JE/NEWS- "Higher Learning"
Title: Higher Learning
Universe: JE/NewS
Theme/Topic: Ryo becomes Shige’s kouhai
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing/s: NewS (Shige and Ryo focus)
Warnings/Spoilers: Crack, OOC, stupidity, weirdness.
Word Count: 2,869
Summary: In which Ryo goes to college and Shige’s life is still hard.
Dedication: From pinkpapyrus’s fic wish meme; I suppose I should take responsibility for my actions, though this clearly turned out FAR DIFFERENT than what we talked about.
A/N: Obviously I have no concept of how Japanese college systems work so pretend it doesn’t matter. Also, I SPENT ALL DAY ON THIS. THIS AND NOT THINGS I SHOULD HAVE SPENT AN ENTIRE SICK DAY ON. My priorities. My priorities are retarded. I blame the illness.
Disclaimer: No harm is meant by this!
When Massu announces that he will finally be applying to colleges for next year like he always wanted to everyone heartily congratulates him and tells him to do his best. Somewhere in the midst of it all Ryo blinks, looks at each of his groupmates one at a time, and says, “Shit,” to himself when he suddenly realizes.
He starts studying for university entrance exams the following week, because if Massu gets into Hosei’s graphic design department (like Kusano has been encouraging him to), then Ryo is going to never live it down.
It’s like Yamapi always says; everyone in NewS hates to lose except for maybe Koyama (which is moot right now anyway, since Koyama has already graduated).
Ryo decides that it’s time to go back to school.
~~~~~
“Where would you even apply?! Who would take you?!” Uchi laughs when Ryo tells him his plans; “And aren’t you too old to go to college now?”
“Nakamaru is 24,” Ryo snaps back, embarrassed.
“Nakamaru is also a huge dork,” Uchi reminds him. “And aren’t you overworked as it is? If you’re going to go to college and be in NewS and be in Eito all at the same time then you better go to a school with someone you know so you can cheat off of their notes.”
Ryo blinks. Uchi has a point.
And then, after a moment of thought, Ryo smiles slowly. “Hey, I know where I’m applying to now,” he says.
He has always been glad that Uchi is one of his best friends.
~~~~~
Months later, when the letter comes in the mail (as he knew it inevitably would) Ryo opens it, smiles, and brings it with him to work.
“Oh by the way,” he says during their rehearsal break, while everyone in the dressing room is happily congratulating Massu on his acceptance to Hosei earlier in the week, “I got into Aoyama’s law department today.”
The other members pause when they hear the announcement and wonder to themselves if it’s just another one of Ryo’s absurd jokes; they stand for a moment and wait for the punch line to come.
Ryo doesn’t mind that they don’t believe him right off; he just smiles and leans back in his chair.
As expected, Shige sees the look on his face and is the first out of everyone to realize that no, no it isn’t a joke.
And then Shige screams.
~~~~~
Koyama screams too-a moment later-and for completely different reasons.
“The best thing in the world is getting to go to school with one of your groupmates!” he squeals, and looks euphoric for both of them.
Yamapi nods in agreement; “This means Ryo-chan and Shige can go on lunch dates between classes, ne.”
“Eh, you’ll be just like me and Kusano,” Massu marvels, and doesn’t mind at all that his thunder was stolen because it’s all good news.
Tegoshi beams. “It’s even better because they’re in the same department, ne!” he says, laughing and clapping cutely. “Sugoi, Ryo-tan!”
When Ryo laughs along with Tegoshi it’s not because he’s awesome (since he already knows that) but because Shige is standing in the back of the room pinching himself in the arm-hard- in the hopes that this is all just a really bad dream.
Ryo casually inquires whether or not Shige-senpai will take him shopping for lawyerly clothes this upcoming weekend.
Shige starts pinching himself a little more frantically.
~~~~~
And so, during the spring of Shige’s senior year at Aoyama, Ryo enters the same university in the same department.
“Why law?!” Shige rails after the entrance ceremony finishes, “Why here?!”
“Don’t you remember what Koyama said?” Ryo tells him around a smirk, “The best thing in the world is getting to go to school with one of your groupmates. Now show me around, Shige-senpai.”
They tour the campus together that afternoon (or rather, Ryo drags him around forcibly), and Shige is blinded by the flashes of other people’s cell phone cameras for the very first time since entering the school.
Later, Ryo makes Shige treat him to lunch.
~~~~~
“What’s it like going to the same school?” an interviewer asks them a week later; “Is it strange for Kato-kun to suddenly be Nishikido-kun’s senpai when it’s been the other way around for so many years?”
“I…” Shige starts, but gets interrupted by Ryo.
“He usually ignores me,” Ryo says, and sounds like he’s complaining. “How come you never want to hang out, senpai?”
Koyama looks heartbroken at the announcement while the others turn expectantly to Shige for an explanation.
Shige sputters. “We don’t have the same schedule! I’m not going to come to campus when I don’t have classes.” He hastily turns to the interviewer to clarify, “The only time of the week we have classes on the same day is Thursday. Thursday.”
“Ah, it’s hard to be an older student at a school where no one wants to help you out,” Ryo sighs next, and earns a sympathetic look from the interviewer.
Shige buries his head in his hands.
~~~~~
The Thursday following the day that interview airs on TV, Shige’s mother presents him with two bentos on his way out the door. “Give one to Nishikido-kun and don’t be a bully,” she says with a telling look, and Shige’s shoulders slump as he heads to campus carrying both boxes.
Ryo happily accepts the food. “What a nice senpai,” he crows, around a mouthful of homemade onigiri.
“It’s not from me it's from my mother!” Shige shouts, and makes the food taste that much better to Ryo when he does.
~~~~~
A month eventually passes and Ryo suddenly shows up at Shige’s house early one Saturday afternoon, wearing reading glasses and holding a bunch of books and papers. He looks-oddly enough-like a normal college student.
“What?” Shige asks, instantly suspicious as Ryo stands on his doorstep yawning.
Ryo promptly shoves his books into Shige’s arms. “Alright, senpai,” he says, “my first test is on Monday and this stuff is actually pretty hard.”
Shige stares. “What?”
Ryo rolls his eyes. “So teach me already.”
Shige is about to snap something along the lines of, “Study by yourself!” but stops when he notices the dark circles under Ryo’s eyes in the sunlight. They’re more pronounced than usual now that Ryo has two groups and school to keep up with; Shige suddenly realizes that as hard as it’s been for him to be in school while working as an idol over the past few years, it has to be that much worse for Ryo.
So he sighs and lets Ryo in.
~~~~~
Hours later, Ryo bangs his head on the desk and groans, “Why law?” he says. “You couldn’t have chosen something easier?”
Shige snorts. “Don’t tell me you joined the law department just because I did.”
Ryo glares. “Well you made it seem easy,” he snaps.
Shige tries not to look pleased about that and shoves another textbook under Ryo’s nose. “Memorize this,” he tells the older boy, before going downstairs to make them both tea.
When he comes back Ryo is bent over the desk studying the sections Shige highlighted intently; Shige laughs a little to himself at the sight and silently drops the tea off before going downstairs to dig up his old notes from freshman year.
He copies them for Ryo and that night, Ryo eats dinner at Shige’s house.
~~~~~
“Ninety-eight points,” Ryo crows the following Thursday, around a mouthful of Shige’s mother’s bento. “I am amazing.”
Shige sits on the lawn next to him and rolls his eyes. “At least give some credit where it’s due.”
Ryo grins. “Sure.” And then he digs into his bag and pulls out another notebook. “Since you’re such a great tutor, help me study for my English test tomorrow, senpai.”
Shige sighs.
~~~~~
The following month NewS starts gearing up for the promotions that will come with their next single release; it just so happens to coincide with the time when Shige and Tegoshi need to submit their proposals for their senior theses and Ryo needs to start preparing for round one of midterms.
Backstage is virtually silent because of that; Shige and Tegoshi are constantly bent over notes and looking thoughtful while Massu clicks around the multiple layers of his next Photoshop project and Ryo reviews English law terms that are actually Latin (neither of which he knows very much about). Koyama and Yamapi try to stay quiet out of respect and mutual understanding for what their groupmates are going through; Koyama pours the studying members tea and buys them snacks while Yamapi peacefully listens to music and does sit ups by himself in the corner.
“NewS’s dressing room is really serious lately,” the staff and directors all marvel to one another, and worry about it because it will make all the backstage reports that come out during the same week as the single seem boring. “It won’t help sales at all if it continues like this.”
Ryo rolls his eyes while Shige just shrugs. “You get used to it,” he says simply, and points out that Ryo spelled factum wrong on his review worksheet.
“Maybe they’ll be cuter once the cameras are actually rolling,” one of the managers murmurs to an assistant director a few minutes later.
Ryo accidentally breaks the lead on his pencil when he overhears and can’t believe Yamapi and Koyama endured four years of this kind of thing and that Shige and Tegoshi are almost there too.
That night, he writes in his blog:
School is really tough.
I’ll keep doing my best.
Those of you who are also still in school, keep doing your best as well.
Nishikido Ryo
That week, NewS hits number one on the Oricon again and Ryo passes his midterms by the skin of his teeth.
~~~~~
“We need to do something fun,” Ryo exclaims on the Thursday after their midterms are over, as he and Shige sit out on the lawn eating lunch together. Shige’s mother made inarizushi today. “College can’t be this boring all the time.”
“Well sorry,” Shige snaps, and looks dangerously close to sulking.
Ryo ignores his over-sensitivity. “We should join a club or something.”
“Do you even have the time?”
Ryo blinks. “Okay, we should start a club or something. Then we can meet on our own terms.”
“I know, how about the My-Mom-Makes-Me-Carry-Two-Lunches-to-School-Every-Thursday-so-we-Can-Eat-Together Club?” Shige suggests after a beat, dryly. “Or even better, the We’re-Idols-so-we-Don’t-Actually-Have-Time-for-any-Real-Club-Activities Club?”
Ryo glares. “I should have gone to Waseda with Tego-nyan. He’s so much cuter than you.”
“I agree,” Shige says, “You should have.”
Ryo throws fried tofu at his head.
~~~~~
As the months go by Ryo decides that he likes criminal law best; Shige snorts and says, “That just figures,” while sounding more and more tired.
He’s five pages into his senior thesis and grumpier than usual.
~~~~~
“Lately there have been a lot of paparazzi photos of Shige and Ryo-chan hanging out together, ne,” Koyama marvels happily towards the end of the semester; “They must be getting along really well!”
“Right!” Yamapi agrees, and flashes a thumbs up for no particular reason.
Not three seconds later, Shige and Ryo storm past the open doorway on their way to the cafeteria together; they’re yelling at each other. “You can’t just motion to suppress left and right like that! It’s like saying here, someone was killed, can we pretend no one ever found the body?”
“You’re wrong and you need another haircut!” Ryo yells back.
A moment.
“I’m glad,” Koyama begins again, more slowly this time, “that they’re getting along so well, ne.”
Yamapi’s smile never changes.
~~~~~
Ryo feels about ready to burst with joy when the semester ends and they get to relax for the summer; Shige looks relieved too, but still has to work on his final paper.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Ryo will say over the phone when he calls Shige on his days off, “How’s your summer going? We should hang out in our free time.”
“I’m working,” Shige snarls darkly, and hangs up.
Ryo laughs and calls him again, ten minutes later.
~~~~~
Second semester starts while Ryo is still working on the tail end of K8’s summer tour; Shige texts him on those days and says snooty things like:
“Did you find time to study? You know that when you get back you’ll have a quiz, right?”
Ryo messages back:
“Worry about your own thesis before bothering someone else! I’m studying just fine.”
Shige responds:
“I worry because I’m a good senpai remember?”
Ryo writes:
“Get a haircut.”
Shige usually sends the last message; it almost always says, “Keep working hard.”
~~~~~
Ryo spends his second semester practically living inside the law library; Shige spends most of it living right next to him, silently typing his thesis with his eyebrows furrowed in a very severe manner.
In those weeks Shige looks like he’s very close to going insane (not surprisingly, Tegoshi looks absolutely fine even if the two of them are technically in the same boat), and during their interviews for the next few weeks, Ryo makes sure to pick on Massu instead of Shige, out of courtesy.
Shige finishes his thesis thirty pages in and with two hours to spare.
During the interviews, Massu only cries once.
~~~~~
When Shige gets confirmation that he will be graduating this year, he surprises everyone by calling Ryo and telling him about it first.
“You idiot,” Ryo says, but can’t quite pull it off because he’s just as excited as Shige is, “now Koyama isn’t going to let us live this down.”
He’s right, of course.
~~~~~
Tegoshi gets his graduation confirmation a few days later and makes sure the first one he calls is Koyama, who is ecstatic to the point of tears.
Ryo has never needed a reason to love Tegoshi, but Tegoshi has always given him lots of them anyway.
~~~~~
“You know,” Ryo admits one Saturday afternoon, as he studies in Shige’s room while Shige pores over graduation packages and instructions and graduation ceremony protocol, “I might actually miss this after next week.”
Shige pauses. Blinks. “Really?”
Ryo looks vaguely embarrassed; “I don’t know, I said I might. We won’t be certain until you actually graduate, right?”
“You just like having a free tutor,” Shige snorts, letting him off the hook.
He tries not to sound touched.
~~~~~
Shige and Tegoshi both graduate during NewS’s concert tour that year; the two of them have good grades and are well liked by all of their professors. Naturally the television networks eat this kind of information up, airing segments of the pair’s commencement ceremonies on the morning news shows while the commentators praise NewS as a whole, for being so smart.
Tegoshi absolutely glows during his ceremony and unabashedly takes pictures the whole time.
In his clips, Shige looks tired but happy to finally be done; he’s very carefully dignified through the entire affair.
Watching the two of them receive their diplomas makes Ryo wonder how he’ll look and feel when he’s sitting there just like them, three years from now.
He wonders if he’ll even make it that far now that Shige isn’t there too.
~~~~~
The next day Ryo gets a text message from Shige while they’re backstage waiting for the final concert to start.
“I hear you have an English test next Monday.”
Ryo blinks and looks across the room, but Shige has his nose buried in a book even though he doesn’t have to anymore.
He texts back:
“What’s it to you?”
Hours later, after the concert is through and everyone is exhausted, Ryo’s phone vibrates again.
“I’m free Saturday.”
~~~~~
“What’s that?” Ryo asks a month later, when, just like always, he shows up at Shige’s house the weekend before his next round of tests is slated to begin. He thinks he comes here more for the familiarity of it all than out of any actual need for tutoring, but makes sure to ask Shige questions every now and again so Shige doesn’t realize that too.
Because the last thing he needs is for Shige to know that he kind of misses having lunch with him Thursday afternoons on the lawn in front of the library, especially since Shige clearly doesn’t miss them at all, what with his new diploma all framed and shiny over his bed and his schedule more open and relaxed than it’s been in years.
Shige turns red at Ryo’s offhanded question and quickly tucks the pamphlet he’d been looking at behind his back; he moves out of the doorway to let Ryo in. “What’s what?” he asks, trying to sound innocent.
“What’s that pamphlet you’re holding, stupid,” Ryo snipes, as he slips off his shoes.
Shige sniffs. “Well clearly you already know what it is. It’s a pamphlet.”
“I know that. What’s it a pamphlet for? Are you ordering porn or something?”
Shige looks scandalized. “It’s not porn!”
“Then what is it?”
Shige sighs. “It’s information about Aoyama’s graduate law program,” he admits after a moment, and looks simultaneously shy and mortified for being caught like this.
Ryo blinks. “Oh.”
A beat.
Then, “Oi, what kind reaction was that?!” Shige demands.
Ryo just laughs at him and heads upstairs with his books.
END
EDITS PLZ I R SICK.
Universe: JE/NewS
Theme/Topic: Ryo becomes Shige’s kouhai
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing/s: NewS (Shige and Ryo focus)
Warnings/Spoilers: Crack, OOC, stupidity, weirdness.
Word Count: 2,869
Summary: In which Ryo goes to college and Shige’s life is still hard.
Dedication: From pinkpapyrus’s fic wish meme; I suppose I should take responsibility for my actions, though this clearly turned out FAR DIFFERENT than what we talked about.
A/N: Obviously I have no concept of how Japanese college systems work so pretend it doesn’t matter. Also, I SPENT ALL DAY ON THIS. THIS AND NOT THINGS I SHOULD HAVE SPENT AN ENTIRE SICK DAY ON. My priorities. My priorities are retarded. I blame the illness.
Disclaimer: No harm is meant by this!
When Massu announces that he will finally be applying to colleges for next year like he always wanted to everyone heartily congratulates him and tells him to do his best. Somewhere in the midst of it all Ryo blinks, looks at each of his groupmates one at a time, and says, “Shit,” to himself when he suddenly realizes.
He starts studying for university entrance exams the following week, because if Massu gets into Hosei’s graphic design department (like Kusano has been encouraging him to), then Ryo is going to never live it down.
It’s like Yamapi always says; everyone in NewS hates to lose except for maybe Koyama (which is moot right now anyway, since Koyama has already graduated).
Ryo decides that it’s time to go back to school.
~~~~~
“Where would you even apply?! Who would take you?!” Uchi laughs when Ryo tells him his plans; “And aren’t you too old to go to college now?”
“Nakamaru is 24,” Ryo snaps back, embarrassed.
“Nakamaru is also a huge dork,” Uchi reminds him. “And aren’t you overworked as it is? If you’re going to go to college and be in NewS and be in Eito all at the same time then you better go to a school with someone you know so you can cheat off of their notes.”
Ryo blinks. Uchi has a point.
And then, after a moment of thought, Ryo smiles slowly. “Hey, I know where I’m applying to now,” he says.
He has always been glad that Uchi is one of his best friends.
~~~~~
Months later, when the letter comes in the mail (as he knew it inevitably would) Ryo opens it, smiles, and brings it with him to work.
“Oh by the way,” he says during their rehearsal break, while everyone in the dressing room is happily congratulating Massu on his acceptance to Hosei earlier in the week, “I got into Aoyama’s law department today.”
The other members pause when they hear the announcement and wonder to themselves if it’s just another one of Ryo’s absurd jokes; they stand for a moment and wait for the punch line to come.
Ryo doesn’t mind that they don’t believe him right off; he just smiles and leans back in his chair.
As expected, Shige sees the look on his face and is the first out of everyone to realize that no, no it isn’t a joke.
And then Shige screams.
~~~~~
Koyama screams too-a moment later-and for completely different reasons.
“The best thing in the world is getting to go to school with one of your groupmates!” he squeals, and looks euphoric for both of them.
Yamapi nods in agreement; “This means Ryo-chan and Shige can go on lunch dates between classes, ne.”
“Eh, you’ll be just like me and Kusano,” Massu marvels, and doesn’t mind at all that his thunder was stolen because it’s all good news.
Tegoshi beams. “It’s even better because they’re in the same department, ne!” he says, laughing and clapping cutely. “Sugoi, Ryo-tan!”
When Ryo laughs along with Tegoshi it’s not because he’s awesome (since he already knows that) but because Shige is standing in the back of the room pinching himself in the arm-hard- in the hopes that this is all just a really bad dream.
Ryo casually inquires whether or not Shige-senpai will take him shopping for lawyerly clothes this upcoming weekend.
Shige starts pinching himself a little more frantically.
~~~~~
And so, during the spring of Shige’s senior year at Aoyama, Ryo enters the same university in the same department.
“Why law?!” Shige rails after the entrance ceremony finishes, “Why here?!”
“Don’t you remember what Koyama said?” Ryo tells him around a smirk, “The best thing in the world is getting to go to school with one of your groupmates. Now show me around, Shige-senpai.”
They tour the campus together that afternoon (or rather, Ryo drags him around forcibly), and Shige is blinded by the flashes of other people’s cell phone cameras for the very first time since entering the school.
Later, Ryo makes Shige treat him to lunch.
~~~~~
“What’s it like going to the same school?” an interviewer asks them a week later; “Is it strange for Kato-kun to suddenly be Nishikido-kun’s senpai when it’s been the other way around for so many years?”
“I…” Shige starts, but gets interrupted by Ryo.
“He usually ignores me,” Ryo says, and sounds like he’s complaining. “How come you never want to hang out, senpai?”
Koyama looks heartbroken at the announcement while the others turn expectantly to Shige for an explanation.
Shige sputters. “We don’t have the same schedule! I’m not going to come to campus when I don’t have classes.” He hastily turns to the interviewer to clarify, “The only time of the week we have classes on the same day is Thursday. Thursday.”
“Ah, it’s hard to be an older student at a school where no one wants to help you out,” Ryo sighs next, and earns a sympathetic look from the interviewer.
Shige buries his head in his hands.
~~~~~
The Thursday following the day that interview airs on TV, Shige’s mother presents him with two bentos on his way out the door. “Give one to Nishikido-kun and don’t be a bully,” she says with a telling look, and Shige’s shoulders slump as he heads to campus carrying both boxes.
Ryo happily accepts the food. “What a nice senpai,” he crows, around a mouthful of homemade onigiri.
“It’s not from me it's from my mother!” Shige shouts, and makes the food taste that much better to Ryo when he does.
~~~~~
A month eventually passes and Ryo suddenly shows up at Shige’s house early one Saturday afternoon, wearing reading glasses and holding a bunch of books and papers. He looks-oddly enough-like a normal college student.
“What?” Shige asks, instantly suspicious as Ryo stands on his doorstep yawning.
Ryo promptly shoves his books into Shige’s arms. “Alright, senpai,” he says, “my first test is on Monday and this stuff is actually pretty hard.”
Shige stares. “What?”
Ryo rolls his eyes. “So teach me already.”
Shige is about to snap something along the lines of, “Study by yourself!” but stops when he notices the dark circles under Ryo’s eyes in the sunlight. They’re more pronounced than usual now that Ryo has two groups and school to keep up with; Shige suddenly realizes that as hard as it’s been for him to be in school while working as an idol over the past few years, it has to be that much worse for Ryo.
So he sighs and lets Ryo in.
~~~~~
Hours later, Ryo bangs his head on the desk and groans, “Why law?” he says. “You couldn’t have chosen something easier?”
Shige snorts. “Don’t tell me you joined the law department just because I did.”
Ryo glares. “Well you made it seem easy,” he snaps.
Shige tries not to look pleased about that and shoves another textbook under Ryo’s nose. “Memorize this,” he tells the older boy, before going downstairs to make them both tea.
When he comes back Ryo is bent over the desk studying the sections Shige highlighted intently; Shige laughs a little to himself at the sight and silently drops the tea off before going downstairs to dig up his old notes from freshman year.
He copies them for Ryo and that night, Ryo eats dinner at Shige’s house.
~~~~~
“Ninety-eight points,” Ryo crows the following Thursday, around a mouthful of Shige’s mother’s bento. “I am amazing.”
Shige sits on the lawn next to him and rolls his eyes. “At least give some credit where it’s due.”
Ryo grins. “Sure.” And then he digs into his bag and pulls out another notebook. “Since you’re such a great tutor, help me study for my English test tomorrow, senpai.”
Shige sighs.
~~~~~
The following month NewS starts gearing up for the promotions that will come with their next single release; it just so happens to coincide with the time when Shige and Tegoshi need to submit their proposals for their senior theses and Ryo needs to start preparing for round one of midterms.
Backstage is virtually silent because of that; Shige and Tegoshi are constantly bent over notes and looking thoughtful while Massu clicks around the multiple layers of his next Photoshop project and Ryo reviews English law terms that are actually Latin (neither of which he knows very much about). Koyama and Yamapi try to stay quiet out of respect and mutual understanding for what their groupmates are going through; Koyama pours the studying members tea and buys them snacks while Yamapi peacefully listens to music and does sit ups by himself in the corner.
“NewS’s dressing room is really serious lately,” the staff and directors all marvel to one another, and worry about it because it will make all the backstage reports that come out during the same week as the single seem boring. “It won’t help sales at all if it continues like this.”
Ryo rolls his eyes while Shige just shrugs. “You get used to it,” he says simply, and points out that Ryo spelled factum wrong on his review worksheet.
“Maybe they’ll be cuter once the cameras are actually rolling,” one of the managers murmurs to an assistant director a few minutes later.
Ryo accidentally breaks the lead on his pencil when he overhears and can’t believe Yamapi and Koyama endured four years of this kind of thing and that Shige and Tegoshi are almost there too.
That night, he writes in his blog:
School is really tough.
I’ll keep doing my best.
Those of you who are also still in school, keep doing your best as well.
Nishikido Ryo
That week, NewS hits number one on the Oricon again and Ryo passes his midterms by the skin of his teeth.
~~~~~
“We need to do something fun,” Ryo exclaims on the Thursday after their midterms are over, as he and Shige sit out on the lawn eating lunch together. Shige’s mother made inarizushi today. “College can’t be this boring all the time.”
“Well sorry,” Shige snaps, and looks dangerously close to sulking.
Ryo ignores his over-sensitivity. “We should join a club or something.”
“Do you even have the time?”
Ryo blinks. “Okay, we should start a club or something. Then we can meet on our own terms.”
“I know, how about the My-Mom-Makes-Me-Carry-Two-Lunches-to-School-Every-Thursday-so-we-Can-Eat-Together Club?” Shige suggests after a beat, dryly. “Or even better, the We’re-Idols-so-we-Don’t-Actually-Have-Time-for-any-Real-Club-Activities Club?”
Ryo glares. “I should have gone to Waseda with Tego-nyan. He’s so much cuter than you.”
“I agree,” Shige says, “You should have.”
Ryo throws fried tofu at his head.
~~~~~
As the months go by Ryo decides that he likes criminal law best; Shige snorts and says, “That just figures,” while sounding more and more tired.
He’s five pages into his senior thesis and grumpier than usual.
~~~~~
“Lately there have been a lot of paparazzi photos of Shige and Ryo-chan hanging out together, ne,” Koyama marvels happily towards the end of the semester; “They must be getting along really well!”
“Right!” Yamapi agrees, and flashes a thumbs up for no particular reason.
Not three seconds later, Shige and Ryo storm past the open doorway on their way to the cafeteria together; they’re yelling at each other. “You can’t just motion to suppress left and right like that! It’s like saying here, someone was killed, can we pretend no one ever found the body?”
“You’re wrong and you need another haircut!” Ryo yells back.
A moment.
“I’m glad,” Koyama begins again, more slowly this time, “that they’re getting along so well, ne.”
Yamapi’s smile never changes.
~~~~~
Ryo feels about ready to burst with joy when the semester ends and they get to relax for the summer; Shige looks relieved too, but still has to work on his final paper.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Ryo will say over the phone when he calls Shige on his days off, “How’s your summer going? We should hang out in our free time.”
“I’m working,” Shige snarls darkly, and hangs up.
Ryo laughs and calls him again, ten minutes later.
~~~~~
Second semester starts while Ryo is still working on the tail end of K8’s summer tour; Shige texts him on those days and says snooty things like:
“Did you find time to study? You know that when you get back you’ll have a quiz, right?”
Ryo messages back:
“Worry about your own thesis before bothering someone else! I’m studying just fine.”
Shige responds:
“I worry because I’m a good senpai remember?”
Ryo writes:
“Get a haircut.”
Shige usually sends the last message; it almost always says, “Keep working hard.”
~~~~~
Ryo spends his second semester practically living inside the law library; Shige spends most of it living right next to him, silently typing his thesis with his eyebrows furrowed in a very severe manner.
In those weeks Shige looks like he’s very close to going insane (not surprisingly, Tegoshi looks absolutely fine even if the two of them are technically in the same boat), and during their interviews for the next few weeks, Ryo makes sure to pick on Massu instead of Shige, out of courtesy.
Shige finishes his thesis thirty pages in and with two hours to spare.
During the interviews, Massu only cries once.
~~~~~
When Shige gets confirmation that he will be graduating this year, he surprises everyone by calling Ryo and telling him about it first.
“You idiot,” Ryo says, but can’t quite pull it off because he’s just as excited as Shige is, “now Koyama isn’t going to let us live this down.”
He’s right, of course.
~~~~~
Tegoshi gets his graduation confirmation a few days later and makes sure the first one he calls is Koyama, who is ecstatic to the point of tears.
Ryo has never needed a reason to love Tegoshi, but Tegoshi has always given him lots of them anyway.
~~~~~
“You know,” Ryo admits one Saturday afternoon, as he studies in Shige’s room while Shige pores over graduation packages and instructions and graduation ceremony protocol, “I might actually miss this after next week.”
Shige pauses. Blinks. “Really?”
Ryo looks vaguely embarrassed; “I don’t know, I said I might. We won’t be certain until you actually graduate, right?”
“You just like having a free tutor,” Shige snorts, letting him off the hook.
He tries not to sound touched.
~~~~~
Shige and Tegoshi both graduate during NewS’s concert tour that year; the two of them have good grades and are well liked by all of their professors. Naturally the television networks eat this kind of information up, airing segments of the pair’s commencement ceremonies on the morning news shows while the commentators praise NewS as a whole, for being so smart.
Tegoshi absolutely glows during his ceremony and unabashedly takes pictures the whole time.
In his clips, Shige looks tired but happy to finally be done; he’s very carefully dignified through the entire affair.
Watching the two of them receive their diplomas makes Ryo wonder how he’ll look and feel when he’s sitting there just like them, three years from now.
He wonders if he’ll even make it that far now that Shige isn’t there too.
~~~~~
The next day Ryo gets a text message from Shige while they’re backstage waiting for the final concert to start.
“I hear you have an English test next Monday.”
Ryo blinks and looks across the room, but Shige has his nose buried in a book even though he doesn’t have to anymore.
He texts back:
“What’s it to you?”
Hours later, after the concert is through and everyone is exhausted, Ryo’s phone vibrates again.
“I’m free Saturday.”
~~~~~
“What’s that?” Ryo asks a month later, when, just like always, he shows up at Shige’s house the weekend before his next round of tests is slated to begin. He thinks he comes here more for the familiarity of it all than out of any actual need for tutoring, but makes sure to ask Shige questions every now and again so Shige doesn’t realize that too.
Because the last thing he needs is for Shige to know that he kind of misses having lunch with him Thursday afternoons on the lawn in front of the library, especially since Shige clearly doesn’t miss them at all, what with his new diploma all framed and shiny over his bed and his schedule more open and relaxed than it’s been in years.
Shige turns red at Ryo’s offhanded question and quickly tucks the pamphlet he’d been looking at behind his back; he moves out of the doorway to let Ryo in. “What’s what?” he asks, trying to sound innocent.
“What’s that pamphlet you’re holding, stupid,” Ryo snipes, as he slips off his shoes.
Shige sniffs. “Well clearly you already know what it is. It’s a pamphlet.”
“I know that. What’s it a pamphlet for? Are you ordering porn or something?”
Shige looks scandalized. “It’s not porn!”
“Then what is it?”
Shige sighs. “It’s information about Aoyama’s graduate law program,” he admits after a moment, and looks simultaneously shy and mortified for being caught like this.
Ryo blinks. “Oh.”
A beat.
Then, “Oi, what kind reaction was that?!” Shige demands.
Ryo just laughs at him and heads upstairs with his books.
END
EDITS PLZ I R SICK.