[JE] Even Butterflies Dress For Dinner
Title: Even Butterflies Dress For Dinner
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Pairing: Slight hints of Kame/Jin
Rating: PG
Genre: Angst, kind of AU
Word count: 7,387
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit
Summary: Jin's birthday is full of surprises. Not all of them are from Kame.
A/N: This is a sequel to Be Your Own Secret Girlfriend and won't make much sense if you haven't read that one.
I appreciate that Japan is going through a rough time at the moment and I'm probably committing some grave faux pas by posting fic, but I've done all I can do personally (by donating). My sympathy goes out to all the people affected by this tragedy.
Even Butterflies Dress For Dinner
In the month leading up to Jin's birthday Kame finds himself mildly irritated by the way all Jin's other friends in the know turn to him for advice on gifts - especially when he hasn't figured out his own yet.
Koki intends to make good on his threat to buy Jin a dress. "But what size do you think he'd be?" he asks Kame. "He's skinny but he's got shoulders, and I don't know if he's ready to go strapless."
"Gift voucher," Kame suggests. "Then he can pick out his own."
He offers the same advice to Nakamaru, who's thinking about shoes and wanting to ensure Jin doesn't wear anything that'll damage his back.
Ueda's sense of mischief is well-developed, but when it comes to shopping he can be indecisive. "I'm going with lingerie," he tells Kame. "Do you think he'd kill me if I bought him a padded bra?"
"Yes," Kame says without hesitation. "And I'd help him hide the body."
Junno, at least, doesn't go for clothes, though he does ask Kame which Cecil McBee bag he finds prettiest. Kame only just manages to resist the urge to buy one for himself while they're in the store.
Yamapi frets over it the most, which surprises Kame because he of all people should know Jin's tastes. But then, he's still trying to get used to all this. They all are.
"Get him a necklace or something," Kame says after they've batted ideas back and forth across the phone line for ten minutes. "You guys buy each other jewellery anyway, don't you? And you know Jin's never exactly had the most masculine taste in accessories."
"I could try that," Yamapi says. "What are you getting him?"
"I wish I knew."
Kame considers buying him make-up, which seems like cheating but will do as a last resort. Maybe some nice tops, or sandals for the hot summer weather. Decorative belts to hold up those baggy shorts.
He's at home, looking at online shops for ideas, when he receives a despairing phone call from Jin.
"My family's having a clear-out," he explains. "My mum dropped off a box of stuff she thought I might want. There's a dress in there, Kame. A dress. Do you think she's trying to tell me something?"
Jin hasn't been able to bring himself to tell his family yet. He and Kame have talked about it a lot, but he's still too self-conscious about it despite Kame's attempts to reassure him. The Akanishi family are nothing if not unconventional - Kame can't see them taking it too badly. As long as Jin's happy, they'll deal with it somehow.
"Depends. Is it in her size?"
"No," Jin says unhappily. "It's in mine."
"Then yes, I think she's trying to tell you something. How does it look?"
"I'm not wearing it!"
No surprise there. In the months since Jin's begun to explore his feminine side, his bouts of "dressing up" have been more trouser-based, mostly leaning towards what Kame would call cute in a tomboyish sort of way. He hasn't shown any interest in skirts or dresses; Kame assumes he had enough of those in his Junior days.
"Do you want to try it on?" he asks.
"I don't think I can do dresses, Kame."
Kame makes a mental note to inform Koki of this. "What are you going to say to your mother?"
"I have no idea."
Jin sounds terribly lost, so Kame gives up on online shopping and invites himself over. He wants to see the dress.
-----
It turns out to be quite pretty, a short red number that Jin could wear unaccompanied if he's feeling brave or over black tights if not. It's got shoulders but they seem loose enough not to chafe, and the neckline doesn't plunge far enough to reveal that he would make an extremely flat-chested girl.
"I think you could probably get away with wearing a black belt with this," Kame says, sizing up the dress with a practised eye. "Give you a little more in the way of hips."
"No way." Jin's shaking his head. "I can't wear this."
Kame shrugs. "So don't. This is supposed to be about you wearing the things you do like, not the things you're not interested in."
Jin relaxes in his chair, clearly relieved that Kame doesn't plan to push the issue. "Wearing a dress would be like...like making a statement, or something."
"A statement that says: 'I'd rather be in Kanjani8'?"
Jin claps his hands together and laughs. "I'd never survive Kanjani8."
"But you and Yasuda could paint each other's nails."
"Don't need him; got you," Jin says matter-of-factly. "It's not as if I'm going to burn the dress or anything, but if I wear it..."
His face is approaching the same colour as the dress and Kame has a sneaking suspicion why. "Don't look at it like some sort of irreversible step. If you try it and don't like it, it's not like you're then stuck wearing dresses for the rest of your life. There's no set path you're supposed to be following."
"I guess..." Jin doesn't seem convinced. "Just don't tell Koki I've got it or he'll have me up on the stage at your concerts, dancing in heels for his solo."
"Can you even dance in heels?"
"I can barely walk in heels."
"You don't always walk so well without them, either," Kame says, catching the couch cushion Jin throws at his head. "And you should come to the concerts anyway. It's your anniversary celebration too."
Jin licks his lips a couple of times, looking like he's trying to get a response out but losing it before it gets as far as his vocal cords. Kame gives it a minute before he decides Jin has no clue how to answer him. As well as the split has turned out for all six of them, it's still a painful subject and reminding Jin - reminding all of them - what they've lost is probably a bad idea. The wound has scabbed over, now, but it's unlikely it will ever fully heal.
Kame takes pity on him. "Forget I said anything. Maybe next year we'll have a guest segment and invite that well-known international star, Jin Akanishi, to take the stage with us. We can turn the MC into an English lesson."
"You're all improving," Jin says. "Even if you can't shake the accent completely."
"We're practising for Hawaii." Kame still wishes it was going to be all six of them making their American debut together, but if he lets himself get mired down by nostalgia, he'll never be able to move forward. At least they'll all have done it, soon, and that's something pretty special. KAT-TUN will make it worldwide one way or another.
"I should practise too. I'm supposed to be heading back to the US a few days after my birthday."
"You're not spending Independence Day over there?"
"Not this time. I'd rather celebrate my birthday here - though I'd better figure out what to say to my mother before she gives me a ballgown for a birthday present."
"I don't think you're the ballgown type," Kame says. "But I'm glad you'll be here for your birthday."
Mostly because he wants to see Jin's face when he opens some of his presents. It's questionable whether or not Ueda will survive long enough to make it to Hawaii, if he goes ahead with the lingerie idea.
Kame's still clueless what to get Jin for his birthday, but he thinks he might have an idea how to help him celebrate.
-----
Summer's a busy time for all of them. KAT-TUN are occupied with concerts, album promo and solo activities. Jin's got his US tour to prepare for, his first English-language single to promote and an album that's been far too long in the making.
Kame spends most of his time travelling, with a schedule that makes the rest of the universe look like slackers, but he finds time to keep up with Jin by email. He tells him all the funny little backstage stories he's missing and asks him what sort of things he's planning for the tour.
What he doesn't ask is how things are going with Jin's family. The answer to that question pops up on Kame's phone one afternoon when he's on the train to Shin-Osaka, causing him to choke on his yakisoba pan.
Mum's just asked me to go shopping with her for nail polish, Jin writes. She definitely knows!
When he manages to wash down the offending mouthful, Kame writes back, I think the dress could've told you that. You should go shopping. She's obviously not got a problem with it; you should say something and get it out in the open.
An hour later, Jin responds with, I asked her about the dress. She says it must've gone to me by mistake. Now what???
But it was in *your* size, Kame writes. Not hers. Tell her it fits okay and see how she reacts.
After twenty minutes, Jin's response arrives. She laughed and asked if I wanted a belt to go with it.
Never turn down free accessories, Kame advises. Get some tights while you're at it. Did you get any nail polish for yourself?
Kame doesn't get an answer until after he's left the train, when Jin actually phones him.
"I didn't get any nail polish," he says, launching straight into conversation. "Or belts. All I got was the dinner bill and a lecture on why I should know better than to think I can keep secrets from my own mother."
"Did you tell her anything?"
Jin sighs. "She told me. I think she got fed up of listening to me beat around the bush. She says she started noticing little changes in my appearance when I was on TV and stuff, and then when she came over to clean a while back - while I was out - she found some of my...um...less manly clothes and decided to risk sending the dress."
"Does your dad know?"
"She hasn't told him or Reio - she's leaving that up to me. Which means it is never happening."
Kame smiles to himself and stretches out on his hotel bed. "Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll approach you instead."
"You have met my brother, right? He's so wrapped up in rehearsals for his play that I doubt he'll even remember my birthday. I don't want him to know, because if he knows, he's going to give me stick over it until I die. That's what brothers do."
"Good point." With three brothers of his own, Kame is no stranger to sibling teasing. "I'm glad it worked out okay with your mum, though."
"It was the most mortifying afternoon of my life," Jin whines, but Kame can tell he's secretly glad, too. "I had to make her promise not to give me anything embarrassing for my birthday."
"Speaking of your birthday, we'll all be back in Tokyo by then. I know you're probably having your usual big party on the actual night, but can you spare me the evening before?"
"You won't come to the party?"
"I will," Kame assures him, "but I thought it would be nice to go out for a quiet celebration beforehand. You could dress up."
Jin likes that idea. "I like that it's finally payback time. After all the meals I've paid for, you're doing your share this year."
"Next year we should just agree to split the bill," Kame says.
They make arrangements for the evening and end the call so Kame can go find his own dinner. He doesn't tell Jin where they'll be going, but at least now he knows what to get him.
-----
Kame turns up on Jin's doorstep the evening before his birthday, holding a couple of shopping bags in one hand and a larkspur bouquet in the other. Jin bursts out laughing when he sees the flowers.
"They're your birthflower," Kame explains. "And I thought the occasion called for flowers."
"You do look pretty dressed up," Jin admits.
Where they're going a suit wouldn't be overkill, but Kame hasn't taken things quite that far. He's wearing the neatest jeans he owns, a white shirt and a black blazer with the cuffs rolled up to the elbow; a gold heart round his neck to match the hoop in his ear.
"Do we have time to go suit-shopping?" Jin's still in his bathrobe and clutching a hairbrush. "I don't think I have anything both girly and formal."
"Actually, I thought you could wear the dress," Kame says. "That's why I'm so early. I brought you a few things to go with it."
"Oh no." Jin starts shaking his head as he backs away towards his wardrobe. "I can't do that."
"It'll be fine, I promise." He notices Jin's suspiciously shorn legs peeking out from beneath the robe. "I see you've already shaved your legs for the occasion."
"I thought I'd try it yesterday. Regretting it now." Jin grimaces. "It feels so weird. You've done it before, right?"
"Only when I had to crossdress for a drama. There's no point me trying to do it the rest of the time - it grows back in hours."
Jin smirks at him. "At least I don't have that problem."
"Did you do under your arms too?"
"Yeah. And before you ask: no, I did not do my bikini line."
"Not a problem," Kame says, setting down the shopping bags. "Nobody's going to be seeing it anyway.
"Now, I've got these tights-"
"I told you, I'm not doing it."
"Jin, I can't tell you where we're going but I can say that you wearing a dress will not be a problem."
"Not doing it." Jin folds his arms across his chest and glares stubbornly at Kame. "Not doing it and you can't make me."
"Fine." Kame sags down in defeat on the bed. "Open up the wardrobe and let's see what else you've got."
"You're giving up that easily?"
"I'm not your manager - it's not my job to talk you into wearing things you don't like."
He wonders for a moment if that's what Jin wants, to be talked into it. Jin's very good at making rebellious protests - it's a KAT-TUN speciality and he's still doing them proud - but Kame knows from experience that when you want to do something but feel like you shouldn't, it's a lot easier to do it if you can at least pretend it's someone else's fault. It's difficult to gauge with something like this, though. If he pushes, he risks ruining the evening before it even gets started.
Then he's struck by an idea. "Tell you what. I still think it's a shame for it not to see any use, so I'll wear the dress. We'll switch for the evening."
"With your legs? You'll look like a gorilla playing dress-up." Jin snatches up the shopping bags. "It wouldn't fit you anyway."
"How do you know? Have you tried it on?"
"Once," Jin says grudgingly. "Just to see if it fit."
"And how did that make you feel?" Kame's starting to feel more like Jin's counsellor than his friend.
"Pretty stupid when I caught sight of myself in the mirror."
"You won't by the time I'm done with you," Kame promises, and Jin lets him get to work.
By the time they're done, Jin looks...stunning; there's no other word Kame can find to describe him. The dress only covers him to mid-thigh; black tights prevent him accidentally flashing the people around him when he bends, and a strategically positioned belt accentuates his hips. He's wearing flat red slingbacks, another of Kame's purchases (they've been able to share shoes for years, so he felt reasonably comfortable buying them for someone else), and finishes it off with a black, white and red shawl, because Kame says the restaurant they're going to tends to turn the air conditioning up very high.
Jin's hair is longer than it's been since his first solo shows in America, curling down past his shoulders. He scrapes it back in a ponytail, most of the time, but now he's brushed it out, has a small, high ponytail right at the top and the rest spilling across the shawl. Dark eyes and red lips give him a hint of mystery.
"I look like a Kuroki Meisa cosplayer," Jin says when they've finished.
"I was going to say you looked like you were trying out for a part in West Side Story," Kame says. "Can I take a picture?"
"Only if you promise never to show it to anyone else. I mean it, Kame. If you do and I find out, you're going to be stuck doing all my housework until you die a horrible dust-related death."
Kame thinks it's worth the risk. He snaps a picture with his phone, since he doesn't have his actual camera with him, and files it away with a password while Jin watches. It's a lovely shot, with Jin looking at himself in the mirror and smiling like a movie star.
"You know, you actually look very convincing," Kame says. "Maybe we should let the press come along - I haven't been caught with a girl in ages and my manager's starting to worry."
"I don't think I qualify as a beard."
"You're not quite up to my usual standards," Kame pretends to consider this, "but you'll do, I suppose."
Jin gives him a decidedly unladylike hand gesture and picks up the small black-and-white bag he'd received from Junno earlier. In go keys, wallet, phone, and half a dozen packs of tissues.
Kame throws in a lip gloss wand for good measure; Jin protests. "I travel light, Kame."
"The lip gloss is for me."
"I don't care." Jin removes the wand.
"I take it back - I have the hottest fake girlfriend in town."
The lip gloss goes back in the bag, which makes Jin realise Kame's not carrying one of his own this time. "No make-up remover?"
"There's a sports bag in the car. It didn't really go with the outfit."
They haven't needed the kit yet and Kame hopes the trend will continue, but he knows better than to go without it - especially since this is the furthest out of his comfort zone Jin's ever been, and Kame's about to take him even further out.
This time it's not one of Kame's discreet, half-hidden places in Shinjuku but an Italian restaurant in Ginza, both expensive and exclusive.
"Don't you have to book a table a month in advance to get in?" Jin says when they're parked as close as Kame can get to the door. "Or be a visiting dignitary?"
"Or play baseball with the owner's son," Kame says with a sly grin. "Otherwise yes, you do have to book that far in advance."
It pays to have friends. But Jin looks uneasy and even when Kame gets out to open his door he shows no sign of wanting to leave the car. It's like the first time all over again.
"Nobody you know is going to be in there," Kame says. "Half your friends couldn't afford it and the other half wouldn't like the atmosphere. I asked for a table on the second floor, so no one's going to see us from the street."
"I should've brought the flowers. At least I could've hidden behind them."
"No need to hide." Kame's being completely honest. "You look beautiful."
Jin gives a derisive snort at the flattery but allows himself to be talked out of the car anyway. Kame offers him an arm, figuring they're dressed up enough to warrant it, and Jin loops his own lightly around it. It's been a long time since they've linked arms like that. They'd held hands as teenagers skipping through Central Park and lived a dozen lifetimes since then.
He doesn't have to pull out Jin's chair - the waiter does that - and he can feel, through their linked arms, Jin relax when nobody calls him on his gender. It's a nice place, with tables for larger parties downstairs and small, intimate tables on the balconies upstairs, closer to the blinding chandeliers and nestled cosily between velvet drapes.
There are three tables on their balcony. One is occupied by a group of four middle-aged businessmen who are obviously senior management of some sort, and the second, intended for pairs, is hosting a young man and woman who only have eyes for each other. Jin and Kame sit at the left-most table; Jin with his back to the wall and Kame with his to the businessmen. Between them they cast eyes over the other patrons and determine that no one known to either of them is dining that night.
"Okay?" Kame says hopefully.
"More than okay." Jin flashes him a grin. "You're right; my friends would never come here. Except for you, anyway."
"A sign of my good taste."
"Or your extravagant spending habits."
No more is said about Kame's spending habits once they see the prices on the menu, but whatever the damage to his bank account, it'll be worth it. Not because he knows firsthand how delicious the food will be but because they're having a relaxing evening out, just the two of them, and Kame can't put a price on that.
Jin keeps fidgeting with his outfit, rearranging his shawl, adjusting the shoulders of his dress; by the time the main course arrives, he confesses to Kame that he's kicked off his shoes under the table. Small wardrobe hitches don't worry Kame. Jin's not tearing off his dress in the middle of the restaurant and declaring it to be the most uncomfortable piece of fabric in the world, so he can live with it.
"Tell me the truth," Jin says suddenly. "Does this actually look good, or does it look ridiculous and you're just being polite?"
"On my honour as a red-blooded male, it looks gorgeous."
"A red-blooded male who prefers guys. I'm not sure I should listen to your opinion."
"Then let's post your picture on the Internet and conduct a poll," Kame teases. "And you're a guy, so I feel qualified to judge."
"Are guys in dresses normally your thing?"
It's the first time Jin's expressed any interest in his preferences, save to ask about telling his family, and it makes Kame feel slightly uneasy. He's used to not talking about it - but then, he doesn't think it's anything to talk about. Maybe Jin thinks differently.
"Not normally, but it's not like I meet that many - even in this business." He twirls a ribbon of pasta around his fork. "I'm not looking for any specific type, if that's what you mean."
"But you are looking?"
"Why the sudden interest in my love life? Worried some jealous athlete's going to track you down and beat you up for going out to dinner with me?"
"No..." Jin looks down at his plate. "Just...like you said, you spend ninety per cent of your time at work and the rest trying to sort out my life. You're supposed to have some time for yourself in there somewhere - don't waste it all on me."
"I don't consider any time spent with you a waste, Jin."
"Not even the Mario Kart tournaments?"
"Well...maybe those." Kame sets down his fork. "Look, I value my time alone, but I value my time with friends and family too. If I meet someone I'm interested in, I won't turn my back, but I'm not going to go out looking for the sake of it."
No point looking elsewhere, but he can hardly say that to Jin.
The conversation turns from Kame's lack of love life to Jin's, which is in a similar state.
"Still no one since that photographer," he confirms. "I've been too busy even to think about it. I wouldn't know what to say, anyway. 'Hey, cute T-shirt, can I borrow it?'"
"Some girls would like that. Sharing clothes."
"I think it's supposed to work the other way around."
Jin's opted for lasagne on the grounds that he stands a better chance of not spilling it down his dress - or worse yet, inside his dress - yet even that doesn't help when he's talking with his hands, waving his fork around as he makes grand gestures. He accidentally splatters Kame's cheek with sauce, fortunately missing his eye.
"Oops. At least I didn't get any on your pristine white shirt?"
"Now I remember why I won't let you cook at my place anymore." Kame picks up his napkin and dabs it over his cheek. "Did I get it?"
"Let me." Jin takes the napkin and leans across to wipe away the sauce. "There. Gone."
Kame thinks he hears a wolf-whistle from behind him, but when he turns around no one's even looking in their direction. His mind is obviously supplying its own sound effects after a decade of dealing with exuberant fangirls. He knows what fanservice looks like, probably better than anyone else in KAT-TUN. After all, he got stuck wearing the wedding dress.
He's almost cleaned his plate when Jin abruptly excuses himself to go to the bathroom. Kame waves him away without even looking up from the one final strand he's chasing with his fork; doesn't realise, until he notices that Jin's plate still has a few rapidly cooling mouthfuls, that he's been gone ten minutes already.
The upper men's room isn't far away; Kame just hopes Jin didn't go in the ladies' room instead or he's going to have to ask some innocent waitress to check for him.
He tries the men's room first, waiting until the two men at the urinals have finished and left before he approaches the single locked stall. "Jin?"
"Kame?"
"Did something disagree with you?"
"Yeah, the four guys leering at me from the next table."
Maybe that wolf-whistle had been real after all. "Just ignore them," Kame advises. "You're famous; you get people looking at you all the time."
"I know a leer when I see it, Kame. I'm not normally on the receiving end - not from men."
Kame has to laugh, knowing perfectly well that's not true. "Do you really not know you've got a lot of male fans?"
"I don't think those guys out there are fans."
"True, but you can't stay in here all night. We can switch seats, you won't be able to see them then."
"I'll still be able to feel them looking. I'm staying in here till they've gone; I'm not going out there dressed like this."
Jin's tone brooks no argument; Kame tries anyway. "You're not doing anything wrong-"
"That doesn't change how I feel!"
Kame takes a deep breath. So much for getting to dessert. There's a small, giftwrapped box in his blazer pocket that may never see the light of day. "I'm going to pay for the meal, then I'll fetch the bag from the car. Give me a few minutes, okay? I'll be back as soon as I can."
The staff look surprised to see Kame return to the restaurant mere minutes after leaving it, but accept his explanation that his friend - an extremely messy diner - requires a change of clothing from the car. Jin opens the cubicle door barely wide enough to receive the sports bag and shuts it before Kame can see his face.
It's a good ten minutes before he emerges to finish off the job in front of the mirrors. Kame's had his work cut out for him looking casual, playing with his phone as he lounges against the wall and tries not to seem like he's hanging out in high-class restaurant bathrooms to pick up men.
Jin's lost dress, tights, shoes and shawl, having replaced them with baggy khaki shorts, light sandals, a plain black T-shirt and a soft grey hoodie. All his hair is scraped back from his face now in one low, curly ponytail, and the make-up is rapidly disappearing as he sets to work with wipes and cotton wool. When he's done he pulls the hood as far down over his face as it will go and turns to Kame.
"Where's your little handbag?" Kame asks.
"Inside your bag." Jin's speaking very quietly, down to his chest rather than to Kame.
"You know, I was going to suggest we go to a club after the meal. Somewhere it wouldn't matter what you were wearing. We could still go?"
"I'm not in the mood. Can you drop me at home, please?"
"We didn't even have a chance to get to dessert-"
Jin cuts him off. "I just want to go home."
They leave the restaurant in silence. The businessmen are already gone.
When Kame parks by Jin's building he decides to invite himself up. Jin's subdued, withdrawn - he hasn't said a word on the drive, and it's obvious to anyone who knows him that he's running the evening over and over again in his mind, trying to fix it so he can feel better about the outcome. He'll be off to America in a few days, and Kame can't let him go in that frame of mind.
If Jin's surprised to find Kame right behind him when he unlocks his front door, he doesn't show it. "I'm going to take a shower," he says flatly. "Help yourself to coffee or whatever."
"Another shower?"
"Hairspray," Jin says, and Kame nods in understanding.
He shrugs out of his blazer and makes himself coffee, because he'd been about to order another one at the restaurant when Jin went to the bathroom, and because he's nice like that he makes one for Jin too.
When the coffee's cool enough for him to have drunk half of it, he realises Jin's been in the shower an awfully long time. Since there are no leering businessmen in sight, he goes to find out why.
"Jin? You okay in there?" He knocks on the bathroom door. "Jin?"
Silence. He knocks again, gives Jin a moment to respond but isn't terribly surprised when he doesn't. He's got a faint idea what Jin might be doing in there, and if he's right...
Jin's bathroom lock isn't hard to open from the outside, not with something flat to use for turning, and Kame's armed with a credit card. He yanks open the door to find the room all steamed up, hot water still flowing steadily from the shower-head. It's got to be too hot for comfort but Jin doesn't seem to notice, far too intent on scrubbing vigorously at his arm with an exfoliating sponge.
Kame pushes aside the transparent curtain, ignores the water and lunges for the sponge, attempting to wrest it free. Jin's pretty strong but Kame's arms are in the best condition they've been since One Pound Gospel and it's no contest. The sponge hits the tiles, forgotten, but the red, raw skin on Jin's arms says the damage is already done.
"You can't rinse it down the drain with hot water!" Kame splutters through the spray. He fumbles blindly for the controls of the ridiculously complicated shower and stops the water. Jin's using his nails now, trying to tear strips off his left arm. Kame's already drenched; it doesn't make one bit of difference to his waterlogged outfit when he steps forward and seizes Jin's wrists from behind. "And you can't scrub it off your skin! Believe me, I've tried."
"I can!"
There's water everywhere, dripping from Jin's hair and Kame's clothes and streaming down both their faces. Kame presses close, resting his sodden shirt against Jin's shaking back. "You can't," he says again. "You can't cut away pieces of your personality just because they make you uncomfortable."
When Jin finally stops trying to twist free, Kame risks letting go of his wrists to snag a towel. He ties it around Jin's waist and prods him gently out of the shower stall, guiding him to sit down on the closed toilet lid. His own clothes will have to wait.
He rummages around in the bathroom cabinet till he finds a tub of cold cream and starts applying it to Jin's reddened arms. The skin's got to be tender; Jin hisses at the slightest touch. He doesn't speak, though - not until Kame's done, looking down at him with worried eyes.
"I've worn a lot of stupid things for work," he says. "Things I'd sooner die than remember. But I don't think I've ever felt like such a freak before."
"You are not a freak. You're stronger than this, Jin. Look how much you've overcome. You're not doing anything wrong by trying to find out who you are."
Kame knows his words are falling on deaf ears, that he might as well be babbling baseball statistics, but he hopes that something of his message will get through. Jin looks up at him with dead eyes and shakes his head.
"I don't know how much longer I can take feeling caught in the middle like this."
"Try looking at it my way instead." Kame doesn't even bother with the slippery buttons of his shirt, just slips it over his head and throws it on the towel rail. "You're not stuck between two immovable walls. You're a planet, moving in your own orbit, with two moons moving in different orbits around you. Sometimes you get close to one of them; sometimes it's the other, and sometimes you're nowhere near them at all. Nothing's fixed. You're not being penned in by anything except yourself."
But Jin's still shaking his head, and it's as much as Kame can do to get him to dry himself and throw on fresh clothing. He helps himself to a few things from the wardrobe too, since his own outfit's not going to dry any time soon.
It's early by their standards, just barely ten, yet Jin crawls between the sheets as soon as his hair's dry enough not to completely soak the pillows. Kame doesn't think it's a good idea to leave him by himself, though there doesn't seem to be much he can do to help. Whether Jin's hearing him or not, he's not responding.
"I'm stealing one of these," Kame plucks one of the unused pillows from the bed, "and taking over your couch for the night. If you feel like talking about it, you know where I am."
He doesn't get very far. Jin's hand closes over the pillow and tugs it back. Kame's about to chide him for being selfish when he remembers words have never been Jin's strong point. Sometimes he expresses himself beautifully in song, but when he speaks he's easy to misunderstand, and what he says isn't always what he means. After so long Kame's had plenty of practice understanding the things Jin can't or won't say.
The bed's easily big enough for two - Jin likes his comfort. Kame stays on the far side and hopes he doesn't wind up embarrassing himself in his sleep. It's been a long time since he's shared a bed, especially with someone even half as attractive as Jin.
Not that he looks so attractive now, with red eyes and tangled hair, arms scraped half raw. He lies on his side and curls himself into a ball. Kame watches his back in the glimmer of light peeking through the curtains, drifting off to sleep until a question in the dark wakes him up.
"You tried too?" Jin asks. "To wipe it away?"
"Yeah." Kame's throat feels like he swallowed the sponge once Jin was done with it. "I thought there was this other layer, this contaminated shell, and if I managed to scrape it all off I could be me again. I was bleeding by the time I realised I'd been me all along - a "me" I didn't know very well yet and wasn't sure about, but someone I thought I could learn to live with in time."
"What made you realise that?"
Kame can hear Jin moving around on the mattress, rolling over to face him. The increased proximity doesn't make what he's about to say any easier. "There was...someone I liked. A guy. I felt happier just being around him. I really looked up to him, thought he was amazing - and very, very attractive. Crushing on him felt better than with girls even though I had to keep it a secret."
"How old were you?"
"Old enough. I nursed my feelings for a few years, and it was okay because it didn't feel real, you know? Like I had this special loophole that meant I didn't have to think about it too much."
"So what happened? Did you ever tell him?" Jin sounds livelier than he has since before they left the restaurant, finally interested in something outside his own problems.
"No. I knew nothing would ever come of it, and things were...complicated." Kame smiles to himself, thinking in hindsight that the complications back then were nothing compared to what's happening now. "I started feeling attracted to someone else, and that's when I realised this wasn't a special case - that I actually liked guys. Not just in a 'Wow, he's so cool! I want to hang out with him!' kind of way, but in an 'I can see myself kissing him' way too.
"That's when I started feeling bad about it. I didn't have anyone to tell me it was okay, that I wasn't doing anything wrong. I felt terrified that if anyone found out, my career would be over and I'd somehow alienate my entire family and all my friends."
"You're a lot more lax about that now," Jin says. "I saw that magazine where you said you were gay, only everyone thought you were joking."
"I don't think it would come as a surprise to anyone now, but my manager would still kill me," Kame says, shuddering at the thought of the lecture he knows he'd receive.
"If that's when you started feeling bad, then...?"
"What made me feel better? I thought about that crush again." Kame thinks it's a good thing Jin can't see him blushing in the dark. This is nothing if not embarrassing. "I couldn't see how caring for someone could possibly be a bad thing. I wasn't hurting anyone, and I was happy."
"Even though he didn't know?"
"Even then. At the time, it was more important that I felt okay about liking him. I tried to hold on to that feeling afterwards so I could accept myself for who I was."
Jin's silent for a moment; Kame holds his breath and hopes this doesn't mean he's putting two and two together, because coming up with four in the middle of the night isn't going to help either of them.
Thankfully, all he says is, "Your bedtime stories need work."
Flippancy is a marked improvement on despondency. "You're turning twenty-seven tomorrow," Kame says. "Aren't you too old for bedtime stories?"
"I'm a child at heart."
That's sort of true. For all Jin's questionable lyrics and seductive dances, his heart remains pure. It's one of the reasons Kame treasures him.
-----
Kame has work the next day and slips out early in his borrowed clothes, before Jin's even awake. He thinks it's safe to do so now.
They see each other later that night, at the party Jin's friends have thrown for him. All of KAT-TUN are there, primarily so they can see his face when he opens Ueda's present. It turns out not to be lingerie, as threatened, but women's perfume. Ryo speculates on whether Ueda got his months mixed up and it's actually a gift for Kame. Ueda refuses to say.
Gift vouchers from Koki and Nakamaru join the pile, along with a box that Yamapi says Jin should open later. Junno gave his previously, since he could hardly give Jin a handbag in front of everyone else, and Jin says Kame did too.
But Kame hasn't given him his proper birthday gift yet. That's still in the pocket of his blazer, which he accidentally left on the back of Jin's couch.
The next day, the day before Jin leaves for the US, he stops by Kame's apartment to return it.
"For someone who spent the night partying you look remarkably well," Kame says when he answers the door.
"I couldn't drink much. Ryo kept needling me about the perfume and I didn't want to let something slip by accident." Jin hands over the blazer. "Here. You left this at my place the other night."
"Thanks." Kame steps back from the doorway so Jin can enter.
"I can't stay long; I have to go find my passport."
Kame smirks. "With the amount of travelling you do, I'd have thought it would be permanently in your wallet."
"You might be on to something." Jin checks inside his wallet and grins. "Found it."
"Now you've got time to pack the rest of your stuff. Don't fly off with just your underwear this time!"
"Yes, Boss." Jin perches on the arm of the couch. "Um...Kame?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you for the other night."
"Did it help?"
"Honestly?" Jin shrugs. "I don't know. But I don't feel like I need to shed my skin right now, and that's better than nothing. The dress was...it was an interesting experiment, but I don't think it's right for me. It's a step further over the line than I want to go."
"At least something good came out of the whole fiasco if you managed to figure that out," Kame says, extremely pleased with this turn of events. "That's what this is all about - discovering what works for you. You'd better warn your mum, though, unless you want another dress for Christmas."
"I told her this morning. I think I ruined all her plans for mother-son shopping trips."
"If you stick to accessories you'll be okay. Most of yours are girly enough anyway."
"Most of the accessories in Japan are girly," Jin points out.
"You could get some in America?"
"Actually...uh...I thought I might try out a few things while I'm in the US. Maybe do myself up a little and hit a couple of clubs where no one knows me."
Kame couldn't be more proud. He reaches into the blazer's pocket and pulls out a tiny giftwrapped package. "Then here's something to wear while you're there. Happy birthday, Jin."
He'd wrapped the box in black and white paper and tied it with a red ribbon, so that it matched Jin's outfit from the other night. Jin tugs the bow with glee and has the paper off in seconds. His face freezes when he opens the box, though.
"Kame..."
"It's symbolic," Kame explains. "You're slowly emerging from your Abercrombie & Fitch hooded chrysalis and spreading your wings to become a beautiful butterfly."
The red and gold brooch stands out like a sunrise when he pins it to Jin's black T-shirt; fierce as fire and twice as beautiful. Jin will be an amazing yellow gold butterfly one day: Kame knows it like he knows the lyrics to 'Kizuna'.
"Just be careful when you're in America, okay?" he warns Jin. "Don't do anything too crazy."
Jin flashes him one of those brilliant, true smiles that make models weep with envy, and catches him up in a hug. "You watch yourself too. I don't want to come back and find you've started dating some random jerk because I'm not taking up all your time anymore."
Kame squeezes tight, happy to be holding Jin for once when nobody's upset and they're both looking to the future with hope in their eyes. "I promise to screen all prospective boyfriends very carefully," he says. "I'll make them send me a résumé and copies of their financial records."
"That settles it." Jin sounds terribly self-satisfied. "No one in Japan can afford to have you as a boyfriend."
Kame draws back enough to meet Jin's eyes, but not enough to let go. Soon they'll have an ocean between them. "Then I'll just have to look overseas, won't I?"
On to transJinder #3 - First Times and Curious Crimes
Fandom: KAT-TUN
Pairing: Slight hints of Kame/Jin
Rating: PG
Genre: Angst, kind of AU
Word count: 7,387
Disclaimer: Not mine, damnit
Summary: Jin's birthday is full of surprises. Not all of them are from Kame.
A/N: This is a sequel to Be Your Own Secret Girlfriend and won't make much sense if you haven't read that one.
I appreciate that Japan is going through a rough time at the moment and I'm probably committing some grave faux pas by posting fic, but I've done all I can do personally (by donating). My sympathy goes out to all the people affected by this tragedy.
Even Butterflies Dress For Dinner
In the month leading up to Jin's birthday Kame finds himself mildly irritated by the way all Jin's other friends in the know turn to him for advice on gifts - especially when he hasn't figured out his own yet.
Koki intends to make good on his threat to buy Jin a dress. "But what size do you think he'd be?" he asks Kame. "He's skinny but he's got shoulders, and I don't know if he's ready to go strapless."
"Gift voucher," Kame suggests. "Then he can pick out his own."
He offers the same advice to Nakamaru, who's thinking about shoes and wanting to ensure Jin doesn't wear anything that'll damage his back.
Ueda's sense of mischief is well-developed, but when it comes to shopping he can be indecisive. "I'm going with lingerie," he tells Kame. "Do you think he'd kill me if I bought him a padded bra?"
"Yes," Kame says without hesitation. "And I'd help him hide the body."
Junno, at least, doesn't go for clothes, though he does ask Kame which Cecil McBee bag he finds prettiest. Kame only just manages to resist the urge to buy one for himself while they're in the store.
Yamapi frets over it the most, which surprises Kame because he of all people should know Jin's tastes. But then, he's still trying to get used to all this. They all are.
"Get him a necklace or something," Kame says after they've batted ideas back and forth across the phone line for ten minutes. "You guys buy each other jewellery anyway, don't you? And you know Jin's never exactly had the most masculine taste in accessories."
"I could try that," Yamapi says. "What are you getting him?"
"I wish I knew."
Kame considers buying him make-up, which seems like cheating but will do as a last resort. Maybe some nice tops, or sandals for the hot summer weather. Decorative belts to hold up those baggy shorts.
He's at home, looking at online shops for ideas, when he receives a despairing phone call from Jin.
"My family's having a clear-out," he explains. "My mum dropped off a box of stuff she thought I might want. There's a dress in there, Kame. A dress. Do you think she's trying to tell me something?"
Jin hasn't been able to bring himself to tell his family yet. He and Kame have talked about it a lot, but he's still too self-conscious about it despite Kame's attempts to reassure him. The Akanishi family are nothing if not unconventional - Kame can't see them taking it too badly. As long as Jin's happy, they'll deal with it somehow.
"Depends. Is it in her size?"
"No," Jin says unhappily. "It's in mine."
"Then yes, I think she's trying to tell you something. How does it look?"
"I'm not wearing it!"
No surprise there. In the months since Jin's begun to explore his feminine side, his bouts of "dressing up" have been more trouser-based, mostly leaning towards what Kame would call cute in a tomboyish sort of way. He hasn't shown any interest in skirts or dresses; Kame assumes he had enough of those in his Junior days.
"Do you want to try it on?" he asks.
"I don't think I can do dresses, Kame."
Kame makes a mental note to inform Koki of this. "What are you going to say to your mother?"
"I have no idea."
Jin sounds terribly lost, so Kame gives up on online shopping and invites himself over. He wants to see the dress.
-----
It turns out to be quite pretty, a short red number that Jin could wear unaccompanied if he's feeling brave or over black tights if not. It's got shoulders but they seem loose enough not to chafe, and the neckline doesn't plunge far enough to reveal that he would make an extremely flat-chested girl.
"I think you could probably get away with wearing a black belt with this," Kame says, sizing up the dress with a practised eye. "Give you a little more in the way of hips."
"No way." Jin's shaking his head. "I can't wear this."
Kame shrugs. "So don't. This is supposed to be about you wearing the things you do like, not the things you're not interested in."
Jin relaxes in his chair, clearly relieved that Kame doesn't plan to push the issue. "Wearing a dress would be like...like making a statement, or something."
"A statement that says: 'I'd rather be in Kanjani8'?"
Jin claps his hands together and laughs. "I'd never survive Kanjani8."
"But you and Yasuda could paint each other's nails."
"Don't need him; got you," Jin says matter-of-factly. "It's not as if I'm going to burn the dress or anything, but if I wear it..."
His face is approaching the same colour as the dress and Kame has a sneaking suspicion why. "Don't look at it like some sort of irreversible step. If you try it and don't like it, it's not like you're then stuck wearing dresses for the rest of your life. There's no set path you're supposed to be following."
"I guess..." Jin doesn't seem convinced. "Just don't tell Koki I've got it or he'll have me up on the stage at your concerts, dancing in heels for his solo."
"Can you even dance in heels?"
"I can barely walk in heels."
"You don't always walk so well without them, either," Kame says, catching the couch cushion Jin throws at his head. "And you should come to the concerts anyway. It's your anniversary celebration too."
Jin licks his lips a couple of times, looking like he's trying to get a response out but losing it before it gets as far as his vocal cords. Kame gives it a minute before he decides Jin has no clue how to answer him. As well as the split has turned out for all six of them, it's still a painful subject and reminding Jin - reminding all of them - what they've lost is probably a bad idea. The wound has scabbed over, now, but it's unlikely it will ever fully heal.
Kame takes pity on him. "Forget I said anything. Maybe next year we'll have a guest segment and invite that well-known international star, Jin Akanishi, to take the stage with us. We can turn the MC into an English lesson."
"You're all improving," Jin says. "Even if you can't shake the accent completely."
"We're practising for Hawaii." Kame still wishes it was going to be all six of them making their American debut together, but if he lets himself get mired down by nostalgia, he'll never be able to move forward. At least they'll all have done it, soon, and that's something pretty special. KAT-TUN will make it worldwide one way or another.
"I should practise too. I'm supposed to be heading back to the US a few days after my birthday."
"You're not spending Independence Day over there?"
"Not this time. I'd rather celebrate my birthday here - though I'd better figure out what to say to my mother before she gives me a ballgown for a birthday present."
"I don't think you're the ballgown type," Kame says. "But I'm glad you'll be here for your birthday."
Mostly because he wants to see Jin's face when he opens some of his presents. It's questionable whether or not Ueda will survive long enough to make it to Hawaii, if he goes ahead with the lingerie idea.
Kame's still clueless what to get Jin for his birthday, but he thinks he might have an idea how to help him celebrate.
-----
Summer's a busy time for all of them. KAT-TUN are occupied with concerts, album promo and solo activities. Jin's got his US tour to prepare for, his first English-language single to promote and an album that's been far too long in the making.
Kame spends most of his time travelling, with a schedule that makes the rest of the universe look like slackers, but he finds time to keep up with Jin by email. He tells him all the funny little backstage stories he's missing and asks him what sort of things he's planning for the tour.
What he doesn't ask is how things are going with Jin's family. The answer to that question pops up on Kame's phone one afternoon when he's on the train to Shin-Osaka, causing him to choke on his yakisoba pan.
Mum's just asked me to go shopping with her for nail polish, Jin writes. She definitely knows!
When he manages to wash down the offending mouthful, Kame writes back, I think the dress could've told you that. You should go shopping. She's obviously not got a problem with it; you should say something and get it out in the open.
An hour later, Jin responds with, I asked her about the dress. She says it must've gone to me by mistake. Now what???
But it was in *your* size, Kame writes. Not hers. Tell her it fits okay and see how she reacts.
After twenty minutes, Jin's response arrives. She laughed and asked if I wanted a belt to go with it.
Never turn down free accessories, Kame advises. Get some tights while you're at it. Did you get any nail polish for yourself?
Kame doesn't get an answer until after he's left the train, when Jin actually phones him.
"I didn't get any nail polish," he says, launching straight into conversation. "Or belts. All I got was the dinner bill and a lecture on why I should know better than to think I can keep secrets from my own mother."
"Did you tell her anything?"
Jin sighs. "She told me. I think she got fed up of listening to me beat around the bush. She says she started noticing little changes in my appearance when I was on TV and stuff, and then when she came over to clean a while back - while I was out - she found some of my...um...less manly clothes and decided to risk sending the dress."
"Does your dad know?"
"She hasn't told him or Reio - she's leaving that up to me. Which means it is never happening."
Kame smiles to himself and stretches out on his hotel bed. "Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll approach you instead."
"You have met my brother, right? He's so wrapped up in rehearsals for his play that I doubt he'll even remember my birthday. I don't want him to know, because if he knows, he's going to give me stick over it until I die. That's what brothers do."
"Good point." With three brothers of his own, Kame is no stranger to sibling teasing. "I'm glad it worked out okay with your mum, though."
"It was the most mortifying afternoon of my life," Jin whines, but Kame can tell he's secretly glad, too. "I had to make her promise not to give me anything embarrassing for my birthday."
"Speaking of your birthday, we'll all be back in Tokyo by then. I know you're probably having your usual big party on the actual night, but can you spare me the evening before?"
"You won't come to the party?"
"I will," Kame assures him, "but I thought it would be nice to go out for a quiet celebration beforehand. You could dress up."
Jin likes that idea. "I like that it's finally payback time. After all the meals I've paid for, you're doing your share this year."
"Next year we should just agree to split the bill," Kame says.
They make arrangements for the evening and end the call so Kame can go find his own dinner. He doesn't tell Jin where they'll be going, but at least now he knows what to get him.
-----
Kame turns up on Jin's doorstep the evening before his birthday, holding a couple of shopping bags in one hand and a larkspur bouquet in the other. Jin bursts out laughing when he sees the flowers.
"They're your birthflower," Kame explains. "And I thought the occasion called for flowers."
"You do look pretty dressed up," Jin admits.
Where they're going a suit wouldn't be overkill, but Kame hasn't taken things quite that far. He's wearing the neatest jeans he owns, a white shirt and a black blazer with the cuffs rolled up to the elbow; a gold heart round his neck to match the hoop in his ear.
"Do we have time to go suit-shopping?" Jin's still in his bathrobe and clutching a hairbrush. "I don't think I have anything both girly and formal."
"Actually, I thought you could wear the dress," Kame says. "That's why I'm so early. I brought you a few things to go with it."
"Oh no." Jin starts shaking his head as he backs away towards his wardrobe. "I can't do that."
"It'll be fine, I promise." He notices Jin's suspiciously shorn legs peeking out from beneath the robe. "I see you've already shaved your legs for the occasion."
"I thought I'd try it yesterday. Regretting it now." Jin grimaces. "It feels so weird. You've done it before, right?"
"Only when I had to crossdress for a drama. There's no point me trying to do it the rest of the time - it grows back in hours."
Jin smirks at him. "At least I don't have that problem."
"Did you do under your arms too?"
"Yeah. And before you ask: no, I did not do my bikini line."
"Not a problem," Kame says, setting down the shopping bags. "Nobody's going to be seeing it anyway.
"Now, I've got these tights-"
"I told you, I'm not doing it."
"Jin, I can't tell you where we're going but I can say that you wearing a dress will not be a problem."
"Not doing it." Jin folds his arms across his chest and glares stubbornly at Kame. "Not doing it and you can't make me."
"Fine." Kame sags down in defeat on the bed. "Open up the wardrobe and let's see what else you've got."
"You're giving up that easily?"
"I'm not your manager - it's not my job to talk you into wearing things you don't like."
He wonders for a moment if that's what Jin wants, to be talked into it. Jin's very good at making rebellious protests - it's a KAT-TUN speciality and he's still doing them proud - but Kame knows from experience that when you want to do something but feel like you shouldn't, it's a lot easier to do it if you can at least pretend it's someone else's fault. It's difficult to gauge with something like this, though. If he pushes, he risks ruining the evening before it even gets started.
Then he's struck by an idea. "Tell you what. I still think it's a shame for it not to see any use, so I'll wear the dress. We'll switch for the evening."
"With your legs? You'll look like a gorilla playing dress-up." Jin snatches up the shopping bags. "It wouldn't fit you anyway."
"How do you know? Have you tried it on?"
"Once," Jin says grudgingly. "Just to see if it fit."
"And how did that make you feel?" Kame's starting to feel more like Jin's counsellor than his friend.
"Pretty stupid when I caught sight of myself in the mirror."
"You won't by the time I'm done with you," Kame promises, and Jin lets him get to work.
By the time they're done, Jin looks...stunning; there's no other word Kame can find to describe him. The dress only covers him to mid-thigh; black tights prevent him accidentally flashing the people around him when he bends, and a strategically positioned belt accentuates his hips. He's wearing flat red slingbacks, another of Kame's purchases (they've been able to share shoes for years, so he felt reasonably comfortable buying them for someone else), and finishes it off with a black, white and red shawl, because Kame says the restaurant they're going to tends to turn the air conditioning up very high.
Jin's hair is longer than it's been since his first solo shows in America, curling down past his shoulders. He scrapes it back in a ponytail, most of the time, but now he's brushed it out, has a small, high ponytail right at the top and the rest spilling across the shawl. Dark eyes and red lips give him a hint of mystery.
"I look like a Kuroki Meisa cosplayer," Jin says when they've finished.
"I was going to say you looked like you were trying out for a part in West Side Story," Kame says. "Can I take a picture?"
"Only if you promise never to show it to anyone else. I mean it, Kame. If you do and I find out, you're going to be stuck doing all my housework until you die a horrible dust-related death."
Kame thinks it's worth the risk. He snaps a picture with his phone, since he doesn't have his actual camera with him, and files it away with a password while Jin watches. It's a lovely shot, with Jin looking at himself in the mirror and smiling like a movie star.
"You know, you actually look very convincing," Kame says. "Maybe we should let the press come along - I haven't been caught with a girl in ages and my manager's starting to worry."
"I don't think I qualify as a beard."
"You're not quite up to my usual standards," Kame pretends to consider this, "but you'll do, I suppose."
Jin gives him a decidedly unladylike hand gesture and picks up the small black-and-white bag he'd received from Junno earlier. In go keys, wallet, phone, and half a dozen packs of tissues.
Kame throws in a lip gloss wand for good measure; Jin protests. "I travel light, Kame."
"The lip gloss is for me."
"I don't care." Jin removes the wand.
"I take it back - I have the hottest fake girlfriend in town."
The lip gloss goes back in the bag, which makes Jin realise Kame's not carrying one of his own this time. "No make-up remover?"
"There's a sports bag in the car. It didn't really go with the outfit."
They haven't needed the kit yet and Kame hopes the trend will continue, but he knows better than to go without it - especially since this is the furthest out of his comfort zone Jin's ever been, and Kame's about to take him even further out.
This time it's not one of Kame's discreet, half-hidden places in Shinjuku but an Italian restaurant in Ginza, both expensive and exclusive.
"Don't you have to book a table a month in advance to get in?" Jin says when they're parked as close as Kame can get to the door. "Or be a visiting dignitary?"
"Or play baseball with the owner's son," Kame says with a sly grin. "Otherwise yes, you do have to book that far in advance."
It pays to have friends. But Jin looks uneasy and even when Kame gets out to open his door he shows no sign of wanting to leave the car. It's like the first time all over again.
"Nobody you know is going to be in there," Kame says. "Half your friends couldn't afford it and the other half wouldn't like the atmosphere. I asked for a table on the second floor, so no one's going to see us from the street."
"I should've brought the flowers. At least I could've hidden behind them."
"No need to hide." Kame's being completely honest. "You look beautiful."
Jin gives a derisive snort at the flattery but allows himself to be talked out of the car anyway. Kame offers him an arm, figuring they're dressed up enough to warrant it, and Jin loops his own lightly around it. It's been a long time since they've linked arms like that. They'd held hands as teenagers skipping through Central Park and lived a dozen lifetimes since then.
He doesn't have to pull out Jin's chair - the waiter does that - and he can feel, through their linked arms, Jin relax when nobody calls him on his gender. It's a nice place, with tables for larger parties downstairs and small, intimate tables on the balconies upstairs, closer to the blinding chandeliers and nestled cosily between velvet drapes.
There are three tables on their balcony. One is occupied by a group of four middle-aged businessmen who are obviously senior management of some sort, and the second, intended for pairs, is hosting a young man and woman who only have eyes for each other. Jin and Kame sit at the left-most table; Jin with his back to the wall and Kame with his to the businessmen. Between them they cast eyes over the other patrons and determine that no one known to either of them is dining that night.
"Okay?" Kame says hopefully.
"More than okay." Jin flashes him a grin. "You're right; my friends would never come here. Except for you, anyway."
"A sign of my good taste."
"Or your extravagant spending habits."
No more is said about Kame's spending habits once they see the prices on the menu, but whatever the damage to his bank account, it'll be worth it. Not because he knows firsthand how delicious the food will be but because they're having a relaxing evening out, just the two of them, and Kame can't put a price on that.
Jin keeps fidgeting with his outfit, rearranging his shawl, adjusting the shoulders of his dress; by the time the main course arrives, he confesses to Kame that he's kicked off his shoes under the table. Small wardrobe hitches don't worry Kame. Jin's not tearing off his dress in the middle of the restaurant and declaring it to be the most uncomfortable piece of fabric in the world, so he can live with it.
"Tell me the truth," Jin says suddenly. "Does this actually look good, or does it look ridiculous and you're just being polite?"
"On my honour as a red-blooded male, it looks gorgeous."
"A red-blooded male who prefers guys. I'm not sure I should listen to your opinion."
"Then let's post your picture on the Internet and conduct a poll," Kame teases. "And you're a guy, so I feel qualified to judge."
"Are guys in dresses normally your thing?"
It's the first time Jin's expressed any interest in his preferences, save to ask about telling his family, and it makes Kame feel slightly uneasy. He's used to not talking about it - but then, he doesn't think it's anything to talk about. Maybe Jin thinks differently.
"Not normally, but it's not like I meet that many - even in this business." He twirls a ribbon of pasta around his fork. "I'm not looking for any specific type, if that's what you mean."
"But you are looking?"
"Why the sudden interest in my love life? Worried some jealous athlete's going to track you down and beat you up for going out to dinner with me?"
"No..." Jin looks down at his plate. "Just...like you said, you spend ninety per cent of your time at work and the rest trying to sort out my life. You're supposed to have some time for yourself in there somewhere - don't waste it all on me."
"I don't consider any time spent with you a waste, Jin."
"Not even the Mario Kart tournaments?"
"Well...maybe those." Kame sets down his fork. "Look, I value my time alone, but I value my time with friends and family too. If I meet someone I'm interested in, I won't turn my back, but I'm not going to go out looking for the sake of it."
No point looking elsewhere, but he can hardly say that to Jin.
The conversation turns from Kame's lack of love life to Jin's, which is in a similar state.
"Still no one since that photographer," he confirms. "I've been too busy even to think about it. I wouldn't know what to say, anyway. 'Hey, cute T-shirt, can I borrow it?'"
"Some girls would like that. Sharing clothes."
"I think it's supposed to work the other way around."
Jin's opted for lasagne on the grounds that he stands a better chance of not spilling it down his dress - or worse yet, inside his dress - yet even that doesn't help when he's talking with his hands, waving his fork around as he makes grand gestures. He accidentally splatters Kame's cheek with sauce, fortunately missing his eye.
"Oops. At least I didn't get any on your pristine white shirt?"
"Now I remember why I won't let you cook at my place anymore." Kame picks up his napkin and dabs it over his cheek. "Did I get it?"
"Let me." Jin takes the napkin and leans across to wipe away the sauce. "There. Gone."
Kame thinks he hears a wolf-whistle from behind him, but when he turns around no one's even looking in their direction. His mind is obviously supplying its own sound effects after a decade of dealing with exuberant fangirls. He knows what fanservice looks like, probably better than anyone else in KAT-TUN. After all, he got stuck wearing the wedding dress.
He's almost cleaned his plate when Jin abruptly excuses himself to go to the bathroom. Kame waves him away without even looking up from the one final strand he's chasing with his fork; doesn't realise, until he notices that Jin's plate still has a few rapidly cooling mouthfuls, that he's been gone ten minutes already.
The upper men's room isn't far away; Kame just hopes Jin didn't go in the ladies' room instead or he's going to have to ask some innocent waitress to check for him.
He tries the men's room first, waiting until the two men at the urinals have finished and left before he approaches the single locked stall. "Jin?"
"Kame?"
"Did something disagree with you?"
"Yeah, the four guys leering at me from the next table."
Maybe that wolf-whistle had been real after all. "Just ignore them," Kame advises. "You're famous; you get people looking at you all the time."
"I know a leer when I see it, Kame. I'm not normally on the receiving end - not from men."
Kame has to laugh, knowing perfectly well that's not true. "Do you really not know you've got a lot of male fans?"
"I don't think those guys out there are fans."
"True, but you can't stay in here all night. We can switch seats, you won't be able to see them then."
"I'll still be able to feel them looking. I'm staying in here till they've gone; I'm not going out there dressed like this."
Jin's tone brooks no argument; Kame tries anyway. "You're not doing anything wrong-"
"That doesn't change how I feel!"
Kame takes a deep breath. So much for getting to dessert. There's a small, giftwrapped box in his blazer pocket that may never see the light of day. "I'm going to pay for the meal, then I'll fetch the bag from the car. Give me a few minutes, okay? I'll be back as soon as I can."
The staff look surprised to see Kame return to the restaurant mere minutes after leaving it, but accept his explanation that his friend - an extremely messy diner - requires a change of clothing from the car. Jin opens the cubicle door barely wide enough to receive the sports bag and shuts it before Kame can see his face.
It's a good ten minutes before he emerges to finish off the job in front of the mirrors. Kame's had his work cut out for him looking casual, playing with his phone as he lounges against the wall and tries not to seem like he's hanging out in high-class restaurant bathrooms to pick up men.
Jin's lost dress, tights, shoes and shawl, having replaced them with baggy khaki shorts, light sandals, a plain black T-shirt and a soft grey hoodie. All his hair is scraped back from his face now in one low, curly ponytail, and the make-up is rapidly disappearing as he sets to work with wipes and cotton wool. When he's done he pulls the hood as far down over his face as it will go and turns to Kame.
"Where's your little handbag?" Kame asks.
"Inside your bag." Jin's speaking very quietly, down to his chest rather than to Kame.
"You know, I was going to suggest we go to a club after the meal. Somewhere it wouldn't matter what you were wearing. We could still go?"
"I'm not in the mood. Can you drop me at home, please?"
"We didn't even have a chance to get to dessert-"
Jin cuts him off. "I just want to go home."
They leave the restaurant in silence. The businessmen are already gone.
When Kame parks by Jin's building he decides to invite himself up. Jin's subdued, withdrawn - he hasn't said a word on the drive, and it's obvious to anyone who knows him that he's running the evening over and over again in his mind, trying to fix it so he can feel better about the outcome. He'll be off to America in a few days, and Kame can't let him go in that frame of mind.
If Jin's surprised to find Kame right behind him when he unlocks his front door, he doesn't show it. "I'm going to take a shower," he says flatly. "Help yourself to coffee or whatever."
"Another shower?"
"Hairspray," Jin says, and Kame nods in understanding.
He shrugs out of his blazer and makes himself coffee, because he'd been about to order another one at the restaurant when Jin went to the bathroom, and because he's nice like that he makes one for Jin too.
When the coffee's cool enough for him to have drunk half of it, he realises Jin's been in the shower an awfully long time. Since there are no leering businessmen in sight, he goes to find out why.
"Jin? You okay in there?" He knocks on the bathroom door. "Jin?"
Silence. He knocks again, gives Jin a moment to respond but isn't terribly surprised when he doesn't. He's got a faint idea what Jin might be doing in there, and if he's right...
Jin's bathroom lock isn't hard to open from the outside, not with something flat to use for turning, and Kame's armed with a credit card. He yanks open the door to find the room all steamed up, hot water still flowing steadily from the shower-head. It's got to be too hot for comfort but Jin doesn't seem to notice, far too intent on scrubbing vigorously at his arm with an exfoliating sponge.
Kame pushes aside the transparent curtain, ignores the water and lunges for the sponge, attempting to wrest it free. Jin's pretty strong but Kame's arms are in the best condition they've been since One Pound Gospel and it's no contest. The sponge hits the tiles, forgotten, but the red, raw skin on Jin's arms says the damage is already done.
"You can't rinse it down the drain with hot water!" Kame splutters through the spray. He fumbles blindly for the controls of the ridiculously complicated shower and stops the water. Jin's using his nails now, trying to tear strips off his left arm. Kame's already drenched; it doesn't make one bit of difference to his waterlogged outfit when he steps forward and seizes Jin's wrists from behind. "And you can't scrub it off your skin! Believe me, I've tried."
"I can!"
There's water everywhere, dripping from Jin's hair and Kame's clothes and streaming down both their faces. Kame presses close, resting his sodden shirt against Jin's shaking back. "You can't," he says again. "You can't cut away pieces of your personality just because they make you uncomfortable."
When Jin finally stops trying to twist free, Kame risks letting go of his wrists to snag a towel. He ties it around Jin's waist and prods him gently out of the shower stall, guiding him to sit down on the closed toilet lid. His own clothes will have to wait.
He rummages around in the bathroom cabinet till he finds a tub of cold cream and starts applying it to Jin's reddened arms. The skin's got to be tender; Jin hisses at the slightest touch. He doesn't speak, though - not until Kame's done, looking down at him with worried eyes.
"I've worn a lot of stupid things for work," he says. "Things I'd sooner die than remember. But I don't think I've ever felt like such a freak before."
"You are not a freak. You're stronger than this, Jin. Look how much you've overcome. You're not doing anything wrong by trying to find out who you are."
Kame knows his words are falling on deaf ears, that he might as well be babbling baseball statistics, but he hopes that something of his message will get through. Jin looks up at him with dead eyes and shakes his head.
"I don't know how much longer I can take feeling caught in the middle like this."
"Try looking at it my way instead." Kame doesn't even bother with the slippery buttons of his shirt, just slips it over his head and throws it on the towel rail. "You're not stuck between two immovable walls. You're a planet, moving in your own orbit, with two moons moving in different orbits around you. Sometimes you get close to one of them; sometimes it's the other, and sometimes you're nowhere near them at all. Nothing's fixed. You're not being penned in by anything except yourself."
But Jin's still shaking his head, and it's as much as Kame can do to get him to dry himself and throw on fresh clothing. He helps himself to a few things from the wardrobe too, since his own outfit's not going to dry any time soon.
It's early by their standards, just barely ten, yet Jin crawls between the sheets as soon as his hair's dry enough not to completely soak the pillows. Kame doesn't think it's a good idea to leave him by himself, though there doesn't seem to be much he can do to help. Whether Jin's hearing him or not, he's not responding.
"I'm stealing one of these," Kame plucks one of the unused pillows from the bed, "and taking over your couch for the night. If you feel like talking about it, you know where I am."
He doesn't get very far. Jin's hand closes over the pillow and tugs it back. Kame's about to chide him for being selfish when he remembers words have never been Jin's strong point. Sometimes he expresses himself beautifully in song, but when he speaks he's easy to misunderstand, and what he says isn't always what he means. After so long Kame's had plenty of practice understanding the things Jin can't or won't say.
The bed's easily big enough for two - Jin likes his comfort. Kame stays on the far side and hopes he doesn't wind up embarrassing himself in his sleep. It's been a long time since he's shared a bed, especially with someone even half as attractive as Jin.
Not that he looks so attractive now, with red eyes and tangled hair, arms scraped half raw. He lies on his side and curls himself into a ball. Kame watches his back in the glimmer of light peeking through the curtains, drifting off to sleep until a question in the dark wakes him up.
"You tried too?" Jin asks. "To wipe it away?"
"Yeah." Kame's throat feels like he swallowed the sponge once Jin was done with it. "I thought there was this other layer, this contaminated shell, and if I managed to scrape it all off I could be me again. I was bleeding by the time I realised I'd been me all along - a "me" I didn't know very well yet and wasn't sure about, but someone I thought I could learn to live with in time."
"What made you realise that?"
Kame can hear Jin moving around on the mattress, rolling over to face him. The increased proximity doesn't make what he's about to say any easier. "There was...someone I liked. A guy. I felt happier just being around him. I really looked up to him, thought he was amazing - and very, very attractive. Crushing on him felt better than with girls even though I had to keep it a secret."
"How old were you?"
"Old enough. I nursed my feelings for a few years, and it was okay because it didn't feel real, you know? Like I had this special loophole that meant I didn't have to think about it too much."
"So what happened? Did you ever tell him?" Jin sounds livelier than he has since before they left the restaurant, finally interested in something outside his own problems.
"No. I knew nothing would ever come of it, and things were...complicated." Kame smiles to himself, thinking in hindsight that the complications back then were nothing compared to what's happening now. "I started feeling attracted to someone else, and that's when I realised this wasn't a special case - that I actually liked guys. Not just in a 'Wow, he's so cool! I want to hang out with him!' kind of way, but in an 'I can see myself kissing him' way too.
"That's when I started feeling bad about it. I didn't have anyone to tell me it was okay, that I wasn't doing anything wrong. I felt terrified that if anyone found out, my career would be over and I'd somehow alienate my entire family and all my friends."
"You're a lot more lax about that now," Jin says. "I saw that magazine where you said you were gay, only everyone thought you were joking."
"I don't think it would come as a surprise to anyone now, but my manager would still kill me," Kame says, shuddering at the thought of the lecture he knows he'd receive.
"If that's when you started feeling bad, then...?"
"What made me feel better? I thought about that crush again." Kame thinks it's a good thing Jin can't see him blushing in the dark. This is nothing if not embarrassing. "I couldn't see how caring for someone could possibly be a bad thing. I wasn't hurting anyone, and I was happy."
"Even though he didn't know?"
"Even then. At the time, it was more important that I felt okay about liking him. I tried to hold on to that feeling afterwards so I could accept myself for who I was."
Jin's silent for a moment; Kame holds his breath and hopes this doesn't mean he's putting two and two together, because coming up with four in the middle of the night isn't going to help either of them.
Thankfully, all he says is, "Your bedtime stories need work."
Flippancy is a marked improvement on despondency. "You're turning twenty-seven tomorrow," Kame says. "Aren't you too old for bedtime stories?"
"I'm a child at heart."
That's sort of true. For all Jin's questionable lyrics and seductive dances, his heart remains pure. It's one of the reasons Kame treasures him.
-----
Kame has work the next day and slips out early in his borrowed clothes, before Jin's even awake. He thinks it's safe to do so now.
They see each other later that night, at the party Jin's friends have thrown for him. All of KAT-TUN are there, primarily so they can see his face when he opens Ueda's present. It turns out not to be lingerie, as threatened, but women's perfume. Ryo speculates on whether Ueda got his months mixed up and it's actually a gift for Kame. Ueda refuses to say.
Gift vouchers from Koki and Nakamaru join the pile, along with a box that Yamapi says Jin should open later. Junno gave his previously, since he could hardly give Jin a handbag in front of everyone else, and Jin says Kame did too.
But Kame hasn't given him his proper birthday gift yet. That's still in the pocket of his blazer, which he accidentally left on the back of Jin's couch.
The next day, the day before Jin leaves for the US, he stops by Kame's apartment to return it.
"For someone who spent the night partying you look remarkably well," Kame says when he answers the door.
"I couldn't drink much. Ryo kept needling me about the perfume and I didn't want to let something slip by accident." Jin hands over the blazer. "Here. You left this at my place the other night."
"Thanks." Kame steps back from the doorway so Jin can enter.
"I can't stay long; I have to go find my passport."
Kame smirks. "With the amount of travelling you do, I'd have thought it would be permanently in your wallet."
"You might be on to something." Jin checks inside his wallet and grins. "Found it."
"Now you've got time to pack the rest of your stuff. Don't fly off with just your underwear this time!"
"Yes, Boss." Jin perches on the arm of the couch. "Um...Kame?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you for the other night."
"Did it help?"
"Honestly?" Jin shrugs. "I don't know. But I don't feel like I need to shed my skin right now, and that's better than nothing. The dress was...it was an interesting experiment, but I don't think it's right for me. It's a step further over the line than I want to go."
"At least something good came out of the whole fiasco if you managed to figure that out," Kame says, extremely pleased with this turn of events. "That's what this is all about - discovering what works for you. You'd better warn your mum, though, unless you want another dress for Christmas."
"I told her this morning. I think I ruined all her plans for mother-son shopping trips."
"If you stick to accessories you'll be okay. Most of yours are girly enough anyway."
"Most of the accessories in Japan are girly," Jin points out.
"You could get some in America?"
"Actually...uh...I thought I might try out a few things while I'm in the US. Maybe do myself up a little and hit a couple of clubs where no one knows me."
Kame couldn't be more proud. He reaches into the blazer's pocket and pulls out a tiny giftwrapped package. "Then here's something to wear while you're there. Happy birthday, Jin."
He'd wrapped the box in black and white paper and tied it with a red ribbon, so that it matched Jin's outfit from the other night. Jin tugs the bow with glee and has the paper off in seconds. His face freezes when he opens the box, though.
"Kame..."
"It's symbolic," Kame explains. "You're slowly emerging from your Abercrombie & Fitch hooded chrysalis and spreading your wings to become a beautiful butterfly."
The red and gold brooch stands out like a sunrise when he pins it to Jin's black T-shirt; fierce as fire and twice as beautiful. Jin will be an amazing yellow gold butterfly one day: Kame knows it like he knows the lyrics to 'Kizuna'.
"Just be careful when you're in America, okay?" he warns Jin. "Don't do anything too crazy."
Jin flashes him one of those brilliant, true smiles that make models weep with envy, and catches him up in a hug. "You watch yourself too. I don't want to come back and find you've started dating some random jerk because I'm not taking up all your time anymore."
Kame squeezes tight, happy to be holding Jin for once when nobody's upset and they're both looking to the future with hope in their eyes. "I promise to screen all prospective boyfriends very carefully," he says. "I'll make them send me a résumé and copies of their financial records."
"That settles it." Jin sounds terribly self-satisfied. "No one in Japan can afford to have you as a boyfriend."
Kame draws back enough to meet Jin's eyes, but not enough to let go. Soon they'll have an ocean between them. "Then I'll just have to look overseas, won't I?"
On to transJinder #3 - First Times and Curious Crimes