Fic for acchikocchi
Title: We Are Standing on the Edge
By: spurious
Pairing: Kame/Jin
Rating: NC-17
Genre/Warnings: AU, character death, buckets upon buckets of angst.
Notes: I cannot begin to express the multitude of ways in which is entire story would not exist without my beta. I hope you enjoy this, acchikocchi!
Summary: "Kame," Jin says, voice almost calm, "the world is ending."
The sky's turned a dazzling array of colors in the past few days.
At first it was captivating, stopping traffic as people stood, open-mouthed, staring in blank horror as the blue slowly faded into red, dripping like blood over the sun.
In retrospect, the red was sort of predictable, really: when you hear about the apocalypse, it seems like everything gets its chance to turn into blood. It had been the green, the orange, the purple that were really unsettling. It threw their shadows into weird relief, Jin's broader shoulders silhouetted next to Kame's narrow ones on a canvas of sickly green pavement.
Today, though. This has reached a whole new level of unsettling. The sky is white, pure white. He can't make out where the sun is, where clouds might be if there are any. It's like someone just tore everything up and started with an entirely blank canvas.
Jin used to like playing tricks on Kame. He would shake him awake after a sleepover, face schooled into a mask of careful sobriety. "Kame," he would say, "someone broke into your house and killed your parents." "Kame, the doctor called, you have cancer and you're going to die." "Kame, the world is ending." Always followed by hysterical laughter and cries of "you should have seen your face!"
Telling Kame the world is ending now seems a bit like a statement of the obvious, but he does it anyway, hand firm on the warmth of Kame's shoulder. His body heat is radiating through the thin fabric of his t-shirt, reassuring Jin that he's still alive.
"Kame," Jin says, voice almost calm, "the world is ending."
Kame turns over, blinking into the unnaturally bright light. "What color--" he trails off when his eyes adjust, staring over Jin's shoulder and out the window.
"What does it mean?" Jin sits down on the bed, head in his hands. He's tired of trying to puzzle it out, this slow-motion destruction.
"I guess it's done with colors?" Kame sounds unsure. He's supposed to be the smart one, the one who stayed in college when Jin dropped out and started doing odd jobs, but Kame's still way out of his depth here. Everyone is. It doesn't stop Jin from getting frustrated with him, taking out the confusion in the way he's so used to.
"Wow, that's really helpful," Jin says sarcastically.
***
They decide to take Kame's car; the argument about that is one of the most explosive Kame can remember having for a long while. It's eventually settled by the fact that Jin's car has no gas and Kame's tank is full. They don't want to get stuck with no gas, and there's no telling if any of the stations along the way will be operational.
As Kame flips on his turn signal, waiting patiently to make his way onto the freeway amidst the worst traffic he's ever seen in his life, Jin plays with the buttons of the car's stereo.
"God, Kame," he says, pushing eject and discarding the CD (Best of The Eagles, set to play Desperado on repeat--admittedly not one of Kame's finer choices, not-wallowing-in-feelings-wise), "You don't listen to any good music." Before Kame can protest that Jin had bought him that CD, years ago, when he was going through a classic rock phase, Jin's replaced it with one of his own, Lady Gaga's "The Fame Monster."
Kame's complaints die under the volume of the music as the first track starts up, and Jin sings along. Kame likes listening to Jin sing, has always sort of thought Jin wasted his potential not trying to do it professionally, but at that moment he's kind of glad to have Jin's voice all to himself, a little secret in his car. Kame can't quite understand the lyrics; he's never had an aptitude for languages, even though he studied English all through school. Jin had never applied himself, but he's picked up surprisingly accurate pronunciation from American music and action movies, along with an almost-impressive repertoire of slang and curse words.
***
The drive from Tokyo to their hometown, across the country, would normally take a full day, but roads are blocked, cars sitting abandoned by their owners, mountain routes strewn with rocks.
"I don't know how long it'll take us," Kame's saying, cell phone pressed to his ear. They'd pulled off the road somewhere that had cell phone service to try calling their families. Their houses are still down the street from each other, just a five minute walk from the beach. Jin remembers playing on the beach every day during summer vacation.
Once, when they were between elementary and middle school, Kame a year behind, Jin had buried Kame in the sand. He did it deep, packing the sand tight around him until just Kame's head showed.
“I’m going to go get my camera,” Jin said when he was finished, “don’t move.”
It took Jin half an hour to complete the 15 minute walk from the beach to his house, then another half hour going back, but he didn’t expect what he found when he got there.
It wasn’t a particularly warm or nice day, so the beach wasn’t too crowded. There were some people walking, a few old men fishing, some kids younger than they were making a sandcastle. Jin and Kame had been past the kids with the sandcastle, near a patch of sand with some grass growing out of it, but when Jin got back he didn’t find Kame, or even any evidence they’d been there.
He didn’t think about how long he was gone, how Kame had probably just gotten bored and walked home. Instead, Jin’s mind flicked straight to panic mode, and he started digging frantically around the spot, convinced that the earth had somehow swallowed Kame up, pulled him down inside it because Jin had left him alone for too long. The sun started to go down after he’d been digging for nearly an hour, sand under his fingernails, muscles aching.
“Jin?”
He didn’t hear the voice behind him at first, too focused on digging.
“Jin? What are you doing?”
Jin turned around, breathless. “Kame?” Kame gave him a look, a “what is wrong with you?” look, but Jin just smiled. “I thought you got swallowed up in the sand!”
“You’re so weird,” Kame said “I went home; I was bored.”
“But I told you to stay here,” Jin said. As the panic flowed out of him, it was replaced with embarrassment, annoyance at himself for being so irrational, for letting Kame see him being that way.
The argument that followed is what Jin remembers as their first, even though they'd been bickering with each other over little things long before then.
"Remember the time I buried you in the sand?" Jin asks, as Kame flips his phone shut.
"What?" Kame fishes his keys from his pocket. "Come on, let's go."
***
They spend the night at a love hotel off the road, in the middle of nowhere, because Kame says a shower and a night in a real bed will make them feel more human. Kame takes the first shower, promising not to take too long, and is curled up asleep in the big bed before Jin can even find the second set of towels.
Jin closes his eyes, letting the hot water wet his hair, run from his shoulders down his back. He tries to empty his mind, a usually easy task he's been having more and more trouble with recently, but when his fingers close around his cock, he still pictures Kame. He thinks about the time he convinced Kame to go clubbing with him, how after a drink he'd danced like his body was made for it, all the usual tension drained out of him and nothing left but fluid movement, a sensuality that Jin had never seen from Kame, only felt running under the surface in a few rare moments.
The bathroom's filling with steam, making it a little hard to breathe, and Jin's moan is swallowed by the sound of water on tile. He tilts his head back, eyes closed, and imagines Kame's skin pressed hot against his own. Jin thinks about the curve of Kame's mouth and strokes his cock faster. His memory is fuzzy, just brief impressions of Kame's lips on his, a tentative hand on him. He wonders if maybe he wouldn't need this if he remembered all the way; if there's something between these fragments that would get it out from under his skin. This, though, will bury the need for a while.
Jin can feel it coming, the moment when his mind will go mercifully blank: he chases it, breathless, squeezing his eyes shut as come spills onto the tile floor, washes down the drain.
He's barely caught his breath when the building starts to shake.
***
Jin graduated a year earlier than Kame, got a job at a convenience store. He made some new friends, older guys who dropped out of high school and kept intending to move to the city but never did. It was seeing them every day that fanned the flames, made Jin’s itch to get out and go places stronger. When Kame started looking at colleges, Jin signed him up on a mailing list for schools in Tokyo.
“I got a pamphlet from Waseda the other day,” Kame said while he was visiting Jin on his break one day.
“Oh?” Jin asked, poorly feigning indifference. “Are you thinking about moving?”
“Maybe,” Kame shifted against the brick wall. “I think Waseda’s a bit out of my league, though.” He said it in this pointed way that Jin knew was designed to tell him that Kame knew he was the one responsible. “Besides,” Kame continued, “I think I might have a hard time moving to Tokyo all on my own.” He was smiling then, a little half-smirk.
“I bet you’d do okay if you had a roommate,” Jin said, playing along. Somehow it was easier to approach this if they talked around it.
“I guess I’ll start looking, then.”
***
Kame remembers moving in to their new apartment in Tokyo. It was small, near Kame’s school but not well-located for “anything interesting,” as Jin put it, which meant there weren’t any good bars or clubs nearby. Jin tried a few different part time jobs, staying at each one for a while until he got bored, or something more interesting came along, while Kame studied and tried to keep the place clean, working at a café in the evenings to supplement the money his parents promised to send him as long as he stayed in school.
It worked out, for a while.
***
After the earthquakes start coming more frequently, seemingly stronger and longer every time, Kame feels even more tense. He tells himself that it’s because he hasn’t slept well.
Kame hasn’t said this aloud, has barely admitted it to himself, even, but he has a plan. Not a course of action, or steps he’s going to take-really, it’s more of an expectation than a plan. Kame plans to live through this. He’s not going to die and that’s the end of it.
They have to turn around after thirty minutes on one road because rocks have fallen, blocking the path. It’s Jin’s turn to drive, but Kame wishes it was his so he could have the distraction. Jin is focused on the road (at least, Kame assumes he is, behind his big sunglasses) but still singing along to the CD in the stereo, and Kame catches himself staring at the shape of Jin’s lips as they form the lyrics. He thinks he feels the ground starting to shake.
“Be careful,” he says, “there’s a tremor starting.”
“I don’t feel anything,” Jin says, glancing from Kame back to the road.
***
Kame flips on the radio for a moment. There are reports of brushfires in the rainforests, monsoons in the desert. The earthquakes are everywhere, already doing damage in places that aren’t prepared for them. Scientists can’t seem to predict what will happen next, and the radio announcer’s voice sounds a bit shaky as she shares suggestions for prolonging survival.
Things are getting worse; nothing much has changed.
***
The low fuel light pings on when they’re about half an hour away.
“We need to stop,” Kame says, shifting nervously in the passenger seat.
“It’s fine,” Jin answers, “we can make it a while longer. There’s always more gas than you think there is.”
Jin’s made this drive before, he should remember that there’s not much between the town they’re on the outskirts of and their home.
“I’d rather stop now than end up having to walk the rest of the way when the car runs out of gas.”
“I told you,” Jin says again, “I think we can make it.”
It’s mid-afternoon, but the sky is getting dark, the wind blowing like there’s a storm coming, and Kame just wants to get home.
“And anyway,” Jin’s still talking, his voice rising slightly in pitch, “why does it even matter where we go? We’re just finding a place to die, aren’t we?”
“No.” Jin doesn’t know, obviously, about Kame’s plan not to die, but they haven’t talked about this frankly yet and Kame’s not ready to start now. He can’t let Jin drag things to the surface like this, like there aren’t any consequences, like it isn’t better when they’re buried.
Suddenly, Kame needs to get away from Jin, from the tiny, stifling environment of the car. It’s always Jin who brings things out, who crashes through the carefully set-up mental landscape Kame’s created for himself.
"Stop the car," he says, not looking at Jin. He clenches his teeth, mouth set in a line.
"What? No." The car continues down the road, not slowing down. "What are you going to do, walk the rest of the way?"
"I thought it didn't matter where we ended up." Kame flicks the lock on his door open, reaching for his seatbelt buckle. He's not about to jump out of a moving car, of course Jin will know that, but sometimes an empty threat is just as good as a full one. He glances at Jin: he's gripping the steering wheel hard, Kame can see the muscles of his forearms tightening.
"Fine," Jin says, stepping on the brake. "I guess it doesn't."
"Okay."
Kame watches the lines on the road, passing more slowly as the car pulls to a stop on the side of the road. Jin reaches over and flicks the emergency flashers on.
"I thought we'd at least be together for it," Jin says, but Kame's already slamming the door shut. He crosses the road, trying to make distance, make it harder for Jin to follow him, but there's no way to get away from him mentally, not with everything he's shaken loose from Kame's consciousness.
It's overwhelming, like things are falling around him in his head, the memories so fresh it's not even like reliving them; Kame feels like he's experiencing them for the first time. He walks on, unaware of what's going on around him because he's back in Tokyo, in the apartment he shared with Jin his first year of college, curled up in his bed with his warm blanket tucked around him.
Kame doesn’t hear the door open, the jingling of Jin’s keys as he comes in. He doesn’t see the light go on in the living room. He doesn’t hear Jin stumble and nearly trip over one of the boxes piled near the door, preparation for him to move a few days later. He doesn’t even hear the creak of his door when Jin pushes it open. What wakes him up is feeling Jin’s body warm next to his when he climbs into Kame’s bed.
“Jin,” he says, blinking in the darkness, “this isn’t your room.”
Kame can smell the alcohol on Jin’s breath when he leans in, taste it when he presses his mouth to Kame’s.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Kame tries to shove Jin away, but if he’s honest with himself, he doesn’t try very hard.
“Oh come on,” Jin says, voice low. He’s breathing against Kame’s ear now, warm and suggestive. “Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about this.”
And Kame has, he’s thought about it but always tried to keep it just that, to keep a boundary between his thoughts about Jin and the real Jin, the flesh and blood Jin whose flesh is pressed against him now, whose blood is pounding through his pulse point when Kame presses his lips to it. It’s already too late.
“Jin-“ Kame falters when Jin slides a hand under his shirt, fingers curling at the waistband of Kame’s pajama pants. He’s already hard, almost aching; prepared to let Jin do whatever he wants but not prepared for what he actually says.
“I want you to fuck me,” Jin says, and Kame hears the deep, deep undercurrent of want, the raw, open need in Jin’s voice, and there’s no way he can say no. Jin wraps his fingers around Kame’s cock and tugs, and Kame makes a strangled noise.
“I-yes, okay, sure, just let me-fuck.” He’s interrupted again, Jin apparently too impatient to wait for an answer and going down, wrapping his lips around Kame’s cock.
Kame’s pajama pants are around his thighs, his shirt pushed up, and suddenly he feels way too hot, needs to get his clothes off immediately. He pulls the shirt off, pushing Jin away to kick off his pants.
“Clothes,” he says, tugging at Jin’s t-shirt, the belt on his tight jeans. Jin’s just staring, the light from the living room shining through Kame’s half open door to illuminate them. Jin’s hair is mussed, his face flushed, and Kame’s seen him come home from clubs looking like this before, but he’s never been the cause of it, and then they’re both frozen for a moment, staring, before Jin breaks away to peel off his shirt.
While Jin undresses, Kame reaches into his drawer for a condom and lube. He fiddles with the condom awkwardly, half-watching Jin gracelessly wriggle out of his pants. He wants to ask if Jin’s done this before, is pretty sure he hasn’t, but instead he just leans in, fingers twisting through that messy hair, and pulls Jin in to kiss him.
“On your back,” Kame says when they break apart, and Jin lies down, his legs splayed apart, eyes wide and dark and focused entirely on Kame.
Kame intends to tease a little, take his time with the prep, but Jin makes this sound when Kame starts fingering him, needy and impatient, and it’s difficult to slow down. He bends forward to mouth at Jin’s cock while he does it, curling his fingers up a little and making Jin gasp, fist his hands in Kame’s hair.
“Kame,” he says, voice strained, and that’s all the encouragement Kame needs to pull away, sliding the condom on his cock. Jin’s still watching him, like he’s drinking this in, like he knows (they both know) they won’t do this again. Kame wonders how much Jin will remember.
Kame palms the back of Jin’s thigh, nudging his leg up as he pushes in. He watches Jin’s face for a reaction, tries to keep it slow in case it hurts him, but he seems okay, seems more than okay. Kame pushes in all the way and Jin’s eyes shut; he tilts his head back and makes a noise halfway between a moan and a contented sort of sigh.
“Kame,” Jin says again, and Kame can’t say anything, just leans in and kisses him, hard.
Jin’s grabbing at Kame, fingernails digging into his biceps, and he’s wrapped his legs tight around Kame’s waist. Kame tries to breathe, to prolong this, but when he opens his eyes and sees Jin laid out under him, he knows he can’t. He reaches between them, wrapping his hand around Jin’s cock, still wet with Kame’s spit.
Their eyes meet, and Jin’s pupils are huge, making his eyes look almost black. Kame feels Jin tensing up, hears the hitching in his breath just before Jin comes, saying Kame’s name and tightening impossibly around his cock.
It’s Kame who looks away first, just as he comes, breaking the contact because it’s overwhelming, having Jin looking at him like that.
After Kame catches his breath, he gets up, crossing the room to throw the condom away, and he hears the sheets rustling as Jin moves. Kame doesn’t know what he’s hoping for, if he’d rather have Jin stay in his bed or leave, if he wants to wake up and pretend it never happened. He knows what he should want, what he should do, but Kame hasn’t been doing what he should yet in this situation, why should he start now?
His decision is made for him when he turns around to see Jin struggling to put his pants on. Kame hadn’t realized just how drunk Jin was. He wonders, again, if Jin will remember any of it. Kame stands awkwardly by his trash can while Jin zips his pants, picks up his shirt and walks out, knocking his shoulder against the doorframe on his way.
***
The slam of the car door seems even louder in the quiet of the car, the ticking of the emergency flashers the only other sound. Jin rolls down his window, opening his mouth to say something, but the only thing he can think of is Kame's name, and that's drowned out by the sound of the car that passes between them after Kame crosses the street.
He watches Kame walk away, not wanting to drive away but too angry to go after him. If Kame wants to face this alone, who's Jin to stop him?
Jin's thoughts are interrupted by a nearly-deafening crack from behind him. He turns around to see a tree just a few hundred feet away bursting into flames. There are flaming pieces blowing in the wind, and Jin can't see Kame anymore, so he starts driving again. He forgets to turn the hazard lights back off, not noticing the clicking sound.
It's hard to go too fast as he gets closer to the center of town, abandoned cars and fallen trees and people blocking the way. Jin can't help but look at all the faces, searching for Kame, wondering where he was going to go. He thinks he sees him, across a wide intersection, in a crowd outside the train station.
Kame can't be planning on taking the train, Jin thinks, there's no way the trains are even working if what they heard on the radio about the damage to the tracks is anything to go on. There's no way to get over there in the car; traffic laws seem to have stopped applying altogether, so Jin gets out.
There are people all around the plaza outside the station, some shouting into cell phones, some huddled together nervously. Jin looks at their faces and sees a mirror of what he's feeling: they don't know why they're all out here, but it seems like the thing they have to do.
The air smells of salt, just like the beach Jin remembers, but there's also a heady sort of feeling in the air, the smell of a storm coming mixed with something Jin can't recognize, but it sets him on edge.
Jin catches sight of Kame, walking up a flight of stairs, and tries to push through the crowd, shouting his name, but just as he opens his mouth, the earth begins to shake. He hears a crack, like the lightning from before, but this time it's a sculpture breaking in two and shattering into shards of stone on the ground. Jin tries to keep his eye on Kame, but the people around him are just as panicked as he is, shoving and screaming and trying to stay standing as the ground under their feet shifts.
It's over faster than Jin had expected (but lately, he's been expecting every successive earthquake to be the one that ends it all, so maybe he just has low expectations), and as soon as he finds his footing he keeps making his way toward the place where he last saw Kame. He climbs a staircase, taking the steps two at a time, and there are people on the ground all over, people who fell during the earthquake, some who hurt themselves, but when the landing comes into view all Jin sees is Kame.
Kame, on the ground. Kame, bleeding.
"Kame," Jin tries to say, but it comes out as a broken sort of sound. He forces his legs to move, to carry him the rest of the way before crumpling next to Kame's body. Jin's hands are shaking when he touches them to Kame's shirt, which is already wet with his blood. "Kame," he tries again, hoarse.
Kame blinks, his eyes unfocused. He chokes on an inhale, coughing, and Jin takes hold of his shoulders, pulling him up against his knees so he can breathe easier. Kame says Jin's name, voice soft, and Jin doesn't know what to do, so he just nods. Jin wants to apologize for letting Kame walk away, for a whole host of other things that he suddenly feels stand behind everything that's led them here.
"I don't know what to do," Jin says. No one around seems to have noticed them (not that Jin would have realized if they had).
"I don't know either," Kame replies, and his mouth twists into a brief smile before he starts coughing again, his body shaking against Jin's knees.
"We need to get out of here." Jin's smelling the sea again, the smell of their childhood when the ocean was laid out in front of them, endless possibility.
Jin helps Kame up, supporting almost all of his weight. Kame's blood is on his hands, his clothes, all over both of them, but he's still breathing. Jin can feel the unsteady rise and fall of his chest against him.
"Where are we going?" Kame asks weakly. Jin's stopped them, looking around for the way to go. There are people all around them, pushing and moving in a vain effort to get somewhere, and Kame is shoved closer against him, stumbling when someone's shoulder knocks his own.
"The beach," Jin replies, and Kame sort of laugh-coughs. It sounds wet, and Jin doesn't let himself think about what that means.
"I guess I don't really have a choice."
"Hold on to me," Jin says, bending down. He loops his arm around the back of Kame's knees and lifts him. Kame's heavier than Jin would have expected, solid.
As he walks, Jin talks. Mostly, he talks about his memories, of the fun they had together on the beach. There are a lot of things he doesn't talk about, deliberate little gaps in their history, but they've always had those. There are good and bad sides to writing their own history, and one is that they're always able to bury anything undesirable. Kame speaks up occasionally, but as they get closer to the beach, his comments are fewer and further between.
It's about twenty minutes before the beach appears on the horizon, surprisingly deserted in comparison to the city itself, and Jin sees an empty bench just at the edge of the sand, facing out toward the ocean.
"Look, Kame," he half-whispers, reverent, "we made it."
The only response Jin hears is the sound of his own breathing. Kame is still in his arms, limp when he eases them onto the bench.
Jin swallows the lump in his throat and tries to keep talking as the earth begins to shake again. It's hard to hear himself over the sound of buildings toppling, of everything coming to an end.
By: spurious
Pairing: Kame/Jin
Rating: NC-17
Genre/Warnings: AU, character death, buckets upon buckets of angst.
Notes: I cannot begin to express the multitude of ways in which is entire story would not exist without my beta. I hope you enjoy this, acchikocchi!
Summary: "Kame," Jin says, voice almost calm, "the world is ending."
The sky's turned a dazzling array of colors in the past few days.
At first it was captivating, stopping traffic as people stood, open-mouthed, staring in blank horror as the blue slowly faded into red, dripping like blood over the sun.
In retrospect, the red was sort of predictable, really: when you hear about the apocalypse, it seems like everything gets its chance to turn into blood. It had been the green, the orange, the purple that were really unsettling. It threw their shadows into weird relief, Jin's broader shoulders silhouetted next to Kame's narrow ones on a canvas of sickly green pavement.
Today, though. This has reached a whole new level of unsettling. The sky is white, pure white. He can't make out where the sun is, where clouds might be if there are any. It's like someone just tore everything up and started with an entirely blank canvas.
Jin used to like playing tricks on Kame. He would shake him awake after a sleepover, face schooled into a mask of careful sobriety. "Kame," he would say, "someone broke into your house and killed your parents." "Kame, the doctor called, you have cancer and you're going to die." "Kame, the world is ending." Always followed by hysterical laughter and cries of "you should have seen your face!"
Telling Kame the world is ending now seems a bit like a statement of the obvious, but he does it anyway, hand firm on the warmth of Kame's shoulder. His body heat is radiating through the thin fabric of his t-shirt, reassuring Jin that he's still alive.
"Kame," Jin says, voice almost calm, "the world is ending."
Kame turns over, blinking into the unnaturally bright light. "What color--" he trails off when his eyes adjust, staring over Jin's shoulder and out the window.
"What does it mean?" Jin sits down on the bed, head in his hands. He's tired of trying to puzzle it out, this slow-motion destruction.
"I guess it's done with colors?" Kame sounds unsure. He's supposed to be the smart one, the one who stayed in college when Jin dropped out and started doing odd jobs, but Kame's still way out of his depth here. Everyone is. It doesn't stop Jin from getting frustrated with him, taking out the confusion in the way he's so used to.
"Wow, that's really helpful," Jin says sarcastically.
***
They decide to take Kame's car; the argument about that is one of the most explosive Kame can remember having for a long while. It's eventually settled by the fact that Jin's car has no gas and Kame's tank is full. They don't want to get stuck with no gas, and there's no telling if any of the stations along the way will be operational.
As Kame flips on his turn signal, waiting patiently to make his way onto the freeway amidst the worst traffic he's ever seen in his life, Jin plays with the buttons of the car's stereo.
"God, Kame," he says, pushing eject and discarding the CD (Best of The Eagles, set to play Desperado on repeat--admittedly not one of Kame's finer choices, not-wallowing-in-feelings-wise), "You don't listen to any good music." Before Kame can protest that Jin had bought him that CD, years ago, when he was going through a classic rock phase, Jin's replaced it with one of his own, Lady Gaga's "The Fame Monster."
Kame's complaints die under the volume of the music as the first track starts up, and Jin sings along. Kame likes listening to Jin sing, has always sort of thought Jin wasted his potential not trying to do it professionally, but at that moment he's kind of glad to have Jin's voice all to himself, a little secret in his car. Kame can't quite understand the lyrics; he's never had an aptitude for languages, even though he studied English all through school. Jin had never applied himself, but he's picked up surprisingly accurate pronunciation from American music and action movies, along with an almost-impressive repertoire of slang and curse words.
***
The drive from Tokyo to their hometown, across the country, would normally take a full day, but roads are blocked, cars sitting abandoned by their owners, mountain routes strewn with rocks.
"I don't know how long it'll take us," Kame's saying, cell phone pressed to his ear. They'd pulled off the road somewhere that had cell phone service to try calling their families. Their houses are still down the street from each other, just a five minute walk from the beach. Jin remembers playing on the beach every day during summer vacation.
Once, when they were between elementary and middle school, Kame a year behind, Jin had buried Kame in the sand. He did it deep, packing the sand tight around him until just Kame's head showed.
“I’m going to go get my camera,” Jin said when he was finished, “don’t move.”
It took Jin half an hour to complete the 15 minute walk from the beach to his house, then another half hour going back, but he didn’t expect what he found when he got there.
It wasn’t a particularly warm or nice day, so the beach wasn’t too crowded. There were some people walking, a few old men fishing, some kids younger than they were making a sandcastle. Jin and Kame had been past the kids with the sandcastle, near a patch of sand with some grass growing out of it, but when Jin got back he didn’t find Kame, or even any evidence they’d been there.
He didn’t think about how long he was gone, how Kame had probably just gotten bored and walked home. Instead, Jin’s mind flicked straight to panic mode, and he started digging frantically around the spot, convinced that the earth had somehow swallowed Kame up, pulled him down inside it because Jin had left him alone for too long. The sun started to go down after he’d been digging for nearly an hour, sand under his fingernails, muscles aching.
“Jin?”
He didn’t hear the voice behind him at first, too focused on digging.
“Jin? What are you doing?”
Jin turned around, breathless. “Kame?” Kame gave him a look, a “what is wrong with you?” look, but Jin just smiled. “I thought you got swallowed up in the sand!”
“You’re so weird,” Kame said “I went home; I was bored.”
“But I told you to stay here,” Jin said. As the panic flowed out of him, it was replaced with embarrassment, annoyance at himself for being so irrational, for letting Kame see him being that way.
The argument that followed is what Jin remembers as their first, even though they'd been bickering with each other over little things long before then.
"Remember the time I buried you in the sand?" Jin asks, as Kame flips his phone shut.
"What?" Kame fishes his keys from his pocket. "Come on, let's go."
***
They spend the night at a love hotel off the road, in the middle of nowhere, because Kame says a shower and a night in a real bed will make them feel more human. Kame takes the first shower, promising not to take too long, and is curled up asleep in the big bed before Jin can even find the second set of towels.
Jin closes his eyes, letting the hot water wet his hair, run from his shoulders down his back. He tries to empty his mind, a usually easy task he's been having more and more trouble with recently, but when his fingers close around his cock, he still pictures Kame. He thinks about the time he convinced Kame to go clubbing with him, how after a drink he'd danced like his body was made for it, all the usual tension drained out of him and nothing left but fluid movement, a sensuality that Jin had never seen from Kame, only felt running under the surface in a few rare moments.
The bathroom's filling with steam, making it a little hard to breathe, and Jin's moan is swallowed by the sound of water on tile. He tilts his head back, eyes closed, and imagines Kame's skin pressed hot against his own. Jin thinks about the curve of Kame's mouth and strokes his cock faster. His memory is fuzzy, just brief impressions of Kame's lips on his, a tentative hand on him. He wonders if maybe he wouldn't need this if he remembered all the way; if there's something between these fragments that would get it out from under his skin. This, though, will bury the need for a while.
Jin can feel it coming, the moment when his mind will go mercifully blank: he chases it, breathless, squeezing his eyes shut as come spills onto the tile floor, washes down the drain.
He's barely caught his breath when the building starts to shake.
***
Jin graduated a year earlier than Kame, got a job at a convenience store. He made some new friends, older guys who dropped out of high school and kept intending to move to the city but never did. It was seeing them every day that fanned the flames, made Jin’s itch to get out and go places stronger. When Kame started looking at colleges, Jin signed him up on a mailing list for schools in Tokyo.
“I got a pamphlet from Waseda the other day,” Kame said while he was visiting Jin on his break one day.
“Oh?” Jin asked, poorly feigning indifference. “Are you thinking about moving?”
“Maybe,” Kame shifted against the brick wall. “I think Waseda’s a bit out of my league, though.” He said it in this pointed way that Jin knew was designed to tell him that Kame knew he was the one responsible. “Besides,” Kame continued, “I think I might have a hard time moving to Tokyo all on my own.” He was smiling then, a little half-smirk.
“I bet you’d do okay if you had a roommate,” Jin said, playing along. Somehow it was easier to approach this if they talked around it.
“I guess I’ll start looking, then.”
***
Kame remembers moving in to their new apartment in Tokyo. It was small, near Kame’s school but not well-located for “anything interesting,” as Jin put it, which meant there weren’t any good bars or clubs nearby. Jin tried a few different part time jobs, staying at each one for a while until he got bored, or something more interesting came along, while Kame studied and tried to keep the place clean, working at a café in the evenings to supplement the money his parents promised to send him as long as he stayed in school.
It worked out, for a while.
***
After the earthquakes start coming more frequently, seemingly stronger and longer every time, Kame feels even more tense. He tells himself that it’s because he hasn’t slept well.
Kame hasn’t said this aloud, has barely admitted it to himself, even, but he has a plan. Not a course of action, or steps he’s going to take-really, it’s more of an expectation than a plan. Kame plans to live through this. He’s not going to die and that’s the end of it.
They have to turn around after thirty minutes on one road because rocks have fallen, blocking the path. It’s Jin’s turn to drive, but Kame wishes it was his so he could have the distraction. Jin is focused on the road (at least, Kame assumes he is, behind his big sunglasses) but still singing along to the CD in the stereo, and Kame catches himself staring at the shape of Jin’s lips as they form the lyrics. He thinks he feels the ground starting to shake.
“Be careful,” he says, “there’s a tremor starting.”
“I don’t feel anything,” Jin says, glancing from Kame back to the road.
***
Kame flips on the radio for a moment. There are reports of brushfires in the rainforests, monsoons in the desert. The earthquakes are everywhere, already doing damage in places that aren’t prepared for them. Scientists can’t seem to predict what will happen next, and the radio announcer’s voice sounds a bit shaky as she shares suggestions for prolonging survival.
Things are getting worse; nothing much has changed.
***
The low fuel light pings on when they’re about half an hour away.
“We need to stop,” Kame says, shifting nervously in the passenger seat.
“It’s fine,” Jin answers, “we can make it a while longer. There’s always more gas than you think there is.”
Jin’s made this drive before, he should remember that there’s not much between the town they’re on the outskirts of and their home.
“I’d rather stop now than end up having to walk the rest of the way when the car runs out of gas.”
“I told you,” Jin says again, “I think we can make it.”
It’s mid-afternoon, but the sky is getting dark, the wind blowing like there’s a storm coming, and Kame just wants to get home.
“And anyway,” Jin’s still talking, his voice rising slightly in pitch, “why does it even matter where we go? We’re just finding a place to die, aren’t we?”
“No.” Jin doesn’t know, obviously, about Kame’s plan not to die, but they haven’t talked about this frankly yet and Kame’s not ready to start now. He can’t let Jin drag things to the surface like this, like there aren’t any consequences, like it isn’t better when they’re buried.
Suddenly, Kame needs to get away from Jin, from the tiny, stifling environment of the car. It’s always Jin who brings things out, who crashes through the carefully set-up mental landscape Kame’s created for himself.
"Stop the car," he says, not looking at Jin. He clenches his teeth, mouth set in a line.
"What? No." The car continues down the road, not slowing down. "What are you going to do, walk the rest of the way?"
"I thought it didn't matter where we ended up." Kame flicks the lock on his door open, reaching for his seatbelt buckle. He's not about to jump out of a moving car, of course Jin will know that, but sometimes an empty threat is just as good as a full one. He glances at Jin: he's gripping the steering wheel hard, Kame can see the muscles of his forearms tightening.
"Fine," Jin says, stepping on the brake. "I guess it doesn't."
"Okay."
Kame watches the lines on the road, passing more slowly as the car pulls to a stop on the side of the road. Jin reaches over and flicks the emergency flashers on.
"I thought we'd at least be together for it," Jin says, but Kame's already slamming the door shut. He crosses the road, trying to make distance, make it harder for Jin to follow him, but there's no way to get away from him mentally, not with everything he's shaken loose from Kame's consciousness.
It's overwhelming, like things are falling around him in his head, the memories so fresh it's not even like reliving them; Kame feels like he's experiencing them for the first time. He walks on, unaware of what's going on around him because he's back in Tokyo, in the apartment he shared with Jin his first year of college, curled up in his bed with his warm blanket tucked around him.
Kame doesn’t hear the door open, the jingling of Jin’s keys as he comes in. He doesn’t see the light go on in the living room. He doesn’t hear Jin stumble and nearly trip over one of the boxes piled near the door, preparation for him to move a few days later. He doesn’t even hear the creak of his door when Jin pushes it open. What wakes him up is feeling Jin’s body warm next to his when he climbs into Kame’s bed.
“Jin,” he says, blinking in the darkness, “this isn’t your room.”
Kame can smell the alcohol on Jin’s breath when he leans in, taste it when he presses his mouth to Kame’s.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Kame tries to shove Jin away, but if he’s honest with himself, he doesn’t try very hard.
“Oh come on,” Jin says, voice low. He’s breathing against Kame’s ear now, warm and suggestive. “Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about this.”
And Kame has, he’s thought about it but always tried to keep it just that, to keep a boundary between his thoughts about Jin and the real Jin, the flesh and blood Jin whose flesh is pressed against him now, whose blood is pounding through his pulse point when Kame presses his lips to it. It’s already too late.
“Jin-“ Kame falters when Jin slides a hand under his shirt, fingers curling at the waistband of Kame’s pajama pants. He’s already hard, almost aching; prepared to let Jin do whatever he wants but not prepared for what he actually says.
“I want you to fuck me,” Jin says, and Kame hears the deep, deep undercurrent of want, the raw, open need in Jin’s voice, and there’s no way he can say no. Jin wraps his fingers around Kame’s cock and tugs, and Kame makes a strangled noise.
“I-yes, okay, sure, just let me-fuck.” He’s interrupted again, Jin apparently too impatient to wait for an answer and going down, wrapping his lips around Kame’s cock.
Kame’s pajama pants are around his thighs, his shirt pushed up, and suddenly he feels way too hot, needs to get his clothes off immediately. He pulls the shirt off, pushing Jin away to kick off his pants.
“Clothes,” he says, tugging at Jin’s t-shirt, the belt on his tight jeans. Jin’s just staring, the light from the living room shining through Kame’s half open door to illuminate them. Jin’s hair is mussed, his face flushed, and Kame’s seen him come home from clubs looking like this before, but he’s never been the cause of it, and then they’re both frozen for a moment, staring, before Jin breaks away to peel off his shirt.
While Jin undresses, Kame reaches into his drawer for a condom and lube. He fiddles with the condom awkwardly, half-watching Jin gracelessly wriggle out of his pants. He wants to ask if Jin’s done this before, is pretty sure he hasn’t, but instead he just leans in, fingers twisting through that messy hair, and pulls Jin in to kiss him.
“On your back,” Kame says when they break apart, and Jin lies down, his legs splayed apart, eyes wide and dark and focused entirely on Kame.
Kame intends to tease a little, take his time with the prep, but Jin makes this sound when Kame starts fingering him, needy and impatient, and it’s difficult to slow down. He bends forward to mouth at Jin’s cock while he does it, curling his fingers up a little and making Jin gasp, fist his hands in Kame’s hair.
“Kame,” he says, voice strained, and that’s all the encouragement Kame needs to pull away, sliding the condom on his cock. Jin’s still watching him, like he’s drinking this in, like he knows (they both know) they won’t do this again. Kame wonders how much Jin will remember.
Kame palms the back of Jin’s thigh, nudging his leg up as he pushes in. He watches Jin’s face for a reaction, tries to keep it slow in case it hurts him, but he seems okay, seems more than okay. Kame pushes in all the way and Jin’s eyes shut; he tilts his head back and makes a noise halfway between a moan and a contented sort of sigh.
“Kame,” Jin says again, and Kame can’t say anything, just leans in and kisses him, hard.
Jin’s grabbing at Kame, fingernails digging into his biceps, and he’s wrapped his legs tight around Kame’s waist. Kame tries to breathe, to prolong this, but when he opens his eyes and sees Jin laid out under him, he knows he can’t. He reaches between them, wrapping his hand around Jin’s cock, still wet with Kame’s spit.
Their eyes meet, and Jin’s pupils are huge, making his eyes look almost black. Kame feels Jin tensing up, hears the hitching in his breath just before Jin comes, saying Kame’s name and tightening impossibly around his cock.
It’s Kame who looks away first, just as he comes, breaking the contact because it’s overwhelming, having Jin looking at him like that.
After Kame catches his breath, he gets up, crossing the room to throw the condom away, and he hears the sheets rustling as Jin moves. Kame doesn’t know what he’s hoping for, if he’d rather have Jin stay in his bed or leave, if he wants to wake up and pretend it never happened. He knows what he should want, what he should do, but Kame hasn’t been doing what he should yet in this situation, why should he start now?
His decision is made for him when he turns around to see Jin struggling to put his pants on. Kame hadn’t realized just how drunk Jin was. He wonders, again, if Jin will remember any of it. Kame stands awkwardly by his trash can while Jin zips his pants, picks up his shirt and walks out, knocking his shoulder against the doorframe on his way.
***
The slam of the car door seems even louder in the quiet of the car, the ticking of the emergency flashers the only other sound. Jin rolls down his window, opening his mouth to say something, but the only thing he can think of is Kame's name, and that's drowned out by the sound of the car that passes between them after Kame crosses the street.
He watches Kame walk away, not wanting to drive away but too angry to go after him. If Kame wants to face this alone, who's Jin to stop him?
Jin's thoughts are interrupted by a nearly-deafening crack from behind him. He turns around to see a tree just a few hundred feet away bursting into flames. There are flaming pieces blowing in the wind, and Jin can't see Kame anymore, so he starts driving again. He forgets to turn the hazard lights back off, not noticing the clicking sound.
It's hard to go too fast as he gets closer to the center of town, abandoned cars and fallen trees and people blocking the way. Jin can't help but look at all the faces, searching for Kame, wondering where he was going to go. He thinks he sees him, across a wide intersection, in a crowd outside the train station.
Kame can't be planning on taking the train, Jin thinks, there's no way the trains are even working if what they heard on the radio about the damage to the tracks is anything to go on. There's no way to get over there in the car; traffic laws seem to have stopped applying altogether, so Jin gets out.
There are people all around the plaza outside the station, some shouting into cell phones, some huddled together nervously. Jin looks at their faces and sees a mirror of what he's feeling: they don't know why they're all out here, but it seems like the thing they have to do.
The air smells of salt, just like the beach Jin remembers, but there's also a heady sort of feeling in the air, the smell of a storm coming mixed with something Jin can't recognize, but it sets him on edge.
Jin catches sight of Kame, walking up a flight of stairs, and tries to push through the crowd, shouting his name, but just as he opens his mouth, the earth begins to shake. He hears a crack, like the lightning from before, but this time it's a sculpture breaking in two and shattering into shards of stone on the ground. Jin tries to keep his eye on Kame, but the people around him are just as panicked as he is, shoving and screaming and trying to stay standing as the ground under their feet shifts.
It's over faster than Jin had expected (but lately, he's been expecting every successive earthquake to be the one that ends it all, so maybe he just has low expectations), and as soon as he finds his footing he keeps making his way toward the place where he last saw Kame. He climbs a staircase, taking the steps two at a time, and there are people on the ground all over, people who fell during the earthquake, some who hurt themselves, but when the landing comes into view all Jin sees is Kame.
Kame, on the ground. Kame, bleeding.
"Kame," Jin tries to say, but it comes out as a broken sort of sound. He forces his legs to move, to carry him the rest of the way before crumpling next to Kame's body. Jin's hands are shaking when he touches them to Kame's shirt, which is already wet with his blood. "Kame," he tries again, hoarse.
Kame blinks, his eyes unfocused. He chokes on an inhale, coughing, and Jin takes hold of his shoulders, pulling him up against his knees so he can breathe easier. Kame says Jin's name, voice soft, and Jin doesn't know what to do, so he just nods. Jin wants to apologize for letting Kame walk away, for a whole host of other things that he suddenly feels stand behind everything that's led them here.
"I don't know what to do," Jin says. No one around seems to have noticed them (not that Jin would have realized if they had).
"I don't know either," Kame replies, and his mouth twists into a brief smile before he starts coughing again, his body shaking against Jin's knees.
"We need to get out of here." Jin's smelling the sea again, the smell of their childhood when the ocean was laid out in front of them, endless possibility.
Jin helps Kame up, supporting almost all of his weight. Kame's blood is on his hands, his clothes, all over both of them, but he's still breathing. Jin can feel the unsteady rise and fall of his chest against him.
"Where are we going?" Kame asks weakly. Jin's stopped them, looking around for the way to go. There are people all around them, pushing and moving in a vain effort to get somewhere, and Kame is shoved closer against him, stumbling when someone's shoulder knocks his own.
"The beach," Jin replies, and Kame sort of laugh-coughs. It sounds wet, and Jin doesn't let himself think about what that means.
"I guess I don't really have a choice."
"Hold on to me," Jin says, bending down. He loops his arm around the back of Kame's knees and lifts him. Kame's heavier than Jin would have expected, solid.
As he walks, Jin talks. Mostly, he talks about his memories, of the fun they had together on the beach. There are a lot of things he doesn't talk about, deliberate little gaps in their history, but they've always had those. There are good and bad sides to writing their own history, and one is that they're always able to bury anything undesirable. Kame speaks up occasionally, but as they get closer to the beach, his comments are fewer and further between.
It's about twenty minutes before the beach appears on the horizon, surprisingly deserted in comparison to the city itself, and Jin sees an empty bench just at the edge of the sand, facing out toward the ocean.
"Look, Kame," he half-whispers, reverent, "we made it."
The only response Jin hears is the sound of his own breathing. Kame is still in his arms, limp when he eases them onto the bench.
Jin swallows the lump in his throat and tries to keep talking as the earth begins to shake again. It's hard to hear himself over the sound of buildings toppling, of everything coming to an end.