and he has a big heart, and he cares about people. He also tells long, rambling stories that go nowhere, and that's Kame all over.
Jin sits on an aeroplane and thinks about Josh, and Kamenashi Kazuya, and Yamashita Tomohisa, and how quickly the world is spinning by, and how helpless he sometimes feels. When he emerges from the airport it's into a world of snow. It feels like he's arrived in a different country, even though he's been to Hokkaido before, more than once.
It sort of feels like the air is fresher up here, and his head has the chance to clear a bit, like it couldn't in Tokyo. He'd booked his ticket and boarded his flight with his insides all twisted up in tight knots of rage, but he almost doesn't possess the energy to be angry anymore. There's a thread of it, maybe, and he's clutching it tightly, stubbornly, because he's a little scared of what will happen when he lets go.
Jin has a lot of defenses put in place when it comes to friendship, and emotional shit, and Kamenashi Kazuya is always breaking them down. He burst through them when they didn't really exist, when they were kids; when Jin's heart was open and wanting. Most people think its Jin who shoved his way into Kame's world, but he wouldn't have had to do it if Kame hadn't been so endlessly fascinating. Jin falls in love a lot, but it's the fleeting kind. Jin's affections burn bright and short, with sudden, intense passion. Those feelings are normal to him; it's the slow, long fixations that scare him. Now, as he stands in front of the airport, iphone clutched in his cold little hand, he thinks: I'm like that stupid werewolf from Twilight, and I've imprinted on Kame.
--
Jin takes a taxi to the address Josh gave him, but it's been snowing, and the driver keeps refusing to take Jin the whole way.
“It's fine,” Jin keeps saying, duffel bag sitting on the seat next to him, staring at the driver's worried face in the mirror. “Just keep going, it'll be fine.”
It won't be fine. It rained that morning, and now the roads are all slick with ice. Every time the cab takes a corner the wheels skid a little, and the driver's face goes all pale and pinched. Eventually he refuses to go any further, and pulls over to the side of the road. He offers to take Jin back, but Jin's already climbing out of the cab, hot with indignation and stubborn misery.
“It's FINE,” he calls through the open window, cash dropping out of his sweaty hand and landing on the passenger seat.
“I can't let you go,” the driver says. He doesn't even know who Jin is; he's just a good guy. He's really into soccer, too. Sometimes Jin likes talking to regular people more than he can express. Kame's really into talking to old people, but Jin just likes talking to whoever, as long as they don't know him as Akanishi Jin. The fame can be nice sometimes, but other times he just wants to be able to talk to a regular guy about drafting options for the national team.
“It's cool,” Jin says, holding up his iphone. A little blue dot pulsates, and Jin waves the phone around. “Google Maps.”
The driver still looks uncertain, but there's not much he can do with Jin standing on the side of the road, the duffel at his feet already growing soggy in the snow.
The car finally takes off, and Jin watches it go. He feels suddenly alone, standing there on the side of the road with no one else in sight. He can't even see any other cars; just miles of icy fields stretching out on either side of the road. He clutches his phone a little more tightly and brings it up in front of his face, where the little blue dot glows comfortingly. Iphones were the best inventions ever. Fuck paper maps. Technology is awesome.
A tiny message pops up on his screen and he squints at it. It's Josh. They've been IMing back and forth since Jin left Tokyo, stupid messages about the plane, and the cold, and now Jin's fingers are flying across the screen again, quick to complain. Josh is always there to listen. He's constantly glued to his phone. He thinks the iphone is the greatest invention of all time.
Im standing in a field, Jin sends, slightly dramatic.
Josh's reply comes immediately. da fcuk? lol 馬鹿! 馬鹿! 馬鹿! 馬鹿!
Jin stabs at the screen and Google Maps pops back up. He takes one, tentative step along the side of the road, and the little blue dot shifts slightly in the wrong direction. Jin casts a doubtful look at the field to his left. No fucking way.
I was kidding but now google maps is telling me i have to walk in field!!! Jin types.
LOL, Josh sends. Fuckn karma mang u can do it !
Josh is so well spoken in real life. Jin will never understand why he comes across as a simpleton in text form. He'd tried bringing it up with Josh once, but Josh had just looked really confused, like what Jin was saying wasn't making any sense at all. It's not like Jin's own English is awesome or anything, but even he can tell that Josh sounds like a total retard. Josh sounds more ESL than Jin does, and Josh is supposed to be American.
He shoves his phone into his mouth instead of replying, teeth biting down hard as he grabs up his duffel bag and leaps over the fence to his left. He lands in an icy, wet field and he spits his phone back out into his hand, eyes trained on that little blue dot. It's weirdly comforting, watching it as he steps forward, one foot in front of the other. It's like a little voice at his side, telling him that he's doing the right thing, even though if he thinks about it for too long he starts feeling insane. Like, if he steps back from it all, he'll stare at the Akanishi Jin who is standing in a field in Hokkaido on some insane mission to break up Kame and Pi's exclusive little friendship retreat. He doesn't want to face that Jin. He wants to be the cool Jin who hangs out with his friends and makes hip music.
So Jin pointedly doesn't think about what he's doing. He just keeps walking, and the road keeps growing smaller and smaller, twisting away behind him until it's just a speck in the distance. It's fine, though, walking through the tall, wet grass, as long as he keeps his eyes on the map. The dot slides along at a steady pace, moving ever closer to the red dot that marks his end location. THE CABIN. It appears in Jin's head just like that; all caps. He has no idea what he'll say when he gets there, and he refuses to let himself think about it. He can't overthink this. He's gotta act on instinct.
Jin keeps walking, and walking, and walking, feeling smug and proud of himself. He's a warrior of nature. He's built for the outdoors. He smiles down at his phone, and that's when the little blue dot takes a giant leap to the right and blinks merrily at him, far, far away from where it had been only moments before.
Jin stops. He shakes his phone a little, in disbelief, but the dot doesn't move back. It just keeps sitting there, in the wrong place.
“What,” Jin says aloud, in abject horror. He lifts his head and looks around, but all he can see is grass, and snow, and trees, and no help in sight. He wishes he'd gone back with the driver. He wishes he was less stubborn. Mostly he wishes that he was back home in his apartment, snug and warm, and not freezing to death in fucking Sapporo by himself. He pictures tomorrow's headlines. AKANISHI JIN DIES ALONE AND FRIENDLESS. FROZEN CORPSE DISCOVERED IN FIELD NO ONE CARES ABOUT. He tries to remember survival tips, but the best ones he has are stupid things he's seen on Lost, and he suspects they're not all that helpful. It's not like he's stuck on an island. The next best thing he can think of is that scene from Star Wars with all the snow, but thinking about it kind of grosses Jin out.
He remembers the time he was sick and Shumpei had come over to keep him company, and they'd watched bad television for hours. Shumpei had tried to introduce Jin to the magic of Bear Grylls, but watching a guy eat goat testicles just hadn't been his idea of a good time. Now he wishes he'd stuck it out. Bear would know what to do in a situation like this. Bear would beat stupid Google Maps into submission.
Part of Jin wants to hurl his phone into the snow at his feet, but the reasonable, mature part of his brain keeps screaming that it's a bad idea. At least Jin still has reception. He just has no one to call.
Im gonna die, Jin types carefully. GPS fuckd and n they gonna find my frozen corpse.
Josh writes back under a minute because he has no life. U need hlep. 亀 or YamaP 電話してよ
Thing is, Jin hasn't exactly called either of them, apart from that failed attempt the night before, when Pi's phone rang and rang and rang. Pi never called him back, either, which feels like a vicious slight, even though Jin knows how lazy Pi is with stuff like that. Ringing Pi now feels like the lamest move on earth. Jin was going to look so cool, throwing open the door of their cabin and demanding Kame reimburse him for the plane tickets. He was going to call Kame a thief and a freeloader.
Cant, Jin replies.
ほんとにすごいやつだYamaP is a nice doodだからcontectしてhlep聞いてね!!
CANT
なんだよ？？？y not ?? just tryy and がんばってcheyaaaa u can do it
--
Jin ends up calling Yamapi. He sits on his duffel bag at the foot of a tree, the glossy screen of his phone pressed to his ear as he fills Yamapi in. Pi doesn't sound angry, or even annoyed that he has to locate Jin somewhere in the wilderness. He mostly just sounds kind of resigned. It's a common reaction to Akanishi Jin.
“I didn't know you were into hiking,” Pi says. Jin doubles the effort to resist burying his phone in a snowdrift.
“I'm not,” Jin says tersely.
Jin hears shuffling in the background, and low, muffled laughter. Pi clears his throat, but Jin can tell he's trying not to laugh, even though Jin is catching his death out in the wilds of Hokkaido. “What do you see?”
“FUCKING NOTHING,” Jin explodes.
“Hey,” Pi says.
Jin makes a tiny noise of frustrated pain. “Nothing. Snow and trees and some ugly bushes. I saw one move. There's probably a polar bear in there.”
“Probably,” Pi agrees. “Listen, can't you just send me your location with Coordinate?”
Jin's suddenly really glad that Josh stole his iphone one day and downloaded about a million must-need apps. He kept purchasing app after app from the store, ignoring Jin's many protests. He'd even kept insisting that Jin needed Talking Tom Cat, an app that brought a giant image of a cat's face up on Jin's screen and repeated everything he said in the most annoying voice ever. He bypasses it now, instead hitting Coordinate and watching his location merrily fly off to Pi's email.
“I'll find you,” Yamapi says in his serious actor voice. He sounds like he's auditioning for the lead role in some sappy drama.
--
Part 2
By: neurochip
Pairing: Akanishi Jin/Kamenashi Kazuya.
Word count: 14k.
Rating: PG-13.
Genre/Warnings: Romance. Jin's crazy brain. Sap.
Notes: I hope you like this, hilaryscribbles.
Summary: If Jin's going to sort things out with Kamenashi, he's going to need the help of his BFF.
The first time Josh realises that Jin is sort of weird about that Kamenashi guy, they're sitting in Josh's living room playing Halo, and Jin's phone rings, and it's a tipsy Kamenashi Kazuya on the other end.
“I've gotta go,” Jin had said, the Xbox controller falling out of his lap as he stood, phone still clutched in his hand. “Kame needs me to pick him up.”
Josh had just blinked a little, mind still on the game. “But I thought you hated that guy...”
“What are you talking about?”
Just the week before Jin had spent two hours complaining about Kamenashi's new haircut.
“Never mind,” Josh had finally said. “Later...”
Now, a year later, after countless Kamenashi conversations, Josh still has no idea what to make of their relationship. One time Jin had taken off on some Kamenashi-related errand, and Josh had turned to Zen and said, just a little hesitantly, “He's sort of weird about that guy, huh?”
“Seriously?” Zen's stare was incredulous at best. “You just noticed that now?”
“I dunno...” Josh isn't good at noticing the details.
“He cries every time you sing Real Face at karaoke.”
“But... I just thought it was a really emotional song...”
That's why, when Jin needs to talk about his big gay love for Kamenashi Kazuya, Josh is there to listen.
--
Yamapi mails Jin a photo of a sleek black impala. Pi is stretched across the hood, wearing a dusty leather jacket and a giant grin.
“What the hell?” Jin demands when Pi answers his phone.
“Hi to you, too,” Pi just says.
“WHERE DID YOU GET THAT CAR?”
“I'm on set,” Pi says slowly. “It's my character's car... cool, huh?”
“I guess,” Jin says, just a little grudgingly. He hasn't been offered an awesome drama in ages. Especially not one with a cool car.
Pi laughs. It's kind of depressing when Jin realises how well the people in his life know him. “Listen, you should come visit the set, I haven't seen you in ages. I can mail you directions?”
“Maaaaaaaaaybe,” Jin says, all long and drawn out. He's a busy and important man.
“It's a drama about demons,” Pi offers. “It's an American remake. I bet if you showed up they'd put you in demon makeup.”
“Maybe,” Jin says again, but he's out the door five minutes later, car keys jangling loudly in his hand. He's going to look so fucking awesome as a demon.
--
The first time Jin had visited Pi on set, he'd been about seventeen, and Pi even younger than that. He'd stood there awkwardly, eyes as big as saucers as he'd looked around. It had still been sort of new to them, the whole acting thing, even though Jin had been cast in multiple roles by then.
Pi had called him the night before, voice thin and reedy on the other end of the line, just a little hesitant. “Only if you're not busy,” he'd said, after asking Jin to visit the set the following day. Pi'd been cast as this character with a heart disease, and Jin remembers holding his hand when they called cut after the first scene, the two of them huddled close together in the dressing room Pi was sharing with the other actors.
“You were really good,” Jin had said, and he'd meant it, too. Yamashita Tomohisa had been a superstar in the making. He wasn't the best actor, or the best singer, but he'd had something inside him from the very start, something bright and shining, and easy for the entire world to see.
--
Now, Jin stands in the catering tent, shoving tiny sandwiches into his mouth.
“Hey,” he says when the filming breaks for lunch and he sees Pi walking towards him, but it just comes out as a gurgle, his mouth wide open as bits of lettuce fall out onto his shirt.
“Wow, sexy Akanishi Jin is here, right here, at my filming,” Pi stares at the tiny bits of lettuce, his voice a dull monotone. “Be jealous, ladies.”
“Shut up!” Jin tries to sound offended, but he just ends up reaching out and hugging Yamapi close, smushing his body against the lettuce. “Good to see you, man.”
“You too.” Pi's eyes are warm, mouth curving into an easy grin even as he brushes the food from his shirt. He's wearing the most awesome leather jacket in the world. He looks badass. Jin adjusts his baseball cap a little self-consciously. It's been a while since he washed his hair... these things are easy to forget when you're a busy man.
“Listen,” Pi says before Jin can compliment the jacket. “Kame should be around here somewhere, you want me to find him?”
Jin blinks slowly. The amount of times he's felt behind on conversations are too many to count. He feels that old, familiar burn of anger start low in his gut.
“Did you invite him here?” he asks, voice low and casual. It's fucking unfair. This is his and Pi's thing, their special tradition. It's weird, cause he's not even angry at Kamenashi right now, but somehow even the mention of his name makes Jin's blood feel hot in his veins. Like it's bubbling under the surface. He feels like a volcano.
“No?” Pi stares at Jin like he's retarded. “He's in the drama, stupid.”
“Oh.” Jin should feel better, but he doesn't. He doesn't at all. “You never mentioned.”
“I thought you knew...” Pi looks a little awkward now. “If you don't want to see him...”
“It's not that,” Jin says. He doesn't even know how to explain himself. He hasn't seen Kame for ages and ages, not alone, anyway. He's seen Kame at events, and he saw him once on Music Station, and they even shook hands in front of a reporter and had a conversation about Jin's new album. It's not like they're in the middle of a huge fight. Kame's been perfectly nice, but that's the problem. Jin's used to bitchy Kame, or annoyed Kame, but somehow all he gets these days in their chance meetings is polite Kame.
“People are confusing,” Jin tries. He must look miserable, because Pi just claps him on the shoulder.
Later, he sees Kame across the set, laughing and joking with a bunch of extras. He looks good; happy and healthy, face rounder than it's been in a while. One time Jin had tried to compliment Kame on his weight gain, but Kame had just thought Jin was calling him fat, and the whole thing had ended in tense, angry silence. 'It's not that I think you're fat,' Jin had wanted to say, 'it's just that I don't like it when you look like you're going to break.' Somehow, when he's around Kame, all that want to escape from his mouth are the girliest, lamest sentences ever.
Jin leaves without his demon makeup, but it's okay. Demons are stupid, anyway.
--
Jin doesn't read the newspaper. He doesn't read the newspaper, and he doesn't read the news online, or watch it on the television, or pay attention to stupid tabloids. It's hard to ignore them when they're shoved in front of his face, though.
“Way to go,” Josh says when Jin opens his front door. He's holding a newspaper in one hand and holding a cup of coffee in the other. A huge, shit-eating grin stretches across his face. “You're a star.”
“I know,” Jin says automatically.
Josh rolls his eyes, but it's sort of pointless because he's wearing sunglasses. “No, I mean, your little rampage got press coverage.”
“Rampage?” Jin's always out of the loop.
“RAMPAGE,” Josh repeats, louder, in English. “Did you punch Kamenashi?”
“WHAT?” Jin steps back to let Josh in, then snatches the newspaper out of his hand. It's one of those flimsy, shitty tabloids, all rumours and no substance, but Jin's name is plastered across the headline in thick black font.
AKANISHI JIN HAS DIVA FIT ON SET OF KAMENASHI KAZUYA'S NEW DRAMA
Josh just keeps staring at him proudly. “Way to go, man!!”
“What the fuck?” Jin says dumbly.
Josh reaches out and pats him on the shoulder, pulling him into a sideways hug. “Listen, I know it's hard, but you've gotta learn to assert yourself.”
“I do assert myself.”
“You're kind of weird about that guy,” Josh says slowly, carefully, just like he'd said to Zen all that time ago.
Jin just keeps staring at the paper. It's so unfair. He hadn't even talked to Kame, but this article is all about how he'd punched a wall and screamed obscenities in Kamenashi Kazuya's face. There are all these insane details about how Yamapi's role had been offered to Jin at first and he'd turned it down, citing Kame and his tumultuous relationship as the reason.
”I can't work with him,” the stupid, lying Akanishi Jin of the tabloid has been quoted as saying. He's such an asshole, always going around sleeping with foreign chicks and talking shit about people.
“Kamenashi and I are on really good terms right now,” Jin says instead of the million insane things clambering to come out.
Josh shrugs. “Does it matter?”
“IT MATTERS.” Jin feels crazy when he yells at Josh, because Josh had been a normal guy with normal friends and a normal life, then Jin had come along and pulled him up on stage in front of thousands of fans and sort of made him a star. It's weird because Josh wasn't born for this kind of life. He doesn't know how it works. He's no johnny. He doesn't even know how to do a backflip.
“He's gonna see it,” Jin says, staring down at his hands.
“So what?”
“So nothing.” Jin shoves the paper into the bag he'd grabbed from the kitchen counter.
He's out the door before Josh even thinks to ask where he's going.
--
It turns out Jin's manager rejected the role.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jin knows his voice is high and squeaky. He sounds like a kid whining to its parents. He sounds like a girl. Jin knows all this, but he just can't make himself stop.
His manager just looks kind of harassed. He brushes Jin's complaints off with a wave of his hand and settles for rolling his eyes. “I asked you about it over six months ago.”
“You did NOT.”
“I did,” his manager says, “and during the meeting all you did was complain about Kamenashi-kun.”
“That doesn't sound like me at all,” Jin grumbles. He has no memory of any meeting.
“I floated the idea,” his manager continues. “Look, they didn't want you if the two of you were going to fight all the time. That's why they decided on Yamashita-kun.”
Jin's hands tighten on the armrests of his chair. “This is bullshit. Tomo wouldn't steal my job.”
“No one's stealing anyone's job, it's not about that. It's about the chemistry on set. Could you have played Kamenashi-kun's brother?”
“I could have,” Jin says.
“It's a shame,” his manager goes on, almost like he hasn't heard Jin, “but these things happen. Supernatural is huge right now. We're lucky we even got the green light for a Japanese remake.”
“They probably haven't even seen the show.” Jin feels all jealous and bitter inside, resentment churning in his gut. He'd watched four seasons of it with Shumpei. Sure, they might've been a little high at the time, but it was still pretty awesome.
His manager turns to face him, and he doesn't look sorry or sad or anything, just kind of resigned.
“This sucks,” Jin says, when it's obvious his manager doesn't have anything else to say. He wants to complain more, to throw his weight around, but his manager has known him since Jin was a just a kid. There's no fooling some people. When Jin meets strangers he can pretend to be this cool, suave guy, but there are far too many people in his life who have seen the real him.
Jin settles for standing up and tossing the tabloid down on the desk in front of him. His fingers are all black from the cheap paper, and they leave dark smudges on the white walls when he leaves through the front door. GOOD, he thinks viciously.
--
“Let me get this straight,” Josh says slowly. He's sitting in a beanbag on his floor, a half eaten packet of rice snacks gaping open beside him. “You and Kamenashi are cool, but everyone thinks you hate each other?”
“Yeah.” Jin picks up the packet and fiddles with it, a small pile of shredded cardboard collecting in his lap. It's such an intensely awkward conversation, and Jin doesn't even know why. Josh has seen him falling down drunk and it's been fine, but somehow the idea of, like, talking about his feelings is a million times worse.
“And you wanna fix it...”
“Yeah.”
Josh eyes him, then snatches back the packet of rice snacks and stuffs a handful into his mouth. He chews thoughtfully. “So you came to your friend Josh for a little advice.”
Jin fixes Josh with an unimpressed stare. “I can go to someone else, you know. Yuichi loves helping with this shit.” It's a lie. Whenever anyone goes to Nakamaru for help, he just looks incredibly awkward, all red in the face and flustered. He always helps in the end, though.
“Except you called ME.” Josh looks smug, like a big fat cat. “Anyway, if you wanted Nakamaru-kun's help you would have asked him. You're embarrassed, right?”
Jin flops down on Josh's couch and makes a loud, muffled sound of pain.
“Right.” Josh says, all business now, face grave. “You came to the right guy.”
“I did?” Jin squints at Josh through the tangle of his own hair.
“I know how you feel about him.” Josh looks uncomfortable, but determined, too.
“Okay......” Jin says, all drawn out and slow.
Josh smiles. “Good man.” He claps Jin on the back, even though Jin just keeps laying there, one arm dangling over the side of the couch. “I'll handle this.”
Jin feels a vague sense of apprehension.
--
A message goes out to Twitter that night, keibosite's profile picture sitting merrily beside it.
cheyyyaaa みんな i gota questoin 俺の友達Jくん havin sum relatienship truble どうしよう？？pls hlep thx
--
“Yo,” Josh says as he holds an envelope out to Kamenashi Kazuya. “These are for you...”
Kamenashi stares at him for a moment before taking the outstretched envelope with both hands, and bowing deeply. “Thank you very much,” he says, but his face just looks super confused.
“It's me... Keibo,” Josh clarifies, and when Kamenashi still looks confused, he scuffs the toe of his sneaker in the dirt and mutters, “Josh... I know Jin.”
“Oh!” Kamenashi's face brightens, but he still looks a little bewildered. “Well, thanks...”
“They're tickets. To Hokkaido. I've got connections.”
The only connection Josh has is the internet on his laptop.
“Thanks,” Kamenashi says for the third time. His fingernails rub against the front of the envelope, a nervous scratch, scratch, scratch.
Josh stares down at the envelope. He's always mocked Jin for being weird about Kamenashi, but now he's starting to understand why.
“Look,” he says at last. “There's two plane tickets to Hokkaido in there. You have to stay in a cabin, the directions are in there as well. It's all paid for... it's important you go. With a friend.”
Kamenashi just stares at him.
“A friend..........” Josh continues, sort of weakly. This had been much easier in his head. “Someone you've worked with in the past... someone we've both worked with...”
“OH,” Kamenashi says, and the understanding dawns clear on his face.
“We understand each other??” Josh asks, the relief clear in his voice.
“Sure,” Kamenashi says. The envelope is tight in his hand now, and he looks confident and happy. Josh can kind of see why he's so popular. “Thanks again.”
“No problem,” Josh manages. Damn. He's hella smooth.
--
Jin's phone rings while he's in the shower, and he has to jump out and grab for it, wet fingers sliding across the screen.
“Don't you have something to say to me?” Josh sounds impatient and jumpy on the other end.
“Uh...”
“It's been two days.”
“Uh huh,” Jin says. He grabs a towel and wraps it around his waist with his free hand.
“Well...” Josh draws the word out, then waits.
“I have no idea what you're talking about.”
The answering sigh sounds sad, and maybe a little angry, too. “A thank you wouldn't go astray. Is this cause I used your credit card?”
Jin stares at himself in the mirror. He feels like he and Josh are having two completely separate conversations. Or maybe they're both having the same conversation, only Jin doesn't understand a word of it.
“Credit card?” he knows he sounds kind of stupid, but Josh isn't making any sense. “Are you drunk?”
“It's 1pm!” Josh says, and now he just sounds injured.
“CREDIT CARD?” Jin repeats, a little more loudly this time. His heart starts beating a little faster, like it can sense the approaching doom.
“I had to use it to book the plane tickets,” Josh explains. “I knew you'd thank me in the end.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Jin says.
“Wait,” Josh says. “Kamenashi didn't contact you?”
“Why would Kamenashi contact me?” Jin's proud of himself for how reasonable he sounds, even as his body starts tensing up in horror.
“Your fans suggested you guys get away and repair your friendship! I gave him tickets to Hokkaido... there was a cabin! I told him to take you.” Josh sounds a little offended now. “He seemed so happy when I gave them to him!”
Josh is ranting about Kamenashi being a great actor and a terrible human being, but Jin's mind is reeling. He feels suddenly, inexorably hurt, for reasons he can't pinpoint.
--
Jin sits on his bed and stares down at his phone and wills it to vibrate with an incoming message. He stares so hard at it that his vision starts to blur, and that's when he realises that he's been sitting there for a good fifteen minutes, just sitting there and staring and being kind of pathetic. The thing is, Jin knows he's pathetic, but that doesn't mean he can stop staring at his phone. His brain knows. His eyes just don't want to move.
“Ughhhhhhh,” he groans, an incoherent sound of frustration, and lets the phone fall noiselessly onto the sheets under him. He flops back on the bed, all boneless, floppy limbs, and stares at the ceiling instead.
He shouldn't even care what Kame's doing.
He shouldn't care, and he's almost certain that he doesn't, but there's this niggling little thought in the back of his mind, like a stone in his shoe, constantly poking at him. It's really fucking annoying.
The thought is: 'Kame should be paying attention to me', and it's been hiding in the recesses of his mind for years.
'You're being a brat,' Jin thinks, in a vain attempt to make the stupid, no-good thought pack its bags up and leave town.
'You can think what you want,' he imagines the thought viciously saying, 'but I'm gonna live in your head forever, until you're a crazy old man with fifty cats and no one to love you.'
It's possible that Jin's going a little crazy. He rolls over and grabs for his phone, stares at the screen again. On a dumb impulse he blindly hits for Nakamaru's name in the phonebook, and presses the phone to his ear. The sun has gone behind a cloud while he's been laying there, and the room is all shadows now. It makes Jin feel even more pathetic, the way he's laying there in the dark. The phone clicks, and he hears someone pick up.
“Fix me,” Jin mews, not pathetic at all, before the person on the other end can say anything.
A long silence answers him.
“Hello?”
Jin stills, then jerks his phone away from his ear. “Shumpei?”
“Jin?”
“Hey,” Jin says, going for casual. He is the lamest person alive. The space between S and Y in his phonebook should be so much larger than it is.
“Hi,” Shumpei replies. Maybe he didn't hear Jin's opening greeting. “Did you ask me to FIX you??”
Jin counts to three, then presses his fingertips against one eyelid, rubbing tiredly. It makes spots dance behind his closed eyes, tiny little sparks jumping around. “Sorta,” he says, foregoing any sort of dignity.
“What's wrong?” Shumpei just sounds concerned now, so Jin presses on.
“It's about Kamenashi, kind of.”
“Kamenashi?” Shumpei's voice goes all weird, and Jin remembers the last time they'd spoken about Kame. Shumpei had been angry because his girlfriend thought Kame was hot. He'd called Kame the Japanese Justin Bieber, and then Jin had felt kind of annoyed, because that Bieber kid had talent. “He collaborated with KANYE,” he'd ended up drunkenly slurring at Shumpei. After that, Shumpei had just thought Jin was a massive Justin Bieber fan.
Shumpei's still talking, and Jin tunes back in. “Is he being an asshole again?”
“No,” Jin says, then stops, considering. Is Kame being an asshole? “I don't know, maybe. It's weird.”
“Look,” Shumpei says, all decisive action. “You've gotta do what I'd do. You march up to him and you give him what for.”
“What for?”
“Well, I dunno,” Shumpei just sounds confused now. “What did he do, anyway? Steal your girl?”
Jin chokes back a laugh, imagining Kame wining and dining one of Jin's ex-girlfriends in some cabin in Hokkaido. “Not exactly.”
“Well, whatever,” Shumpei says. “Can't hide from your problems forever. Do something about it and you'll feel better. Go out, have some fun.”
“I can't go out,” Jin moans. “I have no friends.” It's a lie and they both know it; Jin has more friends than he can count.
“You're a fucking social butterfly,” Shumpei says.
Jin brings his hand to his face, peering weakly at his wrist, the hands of his watch. It's late, but too early to really do anything. He could have dinner. He wonders, for a second, what Josh is doing, but he's seen Josh too much lately. If he rings Josh now, Josh is going to think he's a total loser without any other friends. He hangs up on Shumpei and rings Pi instead, but the phone just keeps ringing and ringing.
'People who ignore their phones are the worst kind of people,' Jin thinks, blatantly ignoring the fact that he does it constantly. He flops over on his bed and pulls his laptop to him, a sleek, shiny macbook pro that he's used maybe twice. He bought it a few months ago when the new models came out. He'd like to say that he lined up for it all morning, but really he just rang when Zen was lining, and had him pick it up. Zen uses his to record stuff all the time, but Jin's has been slowly gathering dust.
'I'm a musician,' Jin thinks weakly, justifying the purchase.
His facebook has amassed a worrying large number of friend requests, and he ignores them all, scrolling through his recent news instead.
Tomo Tonkatsu has checked into New Chitose Airport, Hokkaido pops up on the screen and Jin sees red.
--
For a long time Pi and Kame and Jin existed in a sort of delicate balance, like an unstable, wobbly triangle. Kame and Pi hated each other for a while, but it was okay, because they both loved Jin. Jin thinks he's maybe a little selfish, sometimes.
Jin thinks about Pi and Kame hanging out together in Hokkaido and he feels sick inside, his mind all scrambled and messed up. It's like he's drunk. Drunk on confusion. He books a flight for Hokkaido right then, with his credit card, and for a second he viciously considers calling his bank and telling them that his card was stolen and used without his permission. He could call the police or something, and give them Josh's details. He could get Josh deported from the country. He imagines the police dragging Josh out of his apartment and wrestling him the ground, smashing his face into the floor and breaking his dumb old sunglasses.
Jin is all talk, though. He's really fond of Josh, who tries really hard to speak to Jin's friends in Japanese, and tells long, boring stories about Japan, and who carries this dumb little video camera around with him when he remembers it. He's always interested in the little details, even though they seem really irrelevant to Jin. He realises, suddenly, that Josh is a lot like Kame in some ways. Josh isn't a control freak and a workaholic, but he's fiercely defensive of his friends, and he has a big heart, and he cares about people. He also tells long, rambling stories that go nowhere, and that's Kame all over.
Jin sits on an aeroplane and thinks about Josh, and Kamenashi Kazuya, and Yamashita Tomohisa, and how quickly the world is spinning by, and how helpless he sometimes feels. When he emerges from the airport it's into a world of snow. It feels like he's arrived in a different country, even though he's been to Hokkaido before, more than once.
It sort of feels like the air is fresher up here, and his head has the chance to clear a bit, like it couldn't in Tokyo. He'd booked his ticket and boarded his flight with his insides all twisted up in tight knots of rage, but he almost doesn't possess the energy to be angry anymore. There's a thread of it, maybe, and he's clutching it tightly, stubbornly, because he's a little scared of what will happen when he lets go.
Jin has a lot of defenses put in place when it comes to friendship, and emotional shit, and Kamenashi Kazuya is always breaking them down. He burst through them when they didn't really exist, when they were kids; when Jin's heart was open and wanting. Most people think its Jin who shoved his way into Kame's world, but he wouldn't have had to do it if Kame hadn't been so endlessly fascinating. Jin falls in love a lot, but it's the fleeting kind. Jin's affections burn bright and short, with sudden, intense passion. Those feelings are normal to him; it's the slow, long fixations that scare him. Now, as he stands in front of the airport, iphone clutched in his cold little hand, he thinks: I'm like that stupid werewolf from Twilight, and I've imprinted on Kame.
--
Jin takes a taxi to the address Josh gave him, but it's been snowing, and the driver keeps refusing to take Jin the whole way.
“It's fine,” Jin keeps saying, duffel bag sitting on the seat next to him, staring at the driver's worried face in the mirror. “Just keep going, it'll be fine.”
It won't be fine. It rained that morning, and now the roads are all slick with ice. Every time the cab takes a corner the wheels skid a little, and the driver's face goes all pale and pinched. Eventually he refuses to go any further, and pulls over to the side of the road. He offers to take Jin back, but Jin's already climbing out of the cab, hot with indignation and stubborn misery.
“It's FINE,” he calls through the open window, cash dropping out of his sweaty hand and landing on the passenger seat.
“I can't let you go,” the driver says. He doesn't even know who Jin is; he's just a good guy. He's really into soccer, too. Sometimes Jin likes talking to regular people more than he can express. Kame's really into talking to old people, but Jin just likes talking to whoever, as long as they don't know him as Akanishi Jin. The fame can be nice sometimes, but other times he just wants to be able to talk to a regular guy about drafting options for the national team.
“It's cool,” Jin says, holding up his iphone. A little blue dot pulsates, and Jin waves the phone around. “Google Maps.”
The driver still looks uncertain, but there's not much he can do with Jin standing on the side of the road, the duffel at his feet already growing soggy in the snow.
The car finally takes off, and Jin watches it go. He feels suddenly alone, standing there on the side of the road with no one else in sight. He can't even see any other cars; just miles of icy fields stretching out on either side of the road. He clutches his phone a little more tightly and brings it up in front of his face, where the little blue dot glows comfortingly. Iphones were the best inventions ever. Fuck paper maps. Technology is awesome.
A tiny message pops up on his screen and he squints at it. It's Josh. They've been IMing back and forth since Jin left Tokyo, stupid messages about the plane, and the cold, and now Jin's fingers are flying across the screen again, quick to complain. Josh is always there to listen. He's constantly glued to his phone. He thinks the iphone is the greatest invention of all time.
Im standing in a field, Jin sends, slightly dramatic.
Josh's reply comes immediately. da fcuk? lol 馬鹿! 馬鹿! 馬鹿! 馬鹿!
Jin stabs at the screen and Google Maps pops back up. He takes one, tentative step along the side of the road, and the little blue dot shifts slightly in the wrong direction. Jin casts a doubtful look at the field to his left. No fucking way.
I was kidding but now google maps is telling me i have to walk in field!!! Jin types.
LOL, Josh sends. Fuckn karma mang u can do it !
Josh is so well spoken in real life. Jin will never understand why he comes across as a simpleton in text form. He'd tried bringing it up with Josh once, but Josh had just looked really confused, like what Jin was saying wasn't making any sense at all. It's not like Jin's own English is awesome or anything, but even he can tell that Josh sounds like a total retard. Josh sounds more ESL than Jin does, and Josh is supposed to be American.
He shoves his phone into his mouth instead of replying, teeth biting down hard as he grabs up his duffel bag and leaps over the fence to his left. He lands in an icy, wet field and he spits his phone back out into his hand, eyes trained on that little blue dot. It's weirdly comforting, watching it as he steps forward, one foot in front of the other. It's like a little voice at his side, telling him that he's doing the right thing, even though if he thinks about it for too long he starts feeling insane. Like, if he steps back from it all, he'll stare at the Akanishi Jin who is standing in a field in Hokkaido on some insane mission to break up Kame and Pi's exclusive little friendship retreat. He doesn't want to face that Jin. He wants to be the cool Jin who hangs out with his friends and makes hip music.
So Jin pointedly doesn't think about what he's doing. He just keeps walking, and the road keeps growing smaller and smaller, twisting away behind him until it's just a speck in the distance. It's fine, though, walking through the tall, wet grass, as long as he keeps his eyes on the map. The dot slides along at a steady pace, moving ever closer to the red dot that marks his end location. THE CABIN. It appears in Jin's head just like that; all caps. He has no idea what he'll say when he gets there, and he refuses to let himself think about it. He can't overthink this. He's gotta act on instinct.
Jin keeps walking, and walking, and walking, feeling smug and proud of himself. He's a warrior of nature. He's built for the outdoors. He smiles down at his phone, and that's when the little blue dot takes a giant leap to the right and blinks merrily at him, far, far away from where it had been only moments before.
Jin stops. He shakes his phone a little, in disbelief, but the dot doesn't move back. It just keeps sitting there, in the wrong place.
“What,” Jin says aloud, in abject horror. He lifts his head and looks around, but all he can see is grass, and snow, and trees, and no help in sight. He wishes he'd gone back with the driver. He wishes he was less stubborn. Mostly he wishes that he was back home in his apartment, snug and warm, and not freezing to death in fucking Sapporo by himself. He pictures tomorrow's headlines. AKANISHI JIN DIES ALONE AND FRIENDLESS. FROZEN CORPSE DISCOVERED IN FIELD NO ONE CARES ABOUT. He tries to remember survival tips, but the best ones he has are stupid things he's seen on Lost, and he suspects they're not all that helpful. It's not like he's stuck on an island. The next best thing he can think of is that scene from Star Wars with all the snow, but thinking about it kind of grosses Jin out.
He remembers the time he was sick and Shumpei had come over to keep him company, and they'd watched bad television for hours. Shumpei had tried to introduce Jin to the magic of Bear Grylls, but watching a guy eat goat testicles just hadn't been his idea of a good time. Now he wishes he'd stuck it out. Bear would know what to do in a situation like this. Bear would beat stupid Google Maps into submission.
Part of Jin wants to hurl his phone into the snow at his feet, but the reasonable, mature part of his brain keeps screaming that it's a bad idea. At least Jin still has reception. He just has no one to call.
Im gonna die, Jin types carefully. GPS fuckd and n they gonna find my frozen corpse.
Josh writes back under a minute because he has no life. U need hlep. 亀 or YamaP 電話してよ
Thing is, Jin hasn't exactly called either of them, apart from that failed attempt the night before, when Pi's phone rang and rang and rang. Pi never called him back, either, which feels like a vicious slight, even though Jin knows how lazy Pi is with stuff like that. Ringing Pi now feels like the lamest move on earth. Jin was going to look so cool, throwing open the door of their cabin and demanding Kame reimburse him for the plane tickets. He was going to call Kame a thief and a freeloader.
Cant, Jin replies.
ほんとにすごいやつだYamaP is a nice doodだからcontectしてhlep聞いてね!!
CANT
なんだよ？？？y not ?? just tryy and がんばってcheyaaaa u can do it
--
Jin ends up calling Yamapi. He sits on his duffel bag at the foot of a tree, the glossy screen of his phone pressed to his ear as he fills Yamapi in. Pi doesn't sound angry, or even annoyed that he has to locate Jin somewhere in the wilderness. He mostly just sounds kind of resigned. It's a common reaction to Akanishi Jin.
“I didn't know you were into hiking,” Pi says. Jin doubles the effort to resist burying his phone in a snowdrift.
“I'm not,” Jin says tersely.
Jin hears shuffling in the background, and low, muffled laughter. Pi clears his throat, but Jin can tell he's trying not to laugh, even though Jin is catching his death out in the wilds of Hokkaido. “What do you see?”
“FUCKING NOTHING,” Jin explodes.
“Hey,” Pi says.
Jin makes a tiny noise of frustrated pain. “Nothing. Snow and trees and some ugly bushes. I saw one move. There's probably a polar bear in there.”
“Probably,” Pi agrees. “Listen, can't you just send me your location with Coordinate?”
Jin's suddenly really glad that Josh stole his iphone one day and downloaded about a million must-need apps. He kept purchasing app after app from the store, ignoring Jin's many protests. He'd even kept insisting that Jin needed Talking Tom Cat, an app that brought a giant image of a cat's face up on Jin's screen and repeated everything he said in the most annoying voice ever. He bypasses it now, instead hitting Coordinate and watching his location merrily fly off to Pi's email.
“I'll find you,” Yamapi says in his serious actor voice. He sounds like he's auditioning for the lead role in some sappy drama.
--
Part 2