of tomorrows, 2/2
Title: Of Tomorrows
Pairing(s): Sho/Nino, Ohno/Jun, implied Aiba/Jun
Rating: PG
Word Count: ~19,900
Summary: Sho's assignment for the month of August is simple enough: find Ninomiya Kazunari.
A/N: Part two of two.
And that, Sho decides much later, is where his new assignment really started.
He stayed for nearly an hour. For longer than he should have, certainly, but the weather was disgusting and once Sho sat down on one of Ninomiya's couches he couldn't be bothered to get up again. The feeling of leaving nagged at him for awhile--go, you shouldn't be here, leave, this is your professional job and he's not your friend--but he didn't listen to any of that. There had to be a point in life, Sho thought as he watched Nino move around in the kitchen, silently but efficiently, where you just gave in to your desires and decided to fuck the rest.
It was an unnerving feeling. Sho suspected it had to do a lot with his upbringing, why he felt so odd about all of this, but he forced himself to stay anyway and he forced himself to get comfortable and he forced himself to answer Ninomiya's questions honestly.
Ninomiya had a lot of questions.
"So did you know about me before you took this job?" he asked first. He was unloading his groceries, and part of Sho desperately wanted to peek into the refrigerator to see exactly how much butter and milk such a thin young man could possibly have. But he stayed in his seat.
"You could say that," Sho responded. It was a better answer than the truth--that Sho had basically no idea who Ninomiya Kazunari was until Aiba introduced them, however crudely, through magazine articles.
"You had no idea I existed, did you," Ninomiya shot back. He stepped out of the kitchen, and Sho saw he had a piece of toast and a glass of milk in his hands. "Most people would have gotten flustered, even if they didn't like my work. Whenever you're with someone of--what did you say earlier?--a different 'caliber,' you can't help but give yourself away."
He took a bite of toast and chewed slowly. Sho watched him swallow.
"Did I come in to discuss philosophy? I would have dressed better, in that case." It was the only thing Sho could think of, but Ninomiya laughed again into his glass of milk.
"You're interesting for a grocery deliveryman," he said, and Sho smiled dryly.
"You're interesting for a supposed recluse."
"Ah." Ninomiya took the seat across from Sho and grinned smugly. "So you did know about me."
This time, they both laughed.
Where, Sho thinks later as he drives home--it is still raining, and he is still driving as slowly as he can--where was the logic in that whole situation? Ninomiya should have kicked him out as soon as Sho handed over the bag of groceries. He should have issued Sho a curt "hello" and an even icier "goodbye," and all that should have happened within the span of thirty seconds. He should have told Sho to go home, there's nothing to see here, no apartment to be let into, no conversations to be had.
But none of that happened. Sho stayed and Nino ate his breakfast and talked to Sho about how his family didn't even know he lived here, but he went back sometimes just to let them know he was still okay, that he hadn't disappeared into thin air without leaving a goodbye note.
"My sister said that my movies were like notes to our family," Ninomiya said, and propped his chin in his hand. It made him look even younger, with the bed head and the slouchy pajamas and the moles--Sho noticed the moles as Nino talked. There were three on his face, dotting the left side with some kind of pinpoint accuracy as if he were a target of some sort, a lithe bulls-eye that moved and talked and laughed. And Sho, Sho was the gun.
"Why don't you see them more often?" Sho asked. "It's not like you have to hide yourself away."
"It's not like you have to deliver my groceries," Ninomiya said. "But why do you do it? Because you get paid and it's what you know how to do, right? So I live here and I don't go out because I'm comfortable." He stopped on the edge of another sentence--Sho could see his eyes still in the conversation, still focused on his thoughts--but nothing else came out of his mouth.
Sho couldn't think of anything to say, either. And that was okay, he supposed, because Ninomiya got up soon after and told him he could come back tomorrow.
"Could you bring me some bread?" he asked before Sho left. "I'm running out."
"Technically, you have to call the store and have them add it to your list," Sho said. He could never resist pulling out all the professional stops.
Ninomiya stared.
"Technically," he said flatly, "you're working right now and should not have come into my house."
"Technically you're a recluse," Sho said, "and should not be speaking to me."
Ninomiya made a face and shut the door, but not before saying, "I'll see your technical ass tomorrow."
Soon enough tomorrow becomes like a prayer, and Sho can't shake it off even when he tries--he cleans the entire apartment (Aiba makes exaggerated gagging noises when he goes near cleaning supplies), plays with the kittens for almost an hour, and makes dinner for himself. He even wishes he could go out again to do his normal paparazzo shoots, but since he signed the contract with Weekend he doesn't have to do that anymore. His job now is all Ninomiya, all the time.
He's eating by himself, sitting in the almost-dark at the kitchen table, when the phone rings.
Sho thinks Aiba is calling from Chiba, because under his parents' roof he doesn't have to pay the phone bill and can use the thing whenever, however he wants to. He's done it before under the pretense that he forgot to unplug the iron and wanted Sho to check if he had, but that was when they didn't even have an iron. They ended up talking for a long time that night--it was the first night Aiba stayed away from the apartment for more than two days--and Sho tries not to think about it much, because it makes him feel like they're married. Oh, if only Aiba could give him grandchildren. Then his mother might be happy with something in his life.
But it's not Aiba on the other line this time.
"We just want to see how you're doing, Sakurai-san." The woman's voice filtering in through the phone is one Sho hears often at Weekend; she's not the receptionist, but she works in the office. "You know, how you're progressing with things."
"Just fine, thank you," Sho says curtly, and drags his fork through the sauce on his plate. Just like they do in Zen gardens, he thinks. Be calm. "To be honest there's not much to report. He's not a very open person."
"Of course we know that," the office lady quips. "We wouldn't have you on this job if he was easy to find, you know."
"Yes, of course," Sho responds. The Zen-like lines on his plate get a little more tangled. "Pardon me."
"Anyway, we're just calling to remind you that we need a report of everything you've discovered by the end of next week," she goes on. It sounds like she's immersed in something else--a game of Solitaire, maybe, or she could be filing her nails. There's only so much to do if you work in the office of a tabloid magazine, after all. "So you have a lot of time to gather information."
If Weekend is giving Sho two weeks to compile a report of everything he's found out about Ninomiya Kazunari, then they must be expecting a lot. They would want details of any conversations that took place, the contents of Ninomiya's groceries from day one to fourteen, and the exact color and texture of his window curtains, carpet, and pieces of furniture. They'd want Sho to explain what Ninomiya looks like when he's not working, when he's not making movies--they would want a description of Ninomiya in his loose clothes and messy hair and scattered moles. They would want to know what his feet looked like (this is the only detail Sho can't give; Ninomiya's pants covered the tops of his feet completely).
Sho lets go of the fork and winces at the clattering sound it makes when it hits the plate.
"I won't disappoint," Sho says resolutely, because he can't let himself say anything else. "You'll have your report, don't worry."
But a part of Sho stings. When he closes his eyes he sees Ninomiya yawning, arms stretching toward the ceiling childishly like he hadn't a care in the world, and the image--so vivid, still--makes him miserable. How could anyone give that picture away, even in words, just like that, without even a second thought?
"And you'll have your check," the office lady says cheerfully.
"How much?" It wasn't a polite question, but Sho couldn't help but ask.
"More than you're used to."
Sho puts his forehead on the tabletop and wishes very hard on stars he can't see, because the rain outside is like an ocean being dumped on Tokyo, relentless and unforgiving. He wishes that he could just quit, but that he could still see Ninomiya every morning. He wishes on tomorrow and those twenty-eight stars he can still remember from college. Maybe one fades each year, supernovas blasting far off in space because time passes and you can't keep stars in a jar forever (even fireflies have to die). In that case he's only got twenty-two left, but that's enough for him, and hopefully enough for his wishes.
"You'll have your report," Sho says again, and hangs up.
-
The loaf of bread is whole-wheat, wrapped tightly in plastic and a little damp thanks to the rain (it hadn't stopped from yesterday. Sho worries about Aiba driving in this weather, but he can't do anything about it and so tries to stay positive). It has a sticker on the front--Maruyama Brand Products, it says, in big red letters--and Sho had to smuggle it into Ninomiya's groceries without anyone looking.
"Technically," Sho says as he hands over the loaf, "what I did is illegal, because everything you pay for has to be recorded in the ledger, and you didn't actually pay for this."
Ninomiya accepts the bread gingerly.
"I like white," he says after he's examined the bread with the caution of one examining a strange-looking mold.
"White bread is bad for your health," Sho says matter-of-factly. "Whole-wheat is better for you. It's what I have for breakfast every morning."
"I'm not entirely sure when you became my mother," Ninomiya says, and scratches at the tip of his nose. Their eyes meet briefly and Sho notices the bags under Ninomiya's eyes--not heavy or too dark, but they're there. "Or why you want everyone to have the same breakfast that you have every morning."
"I'm not--that's not what I meant," Sho splutters.
"Sakurai-san," Ninomiya says then, tilting his head slightly. Some of his hair falls across his forehead, and Sho watches him brush it away impatiently. "When's the last time you had pancakes for breakfast?"
"Not for awhile," Sho confesses. "It's always been toast."
"You're deprived," Ninomiya sighs, and pads into his kitchen. "Sit down. You're eating here."
"I'm eating here?"
Ninomiya just looks at Sho with his eyebrows raised. That's what I said, isn't it?
So Sho has plain pancakes, courtesy of Ninomiya Kazunari, on a weekday morning. It's been years since Sho had anything other than bread for breakfast and he's not even sure if he remembers what pancakes taste like, but his first bite is nothing less than a little shock of bliss and he finishes an entire short stack in less than ten minutes. The pancakes may be plain, but they're buttery and fluffy--in any case, they're more flavorful than any crumbly piece of toast could ever be.
Ninomiya watches him silently from across the table. He's wearing different pajamas today, Sho notices: instead of the too-big pants he has shorts on, ones with a red checker pattern that barely cover his knees. Over his torso hangs a tank top, unremarkably white, the kind you'd buy in a pack at the convenience store.
And he hasn't shaved yet. There's a patch of stubble on his chin, and he rubs at it every so often.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you not to accept food from strangers?" Ninomiya asks softly when Sho is done and has laid his fork down, only a little embarrassed to have eaten so much in such a short time.
Sho grins. "Did you drug me?"
"You'll find out."
And maybe Sho is drugged, because he keeps coming back when Ninomiya asks him to, and he stays long after he's passed on the groceries. He stays for pancakes and conversation and to see what Ninomiya looks like on that particular day (always sleepy, always with bed head, and always showing more skin every time Sho comes over). But mostly he stays for the conversation.
They talk about everything. They've had conversations about the weather, about Ninomiya's family, about Sho's economics degree and how Ninomiya never went to college. He was scouted, he says one morning as he slices strawberries for their pancakes (even the pancakes had become a quick tradition), when he was twenty. He'd been in a bookstore and some agent had followed him around for hours before Ninomiya tried to run away and the agent had stopped him and explained everything ("But not," Ninomiya says smugly, "before I tried to punch him in the face").
On the fourth day Ninomiya talks about how no one ever calls him that--no one that knows him, anyway. He asks Sho to call him Nino.
"Does this mean that I know you now?" Sho jokes.
Nino doesn't respond. He only hums, a long and wondering note, and Sho doesn't bring it up again.
What they don't ever discuss is why Nino invited Sho into his apartment on that first day--why Nino decided that this was okay, that Sho was okay. Sho expects that one day it will come up in between their normal conversations, in between talk of hobbies (Nino likes video games; Sho says he's sort of into photography but isn't sure he likes it as much as he thought he did) and friends (Sho talks about Aiba more than he should, but Nino listens intently and laughs at all of Aiba's stupid antics) and food ("Can I bring some of these home?" Sho sometimes asks. He means the pancakes, but Ninomiya just tells him, "You can have some more tomorrow, you don't need to take them home"). But it never does.
Still, Sho can't seem to start his days off right anymore unless he sees Nino in the morning--tired, small Nino with his sharp tongue and strange ways and telling eyes. With every tomorrow that Nino promises and Sho dreams about, the two of them come closer to Weekend's deadline, but Sho won't allow himself to think about it too much.
If he does, he'll have to tell Nino about it. And that--well. Sho won't think about that, either. He's pushing away more thoughts than he ever has in his life, but he figures that what he gets to go through every morning is worth the ignorance.
Sho brings Nino a loaf of white bread on the fifth day.
On the seventh day Sho gets a tour of Nino's apartment. It's a proper tour, and Sho is introduced to the bathroom, the guest room, a walk-in hallway closet that contains nothing more than a vacuum cleaner and a broom, and Nino's bedroom.
Sho peeks in. There's a single bed covered with white sheets, a television, and a dresser. The walls are bare and there are no other decorations unless you count the bedside table, which doesn't have anything on it besides a lamp without a shade and a pair of dark-rimmed glasses. A pair of slippers--blue and fuzzy--sits next to the bed, but Sho's never seen Nino wear them. Sho wouldn't be surprised if Nino said he puts them there just for show.
What catches Sho's attention the most is that Nino has a guest room.
"Do you ever have guests?" Sho says as they stand in front of the room. It's just as plain as Nino's, only there isn't a television and the comforter actually has a violet floral pattern on it, as if that's supposed to make the room more inviting. "I don't see why you'd need a guest room if you don't have anyone visiting."
"I have one visitor, occasionally. A friend I've made in this business," Nino says, and stifles a yawn behind his hand. Sho guesses it must be anywhere from eight to eight-thirty--very early, he supposes, to most people. "He says he comes here to check on me since I don't really go out. But besides him, there's no one."
He turns to Sho. "In fact, I'm surprised you come back every day."
"It's my job," Sho says, but Nino shakes his head.
"If this was just your job," Nino points out, "you'd just leave my groceries at the door and go home. But you don't. You stay here, and probably longer than you should."
Sho swallows thickly. Of course he does all that, and he's only been trying not to think about any of it. But here is Nino, now, bringing everything up like Sho never took the time to throw all those thoughts away in favor of simply acting without thinking. As they stand together in the small hallway Nino has his arms crossed over his chest and his voice is even, calm; he talks like he's been studying Sho for the past week and has come to many conclusions.
And maybe he's right about all of them.
"Tell me, do you care about anything?"
Nino asks the question point-blank. When Sho looks up and into Nino's eyes he suddenly feels trapped there, locked in some sort of force-field that Nino's gaze has created. He won't be let go until he answers.
"Yes," Sho says slowly. He doesn't know any other way around this than to simply answer the question. "I care about my family, and my roommate, and my kittens."
Nino smiles. "That's all?"
Sho nods.
"See," Nino says, and uncrosses his arms. Something in him has relaxed, but Sho doesn't know what. "You didn't say you cared about your job. If you did, we wouldn't be standing here right now. You've told me about your family and your cats and this Aiba-san of yours, but you don't ever talk about what you do for a living. Either you don't enjoy it or you're not allowed to talk about it."
"That doesn't matter, though," Nino continues before Sho can say anything, before he can even register the bubbling feeling of panic in his gut. "I don't really care as long as you keep coming back."
Sho stares, absolutely dumbstruck. Part of him feels frozen and the other half of him doesn't understand what's happening--is Nino trying to say something? Does he know that Sho is the secret connection between Nino's private life and a tabloid with nationwide circulation? And what does he mean when he says none of that matters as long as Sho keeps coming back? Surely Sho can't be hearing this right. He must be missing something.
"Do you want to know," Nino says finally, "why I asked you to come in that first day?"
Sho nods. His body isn't in the right state of mind to do much else.
Of course Nino doesn't tell him right away. For the first time in seven days Sho hopes that he won't hear the word that's become his mantra, his little prayer in the rain and through the night when he can't sleep--but Nino says it. "Tomorrow, I'll tell you," he promises, and sends Sho away, again without any pancakes to take home.
-
Sho drives straight home after he leaves Nino's apartment. When he unlocks the door and sees Aiba sprawled out on the couch, not exactly dressed properly and with a bowl of popcorn balanced in his lap, he swears he's never felt so relieved in his life.
After returning home from Chiba, Aiba received a slew of assignments from Weekend that not only included the regular nighttime haunts but also special daytime ventures. Usually Aiba shot at night, but sometimes if there was a lot going on that day he would have to show up at hotels and airports in broad daylight to shoot at gangbangs, or events where large numbers of paparazzi would be present. He had night-and-day assignments for four days straight, and since Sho left in the morning before Aiba woke they didn't get to see each other until very late at night. By that time, Sho was already in bed and Aiba already asleep while standing.
But here he is now, and somehow Sho feels like everything is going to be okay.
"Another tomorrow?" Aiba asks gently when Sho sits down next to him on the couch. Aiba made room as soon as he saw Sho walk through the door. "I feel like he's playing you."
"I feel like I'm okay with that," Sho says. "I just--I don't get him. He goes out, did you know that? To see his family. He does leave the house. And he does have a life. He has friends, and he cooks."
"So basically you're saying that he's a pro at hide-and-go-seek," Aiba says, and hands the bowl of popcorn over to Sho. Sho takes a handful without even thinking about calories or snack food conservation. "Is that what you're going to tell Weekend? They'll have a fun time with that one."
Sho falls silent. "I don't know what I'm going to tell Weekend," he mumbles.
There are too many things Sho could tell Weekend that it's hard for him to imagine simply lying and saying he didn't find anything out about Nino. In that case, he would lose this special assignment and the extra money and be demoted to the lower ranks of paparazzi--or be fired altogether.
Sho won't let himself get fired from a tabloid magazine. If anything, he would have to be the one to quit.
"Sho-chan," Aiba says soothingly, because Aiba somehow absorbs all of Sho's feelings and manages to make them into something better within seconds, something more manageable and tame than the quiet rages in Sho's chest, "listen. Why don't you just lie to them? Make up some random story? You know they'll believe you. It's not like they have any way of proving whether you're right or not."
Sho rubs his face with both hands. "I'll get fired."
There's a hand on his back within seconds, warm and right like it should have been there all along, and Sho shifts when Aiba presses. He hasn't had a mini-massage like this in a long, long time, and he could use one very badly right now, especially from Aiba. It's a well-established fact that Aiba gives the best massages within miles--the grandmas all say so--and Sho suspects it has something to do with the way Aiba sees people and the world: beautifully. Even if he slips sometimes, he still believes in everything good.
"So you get fired," Aiba whispers. He's moved directly behind Sho, and even the kittens have jumped up onto the couch. Talk about a family life, Sho thinks, and picks up Sammi in one hand and Yujitaka in the other. "It's not like you're going to feel bad about it."
"If I don't get fired," Sho murmurs, "they'll just demote me back to rookie paparazzo status."
Aiba laughs and digs his thumbs into Sho's muscle, right where the tender spot is.
"You like his pancakes?" Aiba asks.
Sho nods sleepily.
"Weekend won't make you pancakes," Aiba says. He's running the heel of his palm around Sho's shoulder blades, now. "The worst thing they could do is make sure no tabloid magazine hires you ever again."
"Good," Sho sighs, and leans back into Aiba's hands.
Something good will happen, and things will change. Maybe this isn't entirely what Sho hoped for when Aiba had said those words to him--what he'd truly wanted was a life-changing event, the kind that would fall out of the sky like lightning and deposit happiness right into his open, waiting palms. But of course he should have known better. Good things come gradually, like the way the first drops of rain only cover so much surface before the storm hits.
What's good about Nino is that he keeps Sho sane. Every morning he has someplace to go that makes him laugh, makes him smile and talk about his life. Every morning he has pancakes and sits on the same couch, and it's different from climbing into the same truck and delivering groceries to the same families. That was Sho's job, before this whole thing with Nino started. And now it's just the precursor to that time after six when he presses the buzzer to Nino's apartment and gets to see a sleepy boy in interesting pajamas, with strange things to say, every single morning for the entire week. For every tomorrow, for every promise made by Nino, there's something in Sho's gut that says, oh, this isn't a job. This is better. You could get used to this.
And from the way Nino reciprocates, Sho is willing to bet he feels the same way. He doesn't give off the actor vibe that Sho has gotten used to from all his years at Weekend--no matter how standoffish and grumpy he may have seemed during his and Sho's first meeting, it's the not-so-secret smiles and tiny jolts of laughter that get to Sho, that make him believe Nino is different than the rest of his breed. It's in the way he makes pancakes for the two of them, just enough so that they can finish them all (though truly most of them are for Sho; Nino doesn't eat much) and the way he gives Sho impromptu tours of his house.
When they look at each other, they know: they're friends. Sho doesn't know how this came to be, but he's not going to trace their short history to find the exact moment.
"I want to meet him," Aiba says then, so quietly Sho almost didn't hear him. He didn't realize that the massage had ended, either, and that Aiba was now rubbing the necks of their kittens with his index fingers. "Can I, sometime?"
"Well," Sho says. "I'll try to get him to say yes."
"He will, for you," Aiba says, and smiles widely. "If you just ask."
Sho promises to do just that--tomorrow, he says. Tomorrow he'll do it.
"Always tomorrow," Aiba teases. "And what are you doing tonight, Sho-chan?"
"Nothing," Sho admits. "Feeding our cats?"
Aiba makes an x with his pinky fingers. "Buu-buu," he mimics, like they're on a variety game show and Sho has just lost his chance to win the prize.
"The correct answer is that tonight, you're coming out with me," he says. "For you-know-what."
"For you-know-who," Sho insists, and Aiba makes Sammi claw at Sho's hand.
-
Tonight, Aiba says as the night wind closes in on them, fresh and sharp, Ohno Satoshi will be at Club Morning Flash for a friend's birthday party. He won't stay for long unless there's good alcohol or unless Jun really likes the party.
"You sure Jun'll be with him?" Sho asks, and surprises himself at how familiar he's suddenly become with a man he's never met, only seen and heard of. "Maybe they like to do their own thing once in awhile."
Aiba shakes his head. "Ohno wouldn't go unless Jun really wanted to."
It's odd, Sho thinks, the way a single person can make you crazy. Matsumoto Jun makes Aiba tenser than Sho has ever seen him--he can't relax, he looks over his shoulder compulsively, and whenever Sho reaches out to touch him Aiba jumps a little before apologizing to the nines and insisting that he's perfectly all right, he's just tired.
But Sho knows what a tired Aiba looks like: pale, with lips a bright, heavy pink that rivals the color of the blush on his cheeks. A tired Aiba is hard to talk to, but easy to smile at, and a tired Aiba will gladly rest his head on your shoulder to catch a few minutes of sleep as the taxi glides through the streets of Tokyo, lit up by traffic signals and the omnipresent glow of neon signs.
It's one in the morning and Aiba is a little anxious, a little wired, but he's trying to hide it behind endless chatter about how Weekend is undergoing an investigation ("Someone called human resources and said the administrative department won't hire men! I believe it; have you ever been called by a guy? No, only women, right? See") and how Club Morning Flash is supposed to be very high-class.
The taxi is pulling around the corner when Sho notices it: Aiba doesn't have his camera.
"If you told me you forgot it, I won't believe you," he whispers so the taxi driver won't hear. Aiba bites his lip. "Is this even your assignment?"
Aiba's eyes rise to meet Sho's. "Maybe not," he says, and reaches out to grab Sho's hand. "But Sho-chan--you don't know what it's like. I got to see him, I ran after him but that's it, he got away just like that. I can't leave that alone, you know?" His grip on Sho tightens, pleading.
Sho doesn't know what to say. He wants to know how Aiba found out about this in the first place, and yet doesn't want to think about how Aiba might have come across this information--through illegal means or because he took a liking to one of the office ladies and decided to sweet-talk her into opening a certain file. Aiba isn't an evil person, but he would do a lot of things for the people he loves, even if he hasn't seen them in over ten years.
"Okay," Sho says finally. He figures that's enough, and that Aiba will understand. "Just be careful."
"Oh, you don't need to tell me that, Sho-chan," Aiba says, and he's back to regular Aiba for just a second with that beautiful smile of his spread wide across his face. "What's a male model going to do to me anyway?"
"I don't mean Jun," Sho says. "I mean Ohno. He has a lot of knives, you know."
Aiba's eyes go wide, and then he laughs. "Sho-chan, really? You've been watching too many horror movies. Ohno-san wouldn't…"
He stops.
It takes Sho a moment to realize that Aiba is looking somewhere past him, over his shoulder and through the tinted window of the taxicab. In the darkness that's settled over Tokyo it's difficult to see anything, especially when you've been blinded by all the lights, but Sho turns anyway. The look on Aiba's face wasn't just a curious one--it was the way you'd look if someone slammed the door in your face and then locked it without even telling you so.
When Sho turns, he sees them: Ohno and Jun, slipping out of Club Morning Flash and into a side walkway.
Aiba scrambles out of the car before it even comes to a complete stop.
Sho isn't sure whether he remembers to pay the taxi driver or not (he must have, because once he steps onto the sidewalk no one is yelling at him) but that's completely secondary to his main goal: follow Aiba. There's no telling what might happen if he manages to catch up with Ohno and Jun--Ohno has knives and Jun has money and neither Sho nor Aiba know them, even if Aiba insists wholeheartedly that Jun is still the same person he was when they lived next to each other as children, when they didn't know any better and only knew each other and that they would be best friends forever.
When Sho squints into the alleyway he catches sight of a figure in dull-white turning a corner. Aiba was wearing--what was Aiba wearing? Shit, Sho thinks, and decides that now is not the time to stand on the sidewalk and make a flowchart in his head of what to do next. He just has to go.
The figure in white is gone by the time Sho walks briskly into the alleyway, and he doesn't see anyone else so he starts running without destination. He passes garbage cans and propped-open doorways that lead into legal and illegal establishments; he even runs past a hooker taking a smoke on her break. But he doesn't see Aiba, or Ohno, or Jun.
"Aiba?" he tries, even though it's not the greatest idea to randomly call out a name in a dark alleyway, especially after midnight. "Aiba, are you around here?"
The hooker looks up and their eyes meet. Sho is the first one to look away.
"Dunno who you're looking for," she rasps. "But there're two guys around the corner there." She waves to the left with her cigarette; the smoke clouds the air between them but Sho manages to thank her, however distractedly. He's already walking in the direction she pointed out.
Sho slips into a skinny alleyway off the walkway and finds Ohno standing there, smoking casually.
"You," Sho says, and bites down the rage that suddenly fills the pit of his stomach. "Why are you alone?"
Ohno looks up. He looks surprised, but just takes another drag off his cigarette and smiles slightly. "Aiba-san is a runner, isn't he?" he chuckles. "He should try out for the Olympics. Japan could use some good long-distance athletes."
Sho just stares. Ohno offers him a cigarette, pack extracted smoothly from his front left pocket, but Sho declines. He's not in the mood.
"Where'd he go?" Sho asks calmly. "And where is Matsumoto?"
"They're both running," Ohno responds, and exhales smoke into the already-grimy city air. "Aiba-san found us and Jun-kun just went. But I don't think they'll be running for long."
A small silence overcomes them, and then Ohno clears his throat. "Jun-kun isn't very good at hiding, you know," he says quietly. "And neither am I, I guess."
"He's not really looking for you," Sho says, even though he knows Ohno understands that. "You've just become part of the situation through circumstance."
"Circumstance," Ohno repeats, and blows the last of the smoke in his mouth away before stubbing out the cigarette beneath his heel. "Not fate?"
The question takes Sho by surprise.
"I don't know," he confesses. "I don't think about fate."
"You should. It's easier than thinking about circumstance."
In the dim light of the alleyway, Sho thinks Ohno's face looks like a moon, waxing and waning when he moves and talks.
"Sakurai-san," Ohno says then, and pushes off from the wall he was leaning against. "If you want, I'll drive you home."
Sho thinks about refusing. It would be easy, to hold up a hand and say thanks, but no thanks, I can take my own taxicab back to my apartment and I won't need to be indebted to you. But Sho can tell Ohno isn't doing this to make Sho owe him--he's doing it because Sho just lost a housemate for the night, and Ohno might have lost his boyfriend for longer than that. He's doing it because he knows the two of them have to let Aiba and Jun chase each other for as long as they want to and not intervene.
The way Sho sees it, this kind of thing might actually be fate and not circumstance. And that makes him uneasy, because how do you deal with fate?
"I'll take the ride," Sho consents. "But not back to my house."
Ohno nods cooperatively. "Wherever you want," he says, and lets Sho lead them out of the alleyway.
-
'Wherever you want' is an obvious place in Sho's mind. These days, when he's not at home, he's either driving or at Nino's apartment. Even though the current time is nowhere near Nino's preferred 'after-six' timeslot and Sho knows he's taking a giant leap of faith rather than his usual, planned steps, he finds it very hard to care.
Ohno drives him there without question or even conversation. He starts the car, thinks over Sho's directions for a second, and then switches on the air conditioning.
"Comfortable?" Ohno says halfway into the ride.
They're on the highway now, far from the burning city lights that Sho sometimes hates with a passion, and the car is driving smoothly without even the roar of the engine to distract Sho from his impending fatigue. The leather seats are cool and the air feels just right, and Ohno is humming along to the song on the radio--something old that Sho can't recognize, but it's bluesy and he likes it.
"Very," he says, and closes his eyes. "Thank you."
Ohno drives on.
When Nino's apartment comes into view Sho snaps out of his half-dream and points the building out to Ohno. It can't be any more than three minutes later when Sho bids Ohno good-bye and thank you again, so much, for the ride; Ohno waves with a smile that Sho hopes to God is genuine but he can't see how it could be anything otherwise.
"If you can," Sho says before Ohno starts the engine again, "if it's not too much trouble--."
"Aiba-san will be fine," Ohno reassures Sho. "You worry too much, I think."
Maybe Ohno is right, but Sho can't help it just like he can't help what he's doing now. The buzzer jumps under his finger just like it does in the mornings, but it's even earlier in the morning right now and he's not holding a bag of groceries in his arms. Sho has no butter, no milk, and no bread. He doesn't have his Maruyama Grocery uniform on. And there is no truck in the parking lot to take him home. He is on his own.
It takes too long before Nino's voice crackles out of the speaker, irritated and thick with sleep.
"Seriously," he says. "I might just call the cops on you."
"Can I come up?" Sho whispers, mouth very close to the holes in the speaker.
"Why are you even here?"
Sho decides to be honest. "I couldn't wait until tomorrow."
Nino doesn't say anything, just grunts. Sho begins to panic--what if Nino doesn't open the door?--but the click of the lock is loud, louder than in the daytime, and Sho exhales (though it does nothing to quell the drumming of his heartbeat).
No one is on the top of the fourth floor staircase waiting for him, but Sho expected that. He also anticipated that the hallway would be an eerie thing to walk through at three in the morning, and he has his arms wrapped around himself and his mouth in a thin line when he finally shows up at Nino's door.
"Cold?" Nino asks flatly. His voice is hoarse and he's squinting, and Sho immediately feels like telling him to just go back to bed, pretend this never happened, it was all a dream and I never woke you up at two-thirty in the morning trying to believe in fate instead of circumstance. "Because I am. Because I'm out of bed."
"Nino," Sho begins, but Nino just shuffles away, mumbling and limping like an old man.
"Nino," Sho tries again. "It's tomorrow."
"And I want to go to sleep," Nino grumbles, though they both know he can't anymore. He's too awake now, too alert at Sho's presence, to just slip back into bed and get carried off to dreamland that easily. "One day I'll kill you when you're least expecting it, Sakurai. Just to get back at you for this moment."
"You like sleeping?" Sho asks, more to distract Nino from noticing that Sho is following him into the bedroom than because he actually wants to know.
Nino makes a garbled humming sound before he realizes that he's in his bedroom again--with Sho.
"You sneaky bastard," he snaps, though in this state it's like a kitten asking for attention than anything with actual bite. "I'm telling you--." Nino drags his finger across his throat and then pokes Sho's chest right where his heart is.
His hand lingers, slipping gently against the fabric of Sho's shirt, and Sho's breath catches a little.
"You can kick me out," Sho says. "I won't hold it against you."
"If you let me kick you out I'd hold that against you," Nino mumbles, and throws the covers back on his bed. "Get in, stupid."
It's almost three in the morning and somewhere on the outskirts of metropolitan Tokyo, there they are: two boys on a bed. Sho's been in this situation before but now it's very different--he can't see the stars this time, but he's still wishing on them even though they're hidden behind drawn curtains in an unfamiliar room. Two boys on a bed, Sho thinks, and they're a funny pair--an actor and a paparazzo; a prey and his predator, though in a softer sense.
Nino yawns hugely. "Story time," he says, and throws one arm over Sho's lap. Sho lets him.
"I'm sorry," Sho says, "it's three in the morning, maybe we should save this until tomorrow--."
"Maybe," Nino says. "But I might not feel like saying everything tomorrow. Did you plan this? People are more vulnerable when they're not fully awake, you know."
"That you're telling me this suggests you're not so vulnerable," Sho says, a little amused. He feels like tugging Nino's shirt down; it's ridden up almost to the bottom of his ribcage.
Nino turns over on his stomach. "Someone," he says, voice muffled in his pillow, "told me I needed to stop acting like a recluse."
Sho blinks--he wasn't aware that story time had already started. "Wait," he says. "Acting like a recluse?"
"My manager told me that I had to act like a role model in my private time," Nino says, and flips over so that he's on his back now. Sho finally decides to tug down Nino's shirt and pulls it gently over the slope of his stomach, all the way to the top of his loose pajama pants. "I told her that I didn't want people to watch me when I wasn't on-screen, so I was just going to act like I didn't like going out in public. She was pretty upset." He laughs a little and yawns in quick succession.
"My family told me to do what I had to do, but that someone I told you about--the one that uses my guest room sometimes--he didn't like it. He used to tell me all the time that people can't hide forever."
"So what?" Sho wonders. "He forced you to start going out more to fix your image? He dragged you outside and called the paparazzo to take your photo in the sunlight as proof?"
Sho hears Nino's snort before he even realizes that the smirk is back. "No," he says. "He asked Weekend to deal with it, and they gave you the job."
There is silence for a long, long while. It is early, Sho thinks, much too early for this kind of realization--the kind that hits you over the head and then in the heart and keeps on plowing through you. He forgets to breathe, for a second, and thinks back to the beginning: the contract that came in the mail, the first few days of August that were overbearingly hot and full of cicada-noise, Sho signing his name on the dotted line.
To Sakurai Sho: We, the editors at Weekend magazine, are writing to inform you of an assignment opportunity. Should you choose to accept this job in lieu of the one you have now, sign the dotted line at the end of this document.
"You rang the buzzer and I expected you to come upstairs with a camera and a notepad and ten thousand questions," Nino continues, voice low. "I was told that you were going to gather information about me and feed it to Weekend, who'd out me to the public."
"And you were okay with that?"
Nino looks at Sho and raises his eyebrows. What do you think?
"I used to get my groceries dropped off by my agency, so I thought I'd see who you were just for the hell of it," Nino says. "I'd figure out your plans and make you leave and then Weekend would have written a story about how I'm a cynical bastard who yells at grocery deliverymen."
"What happened instead?" Sho breathes, and lets himself slide down so that he's lying on his back, eyes turned toward the ceiling. Now they're two boys on a bed lying side-by-side, questioning and thinking and on the edge of sleep.
Nino drags a single finger down Sho's arm, starting from the tip of his shoulder to the rounded crescent moon of his middle fingernail. When he pulls back Sho clenches his fist; his entire arm is tingling lightly.
"Well," Nino whispers, "I haven't called the police on you yet, have I?"
"But that's not news-worthy at all," Sho says, and shuts his eyes. "What am I going to tell Weekend? They'll want something juicy."
"Tell them that I'm suffering from a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome," Nino says, and curls into Sho's side. Someone pulls up the blanket from the foot of the bed. "That I'm addicted to white bread and can't leave the house because everyone else likes that whole-wheat shit. I'm not into health food."
"I'll quote you on that," Sho mumbles, and lets his fingertips rest on the warm nape of Nino's neck. "I'll say that you can't leave the house because you have a phobia of organic food products."
"That's stupid," Nino says through another, final yawn. "Just say that I…that I like…"
"Pancakes," Sho finishes.
Before he falls asleep he sees, through the part in the curtains, a fraction of the stars that dot the sky. One cup of the Milky Way grants a wish, he remembers, and decides that that's not true. You only need twenty-eight, a little luck, and the will to keep going--because if you do, something good might happen, and things might change for the better.
-
Nino drives Sho home in the next morning in a light drizzle, the kind Sho's mother used to call 'baby sprinkles' when he was little. As the car rolls along in the early-morning grey Nino makes snide remarks about how it's August and therefore way past the rainy season, so it shouldn't be raining as much as it has been. Sho agrees, but only because he feels like humoring Nino is his best choice.
They had woken up that morning tangled in sheets; Sho was on one side of the bed still in his clothes from last night and Nino was already sitting up, scrunching a hand through his hair (oh, Sho thought, so that's where the bed head comes from).
"Well," Sho mumbled, choosing his first words of the day as carefully as he would a proposal, "this is new."
Nino rolled out of bed in reply, but Sho caught the sly grin on his face anyway.
In an hour, there were pancakes (blueberry this time because Nino said he was getting tired of plain ones), and Sho tried to help with the flour and the mixing. That only resulted in most of the kitchen getting covered in a thin layer of white, and Nino, after realizing what had happened, kicked Sho out of the kitchen with a warning that if he ever tried to cook again there would be dire consequences. (Sho didn't believe him, but Nino picked up a wooden spoon then and Sho decided that okay, maybe he should just wait in the living room.)
They ate at the table like usual, but this time Sho's knee kept knocking into Nino's--at first accidentally because their chairs were closer than usual, but then Sho started doing it just because and Nino wasn't threatening him.
Now they're in the car, parked in front of Sho's apartment, and Nino reaches over to flick Sho's knee with his index finger.
"Ow!" Sho claps a hand over his knee. "Hey, what was that for?"
"For the abuse I suffered at my own kitchen table," Nino snaps. "If I wake up with a bruise on my knee tomorrow, I'm suing you."
"That's not fair," Sho replies, and unlocks the door. "You'd win."
Nino doesn't say anything to that, only watches Sho open the passenger door.
"Hey," Nino says when Sho is halfway out the car, "Will I see you tomorrow?"
"After six in the morning," Sho says, "just like always," even though both of them know that after last night, 'always' isn't the same as it used to be.
-
Hours later, the buzzer to Sho's apartment rings and Sho jumps up from the couch, his heart already racing and winning against the blood that's rushing through his head. Even though he knows it's probably not Nino--even if he won't let himself think it's Nino--he's still stupidly excited for whoever is asking to come up.
"Hello?" Sho says. "Who's there?"
There's a pause. Then: "It's Ohno."
Well, Sho thinks. Well.
"Come on up," he says, pressing the button to unlock the front door.
"So what is this?" he asks, though good-naturedly, when Ohno appears at Sho's door wearing a ratty old t-shirt, sweatpants, and such an exhausted look on his face that it makes Sho want to offer him the couch for a thirty-minute nap. "Fate or circumstance?"
Sho watches Ohno's eyes crinkle at the sides. "Circumstance for us," he says, and rests a hand against the doorframe. "Fate for Aiba-san and Jun-kun."
"Don't tell me you got kicked out," Sho says, and doesn't know whether to feel relieved or worried. As it is, his stomach is churning with a mixture of both, and it doesn't feel all that pleasant. "Or did you leave on your own volition?"
"I couldn't sleep," Ohno says simply.
And even though he's already had breakfast Sho decides that making some would be the most appropriate thing to do in this situation. He invites Ohno in and lets him sit at the table while he makes tea and instant oatmeal (Sho is an expert at preparing instant foods). He doesn't talk to Ohno and Ohno doesn't say much, either, but Sho figures that there is nothing to be said that they don't already know.
But one thing confuses Sho.
"Why did you let him stay?" Sho asks as he brings over bowls of oatmeal and the teapot to the table, where Ohno has his hands curled around a mug. His eyes are closed and for a second Sho wonders if he's fallen asleep sitting up--but no, Ohno answers. He thinks about it first and takes a sip of tea, but he answers.
"I don't think it would be fair if I intervened," Ohno says quietly. He takes the spoon Sho offers him and dips it into the oatmeal, which is blowing curls of steam into his moonlike face. "I don't feel bitter about Aiba-san. I just want Jun-kun to be happy."
Sho looks up. "That's all?"
"That's all." Ohno smiles. "Besides, Jun-kun talks so much about Aiba-san that I wonder if it even makes sense to be jealous. Maybe he's my second boyfriend and I don't even know it."
He stirs his oatmeal around, making a whirlpool of oats and brown sugar, before scooping a spoonful into his mouth. It's hot--Sho hasn't eaten any of his yet for that reason, and he opens his mouth to warn Ohno--but Ohno looks wonderfully pleased and not as if he's burned his tongue at all.
He makes a sound full of feeling, the kind of noise you'd make if you found food in an obscure cupboard after being hungry for hours on end.
"Delicious," Ohno says, and tucks in.
-
Aiba doesn't come back for two days, but Sho knows there's nothing he can do about it and so he frets in silence and worries with his mouth closed. Even so Nino informs him that the aura around him is like being in a room full of mothers who don't know where their children are.
"If he texts you that he's fine, then why don't you just believe him?"
Nino is seeing Sho out of his apartment. After his day off (that wasn't planned, but Sho has many friends in the management department) he went back to his usual delivery routine.
"I don't know," Sho says irritably, because he honestly doesn't and it's frustrating him. "I just--I don't know him, you know?"
"Okay, well," Nino says as he leans against the wall of the foyer, "I don't see Aiba getting all flustered that you've been spending a lot of time with me. He doesn't know me. You just worry too much, you know that?"
Sho rubs his temples. "That's the second time I've been told that," he mutters.
"So there, Mother Sakurai. Just let it go. Babies grow up into young men with raging hormones, it's perfectly normal," Nino says.
Before he shuts the door he reaches out to fix one of Sho's undone uniform buttons. Blushing mercilessly, Sho thanks him with a smile.
As soon as he unlocks the door into his own apartment, Sho immediately knows that Aiba is back--his shoes are lying against the wall on their sides, the way they usually fall when Aiba kicks them off without a second thought and pushes them out of the way. Sho breathes a heavy sigh of relief and feels a little lighter as he walks into the kitchen.
There, he finds a shirtless male model.
Sho is about to faint.
"I," he begins. He has to lean against the counter for support. "May I help you?"
Jun jumps and looks up. His eyes almost outgrow the size of his head, and he puts down the mug he's holding. (Sho glances at it: yep, it's his personal mug. Oh, he will kill Aiba.) "Oh," Jun says, and clears his throat probably more violently than he intended to. "You must be Sakurai-san, right? Aiba's housemate."
"Ye-e-s," Sho drags out the syllables. "Yes."
The silence between them feels like a giant boulder. Finally Jun speaks up. "Sorry that I'm just hanging out in your kitchen--Aiba's a late sleeper, so…"
"I know," Sho says.
"And I thought I'd make some tea." He runs a hand through his hair nervously. "You can have some if you'd like."
"I will," Sho responds. "It is my kitchen."
He feels, as he moves around the kitchen awkwardly, that he knows too much about Jun through hearsay and secondhand memory. All of it--Aiba's five thousand Jun stories, the Weekend rumors, and all of Ohno's little remarks--flood his mind now as he watches Jun slip into a chair at the table.
Compared to all of the other celebrities Sho has come across, Jun looks the most tired. Perhaps it's because Sho is looking at the Matsumoto Jun that no one else gets to see--the morning-after, just-woke-up, doesn't-do-well-with-mornings Matsumoto Jun. The circles under his eyes are deep and dark and his complexion isn't really as rosy as all the photos make it seem, and the stray half-curls escaping from his hair band make it look like his face is a too-pale canvas sparsely painted with black swirls. It's not the most enchanting image in the world, but Sho finds himself staring anyway, unable to look away.
He's still looking when Jun's eyes meet his.
"This is good tea," Sho says for lack of anything else to comment on. "It's usually really watery when I make it."
"I do cook a lot," Jun replies, and swirls what's left of the liquid in his mug. "That might not extend to tea, but I do."
Jun's eyes are intense, but softly so. Normally Sho wouldn't dare make eye contact with someone he's never met for this long, but he's still looking at Jun and Jun is looking back at him with some sort of curious concentration.
"I hope you don't expect me to apologize," Jun says suddenly. His tone isn't angry or standoffish--Sho can tell he's only speaking the truth. It's a truth full of feeling, of a feeling that only comes from seeing someone in snapshots and fleeting moments when all you want to do is reach out to their back and turn them around to say, hey there, I've missed you.
Sho could never ask anyone to apologize for that.
He thinks about asking the twenty-eight stars so long ago to just make everything work out in the end. He'd deliberated over the wording of that wish for a long time--should he ask for happiness, for Aiba to find Jun, for good fortune and a nice life? Somehow Sho decided that 'everything will work out in the end' was the most neutral thing he could ask for. It wasn't like he was begging by asking for something too specific, but he got his point across.
And honestly, Sho never thought it would come this far. But here he is, sitting across from Matsumoto Jun at the kitchen table on a weekday morning, and he feels calm. He feels like everything has worked out.
After all of the trying and hoping and running, after all of those prayers that started and ended with tomorrow, after all of the breakfasts and the worried pangs in Sho's stomach--after all of it, Sho feels like things have come a long way from where they started.
He shakes his head.
"There's nothing you need to apologize for," he says, and gets up to open the curtains that lead into the balcony. Today, it's sunny outside.
Pairing(s): Sho/Nino, Ohno/Jun, implied Aiba/Jun
Rating: PG
Word Count: ~19,900
Summary: Sho's assignment for the month of August is simple enough: find Ninomiya Kazunari.
A/N: Part two of two.
And that, Sho decides much later, is where his new assignment really started.
He stayed for nearly an hour. For longer than he should have, certainly, but the weather was disgusting and once Sho sat down on one of Ninomiya's couches he couldn't be bothered to get up again. The feeling of leaving nagged at him for awhile--go, you shouldn't be here, leave, this is your professional job and he's not your friend--but he didn't listen to any of that. There had to be a point in life, Sho thought as he watched Nino move around in the kitchen, silently but efficiently, where you just gave in to your desires and decided to fuck the rest.
It was an unnerving feeling. Sho suspected it had to do a lot with his upbringing, why he felt so odd about all of this, but he forced himself to stay anyway and he forced himself to get comfortable and he forced himself to answer Ninomiya's questions honestly.
Ninomiya had a lot of questions.
"So did you know about me before you took this job?" he asked first. He was unloading his groceries, and part of Sho desperately wanted to peek into the refrigerator to see exactly how much butter and milk such a thin young man could possibly have. But he stayed in his seat.
"You could say that," Sho responded. It was a better answer than the truth--that Sho had basically no idea who Ninomiya Kazunari was until Aiba introduced them, however crudely, through magazine articles.
"You had no idea I existed, did you," Ninomiya shot back. He stepped out of the kitchen, and Sho saw he had a piece of toast and a glass of milk in his hands. "Most people would have gotten flustered, even if they didn't like my work. Whenever you're with someone of--what did you say earlier?--a different 'caliber,' you can't help but give yourself away."
He took a bite of toast and chewed slowly. Sho watched him swallow.
"Did I come in to discuss philosophy? I would have dressed better, in that case." It was the only thing Sho could think of, but Ninomiya laughed again into his glass of milk.
"You're interesting for a grocery deliveryman," he said, and Sho smiled dryly.
"You're interesting for a supposed recluse."
"Ah." Ninomiya took the seat across from Sho and grinned smugly. "So you did know about me."
This time, they both laughed.
Where, Sho thinks later as he drives home--it is still raining, and he is still driving as slowly as he can--where was the logic in that whole situation? Ninomiya should have kicked him out as soon as Sho handed over the bag of groceries. He should have issued Sho a curt "hello" and an even icier "goodbye," and all that should have happened within the span of thirty seconds. He should have told Sho to go home, there's nothing to see here, no apartment to be let into, no conversations to be had.
But none of that happened. Sho stayed and Nino ate his breakfast and talked to Sho about how his family didn't even know he lived here, but he went back sometimes just to let them know he was still okay, that he hadn't disappeared into thin air without leaving a goodbye note.
"My sister said that my movies were like notes to our family," Ninomiya said, and propped his chin in his hand. It made him look even younger, with the bed head and the slouchy pajamas and the moles--Sho noticed the moles as Nino talked. There were three on his face, dotting the left side with some kind of pinpoint accuracy as if he were a target of some sort, a lithe bulls-eye that moved and talked and laughed. And Sho, Sho was the gun.
"Why don't you see them more often?" Sho asked. "It's not like you have to hide yourself away."
"It's not like you have to deliver my groceries," Ninomiya said. "But why do you do it? Because you get paid and it's what you know how to do, right? So I live here and I don't go out because I'm comfortable." He stopped on the edge of another sentence--Sho could see his eyes still in the conversation, still focused on his thoughts--but nothing else came out of his mouth.
Sho couldn't think of anything to say, either. And that was okay, he supposed, because Ninomiya got up soon after and told him he could come back tomorrow.
"Could you bring me some bread?" he asked before Sho left. "I'm running out."
"Technically, you have to call the store and have them add it to your list," Sho said. He could never resist pulling out all the professional stops.
Ninomiya stared.
"Technically," he said flatly, "you're working right now and should not have come into my house."
"Technically you're a recluse," Sho said, "and should not be speaking to me."
Ninomiya made a face and shut the door, but not before saying, "I'll see your technical ass tomorrow."
Soon enough tomorrow becomes like a prayer, and Sho can't shake it off even when he tries--he cleans the entire apartment (Aiba makes exaggerated gagging noises when he goes near cleaning supplies), plays with the kittens for almost an hour, and makes dinner for himself. He even wishes he could go out again to do his normal paparazzo shoots, but since he signed the contract with Weekend he doesn't have to do that anymore. His job now is all Ninomiya, all the time.
He's eating by himself, sitting in the almost-dark at the kitchen table, when the phone rings.
Sho thinks Aiba is calling from Chiba, because under his parents' roof he doesn't have to pay the phone bill and can use the thing whenever, however he wants to. He's done it before under the pretense that he forgot to unplug the iron and wanted Sho to check if he had, but that was when they didn't even have an iron. They ended up talking for a long time that night--it was the first night Aiba stayed away from the apartment for more than two days--and Sho tries not to think about it much, because it makes him feel like they're married. Oh, if only Aiba could give him grandchildren. Then his mother might be happy with something in his life.
But it's not Aiba on the other line this time.
"We just want to see how you're doing, Sakurai-san." The woman's voice filtering in through the phone is one Sho hears often at Weekend; she's not the receptionist, but she works in the office. "You know, how you're progressing with things."
"Just fine, thank you," Sho says curtly, and drags his fork through the sauce on his plate. Just like they do in Zen gardens, he thinks. Be calm. "To be honest there's not much to report. He's not a very open person."
"Of course we know that," the office lady quips. "We wouldn't have you on this job if he was easy to find, you know."
"Yes, of course," Sho responds. The Zen-like lines on his plate get a little more tangled. "Pardon me."
"Anyway, we're just calling to remind you that we need a report of everything you've discovered by the end of next week," she goes on. It sounds like she's immersed in something else--a game of Solitaire, maybe, or she could be filing her nails. There's only so much to do if you work in the office of a tabloid magazine, after all. "So you have a lot of time to gather information."
If Weekend is giving Sho two weeks to compile a report of everything he's found out about Ninomiya Kazunari, then they must be expecting a lot. They would want details of any conversations that took place, the contents of Ninomiya's groceries from day one to fourteen, and the exact color and texture of his window curtains, carpet, and pieces of furniture. They'd want Sho to explain what Ninomiya looks like when he's not working, when he's not making movies--they would want a description of Ninomiya in his loose clothes and messy hair and scattered moles. They would want to know what his feet looked like (this is the only detail Sho can't give; Ninomiya's pants covered the tops of his feet completely).
Sho lets go of the fork and winces at the clattering sound it makes when it hits the plate.
"I won't disappoint," Sho says resolutely, because he can't let himself say anything else. "You'll have your report, don't worry."
But a part of Sho stings. When he closes his eyes he sees Ninomiya yawning, arms stretching toward the ceiling childishly like he hadn't a care in the world, and the image--so vivid, still--makes him miserable. How could anyone give that picture away, even in words, just like that, without even a second thought?
"And you'll have your check," the office lady says cheerfully.
"How much?" It wasn't a polite question, but Sho couldn't help but ask.
"More than you're used to."
Sho puts his forehead on the tabletop and wishes very hard on stars he can't see, because the rain outside is like an ocean being dumped on Tokyo, relentless and unforgiving. He wishes that he could just quit, but that he could still see Ninomiya every morning. He wishes on tomorrow and those twenty-eight stars he can still remember from college. Maybe one fades each year, supernovas blasting far off in space because time passes and you can't keep stars in a jar forever (even fireflies have to die). In that case he's only got twenty-two left, but that's enough for him, and hopefully enough for his wishes.
"You'll have your report," Sho says again, and hangs up.
-
The loaf of bread is whole-wheat, wrapped tightly in plastic and a little damp thanks to the rain (it hadn't stopped from yesterday. Sho worries about Aiba driving in this weather, but he can't do anything about it and so tries to stay positive). It has a sticker on the front--Maruyama Brand Products, it says, in big red letters--and Sho had to smuggle it into Ninomiya's groceries without anyone looking.
"Technically," Sho says as he hands over the loaf, "what I did is illegal, because everything you pay for has to be recorded in the ledger, and you didn't actually pay for this."
Ninomiya accepts the bread gingerly.
"I like white," he says after he's examined the bread with the caution of one examining a strange-looking mold.
"White bread is bad for your health," Sho says matter-of-factly. "Whole-wheat is better for you. It's what I have for breakfast every morning."
"I'm not entirely sure when you became my mother," Ninomiya says, and scratches at the tip of his nose. Their eyes meet briefly and Sho notices the bags under Ninomiya's eyes--not heavy or too dark, but they're there. "Or why you want everyone to have the same breakfast that you have every morning."
"I'm not--that's not what I meant," Sho splutters.
"Sakurai-san," Ninomiya says then, tilting his head slightly. Some of his hair falls across his forehead, and Sho watches him brush it away impatiently. "When's the last time you had pancakes for breakfast?"
"Not for awhile," Sho confesses. "It's always been toast."
"You're deprived," Ninomiya sighs, and pads into his kitchen. "Sit down. You're eating here."
"I'm eating here?"
Ninomiya just looks at Sho with his eyebrows raised. That's what I said, isn't it?
So Sho has plain pancakes, courtesy of Ninomiya Kazunari, on a weekday morning. It's been years since Sho had anything other than bread for breakfast and he's not even sure if he remembers what pancakes taste like, but his first bite is nothing less than a little shock of bliss and he finishes an entire short stack in less than ten minutes. The pancakes may be plain, but they're buttery and fluffy--in any case, they're more flavorful than any crumbly piece of toast could ever be.
Ninomiya watches him silently from across the table. He's wearing different pajamas today, Sho notices: instead of the too-big pants he has shorts on, ones with a red checker pattern that barely cover his knees. Over his torso hangs a tank top, unremarkably white, the kind you'd buy in a pack at the convenience store.
And he hasn't shaved yet. There's a patch of stubble on his chin, and he rubs at it every so often.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you not to accept food from strangers?" Ninomiya asks softly when Sho is done and has laid his fork down, only a little embarrassed to have eaten so much in such a short time.
Sho grins. "Did you drug me?"
"You'll find out."
And maybe Sho is drugged, because he keeps coming back when Ninomiya asks him to, and he stays long after he's passed on the groceries. He stays for pancakes and conversation and to see what Ninomiya looks like on that particular day (always sleepy, always with bed head, and always showing more skin every time Sho comes over). But mostly he stays for the conversation.
They talk about everything. They've had conversations about the weather, about Ninomiya's family, about Sho's economics degree and how Ninomiya never went to college. He was scouted, he says one morning as he slices strawberries for their pancakes (even the pancakes had become a quick tradition), when he was twenty. He'd been in a bookstore and some agent had followed him around for hours before Ninomiya tried to run away and the agent had stopped him and explained everything ("But not," Ninomiya says smugly, "before I tried to punch him in the face").
On the fourth day Ninomiya talks about how no one ever calls him that--no one that knows him, anyway. He asks Sho to call him Nino.
"Does this mean that I know you now?" Sho jokes.
Nino doesn't respond. He only hums, a long and wondering note, and Sho doesn't bring it up again.
What they don't ever discuss is why Nino invited Sho into his apartment on that first day--why Nino decided that this was okay, that Sho was okay. Sho expects that one day it will come up in between their normal conversations, in between talk of hobbies (Nino likes video games; Sho says he's sort of into photography but isn't sure he likes it as much as he thought he did) and friends (Sho talks about Aiba more than he should, but Nino listens intently and laughs at all of Aiba's stupid antics) and food ("Can I bring some of these home?" Sho sometimes asks. He means the pancakes, but Ninomiya just tells him, "You can have some more tomorrow, you don't need to take them home"). But it never does.
Still, Sho can't seem to start his days off right anymore unless he sees Nino in the morning--tired, small Nino with his sharp tongue and strange ways and telling eyes. With every tomorrow that Nino promises and Sho dreams about, the two of them come closer to Weekend's deadline, but Sho won't allow himself to think about it too much.
If he does, he'll have to tell Nino about it. And that--well. Sho won't think about that, either. He's pushing away more thoughts than he ever has in his life, but he figures that what he gets to go through every morning is worth the ignorance.
Sho brings Nino a loaf of white bread on the fifth day.
On the seventh day Sho gets a tour of Nino's apartment. It's a proper tour, and Sho is introduced to the bathroom, the guest room, a walk-in hallway closet that contains nothing more than a vacuum cleaner and a broom, and Nino's bedroom.
Sho peeks in. There's a single bed covered with white sheets, a television, and a dresser. The walls are bare and there are no other decorations unless you count the bedside table, which doesn't have anything on it besides a lamp without a shade and a pair of dark-rimmed glasses. A pair of slippers--blue and fuzzy--sits next to the bed, but Sho's never seen Nino wear them. Sho wouldn't be surprised if Nino said he puts them there just for show.
What catches Sho's attention the most is that Nino has a guest room.
"Do you ever have guests?" Sho says as they stand in front of the room. It's just as plain as Nino's, only there isn't a television and the comforter actually has a violet floral pattern on it, as if that's supposed to make the room more inviting. "I don't see why you'd need a guest room if you don't have anyone visiting."
"I have one visitor, occasionally. A friend I've made in this business," Nino says, and stifles a yawn behind his hand. Sho guesses it must be anywhere from eight to eight-thirty--very early, he supposes, to most people. "He says he comes here to check on me since I don't really go out. But besides him, there's no one."
He turns to Sho. "In fact, I'm surprised you come back every day."
"It's my job," Sho says, but Nino shakes his head.
"If this was just your job," Nino points out, "you'd just leave my groceries at the door and go home. But you don't. You stay here, and probably longer than you should."
Sho swallows thickly. Of course he does all that, and he's only been trying not to think about any of it. But here is Nino, now, bringing everything up like Sho never took the time to throw all those thoughts away in favor of simply acting without thinking. As they stand together in the small hallway Nino has his arms crossed over his chest and his voice is even, calm; he talks like he's been studying Sho for the past week and has come to many conclusions.
And maybe he's right about all of them.
"Tell me, do you care about anything?"
Nino asks the question point-blank. When Sho looks up and into Nino's eyes he suddenly feels trapped there, locked in some sort of force-field that Nino's gaze has created. He won't be let go until he answers.
"Yes," Sho says slowly. He doesn't know any other way around this than to simply answer the question. "I care about my family, and my roommate, and my kittens."
Nino smiles. "That's all?"
Sho nods.
"See," Nino says, and uncrosses his arms. Something in him has relaxed, but Sho doesn't know what. "You didn't say you cared about your job. If you did, we wouldn't be standing here right now. You've told me about your family and your cats and this Aiba-san of yours, but you don't ever talk about what you do for a living. Either you don't enjoy it or you're not allowed to talk about it."
"That doesn't matter, though," Nino continues before Sho can say anything, before he can even register the bubbling feeling of panic in his gut. "I don't really care as long as you keep coming back."
Sho stares, absolutely dumbstruck. Part of him feels frozen and the other half of him doesn't understand what's happening--is Nino trying to say something? Does he know that Sho is the secret connection between Nino's private life and a tabloid with nationwide circulation? And what does he mean when he says none of that matters as long as Sho keeps coming back? Surely Sho can't be hearing this right. He must be missing something.
"Do you want to know," Nino says finally, "why I asked you to come in that first day?"
Sho nods. His body isn't in the right state of mind to do much else.
Of course Nino doesn't tell him right away. For the first time in seven days Sho hopes that he won't hear the word that's become his mantra, his little prayer in the rain and through the night when he can't sleep--but Nino says it. "Tomorrow, I'll tell you," he promises, and sends Sho away, again without any pancakes to take home.
-
Sho drives straight home after he leaves Nino's apartment. When he unlocks the door and sees Aiba sprawled out on the couch, not exactly dressed properly and with a bowl of popcorn balanced in his lap, he swears he's never felt so relieved in his life.
After returning home from Chiba, Aiba received a slew of assignments from Weekend that not only included the regular nighttime haunts but also special daytime ventures. Usually Aiba shot at night, but sometimes if there was a lot going on that day he would have to show up at hotels and airports in broad daylight to shoot at gangbangs, or events where large numbers of paparazzi would be present. He had night-and-day assignments for four days straight, and since Sho left in the morning before Aiba woke they didn't get to see each other until very late at night. By that time, Sho was already in bed and Aiba already asleep while standing.
But here he is now, and somehow Sho feels like everything is going to be okay.
"Another tomorrow?" Aiba asks gently when Sho sits down next to him on the couch. Aiba made room as soon as he saw Sho walk through the door. "I feel like he's playing you."
"I feel like I'm okay with that," Sho says. "I just--I don't get him. He goes out, did you know that? To see his family. He does leave the house. And he does have a life. He has friends, and he cooks."
"So basically you're saying that he's a pro at hide-and-go-seek," Aiba says, and hands the bowl of popcorn over to Sho. Sho takes a handful without even thinking about calories or snack food conservation. "Is that what you're going to tell Weekend? They'll have a fun time with that one."
Sho falls silent. "I don't know what I'm going to tell Weekend," he mumbles.
There are too many things Sho could tell Weekend that it's hard for him to imagine simply lying and saying he didn't find anything out about Nino. In that case, he would lose this special assignment and the extra money and be demoted to the lower ranks of paparazzi--or be fired altogether.
Sho won't let himself get fired from a tabloid magazine. If anything, he would have to be the one to quit.
"Sho-chan," Aiba says soothingly, because Aiba somehow absorbs all of Sho's feelings and manages to make them into something better within seconds, something more manageable and tame than the quiet rages in Sho's chest, "listen. Why don't you just lie to them? Make up some random story? You know they'll believe you. It's not like they have any way of proving whether you're right or not."
Sho rubs his face with both hands. "I'll get fired."
There's a hand on his back within seconds, warm and right like it should have been there all along, and Sho shifts when Aiba presses. He hasn't had a mini-massage like this in a long, long time, and he could use one very badly right now, especially from Aiba. It's a well-established fact that Aiba gives the best massages within miles--the grandmas all say so--and Sho suspects it has something to do with the way Aiba sees people and the world: beautifully. Even if he slips sometimes, he still believes in everything good.
"So you get fired," Aiba whispers. He's moved directly behind Sho, and even the kittens have jumped up onto the couch. Talk about a family life, Sho thinks, and picks up Sammi in one hand and Yujitaka in the other. "It's not like you're going to feel bad about it."
"If I don't get fired," Sho murmurs, "they'll just demote me back to rookie paparazzo status."
Aiba laughs and digs his thumbs into Sho's muscle, right where the tender spot is.
"You like his pancakes?" Aiba asks.
Sho nods sleepily.
"Weekend won't make you pancakes," Aiba says. He's running the heel of his palm around Sho's shoulder blades, now. "The worst thing they could do is make sure no tabloid magazine hires you ever again."
"Good," Sho sighs, and leans back into Aiba's hands.
Something good will happen, and things will change. Maybe this isn't entirely what Sho hoped for when Aiba had said those words to him--what he'd truly wanted was a life-changing event, the kind that would fall out of the sky like lightning and deposit happiness right into his open, waiting palms. But of course he should have known better. Good things come gradually, like the way the first drops of rain only cover so much surface before the storm hits.
What's good about Nino is that he keeps Sho sane. Every morning he has someplace to go that makes him laugh, makes him smile and talk about his life. Every morning he has pancakes and sits on the same couch, and it's different from climbing into the same truck and delivering groceries to the same families. That was Sho's job, before this whole thing with Nino started. And now it's just the precursor to that time after six when he presses the buzzer to Nino's apartment and gets to see a sleepy boy in interesting pajamas, with strange things to say, every single morning for the entire week. For every tomorrow, for every promise made by Nino, there's something in Sho's gut that says, oh, this isn't a job. This is better. You could get used to this.
And from the way Nino reciprocates, Sho is willing to bet he feels the same way. He doesn't give off the actor vibe that Sho has gotten used to from all his years at Weekend--no matter how standoffish and grumpy he may have seemed during his and Sho's first meeting, it's the not-so-secret smiles and tiny jolts of laughter that get to Sho, that make him believe Nino is different than the rest of his breed. It's in the way he makes pancakes for the two of them, just enough so that they can finish them all (though truly most of them are for Sho; Nino doesn't eat much) and the way he gives Sho impromptu tours of his house.
When they look at each other, they know: they're friends. Sho doesn't know how this came to be, but he's not going to trace their short history to find the exact moment.
"I want to meet him," Aiba says then, so quietly Sho almost didn't hear him. He didn't realize that the massage had ended, either, and that Aiba was now rubbing the necks of their kittens with his index fingers. "Can I, sometime?"
"Well," Sho says. "I'll try to get him to say yes."
"He will, for you," Aiba says, and smiles widely. "If you just ask."
Sho promises to do just that--tomorrow, he says. Tomorrow he'll do it.
"Always tomorrow," Aiba teases. "And what are you doing tonight, Sho-chan?"
"Nothing," Sho admits. "Feeding our cats?"
Aiba makes an x with his pinky fingers. "Buu-buu," he mimics, like they're on a variety game show and Sho has just lost his chance to win the prize.
"The correct answer is that tonight, you're coming out with me," he says. "For you-know-what."
"For you-know-who," Sho insists, and Aiba makes Sammi claw at Sho's hand.
-
Tonight, Aiba says as the night wind closes in on them, fresh and sharp, Ohno Satoshi will be at Club Morning Flash for a friend's birthday party. He won't stay for long unless there's good alcohol or unless Jun really likes the party.
"You sure Jun'll be with him?" Sho asks, and surprises himself at how familiar he's suddenly become with a man he's never met, only seen and heard of. "Maybe they like to do their own thing once in awhile."
Aiba shakes his head. "Ohno wouldn't go unless Jun really wanted to."
It's odd, Sho thinks, the way a single person can make you crazy. Matsumoto Jun makes Aiba tenser than Sho has ever seen him--he can't relax, he looks over his shoulder compulsively, and whenever Sho reaches out to touch him Aiba jumps a little before apologizing to the nines and insisting that he's perfectly all right, he's just tired.
But Sho knows what a tired Aiba looks like: pale, with lips a bright, heavy pink that rivals the color of the blush on his cheeks. A tired Aiba is hard to talk to, but easy to smile at, and a tired Aiba will gladly rest his head on your shoulder to catch a few minutes of sleep as the taxi glides through the streets of Tokyo, lit up by traffic signals and the omnipresent glow of neon signs.
It's one in the morning and Aiba is a little anxious, a little wired, but he's trying to hide it behind endless chatter about how Weekend is undergoing an investigation ("Someone called human resources and said the administrative department won't hire men! I believe it; have you ever been called by a guy? No, only women, right? See") and how Club Morning Flash is supposed to be very high-class.
The taxi is pulling around the corner when Sho notices it: Aiba doesn't have his camera.
"If you told me you forgot it, I won't believe you," he whispers so the taxi driver won't hear. Aiba bites his lip. "Is this even your assignment?"
Aiba's eyes rise to meet Sho's. "Maybe not," he says, and reaches out to grab Sho's hand. "But Sho-chan--you don't know what it's like. I got to see him, I ran after him but that's it, he got away just like that. I can't leave that alone, you know?" His grip on Sho tightens, pleading.
Sho doesn't know what to say. He wants to know how Aiba found out about this in the first place, and yet doesn't want to think about how Aiba might have come across this information--through illegal means or because he took a liking to one of the office ladies and decided to sweet-talk her into opening a certain file. Aiba isn't an evil person, but he would do a lot of things for the people he loves, even if he hasn't seen them in over ten years.
"Okay," Sho says finally. He figures that's enough, and that Aiba will understand. "Just be careful."
"Oh, you don't need to tell me that, Sho-chan," Aiba says, and he's back to regular Aiba for just a second with that beautiful smile of his spread wide across his face. "What's a male model going to do to me anyway?"
"I don't mean Jun," Sho says. "I mean Ohno. He has a lot of knives, you know."
Aiba's eyes go wide, and then he laughs. "Sho-chan, really? You've been watching too many horror movies. Ohno-san wouldn't…"
He stops.
It takes Sho a moment to realize that Aiba is looking somewhere past him, over his shoulder and through the tinted window of the taxicab. In the darkness that's settled over Tokyo it's difficult to see anything, especially when you've been blinded by all the lights, but Sho turns anyway. The look on Aiba's face wasn't just a curious one--it was the way you'd look if someone slammed the door in your face and then locked it without even telling you so.
When Sho turns, he sees them: Ohno and Jun, slipping out of Club Morning Flash and into a side walkway.
Aiba scrambles out of the car before it even comes to a complete stop.
Sho isn't sure whether he remembers to pay the taxi driver or not (he must have, because once he steps onto the sidewalk no one is yelling at him) but that's completely secondary to his main goal: follow Aiba. There's no telling what might happen if he manages to catch up with Ohno and Jun--Ohno has knives and Jun has money and neither Sho nor Aiba know them, even if Aiba insists wholeheartedly that Jun is still the same person he was when they lived next to each other as children, when they didn't know any better and only knew each other and that they would be best friends forever.
When Sho squints into the alleyway he catches sight of a figure in dull-white turning a corner. Aiba was wearing--what was Aiba wearing? Shit, Sho thinks, and decides that now is not the time to stand on the sidewalk and make a flowchart in his head of what to do next. He just has to go.
The figure in white is gone by the time Sho walks briskly into the alleyway, and he doesn't see anyone else so he starts running without destination. He passes garbage cans and propped-open doorways that lead into legal and illegal establishments; he even runs past a hooker taking a smoke on her break. But he doesn't see Aiba, or Ohno, or Jun.
"Aiba?" he tries, even though it's not the greatest idea to randomly call out a name in a dark alleyway, especially after midnight. "Aiba, are you around here?"
The hooker looks up and their eyes meet. Sho is the first one to look away.
"Dunno who you're looking for," she rasps. "But there're two guys around the corner there." She waves to the left with her cigarette; the smoke clouds the air between them but Sho manages to thank her, however distractedly. He's already walking in the direction she pointed out.
Sho slips into a skinny alleyway off the walkway and finds Ohno standing there, smoking casually.
"You," Sho says, and bites down the rage that suddenly fills the pit of his stomach. "Why are you alone?"
Ohno looks up. He looks surprised, but just takes another drag off his cigarette and smiles slightly. "Aiba-san is a runner, isn't he?" he chuckles. "He should try out for the Olympics. Japan could use some good long-distance athletes."
Sho just stares. Ohno offers him a cigarette, pack extracted smoothly from his front left pocket, but Sho declines. He's not in the mood.
"Where'd he go?" Sho asks calmly. "And where is Matsumoto?"
"They're both running," Ohno responds, and exhales smoke into the already-grimy city air. "Aiba-san found us and Jun-kun just went. But I don't think they'll be running for long."
A small silence overcomes them, and then Ohno clears his throat. "Jun-kun isn't very good at hiding, you know," he says quietly. "And neither am I, I guess."
"He's not really looking for you," Sho says, even though he knows Ohno understands that. "You've just become part of the situation through circumstance."
"Circumstance," Ohno repeats, and blows the last of the smoke in his mouth away before stubbing out the cigarette beneath his heel. "Not fate?"
The question takes Sho by surprise.
"I don't know," he confesses. "I don't think about fate."
"You should. It's easier than thinking about circumstance."
In the dim light of the alleyway, Sho thinks Ohno's face looks like a moon, waxing and waning when he moves and talks.
"Sakurai-san," Ohno says then, and pushes off from the wall he was leaning against. "If you want, I'll drive you home."
Sho thinks about refusing. It would be easy, to hold up a hand and say thanks, but no thanks, I can take my own taxicab back to my apartment and I won't need to be indebted to you. But Sho can tell Ohno isn't doing this to make Sho owe him--he's doing it because Sho just lost a housemate for the night, and Ohno might have lost his boyfriend for longer than that. He's doing it because he knows the two of them have to let Aiba and Jun chase each other for as long as they want to and not intervene.
The way Sho sees it, this kind of thing might actually be fate and not circumstance. And that makes him uneasy, because how do you deal with fate?
"I'll take the ride," Sho consents. "But not back to my house."
Ohno nods cooperatively. "Wherever you want," he says, and lets Sho lead them out of the alleyway.
-
'Wherever you want' is an obvious place in Sho's mind. These days, when he's not at home, he's either driving or at Nino's apartment. Even though the current time is nowhere near Nino's preferred 'after-six' timeslot and Sho knows he's taking a giant leap of faith rather than his usual, planned steps, he finds it very hard to care.
Ohno drives him there without question or even conversation. He starts the car, thinks over Sho's directions for a second, and then switches on the air conditioning.
"Comfortable?" Ohno says halfway into the ride.
They're on the highway now, far from the burning city lights that Sho sometimes hates with a passion, and the car is driving smoothly without even the roar of the engine to distract Sho from his impending fatigue. The leather seats are cool and the air feels just right, and Ohno is humming along to the song on the radio--something old that Sho can't recognize, but it's bluesy and he likes it.
"Very," he says, and closes his eyes. "Thank you."
Ohno drives on.
When Nino's apartment comes into view Sho snaps out of his half-dream and points the building out to Ohno. It can't be any more than three minutes later when Sho bids Ohno good-bye and thank you again, so much, for the ride; Ohno waves with a smile that Sho hopes to God is genuine but he can't see how it could be anything otherwise.
"If you can," Sho says before Ohno starts the engine again, "if it's not too much trouble--."
"Aiba-san will be fine," Ohno reassures Sho. "You worry too much, I think."
Maybe Ohno is right, but Sho can't help it just like he can't help what he's doing now. The buzzer jumps under his finger just like it does in the mornings, but it's even earlier in the morning right now and he's not holding a bag of groceries in his arms. Sho has no butter, no milk, and no bread. He doesn't have his Maruyama Grocery uniform on. And there is no truck in the parking lot to take him home. He is on his own.
It takes too long before Nino's voice crackles out of the speaker, irritated and thick with sleep.
"Seriously," he says. "I might just call the cops on you."
"Can I come up?" Sho whispers, mouth very close to the holes in the speaker.
"Why are you even here?"
Sho decides to be honest. "I couldn't wait until tomorrow."
Nino doesn't say anything, just grunts. Sho begins to panic--what if Nino doesn't open the door?--but the click of the lock is loud, louder than in the daytime, and Sho exhales (though it does nothing to quell the drumming of his heartbeat).
No one is on the top of the fourth floor staircase waiting for him, but Sho expected that. He also anticipated that the hallway would be an eerie thing to walk through at three in the morning, and he has his arms wrapped around himself and his mouth in a thin line when he finally shows up at Nino's door.
"Cold?" Nino asks flatly. His voice is hoarse and he's squinting, and Sho immediately feels like telling him to just go back to bed, pretend this never happened, it was all a dream and I never woke you up at two-thirty in the morning trying to believe in fate instead of circumstance. "Because I am. Because I'm out of bed."
"Nino," Sho begins, but Nino just shuffles away, mumbling and limping like an old man.
"Nino," Sho tries again. "It's tomorrow."
"And I want to go to sleep," Nino grumbles, though they both know he can't anymore. He's too awake now, too alert at Sho's presence, to just slip back into bed and get carried off to dreamland that easily. "One day I'll kill you when you're least expecting it, Sakurai. Just to get back at you for this moment."
"You like sleeping?" Sho asks, more to distract Nino from noticing that Sho is following him into the bedroom than because he actually wants to know.
Nino makes a garbled humming sound before he realizes that he's in his bedroom again--with Sho.
"You sneaky bastard," he snaps, though in this state it's like a kitten asking for attention than anything with actual bite. "I'm telling you--." Nino drags his finger across his throat and then pokes Sho's chest right where his heart is.
His hand lingers, slipping gently against the fabric of Sho's shirt, and Sho's breath catches a little.
"You can kick me out," Sho says. "I won't hold it against you."
"If you let me kick you out I'd hold that against you," Nino mumbles, and throws the covers back on his bed. "Get in, stupid."
It's almost three in the morning and somewhere on the outskirts of metropolitan Tokyo, there they are: two boys on a bed. Sho's been in this situation before but now it's very different--he can't see the stars this time, but he's still wishing on them even though they're hidden behind drawn curtains in an unfamiliar room. Two boys on a bed, Sho thinks, and they're a funny pair--an actor and a paparazzo; a prey and his predator, though in a softer sense.
Nino yawns hugely. "Story time," he says, and throws one arm over Sho's lap. Sho lets him.
"I'm sorry," Sho says, "it's three in the morning, maybe we should save this until tomorrow--."
"Maybe," Nino says. "But I might not feel like saying everything tomorrow. Did you plan this? People are more vulnerable when they're not fully awake, you know."
"That you're telling me this suggests you're not so vulnerable," Sho says, a little amused. He feels like tugging Nino's shirt down; it's ridden up almost to the bottom of his ribcage.
Nino turns over on his stomach. "Someone," he says, voice muffled in his pillow, "told me I needed to stop acting like a recluse."
Sho blinks--he wasn't aware that story time had already started. "Wait," he says. "Acting like a recluse?"
"My manager told me that I had to act like a role model in my private time," Nino says, and flips over so that he's on his back now. Sho finally decides to tug down Nino's shirt and pulls it gently over the slope of his stomach, all the way to the top of his loose pajama pants. "I told her that I didn't want people to watch me when I wasn't on-screen, so I was just going to act like I didn't like going out in public. She was pretty upset." He laughs a little and yawns in quick succession.
"My family told me to do what I had to do, but that someone I told you about--the one that uses my guest room sometimes--he didn't like it. He used to tell me all the time that people can't hide forever."
"So what?" Sho wonders. "He forced you to start going out more to fix your image? He dragged you outside and called the paparazzo to take your photo in the sunlight as proof?"
Sho hears Nino's snort before he even realizes that the smirk is back. "No," he says. "He asked Weekend to deal with it, and they gave you the job."
There is silence for a long, long while. It is early, Sho thinks, much too early for this kind of realization--the kind that hits you over the head and then in the heart and keeps on plowing through you. He forgets to breathe, for a second, and thinks back to the beginning: the contract that came in the mail, the first few days of August that were overbearingly hot and full of cicada-noise, Sho signing his name on the dotted line.
To Sakurai Sho: We, the editors at Weekend magazine, are writing to inform you of an assignment opportunity. Should you choose to accept this job in lieu of the one you have now, sign the dotted line at the end of this document.
"You rang the buzzer and I expected you to come upstairs with a camera and a notepad and ten thousand questions," Nino continues, voice low. "I was told that you were going to gather information about me and feed it to Weekend, who'd out me to the public."
"And you were okay with that?"
Nino looks at Sho and raises his eyebrows. What do you think?
"I used to get my groceries dropped off by my agency, so I thought I'd see who you were just for the hell of it," Nino says. "I'd figure out your plans and make you leave and then Weekend would have written a story about how I'm a cynical bastard who yells at grocery deliverymen."
"What happened instead?" Sho breathes, and lets himself slide down so that he's lying on his back, eyes turned toward the ceiling. Now they're two boys on a bed lying side-by-side, questioning and thinking and on the edge of sleep.
Nino drags a single finger down Sho's arm, starting from the tip of his shoulder to the rounded crescent moon of his middle fingernail. When he pulls back Sho clenches his fist; his entire arm is tingling lightly.
"Well," Nino whispers, "I haven't called the police on you yet, have I?"
"But that's not news-worthy at all," Sho says, and shuts his eyes. "What am I going to tell Weekend? They'll want something juicy."
"Tell them that I'm suffering from a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome," Nino says, and curls into Sho's side. Someone pulls up the blanket from the foot of the bed. "That I'm addicted to white bread and can't leave the house because everyone else likes that whole-wheat shit. I'm not into health food."
"I'll quote you on that," Sho mumbles, and lets his fingertips rest on the warm nape of Nino's neck. "I'll say that you can't leave the house because you have a phobia of organic food products."
"That's stupid," Nino says through another, final yawn. "Just say that I…that I like…"
"Pancakes," Sho finishes.
Before he falls asleep he sees, through the part in the curtains, a fraction of the stars that dot the sky. One cup of the Milky Way grants a wish, he remembers, and decides that that's not true. You only need twenty-eight, a little luck, and the will to keep going--because if you do, something good might happen, and things might change for the better.
-
Nino drives Sho home in the next morning in a light drizzle, the kind Sho's mother used to call 'baby sprinkles' when he was little. As the car rolls along in the early-morning grey Nino makes snide remarks about how it's August and therefore way past the rainy season, so it shouldn't be raining as much as it has been. Sho agrees, but only because he feels like humoring Nino is his best choice.
They had woken up that morning tangled in sheets; Sho was on one side of the bed still in his clothes from last night and Nino was already sitting up, scrunching a hand through his hair (oh, Sho thought, so that's where the bed head comes from).
"Well," Sho mumbled, choosing his first words of the day as carefully as he would a proposal, "this is new."
Nino rolled out of bed in reply, but Sho caught the sly grin on his face anyway.
In an hour, there were pancakes (blueberry this time because Nino said he was getting tired of plain ones), and Sho tried to help with the flour and the mixing. That only resulted in most of the kitchen getting covered in a thin layer of white, and Nino, after realizing what had happened, kicked Sho out of the kitchen with a warning that if he ever tried to cook again there would be dire consequences. (Sho didn't believe him, but Nino picked up a wooden spoon then and Sho decided that okay, maybe he should just wait in the living room.)
They ate at the table like usual, but this time Sho's knee kept knocking into Nino's--at first accidentally because their chairs were closer than usual, but then Sho started doing it just because and Nino wasn't threatening him.
Now they're in the car, parked in front of Sho's apartment, and Nino reaches over to flick Sho's knee with his index finger.
"Ow!" Sho claps a hand over his knee. "Hey, what was that for?"
"For the abuse I suffered at my own kitchen table," Nino snaps. "If I wake up with a bruise on my knee tomorrow, I'm suing you."
"That's not fair," Sho replies, and unlocks the door. "You'd win."
Nino doesn't say anything to that, only watches Sho open the passenger door.
"Hey," Nino says when Sho is halfway out the car, "Will I see you tomorrow?"
"After six in the morning," Sho says, "just like always," even though both of them know that after last night, 'always' isn't the same as it used to be.
-
Hours later, the buzzer to Sho's apartment rings and Sho jumps up from the couch, his heart already racing and winning against the blood that's rushing through his head. Even though he knows it's probably not Nino--even if he won't let himself think it's Nino--he's still stupidly excited for whoever is asking to come up.
"Hello?" Sho says. "Who's there?"
There's a pause. Then: "It's Ohno."
Well, Sho thinks. Well.
"Come on up," he says, pressing the button to unlock the front door.
"So what is this?" he asks, though good-naturedly, when Ohno appears at Sho's door wearing a ratty old t-shirt, sweatpants, and such an exhausted look on his face that it makes Sho want to offer him the couch for a thirty-minute nap. "Fate or circumstance?"
Sho watches Ohno's eyes crinkle at the sides. "Circumstance for us," he says, and rests a hand against the doorframe. "Fate for Aiba-san and Jun-kun."
"Don't tell me you got kicked out," Sho says, and doesn't know whether to feel relieved or worried. As it is, his stomach is churning with a mixture of both, and it doesn't feel all that pleasant. "Or did you leave on your own volition?"
"I couldn't sleep," Ohno says simply.
And even though he's already had breakfast Sho decides that making some would be the most appropriate thing to do in this situation. He invites Ohno in and lets him sit at the table while he makes tea and instant oatmeal (Sho is an expert at preparing instant foods). He doesn't talk to Ohno and Ohno doesn't say much, either, but Sho figures that there is nothing to be said that they don't already know.
But one thing confuses Sho.
"Why did you let him stay?" Sho asks as he brings over bowls of oatmeal and the teapot to the table, where Ohno has his hands curled around a mug. His eyes are closed and for a second Sho wonders if he's fallen asleep sitting up--but no, Ohno answers. He thinks about it first and takes a sip of tea, but he answers.
"I don't think it would be fair if I intervened," Ohno says quietly. He takes the spoon Sho offers him and dips it into the oatmeal, which is blowing curls of steam into his moonlike face. "I don't feel bitter about Aiba-san. I just want Jun-kun to be happy."
Sho looks up. "That's all?"
"That's all." Ohno smiles. "Besides, Jun-kun talks so much about Aiba-san that I wonder if it even makes sense to be jealous. Maybe he's my second boyfriend and I don't even know it."
He stirs his oatmeal around, making a whirlpool of oats and brown sugar, before scooping a spoonful into his mouth. It's hot--Sho hasn't eaten any of his yet for that reason, and he opens his mouth to warn Ohno--but Ohno looks wonderfully pleased and not as if he's burned his tongue at all.
He makes a sound full of feeling, the kind of noise you'd make if you found food in an obscure cupboard after being hungry for hours on end.
"Delicious," Ohno says, and tucks in.
-
Aiba doesn't come back for two days, but Sho knows there's nothing he can do about it and so he frets in silence and worries with his mouth closed. Even so Nino informs him that the aura around him is like being in a room full of mothers who don't know where their children are.
"If he texts you that he's fine, then why don't you just believe him?"
Nino is seeing Sho out of his apartment. After his day off (that wasn't planned, but Sho has many friends in the management department) he went back to his usual delivery routine.
"I don't know," Sho says irritably, because he honestly doesn't and it's frustrating him. "I just--I don't know him, you know?"
"Okay, well," Nino says as he leans against the wall of the foyer, "I don't see Aiba getting all flustered that you've been spending a lot of time with me. He doesn't know me. You just worry too much, you know that?"
Sho rubs his temples. "That's the second time I've been told that," he mutters.
"So there, Mother Sakurai. Just let it go. Babies grow up into young men with raging hormones, it's perfectly normal," Nino says.
Before he shuts the door he reaches out to fix one of Sho's undone uniform buttons. Blushing mercilessly, Sho thanks him with a smile.
As soon as he unlocks the door into his own apartment, Sho immediately knows that Aiba is back--his shoes are lying against the wall on their sides, the way they usually fall when Aiba kicks them off without a second thought and pushes them out of the way. Sho breathes a heavy sigh of relief and feels a little lighter as he walks into the kitchen.
There, he finds a shirtless male model.
Sho is about to faint.
"I," he begins. He has to lean against the counter for support. "May I help you?"
Jun jumps and looks up. His eyes almost outgrow the size of his head, and he puts down the mug he's holding. (Sho glances at it: yep, it's his personal mug. Oh, he will kill Aiba.) "Oh," Jun says, and clears his throat probably more violently than he intended to. "You must be Sakurai-san, right? Aiba's housemate."
"Ye-e-s," Sho drags out the syllables. "Yes."
The silence between them feels like a giant boulder. Finally Jun speaks up. "Sorry that I'm just hanging out in your kitchen--Aiba's a late sleeper, so…"
"I know," Sho says.
"And I thought I'd make some tea." He runs a hand through his hair nervously. "You can have some if you'd like."
"I will," Sho responds. "It is my kitchen."
He feels, as he moves around the kitchen awkwardly, that he knows too much about Jun through hearsay and secondhand memory. All of it--Aiba's five thousand Jun stories, the Weekend rumors, and all of Ohno's little remarks--flood his mind now as he watches Jun slip into a chair at the table.
Compared to all of the other celebrities Sho has come across, Jun looks the most tired. Perhaps it's because Sho is looking at the Matsumoto Jun that no one else gets to see--the morning-after, just-woke-up, doesn't-do-well-with-mornings Matsumoto Jun. The circles under his eyes are deep and dark and his complexion isn't really as rosy as all the photos make it seem, and the stray half-curls escaping from his hair band make it look like his face is a too-pale canvas sparsely painted with black swirls. It's not the most enchanting image in the world, but Sho finds himself staring anyway, unable to look away.
He's still looking when Jun's eyes meet his.
"This is good tea," Sho says for lack of anything else to comment on. "It's usually really watery when I make it."
"I do cook a lot," Jun replies, and swirls what's left of the liquid in his mug. "That might not extend to tea, but I do."
Jun's eyes are intense, but softly so. Normally Sho wouldn't dare make eye contact with someone he's never met for this long, but he's still looking at Jun and Jun is looking back at him with some sort of curious concentration.
"I hope you don't expect me to apologize," Jun says suddenly. His tone isn't angry or standoffish--Sho can tell he's only speaking the truth. It's a truth full of feeling, of a feeling that only comes from seeing someone in snapshots and fleeting moments when all you want to do is reach out to their back and turn them around to say, hey there, I've missed you.
Sho could never ask anyone to apologize for that.
He thinks about asking the twenty-eight stars so long ago to just make everything work out in the end. He'd deliberated over the wording of that wish for a long time--should he ask for happiness, for Aiba to find Jun, for good fortune and a nice life? Somehow Sho decided that 'everything will work out in the end' was the most neutral thing he could ask for. It wasn't like he was begging by asking for something too specific, but he got his point across.
And honestly, Sho never thought it would come this far. But here he is, sitting across from Matsumoto Jun at the kitchen table on a weekday morning, and he feels calm. He feels like everything has worked out.
After all of the trying and hoping and running, after all of those prayers that started and ended with tomorrow, after all of the breakfasts and the worried pangs in Sho's stomach--after all of it, Sho feels like things have come a long way from where they started.
He shakes his head.
"There's nothing you need to apologize for," he says, and gets up to open the curtains that lead into the balcony. Today, it's sunny outside.