[arashi] [aibajun] the first five times 8/??
Meg: Q: is meg crazy? A: well, she just signed up for yuletide.
Crysi: I already answered yes, meg.
... what nine month posting gap? I don't know what you're talking about >_____>
title image by meimi because she loves me even when I am crazy.
TITLE: The First Five Times
PAIRING: Arashi, AibaJun, Ohmiya secondary
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Oh god, not mine.
RATING: R because I freaking made Matsujun a freaking hooker you guys. Please note that the rating is mostly because of the language so far, and will probably continue that way. It's actually more of a screwball comedy .... about hookers.
SUMMARY: Nino doesn't care what Jun does, but he thinks Jun should do something.
NOTES: I guess I don't have any dignity left after all! Thanks to the usual suspects plus Tay. They made me do it. Also the thing with Sho and the grandmother? Happened to me at work once, in slightly modified form.
| PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE | PART FOUR | PART FIVE | PART SIX |
| PART SEVEN | PART EIGHT |
"What are you waiting for?" said Nino.
"For you to get out of my way," said Jun, staggering under the weight of five or six canvas sacks, painted by Ohno and appropriated by the Ninomiya-Matsumoto household because their local store had started charging for bags, the twerps.
"Oh my God, Matsumoto, just blow him," said Nino, putting groceries away and glaring at Jun when he reached over his head to put something else away.
"I don't want to," said Jun automatically. "Give me that pack of gnocchi. Wait, who are you even talking about?"
"Your co-worker," said Nino patiently. Nino held the pack away from him and studied Jun. His brows were slightly drawn together, and his eyes were very black. Jun held his eyes with an effort. "Isn't that what you do for a living?"
"Just give me the damn thing," said Jun. "And no, I don't blow my co-workers for a living, thanks for asking."
Nino handed the package over, but said, in a tone calculated to grind along Jun's nerves like sandpaper, "I think Sho-chan's right. I think you have a complex."
"I do not have a fucking complex!" said Jun, and then, "You owe me thirty-five hundred yen."
"A complex," said Nino, still in his most annoying voice, "a really stupid complex. About fucking. You should have that looked at before it gets worse."
Jun seriously considered kicking Nino, but he was standing on a stool to put oil away and Nino would probably grab his foot and bring him crashing down, and Rie-chan didn't like her models with bruises caused by violence. (He had a sinking feeling that one of these days he was going to come into the green room and find Aiba being carefully made up to look like he'd had a really good time at a bar, though.) Not that it particularly mattered about that. He knew a guy who did like guys with bruises, and paid handsomely to look at them. "Why are we even having this conversation? Did Sakurai make you do it? Because I can tell him to go fuck off too."
"We're having this conversation because you're an annoying prick," said Nino promptly. "And you're specifically annoying me with your mooning after Aiba-chan when all you have to do is say 'Wanna?'. How do I owe you thirty-five hundred? What did you buy, gold-plated carrots?"
"For one thing, we were out of chocolate sauce," said Jun, and ignored the reminiscent look that crossed Nino's face. "For another, we hadn't bought rice in like, three weeks. Or tomato sauce. Or --"
"Okay, okay," said Nino grudgingly, reading the receipt. "God forbid I should come between you and and extra-virgin olive oil." He stuck out his lower lip. "Can't I pay you back in, I don't know, blowjobs? You look like you could use one."
"Not from you," said Jun, with all of his heart.
"Ohno?" said Nino. "You can blow him if you take off my part of the bill."
"I am not blowing Ohno for thirty-five hundred yen worth of groceries," said Jun.
"You're right," said Nino. "Pay for the groceries and drinks for tonight too." He beamed up at Jun. "Deal?"
"No," said Jun with more force than he meant to. "Stop trying to trade your boyfriend for --"
"I wouldn't mind," said Ohno mildly, from the door. Jun jumped, almost braining himself against the cupboard. "But only if Jun-kun made me pasta."
"Oh my God, I thought I was supposed to be the whore," said Jun. He got off the stool and shoved Nino toward Ohno."Both of you, out of this kitchen. We have to leave in an hour and we're not going to have a repeat of the last time Ohno forgot to eat before he drank."
"It was fun, though," said Ohno, a little wistfully, shuffling out with Nino glued to his back. "Sho-chan's face."
It had been a long month, starting with the first meeting with Rie-chan and Aiba.
Rie-chan said, "I think you had the right idea, Masaki-kun, but it needs a little tweaking."
"What idea?" said Jun.
"The fake boyfriend thing," said Rie-chan. "We can really use it." She smiled and both Aiba and Jun kind of took a step back. "Not that we'll actually suggest you're fake boyfriends," she added, much too calmly. "But there's still a lot we can do with it."
There was a terrified silence.
"We should get your little social worker friend to model," said Rie-chan, warming to the idea even more. "Or--"
"Sho-chan says, if he gets within ten meters of you again, it's going to be on accident and he's going to strap a pillow to his butt," said Aiba.
"Do I want to know what happened?"said Jun, lifting his eyebrows. Rie-chan grinned, and Jun said hastily, "Or maybe I don't."
"Sakurai's kind of a big baby," said Aiba.
"I'm actually beginning to wonder about that," said Jun and then, sharply, "Stop fiddling with that."
Aiba stopped fiddling with it. He put the thing down and tried to look like he was paying attention. Jun was getting used to it; it was almost like keeping Ohno on track, only instead of a lack of interest, there was too much interest in everything going around him. He was sort of distractable.
"What did you have in mind? said Jun cautiously.
"Here at Rainbow Storm Designs," said Rie-chan, and Jun could almost see the flare of light outlining her and a majestic vista of mountains and waterfalls swelling up in a slow, meaningful pan behind her, "We believe our designs are not just for fashion, but for a lifestyle! A lifestyle that expresses everything our patrons believe in."
"She sells a lot to obsessive teenagers and wants to get into other markets," translated Aiba.
"I figured," said Jun.
Rie-chan ignored them. "As part of our philosophy," she said, "we believe in a holistic approach to marketing." She looked nobly out into the distance. "Did you follow the campaign for the Wild Spirit line?"
Jun thought about it, and realized that he had never really become consciously aware of the brand, or of Aiba himself. It was just that one day he was standing on the subway and looked up and thought, Ah, it's the guy with the baby animals again. He's really hot. "No," he said slowly. "Come to think of it, I didn't."
"And yet you're very fashion-conscious, aren't you?" said Rie-chan.
Jun thought about it. "I think I get it," he said. "You spent a lot of time building the idea up in people's minds, right, so by the time the line was really launched --"
"Exactly," said Rie-chan, beaming at him. "The new campaign is going to be run in basically the same way. Think of it,"she said, warming to her subject, "Think of it as a very long and unscripted drama. What we're looking for is the suggestion that the public is watching a friendship unfold, that they're actually watching a new star being born, every step of the way."
"So what you're saying is," said Jun, "The idea will be that Aiba gradually makes friends with me and I get more and more attention until I'm actually in the campaign proper?" It was a good idea.
Aiba pulled a wry face. "But it's kind of a nuisance," he said. "I remember that part. You can't actually do anything real and you always have to look for accidental on purpose ways to get noticed."
"Never mind," said Rie-chan soothingly. "It won't be as hard this time, because you're already known." She looked at Jun. "What name do you want to be called?" she said.
Jun shrugged. "My real name is fine, I guess," he said. "Not a lot of people outside of Johnny's know it anyway."
Rie-chan raised her eyebrows, and Jun said, "I have friends there, but they know I don't usually use the name Matsumoto."
"What name do you usually use?" said Aiba, very interested, and then, "Oh, I see, it would be bad if someone knew your real name sometimes, right."
"Moriyama Jirou," said Jun calmly. "Sometimes I let them call me Junnosuke."
Jun smiled a little at the memory of Aiba's peal of laughter.
"Jun, hurry the hell up," said Nino, drawing him fully into the present. Jun quickened his pace as he pulled off his jacket and left it by Nino's work locker.
As he and Ohno and Nino walked up to the table, he saw that Aiba was wearing a thin, clinging shirt with a print of a fudge pop on it. The fudge pop was melting. Jun tried not to groan.
Aiba had this addiction to weird English t-shirts, which Rie-chan blatantly encouraged. Jun was not so good at English himself but even he could tell that a thin emerald-green shirt clinging very slightly to the lines of someone's body and displaying a bare centimeter of hip should probably not also advertise the wearer's Love of Lollipops. Then again, there was always the white one with the silver print scrolling against the side of his hip and the text that said BACK-SIDE GRIND. Or the one that made Sakurai's vein stand out against his forehead the time Aiba had gone over to Johnny's wearing it. Jun had quite liked it, although Sakurai was probably right that a shirt with a red arrow with the word 'OPEN' in it, pointing down, was a bit much to be wearing to that kind of bar unless you meant it.
Sometimes Jun wondered about that, because he'd seen Aiba hesitating between three or four shirts with more or less filthy implications in English and then go unerringly for the one with the most provocative double-meaning. Then again, Aiba could make anything into a provocative double-meaning, sometimes without apparent effort. I like pockets you can slide your hand into, he would say, and somehow your eye was just drawn to his back pocket, which was indeed just right for a hand to slide into. And stay there, while possibly Aiba gave one of his little pleased wriggles and crowded up next to you and his own hand slid into your pocket.
It was very depressing.
Anyway, no matter what Nino said, Jun didn't have a complex about fucking people. It was just that people he liked were usually not people he fucked, so it made him nervous when the two categories of people combined. He was always sure it was going to go all weird. It was already totally weird with Aiba, but Jun didn't want it to go weirder. And it was fine like this. It really was.
Aiba was poking Sho's shoulder, and Sho was slumped over the table, his face flat against the surface. He clutched a long-necked beer with the air of someone clinging to his last link to sanity.
"Your shirt is indecent. I like it," said Nino to Aiba, and then, "Are you okay, Sho-chan?"
"No," said Sho, without lifting his head.
Nino patted his head. "Tell Uncle Nino all about it," he said encouragingly.
"What, so you can laugh about it?" said Sho. "I'm going to my parents tomorrow and joining the business. Just so you guys know."
"Okay, wow," said Jun, "let us get drinks before you tell this one."
"I want another beer," said Sho, to the table. "I want five more beers at least." Ohno slid into the booth next to him and Jun and Nino went to get the drinks, returning with tequila for Ohno, a Shirley Temple for Nino ("Dignity, you have none," said Jun. "Blackmail pictures, I have many," said Nino), a Mai Tai for Jun and beers for Aiba and Sho.
Nino slid in next to Ohno, leaving Jun no choice but to sit down next to Aiba. "All right," said Nino encouragingly.
Sho's hand felt for the new beer and grasped it. He lifted his head enough to take a long gulp, his throat working, and then put his head down again. "So I have a new case," he said to the table. "She's a really nice girl, but her parents are dead and she's been in the care of her grandmother. So her grandmother turns out to have Alzheimer's dementia, and so this poor girl has been taking care of her for the past three years."
"That sucks," said Jun.
"Oh, no, it gets better," said Sho, hitting his head gently against the table a few times. "So Mariko and I get involved in this because the girl hasn't been showing up to school regularly and when she does, she has bruise marks. We spend, I think, five hours talking to her and getting her to trust us, and then she says she has to get home. So we ask her about that, and well, Grandma might set the apartment on fire if she's not there to cook dinner for her. So we offer to take her home so we can incidentally get a look at Grandma and see what's going on."
"Okay," said Nino, rubbing Sho's back absently. "And then?"
"So we get over there," said Sho. "And the girl puts the key in the lock, but it's sticking. And so I try it, and suddenly it gives, and behind the door I see darkness and two gleaming white eyes and just then, something screams like a banshee. I jump, Mariko jumps and clutches me, and the girl flinches. And then we see the girl's grandmother, with her hair all down and wild like Sunekake-baba, glaring at us. And we all stand there, all scared out of our skins, including the grandmother, until the poor girl recovers her wits and says, 'Grandma, Grandma, it's me.'"
"Holy shit," said Aiba finally. He pushed his beer over to Sho.
"It was awful," said Sho, clutching both beers. "And then the grandmother is like 'is that you? is that you?' and calls her by the girl's mother's name, and the girl leads her into the apartment, and Mariko and I just stood there and looked at each other. It took Mariko five minutes to realize she was still grabbing my arm."
"My poor Sho-sho," said Nino, as Ohno petted Sho's hair. "Did you get it straightened out?"
"Mostly," said Sho. He groaned. "Tomorrow we have to get Grandma into a facility and the girl into foster care, and then we have to figure out if there's any other family, and someone's got to get the paperwork straightened out. And by that I mean, I do."
"What an awful day," said Jun.
"I want more beer," said Sho, to the table.
Ohno patted his head. "You want to dance," he said. "With Jun and Aiba."
"Do I?" said Sho. He looked up at Aiba and Jun skeptically.
Jun drained the rest of his drink at a gulp, and looked at Aiba. There was a dare lurking in the corner of Aiba's smile. They looked at Sho. "Yes," said Jun, sliding out of the booth and hauling Nino out of the way so he could pull Sho up by the collar.
"You totally do," said Aiba, snagging Sho's belt loop with one finger.
Crysi: I already answered yes, meg.
... what nine month posting gap? I don't know what you're talking about >_____>
title image by meimi because she loves me even when I am crazy.
TITLE: The First Five Times
PAIRING: Arashi, AibaJun, Ohmiya secondary
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Oh god, not mine.
RATING: R because I freaking made Matsujun a freaking hooker you guys. Please note that the rating is mostly because of the language so far, and will probably continue that way. It's actually more of a screwball comedy .... about hookers.
SUMMARY: Nino doesn't care what Jun does, but he thinks Jun should do something.
NOTES: I guess I don't have any dignity left after all! Thanks to the usual suspects plus Tay. They made me do it. Also the thing with Sho and the grandmother? Happened to me at work once, in slightly modified form.
| PART ONE | PART TWO | PART THREE | PART FOUR | PART FIVE | PART SIX |
| PART SEVEN | PART EIGHT |
"What are you waiting for?" said Nino.
"For you to get out of my way," said Jun, staggering under the weight of five or six canvas sacks, painted by Ohno and appropriated by the Ninomiya-Matsumoto household because their local store had started charging for bags, the twerps.
"Oh my God, Matsumoto, just blow him," said Nino, putting groceries away and glaring at Jun when he reached over his head to put something else away.
"I don't want to," said Jun automatically. "Give me that pack of gnocchi. Wait, who are you even talking about?"
"Your co-worker," said Nino patiently. Nino held the pack away from him and studied Jun. His brows were slightly drawn together, and his eyes were very black. Jun held his eyes with an effort. "Isn't that what you do for a living?"
"Just give me the damn thing," said Jun. "And no, I don't blow my co-workers for a living, thanks for asking."
Nino handed the package over, but said, in a tone calculated to grind along Jun's nerves like sandpaper, "I think Sho-chan's right. I think you have a complex."
"I do not have a fucking complex!" said Jun, and then, "You owe me thirty-five hundred yen."
"A complex," said Nino, still in his most annoying voice, "a really stupid complex. About fucking. You should have that looked at before it gets worse."
Jun seriously considered kicking Nino, but he was standing on a stool to put oil away and Nino would probably grab his foot and bring him crashing down, and Rie-chan didn't like her models with bruises caused by violence. (He had a sinking feeling that one of these days he was going to come into the green room and find Aiba being carefully made up to look like he'd had a really good time at a bar, though.) Not that it particularly mattered about that. He knew a guy who did like guys with bruises, and paid handsomely to look at them. "Why are we even having this conversation? Did Sakurai make you do it? Because I can tell him to go fuck off too."
"We're having this conversation because you're an annoying prick," said Nino promptly. "And you're specifically annoying me with your mooning after Aiba-chan when all you have to do is say 'Wanna?'. How do I owe you thirty-five hundred? What did you buy, gold-plated carrots?"
"For one thing, we were out of chocolate sauce," said Jun, and ignored the reminiscent look that crossed Nino's face. "For another, we hadn't bought rice in like, three weeks. Or tomato sauce. Or --"
"Okay, okay," said Nino grudgingly, reading the receipt. "God forbid I should come between you and and extra-virgin olive oil." He stuck out his lower lip. "Can't I pay you back in, I don't know, blowjobs? You look like you could use one."
"Not from you," said Jun, with all of his heart.
"Ohno?" said Nino. "You can blow him if you take off my part of the bill."
"I am not blowing Ohno for thirty-five hundred yen worth of groceries," said Jun.
"You're right," said Nino. "Pay for the groceries and drinks for tonight too." He beamed up at Jun. "Deal?"
"No," said Jun with more force than he meant to. "Stop trying to trade your boyfriend for --"
"I wouldn't mind," said Ohno mildly, from the door. Jun jumped, almost braining himself against the cupboard. "But only if Jun-kun made me pasta."
"Oh my God, I thought I was supposed to be the whore," said Jun. He got off the stool and shoved Nino toward Ohno."Both of you, out of this kitchen. We have to leave in an hour and we're not going to have a repeat of the last time Ohno forgot to eat before he drank."
"It was fun, though," said Ohno, a little wistfully, shuffling out with Nino glued to his back. "Sho-chan's face."
It had been a long month, starting with the first meeting with Rie-chan and Aiba.
Rie-chan said, "I think you had the right idea, Masaki-kun, but it needs a little tweaking."
"What idea?" said Jun.
"The fake boyfriend thing," said Rie-chan. "We can really use it." She smiled and both Aiba and Jun kind of took a step back. "Not that we'll actually suggest you're fake boyfriends," she added, much too calmly. "But there's still a lot we can do with it."
There was a terrified silence.
"We should get your little social worker friend to model," said Rie-chan, warming to the idea even more. "Or--"
"Sho-chan says, if he gets within ten meters of you again, it's going to be on accident and he's going to strap a pillow to his butt," said Aiba.
"Do I want to know what happened?"said Jun, lifting his eyebrows. Rie-chan grinned, and Jun said hastily, "Or maybe I don't."
"Sakurai's kind of a big baby," said Aiba.
"I'm actually beginning to wonder about that," said Jun and then, sharply, "Stop fiddling with that."
Aiba stopped fiddling with it. He put the thing down and tried to look like he was paying attention. Jun was getting used to it; it was almost like keeping Ohno on track, only instead of a lack of interest, there was too much interest in everything going around him. He was sort of distractable.
"What did you have in mind? said Jun cautiously.
"Here at Rainbow Storm Designs," said Rie-chan, and Jun could almost see the flare of light outlining her and a majestic vista of mountains and waterfalls swelling up in a slow, meaningful pan behind her, "We believe our designs are not just for fashion, but for a lifestyle! A lifestyle that expresses everything our patrons believe in."
"She sells a lot to obsessive teenagers and wants to get into other markets," translated Aiba.
"I figured," said Jun.
Rie-chan ignored them. "As part of our philosophy," she said, "we believe in a holistic approach to marketing." She looked nobly out into the distance. "Did you follow the campaign for the Wild Spirit line?"
Jun thought about it, and realized that he had never really become consciously aware of the brand, or of Aiba himself. It was just that one day he was standing on the subway and looked up and thought, Ah, it's the guy with the baby animals again. He's really hot. "No," he said slowly. "Come to think of it, I didn't."
"And yet you're very fashion-conscious, aren't you?" said Rie-chan.
Jun thought about it. "I think I get it," he said. "You spent a lot of time building the idea up in people's minds, right, so by the time the line was really launched --"
"Exactly," said Rie-chan, beaming at him. "The new campaign is going to be run in basically the same way. Think of it,"she said, warming to her subject, "Think of it as a very long and unscripted drama. What we're looking for is the suggestion that the public is watching a friendship unfold, that they're actually watching a new star being born, every step of the way."
"So what you're saying is," said Jun, "The idea will be that Aiba gradually makes friends with me and I get more and more attention until I'm actually in the campaign proper?" It was a good idea.
Aiba pulled a wry face. "But it's kind of a nuisance," he said. "I remember that part. You can't actually do anything real and you always have to look for accidental on purpose ways to get noticed."
"Never mind," said Rie-chan soothingly. "It won't be as hard this time, because you're already known." She looked at Jun. "What name do you want to be called?" she said.
Jun shrugged. "My real name is fine, I guess," he said. "Not a lot of people outside of Johnny's know it anyway."
Rie-chan raised her eyebrows, and Jun said, "I have friends there, but they know I don't usually use the name Matsumoto."
"What name do you usually use?" said Aiba, very interested, and then, "Oh, I see, it would be bad if someone knew your real name sometimes, right."
"Moriyama Jirou," said Jun calmly. "Sometimes I let them call me Junnosuke."
Jun smiled a little at the memory of Aiba's peal of laughter.
"Jun, hurry the hell up," said Nino, drawing him fully into the present. Jun quickened his pace as he pulled off his jacket and left it by Nino's work locker.
As he and Ohno and Nino walked up to the table, he saw that Aiba was wearing a thin, clinging shirt with a print of a fudge pop on it. The fudge pop was melting. Jun tried not to groan.
Aiba had this addiction to weird English t-shirts, which Rie-chan blatantly encouraged. Jun was not so good at English himself but even he could tell that a thin emerald-green shirt clinging very slightly to the lines of someone's body and displaying a bare centimeter of hip should probably not also advertise the wearer's Love of Lollipops. Then again, there was always the white one with the silver print scrolling against the side of his hip and the text that said BACK-SIDE GRIND. Or the one that made Sakurai's vein stand out against his forehead the time Aiba had gone over to Johnny's wearing it. Jun had quite liked it, although Sakurai was probably right that a shirt with a red arrow with the word 'OPEN' in it, pointing down, was a bit much to be wearing to that kind of bar unless you meant it.
Sometimes Jun wondered about that, because he'd seen Aiba hesitating between three or four shirts with more or less filthy implications in English and then go unerringly for the one with the most provocative double-meaning. Then again, Aiba could make anything into a provocative double-meaning, sometimes without apparent effort. I like pockets you can slide your hand into, he would say, and somehow your eye was just drawn to his back pocket, which was indeed just right for a hand to slide into. And stay there, while possibly Aiba gave one of his little pleased wriggles and crowded up next to you and his own hand slid into your pocket.
It was very depressing.
Anyway, no matter what Nino said, Jun didn't have a complex about fucking people. It was just that people he liked were usually not people he fucked, so it made him nervous when the two categories of people combined. He was always sure it was going to go all weird. It was already totally weird with Aiba, but Jun didn't want it to go weirder. And it was fine like this. It really was.
Aiba was poking Sho's shoulder, and Sho was slumped over the table, his face flat against the surface. He clutched a long-necked beer with the air of someone clinging to his last link to sanity.
"Your shirt is indecent. I like it," said Nino to Aiba, and then, "Are you okay, Sho-chan?"
"No," said Sho, without lifting his head.
Nino patted his head. "Tell Uncle Nino all about it," he said encouragingly.
"What, so you can laugh about it?" said Sho. "I'm going to my parents tomorrow and joining the business. Just so you guys know."
"Okay, wow," said Jun, "let us get drinks before you tell this one."
"I want another beer," said Sho, to the table. "I want five more beers at least." Ohno slid into the booth next to him and Jun and Nino went to get the drinks, returning with tequila for Ohno, a Shirley Temple for Nino ("Dignity, you have none," said Jun. "Blackmail pictures, I have many," said Nino), a Mai Tai for Jun and beers for Aiba and Sho.
Nino slid in next to Ohno, leaving Jun no choice but to sit down next to Aiba. "All right," said Nino encouragingly.
Sho's hand felt for the new beer and grasped it. He lifted his head enough to take a long gulp, his throat working, and then put his head down again. "So I have a new case," he said to the table. "She's a really nice girl, but her parents are dead and she's been in the care of her grandmother. So her grandmother turns out to have Alzheimer's dementia, and so this poor girl has been taking care of her for the past three years."
"That sucks," said Jun.
"Oh, no, it gets better," said Sho, hitting his head gently against the table a few times. "So Mariko and I get involved in this because the girl hasn't been showing up to school regularly and when she does, she has bruise marks. We spend, I think, five hours talking to her and getting her to trust us, and then she says she has to get home. So we ask her about that, and well, Grandma might set the apartment on fire if she's not there to cook dinner for her. So we offer to take her home so we can incidentally get a look at Grandma and see what's going on."
"Okay," said Nino, rubbing Sho's back absently. "And then?"
"So we get over there," said Sho. "And the girl puts the key in the lock, but it's sticking. And so I try it, and suddenly it gives, and behind the door I see darkness and two gleaming white eyes and just then, something screams like a banshee. I jump, Mariko jumps and clutches me, and the girl flinches. And then we see the girl's grandmother, with her hair all down and wild like Sunekake-baba, glaring at us. And we all stand there, all scared out of our skins, including the grandmother, until the poor girl recovers her wits and says, 'Grandma, Grandma, it's me.'"
"Holy shit," said Aiba finally. He pushed his beer over to Sho.
"It was awful," said Sho, clutching both beers. "And then the grandmother is like 'is that you? is that you?' and calls her by the girl's mother's name, and the girl leads her into the apartment, and Mariko and I just stood there and looked at each other. It took Mariko five minutes to realize she was still grabbing my arm."
"My poor Sho-sho," said Nino, as Ohno petted Sho's hair. "Did you get it straightened out?"
"Mostly," said Sho. He groaned. "Tomorrow we have to get Grandma into a facility and the girl into foster care, and then we have to figure out if there's any other family, and someone's got to get the paperwork straightened out. And by that I mean, I do."
"What an awful day," said Jun.
"I want more beer," said Sho, to the table.
Ohno patted his head. "You want to dance," he said. "With Jun and Aiba."
"Do I?" said Sho. He looked up at Aiba and Jun skeptically.
Jun drained the rest of his drink at a gulp, and looked at Aiba. There was a dare lurking in the corner of Aiba's smile. They looked at Sho. "Yes," said Jun, sliding out of the booth and hauling Nino out of the way so he could pull Sho up by the collar.
"You totally do," said Aiba, snagging Sho's belt loop with one finger.