JE/NewS/KAT-TUN- "Tegoshi is Manipulating JE"
BIRTHDAY FIC SPAM 2. GO!
Title: Tegoshi is Manipulating JE
Universe: JE/NewS/KAT-TUN
Theme/Topic: N/A
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing/s: Tegoshi, Yamapi, Ryo, Jin (with guest appearances by Nagase and Tsuyoshi)
Warnings/Spoilers: Crack? OOC? Stupidity? THESE PEOPLE REALLY EXIST OH GOD.
Word Count: 3,921
Summary: In which Jin is Mulder, Yamapi is Scully, and Tegoshi has a secret alien technique of doom. BELIEVE.
Dedication: Ann! Happy birthday again!! PIN MAKES ME FEEL DEGREES STUPIDER.
A/N: I still suck at writing KAT-TUN members. That is all.
Disclaimer: Not mine, though I wish constantly.
Distribution: Just lemme know.
1. Jin is on to Tegoshi
Jin was on to Tegoshi.
“I’m on to Tegoshi,” he told Yamapi, just as soon as he was.
Yamapi frowned. “You can’t sleep with all of my bandmates,” he protested, feeling protective. He clearly did not understand what Jin really meant.
“No! It’s not that!” Jin said. Then paused. “Wait, I can’t? Why not? Who says?”
Yamapi sighed. “Because that makes things awkward for me afterwards, when you don’t call back.”
“Oh. Well. That wasn’t it anyway. What I was trying to tell you was, I’m on to Tegoshi.” Jin tapped his temple, knowingly.
Yamapi wondered how saying the exact same thing he’d said before made Jin’s meaning any different. He blinked. “Huh?”
Jin scowled and stomped his foot when Yamapi proved-once again- that he just could not keep up with Jin’s smartness. “I’ve come to the most secret and amazing and ingenious discovery of the day! Keep up!”
Yamapi really thought his friend should aim higher. Like the week, at least. But Jin already sounded irritated with him, so he decided not to bring it up (plus every time he said something like “aim for the stars” he got smacked because people thought he was blatantly product-placing, except with words). “What ingenious discovery of the day did you discover?” he asked instead.
Jin preened. “Tegoshi is manipulating all of you.”
Yamapi stared. “What?”
Jin pouted again. “Act more awed!”
Yamapi nodded and acted more awed. “What?”
Oh, now he got it. It was about emphasis.
He did it again. “Whaaaat?”
Jin wrinkled his nose. “Too much.”
“Sorry. I mean... What?”
Jin tossed his hair. “I figured it out just now while I was watching. I know you weren’t watching because you were playing with the shiny bits on my belt, but I saw. Koyama was about to take the last bottle of peach tea and then Tegoshi looked at him and did this flutter-flutter thing and Koyama smiled all stupid and let him have it just like that.”
Yamapi didn’t say anything.
Probably because he had gotten distracted by the shiny bits on Jin’s belt again. Jin smacked his hand away. “Pay attention!”
“Sorry! What?” Pause. “I mean… what?”
Jin sighed. “Flutter-flutter! Tegoshi flutter-fluttered at Koyama and got exactly what he wanted. That’s manipulation.”
Yamapi’s brow wrinkled. “Flutter-flutter?”
Jin nodded.
“I see,” Yamapi murmured, and stroked his chin contemplatively once. Twice. “Then… I only have one thing to say.”
Jin waited for it, crossing his arms and looking superior and expectant.
“What,” Yamapi began, “does a flutter-flutter look like?”
Jin nearly fell over.
“Oh my god are you serious?!”
Yamapi wondered what it was about his emphasis that might have suggested he wasn’t serious. He thought that if this kept happening, he’d need to practice his enunciation in the mirror to get it right because he definitely didn’t want to confuse people like this all the time.
In the meantime, Jin sputtered at him.
“What’s a flutter-flutter? What’s a flutter-flutter?!” It’s a… like a… like a… you know!”
Yamapi in fact, did not know.
Jin pursed his lips. “It’s when he does that face! The… like this.” Jin tilted his head to the side in his best Tegoshi imitation, letting some of the layers of his hair obscure part of his cheeks. Then he angled his chin downward. “And the… with the…” he looked up through his lashes at Yamapi next, though it was hard because his friend was a little shorter than him, and in the end it just felt like he was doing stupid things with his neck trying to look down and up all at once. “But yeah…like this.”
Yamapi wrinkled his nose at the strange face Jin was making. “Tegoshi looked like that? Did Koyama run away screaming? I didn’t notice because I was playing with your belt.”
“No!” Jin snarled, and smacked Yamapi on the head. “What are you trying to say about my flutter-flutter face?!”
Yamapi blinked. “I don’t get it.”
Jin sighed. “Well clearly, I’ll just have to show you!”
“How?”
Jin wished that Yamapi would at least try to keep up here. “By collecting evidence, of course!”
Then Jin grabbed Yamapi by the arm and dragged him in the direction Tegoshi had gone off in.
2. Ryo is Not Nice
When they found Tegoshi again he was resting in the lounge. He had his head in Ryo’s lap and he was sipping peach tea peacefully while Ryo read today’s schedule to him to make sure he didn’t forget any of it.
Jin and Yamapi saw the pair on the couch and quickly ducked behind a nearby table.
“See?” Jin hissed.
“See what?”
“He’s manipulating Ryo-chan!”
“That’s a flutter-flutter?” Yamapi asked, when he saw. He was unimpressed. Tegoshi did that all the time and it looked nothing at all like what Jin had shown him just now.
Jin sighed. “Well…no. It’s not the same, exactly. But! Look! Ryo-chan’s being all cuddly. He has to be getting manipulated. He’s not hitting Tegoshi or doing anything mean at all. The last time my face got that close to his crotch he kicked me in the nose.”
Yamapi supposed that was true. Ryo-chan was actually petting Tegoshi’s hair.
“I can hear you, retards,” Ryo snarled suddenly, causing both Yamapi and Jin to jump. “And you do realize that that table is only a slab of wood with four legs and is not blocking you from being seen from underneath it at all, right?”
Jin and Yamapi realized that now.
They ran.
“See?!” Jin said, as they did. “Ryo-chan is only Ryo-chan when he is being like that!”
“I want to see this flutter-flutter!” Yamapi whined.
3. Management Listens to No One
Later that afternoon, they had a meeting regarding NewS and KAT-TUN’s next joint performance on Shounen Club, and before long some technical complications started to arise as to who was going to perform what part of the opening and closing songs with who. The producers wanted Kame to sing with Yamapi even though they knew that it might not sound so good live; at the same time they were worried about putting Jin and Tegoshi together for the second verse because it would probably dishearten the others who would have to sing after them.
Working out all the kinks of a show like this was always difficult, and soon the meeting began to run late. Koyama tried to speed things up by telling the producers that it was okay; he and Shige didn’t mind singing with Jin and Tegoshi respectively. But no one paid any attention to him because it was assumed ahead of time that he and Shige didn’t know anything about solos since they were only going to be singing the chorus along with everyone else anyway.
After they ended up running forty minutes over time Jin leaned back and crossed his arms tiredly. He stopped offering any of his own input on the show’s preparation because he knew that for big joint appearances like this, the management never made decisions based on what the singers wanted anyway.
By coincidence, Tegoshi had ended up sitting across from Jin and Yamapi on the other side of the table for the meeting, and after a moment of looking bored, the younger boy suddenly cocked his head to the side and let some of his bangs fall into his eyes.
Jin noticed immediately (because he was still collecting evidence even if Yamapi wasn’t). He elbowed Yamapi sharply when Tegoshi did this and made a few gestures.
“Ow!” Yamapi barked, and glared at Jin. “I’m paying attention! I’m singing with Kame, right? Don’t hit me.”
Jin wrinkled his nose when he heard that but decided that it was not what was really important here. What was important here was that Tegoshi looked like he was gearing up for more of that manipulation of his. Or more specifically, the flutter. “Look,” Jin hissed under his breath, and pointed to the other side of the table, where Tegoshi was still sitting with his bangs in his eyes. “It’s starting!”
“What is? Eh?” Yamapi blinked and looked at Tegoshi. “Is that it? He just looks sleepy.”
“It’s starting. Wait until the part with the chin and the eyelashes,” Jin told him confidently. “Then you’ll see the flutter-flutter.”
The two of them both held their breaths and waited.
Then Tegoshi finally tilted his chin downward and…
…yawned.
“That is a yawn,” Yamapi felt the need to say-slowly- in case Jin was confused about something.
Jin smacked him again.
In the meantime, everyone had suddenly stopped talking; they were looking at Tegoshi now.
Tegoshi blinked cutely at the attention. “Ah, sorry!” he apologized, and bowed his head repentantly. “I’m really listening!”
The producers all looked at each other after this; they seemed to have a silent conversation amongst themselves with their eyes that was very close to being terrifying. “Are you sleepy, Tegoshi-kun?” one asked him after a moment, sweetly.
Tegoshi squirmed a bit under the producers’ gazes; when they saw him do this, they all said “awww,” collectively.
“I’m just tired, I guess,” Tegoshi informed them with a sheepish half-smile. “But I’m definitely listening to everything everyone is saying, so please go on!”
The producers all “awwwed” again at his studiousness before looking at their watches. It was getting kind of late and Tegoshi-kun still had school tomorrow morning.
They all suddenly seemed resolute and decisive.
“Okay, that’s it for today,” they announced without warning, and clapped their hands together. “Tegoshi-kun will sing with Akanishi-kun, Koki-kun will sing with Masuda-kun, and Yamapi will sing with Kamenashi-kun. The rest is up to you all.”
There was a beat of silence following that, as all gathered boyband members could not quite believe that it was going to be left at something that simple.
But then Tegoshi yawned again- a bit louder this time- and everyone figured that they had better hurry and leave before the management changed their minds about this.
~~~~~
A few minutes later, as Jin and Yamapi were heading to the parking lot together; Jin raised his finger in the air triumphantly and said, “See? Manipulation!”
“Bakanishi,” Yamapi told him tiredly, “if you are trying to tell me that Tegoshi’s flutter-flutter technique is the same as a yawn, even I will be disappointed in your intelligence.”
“But!” Jin began, and pouted fiercely at his best friend. “It’s not about whether he fluttered or not. It’s about what happened! And I’m sure I’m right! He was manipulating us! We even have proof now!”
Yamapi blinked.
“The meeting is over!” Jin shouted loudly, and waved his hands in the air for emphasis. “Doesn’t that say something to you?!”
“Are you saying that the meeting would go on forever unless Tegoshi yawned?” Yamapi asked his friend patiently.
Jin wasn’t quite sure what to say in response to that. So he said, “Yes?” and hoped he sounded convincing.
But Yamapi just eyed Jin worriedly. “Are you really sure that Tegoshi is doing these things? Maybe you’re getting sick and it just seems that way because of a virus or something. The last time I had the flu I thought that there were gummy bears on the wall and I kept asking Koyama to pick them off and feed them to me.”
A moment.
Then, Jin shook his head. “I’m not sick!” he assured Yamapi. “Tomorrow! Tomorrow I’ll definitely find more proof about this! You’ll see then.”
Yamapi nodded warily. “Ah, I think see now.”
Silence.
Then, “Do you want me to drive you to the convenience store? I will even buy you the expensive flu medicine that tastes like cherries.”
4. Even for a Senpai, This is too much
The next day at lunch, Yamapi began to worry even more about his friend’s health when Jin suddenly started making a few sharp, jerking motions with his head while they were supposed to be eating. Yamapi blinked at him and put down his chopsticks. “Does your neck hurt?” he asked. “Should I massage it?”
Jin pouted; what kind of dumb conclusion to his clear-but-subtle gesticulations was that? “You don’t remember yesterday at all, do you?” he accused Yamapi with a frown.
Yamapi paused. Yesterday? What happened yesterday? Then, to remind himself, he pulled out his cell phone and looked at yesterday’s nikki post.
“Konbanchiwa,” he read out loud to himself, “today was fun… Jin and I ate lunch together and Ryo-chan yelled at us. I hope every day is full of good food and good friends like this. But I think Jin might be getting sick. Be sure to take care of your health, ne!”
He put down his cell phone after he finished reading the entry and nodded knowingly. “Now I remember yesterday. See?” He flashed his LCD display at the older boy as proof. “We ate lunch together and Ryo-chan yelled at us. You might be sick.” He slid his phone back into his pocket and looked very self-satisfied.
Jin on the other hand, crossed his arms and seemed perturbed. “I am not sick! And I am talking about Tegoshi’s flutter-flutter!” he barked. “We are collecting evidence against him for being manipulating and stuff, remember?”
“Flutter-flutter? Oh! Right,” Yamapi recalled. Then frowned. “I forgot to write about that in my J-Web. Maybe I should post again…” He moved to take out his cell phone one more time.
“No! You’ll give away the whole investigation!” Jin protested. “You can’t post about it until we have more proof.”
Yamapi was not sure what Jin meant by that. “We have proof? When? How? Did you investigate more without me?”
“I didn’t have to. There’s proof right there! Just look,” Jin ordered brusquely, and made a few more of those sharp gestures with his head again. He was indicating the space directly behind him. Either that or the ceiling; Yamapi couldn’t quite tell.
Yamapi decided to look over his friend’s shoulder first (because Tegoshi probably would not be in the ceiling) and saw that indeed, Tegoshi was at the table behind them; he was sitting peacefully between Tsuyoshi-senpai and Nagase-senpai. He was not eating anything. Nagase-senpai and Tsuyoshi-senpai both had their heads bent down and were staring at their bowls with intense concentration. Neither of them said a word to Tegoshi, and Yamapi could only assume that they really loved the cafeteria’s vegetable curry rice.
“I see no flutter-fluttering,” he also felt the need to report, after a moment.
But then Nagase suddenly stopped picking at his food. He sat up, looked extremely satisfied with himself, and then grinned and slid his bowl over to Tegoshi. Tegoshi took it and beamed back at the older man beatifically. “I’m so happy that Nagase-kun remembers that I don’t like tomatoes!” he chirped. “Thank you!”
Nagase smiled stupidly in response and even blushed a little. “It’s not so hard to pick them out for you. Tsuyoshi’s job is harder!”
Tsuyoshi was apparently picking out the mushrooms in his lunch and putting them into Tegoshi’s bowl.
“I have such good senpai!” Tegoshi exclaimed happily, and ate his lunch.
“See?!” Jin exclaimed when he saw this, and grabbed Yamapi to make sure he was paying proper attention as well. “That! There! That!”
Yamapi cocked his head to the side. “Jin,” he said to his friend slowly, patiently, “That is just a smile. Tegoshi does it all the time. It’s always the same.” Pause. “Did you get flutter-flutter confused with smile?” It was entirely possible; he’d gotten it confused with a yawn yesterday, after all.
“I did not! And it’s not that part that’s important! Nagase-san picked out all the tomatoes for him. Tsuyoshi-san is giving away his mushrooms!”
Even as this was being told to him, Yamapi appeared nonplussed. “Bakanishi! Of course he picked them out for him! Because Tegoshi doesn’t like tomatoes, remember? And he loves mushrooms; he eats Koyama’s all the time.” Yamapi said this all very matter-of-factly, as if these were normal things that happened every day. Then, because Jin apparently needed a reminder, he added, “You picked his tomatoes out for him once too, during Summary. It was right after you saved him from being bullied by Koki after the first show. It’s what any good senpai does, isn’t it? What’s the big deal?”
Jin blinked a few times as he recalled this.
Stared.
Then he gaped and put both hands on his head in distress.
“Oh no, did he get me too?!”
5. Maybe Tegoshi is Innocent After All
“Tegoshi!” Jin shouted, and stormed up to the younger boy in the middle of the hallway after lunch. He looked annoyed.
“Akanishi-kun?” Tegoshi replied, and blinked. “Is something the matter?”
“You manipulated me!” Jin accused, loudly.
“Eh?”
Tegoshi’s face was very cute when it was confused.
Jin bit his bottom lip and slid his eyes sideways to avoid eye contact-he was on to Tegoshi now, so that cute look would not work on him anymore.
From behind him, Yamapi clucked worriedly and put his hand on Jin’s shoulder when he heard his best friend’s angry tone. “Are you sure you’re not sick?” he asked him. “Maybe you should lie down.”
Jin shrugged his hand off. “No! I’m fine! I know exactly what is going on here!” he insisted. “Tegoshi is manipulating everyone!”
Upon hearing this, everyone within hearing range promptly stopped what he or she was doing and turned around to stare at Jin and Yamapi and Tegoshi. Jin suddenly felt as if they were all looking at him with varying degrees of hostility.
Tegoshi in the meantime, didn’t seem to notice the sudden downturn in the atmosphere. Instead, his eyes became huge and he looked up at Jin in distress. “E-eh? I’m manipulating everyone?” the younger boy asked, and was so small and innocent-looking that Jin almost doubted his theories for a moment.
“Y-yes!” Jin said anyway. He was determined to be resolute about this. No more being manipulated from now on!
“Maa, maa… let’s calm down, ne?” Yamapi began, and moved to get between Jin and Tegoshi on instinct. He pushed his friend a step backwards, gently. “I don’t think you’re thinking straight. You were doing funny things with your head earlier; maybe that made something go wonky inside. Do you remember hearing any strange snapping or twisting sounds?”
“I’m FINE! Tegoshi is just an evil, evil manipulator!” Jin insisted. “He made Ryo-chan nice! He doesn’t eat tomatoes! Management listens to him! HE DID SOMETHING WEIRD TO ME.”
Jin could go on, except when he looked over Yamapi’s shoulder at said evil, evil manipulator with the intent of giving him a well-timed glare for emphasis, he paused when he noticed that Tegoshi’s bottom lip was trembling just a little bit and that his hands were both clenched tightly at his sides. His eyes were the size of plates and his knuckles were turning white.
And so Jin stopped talking without knowing why.
He stared.
Swallowed.
And just when Tegoshi looked as if he was about to cry right there on the spot in front of everyone, Jin found himself blurting, “I’m sorry!” without thinking. When he heard it, he even surprised himself.
But Tegoshi’s lip immediately stopped trembling (thankfully) and he blinked instead. “E-eh?”
“I’m sorry! Don’t be mad. Or don’t cry…and yeah,” Jin said quickly, even though he wasn’t sure why he was apologizing all of a sudden; he was still certain that he was right. Maybe.
Yamapi, on the other hand, beamed at the apology like he had been expecting it to come out all along. He patted Jin on the back. “There, isn’t that nice? You feel better now, right?” Then he turned to Tegoshi. “Tegoshi, are you okay?” he asked, just to make sure the younger boy’s feelings hadn’t been hurt by Jin’s sudden outburst or his scary facial expressions.
But Tegoshi only smiled back at him brilliantly and nodded as if nothing odd had happened at all. “Un!” he chirruped at Yamapi. “I’m okay, Yamashita-kun.”
Yamapi smiled back at the younger boy and felt relieved. “Okay! Well, please forgive him for having such bad taste. Jin has just been acting weird since yesterday; I think he either hurt his head or he has the flu.”
Tegoshi shook his head cutely at Yamapi and clasped his hands behind his back. “It’s alright! There’s nothing to forgive, ne!” Then, to Jin, “Feel better quickly, okay, Akanishi-kun!”
Jin could hear it when everyone who was watching their argument let out a collective, “Awww” at Tegoshi’s magnanimity.
But despite Tegoshi’s assurances that he was fine, Yamapi still wanted to be absolutely sure that this would not cause any problems between Jin and Tegoshi in the future. He liked it best when everyone who was important to him could get along happily, after all. So he cleared his throat and said, “Tegoshi, if there’s anything we can do to make it up to you, don’t be shy in asking, okay? Being falsely accused is the worst thing ever, ne!”
When he heard this, Tegoshi immediately sparkled at both of the older boys. He stood up a little straighter. “Well, if Yamashita-kun says so… okay!”
He smiled.
~~~~~
Later, when Jin and Yamapi were picking up Tegoshi’s dry cleaning for him, Yamapi clucked disapprovingly at Jin for what might have been the fifteenth time in a row as they waited at the counter for their order to come up.
“I told you there was no such thing as a flutter-flutter,” he told Jin confidently. “Yappari, Tegoshi just has a really cute smile, ne! He’s such a sweet kid; he’s not manipulating anyone at all.”
Jin nodded and paid the dry cleaning bill repentantly once the items arrived. “Maybe I did hurt my head,” he admitted, and obediently took the hangers with Tegoshi’s clothes on them. He carefully laid them over his arm and turned to Yamapi as they headed back to the parking lot. “Now what?”
Yamapi looked down at the list that he had been given earlier; it was written in Tegoshi’s neat handwriting and even had cute little hearts drawn around Yamapi and Jin’s names. “He needs a new bottle of travel shampoo and face cream,” Yamapi reported. “After we buy them we just need to drop them off at Koyama or Shige’s house so that they can finish packing Tegoshi’s suitcases for him in time for tomorrow’s trip.”
Jin frowned a little when he heard all this; once again, he felt that maybe something was off here after all.
But he stopped himself before he could think any more negative thoughts like that; he’d already learned his lesson from earlier, and he definitely didn’t want to make another scene like he had back at the jimusho. Everyone was already talking about what a jerk he’d been and how nasty Akanishi Jin was to all of his adorable-and-innocent-little kouhai.
So he made sure not to say anything about Tegoshi or manipulation as he and Yamapi climbed into his car and headed for the department store that Yamapi knew Tegoshi liked.
In fact, Jin was feeling so sorry for everything that he’d done by the time evening rolled around that he even bought Tegoshi some fancy candy and a cute stuffed teddy bear while he and Yamapi were at the shopping center.
Later, he gave them to Koyama (along with the travel shampoo and the face cream) so that the older boy could pack them inside of Tegoshi’s suitcase as apology presents.
He hoped Tegoshi liked them.
END
EDITS PLZ.
Title: Tegoshi is Manipulating JE
Universe: JE/NewS/KAT-TUN
Theme/Topic: N/A
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing/s: Tegoshi, Yamapi, Ryo, Jin (with guest appearances by Nagase and Tsuyoshi)
Warnings/Spoilers: Crack? OOC? Stupidity? THESE PEOPLE REALLY EXIST OH GOD.
Word Count: 3,921
Summary: In which Jin is Mulder, Yamapi is Scully, and Tegoshi has a secret alien technique of doom. BELIEVE.
Dedication: Ann! Happy birthday again!! PIN MAKES ME FEEL DEGREES STUPIDER.
A/N: I still suck at writing KAT-TUN members. That is all.
Disclaimer: Not mine, though I wish constantly.
Distribution: Just lemme know.
1. Jin is on to Tegoshi
Jin was on to Tegoshi.
“I’m on to Tegoshi,” he told Yamapi, just as soon as he was.
Yamapi frowned. “You can’t sleep with all of my bandmates,” he protested, feeling protective. He clearly did not understand what Jin really meant.
“No! It’s not that!” Jin said. Then paused. “Wait, I can’t? Why not? Who says?”
Yamapi sighed. “Because that makes things awkward for me afterwards, when you don’t call back.”
“Oh. Well. That wasn’t it anyway. What I was trying to tell you was, I’m on to Tegoshi.” Jin tapped his temple, knowingly.
Yamapi wondered how saying the exact same thing he’d said before made Jin’s meaning any different. He blinked. “Huh?”
Jin scowled and stomped his foot when Yamapi proved-once again- that he just could not keep up with Jin’s smartness. “I’ve come to the most secret and amazing and ingenious discovery of the day! Keep up!”
Yamapi really thought his friend should aim higher. Like the week, at least. But Jin already sounded irritated with him, so he decided not to bring it up (plus every time he said something like “aim for the stars” he got smacked because people thought he was blatantly product-placing, except with words). “What ingenious discovery of the day did you discover?” he asked instead.
Jin preened. “Tegoshi is manipulating all of you.”
Yamapi stared. “What?”
Jin pouted again. “Act more awed!”
Yamapi nodded and acted more awed. “What?”
Oh, now he got it. It was about emphasis.
He did it again. “Whaaaat?”
Jin wrinkled his nose. “Too much.”
“Sorry. I mean... What?”
Jin tossed his hair. “I figured it out just now while I was watching. I know you weren’t watching because you were playing with the shiny bits on my belt, but I saw. Koyama was about to take the last bottle of peach tea and then Tegoshi looked at him and did this flutter-flutter thing and Koyama smiled all stupid and let him have it just like that.”
Yamapi didn’t say anything.
Probably because he had gotten distracted by the shiny bits on Jin’s belt again. Jin smacked his hand away. “Pay attention!”
“Sorry! What?” Pause. “I mean… what?”
Jin sighed. “Flutter-flutter! Tegoshi flutter-fluttered at Koyama and got exactly what he wanted. That’s manipulation.”
Yamapi’s brow wrinkled. “Flutter-flutter?”
Jin nodded.
“I see,” Yamapi murmured, and stroked his chin contemplatively once. Twice. “Then… I only have one thing to say.”
Jin waited for it, crossing his arms and looking superior and expectant.
“What,” Yamapi began, “does a flutter-flutter look like?”
Jin nearly fell over.
“Oh my god are you serious?!”
Yamapi wondered what it was about his emphasis that might have suggested he wasn’t serious. He thought that if this kept happening, he’d need to practice his enunciation in the mirror to get it right because he definitely didn’t want to confuse people like this all the time.
In the meantime, Jin sputtered at him.
“What’s a flutter-flutter? What’s a flutter-flutter?!” It’s a… like a… like a… you know!”
Yamapi in fact, did not know.
Jin pursed his lips. “It’s when he does that face! The… like this.” Jin tilted his head to the side in his best Tegoshi imitation, letting some of the layers of his hair obscure part of his cheeks. Then he angled his chin downward. “And the… with the…” he looked up through his lashes at Yamapi next, though it was hard because his friend was a little shorter than him, and in the end it just felt like he was doing stupid things with his neck trying to look down and up all at once. “But yeah…like this.”
Yamapi wrinkled his nose at the strange face Jin was making. “Tegoshi looked like that? Did Koyama run away screaming? I didn’t notice because I was playing with your belt.”
“No!” Jin snarled, and smacked Yamapi on the head. “What are you trying to say about my flutter-flutter face?!”
Yamapi blinked. “I don’t get it.”
Jin sighed. “Well clearly, I’ll just have to show you!”
“How?”
Jin wished that Yamapi would at least try to keep up here. “By collecting evidence, of course!”
Then Jin grabbed Yamapi by the arm and dragged him in the direction Tegoshi had gone off in.
2. Ryo is Not Nice
When they found Tegoshi again he was resting in the lounge. He had his head in Ryo’s lap and he was sipping peach tea peacefully while Ryo read today’s schedule to him to make sure he didn’t forget any of it.
Jin and Yamapi saw the pair on the couch and quickly ducked behind a nearby table.
“See?” Jin hissed.
“See what?”
“He’s manipulating Ryo-chan!”
“That’s a flutter-flutter?” Yamapi asked, when he saw. He was unimpressed. Tegoshi did that all the time and it looked nothing at all like what Jin had shown him just now.
Jin sighed. “Well…no. It’s not the same, exactly. But! Look! Ryo-chan’s being all cuddly. He has to be getting manipulated. He’s not hitting Tegoshi or doing anything mean at all. The last time my face got that close to his crotch he kicked me in the nose.”
Yamapi supposed that was true. Ryo-chan was actually petting Tegoshi’s hair.
“I can hear you, retards,” Ryo snarled suddenly, causing both Yamapi and Jin to jump. “And you do realize that that table is only a slab of wood with four legs and is not blocking you from being seen from underneath it at all, right?”
Jin and Yamapi realized that now.
They ran.
“See?!” Jin said, as they did. “Ryo-chan is only Ryo-chan when he is being like that!”
“I want to see this flutter-flutter!” Yamapi whined.
3. Management Listens to No One
Later that afternoon, they had a meeting regarding NewS and KAT-TUN’s next joint performance on Shounen Club, and before long some technical complications started to arise as to who was going to perform what part of the opening and closing songs with who. The producers wanted Kame to sing with Yamapi even though they knew that it might not sound so good live; at the same time they were worried about putting Jin and Tegoshi together for the second verse because it would probably dishearten the others who would have to sing after them.
Working out all the kinks of a show like this was always difficult, and soon the meeting began to run late. Koyama tried to speed things up by telling the producers that it was okay; he and Shige didn’t mind singing with Jin and Tegoshi respectively. But no one paid any attention to him because it was assumed ahead of time that he and Shige didn’t know anything about solos since they were only going to be singing the chorus along with everyone else anyway.
After they ended up running forty minutes over time Jin leaned back and crossed his arms tiredly. He stopped offering any of his own input on the show’s preparation because he knew that for big joint appearances like this, the management never made decisions based on what the singers wanted anyway.
By coincidence, Tegoshi had ended up sitting across from Jin and Yamapi on the other side of the table for the meeting, and after a moment of looking bored, the younger boy suddenly cocked his head to the side and let some of his bangs fall into his eyes.
Jin noticed immediately (because he was still collecting evidence even if Yamapi wasn’t). He elbowed Yamapi sharply when Tegoshi did this and made a few gestures.
“Ow!” Yamapi barked, and glared at Jin. “I’m paying attention! I’m singing with Kame, right? Don’t hit me.”
Jin wrinkled his nose when he heard that but decided that it was not what was really important here. What was important here was that Tegoshi looked like he was gearing up for more of that manipulation of his. Or more specifically, the flutter. “Look,” Jin hissed under his breath, and pointed to the other side of the table, where Tegoshi was still sitting with his bangs in his eyes. “It’s starting!”
“What is? Eh?” Yamapi blinked and looked at Tegoshi. “Is that it? He just looks sleepy.”
“It’s starting. Wait until the part with the chin and the eyelashes,” Jin told him confidently. “Then you’ll see the flutter-flutter.”
The two of them both held their breaths and waited.
Then Tegoshi finally tilted his chin downward and…
…yawned.
“That is a yawn,” Yamapi felt the need to say-slowly- in case Jin was confused about something.
Jin smacked him again.
In the meantime, everyone had suddenly stopped talking; they were looking at Tegoshi now.
Tegoshi blinked cutely at the attention. “Ah, sorry!” he apologized, and bowed his head repentantly. “I’m really listening!”
The producers all looked at each other after this; they seemed to have a silent conversation amongst themselves with their eyes that was very close to being terrifying. “Are you sleepy, Tegoshi-kun?” one asked him after a moment, sweetly.
Tegoshi squirmed a bit under the producers’ gazes; when they saw him do this, they all said “awww,” collectively.
“I’m just tired, I guess,” Tegoshi informed them with a sheepish half-smile. “But I’m definitely listening to everything everyone is saying, so please go on!”
The producers all “awwwed” again at his studiousness before looking at their watches. It was getting kind of late and Tegoshi-kun still had school tomorrow morning.
They all suddenly seemed resolute and decisive.
“Okay, that’s it for today,” they announced without warning, and clapped their hands together. “Tegoshi-kun will sing with Akanishi-kun, Koki-kun will sing with Masuda-kun, and Yamapi will sing with Kamenashi-kun. The rest is up to you all.”
There was a beat of silence following that, as all gathered boyband members could not quite believe that it was going to be left at something that simple.
But then Tegoshi yawned again- a bit louder this time- and everyone figured that they had better hurry and leave before the management changed their minds about this.
~~~~~
A few minutes later, as Jin and Yamapi were heading to the parking lot together; Jin raised his finger in the air triumphantly and said, “See? Manipulation!”
“Bakanishi,” Yamapi told him tiredly, “if you are trying to tell me that Tegoshi’s flutter-flutter technique is the same as a yawn, even I will be disappointed in your intelligence.”
“But!” Jin began, and pouted fiercely at his best friend. “It’s not about whether he fluttered or not. It’s about what happened! And I’m sure I’m right! He was manipulating us! We even have proof now!”
Yamapi blinked.
“The meeting is over!” Jin shouted loudly, and waved his hands in the air for emphasis. “Doesn’t that say something to you?!”
“Are you saying that the meeting would go on forever unless Tegoshi yawned?” Yamapi asked his friend patiently.
Jin wasn’t quite sure what to say in response to that. So he said, “Yes?” and hoped he sounded convincing.
But Yamapi just eyed Jin worriedly. “Are you really sure that Tegoshi is doing these things? Maybe you’re getting sick and it just seems that way because of a virus or something. The last time I had the flu I thought that there were gummy bears on the wall and I kept asking Koyama to pick them off and feed them to me.”
A moment.
Then, Jin shook his head. “I’m not sick!” he assured Yamapi. “Tomorrow! Tomorrow I’ll definitely find more proof about this! You’ll see then.”
Yamapi nodded warily. “Ah, I think see now.”
Silence.
Then, “Do you want me to drive you to the convenience store? I will even buy you the expensive flu medicine that tastes like cherries.”
4. Even for a Senpai, This is too much
The next day at lunch, Yamapi began to worry even more about his friend’s health when Jin suddenly started making a few sharp, jerking motions with his head while they were supposed to be eating. Yamapi blinked at him and put down his chopsticks. “Does your neck hurt?” he asked. “Should I massage it?”
Jin pouted; what kind of dumb conclusion to his clear-but-subtle gesticulations was that? “You don’t remember yesterday at all, do you?” he accused Yamapi with a frown.
Yamapi paused. Yesterday? What happened yesterday? Then, to remind himself, he pulled out his cell phone and looked at yesterday’s nikki post.
“Konbanchiwa,” he read out loud to himself, “today was fun… Jin and I ate lunch together and Ryo-chan yelled at us. I hope every day is full of good food and good friends like this. But I think Jin might be getting sick. Be sure to take care of your health, ne!”
He put down his cell phone after he finished reading the entry and nodded knowingly. “Now I remember yesterday. See?” He flashed his LCD display at the older boy as proof. “We ate lunch together and Ryo-chan yelled at us. You might be sick.” He slid his phone back into his pocket and looked very self-satisfied.
Jin on the other hand, crossed his arms and seemed perturbed. “I am not sick! And I am talking about Tegoshi’s flutter-flutter!” he barked. “We are collecting evidence against him for being manipulating and stuff, remember?”
“Flutter-flutter? Oh! Right,” Yamapi recalled. Then frowned. “I forgot to write about that in my J-Web. Maybe I should post again…” He moved to take out his cell phone one more time.
“No! You’ll give away the whole investigation!” Jin protested. “You can’t post about it until we have more proof.”
Yamapi was not sure what Jin meant by that. “We have proof? When? How? Did you investigate more without me?”
“I didn’t have to. There’s proof right there! Just look,” Jin ordered brusquely, and made a few more of those sharp gestures with his head again. He was indicating the space directly behind him. Either that or the ceiling; Yamapi couldn’t quite tell.
Yamapi decided to look over his friend’s shoulder first (because Tegoshi probably would not be in the ceiling) and saw that indeed, Tegoshi was at the table behind them; he was sitting peacefully between Tsuyoshi-senpai and Nagase-senpai. He was not eating anything. Nagase-senpai and Tsuyoshi-senpai both had their heads bent down and were staring at their bowls with intense concentration. Neither of them said a word to Tegoshi, and Yamapi could only assume that they really loved the cafeteria’s vegetable curry rice.
“I see no flutter-fluttering,” he also felt the need to report, after a moment.
But then Nagase suddenly stopped picking at his food. He sat up, looked extremely satisfied with himself, and then grinned and slid his bowl over to Tegoshi. Tegoshi took it and beamed back at the older man beatifically. “I’m so happy that Nagase-kun remembers that I don’t like tomatoes!” he chirped. “Thank you!”
Nagase smiled stupidly in response and even blushed a little. “It’s not so hard to pick them out for you. Tsuyoshi’s job is harder!”
Tsuyoshi was apparently picking out the mushrooms in his lunch and putting them into Tegoshi’s bowl.
“I have such good senpai!” Tegoshi exclaimed happily, and ate his lunch.
“See?!” Jin exclaimed when he saw this, and grabbed Yamapi to make sure he was paying proper attention as well. “That! There! That!”
Yamapi cocked his head to the side. “Jin,” he said to his friend slowly, patiently, “That is just a smile. Tegoshi does it all the time. It’s always the same.” Pause. “Did you get flutter-flutter confused with smile?” It was entirely possible; he’d gotten it confused with a yawn yesterday, after all.
“I did not! And it’s not that part that’s important! Nagase-san picked out all the tomatoes for him. Tsuyoshi-san is giving away his mushrooms!”
Even as this was being told to him, Yamapi appeared nonplussed. “Bakanishi! Of course he picked them out for him! Because Tegoshi doesn’t like tomatoes, remember? And he loves mushrooms; he eats Koyama’s all the time.” Yamapi said this all very matter-of-factly, as if these were normal things that happened every day. Then, because Jin apparently needed a reminder, he added, “You picked his tomatoes out for him once too, during Summary. It was right after you saved him from being bullied by Koki after the first show. It’s what any good senpai does, isn’t it? What’s the big deal?”
Jin blinked a few times as he recalled this.
Stared.
Then he gaped and put both hands on his head in distress.
“Oh no, did he get me too?!”
5. Maybe Tegoshi is Innocent After All
“Tegoshi!” Jin shouted, and stormed up to the younger boy in the middle of the hallway after lunch. He looked annoyed.
“Akanishi-kun?” Tegoshi replied, and blinked. “Is something the matter?”
“You manipulated me!” Jin accused, loudly.
“Eh?”
Tegoshi’s face was very cute when it was confused.
Jin bit his bottom lip and slid his eyes sideways to avoid eye contact-he was on to Tegoshi now, so that cute look would not work on him anymore.
From behind him, Yamapi clucked worriedly and put his hand on Jin’s shoulder when he heard his best friend’s angry tone. “Are you sure you’re not sick?” he asked him. “Maybe you should lie down.”
Jin shrugged his hand off. “No! I’m fine! I know exactly what is going on here!” he insisted. “Tegoshi is manipulating everyone!”
Upon hearing this, everyone within hearing range promptly stopped what he or she was doing and turned around to stare at Jin and Yamapi and Tegoshi. Jin suddenly felt as if they were all looking at him with varying degrees of hostility.
Tegoshi in the meantime, didn’t seem to notice the sudden downturn in the atmosphere. Instead, his eyes became huge and he looked up at Jin in distress. “E-eh? I’m manipulating everyone?” the younger boy asked, and was so small and innocent-looking that Jin almost doubted his theories for a moment.
“Y-yes!” Jin said anyway. He was determined to be resolute about this. No more being manipulated from now on!
“Maa, maa… let’s calm down, ne?” Yamapi began, and moved to get between Jin and Tegoshi on instinct. He pushed his friend a step backwards, gently. “I don’t think you’re thinking straight. You were doing funny things with your head earlier; maybe that made something go wonky inside. Do you remember hearing any strange snapping or twisting sounds?”
“I’m FINE! Tegoshi is just an evil, evil manipulator!” Jin insisted. “He made Ryo-chan nice! He doesn’t eat tomatoes! Management listens to him! HE DID SOMETHING WEIRD TO ME.”
Jin could go on, except when he looked over Yamapi’s shoulder at said evil, evil manipulator with the intent of giving him a well-timed glare for emphasis, he paused when he noticed that Tegoshi’s bottom lip was trembling just a little bit and that his hands were both clenched tightly at his sides. His eyes were the size of plates and his knuckles were turning white.
And so Jin stopped talking without knowing why.
He stared.
Swallowed.
And just when Tegoshi looked as if he was about to cry right there on the spot in front of everyone, Jin found himself blurting, “I’m sorry!” without thinking. When he heard it, he even surprised himself.
But Tegoshi’s lip immediately stopped trembling (thankfully) and he blinked instead. “E-eh?”
“I’m sorry! Don’t be mad. Or don’t cry…and yeah,” Jin said quickly, even though he wasn’t sure why he was apologizing all of a sudden; he was still certain that he was right. Maybe.
Yamapi, on the other hand, beamed at the apology like he had been expecting it to come out all along. He patted Jin on the back. “There, isn’t that nice? You feel better now, right?” Then he turned to Tegoshi. “Tegoshi, are you okay?” he asked, just to make sure the younger boy’s feelings hadn’t been hurt by Jin’s sudden outburst or his scary facial expressions.
But Tegoshi only smiled back at him brilliantly and nodded as if nothing odd had happened at all. “Un!” he chirruped at Yamapi. “I’m okay, Yamashita-kun.”
Yamapi smiled back at the younger boy and felt relieved. “Okay! Well, please forgive him for having such bad taste. Jin has just been acting weird since yesterday; I think he either hurt his head or he has the flu.”
Tegoshi shook his head cutely at Yamapi and clasped his hands behind his back. “It’s alright! There’s nothing to forgive, ne!” Then, to Jin, “Feel better quickly, okay, Akanishi-kun!”
Jin could hear it when everyone who was watching their argument let out a collective, “Awww” at Tegoshi’s magnanimity.
But despite Tegoshi’s assurances that he was fine, Yamapi still wanted to be absolutely sure that this would not cause any problems between Jin and Tegoshi in the future. He liked it best when everyone who was important to him could get along happily, after all. So he cleared his throat and said, “Tegoshi, if there’s anything we can do to make it up to you, don’t be shy in asking, okay? Being falsely accused is the worst thing ever, ne!”
When he heard this, Tegoshi immediately sparkled at both of the older boys. He stood up a little straighter. “Well, if Yamashita-kun says so… okay!”
He smiled.
~~~~~
Later, when Jin and Yamapi were picking up Tegoshi’s dry cleaning for him, Yamapi clucked disapprovingly at Jin for what might have been the fifteenth time in a row as they waited at the counter for their order to come up.
“I told you there was no such thing as a flutter-flutter,” he told Jin confidently. “Yappari, Tegoshi just has a really cute smile, ne! He’s such a sweet kid; he’s not manipulating anyone at all.”
Jin nodded and paid the dry cleaning bill repentantly once the items arrived. “Maybe I did hurt my head,” he admitted, and obediently took the hangers with Tegoshi’s clothes on them. He carefully laid them over his arm and turned to Yamapi as they headed back to the parking lot. “Now what?”
Yamapi looked down at the list that he had been given earlier; it was written in Tegoshi’s neat handwriting and even had cute little hearts drawn around Yamapi and Jin’s names. “He needs a new bottle of travel shampoo and face cream,” Yamapi reported. “After we buy them we just need to drop them off at Koyama or Shige’s house so that they can finish packing Tegoshi’s suitcases for him in time for tomorrow’s trip.”
Jin frowned a little when he heard all this; once again, he felt that maybe something was off here after all.
But he stopped himself before he could think any more negative thoughts like that; he’d already learned his lesson from earlier, and he definitely didn’t want to make another scene like he had back at the jimusho. Everyone was already talking about what a jerk he’d been and how nasty Akanishi Jin was to all of his adorable-and-innocent-little kouhai.
So he made sure not to say anything about Tegoshi or manipulation as he and Yamapi climbed into his car and headed for the department store that Yamapi knew Tegoshi liked.
In fact, Jin was feeling so sorry for everything that he’d done by the time evening rolled around that he even bought Tegoshi some fancy candy and a cute stuffed teddy bear while he and Yamapi were at the shopping center.
Later, he gave them to Koyama (along with the travel shampoo and the face cream) so that the older boy could pack them inside of Tegoshi’s suitcase as apology presents.
He hoped Tegoshi liked them.
END
EDITS PLZ.