Fanfiction: Puppy Love (Chapter 4/5: Where and why did you go?)
Pairing: Takizawa Hideaki x Imai Tsubasa
Mention of Pi, slight TsubaKame and one-sided Akame
Genre: Fluff
Rating: G
Disclaimer: I own TxT, until someone stops me, that is.
Summary: Love seldom comes at the time of your choosing and rarely in the package you’d expect.
Note: This is for Dorayaki-chan. Thank you x 10n.
To Dorayaki-chan and earlier readers, please note that the name of Tsubasa’s ex has been changed to Gabrielle. It is to reflect his second lead involvement in the current play, Gabrielle Chanel. Tsubasa fans, sorry, it didn’t hit me sooner. I’m hardly the sharpest pencil in the box. You get the drift.
Chapter 1: Like at First Sight (Cameo by Pi, Jin and Kame)
Chapter 2: From Like to Hate? (Cameo by Pi, Jin and Kame)
Chapter 3: Strange Blossoming ‘Like’ (Cameo by Pi, Jin and Kame)
On another street not too far away, Gabrielle who had realised that Tsubasa was one-in-a-million, was on her way to Puppy Love Café.
........
Takki, fresh out of Puppy Love Ranger suit, was still all sweaty. Beads of perspiration glistened faintly as he stood by the window feeling the night breeze in his slightly damp hair. Tossing it lightly, he let the soft drift course through his silky mane.
Stepping into Puppy Love Café and caught in that moment, Gabrielle felt her heart stop. Her heart and her breathing.
It was as if the café was a portal, transporting her into another realm where men naturally looked like Greek gods, albeit with dark hair and even darker eyes.
It was a reaction mirrored by Takki. Seeing a stationary goddess just a few feet away from him, he was spellbound. If it took one spell to break another, Takki felt his dry spell with women might just be about over.
Takki was awestruck by Gabrielle. She was everything he hoped for and more. It was like finally finding an oasis after 27 years in a desert. Never had a lady look at him for any length of time and not be strangely repulsed. And she was smiling, smiling at him. A reaction he could only dare hope for in his wildest fantasy.
This was his chance, his chance of a lifetime. And maybe his only chance at romantic happiness and finally getting laid. He might be getting ahead of himself but since his breathing was laboured, his heart was pounding, his stomach was all knotted up and his pants suddenly felt too tight, it had got to be love, right?
Uninitiated and falling love at first sight for the first time, Takki was mesmerized but clueless. All he was capable of was standing there with a deer-in the-headlamp look.
It was Gabrielle, who being the predatory kind, wasted no time in swooping in for the kill. Sweeping Takki off his feet and monopolizing his life.
It struck Gabrielle how such a fine catch could be still single and available. She would think he would be snapped up, fiercely guarded and very busy with creating clones of perfection. Satisfied with her new victim, the thought of reconciling with Tsubasa was unceremoniously dropped like a hot potato.
………..
With the appearance of Gabrielle, there was no room for Puppy Love Ranger. To Takki, being the perfect boyfriend was a full-time job, one that he undertook with fervor.
And with that Puppy Love Ranger became Mr Gabrielle, while his alter ego laid forgotten and collecting dust in the storage room.
………….
With an increasingly anxious and heavy heart, Tsubasa reluctantly queried the staff at Puppy Love Café
Kame was well-aware of the café’s policy to keep Puppy Love’s identity under wraps. But seeing Tsubasa obviously worried, his heart went out to him. He pitied the poor man sitting there shriveling away bit by bit, day after day. But still he had his orders. All he could do was be nicer to him.
‘Oh, I’m not sure what happened. Maybe it’d just ran off with some bitch,’ he replied, feigning all the wide-eyed innocence that he could muster, looking all helpful and caring.
‘But Puppy Love Ranger’s not the only cute thing here. I’m cute too. And I give very good service,’ Kame pouted.
The younger man slumped into the seat beside him all dejected. Daring himself to observe him close up, Tsubasa thought Kame looked rather small and defenceless, like a sulking little girl who had just been denied her favourite toy.
‘He doesn’t look all that lecherously scary after all’ Tsubasa mentally noted. And those puffy cheeks, he almost felt like pinching them.
Reaching over to pacify the ‘puffy cheeked, pouty little girl’ who was sullenly sulking away, Tsubasa carefully placed his hand behind ‘her’ back. Gingerly stroking 'her', he apologized, ‘I’m sorry…. I would very much love to be served by you.’
‘Really?!’ Kame looked up, all bright eyed and bushy tailed.
‘Well then, will it be coffee, tea or me?’
Tsubasa’s shyly blushing expression was too irresistible.
‘Why, silly me. It’s gotta be ME of course!’
Without warning, Kame lightly pressed his lips against Tsubasa’s.
……….
‘Does my ass look fat in this?’
‘Honey, seriously… do I look fat?’ Jin daringly questioned his boss.
Takki rolled his eyes. He would never dream of ever hearing that from a guy. Not even Gabrielle would ask him that. But of course she need not. She was perfect.
‘YOU! Do you want to go eat ramen or not?’
‘I’m weight watching…. But for you, I’ll eat anything,’ Jin flirted.
Surveying himself one last time before leaving, Jin concluded.
‘Fat or hot. I’m still hot as hell!’
………..
In between mouthfuls of butter laden ramen, Jin remarked.
‘It’s rare that your Hime-sama lets you off the leash.’
‘She’s tired from all that marathon shopping. Ah…... but with her, I can do it forever,’ Takki dreamily answered.
‘What about your Tsubasa-san?’
‘The way he forlornly sits there in the corner, waiting to see you, is pathetic.’
‘Tsubasa, who?’ Takki was only half waking from his dream.
‘At this rate. Your ‘owner’s’ gonna ditch you for a turtle.’
‘Kame?’
‘Yes. The way he shamelessly invites Kame’s advances is disgusting.’
‘Are you sure it’s not the other way round?’ Takki teased.
‘Of course, not! My Kame’s all innocent! Pure as virgin snow,’ Jin vehemently defended.
‘Oh, get real! One look at him and you’ll know, he’s not that pure,’ Takki smirked.
‘Tsubasa’s the dangerous one. He’s a dancer, and you know how Kame has a major weakness for hip swivels.’
‘Bakanishi!’ Takki chided.
‘Hands off that! Only my Kame can call me that.’ Jin pouted.
‘You know, the amount of pouting that Akakame does is enough to beat the whole contingent of Miss Universe and Miss World contestants combined,’ Takki profoundly remarked.
‘Akame, I prefer Akame.’
Hiding his pout behind a curtain of ramen, Jin launched a cold war offensive against Takki for the rest of the night.
………….
Disturbed by what Jin had said earlier, Takki was sleepless. And it didn’t help that he had earlier lost appetite because of that too. Hungry and sleep deprived, Takki reminded himself to punish Pi for his staff selection and maybe prolong Jin’s probation to six months.
Sneaking a hand into his senbei-exclusive drawer, what he found was not senbei. It was his conscious.
Looking down on the bag of dog cookies in his hand, he recalled how Tsubasa smilingly rewarded it to Puppy Love Ranger for making him so happy. It didn’t do anything special, they were just walking down the street basking the in the warm evening glow. But it made Tsubasa very happy. It made him very happy too.
Takki wanted to continue to make Tsubasa happy. But not as Puppy Love Ranger, as his real self - Takki. So gathering courage, he decided to reveal his identity to him.
………..
Preparing himself, Takki sat where Tsubasa would in Puppy Love Café. Large, long windows to the right and the entrance within clear sight. He wondered how Tsubasa must have felt looking out the window hoping to see him prancing down the street; or looking to the door every time someone entered. He hated that feeling. That feeling of waiting for someone yet all the time not knowing if the person would ever turn up.
It struck a chord deep in him. So deep that he did not see Gabrielle enter through the wooden door. So lost in his reflection that he did no feel her peck on his sunken cheeks. Nor did he notice that she was running her fingers through his dark brown locks. He was still lost in his thoughts when she slid her arms around his neck and mouthed the corner of his faint lips.
But one thing he did register.
The punch on his face. A forceful punch that hit him without warning.
‘Tsubasa…’
‘No. Wait…Tsubasa….’
Note: Finale, Chapter 5 is hitting the screens soon. Fighting! Fighting for comments too.
Titbit: Takki was the one who coined the term Akakame, which of course later evolved into Akame.