Cordis Somnia 1/2
Title: Cordis somnia
Pairing: Jin / Kame
Word count: 14.541
Rating: PG-15
Warnings: Two timelines - text in italics are scenes placed in the past and they jump around in time, and even though I tried to include dates or reference points for most of them maybe it gets a bit confusing at times. I tried to be as accurate with research as possible, but there may be some mistakes? Mentions of Kanto Great Earthquake in 1923 in case that’s a tw for some… Maybe implied character death that’s really just suggested? Lots of art talk (no really, lots of it) that I can only hope it’s accurate enough. Possibly misspelled French.
Notes: I tried to do my best with the research for this, down to the existence (or actually the non-existence) of color pencils for artistic use in the 19th century (there were color pencils, but aimed for utilitarian purposes; the first color pencils designed for artistic use were commercialized around the 1920s, in case anyone cared). Moleskines didn’t exist per se back then because the modern brand only appeared in 1968, but as it fashioned after those used in the 19th century by artists of any kind, I think it’s easier for everyone if we just call them Moleskines. Homosexuality was illegalized in Japan in 1873 but it was legalized again in 1880 so the previous law does not affect the past story, which takes place roughly between 1881 and 1923 in case the dates are confusing. Some cultural terms have Wikipedia links because I couldn’t find a way to fit their explanation in the story. The Kiyoteru/Seiki Jin mentions was an actual Japanese painter, Kuroda Seiki, whose life I have taken as a general guideline to base Jin’s life on even though his living dates are actually Kazuya’s. Monet and Renoir are, obviously, real painters too.
The title means “Dreams of the heart”, and the cut text “The heart lies in Art”; they’re both in Latin. Second cut text is Japanese because I had a sudden change of heart, and it means “the end of summer”.
betaed by the loveliest bellemainec and Carly, with a lot of hand holding an advice from mirokkuma and cease11! Written for ___clash during 2012's kizuna_exchange
Summary: Art restorer Kamenashi Kazuya starts working on a portrait, and dreams a dream that was once real.
The painting is, if Kame has to bet on it, a portrait. The reduced size at least seems to suggest that, even though it’s not possible to tell much more. The canvas has deteriorated due to time and possibly bad storage, the colors darkened until the figure depicted is but a shapeless shadow barely discernible from the background. The only part of the painting that has somehow received a gentler treatment is the frame, and Kame suspects it has been cleaned only recently, in order to conduct the tests that have set its date as belonging to the late 19th century. Kame sighs and turns toward the man who brought the painting to his studio. The owner’s brother, from what Kame has understood.
“When do you need it ready?”
“I think my brother was planning to open the exposition in a couple of months, if it can be done by then. We’re aware it’s in pretty bad condition…”
“Where was it stored?”
“We found it in the attic of a family property… Probably had been there for a while,” the young man rubs the back of his head sheepishly and Kame sighs again.
“I’ll see what I can do about it.”
The young man thanks him and shakes Kame’s hand before leaving. It’s already late afternoon and shadows are starting to claim his tiny, cramped studio, but Kame turns his gaze toward the mistreated painting. Despite not being very big, it’s in a terrible state, and he’s going to be pressed for time if he has to have it ready in just a couple of months. He is not planning to work for much longer today anyway, but maybe he could start to clear the humidity marks away to get a better view of the whole thing, or even just enough to check the brush strokes to get a better idea of what he’s going to work with. The canvas is not torn so at least he doesn’t need to face and re-line the painting; even though this one was small in size, removing the frame and then using the stretcher and gluing the new fabric was always such a troublesome process, and it’d take him hours.
Kame brings out his camera to take a few pictures of the painting for later comparison and starts cleaning his work table. When he opens the window it’s already chilly outside and he has probably a few hours of natural light left, so he doesn’t waste any time getting his surgical gloves and preparing the chemicals to wipe away the layer of dirt that obscures the drawing. He’ll just do this bit, Kame tells himself, and then he’ll leave it for tomorrow…
Of course, Kame ends up working late into the night.
#
The hooves of the horses barely made a noise on the moist earth of the riverbank, so it was not until they were called that the group of men congregated by the shore turned to face the newcomers. It was a miscellaneous group of foreigners and Japanese men, all surrounding a younger man that was holding a color palette. He couldn’t be much older than seventeen. Like those surrounding him he was dressed in western clothes that contrasted with the kimono one of the riders was wearing. He observed them carefully as they dismounted from their horses.
“Kamenashi-san! Such a nice surprise to see you finally decided to attend our little meeting!” It was one of the foreign men who spoke, loudly and in terribly accented Japanese. “You must introduce us to your companion! Is he the nephew you’ve been talking about?”
“His name is Kazuya. He’s my oldest brother’s heir.”
“Nice to meet you.”
Kazuya’s English was heavily accented, but even the simple phrase got him loud cheers from the foreigners and a couple of strong pats on the back. As the heir of the family business he was expected to learn the language and maintain good relationships with the foreign workers employed by the Meiji government even if they made him uncomfortable. They made his uncle Katsuhiko uncomfortable too, with their loud voices and different manners. Kazuya felt self conscious in his kimono, when even his uncle Goro was dressed in western clothes. Katsuhiko, his adoptive father, didn’t approve of them, but his uncle Goro insisted that it was a time of change and modernization.
“How old are you, Kazuya-kun?”
“I turned sixteen a week ago, sir.” He was glad they had switched back to Japanese at least; being required to learn English didn’t make him any good at speaking it.
“You’re almost the same age as Jin-kun here!” Kazuya found himself being pushed towards the man with the color palette, who looked at him from under the fringe of his unruly black hair; Kazuya’s own was pulled tightly into a ponytail. He was wearing a grey waistcoat over a white shirt, but both were covered with paint stains. The chain of his pocket watch shone across his chest under the soft orange light of twilight. Jin’s bowtie was slightly askew, and Kazuya’s fingers itched with the need to correct it; instead he played with the turtle-shaped netsuke atop his obi.
“He’s a real talent, Jin is! Got nothing to envy from any western painter, I tell you. He’s hoping to be sent abroad to study next year, to the United States, or maybe France, to learn with the maîtres there. Show them what you can do, Jin!”
The young man flushed and shuffled away from the canvas embarrassedly. Over the linen the river was a sinuous snake of gray and golden, capricious jewels shining beautifully where the setting sun fell over the tumultuous waters. Across the river the black roofs of the former Edo houses were a wonder of light and shadow that stretched until they were nothing but a uniform field; at the very end, almost out of sight, rivulets of dark smoke rose towards the soft oranges and blues of the sky, the only hint of Japan’s sole rail line. It was the same sight Kazuya could see beyond the small canvas, a hundred times more beautiful and captured forever by the hands of a man whose cheeks were tinted red. Kazuya, whose uncle only had nihonga art at home, had never seen anything similar before.
“It’s beautiful,” he whispered, and Jin’s cheeks turned a few hues darker, as if the colors of his palette were seeping through his hands to his whole body. He looked down but later, when it was time to leave, he shook Kame’s hand with a shy smile.
The air was chilly as they rode back home, but Kame’s hand felt warm and tingled all through the night.
#
Kame sleeps straight through his alarm and wakes up late, which is unnerving because it’s unlike him; he has too much work to be able to afford sleeping in. His head feels heavy and slow with the loose feelings of a dream he doesn’t remember, so Kame washes his face with cold water and forces his brain to wake up, only vaguely wondering how his right hand stays warm even under the chilly water. Kame’s usually not up for much thinking before his third coffee. He showers and dresses and decides to get some down the street because he is going to be late. Kame stuffs his wallet and his keys in his bag and doesn’t spare a thought to the painting waiting in the room he uses as his studio before he leaves.
Kame has a busy weekend. A lecture to give, a visit to an exhibition for which he restored some paintings and a special invitation to the party afterwards on Saturday; on Sunday there’s buying new materials, the monthly lunch with his parents and dinner with Koki and some drinks later, and maybe he does get a little or a lot drunk despite his best efforts, and when he collapses face first on his bed on the early hours of Monday Kame doesn’t even remember he has a portrait to work on.
#
The glasses were light in his hands and they felt almost frail between his fingers. The frame, round and thin, shone golden under the bright sun of winter. Tokyo had changed all around them, factories and railroads, modernization and dark smoke, but Ueno Park was far from the industrialization advances and the noise couldn’t quite penetrate through the barrier of trees. In their little corner not even indiscreet glances could find them, and Kazuya felt safe and warm despite the cold weather. He put on the glasses, and the firm chest he was resting against rumbled with laughter.
“You can keep them, if you like them that much. You know I don’t need them to see.”
“Showoff,” Kazuya grumbled, but he smiled despite himself when the vibrations of the deep laughter sent shivers through his own back.
He took the glasses off and twisted them in his fingers; the sun had warmed the metal frame. He had seen himself in the mirror while wearing them, and he looked a bit funny and mostly stupid. There was a French name engraved on the inside of their bridge. Kazuya couldn’t read it.
“I like how they look on you better, anyways.”
Kazuya didn’t let go of the glasses though, and merely shifted a bit to get more comfortable as paint stained fingers joined his and the too long sleeves of a French blazer came to rest on his lap. Outside their small island in time, Tokyo kept changing.
#
Restoring a painting is a long process. Kazuya spends the following week bent over his working table, half frozen with his window open to let out the vapors and a medical mask that has more to do with the chemicals than with avoiding a cold. He dabs the cotton pads on the products and rubs them softly over the painting, carefully checking them every few minutes to make sure the paint is not lifting off. He starts on the bottom borders and slowly works his way up, working on the individual elements of the darkened landscape but leaving the central figure for the end.
Kame’s back aches from the long hours bent over his table and his eyes itch and water from the careful inspection of every square inch he cleans. It is time consuming and tiring, and Kame needs breaks to let the room ventilate properly and rest his sight. There are other obligations to attend to: food and sleep, lectures to give or attend, or customers with doubts to answer. The winter days are short and cold and it turns dark inside his studio way too soon, and cold enough that his hands get numb despite his best efforts to keep warm; he can’t really close the window because the chemicals require good ventilation and he can’t open the door instead because the fumes would spread through the house.
It takes Kame the whole week to finish removing the dirt from most of the portrait, and he’s confident he can finish with the figure over the weekend. For now he goes to sleep, because even though he hasn’t been working overnight he always feels tired in the morning, like he hasn’t slept enough. Kame suspects it has something to do with the dreams he knows he keeps having, if only because they cling to his mind and make it slow and fuzzy in the morning and leave him feeling strange. He can't be sure though as he can never remember them anyways.
#
1881 rolled by slowly, bringing small changes to Tokyo and Japan. Kazuya didn’t know how it happened, but somehow he started meeting Jin more often, between his studies and his duties accompanying his oldest uncle. Jin didn’t study, at least not like Kazuya did. Kazuya was expected to enroll in Law studies when he turned eighteen, but Jin, even though he had reached that age already, only painted. He could speak English and French, though, and he helped Kazuya learn even though Kazuya was terrible at them.
Kazuya was born in Nagoya as the son of a Shizoku retainer and even though Edo was Tokyo by the time he was adopted by his uncle and moved there, Kazuya sometimes missed Edo and how things were back then, if only for the way his uncles spoke about it. Jin was born in Edo, the son of a merchant, but he liked Tokyo better. Jin liked all things new better: the factories and the trains and the American ships in their harbors, the foreigners with their clothes and their cigarettes and their alcohol and their art. Kazuya didn’t like the smell of the cigarettes, but he didn’t stop Jin from smoking anyway because Jin looked beautiful when he did, long, slender fingers holding the half burnt stick with an air of elegant decadence. Sometimes Kazuya thought being around Jin was getting to him, because he didn’t remember ever using “elegant decadence” to describe anything before. Kazuya didn’t have an artistic brain like Jin.
Jin took Kazuya to Tokyo’s National Museum, and to Ueno Park to see where the zoo would open the following year. He took Kazuya to the harbors where the American ships docked and unloaded their cargo. Jin talked to the sailors in loud, confident English, and sometimes they offered him loose cigarettes or half finished bottles of imported alcohol if they found him amusing. He took Kazuya to the western style cafés where his foreign friends met to drink dark coffee and liquors and smoke while discussing the latest trends in art and literature a continent away.
In exchange Kazuya took Jin to tea houses and made him attend traditional tea ceremonies dressed in a kimono, laughing at him when Jin proved useless at dressing himself in the traditional clothes or walking without tripping over his own feet. Kazuya took Jin to samisen performances and kabuki and noh plays, and made him read Genji monogatari and recompilations of tanka. He made Jin dress in an elegant kimono too when his uncle Katsuhiko insisted on meeting the young man his adoptive son was spending so much time with, because Jin looked so much bigger and more beautiful in the kimono, and Jin was so nervous he even forgot how uncomfortable the clothes made him feel.
Most of the times, though, Kazuya and Jin didn’t go anywhere and spent the gentle spring afternoons in the garden of Kazuya’s uncle’s house with their bare feet stretched out in the sun and cups of cooling tea waiting on a wooden tray. Kazuya rested his head on Jin’s lap to study and Jin drew in a black moleskine notebooks sketches of birds and flowers and the patterns of light through the tree leaves and sometimes, when Jin thought he wasn’t looking, pictures of Kazuya too.
#
Kame forgets Uchi is moving on Saturday, and when Uchi calls him in the morning to remind Kame that he had promised to help, Kame drowns a disappointed groan into his pillow and rubs his eyes to chase away the weak prodding of images of light through green leaves and the sound of a worn out pencil softly scratching over paper, the only remains of a dream that was making him feel warm and peaceful. He showers and dresses in a rush and promises himself to work on the portrait after all the moving is done.
Moving is grueling and all of Kame’s muscles are screaming in protest within hours, which prompts much teasing about his weak artist physique, even though Kame can still beat them all with a baseball bat. The morning is wasted with finishing off putting away into boxes the things that Uchi was too lazy to do himself and Koki insists they can’t miss lunch; Kame doesn’t complain because at least it means they can force Uchi to treat them all to hot ramen in the restaurant down the street in exchange for their - almost - altruistic help.
By the time they’re done loading the heavy boxes into the rented truck and settled them in Uchi’s new apartment it’s already late in the afternoon, Kame’s sweaty and exhausted and his arms and back hurt with the mere thought of more work. When Uchi suggests that he stay the night as the first guest of honor Kame doesn’t complain and searches for the box with Uchi’s spare futon while Uchi shoos the rest of their friends away under claims of Kame being special and better than them.
#
Jin liked to draw outside, at the park or the riverside or a calm street in the suburbs where the essence of Edo still persisted, because it helped him to see how light affected the objects in real life. Kazuya didn’t mind accompanying him because he liked to watch Jin paint. He helped Jin carry his small canvas, his watercolors and oil paints and his palette, and he bought them kakigoori when it was warm. Jin painted and Kazuya read or watched him and sometimes he just napped for a while, and woke up to a light tickling on his cheek, the sticky feeling of drying paint and Jin grinning widely at him with his paintbrush and palette badly disguised behind his back, looking more like he was still seventeen rather than over ten years older now, his floppy bowtie still askew.
Those were Kazuya’s favorite days.
#
“Well, what do you think?”
Koki scratches at the back of his head, obviously uncomfortable with the situation, and his eyes shift from Kame to the portrait and to Kame again for the fifth time. “Well… It does look a bit like you…?”
“A bit?” Kame deadpans, and Koki swallows nervously. “It’s my spitting image! That guy is me!”
“He can’t be you. You weren’t alive in the 19th century so how can it possibly be you…” A warning glare from Kame is all it takes for Koki to remember the important issue at hand - which would be his physical safety and right now that depends on not upsetting Kame more than he already is - Kame has a tendency to go slightly murderous when he thinks his friends are not being serious enough about the things he thinks are grave. “Are you sure the portrait is legit? Maybe someone’s trying to pull a prank on you.”
“It was tested. The frame and a piece of linen from the canvas where tested and both seemed to be from the last decades of the 19th century. I have taken new samples of the linen and the varnish covering the paint and sent them to a friend in a laboratory, but the results will take nearly two weeks because he has to do it unofficially or he’ll get in trouble.”
Koki nods slowly and looks at the portrait again. The surface dirt has been completely removed and even though the old varnish, turned yellow by time and bad storage, still blemishes the painting, at least the figure can be seen now. A young man sits against a tree, dressed in a grey yukata with his legs folded neatly to the side; on his lap rests a thick, leather bound book, and over the book hovers a pale hand that holds something Koki can’t quite discern yet. The other hand rests on the grass, fingers closed around a fan. The man wears a serious, circumspect expression that looks out of place in the relaxed atmosphere the painting seems to convey, a little bit awkward and uncomfortable.
“What are you going to do about it?” Koki asks, and Kame sighs tiredly.
“I need to keep working on it. If it turns out to be real and I leave it for two weeks I won’t have time to get it all done in time for the exhibition.”
Koki nods again and pats Kame’s shoulder. “Good luck with that. Let me know when the results are out.”
Kame promises he will, even though a nagging feeling inside him tells him they’ll only prove the portrait is, indeed, real. It doesn’t stop him from feeling queasy and on edge all the time.
#
Jin promised to send letters from Paris, and he stuck to his word at first. He sent Kazuya thick envelopes filled with his messy handwriting, sometimes in Japanese and sometimes in French or in English or in an awkward mix of the three that took Kazuya hours to decipher. He told Kazuya about the studio where he studied painting, about how beautiful Paris was, about the magnificent paintings and sculptures in the Louvre, about the wide avenues and the parks and the cafés, about the people and the food, the theatre plays and the ballet and the operas and so many things Kazuya felt dizzy reading about them. Sometimes the letters came with pencil sketches of Notre-Dame, of the Louvre and its sculptures, of the Bastille and the Arc de Triomphe and the Panthéon and all the places Kazuya had read about in his French books. When Jin was feeling nostalgic he sent Kazuya the pencil portraits he had drawn of him from memory, and once, at Kazuya’s request, a self-portrait done with watercolors.
France was a faraway place, and the letters took weeks to arrive in the transoceanic ships. Kazuya always made sure to reply to them right away so he could send them the next day, hoping they’d reach Jin as soon as possible. He told Jin about his studies and all the free time he had with Jin away, about helping his adoptive father Katsuhiko with his job and going to the foreigner’s parties with his uncle Goro. He told Jin about Tokyo and how it was changing, about Ueno Park and the beautiful animals at the zoo, about the new railway stations and whatever else he could think of. He drew some of the animals at the new zoo for Jin, even though his drawings were terrible and Jin always made fun of them.
On one occasion Jin surprised Kazuya by sending him a photograph which showed Jin with a few other boys of his age. One of them, from what Jin had written on the back, was Japanese too. Kazuya spent hours looking at the black and white photograph, at Jin’s figure dressed in his usual western clothes, all up to date with French fashion, at the bowler hat that obscured his eyes and the dark hint of a moustache over his grinning lips. Kazuya bought a frame for the photograph and placed it on the low table in his bedroom.
Eight years, however, was a long time, and Jin’s attention span had never been the best. At some point after the first two years, the letters stopped arriving.
#
The results take a week and a half, and they confirm what Kame already suspected. The portrait dates from the late 19th century; the frame, the canvas and the varnish all give dates within the last decade of the century. The results do nothing to placate Kame’s uneasiness. Koki suggests maybe the man in the portrait is one of Kame’s ancestors, but it’d have to be Kame’s great grandfather, and the documents concerning Kame’s family were lost in a fire during the Kanto Earthquake in 1923, so he has no way to check who the man could be. He thinks about asking his father, but his grandfather died when his father was still young, and the family stories were never passed along.
He tries to convince himself that it doesn’t matter because work’s work after all and he has to get the portrait ready anyway. It becomes something personal, though, like he owes something to the man in the portrait, whoever he is. Kame also feels like the portrait may be linked to his dreams. He knows he keeps having them every night, even though he can never remember anything beyond the feelings: the caress of soft hands, a deep laugh, the warmth of spring’s sun and the intoxicating fragrance of blooming flowers, a deep kiss or an aching longing. Faces and names are lost in the moments between dreams and awareness, even if Kame tries to cling to them as he feels the last seconds of the dream slipping away in time with the loud alarm of his phone.
#
Kazuya was an awful subject to paint. The moment he realized Jin was trying to draw him in his notebook, he became tense and restless, and he squirmed and tried to peek at Jin’s sketch. When Jin asked him to pose, he was so stiff and serious Jin feared Kazuya was going to give him a lecture on being a responsible adult, like he did when they were teenagers and Jin used to insist that Kazuya skip his lessons to go somewhere together. When Jin asked him to smile Kazuya’s beautiful grin turned into an awkward grimace that made Jin sigh in exasperation and wave his hands in frustration at Kazuya, who only pouted at him.
Jin still had notebooks full of sketches of Kazuya, though, pencil and sometimes watercolor, all with dates scrawled on top of them that together spanned almost twenty years. Kazuya eating, sleeping, laughing, talking, studying, pouting, frowning or raising his eyebrows at something Jin had said. Kazuya in the harbor looking at the ships, Kazuya in the zoo feeding the goats, in the park napping on the grass, sitting on his calves with his back straight during a tea ceremony, riding his mare along the riverbank and playing baseball, the only western habit he enjoyed more than Jin did. Some of them were drawn when Kazuya was too busy or relaxed to realize he was being used as a subject, and some were drawn from memory. Kazuya with his eyes closed in ecstasy, Kazuya moaning in pleasure, coming undone with his sweaty dark hair stuck on his forehead, Kazuya asleep on the bed, naked and elegant and flawless under Jin’s gaze.
Kazuya was an awful subject to paint, but he was still Jin’s favorite subject anyway.
#
The portrait looks better once the old, yellowed varnish has been removed. The soft colors and the beautiful reflections of light on the grass and through the trees and the distant pond in the background, all rendered perfectly into immortality by careful eyes and expert hands, suggest it belongs to the school of Impressionism. Kame follows the thick traces of the short, visible paintbrush strokes that the impasto leaves with well trained eyes that cannot help but stop where the layers of varnish and paint have cracked and fallen, revealing the gesso that covers the canvas under them.
Despite the deteriorated state, the portrait is beautiful. Static as it is, the scene is alive with movement in a special way; the patches of light that fall through the thick foliage of the trees seem to dance on the grass and the dark clothes of the seated man, who directs a sad look to the viewer. The shadows and the bright reflections on the pond reveal to the wondering eye a soft summer afternoon. Heat is suggested by the fan resting on the grass but mitigated by the fresh greenness of the forest. Even in the middle of winter, in his cold studio that is always filled with the stench of chemicals and paint, Kame can feel the warmth of the hidden sun and smell the fragrance of the forest that a refreshing breeze carries, barely noticeable in the way some grass strands shift gently or the way the dark hair of the man falls around his neck.
Kame stares at the portrait for hours and he barely feels the freezing mid-February wind that slips through his open window. It’s not difficult for him to get lost in art, but this painting wrenches at something deep inside him in a way Kame doesn’t remember any other work doing. He feels attracted to it, and not only because the subject looks just like him. It’s something that makes him feel like the warmth is real, the sun and breeze and the soft brush of the grass against his skin and the soothing sounds of the pond behind him until he forgets for a moment that it’s not him but the man in the portrait that would have felt those things.
He marvels at the portrait in such a way that he loses track of the hours ticking away, and by the time he comes to his senses again it’s evening already and his eyes hurt from squinting at the painting in the dim light. Kame sighs and rubs his tired eyes in frustration. There’s not light enough to continue restoring the painting anymore today.
#
Most of the people in the building were dressed in elegant western suits: dark, long coats over waistcoats and white shirts with white or black neckties for the men, and beautiful dresses for the women, who concealed their bare shoulders from the newly creeping chill of the end of October with fur shawls and wore gloves up to their elbows. Kazuya felt self conscious in the middle of it, dressed in his most elegant kimono and walking stiffly between the groups of people discussing the exhibited artworks. There were not many Japanese people, and those who were in attendance were not of the type who would wear traditional clothes anymore.
His uncle Goro had disappeared to meet some friends almost as soon as they were admitted into the gallery, where the artworks of what the pamphlet called “The Promise of New Japanese Artists” were hung on the walls. Kazuya followed his adoptive father through the room, distractedly gazing at landscapes and parks, ballerinas and waitresses and children playing on the beach, monuments and friends sharing a brief meal in the countryside, women holding white umbrellas to hide from the early summer sun taking a stroll amidst a sea of green, tall grass. Kazuya’s eyes slid over each painting while he tried to remember what little he knew about the latest conventions of western art, though he looked down in embarrassment when he came across the few pictures of naked women, cheeks dark with blush.
He was trying to rush away from those pictures when he found himself face to face with a big canvas, well over a meter in both width and height. It was a scene out of some countryside town, not unlike many of the others exhibited in the same room, but something in it pulled Kazuya in immediately. In the distance a wide, clear river formed a lazy curve around a small town of stout stone houses, so tiny it was almost a blur of color in which the only discernible feature was the belfry that shot straight up to the sky from in between the cluster of houses. In the foreground a field had been furnished with long tables with plenty of food and drinks and white tents to create a shelter from the sun; small, triangular flags of bright colors hung on invisible strings between the sparse trees, and in a corner a small group of musicians contributed to the festive feeling. There were people in groups and pairs, dancing and laughing and talking, drinking and eating outside the tents to bask in the gentle mid-afternoon sun of spring; women with light dresses and colorful ribbons and men with hats of yellow straw.
In the centre of the composition two children played together. A brunette boy dressed in a white suit and holding his hat in his hand chased someone who could possibly be his sister, a girl his age in a baby blue dress who held onto the skirt as she ran away from her persecutor. The tails of the navy blue ribbon around her boater hat floated behind her along with her red hair, shining beautifully under the bright sun. The painting was not focused on them, nor were they depicted up close; they were just two children playing in the middle of a crowd, yet the eye, maybe teased and drawn by the sudden shock of fiery orange amidst the soft green of the grass and the pale colors of the dresses, focused on them naturally and so insistently they became impossible to ignore. Kazuya took a few steps back to admire the painting better, taking in the short and thick paintbrush strokes, the bright colors contrasting with each other and the soft ends and general blur of the whole scene, that however only made it seem more real as the brain completed what the eyes could only guess.
Kazuya found himself almost drawn into the painting, to the point that he could feel the warmth of the spring afternoon and hear the music the tiny orchestra was playing and the shrill laughs of the children in the cacophony of instruments and cheerful chattering. He could feel the breeze that made the flags flutter and twist and the sun slowly moving to settle beyond the river and the moist soil sinking slightly under his shoes. Kazuya closed his eyes and he could almost physically feel himself standing in the meadow, another man in the partying crowd while in a corner someone brought them to life in a different way. His mind filled in the wide smiles of the children, even though it was impossible for his sight to take on the minute detail.
Kazuya searched for the small tag next to the painting, where the title, the artist name, the size and the technique of the artwork were specified. In accordance to the exhibition theme, the young artists returned from abroad, the information was written in English and French, though there were tiny kanji printed under each line. Kazuya ignored both technique and size and paused on the title. The stylized font read “Un dimanche de printemps”, promptly translated to “A Spring Sunday” and to Japanese under them. Kazuya looked a bit higher to check the artist, coming upon the Japanese text first. Akanishi, the engraved black kanji read, and Kazuya felt a flutter of hope light up inside him, only to die in an instant as he took in the given name. Shinobu. He didn’t know anyone named Akanishi Shinobu. The name used the same kanji, but the furigana written above it crushed Kazuya’s barely rising hope with the same finality of a falling rock. He looked at the wonderful painting again, but part of its former cheerfulness was somehow lost to him now.
“Do you like it?” The voice was deep and rich, familiar in a strange way.
“It’s really beautiful,” Kazuya said, but he couldn’t tear his eyes from the painting to look at the man who had spoken.
“Well, thank you.”
It took moment for Kazuya to realize the implications of the simple answer, as engrossed as he was in the painting. He spun around on his heels, eager to meet the author of the piece that had enchanted him so much, and as he finally saw the man’s face he felt the world stopping around him. His own gasp reached his ears with a certain delay, as if even the sound waves had frozen along with his body, and certainly he couldn’t hear the animated chatter that had been filling the room until a moment ago. Kazuya could not even see anything beyond the smiling face in front of him; in the same way his eyes had kept instinctively going back to the bright blotch of orange and red that was the little girl’s hair, his senses too were focused on the man to the point Kazuya could not notice anything other than him, a presence so enticing it was impossible to ignore.
Eight years was a long time, yet Jin hadn’t changed much at all. He had grown taller, his face had gotten softer around the edges, a bit more round and gentle and he was sporting an ugly half grown moustache, but his grin was as bright as ever, his eyes shone with the same energy has they had always had, even if now it was behind the lenses of thin framed, round golden glasses. He was dressed in a western suit and as usual his tie was askew, but Kazuya restrained himself from fixing it as he had gotten used to and instead played with the old turtle netsuke on his obi that he had only kept because Jin had found it cute almost ten years ago.
“Jin,” Kazuya breathed, and somehow that was enough to break the spell that had fallen over them. Jin was no longer smiling widely with confidence, but squirming nervously as if he didn’t even dare to look Kazuya in the eye. “Is this your painting?”
“Yeah. I’m happy you think it’s beautiful.”
“Did they make a mistake with your name?”
“Hmm?” Jin looked confused for a moment, like he didn’t remember what Kazuya was talking about. He followed Kazuya’s tiny nod toward the bronze plaque next to the painting and his eyes lit up in understanding. “Oh, no. That’s my artist name,” he said, like having a pseudonym was something to be proud of, like it made him important.
Kazuya blinked. “But it’s just another reading of your kanji.”
“Don’t tell anyone,” Jin whispered as he leaned in a bit, and Kazuya suddenly felt a bit hotter around the neck, “but it’s just to confuse all the foreigners.”
Kazuya laughed, and quickly placed his hand over his mouth to muffle the sound. Jin joined him a beat later and with it the awkwardness was suddenly forgotten, eight years of distance closed and put behind them with a simple shared laugh. When Kazuya recovered Jin was looking at him with a wide smile and the next moment Jin’s arms were around Kazuya’s shoulders and he was pulling Kazuya into a bone-crushing hug that squeezed all the air out of Kazuya’s lungs and made him blush so dark it looked like Jin had painted his cheeks crimson.
“I missed you,” Jin whispered in his ear, and for the first time Kazuya was grateful that most of the public in attendance were foreigners, because at least it meant no one was as much as giving them a second look. He brought his arms to Jin’s back and clutched his dark coat, and allowed himself to breathe deeply in Jin’s French cologne and soak up Jin’s closeness for the first time in almost a decade.
“Kazuya,” Katsuhiko called his adoptive son with a stern voice and the two young men quickly jumped apart from each other, both their hearts beating madly at the sudden interruption, as if somehow what had been broken was an intimate moment and not something that was happening in the middle of a public art exhibition. Katsuhiko, already a tall man by nature, looked imposing in a dark kimono with his graying hair tied back in a small knot. “What are you doing?”
“Ah, Father…” Kazuya bowed, stiff and suddenly uncomfortable, and from the corner of his eye he caught Jin squirming nervously. “This is Akanishi-kun. You may not remember him but…”
“That painter boy you used to spend so much time with?”
“Yes, Father.” Kazuya looked down to hide a wince at how tiny his voice had sounded.
Katsuhiko’s tone had not been condemning, but it hadn’t been approving either; he was a business man who had never seen much use in art, and the little he bothered to consider was Japanese art, prints made with woodblocks, portraits of samurai warriors and geishas and views of Mt. Fuji and the sea. Jin seemed to shrink into himself when the man’s eyes fell on him, but Katsuhiko only gave a curt nod.
“It’s good to see the youth of Japan making an impression in the West.” Jin bowed to his waist silently, probably too nervous to trust his own voice, and Katsuhiko turned toward his adoptive son again. “I suppose you have a lot to talk about. You’re dismissed to go with him, as long as you’re home at a reasonable time.”
Kazuya nodded his thanks and finally breathed again as his adoptive father walked away, probably in search of his brother Goro. He started when he felt a hand grab his, but only laughed as Jin started tugging him toward the exit.
“I have so many things to tell you!” Jin blurted out as soon as they were outside, though he didn’t let go of Kazuya’s hand and continued to pull him down the street.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Let’s find a teahouse so we can talk.”
“A teahouse? What is this, Akanishi Jin voluntarily going to a teahouse! What has France done to you?!”
Jin laughed loudly and squeezed Kazuya’s hand. “What do you know, I actually miss the taste of home.”
October’s evenings were already cold, but Kazuya’s hand tingled with a special kind of warmth like it had done one winter evening nine years ago.
#
Restoring a painting is a long process. Kame has already removed the dirt and the old, yellow varnish, but there’s so much more to do. The paint has quaked and left a million thin cracks and the primer, a mix of chemical products named gesso that was applied in several layers over the canvas, each smoothed until the surface is ready to be painted on, is visible. In some points even the gesso has fallen off, and there are whole bits of painting missing on the pond and the little gaps between the tree leaves; what Kame had thought to be patches of light revealed themselves as white primer and even linen under a more careful inspection.
This is the most difficult part of the restoration, the most time consuming. Kame has to fill in the cracks with new layers of gesso and smooth them out before selecting a palette of colors similar to the ones originally used to retouch the portrait. It will take him weeks, because he has to be careful about the colors and keep as close as possible to the original style while filling in the bits that are missing, and then he will have to wait at least two weeks before everything’s dry enough to be exhibited, but February is already a week away from its end and the exposition is scheduled to open the second week of April.
Kame yawns widely and checks his watch. Its only 15 pm, and he still has a couple of hours before it gets too dark to continue working. Maybe he can even finish cleaning the cracks today.
#
”Why don’t you sit over there to read?” Jin waved to a spot in the shadows behind some trees and Kazuya eyed him suspiciously, but obeyed anyway. He stole Jin’s glasses as he went to settle down.
“And what are you going to paint?” Kazuya watched as Jin set up his easel and placed the already prepared canvas on it; Kazuya had had no idea canvases needed to be prepared before Jin had told him, he had always thought one just painted directly on the fabric. Jin had laughed at him, but Kazuya was past feeling offended by now because Jin never meant any harm. “There’s nothing interesting here.”
“Well,” Jin smiled as he squeezed bits of paint from the tubes onto his palette; they were his French tubes and there wasn’t much left. Jin treasured them so whatever he was going to paint had to be important to him. “There’s you.”
“What?!” The effect was immediate. Kazuya stiffened and a frown settled on his until then calm expression. “Can’t you paint something else? The flowers?”
Jin sighed. “I want to have a decent portrait of you, okay? You just read or something, distract yourself. We can chat if you want.”
“But Jin,” Kazuya whined. It was not often that Kazuya allowed himself to be childish like that, especially not since Katsuhiko had died two years ago, but when he was with Jin he felt it was okay to let go. Jin was much more of a kid than him anyways. “You know I can’t pose!”
“That’s why I’m not asking you to pose. Just be natural! I hate posing subjects. Read or talk with me or even just nap a bit, relax. And don’t frown like that; I can’t do justice to your beautiful face if you’re frowning like that.”
“You’re not going to convince me with flattery, you know.”
“Please? Pretty please?” Jin’s grin was wide despite the pout he was trying to direct at Kazuya. “S’il-vous plaît?”
The French finally managed to erase Kazuya’s frown. He thought about his late adoptive father Katsuhiko, who had died two years ago of pneumonia; he thought about his family and his role, about the weight of society and their expectations and the end of the summer, feeling so distant when they were bantering and laughing under its warm sun but approaching so fast, and he just couldn’t say no.
“You better make me look good.”
#
The portrait becomes the centre of Kame’s attention. It’s all he can think about when he wakes up in the morning, during his rushed breakfast, while he goes about his other obligations. Eventually Kame starts ignoring any work that’s not on the portrait - only because the deadline’s so close, he tells himself, and he doesn’t make much of it when he starts skipping meals and missing calls even when his phone is not on silent mode because it’s just normal to get pulled into it when the job is as interesting as this one.
The dreams keep coming every night too, and every morning Kame wakes up with his head full of scattered images and feelings belonging to people whose names and faces he can never remember. It’s tiring, because he wakes up feeling like he hasn’t slept at all and he spends the rest of the day feeling tired and sleepy. He tries to take short naps whenever he can, but as the portrait takes more and more of his attention they become shorter and fewer, and even then the dreams come. The more he works on the portrait, the longer and more intense the dreams feel, and Kame can’t bring himself to do anything about them because he feels that somehow, even if he can’t remember almost anything about them, they bring him closer to the meaning of the painting and the sad-looking man in it.
#
Jin talked about Paris for months on end. He talked about everything he had told Kazuya about in his letters, and about learning with the maîtres there, about the friends he made, about trips to England and Spain, and the beauty of Barcelona and how the Sagrada Familia was going to be the greatest temple ever once it was finished. He told Kazuya about meeting Monet and Renoir and said their names with a reverence Kazuya usually associated with the great heroes of the past.
Jin talked for days and weeks and months and Kazuya listened with polite interest until Jin had nothing else to say. Kazuya filled in the silence with a few stories of his own, about finishing his Law studies and receiving more responsibilities and helping his adoptive father and whatever anecdotes he could think about. When New Year came Jin and Kazuya went together to the temple in the early hours of the morning. They prayed and sat on the stone steps to enjoy the silence of the night, until Kazuya realized Jin had been staring at him.
“I missed you,” Jin blurted out and before Kazuya could say anything in return Jin was leaning forward to kiss him, clumsy and bold and warm against the winter cold. Kazuya tensed and gasped but Jin’s hands were urgently clutching at his kimono, pulling Kazuya closer against his own body.
“I love you,“ Jin whispered, and Kazuya felt warmer than he had in eight years.
Part 2
Pairing: Jin / Kame
Word count: 14.541
Rating: PG-15
Warnings: Two timelines - text in italics are scenes placed in the past and they jump around in time, and even though I tried to include dates or reference points for most of them maybe it gets a bit confusing at times. I tried to be as accurate with research as possible, but there may be some mistakes? Mentions of Kanto Great Earthquake in 1923 in case that’s a tw for some… Maybe implied character death that’s really just suggested? Lots of art talk (no really, lots of it) that I can only hope it’s accurate enough. Possibly misspelled French.
Notes: I tried to do my best with the research for this, down to the existence (or actually the non-existence) of color pencils for artistic use in the 19th century (there were color pencils, but aimed for utilitarian purposes; the first color pencils designed for artistic use were commercialized around the 1920s, in case anyone cared). Moleskines didn’t exist per se back then because the modern brand only appeared in 1968, but as it fashioned after those used in the 19th century by artists of any kind, I think it’s easier for everyone if we just call them Moleskines. Homosexuality was illegalized in Japan in 1873 but it was legalized again in 1880 so the previous law does not affect the past story, which takes place roughly between 1881 and 1923 in case the dates are confusing. Some cultural terms have Wikipedia links because I couldn’t find a way to fit their explanation in the story. The Kiyoteru/Seiki Jin mentions was an actual Japanese painter, Kuroda Seiki, whose life I have taken as a general guideline to base Jin’s life on even though his living dates are actually Kazuya’s. Monet and Renoir are, obviously, real painters too.
The title means “Dreams of the heart”, and the cut text “The heart lies in Art”; they’re both in Latin. Second cut text is Japanese because I had a sudden change of heart, and it means “the end of summer”.
betaed by the loveliest bellemainec and Carly, with a lot of hand holding an advice from mirokkuma and cease11! Written for ___clash during 2012's kizuna_exchange
Summary: Art restorer Kamenashi Kazuya starts working on a portrait, and dreams a dream that was once real.
The painting is, if Kame has to bet on it, a portrait. The reduced size at least seems to suggest that, even though it’s not possible to tell much more. The canvas has deteriorated due to time and possibly bad storage, the colors darkened until the figure depicted is but a shapeless shadow barely discernible from the background. The only part of the painting that has somehow received a gentler treatment is the frame, and Kame suspects it has been cleaned only recently, in order to conduct the tests that have set its date as belonging to the late 19th century. Kame sighs and turns toward the man who brought the painting to his studio. The owner’s brother, from what Kame has understood.
“When do you need it ready?”
“I think my brother was planning to open the exposition in a couple of months, if it can be done by then. We’re aware it’s in pretty bad condition…”
“Where was it stored?”
“We found it in the attic of a family property… Probably had been there for a while,” the young man rubs the back of his head sheepishly and Kame sighs again.
“I’ll see what I can do about it.”
The young man thanks him and shakes Kame’s hand before leaving. It’s already late afternoon and shadows are starting to claim his tiny, cramped studio, but Kame turns his gaze toward the mistreated painting. Despite not being very big, it’s in a terrible state, and he’s going to be pressed for time if he has to have it ready in just a couple of months. He is not planning to work for much longer today anyway, but maybe he could start to clear the humidity marks away to get a better view of the whole thing, or even just enough to check the brush strokes to get a better idea of what he’s going to work with. The canvas is not torn so at least he doesn’t need to face and re-line the painting; even though this one was small in size, removing the frame and then using the stretcher and gluing the new fabric was always such a troublesome process, and it’d take him hours.
Kame brings out his camera to take a few pictures of the painting for later comparison and starts cleaning his work table. When he opens the window it’s already chilly outside and he has probably a few hours of natural light left, so he doesn’t waste any time getting his surgical gloves and preparing the chemicals to wipe away the layer of dirt that obscures the drawing. He’ll just do this bit, Kame tells himself, and then he’ll leave it for tomorrow…
Of course, Kame ends up working late into the night.
#
The hooves of the horses barely made a noise on the moist earth of the riverbank, so it was not until they were called that the group of men congregated by the shore turned to face the newcomers. It was a miscellaneous group of foreigners and Japanese men, all surrounding a younger man that was holding a color palette. He couldn’t be much older than seventeen. Like those surrounding him he was dressed in western clothes that contrasted with the kimono one of the riders was wearing. He observed them carefully as they dismounted from their horses.
“Kamenashi-san! Such a nice surprise to see you finally decided to attend our little meeting!” It was one of the foreign men who spoke, loudly and in terribly accented Japanese. “You must introduce us to your companion! Is he the nephew you’ve been talking about?”
“His name is Kazuya. He’s my oldest brother’s heir.”
“Nice to meet you.”
Kazuya’s English was heavily accented, but even the simple phrase got him loud cheers from the foreigners and a couple of strong pats on the back. As the heir of the family business he was expected to learn the language and maintain good relationships with the foreign workers employed by the Meiji government even if they made him uncomfortable. They made his uncle Katsuhiko uncomfortable too, with their loud voices and different manners. Kazuya felt self conscious in his kimono, when even his uncle Goro was dressed in western clothes. Katsuhiko, his adoptive father, didn’t approve of them, but his uncle Goro insisted that it was a time of change and modernization.
“How old are you, Kazuya-kun?”
“I turned sixteen a week ago, sir.” He was glad they had switched back to Japanese at least; being required to learn English didn’t make him any good at speaking it.
“You’re almost the same age as Jin-kun here!” Kazuya found himself being pushed towards the man with the color palette, who looked at him from under the fringe of his unruly black hair; Kazuya’s own was pulled tightly into a ponytail. He was wearing a grey waistcoat over a white shirt, but both were covered with paint stains. The chain of his pocket watch shone across his chest under the soft orange light of twilight. Jin’s bowtie was slightly askew, and Kazuya’s fingers itched with the need to correct it; instead he played with the turtle-shaped netsuke atop his obi.
“He’s a real talent, Jin is! Got nothing to envy from any western painter, I tell you. He’s hoping to be sent abroad to study next year, to the United States, or maybe France, to learn with the maîtres there. Show them what you can do, Jin!”
The young man flushed and shuffled away from the canvas embarrassedly. Over the linen the river was a sinuous snake of gray and golden, capricious jewels shining beautifully where the setting sun fell over the tumultuous waters. Across the river the black roofs of the former Edo houses were a wonder of light and shadow that stretched until they were nothing but a uniform field; at the very end, almost out of sight, rivulets of dark smoke rose towards the soft oranges and blues of the sky, the only hint of Japan’s sole rail line. It was the same sight Kazuya could see beyond the small canvas, a hundred times more beautiful and captured forever by the hands of a man whose cheeks were tinted red. Kazuya, whose uncle only had nihonga art at home, had never seen anything similar before.
“It’s beautiful,” he whispered, and Jin’s cheeks turned a few hues darker, as if the colors of his palette were seeping through his hands to his whole body. He looked down but later, when it was time to leave, he shook Kame’s hand with a shy smile.
The air was chilly as they rode back home, but Kame’s hand felt warm and tingled all through the night.
#
Kame sleeps straight through his alarm and wakes up late, which is unnerving because it’s unlike him; he has too much work to be able to afford sleeping in. His head feels heavy and slow with the loose feelings of a dream he doesn’t remember, so Kame washes his face with cold water and forces his brain to wake up, only vaguely wondering how his right hand stays warm even under the chilly water. Kame’s usually not up for much thinking before his third coffee. He showers and dresses and decides to get some down the street because he is going to be late. Kame stuffs his wallet and his keys in his bag and doesn’t spare a thought to the painting waiting in the room he uses as his studio before he leaves.
Kame has a busy weekend. A lecture to give, a visit to an exhibition for which he restored some paintings and a special invitation to the party afterwards on Saturday; on Sunday there’s buying new materials, the monthly lunch with his parents and dinner with Koki and some drinks later, and maybe he does get a little or a lot drunk despite his best efforts, and when he collapses face first on his bed on the early hours of Monday Kame doesn’t even remember he has a portrait to work on.
#
The glasses were light in his hands and they felt almost frail between his fingers. The frame, round and thin, shone golden under the bright sun of winter. Tokyo had changed all around them, factories and railroads, modernization and dark smoke, but Ueno Park was far from the industrialization advances and the noise couldn’t quite penetrate through the barrier of trees. In their little corner not even indiscreet glances could find them, and Kazuya felt safe and warm despite the cold weather. He put on the glasses, and the firm chest he was resting against rumbled with laughter.
“You can keep them, if you like them that much. You know I don’t need them to see.”
“Showoff,” Kazuya grumbled, but he smiled despite himself when the vibrations of the deep laughter sent shivers through his own back.
He took the glasses off and twisted them in his fingers; the sun had warmed the metal frame. He had seen himself in the mirror while wearing them, and he looked a bit funny and mostly stupid. There was a French name engraved on the inside of their bridge. Kazuya couldn’t read it.
“I like how they look on you better, anyways.”
Kazuya didn’t let go of the glasses though, and merely shifted a bit to get more comfortable as paint stained fingers joined his and the too long sleeves of a French blazer came to rest on his lap. Outside their small island in time, Tokyo kept changing.
#
Restoring a painting is a long process. Kazuya spends the following week bent over his working table, half frozen with his window open to let out the vapors and a medical mask that has more to do with the chemicals than with avoiding a cold. He dabs the cotton pads on the products and rubs them softly over the painting, carefully checking them every few minutes to make sure the paint is not lifting off. He starts on the bottom borders and slowly works his way up, working on the individual elements of the darkened landscape but leaving the central figure for the end.
Kame’s back aches from the long hours bent over his table and his eyes itch and water from the careful inspection of every square inch he cleans. It is time consuming and tiring, and Kame needs breaks to let the room ventilate properly and rest his sight. There are other obligations to attend to: food and sleep, lectures to give or attend, or customers with doubts to answer. The winter days are short and cold and it turns dark inside his studio way too soon, and cold enough that his hands get numb despite his best efforts to keep warm; he can’t really close the window because the chemicals require good ventilation and he can’t open the door instead because the fumes would spread through the house.
It takes Kame the whole week to finish removing the dirt from most of the portrait, and he’s confident he can finish with the figure over the weekend. For now he goes to sleep, because even though he hasn’t been working overnight he always feels tired in the morning, like he hasn’t slept enough. Kame suspects it has something to do with the dreams he knows he keeps having, if only because they cling to his mind and make it slow and fuzzy in the morning and leave him feeling strange. He can't be sure though as he can never remember them anyways.
#
1881 rolled by slowly, bringing small changes to Tokyo and Japan. Kazuya didn’t know how it happened, but somehow he started meeting Jin more often, between his studies and his duties accompanying his oldest uncle. Jin didn’t study, at least not like Kazuya did. Kazuya was expected to enroll in Law studies when he turned eighteen, but Jin, even though he had reached that age already, only painted. He could speak English and French, though, and he helped Kazuya learn even though Kazuya was terrible at them.
Kazuya was born in Nagoya as the son of a Shizoku retainer and even though Edo was Tokyo by the time he was adopted by his uncle and moved there, Kazuya sometimes missed Edo and how things were back then, if only for the way his uncles spoke about it. Jin was born in Edo, the son of a merchant, but he liked Tokyo better. Jin liked all things new better: the factories and the trains and the American ships in their harbors, the foreigners with their clothes and their cigarettes and their alcohol and their art. Kazuya didn’t like the smell of the cigarettes, but he didn’t stop Jin from smoking anyway because Jin looked beautiful when he did, long, slender fingers holding the half burnt stick with an air of elegant decadence. Sometimes Kazuya thought being around Jin was getting to him, because he didn’t remember ever using “elegant decadence” to describe anything before. Kazuya didn’t have an artistic brain like Jin.
Jin took Kazuya to Tokyo’s National Museum, and to Ueno Park to see where the zoo would open the following year. He took Kazuya to the harbors where the American ships docked and unloaded their cargo. Jin talked to the sailors in loud, confident English, and sometimes they offered him loose cigarettes or half finished bottles of imported alcohol if they found him amusing. He took Kazuya to the western style cafés where his foreign friends met to drink dark coffee and liquors and smoke while discussing the latest trends in art and literature a continent away.
In exchange Kazuya took Jin to tea houses and made him attend traditional tea ceremonies dressed in a kimono, laughing at him when Jin proved useless at dressing himself in the traditional clothes or walking without tripping over his own feet. Kazuya took Jin to samisen performances and kabuki and noh plays, and made him read Genji monogatari and recompilations of tanka. He made Jin dress in an elegant kimono too when his uncle Katsuhiko insisted on meeting the young man his adoptive son was spending so much time with, because Jin looked so much bigger and more beautiful in the kimono, and Jin was so nervous he even forgot how uncomfortable the clothes made him feel.
Most of the times, though, Kazuya and Jin didn’t go anywhere and spent the gentle spring afternoons in the garden of Kazuya’s uncle’s house with their bare feet stretched out in the sun and cups of cooling tea waiting on a wooden tray. Kazuya rested his head on Jin’s lap to study and Jin drew in a black moleskine notebooks sketches of birds and flowers and the patterns of light through the tree leaves and sometimes, when Jin thought he wasn’t looking, pictures of Kazuya too.
#
Kame forgets Uchi is moving on Saturday, and when Uchi calls him in the morning to remind Kame that he had promised to help, Kame drowns a disappointed groan into his pillow and rubs his eyes to chase away the weak prodding of images of light through green leaves and the sound of a worn out pencil softly scratching over paper, the only remains of a dream that was making him feel warm and peaceful. He showers and dresses in a rush and promises himself to work on the portrait after all the moving is done.
Moving is grueling and all of Kame’s muscles are screaming in protest within hours, which prompts much teasing about his weak artist physique, even though Kame can still beat them all with a baseball bat. The morning is wasted with finishing off putting away into boxes the things that Uchi was too lazy to do himself and Koki insists they can’t miss lunch; Kame doesn’t complain because at least it means they can force Uchi to treat them all to hot ramen in the restaurant down the street in exchange for their - almost - altruistic help.
By the time they’re done loading the heavy boxes into the rented truck and settled them in Uchi’s new apartment it’s already late in the afternoon, Kame’s sweaty and exhausted and his arms and back hurt with the mere thought of more work. When Uchi suggests that he stay the night as the first guest of honor Kame doesn’t complain and searches for the box with Uchi’s spare futon while Uchi shoos the rest of their friends away under claims of Kame being special and better than them.
#
Jin liked to draw outside, at the park or the riverside or a calm street in the suburbs where the essence of Edo still persisted, because it helped him to see how light affected the objects in real life. Kazuya didn’t mind accompanying him because he liked to watch Jin paint. He helped Jin carry his small canvas, his watercolors and oil paints and his palette, and he bought them kakigoori when it was warm. Jin painted and Kazuya read or watched him and sometimes he just napped for a while, and woke up to a light tickling on his cheek, the sticky feeling of drying paint and Jin grinning widely at him with his paintbrush and palette badly disguised behind his back, looking more like he was still seventeen rather than over ten years older now, his floppy bowtie still askew.
Those were Kazuya’s favorite days.
#
“Well, what do you think?”
Koki scratches at the back of his head, obviously uncomfortable with the situation, and his eyes shift from Kame to the portrait and to Kame again for the fifth time. “Well… It does look a bit like you…?”
“A bit?” Kame deadpans, and Koki swallows nervously. “It’s my spitting image! That guy is me!”
“He can’t be you. You weren’t alive in the 19th century so how can it possibly be you…” A warning glare from Kame is all it takes for Koki to remember the important issue at hand - which would be his physical safety and right now that depends on not upsetting Kame more than he already is - Kame has a tendency to go slightly murderous when he thinks his friends are not being serious enough about the things he thinks are grave. “Are you sure the portrait is legit? Maybe someone’s trying to pull a prank on you.”
“It was tested. The frame and a piece of linen from the canvas where tested and both seemed to be from the last decades of the 19th century. I have taken new samples of the linen and the varnish covering the paint and sent them to a friend in a laboratory, but the results will take nearly two weeks because he has to do it unofficially or he’ll get in trouble.”
Koki nods slowly and looks at the portrait again. The surface dirt has been completely removed and even though the old varnish, turned yellow by time and bad storage, still blemishes the painting, at least the figure can be seen now. A young man sits against a tree, dressed in a grey yukata with his legs folded neatly to the side; on his lap rests a thick, leather bound book, and over the book hovers a pale hand that holds something Koki can’t quite discern yet. The other hand rests on the grass, fingers closed around a fan. The man wears a serious, circumspect expression that looks out of place in the relaxed atmosphere the painting seems to convey, a little bit awkward and uncomfortable.
“What are you going to do about it?” Koki asks, and Kame sighs tiredly.
“I need to keep working on it. If it turns out to be real and I leave it for two weeks I won’t have time to get it all done in time for the exhibition.”
Koki nods again and pats Kame’s shoulder. “Good luck with that. Let me know when the results are out.”
Kame promises he will, even though a nagging feeling inside him tells him they’ll only prove the portrait is, indeed, real. It doesn’t stop him from feeling queasy and on edge all the time.
#
Jin promised to send letters from Paris, and he stuck to his word at first. He sent Kazuya thick envelopes filled with his messy handwriting, sometimes in Japanese and sometimes in French or in English or in an awkward mix of the three that took Kazuya hours to decipher. He told Kazuya about the studio where he studied painting, about how beautiful Paris was, about the magnificent paintings and sculptures in the Louvre, about the wide avenues and the parks and the cafés, about the people and the food, the theatre plays and the ballet and the operas and so many things Kazuya felt dizzy reading about them. Sometimes the letters came with pencil sketches of Notre-Dame, of the Louvre and its sculptures, of the Bastille and the Arc de Triomphe and the Panthéon and all the places Kazuya had read about in his French books. When Jin was feeling nostalgic he sent Kazuya the pencil portraits he had drawn of him from memory, and once, at Kazuya’s request, a self-portrait done with watercolors.
France was a faraway place, and the letters took weeks to arrive in the transoceanic ships. Kazuya always made sure to reply to them right away so he could send them the next day, hoping they’d reach Jin as soon as possible. He told Jin about his studies and all the free time he had with Jin away, about helping his adoptive father Katsuhiko with his job and going to the foreigner’s parties with his uncle Goro. He told Jin about Tokyo and how it was changing, about Ueno Park and the beautiful animals at the zoo, about the new railway stations and whatever else he could think of. He drew some of the animals at the new zoo for Jin, even though his drawings were terrible and Jin always made fun of them.
On one occasion Jin surprised Kazuya by sending him a photograph which showed Jin with a few other boys of his age. One of them, from what Jin had written on the back, was Japanese too. Kazuya spent hours looking at the black and white photograph, at Jin’s figure dressed in his usual western clothes, all up to date with French fashion, at the bowler hat that obscured his eyes and the dark hint of a moustache over his grinning lips. Kazuya bought a frame for the photograph and placed it on the low table in his bedroom.
Eight years, however, was a long time, and Jin’s attention span had never been the best. At some point after the first two years, the letters stopped arriving.
#
The results take a week and a half, and they confirm what Kame already suspected. The portrait dates from the late 19th century; the frame, the canvas and the varnish all give dates within the last decade of the century. The results do nothing to placate Kame’s uneasiness. Koki suggests maybe the man in the portrait is one of Kame’s ancestors, but it’d have to be Kame’s great grandfather, and the documents concerning Kame’s family were lost in a fire during the Kanto Earthquake in 1923, so he has no way to check who the man could be. He thinks about asking his father, but his grandfather died when his father was still young, and the family stories were never passed along.
He tries to convince himself that it doesn’t matter because work’s work after all and he has to get the portrait ready anyway. It becomes something personal, though, like he owes something to the man in the portrait, whoever he is. Kame also feels like the portrait may be linked to his dreams. He knows he keeps having them every night, even though he can never remember anything beyond the feelings: the caress of soft hands, a deep laugh, the warmth of spring’s sun and the intoxicating fragrance of blooming flowers, a deep kiss or an aching longing. Faces and names are lost in the moments between dreams and awareness, even if Kame tries to cling to them as he feels the last seconds of the dream slipping away in time with the loud alarm of his phone.
#
Kazuya was an awful subject to paint. The moment he realized Jin was trying to draw him in his notebook, he became tense and restless, and he squirmed and tried to peek at Jin’s sketch. When Jin asked him to pose, he was so stiff and serious Jin feared Kazuya was going to give him a lecture on being a responsible adult, like he did when they were teenagers and Jin used to insist that Kazuya skip his lessons to go somewhere together. When Jin asked him to smile Kazuya’s beautiful grin turned into an awkward grimace that made Jin sigh in exasperation and wave his hands in frustration at Kazuya, who only pouted at him.
Jin still had notebooks full of sketches of Kazuya, though, pencil and sometimes watercolor, all with dates scrawled on top of them that together spanned almost twenty years. Kazuya eating, sleeping, laughing, talking, studying, pouting, frowning or raising his eyebrows at something Jin had said. Kazuya in the harbor looking at the ships, Kazuya in the zoo feeding the goats, in the park napping on the grass, sitting on his calves with his back straight during a tea ceremony, riding his mare along the riverbank and playing baseball, the only western habit he enjoyed more than Jin did. Some of them were drawn when Kazuya was too busy or relaxed to realize he was being used as a subject, and some were drawn from memory. Kazuya with his eyes closed in ecstasy, Kazuya moaning in pleasure, coming undone with his sweaty dark hair stuck on his forehead, Kazuya asleep on the bed, naked and elegant and flawless under Jin’s gaze.
Kazuya was an awful subject to paint, but he was still Jin’s favorite subject anyway.
#
The portrait looks better once the old, yellowed varnish has been removed. The soft colors and the beautiful reflections of light on the grass and through the trees and the distant pond in the background, all rendered perfectly into immortality by careful eyes and expert hands, suggest it belongs to the school of Impressionism. Kame follows the thick traces of the short, visible paintbrush strokes that the impasto leaves with well trained eyes that cannot help but stop where the layers of varnish and paint have cracked and fallen, revealing the gesso that covers the canvas under them.
Despite the deteriorated state, the portrait is beautiful. Static as it is, the scene is alive with movement in a special way; the patches of light that fall through the thick foliage of the trees seem to dance on the grass and the dark clothes of the seated man, who directs a sad look to the viewer. The shadows and the bright reflections on the pond reveal to the wondering eye a soft summer afternoon. Heat is suggested by the fan resting on the grass but mitigated by the fresh greenness of the forest. Even in the middle of winter, in his cold studio that is always filled with the stench of chemicals and paint, Kame can feel the warmth of the hidden sun and smell the fragrance of the forest that a refreshing breeze carries, barely noticeable in the way some grass strands shift gently or the way the dark hair of the man falls around his neck.
Kame stares at the portrait for hours and he barely feels the freezing mid-February wind that slips through his open window. It’s not difficult for him to get lost in art, but this painting wrenches at something deep inside him in a way Kame doesn’t remember any other work doing. He feels attracted to it, and not only because the subject looks just like him. It’s something that makes him feel like the warmth is real, the sun and breeze and the soft brush of the grass against his skin and the soothing sounds of the pond behind him until he forgets for a moment that it’s not him but the man in the portrait that would have felt those things.
He marvels at the portrait in such a way that he loses track of the hours ticking away, and by the time he comes to his senses again it’s evening already and his eyes hurt from squinting at the painting in the dim light. Kame sighs and rubs his tired eyes in frustration. There’s not light enough to continue restoring the painting anymore today.
#
Most of the people in the building were dressed in elegant western suits: dark, long coats over waistcoats and white shirts with white or black neckties for the men, and beautiful dresses for the women, who concealed their bare shoulders from the newly creeping chill of the end of October with fur shawls and wore gloves up to their elbows. Kazuya felt self conscious in the middle of it, dressed in his most elegant kimono and walking stiffly between the groups of people discussing the exhibited artworks. There were not many Japanese people, and those who were in attendance were not of the type who would wear traditional clothes anymore.
His uncle Goro had disappeared to meet some friends almost as soon as they were admitted into the gallery, where the artworks of what the pamphlet called “The Promise of New Japanese Artists” were hung on the walls. Kazuya followed his adoptive father through the room, distractedly gazing at landscapes and parks, ballerinas and waitresses and children playing on the beach, monuments and friends sharing a brief meal in the countryside, women holding white umbrellas to hide from the early summer sun taking a stroll amidst a sea of green, tall grass. Kazuya’s eyes slid over each painting while he tried to remember what little he knew about the latest conventions of western art, though he looked down in embarrassment when he came across the few pictures of naked women, cheeks dark with blush.
He was trying to rush away from those pictures when he found himself face to face with a big canvas, well over a meter in both width and height. It was a scene out of some countryside town, not unlike many of the others exhibited in the same room, but something in it pulled Kazuya in immediately. In the distance a wide, clear river formed a lazy curve around a small town of stout stone houses, so tiny it was almost a blur of color in which the only discernible feature was the belfry that shot straight up to the sky from in between the cluster of houses. In the foreground a field had been furnished with long tables with plenty of food and drinks and white tents to create a shelter from the sun; small, triangular flags of bright colors hung on invisible strings between the sparse trees, and in a corner a small group of musicians contributed to the festive feeling. There were people in groups and pairs, dancing and laughing and talking, drinking and eating outside the tents to bask in the gentle mid-afternoon sun of spring; women with light dresses and colorful ribbons and men with hats of yellow straw.
In the centre of the composition two children played together. A brunette boy dressed in a white suit and holding his hat in his hand chased someone who could possibly be his sister, a girl his age in a baby blue dress who held onto the skirt as she ran away from her persecutor. The tails of the navy blue ribbon around her boater hat floated behind her along with her red hair, shining beautifully under the bright sun. The painting was not focused on them, nor were they depicted up close; they were just two children playing in the middle of a crowd, yet the eye, maybe teased and drawn by the sudden shock of fiery orange amidst the soft green of the grass and the pale colors of the dresses, focused on them naturally and so insistently they became impossible to ignore. Kazuya took a few steps back to admire the painting better, taking in the short and thick paintbrush strokes, the bright colors contrasting with each other and the soft ends and general blur of the whole scene, that however only made it seem more real as the brain completed what the eyes could only guess.
Kazuya found himself almost drawn into the painting, to the point that he could feel the warmth of the spring afternoon and hear the music the tiny orchestra was playing and the shrill laughs of the children in the cacophony of instruments and cheerful chattering. He could feel the breeze that made the flags flutter and twist and the sun slowly moving to settle beyond the river and the moist soil sinking slightly under his shoes. Kazuya closed his eyes and he could almost physically feel himself standing in the meadow, another man in the partying crowd while in a corner someone brought them to life in a different way. His mind filled in the wide smiles of the children, even though it was impossible for his sight to take on the minute detail.
Kazuya searched for the small tag next to the painting, where the title, the artist name, the size and the technique of the artwork were specified. In accordance to the exhibition theme, the young artists returned from abroad, the information was written in English and French, though there were tiny kanji printed under each line. Kazuya ignored both technique and size and paused on the title. The stylized font read “Un dimanche de printemps”, promptly translated to “A Spring Sunday” and to Japanese under them. Kazuya looked a bit higher to check the artist, coming upon the Japanese text first. Akanishi, the engraved black kanji read, and Kazuya felt a flutter of hope light up inside him, only to die in an instant as he took in the given name. Shinobu. He didn’t know anyone named Akanishi Shinobu. The name used the same kanji, but the furigana written above it crushed Kazuya’s barely rising hope with the same finality of a falling rock. He looked at the wonderful painting again, but part of its former cheerfulness was somehow lost to him now.
“Do you like it?” The voice was deep and rich, familiar in a strange way.
“It’s really beautiful,” Kazuya said, but he couldn’t tear his eyes from the painting to look at the man who had spoken.
“Well, thank you.”
It took moment for Kazuya to realize the implications of the simple answer, as engrossed as he was in the painting. He spun around on his heels, eager to meet the author of the piece that had enchanted him so much, and as he finally saw the man’s face he felt the world stopping around him. His own gasp reached his ears with a certain delay, as if even the sound waves had frozen along with his body, and certainly he couldn’t hear the animated chatter that had been filling the room until a moment ago. Kazuya could not even see anything beyond the smiling face in front of him; in the same way his eyes had kept instinctively going back to the bright blotch of orange and red that was the little girl’s hair, his senses too were focused on the man to the point Kazuya could not notice anything other than him, a presence so enticing it was impossible to ignore.
Eight years was a long time, yet Jin hadn’t changed much at all. He had grown taller, his face had gotten softer around the edges, a bit more round and gentle and he was sporting an ugly half grown moustache, but his grin was as bright as ever, his eyes shone with the same energy has they had always had, even if now it was behind the lenses of thin framed, round golden glasses. He was dressed in a western suit and as usual his tie was askew, but Kazuya restrained himself from fixing it as he had gotten used to and instead played with the old turtle netsuke on his obi that he had only kept because Jin had found it cute almost ten years ago.
“Jin,” Kazuya breathed, and somehow that was enough to break the spell that had fallen over them. Jin was no longer smiling widely with confidence, but squirming nervously as if he didn’t even dare to look Kazuya in the eye. “Is this your painting?”
“Yeah. I’m happy you think it’s beautiful.”
“Did they make a mistake with your name?”
“Hmm?” Jin looked confused for a moment, like he didn’t remember what Kazuya was talking about. He followed Kazuya’s tiny nod toward the bronze plaque next to the painting and his eyes lit up in understanding. “Oh, no. That’s my artist name,” he said, like having a pseudonym was something to be proud of, like it made him important.
Kazuya blinked. “But it’s just another reading of your kanji.”
“Don’t tell anyone,” Jin whispered as he leaned in a bit, and Kazuya suddenly felt a bit hotter around the neck, “but it’s just to confuse all the foreigners.”
Kazuya laughed, and quickly placed his hand over his mouth to muffle the sound. Jin joined him a beat later and with it the awkwardness was suddenly forgotten, eight years of distance closed and put behind them with a simple shared laugh. When Kazuya recovered Jin was looking at him with a wide smile and the next moment Jin’s arms were around Kazuya’s shoulders and he was pulling Kazuya into a bone-crushing hug that squeezed all the air out of Kazuya’s lungs and made him blush so dark it looked like Jin had painted his cheeks crimson.
“I missed you,” Jin whispered in his ear, and for the first time Kazuya was grateful that most of the public in attendance were foreigners, because at least it meant no one was as much as giving them a second look. He brought his arms to Jin’s back and clutched his dark coat, and allowed himself to breathe deeply in Jin’s French cologne and soak up Jin’s closeness for the first time in almost a decade.
“Kazuya,” Katsuhiko called his adoptive son with a stern voice and the two young men quickly jumped apart from each other, both their hearts beating madly at the sudden interruption, as if somehow what had been broken was an intimate moment and not something that was happening in the middle of a public art exhibition. Katsuhiko, already a tall man by nature, looked imposing in a dark kimono with his graying hair tied back in a small knot. “What are you doing?”
“Ah, Father…” Kazuya bowed, stiff and suddenly uncomfortable, and from the corner of his eye he caught Jin squirming nervously. “This is Akanishi-kun. You may not remember him but…”
“That painter boy you used to spend so much time with?”
“Yes, Father.” Kazuya looked down to hide a wince at how tiny his voice had sounded.
Katsuhiko’s tone had not been condemning, but it hadn’t been approving either; he was a business man who had never seen much use in art, and the little he bothered to consider was Japanese art, prints made with woodblocks, portraits of samurai warriors and geishas and views of Mt. Fuji and the sea. Jin seemed to shrink into himself when the man’s eyes fell on him, but Katsuhiko only gave a curt nod.
“It’s good to see the youth of Japan making an impression in the West.” Jin bowed to his waist silently, probably too nervous to trust his own voice, and Katsuhiko turned toward his adoptive son again. “I suppose you have a lot to talk about. You’re dismissed to go with him, as long as you’re home at a reasonable time.”
Kazuya nodded his thanks and finally breathed again as his adoptive father walked away, probably in search of his brother Goro. He started when he felt a hand grab his, but only laughed as Jin started tugging him toward the exit.
“I have so many things to tell you!” Jin blurted out as soon as they were outside, though he didn’t let go of Kazuya’s hand and continued to pull him down the street.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Let’s find a teahouse so we can talk.”
“A teahouse? What is this, Akanishi Jin voluntarily going to a teahouse! What has France done to you?!”
Jin laughed loudly and squeezed Kazuya’s hand. “What do you know, I actually miss the taste of home.”
October’s evenings were already cold, but Kazuya’s hand tingled with a special kind of warmth like it had done one winter evening nine years ago.
#
Restoring a painting is a long process. Kame has already removed the dirt and the old, yellow varnish, but there’s so much more to do. The paint has quaked and left a million thin cracks and the primer, a mix of chemical products named gesso that was applied in several layers over the canvas, each smoothed until the surface is ready to be painted on, is visible. In some points even the gesso has fallen off, and there are whole bits of painting missing on the pond and the little gaps between the tree leaves; what Kame had thought to be patches of light revealed themselves as white primer and even linen under a more careful inspection.
This is the most difficult part of the restoration, the most time consuming. Kame has to fill in the cracks with new layers of gesso and smooth them out before selecting a palette of colors similar to the ones originally used to retouch the portrait. It will take him weeks, because he has to be careful about the colors and keep as close as possible to the original style while filling in the bits that are missing, and then he will have to wait at least two weeks before everything’s dry enough to be exhibited, but February is already a week away from its end and the exposition is scheduled to open the second week of April.
Kame yawns widely and checks his watch. Its only 15 pm, and he still has a couple of hours before it gets too dark to continue working. Maybe he can even finish cleaning the cracks today.
#
”Why don’t you sit over there to read?” Jin waved to a spot in the shadows behind some trees and Kazuya eyed him suspiciously, but obeyed anyway. He stole Jin’s glasses as he went to settle down.
“And what are you going to paint?” Kazuya watched as Jin set up his easel and placed the already prepared canvas on it; Kazuya had had no idea canvases needed to be prepared before Jin had told him, he had always thought one just painted directly on the fabric. Jin had laughed at him, but Kazuya was past feeling offended by now because Jin never meant any harm. “There’s nothing interesting here.”
“Well,” Jin smiled as he squeezed bits of paint from the tubes onto his palette; they were his French tubes and there wasn’t much left. Jin treasured them so whatever he was going to paint had to be important to him. “There’s you.”
“What?!” The effect was immediate. Kazuya stiffened and a frown settled on his until then calm expression. “Can’t you paint something else? The flowers?”
Jin sighed. “I want to have a decent portrait of you, okay? You just read or something, distract yourself. We can chat if you want.”
“But Jin,” Kazuya whined. It was not often that Kazuya allowed himself to be childish like that, especially not since Katsuhiko had died two years ago, but when he was with Jin he felt it was okay to let go. Jin was much more of a kid than him anyways. “You know I can’t pose!”
“That’s why I’m not asking you to pose. Just be natural! I hate posing subjects. Read or talk with me or even just nap a bit, relax. And don’t frown like that; I can’t do justice to your beautiful face if you’re frowning like that.”
“You’re not going to convince me with flattery, you know.”
“Please? Pretty please?” Jin’s grin was wide despite the pout he was trying to direct at Kazuya. “S’il-vous plaît?”
The French finally managed to erase Kazuya’s frown. He thought about his late adoptive father Katsuhiko, who had died two years ago of pneumonia; he thought about his family and his role, about the weight of society and their expectations and the end of the summer, feeling so distant when they were bantering and laughing under its warm sun but approaching so fast, and he just couldn’t say no.
“You better make me look good.”
#
The portrait becomes the centre of Kame’s attention. It’s all he can think about when he wakes up in the morning, during his rushed breakfast, while he goes about his other obligations. Eventually Kame starts ignoring any work that’s not on the portrait - only because the deadline’s so close, he tells himself, and he doesn’t make much of it when he starts skipping meals and missing calls even when his phone is not on silent mode because it’s just normal to get pulled into it when the job is as interesting as this one.
The dreams keep coming every night too, and every morning Kame wakes up with his head full of scattered images and feelings belonging to people whose names and faces he can never remember. It’s tiring, because he wakes up feeling like he hasn’t slept at all and he spends the rest of the day feeling tired and sleepy. He tries to take short naps whenever he can, but as the portrait takes more and more of his attention they become shorter and fewer, and even then the dreams come. The more he works on the portrait, the longer and more intense the dreams feel, and Kame can’t bring himself to do anything about them because he feels that somehow, even if he can’t remember almost anything about them, they bring him closer to the meaning of the painting and the sad-looking man in it.
#
Jin talked about Paris for months on end. He talked about everything he had told Kazuya about in his letters, and about learning with the maîtres there, about the friends he made, about trips to England and Spain, and the beauty of Barcelona and how the Sagrada Familia was going to be the greatest temple ever once it was finished. He told Kazuya about meeting Monet and Renoir and said their names with a reverence Kazuya usually associated with the great heroes of the past.
Jin talked for days and weeks and months and Kazuya listened with polite interest until Jin had nothing else to say. Kazuya filled in the silence with a few stories of his own, about finishing his Law studies and receiving more responsibilities and helping his adoptive father and whatever anecdotes he could think about. When New Year came Jin and Kazuya went together to the temple in the early hours of the morning. They prayed and sat on the stone steps to enjoy the silence of the night, until Kazuya realized Jin had been staring at him.
“I missed you,” Jin blurted out and before Kazuya could say anything in return Jin was leaning forward to kiss him, clumsy and bold and warm against the winter cold. Kazuya tensed and gasped but Jin’s hands were urgently clutching at his kimono, pulling Kazuya closer against his own body.
“I love you,“ Jin whispered, and Kazuya felt warmer than he had in eight years.
Part 2