The Life and Death of Samuel Selwyn, 1/2
Title: The Life and Death of Samuel Selwyn, Part One
Rating: Both parts together - Hard R
Characters/Pairings: Sakurai Sho/Ninomiya Kazunari; Sakurai Sho/Becky
Summary: “Would it be at all possible for Mr. Ninomiya to pass his summer with you?” Jun inquired.
Notes/Warnings: I've been writing this since March, and I'm happy to have finished it! This is most definitely AU set in Victorian-era England. My basic idea was for Nino to be a playwright and Sho to be his patron and it...got a little bit out of hand? This is for all the Sakumiya folks who follow along here ;)
That the audience had not booed but had instead cheered reminded Sho just how out of touch he felt with what passed as entertainment. It had taken hours of begging at home from his wife and then the innumerable letters from Jun encouraging him to attend the newest play he was producing. Where the bawdy jokes and innuendo that permeated The Gimmick Game had pleased the guests around him, Sho was left cold.
All he wanted was to get back to the coach, but Rebecca had his elbow and was pulling them through the playhouse to the backstage area. Sho was usually rather sociable, but the past few months had been rather trying. That his wife’s first appearance after mourning was for some vulgar play made his anger rise.
Rebecca, however, seemed very happy to be out again regardless of the occasion. “I found it rather amusing,” she was saying again and again as they made their way through the exiting hundreds.
“I think the opera would have been far more appropriate,” Sho muttered. “And you very well know my feelings on opera.”
She laughed, earning a rather pointed glare from an older woman. Ah, finally, someone else who had not found The Gimmick Game to their taste. Sho led her down the steps to Jun’s office. His friend was there, looking as frazzled as he always did on a show night. Every detail had to be perfect, and much as Sho had found the show’s content disagreeable, he could not fault Jun’s ability to stage an eye-catching performance.
“Sakurai!” Jun exclaimed, not moving away from the chaotic mass of flowers he was dividing up to give to the cast. “I see you lurking in my doorway!”
Rebecca abandoned his arm and rushed inside. “You have a remarkable eye for talent, Mr. Matsumoto,” she told his friend. “Congratulations on your success.”
“No success until I tabulate my earnings,” Jun reminded her. “And I could direct your attention to the three negative newspaper reviews that came with my breakfast tray this morning.”
She looked back to see him in the doorway and sighed. “Will you come in and greet your friend? Must you be so gloomy now?”
He bit the inside of his cheek and stepped forward. There were still accounts to deal with and the matter of continuing the endowment at Magdalen and...
“It’s all right,” Jun said as Sho approached. “I am happy you came at all, though I can tell the play was not to your liking.”
“He found it vulgar,” Rebecca said.
Jun nodded. “And he found Titus Andronicus to be vulgar as well when I staged it three years ago. I’m used to his cruelty by now, Mrs. Sakurai.”
“It is not cruelty,” Sho protested. “It is opinion.”
Jun put an arm around his shoulder. “I am glad for the sight of you. It has been ages. A man needn’t cloister himself like a nun in these situations, Sho.”
For all that Jun accused him of cruelty, he was often a bit thoughtless himself. “I have not been cloistered. My father had many connections, and keeping track of them all is a tiresome business. I’ve been from one end of London to the other. Forgive me if I’ve had little opportunity to be sociable.”
Had his father only been gone for half a year now? Sho had become the head of his family and with that came responsibility - for all that Rebecca said he’d become gloomy, it was necessary to take on a more serious character when dealing with banks and estates.
Rebecca could see Sho’s spirits flagging even further and gave him a shake. “We’re not here to bore Jun with such things. We’re here to meet his latest find!”
Sho had never had much of an eye for talent. He’d only come to know Matsumoto through his father, who had been Jun’s greatest financial backer. Sho would of course continue such patronage, but more out of friendship than out of a love for art. He and Jun differed greatly on what constituted enjoyable theater. Fortunately, his wife picked up his slack.
Jun nodded. “Well, he is an interesting personage, you’ll find, Mrs. Sakurai.” Sho could see the slightest quirk to Jun’s lips. “At least as far as playwrights go. Sadly, Mr. Ninomiya did not come tonight.”
“For his own work?” Sho sputtered. “Is he ashamed of his own creation?”
“Oh no,” Jun said, still with that wicked look. “Quite the opposite. He is not very interested in the staging of it. It is the writing of the thing that appeals to him. Once it is in my hands or in the actors’ hands it is of little use.”
Rebecca was enthralled. “I should like to meet such a strange fellow.”
Sho wasn’t so excited. The man had written a silly play and took no responsibility for it? He’d been content to let Jun stage it without any input? Did he take no pride in his work? “Alas, he isn’t here,” he grumbled, the sheer number of flowers in Jun’s office already giving him a headache. “We shall have to make his acquaintance another night.”
Jun and Rebecca exchanged a look - one that Sho knew always meant trouble. “It just so happens,” Jun said, “that Mr. Ninomiya will be attending a little get-together at Mr. Ohno’s next week. I do hope you’ll both consider coming?”
“We’d love to,” Rebecca said almost instantly, not giving Sho a chance to refuse. Ohno was an artist who’d finally found success, also thanks to the investments Sho’s father had made. It would be rude to decline.
Jun shook his hand and kissed Rebecca’s before shooing them out. “I will get you a proper invite. You know that Satoshi hand draws them, yes?”
They made it to their coach quietly, and Rebecca shook her head at him as soon as they were on their way back to Mayfair. “You may not have liked the play, but you could have been kinder to your friend.”
He stared out the coach window. “Jun is rather accustomed to my thoughts on his productions.”
“You’ll not force me to attend Mr. Ohno’s event on my own?”
Mourning for Sho’s father had clearly exhausted her - she was a sociable thing and her event calendar had been dreadfully empty all these months. Who was he to deny her the chatter she craved so much? “I will be cheerful,” he assured her, though she didn’t appear to believe him.
The event at Mr. Ohno’s would irrevocably change his life - he just wasn’t quite aware of that yet.
-
Two hours had passed, and it appeared that Mr. Ninomiya would not be putting in an appearance while dinner was served. “Not altogether sure the man eats,” Jun said, holding his wine glass out for the steward to fill. “He’s certainly an artist with that sort of behavior.”
“The kind you’re so fond of, Mrs. Sakurai,” another of the guests teased, and they all had a good laugh.
It was true. His wife had a definite soft spot in her heart for the struggling artist, whether they were struggling for real or if they did so intentionally. Rebecca had begged him to finance a room for a homeless sculptor for three months, only to discover that he was an illegitimate son of some earl and was receiving a decent allowance.
Their host, Mr. Ohno, merely sat back and watched them all, probably planning to sketch them all comically as soon as they departed and left him alone. Dessert passed quickly, and Rebecca was growing restless. If Mr. Ninomiya only appeared late in the evening, she couldn’t exactly join the men in the drawing room for cigars. She might not get her desired meeting and would be forced to play cards with the other wives, something Sho knew she found dreadfully dull.
He leaned over, pressing a hand to Jun’s shoulder. “Where is your playwright, Matsumoto? Is he snubbing your company yet again?”
Jun smiled. “He’ll be here, I am sure of it. He’s wanted to meet you.”
“Meet me?” he asked. “Rebecca’s the one who fawns over his ilk.”
His friend whispered in his ear. “I told him you hated his play.”
Sho felt ill. Again, Jun had overstepped his bounds. He was always so frustrating this way, knowing just how to rile Sho’s temper for his own amusement. Threatening to not back his next play would only earn laughter from Jun and scolding from his wife, so Sho could do nothing.
Rebecca was forlorn as the party split up. The ladies headed for their gossip and the gentlemen retired to Ohno’s study. The host promised a caricature of each man, and with the amount of wine and brandy all had consumed, the host’s subjects were all too keen to be sketched.
It was late indeed when the butler came in to tell Mr. Matsumoto that “the playwright” was waiting in the library for him. Jun thanked him, and without even a word to their generous host, Sho was being dragged to the library.
“He shows up as he pleases and doesn’t bother to greet Mr. Ohno?”
“It’s part of his charm. Rather frustrating, isn’t he?” Jun teased before rapping twice on the library door.
“If it’s Matsumoto, you owe me seven shillings!”
Ninomiya’s voice was high-pitched and impertinent. Sho wasn’t sure he’d see the same charm in the man that Jun did. Matsumoto opened the library door, revealing a short, thin man curled up on one of Mr. Ohno’s sofas, legs tucked under him. He was sipping brandy all by his lonesome.
“Nino, your greatest fan, Mr. Sho Sakurai,” Jun offered as an introduction. Sho didn’t even process the man’s nickname - Ninomiya was too busy staying seated instead of rising to shake hands.
Sho withdrew his offered hand and sat down heavily in one of Ohno’s leather chairs opposite the playwright. The man had tiny little pieces of paper in his lap and a pencil in his left hand. “Seven shillings, Matsumoto,” the man said, already sizing Sho up with some rather sharp eyes.
“What for?” Jun protested, scanning Ohno’s shelves.
Ninomiya shook his right arm. “New jacket. I didn’t need a new jacket, but you insisted I buy one so as not to look like a pauper in Mr. Ohno’s fine home. You’ll be financing its purchase.”
Jun laughed. “I think not. And if there’s anyone you ought to try pestering about money, it is Mr. Sakurai here.”
“So I’ve been told,” Ninomiya replied, quirking an eyebrow in Sho’s direction. It was making him decidedly uncomfortable how this slight little man was looking him over. “I hear The Gimmick Game offended you.”
“I...” Sho was usually quite good with words, but not when he was being assaulted by the shrewd eyes of a writer. Sho chose words for utility - authors seemed to pick ones that would unnerve even the most well-adjusted man. “It was not to my taste, though my wife was quite fond of it.”
“Do plays about infidelity make you uncomfortable, Mr. Sakurai?” Ninomiya ventured. “Do you find it an inappropriate subject matter?”
Jun wasn’t even helping, merely thumbing through some of Ohno’s books. “You celebrated the dissolution of a marriage,” Sho pointed out. “The husband left an obviously adoring wife for the children’s governess. A lewd woman with coarse language and even coarser manners. You find that to be worth writing about?”
Nino snapped his fingers, and Jun obediently took Nino’s empty brandy glass to refill it. “Worth writing about? I do not calculate the worth of the stories I tell.”
“That is a lie,” Jun said, handing him the glass once more. “You know precisely what you will charge me to produce your works down to the last pence.”
Nino waved his hand. “No, no, not financial worth, much as I am ever concerned about that business. I believe Mr. Sakurai here is questioning the merits of covering uncomfortable topics and heaven forbid, challenging social expectation through art.”
Sho sighed. What a first meeting this was turning out to be. “I’m not here for a debate on art, Ninomiya.”
“Won’t you call me Nino? All of my critics do.”
“I am not a critic.”
“Your financing of Jun’s productions makes your opinion as valid as any critic. If I continue to present Jun here with plays that are anathema to your sensitive nature, I fear that Jun shall turn me out.” Nino uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Shall I write about banks and creditors and things? Jun says you write texts on economics?”
“Only in my free time,” he answered quickly. “And I did not come here to dictate what you should or should not write about. I was only offering my opinion! If you write another play, perhaps I would enjoy it!”
Nino looked at Jun, and the two men laughed uproariously. Sho was unsure what the joke was and why exactly it was on him. “Oh, Matsumoto, I like him. I like him a lot! So passionate!”
Sho rose and headed for the door. “It has been a pleasure, but I think I’ll be taking my wife home now...”
“Oh, do stay! I’m just teasing! Sakurai, come back now!” Nino said, suddenly at his side, having sprung from the sofa like a cat pouncing a mouse. His fingers were ice cold against Sho’s wrist. “I jest, it is just my way. Come now.”
“I am afraid I dislike jests that come at my own expense.”
“Speaking of expenses,” Jun interrupted, eyes darting from Ninomiya and back to Sho. He wasn’t liking the expression Jun was making. Some plot was afoot, and the fingers around his wrist were tightening. “I think I’ll go fetch Rebecca. This is a proposition that concerns her as well.”
“Some new play?” Sho wondered. “I doubt her opinion would be anything but favorable.”
Nino looked slightly embarrassed, tugging Sho back to the chair before curling his legs beneath himself on the sofa once more. “I will let Jun do the talking.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, waiting for Jun’s arrival - for the man who had bound them together, financier and playwright, patron and artisan. “Is there a new play in the works?” he asked Ninomiya, growing slightly uncomfortable at the sudden silence.
The man said nothing, scratching his pencil across one of the slips of paper.
Sho didn’t fill silence well, and his discomfort increased. “What is it that you’re writing?”
Again, Ninomiya said nothing, and Sho shifted in the chair, feeling the lamb dinner settling in his stomach.
“Am I boring you, sir?”
Finally Nino looked up, grinning. “Not at all. I like your voice. The timbre and pitch of it.”
Sho was confused. “You like the sound of it? The contents are irrelevant?”
“You asked if a new play was in progress. There isn’t. Then you asked what I was writing.” Nino held up the paper, but Sho couldn’t decipher the tiny words. “A reminder to clear up my accounts with the grocer. And I’ve already answered the third question.”
He’d never been so infuriated and intrigued by a man, and he’d spent three good years reading history at Oxford with many infuriating men. What on earth was keeping Jun? He was spared another embarrassing war of wits with the playwright when he heard his wife’s voice.
Nino actually stood when Rebecca entered, shaking her hand kindly in a way he hadn’t bothered offering Sho, the person who indirectly kept him from living in some hovel. He helped himself to some brandy while Rebecca praised Ninomiya’s play. The man was nicer with a lady around, discussing lines and scenes with a far different air.
Jun caught his elbow. “Sho.” Nino ceased his conversation and was looking expectantly in Sho’s direction, as was Rebecca. “It appears,” Jun said, “that the Countess Grayson will be summering in Florence. If you recall, Mr. Ninomiya has been residing with the Countess for the past year.”
“Such a lovely woman,” Nino said to Rebecca, though his eyes didn’t look away from Sho’s.
“Unfortunately, the Countess is renting out her home to another couple while she’s away, and they do not seem to have the same appreciation for an artist in residence.”
Sho had an idea what this proposition would be, and so did Rebecca from the giddy glow that was entering her cheeks.
“Would it be at all possible for Mr. Ninomiya to pass his summer with you?” Jun inquired.
He sloshed the liquor around in the glass. “We’ll be summering at the house in Dorset.” Did he sound as nervous as he felt? “We’re renting the Mayfair home the same as the Countess.”
“Oh, I would find the Dorset weather far more agreeable than London’s, I’m sure,” Ninomiya hinted. The thought of Ninomiya lurking about his home, making his comments, writing his vulgarities next door to his wife’s sewing room did not sit well with him.
Rebecca took the glass from his hand, looking at him expectantly. “We could observe him at work! He could write his greatest success in our home.”
“You overestimate my talents, Mrs. Sakurai,” Nino replied.
“Sho?” she asked, “What harm could it be? Jun assured me that he’d be a well-behaved house guest.”
“The best behaved,” Nino said, offering a rather cheeky salute.
Why wasn’t he surprised that Jun and Rebecca had already discussed the matter before their arrival in the library? What reason did he really have to decline Jun’s request? If he had Ninomiya under his own roof, maybe he’d write more sensible plots. And it wasn’t as if the Dorset home didn’t have rooms to spare.
“The country is quiet, Mr. Ninomiya. Will you have enough motivation?”
Nino smiled wickedly. “London is so dark and dreadful, and it finds its way onto my pages. Maybe I’ll write a comedy of errors or a children’s tale while I take the country air.”
Rebecca gave him a poke in the ribs. “Say yes.” She was near to bursting with excitement. Perhaps she was most desirous of a character named for her or a personal thank you in a published work. “Say yes, Sho, please.”
Perhaps, Sho would think later - perhaps he should have just said no.
-
He and Rebecca set off for the house in Dorset in mid-May. Aiba was waiting at the front door, suit pressed and clean, even though his hair was in its usual frazzled state.
“Masaki, I trust you've made all the preparations for our guest?” Sho said immediately upon alighting from the coach.
Aiba didn't bother to answer, instead hurrying over and embracing him. “You were in London too long,” he complained, overstepping his bounds as usual and giving Sho a punch in the arm.
And though Masaki Aiba was the head butler at their home in Dorset, he and Sho had grown up together. Masaki was the son of Sho's childhood nanny, and instead of going somewhere else, becoming a farmer or a cook or something Sho would have preferred for him, Aiba instead chose to stay by his side and remain in his household (even if Sho only came to the Dorset home a few times a year).
That Masaki was so loyal often embarrassed Sho. What had he done to earn such a friendship? It hurt him to know that Aiba would help the maids polish silver and assisted the cook when he could have had a livelihood somewhere else, some place where Sho wouldn't be, in effect, his employer. Then again, Rebecca always pointed out, Aiba didn't really care about Sho's status, and he never had.
Sho gave him a small punch in return. “You'll answer my question, and then you'll help Mrs. Sakurai with her things.”
“Of course the preparations are made,” Masaki assured him, waving his hand as if Sho had only asked if he'd eaten breakfast that morning. Though Aiba did good work, there seemed to be little in his life that he took all that seriously - despite their friendship, it was the one thing about him that Sho found bothersome. “Mrs. Sakurai! It's been so long!”
Rebecca and Aiba started their usual chatter. As Sho had grown up, his parents and the Vaughns had set up his marriage to Rebecca, and she had been as common a fixture in their home as the chandelier in the main hall. Where Sho had always treated his wife as propriety dictated, Masaki and Rebecca were fond of teasing one another.
“How many dresses does a woman need?” Masaki was complaining as he dragged in one of his wife's trunks.
“One in every color, I should think,” she snapped back at him, smile not leaving her face. “What's the matter? Shall I help you carry that? Is it too much for you?”
This only spurred Aiba on, and she chased him and the trunk up the stairs. Sho still wasn't accustomed to all this laughter and cheer. He'd seen little reason to be cheerful since his father had passed, leaving him with so many things to attend to. He left the gaiety of the main hall for his study, closing the door to shut out the noise.
Not a speck of dust on his bookshelves nor on his desk. Aiba had seen to it that the maids be thorough. He set down his satchel. This summer, Sho had decided, he would try to write again. The past few months had been nothing but business and visits to all the people his father had supported and that he would be expected to support in turn. He'd had little time for himself or his own interests.
Aiba let himself in, leaning against the bookshelves. “When's your guest arriving? Rebecca's pretty excited about having him here.”
“Still not fond of knocking, I see,” he replied, but without malice. He'd trust no other man with his home, even if this man was rather different from most in his profession. He checked his pocket watch. “Well, if Matsumoto's worth believing, and he usually is, then his coach should be arriving within the hour.”
Within the hour turned out to be five, and supper was already on the table when Mr. Ninomiya arrived. Sho seemed to be the only person in the household who was disturbed by the late arrival. Aiba was nearly beside himself with excitement, as he passed most of his time with the other staff who mostly doubled him in age. The maids and cook were mostly excited to have a marginally famous person in the house, something they hadn't experienced since Sho's father had been alive and healthy.
Sho refused to leave the dinner table, slicing into the pork roast with precision. “He may join us for the meal if he wishes, but I won't be waiting for him. I'll eat while my dinner is hot.”
Rebecca just smiled at him. “You are letting this man get to you already. Jun said that you and Ninomiya were going to be quite a mismatch.”
“But I'd be quite the ass to not let him stay, right?” Sho snapped back. “I'd be stifling the future of theater in England.”
“Is it such a burden for you, Sho?” she asked, sipping from her wine glass.
Was it a burden? He was barely acquainted with the man, but already he'd allowed Kazunari Ninomiya to slip beneath his skin. For the past several weeks, Ninomiya had written to him almost daily, inquiring about the Dorset house, the surrounding countryside, the members of the household. Sho had simply dropped the letters in his wife's lap and let her respond. Even if Ninomiya was going to be in the house all summer, Sho had goals for writing. He'd stand by his plans so he could return refreshed to London by autumn.
Ninomiya hadn't bothered to dress for dinner, waltzing into the room in a plain cotton shirt and slacks. “Good evening, Mrs. Sakurai, I must apologize for my lateness. I slept in this morning.”
“By mistake?” Sho asked, stabbing at a green bean with his fork.
“By intention,” Ninomiya replied. He dared to give Sho's wife an overly familiar wink. “I do like getting a full night's rest.”
The man had inconvenienced them all so he could get his beauty sleep? Was he so self-involved? The playwright waved Aiba away, pouring his own wine. Aiba found it rather amusing - and that displeased Sho a great deal. He'd find no ally in his wife this summer, and he'd been counting on his friend to support him. Ninomiya had been in the house for less than an hour, and he was already charming the staff. Perhaps he'd struck some deal with the devil to appear likable, and Sho was the only one seeing through his trickery.
“Oh, and about my accommodations...”
“Are they not to your liking?” Rebecca asked.
“My room is lovely, thank you, Mrs. Sakurai,” Ninomiya declared, eyes drifting to Sho's. “It's the work space that is troublesome. You see, I like to have sunlight in the morning. If I must be up, then I must have light. I noticed that your husband's study is positioned in the part of the house that probably gets the most sun.”
“That is my working space,” Sho interrupted. “With one desk.”
“Sho,” his wife warned him.
“I don't write at a desk. I took the liberty of poking my head into your study, and the couch in there...”
The man would steal his own study away? Or he'd attempt to share? The house wasn't so very small! “Mr. Ninomiya, this is my home, and if the rooms you've been given are disagreeable, then I'd happily pay for your return ticket to London.”
“What's wrong with sharing the study?” Rebecca asked. “Won't you be more considerate, Sho?”
“No, no, Mrs. Sakurai, don't let me impose on your husband's space. A man must have his privacy...”
Ninomiya knew exactly how to pick at him, didn't he? Rebecca was growing increasingly impatient with him. If her darling playwright wasn't getting what he wanted, well, then Rebecca wasn't getting what she wanted either, was she?
“This house has a dozen empty rooms,” Rebecca pointed out, “And you write in the afternoon, I know you do, Sho. Let him have the study.”
He agreed without a word, setting down his fork and tossing his napkin on the table. Ninomiya found him in the study minutes later.
“You give in far too easily,” the man said, surveying him from the doorway as he sat in his chair.
“I respect my guests' wishes,” he replied, doing his best to keep the bitterness from his voice, though he was probably failing.
“Ah.”
Sho shoved his papers back in his satchel. He'd be working in a different room the following day, all to be an accommodating host. “Was there something you wanted?”
Nino blocked his exit, looking up at him with an expression that he simply could not read. “I just wanted to tell you that you needn't give in to my every whim.”
“I've no intention of doing so, I assure you.” He took a step forward, hoping to dislodge the man from the doorway. “If you don't mind?”
Nino refused to move. “I've been told that the walking path to town is rather scenic. Would it displease you if I invited your wife to join me tomorrow morning?”
What was his aim here? To seize not only his rooms but to lay claim to his wife as well? Or was it all a game to him? Was he merely trying to test Sho's patience? He would not be swayed or made to be jealous.
“Of course not,” he said, looking down at the shorter man. “She usually writes her letters and finishes by mid-morning. Shall I give you some spending money for lunch at the pub?”
Ninomiya was taken aback by his all too quick response. Perhaps he'd expected more of a protest. “I...believe I may take up that offer.” He stepped away from the doorway, allowing Sho to pass. “Good night.”
“Good night, Mr. Ninomiya.”
“Will you call me Nino?”
He pushed past the other man. “Good night.” He was fairly certain that if he turned, Ninomiya would be grinning.
-
“He comes from such humble beginnings,” Rebecca was relating to Aiba in the hall outside the room he'd settled in for the afternoon. “East side of London near the docks. He was working in a factory from the age of four. Can you believe that? Four years old, and he was reaching into machines when they'd break down. Remarkable!”
“At four, I was nearly drowned by your husband in the creek, Mrs. Sakurai.”
“Probably with good reason,” Rebecca teased, offering a knock on the door. “Sho? I've returned.”
He set down his pen and leaned back in his chair. His wife's cheeks were flushed from her exercise, and Aiba behind her looked just as charmed. In three weeks, Ninomiya had won over the household, and now Sho was the invalid hidden in the back room.
“I trust you and Mr. Ninomiya had a good lunch today?” he asked, rearranging his papers. He'd accomplished nothing that afternoon. A sentence here, a scribbled phrase there, but being away from his usual writing desk was distraction enough. Having to wonder about what vulgarities Ninomiya might have let loose around his wife only added to his discomfort.
“He thinks to write a play about you,” Rebecca said, grinning ear to ear.
“About me?” Sho spluttered.
She walked over, squeezing his shoulders. “Despite your best efforts, it appears that Nino is quite fond of you.”
“Imagine that,” Aiba said, waving farewell to attend to his duties. “A play about Sho Sakurai!”
“It would be a dreadfully dull affair,” Sho grumbled. Were they all in on the same joke? Or was Ninomiya just hateful enough to make him into a caricature for his own amusement? “Jun wouldn't pay for it.”
She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “He says you are a paragon of manhood and responsibility. A gentleman.”
He snorted in a distinctly ungentlemanly manner, taking her hand in his own. “I may be a disappointing subject. He's come here for that reason then? To observe me in my own environment?”
“You'll give him a chance, won't you? He only acts contrary because you're so easily riled up.”
She moved around, settling herself in his lap. It was broad daylight, and any of the servants could walk past. But it seemed like the knowledge that a character was to be based on her very own husband had reawakened her interest in him. It was preferable to her lavishing further attention on Ninomiya. He sighed, leaning back in his seat as she loosened his collar to press slow, gentle kisses to his neck.
“Becky,” he groaned quietly, feeling the damp press of her mouth to his skin as he closed his eyes. Her husband would be immortalized in a play, she was probably thinking. Good or bad, it would bring fame and attention. Was she so easily moved? “Not here.”
She only grew more insistent with her attention, darting her tongue out to taste his pulse. It was a few hundred paces to their bedroom upstairs, but resisting her would be useless. It had been quite a while. With his father's death, he'd been too busy, too stressed to show her much affection. Sho grasped for her hair, dislodging one of the jeweled butterfly pins in his haste. It scattered across the floorboard, reminding him that Aiba had not closed the door.
“I should shut the door,” he whispered, but she moved off of him and to the floor, undoing the buttons of his trousers. “Becky, let me shut the...oh Christ...”
When he opened his eyes again, Rebecca was buttoning him back up, and Ninomiya was in the doorway watching intently. Before Sho could react, the man stepped away without making a sound.
“Something wrong?” Rebecca asked, looking up curiously. Of course, her back had been to the door the whole time. “Are you angry with me?”
“No,” he said, exhaling. He tried to smile for her. “I'm not angry, darling.” A million thoughts, a million questions ran through his mind, but he couldn't even think.
Because unashamed, Ninomiya had watched.
-
“That bad already?” Jun asked, filling his glass anew with brandy. “You've let him run you out of your own home?”
Sho shook his head. “He has not run me out. There are papers I'd like to view at the Treasury,” he claimed, keeping his hand steady on the glass. “Research to do for my writings.”
“Ah,” Jun replied, settling back in the chair across from him. “Forgive my inference, but you wrote so urgently about visiting that I'd thought Ninomiya had crossed some line and truly offended you.”
He downed the alcohol. It had been an escape, Sho realized. Knowing that Ninomiya could wander his halls, quieter than a cat. Knowing Ninomiya intended to base his next protagonist on him. Knowing Ninomiya was watching. He hadn't said one word to the man for a week before finally writing to Jun and making up the flimsy excuse.
For as large as the Dorset home was, the walls were beginning to close in on him after a month of Ninomiya. The playwright lunched with his wife, ingratiated himself with the cook, and was playing chess in the evenings with Aiba. Ninomiya worked in Sho's study, sat on his couch, and used his pens and ink. All of the things that had been Sho's mere weeks ago had all been claimed.
“I'll be happy when the summer is through,” Sho admitted after a few more glassfuls of brandy. Jun poured until they were both asleep in their chairs and the maid came in to extinguish the fire.
-
The solid stack of notes he returned with would hopefully be enough to explain away his absence. Though London had been overcrowded, it had been freeing. Ninomiya wasn't watching from any of the corners. But once he returned to the Dorset home, Aiba brought Sho right back down.
“You went and abandoned him,” Aiba chided him, helping him carry his bags in. “How's a man supposed to write a play about you if you aren't around?”
He had never asked Ninomiya to base a work around him. Sho turned at the top of the staircase, taking his case from his startled butler's hand. “Thank you, Masaki. Take the afternoon off.”
“Sho...”
He turned and continued down the hall, leaving Aiba to obey if he chose. He found Ninomiya coming out of the room just next to his and Rebecca's. “Snooping about?” Sho asked, the first words he'd had for the playwright in nearly two weeks.
“Not snooping,” Nino replied easily, as though Sho had only gone to town for morning errands. “My other room had a nasty draft. I've moved accommodations. Becky insisted.”
Sho nearly dropped his case, setting it down outside the bedroom door with very little grace. It had been an interesting week without him. “Mrs. Sakurai” was now “Becky,” and Ninomiya's bed was on the other side of the wall, an arm's length away if the wall disappeared. There was no place in his home where Ninomiya hadn't insinuated himself.
He opened the door, knowing that Ninomiya was waiting for his reaction. Seeing if Sho would challenge back. “I hope you are comfortable in your new space,” was all he said before taking his bags inside and slamming the door.
-
He knocked the inkwell over, and color bled into all of his papers and into the wood. “Damn it,” he swore, jumping back before the dark liquid spilled onto his clothing. He still had splotches of it all over his hands when he made it to the kitchen, finding one of the scullery maids.
“Be a dear and fetch the housekeeper,” he said, thrusting his hands into the nearest basin full of water. “I've spilled ink everywhere.”
She nodded and scurried off. Another day of progress negated. There'd be no saving anything he'd managed to write, what little there was. “Messy, messy,” he heard from behind, and then Ninomiya was there, leaning against the counter beside the sink. “Did your pen explode?”
Every misfortune Sho had, no matter how small, did not seem to elude Ninomiya. “Not exactly,” he answered curtly. Was every little moment being recorded and stored somewhere in the other man's skull so it might be utilized later to invoke an audience's laughter?
“We don't chat much, you and I,” Nino said, peering into the basin where Sho's hands were submerged for lack of a better thing to do with them.
“You've enough friends around the house here,” he replied. “We have very little in common.”
“We both hide.”
He pulled his hands from the basin, grabbing a cloth from the table where the cook would later chop vegetables for supper. The kitchen windows were open, and the sticky summer heat was already seeping in to slow Sho's reflexes. “Hide from what?”
“We hide. We play parts. We project a different self.”
“Spare me your rhetoric,” Sho grumbled, and once again, Ninomiya was close as he'd been that night in the study doorway. His heartbeat quickened at the man's proximity and his knowing smile. “I am who I am.”
“And who is that, precisely? Is it the Sho Sakurai who does what is asked? The Sho Sakurai who inherited Daddy's problem children and their nasty, vulgar little plays?”
“You'll not mention my father,” he said, tightening his grip on the cloth lest he bring his fist to the playwright's nose.
“You are contradiction, Sho Sakurai,” Nino continued, drumming his fingers on the tabletop. “Walking contradiction. You've no love for me or for the other entertainments that Becky enjoys.”
“And you'll not be so familiar with my wife,” Sho gritted, desperate to ignore the truth in the other man's words.
“You just wish to be left alone with the things you enjoy. Everything in life should go the way you wish, according to the plans you wish. I have upset your plans. I have upset the world that you believe revolves around you. I frustrate you, but you're a gentleman and to protest would be to defy your own self-defined identity! You've trapped yourself with rules and propriety so you can languish in self-pity!”
“Out,” he said, walking the other way around the table. “You will leave my house.”
“You know that I know you!” Nino scoffed. “You know!”
“Masaki!” he shouted, clomping into the hall, and Ninomiya sauntered behind. “Masaki!”
He went from room to room, startling maids and slamming doors, and Ninomiya didn't leave his back for an instant. His voice was lower, almost tender when he grasped Sho's arm and squeezed tightly.
“Why do I frighten you?”
“Masaki!”
Aiba came hurrying down the stairs, and Nino released him. “What? Has something happened?”
Rebecca appeared at the top of the stairs, having just changed out of her riding clothes. Sho knew his face was rather severe as neither Aiba nor his wife said another word.
“Mr. Ninomiya will be leaving the house. He will stay at the King's Arms in town until a more suitable arrangement can be made,” he said, refusing to look at the man behind him. “Please ensure that all his things are packed up and that he is transported with the utmost comfort.”
Aiba nodded. “Mr. Ninomiya, if you'll follow me,” Aiba said gravely, and he heard their footsteps as they left to take another stairwell.
Rebecca stared down at him for a few moments before turning and leaving. He dined alone that evening, hearing the carriage departing for town with Ninomiya in tow.
-
He reclaimed his study the following morning, seeing how Ninomiya had scattered papers all over his desk despite his claim that he sat on the sofa to write. It felt intensely gratifying to toss the scraps and little pieces of paper Ninomiya had chosen to leave behind into the small fire he'd built. Despite the summer heat, it felt freeing to drop dialogue and stage directions into the flames.
It seemed that Ninomiya hadn't been so foolish as to name his protagonist Sho, but it was clear that all the little snippets for Samuel Selwyn were meant to mirror him. Samuel Selwyn, landowner and patron of the arts. What would Jun say when a final draft arrived in his hands?
If a final draft ever arrived, Sho thought with a grin. Ninomiya thought himself so insightful, thought that by living in a man's home and driving him to the brink of fury that he knew him.
No one had dared asked what Ninomiya had done to so incur Sho's wrath. Even Aiba steered clear, chattering gossip that he was. Rebecca had slept in another room and probably would until she cooled down. There'd be a ball for her to attend sooner or later. Maybe she could even invite herself to one of her cousins' homes for a few weeks to socialize with her preferred circles. Sho was past caring.
He watched bits of Samuel Selwyn burn up and disintegrate. Whatever truths Nino thought he'd discovered turned to ash.
PART TWO
Rating: Both parts together - Hard R
Characters/Pairings: Sakurai Sho/Ninomiya Kazunari; Sakurai Sho/Becky
Summary: “Would it be at all possible for Mr. Ninomiya to pass his summer with you?” Jun inquired.
Notes/Warnings: I've been writing this since March, and I'm happy to have finished it! This is most definitely AU set in Victorian-era England. My basic idea was for Nino to be a playwright and Sho to be his patron and it...got a little bit out of hand? This is for all the Sakumiya folks who follow along here ;)
That the audience had not booed but had instead cheered reminded Sho just how out of touch he felt with what passed as entertainment. It had taken hours of begging at home from his wife and then the innumerable letters from Jun encouraging him to attend the newest play he was producing. Where the bawdy jokes and innuendo that permeated The Gimmick Game had pleased the guests around him, Sho was left cold.
All he wanted was to get back to the coach, but Rebecca had his elbow and was pulling them through the playhouse to the backstage area. Sho was usually rather sociable, but the past few months had been rather trying. That his wife’s first appearance after mourning was for some vulgar play made his anger rise.
Rebecca, however, seemed very happy to be out again regardless of the occasion. “I found it rather amusing,” she was saying again and again as they made their way through the exiting hundreds.
“I think the opera would have been far more appropriate,” Sho muttered. “And you very well know my feelings on opera.”
She laughed, earning a rather pointed glare from an older woman. Ah, finally, someone else who had not found The Gimmick Game to their taste. Sho led her down the steps to Jun’s office. His friend was there, looking as frazzled as he always did on a show night. Every detail had to be perfect, and much as Sho had found the show’s content disagreeable, he could not fault Jun’s ability to stage an eye-catching performance.
“Sakurai!” Jun exclaimed, not moving away from the chaotic mass of flowers he was dividing up to give to the cast. “I see you lurking in my doorway!”
Rebecca abandoned his arm and rushed inside. “You have a remarkable eye for talent, Mr. Matsumoto,” she told his friend. “Congratulations on your success.”
“No success until I tabulate my earnings,” Jun reminded her. “And I could direct your attention to the three negative newspaper reviews that came with my breakfast tray this morning.”
She looked back to see him in the doorway and sighed. “Will you come in and greet your friend? Must you be so gloomy now?”
He bit the inside of his cheek and stepped forward. There were still accounts to deal with and the matter of continuing the endowment at Magdalen and...
“It’s all right,” Jun said as Sho approached. “I am happy you came at all, though I can tell the play was not to your liking.”
“He found it vulgar,” Rebecca said.
Jun nodded. “And he found Titus Andronicus to be vulgar as well when I staged it three years ago. I’m used to his cruelty by now, Mrs. Sakurai.”
“It is not cruelty,” Sho protested. “It is opinion.”
Jun put an arm around his shoulder. “I am glad for the sight of you. It has been ages. A man needn’t cloister himself like a nun in these situations, Sho.”
For all that Jun accused him of cruelty, he was often a bit thoughtless himself. “I have not been cloistered. My father had many connections, and keeping track of them all is a tiresome business. I’ve been from one end of London to the other. Forgive me if I’ve had little opportunity to be sociable.”
Had his father only been gone for half a year now? Sho had become the head of his family and with that came responsibility - for all that Rebecca said he’d become gloomy, it was necessary to take on a more serious character when dealing with banks and estates.
Rebecca could see Sho’s spirits flagging even further and gave him a shake. “We’re not here to bore Jun with such things. We’re here to meet his latest find!”
Sho had never had much of an eye for talent. He’d only come to know Matsumoto through his father, who had been Jun’s greatest financial backer. Sho would of course continue such patronage, but more out of friendship than out of a love for art. He and Jun differed greatly on what constituted enjoyable theater. Fortunately, his wife picked up his slack.
Jun nodded. “Well, he is an interesting personage, you’ll find, Mrs. Sakurai.” Sho could see the slightest quirk to Jun’s lips. “At least as far as playwrights go. Sadly, Mr. Ninomiya did not come tonight.”
“For his own work?” Sho sputtered. “Is he ashamed of his own creation?”
“Oh no,” Jun said, still with that wicked look. “Quite the opposite. He is not very interested in the staging of it. It is the writing of the thing that appeals to him. Once it is in my hands or in the actors’ hands it is of little use.”
Rebecca was enthralled. “I should like to meet such a strange fellow.”
Sho wasn’t so excited. The man had written a silly play and took no responsibility for it? He’d been content to let Jun stage it without any input? Did he take no pride in his work? “Alas, he isn’t here,” he grumbled, the sheer number of flowers in Jun’s office already giving him a headache. “We shall have to make his acquaintance another night.”
Jun and Rebecca exchanged a look - one that Sho knew always meant trouble. “It just so happens,” Jun said, “that Mr. Ninomiya will be attending a little get-together at Mr. Ohno’s next week. I do hope you’ll both consider coming?”
“We’d love to,” Rebecca said almost instantly, not giving Sho a chance to refuse. Ohno was an artist who’d finally found success, also thanks to the investments Sho’s father had made. It would be rude to decline.
Jun shook his hand and kissed Rebecca’s before shooing them out. “I will get you a proper invite. You know that Satoshi hand draws them, yes?”
They made it to their coach quietly, and Rebecca shook her head at him as soon as they were on their way back to Mayfair. “You may not have liked the play, but you could have been kinder to your friend.”
He stared out the coach window. “Jun is rather accustomed to my thoughts on his productions.”
“You’ll not force me to attend Mr. Ohno’s event on my own?”
Mourning for Sho’s father had clearly exhausted her - she was a sociable thing and her event calendar had been dreadfully empty all these months. Who was he to deny her the chatter she craved so much? “I will be cheerful,” he assured her, though she didn’t appear to believe him.
The event at Mr. Ohno’s would irrevocably change his life - he just wasn’t quite aware of that yet.
-
Two hours had passed, and it appeared that Mr. Ninomiya would not be putting in an appearance while dinner was served. “Not altogether sure the man eats,” Jun said, holding his wine glass out for the steward to fill. “He’s certainly an artist with that sort of behavior.”
“The kind you’re so fond of, Mrs. Sakurai,” another of the guests teased, and they all had a good laugh.
It was true. His wife had a definite soft spot in her heart for the struggling artist, whether they were struggling for real or if they did so intentionally. Rebecca had begged him to finance a room for a homeless sculptor for three months, only to discover that he was an illegitimate son of some earl and was receiving a decent allowance.
Their host, Mr. Ohno, merely sat back and watched them all, probably planning to sketch them all comically as soon as they departed and left him alone. Dessert passed quickly, and Rebecca was growing restless. If Mr. Ninomiya only appeared late in the evening, she couldn’t exactly join the men in the drawing room for cigars. She might not get her desired meeting and would be forced to play cards with the other wives, something Sho knew she found dreadfully dull.
He leaned over, pressing a hand to Jun’s shoulder. “Where is your playwright, Matsumoto? Is he snubbing your company yet again?”
Jun smiled. “He’ll be here, I am sure of it. He’s wanted to meet you.”
“Meet me?” he asked. “Rebecca’s the one who fawns over his ilk.”
His friend whispered in his ear. “I told him you hated his play.”
Sho felt ill. Again, Jun had overstepped his bounds. He was always so frustrating this way, knowing just how to rile Sho’s temper for his own amusement. Threatening to not back his next play would only earn laughter from Jun and scolding from his wife, so Sho could do nothing.
Rebecca was forlorn as the party split up. The ladies headed for their gossip and the gentlemen retired to Ohno’s study. The host promised a caricature of each man, and with the amount of wine and brandy all had consumed, the host’s subjects were all too keen to be sketched.
It was late indeed when the butler came in to tell Mr. Matsumoto that “the playwright” was waiting in the library for him. Jun thanked him, and without even a word to their generous host, Sho was being dragged to the library.
“He shows up as he pleases and doesn’t bother to greet Mr. Ohno?”
“It’s part of his charm. Rather frustrating, isn’t he?” Jun teased before rapping twice on the library door.
“If it’s Matsumoto, you owe me seven shillings!”
Ninomiya’s voice was high-pitched and impertinent. Sho wasn’t sure he’d see the same charm in the man that Jun did. Matsumoto opened the library door, revealing a short, thin man curled up on one of Mr. Ohno’s sofas, legs tucked under him. He was sipping brandy all by his lonesome.
“Nino, your greatest fan, Mr. Sho Sakurai,” Jun offered as an introduction. Sho didn’t even process the man’s nickname - Ninomiya was too busy staying seated instead of rising to shake hands.
Sho withdrew his offered hand and sat down heavily in one of Ohno’s leather chairs opposite the playwright. The man had tiny little pieces of paper in his lap and a pencil in his left hand. “Seven shillings, Matsumoto,” the man said, already sizing Sho up with some rather sharp eyes.
“What for?” Jun protested, scanning Ohno’s shelves.
Ninomiya shook his right arm. “New jacket. I didn’t need a new jacket, but you insisted I buy one so as not to look like a pauper in Mr. Ohno’s fine home. You’ll be financing its purchase.”
Jun laughed. “I think not. And if there’s anyone you ought to try pestering about money, it is Mr. Sakurai here.”
“So I’ve been told,” Ninomiya replied, quirking an eyebrow in Sho’s direction. It was making him decidedly uncomfortable how this slight little man was looking him over. “I hear The Gimmick Game offended you.”
“I...” Sho was usually quite good with words, but not when he was being assaulted by the shrewd eyes of a writer. Sho chose words for utility - authors seemed to pick ones that would unnerve even the most well-adjusted man. “It was not to my taste, though my wife was quite fond of it.”
“Do plays about infidelity make you uncomfortable, Mr. Sakurai?” Ninomiya ventured. “Do you find it an inappropriate subject matter?”
Jun wasn’t even helping, merely thumbing through some of Ohno’s books. “You celebrated the dissolution of a marriage,” Sho pointed out. “The husband left an obviously adoring wife for the children’s governess. A lewd woman with coarse language and even coarser manners. You find that to be worth writing about?”
Nino snapped his fingers, and Jun obediently took Nino’s empty brandy glass to refill it. “Worth writing about? I do not calculate the worth of the stories I tell.”
“That is a lie,” Jun said, handing him the glass once more. “You know precisely what you will charge me to produce your works down to the last pence.”
Nino waved his hand. “No, no, not financial worth, much as I am ever concerned about that business. I believe Mr. Sakurai here is questioning the merits of covering uncomfortable topics and heaven forbid, challenging social expectation through art.”
Sho sighed. What a first meeting this was turning out to be. “I’m not here for a debate on art, Ninomiya.”
“Won’t you call me Nino? All of my critics do.”
“I am not a critic.”
“Your financing of Jun’s productions makes your opinion as valid as any critic. If I continue to present Jun here with plays that are anathema to your sensitive nature, I fear that Jun shall turn me out.” Nino uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Shall I write about banks and creditors and things? Jun says you write texts on economics?”
“Only in my free time,” he answered quickly. “And I did not come here to dictate what you should or should not write about. I was only offering my opinion! If you write another play, perhaps I would enjoy it!”
Nino looked at Jun, and the two men laughed uproariously. Sho was unsure what the joke was and why exactly it was on him. “Oh, Matsumoto, I like him. I like him a lot! So passionate!”
Sho rose and headed for the door. “It has been a pleasure, but I think I’ll be taking my wife home now...”
“Oh, do stay! I’m just teasing! Sakurai, come back now!” Nino said, suddenly at his side, having sprung from the sofa like a cat pouncing a mouse. His fingers were ice cold against Sho’s wrist. “I jest, it is just my way. Come now.”
“I am afraid I dislike jests that come at my own expense.”
“Speaking of expenses,” Jun interrupted, eyes darting from Ninomiya and back to Sho. He wasn’t liking the expression Jun was making. Some plot was afoot, and the fingers around his wrist were tightening. “I think I’ll go fetch Rebecca. This is a proposition that concerns her as well.”
“Some new play?” Sho wondered. “I doubt her opinion would be anything but favorable.”
Nino looked slightly embarrassed, tugging Sho back to the chair before curling his legs beneath himself on the sofa once more. “I will let Jun do the talking.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, waiting for Jun’s arrival - for the man who had bound them together, financier and playwright, patron and artisan. “Is there a new play in the works?” he asked Ninomiya, growing slightly uncomfortable at the sudden silence.
The man said nothing, scratching his pencil across one of the slips of paper.
Sho didn’t fill silence well, and his discomfort increased. “What is it that you’re writing?”
Again, Ninomiya said nothing, and Sho shifted in the chair, feeling the lamb dinner settling in his stomach.
“Am I boring you, sir?”
Finally Nino looked up, grinning. “Not at all. I like your voice. The timbre and pitch of it.”
Sho was confused. “You like the sound of it? The contents are irrelevant?”
“You asked if a new play was in progress. There isn’t. Then you asked what I was writing.” Nino held up the paper, but Sho couldn’t decipher the tiny words. “A reminder to clear up my accounts with the grocer. And I’ve already answered the third question.”
He’d never been so infuriated and intrigued by a man, and he’d spent three good years reading history at Oxford with many infuriating men. What on earth was keeping Jun? He was spared another embarrassing war of wits with the playwright when he heard his wife’s voice.
Nino actually stood when Rebecca entered, shaking her hand kindly in a way he hadn’t bothered offering Sho, the person who indirectly kept him from living in some hovel. He helped himself to some brandy while Rebecca praised Ninomiya’s play. The man was nicer with a lady around, discussing lines and scenes with a far different air.
Jun caught his elbow. “Sho.” Nino ceased his conversation and was looking expectantly in Sho’s direction, as was Rebecca. “It appears,” Jun said, “that the Countess Grayson will be summering in Florence. If you recall, Mr. Ninomiya has been residing with the Countess for the past year.”
“Such a lovely woman,” Nino said to Rebecca, though his eyes didn’t look away from Sho’s.
“Unfortunately, the Countess is renting out her home to another couple while she’s away, and they do not seem to have the same appreciation for an artist in residence.”
Sho had an idea what this proposition would be, and so did Rebecca from the giddy glow that was entering her cheeks.
“Would it be at all possible for Mr. Ninomiya to pass his summer with you?” Jun inquired.
He sloshed the liquor around in the glass. “We’ll be summering at the house in Dorset.” Did he sound as nervous as he felt? “We’re renting the Mayfair home the same as the Countess.”
“Oh, I would find the Dorset weather far more agreeable than London’s, I’m sure,” Ninomiya hinted. The thought of Ninomiya lurking about his home, making his comments, writing his vulgarities next door to his wife’s sewing room did not sit well with him.
Rebecca took the glass from his hand, looking at him expectantly. “We could observe him at work! He could write his greatest success in our home.”
“You overestimate my talents, Mrs. Sakurai,” Nino replied.
“Sho?” she asked, “What harm could it be? Jun assured me that he’d be a well-behaved house guest.”
“The best behaved,” Nino said, offering a rather cheeky salute.
Why wasn’t he surprised that Jun and Rebecca had already discussed the matter before their arrival in the library? What reason did he really have to decline Jun’s request? If he had Ninomiya under his own roof, maybe he’d write more sensible plots. And it wasn’t as if the Dorset home didn’t have rooms to spare.
“The country is quiet, Mr. Ninomiya. Will you have enough motivation?”
Nino smiled wickedly. “London is so dark and dreadful, and it finds its way onto my pages. Maybe I’ll write a comedy of errors or a children’s tale while I take the country air.”
Rebecca gave him a poke in the ribs. “Say yes.” She was near to bursting with excitement. Perhaps she was most desirous of a character named for her or a personal thank you in a published work. “Say yes, Sho, please.”
Perhaps, Sho would think later - perhaps he should have just said no.
-
He and Rebecca set off for the house in Dorset in mid-May. Aiba was waiting at the front door, suit pressed and clean, even though his hair was in its usual frazzled state.
“Masaki, I trust you've made all the preparations for our guest?” Sho said immediately upon alighting from the coach.
Aiba didn't bother to answer, instead hurrying over and embracing him. “You were in London too long,” he complained, overstepping his bounds as usual and giving Sho a punch in the arm.
And though Masaki Aiba was the head butler at their home in Dorset, he and Sho had grown up together. Masaki was the son of Sho's childhood nanny, and instead of going somewhere else, becoming a farmer or a cook or something Sho would have preferred for him, Aiba instead chose to stay by his side and remain in his household (even if Sho only came to the Dorset home a few times a year).
That Masaki was so loyal often embarrassed Sho. What had he done to earn such a friendship? It hurt him to know that Aiba would help the maids polish silver and assisted the cook when he could have had a livelihood somewhere else, some place where Sho wouldn't be, in effect, his employer. Then again, Rebecca always pointed out, Aiba didn't really care about Sho's status, and he never had.
Sho gave him a small punch in return. “You'll answer my question, and then you'll help Mrs. Sakurai with her things.”
“Of course the preparations are made,” Masaki assured him, waving his hand as if Sho had only asked if he'd eaten breakfast that morning. Though Aiba did good work, there seemed to be little in his life that he took all that seriously - despite their friendship, it was the one thing about him that Sho found bothersome. “Mrs. Sakurai! It's been so long!”
Rebecca and Aiba started their usual chatter. As Sho had grown up, his parents and the Vaughns had set up his marriage to Rebecca, and she had been as common a fixture in their home as the chandelier in the main hall. Where Sho had always treated his wife as propriety dictated, Masaki and Rebecca were fond of teasing one another.
“How many dresses does a woman need?” Masaki was complaining as he dragged in one of his wife's trunks.
“One in every color, I should think,” she snapped back at him, smile not leaving her face. “What's the matter? Shall I help you carry that? Is it too much for you?”
This only spurred Aiba on, and she chased him and the trunk up the stairs. Sho still wasn't accustomed to all this laughter and cheer. He'd seen little reason to be cheerful since his father had passed, leaving him with so many things to attend to. He left the gaiety of the main hall for his study, closing the door to shut out the noise.
Not a speck of dust on his bookshelves nor on his desk. Aiba had seen to it that the maids be thorough. He set down his satchel. This summer, Sho had decided, he would try to write again. The past few months had been nothing but business and visits to all the people his father had supported and that he would be expected to support in turn. He'd had little time for himself or his own interests.
Aiba let himself in, leaning against the bookshelves. “When's your guest arriving? Rebecca's pretty excited about having him here.”
“Still not fond of knocking, I see,” he replied, but without malice. He'd trust no other man with his home, even if this man was rather different from most in his profession. He checked his pocket watch. “Well, if Matsumoto's worth believing, and he usually is, then his coach should be arriving within the hour.”
Within the hour turned out to be five, and supper was already on the table when Mr. Ninomiya arrived. Sho seemed to be the only person in the household who was disturbed by the late arrival. Aiba was nearly beside himself with excitement, as he passed most of his time with the other staff who mostly doubled him in age. The maids and cook were mostly excited to have a marginally famous person in the house, something they hadn't experienced since Sho's father had been alive and healthy.
Sho refused to leave the dinner table, slicing into the pork roast with precision. “He may join us for the meal if he wishes, but I won't be waiting for him. I'll eat while my dinner is hot.”
Rebecca just smiled at him. “You are letting this man get to you already. Jun said that you and Ninomiya were going to be quite a mismatch.”
“But I'd be quite the ass to not let him stay, right?” Sho snapped back. “I'd be stifling the future of theater in England.”
“Is it such a burden for you, Sho?” she asked, sipping from her wine glass.
Was it a burden? He was barely acquainted with the man, but already he'd allowed Kazunari Ninomiya to slip beneath his skin. For the past several weeks, Ninomiya had written to him almost daily, inquiring about the Dorset house, the surrounding countryside, the members of the household. Sho had simply dropped the letters in his wife's lap and let her respond. Even if Ninomiya was going to be in the house all summer, Sho had goals for writing. He'd stand by his plans so he could return refreshed to London by autumn.
Ninomiya hadn't bothered to dress for dinner, waltzing into the room in a plain cotton shirt and slacks. “Good evening, Mrs. Sakurai, I must apologize for my lateness. I slept in this morning.”
“By mistake?” Sho asked, stabbing at a green bean with his fork.
“By intention,” Ninomiya replied. He dared to give Sho's wife an overly familiar wink. “I do like getting a full night's rest.”
The man had inconvenienced them all so he could get his beauty sleep? Was he so self-involved? The playwright waved Aiba away, pouring his own wine. Aiba found it rather amusing - and that displeased Sho a great deal. He'd find no ally in his wife this summer, and he'd been counting on his friend to support him. Ninomiya had been in the house for less than an hour, and he was already charming the staff. Perhaps he'd struck some deal with the devil to appear likable, and Sho was the only one seeing through his trickery.
“Oh, and about my accommodations...”
“Are they not to your liking?” Rebecca asked.
“My room is lovely, thank you, Mrs. Sakurai,” Ninomiya declared, eyes drifting to Sho's. “It's the work space that is troublesome. You see, I like to have sunlight in the morning. If I must be up, then I must have light. I noticed that your husband's study is positioned in the part of the house that probably gets the most sun.”
“That is my working space,” Sho interrupted. “With one desk.”
“Sho,” his wife warned him.
“I don't write at a desk. I took the liberty of poking my head into your study, and the couch in there...”
The man would steal his own study away? Or he'd attempt to share? The house wasn't so very small! “Mr. Ninomiya, this is my home, and if the rooms you've been given are disagreeable, then I'd happily pay for your return ticket to London.”
“What's wrong with sharing the study?” Rebecca asked. “Won't you be more considerate, Sho?”
“No, no, Mrs. Sakurai, don't let me impose on your husband's space. A man must have his privacy...”
Ninomiya knew exactly how to pick at him, didn't he? Rebecca was growing increasingly impatient with him. If her darling playwright wasn't getting what he wanted, well, then Rebecca wasn't getting what she wanted either, was she?
“This house has a dozen empty rooms,” Rebecca pointed out, “And you write in the afternoon, I know you do, Sho. Let him have the study.”
He agreed without a word, setting down his fork and tossing his napkin on the table. Ninomiya found him in the study minutes later.
“You give in far too easily,” the man said, surveying him from the doorway as he sat in his chair.
“I respect my guests' wishes,” he replied, doing his best to keep the bitterness from his voice, though he was probably failing.
“Ah.”
Sho shoved his papers back in his satchel. He'd be working in a different room the following day, all to be an accommodating host. “Was there something you wanted?”
Nino blocked his exit, looking up at him with an expression that he simply could not read. “I just wanted to tell you that you needn't give in to my every whim.”
“I've no intention of doing so, I assure you.” He took a step forward, hoping to dislodge the man from the doorway. “If you don't mind?”
Nino refused to move. “I've been told that the walking path to town is rather scenic. Would it displease you if I invited your wife to join me tomorrow morning?”
What was his aim here? To seize not only his rooms but to lay claim to his wife as well? Or was it all a game to him? Was he merely trying to test Sho's patience? He would not be swayed or made to be jealous.
“Of course not,” he said, looking down at the shorter man. “She usually writes her letters and finishes by mid-morning. Shall I give you some spending money for lunch at the pub?”
Ninomiya was taken aback by his all too quick response. Perhaps he'd expected more of a protest. “I...believe I may take up that offer.” He stepped away from the doorway, allowing Sho to pass. “Good night.”
“Good night, Mr. Ninomiya.”
“Will you call me Nino?”
He pushed past the other man. “Good night.” He was fairly certain that if he turned, Ninomiya would be grinning.
-
“He comes from such humble beginnings,” Rebecca was relating to Aiba in the hall outside the room he'd settled in for the afternoon. “East side of London near the docks. He was working in a factory from the age of four. Can you believe that? Four years old, and he was reaching into machines when they'd break down. Remarkable!”
“At four, I was nearly drowned by your husband in the creek, Mrs. Sakurai.”
“Probably with good reason,” Rebecca teased, offering a knock on the door. “Sho? I've returned.”
He set down his pen and leaned back in his chair. His wife's cheeks were flushed from her exercise, and Aiba behind her looked just as charmed. In three weeks, Ninomiya had won over the household, and now Sho was the invalid hidden in the back room.
“I trust you and Mr. Ninomiya had a good lunch today?” he asked, rearranging his papers. He'd accomplished nothing that afternoon. A sentence here, a scribbled phrase there, but being away from his usual writing desk was distraction enough. Having to wonder about what vulgarities Ninomiya might have let loose around his wife only added to his discomfort.
“He thinks to write a play about you,” Rebecca said, grinning ear to ear.
“About me?” Sho spluttered.
She walked over, squeezing his shoulders. “Despite your best efforts, it appears that Nino is quite fond of you.”
“Imagine that,” Aiba said, waving farewell to attend to his duties. “A play about Sho Sakurai!”
“It would be a dreadfully dull affair,” Sho grumbled. Were they all in on the same joke? Or was Ninomiya just hateful enough to make him into a caricature for his own amusement? “Jun wouldn't pay for it.”
She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “He says you are a paragon of manhood and responsibility. A gentleman.”
He snorted in a distinctly ungentlemanly manner, taking her hand in his own. “I may be a disappointing subject. He's come here for that reason then? To observe me in my own environment?”
“You'll give him a chance, won't you? He only acts contrary because you're so easily riled up.”
She moved around, settling herself in his lap. It was broad daylight, and any of the servants could walk past. But it seemed like the knowledge that a character was to be based on her very own husband had reawakened her interest in him. It was preferable to her lavishing further attention on Ninomiya. He sighed, leaning back in his seat as she loosened his collar to press slow, gentle kisses to his neck.
“Becky,” he groaned quietly, feeling the damp press of her mouth to his skin as he closed his eyes. Her husband would be immortalized in a play, she was probably thinking. Good or bad, it would bring fame and attention. Was she so easily moved? “Not here.”
She only grew more insistent with her attention, darting her tongue out to taste his pulse. It was a few hundred paces to their bedroom upstairs, but resisting her would be useless. It had been quite a while. With his father's death, he'd been too busy, too stressed to show her much affection. Sho grasped for her hair, dislodging one of the jeweled butterfly pins in his haste. It scattered across the floorboard, reminding him that Aiba had not closed the door.
“I should shut the door,” he whispered, but she moved off of him and to the floor, undoing the buttons of his trousers. “Becky, let me shut the...oh Christ...”
When he opened his eyes again, Rebecca was buttoning him back up, and Ninomiya was in the doorway watching intently. Before Sho could react, the man stepped away without making a sound.
“Something wrong?” Rebecca asked, looking up curiously. Of course, her back had been to the door the whole time. “Are you angry with me?”
“No,” he said, exhaling. He tried to smile for her. “I'm not angry, darling.” A million thoughts, a million questions ran through his mind, but he couldn't even think.
Because unashamed, Ninomiya had watched.
-
“That bad already?” Jun asked, filling his glass anew with brandy. “You've let him run you out of your own home?”
Sho shook his head. “He has not run me out. There are papers I'd like to view at the Treasury,” he claimed, keeping his hand steady on the glass. “Research to do for my writings.”
“Ah,” Jun replied, settling back in the chair across from him. “Forgive my inference, but you wrote so urgently about visiting that I'd thought Ninomiya had crossed some line and truly offended you.”
He downed the alcohol. It had been an escape, Sho realized. Knowing that Ninomiya could wander his halls, quieter than a cat. Knowing Ninomiya intended to base his next protagonist on him. Knowing Ninomiya was watching. He hadn't said one word to the man for a week before finally writing to Jun and making up the flimsy excuse.
For as large as the Dorset home was, the walls were beginning to close in on him after a month of Ninomiya. The playwright lunched with his wife, ingratiated himself with the cook, and was playing chess in the evenings with Aiba. Ninomiya worked in Sho's study, sat on his couch, and used his pens and ink. All of the things that had been Sho's mere weeks ago had all been claimed.
“I'll be happy when the summer is through,” Sho admitted after a few more glassfuls of brandy. Jun poured until they were both asleep in their chairs and the maid came in to extinguish the fire.
-
The solid stack of notes he returned with would hopefully be enough to explain away his absence. Though London had been overcrowded, it had been freeing. Ninomiya wasn't watching from any of the corners. But once he returned to the Dorset home, Aiba brought Sho right back down.
“You went and abandoned him,” Aiba chided him, helping him carry his bags in. “How's a man supposed to write a play about you if you aren't around?”
He had never asked Ninomiya to base a work around him. Sho turned at the top of the staircase, taking his case from his startled butler's hand. “Thank you, Masaki. Take the afternoon off.”
“Sho...”
He turned and continued down the hall, leaving Aiba to obey if he chose. He found Ninomiya coming out of the room just next to his and Rebecca's. “Snooping about?” Sho asked, the first words he'd had for the playwright in nearly two weeks.
“Not snooping,” Nino replied easily, as though Sho had only gone to town for morning errands. “My other room had a nasty draft. I've moved accommodations. Becky insisted.”
Sho nearly dropped his case, setting it down outside the bedroom door with very little grace. It had been an interesting week without him. “Mrs. Sakurai” was now “Becky,” and Ninomiya's bed was on the other side of the wall, an arm's length away if the wall disappeared. There was no place in his home where Ninomiya hadn't insinuated himself.
He opened the door, knowing that Ninomiya was waiting for his reaction. Seeing if Sho would challenge back. “I hope you are comfortable in your new space,” was all he said before taking his bags inside and slamming the door.
-
He knocked the inkwell over, and color bled into all of his papers and into the wood. “Damn it,” he swore, jumping back before the dark liquid spilled onto his clothing. He still had splotches of it all over his hands when he made it to the kitchen, finding one of the scullery maids.
“Be a dear and fetch the housekeeper,” he said, thrusting his hands into the nearest basin full of water. “I've spilled ink everywhere.”
She nodded and scurried off. Another day of progress negated. There'd be no saving anything he'd managed to write, what little there was. “Messy, messy,” he heard from behind, and then Ninomiya was there, leaning against the counter beside the sink. “Did your pen explode?”
Every misfortune Sho had, no matter how small, did not seem to elude Ninomiya. “Not exactly,” he answered curtly. Was every little moment being recorded and stored somewhere in the other man's skull so it might be utilized later to invoke an audience's laughter?
“We don't chat much, you and I,” Nino said, peering into the basin where Sho's hands were submerged for lack of a better thing to do with them.
“You've enough friends around the house here,” he replied. “We have very little in common.”
“We both hide.”
He pulled his hands from the basin, grabbing a cloth from the table where the cook would later chop vegetables for supper. The kitchen windows were open, and the sticky summer heat was already seeping in to slow Sho's reflexes. “Hide from what?”
“We hide. We play parts. We project a different self.”
“Spare me your rhetoric,” Sho grumbled, and once again, Ninomiya was close as he'd been that night in the study doorway. His heartbeat quickened at the man's proximity and his knowing smile. “I am who I am.”
“And who is that, precisely? Is it the Sho Sakurai who does what is asked? The Sho Sakurai who inherited Daddy's problem children and their nasty, vulgar little plays?”
“You'll not mention my father,” he said, tightening his grip on the cloth lest he bring his fist to the playwright's nose.
“You are contradiction, Sho Sakurai,” Nino continued, drumming his fingers on the tabletop. “Walking contradiction. You've no love for me or for the other entertainments that Becky enjoys.”
“And you'll not be so familiar with my wife,” Sho gritted, desperate to ignore the truth in the other man's words.
“You just wish to be left alone with the things you enjoy. Everything in life should go the way you wish, according to the plans you wish. I have upset your plans. I have upset the world that you believe revolves around you. I frustrate you, but you're a gentleman and to protest would be to defy your own self-defined identity! You've trapped yourself with rules and propriety so you can languish in self-pity!”
“Out,” he said, walking the other way around the table. “You will leave my house.”
“You know that I know you!” Nino scoffed. “You know!”
“Masaki!” he shouted, clomping into the hall, and Ninomiya sauntered behind. “Masaki!”
He went from room to room, startling maids and slamming doors, and Ninomiya didn't leave his back for an instant. His voice was lower, almost tender when he grasped Sho's arm and squeezed tightly.
“Why do I frighten you?”
“Masaki!”
Aiba came hurrying down the stairs, and Nino released him. “What? Has something happened?”
Rebecca appeared at the top of the stairs, having just changed out of her riding clothes. Sho knew his face was rather severe as neither Aiba nor his wife said another word.
“Mr. Ninomiya will be leaving the house. He will stay at the King's Arms in town until a more suitable arrangement can be made,” he said, refusing to look at the man behind him. “Please ensure that all his things are packed up and that he is transported with the utmost comfort.”
Aiba nodded. “Mr. Ninomiya, if you'll follow me,” Aiba said gravely, and he heard their footsteps as they left to take another stairwell.
Rebecca stared down at him for a few moments before turning and leaving. He dined alone that evening, hearing the carriage departing for town with Ninomiya in tow.
-
He reclaimed his study the following morning, seeing how Ninomiya had scattered papers all over his desk despite his claim that he sat on the sofa to write. It felt intensely gratifying to toss the scraps and little pieces of paper Ninomiya had chosen to leave behind into the small fire he'd built. Despite the summer heat, it felt freeing to drop dialogue and stage directions into the flames.
It seemed that Ninomiya hadn't been so foolish as to name his protagonist Sho, but it was clear that all the little snippets for Samuel Selwyn were meant to mirror him. Samuel Selwyn, landowner and patron of the arts. What would Jun say when a final draft arrived in his hands?
If a final draft ever arrived, Sho thought with a grin. Ninomiya thought himself so insightful, thought that by living in a man's home and driving him to the brink of fury that he knew him.
No one had dared asked what Ninomiya had done to so incur Sho's wrath. Even Aiba steered clear, chattering gossip that he was. Rebecca had slept in another room and probably would until she cooled down. There'd be a ball for her to attend sooner or later. Maybe she could even invite herself to one of her cousins' homes for a few weeks to socialize with her preferred circles. Sho was past caring.
He watched bits of Samuel Selwyn burn up and disintegrate. Whatever truths Nino thought he'd discovered turned to ash.
PART TWO