[14/16] Lifetimes
Lifetimes
November 2012 -
Summary
Mikado Miwa had always been - clichés and all other stereotypes taken into consideration - just an ordinary girl. Pencil pusher-slash-coffee maker in the morning, legendary fanfiction writer and blogger at night. Her stories had been, for more than fifteen years now, about a certain man named Sakurai Sho - idol, rapper, newscaster, godsend. She had been content writing about him, and would have been happy to continue writing about him, had he not one day pulled a pseudo-Akanishi and decided to get himself engaged. It had been a week since that fateful evening the headlines had borne that earth-shattering news. So why was he now standing outside her door in the rain, requesting a place in her life?
A/N
[21.30, 31 October 2013] Thanks to wonderful beta ianne_xxyl! And changing tenses and mood and style for this chapter. Sorry~ But I hope you like it!
Disclaimer
The mastermind behind this plot derives no material profit from it. While several people, places, and events exist in reality, everything that follows should be digested with a healthy dose of suspicion.
Warning
I cannot write bromance or erotica to save my life.
1LDK - One bedroom, living room, dining room, kitchen.
Words 1,148
Lifetimes
For Arashi
Episode Fourteen
Recuperating
The third week of February
Sunday - Miwa decides to dye her hair deep burgundy just because she can. It is the first time she has done anything major to her appearance since graduating from high school, during which she had bleached her hair blond - which, she has recently realized, looks horrible on mere mortals anyway. Even Ninomiya Kazunari can barely handle it. She follows the instructions on the box very carefully but still somehow ends up with a tepid caramel brown that makes her look, if possible, more homely. She wonders briefly if the added plainness is because of her hair or the dark circles under her eyes. Irritably, she pushes the thought aside. She resolves to avoid mirrors as much as she can.
Miwa moves to a new home, a small apartment in Hino. It is a 1LDK hours away from her office by several trains, but she does not care - at least not yet. None of her new appliances are Hitachi - yet another major change. Mitsuo helps her with the moving boxes, and they spend a remarkably lighthearted afternoon trying to squeeze repeatedly into her building’s narrow open staircase. In gratitude she kisses him for the first time, standing in her small kitchen next to her new refrigerator. She wonders if he resents her for it. She does not bother to ask.
Monday - Miwa decides to reconnect with her sister in China. She is older by nine years, still unmarried - with apparently no plans ever to - and still as addicted to Panda research as can be. She scoffs at the memory of Johnny’s buying pandas after the Earthquake. It had been for a good cause, yes - but really, pandas? Miwa sends her a care package filled with signed copies of her current favorite manga, set in an alternate world where humans are on the brink of extinction because giants are eating them for fun. She wonders if the address she has sent her package to is still applicable. She has not seen Sachi since their mother’s funeral. They exchange emails rarely. They had never been close.
After work, Miwa wanders into a pet store and comes home with a Manx kitten. It is black and white, with a funny tail, and at first glance it reminds her of a famous detective. Instinctively she wants to call it Kageyama. She christens it George, just because. On their first evening together, during her first week in her new apartment, George naps on her couch as she watches TV with a framed picture of her mother. Ohno Satoshi is the guest on Marco Porori. She changes channels. Aiba Masaki’s new insurance CM plays. She changes channels. HBO is safe. She watches a zombie movie. She understands nothing of the plot but still sobs her heart out when the female protagonist dies.
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday - Three nights in a row she goes clubbing with her clueless fangirl friends. They are remarkably sensitive, and faithfully stick to her even when she gets too drunk the first night and ends up crawling on the floor of the public toilets. She forgets everything the next day, and is too hungover to work. Mizuki tells her to take a leave. Yuuna frets and asks more questions instead of giving advice. Haruhi pitches in a rare word and tells her to keep working if she can. The second night she drinks more calmly but still ends up singing 90s break-up songs over after-party karaoke. The third night the four of them head home before dawn. At two AM, a tipsy Miwa pops into a convenience store because she’s run out of tissues. The tabloid headlines are all about his wedding the next week. It is rumored to be very private and grand. She adds a dozen beers to her order. The cashier stares at her weirdly.
Friday - Matsumoto Jun somehow procures her mobile phone number. He pretends he wants to forward her fanfiction to one of his publisher friends, for mainstream publishing. She knows he is only worried, and despite herself, ends up spilling tears all over her phone as she types a half-coherent reply. In the end, she responds with a hasty thank you and ignores his messages after that. Somehow she makes it to the end of the work week. She’s lucky, really, to be dating her boss. On Friday evening, when Mitsuo asks her what is bothering her - as something obviously is - she tells him it’s her period. He presses the issue no further. Perhaps he reads the tabloids, too.
Saturday - She finishes her scrapbook of his pictures, worth 32 years of his life. In every page, a photo of him smiling looks up at her. The craft work is shoddy and the sheets are occasionally marked with dried tears. She wonders, for a moment, if she should give them to Komada Setsu - that lucky, lucky girl. But no, she tells herself. Setsu has enough. In memory at least, he can be hers.
Sunday - she rids her apartment of empty beer cans and half-eaten food. Her landlord stares at her carefully as she takes out her trash, still dressed in her sweats and her Beautiful World T-shirt. She acknowledges half her possessions remind her of him and them instinctively. She rubs her eyes, swollen from a week of crying. She knows she has cried herself dry. Now she can function properly again.
George jumps into the chair beside her as she makes herself breakfast. He has somehow convinced himself he is human, and smiling faintly, she gives him a piece of her meal. She bites contentedly into her French toast - it is beyond perfect. She remembers she had first studied the recipe, years and years ago, because on Hanamaru he had said that he liked it. A lump builds up in her throat. But her eyes are exhausted from a whole week of crying. She has cried herself dry. There is nothing left to cry out.
She turns her small TV on and starts watching local television again.
A/N
[22.26, 31 October 2013] Promoting ‘shounen manga about mankind on the brink of extinction because giants are eating them for fun’. YEEEEY. Shingeki no Kyojin!
November 2012 -
Summary
Mikado Miwa had always been - clichés and all other stereotypes taken into consideration - just an ordinary girl. Pencil pusher-slash-coffee maker in the morning, legendary fanfiction writer and blogger at night. Her stories had been, for more than fifteen years now, about a certain man named Sakurai Sho - idol, rapper, newscaster, godsend. She had been content writing about him, and would have been happy to continue writing about him, had he not one day pulled a pseudo-Akanishi and decided to get himself engaged. It had been a week since that fateful evening the headlines had borne that earth-shattering news. So why was he now standing outside her door in the rain, requesting a place in her life?
A/N
[21.30, 31 October 2013] Thanks to wonderful beta ianne_xxyl! And changing tenses and mood and style for this chapter. Sorry~ But I hope you like it!
Disclaimer
The mastermind behind this plot derives no material profit from it. While several people, places, and events exist in reality, everything that follows should be digested with a healthy dose of suspicion.
Warning
I cannot write bromance or erotica to save my life.
1LDK - One bedroom, living room, dining room, kitchen.
Words 1,148
Lifetimes
For Arashi
Episode Fourteen
Recuperating
The third week of February
Sunday - Miwa decides to dye her hair deep burgundy just because she can. It is the first time she has done anything major to her appearance since graduating from high school, during which she had bleached her hair blond - which, she has recently realized, looks horrible on mere mortals anyway. Even Ninomiya Kazunari can barely handle it. She follows the instructions on the box very carefully but still somehow ends up with a tepid caramel brown that makes her look, if possible, more homely. She wonders briefly if the added plainness is because of her hair or the dark circles under her eyes. Irritably, she pushes the thought aside. She resolves to avoid mirrors as much as she can.
Miwa moves to a new home, a small apartment in Hino. It is a 1LDK hours away from her office by several trains, but she does not care - at least not yet. None of her new appliances are Hitachi - yet another major change. Mitsuo helps her with the moving boxes, and they spend a remarkably lighthearted afternoon trying to squeeze repeatedly into her building’s narrow open staircase. In gratitude she kisses him for the first time, standing in her small kitchen next to her new refrigerator. She wonders if he resents her for it. She does not bother to ask.
Monday - Miwa decides to reconnect with her sister in China. She is older by nine years, still unmarried - with apparently no plans ever to - and still as addicted to Panda research as can be. She scoffs at the memory of Johnny’s buying pandas after the Earthquake. It had been for a good cause, yes - but really, pandas? Miwa sends her a care package filled with signed copies of her current favorite manga, set in an alternate world where humans are on the brink of extinction because giants are eating them for fun. She wonders if the address she has sent her package to is still applicable. She has not seen Sachi since their mother’s funeral. They exchange emails rarely. They had never been close.
After work, Miwa wanders into a pet store and comes home with a Manx kitten. It is black and white, with a funny tail, and at first glance it reminds her of a famous detective. Instinctively she wants to call it Kageyama. She christens it George, just because. On their first evening together, during her first week in her new apartment, George naps on her couch as she watches TV with a framed picture of her mother. Ohno Satoshi is the guest on Marco Porori. She changes channels. Aiba Masaki’s new insurance CM plays. She changes channels. HBO is safe. She watches a zombie movie. She understands nothing of the plot but still sobs her heart out when the female protagonist dies.
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday - Three nights in a row she goes clubbing with her clueless fangirl friends. They are remarkably sensitive, and faithfully stick to her even when she gets too drunk the first night and ends up crawling on the floor of the public toilets. She forgets everything the next day, and is too hungover to work. Mizuki tells her to take a leave. Yuuna frets and asks more questions instead of giving advice. Haruhi pitches in a rare word and tells her to keep working if she can. The second night she drinks more calmly but still ends up singing 90s break-up songs over after-party karaoke. The third night the four of them head home before dawn. At two AM, a tipsy Miwa pops into a convenience store because she’s run out of tissues. The tabloid headlines are all about his wedding the next week. It is rumored to be very private and grand. She adds a dozen beers to her order. The cashier stares at her weirdly.
Friday - Matsumoto Jun somehow procures her mobile phone number. He pretends he wants to forward her fanfiction to one of his publisher friends, for mainstream publishing. She knows he is only worried, and despite herself, ends up spilling tears all over her phone as she types a half-coherent reply. In the end, she responds with a hasty thank you and ignores his messages after that. Somehow she makes it to the end of the work week. She’s lucky, really, to be dating her boss. On Friday evening, when Mitsuo asks her what is bothering her - as something obviously is - she tells him it’s her period. He presses the issue no further. Perhaps he reads the tabloids, too.
Saturday - She finishes her scrapbook of his pictures, worth 32 years of his life. In every page, a photo of him smiling looks up at her. The craft work is shoddy and the sheets are occasionally marked with dried tears. She wonders, for a moment, if she should give them to Komada Setsu - that lucky, lucky girl. But no, she tells herself. Setsu has enough. In memory at least, he can be hers.
Sunday - she rids her apartment of empty beer cans and half-eaten food. Her landlord stares at her carefully as she takes out her trash, still dressed in her sweats and her Beautiful World T-shirt. She acknowledges half her possessions remind her of him and them instinctively. She rubs her eyes, swollen from a week of crying. She knows she has cried herself dry. Now she can function properly again.
George jumps into the chair beside her as she makes herself breakfast. He has somehow convinced himself he is human, and smiling faintly, she gives him a piece of her meal. She bites contentedly into her French toast - it is beyond perfect. She remembers she had first studied the recipe, years and years ago, because on Hanamaru he had said that he liked it. A lump builds up in her throat. But her eyes are exhausted from a whole week of crying. She has cried herself dry. There is nothing left to cry out.
She turns her small TV on and starts watching local television again.
A/N
[22.26, 31 October 2013] Promoting ‘shounen manga about mankind on the brink of extinction because giants are eating them for fun’. YEEEEY. Shingeki no Kyojin!