Inbox: 1 New Feeling
Title: Inbox: 1 New Feeling
Summary: While communicating through email, Jin says he’s in love with someone and Kame’s left wondering to himself why he even cares. Jealously comes in all sorts of hues, Kame understands
Genre: Romance/General
Pairings: Implied Jin/Kame (Akame)
Other Characters: None
Content: 1,606-word drabble
Author: Nerd-san
Disclaimer: I am not in any way affiliated with Johnny Entertainment
Inbox: 1 New Feeling
On their day off, Kame is restlessly lounging around his apartment when he receives a new email from Jin. He isn’t surprised, however, and only glimpses at the message with a sort of estrange curiosity.
Setting aside his water bottle and anything else that he may have been carrying, Kame reads the message carefully. This feeling wells up at the pit of his stomach, but he doesn’t understand what it is exactly. He reads the message again. The same feeling comes back.
Kame begins to grow a little accustom to the feeling and even re-reads the message just to have it come back to him. He feels like he is being lifted off the floor by some sort of external force that defies the laws of both gravity and physics.
He feels sick.
Inbox: 1 new message from: Akanishi Jin
Ne Kame, have you ever been in love?
Kame thinks over the question for a minute. Love isn’t an uncommon virtue in one’s life. He thinks over the question for a second time. Why is Jin asking about love so suddenly? And more importantly, why does he feel his grip on his water bottle tightening?
Kame decides that he’s angry.
Very angry.
Words don’t come to him and he can’t find the right thing to say. He doesn’t understand anything about the feeling, but he feels compelled to reply to Jin’s abrupt curiosity. It isn’t like he’s not used to it.
Inbox: 1 message from: Kamenashi Kazuya
Why waste your time falling in love? It’s not like anything good ever comes out of it.
Kame’s reply is brusque and to the point. His brain tells him to turn off his laptop and to further discuss the topic with Jin at the Jimusho tomorrow. His heart doesn’t allow him to do so and the laptop is left open on his living room floor.
He doesn’t look at it.
He’s not going to constantly check his email, waiting for Jin’s reply. This is what Kame tells himself, but he still finds his head buried into the computer’s vast screen. The reply comes shortly after and Kame feels his heart picking up speed again.
He chastises himself for feeling a little giddy, but nonetheless grins at the fact that Jin replied. His response is much like the first, defending his earlier assessment and praising the word love.
Kame skims through his second message again and then comes to a halt once he notes that Jin has written that he himself has fallen in love with someone.
For a minute, Kame feels utmost anger towards the person. He doesn’t know why, but he does. Jealousy? He doubts it. He and Jin have been friends for far too long to feel things as trivial as jealousy.
This doesn’t help the fact that Kame slams shut his laptop and huffs angrily at Jin through his computer. He allows himself an elongated sigh. Jin was in love with some girl?
He wondered why he had never noticed this; it’s not like Jin to keep much of a secret. It’s not like Jin to hide something from him. Nothing this important. At least, Kame didn’t think so. Kame disregards the rest of his thoughts, scrunches his eyebrows and heads off to bed.
Jin was just kidding, right?
After work the next day, Kame receives another message from Jin. He’s a lot more cautious of the soft sound that leeks from his laptop informing him of a new message. He reads the new message, although with a lot more vigilance than the first time. He refuses to be caught off guard again.
Inbox: 1 new message from: Akanishi Jin
I saw them again today.
Kame anxiously draws his tongue from his mouth and lets it slide over his lower lip. He doesn’t understand what the point of any of this was. They had fallen into some sort of pattern.
When he comes home, there would always be a new message from Jin waiting for him in his inbox but it always regarded the same topic. Jin’s love. This annoys Kame.
But Kame, being Kame, takes it in and replies with certainty and friendly advice. He doesn’t remember when he has become this indifferent.
They send messages to and fro, the replies quick and steady without a second’s worth of hesitation. Kame doesn’t understand why, but they stay on the same topic for almost hours. He knows he has a drama shoot in the early morning, but something still refuses to allow him to tell Jin goodbye.
The habit continues and drones on for weeks on end. They never talk about something else and by this time Kame has learned a lot about the person Jin loves. They, too, work at the Jimusho - but Kame didn’t see that fit into the picture.
He can’t imagine his friend obsessing over one of the camera women.
Kame’s in the kitchen preparing his dinner when he hears the familiar beep of his laptop. His thoughts of his busy day immediately leave his clouded mind.
His grin widens and instantly drops his knife and the onion he has been peeling to run for the computer. He scrolls down his messages and clicks on the one marked unread.
Inbox: 1 message from: Akanishi Jin
They were too busy to notice me today!
Kame replies that even he had been busy and that Jin’s love, who as Jin says doesn’t even know loves them, had probably had an equal amount of work.
For the first few minutes, Jin seems satisfied with this aspect but after the initial fulfillment, goes on to complain about said person for at least half an hour.
Kame endures it all.
He replies where necessary and stays silent where needed. The feeling that had always been there since the first time Jin has mentioned the person is still there, but Kame has learned to cope with it. But then he feels the same unbearable anger welling over.
He writes to Jin that Jin should get over them and find someone else to talk about. He accuses Jin of not really loving the person. He thinks the message over before he sends it, but he is far too furious to think straight and hits the send button anyway.
Jin replies quickly.
Inbox: 1 message from: Akanishi Jin
How could you be so insensitive?! I feel sorry for whoever falls in love with you. They’ll be sad all the time. Such a prude…
Kame shuts off his computer after giving Jin a generic apology. He has no right to cry. He’s the one who prompted the man to say what he did. His breathing hitches and he takes a deep breath to calm his unsteady heart pulse down.
He frowns.
He doesn’t understand why his hands are shaking a little or why he cares as much as he does. He wonders to himself what right Jin has to call him insensitive. Telling him that he feels sorry for however falls in love with Kame - isn’t that what you call insensitive?
That’s the reason, Kame tells himself. That’s the reason his lips are quivering. That’s the reason his eyes are beginning to sting a little.
Not necessarily because of what was said, but because Jin was the one who said it. Kame doesn’t know why, but that makes it all the worse. He allows himself to cry for a minute before retiring to bed. There’s no reason he should care.
Kame forgets the incident by the next morning. He just needed some sleep, Kame tells himself, he just needed some sleep and now he will feel normal again. Knowing that Jin loved someone, Kame doubts he will ever feel normal again.
Almost a month later, something unexpected happens - Kame is the one to email Jin first.
Their conversation is no different than what they’ve been discussing for the past month. Jin’s love. Kame knows a little more about them now, but still not enough to identify who they are, exactly.
Kame considers the possibility of Jin liking a guy.
He smiles wearily at himself as he shakes his head. That’s not possible. At least, not for Jin. Kame’s never decided he liked guys, he didn’t - at least not in that way - but he did consider the option of liking Jin.
Then he thinks about the fact that Jin’s a guy. He banishes the thought.
He’s just angry because his friend found someone else to think about other than him. That’s all. He’s not jealous. Kame doesn’t get jealous. Not because of Jin.
Another month whizzes by. Time goes by so fast that Kame hasn’t even noticed that it’s already early April. But their conversations are always the same.
Most days now, Kame is left to himself wondering who Jin speaks of. Sitting in front of his laptop like most other days, he asks Jin again to identify who it is he loves. Jin says that he will do so once he is sure they like him too. Kame sighs at Jin’s reluctance albeit feeling mildly secure at the fact that Jin won’t confess.
Kame asks for a hint to aid him in his search.
Jin just gives him the same reply he always does. He tells him the color clothes they had wore to work.
Inbox: 1 message from: Akanishi Jin
They were wearing faded navy jeans today.
Kame smiles jadedly.
Like he normally would, Kame doesn’t ask Jin who it is he loves for a second time.
If Jin liking them isn’t already frustrating enough, he doesn’t even want to think about who had copied the same jeans he wore.
♫
Too much math…too much math…too much math…I want a hippo D: Sorry, randomness. But seriously, I do want a hippo. Um…yeah. Less hippos more Akame. I wrote this a really long time ago. I just got too lazy to update it. Um…when I say ‘really long time ago’ I just mean the day after my last drabble, whenever that was xDD