FIC: "Happy Days" 1/1 (Akame, R-ish, 3300 words)
Title: Happy Days
Author: soundczech
Disclaimer: I claim no affiliation to KAT-TUN, Johnny's Entertainment, or the characters or people depicted herein.
Summary: Jin's been thinking about Kame for years.
A/N: Okay, the thing you need to understand about this is that I wasn't feeling up to writing anything with an actual plot but I promised samenashi I'd finish something by the end of this week, so what you all receive is totally pointless schmaltz. So be forewarned that this is probably the cheesiest thing I've ever written. Even cheesier than that fic where Kame had a star baby.
Jin’s been thinking about Kame for years. Always thinking about him, in one way or another. Ever since he was a little kid, dreaming about growing up and falling madly in love. Kame’s not a Western princess with golden curls falling down her back, but everything else is the same. Kame’s smile makes Jin all wobbly, like he’s sick, only it feels good.
Lately, Jin’s been wishing he could make Kame smile more. Kame smiles plenty but it’s never for Jin. Every time he turns around Kame’s all bright and beaming at Koki. He’s probably laughing at him and not with him, Jin decides, but it still makes him feel angry, like there are storm clouds rumbling grumpy in his tummy. He’s irritable at rehearsal all the time, all this rising hysterical rage that has nowhere to go. He wants to put green dye in Koki’s shampoo or something, but he’s a responsible adult and doesn’t need to resort to such juvenile measures.
He takes to sending Koki abusive messages from stranger’s cell phones instead. He takes a phone from a giggling Ko-Gal when he’s out clubbing and spends fifteen minutes composing a vitriolic message that he ends up deleting because it was a little too incriminating. In the end he just types in angry English caps, YOU SMELL AND NOBODY LIKES YOU, ESPECIALLY KAMENASHI KAZUYA.
It backfires, because Koki just seems to find it funny. He and Kame hunch and giggle over Koki’s phone during rehearsal, composing the perfect comeback while Jin makes loud comments about how mobile phone use has been linked to brain damage.
“Is that what happened to you?” Koki asks without looking up, but Kame stares at Jin with a slight question in his eyes, a murky confusion that grows into a gentle smile.
The storm clouds in Jin’s tummy make way for the amazing midday sun.
-
Jin has sweaty, panting dreams, the kind that used to leave him desperately shoving his sheets into the washing machine before anybody could wake up and question him. The kind that made him kind of ashamed to face Kame in the innocent light of day. In his dream Kame is long and lean stretched on a sandy beach, warm and strong beneath Jin’s hands in the studio. He is bent double in the backseat of Jin’s car or grinding against him in Johnny’s office, and he is always hot and greedy and he always says, “I love you.”
-
KAT-TUN go out for drinks to unwind after a day hunched over the meeting table arguing about what their next single should be. Away from the pages of lyrics and haphazardly stacked cds the desire to kill each other fades quickly. Jin drinks a lot of sake and whines until Kame agrees to drive him home.
Jin likes Kame’s car. It’s kind of sturdy and sensible and manly, like Kame, only it’s this girly shade of sky blue and the dashboard is lined with plushies. Jin picks up Luffy and makes him dance the tango with a stuffed meerkat. Kame laughs and Jin feels himself beaming proudly, and then he says, “Will you go on a date with me?”
Kame seems to be holding his breath and his pretty eyes are bright as starlight, but he just casually flicks on the indicator and says, “Ask again when you’re sober.”
-
The next morning Jin wakes and feels stupid and clumsy and hungover and embarrassed, but then he remembers the slight starriness of Kame’s eyes and the way he’d touched Jin’s elbow for a second before he’d shoved him out of the car.
He sends Kame a dozen roses with a card that says PLEASE??? in big English letters. Reio is a little disgusted with him, but that’s okay. Kame blushes bright red when Jin sees him and he’s trying to hide the biggest smile in the world. Jin feels like he’s just won something awesome.
-
He plans very carefully. He’s not really used to planning, and he realises he’s not very good at it. Usually he just has big ideas that spill haphazard from his lips and then lets Kame work out the details, but that probably won’t work this time. Kame can’t woo Kame for him. If this date isn’t perfect there’s probably some movie producer or glamorous heiress just waiting to sweep Kame off his feet at the smallest sign of Jin’s negligence.
He’d been lazy before and Kame had ended up with Kyon-Kyon for two years, at fancy galas and dinner parties, always drifting a little further beyond Jin’s grasp.
-
He’s five minutes early to pick Kame up, because he knows Kame expects him to show up an hour late, but he’s determined to show him how mature and reliable he can be. He actually showed up like twenty minutes early and had to sit in his car around the corner until knocking wouldn’t make him seem like a creepy stalker.
“Hey,” Kame says when he answers the intercom. “Hold on.”
Jin’s been planning what to say all day. “Hey baby,” he says. He’s trying to be smooth but his voice breaks a little, the y sound dangling a little at the end. “You look beautiful.”
The intercom crackles confused silence. “You can’t see me,” Kame says at length.
Shit. He’d sort of forgotten that part. In his car he’d been thinking about how he’d say that and Kame would stammer and his cheeks would turn pink, and then he might let Jin kiss him hell, maybe. He hadn’t really factored in the practicalities of the intercom system.
“Right,” Jin says. “I mean. You sound beautiful. You sound really good.”
More crackling.
“Are you going to come down?” Jin asks when it seems like Kame isn’t going to say anything or do anything, is just going to let Jin stand there in the lobby like an idiot for an hour.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Kame asks. He sounds a little high strung, kind of the way he does every time someone announces he’s going to be flying through the air on ropes or something.
“You can’t back out now,” Jin cries. “I MADE RESERVATIONS.”
“Jin --” Kame begins a little sternly. Jin can picture him up in his apartment, strictly plucked eyebrow furrowing and warm brown eyes pinching narrow and flat.
“I’ve never made reservations in my life, Kame. I researched restaurants.”
“You didn’t make the reservations under your own name, did you?” Kame asks suspiciously.
“Of course not,” Jin says, offended. “I’m not an idiot.” The concierge in his dark blue suit is looking at Jin askance now, hand poised on the phone at his side. Jin tugs on his beanie and lowers his face to whisper, “Could you come down already? The concierge thinks I’m a stalker or something.”
“I’m not ready yet,” Kame says. “Give me ten--”
“KAME,” Jin whines.
“Jesus, okay, okay, I’m leaving,” Kame says, and hangs up. Jin feels a little triumphant even though it was probably in his best interests to wait like a perfect patient angel until Kame was ready.
He hurries out of the lift a few minutes later, fussing nervously with his bangs. He’s wearing his favourite black sweater that has sleeves he can stretch protectively over his hands, and Jin detects a slash of eyeliner along his sloping lids.
“Are you wearing make up?” Jin asks before even saying hello. For all that they mock Kame for his vanity, Jin’s never seen him wear so much as clear mascara outside of work. On his off days, Kame can generally be found rolling around his living room floor in a pair of washed out track pants and a faded t-shirt five sizes too big.
“Shut up,” Kame hisses, hiding his pink, glossy lips with his hand.
“It’s hot,” Jin says. He’s a little pleased to see Kame so rattled over this; it’s nice to know he’s not the only one that stood in front of his wardrobe for an hour and a half deciding what to wear to dinner with someone he sees every day. “You look great.”
“Thanks,” Kame says. “You too.” His eyes move down the crisp collar of Jin’s tailored white shirt, to the loosely knotted grey tie. “You look really good.”
Jin preens.
They’re silent as they walk out onto the street. Jin tries to think of something to talk about that makes him sound witty and intelligent, vaguely suitable long term boyfriend for someone like Kamenashi Kazuya.
“I’m so nervous,” Kame says finally. “Check out my hands.” He holds his hand up for Jin to see; it is trembling slightly, the creases of his palm glisterning with sweat. Kame would never let anyone but Jin see him like this. It makes Jin feel brave.
“Don’t be,” Jin says and wraps his hand around Kame’s so their clammy palms touch. “It’s just you and me, right?”
“Right,” Kame says, and lets Jin drag him to the car.
-
Jin orders a bottle of red wine and tops up Kame’s glass until he’s fuzzy eyed and giggling, knee resting against Jin’s thigh beneath the table. Jin chances resting his hands on Kame’s knee and stroking ladders up his thigh, and Kame doesn’t pull away.
“What do people talk about on dates?” Jin asks. He’s never really done this before, not in this kind of setting, not with this kind of pressure. He usually takes girls he barely knows to clubs or the amusement part; he’s never been on a real date with a boy at all. He’s never been on a first date with someone he loves so fiercely. He thinks he’s supposed to ask Kame polite questions about his job or his family or something, but there aren’t many polite facts he doesn’t know about Kame. Not many impolite ones either.
“I don’t know,” Kame says. “This isn’t like a normal date anyway, is it?” He giggles a little. “It’s kind of too late to hide my bad sides from you.”
“I don’t want you to,” Jin says earnestly, watching as Kame’s cheeks darken to match his wine-stained lips.
“Don’t want him to what?” Ryo’s voice says suddenly, rudely. Jin’s gaze snaps to the side; Ryo and Pi are standing there in their jeans and jackets, looking a little rumpled and tired.
“I thought you guys were working tonight,” Jin says, voice taut.
“Practice was cancelled,” Ryo shrugs. “Massu broke his leg or something.”
“Shuuuuuuuuji,” Pi says, ruffling Kame’s hair. “You look handsome.”
“Um,” Kame says, looking uneasy. A minute ago he was leaning intimately over their little table, giggling into Jin’s eyes, but now his spine has drawn up distant and remote and he looks like Kamenashi Kazuya, professional adult. Jin feels a moment of violent rage that shatters into panicked disbelief when Ryo says, “We’ll join you,” and pulls up a chair.
-
Pi and Ryo don’t seem to realise they’ve interrupted anything particularly momentous. Ryo picks bits of meat out of the Mongolian beef and bitches about the girl who just dumped him, about her dumb face and dumb laugh and dumb refusal to call him back. Pi just sits there stuffing his face and not saying much, pausing occasionally only to watch in fascination the way Kame sorts through his stir fry before he’ll eat it, pulling free bits and pieces of vegetables he doesn’t like and leaving them in a neat little pile on his side plate. Pi creases his brow and empties the pile into his own bowl.
“So what were you guys up to?” Ryo asks when he’s exhausted his complaints about poor Sachiko-chan.
“Nothing,” Kame says too quickly.
“Let’s go to karaoke after this,” Ryo suggests.
“NO,” Jin yelps. He sees his panic reflected on Kame’s face. “I’m really tired.”
Ryo scowls. “Don’t be boring,” he says. “You’re coming.”
Jin wants to stab his eyes out with his chopsticks.
When Pi excuses himself to go to the men’s room, Jin sees his chance. He follows Pi into the bathroom, grabs his arm and drags him into a cubicle.
“Um, Jin,” Pi says uneasily. “We’re friends and all but I’m not really into you that way.”
“Shut up,” Jin scowls. “I am not turned on by your manboobs.”
Pi looks relieved. “What’s up, then?”
“We’re on a date,” Jin hisses. “Kame and I. I finally asked him on a date and he said yes and YOU AND RYO ARE RUINING IT.”
“What?” Pi says. “Really?”
“If he doesn’t let me kiss him tonight I’m defriending you,” Jin scowls.
“YOU’RE REALLY ON A DATE?” Pi explodes. “WHY DIDN’T YOU SAY ANYTHING?”
“KEEP YOUR VOICE DOWN,” Jin shrieks. “You can’t tell Ryo. He’s like a woman. He’ll tell everyone and Kame will kill me.”
“Okay,” Pi says. “Okay, I promise. He’ll never suspect a thing.”
When they get back to the table the dishes are being cleared away and Pi flashes Kame a giant smile and a thumbs up behind Ryo’s back. Kame’s eyes slowly shift from Pi to Jin and Jin tries to look innocent.
“Finally,” Ryo says when he sees them. “Let’s go.”
Everybody stands there silently, Jin and Pi and Kame all looking at each other, waiting for something to happen that will save them from this moment. Then Pi suddenly clutches his tummy dramatically and gasps, “OW. Owowowowowowoow. OW.”
“What are you doing?” Ryo asks. Pi’s usually a better actor than this; he’s bending over his stomach as if someone has just stabbed him and moaning.
“My appendix hurts,” Pi says. “Owwwwwww.”
“Shit,” Ryo says, standing quickly. “Are you okay?”
“Take me home...” Pi moans, throwing his arm over Ryo’s shoulder and leaning heavily.
Jin has never been so grateful to Pi in all his life.
“You told Pi, didn’t you?” Kame accuses the second they disappear out the front doors.
“I wanted to be alone with you!” Jin says. His face spasms almost involuntarily, lips twisting slightly to the side, dismayed. “I didn’t know how else to get rid of them.” He kicks at Kame’s ankle. “I’m sorry, about that. I didn’t think they’d be here tonight.”
Kame picks up his wine and swirls it around the glass. “At least now the paparazzi have only found a group of idols having dinner together, not...” He sighs and sounds serious in a way he wasn’t before. He squares his shoulders and says, sounding like somebody’s father, “If we’re going to do this we’ll have to be more careful.” He runs an aggravated hand through his hair. “This time it was just Pi and Ryo. Next time it could be someone who actually matters.”
Jin thinks of their names splashed across the tabloids; AKAKAME IN GAY LOVE DATE ROMP. In the end that won’t stop Jin, but Kame...
“Do you want to do this?” he asks nervously. They both know what ‘this’ is; it’s not this moment, this night. As far as Jin’s concerned, he wants it to be the rest of their lives, and probably every life after that. He knows that that is kind of insane and creepy for someone his age, but he’s always just known, since the very first moment when he saw Kame standing alone in his dorky tracksuit and bushy eyebrows. Kame was made for him.
Kame swallows the rest of his wine and looks a little terrified. “Yeah,” he says shyly, peeking up through black lined lashes. “Yeah.”
“Me too,” Jin says. He wants to lean over and kiss him, but anyone could be watching. Instead he finds Kame’s hand under the table and twists their fingers til they hurt.
-
Their first kiss happens right inside Kame's door, when Jin has barely toed his first sneaker off. Kame presses him up against the inside of the door and frames Jin's face with his hands, kisses him wet and strong and forceful.
"Maybe I don't kiss on the first date," Jin says, but his hands are already creeping beneath the hem of Kame's sweater, nails scratching the flatness of his tailbone. "I don't want you to think I'm easy."
Kame giggles in his ear. His lips, still slightly smudged with buttery lip gloss, rub the shell of Jin's ear and make his shoulders tremble. "As long as you're only easy for me," Kame says, grabbing Jin's hand to tug him toward the bedroom.
"I'm actually pretty hard for you," Jin says, tongue curling around the corner of his lip when Kame rolls his eyes. Jin grabs Kame’s hips and presses against him from behind, dragging wet kisses up the back of Kame’s neck. He tastes a little like cologne, this manly kind of bitter that reminds Jin of whiskey or the cognac Johnny likes to drink when he’s just done something he thinks is genius. Underneath that, though, he tastes like soap and skin, a bit like sweet lemon. Jin buries his nose behind Kame’s ear and breathes.
“I love you,” he says, and Kame makes a desperate noise and spins in his arms, crushes their mouths together again, hands fisting in the chest of Jin’s shirt.
“I love you,” Jin says again, because he likes the way it makes Kame strain against him. “Kazu,” he purrs into his ear, fingers dipping beneath the waist of Kame’s jeans.
Sex with Kame isn’t what Jin expected. He’d always imagined being able to take note of every detail; thought he would remember every beat of Kame’s heart and every soft sigh. Instead, after, all he can remember is twining their legs together and laughter, the look on Kame’s face when he touched Jin’s bare skin for the first time, and the slight tremor in his voice when he’d whispered to Jin, after, when they lay together with the covers pulled over their heads, how much he loved him.
He wakes up the next morning and it feels as though his whole life has changed. He feels like dancing out of time and singing off key, like going outside and climbing trees. Kame’s awake already and watching him with only his eyes poking out over the top of the doona. Jin grins at him and slides his knee behind Kame’s thighs. He’s never felt as safe and loved as he does when Kame grins at him and blows a raspberry against his bare chest.
Kame makes breakfast while Jin’s in the shower; Jin’s got an early call for an ad campaign today but Kame doesn’t have to go in to work at all. Jin kind of wishes he could blow it off and call in sick and stay here in Kame’s obscenely comfortable bed, but he can’t. He’s got to be careful now; he’s got more to lose than ever before.
Kame’s made a haphazard western style breakfast, toast and eggs that Jin knows he’d never eat if he were here alone. It smells amazing. Kame’s food always looks sort of gross but tastes incredible. Jin inhales it. It feels like he has never been so hungry in his life.
He kisses Kame on the cheek when he’s leaving, slides his fingers down the ridges in Kame’s bare back.
“Jin,” Kame says when he’s about to open the door. Jin looks back questioningly, feeling a fresh throb of desire as his eyes move over the line of Kame’s hair where it falls over his brow.
“Yeah?” Jin says.
Kame smiles a little, sheepishly.
“We’re going to be really happy,” he says seriously, biting his lip.
“I know,” Jin says, and ends up kissing Kame for half an hour before he can leave.
Author: soundczech
Disclaimer: I claim no affiliation to KAT-TUN, Johnny's Entertainment, or the characters or people depicted herein.
Summary: Jin's been thinking about Kame for years.
A/N: Okay, the thing you need to understand about this is that I wasn't feeling up to writing anything with an actual plot but I promised samenashi I'd finish something by the end of this week, so what you all receive is totally pointless schmaltz. So be forewarned that this is probably the cheesiest thing I've ever written. Even cheesier than that fic where Kame had a star baby.
Jin’s been thinking about Kame for years. Always thinking about him, in one way or another. Ever since he was a little kid, dreaming about growing up and falling madly in love. Kame’s not a Western princess with golden curls falling down her back, but everything else is the same. Kame’s smile makes Jin all wobbly, like he’s sick, only it feels good.
Lately, Jin’s been wishing he could make Kame smile more. Kame smiles plenty but it’s never for Jin. Every time he turns around Kame’s all bright and beaming at Koki. He’s probably laughing at him and not with him, Jin decides, but it still makes him feel angry, like there are storm clouds rumbling grumpy in his tummy. He’s irritable at rehearsal all the time, all this rising hysterical rage that has nowhere to go. He wants to put green dye in Koki’s shampoo or something, but he’s a responsible adult and doesn’t need to resort to such juvenile measures.
He takes to sending Koki abusive messages from stranger’s cell phones instead. He takes a phone from a giggling Ko-Gal when he’s out clubbing and spends fifteen minutes composing a vitriolic message that he ends up deleting because it was a little too incriminating. In the end he just types in angry English caps, YOU SMELL AND NOBODY LIKES YOU, ESPECIALLY KAMENASHI KAZUYA.
It backfires, because Koki just seems to find it funny. He and Kame hunch and giggle over Koki’s phone during rehearsal, composing the perfect comeback while Jin makes loud comments about how mobile phone use has been linked to brain damage.
“Is that what happened to you?” Koki asks without looking up, but Kame stares at Jin with a slight question in his eyes, a murky confusion that grows into a gentle smile.
The storm clouds in Jin’s tummy make way for the amazing midday sun.
-
Jin has sweaty, panting dreams, the kind that used to leave him desperately shoving his sheets into the washing machine before anybody could wake up and question him. The kind that made him kind of ashamed to face Kame in the innocent light of day. In his dream Kame is long and lean stretched on a sandy beach, warm and strong beneath Jin’s hands in the studio. He is bent double in the backseat of Jin’s car or grinding against him in Johnny’s office, and he is always hot and greedy and he always says, “I love you.”
-
KAT-TUN go out for drinks to unwind after a day hunched over the meeting table arguing about what their next single should be. Away from the pages of lyrics and haphazardly stacked cds the desire to kill each other fades quickly. Jin drinks a lot of sake and whines until Kame agrees to drive him home.
Jin likes Kame’s car. It’s kind of sturdy and sensible and manly, like Kame, only it’s this girly shade of sky blue and the dashboard is lined with plushies. Jin picks up Luffy and makes him dance the tango with a stuffed meerkat. Kame laughs and Jin feels himself beaming proudly, and then he says, “Will you go on a date with me?”
Kame seems to be holding his breath and his pretty eyes are bright as starlight, but he just casually flicks on the indicator and says, “Ask again when you’re sober.”
-
The next morning Jin wakes and feels stupid and clumsy and hungover and embarrassed, but then he remembers the slight starriness of Kame’s eyes and the way he’d touched Jin’s elbow for a second before he’d shoved him out of the car.
He sends Kame a dozen roses with a card that says PLEASE??? in big English letters. Reio is a little disgusted with him, but that’s okay. Kame blushes bright red when Jin sees him and he’s trying to hide the biggest smile in the world. Jin feels like he’s just won something awesome.
-
He plans very carefully. He’s not really used to planning, and he realises he’s not very good at it. Usually he just has big ideas that spill haphazard from his lips and then lets Kame work out the details, but that probably won’t work this time. Kame can’t woo Kame for him. If this date isn’t perfect there’s probably some movie producer or glamorous heiress just waiting to sweep Kame off his feet at the smallest sign of Jin’s negligence.
He’d been lazy before and Kame had ended up with Kyon-Kyon for two years, at fancy galas and dinner parties, always drifting a little further beyond Jin’s grasp.
-
He’s five minutes early to pick Kame up, because he knows Kame expects him to show up an hour late, but he’s determined to show him how mature and reliable he can be. He actually showed up like twenty minutes early and had to sit in his car around the corner until knocking wouldn’t make him seem like a creepy stalker.
“Hey,” Kame says when he answers the intercom. “Hold on.”
Jin’s been planning what to say all day. “Hey baby,” he says. He’s trying to be smooth but his voice breaks a little, the y sound dangling a little at the end. “You look beautiful.”
The intercom crackles confused silence. “You can’t see me,” Kame says at length.
Shit. He’d sort of forgotten that part. In his car he’d been thinking about how he’d say that and Kame would stammer and his cheeks would turn pink, and then he might let Jin kiss him hell, maybe. He hadn’t really factored in the practicalities of the intercom system.
“Right,” Jin says. “I mean. You sound beautiful. You sound really good.”
More crackling.
“Are you going to come down?” Jin asks when it seems like Kame isn’t going to say anything or do anything, is just going to let Jin stand there in the lobby like an idiot for an hour.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Kame asks. He sounds a little high strung, kind of the way he does every time someone announces he’s going to be flying through the air on ropes or something.
“You can’t back out now,” Jin cries. “I MADE RESERVATIONS.”
“Jin --” Kame begins a little sternly. Jin can picture him up in his apartment, strictly plucked eyebrow furrowing and warm brown eyes pinching narrow and flat.
“I’ve never made reservations in my life, Kame. I researched restaurants.”
“You didn’t make the reservations under your own name, did you?” Kame asks suspiciously.
“Of course not,” Jin says, offended. “I’m not an idiot.” The concierge in his dark blue suit is looking at Jin askance now, hand poised on the phone at his side. Jin tugs on his beanie and lowers his face to whisper, “Could you come down already? The concierge thinks I’m a stalker or something.”
“I’m not ready yet,” Kame says. “Give me ten--”
“KAME,” Jin whines.
“Jesus, okay, okay, I’m leaving,” Kame says, and hangs up. Jin feels a little triumphant even though it was probably in his best interests to wait like a perfect patient angel until Kame was ready.
He hurries out of the lift a few minutes later, fussing nervously with his bangs. He’s wearing his favourite black sweater that has sleeves he can stretch protectively over his hands, and Jin detects a slash of eyeliner along his sloping lids.
“Are you wearing make up?” Jin asks before even saying hello. For all that they mock Kame for his vanity, Jin’s never seen him wear so much as clear mascara outside of work. On his off days, Kame can generally be found rolling around his living room floor in a pair of washed out track pants and a faded t-shirt five sizes too big.
“Shut up,” Kame hisses, hiding his pink, glossy lips with his hand.
“It’s hot,” Jin says. He’s a little pleased to see Kame so rattled over this; it’s nice to know he’s not the only one that stood in front of his wardrobe for an hour and a half deciding what to wear to dinner with someone he sees every day. “You look great.”
“Thanks,” Kame says. “You too.” His eyes move down the crisp collar of Jin’s tailored white shirt, to the loosely knotted grey tie. “You look really good.”
Jin preens.
They’re silent as they walk out onto the street. Jin tries to think of something to talk about that makes him sound witty and intelligent, vaguely suitable long term boyfriend for someone like Kamenashi Kazuya.
“I’m so nervous,” Kame says finally. “Check out my hands.” He holds his hand up for Jin to see; it is trembling slightly, the creases of his palm glisterning with sweat. Kame would never let anyone but Jin see him like this. It makes Jin feel brave.
“Don’t be,” Jin says and wraps his hand around Kame’s so their clammy palms touch. “It’s just you and me, right?”
“Right,” Kame says, and lets Jin drag him to the car.
-
Jin orders a bottle of red wine and tops up Kame’s glass until he’s fuzzy eyed and giggling, knee resting against Jin’s thigh beneath the table. Jin chances resting his hands on Kame’s knee and stroking ladders up his thigh, and Kame doesn’t pull away.
“What do people talk about on dates?” Jin asks. He’s never really done this before, not in this kind of setting, not with this kind of pressure. He usually takes girls he barely knows to clubs or the amusement part; he’s never been on a real date with a boy at all. He’s never been on a first date with someone he loves so fiercely. He thinks he’s supposed to ask Kame polite questions about his job or his family or something, but there aren’t many polite facts he doesn’t know about Kame. Not many impolite ones either.
“I don’t know,” Kame says. “This isn’t like a normal date anyway, is it?” He giggles a little. “It’s kind of too late to hide my bad sides from you.”
“I don’t want you to,” Jin says earnestly, watching as Kame’s cheeks darken to match his wine-stained lips.
“Don’t want him to what?” Ryo’s voice says suddenly, rudely. Jin’s gaze snaps to the side; Ryo and Pi are standing there in their jeans and jackets, looking a little rumpled and tired.
“I thought you guys were working tonight,” Jin says, voice taut.
“Practice was cancelled,” Ryo shrugs. “Massu broke his leg or something.”
“Shuuuuuuuuji,” Pi says, ruffling Kame’s hair. “You look handsome.”
“Um,” Kame says, looking uneasy. A minute ago he was leaning intimately over their little table, giggling into Jin’s eyes, but now his spine has drawn up distant and remote and he looks like Kamenashi Kazuya, professional adult. Jin feels a moment of violent rage that shatters into panicked disbelief when Ryo says, “We’ll join you,” and pulls up a chair.
-
Pi and Ryo don’t seem to realise they’ve interrupted anything particularly momentous. Ryo picks bits of meat out of the Mongolian beef and bitches about the girl who just dumped him, about her dumb face and dumb laugh and dumb refusal to call him back. Pi just sits there stuffing his face and not saying much, pausing occasionally only to watch in fascination the way Kame sorts through his stir fry before he’ll eat it, pulling free bits and pieces of vegetables he doesn’t like and leaving them in a neat little pile on his side plate. Pi creases his brow and empties the pile into his own bowl.
“So what were you guys up to?” Ryo asks when he’s exhausted his complaints about poor Sachiko-chan.
“Nothing,” Kame says too quickly.
“Let’s go to karaoke after this,” Ryo suggests.
“NO,” Jin yelps. He sees his panic reflected on Kame’s face. “I’m really tired.”
Ryo scowls. “Don’t be boring,” he says. “You’re coming.”
Jin wants to stab his eyes out with his chopsticks.
When Pi excuses himself to go to the men’s room, Jin sees his chance. He follows Pi into the bathroom, grabs his arm and drags him into a cubicle.
“Um, Jin,” Pi says uneasily. “We’re friends and all but I’m not really into you that way.”
“Shut up,” Jin scowls. “I am not turned on by your manboobs.”
Pi looks relieved. “What’s up, then?”
“We’re on a date,” Jin hisses. “Kame and I. I finally asked him on a date and he said yes and YOU AND RYO ARE RUINING IT.”
“What?” Pi says. “Really?”
“If he doesn’t let me kiss him tonight I’m defriending you,” Jin scowls.
“YOU’RE REALLY ON A DATE?” Pi explodes. “WHY DIDN’T YOU SAY ANYTHING?”
“KEEP YOUR VOICE DOWN,” Jin shrieks. “You can’t tell Ryo. He’s like a woman. He’ll tell everyone and Kame will kill me.”
“Okay,” Pi says. “Okay, I promise. He’ll never suspect a thing.”
When they get back to the table the dishes are being cleared away and Pi flashes Kame a giant smile and a thumbs up behind Ryo’s back. Kame’s eyes slowly shift from Pi to Jin and Jin tries to look innocent.
“Finally,” Ryo says when he sees them. “Let’s go.”
Everybody stands there silently, Jin and Pi and Kame all looking at each other, waiting for something to happen that will save them from this moment. Then Pi suddenly clutches his tummy dramatically and gasps, “OW. Owowowowowowoow. OW.”
“What are you doing?” Ryo asks. Pi’s usually a better actor than this; he’s bending over his stomach as if someone has just stabbed him and moaning.
“My appendix hurts,” Pi says. “Owwwwwww.”
“Shit,” Ryo says, standing quickly. “Are you okay?”
“Take me home...” Pi moans, throwing his arm over Ryo’s shoulder and leaning heavily.
Jin has never been so grateful to Pi in all his life.
“You told Pi, didn’t you?” Kame accuses the second they disappear out the front doors.
“I wanted to be alone with you!” Jin says. His face spasms almost involuntarily, lips twisting slightly to the side, dismayed. “I didn’t know how else to get rid of them.” He kicks at Kame’s ankle. “I’m sorry, about that. I didn’t think they’d be here tonight.”
Kame picks up his wine and swirls it around the glass. “At least now the paparazzi have only found a group of idols having dinner together, not...” He sighs and sounds serious in a way he wasn’t before. He squares his shoulders and says, sounding like somebody’s father, “If we’re going to do this we’ll have to be more careful.” He runs an aggravated hand through his hair. “This time it was just Pi and Ryo. Next time it could be someone who actually matters.”
Jin thinks of their names splashed across the tabloids; AKAKAME IN GAY LOVE DATE ROMP. In the end that won’t stop Jin, but Kame...
“Do you want to do this?” he asks nervously. They both know what ‘this’ is; it’s not this moment, this night. As far as Jin’s concerned, he wants it to be the rest of their lives, and probably every life after that. He knows that that is kind of insane and creepy for someone his age, but he’s always just known, since the very first moment when he saw Kame standing alone in his dorky tracksuit and bushy eyebrows. Kame was made for him.
Kame swallows the rest of his wine and looks a little terrified. “Yeah,” he says shyly, peeking up through black lined lashes. “Yeah.”
“Me too,” Jin says. He wants to lean over and kiss him, but anyone could be watching. Instead he finds Kame’s hand under the table and twists their fingers til they hurt.
-
Their first kiss happens right inside Kame's door, when Jin has barely toed his first sneaker off. Kame presses him up against the inside of the door and frames Jin's face with his hands, kisses him wet and strong and forceful.
"Maybe I don't kiss on the first date," Jin says, but his hands are already creeping beneath the hem of Kame's sweater, nails scratching the flatness of his tailbone. "I don't want you to think I'm easy."
Kame giggles in his ear. His lips, still slightly smudged with buttery lip gloss, rub the shell of Jin's ear and make his shoulders tremble. "As long as you're only easy for me," Kame says, grabbing Jin's hand to tug him toward the bedroom.
"I'm actually pretty hard for you," Jin says, tongue curling around the corner of his lip when Kame rolls his eyes. Jin grabs Kame’s hips and presses against him from behind, dragging wet kisses up the back of Kame’s neck. He tastes a little like cologne, this manly kind of bitter that reminds Jin of whiskey or the cognac Johnny likes to drink when he’s just done something he thinks is genius. Underneath that, though, he tastes like soap and skin, a bit like sweet lemon. Jin buries his nose behind Kame’s ear and breathes.
“I love you,” he says, and Kame makes a desperate noise and spins in his arms, crushes their mouths together again, hands fisting in the chest of Jin’s shirt.
“I love you,” Jin says again, because he likes the way it makes Kame strain against him. “Kazu,” he purrs into his ear, fingers dipping beneath the waist of Kame’s jeans.
Sex with Kame isn’t what Jin expected. He’d always imagined being able to take note of every detail; thought he would remember every beat of Kame’s heart and every soft sigh. Instead, after, all he can remember is twining their legs together and laughter, the look on Kame’s face when he touched Jin’s bare skin for the first time, and the slight tremor in his voice when he’d whispered to Jin, after, when they lay together with the covers pulled over their heads, how much he loved him.
He wakes up the next morning and it feels as though his whole life has changed. He feels like dancing out of time and singing off key, like going outside and climbing trees. Kame’s awake already and watching him with only his eyes poking out over the top of the doona. Jin grins at him and slides his knee behind Kame’s thighs. He’s never felt as safe and loved as he does when Kame grins at him and blows a raspberry against his bare chest.
Kame makes breakfast while Jin’s in the shower; Jin’s got an early call for an ad campaign today but Kame doesn’t have to go in to work at all. Jin kind of wishes he could blow it off and call in sick and stay here in Kame’s obscenely comfortable bed, but he can’t. He’s got to be careful now; he’s got more to lose than ever before.
Kame’s made a haphazard western style breakfast, toast and eggs that Jin knows he’d never eat if he were here alone. It smells amazing. Kame’s food always looks sort of gross but tastes incredible. Jin inhales it. It feels like he has never been so hungry in his life.
He kisses Kame on the cheek when he’s leaving, slides his fingers down the ridges in Kame’s bare back.
“Jin,” Kame says when he’s about to open the door. Jin looks back questioningly, feeling a fresh throb of desire as his eyes move over the line of Kame’s hair where it falls over his brow.
“Yeah?” Jin says.
Kame smiles a little, sheepishly.
“We’re going to be really happy,” he says seriously, biting his lip.
“I know,” Jin says, and ends up kissing Kame for half an hour before he can leave.