One Shot - It's their dearest leader, after all
Title: Their Dearest Leader, after all
Pairing: Arashi Friendship. Ohno-centric. If you squint (not very hard), Ohmiya, Yamapair
Rating: PG
Word count: 1700-ish
Summary: When Ohno suddenly looked so depressed over something, and he couldn’t tell the others about it. Being observant, Sho always noticed the smallest hint, especially when it came to Ohno, and he knew how to deal with it.
A/N: Unbeta’d. Sorry for the grammar mistake you may find. Comment is so much appreciated, so is concrit. I hope you enjoy this! :D
Their Dearest Leader, after all
“Hey, something wrong?”
Nino plopped down on the couch, patted the dozed-off Arashi Leader’s thigh softly to bring him back to reality. It worked, as Ohno smiled at him.
“You look so deep in thought,” Nino stated matter-of-factly. However, this had brought attention from the other members who were seconds ago busy with their own matters; Matsujun and his balance ball, Aiba and his potato chips, Sho and his newspaper.
“Are you feeling unwell, Satoshi-kun?” The Arashi mother hen asked, worried, and took a quick movement to check his leader’s forehead and then compared the heat to his own. “No fever, though.”
Jun was now sitting in the armrest, leaning his weight on Aiba who’s sitting on the single couch across from Ohno’s. He crossed his arms and studied Ohno’s expression closely, clearly seeing that the oldest wasn’t feeling well, if not fever, maybe there’s something that bothering him?
“You can tell us anything,” Aiba said. “Anything,” he repeated, and once again, “Really, anything.”
“You said it thrice!” Jun smacked Aiba’s head hard enough to make him hiss in pain.
“I just wanted to reassure Leader that he can tell us anything.”
“Aiba, come here hurry up before- Ah!”
Sho was trying to save Aiba from a second smack but Jun was as fast as the light and successfully hit Aiba on the head again.
“What have I done~ Matsujun, your thick eyebrows definitely have something to do with your bad personality!” Aiba cried, hurriedly running away, leaving his comfortable couch to stand beside Sho who’s patting his arm gently and mumbling a soft ‘it’s ok, now. It’s ok, now’.
Ohno chuckled, and it caused the other four turned their gaze back at Ohno who’s a bit forgotten by the little play of Matsujun and Aiba.
For a moment, the green room fell quiet as the silence took over the laughter that filled the room few minutes ago.
“Nothing, really,” said Ohno, hoping they would let it go. But no, they didn’t buy it, Ohno knew from the way Nino shifted his sitting just so he could see right into Ohno’s eyes, or Jun’s sigh, or… Sho’s sudden kneeling position and the newscaster faced him with a serious look.
He tried again, though, “I’m just a bit tired.”
“Do you want a massage, then?” Aiba offered. “You know how the grandmas and grandpas liked my massage during Mago Mago filming, right?”
Ohno laughed, really, he wasn’t joking when he told Aiba to take a massage license during those old times.
Those times where they were still young.
Those times where they could do silly things when camera was rolling, well, even now they still can, but those times were just different. They were so carefree without burden.
Now that they are turning old, there are things they can’t do like before. It’s just not the same.
Without realizing it, Ohno had his head lowered.
“Alright!” Sho said, standing on his feet abruptly, and announced that they would have a long-awaited(?) Arashi sleepover at (without permission beforehand) Matsujun’s place.
With a groan of protest from the mansion owner about how unfair it was to decide the place without asking, but they somewhat were enthusiastic about ‘Sho’s contingency plan to cheer Ohno up’ nonetheless.
“Jun-kun’s place is the widest, and already have five futons prepared in case this kind of thing comes up!” Aiba reasoned, and Jun slightly regretted the fact that he’d actually bought five futons for them to have a sleepover sometime, and even more regretted that he’d told Aiba about it.
“Don’t you have a morning shoot tomorrow? This might be a mistake to do this tonight,” Jun reminded him, a victorious grin formed on his face as Aiba gasped without sound and combed his fingers roughly into his hair, totally forgotten about his own schedule.
Nino laughed, while Sho was acting like crazy, panicking about Aiba’s future, and how the world would see their agency if one of their idol was ignoring the schedule and didn’t come to the set. It took Nino a whole five minutes to calm him down that Aiba would do something about it and not going to let any of Sho’s worst scenario to happen.
“Sorry, Aiba-chan,” Ohno mumbled, gave the man an apologetic look. “Should we cancel the plan?”
“No way!” shaking his head furiously, Aiba tried his best to assure Ohno that he’d call his manager to let him know his whereabout. There was no need to worry, or worse, call the fun off.
However, it was indeed a mistake that they went to Jun’s mansion. They found the entire neighborhood, including Jun’s building, in a complete darkness, and when Jun asked about it, they were informed that it was a temporary blackout in the area and it would take a few hours to get it repaired.
Jun sighed heavily, and gave another option to change place and visit the nearest place from here, Sho’s.
“I don’t mind though, but mine is…”
“Do you have candles?” Ohno spoke, with more enthusiasm than before.
“Well, I do. Sho-san’s souvenir.”
“Those will do,” and Ohno’s bright smile ended all discussion. The Leader wanted to have it here, after all. They didn’t have idea though, as to why did he become suddenly excited with the blackout.
So they ended up in the warm futon that placed in line next to each other, with a very limited illumination. One candle was lit up near their futons.
After a long battle with Aiba, Nino won the futon next to Ohno, not failing to grasp the chance to cuddle (or grope) their leader. But it wasn’t Aiba to give in easily, he still grumbled about Nino being so mean and selfish to monopolize Ohno for himself.
“Don’t you know that it’s only me who can make Oh-chan feel relaxed and composed?” Nino reasoned, and no one could argue with that. It’s been confirmed on National TV that Nino’s touch is indeed giving their leader some relaxation, and the feeling is mutual.
Defeated, Aiba pouted.
Sho felt sorry, and he had no other choice but giving up his own place to Aiba and sleeping next to Nino.
“Jun-pon, don’t ever think you can get closer to Oh-chan!”
“Shut up, Nino!” Jun scowled from the other end, causing them to laugh. He added, and warned, “It’s my house and I can kick you out whenever I want.”
“Whoa, Jun-pon’s scary! I’m scaaared,” Nino’s frightened voice was so fake that Jun couldn’t help but throwing his pillow over just to get it landed right on Ohno’s face, who’s laughing heartily, and instead of avenging on Jun, he happily hugging the additional pillow.
“Thanks for the pillow, Jun-kun,” he sing-sang. And they burst in laughter again when they heard Aiba’s voice screaming in pain as his head bumped with the futon, and saw Jun forcefully took Aiba’s pillow.
“Guys,” Ohno started, and the others were waiting for the oldest to finish what he have to say. After they saw such a depressed look on their leader’s face before, surely he had something to say, something that might be bothering him and he had a hard time to tell them.
They heard Ohno continue, “It feels like when we were filming the last episode of Shukudai-kun.”
And they had just realized it.
It did feel like the same.
Futons. Candles. And the five of them.
“San-Ogu isn’t here though,” Aiba giggled, ruining the nostalgic ambience their leader had built.
“Aiba!”
“Ouch! It hurts, Matsujun!”
“Better off wearing pajamas, too!” Sho exclaimed.
“Chan-Sho right!”
“Ehehe,” Ohno giggled. “It’s kind of nostalgic, isn’t it?”
“IT IS!” Aiba was being unreasonably loud, and Jun sensed something ridiculous was about to start.
“Stop it! Don’t start giving us idea!” Nino growled, right before Jun could speak a word.
“Why? Isn’t it why we gathered here?”
“We’re here to cheer Leader up, remember? And don’t waste your energy to make sugoroku or what!”
“Sakurai Sho!” Jun and Nino both shouted at the same time, they’d known for so long that Sho was Aiba’s eternal partner in crime. They’d been wondering if actually the newscaster was the one who gave absurd ideas to Aiba, be it intentionally or not.
“Come on, guys… don’t fight,” came the sleepy voice trying to stop them from arguing.
Jun hissed, “Don’t act like a leader now, leader.” He offered then, “what about Magical Banana?”
“That sounds good, Matsujun. Let’s do it!”
“Leader isn’t good at it, though,” Sho chuckled. “How’s it, Satoshi?”
“Sssh,” Nino softly hushed the noisy members. “Oh-chan’s falling asleep.”
“Geez!”
Jun rose on his elbow to support his weight, and saw the sleeping figure next to Aiba through the dim light room, their leader’s mouth opened and there’s no mistake, he’s sound asleep.
“What the hell.”
“Hey, are you free tomorrow night?” Sho asked suddenly. “I’m thinking about asking Abi-chan and the rest to hang out with us tomorrow.”
“It’s been a while, right?” Nino replied.
“Don’t tell me… Leader’s actually missing the old days,” Aiba whispered, finally realized it.
Jun closed his eyes, and spoke with a defeated tone, “Sho-kun, you knew it from the start, right? That’s why you came up with this sleepover thing?”
“Really??” Aiba asked in disbelief.
“Well, I was kind of catching him flipping through an old magazine,” Sho explained.
“And there’s our picture during Shukudai’s filming?”
Sho nodded, “Something like that.”
“Such a troublesome Leader! Do we have to babysit this old man for the rest of our lives?”
“Guess so, Nino.”
Despite Jun’s faked heavy sigh, all of them knew that no one amongst them mind to take a good care of Ohno.
It’s their beloved leader, after all.
End.
A/N: Uhm, I'm sorry for bringing Shukudai-kun's topic. I'm spending my weekend re-watching Shukudai-kun, and this fic was born because I was being so sentiment about Shukudai-kun hasn’t made a come-back yet (yes, I’m being stubborn about it because I’ll never stop hoping Arashi’s most awesome show will be returned to us). ><
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