[JE] [FAIRY] [WIP] Akanishi Jin and the 5 Idols (of Varying Heights) 2/2
Title: Akanishi Jin and the 5 Idols (of Varying Heights) 2/2
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Rating: PG
Genre: Fairytale fluff, angst
Word count: 15,237
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit
Part 1
Akanishi Jin and the 5 Idols (of Varying Heights) 2/2
Sunday morning found Jin busy in the kitchen, competing with Kame to see who could flip the largest pancake without messing. He'd had to borrow a bathrobe after his shower - Kame had taken all his clothing, underwear included, and dumped it in the washing machine with his own laundry - but since there were only guys in the house, he didn't feel too awkward about it. Good thing there were no Kamenashi sisters.
"You'll never manage that one," Kame teased. "It must be the size of your head!"
"I can definitely do it!"
Jin studied the oversized pancake, trying to decide the best angle for an approach, and realised he'd have to use a second spatula. He didn't even have to think about which drawer to reach for - proof that he was probably overstaying his welcome in the Kamenashi household. Breakfast, fun though it was, couldn't last forever.
"Just watch," he said, and with a spatula in both hands, managed to execute a flip that almost succeeded. One tiny little piece along the rim stuck to the pan and failed to go. Kame poked it with the batter spoon till it loosened enough to be removed.
"Nice try."
"It's the taste that counts," Jin huffed. "Nobody's complained about that so far."
Indeed, the other brothers had been most vocal in their appreciation for Jin's pancakes, devouring huge stacks of the things before leaving the house. Kame had played delivery boy, taking the plates through when they were ready, and snatching up the odd sample himself - for quality control, he said.
Now they were down to the last few, and Jin took the opportunity to enjoy some pancakes of his own while Kame took a turn at the frying pan, trying to shape the batter into stars with careful nudges from the spatula. He didn't have much luck but that didn't stop him trying, tongue peeking out between his lips as he worked with fierce concentration.
Jin couldn't remember yesterday's breakfast at all, but somehow he didn't think it could've been anywhere near as much fun as this one. He'd never had anyone else to cook for before, much less someone with whom he could have stupid competitions about who could flip the largest pancake, or who could make the most interesting shape with the batter. He wondered whether this was what it would be like if his brother had lived, two boys laughing and joking in the kitchen, talking complete nonsense as they ate and not caring that they must've looked and sounded like idiots.
"This one's almost a star?" Kame said, hope shining in his eyes, and even though it wasn't, Jin couldn't find it in his heart to contradict him.
"Almost," he agreed. "I mean, it's got five points and everything, even if they are in weird places."
Kame's smile grew impossibly brighter, the way no pancake star ever could no matter how many points it had. "You can eat this one. There's enough batter left for one more, I think? Your turn to make a shape."
Jin spread syrup across his star and allowed himself one glorious mouthful before pouring the remaining batter into the frying pan. He only had seconds to form a shape before it solidified into the default circle, so anything complicated was out. He had no idea how Kame had managed to get any points on his star at all, given the time limit, but somehow it didn't surprise him that Kame could do impossible things. He could've said he could fly, and Jin would've believed him.
The shape he tried to make had only one point and didn't require him to deviate too far from the circle. Jin used both spatulas to nudge the batter into place, then ate his star while it cooked. He flipped it, let the other side reach a smooth, golden brown, and turned it out on Kame's plate.
Kame grinned. "You made me a heart? You're such a girl, Akanishi."
"Shut up," Jin mumbled. "It was the easiest shape I could think of, okay?"
"Sure it was..."
When Jin threatened to take the heart away from him, Kame promptly smeared it with strawberry jam, grabbed a fork, and devoured the whole thing in seconds.
"Nobody steals my heart," he said.
"Not even baseball?"
"Well...maybe baseball. But no sport can make me pancakes."
"It would be kind of messy."
Kame switched off the heat, because Jin had forgotten, and left him to clear up the kitchen by himself when the phone rang. Jin had the dishes dripping dry on the side and was just wiping down the sticky counter when Kame returned, paler than when he'd left and visibly unhappy.
"That was my dad on the phone," he said. "My grandmother's in hospital."
Jin gasped, dropping the sponge on the side. "What happened?"
"My parents took her out last night; the restaurant was at the top of some steps and she slipped on the ice. She hit her head, broke her leg."
The cleaning could wait. Jin wiped his hands on a towel and crossed the floor to join Kame. Misery loved company, after all.
"Is she going to be okay?"
"He said she regained consciousness last night, but she's concussed and pretty woozy. She has to stay in the hospital for now." Kame stared at the floor. "She's got help on the farm but no one who lives there full-time to take care of her, so Mum's going to stay with her for a while. Dad's coming home in a couple of days, he thinks; he wants me to put together a case to send to Mum."
"I'm sorry about your grandmother." Jin risked a tentative pat to Kame's shoulder; Kame hunched further into himself, making his tiny form even smaller. "I'll leave once my clothes are dry. The last thing you need is having me to worry about."
"And go where? You said last night you don't have anywhere to go. At least wait until my dad gets home, okay? We can figure something out for you."
"I've already caused you enough trouble." Jin licked his lips, nervous about volunteering to leave this warm, safe, comfortable house. "I'm really grateful for everything, Kame, but that's exactly why I don't want to be a burden on you. I don't want to owe anything to anyone, and I know I can't repay you for anything you've done.
"Maybe I'll just...I don't know, go to the police or something. I can always tell them I got robbed and that's why I don't have any ID."
"And if they manage to get you back home your life will be in danger. You really think I'd let you walk out of here, knowing that?" Kame raised his head, met Jin's eyes with a stubborn glare. "If you want to pay me back, you can finish cleaning up here and then help me pack a suitcase."
Kame stalked off to check on the laundry. Jin reclaimed the sponge, wiped thick, sticky syrup spills from the counter and considered Kame's words. They might've sounded like orders to a domestic servant, but Jin knew what they really meant.
Don't leave me alone.
-----
Packing a suitcase for Mrs. Kamenashi taught Jin more than he'd ever wanted to know about the private life of a housewife - and more than Kame wanted to know, too, to judge by his scarlet cheeks. Aunt Makiko probably had racier undergarments but Jin didn't make a habit of going through her drawers. They worked from an emailed checklist with Kame finding the requested items and Jin packing them in the case, neat as he could manage.
"I'll send it by takkyubin later," Kame said. "There's an agency not far from here."
"I'll carry it," Jin said.
"It's on wheels." Kame demonstrated, flipping the case on its end and rolling it towards Jin. "But you can still take it."
They were all little things. Cooking breakfast, doing the dishes, carrying a case. Jin didn't think they added up to much, couldn't see how Kame could possibly consider the two of them even.
Because if Kame hadn't knocked on the door when he had, Jin might be there still, locked in a cold stall in Shinjuku station and locked inside himself, too: brain trapped in a loop of panic and despair, body unable to move without guidance.
Kame had saved him from that, from being alone, and no matter what happened from here onwards, Jin thought he might be able to find the strength to deal with it. For that, he'd take on any task Kame asked of him.
He carried the case downstairs, depositing it by the front door. He certainly couldn't take it anywhere yet, though, and Kame gave him an apologetic smile.
"Sorry, sorry. Your clothes should be dry by now. I'll get them."
Fortunately, everything was dry, so Jin retreated into the bathroom to change. Wearing his own clothes again helped. He had to borrow deodorant, of course, but at least he didn't have to shave yet.
He emerged to find Kame gazing at a notebook with the sort of glazed expression he normally saw on his classmates, and assumed - correctly, as it turned out - that the other boy was doing homework. He didn't seem to be getting very far.
"Maybe you'd do better if you switched off the radio?" Jin suggested.
"The music usually helps...but I guess I've just got too much to think about right now. Hey, you're ahead of me in school: does any of this make sense to you?"
Kame tossed the notebook over. Jin caught it, took one look at the equations, and felt his own eyes starting to glaze over. "Maths isn't exactly my strong point." He threw it back; Kame didn't bother to catch it, letting it drop on the bed.
"Nobody's perfect."
"It's not your strong point either, is it?" Jin teased.
"I just can't see when in my life I'm ever going to need calculus."
"Probably about the same time you need to know the freezing point of nitrogen."
"That, I could possibly tell you..."
Kame rolled off the bed and made for the radio, but Jin raised a hand to stop him. He knew the song playing, 'Kanashimi Blue' by the KinKi Kids - had sung it a couple of times at karaoke with his friends, even - and started to sing along.
"Hmm, you're not bad," Kame said after listening to Jin sing his way through to the end. "You've got a pretty nice voice - better than a lot of the Juniors, actually. Have you ever had training?"
"I sing all the time, but I've never had training or anything." Jin felt unreasonably pleased by Kame's compliment. "Sometimes I'll be shopping with friends and I'll just start singing along with whatever's playing in the shops, and forget that I'm out in public."
Kame broke into a smile, his first since the phone call about his grandmother. "I bet your friends think you're embarrassing."
"Mostly they start talking over me and I eventually get the message."
"My friends distract me with baseball when I do that. It doesn't take much."
"You do it too, huh?"
"Yeah...but my voice isn't like yours. I don't think it ever will be."
"Neither of us is done growing yet," Jin said. "Who knows what we'll sound like in a few years? Can I hear you sing?"
Kame wouldn't look at him. "Now?"
"Please? Juniors sing too, right? And if you want a CD debut you're going to have to let people hear you at some point."
"People hear me sing all the time," Kame mumbled, "but mostly when I'm working. Not just sitting here like this."
Jin fiddled with the dials on the radio till he found a station playing something he recognised - a marathon of SMAP songs. He figured Kame had to know most of them, what with SMAP being one of KAT-TUN's senpai groups.
"Nothing weird about singing along with the radio, right?"
Kame still didn't look at him, but sang along whether he agreed or not. Hesitantly at first, in a voice little more than a whisper and easily lost in the melody. Jin inched closer to hear, striving to move in silence and failing miserably when he whacked his hand on the edge of the desk.
The distraction seemed to jar Kame, though not as Jin had feared: indeed, it spurred him on, more than doubling the strength and volume of his song and giving him confidence to face Jin with a smile - though he turned away again on the final note.
"I think your voice is better than you probably think it is," Jin said, hoping he didn't confuse Kame. "You just need to relax."
"I keep going flat."
"Don't worry so much about how you sound. Keep practising, and sing songs you love to sing - you'll always sound better if you're singing something you like."
Kame had a slightly nasal, at times flat voice, but he also had moments of sweetness that resonated in Jin's heart. He didn't have a voice that would sell CDs, yet, but in Jin's amateur opinion, the potential was there.
"Anyway," Jin said, "SMAP are hardly known for their amazing singing voices but that doesn't stop them being popular. You've got time to work on it; just let things develop at their own pace."
"You definitely need to become a Junior," Kame decided. "You can sing, you can dance, and it doesn't matter that you're no good at calculus."
"But I don't even live here!"
"There are Kansai Juniors too, but I think you should be a Tokyo Junior. It's safer for you here."
"I wish I could." Jin had a lot of wishes, but not a single clue how to go about fulfilling any of them. You couldn't live on wishes, no matter how hard you tried or how much you wanted to.
"So let's go back to the office and fill out some forms," Kame said.
"Using my real address? Wouldn't that be weird?"
"You could say you're staying with me for a while until you find a place in Tokyo?" Kame suggested. "And you'll get paid, you know. The salary's dependent on what you do, but as part-time jobs go, it's a lot of fun."
"I don't have anywhere for a salary to go. I can't risk using my bank account - which my stepmother's probably having watched, anyway."
"Why don't you let me worry about that?"
Jin couldn't hold back his laughter. "You love taking care of people, don't you?"
"I'm nearly the youngest in my family, and I'm the youngest in KAT-TUN even though I'm first. Let me baby someone else for a change."
"What do you mean you're first?" Jin asked, curious. "You were the first member?"
Kame shook his head. "The group's made up from the first letter of our surnames, so I'm first. Kamenashi, Akiyama, Taguchi, Tanaka, Ueda and Nakamaru. People have trouble pronouncing it right, though. We get 'katsu-un' all the time."
"'Winning luck' isn't such a bad way to get it wrong. Kind of fortuitous."
"It might be if we ever had any luck." Kame sighed and switched off the radio. "We fight all the time - over stupid, little things, mostly - and we're not very good at compromising. Which is a shame, because I think if we could ever fix it so that we're all pointing in the same direction, we could do amazing things.
"Tanaka raps, and Nakamaru beatboxes, and Ueda plays guitar and piano, and Taguchi's really good at acrobatics, and Akiyama's one of the best dancers in the agency. We're a unique mix."
"You left yourself out, Kame."
"Me?" Kame shrugged. "I'm still working on it. Maybe I'll be the actor, like Arashi's Ninomiya. He likes baseball too."
"You don't have to be 'like' anyone; isn't it okay to just be yourself?"
"Like I said, still working on it. I don't think the real me is idol material, though. Not cool enough."
It amazed Jin how Kame could have such confidence in some things, and a total lack in others. "I'm probably not your target audience, but for what it's worth, I think you're cool. Anybody who'd do all this for a complete stranger is obviously a wonderful person."
Jin's words might as well have been sunshine nourishing a flower garden, for Kame blossomed at the praise, holding his head higher, looking less like a turtle trying to hide away in his shell and more like a young man taking justifiable pride in himself.
"Maybe I just like the idea of having a housekeeper."
"At least you said 'housekeeper' and not 'slave'." Not that Jin considered himself housekeeper material - what seventeen year old boy would? - but it did sound vaguely respectable, if rather dull.
"Whenever anime guys get slaves they're always cute girls," Kame said. "You don't count, even if you did make me a heart pancake."
"I told you, it was just the easiest shape to make! A lot easier than your star."
"But doesn't it feel more satisfying when you achieve something you've really had to work hard for?"
Jin had to admit that it did. "When I first started playing soccer I couldn't juggle at all. I couldn't even keep the ball in the air for a minute, I was that bad. Then my friends started to practise without me 'cause I couldn't keep up.
"I didn't want to fall behind them, so I practised on my own all the time, whenever I could." He puffed out his chest proudly. "I was the best in my middle school by the time I graduated."
"And it's the same with anything else," Kame said. "Even pancakes. If you keep working at it, you'll get somewhere, even if it seems hopeless at first."
"You too, Kame." Jin wanted very much for his new friend to succeed. "One day you'll be a top idol and everyone in Japan's going to know your name."
Kame snorted and left to find his jacket.
-----
As promised, Jin took charge of the suitcase. With Mrs. Kamenashi's clothing safely on its way to Tochigi by overnight delivery some of the tension left Kame's face.
Unfortunately it transferred itself to Jin's shoulders, which grew more and more tense as they returned to the office. Could Kame really mean to get Jin signed up as a Junior?
"Just leave it to me," Kame assured him as they made their way down the hall. "I made a phone call while you were getting ready."
He said this with such confidence that for a moment Jin wondered if he'd escaped the clutches of one yakuza only to fall prey to another, but surely the shadiness of the entertainment industry didn't extend to fifteen year old boys. Kame seemed to know what he was doing, though. After a word with the receptionist he led Jin up to the top floor and parked him on a couch outside an office.
"I won't be long," he said. He knocked on the door and vanished inside.
Jin fidgeted with the pompom on his hat until Kame emerged with a clipboard full of papers and a pen. Of course there was no way they could go through with it. Jin couldn't join Johnnys. Definitely not. He had bigger problems than remembering lyrics and dance steps.
Kame didn't appear to understand that, because he insisted on filling out the forms. "This one's about your health and any physical limitations on what you can do." He passed the pen to Jin. "Any problems?"
"I catch cold pretty easily, but nothing else that I know about."
"How do you feel about heights?"
"Er..." Jin squirmed on the blue leather couch. "Depends on the context."
"Rollercoasters?"
"Fun!"
"Aeroplanes?"
"No problem!"
"Bungee jumping?"
"Never tried it." The thought didn't hold much appeal. "I could, I guess?"
"I hate heights," Kame said frankly. "And I can't stand the feeling I get on rollercoasters. But sometimes they like us to do wire work, so I want to be able to overcome that."
Then there was a form about education. "Since many Juniors are still in school," Kame explained, "the agency needs to know when they're unavailable, and how much time they need for homework and stuff. A lot of the guys tend to quit high school if there's enough work for them to make a living out of it."
"Think you'll quit?"
"Maybe?" Kame shrugged. "Depends how things go with the agency. Some of the guys manage to graduate high school and go to university but I doubt I'd be able to afford it, and I'm not really the academic type anyway."
"I guess I might've just quit," Jin said giddily, the very thought making him feel lightheaded. "Or my stepmother quit for me." He ran his hands through his hair, leaving it sticking out at all manner of strange angles. "I wonder what she'll tell the school?"
"Probably that you ran away. It's not like you're going to show up and contradict her." Kame plucked the pen from Jin's hand and shuffled the clipboard across to his own lap. "We'll just say you dropped out of high school in Osaka and came to Tokyo to look for work."
There were also forms about Jin's family, which Kame told him to leave, and another one requiring his bank details. Kame told him to leave that one too.
"But-"
"Don't worry about it," Kame said. "It's going to be fine."
Most people, Jin reflected later, wouldn't take a stranger's word for it. But it wasn't physically possible for him to doubt Kame.
Jin didn't require a parent's permission, so he signed his own name and watched Kame walk off with the paperwork that could change his life - or at least make it more sparkly. He felt like there should've been some kind of initiation rite, like parading around the streets of Tokyo in ruffles and sequins, or at least some sort of occasion to mark the event.
"I can't do anything about the ruffles," Kame said when Jin told him, "but we should mark the occasion anyway. Come on, we're getting you a toothbrush."
-----
The Kamenashi family didn't have much money to spare, Jin knew, so the twinges of guilt returned when Kame insisted on getting him a toothbrush, some underwear, and a couple of pairs of socks.
"Some of my clothes would fit you," Kame said, "and I've got some hand-me-downs from my eldest brother that definitely will, but there are some things I draw the line at sharing."
Jin wondered if Kame thought they were living in a fairy tale, where nothing ever ended. It sure felt like it. "Whose office was that?"
"Johnny's." Kame grinned slyly "Since he was the one who decided you should join, I thought I'd take the problem straight to the top."
Better not to say anything, Jin thought. The bubble might burst, if he did.
That wasn't all they bought; Kame had been tasked with grocery shopping too, on the grounds that he managed a lot better in the kitchen than Koji or their dad, and Yuya was too young to do more than "help" from time to time. Jin carried the basket around the supermarket and helped Kame hunt for bargains.
"Things are better now that I'm working," Kame explained as they examined cuts of meat, "but we can't do anything extravagant. Not yet. When KAT-TUN start getting more exposure, I'll be able to take the whole family out for meals."
"What sort of exposure?"
Kame found a reasonable-looking pack of stewing steak and added it to the basket. "I haven't heard anything definite, but there's talk about us maybe having a concert of our own this year. The fans keep requesting one. It would be amazing to be able to do that when we haven't even debuted!"
Jin found himself caught up in Kame's enthusiasm, playing along as the other boy described the costumes they might wear, or the songs they might perform. No shortage of creativity there. He had visions of Kame on a grand stage, surrounded by glittering adolescent boys, strutting around like a wannabe rockstar.
For a moment, he wanted to be there too.
-----
Kame's brothers didn't object to Jin staying another night when he turned out to be decent rival material for all their favourite video games, though Yuya did try to argue that he should be allowed to sleep in their parents' room since he was being displaced again. Kame gave him another helping of nabe to pacify him.
Dinner had been another combined effort, with Kame doing everything he didn't trust Jin to do and Jin doing everything else. He learned fast, though. Cooking a dish where you simply threw everything together suited him better than something where everything had to be precise.
"I'm going to make the lunches for tomorrow now," Kame said when they'd cleared the table. "Do you want to take first bath?"
"Tomorrow?"
"Yeah; the three of us have school tomorrow. Koji's got cram school afterwards and I've got baseball and-" Kame broke off with a frown.
"What?"
"Yuya. Mum normally picks him up from school." He gave Jin a hopeful look. "It's not like you've got anything better to do tomorrow, right? He wouldn't be any trouble, and he seems to like you."
"He likes that I know attacks he hasn't learned yet," Jin corrected.
"Good enough. You could bring him home and make a start on dinner?" Kame suggested.
"But I don't even know where his school is!"
Kame refused to let go of the idea. "I'll walk you there with him in the morning. You can borrow the spare key."
Jin suspected Kame's dad would kill them both when he got home. Inviting a strange boy home for dinner was one thing, but giving him a key to your house and asking him to baby-sit your brother?
They argued the point back and forth for a while, long enough that Yuya came in to put in a request for lunch, overheard them, and asked why Jin wouldn't be busy with school himself tomorrow.
"We...uh..." Jin flustered for a moment, then realised he couldn't keep up his original pretext for being at the Kamenashi house. "We lied about working on a project together. I...I quit high school. End of last week. But my family's kind of mad about it so I needed to get away from home for a while."
"Why did you quit?" Yuya wanted to know. "To work?"
"Kind of." Jin swallowed hard. "I've just become a Johnnys Junior."
This didn't appear to carry much weight with the youngest Kamenashi brother, who hadn't quite reached the age where he learned to make strategically-timed sounds to indicate he was paying attention. He put in his lunch request and left to finish up some homework - as guest, Jin got first bath, even if his status had now dropped from "brother's classmate" to "high school drop-out and future wearer of sequins".
By the time Jin emerged from his bath Kame had rounded up some better-fitting sweatpants from a box of his eldest brother's stuff - none of the others had managed to grow into them yet but they suited Jin just fine - and set aside a quarter of a dresser drawer for Jin's meagre collection of vestments, which principally consisted of borrowed hand-me-downs and brand new underwear.
"It feels like I'm moving in." Jin picked out a cosy-looking jumper from the clothes allotted to him, needing something to keep him warm after the bath.
"Everybody should have a space that's just for them, right? Even if it's only a little bit," Kame said.
Even in someone else's house. Jin didn't know whether to be charmed or alarmed by the measures Kame was willing to take to make him feel comfortable. Mostly charmed, he decided as he settled down for his second night of sleep in the Kamenashi house. He'd have to be the best babysitter ever to pay him back.
-----
It felt strange when Monday morning arrived and Jin was the only one in the house not donning a school uniform. He busied himself with the ricecooker while the Kamenashi brothers got themselves sorted for school, scrambling to pack bags abandoned for the weekend and flatten wayward hair into something bearing less resemblance to a haystack. They weren't terribly successful.
"Nice trousers," Jin commented when he and Kame passed each other on the stairs. "I'd have quit your high school just for those."
Kame glared at him. "You'll think they're tame when you see some of the costumes you'll have to wear." He held out a key. "Lose this and you're a dead man."
"I already am."
"Oops." Kame winced, instantly contrite. "Sorry. But you know what I mean."
Jin pocketed the key, noting as he did so a cobweb up in the corner, above Kame's line of sight. He could remove that later, he thought. He didn't want Mr. Kamenashi to come home and think his kids had let the place fall apart. It was the least he could do in return for such kindness.
After a rushed breakfast the four of them set out for school. Jin hoped he could remember his way around or he'd be stuck wandering the streets of Tokyo until he found somewhere familiar. Not having a cell phone was a real nuisance. He had Kame's phone number, now, in case he needed to call him from the house, but that was all he could do. And Kame would be in class, anyway.
"You're sure you can find your way home again?" Kame checked after they'd walked Yuya to school and confirmed a time for Jin to return.
Home. Jin liked the sound of that, even if it wasn't his. "I'll be fine," he assured Kame.
"You sure you don't need me to walk you back quickly?"
"You worry too much. If you get wrinkles are you still allowed to be a Junior?"
"They might have to make me a Senior..."
Having accepted that Jin wasn't about to get lost straight off the bat Kame continued on to his own school, promising to be home as soon as he could and instructing Jin to call immediately if anything happened. "Anything", as far as Jin could tell, seemed to range from accidentally breaking a plate to having his stepmother's pet thugs turn up and finish him off.
Seeing all the students walking past in their uniforms evoked unexpected nostalgia in Jin. He didn't miss school, exactly. He didn't have the worst grades in class but he didn't have the best, either, and no matter how hard he tried he knew he'd never be the academic type. He found textbooks too dry; teachers too dull.
He loved to learn, though; obscure facts fixed themselves in his mind easily, ensuring he had an enormous stock of random trivia for party games. Anything Jin could pick up, he did, even if it wasn't through studying in the conventional sense. Languages, for example. He'd made friends with a boy in his class who happened to be half-Italian, and as a result had acquired a smattering of the language to mangle with his Japanese accent.
Not that he'd ever get the chance to learn more. Jin staunchly resolved to ignore that weird, empty feeling caused by the sight of school uniforms, turned his back on Kame's tiny figure disappearing into the distance, and headed off to the Kamenashi house to do something about the cobwebs.
-----
It took Jin over an hour to return to his temporary home. Not because he got lost, and he would deny it if anyone were to say so, but because he wanted to refamiliarise himself with the city. He wandered up one street and down the next, using subway stations, department stores and karaoke chains as landmarks in order to build up a mental map of his surroundings. He found the supermarket where they'd shopped the previous day, and the AM-PM where Kame had wanted to pick up a toothbrush, and a bookshop with idol magazines spread across a table for the world to see.
They had funny names. 'Potato'. 'Wink Up'. What did those have to do with being an idol? Jin stopped to leaf through them, earning himself some strange looks from a pair of middle-aged women cooing over a fashion magazine with Kimura Takuya on the cover. Smooth, polished young men, obviously debuted and in the prime of their careers, graced the pages nearest the front. Jin spotted names he recognised. They all looked so...finished, like their rough edges had been smoothed out upon debut to leave nothing but perfection behind.
He kept turning pages until he found the Juniors. They didn't get their own pages unless they were doing something particularly noteworthy, he discovered. They appeared in small groups, flashing gap-toothed smiles for the camera, revelling in bad haircuts and crazy outfits and happy just to be noticed.
KAT-TUN had their own page, near the back, where the hideous pyjamas they were modelling wouldn't scare off too many prospective purchasers. Nakamaru looked embarrassed about his grey and green plaid, holding himself stiffly upright while Tanaka lounged in leopard-print on a pillow next to him, clearly more at ease. Akiyama stretched out on a mattress, long legs taking up all the room and creating a barrier between himself and the others - the older brother forced to chaperone his younger siblings' sleepover. Ueda's yellow fuzzy duck pyjamas didn't do him any favours, but from the faraway look in his eyes, he'd mentally removed himself from the situation already, ignoring Taguchi's obvious efforts to engage him in conversation by using his half-open crimson pyjama top as a lure.
And as for Kame... Some bright spark had decided to make a play on his surname, decking him out in white and green pyjamas patterned with tiny turtles and pears. Either Kame really liked them or he just didn't care - he grinned at the plate of cookies next to him like he hadn't eaten for days, had one in his hand just waiting to be devoured. An innocent - if starved - child playing with his friends, completely at odds with the efficient, responsible young man who'd somehow managed to take control of Jin's life in less than forty-eight hours.
It had to be weird, being able to pick up a magazine and see your own face inside. Jin wondered if Kame ever looked at them, or if he'd think it was creepy to be looking at magazines so obviously aimed at girls.
"Who's your favourite?"
A voice from behind made Jin jump; he turned to see a young woman, maybe early twenties, reach past him for a fresh copy of 'Wink Up'.
"Mine's Ohno," she continued. "He's the best dancer, don't you think?"
"Um...I haven't seen Arashi perform much," Jin said, feeling his face grow warm and knowing he had to be blushing up a storm. "I'm not really a fan, I just...uh..."
"I get it." The woman winked at him slyly. "Buying a copy for your sister, right?"
"I'm not buying it at all!" Jin realised that made him sound like a shoplifter and hastily backpedalled. "Uh, I mean I'm just looking. One of my friends is in the magazine."
"Show me?"
Jin pointed to Kame and his plate of cookies, winning a smile from his new acquaintance.
"Your friend is kind of cute," she said. "Do you want the page?"
"Huh?"
"I'm just about to buy this magazine, but I don't follow any of the Junior groups. If you'll wait a minute I'll give you that page and you can needle your friend about his pyjamas or something."
She was as good as her word, carefully scoring the page with a pair of nail scissors and slicing it free for Jin. He folded it up, ensuring no lines crossed Kame's face, and tucked it away in his pocket. Somehow that made everything seem a little more real, like waving goodbye to Kame that morning hadn't been the last they'd see of each other, like Kame wasn't some mythical hero who'd saved him in his hour of need and had now disappeared back into his own personal legend.
But carrying around a picture of a friend you'd known for all of two days - and a guy, at that - bordered on creepy, and since Jin didn't want Kame to think he was weird, he resolved not to let him know about it. Under the circumstances, he felt entitled to find comfort in any way he could. This was right up there with having his own drawer space and somebody who believed him.
-----
Jin hesitated with the key in the lock. Kame trusted him to do this, but did he have any right to go letting himself in to someone else's house? What if Mr. Kamenashi came home earlier than expected and found him there? What if the neighbours saw him and called the police because they thought he was a burglar?
The weather made up his mind for him when it started to rain. He let himself in, shucked his shoes and outer layers, and set to work.
Finding a duster didn't take long - Jin suspected Kame had a hand in the organisation of the cleaning supplies as well. He switched on the radio for background music. Hidden patches of dust and cobwebs in long-forgotten corners fell prey to Jin's mighty feather duster, which he brandished like a sword against the evils of domestic dirt.
Dusting done, he realised he'd made more of a mess than he'd cleaned, some of the dust having made the transition to the floor instead. Out came the vacuum.
By the time Jin took a break to make himself a sandwich for lunch, he'd finished the floors and carpets and was contemplating cleaning the bath, maybe laundering the towels. He'd just sat down with his plate when the phone rang, trilling above the radio.
Jin answered without thinking, only realising after he'd said hello that he might be about to lose his afternoon in conversation with a salesman, or possibly have to answer some awkward questions from one of Mrs. Kamenashi's friends.
Fortunately, he knew the voice on the other end.
"I figured I'd better see if you made it home okay," Kame said.
Though Jin expected to hear an implied, "or at all", Kame didn't even seem to consider it a possibility that Jin might've let himself in, robbed the family blind, and skipped town. Once again, he found himself touched by Kame's trust in him.
"I took the scenic route back, but I made it. I told you not to worry."
Kame laughed at his phrasing, relieved. "Good. I'd hate to think I was leaving my baby brother in the care of someone who couldn't even find his way home."
There it was again, that word: home. "He's not that many years younger than you," Jin pointed out. "And you look pretty similar. I bet if he showed up to baseball practice in your uniform, no one would notice."
"They would when he tried to pitch. He tries hard, but..."
"He's not in your league," Jin finished. "Mr. World Representative."
He meant to tease, but Kame didn't run with it. "I should go eat lunch. I'll see you later. Don't let Yuya get away with telling you we should have ice cream for dinner, okay?"
"I'll try find something a bit healthier than that to feed you," Jin promised, though he thought the ice cream, if there was any, would make a nice dessert.
Exactly what he was going to do about dinner, he had no idea, but after Kame hung up and they'd returned to their respective lunches, Jin found a couple of cookbooks lurking on the bookcase. He flipped through them while he ate, searching for inspiration. So many meals sounded promising but when he investigated the cupboards, his choice of available ingredients proved to be somewhat limited. Now better acquainted with the contents of the Kamenashi kitchen, Jin resolved to think it over while he cleaned the bath.
He got so caught up in cleaning not just the bath, but the rest of the room too, that he almost forgot he'd been entrusted with picking Yuya up from school. He was halfway to the front door before he realised he'd left his key upstairs. Then he had to rummage around until he found a pair of umbrellas, because it was absolutely pouring outside. Once he got outside and had his umbrella up, he remembered he'd left his gloves behind.
By the time he reached Yuya's school, the youngest Kamenashi brother had already finished and was stood outside the gate, taking shelter under a tree while casting dismayed looks at the sky. Jin raced up to him with an umbrella and a breathless apology for being late. Yuya accepted both, but would only promise not to tell his brother if they could have his choice for dinner.
Jin had been bracing himself for ice cream but it turned out to be lasagne. He had a vague sort of idea as to what had to go in it and thought they were covered for ingredients, so he agreed. He'd just have to improvise, otherwise. Maybe the cookbooks would help.
Babysitting wasn't such a bad job, or so he thought until struggling with the cheese sauce made him want to strangle the kid for even suggesting it. Keeping it lump-free was a task and a half and he didn't have enough cheese left for a second attempt. He hoped making perfect lasagne wasn't one of the things Juniors had to be able to do. From the little he'd seen, he thought being able to dance without tripping over your own feet was more important - or better still, without tripping up the guy you were backdancing for. That, he thought he could manage.
While the lasagne was a success as far as Yuya was concerned, and Jin's tardiness was a buried secret, the meal hadn't gone down so well with Kame. Jin stared at the pile of neatly extracted tomatoes and green peppers on the side of Kame's plate with dismay.
"You weren't to know," Kame said.
"Do you have to be such a fussy eater?" Jin reached over to steal a forkful of the peppers. "I thought I was doing well."
"You were." With an expression of obvious reluctance, Kame raised a piece of tomato to his mouth and nibbled delicately on it
And that's all I wrote. Fic ends here, folks.
I have some notes that explain roughly how the rest of it should go:
The solution is for Jin to stay in Tokyo, as he discovers when he goes to dance practice with Kame and an old man says, "YOU, get up and join them." They also check Jin's singing ability, acrobatics and general coordination. He becomes part of the agency, staying with Kame, and working in a jewellery store so he can pay them rent etc., but because all his TV appearances etc. are basically as a backdancer, no one catches on that it's the same guy.
He's able to move out after a while, and he's been through many changes in that time - he looks very different now. KAT-TUN have had several concerts now, for which he's backdanced, but before their debut Akiyama gets suspended over pictures his girlfriend posted on her blog, and he quits. Jin gets subbed in on a trial basis and the collaboration is so successful he becomes the 'A'.
KT's popularity reaches extreme heights and they debut. Jin's stepmother is annoyed to find a familiar name in the opinion polls again, tracks him down once she realises it's the same guy, and determines to do the job herself.
First she disguises herself as a wardrobe assistant? The guys are supposed to be dressing up in collars for a photoshoot and she does Jin's too tight and leaves him unconscious in the dressing room? But Kame finds him and revives him.
Next attempt is disguised as a stylist, who scrapes Jin's head with a poisoned comb. Luckily they find him in time and get him to hospital, where he gets treated (but now has a slight bald patch, so wears a fedora for a while).
The final attempt is with food. It's poisoned chocolate, but one of the chocolates isn't poisoned and the stepmother eats it herself to prove it's okay. She leaves, because Jin's got rehearsal or something so he doesn't have them until later, and then he has one when he's by himself at home. He collapses. Kame shows up later with Koki, lets himself in, can't wake Jin no matter what he does. Koki calls for an ambulance while Kame tries to go through emergency medical procedure, accidentally knocking Jin off the couch in the process and dislodging the chocolate. Jin wakes up.
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Rating: PG
Genre: Fairytale fluff, angst
Word count: 15,237
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit
Part 1
Akanishi Jin and the 5 Idols (of Varying Heights) 2/2
Sunday morning found Jin busy in the kitchen, competing with Kame to see who could flip the largest pancake without messing. He'd had to borrow a bathrobe after his shower - Kame had taken all his clothing, underwear included, and dumped it in the washing machine with his own laundry - but since there were only guys in the house, he didn't feel too awkward about it. Good thing there were no Kamenashi sisters.
"You'll never manage that one," Kame teased. "It must be the size of your head!"
"I can definitely do it!"
Jin studied the oversized pancake, trying to decide the best angle for an approach, and realised he'd have to use a second spatula. He didn't even have to think about which drawer to reach for - proof that he was probably overstaying his welcome in the Kamenashi household. Breakfast, fun though it was, couldn't last forever.
"Just watch," he said, and with a spatula in both hands, managed to execute a flip that almost succeeded. One tiny little piece along the rim stuck to the pan and failed to go. Kame poked it with the batter spoon till it loosened enough to be removed.
"Nice try."
"It's the taste that counts," Jin huffed. "Nobody's complained about that so far."
Indeed, the other brothers had been most vocal in their appreciation for Jin's pancakes, devouring huge stacks of the things before leaving the house. Kame had played delivery boy, taking the plates through when they were ready, and snatching up the odd sample himself - for quality control, he said.
Now they were down to the last few, and Jin took the opportunity to enjoy some pancakes of his own while Kame took a turn at the frying pan, trying to shape the batter into stars with careful nudges from the spatula. He didn't have much luck but that didn't stop him trying, tongue peeking out between his lips as he worked with fierce concentration.
Jin couldn't remember yesterday's breakfast at all, but somehow he didn't think it could've been anywhere near as much fun as this one. He'd never had anyone else to cook for before, much less someone with whom he could have stupid competitions about who could flip the largest pancake, or who could make the most interesting shape with the batter. He wondered whether this was what it would be like if his brother had lived, two boys laughing and joking in the kitchen, talking complete nonsense as they ate and not caring that they must've looked and sounded like idiots.
"This one's almost a star?" Kame said, hope shining in his eyes, and even though it wasn't, Jin couldn't find it in his heart to contradict him.
"Almost," he agreed. "I mean, it's got five points and everything, even if they are in weird places."
Kame's smile grew impossibly brighter, the way no pancake star ever could no matter how many points it had. "You can eat this one. There's enough batter left for one more, I think? Your turn to make a shape."
Jin spread syrup across his star and allowed himself one glorious mouthful before pouring the remaining batter into the frying pan. He only had seconds to form a shape before it solidified into the default circle, so anything complicated was out. He had no idea how Kame had managed to get any points on his star at all, given the time limit, but somehow it didn't surprise him that Kame could do impossible things. He could've said he could fly, and Jin would've believed him.
The shape he tried to make had only one point and didn't require him to deviate too far from the circle. Jin used both spatulas to nudge the batter into place, then ate his star while it cooked. He flipped it, let the other side reach a smooth, golden brown, and turned it out on Kame's plate.
Kame grinned. "You made me a heart? You're such a girl, Akanishi."
"Shut up," Jin mumbled. "It was the easiest shape I could think of, okay?"
"Sure it was..."
When Jin threatened to take the heart away from him, Kame promptly smeared it with strawberry jam, grabbed a fork, and devoured the whole thing in seconds.
"Nobody steals my heart," he said.
"Not even baseball?"
"Well...maybe baseball. But no sport can make me pancakes."
"It would be kind of messy."
Kame switched off the heat, because Jin had forgotten, and left him to clear up the kitchen by himself when the phone rang. Jin had the dishes dripping dry on the side and was just wiping down the sticky counter when Kame returned, paler than when he'd left and visibly unhappy.
"That was my dad on the phone," he said. "My grandmother's in hospital."
Jin gasped, dropping the sponge on the side. "What happened?"
"My parents took her out last night; the restaurant was at the top of some steps and she slipped on the ice. She hit her head, broke her leg."
The cleaning could wait. Jin wiped his hands on a towel and crossed the floor to join Kame. Misery loved company, after all.
"Is she going to be okay?"
"He said she regained consciousness last night, but she's concussed and pretty woozy. She has to stay in the hospital for now." Kame stared at the floor. "She's got help on the farm but no one who lives there full-time to take care of her, so Mum's going to stay with her for a while. Dad's coming home in a couple of days, he thinks; he wants me to put together a case to send to Mum."
"I'm sorry about your grandmother." Jin risked a tentative pat to Kame's shoulder; Kame hunched further into himself, making his tiny form even smaller. "I'll leave once my clothes are dry. The last thing you need is having me to worry about."
"And go where? You said last night you don't have anywhere to go. At least wait until my dad gets home, okay? We can figure something out for you."
"I've already caused you enough trouble." Jin licked his lips, nervous about volunteering to leave this warm, safe, comfortable house. "I'm really grateful for everything, Kame, but that's exactly why I don't want to be a burden on you. I don't want to owe anything to anyone, and I know I can't repay you for anything you've done.
"Maybe I'll just...I don't know, go to the police or something. I can always tell them I got robbed and that's why I don't have any ID."
"And if they manage to get you back home your life will be in danger. You really think I'd let you walk out of here, knowing that?" Kame raised his head, met Jin's eyes with a stubborn glare. "If you want to pay me back, you can finish cleaning up here and then help me pack a suitcase."
Kame stalked off to check on the laundry. Jin reclaimed the sponge, wiped thick, sticky syrup spills from the counter and considered Kame's words. They might've sounded like orders to a domestic servant, but Jin knew what they really meant.
Don't leave me alone.
-----
Packing a suitcase for Mrs. Kamenashi taught Jin more than he'd ever wanted to know about the private life of a housewife - and more than Kame wanted to know, too, to judge by his scarlet cheeks. Aunt Makiko probably had racier undergarments but Jin didn't make a habit of going through her drawers. They worked from an emailed checklist with Kame finding the requested items and Jin packing them in the case, neat as he could manage.
"I'll send it by takkyubin later," Kame said. "There's an agency not far from here."
"I'll carry it," Jin said.
"It's on wheels." Kame demonstrated, flipping the case on its end and rolling it towards Jin. "But you can still take it."
They were all little things. Cooking breakfast, doing the dishes, carrying a case. Jin didn't think they added up to much, couldn't see how Kame could possibly consider the two of them even.
Because if Kame hadn't knocked on the door when he had, Jin might be there still, locked in a cold stall in Shinjuku station and locked inside himself, too: brain trapped in a loop of panic and despair, body unable to move without guidance.
Kame had saved him from that, from being alone, and no matter what happened from here onwards, Jin thought he might be able to find the strength to deal with it. For that, he'd take on any task Kame asked of him.
He carried the case downstairs, depositing it by the front door. He certainly couldn't take it anywhere yet, though, and Kame gave him an apologetic smile.
"Sorry, sorry. Your clothes should be dry by now. I'll get them."
Fortunately, everything was dry, so Jin retreated into the bathroom to change. Wearing his own clothes again helped. He had to borrow deodorant, of course, but at least he didn't have to shave yet.
He emerged to find Kame gazing at a notebook with the sort of glazed expression he normally saw on his classmates, and assumed - correctly, as it turned out - that the other boy was doing homework. He didn't seem to be getting very far.
"Maybe you'd do better if you switched off the radio?" Jin suggested.
"The music usually helps...but I guess I've just got too much to think about right now. Hey, you're ahead of me in school: does any of this make sense to you?"
Kame tossed the notebook over. Jin caught it, took one look at the equations, and felt his own eyes starting to glaze over. "Maths isn't exactly my strong point." He threw it back; Kame didn't bother to catch it, letting it drop on the bed.
"Nobody's perfect."
"It's not your strong point either, is it?" Jin teased.
"I just can't see when in my life I'm ever going to need calculus."
"Probably about the same time you need to know the freezing point of nitrogen."
"That, I could possibly tell you..."
Kame rolled off the bed and made for the radio, but Jin raised a hand to stop him. He knew the song playing, 'Kanashimi Blue' by the KinKi Kids - had sung it a couple of times at karaoke with his friends, even - and started to sing along.
"Hmm, you're not bad," Kame said after listening to Jin sing his way through to the end. "You've got a pretty nice voice - better than a lot of the Juniors, actually. Have you ever had training?"
"I sing all the time, but I've never had training or anything." Jin felt unreasonably pleased by Kame's compliment. "Sometimes I'll be shopping with friends and I'll just start singing along with whatever's playing in the shops, and forget that I'm out in public."
Kame broke into a smile, his first since the phone call about his grandmother. "I bet your friends think you're embarrassing."
"Mostly they start talking over me and I eventually get the message."
"My friends distract me with baseball when I do that. It doesn't take much."
"You do it too, huh?"
"Yeah...but my voice isn't like yours. I don't think it ever will be."
"Neither of us is done growing yet," Jin said. "Who knows what we'll sound like in a few years? Can I hear you sing?"
Kame wouldn't look at him. "Now?"
"Please? Juniors sing too, right? And if you want a CD debut you're going to have to let people hear you at some point."
"People hear me sing all the time," Kame mumbled, "but mostly when I'm working. Not just sitting here like this."
Jin fiddled with the dials on the radio till he found a station playing something he recognised - a marathon of SMAP songs. He figured Kame had to know most of them, what with SMAP being one of KAT-TUN's senpai groups.
"Nothing weird about singing along with the radio, right?"
Kame still didn't look at him, but sang along whether he agreed or not. Hesitantly at first, in a voice little more than a whisper and easily lost in the melody. Jin inched closer to hear, striving to move in silence and failing miserably when he whacked his hand on the edge of the desk.
The distraction seemed to jar Kame, though not as Jin had feared: indeed, it spurred him on, more than doubling the strength and volume of his song and giving him confidence to face Jin with a smile - though he turned away again on the final note.
"I think your voice is better than you probably think it is," Jin said, hoping he didn't confuse Kame. "You just need to relax."
"I keep going flat."
"Don't worry so much about how you sound. Keep practising, and sing songs you love to sing - you'll always sound better if you're singing something you like."
Kame had a slightly nasal, at times flat voice, but he also had moments of sweetness that resonated in Jin's heart. He didn't have a voice that would sell CDs, yet, but in Jin's amateur opinion, the potential was there.
"Anyway," Jin said, "SMAP are hardly known for their amazing singing voices but that doesn't stop them being popular. You've got time to work on it; just let things develop at their own pace."
"You definitely need to become a Junior," Kame decided. "You can sing, you can dance, and it doesn't matter that you're no good at calculus."
"But I don't even live here!"
"There are Kansai Juniors too, but I think you should be a Tokyo Junior. It's safer for you here."
"I wish I could." Jin had a lot of wishes, but not a single clue how to go about fulfilling any of them. You couldn't live on wishes, no matter how hard you tried or how much you wanted to.
"So let's go back to the office and fill out some forms," Kame said.
"Using my real address? Wouldn't that be weird?"
"You could say you're staying with me for a while until you find a place in Tokyo?" Kame suggested. "And you'll get paid, you know. The salary's dependent on what you do, but as part-time jobs go, it's a lot of fun."
"I don't have anywhere for a salary to go. I can't risk using my bank account - which my stepmother's probably having watched, anyway."
"Why don't you let me worry about that?"
Jin couldn't hold back his laughter. "You love taking care of people, don't you?"
"I'm nearly the youngest in my family, and I'm the youngest in KAT-TUN even though I'm first. Let me baby someone else for a change."
"What do you mean you're first?" Jin asked, curious. "You were the first member?"
Kame shook his head. "The group's made up from the first letter of our surnames, so I'm first. Kamenashi, Akiyama, Taguchi, Tanaka, Ueda and Nakamaru. People have trouble pronouncing it right, though. We get 'katsu-un' all the time."
"'Winning luck' isn't such a bad way to get it wrong. Kind of fortuitous."
"It might be if we ever had any luck." Kame sighed and switched off the radio. "We fight all the time - over stupid, little things, mostly - and we're not very good at compromising. Which is a shame, because I think if we could ever fix it so that we're all pointing in the same direction, we could do amazing things.
"Tanaka raps, and Nakamaru beatboxes, and Ueda plays guitar and piano, and Taguchi's really good at acrobatics, and Akiyama's one of the best dancers in the agency. We're a unique mix."
"You left yourself out, Kame."
"Me?" Kame shrugged. "I'm still working on it. Maybe I'll be the actor, like Arashi's Ninomiya. He likes baseball too."
"You don't have to be 'like' anyone; isn't it okay to just be yourself?"
"Like I said, still working on it. I don't think the real me is idol material, though. Not cool enough."
It amazed Jin how Kame could have such confidence in some things, and a total lack in others. "I'm probably not your target audience, but for what it's worth, I think you're cool. Anybody who'd do all this for a complete stranger is obviously a wonderful person."
Jin's words might as well have been sunshine nourishing a flower garden, for Kame blossomed at the praise, holding his head higher, looking less like a turtle trying to hide away in his shell and more like a young man taking justifiable pride in himself.
"Maybe I just like the idea of having a housekeeper."
"At least you said 'housekeeper' and not 'slave'." Not that Jin considered himself housekeeper material - what seventeen year old boy would? - but it did sound vaguely respectable, if rather dull.
"Whenever anime guys get slaves they're always cute girls," Kame said. "You don't count, even if you did make me a heart pancake."
"I told you, it was just the easiest shape to make! A lot easier than your star."
"But doesn't it feel more satisfying when you achieve something you've really had to work hard for?"
Jin had to admit that it did. "When I first started playing soccer I couldn't juggle at all. I couldn't even keep the ball in the air for a minute, I was that bad. Then my friends started to practise without me 'cause I couldn't keep up.
"I didn't want to fall behind them, so I practised on my own all the time, whenever I could." He puffed out his chest proudly. "I was the best in my middle school by the time I graduated."
"And it's the same with anything else," Kame said. "Even pancakes. If you keep working at it, you'll get somewhere, even if it seems hopeless at first."
"You too, Kame." Jin wanted very much for his new friend to succeed. "One day you'll be a top idol and everyone in Japan's going to know your name."
Kame snorted and left to find his jacket.
-----
As promised, Jin took charge of the suitcase. With Mrs. Kamenashi's clothing safely on its way to Tochigi by overnight delivery some of the tension left Kame's face.
Unfortunately it transferred itself to Jin's shoulders, which grew more and more tense as they returned to the office. Could Kame really mean to get Jin signed up as a Junior?
"Just leave it to me," Kame assured him as they made their way down the hall. "I made a phone call while you were getting ready."
He said this with such confidence that for a moment Jin wondered if he'd escaped the clutches of one yakuza only to fall prey to another, but surely the shadiness of the entertainment industry didn't extend to fifteen year old boys. Kame seemed to know what he was doing, though. After a word with the receptionist he led Jin up to the top floor and parked him on a couch outside an office.
"I won't be long," he said. He knocked on the door and vanished inside.
Jin fidgeted with the pompom on his hat until Kame emerged with a clipboard full of papers and a pen. Of course there was no way they could go through with it. Jin couldn't join Johnnys. Definitely not. He had bigger problems than remembering lyrics and dance steps.
Kame didn't appear to understand that, because he insisted on filling out the forms. "This one's about your health and any physical limitations on what you can do." He passed the pen to Jin. "Any problems?"
"I catch cold pretty easily, but nothing else that I know about."
"How do you feel about heights?"
"Er..." Jin squirmed on the blue leather couch. "Depends on the context."
"Rollercoasters?"
"Fun!"
"Aeroplanes?"
"No problem!"
"Bungee jumping?"
"Never tried it." The thought didn't hold much appeal. "I could, I guess?"
"I hate heights," Kame said frankly. "And I can't stand the feeling I get on rollercoasters. But sometimes they like us to do wire work, so I want to be able to overcome that."
Then there was a form about education. "Since many Juniors are still in school," Kame explained, "the agency needs to know when they're unavailable, and how much time they need for homework and stuff. A lot of the guys tend to quit high school if there's enough work for them to make a living out of it."
"Think you'll quit?"
"Maybe?" Kame shrugged. "Depends how things go with the agency. Some of the guys manage to graduate high school and go to university but I doubt I'd be able to afford it, and I'm not really the academic type anyway."
"I guess I might've just quit," Jin said giddily, the very thought making him feel lightheaded. "Or my stepmother quit for me." He ran his hands through his hair, leaving it sticking out at all manner of strange angles. "I wonder what she'll tell the school?"
"Probably that you ran away. It's not like you're going to show up and contradict her." Kame plucked the pen from Jin's hand and shuffled the clipboard across to his own lap. "We'll just say you dropped out of high school in Osaka and came to Tokyo to look for work."
There were also forms about Jin's family, which Kame told him to leave, and another one requiring his bank details. Kame told him to leave that one too.
"But-"
"Don't worry about it," Kame said. "It's going to be fine."
Most people, Jin reflected later, wouldn't take a stranger's word for it. But it wasn't physically possible for him to doubt Kame.
Jin didn't require a parent's permission, so he signed his own name and watched Kame walk off with the paperwork that could change his life - or at least make it more sparkly. He felt like there should've been some kind of initiation rite, like parading around the streets of Tokyo in ruffles and sequins, or at least some sort of occasion to mark the event.
"I can't do anything about the ruffles," Kame said when Jin told him, "but we should mark the occasion anyway. Come on, we're getting you a toothbrush."
-----
The Kamenashi family didn't have much money to spare, Jin knew, so the twinges of guilt returned when Kame insisted on getting him a toothbrush, some underwear, and a couple of pairs of socks.
"Some of my clothes would fit you," Kame said, "and I've got some hand-me-downs from my eldest brother that definitely will, but there are some things I draw the line at sharing."
Jin wondered if Kame thought they were living in a fairy tale, where nothing ever ended. It sure felt like it. "Whose office was that?"
"Johnny's." Kame grinned slyly "Since he was the one who decided you should join, I thought I'd take the problem straight to the top."
Better not to say anything, Jin thought. The bubble might burst, if he did.
That wasn't all they bought; Kame had been tasked with grocery shopping too, on the grounds that he managed a lot better in the kitchen than Koji or their dad, and Yuya was too young to do more than "help" from time to time. Jin carried the basket around the supermarket and helped Kame hunt for bargains.
"Things are better now that I'm working," Kame explained as they examined cuts of meat, "but we can't do anything extravagant. Not yet. When KAT-TUN start getting more exposure, I'll be able to take the whole family out for meals."
"What sort of exposure?"
Kame found a reasonable-looking pack of stewing steak and added it to the basket. "I haven't heard anything definite, but there's talk about us maybe having a concert of our own this year. The fans keep requesting one. It would be amazing to be able to do that when we haven't even debuted!"
Jin found himself caught up in Kame's enthusiasm, playing along as the other boy described the costumes they might wear, or the songs they might perform. No shortage of creativity there. He had visions of Kame on a grand stage, surrounded by glittering adolescent boys, strutting around like a wannabe rockstar.
For a moment, he wanted to be there too.
-----
Kame's brothers didn't object to Jin staying another night when he turned out to be decent rival material for all their favourite video games, though Yuya did try to argue that he should be allowed to sleep in their parents' room since he was being displaced again. Kame gave him another helping of nabe to pacify him.
Dinner had been another combined effort, with Kame doing everything he didn't trust Jin to do and Jin doing everything else. He learned fast, though. Cooking a dish where you simply threw everything together suited him better than something where everything had to be precise.
"I'm going to make the lunches for tomorrow now," Kame said when they'd cleared the table. "Do you want to take first bath?"
"Tomorrow?"
"Yeah; the three of us have school tomorrow. Koji's got cram school afterwards and I've got baseball and-" Kame broke off with a frown.
"What?"
"Yuya. Mum normally picks him up from school." He gave Jin a hopeful look. "It's not like you've got anything better to do tomorrow, right? He wouldn't be any trouble, and he seems to like you."
"He likes that I know attacks he hasn't learned yet," Jin corrected.
"Good enough. You could bring him home and make a start on dinner?" Kame suggested.
"But I don't even know where his school is!"
Kame refused to let go of the idea. "I'll walk you there with him in the morning. You can borrow the spare key."
Jin suspected Kame's dad would kill them both when he got home. Inviting a strange boy home for dinner was one thing, but giving him a key to your house and asking him to baby-sit your brother?
They argued the point back and forth for a while, long enough that Yuya came in to put in a request for lunch, overheard them, and asked why Jin wouldn't be busy with school himself tomorrow.
"We...uh..." Jin flustered for a moment, then realised he couldn't keep up his original pretext for being at the Kamenashi house. "We lied about working on a project together. I...I quit high school. End of last week. But my family's kind of mad about it so I needed to get away from home for a while."
"Why did you quit?" Yuya wanted to know. "To work?"
"Kind of." Jin swallowed hard. "I've just become a Johnnys Junior."
This didn't appear to carry much weight with the youngest Kamenashi brother, who hadn't quite reached the age where he learned to make strategically-timed sounds to indicate he was paying attention. He put in his lunch request and left to finish up some homework - as guest, Jin got first bath, even if his status had now dropped from "brother's classmate" to "high school drop-out and future wearer of sequins".
By the time Jin emerged from his bath Kame had rounded up some better-fitting sweatpants from a box of his eldest brother's stuff - none of the others had managed to grow into them yet but they suited Jin just fine - and set aside a quarter of a dresser drawer for Jin's meagre collection of vestments, which principally consisted of borrowed hand-me-downs and brand new underwear.
"It feels like I'm moving in." Jin picked out a cosy-looking jumper from the clothes allotted to him, needing something to keep him warm after the bath.
"Everybody should have a space that's just for them, right? Even if it's only a little bit," Kame said.
Even in someone else's house. Jin didn't know whether to be charmed or alarmed by the measures Kame was willing to take to make him feel comfortable. Mostly charmed, he decided as he settled down for his second night of sleep in the Kamenashi house. He'd have to be the best babysitter ever to pay him back.
-----
It felt strange when Monday morning arrived and Jin was the only one in the house not donning a school uniform. He busied himself with the ricecooker while the Kamenashi brothers got themselves sorted for school, scrambling to pack bags abandoned for the weekend and flatten wayward hair into something bearing less resemblance to a haystack. They weren't terribly successful.
"Nice trousers," Jin commented when he and Kame passed each other on the stairs. "I'd have quit your high school just for those."
Kame glared at him. "You'll think they're tame when you see some of the costumes you'll have to wear." He held out a key. "Lose this and you're a dead man."
"I already am."
"Oops." Kame winced, instantly contrite. "Sorry. But you know what I mean."
Jin pocketed the key, noting as he did so a cobweb up in the corner, above Kame's line of sight. He could remove that later, he thought. He didn't want Mr. Kamenashi to come home and think his kids had let the place fall apart. It was the least he could do in return for such kindness.
After a rushed breakfast the four of them set out for school. Jin hoped he could remember his way around or he'd be stuck wandering the streets of Tokyo until he found somewhere familiar. Not having a cell phone was a real nuisance. He had Kame's phone number, now, in case he needed to call him from the house, but that was all he could do. And Kame would be in class, anyway.
"You're sure you can find your way home again?" Kame checked after they'd walked Yuya to school and confirmed a time for Jin to return.
Home. Jin liked the sound of that, even if it wasn't his. "I'll be fine," he assured Kame.
"You sure you don't need me to walk you back quickly?"
"You worry too much. If you get wrinkles are you still allowed to be a Junior?"
"They might have to make me a Senior..."
Having accepted that Jin wasn't about to get lost straight off the bat Kame continued on to his own school, promising to be home as soon as he could and instructing Jin to call immediately if anything happened. "Anything", as far as Jin could tell, seemed to range from accidentally breaking a plate to having his stepmother's pet thugs turn up and finish him off.
Seeing all the students walking past in their uniforms evoked unexpected nostalgia in Jin. He didn't miss school, exactly. He didn't have the worst grades in class but he didn't have the best, either, and no matter how hard he tried he knew he'd never be the academic type. He found textbooks too dry; teachers too dull.
He loved to learn, though; obscure facts fixed themselves in his mind easily, ensuring he had an enormous stock of random trivia for party games. Anything Jin could pick up, he did, even if it wasn't through studying in the conventional sense. Languages, for example. He'd made friends with a boy in his class who happened to be half-Italian, and as a result had acquired a smattering of the language to mangle with his Japanese accent.
Not that he'd ever get the chance to learn more. Jin staunchly resolved to ignore that weird, empty feeling caused by the sight of school uniforms, turned his back on Kame's tiny figure disappearing into the distance, and headed off to the Kamenashi house to do something about the cobwebs.
-----
It took Jin over an hour to return to his temporary home. Not because he got lost, and he would deny it if anyone were to say so, but because he wanted to refamiliarise himself with the city. He wandered up one street and down the next, using subway stations, department stores and karaoke chains as landmarks in order to build up a mental map of his surroundings. He found the supermarket where they'd shopped the previous day, and the AM-PM where Kame had wanted to pick up a toothbrush, and a bookshop with idol magazines spread across a table for the world to see.
They had funny names. 'Potato'. 'Wink Up'. What did those have to do with being an idol? Jin stopped to leaf through them, earning himself some strange looks from a pair of middle-aged women cooing over a fashion magazine with Kimura Takuya on the cover. Smooth, polished young men, obviously debuted and in the prime of their careers, graced the pages nearest the front. Jin spotted names he recognised. They all looked so...finished, like their rough edges had been smoothed out upon debut to leave nothing but perfection behind.
He kept turning pages until he found the Juniors. They didn't get their own pages unless they were doing something particularly noteworthy, he discovered. They appeared in small groups, flashing gap-toothed smiles for the camera, revelling in bad haircuts and crazy outfits and happy just to be noticed.
KAT-TUN had their own page, near the back, where the hideous pyjamas they were modelling wouldn't scare off too many prospective purchasers. Nakamaru looked embarrassed about his grey and green plaid, holding himself stiffly upright while Tanaka lounged in leopard-print on a pillow next to him, clearly more at ease. Akiyama stretched out on a mattress, long legs taking up all the room and creating a barrier between himself and the others - the older brother forced to chaperone his younger siblings' sleepover. Ueda's yellow fuzzy duck pyjamas didn't do him any favours, but from the faraway look in his eyes, he'd mentally removed himself from the situation already, ignoring Taguchi's obvious efforts to engage him in conversation by using his half-open crimson pyjama top as a lure.
And as for Kame... Some bright spark had decided to make a play on his surname, decking him out in white and green pyjamas patterned with tiny turtles and pears. Either Kame really liked them or he just didn't care - he grinned at the plate of cookies next to him like he hadn't eaten for days, had one in his hand just waiting to be devoured. An innocent - if starved - child playing with his friends, completely at odds with the efficient, responsible young man who'd somehow managed to take control of Jin's life in less than forty-eight hours.
It had to be weird, being able to pick up a magazine and see your own face inside. Jin wondered if Kame ever looked at them, or if he'd think it was creepy to be looking at magazines so obviously aimed at girls.
"Who's your favourite?"
A voice from behind made Jin jump; he turned to see a young woman, maybe early twenties, reach past him for a fresh copy of 'Wink Up'.
"Mine's Ohno," she continued. "He's the best dancer, don't you think?"
"Um...I haven't seen Arashi perform much," Jin said, feeling his face grow warm and knowing he had to be blushing up a storm. "I'm not really a fan, I just...uh..."
"I get it." The woman winked at him slyly. "Buying a copy for your sister, right?"
"I'm not buying it at all!" Jin realised that made him sound like a shoplifter and hastily backpedalled. "Uh, I mean I'm just looking. One of my friends is in the magazine."
"Show me?"
Jin pointed to Kame and his plate of cookies, winning a smile from his new acquaintance.
"Your friend is kind of cute," she said. "Do you want the page?"
"Huh?"
"I'm just about to buy this magazine, but I don't follow any of the Junior groups. If you'll wait a minute I'll give you that page and you can needle your friend about his pyjamas or something."
She was as good as her word, carefully scoring the page with a pair of nail scissors and slicing it free for Jin. He folded it up, ensuring no lines crossed Kame's face, and tucked it away in his pocket. Somehow that made everything seem a little more real, like waving goodbye to Kame that morning hadn't been the last they'd see of each other, like Kame wasn't some mythical hero who'd saved him in his hour of need and had now disappeared back into his own personal legend.
But carrying around a picture of a friend you'd known for all of two days - and a guy, at that - bordered on creepy, and since Jin didn't want Kame to think he was weird, he resolved not to let him know about it. Under the circumstances, he felt entitled to find comfort in any way he could. This was right up there with having his own drawer space and somebody who believed him.
-----
Jin hesitated with the key in the lock. Kame trusted him to do this, but did he have any right to go letting himself in to someone else's house? What if Mr. Kamenashi came home earlier than expected and found him there? What if the neighbours saw him and called the police because they thought he was a burglar?
The weather made up his mind for him when it started to rain. He let himself in, shucked his shoes and outer layers, and set to work.
Finding a duster didn't take long - Jin suspected Kame had a hand in the organisation of the cleaning supplies as well. He switched on the radio for background music. Hidden patches of dust and cobwebs in long-forgotten corners fell prey to Jin's mighty feather duster, which he brandished like a sword against the evils of domestic dirt.
Dusting done, he realised he'd made more of a mess than he'd cleaned, some of the dust having made the transition to the floor instead. Out came the vacuum.
By the time Jin took a break to make himself a sandwich for lunch, he'd finished the floors and carpets and was contemplating cleaning the bath, maybe laundering the towels. He'd just sat down with his plate when the phone rang, trilling above the radio.
Jin answered without thinking, only realising after he'd said hello that he might be about to lose his afternoon in conversation with a salesman, or possibly have to answer some awkward questions from one of Mrs. Kamenashi's friends.
Fortunately, he knew the voice on the other end.
"I figured I'd better see if you made it home okay," Kame said.
Though Jin expected to hear an implied, "or at all", Kame didn't even seem to consider it a possibility that Jin might've let himself in, robbed the family blind, and skipped town. Once again, he found himself touched by Kame's trust in him.
"I took the scenic route back, but I made it. I told you not to worry."
Kame laughed at his phrasing, relieved. "Good. I'd hate to think I was leaving my baby brother in the care of someone who couldn't even find his way home."
There it was again, that word: home. "He's not that many years younger than you," Jin pointed out. "And you look pretty similar. I bet if he showed up to baseball practice in your uniform, no one would notice."
"They would when he tried to pitch. He tries hard, but..."
"He's not in your league," Jin finished. "Mr. World Representative."
He meant to tease, but Kame didn't run with it. "I should go eat lunch. I'll see you later. Don't let Yuya get away with telling you we should have ice cream for dinner, okay?"
"I'll try find something a bit healthier than that to feed you," Jin promised, though he thought the ice cream, if there was any, would make a nice dessert.
Exactly what he was going to do about dinner, he had no idea, but after Kame hung up and they'd returned to their respective lunches, Jin found a couple of cookbooks lurking on the bookcase. He flipped through them while he ate, searching for inspiration. So many meals sounded promising but when he investigated the cupboards, his choice of available ingredients proved to be somewhat limited. Now better acquainted with the contents of the Kamenashi kitchen, Jin resolved to think it over while he cleaned the bath.
He got so caught up in cleaning not just the bath, but the rest of the room too, that he almost forgot he'd been entrusted with picking Yuya up from school. He was halfway to the front door before he realised he'd left his key upstairs. Then he had to rummage around until he found a pair of umbrellas, because it was absolutely pouring outside. Once he got outside and had his umbrella up, he remembered he'd left his gloves behind.
By the time he reached Yuya's school, the youngest Kamenashi brother had already finished and was stood outside the gate, taking shelter under a tree while casting dismayed looks at the sky. Jin raced up to him with an umbrella and a breathless apology for being late. Yuya accepted both, but would only promise not to tell his brother if they could have his choice for dinner.
Jin had been bracing himself for ice cream but it turned out to be lasagne. He had a vague sort of idea as to what had to go in it and thought they were covered for ingredients, so he agreed. He'd just have to improvise, otherwise. Maybe the cookbooks would help.
Babysitting wasn't such a bad job, or so he thought until struggling with the cheese sauce made him want to strangle the kid for even suggesting it. Keeping it lump-free was a task and a half and he didn't have enough cheese left for a second attempt. He hoped making perfect lasagne wasn't one of the things Juniors had to be able to do. From the little he'd seen, he thought being able to dance without tripping over your own feet was more important - or better still, without tripping up the guy you were backdancing for. That, he thought he could manage.
While the lasagne was a success as far as Yuya was concerned, and Jin's tardiness was a buried secret, the meal hadn't gone down so well with Kame. Jin stared at the pile of neatly extracted tomatoes and green peppers on the side of Kame's plate with dismay.
"You weren't to know," Kame said.
"Do you have to be such a fussy eater?" Jin reached over to steal a forkful of the peppers. "I thought I was doing well."
"You were." With an expression of obvious reluctance, Kame raised a piece of tomato to his mouth and nibbled delicately on it
And that's all I wrote. Fic ends here, folks.
I have some notes that explain roughly how the rest of it should go:
The solution is for Jin to stay in Tokyo, as he discovers when he goes to dance practice with Kame and an old man says, "YOU, get up and join them." They also check Jin's singing ability, acrobatics and general coordination. He becomes part of the agency, staying with Kame, and working in a jewellery store so he can pay them rent etc., but because all his TV appearances etc. are basically as a backdancer, no one catches on that it's the same guy.
He's able to move out after a while, and he's been through many changes in that time - he looks very different now. KAT-TUN have had several concerts now, for which he's backdanced, but before their debut Akiyama gets suspended over pictures his girlfriend posted on her blog, and he quits. Jin gets subbed in on a trial basis and the collaboration is so successful he becomes the 'A'.
KT's popularity reaches extreme heights and they debut. Jin's stepmother is annoyed to find a familiar name in the opinion polls again, tracks him down once she realises it's the same guy, and determines to do the job herself.
First she disguises herself as a wardrobe assistant? The guys are supposed to be dressing up in collars for a photoshoot and she does Jin's too tight and leaves him unconscious in the dressing room? But Kame finds him and revives him.
Next attempt is disguised as a stylist, who scrapes Jin's head with a poisoned comb. Luckily they find him in time and get him to hospital, where he gets treated (but now has a slight bald patch, so wears a fedora for a while).
The final attempt is with food. It's poisoned chocolate, but one of the chocolates isn't poisoned and the stepmother eats it herself to prove it's okay. She leaves, because Jin's got rehearsal or something so he doesn't have them until later, and then he has one when he's by himself at home. He collapses. Kame shows up later with Koki, lets himself in, can't wake Jin no matter what he does. Koki calls for an ambulance while Kame tries to go through emergency medical procedure, accidentally knocking Jin off the couch in the process and dislodging the chocolate. Jin wakes up.