camera lucida 2/5
::previous
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Two days before Christmas, and the sun feels warm on Kame's face as he turns it upward to a blue sky. He hears music floating ever closer, echoing off the steep walls of the canals. Behind him, a somewhat steady stream of traffic has been tromping up the steps, occasionally pausing on the landing, and then clattering down the other side of the small bridge whose stone rail he's leaned up against with one hip. It's brisk and breezy in Venice, so he's zipped up to the throat in a sleek, black, down-filled parka, with an extra-warm fleece-lined black wool cap jammed down over his ears and his hands wrapped in a pair of his favorite gloves with the mitten flap to cover his cut-off fingers when he's done. There's nothing so icy as a metal-body camera in the cold.
Kame lifts the camera, framing the approaching gondola between the dark walls, with the sun dazzling at the far end of the narrow canal where it meets a larger waterway. Accompanied by an older man with an accordion, a young ponytailed man in a short wool coat and red scarf is singing "Torna a Surriento," his voice resonating and drawing the attention of tourists who cluster around Kame against the railing. He silently prays that no one jostles him during the shot as he waits for the singer's silhouette to arrive at the right angle, and there, the shot lines up, he squeezes off a few times, and he steps back, allowing the tourists to fill in his space. He paces to the other side of the bridge as the gondola quietly poles under, the singer's voice gaining a strange hollow tone for a few seconds before he emerges on the other side. Kame braces his foot against the base of the rail and takes a few more. Kame stands there, amused that the singer is begging someone to return to Sorrento...while in Venice. Who would leave Venice for Sorrento. He's shaking his head when his phone goes off in one of his front pockets.
Not unexpectedly, it's his father, and he's already in the city, checked into a hotel.
They meet for dinner at Harry's Bar where his father has a reservation, and once they're settled into a little table in the corner of a butter-yellow room overlooking the water, Kamenashi senior begins a silent observation that makes Kame squirm. His gaze is always careful, unfailingly polite, and yet hungry with parental interest. His father has never been distant with his children.
"Are you well," his father inquires, studying Kame over the top of a goblet of sparkling mineral water. Kame's father wears delicate silver-framed glasses and his mane of grey hair ripples back from his forehead. He has always given Kame the impression of tremendous vigor, but his face has grown softer of late.
"I'm fine," Kame says, looking away and out the window at San Giorgio, gold-lit against the inky black night sky, its waterfront edged with strings of electric lights, the docks a winter forest of bare black sailboat masts bobbing in the choppy water of the lagoon.
"And your work," Kame's father asks, "how is it?"
"It's fine," Kame answers, propping his chin in his hand, "busy."
"Yes," his father murmurs, watching him over the top of his menu, "yes, of course."
They are quiet until the server returns, and eyeing them, understandably begins what sounds like a 'for tourists' spiel. Kame interrupts politely before the older man can get too far, orders the seafood antipasto trio of the day and two dishes of risotto, whatever the server recommends, and a bottle of prosecco. Kame meets his father's eyes as he concludes, and feels a burst of warmth from the nod his father gives him, the pleasure in his eyes. The server gives him a small knowing smile, and nods, saying, "Very well, signore."
Kame manages to down a glass of prosecco before the antipasti arrive: glistening jewel-toned tuna tartare, steamed Alaskan king crab with melted butter and a creamy tuna tart in a crisp pastry shell. It's been hours since he'd last eaten, so he's starving. He'd had a coffee and croissant for breakfast before heading to the Peggy Guggenheim where his session lasted all morning and into early afternoon, too long to spend with a fussy exhibit curator and the grumpy Italian kid he'd assigned Kame to help with his equipment. He and the exhibit's featured artist had managed to escape for another cup of coffee in the early afternoon, but that was hours ago, before he'd taken off for the day into the labyrinthine Venetian streets to wander alone.
While Kame devours his antipasti, he asks after his father's Norwegian architectural firm, about the projects he's been working on, until the server brings two dishes of risotto, one with sepia and ink and the other with small Mediterranean shrimp and thistle. While Kame's father describes his current design projects, they divide the risotto up between them until the plates are practically licked clean. He suggests that Kame might like to take a look at their new line of eco-friendly pre-fab urban modular systems, whose clean, modernist lines Kame may want to photograph. As their meal concludes with a towering slice of four-layer meringue cake and a generous piece of lemon meringue pie, Kame and his father discuss a possible visit to Oslo perhaps sometime during the next summer.
The bottle of prosecco has been taken away, and they've finished glasses of port by the time the meal is finished and the bill paid. When they walk out of the dining room, Kame's father stops and turns, looking at a photo on the wall. "Look," he says, his voice gruff. Kame stands behind his father's shoulder and takes in the large photograph on the wall, a black-and-white of an enormous pile of rubble in Piazza San Marco. "It's the campanile of San Marco," he explains, "the bell tower. It collapsed in 1902 into that pile of stone. No one was killed, not even injured. Can you believe it? Only a cat disappeared."
"Only," Kame repeats, regarding the old faded image framed in gold. A forever-frozen moment, history, something tall and strong and beautiful, collapsed into a pile of stones, into wreckage.
"Your mother," his father continues heavily, "would have loved this city."
He turns and Kame follows him down the steep narrow staircase and they wait for their coats to be returned before heading out into the frigid night. It's late, and Kame is warm from food and alcohol as they cross the piazza and pass the gorgeously-lit basilica. The cold feels good, refreshing against his hot cheeks.
It takes about twenty minutes to accompany his father back to his hotel. Kame pauses on the street outside the doors to the lobby, not meeting his father's eyes.
"Good night," his father says, and pulls him into a rough hug. After a few seconds Kame returns the embrace, his limbs heavy with cold, his joints rusted. He breathes in short frozen puffs. He remembers this. He remembers this feeling, like something from a dream.
"You should stay with me," Kame mumbles, the thing he's been trying and failing to say all evening. His father's coat is icy against his cheek. "I have plenty of room."
Kame's father stills before drawing back, his hands clasping both of Kame's arms just below his shoulders. He says nothing, his dark eyes regarding him silently. Kame rushes to fill the silence.
"I have a suite, two bedrooms," he explains quickly, "there's no need for you to stay here." Alone.
"Are you sure," his father says, "I would not want to intrude."
"No, no," Kame is shaking his head, talking too fast, "it's huge, really, you know, one of those old converted palaces, you know the type, so the rooms are enormous and I feel-" Kame stops, feels the flush coming on. He doesn't want to admit that this time he regrets the solitude, that for the first time in years he thinks he should have stayed back at the house for the holidays, with his housemates, instead of his annual duck-and-run. He supposes that he should be grateful his father has never let him get away with it, has never really let him be alone.
Kame's father just watches him, listens to his stammered explanations. Too hard, Kame's trying to hard.
"Of course," his father murmurs quietly when it's clear Kame has nothing more to say, "I will come tomorrow."
It isn't until later, when Kame is tossing and turning in his hotel bed, that he realizes. His father never asked why, this year, his suite has an extra bedroom.
"I never should've let her do it," Kame's father says, fumbling at the french doors leading to the small terrace. It's late Christmas night, and they've been working their way through a couple bottles of wine and one of a homemade grappa made by the hotelier's elderly father. Kame squats in front of the crackling fire in the hearth, thrusting aimlessly at it with a long brass poker.
"Don't-" Kame begins, but he stops, staring into the flames, seeing shapes flicker in and out of existence until he has to squeeze his eyes shut and blink, look away from the dancing light. He puts out a hand to avoid swaying onto the floor.
When he looks over his shoulder, the french doors are open, and his father is no longer visible.
Kame sighs, pushing himself up to an unsteady stand. He finds the coat stand and pulls his father's overcoat off, tugs his parka on, and makes his way back to the terrace where he finds his father leaned against the small stone balustrade. Kame drapes the overcoat over his father's shoulder and partially closes the french doors behind them.
His father turns to look at him, angling his body so he can face Kame who comes to stand beside him.
"I never should've let her do it," his father repeats, eyes bright with grappa. A small tumbler with clear liquid balances on the stone rail.
Kame sighs. "Do what." His head hurts, and his chest, too, sharp, quick stabs. He stands gingerly, breathes shallowly.
"You know, what she did to you." His father's words come slow, too careful.
"I don't know what you mean," Kame says, looking straight down on the quiet street. Nothing stirs, no one to overhear. And likely no one who understands Japanese anyway.
"She wasn't well, your mother."
"I know that," Kame says, feeling himself sink into a sullen monotone, "she was dying, of course she wasn't well."
"She refused to let me tell you boys." His father's voice is soft now, sad. "She insisted I stay silent. She-she didn't want you to think of her that way. As - as sick or-"
Kame knows all this. They've been through this before.
"You were so young. Too young to make sense of it, I always thought, without some preparation. I should've stood up to her. That was my responsibility, to look out for you boys, to look out for you, but I was weak. I loved her too much, so I did what she wished."
"It's okay," Kame says dully.
"She put too much on you," his father says, "I know. I know what she told you."
"You do?"
"She gave you everything," his father replies simply, "all her equipment, all her unsold work, all her books, her papers, everything. Every last bit of her vocation. It was all for you. She chose you. You think I don't know what she meant?" His voice rings in the icy Venetian silence, strident, perhaps angry.
Kame knows what it meant, too. It meant he had a job to do, to fulfill her wishes, to carry on her work. It's given him purpose, that inheritance. It gave his life shape.
"She never gave you a choice."
"That's not true," Kame protests, frowning. "Of course I had a choice. I have choices."
His father looks at him sadly. "What choices. What choices have you had? My son. What did we do to you?"
Kame wants to back away from the regret and pity that he sees in his father's eyes. He doesn't want to listen to this, and he doesn't want to be pitied. He doesn't feel sorry for himself. Things happen the way they're supposed to. He believes this. His mother died, he's alive to carry on her work. He feels very practical about this. There's no point in wasting time or energy on wishing things could be different. Things happen, and you stay the course, you go as far as you can, and you make your peace with it. Just like she did. Clumsily he tries to say this, but he trips over the words.
"That's right, son," his father picks up, when he stops, unable to continue, "you go on, we all do, every one of us. But-" he knocks back the grappa, lowers the glass to the balustrade "-you. I'm afraid your burden has been the heaviest of all."
Kame frowns again and shakes his head. "What burden," he asks, his lips growing stiffer and colder. His father has tucked one hand into the crook of Kame's elbow. He seems smaller than before, almost frail. The scent of grappa mingles with the smell of wood smoke and the frozen humidity in the air.
"To live up to her, of course," his father rasps, and he clutches Kame's arm tighter, turning and reaching up to touch Kame's cold cheek with a papery-dry palm. Kame forces himself not to flinch away. He loves his father, and he knows he means well.
"She was a colossus, your mother. She still is, I suppose. You are, too, I think. Not the same. Not like her." He sighs deeply, his eyes sunken, his usual vigor replaced by something like desperation. "Kame, my son. You must understand this. It is very important. You are not her. You are not like her. You are like you, and that is the greatest thing you can be. Why isn't that enough for you?" He gives Kame a small shake. "Why do you want to be something else? It is what she loved, what she saw in you. It is what I see in you. You are our precious son. Don't try to be anything else. Whatever you do, don't try to be her."
The wind's picked up, snatching at his father's words, Kame's stopped listening. His father is wrong. He's wrong. Kame knows what he is and who he is. He remembers it every day. She told him, just before she died, and no matter what anyone says, Kame knows she was right.
When he arrives at Narita, Kame checks his phone and sees another text from Jin who he's been dodging for days, unwilling to engage for reasons he doesn't want to analyze. But now, on impulse, he sends a message back: in Tokyo for New Year.
By the time he arrives at the family home in Edogawa, Jin's sent a flurry of messages, all eager in tone, full of half-formed thoughts. Kame glances at them, bemused, but he doesn't allow himself to read them carefully, preoccupied with heavy thoughts and the intermittent chest pains and nausea which have been flaring fairly regularly since Christmas with his father. There was more hair, handfuls of it over the last two days, nausea, dizzy spells, never very long, but worrying nevertheless. Kame had stared at himself in the mirror of an airport bathroom, knit cap pulled down nearly to his eyebrows. He's never been afraid before, but now it's beginning to taste like ash on his tongue.
Kame's childhood home, a traditional wooden structure, had gone to his eldest brother when he married, so Yuichiro's wife greets him at the door, two children beside her.
"Kazuya-kun!" she exclaims with a happy smile.
"I'm home," Kame says, trying to look more cheerful.
"Welcome home," she says, letting him in as he reaches down to tweak the noses of both the boy and girl, his nephew and niece. "How was your flight?"
"Fine," Kame replies, removing his shoes, "just long." He asks after his father when he looks up, and she tells him his father arrived the day before with no problems.
"It's so nice," she says, "he said you spent Christmas together in Venice. I would love to see Venice."
Kame doesn't mention the job that brought him there, or the cranky curator who'd balked at most of his set-ups, or the lackey assigned to help Kame with his equipment who helped as little as he possibly could. If it hadn't been for the engaging Australian artist, or her work, which he'd really enjoyed photographing, he might've killed someone (probably the lackey) before long. And then his father had arrived. Which hadn't been so bad, really. Kame doesn't say any of this.
"You will," he says, managing a smile, "just don't go in the summer. I'm sure you'll love it."
He follows her into the main room where they've installed the small shrine. Kame rolls down to his knees and stares at the black-and-white photograph of his mother, not taken near the end, but somewhere in the middle. She doesn't smile, and she looks the way Kame likes to remember, with her wild, unruly hair tumbled around her shoulders in the usual disarray, an old tank top showing off sinewy bare arms. His mother had been an active and athletic woman, decidedly nonconformist, and it shows in her fierce expression, the way she lifts her chin and stares into the camera, a challenge in her eyes. The photograph is a self-portrait.
Kame notes the fresh flowers, the incense, the tiny gong just before he claps his hands together twice and closes his eyes, holding the pose for a long bottomless moment. When he opens them, he realizes his niece is kneeling next to him, looking solemnly at the grandmother she never knew.
"Uncle Kazuya," she says as she turns to him, exposing her missing front two teeth, "don't be sad."
Kame is silent for a moment as he returns her unwavering dark gaze. He lifts both hands to his face, brushes the backs of them over his cheeks before he reaches over to her, lifting her into his arms and climbing to his feet. Her small arms go around his neck, her cheek resting on his shoulder. Kame stands with her and walks over to the wall where there are four vertical panels, each a long strip of black and white photograph, one for each of them, Kame and his brothers. He doubts Yuya remembers when his was taken, he was so young then, but Kame remembers his photo, how long it took to complete, naked, standing in the water up to his navel, wet everywhere, his hair matted just so, and yet ruffled to stick up in exactly the right place, his hands balled into fists. Kame remembers how his hands had cramped from clenching them so hard while she was busy behind her huge bellows camera, hidden under the heavy photographer's cloth. He was an ugly child, Kame thinks, and his mother's camera hadn't flinched away from his ugliness. And yet somehow, she found beauty in him, too, something ferocious, feral. He sees it now, with the eyes she gave him.
"What do you think?" he asks his niece, turning so she can see the photographs. She shrugs, putting her fingers in her mouth. It's all right, Kame doesn't expect her to have an opinion. He's glad Yuichiro has left the photos on the wall, glad that none of his brothers are ashamed of or embarrassed by their mother's work. Looking at the four portraits, it doesn't matter that they were staged. It doesn't matter how long they each had to stay still, holding a pose. In those images, Kame sees something true. He remembers those moments. He remembers how it felt, that expression on his face. Their mother had caught them there in an instant of childhood. Trapped them with light and chemicals and paper, colorless and yet absolutely vivid in light and shadow and expression, bravely and unflinchingly real.
Kame reads Jin's messages the next day, in the kitchen while he's getting a glass of water, and he sees that Jin has proposed nearly a dozen possible plans for meeting, including trying to meet up at the same shrine, which gets nixed by the next message. Details keep changing, time, venue, and all this without Kame actually replying to a single message. Kame feels like laughing as he tries to decipher Jin's shorthand, and he's congratulating himself when he thinks he's made sense of it. That is, until another message comes through, with another plan, and this time he has no idea. Kame quickly texts his agreement to any plan after four on New Year's day. He's surprised when his phone rings a few moments after.
"Kamenashi!" Jin sounds breathless.
"Akanishi," Kame says cautiously.
"You didn't tell me you would be in Tokyo." There's the faintest hint of accusation in his voice.
"Sorry," Kame replies. He doesn't know why he hadn't told him; before he left for Venice, they'd eaten meals together, gone shopping together, even hit the trail in the park together for afternoon runs, but Kame had never thought to ask what Jin was doing for New year. He realizes now he should have.
"How long will you stay?"
"I go back day after tomorrow."
"Oh, okay." Jin's silent for a long moment.
"Is that all?" Kame asks.
"No," Jin answers, "no. I just - I was hoping you'd have time to meet."
Kame frowns. "Didn't I already say yes?"
"Oh!" Jin sounds flustered. "Of course, you did. Sorry. I'm really. I - uh, I don't have a lot of time either, so um, I hope you don't mind if there's a group."
Kame sighs, rubs his forehead. "No, that's fine. Just let me know when and where. I can't stay out too late, though."
"No - that's fine! Great."
"Good," Kame says, "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Yeah," Jin says, "bye-" but Kame cuts the call off without waiting, stares down at the phone like it might start crawling.
Kame doesn't really mind spending a few days with his family, but he's not used to them anymore. He remembers feeling united in a kind of solidarity with his older brothers when their mother was alive, united against the tyranny of her perpetually-watchful lens. It wasn't that they'd hated being photographed. Sometimes they'd loved it, showing off, making her laugh, hearing her voice praise them when they got it exactly right. She'd been a tyrant but a benevolent sort; she encouraged their engagement, their input, their participation in creating something she always told them was bigger than just them.
But that unity had died with her; Kame remembers how his older brothers had pulled away, after, the way they'd held themselves separate, aloof in their grief. Only Yuya had stayed close; his bewilderment and sense of loss had most closely resembled his own.
New Year's day dawns bright and very cold. The whole family bundles up to make the requisite shrine visit which takes a fair amount of the morning, but Kame is okay with that. He's enjoying spending time with his nieces and nephews, who see him little enough that he's a novelty. Surreptitiously, he photographs them at play, but it's nothing more than snapshots, the kind that no one notices until it's done - if they notice at all. He captures them all - his brothers, their wives, the kids, his father - like that, never asking anyone to look at the camera, never admonishing anyone to smile or not to smile. They're more than a little sensitive to it, Yuichiro and Koji, even Kame, sometimes. Yuya was too young to really remember what it was like for them, what it was like to be pushed and pulled, prodded and posed, to be taught certain expressions, to learn where to look and how to look, a million things that make both Yuichiro and Koji tense up when anyone asks them to pose for a photo. Kame never does.
Kame texts Jin when he arrives at the restaurant and doesn't see him, only to get a message back that they're running late, so he should sit tight until they arrive. Kame chews the inside of his cheek for a second, but nevertheless he goes to the bar, orders a drink and settles in to wait. An hour later, he's still sitting there with a second glass of beer, his small notebook spread out in front of him, and he's written several pages, when Jin blows in and half collapses against the bar beside him, slightly disheveled, and panting as though he's been running.
Kame turns his head, gazes at him coolly. "You're late." He watches Jin sag against the bar, trying and failing to blow hair out of his face. Kame's lips twitch.
"I know, sorry. I'm really sorry. It's been, god, you know how it is."
Kame says nothing. He closes his journal, sliding it back into his messenger bag which feels heavy from the book he'd slid in there, bought on impulse at the Peggy Guggenheim bookstore in Venice. He stands, takes up both his bag and his drink, and looks at Jin expectantly.
Jin's watching him with a slightly anxious expression. "Are you mad?"
Kame tilts his head thoughtfully. "No, not mad."
"But-"
Kame shrugs. "I've been waiting an hour. Annoyed, maybe. Not mad."
"Hmm," Jin says, "that's fair. Look, I'll make it up to you. I'll buy you dinner, how's that." He starts walking and Kame follows. "Are you hungry? This place is supposed to be really good. I haven't eaten here, though. It's one of Yamapi's favorites, and he really loves food."
Jin talks fast as he leads Kame toward the back, explaining that they have a private room because his friend Yamashita is some kind of a pop idol, it makes it easier.
"Which agency?" Kame asks absently, stuck on the dark hair tangled in Jin's crisp white collar, the line of Jin's shoulders shifting inside his shirt, his loping stride. Before Jin can answer, he's pushing a door open, and a raucous chorus of voices greets them, probably twenty people in a dim-lit large room.
It's a noisy din, and it's not long before Kame's stomach begins to churn. He pastes on a smile and tries to act the part, bowing as he's introduced to everyone. Some guy saunters over to Jin and hooks his elbow around Jin's neck.
"So this is Kamenashi," he says, "cool. So you're the porn star." He doubles over, laughing, dragging Jin down with him. Jin twists away, shoving him lightly.
"Kamenashi," Jin says with a flash of irritation, "this is Yamashita."
Kame slides his hands into his pockets.
Jin looks at Yamashita. "What the hell are you talking about a porn star?"
"You mean you don't know?" Yamashita crows, meeting Kame's eyes briefly, widening a shark-toothed smile. "You didn't tell him?"
"Tell me what?"
Yamashita fumbles for his cell phone, thumbing at it. "I looked him up on the internet, and it's all there, man. You can even see the photographs." He holds the phone out to Jin, but Jin's looking at Kame now.
"It's not porn," Kame says in a patient, withering tone, drawing himself up as straight as he can. He's met guys like Yamashita many times over the years, guys who find it all risqué and titillating, or worse, think Kame will find it humiliating. "My mother was an artist," he continues. Jin is still looking at him, his expression curious now, ignoring the cell phone thrust against his chest. Jin gently pushes Yamashita's arm away.
"Ignore him," Jin tells Kame, frowning a little, "Yamapi, you can really be a jerk sometimes."
"What," Yamashita says. "I can read, you know. I didn't make it up. The photos were controversial." He lifts his arms, making exaggerated air quotes, his tone salacious, gossipy. "No offense, man," Yamashita nods at Kame, "nice to meet you."
Kame lifts his chin. "None taken," he says at the same time that Jin says, "Whatever" to Yamashita and rolls his eyes. Kame looks at Jin. "Actually..."
"Yeah?"
"Never mind," Kame says quickly, feeling the tight band of the strap across his chest. He loosens it, pulls the messenger bag over his head, sets it aside. The tight band remains, constraining his breath. "I'll tell you later. We can talk later."
"Okay," Jin says, looking doubtful, his gaze flickering away and catching on Yamashita, who is wandering back to the group. Kame watches him sprawl out in a chair next to a pretty girl, his bow-mouth lifted in a smile, his idol-hair waving back from his perfect, laughing face.
Jin catches up to him later when Kame waves from across the room. It hasn't been a terrible evening; Kame managed to find some people to talk to, but Jin's expression is guilty.
"I suck," he says as he falls into step beside Kame, shrugging into his coat. Kame looks over instinctively, his gaze snaring on Jin's mouth before he meets Jin's eyes.
Kame hopes the night hides his flush as he shrugs. "Nah," he says, "it's okay."
"Yeah, but. I invited you out and I barely got to talk to you."
"You bought me dinner," Kame points out.
"That doesn't count," Jin says, "I owed you that for being late. The least I could do is hang out with you, right."
Kame feels strange, like this is more important to Jin than it should be; he sounds genuinely upset.
"Don't worry about it," Kame says.
"I-no, wait." Jin grabs Kame's elbow and stops him. They're standing on the street outside the restaurant, breath coming in white plumes. Jin stamps his feet and hunches his shoulders, his hands tucked back into his pockets. "You said we could talk later."
Kame stares at him, and then looks around. "Yeah, but. Not here. It's fucking freezing."
"We can go somewhere," Jin says, looking at him steadily.
Kame's stomach twists around. "But what about-" He waves one gloved hand back at the restaurant.
Jin shrugs, but he doesn't look away, waiting. Kame bites his lip, considering.
"Okay," he says, "whatever. This is. This isn't. I didn't plan on doing this on the street-"
"We can go somewhere," Jin repeats, and his eyes are warm. Kame feels his throat tighten alarmingly.
"No, that's all right," he says quickly. "Your friend, Yamashita-"
Jin laughs. "You mean my asshole friend."
"Your friend," Kame repeats, "what he said. That's sort of what I wanted to talk to you about. I. I wanted you to know-" He grinds to a halt, biting his lip again. He ducks his head and twists his messenger bag around to the front, opening the flap and pulling out the handled paper bag inside. He hands it to Jin.
Kame's face is on fire now, but he doesn't know why this should be such a big deal. It's not like other people don't know, and it's not some big secret. It's all over the internet, after all, and it's been out in the world for more than twenty years, written about and talked about, and fuck, there were even gallery exhibits. But after Jin's reaction at the jazz club, he hasn't been able to stop thinking about it. He wants him to understand.
Jin's looking down, turning the bag over in his hands.
"It's not a gift," Kame says quickly, just so there's no confusion, "but it's yours, I mean, you can keep it. If you want to. If you don't, just. I don't know, give it away or something."
Jin looks back up at him, cocking his head, waiting.
Kame swallows. "You asked me before, if I had modeled. And I said yes. So I thought you'd like to see, um."
Jin's expression flickers. "Kame-" he begins, but Kame waves him off. He's glad now that they're doing this, having this conversation on a frozen Tokyo street. He didn't know it would feel this way. He retreats slowly, one step at a time, walking backward toward the curb. Jin takes a step toward him.
Kame hears a taxi pulling up to the curb. He looks over his shoulder and waves at the driver. The door opens. "Happy New Year, Jin," he says, and he ducks down, folding himself inside. The door swings shut.
"Wait," he hears, muffled, and Jin's there, yanking the door open, leaning down into the gap. "Wait," he says again, and there are spots of color on his cheeks, visible even in the streetlight. "Thank you. Thanks for coming tonight, even though I was a shitty friend and I didn't really talk to you. And, and. Thanks for this." He gestures with the arm that's clutching the bag.
Kame just looks at Jin, his dark hair dripping into his eyes, his chapped lips, the bare patch of skin visible between the open v of his collar.
"Right," Jin says, as though he's talking to himself, "okay. Have a safe flight tomorrow, all right? I'll see you back home. Happy New Year, Kame."
Jin moves to close the taxi door, which unfreezes Kame. He stops the door from slamming shut, holds it open, just enough to say, "You, too," meeting Jin's eyes.
Jin nods, and closes the door. He stands there, clutching the bag, as the taxi pulls away from the curb. Kame leans his head back, his lips burning, watches the lights of the city pass outside his window, and his mind is a blur, a chaos he can't tame. Friend, he thinks, and home, and he tries to catch his breath.
::next
