Lolol Gokusen II fic

[tretton]

Title: Of importance
Pairing: Hayato/Ryu
Rating: R
Word count: 3 457
Disclaimer: There is no money being made here and no harm intended.
Warnings: Angst
Notes: I like it when Hayato and Ryu are sweet like puppies. Crazy in love and too dense to realise they're so obviously meant to be. It's always very frustrating to read but you just get through it because you know the reward is waiting for you at the end when Hayato kisses Ryu because it's the only thing Hayato'll ever figure out before Ryu does and Hayato's all about the bold gestures and the repressed feelings he'll never put to words. But it's alright because Ryu really gets him. They don't need words. That's how in love they are. And, yeah, I really, really like it when Hayato/Ryu fic is like this.

Naturally, when I write it you're just lucky I didn't kill Ryu in a plane crash. Because I couldn't work it into the story.

Finally. This isn't a fic. It might look like a fic but it isn't. This is not-a-fic I'm putting here in all its unedited glory just to make sure I don't start working on it again. Because I don't have the time for it. I need to prioritise or I'll have a hissy fit.



Ryu comes back on a Friday, hours before the funeral. Hayato meets him at the airport in his father’s old suit, still a bit too large after all these years, loose sleeves getting in his way as he sips stale coffee on a creaking plastic bench in arrivals. He’s staring at an instant ramen ad on a screen right next to the board when a sleek and thin man steps up to him

“What?” Hayato asks as he stands up. “Your plane was early? Never heard that one before.”

Ryu offers a weak smile, he looks pale and neatly put together. “Actually you’re late. Like I knew you’d be. Which is why I gave you the wrong time.”

Hayato huffs and laughs and makes a gesture as if to take his hand but changes his mind midway, somewhat rowdily flinging his arms around him, crushing Ryu's outstretched hand against his chest. Ryu smells musky and stingy, like something defined and highly adequate. He smells like success.

They pool around them at the funeral. Ryu and Hayato, searching for the jagged sort of leadership that Hayato used to offer. Hayato feels more unsuited for the role than ever before. Ryu would have been a better leader, really, but he was never interested, despite the way Hayato always relied on him to point out flaws in his magnificent plans.

Tsuchi seems relieved when he sees Ryu, gives him a crumbling hug that nearly topples Ryu to the ground. Hayato’s lips twitch and he’s filled with an urge to reach out and ruffle Ryu’s hair, tell him You’re so tiny, like he used to when they were still in high school. When Take was still alive.

“Cancer?” Ryu whispers on a crackling connection from Washington. “For how long?”

“I don’t know. They don’t know. It’s the bones and there’s no one- " Hayato’s voice breaks. "He’s not going to make it. That’s all they know.”

That used to embarrass him. How he could never keep his emotions in check. It was a good enough quality to possess when in a fight. But it made it difficult when he tried to just tell someone that he cared. That’s why, in most cases, he ended up saying nothing at all. And Ryu is no exception, but Hayato trusts Ryu will understand him regardless.

“I’ll come as soon as I can,” Ryu says before hanging up.

They drink rounds of beer in a cheap place on the corner of Hayato’s block, taking turns to pay for them and toasting in Take’s honour until they’re slumped on their elbows on the table. “How long are you staying?” Hyuuga asks as they watch Tsuchi trying to take control of his long limbs in order to transport himself to the bathroom. They observe him leaning dangerously against a beam in the middle of the room as Ryu shrugs and says “A couple of days,” and Hayato feels something almost lucid and painful stir in his chest. That’s a couple of days longer than he had dared to hope for.

“Where’re you staying at?” Hyuuga says with a little slur as he stares up at Ryu with his head on the table. Ryu shrugs and Hayato sits up straight. “Baka!” he says with a sudden increase in volume, “You’re staying with me of course!”

Hyuuga makes a little gurgling sound, maybe something that's supposed to be a giggle or possibly a snort. “Your place’s tiny. It’s like the closet of a, ah, closet.”

“That doesn’t matter!” Hayato persist, “He’s staying with me!” and looks genuinely outraged at the thought of any objections.

When Hayato slides in the key to his apartment he’s at that stage when he’s long since passed the peak of his intoxication and is now starting to feel slightly nauseous, catching up with the exhaustion his body’s been weighted down by for the last couple of days. His head’s cleared enough for him to turn to Ryu standing in the grimy, ill-lit stairway and recognise that Ryu doesn’t belong in this place. It was easy enough when they were at school and he could spit at the importance of cultivated manners. He used to think of Ryu as someone who had betrayed his class because it was such a cool thing to imagine and Hayato sometimes liked to think Ryu did all of that for him, to get to be a part of Hayato’s wretched and unruly world. But now Ryu’s grown up and even hanging on the banister, looking like he’s going to get thrown down the stairs any minute now by the sheer weight of the bag slung over his shoulder, he’s still so very obviously trim and handsome and nothing like Hayato.

“What?” he says when he notices Hayato’s turned around. “Did you lose your key?”

“It’s actually- I guess it is kind of tiny.”

Ryu looks surprised and then tries to push past Hayato to get at the door handle. “You told me,” he mutters. “I said I don’t mind.”

“That was me,” Hayato points out as Ryu gets the door open and fumbles on the wall for a light switch. Hayato winces a little when he finds it and light floods over his mess of dirty clothes and a few days worth of dishes in the tiny kitchen area. “It’s-” he says and swallows.

Ryu gratefully collapses in a little heap on the bed that takes up a large section of the room. “You used to be so proud,” he says with his eyes closed and then opens them to look at Hayato.

“Of what?” Hayato asks as he closes the door.

“Everything. Just- Yourself.”

Hayato laughs and shrugs out of the suit jacket, hanging it over the back of a chair. “Not much to be proud of these days.”

“You’re still you,” Ryu says, sounding a little wistfully. “I’d say that’s plenty to be proud of.”

Hayato's alarm wakes them up at six thirty. “I have work,” Hayato says. He had contemplated rolling out his futon on the floor before going to bed earlier but it had seemed like such a strenuous task to handle he’d simply dropped down next to Ryu in the end.

He can feel Ryu’s eyes on him as he rummages around in his closet for a clean shirt. “What do you do?” Ryu asks in a hoarse voice.

“I work in a conbini three blocks from here,” Hayato says and tries not to think about all of the great things he told Ryu he’d do when they were teenagers. How much money he’d have and what a successful life he’d lead.

Ryu gives him a crooked smile from the bed that Hayato doesn’t return. “I’ll be back around three. Do you want a key?”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“There’s food,” Hayato says with a little half-wave towards the fridge before leaving.

He’s eating rice balls when Hayato gets back. Wearing one of Hayato’s old sweatshirts he looks small and childish and he smiles at him when Hayato takes off his jacket.

“How was work?”

“I was late,” Hayato says as he sits down to grab a rice ball of his own. “Got yelled at.”

Ryu grins again and Hayato tells him to shut up with his mouth full of rice.

“Do you want to go out?” Hayato asks and then immediately regrets it. Ryu calls him sometimes, from Shanghai, London, Milan. Ryu’s been around the world while Hayato’s been running up a steady tab at the same place for three years now. He doesn’t want to take Ryu out clubbing, doesn’t want to give him a tour of his shitty life.

But Ryu merely smiles from the other side of the bed where they lie watching a game show on Hayato’s small TV. “I liked the place from last night. Let’s just go there again.”

Hayato wrinkles his nose. “Why?”

“They knew your name and everything. I don’t know what you’ve been up to all these years but you must have spent at least some of your time there. I like that idea. Going someplace where you belong.”

“It’s just somewhere I go to eat and drink beer. Look you don’t have to pretend-”

“I’m not pretending,” Ryu says and suddenly looks at him, startled but fierce. “You think I’m pretending?”

“No, I think- It’s just- I don’t really know what you expect from me.”

“Expect? What are you talking about? I don’t expect anything.”

“Let’s just-” Hayato says and stands up to avoid Ryu’s searching eyes. “Let’s just go.”

Hayato hadn’t planned on it but they get drunk again and sometime around half past one when they try to make their way back to his apartment on unsteady legs Ryu says “You can hit me if that would make you feel better,” in that calm an collected voice that used to be the only thing Hayato would listen to when fury got to his head.

Hayato laughs and then strikes out with his left hook. Ryu reciprocates with a fist to his stomach that sends them both tumbling to the ground and Hayato’s so out of it. He hasn’t been in a fight for years. They wrestle clumsily but it just ends in Hayato slumping down on top of Ryu, breathing heavily, his face pressed into the juncture of Ryu’s neck.

“Did you leave because of me?” Hayato asks despite not wanting to know the answer.

And just like in all of the nightmares Hayato’s had Ryu says “Yes.” He touches Hayato’s hair. It’s gentle and hesitant and it makes Hayato flinch and raise his head to look at him.

He looks scared.

“Ryu,” Hayato says and feels something catch in his throat, something that’s not entirely due to being drunk. “Ryu,” he says and touches Ryu’s face, feels his own soften.

It’s kind of like a fight, Hayato thinks. Except he doesn’t want to win, he just wants it to go on and on until he’s drained and empty doesn’t have anything left to give.

“Hayato,” Ryu breathes when they kiss and bite and scratch at each other on the bed.

The alarm starts again at six thirty. Hayato reaches out to turn it off and then slumps back down. “You’ll be late,” Ryu says when Hayato makes no further effort to get up.

“I hate my job.”

Ryu turns around and leans on an elbow, seemingly innocent in the pale morning light he frowns down at him. “But-”

“Don’t you get it? I hate my job. I hate my apartment. I hate my life. It’s so stupid. You coming back is the best thing that’s happened for years. It’s pathetic.”

“Hayato,” Ryu says and lays a cold hand against his cheek.

He ends up late for work again.

The apartment’s empty when he gets back. Hayato looks at Ryu’s opened but unpacked bag standing in the centre of the floor. Looks at the clean plates on the dish rack and thinks that Ryu must have been severely bored to be driven to such extents. Ryu hates housework. At least he used to. Maybe that’s changed, Hayato thinks when his phone starts ringing.

“I’m at Kuma’s place,” Ryu says. “Come have dinner.”

Hayato thought about asking Kuma for a job after graduation. But he knew he probably couldn’t afford it. Hayato didn’t want to cause any trouble. So he took the first job available and moved out as soon as he could afford it. Ryu left a month after graduation. It took Hayato about the same amount of time to accept that he was gone. He used to eat dinner at Kuma’s every night those first two months. He stopped going when Ryu called him from New Delhi and told him he was working in his father’s company.

“Yabuki,” Kuma says when Hayato ducks into the small ramen shop, puts his fist to his sides and scrutinizes him up and down. Hayato bends his head and feels like a bashful schoolboy, caught up to no good. Then Kuma laughs and tugs him in for a bone-crackling hug.

“Oi, you could have at least stopped by to let me know he was still alive,” Kuma says with a nod in the direction of the counter where Ryu sits grinning at them.

Monday is his day off. They catch a train that brings them to a small town by the ocean in less than an hour. Walking along the pier Hayato takes his hand and drags him into an alley between rundown industrial buildings, the thud of Ryu’s body hitting the wall making empty echoes as Hayato unbuckles Ryu's belt to give him a handjob. Ryu laughs and moans and grips his shoulders and Hayato presses his hardness into sharp hips and feels like a teenager all over again.

Spring is late this year and the salty winds blowing in from the water are cold and persistent. They watch the waves sitting on a wooden railing, side by side.

“In school,” Hayato starts and Ryu turns to look at him. “Did you know? I mean, what you felt. Did you know?”

Ryu nods and Hayato doesn’t know why he asked. Doesn’t know what to do with information like that.

“I know you don’t need it,” Hayato suddenly says. “But it’s like- Those things important to me. Wanting to protect them. I want to protect you too.”

The thin silence breaks as Ryu’s phone starts to ring in his pocket.

“Don’t answer,” Hayato says before he realises what he’s thinking. Ryu gives him a startled glance and then leans in to press a quick kiss to his chapped lips before jumping down from the railing.

“When are you leaving?” Hayato asks when he gets back, doesn’t care about the petulant tone in which he says it.

“Tomorrow,” Ryu says quietly.

Hayato leaves for work as usual on Tuesday. He prefers it this way. Swift and efficient, like pulling off a band aid. Ryu will be gone when he gets back and Hayato will get on with trying to figure out what it is he wants with his life.

He keeps glancing at the time as he works. Ten AM comes and goes and Hayato imagines Ryu in first class. Ryu on his way to wherever he’s going and then he thinks about Ryu in Hayato’s clothes; Ryu in his bed, naked and honest and beautiful. He drops a can of beans on the floor and mr Washio glares at him from behind the counter.

He goes to Kuma’s ramen shop after work.

“Left again, did he?” Kuma says when he slumps down by the counter.

Hayato laughs and pretends to stare at the menu. “Nothing keeping him,” he mutters as bile pricks somewhere deep in his throat. He's not there because he’s hungry.

“Yo,” Ryu says the next time he calls.

“Yo,” Hayato answers, trying to sound casual. As he sits up he spills his beer and swears quietly.

“What was that?”

“Ah, nothing. Just- Where are you?”

“New York,” Ryu says and Hayato can hear him walking, can hear traffic and faint voices passing by.

“You stole my sweatshirt,” Hayato says when he can’t think of anything else.

“I did,” Ryu says with a little laugh. “I’m sorry. I’ll give it to you when I get back.”

“And when is that?”

Ryu sighs into the phone and Hayato takes a sip of his beer bottle just to do something. He feels like throwing it across the room but that would only mean he’d have to take care of it later, when he’s feeling even more miserable than right now.

“How do you-“ Ryu begins. “How is it you see us? How do you even see this working out?”

Hayato hangs up and throws the beer bottle across the room.

“Hayato,” Take said a few days before he passed away. Lying in his hospital bed looking faded and grey, smiling despite the hand that Hayato was probably holding on way too hard to. “Hayato,” he’d said and looked him in the eye. “Now that you’ll see him again, don’t do anything stupid.”

Hayato doesn’t know if this is what Take meant. That he shouldn’t have slept with Ryu. That maybe he’d destroyed what they’d had by turning it into something sordid and cheap.

Hayato kissed Ryu once when they were younger. Ryu had looked so shocked that Hayato had apologised immediately, laughed and said it was a joke, idiot. Caught you, didn’t I?

“You’re so stupid,” was Take’s only reply when Hayato later told him the story. “You’re so stupid.” And then he’d smiled, as if he knew more about it than Hayato did.

It’s two AM, exactly one month since their last phone call, when Hayato wakes up to the buzz of his doorbell. He knows it’s Ryu. Even though it makes no sense. The last time Ryu left, he stayed away for three years. And Hayato’s convinced there is no person on this earth more stubborn and proud than Odagiri Ryu.

“I can hear you breathing,” Ryu says after letting Hayato watch him through the peep hole for a while.

“My neighbours will think you’re crazy. Talking to a closed door,” Hayato says without moving a muscle. Watching him.

Ryu gives him a sceptical look through the hole. “I don’t know Hayato. The walls in this building are pretty thin. I think they can hear you.”

Hayato opens up but doesn’t invite him in, keeps his hand on the door handle as he leans against the frame. “How do you know that?” he asks.

“Your neighbour told me,” Ryu says with a wave towards the door opposite Hayato’s. “When she stopped by to complain about the noises.”

“The noises?” Hayato asks and frowns.

“The noises we were- When-” Ryu says and then shifts his bag on his shoulder, shifts his eyes away from Hayato.

And maybe if they’d still been in school Hayato would have found his embarrassment irresistible. Would have smiled and blushed himself.

“Do you regret it?” Hayato asks and the sound of his voice seems to cut through the air like a knife. Ugly and raw when compared to Ryu's soft tones.

Ryu looks up, wide eyes and innocence. Ryu hasn't become jaded with age, the years only seem to soften him. “What?” he questions with a little frown.

“Fucking me,” Hayato spits. Don’t do anything stupid. “Do you regret it?”

“Did I look like I regretted it?” Ryu asks. Calm and collected.

“I don’t know,” Hayato says and feels his shoulders rise in a shrug, like his body and brain are trying to collaborate despite being separated at the moment. “You left,” he says, hoarse like he rehearsed this while screaming.

Ryu looks away. Hayato wants to hit him and hold him at the same time. Force some of his frustration into this resistant creature before him.

“I was thinking,” Ryu says, a sudden sound in the silence surrounding them. “Leaving because of you and leaving you are two different things.”

“How was I supposed to know that? You were always the first one to call me stupid.”

“I only said it because I knew it wasn’t really true.”

Hayato could probably have kept it up a lot longer. The sham. Pretending to debate whether or not to let him in. Pretending to have more resolve. Pretending he wouldn’t kiss him today. Wouldn’t sleep with him and make the same mistake all over again. But then his neighbour opens a crack in her door and Hayato drags him inside with a roll of his eyes.

He could have kept it up for hours. But Hayato’s apartment is too small, Ryu’s presence all too pressing. Hayato kisses him as soon as his bag hits the floor.

“I thought about it,” Hayato says.

“About what?” Ryu asks. They’re watching TV again, even the same game show as before Hayato thinks.

“About how I see this working out.”

“And?” Ryu prompts

“I couldn’t think of anything.”

Ryu twists his fingers around the loose threads in Hayato’s ripped jeans. “I see,” he says.

“But,” Hayato says and takes his hand. “I want you to stay anyway.”

“You know, Take once said,” Ryu says as they make their way to Kuma’s ramen shop, walking close, sharing glances and smiles. Hayato’s heart still aches every time someone mentions Take’s name and he grabs hold of Ryu’s hand to try to take the edge off the pain. Ryu makes a small startled movement and looks down at their entwined fingers. He looks back at Hayato and says “Take once said he’d never truly be worried about me,” and then stops to lay one of his cold hands on Hayato’s cheek. “Because you’d always protect me.”