Letters
When we set out to write a letter, there aren’t many factors that seem dependent on time and place and delivery. Usually when we set out to write a letter, there is a pen and paper and a mailbox involved in the process somewhere. But when we set out to write a letter we never think about time and place and delivery. After death, these things become the utmost important factors.
Heaven’s Edge
In the afterlife, there are both many things and very little things to see. It is a calm place, where serenity becomes air and quietness touches your soul in a way that is almost impossible to describe. When I first arrived here, it was the brightest kind of torture.
It was a sort of lonely place when I first arrived, all detached and transparent. There was nothing but clouds and flowers and endless quiet that surrounded me and it was weeks before I found a familiar face that stood out. Everyone in Heaven seems familiar, their faces seem to blend together in an endless lifestream of connections and bridges and past-ness. It seemed as if everyone in Heaven were a part of my family, relatives long forgotten but newly discovered.
It was when I first sat down on the edge of a cloud to peer over the skies in hopes of finding Japan did I meet a real and true familiar soul.
“Kazu.”
My head snaps up and I turn around, “Jii-ji?”
“You really haven’t grown at all my boy. You’re still the same little munchkin your mom and I raised.” He remarked, squatting down next to me. His face is bright and relaxed, the lines that marred him in his human life seemed right and proper in Heaven. Heaven seemed like a place where the old belonged because young are too young to have died and therefore, never seemed to belong.
He smiles at me, patting the hand that rests on my knee. His touch is warm and suddenly I am able to remember how much I miss physical contact. I take his hand in mine and squeeze.
I smile at him, feeling peaceful for the first time since entering Heaven. “Jii-chan. How are you?”
“Old,” He says candidly, “old and dead. But on the whole, better than I have been in many years.”
“Am I dead too?” I ask him, a little perplexed, because I cannot remember dying. “Is this really what death is like? All wandering and no resting?”
“Death is a strange thing.” My old grandfather replies, chuckling to himself, “We ask so many questions about it and we think it is so definite. But I have come to understand that it comes and goes.”
“So I am dead?” I say. A small smile plays upon my lips and I remember where I learned my evasiveness and my strange ways of sitting as I look at him. The longer I look, the more I am able to see where my evasiveness and my sitting habits and even my personality have come from. But then I am sad because I am dead. “I’m dead.”
He says nothing in response to this and indicates the space below us instead and suddenly I can see Japan. “I have watched you many times from here since I passed.”
“I missed you every day after that time.” I reply, looking down too, wondering if I too could see my loved ones.
“I know.” He says simply and lovingly. He pats my hand again. “You are my special boy. I was sorry to leave.”
“Did you have to?” The childish question escapes me before I can stop it and then I remember that he is my Jii-ji and I can be just myself with him. No walls, no guards, no evasive answers. I don’t feel the need to hide anything from him.
“I had to.” He replied again, warmly and a little gruffly, “But it was hard.”
“What made you feel like you could leave? I didn’t want you to leave and neither did Kaa-san and and Onee-san.”
“She was waiting for me.”
“Who was waiting?”
“Your grandmother.”
I look at him now and I understand. The pull of your beloved one is hard to ignore, especially when your beloved one has been waiting all this time for you. And then in my heart there is a pang of regret. I am dead and my beloved one is not.
I can see the buildings and lights of a dark Tokyo now. The sounds of the city rise around us and I turn to Jii-ji in awe, almost feeling like I am down there in that city, standing in a crowded street and listening to the sounds of life as they evolve and morph around me.
“Then I left someone behind, Jii-chan.”
“He is not left behind.”
“I should have told him before I died.” I say, feeling a wave of regret, “I should have told him I love him.”
“The one you call ‘Oh-chan?’” Jii-ji laughs, “it is never too late.”
“But I’m dead.”
“Are you?”
An echo and a whistle race their way across Heaven to where we are perched and my eyes hurt as a bright light flashes. Wincing, I open my eyes again and suddenly we are looking down upon a hospital room.
Ohno is sitting by a hospital bed, his hand gripping a small, chubby pale one. He is sitting next to my mother. And in the bed I am laying, bandage wrapped across my head and connected to at least three machines, eyes closed.
From where I sit there is no air in my lungs and I am choking in confusion. “Jii-ji, jii-ji! What is this?”
“You are not dead.” He says simply. He is happy now. “You can still go back.”
“How?”
“Patience.”
I turn my attention again to the hospital room below us and feel perturbed, looking upon my own body. Ohno is saying something now and I strain myself to listen, leaning closer to the scene below us. He looks so tired and my mother looks even more worn and weary. The edges are hazy and I attribute this to the faraway tinny sound of his voice.
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
“What have the doctors said about him?”
“Unconscious. There is still some brain activity, so we know there is a chance that he will wake up. When the brain is injured, neurogenesis occurs in many patients but not many regain consciousness. If we are lucky, both will happen for Kazu.”
“He’s the luckiest person I know.” Ohno replies, his lip thrown out in defiance.
Ohno turns to Nino and places his hands on Nino’s cheeks and says fiercely. “You’re lucky, you hear?”
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Johnny’s Agency, Arashi Greenroom
“Aiba-chan, please pull yourself together. We have to go out there soon.” Sho-kun says, pleadingly, his eyes betray him, because they are puffed and red, irritated from crying too.
From his corner of the room, Jun-kun sniffs inconspicuously, “Stop crying. We have five minutes until the press meeting starts. You’ve got to hold yourself together.”
Aiba lets out an unbelievable trumpeting noise, blowing his nose into a tissue and takes a deep breath. “Why are they making us do this today? We just found out too.”
“Because,” Sho reasons, even though he himself is angry, “Because we are idols and we have to. We can’t just stop our work. It has to go on. This is the life we signed up for. Now please, stop crying.”
“Okay, okay.” Aiba breathes haltingly, “Okay.”
Ohno has said nothing since he arrived that morning. But the members know, because it is mirrored on all their faces, the emptiness that is the sofa before them and the tightness that squeezes their chests together, like rubber bands that can’t expand. It is hard to breathe and the air is thick with anger and worry and sadness. Ohno opens his mouth, “It’s not like he’s dead. He’ll wake up.”
There is a long silence as they look at each other, broken only when a staff member knocks and opens the door, handing them scripts to read to the press.
Within the hour, every single Japanese news station is reporting the same thing, “Breaking News: Ninomiya Kazunari hospitalized in critical condition after car accident, Arashi members visibly disturbed.”
~~~
“Fuck them.” Sho says, throwing the newspapers onto the coffee table of their dressing room.
The other three members look up startled, because Sho knows better than all of them to be swearing early in the morning and moreover, Sho swearing is ALWAYS startling.
It has been three days since Nino’s accident and the headlines of tabloids are screaming, “Ninomiya, drunk and behind the wheel-doctors suspect drugs use.”
“Fuck them all.”
Heaven’s Edge
“Jii-chan,” Nino says, looking at him, “Life keeps going right?”
“It does.”
“You know what I miss the most about it?”
“Your games?”
Nino laughs and rests his head on his grandfather’s shoulder, a gesture that takes him back to childhood, “I miss my guitar.”
“Not your friends or family?”
Nino shakes his head and closes his eyes, imagining the strings beneath his fingertips, the smoothness of his guitar’s wood, and the vibrating sounds. “I miss my guitar because it helped me show my love. When I didn’t know what else to do or say for someone, I played with my instruments and suddenly I could show them. I miss that.”
There is silence for the longest time around them and Nino is comfortable. His grandfather is warm and he sings little songs from Nino’s childhood. The hands remind him of what it is like to feel love and to be connected to someone. He wonders where his grandfather learned this but then remembers that he is the one who learned these feelings from his grandfather. Eventually, the suns in Heaven fade and it is night time.
From the corner of his eyes, he sees his grandmother, she is smiling and waving, so Nino knows it is time for his Jii-ji to leave for the day. Once they are gone, hand in hand, Nino is alone and surrounded by the darkness of Heaven.
Softly, Nino begins to sing, a song so deep and so sad that it makes his soul ripple in protest. No one is supposed to be sad in Heaven, but Nino is.
He thinks back to the time where his guitar and piano were the only instruments he could write letters with.
“Nino-chaaaaan,” Aiba sang, “I’m tired, sing me to sleep!” He flopped himself onto the sofa of the dressing room. “Sing me to sleep!”
“Sing yourself to sleep!” Nino snapped, throwing himself into a chair grumpily, filming took all of his energy reserves for the day and he had to wait for the PV to be finished before going home because he was the last one to film his solo shot. But despite himself, he pulled his computer open and played a song for Aiba from it, “Now shut up.”
Sho-kun emerged from the restroom and hummed along with it, a little bit off-pitched but none the less, happily and enthusiastically. He waved goodbye to Nino and patted Aiba on the head as he passed by. Jun-kun left shortly after.
Finally Ohno came back from his solo shooting, he smiled at Nino and shook Aiba awake, telling him that it was his turn to film. With a snort, Aiba rolled awake and ambled out of the room, smacking his head on the doorframe on the way out. They could hear him giggling foolishly as he made his way to the set.
Ohno sat down and sighed heavily. “Nino is always the last one to leave.”
From his chair, Nino grumbled, but continued to play his game.
“I’ll wait for you.”
This time Nino looked up, his expression soft and betraying how his heart pounded, “You don’t have to. It’s going to take at least another hour.”
“It’s okay.” Ohno said, he stretched himself onto the couch and closed his eyes to sleep.
Setting his game down, Nino walked over to the sofa and sat down in front of it. Slowly, he took hold of Ohno’s hands and held them. He treasured these hands more than he treasured his favorite game. From his position, Ohno smiled and hummed his response to Nino’s touch. He could never get over how soft and gentle Nino could be, when he was cupping Ohno’s hands and protecting them from everything and nothing.
Quietly and always a little shyly, Nino began to sing, songs of his past and songs that Ohno has never heard before. But he feels like he knows them because they are Nino’s creations and therefore, they are Ohno’s creations too.
So as he listened, Nino’s voice lulled him to sleep and in the tiny space of time between waking and sleeping, Ohno realized that he has never loved anyone more than he loves Nino.
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
Ohno moves slowly, afraid that any abrupt movements will wake up a dozing Aiba-chan. He picks up a spare blanket and drapes it over Aiba’s shoulders and then rearranges Jun-kun’s pillows, who is resting on the sofa next to Aiba. They refuse to go back home for the night and the doctors and nurse staff couldn’t turn them down. One pout from Aiba-chan and the battle was won. Wearily, he gives Nino a onceover, and leaves the hospital room.
The bathroom is down the hall and he locks himself in a stall, squeezing his eyes shut to will the tears to stop falling. He keeps clenching his fist, tight enough so that he can feel his nails digging into his skin, tight enough so that it hurts. He wants to feel something instead of this deep emptiness, anything to cover the gaping hole he has been feeling for the past week. And he bites his other fist to keep from screaming out loud.
His breath is coming fast and short and his heart is racing. He wants to yell and shout and destroy because he’s so mad. He’s utterly pissed at the world and everything in it. Nothing is ever easy and he’s so mad that it has to be harder than it already is. He hates the world and he hates the paparazzi even more for their lies and defaming of Nino. He thinks Sho-kun is right, “Fuck them all.”
Swearing loudly, Ohno punches the stall and his hand aches and only then can he take a deep breath and let the tears fall.
The bathroom is dark and he huddles in a closed stall, willing himself back into some semblance of sanity.
He remembers a happier situation, where he sat in a dark closet with a very important person.
“Hurry! Hurry!” Nino shouted urgently from behind him, running at full speed in the opposite direction from their dressing, grabbing Ohno’s hand as he ran and pulling him along.
“Why?” Ohno asked, tripping over his feet in order to keep pace with the racing gamer, “What’s going on?”
“Aiba-chan accidentally spilled coffee on all of Matsujun’s stuff! HE’S GOING TO EXPLODE. WE HAVE TO RUN!”
Ohno laughed at the ridiculous panic in Nino’s tone, hardly able to contain the mirth as Nino sprinted alongside him. They head straight down the hall, darting passed another Johnny, Shige, maybe? By the looks of the hair but you can never be too sure in this place. And they laugh even harder as Shige called after them “WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING, IDIOTS!”
They raced past Sho-kun, grabbing hold of his wrist too, “What’s going on?!”
“Code Bomb Stain!” Nino shouted at the top of his lungs, laughing hysterically along with Ohno.
Sho-kun choked on his giggle and pulls his wrist away, running in the opposite direction, “I have to save him!”
“Every man for himself!” Nino shouted as they left him behind.
“The door!” Ohno panted, pointing to a door down the end of the hall. They rushed to it and inside, slamming the door shut with finality and collapsed onto the ground.
Nino sat up and giggled, panting and wiping the sweat from his face. In this light, Ohno thought he looked extremely cute. He informed Nino of this thought and was walloped on the head, though Nino smiled. They pressed their ears against the door and listened for sounds of war.
“Do you think he’ll be okay?”
“Aiba-chan or Sho-kun?”
Ohno chuckled and settled himself against the door, catching the little fuzzies dancing in the air above the light. “Where are we?”
The tiny space looked like it was being used as a storage closet, costumes and props were lined up against the wall and in the middle of the room there was an old and dusty looking chalkboard.
“A prop closet maybe?” Nino ventured to guess, heaving himself off the floor and standing in front of the chalkboard. “It looks like it hasn’t been used in years. Look at the dust covering it! What a waste of money.”
He made a face, a classic face that only Nino can make.
Nino can be so many things at once, Ohno thought in that tiny closet. He can be loud and quiet and sensitive and inconsiderate. Nino was many things. Sometimes he wondered if Nino could be everything.
“Are you even listening?”
“Yes.”
“You’re lying.”
“You’re right.”
They both laughed. And then Ohno picked himself up on the floor, walked over to Nino and traced a little happy face with his finger into the dust of the chalkboard in the top corner.
Grinning, Nino reached above him and added his own smiley face. Together, they draw a story on the chalkboard in dust. A happy meeting and more silly faces, sometimes the faces are angry, but there aren’t many and there are more happy faces than there are angry faces. Once or twice they draw a sad face, but it only happens twice. Sometimes they write words to fill in the strange expressions, “Hungry,” “Shy,” “Romantic,” “Dedication,” “Gentle,” “Soft,” “Forever.” And when they reached the end of the chalkboard, instead of drawing an ending, in the tiny little space, they wrote “Ohmiya: Love Story.”
They walked away and out of the closet, hand in hand, with so many unsaid words in their minds but many written words having been expressed instead.
When they reached their dressing room, Matsujun was dabbing a suspicious smelling ointment on Sho-kun’s knee, because he tripped over his feet as he crashed his way into their dressing room in order to save Aiba-chan.
When Ohno returns to the hospital room, he sees that Sho-kun has arrived and is snoring lightly across the laps of Aiba and Jun. He fishes around his things and finds a sheet of worn paper, in which he and Nino spent hours writing promises of forever and always and togetherness. He wonders why they have never said aloud, “I love you” and only chose to write it in letters. He folds it into a small square and places it in his wallet, to keep with him at all times.
Heaven’s Edge
“Obaa-chan,” Nino says, as she sits dreamily beside him, gazing into the openness of the sky, “Jii-ji says that death comes and goes, what does he mean?”
She turns to him, a wrinkled smile pulling at her cheeks, which are rosy and cherub-like, “He means that there is death everywhere, in everything humans do.”
“Can you choose to die?”
“You should not.”
“You can choose to leave?”
“You should not.”
“So, in the end it is not a choice?”
“No,” She says now, her voice is faraway, like she is remembering something. She moves her hands to her lap with grace. They are long and slender despite the age she died at, “everyone has their own set time to die and to leave.”
“Young souls who choose to die are always the saddest souls.” She says softly, “And for the young souls who die young, it can be hard.”
“But I am not a soul who dies young.”
“You’re not.” She agrees, smiling again, “You’re here because you tied yourself to Earth before you left and it wasn’t your time. You are here because you made a strong tie and Heaven made a mistake in trying to break it so soon.”
“When do I get to go back?”
“Soon.” She promises, “Very soon.”
Nino turns his face to look at her, abandoning his vigil of the movements of Arashi down on Earth. She is a small woman and he can see bits of his mother in her. She has a weathered form, pretty hands, and a tanned face. She is a little hunched in her old age, but he can see the vigor she moves with. Everything about her is deliberate and she seems to be thinking within herself often. He sees how she is like Jii-ji.
She purses her lips at his examination, “Did you have another question?”
“Were you lonely without Jii-chan?”
“I was, at first.” She replied, a spot between her eyes wrinkling as she frowned. “But I knew I had to wait.”
“Why?”
“Because of you.” She said simply. “For you and your sister.”
For a moment, they both look at the setting sun and the puffs of color it paints in front of them.
Nino digests this and says, “Thank you.”
She chuckles. “I had a long lifetime with him so I decided it was okay to wait for a lifetime of forever with him.”
“What was your life on Earth like?”
“We worked hard, you know, to build our lives after the war. Jii-chan worked in the factory and I worked outside in the gardens for food to sell.”
“He made you work outside and him inside? What a lazy man!”
“I liked going outside,” She replied laughing, “And he liked staying inside.”
“Still,” Nino says sneakily, “A man should take care of a woman.”
“And a woman should take care of a man.”
There is a moment of silence and Nino thinks he has finally met the second person who has ever rendered him speechless, first, Ohno Satashi, and second, his own grandmother.
“I knew it!” Nino exclaimed, nodding his head as if to confirm a question.
“You knew what?” His grandmother asked, her expression piquing curiously.
“I got my sense of humor and smarts from you.” Nino said, his face a mask of innocence, “Not from that crazy old Jii-ji.”
“It’s hot outside, huh?” Sho-kun remarked, as they made their way across the beach. The sand sunk beneath their feet and the waves pulled to and away from the shore. The sun was blazing across the sky, a last banner of “Good-bye” for the day.
Nino nodded, wiping his forehead with his forearm.
They were on the sunny beaches of Japan, filming for a show and had just finished for the day. Behind them, Aiba trailed giggling and talking with Ohno about how weird the sand felt between his toes. From in front of them, Jun-kun was walking, taking in the sun and the waves and the wind. By the time they reached the beach house where they were staying, the sun had set and the sounds of the tides had reached a lulling pitch.
Nino stood outside the house, listening to the water and watching the gentle pooling of water. He hated the sea because of his tendency to get extremely seasick, but he could appreciate beauty when he saw it. From inside, Jun-kun was barking orders and Sho-kun was following them. Aiba-chan was singing as he took a shower.
The sounds became a symphony of magic and as Nino closed his eyes to listen to the sounds of life, he suddenly became aware of another person’s presence.
“Oh-chan. Did you have a nice bath?”
He hummed his response and stood next to Nino. “Are you still feeling sick?”
Taking a deep breath and letting the salty ocean air clean out his lungs, Nino smiled, “I feel much better now that I’m away from that damned boat.”
“How are you Japanese and seasick?” Ohno teased playfully, “The country is an island.”
“Oh, and I’m sure that you’re the model Japanese citizen, Mr. I-Can’t-Read-At-A-Grade-School-Level.”
Ohno snorted. Nino did have a point.
“You’re an Italian, remember?”
Ohno’s mouth curled, a small smirk formed on his lips and the expression reached his eyes, “Kazu! I’m Japanese!”
“Why are you being so familiar with me?” Nino exclaimed in mock surprise, “I don’t know any foreigners!”
“I’m from a foreign land,” Ohno said solemnly now, grinning. “It’s a previously deserted island that I want to take Nino to.”
“Being outside might kill me.”
“I’ll be outside and you can stay inside.”
Nino laughed. “You make me sound like a housewife.”
“You’re my beautiful housewife.”
“If I’m the housewife,” Nino proclaimed, “You’d better put up with my nagging.”
“Don’t I, already?” Ohno said softly, squeezing their hands together.
Nino turned his face to Ohno’s, a soft smile on his lips. He leaned in and very briefly, very softly, and gently, pressed his lips to Ohno’s. And then they both smiled, pressing their foreheads and their noses together.
Heaven’s Edge
Nino was sitting with his head between his hands. He had a headache. Were headache’s even possible in Heaven? Wasn’t this place supposed to be pain-free?
A little disturbance in the air told him that his grandfather had taken a seat next to him. “Head hurt?”
Nino grumbled.
His grandfather laughed, “You’ll be leaving soon.”
“How do you know?”
“Your head hurts because your brain is starting to pull you back.”
“Isn’t there a less painful way?” He whines.
“You haven’t changed at all.”
They sit there for a few hours in silence and as the sun stretches across the sky. Nino feels content because even though his head hurts, he is in a peaceful place and with his grandfather. He hums to himself and thinks quietly inside that he will be sad to leave the old man.
“Jii-chan?”
“My boy?”
“Obaa-chan says I tied myself to the Earth. How did I do that?”
“You promised Ohno-kun. It’s a strong tie, the threads of fate.”
“Fate?”
“You don’t believe?”
“Then how come Obaa-chan died before you?”
“We had a whole lifetime together, my boy.” Jii-ji explains contently, “But to take that away from you is unfair.”
“Do people normally get a second chance?”
“They don’t.”
“Then, why…?”
His grandfather is looking at him now, “There is no answer to that question, my dear boy.”
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
“This is the same room Kazu was born in.” Nino’s mother says, smiling sadly. She is looking at her son so fondly. There is sorrow etched across her brow. “I pray and pray it will not be the same room he dies in.”
She wipes a few tears and clasps her shaking hands together. She smiles at the bandmates of her son. They have come as often as they could, spending nights in the hospital rather than going to their own homes. And sometimes it is painful because Arashi sees where Nino inherited his little quirks of consideration and thoughtful gestures.
Later that evening, when Ohno sits in the hospital room with Nino after finishing interviews and photoshoots, he takes out their letter again and begins to read aloud.
From inside his head, he thinks he can hear Nino’s voice, talking to him, calling to him, whispering to him, and he is overcome with emotion but he still reads aloud. There is something freeing about reading their letter, of letting love be free in the air and saying the words instead of keeping them bottled up inside in silence. By the time he reaches the end, his eyes are red and his throat aches, but he feels content.
His head is bowed when he feels it, soft stroking on his hands. And for a moment, the world seems frozen and Ohno has forgotten what it is like to breathe. He is too scared to look up.
And then he hears it and his heart almost stops.
“Oh-chan.”
Ohno’s head snaps up and he is looking into Nino’s face. His eyes are opened just slightly and there is a tiny, barely there, smile on his thin lips. “Satoshi.”
“Nino.” He breathes back, moving closer to the man lying before him, “Nino, Kazu, Nino, Kazu.”
Nino’s lips twitch and he murmurs softly, exerting effort that he barely has, “Pick one, old man.”
“Kazu,” Ohno whispers back, “Kazu, I love you.”
“I love you too.”
The words are bare and straight forward. There are no walls and no guards between them anymore. They are out loud and in the air. For a moment, they are the two most vulnerable people in the world. Somewhere in the background, the machines that are hooked to Nino beep in a steady rhythm.
Nino continues to stroke his hands, “I’m sorry. I won’t leave again.”
“Then,” Ohno says, “We have a whole lifetime together.”
“And even longer after that.”
Letters are important tools. They were given to humans by God in order to change their lives. Time and place and delivery, they are the most fundamental aspects of letter writing. Letters establish the ties we make in the world and most importantly, they establish the ties of fate which connect us.
The End.
*****
Hi everyone!! I really just wanted to make this edit to thank everyone for their kind comments!! This totally made my day. I'm an undergrad doing summer research and it's just really nice to come back to my place and see these comments after a really long day. Again, thank you so much!!! I'm really grateful.
Heaven’s Edge
In the afterlife, there are both many things and very little things to see. It is a calm place, where serenity becomes air and quietness touches your soul in a way that is almost impossible to describe. When I first arrived here, it was the brightest kind of torture.
It was a sort of lonely place when I first arrived, all detached and transparent. There was nothing but clouds and flowers and endless quiet that surrounded me and it was weeks before I found a familiar face that stood out. Everyone in Heaven seems familiar, their faces seem to blend together in an endless lifestream of connections and bridges and past-ness. It seemed as if everyone in Heaven were a part of my family, relatives long forgotten but newly discovered.
It was when I first sat down on the edge of a cloud to peer over the skies in hopes of finding Japan did I meet a real and true familiar soul.
“Kazu.”
My head snaps up and I turn around, “Jii-ji?”
“You really haven’t grown at all my boy. You’re still the same little munchkin your mom and I raised.” He remarked, squatting down next to me. His face is bright and relaxed, the lines that marred him in his human life seemed right and proper in Heaven. Heaven seemed like a place where the old belonged because young are too young to have died and therefore, never seemed to belong.
He smiles at me, patting the hand that rests on my knee. His touch is warm and suddenly I am able to remember how much I miss physical contact. I take his hand in mine and squeeze.
I smile at him, feeling peaceful for the first time since entering Heaven. “Jii-chan. How are you?”
“Old,” He says candidly, “old and dead. But on the whole, better than I have been in many years.”
“Am I dead too?” I ask him, a little perplexed, because I cannot remember dying. “Is this really what death is like? All wandering and no resting?”
“Death is a strange thing.” My old grandfather replies, chuckling to himself, “We ask so many questions about it and we think it is so definite. But I have come to understand that it comes and goes.”
“So I am dead?” I say. A small smile plays upon my lips and I remember where I learned my evasiveness and my strange ways of sitting as I look at him. The longer I look, the more I am able to see where my evasiveness and my sitting habits and even my personality have come from. But then I am sad because I am dead. “I’m dead.”
He says nothing in response to this and indicates the space below us instead and suddenly I can see Japan. “I have watched you many times from here since I passed.”
“I missed you every day after that time.” I reply, looking down too, wondering if I too could see my loved ones.
“I know.” He says simply and lovingly. He pats my hand again. “You are my special boy. I was sorry to leave.”
“Did you have to?” The childish question escapes me before I can stop it and then I remember that he is my Jii-ji and I can be just myself with him. No walls, no guards, no evasive answers. I don’t feel the need to hide anything from him.
“I had to.” He replied again, warmly and a little gruffly, “But it was hard.”
“What made you feel like you could leave? I didn’t want you to leave and neither did Kaa-san and and Onee-san.”
“She was waiting for me.”
“Who was waiting?”
“Your grandmother.”
I look at him now and I understand. The pull of your beloved one is hard to ignore, especially when your beloved one has been waiting all this time for you. And then in my heart there is a pang of regret. I am dead and my beloved one is not.
I can see the buildings and lights of a dark Tokyo now. The sounds of the city rise around us and I turn to Jii-ji in awe, almost feeling like I am down there in that city, standing in a crowded street and listening to the sounds of life as they evolve and morph around me.
“Then I left someone behind, Jii-chan.”
“He is not left behind.”
“I should have told him before I died.” I say, feeling a wave of regret, “I should have told him I love him.”
“The one you call ‘Oh-chan?’” Jii-ji laughs, “it is never too late.”
“But I’m dead.”
“Are you?”
An echo and a whistle race their way across Heaven to where we are perched and my eyes hurt as a bright light flashes. Wincing, I open my eyes again and suddenly we are looking down upon a hospital room.
Ohno is sitting by a hospital bed, his hand gripping a small, chubby pale one. He is sitting next to my mother. And in the bed I am laying, bandage wrapped across my head and connected to at least three machines, eyes closed.
From where I sit there is no air in my lungs and I am choking in confusion. “Jii-ji, jii-ji! What is this?”
“You are not dead.” He says simply. He is happy now. “You can still go back.”
“How?”
“Patience.”
I turn my attention again to the hospital room below us and feel perturbed, looking upon my own body. Ohno is saying something now and I strain myself to listen, leaning closer to the scene below us. He looks so tired and my mother looks even more worn and weary. The edges are hazy and I attribute this to the faraway tinny sound of his voice.
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
“What have the doctors said about him?”
“Unconscious. There is still some brain activity, so we know there is a chance that he will wake up. When the brain is injured, neurogenesis occurs in many patients but not many regain consciousness. If we are lucky, both will happen for Kazu.”
“He’s the luckiest person I know.” Ohno replies, his lip thrown out in defiance.
Ohno turns to Nino and places his hands on Nino’s cheeks and says fiercely. “You’re lucky, you hear?”
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Johnny’s Agency, Arashi Greenroom
“Aiba-chan, please pull yourself together. We have to go out there soon.” Sho-kun says, pleadingly, his eyes betray him, because they are puffed and red, irritated from crying too.
From his corner of the room, Jun-kun sniffs inconspicuously, “Stop crying. We have five minutes until the press meeting starts. You’ve got to hold yourself together.”
Aiba lets out an unbelievable trumpeting noise, blowing his nose into a tissue and takes a deep breath. “Why are they making us do this today? We just found out too.”
“Because,” Sho reasons, even though he himself is angry, “Because we are idols and we have to. We can’t just stop our work. It has to go on. This is the life we signed up for. Now please, stop crying.”
“Okay, okay.” Aiba breathes haltingly, “Okay.”
Ohno has said nothing since he arrived that morning. But the members know, because it is mirrored on all their faces, the emptiness that is the sofa before them and the tightness that squeezes their chests together, like rubber bands that can’t expand. It is hard to breathe and the air is thick with anger and worry and sadness. Ohno opens his mouth, “It’s not like he’s dead. He’ll wake up.”
There is a long silence as they look at each other, broken only when a staff member knocks and opens the door, handing them scripts to read to the press.
Within the hour, every single Japanese news station is reporting the same thing, “Breaking News: Ninomiya Kazunari hospitalized in critical condition after car accident, Arashi members visibly disturbed.”
~~~
“Fuck them.” Sho says, throwing the newspapers onto the coffee table of their dressing room.
The other three members look up startled, because Sho knows better than all of them to be swearing early in the morning and moreover, Sho swearing is ALWAYS startling.
It has been three days since Nino’s accident and the headlines of tabloids are screaming, “Ninomiya, drunk and behind the wheel-doctors suspect drugs use.”
“Fuck them all.”
Heaven’s Edge
“Jii-chan,” Nino says, looking at him, “Life keeps going right?”
“It does.”
“You know what I miss the most about it?”
“Your games?”
Nino laughs and rests his head on his grandfather’s shoulder, a gesture that takes him back to childhood, “I miss my guitar.”
“Not your friends or family?”
Nino shakes his head and closes his eyes, imagining the strings beneath his fingertips, the smoothness of his guitar’s wood, and the vibrating sounds. “I miss my guitar because it helped me show my love. When I didn’t know what else to do or say for someone, I played with my instruments and suddenly I could show them. I miss that.”
There is silence for the longest time around them and Nino is comfortable. His grandfather is warm and he sings little songs from Nino’s childhood. The hands remind him of what it is like to feel love and to be connected to someone. He wonders where his grandfather learned this but then remembers that he is the one who learned these feelings from his grandfather. Eventually, the suns in Heaven fade and it is night time.
From the corner of his eyes, he sees his grandmother, she is smiling and waving, so Nino knows it is time for his Jii-ji to leave for the day. Once they are gone, hand in hand, Nino is alone and surrounded by the darkness of Heaven.
Softly, Nino begins to sing, a song so deep and so sad that it makes his soul ripple in protest. No one is supposed to be sad in Heaven, but Nino is.
He thinks back to the time where his guitar and piano were the only instruments he could write letters with.
“Nino-chaaaaan,” Aiba sang, “I’m tired, sing me to sleep!” He flopped himself onto the sofa of the dressing room. “Sing me to sleep!”
“Sing yourself to sleep!” Nino snapped, throwing himself into a chair grumpily, filming took all of his energy reserves for the day and he had to wait for the PV to be finished before going home because he was the last one to film his solo shot. But despite himself, he pulled his computer open and played a song for Aiba from it, “Now shut up.”
Sho-kun emerged from the restroom and hummed along with it, a little bit off-pitched but none the less, happily and enthusiastically. He waved goodbye to Nino and patted Aiba on the head as he passed by. Jun-kun left shortly after.
Finally Ohno came back from his solo shooting, he smiled at Nino and shook Aiba awake, telling him that it was his turn to film. With a snort, Aiba rolled awake and ambled out of the room, smacking his head on the doorframe on the way out. They could hear him giggling foolishly as he made his way to the set.
Ohno sat down and sighed heavily. “Nino is always the last one to leave.”
From his chair, Nino grumbled, but continued to play his game.
“I’ll wait for you.”
This time Nino looked up, his expression soft and betraying how his heart pounded, “You don’t have to. It’s going to take at least another hour.”
“It’s okay.” Ohno said, he stretched himself onto the couch and closed his eyes to sleep.
Setting his game down, Nino walked over to the sofa and sat down in front of it. Slowly, he took hold of Ohno’s hands and held them. He treasured these hands more than he treasured his favorite game. From his position, Ohno smiled and hummed his response to Nino’s touch. He could never get over how soft and gentle Nino could be, when he was cupping Ohno’s hands and protecting them from everything and nothing.
Quietly and always a little shyly, Nino began to sing, songs of his past and songs that Ohno has never heard before. But he feels like he knows them because they are Nino’s creations and therefore, they are Ohno’s creations too.
So as he listened, Nino’s voice lulled him to sleep and in the tiny space of time between waking and sleeping, Ohno realized that he has never loved anyone more than he loves Nino.
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
Ohno moves slowly, afraid that any abrupt movements will wake up a dozing Aiba-chan. He picks up a spare blanket and drapes it over Aiba’s shoulders and then rearranges Jun-kun’s pillows, who is resting on the sofa next to Aiba. They refuse to go back home for the night and the doctors and nurse staff couldn’t turn them down. One pout from Aiba-chan and the battle was won. Wearily, he gives Nino a onceover, and leaves the hospital room.
The bathroom is down the hall and he locks himself in a stall, squeezing his eyes shut to will the tears to stop falling. He keeps clenching his fist, tight enough so that he can feel his nails digging into his skin, tight enough so that it hurts. He wants to feel something instead of this deep emptiness, anything to cover the gaping hole he has been feeling for the past week. And he bites his other fist to keep from screaming out loud.
His breath is coming fast and short and his heart is racing. He wants to yell and shout and destroy because he’s so mad. He’s utterly pissed at the world and everything in it. Nothing is ever easy and he’s so mad that it has to be harder than it already is. He hates the world and he hates the paparazzi even more for their lies and defaming of Nino. He thinks Sho-kun is right, “Fuck them all.”
Swearing loudly, Ohno punches the stall and his hand aches and only then can he take a deep breath and let the tears fall.
The bathroom is dark and he huddles in a closed stall, willing himself back into some semblance of sanity.
He remembers a happier situation, where he sat in a dark closet with a very important person.
“Hurry! Hurry!” Nino shouted urgently from behind him, running at full speed in the opposite direction from their dressing, grabbing Ohno’s hand as he ran and pulling him along.
“Why?” Ohno asked, tripping over his feet in order to keep pace with the racing gamer, “What’s going on?”
“Aiba-chan accidentally spilled coffee on all of Matsujun’s stuff! HE’S GOING TO EXPLODE. WE HAVE TO RUN!”
Ohno laughed at the ridiculous panic in Nino’s tone, hardly able to contain the mirth as Nino sprinted alongside him. They head straight down the hall, darting passed another Johnny, Shige, maybe? By the looks of the hair but you can never be too sure in this place. And they laugh even harder as Shige called after them “WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING, IDIOTS!”
They raced past Sho-kun, grabbing hold of his wrist too, “What’s going on?!”
“Code Bomb Stain!” Nino shouted at the top of his lungs, laughing hysterically along with Ohno.
Sho-kun choked on his giggle and pulls his wrist away, running in the opposite direction, “I have to save him!”
“Every man for himself!” Nino shouted as they left him behind.
“The door!” Ohno panted, pointing to a door down the end of the hall. They rushed to it and inside, slamming the door shut with finality and collapsed onto the ground.
Nino sat up and giggled, panting and wiping the sweat from his face. In this light, Ohno thought he looked extremely cute. He informed Nino of this thought and was walloped on the head, though Nino smiled. They pressed their ears against the door and listened for sounds of war.
“Do you think he’ll be okay?”
“Aiba-chan or Sho-kun?”
Ohno chuckled and settled himself against the door, catching the little fuzzies dancing in the air above the light. “Where are we?”
The tiny space looked like it was being used as a storage closet, costumes and props were lined up against the wall and in the middle of the room there was an old and dusty looking chalkboard.
“A prop closet maybe?” Nino ventured to guess, heaving himself off the floor and standing in front of the chalkboard. “It looks like it hasn’t been used in years. Look at the dust covering it! What a waste of money.”
He made a face, a classic face that only Nino can make.
Nino can be so many things at once, Ohno thought in that tiny closet. He can be loud and quiet and sensitive and inconsiderate. Nino was many things. Sometimes he wondered if Nino could be everything.
“Are you even listening?”
“Yes.”
“You’re lying.”
“You’re right.”
They both laughed. And then Ohno picked himself up on the floor, walked over to Nino and traced a little happy face with his finger into the dust of the chalkboard in the top corner.
Grinning, Nino reached above him and added his own smiley face. Together, they draw a story on the chalkboard in dust. A happy meeting and more silly faces, sometimes the faces are angry, but there aren’t many and there are more happy faces than there are angry faces. Once or twice they draw a sad face, but it only happens twice. Sometimes they write words to fill in the strange expressions, “Hungry,” “Shy,” “Romantic,” “Dedication,” “Gentle,” “Soft,” “Forever.” And when they reached the end of the chalkboard, instead of drawing an ending, in the tiny little space, they wrote “Ohmiya: Love Story.”
They walked away and out of the closet, hand in hand, with so many unsaid words in their minds but many written words having been expressed instead.
When they reached their dressing room, Matsujun was dabbing a suspicious smelling ointment on Sho-kun’s knee, because he tripped over his feet as he crashed his way into their dressing room in order to save Aiba-chan.
When Ohno returns to the hospital room, he sees that Sho-kun has arrived and is snoring lightly across the laps of Aiba and Jun. He fishes around his things and finds a sheet of worn paper, in which he and Nino spent hours writing promises of forever and always and togetherness. He wonders why they have never said aloud, “I love you” and only chose to write it in letters. He folds it into a small square and places it in his wallet, to keep with him at all times.
Heaven’s Edge
“Obaa-chan,” Nino says, as she sits dreamily beside him, gazing into the openness of the sky, “Jii-ji says that death comes and goes, what does he mean?”
She turns to him, a wrinkled smile pulling at her cheeks, which are rosy and cherub-like, “He means that there is death everywhere, in everything humans do.”
“Can you choose to die?”
“You should not.”
“You can choose to leave?”
“You should not.”
“So, in the end it is not a choice?”
“No,” She says now, her voice is faraway, like she is remembering something. She moves her hands to her lap with grace. They are long and slender despite the age she died at, “everyone has their own set time to die and to leave.”
“Young souls who choose to die are always the saddest souls.” She says softly, “And for the young souls who die young, it can be hard.”
“But I am not a soul who dies young.”
“You’re not.” She agrees, smiling again, “You’re here because you tied yourself to Earth before you left and it wasn’t your time. You are here because you made a strong tie and Heaven made a mistake in trying to break it so soon.”
“When do I get to go back?”
“Soon.” She promises, “Very soon.”
Nino turns his face to look at her, abandoning his vigil of the movements of Arashi down on Earth. She is a small woman and he can see bits of his mother in her. She has a weathered form, pretty hands, and a tanned face. She is a little hunched in her old age, but he can see the vigor she moves with. Everything about her is deliberate and she seems to be thinking within herself often. He sees how she is like Jii-ji.
She purses her lips at his examination, “Did you have another question?”
“Were you lonely without Jii-chan?”
“I was, at first.” She replied, a spot between her eyes wrinkling as she frowned. “But I knew I had to wait.”
“Why?”
“Because of you.” She said simply. “For you and your sister.”
For a moment, they both look at the setting sun and the puffs of color it paints in front of them.
Nino digests this and says, “Thank you.”
She chuckles. “I had a long lifetime with him so I decided it was okay to wait for a lifetime of forever with him.”
“What was your life on Earth like?”
“We worked hard, you know, to build our lives after the war. Jii-chan worked in the factory and I worked outside in the gardens for food to sell.”
“He made you work outside and him inside? What a lazy man!”
“I liked going outside,” She replied laughing, “And he liked staying inside.”
“Still,” Nino says sneakily, “A man should take care of a woman.”
“And a woman should take care of a man.”
There is a moment of silence and Nino thinks he has finally met the second person who has ever rendered him speechless, first, Ohno Satashi, and second, his own grandmother.
“I knew it!” Nino exclaimed, nodding his head as if to confirm a question.
“You knew what?” His grandmother asked, her expression piquing curiously.
“I got my sense of humor and smarts from you.” Nino said, his face a mask of innocence, “Not from that crazy old Jii-ji.”
“It’s hot outside, huh?” Sho-kun remarked, as they made their way across the beach. The sand sunk beneath their feet and the waves pulled to and away from the shore. The sun was blazing across the sky, a last banner of “Good-bye” for the day.
Nino nodded, wiping his forehead with his forearm.
They were on the sunny beaches of Japan, filming for a show and had just finished for the day. Behind them, Aiba trailed giggling and talking with Ohno about how weird the sand felt between his toes. From in front of them, Jun-kun was walking, taking in the sun and the waves and the wind. By the time they reached the beach house where they were staying, the sun had set and the sounds of the tides had reached a lulling pitch.
Nino stood outside the house, listening to the water and watching the gentle pooling of water. He hated the sea because of his tendency to get extremely seasick, but he could appreciate beauty when he saw it. From inside, Jun-kun was barking orders and Sho-kun was following them. Aiba-chan was singing as he took a shower.
The sounds became a symphony of magic and as Nino closed his eyes to listen to the sounds of life, he suddenly became aware of another person’s presence.
“Oh-chan. Did you have a nice bath?”
He hummed his response and stood next to Nino. “Are you still feeling sick?”
Taking a deep breath and letting the salty ocean air clean out his lungs, Nino smiled, “I feel much better now that I’m away from that damned boat.”
“How are you Japanese and seasick?” Ohno teased playfully, “The country is an island.”
“Oh, and I’m sure that you’re the model Japanese citizen, Mr. I-Can’t-Read-At-A-Grade-School-Level.”
Ohno snorted. Nino did have a point.
“You’re an Italian, remember?”
Ohno’s mouth curled, a small smirk formed on his lips and the expression reached his eyes, “Kazu! I’m Japanese!”
“Why are you being so familiar with me?” Nino exclaimed in mock surprise, “I don’t know any foreigners!”
“I’m from a foreign land,” Ohno said solemnly now, grinning. “It’s a previously deserted island that I want to take Nino to.”
“Being outside might kill me.”
“I’ll be outside and you can stay inside.”
Nino laughed. “You make me sound like a housewife.”
“You’re my beautiful housewife.”
“If I’m the housewife,” Nino proclaimed, “You’d better put up with my nagging.”
“Don’t I, already?” Ohno said softly, squeezing their hands together.
Nino turned his face to Ohno’s, a soft smile on his lips. He leaned in and very briefly, very softly, and gently, pressed his lips to Ohno’s. And then they both smiled, pressing their foreheads and their noses together.
Heaven’s Edge
Nino was sitting with his head between his hands. He had a headache. Were headache’s even possible in Heaven? Wasn’t this place supposed to be pain-free?
A little disturbance in the air told him that his grandfather had taken a seat next to him. “Head hurt?”
Nino grumbled.
His grandfather laughed, “You’ll be leaving soon.”
“How do you know?”
“Your head hurts because your brain is starting to pull you back.”
“Isn’t there a less painful way?” He whines.
“You haven’t changed at all.”
They sit there for a few hours in silence and as the sun stretches across the sky. Nino feels content because even though his head hurts, he is in a peaceful place and with his grandfather. He hums to himself and thinks quietly inside that he will be sad to leave the old man.
“Jii-chan?”
“My boy?”
“Obaa-chan says I tied myself to the Earth. How did I do that?”
“You promised Ohno-kun. It’s a strong tie, the threads of fate.”
“Fate?”
“You don’t believe?”
“Then how come Obaa-chan died before you?”
“We had a whole lifetime together, my boy.” Jii-ji explains contently, “But to take that away from you is unfair.”
“Do people normally get a second chance?”
“They don’t.”
“Then, why…?”
His grandfather is looking at him now, “There is no answer to that question, my dear boy.”
Earth, Tokyo, Japan, Tokyo Hospital
“This is the same room Kazu was born in.” Nino’s mother says, smiling sadly. She is looking at her son so fondly. There is sorrow etched across her brow. “I pray and pray it will not be the same room he dies in.”
She wipes a few tears and clasps her shaking hands together. She smiles at the bandmates of her son. They have come as often as they could, spending nights in the hospital rather than going to their own homes. And sometimes it is painful because Arashi sees where Nino inherited his little quirks of consideration and thoughtful gestures.
Later that evening, when Ohno sits in the hospital room with Nino after finishing interviews and photoshoots, he takes out their letter again and begins to read aloud.
From inside his head, he thinks he can hear Nino’s voice, talking to him, calling to him, whispering to him, and he is overcome with emotion but he still reads aloud. There is something freeing about reading their letter, of letting love be free in the air and saying the words instead of keeping them bottled up inside in silence. By the time he reaches the end, his eyes are red and his throat aches, but he feels content.
His head is bowed when he feels it, soft stroking on his hands. And for a moment, the world seems frozen and Ohno has forgotten what it is like to breathe. He is too scared to look up.
And then he hears it and his heart almost stops.
“Oh-chan.”
Ohno’s head snaps up and he is looking into Nino’s face. His eyes are opened just slightly and there is a tiny, barely there, smile on his thin lips. “Satoshi.”
“Nino.” He breathes back, moving closer to the man lying before him, “Nino, Kazu, Nino, Kazu.”
Nino’s lips twitch and he murmurs softly, exerting effort that he barely has, “Pick one, old man.”
“Kazu,” Ohno whispers back, “Kazu, I love you.”
“I love you too.”
The words are bare and straight forward. There are no walls and no guards between them anymore. They are out loud and in the air. For a moment, they are the two most vulnerable people in the world. Somewhere in the background, the machines that are hooked to Nino beep in a steady rhythm.
Nino continues to stroke his hands, “I’m sorry. I won’t leave again.”
“Then,” Ohno says, “We have a whole lifetime together.”
“And even longer after that.”
Letters are important tools. They were given to humans by God in order to change their lives. Time and place and delivery, they are the most fundamental aspects of letter writing. Letters establish the ties we make in the world and most importantly, they establish the ties of fate which connect us.
The End.
*****
Hi everyone!! I really just wanted to make this edit to thank everyone for their kind comments!! This totally made my day. I'm an undergrad doing summer research and it's just really nice to come back to my place and see these comments after a really long day. Again, thank you so much!!! I'm really grateful.