#46: fic: Under the Bridge
Title: Under the Bridge
Fandom: Arashi
Summary: Nino finds that turning thirty is harder than expected.
Notes: Written for the shoneenclub October contest, originally posted here.
1.
It happened the day after his thirtieth birthday. The photographer from one of the magazines contacted Nino’s manager to request (extremely apologetically) for a re-shoot.
“What was wrong with those photos we took?” asked Nino, a little bit peeved at having to go back and pose all over again. That lion tamer costume had been hard work.
“I’m not sure,” said Nino’s manager, sounding rather puzzled, “he told me something about the photos not coming out properly. It might have been a lighting issue.”
“The only photographs that came out all right were those we shot outdoors,” said the photographer. “We’re not taking any chances today.”
They did the shoot in the sun.
The pictures came out beautiful.
2.
Then there were the mood swings. Or at least that’s what Nino’s manager called them, even though there really wasn’t much amplitude between grumpy and irate.
He didn’t like the bento they got during lunch. The lights were too bright. The sound from the children’s programme being recorded in the next studio was making him irrationally hungry.
All Nino wanted to do was sit under a bridge somewhere and fiddle with his DS.
3.
“I understand what you’re going through,” said Kokubun one day while they were on standby for a performance on Shounen Club Premium. He had on that infuriating smile again; the one that was a cross between smug and benign.
“What are you talking about?” asked Sho. He had been away doing a report in Guangzhou, and had thus missed two weeks of Nino eating only raw meat and crouching darkly under furniture.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” Kokubun told him.
“No, really,” said Sho. “I don’t.”
“Ninomiya-kun,” said Kokubun significantly.
Sho looked nonplussed. “What about him?”
“I understand you’re still in denial,” said Kokubun, “but Joshima-san went through the exact same thing... and he’s turned out all right. Generally speaking.”
4.
“It’s Kazu-chan,” said Ohno. “He’s turning into a troll.”
5.
“What?” said Sho.
“It’s true,” Ohno murmured solemnly.
6.
“That is insane,” said Sho. “People don’t just turn into trolls.”
“Joshima did,” said Ohno. “I hear it’s genetic.”
“I don’t understand.”
Ohno sighed. “Some things in life are a mystery.”
“No, really,” said Sho. “I don’t understand. Is this some sort of a joke?”
“Does it look like we’re joking?” asked Jun. “He’s turning into a troll. A human troll. The company’s even got a team of doctors charting his progress-”
“Isn’t the term ‘human troll’ sort of an oxymoron?” asked Sho, for the lack of a better response.
Ohno considered this gravely. “You have to take a more pluralistic view of things, Sho-kun,” he said, finally.
Sho threw his hands up in the air. “What does that even mean?”
7.
“So you’ve heard,” said Nino, looking somewhat morose as he considered his plate of raw beef. “I’m turning into a troll.”
“You look pretty normal to me,” said Sho.
“It comes and goes,” Nino replied. “Sunlight helps. It suppresses the trollishness. Not that I become hideous and green or anything. Mostly, I just look belligerent.”
“But you’ve always been belligerent,” said Sho.
“Trust me on this,” Nino told him. “I said hello to Ashida Mana in the corridor and she cried.”
8.
They filmed VS Arashi outdoors so Nino could look friendlier onscreen. Himitsu’s producers suggested an Okinawa beach special that would last three episodes.
Only three members of Arashi performed their new single on Music Station, however. (Jun was very badly sunburned and barred from appearing by the management.) They had also postponed their concert dates by two months. Regardless of the precedents set by Joshima and one or two of the other senpai, the truth was still painfully clear - it was hard to be an idol and a troll at the same time.
It didn’t mean that they weren’t trying.
“I’d like to propose,” said Sho, during their meeting with Nihon TV’s producers, “that we do the next episode of Arashi ni Shiyagare in bear costumes.”
9.
And so they did.
And the following week, they were tortoises.
And the week after, parakeets.
10.
“I’m sorry,” said Nino, pulling off the head of his killer whale costume and squinting at the rest of them in the harsh sunlight. “I don’t think I can do this any longer.”
“Neither can I, actually,” said Aiba, who had to change costumes thrice already because he was perspiring so profusely.
“Maybe we could do it without the costume bodies?” asked Ohno.
“Maybe you could do it without me,” said Nino. He set the head down on the grass quite politely and lumbered off. It was a rather endearing lumber, really, since he didn’t quite have the height or body mass to actually look menacing.
11.
“It’s not that bad,” was what Sho said the moment Nino answered the door. “Really.”
“Is that a bamboo garden bridge you have behind you?” asked Nino. He was scowling rather heavily but he was still Nino underneath that - Nino’s nose and Nino’s mouth and Nino’s crafty, crafty eyes.
“...Yes,” said Sho. “I thought it might help improve your mood.”
“By sleeping under it?” asked Nino.
“...Yes.”
There was a moment in which Nino just looked incredulous and Sho was deeply embarrassed. Then:
“Thanks,” said Nino, his expression softening a little.
“So do you think you could manage one more episode in the whale costume?” asked Sho. “Nihon TV’s spent good money on those, and I think audience ratings went up once we started on creatures of the sea.”
“You could just do it without me,” said Nino. “In normal clothes.”
“No, we couldn’t,” Sho told him. “We won’t. You’re part of Arashi and we’ll be doing everything together.”
“But I’m a troll,” said Nino savagely.
“But you’re our troll,” said Sho.
12.
Life as a troll was not all that different, really, once one got past the bad-temperedness and the sudden animosity towards small children and billy goats.
But he was still Nino, despite all the changes; he still did Nino things like learn card tricks and play games on his DS. He still liked music and messing around with his guitar, and organising his collection of Takeuchi Yuko DVDs on the special shelf he had bought for them.
Sho came round a lot, more than any of the others. Nino didn’t ask why. Sho’s hero complex might have been part of the reason, but it didn’t explain why Sho always looked like he genuinely enjoyed Nino’s company, crabby comments and all.
“I can’t believe next year’s going to be our fifteen-year anniversary,” said Sho musingly one night. He had dropped by unannounced after his drama shoot and had proceeded to consume the last of Nino’s instant ramen.
“Please stop sitting on my bridge,” Nino gritted out, “I am trying to sleep.” Nino would probably never admit this, but Sho’s bridge was quickly becoming one of his favourite places in the world.
“It’s technically my bridge,” said Sho, swinging his legs, “and you’re not supposed to interrupt my moment of introspection. It is very rude.”
“In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a troll,” said Nino, before yanking Sho unceremoniously off by his ankles.
13.
It didn’t take long for the others to notice that there was something different about Nino when he was around Sho.
“You’re less trollish,” said Aiba. “You’re less trollish with Sho-chan.”
“Nonsense,” said Nino, devouring a strip of raw bacon.
“It’s true,” Aiba persisted. “The last time we had lunch he even persuaded you to eat something other than meat.”
“That was one mushroom,” Nino countered. “And trolls like mushrooms.”
“No, they don’t,” said Aiba, sounding smug.
Nino ignored him for the rest of the meal.
14.
“Try a mushroom?” asked Sho.
“Raaarughhhh,” replied Nino.
15.
“I’m sorry,” said Nino. “I shouldn’t have roared at you. That was rude.”
They were crouched under Nino’s bridge (the one that Sho had given him), watching My Neighbour Totoro on a portable DVD player.
“That’s okay,” said Sho. After a pause, he added, “Why are we watching this?”
“Felt like it,” Nino replied.
“We could always re-position the bridge so that you can see your television from here,” Sho told him. “I’m getting a neck ache.”
“You could, alternatively, pay attention to the movie,” said Nino. It was more of a command than a suggestion.
“I could,” Sho agreed, after a pause.
“Good,” said Nino.
Illuminated by the light from the portable DVD player, Nino’s expression was far from belligerent or trollish. All Sho could discern was something that might have been contentment.
16.
Nino’s first photoshoot after turning into a troll took place at the sunniest patch of beach they could find in Chiba. Even so, the theme of the shoot mostly revolved around sitting on rocks and looking moody.
It was a constant struggle for the crew to keep Nino looking normal but not overexposed. As the shoot wore on Nino’s face was like thunder, despite his best efforts at maintaining a pleasant expression.
“Perhaps we’ll use that one,” said the photographer during the break, pointing nervously at a picture that featured Nino looking vaguely displeased.
“Hmph,” said Nino, for lack of a better response.
The photographer’s assistant was about to make another suggestion when they were interrupted by a small commotion not far off. On closer inspection, it appeared to be Sho, who had somehow wrangled himself a long enough break to pop in on Nino with some lunch.
“Did you seriously bring me raw hamburgers again?” asked Nino, inspecting the box critically the moment Sho handed it over.
“You said they were your favourite,” said Sho.
The next issue of Myojo featured a two-page spread of photos featuring Nino and Sho having lunch. While some fans noticed Nino’s rather serious expression in many of the photographs, the most striking of all was the one in the centre.
Sho was brandishing his chopsticks at Nino with a mischievous look on his face, and Nino was smiling.
17.
The photograph was next seen pinned on the wall of their Nihon TV green room.
Underneath it, in Aiba’s handwriting, were the words: MY THEORY IS PROVEN.
18.
More than a month passed. The producers for their various programmes finally came to terms with the fact that Nino looking happy on television was now a thing of the past.
The first team to realise this was the Shiyagare team, who promptly capitalised on this fact by creating a corner in which Arashi tried out various jobs. The episodes featuring Nino as a sullen sports masseuse and an irritable parking attendant received the highest ratings in six months.
“I don’t understand this sudden spike in popularity,” said Jun one afternoon, after Nino had won three categories in the Ranking Derby. “You don’t even try to be nice now.”
Nino was sitting underneath the large desk in the room and looking quite onerous. “Trolls have natural charm,” he said, with no trace of irony.
“Well, maybe people like that sort of thing,” Sho replied. There was still some residual smugness in his voice after the day’s filming. Twenty-seven out of thirty heart surgeons had named him ‘member best suited to be a doctor’, and he was naturally very pleased with himself.
“What sort of thing?” asked Jun. “Lumbering, grumpiness and a habit of being contrary?”
“At least we don’t have to wear the bear costumes,” said Ohno wisely.
“That is true,” Jun conceded.
There was a pause in which all of them contemplated those terrible weeks of near-blindness and suffocation.
“I quite liked the bear costume, actually,” said Aiba all of a sudden. “It was the parakeet one I couldn’t stand.”
19.
“Well, I think this being-a-troll business opens up to you a whole world of new possibilities,” said Sho. “Like period movies where all the samurai are deeply disgruntled.”
“Yes, it would be effortless for me,” Nino agreed dryly. “I’d just turn up in costume and glare.”
“Well, we can’t be the same sort of idol forever, can we?” said Sho. “I kind of like that Jun-kun has his sneaker line, and I’ve got my news, and you’ve made the transition into becoming a troll-idol-”
“-and that Ohno has taken to wearing this one t-shirt all the time that says What’s Wrong With Being Naked?”
“...that, not so much,” said Sho, with vague distaste.
“And you don’t mind that you’re always paired with me when we’re on tour?” asked Nino. “That we have to do our solos together?”
“I like that,” said Sho.
“That we share a suite instead of getting individual ones like the rest?” Nino continued.
“You can’t have moved the temporary bridge in by yourself,” said Sho reasonably. “And I’ve always liked rooming with you. Even when we were juniors.”
“It’s different now,” said Nino. “I’m a troll.”
“Well,” Sho replied, “you’re my troll.”
End
Fandom: Arashi
Summary: Nino finds that turning thirty is harder than expected.
Notes: Written for the shoneenclub October contest, originally posted here.
1.
It happened the day after his thirtieth birthday. The photographer from one of the magazines contacted Nino’s manager to request (extremely apologetically) for a re-shoot.
“What was wrong with those photos we took?” asked Nino, a little bit peeved at having to go back and pose all over again. That lion tamer costume had been hard work.
“I’m not sure,” said Nino’s manager, sounding rather puzzled, “he told me something about the photos not coming out properly. It might have been a lighting issue.”
“The only photographs that came out all right were those we shot outdoors,” said the photographer. “We’re not taking any chances today.”
They did the shoot in the sun.
The pictures came out beautiful.
2.
Then there were the mood swings. Or at least that’s what Nino’s manager called them, even though there really wasn’t much amplitude between grumpy and irate.
He didn’t like the bento they got during lunch. The lights were too bright. The sound from the children’s programme being recorded in the next studio was making him irrationally hungry.
All Nino wanted to do was sit under a bridge somewhere and fiddle with his DS.
3.
“I understand what you’re going through,” said Kokubun one day while they were on standby for a performance on Shounen Club Premium. He had on that infuriating smile again; the one that was a cross between smug and benign.
“What are you talking about?” asked Sho. He had been away doing a report in Guangzhou, and had thus missed two weeks of Nino eating only raw meat and crouching darkly under furniture.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” Kokubun told him.
“No, really,” said Sho. “I don’t.”
“Ninomiya-kun,” said Kokubun significantly.
Sho looked nonplussed. “What about him?”
“I understand you’re still in denial,” said Kokubun, “but Joshima-san went through the exact same thing... and he’s turned out all right. Generally speaking.”
4.
“It’s Kazu-chan,” said Ohno. “He’s turning into a troll.”
5.
“What?” said Sho.
“It’s true,” Ohno murmured solemnly.
6.
“That is insane,” said Sho. “People don’t just turn into trolls.”
“Joshima did,” said Ohno. “I hear it’s genetic.”
“I don’t understand.”
Ohno sighed. “Some things in life are a mystery.”
“No, really,” said Sho. “I don’t understand. Is this some sort of a joke?”
“Does it look like we’re joking?” asked Jun. “He’s turning into a troll. A human troll. The company’s even got a team of doctors charting his progress-”
“Isn’t the term ‘human troll’ sort of an oxymoron?” asked Sho, for the lack of a better response.
Ohno considered this gravely. “You have to take a more pluralistic view of things, Sho-kun,” he said, finally.
Sho threw his hands up in the air. “What does that even mean?”
7.
“So you’ve heard,” said Nino, looking somewhat morose as he considered his plate of raw beef. “I’m turning into a troll.”
“You look pretty normal to me,” said Sho.
“It comes and goes,” Nino replied. “Sunlight helps. It suppresses the trollishness. Not that I become hideous and green or anything. Mostly, I just look belligerent.”
“But you’ve always been belligerent,” said Sho.
“Trust me on this,” Nino told him. “I said hello to Ashida Mana in the corridor and she cried.”
8.
They filmed VS Arashi outdoors so Nino could look friendlier onscreen. Himitsu’s producers suggested an Okinawa beach special that would last three episodes.
Only three members of Arashi performed their new single on Music Station, however. (Jun was very badly sunburned and barred from appearing by the management.) They had also postponed their concert dates by two months. Regardless of the precedents set by Joshima and one or two of the other senpai, the truth was still painfully clear - it was hard to be an idol and a troll at the same time.
It didn’t mean that they weren’t trying.
“I’d like to propose,” said Sho, during their meeting with Nihon TV’s producers, “that we do the next episode of Arashi ni Shiyagare in bear costumes.”
9.
And so they did.
And the following week, they were tortoises.
And the week after, parakeets.
10.
“I’m sorry,” said Nino, pulling off the head of his killer whale costume and squinting at the rest of them in the harsh sunlight. “I don’t think I can do this any longer.”
“Neither can I, actually,” said Aiba, who had to change costumes thrice already because he was perspiring so profusely.
“Maybe we could do it without the costume bodies?” asked Ohno.
“Maybe you could do it without me,” said Nino. He set the head down on the grass quite politely and lumbered off. It was a rather endearing lumber, really, since he didn’t quite have the height or body mass to actually look menacing.
11.
“It’s not that bad,” was what Sho said the moment Nino answered the door. “Really.”
“Is that a bamboo garden bridge you have behind you?” asked Nino. He was scowling rather heavily but he was still Nino underneath that - Nino’s nose and Nino’s mouth and Nino’s crafty, crafty eyes.
“...Yes,” said Sho. “I thought it might help improve your mood.”
“By sleeping under it?” asked Nino.
“...Yes.”
There was a moment in which Nino just looked incredulous and Sho was deeply embarrassed. Then:
“Thanks,” said Nino, his expression softening a little.
“So do you think you could manage one more episode in the whale costume?” asked Sho. “Nihon TV’s spent good money on those, and I think audience ratings went up once we started on creatures of the sea.”
“You could just do it without me,” said Nino. “In normal clothes.”
“No, we couldn’t,” Sho told him. “We won’t. You’re part of Arashi and we’ll be doing everything together.”
“But I’m a troll,” said Nino savagely.
“But you’re our troll,” said Sho.
12.
Life as a troll was not all that different, really, once one got past the bad-temperedness and the sudden animosity towards small children and billy goats.
But he was still Nino, despite all the changes; he still did Nino things like learn card tricks and play games on his DS. He still liked music and messing around with his guitar, and organising his collection of Takeuchi Yuko DVDs on the special shelf he had bought for them.
Sho came round a lot, more than any of the others. Nino didn’t ask why. Sho’s hero complex might have been part of the reason, but it didn’t explain why Sho always looked like he genuinely enjoyed Nino’s company, crabby comments and all.
“I can’t believe next year’s going to be our fifteen-year anniversary,” said Sho musingly one night. He had dropped by unannounced after his drama shoot and had proceeded to consume the last of Nino’s instant ramen.
“Please stop sitting on my bridge,” Nino gritted out, “I am trying to sleep.” Nino would probably never admit this, but Sho’s bridge was quickly becoming one of his favourite places in the world.
“It’s technically my bridge,” said Sho, swinging his legs, “and you’re not supposed to interrupt my moment of introspection. It is very rude.”
“In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a troll,” said Nino, before yanking Sho unceremoniously off by his ankles.
13.
It didn’t take long for the others to notice that there was something different about Nino when he was around Sho.
“You’re less trollish,” said Aiba. “You’re less trollish with Sho-chan.”
“Nonsense,” said Nino, devouring a strip of raw bacon.
“It’s true,” Aiba persisted. “The last time we had lunch he even persuaded you to eat something other than meat.”
“That was one mushroom,” Nino countered. “And trolls like mushrooms.”
“No, they don’t,” said Aiba, sounding smug.
Nino ignored him for the rest of the meal.
14.
“Try a mushroom?” asked Sho.
“Raaarughhhh,” replied Nino.
15.
“I’m sorry,” said Nino. “I shouldn’t have roared at you. That was rude.”
They were crouched under Nino’s bridge (the one that Sho had given him), watching My Neighbour Totoro on a portable DVD player.
“That’s okay,” said Sho. After a pause, he added, “Why are we watching this?”
“Felt like it,” Nino replied.
“We could always re-position the bridge so that you can see your television from here,” Sho told him. “I’m getting a neck ache.”
“You could, alternatively, pay attention to the movie,” said Nino. It was more of a command than a suggestion.
“I could,” Sho agreed, after a pause.
“Good,” said Nino.
Illuminated by the light from the portable DVD player, Nino’s expression was far from belligerent or trollish. All Sho could discern was something that might have been contentment.
16.
Nino’s first photoshoot after turning into a troll took place at the sunniest patch of beach they could find in Chiba. Even so, the theme of the shoot mostly revolved around sitting on rocks and looking moody.
It was a constant struggle for the crew to keep Nino looking normal but not overexposed. As the shoot wore on Nino’s face was like thunder, despite his best efforts at maintaining a pleasant expression.
“Perhaps we’ll use that one,” said the photographer during the break, pointing nervously at a picture that featured Nino looking vaguely displeased.
“Hmph,” said Nino, for lack of a better response.
The photographer’s assistant was about to make another suggestion when they were interrupted by a small commotion not far off. On closer inspection, it appeared to be Sho, who had somehow wrangled himself a long enough break to pop in on Nino with some lunch.
“Did you seriously bring me raw hamburgers again?” asked Nino, inspecting the box critically the moment Sho handed it over.
“You said they were your favourite,” said Sho.
The next issue of Myojo featured a two-page spread of photos featuring Nino and Sho having lunch. While some fans noticed Nino’s rather serious expression in many of the photographs, the most striking of all was the one in the centre.
Sho was brandishing his chopsticks at Nino with a mischievous look on his face, and Nino was smiling.
17.
The photograph was next seen pinned on the wall of their Nihon TV green room.
Underneath it, in Aiba’s handwriting, were the words: MY THEORY IS PROVEN.
18.
More than a month passed. The producers for their various programmes finally came to terms with the fact that Nino looking happy on television was now a thing of the past.
The first team to realise this was the Shiyagare team, who promptly capitalised on this fact by creating a corner in which Arashi tried out various jobs. The episodes featuring Nino as a sullen sports masseuse and an irritable parking attendant received the highest ratings in six months.
“I don’t understand this sudden spike in popularity,” said Jun one afternoon, after Nino had won three categories in the Ranking Derby. “You don’t even try to be nice now.”
Nino was sitting underneath the large desk in the room and looking quite onerous. “Trolls have natural charm,” he said, with no trace of irony.
“Well, maybe people like that sort of thing,” Sho replied. There was still some residual smugness in his voice after the day’s filming. Twenty-seven out of thirty heart surgeons had named him ‘member best suited to be a doctor’, and he was naturally very pleased with himself.
“What sort of thing?” asked Jun. “Lumbering, grumpiness and a habit of being contrary?”
“At least we don’t have to wear the bear costumes,” said Ohno wisely.
“That is true,” Jun conceded.
There was a pause in which all of them contemplated those terrible weeks of near-blindness and suffocation.
“I quite liked the bear costume, actually,” said Aiba all of a sudden. “It was the parakeet one I couldn’t stand.”
19.
“Well, I think this being-a-troll business opens up to you a whole world of new possibilities,” said Sho. “Like period movies where all the samurai are deeply disgruntled.”
“Yes, it would be effortless for me,” Nino agreed dryly. “I’d just turn up in costume and glare.”
“Well, we can’t be the same sort of idol forever, can we?” said Sho. “I kind of like that Jun-kun has his sneaker line, and I’ve got my news, and you’ve made the transition into becoming a troll-idol-”
“-and that Ohno has taken to wearing this one t-shirt all the time that says What’s Wrong With Being Naked?”
“...that, not so much,” said Sho, with vague distaste.
“And you don’t mind that you’re always paired with me when we’re on tour?” asked Nino. “That we have to do our solos together?”
“I like that,” said Sho.
“That we share a suite instead of getting individual ones like the rest?” Nino continued.
“You can’t have moved the temporary bridge in by yourself,” said Sho reasonably. “And I’ve always liked rooming with you. Even when we were juniors.”
“It’s different now,” said Nino. “I’m a troll.”
“Well,” Sho replied, “you’re my troll.”
End