Gift fic for lilly0
Title: Déjà vu
Pairing/Characters: Ryo/Subaru, Yoko, Uchi, Jin & Yamapi.
Rating: pg13-15.
Warnings: Despite its beginning, none.
Notes: For lilly0 with all my love. I know I´m taking my chances with this plot, but I have my hopes high and hope you will like it. I know you asked for not a too angsty fic and I believe that came from your fear of not having it the way you want, because I know you love the “correct type of angst” So with that in mind, I´m here to risk it. BTW I got the idea from Sandra Bullock´s Premonition movie.
Summary: A tragedy sets off a chain of events and Ryo must make a choice, one that could affect his future forever or be the opportunity he has been waiting for.
Déjà vu
Saturday.
Ryo looks around him. He watches as his group-mates wear sour faces, the sadness and pain of inevitability so present in the environment, it is hard to breathe.
He chokes on his own sobs, and the tiny figure at his left squeezes his hand.
“Are you ok, uncle?” His niece, the one he is guardian of, has red puffy eyes, and the image breaks Ryo´s heart all over, if there is still a piece of it not already broken.
He looks to the front of the room, where his boyfriend lies, frozen, still, pale and he cries again. He sniffles loudly, but ignores the looks of pity on everybody’s face.
He wishes he could bury himself deeply, or go far away, somewhere where it doesn’t hurt so badly anymore. Somewhere he can hide in a cocoon of despair and be left alone, for the rest of his life.
To just…disappear.
Flashback.
“Uncle, uncle!” Kara comes running to their bed and then jumps on it. She starts bouncing between their tired bodies.
“Your turn,” Subaru says drowsily, then turns over to go back to sleep.
“Hey, it was my turn yesterday too, remember?” Ryo complains, not as annoyed as he should’ve been. He turns over and hugs Subaru from behind. Kara pouts and sneaks under the bed sheets with them, right in the middle. Ryo smiles and kisses her forehead. “Why are you up so early?”
“It’s not early. It’s 10 am and I should be fed. I’m going to tell granny on you.”
Subaru chuckles and finally gets out of bed.
“Ok, I’ll do it, but you should know, little one, that you ruined our day off sleep-in.”
She giggles, gets up and then runs to the kitchen after Subaru while Ryo heads to the shower. Kara has been living with them for two years now, ever since Ryo’s older brother and his wife died in a car accident. For some reason Ryo still doesn’t quite comprehend, they thought it was a good idea to leave their child with him, trusting the most precious thing they left behind to Ryo, somehow convinced that he was suitable to be a parent.
As he gets out of the shower, Ryo hears the seven-year old screaming, “I want pancakes!” He enters the kitchen and sees his boyfriend yawning while preparing breakfast.
Subaru’s phone rings, he sees the name on the ID and gives an apologetic look to Ryo as he leaves the room, while Ryo finishes setting the table and after a few minutes, Subaru is back.
“I have to go to Osaka,” he explains.
Kara frowns and whines, “But we were going to Disney today!”
“I’m sorry, Kiddo, I can’t. I have an interview, I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Ryo doesn’t argue, why would he? It is work. It’s always work. He perceives that something is off though-the way Subaru keeps fidgeting nervously makes Ryo shiver. He ignores the goosebumps and they have breakfast like every morning. They kiss goodbye like every morning, and they part ways like every morning.
Little did Ryo know that that was going to be the last time he was ever going to see him.
It was Thursday, the eighteenth of September.
End Flashback.
The wake is probably the saddest thing he has ever experienced in his life. Watching friends, colleagues, and family coming and going to say sorry or how they supposedly know how it feels, in a never-ending parade of misery and half-empty words.
They don’t know shit about how he feels. Do they feel like they can’t breathe? Like the world stopped and shattered into pieces? Do their stomachs convulse inside them? As if life ceased to have sense anymore? To still be there when he is not? To painfully know that you have to keep going, to continue living in a world where the person that meant everything to you is not there anymore?
No, they don’t know a thing.
Kara cries so much, she falls asleep next to him. He lifts her and embraces her sleeping figure tightly, he holds her close and tries to figure out what is he supposed to do. He has someone that depends on him, he can’t let himself be defeated by depression and self-pity; But how? How is he going to move on without him?
He loves Subaru, has for years, probably his entire life, ever since those juniors days when Baru protected him and became one of his best friends.
He takes the little figure in his arms and stands up. He glances one last time at his boyfriend, his partner, the one, and leaves the wake.
After he is back at home, he persuades Kara to eat, then, he gives her a bath and tucks her into bed.
“Do you think he is watching over us?” his sweet little girls asks him, and a new wave of pain crushes his heart.
“Yeah,” he says unconvinced and kisses her softly.
He goes to his bedroom, the one he is never going to share with Baru anymore. He shakes and collapses on Subaru´s side of the bed; he clings to his pillow and cries the entire night.
Monday
Ryo hears someone yawning at his side. He figures Kara must have come into his bed during night. His eyes hurt from all the crying, he whimpers, knowing that from now on he will wake up every morning to an empty bed and that he also will have to take care of their little girl alone.
The gloomy picture makes his eyes tear all over again.
“I know you are awake. Don’t cheat and make breakfast.”
Ryo jumps at the sound of that voice, his mind might be playing tricks on him because he swears Subaru is right there stretching like a cat next to him.
“Wh---what?” Ryo stutters and swallows forcefully. The lump in his throat is still there, though. His logic is trying to fight back the image in front of him, while his heart is jumping with happiness he never thought he was going to feel again. The crazy look on his face makes Baru frown.
“What’s wrong?” Baru asks curiously, clearly amused and worried about Ryo.
Ryo rubs his eyes repeatedly. What the fuck is going on? He lifts a shaking hand in Subaru´s direction, and when he touches skin he whimpers in disbelief.
He is here, he really is!
“Baru!” he screams and launches himself at his boyfriend. He doesn’t understand how, why, or what happened, all he knows is that Baru is right there, in front of him, looking at him as if he has grown a second head, but there nevertheless. While clenching desperately to him, Ryo starts crying so hard, his entire body is trembling.
“Hey, are you ok?” Subaru´s gentle hands are stroking his hair now, as he hugs him back tightly.
“You . . . ” Ryo´s voice gives up on him.
“Food!” Kara says as she storms into their bedroom. They part, embarrassed and Ryo rubs his eyes once more, he looks at Baru smiling sweetly at their girl and his heart flutters with joy.
“Here!” she continues while pointing at her mouth. She then puts her little fingers in her cheeks and puffs them out. “Now!”
“Ok, sweetie, go change and we will be in the kitchen in a few,” Subaru replies. Ryo bites his lips nervously, Have I gone mad? He wonders, he sounds the same, feels the same, maybe he didn’t die after all and the previous day was a nightmare, a horrible horrendous nightmare “I swear that little girl was Pacman in a past life,” Baru comments as he gets out of bed. Ryo watches him strip off his boxers, his bare butt now clearly in his sight and his cock twinges in old familiarity. He sighs in relief.
Everything is ok, nothing bad happened, Baru is still part of their lives.
“Ok, I’m going to take a shower now. You sure you are ok?”
“Yes, I couldn’t be better actually,” Ryo replies and smiles at him, not quite sure if he is still sleeping, having a sweet dream where he is happy and complete again, the hell, if it is a dream he can happily live there. He stands up and with a more secure smile now, he starts dressing himself for a day of work, feeling optimistic and blessed, he puts on his shirt and heads to the night stand where his phone always lies. He stops dead in his tracks when he sees the clock showing the date in bright red lights.
He starts panting heavily. According to that clock, the one that always works perfectly, it is Monday, but not just any Monday. It is September fifteenth. That can’t be, though, because that day he had an interview in Osama no Brunch, and it already happened. In fact, it aired on Wednesday morning and he watched it while he was having breakfast.
He starts panicking and runs to the living room, where he ignores the curious look Kara gives him as she munches a banana. He turns the TV on and looks for the date on the screen. He zaps through the channels, desperate, as one after another show him the same date.
He rubs his head in distress, he looks at his surroundings, realizing that he has already lived this day. It was supposed to be Sunday, but instead, it is Monday, of the week before.
Ok, dude, you lost it. What the fuck is happening? He tries to remember that Monday; Kara was eating a banana that day, too, but well, that wasn’t unusual. Ok, what else happened? Oh right, Baru got annoyed about his dirty clothes left on the floor of their room, that hasn’t happened, so that means-
“Ryo, could you please take this to the laundry room?”
Ok….it happened…Ok, Ryo don’t panic. That happens all the time, too, nothing unusual. You definitely need to worry if the morning news reports a 5.2 earthquake in Fukuoka.
“This morning, at five am, Fukuoka woke up to a quake measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale.”
His mouth fell to the floor.
“Papa Ryo looks like a gold-fish,” Kara says, giggling.
He composes himself, or at least tries to, and smiles weakly at her. He tries to appear calm when going back to his bedroom, but stumbles over his own feet as he starts running once he is sure Kara can’t see him anymore. Once in the bedroom he hears the shower still on and peeks inside the bathroom; Subaru´s naked form is visible through the steamed partition, he gulps at the sudden rush of desire and how his hardening cock makes him, for a moment, forget the mess he is in right now.
A big one this time around, one that is playing with time. He grabs his phone from his back pocket, dials, and waits.
“Uchi!”
“What the fuck do you want?” Uchi answers on the other end, clearly annoyed. “Do you have any idea of what time is it!?”
Of course I know! But it’s the wrong day!
“Look Uchi, I don’t know what’s happening but I swear Subaru was dead yesterday and now he is here.” He rushes to say everything in one go. Once he finishes, his panting and his frantic message make his friend snort at him.
“Are you on glue? What did you take last night? Now Ryo, you are a parent now, you shouldn’t keep drinking like a fish. That gives the wrong message to your daughter.”
“Would you shut up! I’m telling you! He was dead yesterday!”
“Whatever dude, let me sleep and I will call you later.”
Uchi does not wait for a reply; he simply hangs up on him. Ryo closes his eyes and balls his hands into tight fists and before he breaks his own phone, he lets them go and dials a new number, and this time he has the hope someone will believe him.
“Jin! Please don’t think I’m crazy, but I swear Subaru died and now he is walking around the room.”
“Wow, dead? You must be good at it aren’t you. So what, if he is walking again then you should bang him some more,” Jin says and without further ado ends the call. Ryo curses silently and sighs. He blames himself for thinking any of his stupid friends would get their heads out of their asses and actually listen to what he is saying.
“Pi!”
“I know, Jin sent me a message while he was on the phone with you,” Pi says once he calls him. Ryo hopes Pi will work. After all, he is the serious one of the three. “Dude, you should be proud of yourself. I mean, I wish I had that effect on my lovers.”
Lovers? As in plural? God, Ryo, focus!
Ryo starts banging his head against a wall while still supporting the phone on his right ear; he hears the shower stop and hides behind the half-closed door.
“Would you two stop thinking about sex! This is serious damn it!” he hisses, not wanting Subaru to hear him and give him more reasons to think he is crazy.
Although he probably is.
He most certainly is.
“Then buy some Viagra, what do I care? Now I need to hang up. This conversation continues with my shower, my hand, and my imagination. Bye.”
The dial tone at the end of the line is what follows and Ryo can’t believe he has such obtuse friends. He enters the bedroom, and sees Baru drying his hair, water drops dancing leisurely down his body.
Oh God…
“Hey, you sure you are ok?” Baru asks suddenly making Ryo jump, he is definitely not sure if he is ok. Should he say anything at all? Baru is here after all. The second chance he silently asked for from heaven is right here staring at him.
“Yeah,” he says and approaches his boyfriend. He hugs him tightly, not caring that his clothes are getting wet, and lifts his head, he stares into Subaru´s eyes, he doesn’t remember the last time he did that, the last time he actually took a minute to enjoy drowning himself in those brown seas. He takes a second to wonder why they haven’t done that in so long, then, he realizes for the first time that life, responsibility, and routine have notched their relationship. His heart shrinks with that sudden revelation. Has he been ignoring Subaru somehow? Sure, they have a life together, a daughter, work, they make love on a regular basis, but is the emotional side as close as before? Probably not. He caresses his boyfriend’s face lovingly. God, he loves him so much, and just the painful memory of losing him jolts him and Ryo kisses him, hard, deep, like he hasn’t in what feels like years, the butterflies in his stomach make him moan against his lips. Subaru answers his demands but stops him suddenly; the stern look on his face makes Ryo feel insecure about them for the first time “What?”
“Nothing. I’ll be late for work.”
“Oh, ok,” Ryo replies, but the disappointment in his voice is clear. Subaru looks at him and sighs. He smiles at him guiltily, and Ryo wonders why he looks apologetic. Now that he thinks of it, that is the very same expression he saw on Subaru’s face the last time he saw him. That day.
They have breakfast as usual; they take Kara to school and then go to work. The rest of the day passes without any strange event, well, if you don’t count that he is doing the same exact things for the second time in less than a week, although, some things are slightly different; For example, that first Monday, Yasu spilled some orange juice on Maru´s head, while on this Monday, the one that got spilled on was Ohkura.
Little tiny things are different, not much, but they are definitely there and noticeable.
Later, they pick Kara up from school and go back home. They have dinner and watch Monsters inc. on TV.
Ryo feels weird. He feels as if this day is somehow a premonition, as if some greater power is sending him a message he is too blind, preoccupied, or thick to see. He just wishes Subaru could stay with him forever, because having to pass through his death and feel that pain again is too heartbreaking.
They are all three sitting together on the couch; Kara is laughing at the sweet, enormous blue monster on the TV screen as Ryo peeks over and realizes Baru isn’t looking at the TV-well, he is looking in that direction, but his eyes are just staring off into space.
He wonders what’s happening to him and how long Baru has been like this. He feels guilty for not noticing Baru´s state of mind; he is the person he claims to loves the most.
Well then, how come he looks so lost? Ryo hates himself for being unable to answer his own question.
“Ne, Subaru, are you happy?” Ryo asks him timidly; maybe he needs to make some changes. If life has given him a chance at having Baru again, he needs to be someone that deserves that gift.
“Yeah, sure, why are you asking?”
Ryo ignores how absentminded Baru sounds, as if he wasn’t really there, sharing time with their family, but instead, far away, so far, Ryo thinks it would be almost impossible to reach. His heart breaks a little. Maybe Subaru doesn’t love him anymore, or not like he thought he did.
“Just, I don’t know. I guess I wanted to know if you were somehow content with your life, with our life-”
Ryo´s voice breaks, he shuts up because he just doesn´t have the force to continue voicing out loud his worst fears and abruptly embraces Baru forcefully, trying to get the message across. He loves him so much and so entirely, he thinks not having Baru’s love in return would be even worse than his death.
“You are weird today,” Baru says and ruffles his hair. Ryo recognizes the old Baru in his eyes, and in a second all his worries fly out of the window, he smiles and pecks him sweetly, a deep blush creeping on his face.
“Uncle is always weird,” Kara says. She laughs when Ryo tickles her. He looks at Subaru, who suddenly wears the most honest smile he has seen in a really long time.
“Baru?”
“Mm?”
“Don’t ever leave me, ok?”
Subaru never answers; instead they cuddle together, and later go to sleep.
Thursday.
Ryo´s head hurts badly. He feels as if the entire room is spinning. He closes his eyes again and takes deep breathes trying to calm the storm that’s in his head.
He hears ringing and then banging at the door. He curses and stumbles out of bed.
“Coming!” he barks at the door. He scratches his butt sleepily and opens the door. “Where’s the fire?” he asks wrinkling his nose in disgust, then, he sees Uchi with eyes blood red. He looks as if something is choking him.
“Jeez dude, are you ok?” Uchi enters the apartment and turns around, silent tears start pouring from his eyes. He looks so devastated that Ryo fidgets in fear. “What’s wrong?”
“There has been an accident, Ryo.”
Ryo´s eyes widen. God, this is awfully familiar. He starts panting, already knowing what is coming next, he looks at the calendar on the fridge and closes his eyes while his head starts spinning once again. It feels as if the earth under his feet is opening, ready to swallow him and not let him see the light of day ever again.
“What happened?” he asks nevertheless, hoping this time it is different.
“Subaru…he…”
God, no.
“NO, NO, NO!” he screams. His eyes start watering despite himself and the impossibility. Baru is ok; he knows he is, this is just another nightmare, tomorrow he will wake up in his loving arms once more. Yet, he is dead; he knows that somehow he is back to that horrible day. “This can’t be! Not this again! He was alive again yesterday!”
“Ryo, no, what are you talking about?”
“Uchi, he was dead the day before yesterday, but then yesterday he was ok. We had dinner and we watched a movie,” He paces back and forth desperately trying to make some sense out of all this. Frustration starts replacing his tears, and the anxiety he feels increases.
“Where’s Kara?”
“Kara?” Ryo swallows. He totally forgot about her; he glances around, not sure where to start looking for her, or why she isn’t there to begin with. He feels entirely lost. “I…I don’t know…” Guilt starts creeping into his body; his own craziness has gotten the best of him. He is a good father, at least most of the time-time elations and death premonitions aren’t a daily occurrence.
He snaps and starts searching the apartment for his daughter. He looks frantically in her room, their room, bathroom, and kitchen and he finally finds a sheet of paper with Baru´s handwriting.
You looked green this morning, didn’t want to wake you. I’m taking Kara to school and don’t worry, I fed her, not that she didn’t remind me of it hundred times, mind you. Can you explain to me where she puts all that food?
“Here! See, the story has changed already. This is not how it happened. That morning we had breakfast, and I took Kara to school. Today I was feeling bad and he took her there instead,” Ryo says while shoving the note under Uchi´s nose.
“Ryo, please calm down.”
“I can’t calm down!”
His body shakes uncontrollably and he finds air hard to push into his lungs. His mouth gets dry and the entire room wobbles.
“He is not dead, you hear me! He is not!”
“Ryo!”
Ryo is not sure what happens next. He sees white lights over his head and the sound of wheels behind him, as he lies on something soft and strangers hover over him. He spots Uchi through his half closed eyelids and wants to say something but there’s something covering his mouth that prevents him from talking.
“What happened?”
“He had a panic attack.”
Ryo watches as the strangers in white coats talk around him. His arm burns when something pinches it and then everything turns black.
Tuesday
Ryo moans in pain. His entire body aches and after he stops feeling like puking his brains out, he remembers everything that happened and sighs, but even doing something as simple as that hurts. What the fuck kind of shot did they give him?
“Hey, sleepy head.”
Ryo jumps and turns his head just enough to see Baru dressing himself.
“Oh my frigging God!” he screams. He rubs his eyes, and once he realizes he is there again, he now is sure he has gone completely mental. “You are here!”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m bothering you?” The offended and saddened tone in Subaru´s voice makes him cringe, he looks really offended by his words. Ryo feels at a loss; why would he be so sensitive about something like that? He doesn’t know he is going to die, or that he is already dead.
Oh God, what a mess.
“It’s not that . . . where are you going?” Ryo says instead, and smiles at him reassuringly. Subaru sighs and rubs his head. Ryo realizes for the first time how tired he looks, in fact, he has for a while now, and the guilt he feels increases. How come he is discovering all those things now, now that he is gone? Or now that he is going to…
“Work?”
“What day is it?”
“Tuesday.”
“Two days before…”
“Before what?”
“Nothing.”
What else can he say anyway? How do you explain what’s happening to him? Ryo doesn’t understand it himself, and his attempts to explain it haven’t worked with his friends either. Suddenly, Ryo feels as if he is ninety years old.
The entire morning routine goes on; they leave Kara at school, take the highway, and go to work. The entire trip is silent, Ryo really doesn’t know what to say. Ignoring the fact that Baru shouldn’t be there at all in the first place, he feels him excruciatingly distant. He has that constant feeling in the pit of his stomach that something is really off with Baru, and he feels stupid and oblivious for not realizing it before. How long has Subaru been so off?
What kind of boyfriend, partner or life companion was Ryo, if he couldn’t tell, or worse, didn’t even notice in all that time how lost Subaru has been? He awkwardly glances in his direction, and wishes for a minute that he could erase that blunt pain inside him.
They park the car and walk into the company; they greet colleagues and some mutual friends in the hallways. They say goodbye-not kisses of course, it is a place of work; Ryo hates how pompous his own rejections must have sounded to Subaru. He has solo interviews that day, which means he isn’t going to see him the whole day. He sighs tiredly and drops his belongings on the couch, noisily letting his body land on top of them, hew seconds after, he emits a surprised squeal when he sees Baru´s bento peeking out of his rucksack.
He grabs it and looks at his watch-he has ten minutes before his manager arrives. He runs to the hallway where they just parted.
“Subaru!” he screams when he sees him, but Subaru does not hear him, he keeps going and enters a recording room.
Ryo runs after him. He opens the door a crack and sees that Yoko is there as well. Something in the atmosphere makes him stop and hide behind the half-opened door. He sees Yoko and Subaru staring at each other, and something makes Ryo frown and swallow uncomfortably. The intimacy in their eyes makes him want to punch them both and kick Yoko´s balls. Other people aren’t allowed to look at Baru like that, but seeing that Baru is the one allowing it sends the acid in his stomach straight to his throat.
“So are you coming tomorrow?” Yoko locks eyes with Baru and asks.
“I don’t know if I can come up with an excuse,” His boyfriend answers while staring shyly at the floor.
“I asked the manager to include you in the interview. The interview is in the evening, and by the time it ends there won’t be any trains back to Tokyo.”
“I just….”
“I know, the first time doing this can be hard but-”
Ryo sees Yoko caressing Baru´s arm and he suddenly feels the urge to chop that arm off. What is all this? Is Baru cheating on him? Pure rage and disappointment propel him to push the door open.
“Oh hey, Ryo,” Yoko greets him coolly and Ryo hates how cheeky he is, he glares with all his might, at his nerve to dare talking to him when he is trying to steal the one thing Ryo loves the most, when he is willingly destroying a family, because he and Baru and Kara are a family, despite his mistakes and his own obliviousness, he doesn’t deserve a low blow like this one.
He chokes back infuriated tears and shoves the bento into Baru´s chest, who jumps at the force of the impact.
“You forgot your lunch.”
“Oh right, sorry.”
The bastard doesn’t even have the decency to look him in the eye. Ryo is sure they didn’t see him hiding before, but apparently Subaru feels as if he has been caught.
“See you at home,” Ryo says and turns around. He walks back to his dressing room. He is not going to make a scene out of this. For starters, those two probably think they have it all figured and that he doesn’t even know. Ryo hates how ignorant he is, of everything. If it wasn’t for this déjà vu, there is no way he would have known Yoko and Baru had a history together.
I know the first time doing this can be hard but…
Does that mean that they haven’t done anything yet? Does that really excuse Baru? Hell, no. It doesn’t. He must be an unaware idiot-fuck, he feels like they must be laughing at him. How come he never perceived anything weird between those two? But now all Baru´s weird behaviors somehow made sense.
Does this means he wants to break it off? To end what they have? The thought makes him stop; he clutches his heart, trying to calm his heavy breathing and the mix of pain, fury and discontentment he is feeling. He takes a deep breath and resumes walking. He is a professional, he has work to do. Even if he is a frigging ghost now.
The rest of the day passes like a blur. His mind keeps going around and around the whys, the regrets and the blame, yet none of them actually giving him an answer.
When he gets home, he goes straight to bed. He is really tired, as if the entire force and energy that kept him going has left him and maybe it’s exactly that, since the love he thought only belonged to him is for someone else.
It was odd. He saw it, he heard it, and somehow, his heart refused to believe that Baru doesn’t love him anymore, but if you cheat on someone you don’t love them right? Ryo’s one consolation is that Subaru never went through with it. He died before he could.
He breaks into violent sobs; he then takes his phone and dials. For once he felt grateful Kara wasn’t there, that soon to be cheating bastard is going to pick her up from his aunt.
“Ryo?” Uchi asks in a concerned tone, probably hearing his hiccups on the other end of the line.
“I figured it out.”
“What did you figure out?”
“Why I keep reliving this week over and over, and why he was so off lately.”
“Ok….”
Ryo knows Uchi is playing along. Uchi knows him way too well to stop his rarely profound ramblings, and God, Ryo can´t be happier about that under the circumstances. Even if Uchi doesn’t understand a word of what he is saying.
“He was going to cheat on me Uchi, with Yoko.”
“What!? What are you talking about?”
The surprise in his friend’s tone does little to ease his pain.
“Subaru, before he died. The sudden trip to Osaka on his day off, he was going to cheat on me with Yoko.”
“Ok, I don’t know what you are talking about, but Subaru would never do that to you.”
Friendship and loyalty 101 always gets in the way of truth, he thinks bitterly.
“Are you sure?” Ryo asks, and for the first time he wonders if his friends don’t know about this. He is oblivious, awkward and shy, everybody knows that. His own awkward personality has always gotten in the way when trying to interpret things, but not with his friends, they are not like that. He fears that maybe more people than just Yoko and Baru have been laughing at him “Lately… we haven’t been that ok, you know? Parenthood is hard. In the past we would fuck each other’s brains out on a daily basis, cuddle on every hard surface we found. But when Kara came along, I don’t know, life suddenly got real, and monotony got the better of us.”
“But you said, he is going to cheat on you. That means you can prevent it from happening, right?”
The logic in his friend’s words works like a sharp punch in the pit of his stomach.
“Should I? Do I want to? Maybe I should let him die. If he has reached the point where he wants to cheat, why bother?”
“Ok, you are scaring me.”
“Is it like murdering him? Knowing he will die, and not doing anything about it because deep inside I think he deserves it?”
“No one deserves to die, Ryo.”
“I’m not sure about that.”
He really isn’t.
He hangs up and turns off the phone, not wanting to talk with anybody else. He lays there on their bed, except now it feels giant and cold, and buries deep inside the silk sheets, clothes still on, as he closes his eyes. He wonders if the sun is ever going to shine again.
Friday
Ryo wakes up and the first thing he does is look at the clock on the night stand. Friday. He sighs. That means Baru is dead by now. His vindictive self is not sure if it is relieved about it, or if it wants to follow him and never wake up anymore.
He climbs out of the bed and goes to the kitchen. His mouth feels like an entire cabinet of medicine lives inside, he swallows in disgust and jumps when he feels a hand at his back, his heart speeds; that can’t be. Subaru is dead! Or he is supposed to be on Friday!
He turns around and sees Uchi´s puffy eyes staring back at him, making Ryo whine in annoyance.
“What are you doing here?”
“Baru…yesterday…the hospital.”
“Oh right, you stayed the night,” Ryo says as he recalls the panic attack. He sighs; this mess is getting out of hand. “Where’s Kara?”
“Your mom took her for the night.”
He rubs his head attempting to ease the ache. He is trying to figure out the correct call, the right thing to do, he is confused at how the days keep alternating between each other, he figures there´s must be a pattern even through all this craziness, so with frantic, annoyed motions he goes to the living room and searches for a calendar in the drawers. He finds one and shoves the things on top of the table to the floor. He spreads out the calendar and starts writing on it.
“What are you doing?” Uchi asks worriedly at him.
“I need to figure something out.”
September
15-Monday->I saw him alive after the wake.
16-Tuesday->Mother Fucker. YokoBaru duo stabs me in the back.
17-Wednesday->
18-Thursday-> He dies.
19-Friday->
20-Saturday->Wake
21-Sunday->
“Today is Friday, am I right?” he asks Uchi, who just keeps staring at the calendar and then at Ryo weirdly.
“Ryo, what’s wrong with you? I know it’s hard, but you have been talking nonsense the entire week.”
“I know you are not going to believe me, but bear with me on this will´ya?”
“Ok….”
“Subaru died. We were at the wake on Saturday.”
“No Ryo, there hasn’t been a wake yet. He died yesterday. I know you are confused but-”
“Shush!” Ryo shuts him and glares impatiently. Uchi sighs in exchange and nods at him to continue. “As I was saying, the wake was on Saturday, then, on Monday, he was alive again, as if nothing happened. Then he died again on Thursday and I ended up in the hospital. Tuesday, I discovered he was going to cheat on me. And today, Friday, it’s a day after his death and the day before the wake.”
“Ok….” Uchi says, unsure. “Do you want a beer? Some tea? A shrink maybe?” He moans in pain when Ryo hits him in the head.
Ryo looks at the calendar in front of him, his messy and clearly rushed handwriting staring back at him, as if suddenly giving him an answer.
“There are three spaces…. three spaces blank yet, which means I still have three days.”
His mind quickly recalls every event. He then looks for probabilities and comes to one conclusion: he is sure that the days have been repeating only once, which means that the day of his death is not going to repeat again. He doesn’t have the chance to prevent that fateful day from happening. Subaru is going to die.
Unless…
Unless, he somehow makes him change his mind, convinces him to not go to Osaka, to not follow Yoko, and to not die as a result.
“Three days for what?” Uchi asks once again, clearly at a loss for what his friend rambling about. But he is being supportive. Knowing Uchi, Ryo figures that he prefers this crazy-talking Ryo to the depressed-to-the-gut hospitalized Ryo.
“That’s the thing. I’m not sure if it’s worth it.”
“If what’s worth it?”
“Subaru, me, us,” he says. Flashes of them together rush to his mind-their junior days, their first kiss, the first time they made love, everything they built together now on the verge of collapsing. His chest constricts painfully and before he knows it he is crying again. God, all this mess has turned him in a whiny, crying pussy.
“Hey, don’t cry.”
“How could he!”
“Subaru never cheated on you.”
“Yeah, ‘cause he died before he had a chance to do it!”
Uchi hugs him tightly. “Don’t be like that Ryo. Think of him and all the things you’ve done together, your family, the family you formed together.”
“And yet, he was going to throw all that down the toilet for the sake of a fuck.”
“Maybe he was searching for something….” Uchi says and the hesitation in his voice makes Ryo look warily at him. Uchi swallows. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this right now, but….Baru came to talk to me once. He was really troubled. He kept saying how he couldn’t find a place in your life anymore, or in Kara’s.”
“What? I love him, how could he think that?”
“I know, that’s what I told him”
“And Kara….Kara’s our daughter, we are a family. She adores him, I adore him. What the fuck is wrong with that guy?”
“I think at some point he lost his self confidence. He saw you so sufficient and confident about how your lives had changed, how you passed from being a partying, half alcoholic guy to an amazing parent, while Baru was lost all the time about what to do. It seemed natural for you while for him it was like learning how to eat, talk, and tie his shoes for the first time. You know he has never been good with kids or emotions. And I think he thought you were better off without him, or worse, that he didn’t make any difference at all in your lives.”
“But that’s nonsense!”
“I know. Look Ryo, Baru is gone now, and you know he loved you. Maybe Yoko was a way to escape from something, not the family you were, but how unworthy of you and Kara he felt.”
Ryo closed his eyes, his mouth in a thin line, his being conflicted by Uchi´s words. Was it possible? That all that pain, that odd attitude he finally noticed in Subaru, was a result of his own insecurity?
“When did he tell you that?”
“I’m not sure. A year ago maybe?”
Ryo bit his trembling lips, his eyes watering once again. A whole year feeling like that and never saying anything? Was he stupid? Instead of confronting him, he was going to give Ryo the perfect excuse to leave him and to never look back, maybe that was his intention from the beginning. Ryo is a proud person, he would’ve never forgiven something like that, and the certainty of his own personality would’ve shot Subaru out of his life for good. The knowledge that Baru was actually counting on that causes twinges in Ryo´s heart.
His headache finally wins, and he suspects that Uchi was the one leaving him sleeping on the bed that night.
Wednesday
Ryo looks at the clock, the one he has been hating this whole week. Wednesday. He turns around to see Subaru´s sleeping face and his heart flutters in recognition. God, he wants so badly to be like this forever, to just stare at him and have the liberty to touch him whenever he wants.
He caresses Subaru’s face softly, his fingers following the path they know by heart, and yet, it still gives him that tingling feeling and the squirming in his belly. If Baru only knew how important he was, he is, and how much of a perfect family they can be together, because Ryo is sure Subaru miscalculated, if for a minute he thought Ryo was better off alone, with someone else, or just with Kara, he was wrong.
He needs Subaru, he needs him to hug him and kiss him every morning. It’s that well-known routine that makes the rest of day bearable.
He wonders why this week has happened at all. In the end he reaches the conclusion that asking that question is like asking why the sky is blue, why it rains, or why he loves Baru.
It doesn’t make sense, it isn’t logical, and yet, it’s breathtakingly beautiful.
A second chance to make amends.
“Morning,” Ryo says when he sees Baru´s eye flutter open.
“Morning,” he replies, and Ryo, in an impulse, closes the distance between them and kisses him. He puts his hand on his chest and feels Subaru´s heart speeding at the slight touch of their lips, completely harmonized with his own.
It makes Ryo feel hopeful. He pulls away and locks eyes with him, ignoring the shyness that assaults him. He sees Baru smirking at him, amused at his timidity.
Ryo bites his lips, knowing he is blushing. “Hey, I know you have to work today, but can’t you call in sick, so we can spend some time together?” Ryo says, hopeful. Maybe he can’t change the future, but he wants to spend as much time as he can with Baru, to be happy and perfect with him again. And maybe, just maybe, life can give him another miracle.
“I’m not sure if I can.”
“Please Baru, please,” he begs. He knows he is begging, but for once, his proud, timid or awkward self isn’t leading.
“Ok.”
He smiles at him in happiness and kisses him once more. This time, he deepens the kiss. Baru hovers over him, and Ryo caresses his chest. They part and pant heavily as Ryo feels his cock, hard and stiff between them, and all he wants is for Subaru to do something about it, and perhaps make love for one last time. He doesn’t remember the last time they did it, and with painful regret he realizes that maybe he and Subaru had neglected more than he thought.
Their little bundle of joy interrupts them when she screams for food. He looks insecurely at Subaru, fearing that maybe that was the part of parenthood that has been so hard for him. But the way Baru fondly smiles and his gentle reply to Kara erases his doubts.
As far as he can tell, Baru loves her, and by the way he reacts to him, he loves Ryo, too. Maybe it isn’t all lost.
At least for the time they have left.
…
“Higher! Higher!” Kara commands from the swing. Subaru chuckles and pushes her further.
“To the clouds?” he asks and Ryo´s heart constricts; is Baru blind? Can’t he see how important he is to her, how bonded they are? How much of a good father he is?
“Beyond the clouds, to the sun!” Kara screams and points to the sun. Her happy laughs reach each and every cell in Ryo. A girl that lost her parents can’t be that happy in an unstable, unhappy environment. They gave her a home, a life, a family, and they did it together. How could he not see that?
He pushes away the frustration he feels at his very oblivious boyfriend, and realizes how alike they are after all. He smiles despite himself and joins them.
…
“Is that healthy?” Baru asks when Ryo gives Kara a huge caramel apple. He frowns, doubtful, probably wanting to take that thing out of her hands. Ryo giggles and pecks him on the cheek.
“One time won’t hurt her.”
“Her one times are way too many,” Baru replies, still preoccupied and Ryo can’t help but love him more because of that, for loving her as if she was his own.
…
They get home late that night. It was a perfect day, full of laughs and happiness. Ryo thinks he hasn’t ever been this happy, he has realized that he might have taken Baru for granted, that maybe he assumed he was always going to be there and somehow, in the light of tragedy, he has experienced firsthand how crushed he feels by not having him.
Subaru flops tiredly on the couch as Ryo sits on the chair in front of him. He sees him rub his neck while wearing a contented smile in his face, Ryo feels like he has accomplished something that day, the last one he has with Baru alive, He has given him the smile he has been missing.
And maybe that’s the gift all these déjà vus were meant to give him.
“Hey Kara, why don’t you give Dada Baru a hug,” Ryo says and watches as she smiles at him happily.
“Kay.”
Ryo watches them, how Baru´s face looks a little guilty while he embraces her tightly. She retreats and goes to Ryo, to hug him as well.
“I think he needs more love,” he whispers in her ear. She smiles and runs back to Baru, hugging him with even more force that before. “Tell Dada Baru how much you love him,” Ryo orders, not just to show Baru how true it is, but also to tell him how much he is risking, how much is he going to lose if he pursues that nonsensical affair.
“Love you, Dada Baru.”
“Why don’t you tell her you love her, too, Baru?” Ryo presses, just to see how Baru will react, knowing that tomorrow he was planning on leaving them, to Osaka, to someone else that isn’t worthy, to his own death, although he doesn’t know that last part.
“Of course I love her. You are my sweet kiddo,” Subaru replies, and Ryo swears his voice cracks a little. Ryo realizes that, after all, he still feels disappointed, that all that happened was because Baru didn’t have the guts to confront the situation.
“Tell Papa Ryo you love him, too,” he hears Kara saying and he blushes, not expecting their innocent kid to intercede.
“Of course I love him, too, and I care about him, too.”
Baru´s answer hurt as much as it soothed. God, as if this week hasn’t been an entire mess. He wants to punch, kick, kiss and fuck him senseless. He never thought it was possible to love someone so much and to still want to kill him, to shake him, just to tell him how stupid he has been.
But Subaru hasn’t been the only one making mistakes-he has, too. He has been oblivious, selfish, and terribly neglecting. How can he blame Baru for being dense when he has been as well?
They leave Kara peacefully sleeping in her room. She was knocked out as soon as her head hit the pillow.
They go to their bedroom then, Ryo starts undressing himself and watches as his boyfriend does the same, he looks as if he is totally lost in his own thoughts.
Ryo decides that since they have been changing the story already, they might as well do it fully, so at least he does not have any regrets on Sunday, when he wakes up to an empty bed and a buried Baru. “Don’t you think we should talk?”
“About what?”
“About your sudden trip to Osaka, Subaru, what else?”
“I…how did you? I haven’t told you about that.” The nervous glances Subaru gives him only increase the pain he feels. He is sure that if he hadn’t been positive about the soon-to-be affair, he would be now, just by the way Baru looks so guilty and out of it.
But since he was an oblivious idiot, he probably wouldn’t have.
“Do you like our family, Baru?” he asks with crushed eyes. He knows the answer, but he wants to remind Baru of what he is really about to do. The doubts he still sees in his boyfriend’s face only brings him pain, disappointment, and heartache. “I wish you knew how much I miss you, miss us, the way we used to be.” He flushes at how direct he is. He sees Subaru embarrassedly staring at him, taken aback by his bold confession.
“We grew old,” Subaru says with a sad smile. Ryo approaches him then and takes his hands in his own and kisses them, then he looks at him straight in the eyes.
“Can’t we…be like before?” He lifts his arms to put them on Subaru’s neck as he closes the distance between them, in every sense. He feels as if with every inch he is drifting closer, he is breaking little walls down. “I love you so much, more than you will ever know.” He gulps at the sudden knot in his throat. Slowly, as if they had all the time in the world, even though they don’t, he kisses him.
If Ryo ever imagined a perfect night of love making, it wouldn’t have compared to reality, ever. Because reality, when it’s this perfect, this amazing, is a million times better than anything he could ever imagine. Even if it’s the last time.
But God, it feels like a start.
Sunday
Ryo wakes up with the usual pound in his head; he glances at the clock on the night stand, like he has been doing the entire week: Sunday, 8:18 am.
A day after the wake.
He buries himself deeper in the silk sheets, not wanting to be out in the world just yet, knowing that he isn’t ever going to see the love of his life again. Raw tears escape his eyes, he hears a bothersome noise and he peeks out of his cocoon, his phone is beeping; he groans while he takes it and buries himself in the sheets again, he realizes there’s a voice mail in his inbox, so he presses the button and waits.
“Hi, so…mmm…I’m driving right now.” His eyes widen when he hears Baru on the other end of the line. “About last night, and the weird things you have been asking lately, well…I just want you to know that you two are the best thing that has ever happened to me, so…” he whimpers in bittersweet hurt. Ryo hears the sound of wheels skidding on road. “Sorry, I was turning around right now,” Baru continues. “Anyway… I love you Ryo with all my heart. Sorry I didn’t say it last night, when you, when we….after we….well, you know…. and I was on my way toward making the biggest mistake of my life you know, probably one that would destroy our family and us altogether, and I just…I’ve been a little lost these couple of years….” Hope rises in Ryo’s heart at those words. Was it possible? “But I still choose you, us…so see you at home babe, I really hope to find Kara sleeping and you waiting for me naked with Yakisoba,” he says and Ryo laughs, happy tears now sliding from his eyes. “I know, you will wait me with rice instead, but it’s cool, as long as you are naked,” Baru says with humor. Ryo thinks he hasn’t ever heard him being this happy before. “Love you.” Ryo swallows at those last words. He pants nervously and jumps when he feels a tender hand caressing his back. He turns around, and he cries, smiles, and laughs at the same time when he sees Subaru staring lovingly back at him.
Alive. Real. Loved.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
Ryo´s sure the world starts making sense all over again.
Ryo´s lips are suddenly claimed with force, passion, and desperation; he squirms in surprise, he hadn’t realized up until that breathtaking kiss, how numb their love had become, and now, having him right there, kissing him as if there was no tomorrow, he doesn’t want it to ever become numb again, especially if he gets to have kisses like this one. He feels as if he is waking up from a bad dream, a long one, where life, marriage, took away what made them unique.
As Baru´s tongue invades him and his head spins uncontrollably, he realizes he is never going to let that happen again, to be lost in monotony like that, and by the way he fought to have Subaru back, he is sure he is not going to let him drift apart either.
He moans out loud as Baru pounds on him with their boxers still interceding. He groans lustfully and keeps kissing him senseless.
After a few moments of absolute love perfection, between heated kisses and burning skin Ryo stops to ask, “What if Kara wakes up?”
“We’ll be quiet. Plus, I locked the door,” Subaru says mischievously. “And there are bananas on the kitchen table.”
Ryo giggles, and then, he is the one shoving his tongue passionately on Baru´s, leisurely and wonderful.
This time, he believes, they do have all the time in the world.
Pairing/Characters: Ryo/Subaru, Yoko, Uchi, Jin & Yamapi.
Rating: pg13-15.
Warnings: Despite its beginning, none.
Notes: For lilly0 with all my love. I know I´m taking my chances with this plot, but I have my hopes high and hope you will like it. I know you asked for not a too angsty fic and I believe that came from your fear of not having it the way you want, because I know you love the “correct type of angst” So with that in mind, I´m here to risk it. BTW I got the idea from Sandra Bullock´s Premonition movie.
Summary: A tragedy sets off a chain of events and Ryo must make a choice, one that could affect his future forever or be the opportunity he has been waiting for.
Déjà vu
Saturday.
Ryo looks around him. He watches as his group-mates wear sour faces, the sadness and pain of inevitability so present in the environment, it is hard to breathe.
He chokes on his own sobs, and the tiny figure at his left squeezes his hand.
“Are you ok, uncle?” His niece, the one he is guardian of, has red puffy eyes, and the image breaks Ryo´s heart all over, if there is still a piece of it not already broken.
He looks to the front of the room, where his boyfriend lies, frozen, still, pale and he cries again. He sniffles loudly, but ignores the looks of pity on everybody’s face.
He wishes he could bury himself deeply, or go far away, somewhere where it doesn’t hurt so badly anymore. Somewhere he can hide in a cocoon of despair and be left alone, for the rest of his life.
To just…disappear.
Flashback.
“Uncle, uncle!” Kara comes running to their bed and then jumps on it. She starts bouncing between their tired bodies.
“Your turn,” Subaru says drowsily, then turns over to go back to sleep.
“Hey, it was my turn yesterday too, remember?” Ryo complains, not as annoyed as he should’ve been. He turns over and hugs Subaru from behind. Kara pouts and sneaks under the bed sheets with them, right in the middle. Ryo smiles and kisses her forehead. “Why are you up so early?”
“It’s not early. It’s 10 am and I should be fed. I’m going to tell granny on you.”
Subaru chuckles and finally gets out of bed.
“Ok, I’ll do it, but you should know, little one, that you ruined our day off sleep-in.”
She giggles, gets up and then runs to the kitchen after Subaru while Ryo heads to the shower. Kara has been living with them for two years now, ever since Ryo’s older brother and his wife died in a car accident. For some reason Ryo still doesn’t quite comprehend, they thought it was a good idea to leave their child with him, trusting the most precious thing they left behind to Ryo, somehow convinced that he was suitable to be a parent.
As he gets out of the shower, Ryo hears the seven-year old screaming, “I want pancakes!” He enters the kitchen and sees his boyfriend yawning while preparing breakfast.
Subaru’s phone rings, he sees the name on the ID and gives an apologetic look to Ryo as he leaves the room, while Ryo finishes setting the table and after a few minutes, Subaru is back.
“I have to go to Osaka,” he explains.
Kara frowns and whines, “But we were going to Disney today!”
“I’m sorry, Kiddo, I can’t. I have an interview, I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Ryo doesn’t argue, why would he? It is work. It’s always work. He perceives that something is off though-the way Subaru keeps fidgeting nervously makes Ryo shiver. He ignores the goosebumps and they have breakfast like every morning. They kiss goodbye like every morning, and they part ways like every morning.
Little did Ryo know that that was going to be the last time he was ever going to see him.
It was Thursday, the eighteenth of September.
End Flashback.
The wake is probably the saddest thing he has ever experienced in his life. Watching friends, colleagues, and family coming and going to say sorry or how they supposedly know how it feels, in a never-ending parade of misery and half-empty words.
They don’t know shit about how he feels. Do they feel like they can’t breathe? Like the world stopped and shattered into pieces? Do their stomachs convulse inside them? As if life ceased to have sense anymore? To still be there when he is not? To painfully know that you have to keep going, to continue living in a world where the person that meant everything to you is not there anymore?
No, they don’t know a thing.
Kara cries so much, she falls asleep next to him. He lifts her and embraces her sleeping figure tightly, he holds her close and tries to figure out what is he supposed to do. He has someone that depends on him, he can’t let himself be defeated by depression and self-pity; But how? How is he going to move on without him?
He loves Subaru, has for years, probably his entire life, ever since those juniors days when Baru protected him and became one of his best friends.
He takes the little figure in his arms and stands up. He glances one last time at his boyfriend, his partner, the one, and leaves the wake.
After he is back at home, he persuades Kara to eat, then, he gives her a bath and tucks her into bed.
“Do you think he is watching over us?” his sweet little girls asks him, and a new wave of pain crushes his heart.
“Yeah,” he says unconvinced and kisses her softly.
He goes to his bedroom, the one he is never going to share with Baru anymore. He shakes and collapses on Subaru´s side of the bed; he clings to his pillow and cries the entire night.
Monday
Ryo hears someone yawning at his side. He figures Kara must have come into his bed during night. His eyes hurt from all the crying, he whimpers, knowing that from now on he will wake up every morning to an empty bed and that he also will have to take care of their little girl alone.
The gloomy picture makes his eyes tear all over again.
“I know you are awake. Don’t cheat and make breakfast.”
Ryo jumps at the sound of that voice, his mind might be playing tricks on him because he swears Subaru is right there stretching like a cat next to him.
“Wh---what?” Ryo stutters and swallows forcefully. The lump in his throat is still there, though. His logic is trying to fight back the image in front of him, while his heart is jumping with happiness he never thought he was going to feel again. The crazy look on his face makes Baru frown.
“What’s wrong?” Baru asks curiously, clearly amused and worried about Ryo.
Ryo rubs his eyes repeatedly. What the fuck is going on? He lifts a shaking hand in Subaru´s direction, and when he touches skin he whimpers in disbelief.
He is here, he really is!
“Baru!” he screams and launches himself at his boyfriend. He doesn’t understand how, why, or what happened, all he knows is that Baru is right there, in front of him, looking at him as if he has grown a second head, but there nevertheless. While clenching desperately to him, Ryo starts crying so hard, his entire body is trembling.
“Hey, are you ok?” Subaru´s gentle hands are stroking his hair now, as he hugs him back tightly.
“You . . . ” Ryo´s voice gives up on him.
“Food!” Kara says as she storms into their bedroom. They part, embarrassed and Ryo rubs his eyes once more, he looks at Baru smiling sweetly at their girl and his heart flutters with joy.
“Here!” she continues while pointing at her mouth. She then puts her little fingers in her cheeks and puffs them out. “Now!”
“Ok, sweetie, go change and we will be in the kitchen in a few,” Subaru replies. Ryo bites his lips nervously, Have I gone mad? He wonders, he sounds the same, feels the same, maybe he didn’t die after all and the previous day was a nightmare, a horrible horrendous nightmare “I swear that little girl was Pacman in a past life,” Baru comments as he gets out of bed. Ryo watches him strip off his boxers, his bare butt now clearly in his sight and his cock twinges in old familiarity. He sighs in relief.
Everything is ok, nothing bad happened, Baru is still part of their lives.
“Ok, I’m going to take a shower now. You sure you are ok?”
“Yes, I couldn’t be better actually,” Ryo replies and smiles at him, not quite sure if he is still sleeping, having a sweet dream where he is happy and complete again, the hell, if it is a dream he can happily live there. He stands up and with a more secure smile now, he starts dressing himself for a day of work, feeling optimistic and blessed, he puts on his shirt and heads to the night stand where his phone always lies. He stops dead in his tracks when he sees the clock showing the date in bright red lights.
He starts panting heavily. According to that clock, the one that always works perfectly, it is Monday, but not just any Monday. It is September fifteenth. That can’t be, though, because that day he had an interview in Osama no Brunch, and it already happened. In fact, it aired on Wednesday morning and he watched it while he was having breakfast.
He starts panicking and runs to the living room, where he ignores the curious look Kara gives him as she munches a banana. He turns the TV on and looks for the date on the screen. He zaps through the channels, desperate, as one after another show him the same date.
He rubs his head in distress, he looks at his surroundings, realizing that he has already lived this day. It was supposed to be Sunday, but instead, it is Monday, of the week before.
Ok, dude, you lost it. What the fuck is happening? He tries to remember that Monday; Kara was eating a banana that day, too, but well, that wasn’t unusual. Ok, what else happened? Oh right, Baru got annoyed about his dirty clothes left on the floor of their room, that hasn’t happened, so that means-
“Ryo, could you please take this to the laundry room?”
Ok….it happened…Ok, Ryo don’t panic. That happens all the time, too, nothing unusual. You definitely need to worry if the morning news reports a 5.2 earthquake in Fukuoka.
“This morning, at five am, Fukuoka woke up to a quake measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale.”
His mouth fell to the floor.
“Papa Ryo looks like a gold-fish,” Kara says, giggling.
He composes himself, or at least tries to, and smiles weakly at her. He tries to appear calm when going back to his bedroom, but stumbles over his own feet as he starts running once he is sure Kara can’t see him anymore. Once in the bedroom he hears the shower still on and peeks inside the bathroom; Subaru´s naked form is visible through the steamed partition, he gulps at the sudden rush of desire and how his hardening cock makes him, for a moment, forget the mess he is in right now.
A big one this time around, one that is playing with time. He grabs his phone from his back pocket, dials, and waits.
“Uchi!”
“What the fuck do you want?” Uchi answers on the other end, clearly annoyed. “Do you have any idea of what time is it!?”
Of course I know! But it’s the wrong day!
“Look Uchi, I don’t know what’s happening but I swear Subaru was dead yesterday and now he is here.” He rushes to say everything in one go. Once he finishes, his panting and his frantic message make his friend snort at him.
“Are you on glue? What did you take last night? Now Ryo, you are a parent now, you shouldn’t keep drinking like a fish. That gives the wrong message to your daughter.”
“Would you shut up! I’m telling you! He was dead yesterday!”
“Whatever dude, let me sleep and I will call you later.”
Uchi does not wait for a reply; he simply hangs up on him. Ryo closes his eyes and balls his hands into tight fists and before he breaks his own phone, he lets them go and dials a new number, and this time he has the hope someone will believe him.
“Jin! Please don’t think I’m crazy, but I swear Subaru died and now he is walking around the room.”
“Wow, dead? You must be good at it aren’t you. So what, if he is walking again then you should bang him some more,” Jin says and without further ado ends the call. Ryo curses silently and sighs. He blames himself for thinking any of his stupid friends would get their heads out of their asses and actually listen to what he is saying.
“Pi!”
“I know, Jin sent me a message while he was on the phone with you,” Pi says once he calls him. Ryo hopes Pi will work. After all, he is the serious one of the three. “Dude, you should be proud of yourself. I mean, I wish I had that effect on my lovers.”
Lovers? As in plural? God, Ryo, focus!
Ryo starts banging his head against a wall while still supporting the phone on his right ear; he hears the shower stop and hides behind the half-closed door.
“Would you two stop thinking about sex! This is serious damn it!” he hisses, not wanting Subaru to hear him and give him more reasons to think he is crazy.
Although he probably is.
He most certainly is.
“Then buy some Viagra, what do I care? Now I need to hang up. This conversation continues with my shower, my hand, and my imagination. Bye.”
The dial tone at the end of the line is what follows and Ryo can’t believe he has such obtuse friends. He enters the bedroom, and sees Baru drying his hair, water drops dancing leisurely down his body.
Oh God…
“Hey, you sure you are ok?” Baru asks suddenly making Ryo jump, he is definitely not sure if he is ok. Should he say anything at all? Baru is here after all. The second chance he silently asked for from heaven is right here staring at him.
“Yeah,” he says and approaches his boyfriend. He hugs him tightly, not caring that his clothes are getting wet, and lifts his head, he stares into Subaru´s eyes, he doesn’t remember the last time he did that, the last time he actually took a minute to enjoy drowning himself in those brown seas. He takes a second to wonder why they haven’t done that in so long, then, he realizes for the first time that life, responsibility, and routine have notched their relationship. His heart shrinks with that sudden revelation. Has he been ignoring Subaru somehow? Sure, they have a life together, a daughter, work, they make love on a regular basis, but is the emotional side as close as before? Probably not. He caresses his boyfriend’s face lovingly. God, he loves him so much, and just the painful memory of losing him jolts him and Ryo kisses him, hard, deep, like he hasn’t in what feels like years, the butterflies in his stomach make him moan against his lips. Subaru answers his demands but stops him suddenly; the stern look on his face makes Ryo feel insecure about them for the first time “What?”
“Nothing. I’ll be late for work.”
“Oh, ok,” Ryo replies, but the disappointment in his voice is clear. Subaru looks at him and sighs. He smiles at him guiltily, and Ryo wonders why he looks apologetic. Now that he thinks of it, that is the very same expression he saw on Subaru’s face the last time he saw him. That day.
They have breakfast as usual; they take Kara to school and then go to work. The rest of the day passes without any strange event, well, if you don’t count that he is doing the same exact things for the second time in less than a week, although, some things are slightly different; For example, that first Monday, Yasu spilled some orange juice on Maru´s head, while on this Monday, the one that got spilled on was Ohkura.
Little tiny things are different, not much, but they are definitely there and noticeable.
Later, they pick Kara up from school and go back home. They have dinner and watch Monsters inc. on TV.
Ryo feels weird. He feels as if this day is somehow a premonition, as if some greater power is sending him a message he is too blind, preoccupied, or thick to see. He just wishes Subaru could stay with him forever, because having to pass through his death and feel that pain again is too heartbreaking.
They are all three sitting together on the couch; Kara is laughing at the sweet, enormous blue monster on the TV screen as Ryo peeks over and realizes Baru isn’t looking at the TV-well, he is looking in that direction, but his eyes are just staring off into space.
He wonders what’s happening to him and how long Baru has been like this. He feels guilty for not noticing Baru´s state of mind; he is the person he claims to loves the most.
Well then, how come he looks so lost? Ryo hates himself for being unable to answer his own question.
“Ne, Subaru, are you happy?” Ryo asks him timidly; maybe he needs to make some changes. If life has given him a chance at having Baru again, he needs to be someone that deserves that gift.
“Yeah, sure, why are you asking?”
Ryo ignores how absentminded Baru sounds, as if he wasn’t really there, sharing time with their family, but instead, far away, so far, Ryo thinks it would be almost impossible to reach. His heart breaks a little. Maybe Subaru doesn’t love him anymore, or not like he thought he did.
“Just, I don’t know. I guess I wanted to know if you were somehow content with your life, with our life-”
Ryo´s voice breaks, he shuts up because he just doesn´t have the force to continue voicing out loud his worst fears and abruptly embraces Baru forcefully, trying to get the message across. He loves him so much and so entirely, he thinks not having Baru’s love in return would be even worse than his death.
“You are weird today,” Baru says and ruffles his hair. Ryo recognizes the old Baru in his eyes, and in a second all his worries fly out of the window, he smiles and pecks him sweetly, a deep blush creeping on his face.
“Uncle is always weird,” Kara says. She laughs when Ryo tickles her. He looks at Subaru, who suddenly wears the most honest smile he has seen in a really long time.
“Baru?”
“Mm?”
“Don’t ever leave me, ok?”
Subaru never answers; instead they cuddle together, and later go to sleep.
Thursday.
Ryo´s head hurts badly. He feels as if the entire room is spinning. He closes his eyes again and takes deep breathes trying to calm the storm that’s in his head.
He hears ringing and then banging at the door. He curses and stumbles out of bed.
“Coming!” he barks at the door. He scratches his butt sleepily and opens the door. “Where’s the fire?” he asks wrinkling his nose in disgust, then, he sees Uchi with eyes blood red. He looks as if something is choking him.
“Jeez dude, are you ok?” Uchi enters the apartment and turns around, silent tears start pouring from his eyes. He looks so devastated that Ryo fidgets in fear. “What’s wrong?”
“There has been an accident, Ryo.”
Ryo´s eyes widen. God, this is awfully familiar. He starts panting, already knowing what is coming next, he looks at the calendar on the fridge and closes his eyes while his head starts spinning once again. It feels as if the earth under his feet is opening, ready to swallow him and not let him see the light of day ever again.
“What happened?” he asks nevertheless, hoping this time it is different.
“Subaru…he…”
God, no.
“NO, NO, NO!” he screams. His eyes start watering despite himself and the impossibility. Baru is ok; he knows he is, this is just another nightmare, tomorrow he will wake up in his loving arms once more. Yet, he is dead; he knows that somehow he is back to that horrible day. “This can’t be! Not this again! He was alive again yesterday!”
“Ryo, no, what are you talking about?”
“Uchi, he was dead the day before yesterday, but then yesterday he was ok. We had dinner and we watched a movie,” He paces back and forth desperately trying to make some sense out of all this. Frustration starts replacing his tears, and the anxiety he feels increases.
“Where’s Kara?”
“Kara?” Ryo swallows. He totally forgot about her; he glances around, not sure where to start looking for her, or why she isn’t there to begin with. He feels entirely lost. “I…I don’t know…” Guilt starts creeping into his body; his own craziness has gotten the best of him. He is a good father, at least most of the time-time elations and death premonitions aren’t a daily occurrence.
He snaps and starts searching the apartment for his daughter. He looks frantically in her room, their room, bathroom, and kitchen and he finally finds a sheet of paper with Baru´s handwriting.
You looked green this morning, didn’t want to wake you. I’m taking Kara to school and don’t worry, I fed her, not that she didn’t remind me of it hundred times, mind you. Can you explain to me where she puts all that food?
“Here! See, the story has changed already. This is not how it happened. That morning we had breakfast, and I took Kara to school. Today I was feeling bad and he took her there instead,” Ryo says while shoving the note under Uchi´s nose.
“Ryo, please calm down.”
“I can’t calm down!”
His body shakes uncontrollably and he finds air hard to push into his lungs. His mouth gets dry and the entire room wobbles.
“He is not dead, you hear me! He is not!”
“Ryo!”
Ryo is not sure what happens next. He sees white lights over his head and the sound of wheels behind him, as he lies on something soft and strangers hover over him. He spots Uchi through his half closed eyelids and wants to say something but there’s something covering his mouth that prevents him from talking.
“What happened?”
“He had a panic attack.”
Ryo watches as the strangers in white coats talk around him. His arm burns when something pinches it and then everything turns black.
Tuesday
Ryo moans in pain. His entire body aches and after he stops feeling like puking his brains out, he remembers everything that happened and sighs, but even doing something as simple as that hurts. What the fuck kind of shot did they give him?
“Hey, sleepy head.”
Ryo jumps and turns his head just enough to see Baru dressing himself.
“Oh my frigging God!” he screams. He rubs his eyes, and once he realizes he is there again, he now is sure he has gone completely mental. “You are here!”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m bothering you?” The offended and saddened tone in Subaru´s voice makes him cringe, he looks really offended by his words. Ryo feels at a loss; why would he be so sensitive about something like that? He doesn’t know he is going to die, or that he is already dead.
Oh God, what a mess.
“It’s not that . . . where are you going?” Ryo says instead, and smiles at him reassuringly. Subaru sighs and rubs his head. Ryo realizes for the first time how tired he looks, in fact, he has for a while now, and the guilt he feels increases. How come he is discovering all those things now, now that he is gone? Or now that he is going to…
“Work?”
“What day is it?”
“Tuesday.”
“Two days before…”
“Before what?”
“Nothing.”
What else can he say anyway? How do you explain what’s happening to him? Ryo doesn’t understand it himself, and his attempts to explain it haven’t worked with his friends either. Suddenly, Ryo feels as if he is ninety years old.
The entire morning routine goes on; they leave Kara at school, take the highway, and go to work. The entire trip is silent, Ryo really doesn’t know what to say. Ignoring the fact that Baru shouldn’t be there at all in the first place, he feels him excruciatingly distant. He has that constant feeling in the pit of his stomach that something is really off with Baru, and he feels stupid and oblivious for not realizing it before. How long has Subaru been so off?
What kind of boyfriend, partner or life companion was Ryo, if he couldn’t tell, or worse, didn’t even notice in all that time how lost Subaru has been? He awkwardly glances in his direction, and wishes for a minute that he could erase that blunt pain inside him.
They park the car and walk into the company; they greet colleagues and some mutual friends in the hallways. They say goodbye-not kisses of course, it is a place of work; Ryo hates how pompous his own rejections must have sounded to Subaru. He has solo interviews that day, which means he isn’t going to see him the whole day. He sighs tiredly and drops his belongings on the couch, noisily letting his body land on top of them, hew seconds after, he emits a surprised squeal when he sees Baru´s bento peeking out of his rucksack.
He grabs it and looks at his watch-he has ten minutes before his manager arrives. He runs to the hallway where they just parted.
“Subaru!” he screams when he sees him, but Subaru does not hear him, he keeps going and enters a recording room.
Ryo runs after him. He opens the door a crack and sees that Yoko is there as well. Something in the atmosphere makes him stop and hide behind the half-opened door. He sees Yoko and Subaru staring at each other, and something makes Ryo frown and swallow uncomfortably. The intimacy in their eyes makes him want to punch them both and kick Yoko´s balls. Other people aren’t allowed to look at Baru like that, but seeing that Baru is the one allowing it sends the acid in his stomach straight to his throat.
“So are you coming tomorrow?” Yoko locks eyes with Baru and asks.
“I don’t know if I can come up with an excuse,” His boyfriend answers while staring shyly at the floor.
“I asked the manager to include you in the interview. The interview is in the evening, and by the time it ends there won’t be any trains back to Tokyo.”
“I just….”
“I know, the first time doing this can be hard but-”
Ryo sees Yoko caressing Baru´s arm and he suddenly feels the urge to chop that arm off. What is all this? Is Baru cheating on him? Pure rage and disappointment propel him to push the door open.
“Oh hey, Ryo,” Yoko greets him coolly and Ryo hates how cheeky he is, he glares with all his might, at his nerve to dare talking to him when he is trying to steal the one thing Ryo loves the most, when he is willingly destroying a family, because he and Baru and Kara are a family, despite his mistakes and his own obliviousness, he doesn’t deserve a low blow like this one.
He chokes back infuriated tears and shoves the bento into Baru´s chest, who jumps at the force of the impact.
“You forgot your lunch.”
“Oh right, sorry.”
The bastard doesn’t even have the decency to look him in the eye. Ryo is sure they didn’t see him hiding before, but apparently Subaru feels as if he has been caught.
“See you at home,” Ryo says and turns around. He walks back to his dressing room. He is not going to make a scene out of this. For starters, those two probably think they have it all figured and that he doesn’t even know. Ryo hates how ignorant he is, of everything. If it wasn’t for this déjà vu, there is no way he would have known Yoko and Baru had a history together.
I know the first time doing this can be hard but…
Does that mean that they haven’t done anything yet? Does that really excuse Baru? Hell, no. It doesn’t. He must be an unaware idiot-fuck, he feels like they must be laughing at him. How come he never perceived anything weird between those two? But now all Baru´s weird behaviors somehow made sense.
Does this means he wants to break it off? To end what they have? The thought makes him stop; he clutches his heart, trying to calm his heavy breathing and the mix of pain, fury and discontentment he is feeling. He takes a deep breath and resumes walking. He is a professional, he has work to do. Even if he is a frigging ghost now.
The rest of the day passes like a blur. His mind keeps going around and around the whys, the regrets and the blame, yet none of them actually giving him an answer.
When he gets home, he goes straight to bed. He is really tired, as if the entire force and energy that kept him going has left him and maybe it’s exactly that, since the love he thought only belonged to him is for someone else.
It was odd. He saw it, he heard it, and somehow, his heart refused to believe that Baru doesn’t love him anymore, but if you cheat on someone you don’t love them right? Ryo’s one consolation is that Subaru never went through with it. He died before he could.
He breaks into violent sobs; he then takes his phone and dials. For once he felt grateful Kara wasn’t there, that soon to be cheating bastard is going to pick her up from his aunt.
“Ryo?” Uchi asks in a concerned tone, probably hearing his hiccups on the other end of the line.
“I figured it out.”
“What did you figure out?”
“Why I keep reliving this week over and over, and why he was so off lately.”
“Ok….”
Ryo knows Uchi is playing along. Uchi knows him way too well to stop his rarely profound ramblings, and God, Ryo can´t be happier about that under the circumstances. Even if Uchi doesn’t understand a word of what he is saying.
“He was going to cheat on me Uchi, with Yoko.”
“What!? What are you talking about?”
The surprise in his friend’s tone does little to ease his pain.
“Subaru, before he died. The sudden trip to Osaka on his day off, he was going to cheat on me with Yoko.”
“Ok, I don’t know what you are talking about, but Subaru would never do that to you.”
Friendship and loyalty 101 always gets in the way of truth, he thinks bitterly.
“Are you sure?” Ryo asks, and for the first time he wonders if his friends don’t know about this. He is oblivious, awkward and shy, everybody knows that. His own awkward personality has always gotten in the way when trying to interpret things, but not with his friends, they are not like that. He fears that maybe more people than just Yoko and Baru have been laughing at him “Lately… we haven’t been that ok, you know? Parenthood is hard. In the past we would fuck each other’s brains out on a daily basis, cuddle on every hard surface we found. But when Kara came along, I don’t know, life suddenly got real, and monotony got the better of us.”
“But you said, he is going to cheat on you. That means you can prevent it from happening, right?”
The logic in his friend’s words works like a sharp punch in the pit of his stomach.
“Should I? Do I want to? Maybe I should let him die. If he has reached the point where he wants to cheat, why bother?”
“Ok, you are scaring me.”
“Is it like murdering him? Knowing he will die, and not doing anything about it because deep inside I think he deserves it?”
“No one deserves to die, Ryo.”
“I’m not sure about that.”
He really isn’t.
He hangs up and turns off the phone, not wanting to talk with anybody else. He lays there on their bed, except now it feels giant and cold, and buries deep inside the silk sheets, clothes still on, as he closes his eyes. He wonders if the sun is ever going to shine again.
Friday
Ryo wakes up and the first thing he does is look at the clock on the night stand. Friday. He sighs. That means Baru is dead by now. His vindictive self is not sure if it is relieved about it, or if it wants to follow him and never wake up anymore.
He climbs out of the bed and goes to the kitchen. His mouth feels like an entire cabinet of medicine lives inside, he swallows in disgust and jumps when he feels a hand at his back, his heart speeds; that can’t be. Subaru is dead! Or he is supposed to be on Friday!
He turns around and sees Uchi´s puffy eyes staring back at him, making Ryo whine in annoyance.
“What are you doing here?”
“Baru…yesterday…the hospital.”
“Oh right, you stayed the night,” Ryo says as he recalls the panic attack. He sighs; this mess is getting out of hand. “Where’s Kara?”
“Your mom took her for the night.”
He rubs his head attempting to ease the ache. He is trying to figure out the correct call, the right thing to do, he is confused at how the days keep alternating between each other, he figures there´s must be a pattern even through all this craziness, so with frantic, annoyed motions he goes to the living room and searches for a calendar in the drawers. He finds one and shoves the things on top of the table to the floor. He spreads out the calendar and starts writing on it.
“What are you doing?” Uchi asks worriedly at him.
“I need to figure something out.”
September
15-Monday->I saw him alive after the wake.
16-Tuesday->Mother Fucker. YokoBaru duo stabs me in the back.
17-Wednesday->
18-Thursday-> He dies.
19-Friday->
20-Saturday->Wake
21-Sunday->
“Today is Friday, am I right?” he asks Uchi, who just keeps staring at the calendar and then at Ryo weirdly.
“Ryo, what’s wrong with you? I know it’s hard, but you have been talking nonsense the entire week.”
“I know you are not going to believe me, but bear with me on this will´ya?”
“Ok….”
“Subaru died. We were at the wake on Saturday.”
“No Ryo, there hasn’t been a wake yet. He died yesterday. I know you are confused but-”
“Shush!” Ryo shuts him and glares impatiently. Uchi sighs in exchange and nods at him to continue. “As I was saying, the wake was on Saturday, then, on Monday, he was alive again, as if nothing happened. Then he died again on Thursday and I ended up in the hospital. Tuesday, I discovered he was going to cheat on me. And today, Friday, it’s a day after his death and the day before the wake.”
“Ok….” Uchi says, unsure. “Do you want a beer? Some tea? A shrink maybe?” He moans in pain when Ryo hits him in the head.
Ryo looks at the calendar in front of him, his messy and clearly rushed handwriting staring back at him, as if suddenly giving him an answer.
“There are three spaces…. three spaces blank yet, which means I still have three days.”
His mind quickly recalls every event. He then looks for probabilities and comes to one conclusion: he is sure that the days have been repeating only once, which means that the day of his death is not going to repeat again. He doesn’t have the chance to prevent that fateful day from happening. Subaru is going to die.
Unless…
Unless, he somehow makes him change his mind, convinces him to not go to Osaka, to not follow Yoko, and to not die as a result.
“Three days for what?” Uchi asks once again, clearly at a loss for what his friend rambling about. But he is being supportive. Knowing Uchi, Ryo figures that he prefers this crazy-talking Ryo to the depressed-to-the-gut hospitalized Ryo.
“That’s the thing. I’m not sure if it’s worth it.”
“If what’s worth it?”
“Subaru, me, us,” he says. Flashes of them together rush to his mind-their junior days, their first kiss, the first time they made love, everything they built together now on the verge of collapsing. His chest constricts painfully and before he knows it he is crying again. God, all this mess has turned him in a whiny, crying pussy.
“Hey, don’t cry.”
“How could he!”
“Subaru never cheated on you.”
“Yeah, ‘cause he died before he had a chance to do it!”
Uchi hugs him tightly. “Don’t be like that Ryo. Think of him and all the things you’ve done together, your family, the family you formed together.”
“And yet, he was going to throw all that down the toilet for the sake of a fuck.”
“Maybe he was searching for something….” Uchi says and the hesitation in his voice makes Ryo look warily at him. Uchi swallows. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this right now, but….Baru came to talk to me once. He was really troubled. He kept saying how he couldn’t find a place in your life anymore, or in Kara’s.”
“What? I love him, how could he think that?”
“I know, that’s what I told him”
“And Kara….Kara’s our daughter, we are a family. She adores him, I adore him. What the fuck is wrong with that guy?”
“I think at some point he lost his self confidence. He saw you so sufficient and confident about how your lives had changed, how you passed from being a partying, half alcoholic guy to an amazing parent, while Baru was lost all the time about what to do. It seemed natural for you while for him it was like learning how to eat, talk, and tie his shoes for the first time. You know he has never been good with kids or emotions. And I think he thought you were better off without him, or worse, that he didn’t make any difference at all in your lives.”
“But that’s nonsense!”
“I know. Look Ryo, Baru is gone now, and you know he loved you. Maybe Yoko was a way to escape from something, not the family you were, but how unworthy of you and Kara he felt.”
Ryo closed his eyes, his mouth in a thin line, his being conflicted by Uchi´s words. Was it possible? That all that pain, that odd attitude he finally noticed in Subaru, was a result of his own insecurity?
“When did he tell you that?”
“I’m not sure. A year ago maybe?”
Ryo bit his trembling lips, his eyes watering once again. A whole year feeling like that and never saying anything? Was he stupid? Instead of confronting him, he was going to give Ryo the perfect excuse to leave him and to never look back, maybe that was his intention from the beginning. Ryo is a proud person, he would’ve never forgiven something like that, and the certainty of his own personality would’ve shot Subaru out of his life for good. The knowledge that Baru was actually counting on that causes twinges in Ryo´s heart.
His headache finally wins, and he suspects that Uchi was the one leaving him sleeping on the bed that night.
Wednesday
Ryo looks at the clock, the one he has been hating this whole week. Wednesday. He turns around to see Subaru´s sleeping face and his heart flutters in recognition. God, he wants so badly to be like this forever, to just stare at him and have the liberty to touch him whenever he wants.
He caresses Subaru’s face softly, his fingers following the path they know by heart, and yet, it still gives him that tingling feeling and the squirming in his belly. If Baru only knew how important he was, he is, and how much of a perfect family they can be together, because Ryo is sure Subaru miscalculated, if for a minute he thought Ryo was better off alone, with someone else, or just with Kara, he was wrong.
He needs Subaru, he needs him to hug him and kiss him every morning. It’s that well-known routine that makes the rest of day bearable.
He wonders why this week has happened at all. In the end he reaches the conclusion that asking that question is like asking why the sky is blue, why it rains, or why he loves Baru.
It doesn’t make sense, it isn’t logical, and yet, it’s breathtakingly beautiful.
A second chance to make amends.
“Morning,” Ryo says when he sees Baru´s eye flutter open.
“Morning,” he replies, and Ryo, in an impulse, closes the distance between them and kisses him. He puts his hand on his chest and feels Subaru´s heart speeding at the slight touch of their lips, completely harmonized with his own.
It makes Ryo feel hopeful. He pulls away and locks eyes with him, ignoring the shyness that assaults him. He sees Baru smirking at him, amused at his timidity.
Ryo bites his lips, knowing he is blushing. “Hey, I know you have to work today, but can’t you call in sick, so we can spend some time together?” Ryo says, hopeful. Maybe he can’t change the future, but he wants to spend as much time as he can with Baru, to be happy and perfect with him again. And maybe, just maybe, life can give him another miracle.
“I’m not sure if I can.”
“Please Baru, please,” he begs. He knows he is begging, but for once, his proud, timid or awkward self isn’t leading.
“Ok.”
He smiles at him in happiness and kisses him once more. This time, he deepens the kiss. Baru hovers over him, and Ryo caresses his chest. They part and pant heavily as Ryo feels his cock, hard and stiff between them, and all he wants is for Subaru to do something about it, and perhaps make love for one last time. He doesn’t remember the last time they did it, and with painful regret he realizes that maybe he and Subaru had neglected more than he thought.
Their little bundle of joy interrupts them when she screams for food. He looks insecurely at Subaru, fearing that maybe that was the part of parenthood that has been so hard for him. But the way Baru fondly smiles and his gentle reply to Kara erases his doubts.
As far as he can tell, Baru loves her, and by the way he reacts to him, he loves Ryo, too. Maybe it isn’t all lost.
At least for the time they have left.
…
“Higher! Higher!” Kara commands from the swing. Subaru chuckles and pushes her further.
“To the clouds?” he asks and Ryo´s heart constricts; is Baru blind? Can’t he see how important he is to her, how bonded they are? How much of a good father he is?
“Beyond the clouds, to the sun!” Kara screams and points to the sun. Her happy laughs reach each and every cell in Ryo. A girl that lost her parents can’t be that happy in an unstable, unhappy environment. They gave her a home, a life, a family, and they did it together. How could he not see that?
He pushes away the frustration he feels at his very oblivious boyfriend, and realizes how alike they are after all. He smiles despite himself and joins them.
…
“Is that healthy?” Baru asks when Ryo gives Kara a huge caramel apple. He frowns, doubtful, probably wanting to take that thing out of her hands. Ryo giggles and pecks him on the cheek.
“One time won’t hurt her.”
“Her one times are way too many,” Baru replies, still preoccupied and Ryo can’t help but love him more because of that, for loving her as if she was his own.
…
They get home late that night. It was a perfect day, full of laughs and happiness. Ryo thinks he hasn’t ever been this happy, he has realized that he might have taken Baru for granted, that maybe he assumed he was always going to be there and somehow, in the light of tragedy, he has experienced firsthand how crushed he feels by not having him.
Subaru flops tiredly on the couch as Ryo sits on the chair in front of him. He sees him rub his neck while wearing a contented smile in his face, Ryo feels like he has accomplished something that day, the last one he has with Baru alive, He has given him the smile he has been missing.
And maybe that’s the gift all these déjà vus were meant to give him.
“Hey Kara, why don’t you give Dada Baru a hug,” Ryo says and watches as she smiles at him happily.
“Kay.”
Ryo watches them, how Baru´s face looks a little guilty while he embraces her tightly. She retreats and goes to Ryo, to hug him as well.
“I think he needs more love,” he whispers in her ear. She smiles and runs back to Baru, hugging him with even more force that before. “Tell Dada Baru how much you love him,” Ryo orders, not just to show Baru how true it is, but also to tell him how much he is risking, how much is he going to lose if he pursues that nonsensical affair.
“Love you, Dada Baru.”
“Why don’t you tell her you love her, too, Baru?” Ryo presses, just to see how Baru will react, knowing that tomorrow he was planning on leaving them, to Osaka, to someone else that isn’t worthy, to his own death, although he doesn’t know that last part.
“Of course I love her. You are my sweet kiddo,” Subaru replies, and Ryo swears his voice cracks a little. Ryo realizes that, after all, he still feels disappointed, that all that happened was because Baru didn’t have the guts to confront the situation.
“Tell Papa Ryo you love him, too,” he hears Kara saying and he blushes, not expecting their innocent kid to intercede.
“Of course I love him, too, and I care about him, too.”
Baru´s answer hurt as much as it soothed. God, as if this week hasn’t been an entire mess. He wants to punch, kick, kiss and fuck him senseless. He never thought it was possible to love someone so much and to still want to kill him, to shake him, just to tell him how stupid he has been.
But Subaru hasn’t been the only one making mistakes-he has, too. He has been oblivious, selfish, and terribly neglecting. How can he blame Baru for being dense when he has been as well?
They leave Kara peacefully sleeping in her room. She was knocked out as soon as her head hit the pillow.
They go to their bedroom then, Ryo starts undressing himself and watches as his boyfriend does the same, he looks as if he is totally lost in his own thoughts.
Ryo decides that since they have been changing the story already, they might as well do it fully, so at least he does not have any regrets on Sunday, when he wakes up to an empty bed and a buried Baru. “Don’t you think we should talk?”
“About what?”
“About your sudden trip to Osaka, Subaru, what else?”
“I…how did you? I haven’t told you about that.” The nervous glances Subaru gives him only increase the pain he feels. He is sure that if he hadn’t been positive about the soon-to-be affair, he would be now, just by the way Baru looks so guilty and out of it.
But since he was an oblivious idiot, he probably wouldn’t have.
“Do you like our family, Baru?” he asks with crushed eyes. He knows the answer, but he wants to remind Baru of what he is really about to do. The doubts he still sees in his boyfriend’s face only brings him pain, disappointment, and heartache. “I wish you knew how much I miss you, miss us, the way we used to be.” He flushes at how direct he is. He sees Subaru embarrassedly staring at him, taken aback by his bold confession.
“We grew old,” Subaru says with a sad smile. Ryo approaches him then and takes his hands in his own and kisses them, then he looks at him straight in the eyes.
“Can’t we…be like before?” He lifts his arms to put them on Subaru’s neck as he closes the distance between them, in every sense. He feels as if with every inch he is drifting closer, he is breaking little walls down. “I love you so much, more than you will ever know.” He gulps at the sudden knot in his throat. Slowly, as if they had all the time in the world, even though they don’t, he kisses him.
If Ryo ever imagined a perfect night of love making, it wouldn’t have compared to reality, ever. Because reality, when it’s this perfect, this amazing, is a million times better than anything he could ever imagine. Even if it’s the last time.
But God, it feels like a start.
Sunday
Ryo wakes up with the usual pound in his head; he glances at the clock on the night stand, like he has been doing the entire week: Sunday, 8:18 am.
A day after the wake.
He buries himself deeper in the silk sheets, not wanting to be out in the world just yet, knowing that he isn’t ever going to see the love of his life again. Raw tears escape his eyes, he hears a bothersome noise and he peeks out of his cocoon, his phone is beeping; he groans while he takes it and buries himself in the sheets again, he realizes there’s a voice mail in his inbox, so he presses the button and waits.
“Hi, so…mmm…I’m driving right now.” His eyes widen when he hears Baru on the other end of the line. “About last night, and the weird things you have been asking lately, well…I just want you to know that you two are the best thing that has ever happened to me, so…” he whimpers in bittersweet hurt. Ryo hears the sound of wheels skidding on road. “Sorry, I was turning around right now,” Baru continues. “Anyway… I love you Ryo with all my heart. Sorry I didn’t say it last night, when you, when we….after we….well, you know…. and I was on my way toward making the biggest mistake of my life you know, probably one that would destroy our family and us altogether, and I just…I’ve been a little lost these couple of years….” Hope rises in Ryo’s heart at those words. Was it possible? “But I still choose you, us…so see you at home babe, I really hope to find Kara sleeping and you waiting for me naked with Yakisoba,” he says and Ryo laughs, happy tears now sliding from his eyes. “I know, you will wait me with rice instead, but it’s cool, as long as you are naked,” Baru says with humor. Ryo thinks he hasn’t ever heard him being this happy before. “Love you.” Ryo swallows at those last words. He pants nervously and jumps when he feels a tender hand caressing his back. He turns around, and he cries, smiles, and laughs at the same time when he sees Subaru staring lovingly back at him.
Alive. Real. Loved.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
Ryo´s sure the world starts making sense all over again.
Ryo´s lips are suddenly claimed with force, passion, and desperation; he squirms in surprise, he hadn’t realized up until that breathtaking kiss, how numb their love had become, and now, having him right there, kissing him as if there was no tomorrow, he doesn’t want it to ever become numb again, especially if he gets to have kisses like this one. He feels as if he is waking up from a bad dream, a long one, where life, marriage, took away what made them unique.
As Baru´s tongue invades him and his head spins uncontrollably, he realizes he is never going to let that happen again, to be lost in monotony like that, and by the way he fought to have Subaru back, he is sure he is not going to let him drift apart either.
He moans out loud as Baru pounds on him with their boxers still interceding. He groans lustfully and keeps kissing him senseless.
After a few moments of absolute love perfection, between heated kisses and burning skin Ryo stops to ask, “What if Kara wakes up?”
“We’ll be quiet. Plus, I locked the door,” Subaru says mischievously. “And there are bananas on the kitchen table.”
Ryo giggles, and then, he is the one shoving his tongue passionately on Baru´s, leisurely and wonderful.
This time, he believes, they do have all the time in the world.