Gift fic for frameofmind6: Some things that change, and the others that don't (1/3)
Title: Some things that change, and the others that don't
Written For: frameofmind6
Pairing: Akame
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 16 230
Warnings: occasional despondency, some adult cynicism, free interpretation of the story behind KAT-TUN hiatus and utter disregard to the canon things that happen after the timeline of this story, such as the second Akanishi baby.
Author's Notes: Dear Jess, sorry I couldn't follow your trope closer or make it into a higher rating, somehow the story just wanted to end where it ends. I hope you enjoy the story nevertheless.
Summary: In a way, it would have been easier, if their relationship were something new, without all these memories of shared past facing them like an insurmountable hurdle or a high cliff they have to close their eyes and jump of.
Nakamaru has a different number - again, and Jin is undecided whether to count it as a thing that changed or one of the essentially Nakamaru traits that make him equally exasperating and endearing. Indeed if Jin scrolls through the history of their calls far enough, there they will be - the ‘Contact number changed’ notifications meticulously sent to him every couple of years. To him, and probably to all the other people in Nakamaru’s cellular as well, and Jin wonders whether the guy actually uses such occasions to cleanse his “Contacts” or rather - to inauspiciously remind the recipients that it’s high time to call. Jin, for instance, calls him back as soon as he can each time that he receives one.
The thing that most definitely has not changed even one bit is Nakamaru’s habit to teach people how they should live their lives. This time too, Jin barely has time to recognize his voice, and Nakamaru is already commanding, “You should call Kame!”
“Why?”
“Because he may answer you!” Nakamaru sounds irritable and stressed, but then Nakamaru is prone to stressing over anything that doesn’t fit into his imaginary order of things, and the fact - in and of itself - is not a justifiable cause for Jin to worry as well.
“Well, the two of us have not talked-”
“Since that Bruno Mars concert, I know,” Nakamaru interrupts impatiently, and that is… not really true. Jin and Kame may not ‘talk’ per se, but they still call each other sort of regularly. Jin’s calls - just a mumbled ‘Happy birthday, have a good year’, followed by a long silence and a measured ‘Thank you’. Kame’s - all smooth congratulations, making one wonder if he writes them in advance and rehearses before the mirror for just the proper tinge of sincerity. ‘How is your wife doing?’, and ‘How is your daughter doing?’, and ‘How is the songwriting going?’ - this kind of stuff… Nice and grown-up behavior that Kame is cultivating nowadays…
Touching, nevertheless.
That Nakamaru is oblivious of this fact, though, is interesting. For Kame and Nakamaru converse a lot, not only about work, and at some point they did talk about him, Jin is fairly sure, otherwise… well, Nakamaru would not appeal to him now? So, well… if Kame chose to keep quiet about calling him barely three months ago, Jin can follow suit.
“Exactly. So, why me?”
“Because he doesn’t answer me, and Ueda won’t call, even if I-”
“Have you tried Pi? They keep in touch…”
Yet, come to think of it… Pi has never shown that he knows about those birthday calls either… Very, very interesting, Kame! Jin draws on his cigarette to hide a satisfied smirk.
“I did, but his manager told, he was busy filming, and his cellular was turned off.”
“Hmm… Taguchi? Kame used to have a soft spot for this idiot…” Jin, for one, would definitely ask Taguchi before even considering Ueda, or… well, himself.
There is silence in his cellular. Sudden and complete. A bad silence, telling… The more so, since the guy he is speaking with is someone able to fire a thousand words a minute, indeed, was doing just that but a few moments ago…
Jin rubs his forearms, suddenly feeling cold in a stifling studio. “Has something happened?”
The question comes almost by instinct, and yes, maybe Jin is overreacting, goosebumps and all… But this is KAT-TUN, you know? The band where things happen. And whatever happens… more often than not - is shit…
Now, where the bloody fuck has he put his coat?!
Nakamaru on the other side sighs tiredly. “He will tell you himself. If he answers, that is, and, well, if you call.”
***
Kame sounds tired as well, when he answers on the third ring. Tired, distracted and stressed. “What do you want?”
Wow, if it isn’t a question that Jin can answer in a number of ways… Now is probably not the right time though, so he goes with the simplest and more immediate. “I’m standing before your building. The code on the front door has changed.”
There is a long pause, and Jin can almost imagine Kame staring at the screen of his cellular, as if the thing has utterly, unbelievably betrayed him, absently rubbing his shoulder, and then… Yes, here is this barely audible sound of someone licking his lips.
“Wait a moment. It’s somewhere in my wallet…”
Jin hears the distant shuffling, probably, Kame rising from his sofa and heading into genkan, where he dropped his bag.
“They only changed it last month, and I mostly come and go through the parking lot, so… Hasn’t learnt it myself.” As if it really is something that he needs to apologize for.
More shuffling, clatter, a muffled curse.
“Right. Here it is. Five-two-zero-two-one… But, ehm… Couldn’t you just press the doorbell? So I could buzz you in?”
“Wanted to,” Jin confesses easily, pressing the keys and pulling on the handle once he hears the buzz. “But it turns out I do not remember your apartment by number, only that it is third from the elevator. Didn’t want to wake your neighbor by mistake.”
A quite chuckle. “Typically you… Well, come on up.” And the call disconnects.
***
The code on Kame’s apartment door has not changed.
Ever since they started installing the electronic locks and over the several gradually improving apartments, it remained the same. ‘Zero-two-two-three’, a dead giveaway for anyone, who knows Kame even a trifle. He chooses the buildings with the tightest security and ardently guards his address from anyone, who is not family or the closest circle of friends, yet, refuses to re-code the lock. Kame is complicated like this.
Pausing before the door, Jin wonders if he still counts as one of ‘friends’ and whether Kame expects him to just let himself in - like in the olden days - or press the bell.
In the end, he dials the code anyway, and once he enters the genkan, Jin’s head reels with the sudden sense of nostalgia - for everything feels exactly the same. Well… The shoes neatly straightened by the wall are new and there are a few additions among the souvenirs on the side table, but he knows this umbrella-stand, and this vitrine with Kame’s baseball memorabilia, and even the way how Kame sits on his sofa - all balled up with his legs pulled tightly to the chest - awakes the memories of times, Jin better not start remembering right now.
So, he concentrates on the things that are different: the new sofa; the new haircut; the new type of booze on the glass table - expensive whiskey in place of beer and wine they got soused on before; tight fitting slacks and a white shirt - instead of loose sweatpants and washed-out tee.
The latter though may simply mean that Kame is sitting like this ever since he came from work without bothering to undress…
He enters the living room and Kame raises his head. The eye contact is brief, Kame pats the sofa invitingly and returns to contemplating his glass even before Jin has lowered himself onto the off-white upholstery - not too close to him, but not too far either, leaving just enough space between them for a really, really thin person to fit tightly. Kame lowers his legs to the floor, but doesn’t move away, as Jin half expects him to do.
“Want some whiskey?”
There is a spare glass on the table, which could be Kame habitually picking one on his way back from genkan, driven by the same nostalgia that Jin has experienced just now, or just Kame playing the ideal host for the unwanted guest. Whichever the case, Jin plays along and pours a shot.
“What brings you here?” The question too is a peculiar mix of outward politeness and intended rudeness that only Kame is capable to pull off. It used to irk Jin like hell, when Kame tried this tone on him, but now he finds it almost endearing, this protective tactic - another slip in the composed indifference act. If Kame really didn’t want to see him, he could have told so by phone, not tell Jin the code.
“Nakamaru.”
Kame nods slightly, as if registering it as reason enough.
“Told you what happened?”
“Not really. I only figured that it is somehow related to Taguchi.” Jin sighs. “Something fairly serious, for him to call me. Did the two of you fight?”
“He is leaving.”
“Though who could honestly fight with Taguchi?” Jin blabbers on, until Kame’s quiet interjection finally sinks in completely. “ Wait… what?! Leaving? Who? Taguchi?.. No way!”
He gapes at Kame in utter disbelief, almost prepared for the guy to call it a joke, but Kame looks somber and very, very tired, biting his lip and staring into his glass with the intensity suggesting that the remaining few sips of whiskey in there hide all the mysteries of the universe.
“Yet, he is,” he confirms evenly. “Nobody knows about it outside of the Agency, so keep quiet”.
Jin’s mind positively swirls with the sudden news. Now, say about shit happening! Exclusively KAT-TUN bloody shit…
“What did he do? Got caught again with this… what’s-her-name, the girl he’s been dating for years? No, that would be too minor, unless… Married her in secret, and the Old Bitch learned it somehow and is sacking him because of that?”
“Aren’t you confusing Taguchi with yourself?” Kame bursts out irritably. “Or did I tell something to suggest that he is being sacked?” He breathes in deeply and then puts his glass onto the table and continues in a carefully measured tone, “He is quitting the Agency all of his own sweet volition. Something about him being thirty and wanting to live his own life and do the things that he likes… We’ve spent the last month and half trying to talk him out of it.”
“Let me guess… There was a lot of Nakamaru shouting, Ueda sulking, and Taguchi crying and trying to explain himself, right? In the end, Taguchi didn’t budge, and you are hiding from Nakamaru, because he wants you talk with Taguchi again, while you… wonder whether you have the right to try to make him stay, am I wrong?”
Kame’s hand clenches, where it has been lying peacefully on his knees, nails digging into the expensive cloth of his pants. “Don’t you think that your right to even presume that you know what I… No, what anyone in KAT-TUN does or thinks has expired six years ago?”
‘Some things do not change’, Jin wants to tell, but does not. Kame’s irritation itself tells him that his suppositions were more or less right on mark, so…
“All right,” he agrees amiably. “So why are you avoiding Nakamaru’s calls?”
Kame sighs, squirms a little, his glance jumping from his hands to the whiskey glass on the table, to the balcony door, as if he is purposefully avoiding looking at Jin or just craves a drink and a cigarette. Jin certainly could use the latter.
“He is… worried. Scared. Needs a reassurance and, yes, a promise that I will speak with Taguchi again. And I cannot give him one, because I doubt that whatever we can tell Taguchi can make him change his mind. Budge, as you put it… And I do not have the heart to tell Nakamaru to just fucking accept the fact.”
Jin nods understandingly. “He should, you know… Leaving the life that you lived for years, is not such an easy choice. Scary like hell… What will happen to me, once I leave? What will happen to the people I’m leaving? Can I possibly succeed on my own? Will my friends and my fans accept my decision, or will they just end up hating my guts?” He twirls the whiskey in his glass, but does not lift it to make a sip. “And in the end - will this new life be enough to compensate for all the things I will have to abandon?.. You ask yourself all those questions, before you ever tell anyone about your decision…”
He lifts his eyes to find Kame watching him quietly with a soft and very sad smile. “You really don’t have to repeat your own arguments and try to convince me - again. Six years ago-”
“You told me, I do not need to explain. That you asked yourself much the same questions, when you decided to quit baseball…”
For a few moments, they just hold each other’s gaze, the nostalgia hanging thick in the air, like a stale cigarette smoke of that bitterly remembered day, when they first exchanged these very words.
Then Kame visibly shakes himself awake. “It is late already. And I have to be at the ‘Giants’ training session by eight tomorrow.”
He rises to his feet, wordlessly showing that the time of Jin’s ‘friendly visit’ has run out, follows him to the genkan, and speaks again only once Jin has finished putting on his shoes and coat and is ready to leave.
“I didn’t expect it, but talking with you really helped me to make up my mind. So…” - Kame gathers his breath as if preparing for a difficult plunge - “thank you for coming today, but… let’s not make it a habit. Especially… on the day when we announce about Taguchi publically. Knowing you, you may think that you need to, but - don’t come then. I’m serious, don’t. Don’t come…”
***
Much to his surprise, Jin learns about the day of the announcement from Kame himself.
Meisa has a photoshoot until late in the evening, so it is Jin’s ‘household day’.
He wakes up at quarter past ten and stumbles to the kitchen picking up toys, pencils, pajama parts, tiny slippers and other relics of the early morning commotion, called ‘Meisa taking Theia to kindergarten, while being in a hurry herself’, as he goes. A blue crayon got smashed near the sofa by someone’s uncaring foot, so Jin makes a mental note to clean the place, once he gets more awake and up to the task.
After laying his findings on the kitchen table to be sorted later, Jin pours himself a cup of still lukewarm coffee, takes it to the balcony, makes a deep drag on the first morning ciggy, and, finally, feels just sufficiently awake to check his smartphone for what’s happening in the world.
And, well... what’s happening is a one-line message from Kame: “Best Artist tonight. Do not come.”
More than a month has passed since Jin’s visit, and quite a hectic month at that - with a concert in Shanghai, preparation of the DVD, new official goods, website redesign and all. So, for a few moments, Jin just stares on the message - curiously bare and un-Kame-like without the emoticons - wondering why, on Earth, would Kame all of a sudden notify him of a KAT-TUN performance. It’s actually the last three words that make the coin drop, because absent-minded as Jin is, the second meeting with Kame in six bloody years stays pretty much word-for-word clear in his memory.
Initially, all Jin thinks about this written reminder is ‘What the fuck?’ Does Kame really think that Jin is a child, who needs to be told things repeatedly? Home visiting is off-limits. Okay, point taken. No need to stress it again…
But as the day goes by, he grows more and more restlessness, and the simple household chores that he is doing - cleaning the crayon stain on the carpet, loading the dishwasher and taking the clean linen out of the washing machine - cannot really distract his mind from poking into the logical holes of this initial explanation.
Why has Kame decided to inform him about the announcement himself? Wouldn’t it be more logical for him to hope that Jin misses the broadcast altogether? Sure, Nippon TV’s Best Artist is one of the major music events of the year, and Jin might have watched it if not for KAT-TUN then for some other participants. But Kame could not be sure of it, right? Right. Actually, busy as Jin was this autumn - he didn’t even look up the date of the program, never mind the line-up.
Jin is equally positive that he had never-ever let it slip to any common acquaintances (be it Nakamaru, Pi, Ryo, or even Tackey, for that matter) that he still followed KAT-TUN appearances on TV. Well, not to the point of watching every single episode of them exploring the wilderness or stuffing their faces at the local ramen-shops, nor, definitely, their separate appearances as guests or co-hosts on various talk shows, but… well… their musical progress, okay? So-o… If Kame could not learned it from them, he could not have just guessed as much… or could he?
It’s really difficult to tell - with Kame. Jin knows him, possibly, better than anyone else does, and still the lines of reasoning that Kame’s mind is capable to come up with astounded him quite a few times - in the past. More importantly, Jin has long come to suspect that Kame’s logic oftentimes is based, like, directly on Kame’s subconscious, so what the guy actually does, and what he thinks that he is doing, may not always be exactly the same.
So, say… what if Kame’s subconscious wants Jin to come? He obviously can’t ask Jin directly, because he is, like, all for maintaining the distance, to the point where he himself has forcefully forbidden it before. And, for a person as proud as Kame, going back on his word will only make him feel pitiful. No, he cannot do that.
On the other hand, he must know very well that, if Jin watches the announcement, he will, definitely, want to come, and will, actually, most probably come, because - when exactly did Jin heed Kame’s prohibitions, if he was sure that he needed to do something? The more so, if Kame gives his contradictive spirit a little push with this last unnecessary reminder…
In such a case, of course, Kame would not want to risk Jin missing the show, because he’s, say, cooped up in the studio with his cellular turned off. Nor would he trust the above-mentioned acquaintances to inform Jin about it, because it can happen, like, much later, way into the night or even on tomorrow morning. Hence - this pre-emptive message sent so early Jin certainly receives it in time.
The theory makes sense, in a perfectly convoluted Kame-like way, the only downside to it being… that it could also be altogether wrong. In which case, if Jin does come, then Kame, already stressed out by the announcement, may get just mad enough to break what feeble kind of contact they’ve managed to re-establish…
And that’s where Jin’s mind makes an about turn and goes searching for other explanations all over again.
It gets a little better, once he picks Theia from the kindergarten, for his daughter is not the one to let him be distracted. They play and draw, and eat, and watch a few cartoons, and play, and draw again. In the end, as it ironically was just bound to happen, even though Jin has turned the TV on and to the right channel well in advance, Theia manages to upend a full glass of vegetable juice upon herself - literally upon, head to toes - at the exactly inopportune moment for Jin to miss the announcement completely.
He returns from the bathroom with his daughter freshly washed and wrapped in a bath towel, just in time to hear Kame’s voice hitch on the first notes of ‘Dead or Alive’, waits, ignoring the defiantly wriggling bundle in his arms, right until KAT-TUN - unusually unsmiling - bow at the end of the song, and only then carries Theia into her bedchamber.
An hour later, when she is safely asleep and her clothes are put into a basin to presoak in a stain-remover, Jin turns on his laptop to search the web for the part that he missed. He doesn’t have to search long, KAT-TUN is in the top ten on twitter, the shocked netizens madly reposting excerpts from the Best Artist and other programs that have already covered the news. The whole fandom is awash with crying emoticons, but Jin skips the text bits.
He concentrates on the videos, watching and re-watching them for every tiny detail: the rigid poses; the faces all the more ashen in contrast with their bright red frockcoats; Taguchi’s voice ringing with a curious mixture of remorse and triumphal liberation - all too familiar to JIn himself; Ueda looking like he wants to be anywhere but here; Nakamaru constantly shooting sideways glances into Kame’s direction; and the way Kame’s mike is imperceptibly shaking, when he apologizes on behalf of the whole group.
As he always does.
Now, and when Tanaka was kicked out, and… Jin wasn’t yet as proficient in pirate video searching back then, so he is not sure, but, most likely, when Jin left as well. He cannot even imagine how much Kame must hate it - this need to step forward to apologize and take the responsibility, and make promises - every time when someone else leaves. And him being the youngest, the fucking ‘baby of the group’, couldn’t they at least fucking take turns?!
But Jin is hardly the one, who has the right to blame them… and, knowing the idiot, he probably volunteers.
Jin is re-watching the sequence for the sixth or seventh time already, when Meisa returns. She must have heard the news at work, some ‘kind soul’ among the staff feeling the need to inform her about it, since she is Jin’s wife, and Jin is ex-KAT-TUN. Bad news travel fast. And she must have watched some news program between takes, because she recognizes the picture frozen on Jin’s laptop at once and greets him with ‘So you already know…’ instead of ‘I’m home’.
“I very nearly broke a few traffic laws, trying to get back sooner,” she continues before Jin has so much as said, ‘Yes, I do’. “You should still be able to make it by train. Or better still, take a taxi. I’d let you have the car, but I’ll need it to take Theia to the kindergarten tomorrow.”
Part 2
Written For: frameofmind6
Pairing: Akame
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 16 230
Warnings: occasional despondency, some adult cynicism, free interpretation of the story behind KAT-TUN hiatus and utter disregard to the canon things that happen after the timeline of this story, such as the second Akanishi baby.
Author's Notes: Dear Jess, sorry I couldn't follow your trope closer or make it into a higher rating, somehow the story just wanted to end where it ends. I hope you enjoy the story nevertheless.
Summary: In a way, it would have been easier, if their relationship were something new, without all these memories of shared past facing them like an insurmountable hurdle or a high cliff they have to close their eyes and jump of.
Nakamaru has a different number - again, and Jin is undecided whether to count it as a thing that changed or one of the essentially Nakamaru traits that make him equally exasperating and endearing. Indeed if Jin scrolls through the history of their calls far enough, there they will be - the ‘Contact number changed’ notifications meticulously sent to him every couple of years. To him, and probably to all the other people in Nakamaru’s cellular as well, and Jin wonders whether the guy actually uses such occasions to cleanse his “Contacts” or rather - to inauspiciously remind the recipients that it’s high time to call. Jin, for instance, calls him back as soon as he can each time that he receives one.
The thing that most definitely has not changed even one bit is Nakamaru’s habit to teach people how they should live their lives. This time too, Jin barely has time to recognize his voice, and Nakamaru is already commanding, “You should call Kame!”
“Why?”
“Because he may answer you!” Nakamaru sounds irritable and stressed, but then Nakamaru is prone to stressing over anything that doesn’t fit into his imaginary order of things, and the fact - in and of itself - is not a justifiable cause for Jin to worry as well.
“Well, the two of us have not talked-”
“Since that Bruno Mars concert, I know,” Nakamaru interrupts impatiently, and that is… not really true. Jin and Kame may not ‘talk’ per se, but they still call each other sort of regularly. Jin’s calls - just a mumbled ‘Happy birthday, have a good year’, followed by a long silence and a measured ‘Thank you’. Kame’s - all smooth congratulations, making one wonder if he writes them in advance and rehearses before the mirror for just the proper tinge of sincerity. ‘How is your wife doing?’, and ‘How is your daughter doing?’, and ‘How is the songwriting going?’ - this kind of stuff… Nice and grown-up behavior that Kame is cultivating nowadays…
Touching, nevertheless.
That Nakamaru is oblivious of this fact, though, is interesting. For Kame and Nakamaru converse a lot, not only about work, and at some point they did talk about him, Jin is fairly sure, otherwise… well, Nakamaru would not appeal to him now? So, well… if Kame chose to keep quiet about calling him barely three months ago, Jin can follow suit.
“Exactly. So, why me?”
“Because he doesn’t answer me, and Ueda won’t call, even if I-”
“Have you tried Pi? They keep in touch…”
Yet, come to think of it… Pi has never shown that he knows about those birthday calls either… Very, very interesting, Kame! Jin draws on his cigarette to hide a satisfied smirk.
“I did, but his manager told, he was busy filming, and his cellular was turned off.”
“Hmm… Taguchi? Kame used to have a soft spot for this idiot…” Jin, for one, would definitely ask Taguchi before even considering Ueda, or… well, himself.
There is silence in his cellular. Sudden and complete. A bad silence, telling… The more so, since the guy he is speaking with is someone able to fire a thousand words a minute, indeed, was doing just that but a few moments ago…
Jin rubs his forearms, suddenly feeling cold in a stifling studio. “Has something happened?”
The question comes almost by instinct, and yes, maybe Jin is overreacting, goosebumps and all… But this is KAT-TUN, you know? The band where things happen. And whatever happens… more often than not - is shit…
Now, where the bloody fuck has he put his coat?!
Nakamaru on the other side sighs tiredly. “He will tell you himself. If he answers, that is, and, well, if you call.”
***
Kame sounds tired as well, when he answers on the third ring. Tired, distracted and stressed. “What do you want?”
Wow, if it isn’t a question that Jin can answer in a number of ways… Now is probably not the right time though, so he goes with the simplest and more immediate. “I’m standing before your building. The code on the front door has changed.”
There is a long pause, and Jin can almost imagine Kame staring at the screen of his cellular, as if the thing has utterly, unbelievably betrayed him, absently rubbing his shoulder, and then… Yes, here is this barely audible sound of someone licking his lips.
“Wait a moment. It’s somewhere in my wallet…”
Jin hears the distant shuffling, probably, Kame rising from his sofa and heading into genkan, where he dropped his bag.
“They only changed it last month, and I mostly come and go through the parking lot, so… Hasn’t learnt it myself.” As if it really is something that he needs to apologize for.
More shuffling, clatter, a muffled curse.
“Right. Here it is. Five-two-zero-two-one… But, ehm… Couldn’t you just press the doorbell? So I could buzz you in?”
“Wanted to,” Jin confesses easily, pressing the keys and pulling on the handle once he hears the buzz. “But it turns out I do not remember your apartment by number, only that it is third from the elevator. Didn’t want to wake your neighbor by mistake.”
A quite chuckle. “Typically you… Well, come on up.” And the call disconnects.
***
The code on Kame’s apartment door has not changed.
Ever since they started installing the electronic locks and over the several gradually improving apartments, it remained the same. ‘Zero-two-two-three’, a dead giveaway for anyone, who knows Kame even a trifle. He chooses the buildings with the tightest security and ardently guards his address from anyone, who is not family or the closest circle of friends, yet, refuses to re-code the lock. Kame is complicated like this.
Pausing before the door, Jin wonders if he still counts as one of ‘friends’ and whether Kame expects him to just let himself in - like in the olden days - or press the bell.
In the end, he dials the code anyway, and once he enters the genkan, Jin’s head reels with the sudden sense of nostalgia - for everything feels exactly the same. Well… The shoes neatly straightened by the wall are new and there are a few additions among the souvenirs on the side table, but he knows this umbrella-stand, and this vitrine with Kame’s baseball memorabilia, and even the way how Kame sits on his sofa - all balled up with his legs pulled tightly to the chest - awakes the memories of times, Jin better not start remembering right now.
So, he concentrates on the things that are different: the new sofa; the new haircut; the new type of booze on the glass table - expensive whiskey in place of beer and wine they got soused on before; tight fitting slacks and a white shirt - instead of loose sweatpants and washed-out tee.
The latter though may simply mean that Kame is sitting like this ever since he came from work without bothering to undress…
He enters the living room and Kame raises his head. The eye contact is brief, Kame pats the sofa invitingly and returns to contemplating his glass even before Jin has lowered himself onto the off-white upholstery - not too close to him, but not too far either, leaving just enough space between them for a really, really thin person to fit tightly. Kame lowers his legs to the floor, but doesn’t move away, as Jin half expects him to do.
“Want some whiskey?”
There is a spare glass on the table, which could be Kame habitually picking one on his way back from genkan, driven by the same nostalgia that Jin has experienced just now, or just Kame playing the ideal host for the unwanted guest. Whichever the case, Jin plays along and pours a shot.
“What brings you here?” The question too is a peculiar mix of outward politeness and intended rudeness that only Kame is capable to pull off. It used to irk Jin like hell, when Kame tried this tone on him, but now he finds it almost endearing, this protective tactic - another slip in the composed indifference act. If Kame really didn’t want to see him, he could have told so by phone, not tell Jin the code.
“Nakamaru.”
Kame nods slightly, as if registering it as reason enough.
“Told you what happened?”
“Not really. I only figured that it is somehow related to Taguchi.” Jin sighs. “Something fairly serious, for him to call me. Did the two of you fight?”
“He is leaving.”
“Though who could honestly fight with Taguchi?” Jin blabbers on, until Kame’s quiet interjection finally sinks in completely. “ Wait… what?! Leaving? Who? Taguchi?.. No way!”
He gapes at Kame in utter disbelief, almost prepared for the guy to call it a joke, but Kame looks somber and very, very tired, biting his lip and staring into his glass with the intensity suggesting that the remaining few sips of whiskey in there hide all the mysteries of the universe.
“Yet, he is,” he confirms evenly. “Nobody knows about it outside of the Agency, so keep quiet”.
Jin’s mind positively swirls with the sudden news. Now, say about shit happening! Exclusively KAT-TUN bloody shit…
“What did he do? Got caught again with this… what’s-her-name, the girl he’s been dating for years? No, that would be too minor, unless… Married her in secret, and the Old Bitch learned it somehow and is sacking him because of that?”
“Aren’t you confusing Taguchi with yourself?” Kame bursts out irritably. “Or did I tell something to suggest that he is being sacked?” He breathes in deeply and then puts his glass onto the table and continues in a carefully measured tone, “He is quitting the Agency all of his own sweet volition. Something about him being thirty and wanting to live his own life and do the things that he likes… We’ve spent the last month and half trying to talk him out of it.”
“Let me guess… There was a lot of Nakamaru shouting, Ueda sulking, and Taguchi crying and trying to explain himself, right? In the end, Taguchi didn’t budge, and you are hiding from Nakamaru, because he wants you talk with Taguchi again, while you… wonder whether you have the right to try to make him stay, am I wrong?”
Kame’s hand clenches, where it has been lying peacefully on his knees, nails digging into the expensive cloth of his pants. “Don’t you think that your right to even presume that you know what I… No, what anyone in KAT-TUN does or thinks has expired six years ago?”
‘Some things do not change’, Jin wants to tell, but does not. Kame’s irritation itself tells him that his suppositions were more or less right on mark, so…
“All right,” he agrees amiably. “So why are you avoiding Nakamaru’s calls?”
Kame sighs, squirms a little, his glance jumping from his hands to the whiskey glass on the table, to the balcony door, as if he is purposefully avoiding looking at Jin or just craves a drink and a cigarette. Jin certainly could use the latter.
“He is… worried. Scared. Needs a reassurance and, yes, a promise that I will speak with Taguchi again. And I cannot give him one, because I doubt that whatever we can tell Taguchi can make him change his mind. Budge, as you put it… And I do not have the heart to tell Nakamaru to just fucking accept the fact.”
Jin nods understandingly. “He should, you know… Leaving the life that you lived for years, is not such an easy choice. Scary like hell… What will happen to me, once I leave? What will happen to the people I’m leaving? Can I possibly succeed on my own? Will my friends and my fans accept my decision, or will they just end up hating my guts?” He twirls the whiskey in his glass, but does not lift it to make a sip. “And in the end - will this new life be enough to compensate for all the things I will have to abandon?.. You ask yourself all those questions, before you ever tell anyone about your decision…”
He lifts his eyes to find Kame watching him quietly with a soft and very sad smile. “You really don’t have to repeat your own arguments and try to convince me - again. Six years ago-”
“You told me, I do not need to explain. That you asked yourself much the same questions, when you decided to quit baseball…”
For a few moments, they just hold each other’s gaze, the nostalgia hanging thick in the air, like a stale cigarette smoke of that bitterly remembered day, when they first exchanged these very words.
Then Kame visibly shakes himself awake. “It is late already. And I have to be at the ‘Giants’ training session by eight tomorrow.”
He rises to his feet, wordlessly showing that the time of Jin’s ‘friendly visit’ has run out, follows him to the genkan, and speaks again only once Jin has finished putting on his shoes and coat and is ready to leave.
“I didn’t expect it, but talking with you really helped me to make up my mind. So…” - Kame gathers his breath as if preparing for a difficult plunge - “thank you for coming today, but… let’s not make it a habit. Especially… on the day when we announce about Taguchi publically. Knowing you, you may think that you need to, but - don’t come then. I’m serious, don’t. Don’t come…”
***
Much to his surprise, Jin learns about the day of the announcement from Kame himself.
Meisa has a photoshoot until late in the evening, so it is Jin’s ‘household day’.
He wakes up at quarter past ten and stumbles to the kitchen picking up toys, pencils, pajama parts, tiny slippers and other relics of the early morning commotion, called ‘Meisa taking Theia to kindergarten, while being in a hurry herself’, as he goes. A blue crayon got smashed near the sofa by someone’s uncaring foot, so Jin makes a mental note to clean the place, once he gets more awake and up to the task.
After laying his findings on the kitchen table to be sorted later, Jin pours himself a cup of still lukewarm coffee, takes it to the balcony, makes a deep drag on the first morning ciggy, and, finally, feels just sufficiently awake to check his smartphone for what’s happening in the world.
And, well... what’s happening is a one-line message from Kame: “Best Artist tonight. Do not come.”
More than a month has passed since Jin’s visit, and quite a hectic month at that - with a concert in Shanghai, preparation of the DVD, new official goods, website redesign and all. So, for a few moments, Jin just stares on the message - curiously bare and un-Kame-like without the emoticons - wondering why, on Earth, would Kame all of a sudden notify him of a KAT-TUN performance. It’s actually the last three words that make the coin drop, because absent-minded as Jin is, the second meeting with Kame in six bloody years stays pretty much word-for-word clear in his memory.
Initially, all Jin thinks about this written reminder is ‘What the fuck?’ Does Kame really think that Jin is a child, who needs to be told things repeatedly? Home visiting is off-limits. Okay, point taken. No need to stress it again…
But as the day goes by, he grows more and more restlessness, and the simple household chores that he is doing - cleaning the crayon stain on the carpet, loading the dishwasher and taking the clean linen out of the washing machine - cannot really distract his mind from poking into the logical holes of this initial explanation.
Why has Kame decided to inform him about the announcement himself? Wouldn’t it be more logical for him to hope that Jin misses the broadcast altogether? Sure, Nippon TV’s Best Artist is one of the major music events of the year, and Jin might have watched it if not for KAT-TUN then for some other participants. But Kame could not be sure of it, right? Right. Actually, busy as Jin was this autumn - he didn’t even look up the date of the program, never mind the line-up.
Jin is equally positive that he had never-ever let it slip to any common acquaintances (be it Nakamaru, Pi, Ryo, or even Tackey, for that matter) that he still followed KAT-TUN appearances on TV. Well, not to the point of watching every single episode of them exploring the wilderness or stuffing their faces at the local ramen-shops, nor, definitely, their separate appearances as guests or co-hosts on various talk shows, but… well… their musical progress, okay? So-o… If Kame could not learned it from them, he could not have just guessed as much… or could he?
It’s really difficult to tell - with Kame. Jin knows him, possibly, better than anyone else does, and still the lines of reasoning that Kame’s mind is capable to come up with astounded him quite a few times - in the past. More importantly, Jin has long come to suspect that Kame’s logic oftentimes is based, like, directly on Kame’s subconscious, so what the guy actually does, and what he thinks that he is doing, may not always be exactly the same.
So, say… what if Kame’s subconscious wants Jin to come? He obviously can’t ask Jin directly, because he is, like, all for maintaining the distance, to the point where he himself has forcefully forbidden it before. And, for a person as proud as Kame, going back on his word will only make him feel pitiful. No, he cannot do that.
On the other hand, he must know very well that, if Jin watches the announcement, he will, definitely, want to come, and will, actually, most probably come, because - when exactly did Jin heed Kame’s prohibitions, if he was sure that he needed to do something? The more so, if Kame gives his contradictive spirit a little push with this last unnecessary reminder…
In such a case, of course, Kame would not want to risk Jin missing the show, because he’s, say, cooped up in the studio with his cellular turned off. Nor would he trust the above-mentioned acquaintances to inform Jin about it, because it can happen, like, much later, way into the night or even on tomorrow morning. Hence - this pre-emptive message sent so early Jin certainly receives it in time.
The theory makes sense, in a perfectly convoluted Kame-like way, the only downside to it being… that it could also be altogether wrong. In which case, if Jin does come, then Kame, already stressed out by the announcement, may get just mad enough to break what feeble kind of contact they’ve managed to re-establish…
And that’s where Jin’s mind makes an about turn and goes searching for other explanations all over again.
It gets a little better, once he picks Theia from the kindergarten, for his daughter is not the one to let him be distracted. They play and draw, and eat, and watch a few cartoons, and play, and draw again. In the end, as it ironically was just bound to happen, even though Jin has turned the TV on and to the right channel well in advance, Theia manages to upend a full glass of vegetable juice upon herself - literally upon, head to toes - at the exactly inopportune moment for Jin to miss the announcement completely.
He returns from the bathroom with his daughter freshly washed and wrapped in a bath towel, just in time to hear Kame’s voice hitch on the first notes of ‘Dead or Alive’, waits, ignoring the defiantly wriggling bundle in his arms, right until KAT-TUN - unusually unsmiling - bow at the end of the song, and only then carries Theia into her bedchamber.
An hour later, when she is safely asleep and her clothes are put into a basin to presoak in a stain-remover, Jin turns on his laptop to search the web for the part that he missed. He doesn’t have to search long, KAT-TUN is in the top ten on twitter, the shocked netizens madly reposting excerpts from the Best Artist and other programs that have already covered the news. The whole fandom is awash with crying emoticons, but Jin skips the text bits.
He concentrates on the videos, watching and re-watching them for every tiny detail: the rigid poses; the faces all the more ashen in contrast with their bright red frockcoats; Taguchi’s voice ringing with a curious mixture of remorse and triumphal liberation - all too familiar to JIn himself; Ueda looking like he wants to be anywhere but here; Nakamaru constantly shooting sideways glances into Kame’s direction; and the way Kame’s mike is imperceptibly shaking, when he apologizes on behalf of the whole group.
As he always does.
Now, and when Tanaka was kicked out, and… Jin wasn’t yet as proficient in pirate video searching back then, so he is not sure, but, most likely, when Jin left as well. He cannot even imagine how much Kame must hate it - this need to step forward to apologize and take the responsibility, and make promises - every time when someone else leaves. And him being the youngest, the fucking ‘baby of the group’, couldn’t they at least fucking take turns?!
But Jin is hardly the one, who has the right to blame them… and, knowing the idiot, he probably volunteers.
Jin is re-watching the sequence for the sixth or seventh time already, when Meisa returns. She must have heard the news at work, some ‘kind soul’ among the staff feeling the need to inform her about it, since she is Jin’s wife, and Jin is ex-KAT-TUN. Bad news travel fast. And she must have watched some news program between takes, because she recognizes the picture frozen on Jin’s laptop at once and greets him with ‘So you already know…’ instead of ‘I’m home’.
“I very nearly broke a few traffic laws, trying to get back sooner,” she continues before Jin has so much as said, ‘Yes, I do’. “You should still be able to make it by train. Or better still, take a taxi. I’d let you have the car, but I’ll need it to take Theia to the kindergarten tomorrow.”
Part 2