One-shot: The pot flower that saw it all
Title: The pot flower that saw it all
Pairings/Characters: Ryo/Shige
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fern used as more than a plot device
Summary: This is a story of moments through which two people evolved.
Notes: This is better taken with a grain of salt. I sincerely hope I stayed within the boundaries set out by the rules.
This was written for je_telephone challenge, basically one long chain of remixes. It is thus a remix of Cold Feet, Empty Beds and the Return of the Melodrama by solesakuma. You can find the rest of the fics and explanation at the community. 2977 words
Thanks to Pix, who let me whine at her, and to Maia, who provided a very lovely beta. ♥
This is a story of the third generation of the ferns living in the Nishikido Ryo household. You might ask how on earth a fern can tell a story, but there are things even modern science can’t grasp yet. And ferns can tell stories, the stories whispered in the rustle of their leaves. It would actually be quite revolutionary if people listened to the stories of the ferns. After all, ferns have been through it all, witnessed so many things, so much of evolution, so much of change. Ferns are proud of their stories. This particular fern thinks of its story as an evolution of its own; one that spans over four years so far. In the big picture, this story would be an insignificant one, light, cheesy, and told to pass a moment of boredom. Yet it is a story that should be told. It is a story of moments through which two people evolved.
The rise of ferns
Ryo remembers the day Shige grabbed his collar and kissed him way too vividly. It happened out of the blue when Ryo was whining about Shige’s hair as they walked down the hallway. It was a short kiss, but there was tongue and teeth, and when Shige let him go, Ryo fell right through the door of NEWS dressing room. For Ryo that is the day their relationship started. Okay, so it took them another month, at least, to address the kiss, yet another one for Ryo to realize he wanted for Shige to never do that to anyone else again, and a few more weeks after that for Shige to admit that maybe they were dating.
Ryo murmurs that one year old history to himself as he carries the fern upstairs. He spent thirty minutes in the flower shop deciding what to get Shige for their first anniversary. But flowers are such a corny gift, especially when Shige doesn’t acknowledge this day as their anniversary in the first place. But if it isn’t on the day they kissed for the first time, then Ryo really doesn’t know when it all started. He refuses to just not know.
The fern is a compromise. It’s perfect. It won’t die if Shige forgets to water it when he studies or if he’s gone a longer time for location shooting or traveling. It will resist everything, and isn’t that a damn good symbolism? It’s perfect. Plus Shige is a sensible guy; potted flowers should totally be his thing.
Ryo sets the pot by his balcony door in the kitchen and cooks a nice meal. He sets the table and gets dressed into something fancier than the pair of sweatpants and t-shirt in which he cooked. Then he waits.
Shige is a bit late but Ryo’s temper only rises when he practically falls right through Ryo’s front door and glares at Ryo.
“You better have something super important to tell me to make me come here today,” he says and heads for the kitchen, grabbing a glass and getting some water. That is the first time the fern meets Shige.
“Isn’t our anniversary important enough?” Ryo asks, hands crossed, from the door way.
Shige raises an eyebrow. He seems to be counting in his head, and then he matches Ryo’s glare and the hands crossed on his chest.
“Today is not our first anniversary,” he says. He notices the set table and the lack of sweatpants on Ryo’s part. “Why do you always act by yourself? So stubborn.”
“Why can’t you just accept the fact? You started it all. I’m trying to be romantic here,” Ryo says angrily, stepping into Shige’s personal space.
“It’s not today. Besides, I didn’t even know it’s been a year. I’m too tired and not in the mood to celebrate. I didn’t get you anything.”
“Well I didn’t get you anything either,” Ryo says crossly. He is now breathing down Shige’s neck.
Shige pulls at Ryo’s nice sleek shirt and kisses him.
Ryo whines and pushes him away. “Shige,” he says angry. “You are not shutting me up this time.”
Shige sighs. He crosses the room and opens the balcony door, passing the fern and giving it only a short glance.
“I would never think a set date would be so important to you. Are you that sappy?” he asks.
Ryo follows him to the balcony. “Are you that cold-hearted?” he retorts.
“I’m not,” Shige sighs. “But I’d rather not count the time we spent together. All I care about is that I still want to spend more with you,” he says, looking directly at Ryo.
Ryo deflates. Shige is standing there, saying sappy things, smiling lightly, his hair a mess, eyes tired but shining with contentment, and the crinkled clothes make him look relaxed and pretty perfect. Ryo wants to celebrate, not argue, tonight.
“You are such a sweet-talker,” he mutters as he approaches Shige. Shige laughs a little.
Ryo grabs Shige’s collar and kisses him. Shige is soon pressed against the railing, one leg hooked over Ryo’s hip and whining into Ryo’s mouth, as they press closer and push against each other and forget anything but each other. It is quite an introduction to the fern’s new life. It never leaves the shelf by the balcony afterwards.
The downfall of early generations
That was four years ago and since then the fern has been replaced twice. Though Nishikido Ryo still thinks it is the first one he nurses in his kitchen. He never told Shige it was for him, but Shige turned out to be a smart man and figured it out. He caressed the ferns leaves the next morning and took care of it. Maybe even too much. He’d water it every time he came to Ryo’s apartment, and he was not the only one. Ryo did it too, determined to not kill it. Since it was his token of love or something.
The fern dies not even a year after it was brought to the apartment. Shige’s moved in with Ryo more or less by then. He waters the plant every day, and surprisingly for a genius like him he never bothers to check if it’s really necessary or not. Then Ryo leaves for Osaka and Shige spends three days stuck in a library, and when he comes back to the apartment, the fern is brown and the leaves are either on the floor or sagged, lifeless. The shock of being over-watered for ages and then being completely abandoned can no longer be redeemed. Shige is a sensible man so of course he panics. A token of love cannot die. In the end, he runs to the store and buys a new fern of similar size. He feels guilty about replacing it. That’s why he sits in the kitchen and whispers everything that he and Ryo have been through against the plant’s leaves, catching the fern up on everything.
“I’m going to take better care of you from now on-of us,” he says.
A week later Shige cautiously watches Ryo come back home. The first thing Ryo does is water the new fern. Then he kisses Shige and collapses in his bed. Shige figures all is perfectly well. Another week later, Shige is staying over. Why they still call it that when he has things in the closet and books on the shelves is a mystery. Shige falls asleep with his hand thrown over Ryo’s hip, feeling pretty content. When he wakes up, it is just in time to make it to work on time. He barely registers that Ryo left before him.
Shige doesn’t remember that Ryo has a few days of vacation coming up until he comes back home and realizes Ryo hasn’t called him or messaged him all day even though they had plans to watch a movie. He looks around. Ryo’s favourite guitar is missing, one bookshelf is almost empty, and in the wardrobe, Ryo’s never ending stack of white t-shirts is significantly smaller. The dogs haven’t been fed and are hanging about Shige’s feet. Ryo’s biggest suitcase, cologne and toothbrush are missing as well.
Ryo doesn’t pick up his phone, answer Shige’s emails or otherwise contact Shige during the three days Shige tries to reach him. Shige can’t figure out if this means Ryo actually moved out of his own apartment. Why would he do that? Because Shige spent so much time there? Shige goes back to his own apartment for a night and tries not to think of breakups and broken hearts and reasons for midnight flights without explanations. On the fourth day, he goes into Ryo’s apartment again. When he doesn’t find him there, he dumps the fern, of all things, into the trash. He takes the trash out and spends the night sitting on a balcony. He isn’t any wiser in the morning but gives up on contacting Ryo for now. He figures the guy has to come back home again at some point. No matter where he’s staying, there’re still things here he needs and wants. Even if those might not include Shige. So he stays there, the bed making him feel nauseous every time he gets into it alone. It feels like a stranger’s bed, not like the bed of someone he thought he knew.
Ryo comes back at the end of his holiday. In the middle of the night. He slips under covers, drapes himself over Shige’s back, runs his hands through Shige’s hair and kisses his hairline.
“I’m sorry,” he mutters. Shige only realizes he hasn’t dreamt it in the morning when Ryo is still clinging to him. Shige’s heart races. He is upset, furious in fact, but all that it covered by a great relief because he wasn’t ready to let go. Ryo came back, chose to wake up next to Shige again, overcoming whatever it was that made him run away. In the next moment, Shige is carefully slipping out of bed and rushing out the front door.
The battle of the third generation
Ryo brushes his fingertips over the fern’s leaves and tells Shige he is glad it is still there. Shige gives him a crooked smile. That is how the fern meets Nishikido Ryo.
The fern learns its story over the years. It learns throughout the time when Ryo and Shige eventually argue over the Nishikido flight after all when Shige’s relief gives way to his anger. It learns through witnessing many mornings and dinners, silent or spent in lively conversation, just the two men living here or a big company of their friends. It slowly puts the puzzle together. Some things the fern guesses, some it imagines.
The next three years are spent making things work, building the connection over and over again, no matter what doubt crosses the kitchen of this household. The fern could tell so many stories and anecdotes. It could write a whole book about the people that visit this kitchens, love stories, heartbreaks and great friendships playing out in front of it. It becomes a victim of three abductions-the tool for blackmail and the point of pranks. Not to mention the two failed attempts to destroy it. These men have very strange friends.
But for the fern, the story that really matters is the story of those two. The one it prides itself on being a part of. It all comes together the night Shige sits on the balcony, alone and huddled, facing the fern, not the world outside, and tells the story from the start. But now it is tainted with doubts and fears. Shige doesn’t know where they are heading, if there is logic behind the two of them, if it is right to cling to what they have. It’s not usual, it’s not safe, it’s not perfect, and it means giving up too much. Shige loves Ryo. He thinks, on most days, Ryo loves Shige too, but is that really enough? Will the next five years be as foolish as the first five? How much longer can they go on? How much can they do together? Is there still something that Shige is able to do alone? What is it that he wants and needs? Shige crumbles that night.
More than ever, the fern wants to tell its story that night; what it sees and feels when Ryo and Shige sit in the kitchen together and the fern’s leaves are content to rustle in the calmness of the moment.
The renaissance of ferns
Two days later, Ryo wakes up feeling cold. All of Shige’s things are gone. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. It’s also quite clear where Shige went. He still has his own apartment. Maybe that was Ryo’s mistake; he let Shige have it, never asking him to just get rid of it. What is the point in keeping such a big storage room? Ryo doesn’t write Shige a message, doesn’t call him. He intends to go and grab Shige by his hair right after work, intends to make him come home.
“I couldn’t do it,” he murmurs that evening when he comes into the kitchen. He waters the fern, the second time that day. “You’re a freaking token, and I’m not letting you die. Not now,” he mutters.
Ryo then cooks dinner and indulges in feeling pathetic because he misses bitching at Shige for doing things wrong.
“You were always useless in the kitchen. Why is the only thing you are good at cooking fish? I don’t even like fish.”
Ryo laughs into the empty kitchen and listens to the laughter bouncing of the walls aimlessly. It sounds kind of creepy.
“Is this the end?” Ryo asks two days later. He’s had people over the night before because someone needed to eat all the leftover food from his private cooking romp, but now he’s back to talking to the stupid plant.
The fern wants to smack him over head for not going after Shige.
“Maybe you are getting old,” Ryo muses. “How long do ferns live? Is four years long?”
The fern wishes it had couples counselling written in its genetic code. Evolution didn’t get that far. Maybe it’s time for some more evolving though.
“He didn’t break up with you,” Yassu says to Ryo as he grabs a beer from the fridge and sits down with his guitar.
“How do you know that?” Ryo glares. “Why do you people always have to meddle?”
“I don’t think you believe he broke up with you either,” Yassu shrugs. “I still remember your mourning phases and this is not how it goes. Song writing comes much later.”
Ryo sighs and grabs a guitar. “I’ve done this to him before.”
“I know. Subaru whined at me the entire time you hijacked his apartment.”
“Great,” Ryo makes a sour face. Yassu just starts to play.
“So have you poured your heart into your next hit ballad yet?” Jin asks over the phone.
“Why does everybody need to discuss my love life?” Ryo whines.
“I remember how much Shige clung to you three years ago. He kept calling,” Jin continues instead of an answer. “How many times have you called him?”
“I’m clinging in my own way,” Ryo says and waters the fern. The fern knows its end when it sees it. If Shige doesn’t come back soon, it will die the same death as its predecessor.
Jin calls Ryo an idiot and hangs up.
“I’m giving him some space to figure it out,” Ryo tells the fern.
Shige comes back at the end of the week. Ryo hears the low thud of a bag in his hallway. Shige is slow in walking to the kitchen. He looks at Ryo, sitting and eating his dinner, with eyes dark and full of questions. Shige’s hands are in fists, determined.
“I’m back,” he mutters.
Ryo stands up, chair toppling over. “And where exactly had you gone?”
Shige’s eyes slide down from Ryo’s face then suddenly he is storming forward.
“What on earth have you done to the fern?” he asks, passing Ryo without a second look and grabbing the plant. He drains all the extensive water in the pot coaster and sets the fern back. “You can’t water it too much; it’s going to die.”
Shige turns to Ryo and finds him very close, staring at him down.
“Wouldn’t you like that?”
“No. I like the plant,” Shige shoots back.
Really, humans. The fern ruffles in relief. Shige’s back. It will survive.
“Then why did you leave it out of the blue?” Ryo asks, coming even closer.
“I didn’t. I left it with you,” Shige says.
Ryo grabs his collar and kisses him. It’s harsh and demanding, angry and desperate, deep and breath-taking.
Shige ends up pressed against the cold glass of the balcony door, clinging to Ryo’s back and moving closer and closer. Ryo pulls his leg up and over his hip and buries his hand in Shige’s hair. He only leaves Shige’s mouth to kiss across his jaw and pull at Shige’s earlobe.
“We are even now,” he whispers, digging his nails into Shige’s thigh. “No more midnight flights.”
Shige nods, hitting his head against the glass in the process. Ryo pulls him into another kiss.
Shige makes sure the fern gets back into shape afterward.
“I can do things on my own. I’m just better at them when I’m with Ryo,” he mutters. “Plus he clearly can’t stay without me for too long,” he adds, a bit more angry, inspecting the leaves and making sure the fern’s recovering.
The fern knows Shige is the same.
Maybe this fern won’t be able to pass the story on either, but Shige and Ryo will. Just like all generations of humans, those two like talking to plants too. Just like that the evolution goes on.
end
Hotel Employees
A/N:I am not that big on remixes (I fret too much to be comfortable writing them I guess), but I wanted to be part of this challenge because it sounded like a really cool and interesting idea. I will not lie, I would never chose the fic I got had this been a regular remix -- neither characters nor the plot was really my forte in any way. Thus the word 'challenge' was very true this time around. And that is probably why the result is from a POV of a fern (*faceplam*). At least this has been an interesting experiment :D And I apparently like using subtitles when remixing :DDDD I also completely forgot I really named the fic what I named it and had a good laugh about it, sorry for the lack of originality!
Comments, edits?
Pairings/Characters: Ryo/Shige
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fern used as more than a plot device
Summary: This is a story of moments through which two people evolved.
Notes: This is better taken with a grain of salt. I sincerely hope I stayed within the boundaries set out by the rules.
This was written for je_telephone challenge, basically one long chain of remixes. It is thus a remix of Cold Feet, Empty Beds and the Return of the Melodrama by solesakuma. You can find the rest of the fics and explanation at the community. 2977 words
Thanks to Pix, who let me whine at her, and to Maia, who provided a very lovely beta. ♥
This is a story of the third generation of the ferns living in the Nishikido Ryo household. You might ask how on earth a fern can tell a story, but there are things even modern science can’t grasp yet. And ferns can tell stories, the stories whispered in the rustle of their leaves. It would actually be quite revolutionary if people listened to the stories of the ferns. After all, ferns have been through it all, witnessed so many things, so much of evolution, so much of change. Ferns are proud of their stories. This particular fern thinks of its story as an evolution of its own; one that spans over four years so far. In the big picture, this story would be an insignificant one, light, cheesy, and told to pass a moment of boredom. Yet it is a story that should be told. It is a story of moments through which two people evolved.
The rise of ferns
Ryo remembers the day Shige grabbed his collar and kissed him way too vividly. It happened out of the blue when Ryo was whining about Shige’s hair as they walked down the hallway. It was a short kiss, but there was tongue and teeth, and when Shige let him go, Ryo fell right through the door of NEWS dressing room. For Ryo that is the day their relationship started. Okay, so it took them another month, at least, to address the kiss, yet another one for Ryo to realize he wanted for Shige to never do that to anyone else again, and a few more weeks after that for Shige to admit that maybe they were dating.
Ryo murmurs that one year old history to himself as he carries the fern upstairs. He spent thirty minutes in the flower shop deciding what to get Shige for their first anniversary. But flowers are such a corny gift, especially when Shige doesn’t acknowledge this day as their anniversary in the first place. But if it isn’t on the day they kissed for the first time, then Ryo really doesn’t know when it all started. He refuses to just not know.
The fern is a compromise. It’s perfect. It won’t die if Shige forgets to water it when he studies or if he’s gone a longer time for location shooting or traveling. It will resist everything, and isn’t that a damn good symbolism? It’s perfect. Plus Shige is a sensible guy; potted flowers should totally be his thing.
Ryo sets the pot by his balcony door in the kitchen and cooks a nice meal. He sets the table and gets dressed into something fancier than the pair of sweatpants and t-shirt in which he cooked. Then he waits.
Shige is a bit late but Ryo’s temper only rises when he practically falls right through Ryo’s front door and glares at Ryo.
“You better have something super important to tell me to make me come here today,” he says and heads for the kitchen, grabbing a glass and getting some water. That is the first time the fern meets Shige.
“Isn’t our anniversary important enough?” Ryo asks, hands crossed, from the door way.
Shige raises an eyebrow. He seems to be counting in his head, and then he matches Ryo’s glare and the hands crossed on his chest.
“Today is not our first anniversary,” he says. He notices the set table and the lack of sweatpants on Ryo’s part. “Why do you always act by yourself? So stubborn.”
“Why can’t you just accept the fact? You started it all. I’m trying to be romantic here,” Ryo says angrily, stepping into Shige’s personal space.
“It’s not today. Besides, I didn’t even know it’s been a year. I’m too tired and not in the mood to celebrate. I didn’t get you anything.”
“Well I didn’t get you anything either,” Ryo says crossly. He is now breathing down Shige’s neck.
Shige pulls at Ryo’s nice sleek shirt and kisses him.
Ryo whines and pushes him away. “Shige,” he says angry. “You are not shutting me up this time.”
Shige sighs. He crosses the room and opens the balcony door, passing the fern and giving it only a short glance.
“I would never think a set date would be so important to you. Are you that sappy?” he asks.
Ryo follows him to the balcony. “Are you that cold-hearted?” he retorts.
“I’m not,” Shige sighs. “But I’d rather not count the time we spent together. All I care about is that I still want to spend more with you,” he says, looking directly at Ryo.
Ryo deflates. Shige is standing there, saying sappy things, smiling lightly, his hair a mess, eyes tired but shining with contentment, and the crinkled clothes make him look relaxed and pretty perfect. Ryo wants to celebrate, not argue, tonight.
“You are such a sweet-talker,” he mutters as he approaches Shige. Shige laughs a little.
Ryo grabs Shige’s collar and kisses him. Shige is soon pressed against the railing, one leg hooked over Ryo’s hip and whining into Ryo’s mouth, as they press closer and push against each other and forget anything but each other. It is quite an introduction to the fern’s new life. It never leaves the shelf by the balcony afterwards.
The downfall of early generations
That was four years ago and since then the fern has been replaced twice. Though Nishikido Ryo still thinks it is the first one he nurses in his kitchen. He never told Shige it was for him, but Shige turned out to be a smart man and figured it out. He caressed the ferns leaves the next morning and took care of it. Maybe even too much. He’d water it every time he came to Ryo’s apartment, and he was not the only one. Ryo did it too, determined to not kill it. Since it was his token of love or something.
The fern dies not even a year after it was brought to the apartment. Shige’s moved in with Ryo more or less by then. He waters the plant every day, and surprisingly for a genius like him he never bothers to check if it’s really necessary or not. Then Ryo leaves for Osaka and Shige spends three days stuck in a library, and when he comes back to the apartment, the fern is brown and the leaves are either on the floor or sagged, lifeless. The shock of being over-watered for ages and then being completely abandoned can no longer be redeemed. Shige is a sensible man so of course he panics. A token of love cannot die. In the end, he runs to the store and buys a new fern of similar size. He feels guilty about replacing it. That’s why he sits in the kitchen and whispers everything that he and Ryo have been through against the plant’s leaves, catching the fern up on everything.
“I’m going to take better care of you from now on-of us,” he says.
A week later Shige cautiously watches Ryo come back home. The first thing Ryo does is water the new fern. Then he kisses Shige and collapses in his bed. Shige figures all is perfectly well. Another week later, Shige is staying over. Why they still call it that when he has things in the closet and books on the shelves is a mystery. Shige falls asleep with his hand thrown over Ryo’s hip, feeling pretty content. When he wakes up, it is just in time to make it to work on time. He barely registers that Ryo left before him.
Shige doesn’t remember that Ryo has a few days of vacation coming up until he comes back home and realizes Ryo hasn’t called him or messaged him all day even though they had plans to watch a movie. He looks around. Ryo’s favourite guitar is missing, one bookshelf is almost empty, and in the wardrobe, Ryo’s never ending stack of white t-shirts is significantly smaller. The dogs haven’t been fed and are hanging about Shige’s feet. Ryo’s biggest suitcase, cologne and toothbrush are missing as well.
Ryo doesn’t pick up his phone, answer Shige’s emails or otherwise contact Shige during the three days Shige tries to reach him. Shige can’t figure out if this means Ryo actually moved out of his own apartment. Why would he do that? Because Shige spent so much time there? Shige goes back to his own apartment for a night and tries not to think of breakups and broken hearts and reasons for midnight flights without explanations. On the fourth day, he goes into Ryo’s apartment again. When he doesn’t find him there, he dumps the fern, of all things, into the trash. He takes the trash out and spends the night sitting on a balcony. He isn’t any wiser in the morning but gives up on contacting Ryo for now. He figures the guy has to come back home again at some point. No matter where he’s staying, there’re still things here he needs and wants. Even if those might not include Shige. So he stays there, the bed making him feel nauseous every time he gets into it alone. It feels like a stranger’s bed, not like the bed of someone he thought he knew.
Ryo comes back at the end of his holiday. In the middle of the night. He slips under covers, drapes himself over Shige’s back, runs his hands through Shige’s hair and kisses his hairline.
“I’m sorry,” he mutters. Shige only realizes he hasn’t dreamt it in the morning when Ryo is still clinging to him. Shige’s heart races. He is upset, furious in fact, but all that it covered by a great relief because he wasn’t ready to let go. Ryo came back, chose to wake up next to Shige again, overcoming whatever it was that made him run away. In the next moment, Shige is carefully slipping out of bed and rushing out the front door.
The battle of the third generation
Ryo brushes his fingertips over the fern’s leaves and tells Shige he is glad it is still there. Shige gives him a crooked smile. That is how the fern meets Nishikido Ryo.
The fern learns its story over the years. It learns throughout the time when Ryo and Shige eventually argue over the Nishikido flight after all when Shige’s relief gives way to his anger. It learns through witnessing many mornings and dinners, silent or spent in lively conversation, just the two men living here or a big company of their friends. It slowly puts the puzzle together. Some things the fern guesses, some it imagines.
The next three years are spent making things work, building the connection over and over again, no matter what doubt crosses the kitchen of this household. The fern could tell so many stories and anecdotes. It could write a whole book about the people that visit this kitchens, love stories, heartbreaks and great friendships playing out in front of it. It becomes a victim of three abductions-the tool for blackmail and the point of pranks. Not to mention the two failed attempts to destroy it. These men have very strange friends.
But for the fern, the story that really matters is the story of those two. The one it prides itself on being a part of. It all comes together the night Shige sits on the balcony, alone and huddled, facing the fern, not the world outside, and tells the story from the start. But now it is tainted with doubts and fears. Shige doesn’t know where they are heading, if there is logic behind the two of them, if it is right to cling to what they have. It’s not usual, it’s not safe, it’s not perfect, and it means giving up too much. Shige loves Ryo. He thinks, on most days, Ryo loves Shige too, but is that really enough? Will the next five years be as foolish as the first five? How much longer can they go on? How much can they do together? Is there still something that Shige is able to do alone? What is it that he wants and needs? Shige crumbles that night.
More than ever, the fern wants to tell its story that night; what it sees and feels when Ryo and Shige sit in the kitchen together and the fern’s leaves are content to rustle in the calmness of the moment.
The renaissance of ferns
Two days later, Ryo wakes up feeling cold. All of Shige’s things are gone. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. It’s also quite clear where Shige went. He still has his own apartment. Maybe that was Ryo’s mistake; he let Shige have it, never asking him to just get rid of it. What is the point in keeping such a big storage room? Ryo doesn’t write Shige a message, doesn’t call him. He intends to go and grab Shige by his hair right after work, intends to make him come home.
“I couldn’t do it,” he murmurs that evening when he comes into the kitchen. He waters the fern, the second time that day. “You’re a freaking token, and I’m not letting you die. Not now,” he mutters.
Ryo then cooks dinner and indulges in feeling pathetic because he misses bitching at Shige for doing things wrong.
“You were always useless in the kitchen. Why is the only thing you are good at cooking fish? I don’t even like fish.”
Ryo laughs into the empty kitchen and listens to the laughter bouncing of the walls aimlessly. It sounds kind of creepy.
“Is this the end?” Ryo asks two days later. He’s had people over the night before because someone needed to eat all the leftover food from his private cooking romp, but now he’s back to talking to the stupid plant.
The fern wants to smack him over head for not going after Shige.
“Maybe you are getting old,” Ryo muses. “How long do ferns live? Is four years long?”
The fern wishes it had couples counselling written in its genetic code. Evolution didn’t get that far. Maybe it’s time for some more evolving though.
“He didn’t break up with you,” Yassu says to Ryo as he grabs a beer from the fridge and sits down with his guitar.
“How do you know that?” Ryo glares. “Why do you people always have to meddle?”
“I don’t think you believe he broke up with you either,” Yassu shrugs. “I still remember your mourning phases and this is not how it goes. Song writing comes much later.”
Ryo sighs and grabs a guitar. “I’ve done this to him before.”
“I know. Subaru whined at me the entire time you hijacked his apartment.”
“Great,” Ryo makes a sour face. Yassu just starts to play.
“So have you poured your heart into your next hit ballad yet?” Jin asks over the phone.
“Why does everybody need to discuss my love life?” Ryo whines.
“I remember how much Shige clung to you three years ago. He kept calling,” Jin continues instead of an answer. “How many times have you called him?”
“I’m clinging in my own way,” Ryo says and waters the fern. The fern knows its end when it sees it. If Shige doesn’t come back soon, it will die the same death as its predecessor.
Jin calls Ryo an idiot and hangs up.
“I’m giving him some space to figure it out,” Ryo tells the fern.
Shige comes back at the end of the week. Ryo hears the low thud of a bag in his hallway. Shige is slow in walking to the kitchen. He looks at Ryo, sitting and eating his dinner, with eyes dark and full of questions. Shige’s hands are in fists, determined.
“I’m back,” he mutters.
Ryo stands up, chair toppling over. “And where exactly had you gone?”
Shige’s eyes slide down from Ryo’s face then suddenly he is storming forward.
“What on earth have you done to the fern?” he asks, passing Ryo without a second look and grabbing the plant. He drains all the extensive water in the pot coaster and sets the fern back. “You can’t water it too much; it’s going to die.”
Shige turns to Ryo and finds him very close, staring at him down.
“Wouldn’t you like that?”
“No. I like the plant,” Shige shoots back.
Really, humans. The fern ruffles in relief. Shige’s back. It will survive.
“Then why did you leave it out of the blue?” Ryo asks, coming even closer.
“I didn’t. I left it with you,” Shige says.
Ryo grabs his collar and kisses him. It’s harsh and demanding, angry and desperate, deep and breath-taking.
Shige ends up pressed against the cold glass of the balcony door, clinging to Ryo’s back and moving closer and closer. Ryo pulls his leg up and over his hip and buries his hand in Shige’s hair. He only leaves Shige’s mouth to kiss across his jaw and pull at Shige’s earlobe.
“We are even now,” he whispers, digging his nails into Shige’s thigh. “No more midnight flights.”
Shige nods, hitting his head against the glass in the process. Ryo pulls him into another kiss.
Shige makes sure the fern gets back into shape afterward.
“I can do things on my own. I’m just better at them when I’m with Ryo,” he mutters. “Plus he clearly can’t stay without me for too long,” he adds, a bit more angry, inspecting the leaves and making sure the fern’s recovering.
The fern knows Shige is the same.
Maybe this fern won’t be able to pass the story on either, but Shige and Ryo will. Just like all generations of humans, those two like talking to plants too. Just like that the evolution goes on.
end
Hotel Employees
A/N:I am not that big on remixes (I fret too much to be comfortable writing them I guess), but I wanted to be part of this challenge because it sounded like a really cool and interesting idea. I will not lie, I would never chose the fic I got had this been a regular remix -- neither characters nor the plot was really my forte in any way. Thus the word 'challenge' was very true this time around. And that is probably why the result is from a POV of a fern (*faceplam*). At least this has been an interesting experiment :D And I apparently like using subtitles when remixing :DDDD I also completely forgot I really named the fic what I named it and had a good laugh about it, sorry for the lack of originality!
Comments, edits?