Fanfiction: Johnny's Entertainment: Making Up Rhymes of Yesterday
Title: Making Up Rhymes of Yesterday
Fandom: Johnny's Entertainment
Pairings: Yamashita Tomohisa/Koyama Keiichiro
Warnings: AU! Slash. The last part was written, and the whole thing edited while mostly drugged-out, so be warned for incoherency and suck.
Status: I have no idea if this has a sequel. I have plans for a part II, but I don't know if they're concrete enough to work on. 8D
Notes: Rumours of my lack of fic-writing are greatly exaggerated. I've just been really slow at finishing anything.
I started writing this almost two months ago, for zukkii. I don't even remember what the prompt was, if there ever was one. But here it is. I'm sorry for the complete fail and lack of plot and resolution. If there ever was a model for an exercise of self-indulgence, this would be it. (Except maybe Oscar Wilde.)
The title is from the song "One", performed originally by Three Dog Night.
The Wednesday of Yamashita’s first week of his part-time job taking the night shift at the local train station is a slow one, because the rain has been sleeting down ever since it started out as a surprise shower at four in the afternoon, and it shows no sign of stopping. Yamashita twirls his pencil absentmindedly as he sits behind the counter and studies his mathematics textbook (which he really shouldn’t be doing on the job, but it isn’t as if anyone is actually around to check on him), when a tall young man, coat flapping wetly behind him, comes in through the main doors across from the ticket counter with such force that Yamashita looks up from his books and leans out to take a look.
The man strides hurriedly across the station, checking the boards for the train schedule and taking his train pass from his pocket at the same time. As Yamashita watches in vague curiosity he can’t help but notice the way the draft of the closing doors blows away the drops of rain gathering at the tips of the strands of hair at the base of his neck. He watches until he is out of sight, and then leans back in through his tiny window - but at that moment he notices that the tall man has, in his haste, dropped his wallet on the floor. Yamashita leaves his counter and hurries over, but even as he picks it up he knows the man is long gone, insanely long strides taking him far away into the inner regions of the station.
Yamashita opens the wallet and sees the photo ID of one Koyama, a slightly-smiling boy only slightly older than he is. He goes back to his position behind the counter and searches through the wallet for any contact information, but fails to find any. So he opens a drawer for lost items, puts it in carefully, closes it and hopes the young man will come back for it - perhaps tomorrow evening, when he will be on shift again.
*
On Thursday Yamashita’s classes end early, so for the lack of anything better to do he goes down to the station early and decides to explore the area. He spies a half-empty ramen store and realises he hasn’t eaten any for awhile, so he walks in, gets his order slip, takes a seat, and places his ticket on the wooden counter in front of him. The wait staff soon appears in front of him, and Yamashita looks up to find, to his greatest astonishment, the tall man from the station last night standing there and confirming his order with him.
Koyama, however, stares unblinkingly back at him, and Yamashita realises eerily that the recognition is, of course, one-sided.
“Pork-slice ramen?” Koyama says, and Yamashita realises he’s actually repeated the order twice, so he apologises and confirms his order. Koyama soon comes back with a bowl of steaming noodles, and as the bowl is set down on the counter Yamashita finds himself saying, “I’m sorry for this strange question, but did you drop your wallet yesterday?” and from this distance he can see the way his single-lidded eyes slope strangely downward.
“Yes, I did,” Koyama says, a surprised expression crossing his face. His hand lingers on the bowl, and he asks, “I’m sorry, you are…?”
“I’m sorry for my rudeness. I’m the person who found your wallet,” Yamashita says, bowing slightly. “Have you got it back?”
“No, I haven’t,” he replies. “I don’t know where I dropped it. I tried to retrace my steps today, but was nearly late for work in the process.”
“It’s in the train station, at the counter,” Yamashita tells him. “I left it there last night.”
“It must have fallen out of my pocket when I was taking my pass out,” Koyama says, half to himself, and a rueful, embarrassed look crosses his face. Someone calls out to him in the kitchen and he snaps straight up again, yelling a “Yes!” over his shoulder, before bowing to Yamashita and saying, “Thank you very much for your kindness!” and returning back to the kitchen.
Yamashita picks his chopsticks up, eats at a speed appropriate for a growing boy, then leaves, humming happily. Somehow reuniting a wallet with a lost owner feels better than it has any reason to.
*
That night after his shift Koyama stops by the ticket counter, and finds, to his surprise, the boy from the ramen store framed in the window, bent over some books with his hand in his hair. “Ah, sorry,” Koyama says tentatively, and as the boy looks up, Koyama almost misses the way his eyes light up slightly when he sees who it is. But Koyama does not miss the way he might have mistaken that slightly long hair, those big, rounded eyes and those pretty lips for belonging to a girl if he hadn’t already heard his voice earlier in the day.
“Oh, it’s you,” the boy says pleasantly, and he opens up a drawer, carefully removes Koyama’s wallet from it, and holds it out to him. “Check that everything is in there, please,” he says.
Koyama scans through his wallet and finds nothing amiss, so he closes it and tucks it securely back into his pocket. “I didn’t know you worked here,” he says, smiling.
“Well, who else but me could have picked it up? I’m the only one here at night,” the boy drawls lazily in return, grinning back at him.
Koyama laughs slightly, and says, “It is a rather small town, isn’t it? But I’ve lived here all my life, so I’m used to it.”
“I’ve just moved here, so I’m not used to it,” Yamashita says, and Koyama finds himself chuckling at the boy’s wry wit.
“Let me take you out for a drink to thank you,” Koyama says, and as Yamashita opens his mouth to protest, “And to give you a belated welcome to town.”
Yamashita shuts his mouth and nods his agreement, and discovers that when Koyama smiles, his eyes crinkle beautifully at the corners.
*
On Friday Koyama sweeps into the station at the end of his shift, but this time he slows down and nods to the boy in the ticketing window, who smiles and nods back to him.
*
On Saturday Yamashita meets Koyama as downtown as this town can get, and Koyama buys Yamashita lunch against the will of his best protests. “But you said a drink,” Yamashita grumbles, but most growing boys can’t resist the temptation of food, and he falls to.
Koyama watches as he picks at his own food. He is rarely truly hungry nowadays, despite spending most of his day surrounded by food. Yamashita-kun is only slightly shorter than him, but he’s more heavily built so he looks shorter and stockier. But, he thinks, that solid build befits that steady gaze, lends an androgyny to his strangely feminine face.
“What are you looking at?” Yamashita asks, but his voice sounds curious rather than offended.
“Nothing,” he smiles and asks, “What do you feel like doing after this?”
*
On Saturday evening Yamashita goes home feeling happier and less lonely than he has in a long, long time. He greets his mother and sister and places in front of them the supper he has bought for them; they sit at the dining table and exchange hidden, pleased smiles as he walks into his room, unconscious of the grin on his lips.
*
On Sunday evening, Yamashita calls Koyama.
Two minutes into the conversation, which thus far has consisted mainly of Yamashita rambling on and on about the homework he hasn’t completed all weekend, Koyama asks, gently, “Are you lonely?”
The uncertain silence on the line answers the question better than any half-excuse Yamashita might have stammered out. “It’s okay to be lonely, Yamashita-kun,” he continues. He is only a year older than this boy, but already he knows he has to take care of him the way only an older brother can. “Being alone is your chance to discover more things about yourself that no one else will ever find out about you.”
“Being alone isn’t the same as being lonely,” Yamashita says softly, and Koyama wishes the statement weren’t truth, because then he would have something to say in return to that.
Instead, he asks, “So which are you?”
“A little bit of both,” Yamashita admits, and Koyama smiles at his courage.
“I’m a little bit lonely too,” Koyama admits in return, because it’s only fair.
“But you’ve lived here all your life. And you’re good at talking to people.”
Koyama smiles sadly to himself. “Do your homework, Yamashita-kun,” he says, and hangs up.
*
Koyama is entering Mei-dai in September, he tells Yamashita one day as they are standing on a bridge overlooking a river, talking about their dreams and futures. He’d taken the exam for the Literature course earlier in the year, and Yamashita is doubly surprised because he didn’t look the literary sort, and because it had never occurred to him that Koyama-san was a student, just like he was. Yamashita notices that he’s postponed his studies a semester, though, and when he points that out he agrees but does not say why. Yamashita does not probe. Instead, he asks him what he is reading, asks him what texts he will be studying.
In the fall, he thinks, I shall be lonely again.
*
In a week it will be Koyama’s birthday. Yamashita wonders if he should do anything. Koyama hadn’t told him about it, of course; no, he’d snuck a peek at his photo ID when he’d been waiting for the man to come pick it up.
A week turns into six days, then five, then four. Yamashita rarely buys people presents for their birthdays so he doesn’t have much practice in hunting for the perfect gift. He far prefers to give gifts out of season, believing that doting on loved ones shouldn’t only be restricted to special occasions. Besides, it is far more convenient to buy the perfect gift when you see it and give it away to the perfect recipient, rather than take a mental note of it and forget about it when you intend to buy something for someone.
This time around, though, he knows he has to look, if only because he doesn’t know how much longer his special friendship with this man will last.
On Thursday Yamashita heads out into the town in the brief hours he has before having to head to his job to search for something appropriate.
He walks past the stores which proudly sell the town’s local craft specialty, knowing that while they are foreign to him, they will not be to Koyama; he walks past the tiny cramped knick-knack stores, knowing that while they will be full of fascinating objects, the chances of him finding something that will hit the right spot are extremely slim, particularly when he doesn’t know much of Koyama’s personal life and interests.
He walks past a bookstore, then pauses, and backtracks; something in the glass front of the store has caught his eye - it is a newly-released edition of Basho’s complete poetry, complete with updated annotations and essays. He remembers Koyama’s list of texts; feels certain that, at least, this poet was on it.
He walks into the store and asks for a copy of it. When the price is read out to him he doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t even flinch, but pulls the money out of his wallet and pays.
He walks out of the store, satisfied.
*
On Sunday evening Yamashita writes a short note to Koyama and tucks it into the book, then puts the book back into its paper bag. He picks up a marker and decorates the bag with silly cartoon drawings and line-drawings of sunsets.
Then he puts the gift into his school bag so he won’t forget, and goes to sleep.
*
On Monday evening, toward the end of his shift, Yamashita looks up from his books and begins to watch the doors to the station located across from his ticket counter. He watches carefully, though he knows he will not, can not, miss the tall man who strides in through that door every evening after his own shift at the ramen store has ended. Still he watches carefully, because tonight of all nights he doesn’t want to miss him.
Sure enough, Koyama walks in through the door, as always, and just as always, Yamashita smiles and nods in return to his own greeting nod. This time, though, he sticks his head out and asks him to come over.
Koyama breaks his stride and trots over. “What’s wrong?” he says, a slightly worried look creasing his brow.
“Don’t worry,” Yamashita says, half-laughing at the way his friend worries so easily. “I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday,” and he hands the package over to him.
“How did you know?!” Koyama’s eyes nearly boggle out of his head with the ferocity of his amazement. Yamashita does laugh at this, but he merely winks and says it’s a secret.
So Koyama stands there at the ticket window and opens the present. He sees the book and his eyes widen again and he exclaims, “But it costs so much! More than what a student like you should be affording!”
“I’m not really much of a literature person,” Yamashita says, nodding at the book in Koyama’s hand. “But I remembered from Japanese lessons that he was a pretty important guy. I hope it will help.”
“Thank you,” Koyama says, but the way his eyes shine tells Yamashita that his statement is an understatement to the depth of emotion he is feeling. “You really shouldn’t have. Thank you.”
Yamashita shrugs and ducks his head, suddenly shy. Koyama looks back down at the book, and opens the first page to read the note.
Koyama-san,
Happy Birthday!, he has written in English, before reverting back to Japanese. A magic, special day that happens only once a year! ♪~ Sorry, I heard that on a radio song somewhere and it stuck in the most irritating way. I hope you will enjoy your present. It seemed like you would, so I bought it.
Once again, congratulations on your birthday. I, Yamashita Tomohisa, wish you all the very best for your future.
Koyama cannot help but smile. The note is convoluted and seemingly inane, but Koyama knows that this is because it was written from the bottom of the heart.
He steps away from the window, bows so low that it shocks and surprises Yamashita, and says, “Thank you,” in the most heartfelt way he can. Then he somehow fits his head and arms through the window and wraps Yamashita in a warm, though slightly uncomfortable, hug.
Though it probably lasted for just a split second, there is a pause that feels like hours elapsed before Yamashita eventually, slowly, brings his arms up and around Koyama’s body. For some reason his heart is thudding loudly and slowly in his chest, and his arms are tingling to the very tips of his fingers. Koyama suspects nothing; he draws away after the same length of time that would have elapsed if Yamashita had automatically returned the hug.
Yamashita is slightly disappointed - but also simultaneously, and mostly, relieved.
*
The next few months bring a whole spate of tests and activities. Yamashita tries out for the track team on a whim and is surprised when he gets in; he trains hard every day for a month to catch up and then to keep pace with the rest of his peers. The team gets knocked out early on and Yamashita expects that to be the end of his track experience, so he’s surprised when, the following week, the guys slap his back and drag him out for dinner after school as if they’d been teammates for ages.
Yamashita doesn’t see Koyama very much in this time, apart from the few minutes slightly past 9PM in the train station every evening when Koyama walks past and talks to him. Yamashita begins to live for these few minutes. He tells Koyama about his work and his team; tells him how tired he is but how alive he feels. Koyama smiles like a proud older brother, but reminds him worriedly to take care of his health. Each time, Yamashita half-laughs and reminds him that his mother already does that for him.
In August school finally lets out, and Koyama has already quit his job in order to better make his preparations for leaving.
Yamashita hangs out with him a lot during this time. He goes over once to help him pack, and when he sees Koyama’s room for the first time, he is almost disappointed to find that it looks very much like his, with books and papers strewn all over the table, the floor remarkably neat, the bedspread slightly rumpled where he’d probably lain down to rest and, inevitably, think - only that it is different, for while Koyama’s shelves were sagging with forgotten toys and once-read books, Yamashita’s are still empty from the things he couldn’t bring when his family moved.
With two pairs of hands at work, Koyama is very quickly packed. When he looks around his room, he is surprised to find that there aren’t very many things that he can’t bear to leave behind. His clothes are in one big box, and his books are packed away in a smaller one. Both stand ready by the door to be sent ahead of his arrival in Tokyo.
They both flop, side-by-side, onto Koyama’s bed, and lie there staring at the ceiling. Somewhere outside, a dog barks, is hushed, and barks again. Yamashita wonders at the tranquillity and poetry that comes in moments like these, spaces of time he has rarely shared with another person, content just to be in the other’s presence.
In the near-silence and dimness of the room, full of the paraphernalia that make the memories of Koyama’s childhood and adolescence, he asks, “Will you miss me?”
And Koyama says, “Yes. Yes. Of course,” and Yamashita’s heart leaps so far into his throat that it is a while before he is sure that he can speak again.
*
One day the week before Koyama is due to leave, Koyama invites him on a tour of the town.
“For me to say goodbye,” he says light-heartedly over the phone, “And for you to say hello.”
Koyama brings him to a park three stations down on the local line, shows him his favourite place to sit and think, tells him where to find the best places to watch the sakura when they bloom. They are standing in silence on a bridge overlooking a pond, admiring the sleek, majestic carp, when Yamashita hears Koyama murmur a poem off the top of his head.
It is not quite the words that touch him, or the fact that he had already so quickly memorised and dissected a poem from the book that amazed him, but rather it is the tender, quiet way the syllables fall gently from his lips, the reverent, contemplative way he uttered the words that made them feel like cherished objects, which opens Yamashita’s eyes to the world outside of himself. It was true that he had always known that the great wide world was out there, but for the first time he is experiencing exactly how vast it is that his heart can not contain it all. In that second he understands what the old masters had meant when they had pronounced that all things were one.
Koyama Keiichiro, for all his clumsy carelessness and uncertain angles, turned out to have a certain un-self-conscious charm, after all. He misses it already. He wonders what he would do, what his life would be like, without Koyama around.
“Yamashita-kun,” Koyama is saying, earnestly. “You will take care of yourself?”
“Yes. Yes, of course,” Yamashita is startled into answering, echoing subconsciously the words he’d been turning over in his mind for a while. “What makes you think that I wouldn’t?”
Koyama shrugs, the slender line of his shoulders undulating gracefully. “You’re like the little brother I’ve never known,” he says, “So I worry about you.”
Yamashita is silent for a while. Those words, little brother, they cut deep into his heart. As long as Koyama had never said it, Yamashita could carry on pretending that what they had could lead to something more. But now that he had, he knew it couldn’t, knew that it would take a few more years of growing up for this man to ever see him as an equal.
Eventually he says, “I promise not to be lonely if you promise not to be too.”
Koyama smiles and makes them hook fingers, so they can never break the promise. “You’re a good boy, Yamashita-kun,” he says, and those words, coupled with the gentle, beautiful smile on his face, and the tender look in his eyes that could maybe but probably not be love, nearly break Yamashita’s heart.
*
Yamashita sees Koyama off the following week. He stands on the platform, hands buried deep inside the pockets of his jacket, refusing to wave, because that will be too much like one of those ridiculous soaps his mother and sister insisted on watching. Instead, he watches the train until it disappears into the distance, and tries not to wonder if Koyama is too watching him turn into a mere speck on the platform.
He turns and walks away, past the ticketing counter, where he’s already quit his part-time job. The absence of Koyama every evening at the ticketing counter would only fill his hours with needless grief and longing, distractions he did not need, and wanted even less.
He’s made up his mind to study harder. His mother would be pleased to hear that he was intending to take the entrance exam for Mei-dai come the following year.
If he started now, he could still catch up.
[edit 19 March 2010]: myxstorie remixed this fic for the 3rd cycle of jentfic_remix. It's called Composing the Songs of Tomorrow, and while is mostly Ryo/Shige, is pretty awesome. :D
Fandom: Johnny's Entertainment
Pairings: Yamashita Tomohisa/Koyama Keiichiro
Warnings: AU! Slash. The last part was written, and the whole thing edited while mostly drugged-out, so be warned for incoherency and suck.
Status: I have no idea if this has a sequel. I have plans for a part II, but I don't know if they're concrete enough to work on. 8D
Notes: Rumours of my lack of fic-writing are greatly exaggerated. I've just been really slow at finishing anything.
I started writing this almost two months ago, for zukkii. I don't even remember what the prompt was, if there ever was one. But here it is. I'm sorry for the complete fail and lack of plot and resolution. If there ever was a model for an exercise of self-indulgence, this would be it. (Except maybe Oscar Wilde.)
The title is from the song "One", performed originally by Three Dog Night.
The Wednesday of Yamashita’s first week of his part-time job taking the night shift at the local train station is a slow one, because the rain has been sleeting down ever since it started out as a surprise shower at four in the afternoon, and it shows no sign of stopping. Yamashita twirls his pencil absentmindedly as he sits behind the counter and studies his mathematics textbook (which he really shouldn’t be doing on the job, but it isn’t as if anyone is actually around to check on him), when a tall young man, coat flapping wetly behind him, comes in through the main doors across from the ticket counter with such force that Yamashita looks up from his books and leans out to take a look.
The man strides hurriedly across the station, checking the boards for the train schedule and taking his train pass from his pocket at the same time. As Yamashita watches in vague curiosity he can’t help but notice the way the draft of the closing doors blows away the drops of rain gathering at the tips of the strands of hair at the base of his neck. He watches until he is out of sight, and then leans back in through his tiny window - but at that moment he notices that the tall man has, in his haste, dropped his wallet on the floor. Yamashita leaves his counter and hurries over, but even as he picks it up he knows the man is long gone, insanely long strides taking him far away into the inner regions of the station.
Yamashita opens the wallet and sees the photo ID of one Koyama, a slightly-smiling boy only slightly older than he is. He goes back to his position behind the counter and searches through the wallet for any contact information, but fails to find any. So he opens a drawer for lost items, puts it in carefully, closes it and hopes the young man will come back for it - perhaps tomorrow evening, when he will be on shift again.
*
On Thursday Yamashita’s classes end early, so for the lack of anything better to do he goes down to the station early and decides to explore the area. He spies a half-empty ramen store and realises he hasn’t eaten any for awhile, so he walks in, gets his order slip, takes a seat, and places his ticket on the wooden counter in front of him. The wait staff soon appears in front of him, and Yamashita looks up to find, to his greatest astonishment, the tall man from the station last night standing there and confirming his order with him.
Koyama, however, stares unblinkingly back at him, and Yamashita realises eerily that the recognition is, of course, one-sided.
“Pork-slice ramen?” Koyama says, and Yamashita realises he’s actually repeated the order twice, so he apologises and confirms his order. Koyama soon comes back with a bowl of steaming noodles, and as the bowl is set down on the counter Yamashita finds himself saying, “I’m sorry for this strange question, but did you drop your wallet yesterday?” and from this distance he can see the way his single-lidded eyes slope strangely downward.
“Yes, I did,” Koyama says, a surprised expression crossing his face. His hand lingers on the bowl, and he asks, “I’m sorry, you are…?”
“I’m sorry for my rudeness. I’m the person who found your wallet,” Yamashita says, bowing slightly. “Have you got it back?”
“No, I haven’t,” he replies. “I don’t know where I dropped it. I tried to retrace my steps today, but was nearly late for work in the process.”
“It’s in the train station, at the counter,” Yamashita tells him. “I left it there last night.”
“It must have fallen out of my pocket when I was taking my pass out,” Koyama says, half to himself, and a rueful, embarrassed look crosses his face. Someone calls out to him in the kitchen and he snaps straight up again, yelling a “Yes!” over his shoulder, before bowing to Yamashita and saying, “Thank you very much for your kindness!” and returning back to the kitchen.
Yamashita picks his chopsticks up, eats at a speed appropriate for a growing boy, then leaves, humming happily. Somehow reuniting a wallet with a lost owner feels better than it has any reason to.
*
That night after his shift Koyama stops by the ticket counter, and finds, to his surprise, the boy from the ramen store framed in the window, bent over some books with his hand in his hair. “Ah, sorry,” Koyama says tentatively, and as the boy looks up, Koyama almost misses the way his eyes light up slightly when he sees who it is. But Koyama does not miss the way he might have mistaken that slightly long hair, those big, rounded eyes and those pretty lips for belonging to a girl if he hadn’t already heard his voice earlier in the day.
“Oh, it’s you,” the boy says pleasantly, and he opens up a drawer, carefully removes Koyama’s wallet from it, and holds it out to him. “Check that everything is in there, please,” he says.
Koyama scans through his wallet and finds nothing amiss, so he closes it and tucks it securely back into his pocket. “I didn’t know you worked here,” he says, smiling.
“Well, who else but me could have picked it up? I’m the only one here at night,” the boy drawls lazily in return, grinning back at him.
Koyama laughs slightly, and says, “It is a rather small town, isn’t it? But I’ve lived here all my life, so I’m used to it.”
“I’ve just moved here, so I’m not used to it,” Yamashita says, and Koyama finds himself chuckling at the boy’s wry wit.
“Let me take you out for a drink to thank you,” Koyama says, and as Yamashita opens his mouth to protest, “And to give you a belated welcome to town.”
Yamashita shuts his mouth and nods his agreement, and discovers that when Koyama smiles, his eyes crinkle beautifully at the corners.
*
On Friday Koyama sweeps into the station at the end of his shift, but this time he slows down and nods to the boy in the ticketing window, who smiles and nods back to him.
*
On Saturday Yamashita meets Koyama as downtown as this town can get, and Koyama buys Yamashita lunch against the will of his best protests. “But you said a drink,” Yamashita grumbles, but most growing boys can’t resist the temptation of food, and he falls to.
Koyama watches as he picks at his own food. He is rarely truly hungry nowadays, despite spending most of his day surrounded by food. Yamashita-kun is only slightly shorter than him, but he’s more heavily built so he looks shorter and stockier. But, he thinks, that solid build befits that steady gaze, lends an androgyny to his strangely feminine face.
“What are you looking at?” Yamashita asks, but his voice sounds curious rather than offended.
“Nothing,” he smiles and asks, “What do you feel like doing after this?”
*
On Saturday evening Yamashita goes home feeling happier and less lonely than he has in a long, long time. He greets his mother and sister and places in front of them the supper he has bought for them; they sit at the dining table and exchange hidden, pleased smiles as he walks into his room, unconscious of the grin on his lips.
*
On Sunday evening, Yamashita calls Koyama.
Two minutes into the conversation, which thus far has consisted mainly of Yamashita rambling on and on about the homework he hasn’t completed all weekend, Koyama asks, gently, “Are you lonely?”
The uncertain silence on the line answers the question better than any half-excuse Yamashita might have stammered out. “It’s okay to be lonely, Yamashita-kun,” he continues. He is only a year older than this boy, but already he knows he has to take care of him the way only an older brother can. “Being alone is your chance to discover more things about yourself that no one else will ever find out about you.”
“Being alone isn’t the same as being lonely,” Yamashita says softly, and Koyama wishes the statement weren’t truth, because then he would have something to say in return to that.
Instead, he asks, “So which are you?”
“A little bit of both,” Yamashita admits, and Koyama smiles at his courage.
“I’m a little bit lonely too,” Koyama admits in return, because it’s only fair.
“But you’ve lived here all your life. And you’re good at talking to people.”
Koyama smiles sadly to himself. “Do your homework, Yamashita-kun,” he says, and hangs up.
*
Koyama is entering Mei-dai in September, he tells Yamashita one day as they are standing on a bridge overlooking a river, talking about their dreams and futures. He’d taken the exam for the Literature course earlier in the year, and Yamashita is doubly surprised because he didn’t look the literary sort, and because it had never occurred to him that Koyama-san was a student, just like he was. Yamashita notices that he’s postponed his studies a semester, though, and when he points that out he agrees but does not say why. Yamashita does not probe. Instead, he asks him what he is reading, asks him what texts he will be studying.
In the fall, he thinks, I shall be lonely again.
*
In a week it will be Koyama’s birthday. Yamashita wonders if he should do anything. Koyama hadn’t told him about it, of course; no, he’d snuck a peek at his photo ID when he’d been waiting for the man to come pick it up.
A week turns into six days, then five, then four. Yamashita rarely buys people presents for their birthdays so he doesn’t have much practice in hunting for the perfect gift. He far prefers to give gifts out of season, believing that doting on loved ones shouldn’t only be restricted to special occasions. Besides, it is far more convenient to buy the perfect gift when you see it and give it away to the perfect recipient, rather than take a mental note of it and forget about it when you intend to buy something for someone.
This time around, though, he knows he has to look, if only because he doesn’t know how much longer his special friendship with this man will last.
On Thursday Yamashita heads out into the town in the brief hours he has before having to head to his job to search for something appropriate.
He walks past the stores which proudly sell the town’s local craft specialty, knowing that while they are foreign to him, they will not be to Koyama; he walks past the tiny cramped knick-knack stores, knowing that while they will be full of fascinating objects, the chances of him finding something that will hit the right spot are extremely slim, particularly when he doesn’t know much of Koyama’s personal life and interests.
He walks past a bookstore, then pauses, and backtracks; something in the glass front of the store has caught his eye - it is a newly-released edition of Basho’s complete poetry, complete with updated annotations and essays. He remembers Koyama’s list of texts; feels certain that, at least, this poet was on it.
He walks into the store and asks for a copy of it. When the price is read out to him he doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t even flinch, but pulls the money out of his wallet and pays.
He walks out of the store, satisfied.
*
On Sunday evening Yamashita writes a short note to Koyama and tucks it into the book, then puts the book back into its paper bag. He picks up a marker and decorates the bag with silly cartoon drawings and line-drawings of sunsets.
Then he puts the gift into his school bag so he won’t forget, and goes to sleep.
*
On Monday evening, toward the end of his shift, Yamashita looks up from his books and begins to watch the doors to the station located across from his ticket counter. He watches carefully, though he knows he will not, can not, miss the tall man who strides in through that door every evening after his own shift at the ramen store has ended. Still he watches carefully, because tonight of all nights he doesn’t want to miss him.
Sure enough, Koyama walks in through the door, as always, and just as always, Yamashita smiles and nods in return to his own greeting nod. This time, though, he sticks his head out and asks him to come over.
Koyama breaks his stride and trots over. “What’s wrong?” he says, a slightly worried look creasing his brow.
“Don’t worry,” Yamashita says, half-laughing at the way his friend worries so easily. “I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday,” and he hands the package over to him.
“How did you know?!” Koyama’s eyes nearly boggle out of his head with the ferocity of his amazement. Yamashita does laugh at this, but he merely winks and says it’s a secret.
So Koyama stands there at the ticket window and opens the present. He sees the book and his eyes widen again and he exclaims, “But it costs so much! More than what a student like you should be affording!”
“I’m not really much of a literature person,” Yamashita says, nodding at the book in Koyama’s hand. “But I remembered from Japanese lessons that he was a pretty important guy. I hope it will help.”
“Thank you,” Koyama says, but the way his eyes shine tells Yamashita that his statement is an understatement to the depth of emotion he is feeling. “You really shouldn’t have. Thank you.”
Yamashita shrugs and ducks his head, suddenly shy. Koyama looks back down at the book, and opens the first page to read the note.
Koyama-san,
Happy Birthday!, he has written in English, before reverting back to Japanese. A magic, special day that happens only once a year! ♪~ Sorry, I heard that on a radio song somewhere and it stuck in the most irritating way. I hope you will enjoy your present. It seemed like you would, so I bought it.
Once again, congratulations on your birthday. I, Yamashita Tomohisa, wish you all the very best for your future.
Koyama cannot help but smile. The note is convoluted and seemingly inane, but Koyama knows that this is because it was written from the bottom of the heart.
He steps away from the window, bows so low that it shocks and surprises Yamashita, and says, “Thank you,” in the most heartfelt way he can. Then he somehow fits his head and arms through the window and wraps Yamashita in a warm, though slightly uncomfortable, hug.
Though it probably lasted for just a split second, there is a pause that feels like hours elapsed before Yamashita eventually, slowly, brings his arms up and around Koyama’s body. For some reason his heart is thudding loudly and slowly in his chest, and his arms are tingling to the very tips of his fingers. Koyama suspects nothing; he draws away after the same length of time that would have elapsed if Yamashita had automatically returned the hug.
Yamashita is slightly disappointed - but also simultaneously, and mostly, relieved.
*
The next few months bring a whole spate of tests and activities. Yamashita tries out for the track team on a whim and is surprised when he gets in; he trains hard every day for a month to catch up and then to keep pace with the rest of his peers. The team gets knocked out early on and Yamashita expects that to be the end of his track experience, so he’s surprised when, the following week, the guys slap his back and drag him out for dinner after school as if they’d been teammates for ages.
Yamashita doesn’t see Koyama very much in this time, apart from the few minutes slightly past 9PM in the train station every evening when Koyama walks past and talks to him. Yamashita begins to live for these few minutes. He tells Koyama about his work and his team; tells him how tired he is but how alive he feels. Koyama smiles like a proud older brother, but reminds him worriedly to take care of his health. Each time, Yamashita half-laughs and reminds him that his mother already does that for him.
In August school finally lets out, and Koyama has already quit his job in order to better make his preparations for leaving.
Yamashita hangs out with him a lot during this time. He goes over once to help him pack, and when he sees Koyama’s room for the first time, he is almost disappointed to find that it looks very much like his, with books and papers strewn all over the table, the floor remarkably neat, the bedspread slightly rumpled where he’d probably lain down to rest and, inevitably, think - only that it is different, for while Koyama’s shelves were sagging with forgotten toys and once-read books, Yamashita’s are still empty from the things he couldn’t bring when his family moved.
With two pairs of hands at work, Koyama is very quickly packed. When he looks around his room, he is surprised to find that there aren’t very many things that he can’t bear to leave behind. His clothes are in one big box, and his books are packed away in a smaller one. Both stand ready by the door to be sent ahead of his arrival in Tokyo.
They both flop, side-by-side, onto Koyama’s bed, and lie there staring at the ceiling. Somewhere outside, a dog barks, is hushed, and barks again. Yamashita wonders at the tranquillity and poetry that comes in moments like these, spaces of time he has rarely shared with another person, content just to be in the other’s presence.
In the near-silence and dimness of the room, full of the paraphernalia that make the memories of Koyama’s childhood and adolescence, he asks, “Will you miss me?”
And Koyama says, “Yes. Yes. Of course,” and Yamashita’s heart leaps so far into his throat that it is a while before he is sure that he can speak again.
*
One day the week before Koyama is due to leave, Koyama invites him on a tour of the town.
“For me to say goodbye,” he says light-heartedly over the phone, “And for you to say hello.”
Koyama brings him to a park three stations down on the local line, shows him his favourite place to sit and think, tells him where to find the best places to watch the sakura when they bloom. They are standing in silence on a bridge overlooking a pond, admiring the sleek, majestic carp, when Yamashita hears Koyama murmur a poem off the top of his head.
It is not quite the words that touch him, or the fact that he had already so quickly memorised and dissected a poem from the book that amazed him, but rather it is the tender, quiet way the syllables fall gently from his lips, the reverent, contemplative way he uttered the words that made them feel like cherished objects, which opens Yamashita’s eyes to the world outside of himself. It was true that he had always known that the great wide world was out there, but for the first time he is experiencing exactly how vast it is that his heart can not contain it all. In that second he understands what the old masters had meant when they had pronounced that all things were one.
Koyama Keiichiro, for all his clumsy carelessness and uncertain angles, turned out to have a certain un-self-conscious charm, after all. He misses it already. He wonders what he would do, what his life would be like, without Koyama around.
“Yamashita-kun,” Koyama is saying, earnestly. “You will take care of yourself?”
“Yes. Yes, of course,” Yamashita is startled into answering, echoing subconsciously the words he’d been turning over in his mind for a while. “What makes you think that I wouldn’t?”
Koyama shrugs, the slender line of his shoulders undulating gracefully. “You’re like the little brother I’ve never known,” he says, “So I worry about you.”
Yamashita is silent for a while. Those words, little brother, they cut deep into his heart. As long as Koyama had never said it, Yamashita could carry on pretending that what they had could lead to something more. But now that he had, he knew it couldn’t, knew that it would take a few more years of growing up for this man to ever see him as an equal.
Eventually he says, “I promise not to be lonely if you promise not to be too.”
Koyama smiles and makes them hook fingers, so they can never break the promise. “You’re a good boy, Yamashita-kun,” he says, and those words, coupled with the gentle, beautiful smile on his face, and the tender look in his eyes that could maybe but probably not be love, nearly break Yamashita’s heart.
*
Yamashita sees Koyama off the following week. He stands on the platform, hands buried deep inside the pockets of his jacket, refusing to wave, because that will be too much like one of those ridiculous soaps his mother and sister insisted on watching. Instead, he watches the train until it disappears into the distance, and tries not to wonder if Koyama is too watching him turn into a mere speck on the platform.
He turns and walks away, past the ticketing counter, where he’s already quit his part-time job. The absence of Koyama every evening at the ticketing counter would only fill his hours with needless grief and longing, distractions he did not need, and wanted even less.
He’s made up his mind to study harder. His mother would be pleased to hear that he was intending to take the entrance exam for Mei-dai come the following year.
If he started now, he could still catch up.
[edit 19 March 2010]: myxstorie remixed this fic for the 3rd cycle of jentfic_remix. It's called Composing the Songs of Tomorrow, and while is mostly Ryo/Shige, is pretty awesome. :D