Characters: Kisarazu Ryou, Kisarazu Atsushi, Tanaka Youhei
Location: Classrooms
Time: October 18th
Rating: PG
Summary: Youhei needs someone to talk to about being a twin, he finds someones.
“Seriously, Nikola Tesla. I was thinking Napoleon, but he’s been done so many times,” Ryou said, stepping out of the classroom. Their History of the Mutant in Japan class had ended a short time before, but he and Atsushi had gotten caught up in discussing their Senior Projects with the teacher. The halls were awash with students, the junior classes must have just let out as well.
Although they had different classes, being apart didn’t bother the Tanaka twins. After all, it was easy to talk in class when you didn’t even have to be near each other or speak. And that was how Youhei ended up alone in the halls, leaning against the wall and staring down at his DS as usual, although this time he wasn’t really playing it. In fact, he was even glancing up once in a while, though he wouldn’t admit that he was wary of seeing Yukimura there. What he did see though, was the other pair of twins at their school. After a moment of fiddling with his game, Youhei actually put it away, and found himself following after them curiously. He had to stick close too, as with so many people he might have lost them.
It did not take long for Atsushi and Ryou to discover they were being followed. Something about the predator instinct made them notice things like that. ”Isn’t that Youhei following us?” Atsushi asked Ryou, speaking in cat.
”Looks like it. We should find a quiet place where he can catch us and see what it is he wants,” Ryou responded. His tail and ears came out and he grinned at his brother. ”Second music room should be empty and if he doesn’t want to talk we can get in some guitar practice.”
”Sounds good to me,” Atsushi said, his own tail and ears appearing. In Japanese, he said, “Let’s go to the music rooms and practice!” before turning and heading in that direction.
Youhei knew it was weird to be following someone, but he already knew he was weird. Or at least thought he was. That was the reason he was following these two; maybe if he could see how other twins acted he could get an idea of whether acting like he and Kouhei did was strange after all. He was taken aback by the sudden appearance of ears and tails, and at those words he wondered if maybe he should stop tailing them.
When’s dinner? Kouhei’s thought came, interrupting Youhei from his own.
I don’t know, ask Ohtori.
You’re not in your room?
No, just taking a walk. I’ll be there by dinner though. Youhei replied, trying to make his thoughts seem as relaxed and unsuspicious as possible. Kouhei continued to prod, wondering what Youhei was doing, but Youhei guiltily stopped listening, and most importantly, stopped answering. He’d been doing it a lot more recently, something he knew was troubling Kouhei, but sometimes he needed time to himself.
Before he knew it, Youhei was watching the other twins enter a music room, and he hovered at the door, wondering just what he was doing there. “You’re twins,” he blurted out, looking between the two. He knew it was obvious, but at the same time he wouldn’t be watching them if they weren’t.
The Kisarazu twins turned in unison to look at him. “Often,” they said together. Things like that would occasionally make people jump, but they figured that Youhei would understand rather than be alarmed. “Why don’t you come in and close the door,” Atsushi said, “and we can talk about it.”
Ryou pulled three chairs close together and nodded at his brother. “He’s Atsushi, I’m Ryou. You’re Youhei, correct? What can we do for you?” He sat down and gave the other boy a calm look.
In fact, not only was the two cat-boys speaking in unison not alarming to Youhei, it was oddly comforting, as if maybe these two would know exactly what sort of things he went through daily. He was starting to get suspicious they had the same power as he and Kouhei as well, only maybe they’d made it work on other people, because it felt like they were reading his mind as they ushered him in. Still, Youhei hesitated before actually stepping inside, but since he was here already, he finally walked in.
Before sitting down though, he took one of the chairs and pulled it away from the other two a bit, not used to willingly being close to anyone who wasn’t Kouhei. He almost said something to his brother even, about how these two were kind of weird and how maybe they were psychics, but he bottled it up instead, not wanting Kouhei to even know he was there. He squirmed in his chair slightly, but did spend time looking between Ryou and Atsushi, working on memorizing which one was which, because that was important. “...Does it bother you when people can’t tell you apart?”
“Used to,” Atsushi said. “I even went so far as to cut my hair and attend a different middle school, just so I could be my own person.” That wasn’t the entire truth, but it was close enough. “Is that why you and your brother have different hair?” he asked.
“Occasionally, usually during the first of the semester, Atsushi will wear a headband in order to help people figure us out. We drop it after a while, because if they haven’t figured it out by now, they likely won’t,” Ryou said. “We were always close, as twins can be, but in middle school we tried to be different to please other people. Now, we please only ourselves.”
Youhei looked surprised at Atsushi’s admission, trying to imagine him with shorter hair. At the question he lifted his hand to his own hair; pink, and shorter than Kouhei’s, and shrugged slightly. “It’s... yeah, kind of like that.” His hair was his way because he wanted it. Despite the way Kouhei wanted his being different. He could have let it grow out too, but he wanted it shorter, because... he was Youhei, not just a Tanaka twin.
What Ryou said confused him though, and there was a frown on his face as he thought about it. “You like being the same? What if... pleasing yourself meant wanting to be different?” Youhei looked away to the side, guiltily. “Don’t you lose who you are if you’re always just like your brother, too?”
“We accept our similarities, but we have our differences,” Atsushi said. “For example, I prefer to read, Ryou prefers to watch movies. I don’t mind watching with him, and he doesn’t mind sitting and reading with me, but we...we are comfortable enough that we can do different things and yet still be us.”
“Even if I’m watching a movie with Shishido or Atsushi’s hanging out with Niou, I know Atsushi is there, and vice versa. We don’t need to be together, we don’t need to be doing the same thing, heck we don’t even need to have the same friends, though we tend to. Our differences do not pull us apart because we cannot be pulled apart,” Ryou said. “In fact, if anything, they make us closer.”
Youhei nodded just a little bit; he understood what they were saying, and really he and Kouhei managed to be apart quite a lot... but that’s only what it looked like to other people. To them, they were always sharing the same mindspace, unless there were times, like this, when Youhei cut his brother off. And so he shook his head. “Kouhei and I are telepaths. ...We’re only apart when I try to be. It doesn’t bother him that we’re always thinking the same things, or always together... I get the feeling he’s trying to be me.”
He shrugged, and looked back at Ryou and Atsushi, “Don’t tell him any of this, okay? I’m already hurting him enough by trying to just... be myself.” Youhei gave a wry smile, one that didn’t seem too happy. “Now I’m hiding things from him.”
“Have you talked with him about it?” Ryou asked. “Are you certain he’s trying to be you or is he just trying to be a part of you, afraid to lose the one anchor he can be sure of?”
“Being a twin and a teenager can be so difficult. Add in mutations and other differences and that just makes it that much more of an uncertain world. When you cannot rely on yourself, it is comforting to know there is someone out there you can rely on unconditionally,” Atsushi said, placing his hand on Ryou’s shoulder.
“We’re not telepathic, mostly empathic, plus we can talk as cats do, which goes mostly unnoticed by your average person, so it will be different for the two of you, but when Atsushi left back in middle school, even though intellectually I knew why, it still hurt and it caused a rift that only an earthquake fixed,” Ryou said. “Sometimes...sometimes you need to talk out loud. To be heard and understood. Don’t rely on telepathy and what you think you know. It isn’t always what you think.”
Youhei shook his head again. He hadn’t talked to Kouhei about it. And while his goal wasn’t to push Kouhei away at all, he was too afraid that that would be exactly what he was doing if he told him he wanted to be more of himself. He didn’t even know these twins, not really, and yet here he was telling them something that he rarely even let himself think about, out of worry that he’d let it slip to Kouhei.
“An earthquake?” Youhei asked in confusion. He really didn’t want to cause a rift that needed a natural disaster to happen, or even to cause a rift at all. “But what if he takes it the wrong way?” Then again, was there even a wrong way to take it? Most of the problem would be him taking it the right way. But he did know they were right about that; if he could hide this from Kouhei, who knew what his brother might be thinking that he didn’t know. And that thought made him frown even more. “Of course I don’t want to push him away. I just don’t want to be him.”
“Of course you don’t,” Atsushi said, leaning forward. His hand was still on Ryou’s shoulder. “You aren’t the same person. You happen to be closer than two people normally are, but that does not mean that you aren’t an individual. As is he.”
“It took a disaster for us to realize that we could be Ryou and Atsushi and still be twins at the same time.” Ryou looked at Youhei. “Do you know for certain that he isn’t hiding anything from you? Or what he thinks when you cut yourself off from him? Maybe he’s clinging tighter because he thinks you want a complete break.” He paused a moment, then asked, “Do you?”
Youhei gave Ryou a startled look at that. Could Kouhei really be thinking that’s what he wanted? “No!” he said quickly, looking troubled. Kouhei was all he had. Or at least the only thing he had that really mattered. And yet his sense of self mattered too. Always being on the same wavelength, to confer about everything; it was good for the ego, but in a way it wasn’t like companionship with someone else... it was like talking to himself. “I just don’t want to feel like I’m him and he’s me. Kouhei is my brother... not me. But sharing thoughts is hard to keep separate without feeling like I’m doing something bad.”
“You aren’t doing anything bad. Except for where you aren’t talking to your brother and explaining this to him,” Ryou said. “He deserves to know. Atsushi and I will always have that bond, same as you, but...having separate interests...”
“...give us something to talk about,” Atsushi finished, not missing a beat. “Only so long you can talk to yourself without growing bored and lonely. Talking to someone who knows you as well if not better than you know yourself about new stuff? That’s where the real fun is. Close yourself off and read a book and then tell Kouhei about it. It’s a whole other world,” he said with a grin.
Youhei sat quietly, looking between Ryou and Atsushi as they spoke, and realized that for once he was looking to someone to learn from them, not to find a reason why they were wrong while he was right. Atsushi’s idea sounded like a good one, one that he wished he could try, or at least something like that, only... he’d still have to hope it wouldn’t be hurting Kouhei, even if he explained it. “And you think he’d understand?” Really, he knew he shouldn’t be asking them; the one who knew Kouhei best was him, and if he didn’t know for sure, how could anyone else?
There was something else though, mostly unrelated, about these twins that had him curious. But not sure he wanted to know the answer. It was just a rumor, right? Rumors were often wrong. “And do you really...?” Youhei paused, not sure how to phrase it, and he shifted awkwardly. “How close are you?”
“Hopefully?” Ryou said, shrugging. “We’re not you, so we can’t say for certain. But...if you would like us to be there when you talk to him, just in case things...need clarifying, we would be happy to help,” he offered.
Atsushi nodded. Then he exchanged a smile with Ryou at the next question. “You...said that telepathy with Kouhei is like talking to yourself?” This time it was he who shrugged. “It’s like masterbation. Just with more parts. As close as we are, not feeling what the other is when touching yourself is difficult. So we stopped trying. It’s not for everyone though,” he said with a grin at the obviously uncomfortable younger man.
“We won’t suggest it to you or Kouhei, don’t worry,” added Ryou. “It’s one of those things you either figure out on your own or you just don’t.” It may have been phrased oddly, but hopefully Youhei got the idea.
Youhei felt his face flush instantly at the mention of masterbation, and while in a way he could see exactly what they meant by that, the thought still sounded really awkward. He nodded just slightly, glad to take that as it was, an opening to not worry about it, and was glad he wasn’t sharing thoughts with Kouhei right then. “I’ll talk to him myself,” he said, quieter than before as if he was trying to tiptoe around that topic he had brought up. “It’s between us, but...” He shifted again, this time embarassed for a different reason; he’d just opened up more to strangers than his own twin. “Thanks, senpai.”
“You’re welcome,” both Ryou and Atsushi responded together. “If we can be of any help, just let us know, okay?” Atsushi added.
“We take our responsibilities to our kouhai very seriously,” Ryou said. “And if Kouhei needs someone to talk to...or to blame, point him at us, okay?” he said seriously. Atsushi nodded.
Youhei couldn’t help raising his eyebrows at that. When he’d blamed Yukimura for not being responsible for his kouhai, he didn’t mean it seriously. But at the same time it was nice to have people around who were the closest to understanding his situation, and so he probably would keep his mind open to the idea of coming to them with problems. Or letting Kouhei know there was someone to talk to. “I will,” he agreed. “...I should probably go see him,” he said softly. Youhei wasn’t too eager to what he’d face when he did, but he didn’t want to keep feeling guilty every time he went quiet either. “I’ll see you around, Ryou, Atsushi.” he said pointedly as he stood, nodding to each of them in turn. Because it was important that they were still individuals.
“See you, Youhei!” they said, nodding back. As the other left, Atsushi turned to Ryou, “Now, how about that guitar practice?”