Sakura Michi - Chapter 7 -
Title: Even Cherry Blossom Paths Can Lead Astray
Rating: PG-13-ish
Disclaimer: I don’t own them! I wish I did, but I never will (tear)
Warning: Some swearing here I think. And another Uncommunicative!Ueda character (laugh)
Summary: Kame and Ueda have been going steady since shortly after Jin left for L.A. and Kame finally decided to confess… but what happens when the little things start pushing the two apart? Will they be able to bridge the growing gap, and when Kame decides to take things into his own hands, how does it bode for his lover?
| Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3| Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 |
| Chapter 6|
Chapter 7
- Kame’s P.o.V. -
Taguchi walks out to the change-room ahead of us, eager to get his things read so he’s got some time on his DS. That’s normal, and I’m ready to step aside as the door swings into the place where I was standing only a second ago. What I’m not prepared for is how, only a few minutes later, he comes running back but in a panic this time.
“K-Kame! Uepi- he’s sleeping but… he’s restless and his forehead’s all sweaty,” he frowns, bites his lip. “He looks troubled so I tried to wake him up, it’s probably another nightmare, but... but I can’t wake him up! He won’t wake up!”
“What?!” I button up the jeans I was pulling on and run out the door, closely followed by Jin and Nakamaru. Koki’s still showering, we leave him be. I bolt to the couch where Ueda’s sleeping. From afar, he peaceful enough but I see how his one hand is gripping the couch so hard his knuckles are white. I kneel in front of the couch and see a sheen of sweat over his face and chest. “Jin, get me a cool cloth,” I order without looking from Ueda’s face and hear him move quickly away. I reach up and gently shake Ueda’s shoulder. “Ueda,” I call softly but firmly. He doesn’t move, stays asleep so I shake his shoulder harder, call him more insistently and still he doesn’t rouse. I reach behind his back and hug him tight as he starts mumbling and fighting from my touch. “Ueda, Ueda, wake up!” I bite my lip. “Tatsuya! Tatsuya, it’s Kazuya! Oi, Tatsuya! Wake up!”
Finally, he starts to rouse. His eyes are glazed over at first and he tries to fight away from me in panic, but I clutch him tightly, take Jin’s proffered cloth and tenderly wipe his face as his head starts to clear. I murmur to him the whole time, coaxing him back into the real world. After a minute, he starts to recognize me. “Kazu- Kamenashi…” there’s some feeling in his voice I can’t identify. It’s like relief but… different. After he realizes where he is, though, he drops his head and refuses to meet my eyes. Ugh… look at me, damnit! Let me see you’re alright!
Nakamaru kneels next to me and lays a hand on Ueda’s shoulder. “They’re worse,” his tone implies there’s more to it than the simple statement. It’s a question too, that seeks elaboration.
Ueda looks at him and his face is angled just so that I can’t see his eyes- not really. But what I can see of them shine over-bright. Tears? Ueda nods to Nakamaru but doesn’t elaborate like we want.
“Ueda…?” my voice is a little high but I don’t care. We’re all tense, all but Nakamaru. What does he know that I don’t?
Ueda scrunches his face up, as if to rid it of sleepiness and looks at me at last. “S-sorry… I fell asleep… I should have known not to-”
“Idiot!” I snap at him and he flinches. Everyone does. “I don’t care that you fell asleep: I care that it took us so long to wake you up! Do you have any idea what kind of panic Taguchi was in when he came to get us? What’s going on?”
“I-it’s nothing serious; they’re just nightmares. You know I get them when-”
“When you’re under stress, I know, but they’ve never been this bad. We’ve always been able to wake you within seconds and you’ve never had them more than four times a week if you’re sick too. Can you see the circles under your eyes? They’re like bruises! How many times have they woken you in the middle of the night this week alone?”
He doesn’t reply.
“How many times?” I demand, almost in a yell.
“Kame,” Jin puts a calming hand on my shoulder but I ignore it. I didn’t think it mattered to me all that much but seeing Ueda, my Ueda get worse and worse over the past few weeks through almost imperceptible degrees is killing me. I can’t do anything to help him and he won’t let me do anything to help him and I don’t even know why he gets these dreams. He never talks about them. Just thinking about it reminds me of everything he seems to insist on keeping a secret. Too many times, we’ve gotten into a fight over what seems like the pettiest things but that bother him immensely for a reason he can’t tell me. He’ll tell me later, he always says. “Another time, another place, just please not now,” but he never does. And look where it’s bringing us.
“Tatsuya…” my previous question remains, again, unanswered.
He takes a breath. “E-every night. At least once, they wake me,” he finally says. “They don’t keep me up long, just wake me for a while-”
“But you still wake up tired,” this time it’s Koki who interrupts. He’s standing behind us now, arms crossed. I don’t know when he got there, but right now I don’t really care.
Ueda nods at him. I sigh as a dull throb punches my heart. Every night. Every night he’s dreamt of some horror I can’t reach, and something that involves me, from the way he acts when I’m there. And every morning he’s been waking up drained from the night’s fighting.
And he hasn’t said a word of it to me.
I run a hand over my eyes and through my hair, exhaling every inch of air in my lungs. I suck it in fast again as I stand and walk away a few steps. I don’t care that the others might think I’m taking this strangely- too personally. And I can’t speak: my throat is tight with the spreading ache in my chest. “He didn’t tell me a thing,” I mouth silently, bitterly, my back turned to the others. Does he not trust me enough? Is he afraid I’ll leave him, rather than take the trouble to look after him? Does he think he has to be the strong one, or something? Does he think I’m some frivolous girl who’ll run away at the first sight of imperfection?
A cool hand touches my shoulder, ever so lightly. It sends a chill down my spine and a stab through my heart. I round on Ueda, ready to snap at him again but he looks so lost, so apologetic, so sincere…
“I’ll take him home,” Nakamaru announces. “He’s in no state to be drinking if he’s this worn out.”
I shake my head, not breaking eye contact with my boyfriend. “No, I’ll take him home. I’m in no mood to drink. I’m tired.”
“I’m fi-” Ueda starts but everyone interrupts him.
“No, you’re not,” we say immediately.
Jin comes up and sets a hand on both my shoulder and Ueda’s. “Tat- Ueda needs someone to talk to about all this-”
“I don’t want to-”
“You need to talk about it,” Jin stares down the shorter man. Everyone knows not to refuse Jin when he’s this serious. “Kame’s the best for that right now. Come on guys, everything’ll be fine. You know post-performance depression and all that. I’m sure it’s just some little thing that’s been blown up due to all this stress which, I’ll admit, was definitely helped along by me,” he smiles humourlessly. “We all have these times. Now let’s leave it to these guys to figure it out,” he throws on a shirt and grabs his bag. Everyone gets their stuff together and follows him out, though Nakamaru stops at the door with a worried look. Taguchi tugs his arm and they leave.
Ueda walks back over to the couch again and sits, his fingers at his temples, head bowed. “Kamenashi… you don’t need to make such a big deal out of this. I won’t say it isn’t serious,” he presses, seeing I’m about to interrupt him, “but I can’t do anything about them and they will pass just like they always do. Maybe it was the added stress of Jin-kun’s return or something and the worry that he’ll find us out; I don’t know but…” he trails off and doesn’t continue.
“You know,” he finally looks up at me when I speak, “it’s not even so much that you haven’t been telling me how bad they are, or why you get them, or why I can’t do anything to help or even that you don’t seem to think it’s important enough to tell me,” something in his eyes breaks when he hears my tone but I force myself to continue. “What really gets to me, do you know it?” I pause and he shakes his head. I look away. “It’s that they’ve got something to do with me this time and still you won’t tell me. I’m the one doing this to you and you won’t say it!”
He recoils wordlessly and his coppery curls fall over his eyes again, shielding them.
“What are you dreaming about?” I ask him softly, weakly. “I’ve been pretending to ignore it but it still happens; I’ll wake up to see you staring at me intensely, like you’re memorizing my face. I’ll wake you up from a nap and until you’re fully awake, you look like you’re going to cry you’re so glad I’m there at all. What is it you’re dreaming about?” my voice is pleading and I hate it but I can’t help it.
“…I…don’t know,” he whispers.
I kneel in front of him, force his head up with a firm but gentle hand. “You don’t know, or you won’t tell me?”
He shivers but meets my gaze. His eyes are heartbreakingly pained and confused but I don’t waver. “I don’t know,” he says softly. “I don’t remember, okay? I don’t remember anything… I only remember the feeling…. The feeling that I’ve lost you,” he looks away and his eyes are bright with unshed tears.
“Then at least tell me why you get these dreams,” I press. “I know they’re triggered by stress but you’ve ever told me why.”
“I can’t tell you,” he whispers. His eyes are on mine again and they beg me to leave it be.
I brush his hair back from his face and run my fingers through it. I kiss his chastely and stand. “You’d better be able to tell me soon, then. I admire your acting skills but pretending that nothing’s wrong between us is just…” I close my eyes and shake my head. “I can’t stand it, Tatsuya.” I glance back at him as I go to get my bag. He’s sitting watching me through his hair. I can’t see his eyes, but I can tell.
Why can’t he be more open like Koki? I can always tell what Koki’s thinking. And he always tells us when something’s up. But with Tatsuya… I slip on a shirt and shake my head again. With Tatsuya, it’s like being lost in a maze with a garden at its heart. I can catch snatches of it sometimes, and hints, but whenever I think I’ve found my way I turn another wrong corner. And in the end, I’m still lost inside and I still can’t give up.
I sling my bag over my shoulder and hand Ueda his. “Come on, I’m taking you to your apartment. We can come back for your car another time.”
He nods and stands, takes his bag and his jacket. “A coffee might be good,” he says quietly. It’s like he’s afraid to speak to me. “I’m scared I’ll fall asleep before we get home,” his tone says it’s supposed to be a joke but I see the panic in his eyes that tells me every word is true. He truly is afraid of falling sleep.
“We’ll stop somewhere on our way,” I assure him. “We’ll get some food too,” I add. I go to open the door for him but he opens it before I can.
“I’ve got it,” he mutters.
The silence in the car is awkward but some of my hurt fury begins to fade in the quiet. By the time we stop at a coffeehouse, I can successfully muster a fake smile. By the time we reach his apartment, Ueda’s managed to even offer some comments concerning our concert, though my replies, like his own words, are short and clipped. He lets me into the apartment and I kick off my shoes and bring our convenience-store dinners into the kitchen. We sit together at the table and sip our coffees in silence, until the microwave beeps, announcing that our dinners are ready. I force Ueda to eat his though I know his seems to be tasting as much like cardboard as my own at the moment. I toss the packages when we’re done and sit back down. He watches me warily and he takes a sip of his coffee.
“Time to talk,” I say, trying not to sound cold.
He winces and swallows the last bit of his drink, looking longingly at the empty cup. “I-I can’t-”
“You’ll tell me what you can, for now,” I interrupt, “but the rest had better come later, and ‘later’ had better be soon. I’m your boyfriend for God’s sake. Do you not trust me or something?”
“I-I do! I’d trust you with my life, Kazuya, but this is…”
“This is what? I don’t even know when they started-”
“I was young, maybe ten or twelve-”
“Or why-”
“I… that…” I wait for what feels like a full minute but he shakes his head.
I sigh in frustration. “I know I won’t get anything else out of you when you’re like this. Come on, let’s get to bed.”
“It’s still early,” he argues.
“And is there anything else you want to do?”
“… No.”
“Then let’s get ready to sleep. You need all the rest you can get if it’s going to be… interrupted.”
He nods meekly.
After changing and slipping under the covers, Ueda wraps his arms around me tightly, seeking my warmth needily. I brush the hair from his eyes yet again and kiss his forehead. “You need to learn to talk to me about the important things, Tatsuya,” I sigh. “I can’t keep going like this. It hurts too much, not knowing.”
He grips me closer and shifts down, burying his head under my chin. “Can’t… keep going…?” his words are a terrified whisper.
“Not like that!” I insist desperately. “Not like that… and… it’s nothing to worry about, if- if you learn to open up to me,” no matter how I look at it, my words sound like a threat but I can’t help it. I love him too much to leave him but eventually I’ll have to if all I can feel for him is anxiety about what he’s hiding from me now. I can’t live like that. “Tatsuya, I used to think I could accept whatever secrets, whatever lies-”
“Please stop quoting our group’s lyrics…” his voice is so cold, yet so broken it’s as if they’re shards of ice in my chest.
I feel like a monster when I feel the hot dampness of his tears on my shirt and I bite my lip and run my hand gently over his hair. The pain in my chest is making me shiver but my main concern is the trembling form who’s gripping me so tightly it hurts. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry but please try to see it from my side too,” I whisper into his hair. “I can’t live with these kinds of worries. I’ll try, I’ve been trying, because it’s for you, but-”
“I understand,” he says. “I understand. I just need time to… to figure everything out. Please, I’ve never wanted to hide anything from you, I’ve always been honest, I just…” his muffled voice chokes off and goes silent.
“Can’t?” I offer.
He nods. There’s a moment of silence. Eventually, he pulls his head back and looks at me pleadingly. “Kazuya… I love you,” his arms loosen from around my waist and he runs his fingers through my hair, rests his warm palm against my cheek.
I close my eyes and savour the touch. “I love you too, Tatsuya,” I murmur. “Now, let’s get to sleep. I’m drained and you are and it’s going to be hard pretending this never happened,” my eyes open and search his anxious face.
He nods and kisses me softly, longingly, and snakes his arm back around my waist. When he pulls away, I lean my forehead against his and take a deep breath. All I can seem to think about is how I wish I could be at Koki’s place practicing those martial arts patterns. I can think so much more clearly then. Maybe I can ask Koki some advice too, in a round-about way. He never has trouble expressing himself, in one way or another. He’ll know what to do.
I look back at Ueda and see that he’s already asleep. His expression is so open and innocent when he’s like this- childlike, though he’d argue determinedly if I said as much to him. I realize just how hard it was for him to reveal that vulnerable side of him to me, to us today. He never strips himself of his pride like that. I’ve only ever glimpsed it. My eyes tear up and I kiss his head. “Why do you do things like that? Why can’t you just make me hate you for what you’re doing to me?”
He snuggles closer, seeking warmth even in the depths of his unconsciousness and the tiniest smile graces his lips.
“Thank you, though,” I murmur, almost imperceptibly.
On to | Chapter 8|