bang bang!
first post, finally, so let's start off with a bang. (and that is the sound of a bullet going through my head, yes.)
this will probably be a good indicator of all future entries to come, meaning: a) this is kind of hysterically stupid and ridiculous, and b) half of this is to be blamed on tinyangl who said something like, "i want je!lj fic!" maybe a month ago. so if you don't like what you see, you might not want to stick around. (except no, i swear i usually do not write this much. :/)
the other half of the blame goes to my ever inspiring, ever amazing f-list, for whom i have an unhealthy amount of love. because you know me, my word count? directly proportional to my love. ♥
going live
massu, nakamaru, news, kat-tun. 7068 words.
-- massu-thon prompt 80; the places we trust. au. masuda takahisa is eighteen and in for a long and boring summer. so what's this live journal nonsense about?
Masuda Takahisa is eighteen, a fresh graduate from high school looking at a long summer ahead of him before college finally begins in the fall. A long, boring, and apparently jobless summer as no one will hire him. And hot. A really really hot summer. He should probably get around to buying that air-conditioner for his room someday. If only he had the money.
And no, the irony isn't lost on him either.
He laments all his troubles to his good friend, who works at the local ice cream place in their area. He comes here often, partly because the local ice cream place is gloriously air-conditioned, and partly because Nakamaru always gives him a discount--and extra sprinkles. And the company is nice too.
He's slowly working through a banana split today, which Nakamaru sneaks bites of in-between scooping ice cream for other patrons. When the place empties out and the manager goes home an hour early, Nakamaru loses all pretense of work and collapses onto the chair across from Masuda. Masuda laughs and scoops up a bit of vanilla ice cream--Nakamaru's favorite--and hovers it around Nakamaru's face, who smiles wryly before closing his mouth over the spoon. While Nakamaru proceeds to dig into the remaining banana split, Masuda sighs and rests his cheek against the sticky table.
"I'm so bored and poor," he whines, pounding on the table half-heartedly with his palms.
"So get a job," Nakamaru replies helpfully, except it's not helpful at all when Nakamaru knows Masuda has already applied to five different part-time jobs; two said they'd call him back and never did, the other three didn't say a thing. Masuda unsticks his face from the table and glares, which settles into a pout, which lifts at the corners when Nakamaru gets whipped cream on his nose.
"I just wish that there was a job where, I don't know, all I had to do was smile and be cute to get paid, you know? Something I didn't need real talent or skills for, or something I don't have to do any real work for to be successful."
"If only." Nakamaru shrugs, wiping at his nose. He pops the leftover maraschino cherry in his mouth and sighs happily. Masuda puffs his cheeks. "Okay, you are useless. We are so not best friends anymore."
Nakamaru laughs. "Okay, okay. If you're that bored all summer, why don't you just go on the internet? The internet is free." He pauses. "Well, you aren't paying for it, anyway."
"It's hot in my house, remember?" Masuda frowns. "Besides, what's there to do on the internet all day?"
Nakamaru shrugs again. "I don't know--games? Videos? Blogs?"
"Blogs?"
"It's like people writing in journals--only they publish it to the web."
"Who would care about what other people have to say on the internet?" Masuda asks, eyebrow raised suspiciously.
"You'd be surprised."
When Masuda's other eyebrow goes up, Nakamaru laughs. "Here, let me close up the store and I'll show you."
-
"See this? This is called livejournal, and it's probably one of the most successful and popular blogging communities on the web," Nakamaru says, navigating to the website: http://www.livejournal.com.
"Okay," Masuda says, nodding. He blinks. "Now what?"
"Uhm, let's create an account for you," Nakamaru replies, clicking around the site. Masuda looks stricken. "Wait, I told you I don't have any money!"
"It's free, remember?"
"Oh." Masuda blinks again. "Really? It's just--free?"
"Yes." Nakamaru laughs. "Now what username do you want?"
"What?"
"A username. Like, a name you want to go by."
"...Masuda Takahisa?"
"Well, I don't think you want your full name out in the open for everyone else to see. Hmm--what's your email address then?"
Masuda blinks. "Masuda dot Takahisa at--"
"Okay, never mind that then."
Masuda shrugs. "I don't know. You pick one for me."
Nakamaru's about to protest when Masuda gets distracted by something on his shelf; it's the book on beatboxing he gave Nakamaru for Christmas. "Say, have you been getting any better at this?" he asks, flipping through the pages, a smile lighting up his face. Nakamaru thinks he knows the perfect username.
-
sunlitsmiles joins the livejournal community on July 7th.
"Sunlitsmiles?" Masuda asks flatly, when Nakamaru proudly shows him his new 'blog' name. "What kind of gay name is that?"
Nakamaru throws a pillow at him. "If you don't like it then make your own!" he says peevishly.
"No, it's fine. I don't care that much." Masuda pauses. "Say, do you have one?"
Nakamaru hesitates. "Erm, one what?"
"A livejournal."
"...Maybe."
"Eh? Really? What's your username, then?" Masuda asks curiously.
"I'm not telling."
"Why?!"
"It's private." Nakamaru huffs, and his ears are turning bright red like they always do when he's embarrassed. He's saved from further interrogation, though, when his mother calls them down to dinner.
-
When Masuda gets home later that night, he heads straight for his laptop. He logs into his account on livejournal, and spends a while looking at different options, finds himself a basic layout that isn't terribly ugly to look at, and finally brings up the entry screen like Nakamaru taught him. He writes his first entry ever:JULY 08 12:14 AM
- (no subject)
It's hot. :(
He pushes the 'post' button and stares in fascination at the thing he's just created, just published to the internet, where anyone in the whole wide web could be reading it at any given moment. It's--cool, Masuda thinks, settling back in his chair, satisfied.
The novelty of livejournal ends up lasting only two days.
-
"But why won't you tell me your username, Nakamaru?" Masuda whines on the third day, back at the ice cream place, tugging on Nakamaru's sleeve impatiently. Nakamaru shakes him off and finishes scooping some strawberry ice cream into a cone for the little girl in front of him. "Two dollars," he tells her, with a big smile on his face, before turning to Masuda with a glare. "And you're not even supposed to be behind the counter."
The little girl leaves after paying, all flying pigtails and hair baubles as she skips out the door. The chimes sound. Masuda tugs on Nakamaru's sleeve again, even as he gets pushed to the other side of the counter.
"I told you it's private," Nakamaru sighs, and scoops some chocolate ice cream into a cone for Masuda--and tops it with extra sprinkles. Masuda frowns, but takes a lick of the offered cone anyway.
"Why do you even want to know, anyway?" Nakamaru says, frowning because Masuda is frowning--and it's hard to be anything but unhappy when Masuda is frowning.
"It's boring," Masuda replies, around a mouthful of chocolate. "It says I have no friends. I don't want to have no friends. Why, Nakamaru? Why won't you be my friend?"
Nakamaru twitches in the way he usually does when Masuda tries to guilt him about something, but he shakes his head. "If you want friends then why don't you just find some people with the same interests or join some communities or something?"
"You mean," Masuda replies after a moment. "Like, people I've never met before?" He blinks. "Isn't that weird? Being friends only on the internet?"
"Not really," Nakamaru trails off, rinsing an ice cream scoop in the sink. "I mean, it's all in good fun and you can meet some cool people."
Masuda considers this, and shrugs, thinking that maybe it would be kind of interesting to meet random people online. Interesting, and possibly dangerous. He's just glad Nakamaru talked him out of using his real name. And at least it might waste some time.
After they close up the shop, they head back over to Nakamaru's again, where Nakamaru teaches him how to add interests and search for communities.
While he's at it, Masuda also asks Nakamaru what the hell an "lj-cut" is.
-
Livejournal becomes a little more interesting after that, and Masuda spends the next day surfing through random communities--it seems like there's really one for everything.
He also adds in some interests, and after thinking about it long and hard, he finally adds: running, food, gyoza--and dragon ball.
He also starts commenting on random community entries for the hell of it.
-
The first person that becomes his friend on livejournal is wagahaishige.
It's after he sees some pretty awful fanart on one of the Dragon Ball communities and wonders how badly he can draw, himself. He spends one whole day sketching, and it's not Monet, but it's not that bad either. It's surely better than what that domo_k fellow draws, anyway.
He scans it and posts it to his journal. After a moment of consideration, he thinks, why the hell not, and posts it to the community as well.
He's surprised to find an email in his inbox later that day. He hardly ever checks his mail, really, only did it this time because his mom wanted to know if his college had sent anything. But sitting in his inbox is an email that says: wagahaishige - LJ Comment Reply to your entry...
His comment reads: Hey that's pretty good! :D
Masuda sits there, kind of astounded, before closing his email when his mother calls him over to the kitchen to help.
He replies to the comment with a simple, "Thanks!" the next day, and figures that will be the end of it. Only wagahaishige responds again, and, thinking it'd be rude not to follow in suit, Masuda replies right back; they end up having a whole conversation spanning everything and nothing.
Eventually wagahaishige asks if they can be friends, and Masuda cheerfully agrees because he was thinking the same thing.
-
The first person to tag him for a meme is lj_ai, even though Masuda isn't quite sure what a meme is, let alone how to pronounce it--is it "meemee," or "mehmeh," or "mehm," or "meem," anyway? He gets the gist of it though, since all he has to do is answer questions. And there's something fun in seeing his username pop up on someone else's journal, like they're friends or something.
Well, they technically are friends in some sense, Masuda guesses. He met lj_ai through wagahaishige, right around the time he met _kusanoman, actually. They leave each other comments all the time, even though Masuda always feels kind of strange reading about things happening in their real lives; his entries mostly consist of memes and whatever he's drawn that week. If he ever says anything about his personal life, it's brief and never warrants its own post.
They are friends, sure, but a part of Masuda thinks that, in the end, they are just usernames.
-
tegoshi_desu is the first one that challenges that thought, and it begins with a simple question.tegoshi_desu: ne, what should i call you? ^^
sunlitsmiles: what do you mean?
tegoshi_desu: well, i can't just call you 'sunlitsmiles' all the time--that's weird.
Masuda blinks, because he's not too sure how to respond to that. It's true that he's started just calling wagahaishige Shige--though for a while he liked to call him Wagahai--and _kusanoman Kusano and tegoshi_desu Tegoshi--but that was because they didn't seem to see any problems in using their real names. Of course, he also started calling lj_ai Koyama only because everyone else seemed to call him that and Masuda is just too lazy to code sometimes. He'd never really thought about what they should call him. sunlitsmiles: ...my family name is masuda.
tegoshi_desu: jaa, can i call you massu then?
sunlitsmiles: ...massu???
tegoshi_desu: it's cute, isn't it?! :Dv
Masuda doesn't really know what Tegoshi is thinking with this strange nickname; they've only known each other for two weeks--and for the first week Masuda was pretty sure Tegoshi was a girl. But there's something about the way Tegoshi speaks--types, the way he types--that generally lets him get his way with everything. Shige seems to know him firsthand, and is generally conned into making random graphics for Tegoshi. sunlitsmiles OK. massu is fine then.
tegoshi_desu: YAY! MASSU. ♥♥♥
He laughs when he gets Tegoshi's reply, but doesn't think too much on it, though, doesn't expect it to catch on.
It takes less than twenty-four hours for everyone on his f-list to start calling him "Massu."
-
He meets mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi on a Dragon Ball friending meme, or a Dragon Quest friending meme, or something; Kusano just directed him there with many exclamation points and ones and it was hard to say no. So he fills out the form, and for the question that asks, "anything else?" he answers: My friend was the one who chose this username for me, I swear.
After about five seconds he gets a reply from mr_pinkk that reads: LOLOL. MINE TOO. LET'S BE FRIENDS. :D
When he goes to reply he's amazed that his thread has already quadrupled in size.mr_pinkk: LOLOL. MINE TOO. LET'S BE FRIENDS. :D
bakabakanishi: LIES YOU ARE JUST GAY, YAMAPINK.
mr_pinkk: it's not a lie, you already know takki made this account for me. :(
bakabakanishi: YAMAPINK. YAMAPINK. YAMAPINK.
And as Masuda watches it all unfold with every refresh of the webpage, he doesn't know what else to do but laugh out loud--and join in.
After a comment spam of 200 comments, he ends up friends with them both; the two are kind of a package deal, after all. Both mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi's sizable f-lists--that number around 250 people each--are practically identical except for the few odd person here and there. What's more surprising is that they genuinely seem to be very good friends with a good amount of those people. They're also practically married, or lovers, or something; attached at the hip--even though they've actually never met in real life.
He later learns that many people on livejournal seem to be married or lovers in some form on lj.
-
The first person Masuda actually asks to friend is nishifuckinkido, and it's only because at Tegoshi's insistence that "Nishikido is a really nice person," that Masuda agrees. Truthfully, nishifuckinkido kind of intimidates him. He's seen him around a lot--and many people seem to be unsure whether to love him or hate him--and he's friends with lots of his friends--even though nishifuckinkido's f-list is a good deal bigger than his. But he also has a banner on the first (and only) post of his livejournal that reads: FRIENDS ONLY, FUCKERS.
Masuda stares at the message long and hard before going back to Tegoshi's journal and writing: I can't.
So it's no surprise that he freaks out a little the next day, when there is a comment from nishifuckinkido: Hey sup. Let's be friends.
He replies with a simple, "OK!" and hopes nishifuckinkido can't read the fear in his text.
And even after they become friends, Masuda is kind of wary of commenting on nishifuckinkido's journal. He doesn't want to sound stupid. nishifuckinkido points out stupid people and mocks them relentlessly. mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi are a prime examples of this, even though Masuda realizes that the three are close enough to joke in that way together. He still reads all his journal entries though, even if Masuda never thinks of anything to comment on.
But when nishifuckinkido's dog dies and he seems really upset about it, Masuda stops lurking around and offers his condolences.
And when the manager at the ice cream place finally offers Masuda a job because he's there so much he might as well help out and get paid, Masuda ecstatically makes a post simply to celebrate finally having a job. Nishikido is the first person to comment: Well finally. Maybe now you can stop whining and make enough money for that air conditioner. ♥
-
It's not until late August that he finally stumbles onto Nakamaru's journal by pure accident; it's a small world after all. Nakamaru has apparently been good friends with bakabakanishi for years. Masuda sees his username often on Akanishi's journal, as he's usually the first one tagged for random memes. The username amuses him, so in a fit of summer-induced boredom Masuda clicks on the journal, out of curiosity. The journal is mostly filled with writing--fanfic?--that tend to get lots and lots of comments. Masuda reads a few and thinks they're well written, even though he doesn't really know any of the people in the stories. The rl entries, in comparison, seem to get very few, but Masuda clicks through them further, anyway. Out of curiosity. He works at an ice cream shop and has a good friend named M, but it's not until there are quotes of conversations between him and M that it finally all clicks together for Masuda.
-
"Fearthenose?" Masuda asks the next day, unable to control his hysterical laughter. Nakamaru glares at Masuda, who manages enough composure to hand the towering triple scoop ice cream cone to the little boy without dropping it.
"What kind of gay name is that?" Masuda finally asks when the boy leaves, breaking into another fit of laughter.
"Shut up!" Nakamaru growls, and his ears are as red as the maraschino cherries in the cooler.
-
sunlitsmiles friends fearthenose after work that day. When they meet again the next day, Nakamaru blatantly refuses Masuda's pleas to be friended back, and it takes a lot of wheedling and spammy comments and pulling the "best friend" card, and even a pout or two and the infamous "but school is starting soon and we won't be able to see each other often" line for Nakamaru to finally, grudgingly agree.
fearthenose friends sunlitsmiles back on August 29. Two days before he has to pack up to go off to college.
Masuda doesn't know where the summer has gone.
-
And suddenly he's standing in an empty room--once his father finally gets his mother out the door after twenty hugs and at least fourteen "My baby is all grown up!"s. He takes a deep breath, contemplates the other half of the room already decorated in dark shades and posters of unnamed leather-clad rock stars, before setting about unpacking all his things.
When ten o'clock rolls around, Masuda is fully unpacked and organized. He spends his first night on campus the way he's spent his entire summer vacation: on his laptop. He's talking to Nakamaru and Tegoshi over aim when the door to his room finally swings open.
"Ah! You must be my roommate, ne?" Masuda says cheerfully, getting up and offering a hand. "Nice to meet you, I'm Masuda Takahisa."
Said roommate raises an eyebrow and nods, sheds his leather jacket and dumps it on top of his bed. "Yeah, I'm Moriuchi Takahiro."
"Oh, that's cool! Our names kind of match!"
Moriuchi blinks.
Masuda laughs nervously. "Because the M--and the T--Taka. And--"
"Right," Moriuchi says, and then retires to his own chair; he spends the rest of the night blasting rock music on his speakers. Masuda laughs and finally retreats back to his own laptop, thinks, this must be what college is all about.
-
Over the next new months Moriuchi becomes a regular character in Masuda's livejournal posts; usually a line that goes something like, "Ah, it's midnight and my roommate still isn't back." Moriuchi's classes all start at around noon and he's usually dead asleep when Masuda gets up at seven to go for his morning jog. They're polar opposites, but they mostly get along well--if "get along well" is the equivalent to "hardly ever see each other," meaning they hardly ever get a chance to even speak, meaning there's no way for them to really get onto each other's nerves. Really, as far as roommate horror stories go, the only thing Masuda has to worry about it whether Moriuchi is getting enough sleep from all those nights out. And the fact that Nishikido seems to think his roommate is a vampire or something.
Masuda's only problem with him arises during midterm week, when Moriuchi spends more of his time in the room, studying. Unfortunately, Moriuchi's idea of studying includes the blasting of loud music--even at nearly two in the morning when all the campus libraries have closed for the night. Masuda tries to study through it, though, tries hard, really--but when his second pencil snaps in half, he decides to ask his friends for help. Meanwhile he goes back to trying to study.
Several emails are waiting for him when he refreshes his inbox twenty minutes later, just before the urge to snap pencil number three in half surfaces.mr_pinkk: you should be glad music is your only problem. my freshman roommate used to lock me out of the room when he...masturbated. and he did it a LOT. :|
bakabakanishi: like you didn't do the same thing.
nishifuckinkido: Fend him off with garlic.
_kusanoman: just kick his ass.
Masuda realizes, in that moment, that most of his livejournal friends are idiots. Lovable idiots, but idiots all the same. And then a comment from Koyama comes in.lj_ai: Well, if you're having a problem with his loud music, why not talk it out? It's better to let it out in the open if it's bothering you.
Masuda thinks he might as well follow the only real bit of advice--that won't get him suspended or make his room smell like garlic--that his friends have given him.
"Uhm, M-Moriuchi?" Masuda says, over the blaring rock music from Moriuchi's laptop. Moriuchi glances at him over his shoulder.
"What?"
"C-Could you turn down your music?"
"What?"
"Could you turn down your music?!"
"What?"
"COULD YOU--" Masuda cuts off abruptly when the music suddenly stops, voice echoing in the small rectangle of a double room. "--turn down your music."
"Oh sure," Moriuchi says, rummaging around his desk for a pair of headphones. He plugs it into his laptop and then turns to Masuda, a wry smile on his face. "Sorry, I didn't know it bothered you. You should've just said something! You're so damn soft spoken, sometimes."
Masuda laughs. "Yeah, kind of." He bites at his lip shyly. "But thanks, Moriuchi."
Moriuchi waves his hand flippantly and plugs his headphones into his laptop. "It's nothing, don't worry about it. And hey, it's been like half a semester already--call me Taka."
Masuda beams. "Then you can call me Massu."
Moriuchi looks at him quizzically, and then removes the headphones from his ears and hangs them around his neck. "What?"
Massu laughs so hard his cheeks start to hurt; Taka joins in only a few seconds later.
-
Massu meets gangsterap shortly after midterms end. He hadn't been able to comment much in his valiant attempt to not flunk right out of college, even though he practically read every post on his f-list that entire week anyway. He still feels bad about not being able to comment, though, and thus makes sure to read and comment on every single entry that pops up over the weekend.
Nakamaru's latest entry is about beatboxing.
Massu is about to cheerfully ask him how he's been and if he's gotten any better when he notices the comment left by gangsterap: Oh good! You hadn't said anything about it lately so I was wondering if you had given up. How are we going to form our beatboxing/rapping duo TaNaka if you don't get better!?
A lightbulb goes off in Massu's head. He types: Wait! Were you the reason Nakamaru suddenly got so interested in beatboxing?? He suddenly started going on and on about it some time ago. It made buying his Christmas gift that year really easy. XDgangsterap: Wait, does that mean you are M?! The guy he talks about all the time?
sunlitsmiles: LOL. well not all the time...?
gangsterap: are you kidding? it's always M this, M that. i always thought he was a little homo for you...
sunlitsmiles: you're the one who got him randomly interested in beatboxing though! it's totally not something he'd normally like. if he's homo for anyone--it's you.
fearthenose: I AM NOT HOMO FOR EITHER OF YOU OKAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY?
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: YOU'RE ONE TO TALK. YOU'RE MARRIED.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
sunlitsmiles: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: YOU TOO?!
gangsterap: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: o i hate you all. >(
v_punny: make sure to rest your hands, nakamaru! those beats can be pretty exhausting to box all the time. 8Db
Massu ends up friending both gangsterap and v_punny from the entry--which gets up to 308 comments before Jin finally goes to bed; gangsterap because it's easier to tagteam Nakamaru if they know each other, and v_punny because anyone that can spin a pun out of anything? Worth befriending.
-
Massu never actually ends up friending turtlepluspear or gacktfan114, even though he sees them around lj a lot due to many mutual friends, and even though he sees no real qualms about joining in their conversations on other people's journals and vice versa. In fact, it's so comfortable that it's almost like they're friends--except they're not, and at this point it seems almost awkward and kind of ridiculous to ask.
-
Toward the end of first semester, Massu meets tegoshi_desu--in person. It's after he casually mentions the name of the school he attends that Tegoshi spazzes under the realization that they live relatively close by to each other. Tegoshi asks if he'd like to meet sometime, and without much thought and buzzed off of the adrenaline of contagious excitement, Massu agrees. It'd be cool to meet someone he met through the internet, after all.
Waiting at the train stop that day, though, Massu starts to regret it. Because, what does one even say to someone whose entire existence was text in a blinking im or a comment window or an entry screen only a few hours prior? Not to mention Tegoshi--if that is his real name--could very well be some serial rapist pedophile haunting lj to scam little kids. Not that Massu really believes Tegoshi is capable of such a thing. Probably.
He's nervous and fidgety and half about to hightail it out of there when someone taps him on the shoulder. "Massu?"
Massu turns quickly and blinks and comes eye to eye with a fair skinned, fair haired boy around his age, wearing a t-shirt and jeans--with boots! Tegoshi always had an affinity toward boots.
"You're Massu, right?" the boy--not the strange old man--continues cheerfully, all smiles and sparkles and as close to happy emoji Massu has ever seen in real life. Something about Tegoshi's cheerful and familiar demeanor finally puts Massu at ease. Plus, Massu thinks, if worst comes to worst, Tegoshi is a stick about half his size and Massu could totally take him if there was a brawl.
Worst doesn't come to worst, though, and Tegoshi cheerfully leads Massu to his favorite shopping places. And then his favorite bowling alley. And then his favorite karaoke place. Best of all, it's not awkward in the least bit. In fact, it turns out to be a pretty fun day, all things considered.
They part at the train station with promises of hanging out again sometime and when Massu gets back to his dorm at night, he writes up a brief outline of his outing with Tegoshi. He gets an immediate comment from Nishikido.nishifuckinkido: Sounds like you had fun on your date.
sunlitsmiles: it was not a date. :/ but yeah, we had fun!
domo_t: shopping, bowling, and then karaoke? you guys sound like a couple.
wagahaishige: LOL. i bet they sang cheesy love songs, too.
gangsterap: aw man, now poor nakamaru will be heartbroken m.
fearthenose: I am not in love with Massu. He can date whoever he wants.
lj_ai: eh?! massu and tegoshi went on a date?! why didn't i hear about this?!
Massu is about to indignantly reply to everyone that it was not a date, but a comment from Tegoshi cuts off all further argument on the subject.tegoshi_desu: Ne Massu, today was fun! Let's go on another date soon!
Massu sighs wearily when he gets that comment and figures he might as wait for the inevitable spam from Akanishi that will probably read, "MASSU IS GAY!"
-
If he thinks about it, Massu wouldn't say he's particularly popular on lj. His life on livejournal kind of mirrors his real life in that aspect: Massu's never been one for having many acquaintances, only has a handful of people he'd consider really good friends. But he likes it better that way, because the people he does consider friends are wonderful and amazing and he's really thankful to have been able to meet each and every one of them. His real life mirrors his life on livejournal in that aspect too.
So even though he has Taka and a few guys from class he could go hang out with, sometimes Massu just prefers getting in his pjs and starting his weekend early--on his laptop.
"You're on your laptop a lot, aren't you?" Taka asks, eyebrows raised as he slips on his jacket. "Are you sure you don't want to go with me and the guys?"
"No," Massu replies, shaking his head lightly, a smile on his face. "Thank you, though."
"Your call," Taka shrugs and heads out the door, and Massu waves him off before going back to his aim window, where Koyama is yammering on and on about how much his cute cat Nyanta loves playing with his cute nephew.
-
If he thinks about it, Massu wouldn't say he's particularly popular on lj, but sometimes he does wonder why he's the friend of some random people--people he seems to have nothing in common with and that, for the life of him, he can't remember ever saying even a single word to. He doesn't think his life is very interesting, doesn't even draw much anymore, but if people want to friend him for whatever reason, he supposes it's okay--it doesn't hurt anyone, after all.
Still, he thinks it'd be nice if they said something. Ever. Maybe they could be friends.
-
dare_deshou disappears from lj early in Massu's second semester, just a struck out name on his profile page.
Massu can't say he'd gotten to know him very well, or had gotten to talk to him very often, but he's still worried that something could be wrong. Nishikido knows Uchi in real life though, and says that things are just a little tough right now, but he is otherwise okay.
It makes Massu feel a little better.
-
A few weeks later _kusanoman's journal gets deleted without warning.
No one says anything about it--no one seems to know anything--and even though it seems silly, because who is Kusano to him really?--Massu can't help but feel that awful, twisting feeling in his gut.
He's not sure whether to feel relieved or worse when he finds the feeling fade a little more every day until he hardly remembers it at all.
After a month he finally removes the usernames from his friends list.
-
Midterms roll around before he knows it, and it's back to the books and studying and the reading of lj posts without commenting. He's in his room, studying for his second exam, when he gets the call. Taka, recognizing the ringtone, mutes the volume on his computer and Massu sends him a grateful smile.
"Hello? Mom? How are you?" he asks cheerfully, always up for a quick chat with his mother. The smile gradually slips from his face. And then his heart stops. "What?"
He swallows painfully and it must show on his face because Taka mouths, "What's wrong?" at him, but Massu can't find the words to reply, only shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut as his mother continues talking talking talking.
When he finally hangs up he doesn't know what to do with himself, is too shocked to even cry or scream or anything, just takes a shaky breath and ends up collapsing onto the floor, leaning against the leg of his bed for support. He covers his face with his hands.
"Massu? Massu, What is it?" Taka asks softly, getting up form his chair to kneel in front of him.
"...My dad got into a car accident," Massu repeats, the words hollow and bitter on his tongue. He clamps his mouth shut as if retracting the words could make it all untrue. He hears Taka inhale sharply but won't uncover his face. Taka doesn't say anything else, walks over and raises the volume on his laptop full blast before seating himself next to Massu, placing an arm around his shoulders. The rock music blares until late late into the night.
-
For days afterward Massu can't concentrate on anything, even after his mother and sister call to tell him that the surgery went well and that everything seems to be okay. For now they tell him to just concentrate in school; there's only a few days before vacation, anyway, so he can come home then. They don't tell him any real details though, they never do; he's the youngest and easily prone to worry, easily prone to tears--a regular crybaby. It's why he remains unsettled, even when they tell him to concentrate on his tests. In fact, he might've missed his second exam altogether had it not been for Taka, who woke him up thirty minutes before his 9AM exam.
After the test, which he's pretty sure he's failed and pretty sure he doesn't even care, Massu still feels listless and restless and he just wants to get his mind off of everything. So he does what he always does in times like these: he turns on his laptop and visits livejournal. He hasn't visited in a while and he feels rather bad about it, so he clicks on his f-list and starts to read.
He finds himself growing increasingly irritated about the stupid and meaningless entries about mediocre love problems or life problems when god, his father is still in the hospital and they wouldn't understand real problems if it slapped them in the face. He tries to keep the bitterness inside though, tries to bottle it up and not show that something is wrong. Because he likes these people, he honestly does; he considers them friends except. Except, in the end, they are still mostly just usernames to him--what do they care about his real life? He hardly blogs about that, anyway. So he tries to comment as usual, tries to make up for being a pretty neglectful friend lately, but all his comments sound embittered and harsh after he presses post and half of him thinks he's doing it on purpose, a strange vindicated anger at people that wouldn't know what he was so angry about in the first place.
He ends up feeling so horrible and wrought with guilt that he closes the window at once. He shakes his head, composes himself a little, and bring up the entry screen. He writes:APRIL 26 1:12 PM
-(no subject)
i'm sorry if i've said something wrong lately. i'm--not feeling myself.
He hopes that suffices and that maybe a bit of his guilt will subside. He then shuts off his laptop and decides to go for a walk.
When he returns there are fifteen emails in his inbox, and they're all for his recent entry, and they all ask "if everything's okay" and "is something wrong?" and he realizes that he doesn't feel better, not one bit. In fact, if possible, he feels more guilty and more wretched, because instead of them forgiving him for being a terrible friend, they're more concerned with why he's acting this way. He can't take it.APRIL 26 3:43 PM
-(no subject)
hiatus.
he writes, and this time makes sure to lock the comment feature.
-
"Let's go watch a movie or something," Massu announces when Taka enters the room after his last class has ended. He'd been sitting in the room trying to do his calculus homework, but all he'd ended up with was five broken pencils. Taka raises an eyebrow.
"But you hardly ever want to go out."
Massu shrugs, unfazed. "Yeah, well now I want to."
"We have class tomorrow."
"Since when do you care?" Massu asks, arching an eyebrow. Taka shrugs. "Good point, let's go."
-
Vacation comes much later than sooner, and Massu quickly hops the first train he can back home. On the ride over he calls Nakamaru, finally, who had left him a few worried voice mails and texts. They talk until Massu's phone battery almost runs out and Massu suddenly remembers how comforting his best friend's voice can be, even in a time like this.
He gets off at the train station around noon, where his sister is waiting with the car, and he demands that they go visit the hospital before anything else. They make it there only ten minutes before visiting hours end and Massu runs for his life after pleading with the nurses to let him in for just one minute will do.
The sight of his father's smiling and cheerful face makes him so relieved that he can't help the tears pouring down his cheeks when he leaps at his father for a hug. He's always been prone to tears.
-
Back in the car while his sister makes fun of him for being so emotional and why didn't he believe them when they said it was all okay, Massu just nods without really paying attention and rubs at his eyes. He sends two text messages from his phone; one to Nakamaru and one to Taka: My dad is okay.
He almost starts crying anew when he gets replies from them both, telling them how relieved and happy they are for him.
-
Vacation passes slowly and lazily at home, and he spends his time mostly watching tv, or eating his mother's wonderful home cooking, or listening to his sister's annoying chatter; he'd left his laptop at school. His father finally gets released from the hospital a few days into the vacation and Massu makes sure to spend as much time as he can with him, not even caring when his sister calls him out on being a petulant worrywart.
When it's time to go back, Massu almost misses the train because he doesn't want to let go of his father.
-
The rest of the semester flies by, and Massu has to work extra hard to make up for all the work he had failed before he had left. He has to go to extra tutoring hours and review sessions to pull up all his grades to an even passing level.
He basically has no time for lj, even if he wasn't terrified of going back there and see how all his friends are doing.
To see if they are still his friends.
-
And suddenly he's back in his own room, back for another long and boring summer before school starts again in the fall.
At least he's not jobless this time around.
He finishes up a banana split for two eager little boys, plops on extra sprinkles and two maraschino cherries, and hands it to them with a smile when he sees how excited they are. They wander off to a table happily, and Massu's smile grows a little wider at the sight. He turns around only to see Nakamaru standing behind him, staring at him curiously.
"Mm? What is it?" Massu asks, moving aside and dumping the scoops into a bin. He turns on the faucet and rinses his hands.
"They're worried, you know. They haven't once stopped asking me about you," Nakamaru says quietly, and Massu stiffens. He turns off the tap and dries his hands on a paper towel.
"What are you talking about?" he asks lightly, and plasters on a grin when he turns to face him.
"Massu," Nakamaru says, and Massu sighs.
-
He finally gets around to writing an entry just before he goes to bed. He doesn't check his f-list, doesn't think he could stand it just yet, but he opens up his entry screen and begins to write, heart hammering strangely in his chest. JUNE 1 3:14 AM
-hi...
Uhm, hi.
I'm back.
Uhm...I guess I should explain myself and why I've been acting the way I have, lately.
A--a few months ago my dad got into a car accident. Ah, but he's okay! He's been okay for a while--only, only I was a bit afraid of coming back after I'd been so short with you all, lately.
But I just. I'm sorry, really I am. Even though all of you have been nothing but amazing friends to me--I--I'm sorry if I've concerned you. But thank you. Thank you so much for caring.
I'm so grateful to have met each and every one of you.
Thank you. I love you all.
-Massu.
He's blinking back tears by the time he finishes typing, and he knows it's silly and nothing short of ridiculous that he feels so strongly about these people he's separated from by oceans and hours and miles and miles of cyberspace--but he can't help it. He debates over and writes and rewrites his entry about five times in the span of thirty minutes, hesitates uncertain fingers over his mouse before finally deciding to just get on with it and press post.
LJ eats his entry.
He manages an entry mostly similar to the first, after another painstaking twenty minutes, and when he's finished for the second time, Massu presses post again--but not before copying-and-pasting the entire entry into a new word document. When the entry is posted successfully, Massu lets out the strange breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. He quickly exits the window, shuts down his computer, and goes to sleep, nerves too wracked to do anything else.
When he wakes up the next morning, he finds around 14 new messages in his inbox.
Massu thinks his heart has never felt fuller.
-
NOTE 01: before anyone says anything: YES. this is pretty much inspired by (read: plagiarized off of, SORRY) the idea in database unavailable by unrequitedangst, where je is in fandom/lj. and it possibly one of the most brilliant things i have ever read in this fandom.
NOTE 02: none of those usernames belong to real people! i made sure to use ones that didn't exist or journals that were deleted and purged. so--don't bother trying to go to them. XD
NOTE 03: i spend way too much fucking time on lj. it is unhealthy.
NOTE 04: can you tell how much fun it was to code this? just CAN YOU TELL.
NOTE 05: if i've grazed upon even one instance of why you're here and why you've stayed around on lj--i'll think i've accomplished something. ♥
this will probably be a good indicator of all future entries to come, meaning: a) this is kind of hysterically stupid and ridiculous, and b) half of this is to be blamed on tinyangl who said something like, "i want je!lj fic!" maybe a month ago. so if you don't like what you see, you might not want to stick around. (except no, i swear i usually do not write this much. :/)
the other half of the blame goes to my ever inspiring, ever amazing f-list, for whom i have an unhealthy amount of love. because you know me, my word count? directly proportional to my love. ♥
going live
massu, nakamaru, news, kat-tun. 7068 words.
-- massu-thon prompt 80; the places we trust. au. masuda takahisa is eighteen and in for a long and boring summer. so what's this live journal nonsense about?
Masuda Takahisa is eighteen, a fresh graduate from high school looking at a long summer ahead of him before college finally begins in the fall. A long, boring, and apparently jobless summer as no one will hire him. And hot. A really really hot summer. He should probably get around to buying that air-conditioner for his room someday. If only he had the money.
And no, the irony isn't lost on him either.
He laments all his troubles to his good friend, who works at the local ice cream place in their area. He comes here often, partly because the local ice cream place is gloriously air-conditioned, and partly because Nakamaru always gives him a discount--and extra sprinkles. And the company is nice too.
He's slowly working through a banana split today, which Nakamaru sneaks bites of in-between scooping ice cream for other patrons. When the place empties out and the manager goes home an hour early, Nakamaru loses all pretense of work and collapses onto the chair across from Masuda. Masuda laughs and scoops up a bit of vanilla ice cream--Nakamaru's favorite--and hovers it around Nakamaru's face, who smiles wryly before closing his mouth over the spoon. While Nakamaru proceeds to dig into the remaining banana split, Masuda sighs and rests his cheek against the sticky table.
"I'm so bored and poor," he whines, pounding on the table half-heartedly with his palms.
"So get a job," Nakamaru replies helpfully, except it's not helpful at all when Nakamaru knows Masuda has already applied to five different part-time jobs; two said they'd call him back and never did, the other three didn't say a thing. Masuda unsticks his face from the table and glares, which settles into a pout, which lifts at the corners when Nakamaru gets whipped cream on his nose.
"I just wish that there was a job where, I don't know, all I had to do was smile and be cute to get paid, you know? Something I didn't need real talent or skills for, or something I don't have to do any real work for to be successful."
"If only." Nakamaru shrugs, wiping at his nose. He pops the leftover maraschino cherry in his mouth and sighs happily. Masuda puffs his cheeks. "Okay, you are useless. We are so not best friends anymore."
Nakamaru laughs. "Okay, okay. If you're that bored all summer, why don't you just go on the internet? The internet is free." He pauses. "Well, you aren't paying for it, anyway."
"It's hot in my house, remember?" Masuda frowns. "Besides, what's there to do on the internet all day?"
Nakamaru shrugs again. "I don't know--games? Videos? Blogs?"
"Blogs?"
"It's like people writing in journals--only they publish it to the web."
"Who would care about what other people have to say on the internet?" Masuda asks, eyebrow raised suspiciously.
"You'd be surprised."
When Masuda's other eyebrow goes up, Nakamaru laughs. "Here, let me close up the store and I'll show you."
-
"See this? This is called livejournal, and it's probably one of the most successful and popular blogging communities on the web," Nakamaru says, navigating to the website: http://www.livejournal.com.
"Okay," Masuda says, nodding. He blinks. "Now what?"
"Uhm, let's create an account for you," Nakamaru replies, clicking around the site. Masuda looks stricken. "Wait, I told you I don't have any money!"
"It's free, remember?"
"Oh." Masuda blinks again. "Really? It's just--free?"
"Yes." Nakamaru laughs. "Now what username do you want?"
"What?"
"A username. Like, a name you want to go by."
"...Masuda Takahisa?"
"Well, I don't think you want your full name out in the open for everyone else to see. Hmm--what's your email address then?"
Masuda blinks. "Masuda dot Takahisa at--"
"Okay, never mind that then."
Masuda shrugs. "I don't know. You pick one for me."
Nakamaru's about to protest when Masuda gets distracted by something on his shelf; it's the book on beatboxing he gave Nakamaru for Christmas. "Say, have you been getting any better at this?" he asks, flipping through the pages, a smile lighting up his face. Nakamaru thinks he knows the perfect username.
-
sunlitsmiles joins the livejournal community on July 7th.
"Sunlitsmiles?" Masuda asks flatly, when Nakamaru proudly shows him his new 'blog' name. "What kind of gay name is that?"
Nakamaru throws a pillow at him. "If you don't like it then make your own!" he says peevishly.
"No, it's fine. I don't care that much." Masuda pauses. "Say, do you have one?"
Nakamaru hesitates. "Erm, one what?"
"A livejournal."
"...Maybe."
"Eh? Really? What's your username, then?" Masuda asks curiously.
"I'm not telling."
"Why?!"
"It's private." Nakamaru huffs, and his ears are turning bright red like they always do when he's embarrassed. He's saved from further interrogation, though, when his mother calls them down to dinner.
-
When Masuda gets home later that night, he heads straight for his laptop. He logs into his account on livejournal, and spends a while looking at different options, finds himself a basic layout that isn't terribly ugly to look at, and finally brings up the entry screen like Nakamaru taught him. He writes his first entry ever:JULY 08 12:14 AM
- (no subject)
It's hot. :(
He pushes the 'post' button and stares in fascination at the thing he's just created, just published to the internet, where anyone in the whole wide web could be reading it at any given moment. It's--cool, Masuda thinks, settling back in his chair, satisfied.
The novelty of livejournal ends up lasting only two days.
-
"But why won't you tell me your username, Nakamaru?" Masuda whines on the third day, back at the ice cream place, tugging on Nakamaru's sleeve impatiently. Nakamaru shakes him off and finishes scooping some strawberry ice cream into a cone for the little girl in front of him. "Two dollars," he tells her, with a big smile on his face, before turning to Masuda with a glare. "And you're not even supposed to be behind the counter."
The little girl leaves after paying, all flying pigtails and hair baubles as she skips out the door. The chimes sound. Masuda tugs on Nakamaru's sleeve again, even as he gets pushed to the other side of the counter.
"I told you it's private," Nakamaru sighs, and scoops some chocolate ice cream into a cone for Masuda--and tops it with extra sprinkles. Masuda frowns, but takes a lick of the offered cone anyway.
"Why do you even want to know, anyway?" Nakamaru says, frowning because Masuda is frowning--and it's hard to be anything but unhappy when Masuda is frowning.
"It's boring," Masuda replies, around a mouthful of chocolate. "It says I have no friends. I don't want to have no friends. Why, Nakamaru? Why won't you be my friend?"
Nakamaru twitches in the way he usually does when Masuda tries to guilt him about something, but he shakes his head. "If you want friends then why don't you just find some people with the same interests or join some communities or something?"
"You mean," Masuda replies after a moment. "Like, people I've never met before?" He blinks. "Isn't that weird? Being friends only on the internet?"
"Not really," Nakamaru trails off, rinsing an ice cream scoop in the sink. "I mean, it's all in good fun and you can meet some cool people."
Masuda considers this, and shrugs, thinking that maybe it would be kind of interesting to meet random people online. Interesting, and possibly dangerous. He's just glad Nakamaru talked him out of using his real name. And at least it might waste some time.
After they close up the shop, they head back over to Nakamaru's again, where Nakamaru teaches him how to add interests and search for communities.
While he's at it, Masuda also asks Nakamaru what the hell an "lj-cut" is.
-
Livejournal becomes a little more interesting after that, and Masuda spends the next day surfing through random communities--it seems like there's really one for everything.
He also adds in some interests, and after thinking about it long and hard, he finally adds: running, food, gyoza--and dragon ball.
He also starts commenting on random community entries for the hell of it.
-
The first person that becomes his friend on livejournal is wagahaishige.
It's after he sees some pretty awful fanart on one of the Dragon Ball communities and wonders how badly he can draw, himself. He spends one whole day sketching, and it's not Monet, but it's not that bad either. It's surely better than what that domo_k fellow draws, anyway.
He scans it and posts it to his journal. After a moment of consideration, he thinks, why the hell not, and posts it to the community as well.
He's surprised to find an email in his inbox later that day. He hardly ever checks his mail, really, only did it this time because his mom wanted to know if his college had sent anything. But sitting in his inbox is an email that says: wagahaishige - LJ Comment Reply to your entry...
His comment reads: Hey that's pretty good! :D
Masuda sits there, kind of astounded, before closing his email when his mother calls him over to the kitchen to help.
He replies to the comment with a simple, "Thanks!" the next day, and figures that will be the end of it. Only wagahaishige responds again, and, thinking it'd be rude not to follow in suit, Masuda replies right back; they end up having a whole conversation spanning everything and nothing.
Eventually wagahaishige asks if they can be friends, and Masuda cheerfully agrees because he was thinking the same thing.
-
The first person to tag him for a meme is lj_ai, even though Masuda isn't quite sure what a meme is, let alone how to pronounce it--is it "meemee," or "mehmeh," or "mehm," or "meem," anyway? He gets the gist of it though, since all he has to do is answer questions. And there's something fun in seeing his username pop up on someone else's journal, like they're friends or something.
Well, they technically are friends in some sense, Masuda guesses. He met lj_ai through wagahaishige, right around the time he met _kusanoman, actually. They leave each other comments all the time, even though Masuda always feels kind of strange reading about things happening in their real lives; his entries mostly consist of memes and whatever he's drawn that week. If he ever says anything about his personal life, it's brief and never warrants its own post.
They are friends, sure, but a part of Masuda thinks that, in the end, they are just usernames.
-
tegoshi_desu is the first one that challenges that thought, and it begins with a simple question.tegoshi_desu: ne, what should i call you? ^^
sunlitsmiles: what do you mean?
tegoshi_desu: well, i can't just call you 'sunlitsmiles' all the time--that's weird.
Masuda blinks, because he's not too sure how to respond to that. It's true that he's started just calling wagahaishige Shige--though for a while he liked to call him Wagahai--and _kusanoman Kusano and tegoshi_desu Tegoshi--but that was because they didn't seem to see any problems in using their real names. Of course, he also started calling lj_ai Koyama only because everyone else seemed to call him that and Masuda is just too lazy to code sometimes. He'd never really thought about what they should call him. sunlitsmiles: ...my family name is masuda.
tegoshi_desu: jaa, can i call you massu then?
sunlitsmiles: ...massu???
tegoshi_desu: it's cute, isn't it?! :Dv
Masuda doesn't really know what Tegoshi is thinking with this strange nickname; they've only known each other for two weeks--and for the first week Masuda was pretty sure Tegoshi was a girl. But there's something about the way Tegoshi speaks--types, the way he types--that generally lets him get his way with everything. Shige seems to know him firsthand, and is generally conned into making random graphics for Tegoshi. sunlitsmiles OK. massu is fine then.
tegoshi_desu: YAY! MASSU. ♥♥♥
He laughs when he gets Tegoshi's reply, but doesn't think too much on it, though, doesn't expect it to catch on.
It takes less than twenty-four hours for everyone on his f-list to start calling him "Massu."
-
He meets mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi on a Dragon Ball friending meme, or a Dragon Quest friending meme, or something; Kusano just directed him there with many exclamation points and ones and it was hard to say no. So he fills out the form, and for the question that asks, "anything else?" he answers: My friend was the one who chose this username for me, I swear.
After about five seconds he gets a reply from mr_pinkk that reads: LOLOL. MINE TOO. LET'S BE FRIENDS. :D
When he goes to reply he's amazed that his thread has already quadrupled in size.mr_pinkk: LOLOL. MINE TOO. LET'S BE FRIENDS. :D
bakabakanishi: LIES YOU ARE JUST GAY, YAMAPINK.
mr_pinkk: it's not a lie, you already know takki made this account for me. :(
bakabakanishi: YAMAPINK. YAMAPINK. YAMAPINK.
And as Masuda watches it all unfold with every refresh of the webpage, he doesn't know what else to do but laugh out loud--and join in.
After a comment spam of 200 comments, he ends up friends with them both; the two are kind of a package deal, after all. Both mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi's sizable f-lists--that number around 250 people each--are practically identical except for the few odd person here and there. What's more surprising is that they genuinely seem to be very good friends with a good amount of those people. They're also practically married, or lovers, or something; attached at the hip--even though they've actually never met in real life.
He later learns that many people on livejournal seem to be married or lovers in some form on lj.
-
The first person Masuda actually asks to friend is nishifuckinkido, and it's only because at Tegoshi's insistence that "Nishikido is a really nice person," that Masuda agrees. Truthfully, nishifuckinkido kind of intimidates him. He's seen him around a lot--and many people seem to be unsure whether to love him or hate him--and he's friends with lots of his friends--even though nishifuckinkido's f-list is a good deal bigger than his. But he also has a banner on the first (and only) post of his livejournal that reads: FRIENDS ONLY, FUCKERS.
Masuda stares at the message long and hard before going back to Tegoshi's journal and writing: I can't.
So it's no surprise that he freaks out a little the next day, when there is a comment from nishifuckinkido: Hey sup. Let's be friends.
He replies with a simple, "OK!" and hopes nishifuckinkido can't read the fear in his text.
And even after they become friends, Masuda is kind of wary of commenting on nishifuckinkido's journal. He doesn't want to sound stupid. nishifuckinkido points out stupid people and mocks them relentlessly. mr_pinkk and bakabakanishi are a prime examples of this, even though Masuda realizes that the three are close enough to joke in that way together. He still reads all his journal entries though, even if Masuda never thinks of anything to comment on.
But when nishifuckinkido's dog dies and he seems really upset about it, Masuda stops lurking around and offers his condolences.
And when the manager at the ice cream place finally offers Masuda a job because he's there so much he might as well help out and get paid, Masuda ecstatically makes a post simply to celebrate finally having a job. Nishikido is the first person to comment: Well finally. Maybe now you can stop whining and make enough money for that air conditioner. ♥
-
It's not until late August that he finally stumbles onto Nakamaru's journal by pure accident; it's a small world after all. Nakamaru has apparently been good friends with bakabakanishi for years. Masuda sees his username often on Akanishi's journal, as he's usually the first one tagged for random memes. The username amuses him, so in a fit of summer-induced boredom Masuda clicks on the journal, out of curiosity. The journal is mostly filled with writing--fanfic?--that tend to get lots and lots of comments. Masuda reads a few and thinks they're well written, even though he doesn't really know any of the people in the stories. The rl entries, in comparison, seem to get very few, but Masuda clicks through them further, anyway. Out of curiosity. He works at an ice cream shop and has a good friend named M, but it's not until there are quotes of conversations between him and M that it finally all clicks together for Masuda.
-
"Fearthenose?" Masuda asks the next day, unable to control his hysterical laughter. Nakamaru glares at Masuda, who manages enough composure to hand the towering triple scoop ice cream cone to the little boy without dropping it.
"What kind of gay name is that?" Masuda finally asks when the boy leaves, breaking into another fit of laughter.
"Shut up!" Nakamaru growls, and his ears are as red as the maraschino cherries in the cooler.
-
sunlitsmiles friends fearthenose after work that day. When they meet again the next day, Nakamaru blatantly refuses Masuda's pleas to be friended back, and it takes a lot of wheedling and spammy comments and pulling the "best friend" card, and even a pout or two and the infamous "but school is starting soon and we won't be able to see each other often" line for Nakamaru to finally, grudgingly agree.
fearthenose friends sunlitsmiles back on August 29. Two days before he has to pack up to go off to college.
Masuda doesn't know where the summer has gone.
-
And suddenly he's standing in an empty room--once his father finally gets his mother out the door after twenty hugs and at least fourteen "My baby is all grown up!"s. He takes a deep breath, contemplates the other half of the room already decorated in dark shades and posters of unnamed leather-clad rock stars, before setting about unpacking all his things.
When ten o'clock rolls around, Masuda is fully unpacked and organized. He spends his first night on campus the way he's spent his entire summer vacation: on his laptop. He's talking to Nakamaru and Tegoshi over aim when the door to his room finally swings open.
"Ah! You must be my roommate, ne?" Masuda says cheerfully, getting up and offering a hand. "Nice to meet you, I'm Masuda Takahisa."
Said roommate raises an eyebrow and nods, sheds his leather jacket and dumps it on top of his bed. "Yeah, I'm Moriuchi Takahiro."
"Oh, that's cool! Our names kind of match!"
Moriuchi blinks.
Masuda laughs nervously. "Because the M--and the T--Taka. And--"
"Right," Moriuchi says, and then retires to his own chair; he spends the rest of the night blasting rock music on his speakers. Masuda laughs and finally retreats back to his own laptop, thinks, this must be what college is all about.
-
Over the next new months Moriuchi becomes a regular character in Masuda's livejournal posts; usually a line that goes something like, "Ah, it's midnight and my roommate still isn't back." Moriuchi's classes all start at around noon and he's usually dead asleep when Masuda gets up at seven to go for his morning jog. They're polar opposites, but they mostly get along well--if "get along well" is the equivalent to "hardly ever see each other," meaning they hardly ever get a chance to even speak, meaning there's no way for them to really get onto each other's nerves. Really, as far as roommate horror stories go, the only thing Masuda has to worry about it whether Moriuchi is getting enough sleep from all those nights out. And the fact that Nishikido seems to think his roommate is a vampire or something.
Masuda's only problem with him arises during midterm week, when Moriuchi spends more of his time in the room, studying. Unfortunately, Moriuchi's idea of studying includes the blasting of loud music--even at nearly two in the morning when all the campus libraries have closed for the night. Masuda tries to study through it, though, tries hard, really--but when his second pencil snaps in half, he decides to ask his friends for help. Meanwhile he goes back to trying to study.
Several emails are waiting for him when he refreshes his inbox twenty minutes later, just before the urge to snap pencil number three in half surfaces.mr_pinkk: you should be glad music is your only problem. my freshman roommate used to lock me out of the room when he...masturbated. and he did it a LOT. :|
bakabakanishi: like you didn't do the same thing.
nishifuckinkido: Fend him off with garlic.
_kusanoman: just kick his ass.
Masuda realizes, in that moment, that most of his livejournal friends are idiots. Lovable idiots, but idiots all the same. And then a comment from Koyama comes in.lj_ai: Well, if you're having a problem with his loud music, why not talk it out? It's better to let it out in the open if it's bothering you.
Masuda thinks he might as well follow the only real bit of advice--that won't get him suspended or make his room smell like garlic--that his friends have given him.
"Uhm, M-Moriuchi?" Masuda says, over the blaring rock music from Moriuchi's laptop. Moriuchi glances at him over his shoulder.
"What?"
"C-Could you turn down your music?"
"What?"
"Could you turn down your music?!"
"What?"
"COULD YOU--" Masuda cuts off abruptly when the music suddenly stops, voice echoing in the small rectangle of a double room. "--turn down your music."
"Oh sure," Moriuchi says, rummaging around his desk for a pair of headphones. He plugs it into his laptop and then turns to Masuda, a wry smile on his face. "Sorry, I didn't know it bothered you. You should've just said something! You're so damn soft spoken, sometimes."
Masuda laughs. "Yeah, kind of." He bites at his lip shyly. "But thanks, Moriuchi."
Moriuchi waves his hand flippantly and plugs his headphones into his laptop. "It's nothing, don't worry about it. And hey, it's been like half a semester already--call me Taka."
Masuda beams. "Then you can call me Massu."
Moriuchi looks at him quizzically, and then removes the headphones from his ears and hangs them around his neck. "What?"
Massu laughs so hard his cheeks start to hurt; Taka joins in only a few seconds later.
-
Massu meets gangsterap shortly after midterms end. He hadn't been able to comment much in his valiant attempt to not flunk right out of college, even though he practically read every post on his f-list that entire week anyway. He still feels bad about not being able to comment, though, and thus makes sure to read and comment on every single entry that pops up over the weekend.
Nakamaru's latest entry is about beatboxing.
Massu is about to cheerfully ask him how he's been and if he's gotten any better when he notices the comment left by gangsterap: Oh good! You hadn't said anything about it lately so I was wondering if you had given up. How are we going to form our beatboxing/rapping duo TaNaka if you don't get better!?
A lightbulb goes off in Massu's head. He types: Wait! Were you the reason Nakamaru suddenly got so interested in beatboxing?? He suddenly started going on and on about it some time ago. It made buying his Christmas gift that year really easy. XDgangsterap: Wait, does that mean you are M?! The guy he talks about all the time?
sunlitsmiles: LOL. well not all the time...?
gangsterap: are you kidding? it's always M this, M that. i always thought he was a little homo for you...
sunlitsmiles: you're the one who got him randomly interested in beatboxing though! it's totally not something he'd normally like. if he's homo for anyone--it's you.
fearthenose: I AM NOT HOMO FOR EITHER OF YOU OKAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY?
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: YOU'RE ONE TO TALK. YOU'RE MARRIED.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
bakabakanishi: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
sunlitsmiles: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: YOU TOO?!
gangsterap: NAKAMARU IS GAY.
fearthenose: o i hate you all. >(
v_punny: make sure to rest your hands, nakamaru! those beats can be pretty exhausting to box all the time. 8Db
Massu ends up friending both gangsterap and v_punny from the entry--which gets up to 308 comments before Jin finally goes to bed; gangsterap because it's easier to tagteam Nakamaru if they know each other, and v_punny because anyone that can spin a pun out of anything? Worth befriending.
-
Massu never actually ends up friending turtlepluspear or gacktfan114, even though he sees them around lj a lot due to many mutual friends, and even though he sees no real qualms about joining in their conversations on other people's journals and vice versa. In fact, it's so comfortable that it's almost like they're friends--except they're not, and at this point it seems almost awkward and kind of ridiculous to ask.
-
Toward the end of first semester, Massu meets tegoshi_desu--in person. It's after he casually mentions the name of the school he attends that Tegoshi spazzes under the realization that they live relatively close by to each other. Tegoshi asks if he'd like to meet sometime, and without much thought and buzzed off of the adrenaline of contagious excitement, Massu agrees. It'd be cool to meet someone he met through the internet, after all.
Waiting at the train stop that day, though, Massu starts to regret it. Because, what does one even say to someone whose entire existence was text in a blinking im or a comment window or an entry screen only a few hours prior? Not to mention Tegoshi--if that is his real name--could very well be some serial rapist pedophile haunting lj to scam little kids. Not that Massu really believes Tegoshi is capable of such a thing. Probably.
He's nervous and fidgety and half about to hightail it out of there when someone taps him on the shoulder. "Massu?"
Massu turns quickly and blinks and comes eye to eye with a fair skinned, fair haired boy around his age, wearing a t-shirt and jeans--with boots! Tegoshi always had an affinity toward boots.
"You're Massu, right?" the boy--not the strange old man--continues cheerfully, all smiles and sparkles and as close to happy emoji Massu has ever seen in real life. Something about Tegoshi's cheerful and familiar demeanor finally puts Massu at ease. Plus, Massu thinks, if worst comes to worst, Tegoshi is a stick about half his size and Massu could totally take him if there was a brawl.
Worst doesn't come to worst, though, and Tegoshi cheerfully leads Massu to his favorite shopping places. And then his favorite bowling alley. And then his favorite karaoke place. Best of all, it's not awkward in the least bit. In fact, it turns out to be a pretty fun day, all things considered.
They part at the train station with promises of hanging out again sometime and when Massu gets back to his dorm at night, he writes up a brief outline of his outing with Tegoshi. He gets an immediate comment from Nishikido.nishifuckinkido: Sounds like you had fun on your date.
sunlitsmiles: it was not a date. :/ but yeah, we had fun!
domo_t: shopping, bowling, and then karaoke? you guys sound like a couple.
wagahaishige: LOL. i bet they sang cheesy love songs, too.
gangsterap: aw man, now poor nakamaru will be heartbroken m.
fearthenose: I am not in love with Massu. He can date whoever he wants.
lj_ai: eh?! massu and tegoshi went on a date?! why didn't i hear about this?!
Massu is about to indignantly reply to everyone that it was not a date, but a comment from Tegoshi cuts off all further argument on the subject.tegoshi_desu: Ne Massu, today was fun! Let's go on another date soon!
Massu sighs wearily when he gets that comment and figures he might as wait for the inevitable spam from Akanishi that will probably read, "MASSU IS GAY!"
-
If he thinks about it, Massu wouldn't say he's particularly popular on lj. His life on livejournal kind of mirrors his real life in that aspect: Massu's never been one for having many acquaintances, only has a handful of people he'd consider really good friends. But he likes it better that way, because the people he does consider friends are wonderful and amazing and he's really thankful to have been able to meet each and every one of them. His real life mirrors his life on livejournal in that aspect too.
So even though he has Taka and a few guys from class he could go hang out with, sometimes Massu just prefers getting in his pjs and starting his weekend early--on his laptop.
"You're on your laptop a lot, aren't you?" Taka asks, eyebrows raised as he slips on his jacket. "Are you sure you don't want to go with me and the guys?"
"No," Massu replies, shaking his head lightly, a smile on his face. "Thank you, though."
"Your call," Taka shrugs and heads out the door, and Massu waves him off before going back to his aim window, where Koyama is yammering on and on about how much his cute cat Nyanta loves playing with his cute nephew.
-
If he thinks about it, Massu wouldn't say he's particularly popular on lj, but sometimes he does wonder why he's the friend of some random people--people he seems to have nothing in common with and that, for the life of him, he can't remember ever saying even a single word to. He doesn't think his life is very interesting, doesn't even draw much anymore, but if people want to friend him for whatever reason, he supposes it's okay--it doesn't hurt anyone, after all.
Still, he thinks it'd be nice if they said something. Ever. Maybe they could be friends.
-
dare_deshou disappears from lj early in Massu's second semester, just a struck out name on his profile page.
Massu can't say he'd gotten to know him very well, or had gotten to talk to him very often, but he's still worried that something could be wrong. Nishikido knows Uchi in real life though, and says that things are just a little tough right now, but he is otherwise okay.
It makes Massu feel a little better.
-
A few weeks later _kusanoman's journal gets deleted without warning.
No one says anything about it--no one seems to know anything--and even though it seems silly, because who is Kusano to him really?--Massu can't help but feel that awful, twisting feeling in his gut.
He's not sure whether to feel relieved or worse when he finds the feeling fade a little more every day until he hardly remembers it at all.
After a month he finally removes the usernames from his friends list.
-
Midterms roll around before he knows it, and it's back to the books and studying and the reading of lj posts without commenting. He's in his room, studying for his second exam, when he gets the call. Taka, recognizing the ringtone, mutes the volume on his computer and Massu sends him a grateful smile.
"Hello? Mom? How are you?" he asks cheerfully, always up for a quick chat with his mother. The smile gradually slips from his face. And then his heart stops. "What?"
He swallows painfully and it must show on his face because Taka mouths, "What's wrong?" at him, but Massu can't find the words to reply, only shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut as his mother continues talking talking talking.
When he finally hangs up he doesn't know what to do with himself, is too shocked to even cry or scream or anything, just takes a shaky breath and ends up collapsing onto the floor, leaning against the leg of his bed for support. He covers his face with his hands.
"Massu? Massu, What is it?" Taka asks softly, getting up form his chair to kneel in front of him.
"...My dad got into a car accident," Massu repeats, the words hollow and bitter on his tongue. He clamps his mouth shut as if retracting the words could make it all untrue. He hears Taka inhale sharply but won't uncover his face. Taka doesn't say anything else, walks over and raises the volume on his laptop full blast before seating himself next to Massu, placing an arm around his shoulders. The rock music blares until late late into the night.
-
For days afterward Massu can't concentrate on anything, even after his mother and sister call to tell him that the surgery went well and that everything seems to be okay. For now they tell him to just concentrate in school; there's only a few days before vacation, anyway, so he can come home then. They don't tell him any real details though, they never do; he's the youngest and easily prone to worry, easily prone to tears--a regular crybaby. It's why he remains unsettled, even when they tell him to concentrate on his tests. In fact, he might've missed his second exam altogether had it not been for Taka, who woke him up thirty minutes before his 9AM exam.
After the test, which he's pretty sure he's failed and pretty sure he doesn't even care, Massu still feels listless and restless and he just wants to get his mind off of everything. So he does what he always does in times like these: he turns on his laptop and visits livejournal. He hasn't visited in a while and he feels rather bad about it, so he clicks on his f-list and starts to read.
He finds himself growing increasingly irritated about the stupid and meaningless entries about mediocre love problems or life problems when god, his father is still in the hospital and they wouldn't understand real problems if it slapped them in the face. He tries to keep the bitterness inside though, tries to bottle it up and not show that something is wrong. Because he likes these people, he honestly does; he considers them friends except. Except, in the end, they are still mostly just usernames to him--what do they care about his real life? He hardly blogs about that, anyway. So he tries to comment as usual, tries to make up for being a pretty neglectful friend lately, but all his comments sound embittered and harsh after he presses post and half of him thinks he's doing it on purpose, a strange vindicated anger at people that wouldn't know what he was so angry about in the first place.
He ends up feeling so horrible and wrought with guilt that he closes the window at once. He shakes his head, composes himself a little, and bring up the entry screen. He writes:APRIL 26 1:12 PM
-(no subject)
i'm sorry if i've said something wrong lately. i'm--not feeling myself.
He hopes that suffices and that maybe a bit of his guilt will subside. He then shuts off his laptop and decides to go for a walk.
When he returns there are fifteen emails in his inbox, and they're all for his recent entry, and they all ask "if everything's okay" and "is something wrong?" and he realizes that he doesn't feel better, not one bit. In fact, if possible, he feels more guilty and more wretched, because instead of them forgiving him for being a terrible friend, they're more concerned with why he's acting this way. He can't take it.APRIL 26 3:43 PM
-(no subject)
hiatus.
he writes, and this time makes sure to lock the comment feature.
-
"Let's go watch a movie or something," Massu announces when Taka enters the room after his last class has ended. He'd been sitting in the room trying to do his calculus homework, but all he'd ended up with was five broken pencils. Taka raises an eyebrow.
"But you hardly ever want to go out."
Massu shrugs, unfazed. "Yeah, well now I want to."
"We have class tomorrow."
"Since when do you care?" Massu asks, arching an eyebrow. Taka shrugs. "Good point, let's go."
-
Vacation comes much later than sooner, and Massu quickly hops the first train he can back home. On the ride over he calls Nakamaru, finally, who had left him a few worried voice mails and texts. They talk until Massu's phone battery almost runs out and Massu suddenly remembers how comforting his best friend's voice can be, even in a time like this.
He gets off at the train station around noon, where his sister is waiting with the car, and he demands that they go visit the hospital before anything else. They make it there only ten minutes before visiting hours end and Massu runs for his life after pleading with the nurses to let him in for just one minute will do.
The sight of his father's smiling and cheerful face makes him so relieved that he can't help the tears pouring down his cheeks when he leaps at his father for a hug. He's always been prone to tears.
-
Back in the car while his sister makes fun of him for being so emotional and why didn't he believe them when they said it was all okay, Massu just nods without really paying attention and rubs at his eyes. He sends two text messages from his phone; one to Nakamaru and one to Taka: My dad is okay.
He almost starts crying anew when he gets replies from them both, telling them how relieved and happy they are for him.
-
Vacation passes slowly and lazily at home, and he spends his time mostly watching tv, or eating his mother's wonderful home cooking, or listening to his sister's annoying chatter; he'd left his laptop at school. His father finally gets released from the hospital a few days into the vacation and Massu makes sure to spend as much time as he can with him, not even caring when his sister calls him out on being a petulant worrywart.
When it's time to go back, Massu almost misses the train because he doesn't want to let go of his father.
-
The rest of the semester flies by, and Massu has to work extra hard to make up for all the work he had failed before he had left. He has to go to extra tutoring hours and review sessions to pull up all his grades to an even passing level.
He basically has no time for lj, even if he wasn't terrified of going back there and see how all his friends are doing.
To see if they are still his friends.
-
And suddenly he's back in his own room, back for another long and boring summer before school starts again in the fall.
At least he's not jobless this time around.
He finishes up a banana split for two eager little boys, plops on extra sprinkles and two maraschino cherries, and hands it to them with a smile when he sees how excited they are. They wander off to a table happily, and Massu's smile grows a little wider at the sight. He turns around only to see Nakamaru standing behind him, staring at him curiously.
"Mm? What is it?" Massu asks, moving aside and dumping the scoops into a bin. He turns on the faucet and rinses his hands.
"They're worried, you know. They haven't once stopped asking me about you," Nakamaru says quietly, and Massu stiffens. He turns off the tap and dries his hands on a paper towel.
"What are you talking about?" he asks lightly, and plasters on a grin when he turns to face him.
"Massu," Nakamaru says, and Massu sighs.
-
He finally gets around to writing an entry just before he goes to bed. He doesn't check his f-list, doesn't think he could stand it just yet, but he opens up his entry screen and begins to write, heart hammering strangely in his chest. JUNE 1 3:14 AM
-hi...
Uhm, hi.
I'm back.
Uhm...I guess I should explain myself and why I've been acting the way I have, lately.
A--a few months ago my dad got into a car accident. Ah, but he's okay! He's been okay for a while--only, only I was a bit afraid of coming back after I'd been so short with you all, lately.
But I just. I'm sorry, really I am. Even though all of you have been nothing but amazing friends to me--I--I'm sorry if I've concerned you. But thank you. Thank you so much for caring.
I'm so grateful to have met each and every one of you.
Thank you. I love you all.
-Massu.
He's blinking back tears by the time he finishes typing, and he knows it's silly and nothing short of ridiculous that he feels so strongly about these people he's separated from by oceans and hours and miles and miles of cyberspace--but he can't help it. He debates over and writes and rewrites his entry about five times in the span of thirty minutes, hesitates uncertain fingers over his mouse before finally deciding to just get on with it and press post.
LJ eats his entry.
He manages an entry mostly similar to the first, after another painstaking twenty minutes, and when he's finished for the second time, Massu presses post again--but not before copying-and-pasting the entire entry into a new word document. When the entry is posted successfully, Massu lets out the strange breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. He quickly exits the window, shuts down his computer, and goes to sleep, nerves too wracked to do anything else.
When he wakes up the next morning, he finds around 14 new messages in his inbox.
Massu thinks his heart has never felt fuller.
-
NOTE 01: before anyone says anything: YES. this is pretty much inspired by (read: plagiarized off of, SORRY) the idea in database unavailable by unrequitedangst, where je is in fandom/lj. and it possibly one of the most brilliant things i have ever read in this fandom.
NOTE 02: none of those usernames belong to real people! i made sure to use ones that didn't exist or journals that were deleted and purged. so--don't bother trying to go to them. XD
NOTE 03: i spend way too much fucking time on lj. it is unhealthy.
NOTE 04: can you tell how much fun it was to code this? just CAN YOU TELL.
NOTE 05: if i've grazed upon even one instance of why you're here and why you've stayed around on lj--i'll think i've accomplished something. ♥