Because You Never Get Second Chances -- Part Two
Title: Because You Never Get Second Chances
Fandom: Gravitation
Pairings: mainly Eiri/Shuichi, Shuichi/OC, Hiro/Ayaka, Yuji/Suguru, Tatsuha/Maiko
Rating: R, for content and language
Warnings: CHARACTER DEATH
Part Two: Too Much; or, see what you still meant to me
Their plane landed in Tokyo around eight the next morning. Shuichi slung his carry-on over his shoulder and smoothed down his restless-sleep-tousled hair. He yawned quietly as he stepped out of the Jetway and into the gate, and then paused, vaguely registering the sound of mumbled conversation behind him. He stood still and found himself looking deep into the eyes of his former best friend, for the first time in four years. He felt frozen, unable to move, unable to blink or breathe. Until Hiro smiled at him.
“The will hearing isn’t until this afternoon,” Hiro told them as they made their way through baggage claim, picking out their suitcases and bags. “I thought I’d take you guys back to my place, so you could get some decent rest.” He looked at Shuichi with a faint smirk and a chuckle. “I’ve got a car now, can you believe it?”
“A car?” Shuichi laughed nervously. “I’m still stuck on the part about medical school.”
“Ah, that.” Hiro rubbed the back of his neck, almost apologetic. “Well, I didn’t have much use for my guitar, you know? Besides,” he reached a hand out, haltingly, to touch Shuichi’s shoulder, to pat it twice, “don’t you think Nakano-sensei has a nice ring to it?”
Shuichi didn’t know whether to hug him or hit him, so he settled on neither.
Tohma was sleeping in for the first time in years. Mika watched his chest rise and fall, and thought about how he would always wake up before her, and how in the very beginning he would kiss her closed eyelids, and how in the later years he would just leave their room and not return until N-G closed its doors for the night. She toyed with the idea of stepping out on her own, leaving him to wake up alone for once, going out to a store or a library just to say she’d gone out. But she didn’t want to be alone, and their daughter was waking up in the next room, and she was needed at home. She repressed a sigh as she swung her legs over the side of the bed and her bare toes pressed against the floor. They’d have to go to the attorney’s office today. Or, at least, Tohma would. She might not go. Maybe she’d stay home with their daughter, who still smiled during the day and was unable to grasp the concept that her uncle with the eyes like a sun god wasn’t going to visit her anymore, and wasn’t going to put her on his shoulders so she could call herself a cloud. Maybe they’d play a board game or read a book or watch a movie-a really good comedy, something to make her cry and actually enjoy the tears. Maybe Mika would try to make her understand. Maybe she would be brutal and say “you’re never going to see him again, he doesn’t exist anymore”, and feel guilty about it later. Damn, but she envied her daughter.
Tatsuha was searching for a coin. His dorm room was a mess, despite the impending date of graduation and the ultimate move he would make into his own apartment. He had packed most of everything, but discovered that ripping at tape and tossing around clothes and tearing old papers he’d thought he’d use again and creating general chaos, was therapeutic. It was only when he’d finished that he’d realized he’d have to pack it all up again. He really wished his brother had been more considerate, and had waited until after he’d moved out to blow out his brains.
He really wished his brother had been more considerate, and hadn’t blown out his brains at all.
He wasn’t like Mika. He didn’t pity Eiri or cry over missing him or anything like that. He was angry. No, he was furious at him. Furious at Eiri for leaving him behind. Furious at Eiri for not thinking about him, for not trying to be a good, older brother-but when he had ever?
No, he took it back. There was that one time where he’d taught him how to do that thing with his tongue to drive the girls really wild. And there as that time when he’d promised to perform the funeral service of a man their father had really hated, in exchange for letting Tatsuha get his ear pierced.
But all that kind of pales in comparison to killing yourself.
His cell phone vibrated on his desk. He paused in his searching to step over piles of miscellaneous possessions and flipped his phone open.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, it’s me.” Maiko. Her voice was soft and unsure, the same way it’d been ever since the suicide. He wasn’t sure whether he appreciated it or was irritated by it. He didn’t want people to think they had to treat him like glass or anything. “You’re going to the will reading, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know. I was gonna flip a coin.” He regarded the hopeless mess on his floor and fell back onto his bed, resignedly. “I guess so.”
“Shuichi arrived this morning,” she said, rushing quickly over his name as if she were afraid to say it. “I was thinking of going to see him, before. He’s at Hiro’s.” She paused. “I could see you. At the hearing. Maybe stay in your dorm tonight?”
“Sure.” It’d been awhile. He’d been reluctant to invite her over. He got so angry sometimes and he thought he might’ve hurt her, might’ve sunken his teeth too far into her shoulder, might’ve shoved her too hard against the mattress. And it was difficult to hold an erection when all he could really see in his mind and taste in his mouth was blood. “I can’t promise-”
“I know, it’s okay,” she assured him. She wasn’t in it for that, anyway. “I’ll see you, then?”
“Yeah.” He hung up and closed his eyes. He hadn’t felt this fucked up in a long time. He raised his middle finger to the ceiling. “Thanks a bunch, bro.”
-
Money and price and salary in the music industry were a section of information that was generally not released to the public. The press found out about drug use and alcohol problems; they found out about sex lives and scandals; but talk of money was successfully kept on the down-low. But it was common knowledge that the offer made to Shuichi Shindou from America was one of the largest bribes the industry had seen in a while. As important as Shuichi was to them-and even with the money from Bad Luck’s popularity and Nittle Grasper’s reunion combined-they couldn’t match it.
Shuichi’s decision to sign the new contract was announced at a press conference four days after Shuichi came into the music studio with his jaw set and his eyes moist. Shuichi did most of the talking, laughing sometimes in what sounded like a foreign language. Hiro and Suguru sat on either side of him and wore empty smiles for the cameras. And they talked about things that held no meaning, like how Shuichi hated learning English and how America will be great for his career, and how Suguru will be glad he can focus on his schoolwork again, and how Hiro will be glad he won’t have to wear make-up anymore.
And they didn’t talk about what mattered. How Suguru practically yelled and how he ripped music, on purpose, for the first time. How Hiro shoved Shuichi against the wall and how he moved like an animal. How Shuichi cried and how Hiro cried. How they grasped at each other’s arms and shoulders. How their faces burned red. How all that time and music and friendship they’d all shared broke apart in a mere matter of minutes.
By the time Shuichi left Japan, he was still unable to look Hiro in the eye. He could only look at the center of his chest, at the spot where he’d buried his face and sobbed and choked on how sorry he was. He’d wanted Hiro to go with him to America. He’d imagined them trying to read the maps and street signs and getting lost together in Miami or Los Angeles or Chicago. But he hadn’t dared to ask. Not when he could feel the betrayal that was in his best friend’s heart, when he could feel it when Hiro spoke and told him to take care of himself and to call often and have fun and to rock the USA all the way into the stars.
-
Shuichi woke up on an unfamiliar couch. He hadn’t noticed it when they’d first arrived; they’d crashed immediately and were practically in comas for hours. But he could tell now that this couch was different, new, and the realization felt like lead inside of him.
“I felt really bad about it.” Shuichi looked up from the smooth and foreign cushion at the sound of Hiro’s voice. The redhead sat on the floor with a big medical textbook in front of him, in that casual and open posture he was so good at maintaining; one leg stretched out and the other bent at the knee to use as a resting place for his elbow, feet bare and unashamed, jeans close to ripping, oversized T-shirt hanging limply off his body, hair pulled back messily. He gestured to the furniture Shuichi was currently occupying. “The couch, the old one, I mean.”
Shuichi swallowed and shook his head. He didn’t want Hiro to apologize. Not for anything. He sat up, blue blanket pooling around his waist. “I did too,” he said. “Not for the couch-I’ve never even really owned a couch, I just kinda slept on everyone else’s-but for-I mean-I felt bad.” The words were a nervous tumble and quite unlike the eloquent apologies he’d sometimes put into song lyrics but had never sang, because they hadn’t fit the band’s image. But Hiro’s mouth quirked upwards, anyway, because he always knew whatever Shuichi meant to say.
“Such a lovable idiot,” he muttered affectionately, bits of a grin sneaking into his tone so his words held no bite.
Shuichi smiled back, feeling that same urge he’d felt at the airport-but he wasn’t comfortable enough to punch him yet, so he all but fell off of the couch as he threw himself into Hiro’s arms. Crying and sniffling and general eye watering and nose dripping ensued.
“I’m sorry!”
“I’m sorry, too!”
“I missed you!”
“I missed you, too!”
“Oh, Hiro!”
“Shuichi!”
Maiko walked in on the familiar sight of her brother and Hiro in a suggestively overzealous embrace. She frowned playfully and shook her head.
“If you guys are going to do that, you could at least lock the front door.”
Eiri really didn’t detail much in his will. There were such few things that he’d regarded as precious to him during his life-and such few people, as well. His car went to Mika, because he could trust her not to crash it or let it get too dirty. His laptop went to Tohma, because he was possibly the only one who could guess at the password that protected its contents. His money, quite obviously his largest asset-including money not only accumulated over the years of his sterling career, but also any money made off of book sales after his death-was to be divided between Tatsuha-because he needed it, and Eiri didn’t have much else to give him-and the Seguchi daughter, because she had a long life ahead of her with clothes and college and boyfriends and bills, and money would come in handy. And lastly, the lease on his apartment and any personal belongings in it went, inevitably, to Shuichi Shindou.
“What the heck was he thinking?!”
The streetlights flashed across Hiro’s calm and thoughtful expression as he drove his wide-eyed and bristling friend to the novelist’s home.
“What am I going to do with his apartment?! I mean, geez, I don’t even live here!”
“Maybe you could rent it out,” Hiro suggested jokingly. Shuichi snorted.
“Yeah, sure. Ooh, like a one-room love hotel, right?” He grinned devilishly and prodded Hiro in the shoulder. “Bet you could appreciate something like that, huh? You and Ayaka? Eh, eh?”
Hiro laughed lightly, but made sure to keep his eyes on the road when he said, “Ah, yeah. Ayaka and I broke up.”
“What?” Shuichi stared at him, brow knitted. “When?”
“Little less than two years ago, I guess.” He shrugged. “I don’t really know what happened, to be honest.”
“Oh.” Shuichi’s eyes fell to his hands in his lap. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. Things happen. We know that better than anyone.”
They didn’t speak for the rest of the ride.
Shuichi slowly fit the key into the keyhole and turned it. He leaned his forehead against the coolness of the door and took a deep breath. Then, in one, swift movement, so fast that he couldn’t stop himself, he flung the door open and looked inside.
It looked exactly as he remembered it. He wasn’t sure it that made it better or worse. The lights were off, but with the moon shining in from the windows and aiding his memory, he could walk through the place as easily as if it were daylight. The stains he’d seen on the news were gone and there was no sign that anything terrible had happened.
Everything was in its place. There was beer and shortcake in the fridge. There was his citrus body wash in the shower. There was a pack of cigarettes on the coffee table. There were suits and slacks and button-down shirts in the closet. There were his reading glasses on the bedside table next to one of the trashy paperbacks he liked to read after meeting a deadline. It was like nothing had changed. Like Shuichi had never left. Like he was just coming home from the studio and Eiri was in his study, pretending to work although he’d actually finished the last chapter already because he knew he wouldn’t get any work done with Shuichi hanging all over him and telling him about his day.
Shuichi’s heart rate began to speed up as he realized that, really, it looked the exact same as it did four years ago. A surreal feeling came over him as he noticed things-little things-like the strawberry magnets he’d bought for the novelist that still remained on the freezer door. The Bad Luck singles that he’d made sure Eiri had as soon as they were recorded, were still stacked neatly beside the stereo. Shuichi ran to the bedroom and saw that his pillow was still there and-he placed his hands on it-cold, unused, perhaps since the last night he’d laid his head upon it.
“No…” He barely spoke the word, but he heard it, inside; his heart screamed it. He hurried back to the coffee table in the living room, to the cigarettes, and searched for the lighter. The lighter. With the fading and peeling sticker photo of them on their very first date. There, right there, for him to see, even years after, every time he lit a cigarette, a constant reminder, every single time-
“No. No, no, no, no.” Like a mantra, each time increasing a little in volume, in horror as the truth came crashing down on him. Eiri Yuki had still loved him.
Tatsuha needed the money, but he didn’t want it. He pressed himself flush against Maiko, pawing at the front of her blouse, buttons opening under his busy fingers. She arched her body into him, her hands running, quick, up and down his back, to make him forget. But he couldn’t. Because it was a lot of money. And all he wanted to do was burn it. Burn it in the fire that he felt building in his groin when he kissed her hard. The fire that escalated as they exposed their bodies to each other. He put his a hand on her hip while his other felt out her breast, and he felt the blood pulsing underneath her skin and he saw it in the back of his mind, the red blood; and he saw it spurting, coating the piles and piles of money with a deep dark red and it all burned in the fire that was moving up through his stomach and chest and into his throat-
“Shit.”
“Tatsuha?”
He pushed himself away from her, hand going to his mouth, and he stumbled from the bed, over the piles of his belongings.
“Stay there,” he told her through his fingers before he disappeared into the bathroom and shut the door. Maiko sat up concernedly as she heard the faint sounds of retching from behind the door.
“Oh, Tatsuha…”
When she heard the shower running five minutes later, she put her clothes back on and straightened out the sheets on the bed. As she finished her cell phone started to ring.
“Hello?” There was silence. “Someone there?” There was quiet, ragged breathing. “Hello?”
“Maiko, sorry,” the voice all but whispered, “I had to call someone, anyone, and…”
Maiko let out a relieved sigh.
“Geez, Shuichi, you scared me!”
“Maiko, it’s all my fault.”
“What?” Maiko pressed the phone closer to her ear so she could better hear her brother’s broken voice. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s my fault. I didn’t want to think it was, before, when I first found out, but, I know it, now, it’s all my fault.” He was speaking fast, and Maiko could clearly picture him shaking, gripping at his hair, tears as shiny as silver. “He did it because of me.”
“No,” Maiko spoke softly, trying to soothe and insist at the same time. “Shuichi, no. Don’t say that.”
“But it’s true! If I hadn’t gone-” A quick intake of breath. “He wouldn’t have done it. We would’ve still been-”
Maiko bit her lip. She didn’t know what to say, because she knew he was right. But it tore at her heart to hear him like that. Her grip tightened on the phone when the bathroom door opened and Tatsuha stepped, towel wrapped loosely around his waist. He looked at her and the phone in a way that made it clear he knew who she was talking to. She felt torn for a moment, unsure of how her lover would react, but she couldn’t ignore her brother’s pain.
“You can’t blame yourself,” she said finally. “You didn’t know.”
“I didn’t,” he echoed, almost inaudible. “I swear I didn’t.”
Tatsuha walked carefully back to the bed and sat down behind her. He slid his arms around her and rested his chin on her shoulder and nodded, silent, understanding, weary.
“Maiko, I swear I didn’t know. If I had, I would’ve-would’ve-”
“Oh, Shuichi,” she whispered, her eyes beginning to brim with tears. “I know. It’s okay. I know.” She leaned back into Tatsuha and he leaned forward, and they rocked, back and forth as she cradled the phone to her ear and listened to Shuichi cry and felt Tatsuha’s breath on her neck, until they rocked and cried and breathed themselves to sleep.
Back to Part One
On to Part Three
Fandom: Gravitation
Pairings: mainly Eiri/Shuichi, Shuichi/OC, Hiro/Ayaka, Yuji/Suguru, Tatsuha/Maiko
Rating: R, for content and language
Warnings: CHARACTER DEATH
Part Two: Too Much; or, see what you still meant to me
Their plane landed in Tokyo around eight the next morning. Shuichi slung his carry-on over his shoulder and smoothed down his restless-sleep-tousled hair. He yawned quietly as he stepped out of the Jetway and into the gate, and then paused, vaguely registering the sound of mumbled conversation behind him. He stood still and found himself looking deep into the eyes of his former best friend, for the first time in four years. He felt frozen, unable to move, unable to blink or breathe. Until Hiro smiled at him.
“The will hearing isn’t until this afternoon,” Hiro told them as they made their way through baggage claim, picking out their suitcases and bags. “I thought I’d take you guys back to my place, so you could get some decent rest.” He looked at Shuichi with a faint smirk and a chuckle. “I’ve got a car now, can you believe it?”
“A car?” Shuichi laughed nervously. “I’m still stuck on the part about medical school.”
“Ah, that.” Hiro rubbed the back of his neck, almost apologetic. “Well, I didn’t have much use for my guitar, you know? Besides,” he reached a hand out, haltingly, to touch Shuichi’s shoulder, to pat it twice, “don’t you think Nakano-sensei has a nice ring to it?”
Shuichi didn’t know whether to hug him or hit him, so he settled on neither.
Tohma was sleeping in for the first time in years. Mika watched his chest rise and fall, and thought about how he would always wake up before her, and how in the very beginning he would kiss her closed eyelids, and how in the later years he would just leave their room and not return until N-G closed its doors for the night. She toyed with the idea of stepping out on her own, leaving him to wake up alone for once, going out to a store or a library just to say she’d gone out. But she didn’t want to be alone, and their daughter was waking up in the next room, and she was needed at home. She repressed a sigh as she swung her legs over the side of the bed and her bare toes pressed against the floor. They’d have to go to the attorney’s office today. Or, at least, Tohma would. She might not go. Maybe she’d stay home with their daughter, who still smiled during the day and was unable to grasp the concept that her uncle with the eyes like a sun god wasn’t going to visit her anymore, and wasn’t going to put her on his shoulders so she could call herself a cloud. Maybe they’d play a board game or read a book or watch a movie-a really good comedy, something to make her cry and actually enjoy the tears. Maybe Mika would try to make her understand. Maybe she would be brutal and say “you’re never going to see him again, he doesn’t exist anymore”, and feel guilty about it later. Damn, but she envied her daughter.
Tatsuha was searching for a coin. His dorm room was a mess, despite the impending date of graduation and the ultimate move he would make into his own apartment. He had packed most of everything, but discovered that ripping at tape and tossing around clothes and tearing old papers he’d thought he’d use again and creating general chaos, was therapeutic. It was only when he’d finished that he’d realized he’d have to pack it all up again. He really wished his brother had been more considerate, and had waited until after he’d moved out to blow out his brains.
He really wished his brother had been more considerate, and hadn’t blown out his brains at all.
He wasn’t like Mika. He didn’t pity Eiri or cry over missing him or anything like that. He was angry. No, he was furious at him. Furious at Eiri for leaving him behind. Furious at Eiri for not thinking about him, for not trying to be a good, older brother-but when he had ever?
No, he took it back. There was that one time where he’d taught him how to do that thing with his tongue to drive the girls really wild. And there as that time when he’d promised to perform the funeral service of a man their father had really hated, in exchange for letting Tatsuha get his ear pierced.
But all that kind of pales in comparison to killing yourself.
His cell phone vibrated on his desk. He paused in his searching to step over piles of miscellaneous possessions and flipped his phone open.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, it’s me.” Maiko. Her voice was soft and unsure, the same way it’d been ever since the suicide. He wasn’t sure whether he appreciated it or was irritated by it. He didn’t want people to think they had to treat him like glass or anything. “You’re going to the will reading, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know. I was gonna flip a coin.” He regarded the hopeless mess on his floor and fell back onto his bed, resignedly. “I guess so.”
“Shuichi arrived this morning,” she said, rushing quickly over his name as if she were afraid to say it. “I was thinking of going to see him, before. He’s at Hiro’s.” She paused. “I could see you. At the hearing. Maybe stay in your dorm tonight?”
“Sure.” It’d been awhile. He’d been reluctant to invite her over. He got so angry sometimes and he thought he might’ve hurt her, might’ve sunken his teeth too far into her shoulder, might’ve shoved her too hard against the mattress. And it was difficult to hold an erection when all he could really see in his mind and taste in his mouth was blood. “I can’t promise-”
“I know, it’s okay,” she assured him. She wasn’t in it for that, anyway. “I’ll see you, then?”
“Yeah.” He hung up and closed his eyes. He hadn’t felt this fucked up in a long time. He raised his middle finger to the ceiling. “Thanks a bunch, bro.”
-
Money and price and salary in the music industry were a section of information that was generally not released to the public. The press found out about drug use and alcohol problems; they found out about sex lives and scandals; but talk of money was successfully kept on the down-low. But it was common knowledge that the offer made to Shuichi Shindou from America was one of the largest bribes the industry had seen in a while. As important as Shuichi was to them-and even with the money from Bad Luck’s popularity and Nittle Grasper’s reunion combined-they couldn’t match it.
Shuichi’s decision to sign the new contract was announced at a press conference four days after Shuichi came into the music studio with his jaw set and his eyes moist. Shuichi did most of the talking, laughing sometimes in what sounded like a foreign language. Hiro and Suguru sat on either side of him and wore empty smiles for the cameras. And they talked about things that held no meaning, like how Shuichi hated learning English and how America will be great for his career, and how Suguru will be glad he can focus on his schoolwork again, and how Hiro will be glad he won’t have to wear make-up anymore.
And they didn’t talk about what mattered. How Suguru practically yelled and how he ripped music, on purpose, for the first time. How Hiro shoved Shuichi against the wall and how he moved like an animal. How Shuichi cried and how Hiro cried. How they grasped at each other’s arms and shoulders. How their faces burned red. How all that time and music and friendship they’d all shared broke apart in a mere matter of minutes.
By the time Shuichi left Japan, he was still unable to look Hiro in the eye. He could only look at the center of his chest, at the spot where he’d buried his face and sobbed and choked on how sorry he was. He’d wanted Hiro to go with him to America. He’d imagined them trying to read the maps and street signs and getting lost together in Miami or Los Angeles or Chicago. But he hadn’t dared to ask. Not when he could feel the betrayal that was in his best friend’s heart, when he could feel it when Hiro spoke and told him to take care of himself and to call often and have fun and to rock the USA all the way into the stars.
-
Shuichi woke up on an unfamiliar couch. He hadn’t noticed it when they’d first arrived; they’d crashed immediately and were practically in comas for hours. But he could tell now that this couch was different, new, and the realization felt like lead inside of him.
“I felt really bad about it.” Shuichi looked up from the smooth and foreign cushion at the sound of Hiro’s voice. The redhead sat on the floor with a big medical textbook in front of him, in that casual and open posture he was so good at maintaining; one leg stretched out and the other bent at the knee to use as a resting place for his elbow, feet bare and unashamed, jeans close to ripping, oversized T-shirt hanging limply off his body, hair pulled back messily. He gestured to the furniture Shuichi was currently occupying. “The couch, the old one, I mean.”
Shuichi swallowed and shook his head. He didn’t want Hiro to apologize. Not for anything. He sat up, blue blanket pooling around his waist. “I did too,” he said. “Not for the couch-I’ve never even really owned a couch, I just kinda slept on everyone else’s-but for-I mean-I felt bad.” The words were a nervous tumble and quite unlike the eloquent apologies he’d sometimes put into song lyrics but had never sang, because they hadn’t fit the band’s image. But Hiro’s mouth quirked upwards, anyway, because he always knew whatever Shuichi meant to say.
“Such a lovable idiot,” he muttered affectionately, bits of a grin sneaking into his tone so his words held no bite.
Shuichi smiled back, feeling that same urge he’d felt at the airport-but he wasn’t comfortable enough to punch him yet, so he all but fell off of the couch as he threw himself into Hiro’s arms. Crying and sniffling and general eye watering and nose dripping ensued.
“I’m sorry!”
“I’m sorry, too!”
“I missed you!”
“I missed you, too!”
“Oh, Hiro!”
“Shuichi!”
Maiko walked in on the familiar sight of her brother and Hiro in a suggestively overzealous embrace. She frowned playfully and shook her head.
“If you guys are going to do that, you could at least lock the front door.”
Eiri really didn’t detail much in his will. There were such few things that he’d regarded as precious to him during his life-and such few people, as well. His car went to Mika, because he could trust her not to crash it or let it get too dirty. His laptop went to Tohma, because he was possibly the only one who could guess at the password that protected its contents. His money, quite obviously his largest asset-including money not only accumulated over the years of his sterling career, but also any money made off of book sales after his death-was to be divided between Tatsuha-because he needed it, and Eiri didn’t have much else to give him-and the Seguchi daughter, because she had a long life ahead of her with clothes and college and boyfriends and bills, and money would come in handy. And lastly, the lease on his apartment and any personal belongings in it went, inevitably, to Shuichi Shindou.
“What the heck was he thinking?!”
The streetlights flashed across Hiro’s calm and thoughtful expression as he drove his wide-eyed and bristling friend to the novelist’s home.
“What am I going to do with his apartment?! I mean, geez, I don’t even live here!”
“Maybe you could rent it out,” Hiro suggested jokingly. Shuichi snorted.
“Yeah, sure. Ooh, like a one-room love hotel, right?” He grinned devilishly and prodded Hiro in the shoulder. “Bet you could appreciate something like that, huh? You and Ayaka? Eh, eh?”
Hiro laughed lightly, but made sure to keep his eyes on the road when he said, “Ah, yeah. Ayaka and I broke up.”
“What?” Shuichi stared at him, brow knitted. “When?”
“Little less than two years ago, I guess.” He shrugged. “I don’t really know what happened, to be honest.”
“Oh.” Shuichi’s eyes fell to his hands in his lap. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. Things happen. We know that better than anyone.”
They didn’t speak for the rest of the ride.
Shuichi slowly fit the key into the keyhole and turned it. He leaned his forehead against the coolness of the door and took a deep breath. Then, in one, swift movement, so fast that he couldn’t stop himself, he flung the door open and looked inside.
It looked exactly as he remembered it. He wasn’t sure it that made it better or worse. The lights were off, but with the moon shining in from the windows and aiding his memory, he could walk through the place as easily as if it were daylight. The stains he’d seen on the news were gone and there was no sign that anything terrible had happened.
Everything was in its place. There was beer and shortcake in the fridge. There was his citrus body wash in the shower. There was a pack of cigarettes on the coffee table. There were suits and slacks and button-down shirts in the closet. There were his reading glasses on the bedside table next to one of the trashy paperbacks he liked to read after meeting a deadline. It was like nothing had changed. Like Shuichi had never left. Like he was just coming home from the studio and Eiri was in his study, pretending to work although he’d actually finished the last chapter already because he knew he wouldn’t get any work done with Shuichi hanging all over him and telling him about his day.
Shuichi’s heart rate began to speed up as he realized that, really, it looked the exact same as it did four years ago. A surreal feeling came over him as he noticed things-little things-like the strawberry magnets he’d bought for the novelist that still remained on the freezer door. The Bad Luck singles that he’d made sure Eiri had as soon as they were recorded, were still stacked neatly beside the stereo. Shuichi ran to the bedroom and saw that his pillow was still there and-he placed his hands on it-cold, unused, perhaps since the last night he’d laid his head upon it.
“No…” He barely spoke the word, but he heard it, inside; his heart screamed it. He hurried back to the coffee table in the living room, to the cigarettes, and searched for the lighter. The lighter. With the fading and peeling sticker photo of them on their very first date. There, right there, for him to see, even years after, every time he lit a cigarette, a constant reminder, every single time-
“No. No, no, no, no.” Like a mantra, each time increasing a little in volume, in horror as the truth came crashing down on him. Eiri Yuki had still loved him.
Tatsuha needed the money, but he didn’t want it. He pressed himself flush against Maiko, pawing at the front of her blouse, buttons opening under his busy fingers. She arched her body into him, her hands running, quick, up and down his back, to make him forget. But he couldn’t. Because it was a lot of money. And all he wanted to do was burn it. Burn it in the fire that he felt building in his groin when he kissed her hard. The fire that escalated as they exposed their bodies to each other. He put his a hand on her hip while his other felt out her breast, and he felt the blood pulsing underneath her skin and he saw it in the back of his mind, the red blood; and he saw it spurting, coating the piles and piles of money with a deep dark red and it all burned in the fire that was moving up through his stomach and chest and into his throat-
“Shit.”
“Tatsuha?”
He pushed himself away from her, hand going to his mouth, and he stumbled from the bed, over the piles of his belongings.
“Stay there,” he told her through his fingers before he disappeared into the bathroom and shut the door. Maiko sat up concernedly as she heard the faint sounds of retching from behind the door.
“Oh, Tatsuha…”
When she heard the shower running five minutes later, she put her clothes back on and straightened out the sheets on the bed. As she finished her cell phone started to ring.
“Hello?” There was silence. “Someone there?” There was quiet, ragged breathing. “Hello?”
“Maiko, sorry,” the voice all but whispered, “I had to call someone, anyone, and…”
Maiko let out a relieved sigh.
“Geez, Shuichi, you scared me!”
“Maiko, it’s all my fault.”
“What?” Maiko pressed the phone closer to her ear so she could better hear her brother’s broken voice. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s my fault. I didn’t want to think it was, before, when I first found out, but, I know it, now, it’s all my fault.” He was speaking fast, and Maiko could clearly picture him shaking, gripping at his hair, tears as shiny as silver. “He did it because of me.”
“No,” Maiko spoke softly, trying to soothe and insist at the same time. “Shuichi, no. Don’t say that.”
“But it’s true! If I hadn’t gone-” A quick intake of breath. “He wouldn’t have done it. We would’ve still been-”
Maiko bit her lip. She didn’t know what to say, because she knew he was right. But it tore at her heart to hear him like that. Her grip tightened on the phone when the bathroom door opened and Tatsuha stepped, towel wrapped loosely around his waist. He looked at her and the phone in a way that made it clear he knew who she was talking to. She felt torn for a moment, unsure of how her lover would react, but she couldn’t ignore her brother’s pain.
“You can’t blame yourself,” she said finally. “You didn’t know.”
“I didn’t,” he echoed, almost inaudible. “I swear I didn’t.”
Tatsuha walked carefully back to the bed and sat down behind her. He slid his arms around her and rested his chin on her shoulder and nodded, silent, understanding, weary.
“Maiko, I swear I didn’t know. If I had, I would’ve-would’ve-”
“Oh, Shuichi,” she whispered, her eyes beginning to brim with tears. “I know. It’s okay. I know.” She leaned back into Tatsuha and he leaned forward, and they rocked, back and forth as she cradled the phone to her ear and listened to Shuichi cry and felt Tatsuha’s breath on her neck, until they rocked and cried and breathed themselves to sleep.
Back to Part One
On to Part Three