fic: Shifting Currents (2/2)
Breaking down Kanzaki’s walls is a lengthy and exhausting process. He’s the devoted kind, emotionally clinging to the little lights in his life although his uncertainty makes him back away in order to protect all of those involved. Would Natsu be any less insistent and stubborn, they wouldn’t get anywhere. He calls the man’s house phone often and drops by at the man’s apartment when Kanzaki isn’t particularly articulate or when he’s seriously attempting to avoid him. Natsu has never been good at giving up.
“Why do you do this?” Kanzaki enquires. He’s serious - slightly timid and avoidant. Natsu hands him a glass bottle of beer and takes a long swig from his own drink. He sucks his lips thoughtfully before he answers.
“I care. It just happened.”
“Strange,” Kanzaki sighs and lets Natsu glances at him. They’re walking on the streets around Natsu’s local area. Kanzaki’s been awfully quiet again, but his aura is quite pleasant. It’s a tad bit nervous in the curious kind of way. It pulls on Natsu’s heartstrings.
He bumps Kanzaki’s shoulder with his elbow a little, making him turn his head to look at him. Natsu wonders what he sees in him, what goes through his head. He looks so thoughtful.
In the end, Kanzaki resorts to taking a big gulp of alcohol to drown his confusion. It makes Natsu want to get a little closer, but he doesn’t dare to risk it. Maybe after Kanzaki’s done with the bottle. He briefly wonders how well Kanzaki actually handles his liquor.
“That night when I had been drinking…” Kanzaki finally mumbles with his gaze firmly set at his feet, “did I really… Do you know if I really had sex and...?”
His voice fades out. Natsu keeps staring at him. He feels oddly warm. So warm, in fact, that he can almost distort the horrible memories of that night in his mind. White lies… when they’re well-intended, they aren’t really so bad. Not in his opinion.
“Yeah,” he croaks. “Why do you ask? Can’t see it?” He takes a longer swig from his bottle. It’s one of the things he’s afraid of… that Kanzaki really can’t even consider ever doing it with a man. That he really is straight to the bone.
“I just… didn’t expect it, I guess,” Kanzaki mumbles awkwardly. He avoids looking Natsu in the eye. “Truth be told, I haven’t… It’s been a while, even with a woman. I don’t really…”
Natsu accidentally spits some of the beer in his mouth out. Kanzaki flushes red and finally glares at him like he’s horribly offending him or something. Natsu can’t hold back a smirk.
“You don’t really have much sex?” he exclaims in surprise. The fact that his sex life has been less busy lately isn’t really crucial to the discussion. “You’re deprived?”
“Oh shut it…”
It becomes quiet again as Kanzaki avoids him. Natsu can’t help humming to himself and grinning. His heart is beating seriously hard. He’s kind of afraid that Kanzaki will hear it. He wonders if the younger man gets any funny sensations like this with him.
At one point, Natsu isn’t able to fight back anymore. He extends his hand a little and enlaces their fingers firmly. He refuses to let Kanzaki tug his hand away and looks at him a bit pleadingly. Kanzaki’s hand is warm and rough. It makes his heart race even more anxiously if possible.
“Come over,” he offers with a hoarse voice. Kanzaki is uneasy. He doesn’t know. Natsu can’t blame him. He pulls the man a little closer. The streets aren’t very busy around here. “I told you to let me think when you don’t know. I’ll make it good. I’ll be nice. I promise.”
“I don’t know,” Kanzaki still tries to resist a little. He grimaces, shrugs and lowers his head shamefully. “I feel too agitated to just… It’s freaky. With my condition,” he mumbles. “Even if it’s casual. You leave my sight and then you come back and… it’s just…”
“I’ll get around it,” Natsu promises firmly. His heart is pounding so fast and Kanzaki’s hand feels slippery in his hold. “I’ll make it good for you.”
He doesn’t know how Kanzaki feels. Half an hour later, when he makes him sit down on the edge of his bed and binds his eyes carefully with a black strip of fabric, Kanzaki holds onto his wrists lightly. He pushes the man down, lets him map his body carefully with his hands, thumbs massaging circles over his cheekbones and the heels of his palms sliding over his shoulders. “I’m here for you,” he whispers breathlessly to Kanzaki and kisses his lips, hungry and sweet.
Kanzaki is the type to indulge in making sweaty and clingy love. His muscles quiver at Natsu’s touch and his lips part into soundless cries when Natsu embraces him desperately. He lets Natsu call him Hiroto, responds to it helplessly and pulls him into a rewarding kiss with his fingers tangled in the curly locks of Natsu’s hair.
“Hiroto,” Natsu groans into the man’s ear and feels him shiver underneath him, hands guiding him at his sides. He’s uneasy, tight and nervous, but it’s not so bad. It’s working. Like this, Natsu thinks, they’re both finally blooming. It’s a disturbing thought, since he doesn’t really see himself as the blooming kind of guy.
His heart is still hammering and his skin feels prickly in his post-coital afterglow. He hugs the body in front of him closer, buries his nose in the man’s clammy nape and breathes in the sharp, metallic scent. Hiroto is quiet and motionless on the sheets, his eyes still covered with the velvety strip of black fabric. Natsu presses his lips behind the man’s ear and gives him a lazy kiss. He feels giddy at the goose bumps his action seems to cause, the tiny jolt of the muscled shoulders.
It’s scary to be so helplessly vulnerable with the man. When he had first approached him, this hadn’t exactly been what he’d had in mind. His problem is that once he’s stuck on someone, it’s difficult to cut himself loose.
He snakes his arms around Hiroto’s body and takes a moment to enjoy the feel of his flushed and naked skin. The man in his arms turns over and crawls closer against him, buries his face in Natsu’s neck and presses his palm flat against his chest.
“We should stop this,” Hiroto croaks quietly. His voice comes out muffled but Natsu catches his words anyway, grimaces and tightens his hold. “Before we get more attached.”
“What, you don’t want to be with me?” Natsu scoffs coldly. It’s an instant reaction to rejection - his blood is boiling, palms sweating and there’s a hurricane roaming around his brains. He wants to pin Hiroto down, keep him still and force him until he clings to him with just as much strength as he does. Truth be told, he’s lonely. His pursuits always end up one-sided, no matter how much effort he puts into it, how much of a gentleman he can be about his approaches. None of it ever matters.
“It’s not -”
“Is it because I’m not your ex-wife?” he laughs bitterly and Hiroto’s muscles stiffen. He’s scared, but that must be because he’s hit a nerve now. It’s not like it wouldn’t be blaringly obvious. “I’m just some substitute, since we look kind of alike in the face, don’t we? You like that. It’s the only reason why you’d want to be with me.”
“That’s not -” Hiroto tries to defend himself, but he doesn’t really have an explanation for it himself. “It’s not that. I’m not… that… How do you even know how my ex-wife looks?”
“You have her picture in your wallet,” Natsu accuses him. The number one sign of someone who hasn’t been able to let go. He’s such an idiot.
“When did you go through my wallet?”
“After I had sex with you that night after the bar and you passed out,” Natsu confesses crudely and rolls over Hiroto. He ignores the resistance he’s met with. Hiroto squirms and attempts to push him off but he refuses to budge. He isn’t going to go anywhere.
“Let go. You’re bruising me!”
“SHUT UP!” Natsu rages, spit flying out of his mouth and landing on Hiroto’s cooling, sweaty skin. He chuckles darkly and leans forward, feels Hiroto’s shallow breath against his face and grits his teeth together. He’s starting to tremble with fury.
“She’s not mourning after you like you’re doing for her,” he growls threateningly, content about the knowledge he’s acquired. He’s not quite sure why he wants to hurt Hiroto so much. It probably has something to do with the overwhelming pain the man is inflecting on him, but he understands that he’s being plain cruel in comparison. “She’s already cast you aside and moved on. She doesn’t want you. You’re divorced. She’s already got a new man. I saw them, I even have a picture if you want to see!”
Hiroto yanks his arms furiously. He looks angry, lost and scared beneath Natsu, trapped like a mere toy. “How would you know? It’s none of your business. Let me go.”
His voice is shaky and it makes Natsu’s chest swell with guilt. He presses himself helplessly against the man, buries his face in his neck, breathes in the musky scent and trembles. This isn’t what he wants. This was definitely not what he wanted. He’s screwed everything up… again.
“I want you to look at me,” he murmurs anxiously, his voice a mere desperate croak. “You need to look at me. I want you to look at my face.”
“No,” Hiroto resists immediately and jerks beneath him, unable to break away. “Not now.”
“I’ll take it off. The blindfold,” Natsu threatens as he withdraws a bit, pressing Hiroto harder against the mattress from his wrists. Hiroto’s breathing speeds up in panic and he tosses his head to the side, avoidant.
“Don’t you dare to do that.”
“I want you to look at me!” Natsu rages. When he removes his hand from one of Hiroto’s wrists to yank on the blindfold, the man’s free hand shoots up in panic to punch him. It hurts but it doesn’t matter, and Hiroto’s functioning with one sense less.
When he removes the blindfold, Hiroto’s eyes are squeezed shut. He’s trembling and quiet, all muscles rigid. His free arm flies to rest over his eyes and Natsu sees the gravity of his complex, the fear he has towards himself.
It doesn’t stop him.
“Wasn’t the point to look at me anyway?” he chuckles unhappily as he starts struggling to remove Hiroto’s protective hands from his face. “I’m not all that important. I could be anyone to you. It didn’t even matter if there were many of me, if all of the Natsus you slept with were imposters, because they were all just substitutes for your ex-wife. So look at me, you shit-head!”
“That’s not true,” Hiroto insists, borderline teary. “Don’t do this. P-please. At least leave the room first.”
“I won’t,” Natsu rejects his demand and grabs Hiroto’s face in his hands, pulls it close and uses his opportunity when one of the man’s hands shoots against the mattress to offer him support. He forces one of Hiroto’s eyes open.
The man stops resisting and goes quiet. Natsu presses him down again, brushes away the blindfold from the sheets and tries to kiss him, but Hiroto turns his head away. Natsu snorts coldly and swipes the younger man’s fringe off his face.
“Look at me,” he demands and Hiroto does, the look in his eyes betrayed and angry. “Nothing has changed about my face. Nothing. So stop fucking around.”
“Get off me,” Hiroto demands, his voice calm and cold. This time, Natsu obeys him. He rolls off and watches as Hiroto sits up, worn, bruised and distant, sits at the very edge of the bed and starts picking his clothes up from the floor.
He’s going to leave him too. They’re over.
“It’s not my fault,” Hiroto croaks quietly. He sounds depressed and he doesn’t turn around as he speaks. Doesn’t want to look at Natsu. “I can’t explain it. I told you that the doctors think it’s neurological. I can’t help it. If I could, I would.”
“I don’t care.” He does, but he doesn’t, and it’s a strange feeling. He just can’t sort out his head. “I don’t care if you think there are ten, twenty, thirty or a hundred versions of me. I’d make you love each one of them. They’d all be for you.”
“I’m not that intriguing,” Hiroto mumbles as he gets up and pulls his jeans on. Natsu doesn’t want him to go. The mere thought makes his chest feel pressured. It’s a painful sensation. “And I don’t work like that. I can’t give my heart to more than one person at a time. It’s futile.”
“I want you.” Futile. Hiroto already has his shirt on but he’s hesitating. It doesn’t matter, though. They always hesitate. No matter how hard he tries, Natsu can’t bind them to him.
In the end, Hiroto never answers him. He picks his bag up from the floor, pulls his jacket on and leaves the room. Leaves the apartment. After only a brief moment, the sound of his footsteps is gone.
Natsu doesn’t get out of bed. The silence is suffocating, and so is the metallic and oily scent absorbed in the sheets.
--
A month passes. He endures a long and meaningless month of his manager bitching at him for being unproductive and unmotivated. There are a few one night stands who come and go, and a notable amount of bitch slaps and sleazy girls who try to come onto him and make him feel nauseous.
He watches the video with Asako a few times. Stares at the screen expressionlessly, not feeling anything other than how hollow he really is inside. Somehow the ugly scene reminds himself of his worth, of himself - hadn’t she told him how similar they were, how she hated seeing herself in him?
Well, now he feels like he can relate to her awful feeling. He’d rather not, though.
There’s nothing left of Hiroto in his life. Not a picture, nor an article of clothing. Even the factory smell imprinted on him is gone now. Only the memories remain, the bottomless remorse and yearning. He can’t make himself feel better. Not that he was really trying.
He’s staggering home from a bar when he catches a figure leaning against the bridge railing. He’s illuminated by the pale yellow light from the streetlamps. He’s got a cigarette between his fingers and smoke rises languidly from his nostrils. He looks like he’s trapped somewhere far away as the black skyline stretches out in front of him.
For a moment, Natsu wonders if he wants to jump into the depths of the cold water and get whisked away by its strong current. Right afterwards he wonders if he does.
Then he recognizes the hunched figure. There’s the familiar crooked nose and curvy lips that he’s spent weeks longing for. His heart traitorously skips a beat and he fishes a cigarette from his own pocket as he approaches the person nonchalantly. There’s no rule that tells him not to.
“Can I join you?” he asks Hiroto when he reaches him. The younger man startles briefly and stares at him, taking in the sight of his face. Natsu fights the anxiousness and ruffles his hair. Hiroto looks lost. “I will then,” he decides on it himself before the man has the time to answer. “I didn’t know you smoke.”
“…I always have,” Hiroto finally mumbles as he tears his gaze away and looks at the Cosmo Clock 21 Ferris Wheel in the distance. He looks unimaginably tired, almost as if he’d be nearing his breaking point. “Ever since I was a teenager. I tried to cut back when I was married and Nao got pregnant but… I guess I’m picking up the old habit now that things have changed.”
“Hmm,” Natsu acknowledges him and leans his back against the railing. The wind is chilly but soft. It makes the hair flutter away from Hiroto’s face. He has to hold his own away while he takes a drag from his smoke.
It’s silent for a long while. Just Hiroto’s presence is enough for now. He can breathe and feel the tingling in his body, and he doesn’t really want this to end, doesn’t want them to go their separate ways. He doesn’t know how Hiroto feels or what he’s thinking. He’s not sure if his presence makes Hiroto feel anything.
“You said you saw her,” Hiroto speaks brokenly, his head shamefully lowered. “That you had a picture of her with another man. Was it true or did you just say that?”
Natsu turns his head, faces Hiroto’s mournful face. Hiroto looks him in the eye, desperately clinging to the hope. What kind of hope, Natsu isn’t quite sure.
“I wasn’t lying,” Natsu grimaces and breathes in the smoke from his cigarette. Hiroto’s shoulders tremble. He doubts it’s due to the cold. The summer nights aren’t so bad. “He kissed her.” Forehead, but it’s basically the same thing. There wasn’t really any question with their body language.
Hiroto flicks his cigarette off the edge. The tiny light fades away into the blackness. The light from the post lamps makes the tears in Hiroto’s eyes strikingly visible. He looks like a wreck. “I just can’t believe it,” he murmurs shakily, pressing his knuckles against his lips. “She hasn’t said anything.”
Natsu uneasily takes a deep breath of fresh air. He extends his arm and wraps it around Hiroto’s shoulder, pulls him comfortingly closer. It makes a lone tear escape from his eye. “D-do you have the picture?” Hiroto enquires, trying to act calm although he’s everything but. “Or did you delete it?”
“I have it,” Natsu mumbles and pulls his phone from his pocket. Their closeness is making his heart pound painfully, fast and hard. He’s grinding his teeth together to contain himself while Hiroto looks at the picture on his phone’s screen, silent and disbelieving.
“It looks like her. But it might not be her,” Hiroto attempts to insist faintly. “I haven’t seen the jacket. It could be just a trick.”
“Didn’t you already say that you aren’t insane?” Natsu snarls as he takes the phone away from the younger man and stuffs it back in his pocket. “There was a woman in that picture. A woman who looks just like your ex-wife. Your daughter was there too. You can recognize them. They’re so similar it’s impossible for them to be anyone else. No one is after you, no one is trying to screw you over with any replicas. It’s your family with another man. That man is a substitute. Not your family.”
Hiroto turns his head away and hides behind his fringe. He must be thinking that too, must know how logical he is, even if his brains are trying to fight against him. It would be easier for him if he could just believe. It’s tragic that he can’t.
“It can’t be my wife,” Hiroto cries. He’s hiccupping quietly, far from attractive and manly. “She’s just gone. Everything is so lifelike, but she’s just not around anymore.”
Natsu drops his cigarette, stomps it and pulls Hiroto into a tight hug. He strokes his back and hair, listens to his sobbing and keeps him up on his feet. He can’t stop himself from pressing a kiss on the top of his head, hugging him so close it hurts and feeling an inkling of hope in the air.
“I’m alright with you not being sure if I’m the person you’re with,” he chokes out and realises that he’s teary himself. He takes Hiroto’s face in his hands and draws it back from his shoulder so that Hiroto can look at him, his eyes wide like a deer’s, bloodshot and swollen. He can’t stand getting separated from this person. Not anymore. “Look at me. You know what I look like. It doesn’t matter if it’s really me or not. It’s still someone who’s attempting to be me, to play my part in your life. I can love you or I can screw you over, but I could do that all by myself as well. It doesn’t matter if you think there are a million versions of me constantly switching and taking turns in being with you. They all want to be with you. So please, just accept them,” he whimpers hopelessly and clings to Hiroto’s shoulders. “Please.”
“I cause too much pain,” Hiroto chuckles unhappily. “My wife who loved me more than anything in the world divorced me. I wasn’t safe. I’m a bad influence for my own baby girl.”
“I don’t care,” Natsu threatens him and presses his face closer, keeps Hiroto still and unable to back away. “I’m not a very good choice myself.”
Hiroto closes his eyes. He raises his shaky hands to brush Natsu’s face, take in the feel of it. He bites back a sob and presses their foreheads together in a way that makes Natsu’s heart jump to his throat.
“I like this you,” Hiroto cries tiredly. “You always come to find me.”
Natsu kisses him, desperately and sweetly. Hiroto clings to him helplessly and cries. He still doesn’t look very convinced.
--
He strums his guitar absently as his manager has a heated argument with the music producer. He doesn’t really care much - butting in never did a thing to him, and his manager has made it crystal clear that it’s better if he just shuts up and doesn’t make things any worse. He doesn’t really take all of her words to heart, but their argument is uninteresting compared to music.
It’s a sad yet soft tune, a heartfelt one. He’s been caught up in it for a few weeks now, sitting on his bed and trying it out, changing it, developing it. He hums silently to the melody with his eyes closed, foot tapping the beat to the floor.
He’s thinking too much again. Difficult love has an effect like that on him. He thinks of Hiroto, his tragedy, his inability to distinguish his loved ones. He’s a sad and lonely being, Natsu knows, in his head abandoned by his dearest, and in practice unable to give them what they deserve. Hiroto can’t express his strong feelings about people face-to-face.
“Can you stop it and stay quiet?” Yukari, the manager, snaps at him. She looks like she’s developing a splitting headache. Natsu sighs, cocks his head in boredom and tries to resist the urge to pluck on the guitar strings while the argument goes over his head without a word getting processed by his brains.
After a while he’s humming the tune again, muttering lyrical bits to himself, fingers tapping a rhythm to the wooden case of his guitar. Eventually, the argument ends, probably not at the conclusion his manager would’ve liked. Yukari glares at him and almost smacks the guitar off his hands, startling him.
“Can’t you at least compose something we can actually sell? You’re getting too deep again,” she nags at him. Natsu scoffs and goes back to properly strumming his guitar. She lets out a bitchy sigh in defeat, clanks her heels and storms out of the room.
Natsu sulks and ignores the nagging feeling in his head as he returns to composing. He didn’t become a musician to tailor his songs for other people’s tastes.
--
Hiroto sits on the passenger’s seat with a simple black eye mask on his face. Natsu snorts a little as he throws his guitar to the backseat and hops on the driver’s seat. Hiroto is smiling at him. He knows the sound of Natsu’s snort.
“Aren’t you a little early with that?” Natsu questions him humouredly and Hiroto laughs. The engine makes a loud noise and the car jolts a little when Natsu turns the key in the socket. Hiroto doesn’t let him drive off the curb before leaning in for a soft kiss. Natsu can’t help breaking into a smile.
“You’re so cheesy,” he accuses him, not that he’d really mind. Hiroto hums in agreement and leans back against the headrest, just listening. Natsu turns the radio on but allows Hiroto to turn the volume down. “You’re boring,” he complains half-heartedly. Hiroto hums again, and when Natsu glances at him briefly as he finally starts driving, he’s smiling contently and at peace. It’s a beautiful sight.
“You’re smiling,” Hiroto notes randomly, stretching his neck a little.
“Haa?” Natsu objects in surprise - he was, but it’s not like Hiroto could really have caught him in action.
The man is grinning widely beside him. “You made that noise. You let out a breath a bit louder through your nose when you smile.”
“Creep,” Natsu scoffs. “I do not. I wasn’t smiling.”
“Sure you weren’t,” Hiroto hums without arguing further.
They’re settling down more comfortably that Natsu ever dared to expect. He might’ve lived for over forty years, but this is probably the closest he’s ever gotten to an actually serious relationship. It’s nerving and he isn’t always quite sure how to go about it. It’s good that one of them has some experience to take the lead.
Hiroto wordlessly fumbles for his hand. Natsu glances at him briefly, careful with the traffic. He takes it in his hand and smiles. Hiroto chuckles. There’s a warm feeling coiling in his stomach. “It’s nice like this,” Hiroto sighs languidly. “When I can be sure.”
“Keep that attitude up,” Natsu snarls as he turns at an intersection. “God knows the things I’d want to do to you when you get back from your ex-wife’s house. I’m possessive, you know. I don’t share.”
“My daughter is there,” Hiroto reminds him calmly. “I won’t miss a meeting with her. I’m still her father. I want to be there for her when she grows up.”
“Which is why I let you go in the first place,” Natsu scoffs and tries hard to keep his attention on the road. Hiroto sighs and squeezes his hand reassuringly. He doesn’t mean anything bad with this. He can’t help his heart. Natsu’s just… still going to take a while to worm his way fully in. It’s not going so badly.
The drive is mostly silent, but it’s not a heavy one. It’s somehow good like this. Moments like these let him regain his confidence in comparison to the moments when Hiroto can’t help but mutter some absurd nonsense about ‘the other one’ doing this or that better or the accusations of just screwing him over and not loving him like the others do. It’s still sometimes a bit difficult to fully comprehend that Hiroto really isn’t insane.
He demands a kiss before he lets Hiroto hop off the vehicle. It’s sweet and brief, with a little more initiative from himself, but he’ll deal. Hiroto ruffles his hair as he heads off. Natsu studies his back profile as he makes his way towards the house, blindly but smoothly. He’s used to this.
“Jerk,” Natsu mumbles to himself grumpily as he digs out his guitar and musical notebook from the backseat, lights himself a cigarette and starts killing boredom. He’ll probably have quite a few hours to waste. His own fault for insisting on staying.
It’s good to be composing again. His tunes have been turning soft, vulnerable and melodic lately. It’s probably because of the love bug he’s managed to get bitten by. The car slowly fills with the strong smell of the smoke, but it’s pleasant and familiar. It’s good to have something to calm him down in a strange and new situation.
He plays his guitar absently and scribbles down notes to the little booklet when he comes up with something he quite likes. Time feels slow when he’s just forced to sit here like this and he’s constantly distracted, but it’s not so bad. He’ll deal. He understands that this has to be done. He just doesn’t like the fact that Hiroto still clearly harbours some kind of feelings for his ex-wife.
Speaking of the ex-wife, there’s a knock on the window that startles him. He puts out his cigarette to the ashtray between the benches and rolls the window down, heart pounding painfully in his chest. The situation is absurd - why is Tsukioka Nao standing beside his car when she’s supposed to be spending time with Hiroto indoors?
“Um,” Natsu mumbles stupidly. “Hello.”
“Hello,” the woman greets him politely and bows her head a little. “I couldn’t help noticing you. You drove Hiroto here, didn’t you?” she enquires and Natsu tries to nod a bit evasively. He never really expected to have to deal with this situation. He kind of feels like the first impression she’s getting of him isn’t going to be the best, but at least she’s smiling a bit now. “Would you like to come inside? I can offer you some tea. It looks like Mika isn’t going to let him go anytime soon. You don’t have to,” she decides to clarify with a hint of a grin. “I just thought I’d offer.”
“…Can I?” Natsu mumbles, feeling a bit taken aback. “I won’t be a bother?”
“I’m sure Mika would like to see some of her father’s friends as well,” she nods. “Some old friends come by every now and then but that’s it, really. Besides, I have something I’d like to discuss with Hiroto,” she sighs. “It’d be… good to keep her distracted.”
“I can come,” Natsu agrees right away. He hops out of the car with his guitar and glances at the case on the backseat uneasily. “Can I take this with me?” he asks. “It’s a bit expensive to just leave it lying around.”
“Sure, no problem,” Nao nods. She slams the car door shut and Natsu locks it before taking a look at the family house which is quite different in comparison to Hiroto’s tiny and minimalistic apartment. She leads him inside and instructs him to leave his shoes in the foyer. He obeys and feels nervous as he glances around uneasily. He wonders if Hiroto used to live in this house.
When Natsu catches a glimpse of Hiroto on the couch with Mika on his lap, blabbering away about school and whatnot, he finally understands the odd yearning and possessiveness. He wants to be a part of this. It’s ridiculous, beginning to want a family past the age of forty, but some people get hit by the family bug a little late, he assumes. Hiroto wasn’t late.
“Thank you for having me,” he mumbles humbly and Hiroto’s head snaps in his direction. Nao has hurried towards the kitchen so Natsu makes his way to the couch, sitting down beside the pair.
“Is that a guitar? Can you play?!” Mika exclaims excitedly while pointing a finger at him.
“I sure can,” Natsu assures her with a smile.
Hiroto is quiet, recovering from the shock. “Nao invited me in,” Natsu explains. “She wants to talk to you,” he continues more softly and sees the muscles on the man’s face strain a little. “I’ll be here. I can look after her,” he offers gently. Hiroto nods absently and gets up with the girl in his arms before setting her on his feet, kneeling down to ask for a peck and ruffling her hair.
“I’ll be right back,” Hiroto promises to both of them. “Natsu is very good with the guitar,” he tells Mika with an adorable baby-voice and points at the man. “I’m sure he can play you some song you like.”
“Yay!” she squeals and climbs back on the couch. Her eyes are shiny and full of naivety which is admirable given her family’s condition. Natsu watches worriedly as Hiroto heads towards the kitchen.
He doesn’t hear from the two of them for a while. Instead, he sits on the couch with an adorable little girl on his lap and plays parts of children’s songs and a few of his own pieces to the curious girl who looks far more interested in the guitar than in himself. He has an inkling feeling what is taking so long in the kitchen. It’s about time.
When Hiroto will come back, he’ll be here. He’ll take him home, let him cry against his chest and support him when he finally really has to move on.
It’s not only an ending. It’s a beginning as well, and he’s determined to make it as beautiful as he can, given the conditions. They’ll pull through. There’s always a tomorrow waiting for them right around the corner.
“Why do you do this?” Kanzaki enquires. He’s serious - slightly timid and avoidant. Natsu hands him a glass bottle of beer and takes a long swig from his own drink. He sucks his lips thoughtfully before he answers.
“I care. It just happened.”
“Strange,” Kanzaki sighs and lets Natsu glances at him. They’re walking on the streets around Natsu’s local area. Kanzaki’s been awfully quiet again, but his aura is quite pleasant. It’s a tad bit nervous in the curious kind of way. It pulls on Natsu’s heartstrings.
He bumps Kanzaki’s shoulder with his elbow a little, making him turn his head to look at him. Natsu wonders what he sees in him, what goes through his head. He looks so thoughtful.
In the end, Kanzaki resorts to taking a big gulp of alcohol to drown his confusion. It makes Natsu want to get a little closer, but he doesn’t dare to risk it. Maybe after Kanzaki’s done with the bottle. He briefly wonders how well Kanzaki actually handles his liquor.
“That night when I had been drinking…” Kanzaki finally mumbles with his gaze firmly set at his feet, “did I really… Do you know if I really had sex and...?”
His voice fades out. Natsu keeps staring at him. He feels oddly warm. So warm, in fact, that he can almost distort the horrible memories of that night in his mind. White lies… when they’re well-intended, they aren’t really so bad. Not in his opinion.
“Yeah,” he croaks. “Why do you ask? Can’t see it?” He takes a longer swig from his bottle. It’s one of the things he’s afraid of… that Kanzaki really can’t even consider ever doing it with a man. That he really is straight to the bone.
“I just… didn’t expect it, I guess,” Kanzaki mumbles awkwardly. He avoids looking Natsu in the eye. “Truth be told, I haven’t… It’s been a while, even with a woman. I don’t really…”
Natsu accidentally spits some of the beer in his mouth out. Kanzaki flushes red and finally glares at him like he’s horribly offending him or something. Natsu can’t hold back a smirk.
“You don’t really have much sex?” he exclaims in surprise. The fact that his sex life has been less busy lately isn’t really crucial to the discussion. “You’re deprived?”
“Oh shut it…”
It becomes quiet again as Kanzaki avoids him. Natsu can’t help humming to himself and grinning. His heart is beating seriously hard. He’s kind of afraid that Kanzaki will hear it. He wonders if the younger man gets any funny sensations like this with him.
At one point, Natsu isn’t able to fight back anymore. He extends his hand a little and enlaces their fingers firmly. He refuses to let Kanzaki tug his hand away and looks at him a bit pleadingly. Kanzaki’s hand is warm and rough. It makes his heart race even more anxiously if possible.
“Come over,” he offers with a hoarse voice. Kanzaki is uneasy. He doesn’t know. Natsu can’t blame him. He pulls the man a little closer. The streets aren’t very busy around here. “I told you to let me think when you don’t know. I’ll make it good. I’ll be nice. I promise.”
“I don’t know,” Kanzaki still tries to resist a little. He grimaces, shrugs and lowers his head shamefully. “I feel too agitated to just… It’s freaky. With my condition,” he mumbles. “Even if it’s casual. You leave my sight and then you come back and… it’s just…”
“I’ll get around it,” Natsu promises firmly. His heart is pounding so fast and Kanzaki’s hand feels slippery in his hold. “I’ll make it good for you.”
He doesn’t know how Kanzaki feels. Half an hour later, when he makes him sit down on the edge of his bed and binds his eyes carefully with a black strip of fabric, Kanzaki holds onto his wrists lightly. He pushes the man down, lets him map his body carefully with his hands, thumbs massaging circles over his cheekbones and the heels of his palms sliding over his shoulders. “I’m here for you,” he whispers breathlessly to Kanzaki and kisses his lips, hungry and sweet.
Kanzaki is the type to indulge in making sweaty and clingy love. His muscles quiver at Natsu’s touch and his lips part into soundless cries when Natsu embraces him desperately. He lets Natsu call him Hiroto, responds to it helplessly and pulls him into a rewarding kiss with his fingers tangled in the curly locks of Natsu’s hair.
“Hiroto,” Natsu groans into the man’s ear and feels him shiver underneath him, hands guiding him at his sides. He’s uneasy, tight and nervous, but it’s not so bad. It’s working. Like this, Natsu thinks, they’re both finally blooming. It’s a disturbing thought, since he doesn’t really see himself as the blooming kind of guy.
His heart is still hammering and his skin feels prickly in his post-coital afterglow. He hugs the body in front of him closer, buries his nose in the man’s clammy nape and breathes in the sharp, metallic scent. Hiroto is quiet and motionless on the sheets, his eyes still covered with the velvety strip of black fabric. Natsu presses his lips behind the man’s ear and gives him a lazy kiss. He feels giddy at the goose bumps his action seems to cause, the tiny jolt of the muscled shoulders.
It’s scary to be so helplessly vulnerable with the man. When he had first approached him, this hadn’t exactly been what he’d had in mind. His problem is that once he’s stuck on someone, it’s difficult to cut himself loose.
He snakes his arms around Hiroto’s body and takes a moment to enjoy the feel of his flushed and naked skin. The man in his arms turns over and crawls closer against him, buries his face in Natsu’s neck and presses his palm flat against his chest.
“We should stop this,” Hiroto croaks quietly. His voice comes out muffled but Natsu catches his words anyway, grimaces and tightens his hold. “Before we get more attached.”
“What, you don’t want to be with me?” Natsu scoffs coldly. It’s an instant reaction to rejection - his blood is boiling, palms sweating and there’s a hurricane roaming around his brains. He wants to pin Hiroto down, keep him still and force him until he clings to him with just as much strength as he does. Truth be told, he’s lonely. His pursuits always end up one-sided, no matter how much effort he puts into it, how much of a gentleman he can be about his approaches. None of it ever matters.
“It’s not -”
“Is it because I’m not your ex-wife?” he laughs bitterly and Hiroto’s muscles stiffen. He’s scared, but that must be because he’s hit a nerve now. It’s not like it wouldn’t be blaringly obvious. “I’m just some substitute, since we look kind of alike in the face, don’t we? You like that. It’s the only reason why you’d want to be with me.”
“That’s not -” Hiroto tries to defend himself, but he doesn’t really have an explanation for it himself. “It’s not that. I’m not… that… How do you even know how my ex-wife looks?”
“You have her picture in your wallet,” Natsu accuses him. The number one sign of someone who hasn’t been able to let go. He’s such an idiot.
“When did you go through my wallet?”
“After I had sex with you that night after the bar and you passed out,” Natsu confesses crudely and rolls over Hiroto. He ignores the resistance he’s met with. Hiroto squirms and attempts to push him off but he refuses to budge. He isn’t going to go anywhere.
“Let go. You’re bruising me!”
“SHUT UP!” Natsu rages, spit flying out of his mouth and landing on Hiroto’s cooling, sweaty skin. He chuckles darkly and leans forward, feels Hiroto’s shallow breath against his face and grits his teeth together. He’s starting to tremble with fury.
“She’s not mourning after you like you’re doing for her,” he growls threateningly, content about the knowledge he’s acquired. He’s not quite sure why he wants to hurt Hiroto so much. It probably has something to do with the overwhelming pain the man is inflecting on him, but he understands that he’s being plain cruel in comparison. “She’s already cast you aside and moved on. She doesn’t want you. You’re divorced. She’s already got a new man. I saw them, I even have a picture if you want to see!”
Hiroto yanks his arms furiously. He looks angry, lost and scared beneath Natsu, trapped like a mere toy. “How would you know? It’s none of your business. Let me go.”
His voice is shaky and it makes Natsu’s chest swell with guilt. He presses himself helplessly against the man, buries his face in his neck, breathes in the musky scent and trembles. This isn’t what he wants. This was definitely not what he wanted. He’s screwed everything up… again.
“I want you to look at me,” he murmurs anxiously, his voice a mere desperate croak. “You need to look at me. I want you to look at my face.”
“No,” Hiroto resists immediately and jerks beneath him, unable to break away. “Not now.”
“I’ll take it off. The blindfold,” Natsu threatens as he withdraws a bit, pressing Hiroto harder against the mattress from his wrists. Hiroto’s breathing speeds up in panic and he tosses his head to the side, avoidant.
“Don’t you dare to do that.”
“I want you to look at me!” Natsu rages. When he removes his hand from one of Hiroto’s wrists to yank on the blindfold, the man’s free hand shoots up in panic to punch him. It hurts but it doesn’t matter, and Hiroto’s functioning with one sense less.
When he removes the blindfold, Hiroto’s eyes are squeezed shut. He’s trembling and quiet, all muscles rigid. His free arm flies to rest over his eyes and Natsu sees the gravity of his complex, the fear he has towards himself.
It doesn’t stop him.
“Wasn’t the point to look at me anyway?” he chuckles unhappily as he starts struggling to remove Hiroto’s protective hands from his face. “I’m not all that important. I could be anyone to you. It didn’t even matter if there were many of me, if all of the Natsus you slept with were imposters, because they were all just substitutes for your ex-wife. So look at me, you shit-head!”
“That’s not true,” Hiroto insists, borderline teary. “Don’t do this. P-please. At least leave the room first.”
“I won’t,” Natsu rejects his demand and grabs Hiroto’s face in his hands, pulls it close and uses his opportunity when one of the man’s hands shoots against the mattress to offer him support. He forces one of Hiroto’s eyes open.
The man stops resisting and goes quiet. Natsu presses him down again, brushes away the blindfold from the sheets and tries to kiss him, but Hiroto turns his head away. Natsu snorts coldly and swipes the younger man’s fringe off his face.
“Look at me,” he demands and Hiroto does, the look in his eyes betrayed and angry. “Nothing has changed about my face. Nothing. So stop fucking around.”
“Get off me,” Hiroto demands, his voice calm and cold. This time, Natsu obeys him. He rolls off and watches as Hiroto sits up, worn, bruised and distant, sits at the very edge of the bed and starts picking his clothes up from the floor.
He’s going to leave him too. They’re over.
“It’s not my fault,” Hiroto croaks quietly. He sounds depressed and he doesn’t turn around as he speaks. Doesn’t want to look at Natsu. “I can’t explain it. I told you that the doctors think it’s neurological. I can’t help it. If I could, I would.”
“I don’t care.” He does, but he doesn’t, and it’s a strange feeling. He just can’t sort out his head. “I don’t care if you think there are ten, twenty, thirty or a hundred versions of me. I’d make you love each one of them. They’d all be for you.”
“I’m not that intriguing,” Hiroto mumbles as he gets up and pulls his jeans on. Natsu doesn’t want him to go. The mere thought makes his chest feel pressured. It’s a painful sensation. “And I don’t work like that. I can’t give my heart to more than one person at a time. It’s futile.”
“I want you.” Futile. Hiroto already has his shirt on but he’s hesitating. It doesn’t matter, though. They always hesitate. No matter how hard he tries, Natsu can’t bind them to him.
In the end, Hiroto never answers him. He picks his bag up from the floor, pulls his jacket on and leaves the room. Leaves the apartment. After only a brief moment, the sound of his footsteps is gone.
Natsu doesn’t get out of bed. The silence is suffocating, and so is the metallic and oily scent absorbed in the sheets.
--
A month passes. He endures a long and meaningless month of his manager bitching at him for being unproductive and unmotivated. There are a few one night stands who come and go, and a notable amount of bitch slaps and sleazy girls who try to come onto him and make him feel nauseous.
He watches the video with Asako a few times. Stares at the screen expressionlessly, not feeling anything other than how hollow he really is inside. Somehow the ugly scene reminds himself of his worth, of himself - hadn’t she told him how similar they were, how she hated seeing herself in him?
Well, now he feels like he can relate to her awful feeling. He’d rather not, though.
There’s nothing left of Hiroto in his life. Not a picture, nor an article of clothing. Even the factory smell imprinted on him is gone now. Only the memories remain, the bottomless remorse and yearning. He can’t make himself feel better. Not that he was really trying.
He’s staggering home from a bar when he catches a figure leaning against the bridge railing. He’s illuminated by the pale yellow light from the streetlamps. He’s got a cigarette between his fingers and smoke rises languidly from his nostrils. He looks like he’s trapped somewhere far away as the black skyline stretches out in front of him.
For a moment, Natsu wonders if he wants to jump into the depths of the cold water and get whisked away by its strong current. Right afterwards he wonders if he does.
Then he recognizes the hunched figure. There’s the familiar crooked nose and curvy lips that he’s spent weeks longing for. His heart traitorously skips a beat and he fishes a cigarette from his own pocket as he approaches the person nonchalantly. There’s no rule that tells him not to.
“Can I join you?” he asks Hiroto when he reaches him. The younger man startles briefly and stares at him, taking in the sight of his face. Natsu fights the anxiousness and ruffles his hair. Hiroto looks lost. “I will then,” he decides on it himself before the man has the time to answer. “I didn’t know you smoke.”
“…I always have,” Hiroto finally mumbles as he tears his gaze away and looks at the Cosmo Clock 21 Ferris Wheel in the distance. He looks unimaginably tired, almost as if he’d be nearing his breaking point. “Ever since I was a teenager. I tried to cut back when I was married and Nao got pregnant but… I guess I’m picking up the old habit now that things have changed.”
“Hmm,” Natsu acknowledges him and leans his back against the railing. The wind is chilly but soft. It makes the hair flutter away from Hiroto’s face. He has to hold his own away while he takes a drag from his smoke.
It’s silent for a long while. Just Hiroto’s presence is enough for now. He can breathe and feel the tingling in his body, and he doesn’t really want this to end, doesn’t want them to go their separate ways. He doesn’t know how Hiroto feels or what he’s thinking. He’s not sure if his presence makes Hiroto feel anything.
“You said you saw her,” Hiroto speaks brokenly, his head shamefully lowered. “That you had a picture of her with another man. Was it true or did you just say that?”
Natsu turns his head, faces Hiroto’s mournful face. Hiroto looks him in the eye, desperately clinging to the hope. What kind of hope, Natsu isn’t quite sure.
“I wasn’t lying,” Natsu grimaces and breathes in the smoke from his cigarette. Hiroto’s shoulders tremble. He doubts it’s due to the cold. The summer nights aren’t so bad. “He kissed her.” Forehead, but it’s basically the same thing. There wasn’t really any question with their body language.
Hiroto flicks his cigarette off the edge. The tiny light fades away into the blackness. The light from the post lamps makes the tears in Hiroto’s eyes strikingly visible. He looks like a wreck. “I just can’t believe it,” he murmurs shakily, pressing his knuckles against his lips. “She hasn’t said anything.”
Natsu uneasily takes a deep breath of fresh air. He extends his arm and wraps it around Hiroto’s shoulder, pulls him comfortingly closer. It makes a lone tear escape from his eye. “D-do you have the picture?” Hiroto enquires, trying to act calm although he’s everything but. “Or did you delete it?”
“I have it,” Natsu mumbles and pulls his phone from his pocket. Their closeness is making his heart pound painfully, fast and hard. He’s grinding his teeth together to contain himself while Hiroto looks at the picture on his phone’s screen, silent and disbelieving.
“It looks like her. But it might not be her,” Hiroto attempts to insist faintly. “I haven’t seen the jacket. It could be just a trick.”
“Didn’t you already say that you aren’t insane?” Natsu snarls as he takes the phone away from the younger man and stuffs it back in his pocket. “There was a woman in that picture. A woman who looks just like your ex-wife. Your daughter was there too. You can recognize them. They’re so similar it’s impossible for them to be anyone else. No one is after you, no one is trying to screw you over with any replicas. It’s your family with another man. That man is a substitute. Not your family.”
Hiroto turns his head away and hides behind his fringe. He must be thinking that too, must know how logical he is, even if his brains are trying to fight against him. It would be easier for him if he could just believe. It’s tragic that he can’t.
“It can’t be my wife,” Hiroto cries. He’s hiccupping quietly, far from attractive and manly. “She’s just gone. Everything is so lifelike, but she’s just not around anymore.”
Natsu drops his cigarette, stomps it and pulls Hiroto into a tight hug. He strokes his back and hair, listens to his sobbing and keeps him up on his feet. He can’t stop himself from pressing a kiss on the top of his head, hugging him so close it hurts and feeling an inkling of hope in the air.
“I’m alright with you not being sure if I’m the person you’re with,” he chokes out and realises that he’s teary himself. He takes Hiroto’s face in his hands and draws it back from his shoulder so that Hiroto can look at him, his eyes wide like a deer’s, bloodshot and swollen. He can’t stand getting separated from this person. Not anymore. “Look at me. You know what I look like. It doesn’t matter if it’s really me or not. It’s still someone who’s attempting to be me, to play my part in your life. I can love you or I can screw you over, but I could do that all by myself as well. It doesn’t matter if you think there are a million versions of me constantly switching and taking turns in being with you. They all want to be with you. So please, just accept them,” he whimpers hopelessly and clings to Hiroto’s shoulders. “Please.”
“I cause too much pain,” Hiroto chuckles unhappily. “My wife who loved me more than anything in the world divorced me. I wasn’t safe. I’m a bad influence for my own baby girl.”
“I don’t care,” Natsu threatens him and presses his face closer, keeps Hiroto still and unable to back away. “I’m not a very good choice myself.”
Hiroto closes his eyes. He raises his shaky hands to brush Natsu’s face, take in the feel of it. He bites back a sob and presses their foreheads together in a way that makes Natsu’s heart jump to his throat.
“I like this you,” Hiroto cries tiredly. “You always come to find me.”
Natsu kisses him, desperately and sweetly. Hiroto clings to him helplessly and cries. He still doesn’t look very convinced.
--
He strums his guitar absently as his manager has a heated argument with the music producer. He doesn’t really care much - butting in never did a thing to him, and his manager has made it crystal clear that it’s better if he just shuts up and doesn’t make things any worse. He doesn’t really take all of her words to heart, but their argument is uninteresting compared to music.
It’s a sad yet soft tune, a heartfelt one. He’s been caught up in it for a few weeks now, sitting on his bed and trying it out, changing it, developing it. He hums silently to the melody with his eyes closed, foot tapping the beat to the floor.
He’s thinking too much again. Difficult love has an effect like that on him. He thinks of Hiroto, his tragedy, his inability to distinguish his loved ones. He’s a sad and lonely being, Natsu knows, in his head abandoned by his dearest, and in practice unable to give them what they deserve. Hiroto can’t express his strong feelings about people face-to-face.
“Can you stop it and stay quiet?” Yukari, the manager, snaps at him. She looks like she’s developing a splitting headache. Natsu sighs, cocks his head in boredom and tries to resist the urge to pluck on the guitar strings while the argument goes over his head without a word getting processed by his brains.
After a while he’s humming the tune again, muttering lyrical bits to himself, fingers tapping a rhythm to the wooden case of his guitar. Eventually, the argument ends, probably not at the conclusion his manager would’ve liked. Yukari glares at him and almost smacks the guitar off his hands, startling him.
“Can’t you at least compose something we can actually sell? You’re getting too deep again,” she nags at him. Natsu scoffs and goes back to properly strumming his guitar. She lets out a bitchy sigh in defeat, clanks her heels and storms out of the room.
Natsu sulks and ignores the nagging feeling in his head as he returns to composing. He didn’t become a musician to tailor his songs for other people’s tastes.
--
Hiroto sits on the passenger’s seat with a simple black eye mask on his face. Natsu snorts a little as he throws his guitar to the backseat and hops on the driver’s seat. Hiroto is smiling at him. He knows the sound of Natsu’s snort.
“Aren’t you a little early with that?” Natsu questions him humouredly and Hiroto laughs. The engine makes a loud noise and the car jolts a little when Natsu turns the key in the socket. Hiroto doesn’t let him drive off the curb before leaning in for a soft kiss. Natsu can’t help breaking into a smile.
“You’re so cheesy,” he accuses him, not that he’d really mind. Hiroto hums in agreement and leans back against the headrest, just listening. Natsu turns the radio on but allows Hiroto to turn the volume down. “You’re boring,” he complains half-heartedly. Hiroto hums again, and when Natsu glances at him briefly as he finally starts driving, he’s smiling contently and at peace. It’s a beautiful sight.
“You’re smiling,” Hiroto notes randomly, stretching his neck a little.
“Haa?” Natsu objects in surprise - he was, but it’s not like Hiroto could really have caught him in action.
The man is grinning widely beside him. “You made that noise. You let out a breath a bit louder through your nose when you smile.”
“Creep,” Natsu scoffs. “I do not. I wasn’t smiling.”
“Sure you weren’t,” Hiroto hums without arguing further.
They’re settling down more comfortably that Natsu ever dared to expect. He might’ve lived for over forty years, but this is probably the closest he’s ever gotten to an actually serious relationship. It’s nerving and he isn’t always quite sure how to go about it. It’s good that one of them has some experience to take the lead.
Hiroto wordlessly fumbles for his hand. Natsu glances at him briefly, careful with the traffic. He takes it in his hand and smiles. Hiroto chuckles. There’s a warm feeling coiling in his stomach. “It’s nice like this,” Hiroto sighs languidly. “When I can be sure.”
“Keep that attitude up,” Natsu snarls as he turns at an intersection. “God knows the things I’d want to do to you when you get back from your ex-wife’s house. I’m possessive, you know. I don’t share.”
“My daughter is there,” Hiroto reminds him calmly. “I won’t miss a meeting with her. I’m still her father. I want to be there for her when she grows up.”
“Which is why I let you go in the first place,” Natsu scoffs and tries hard to keep his attention on the road. Hiroto sighs and squeezes his hand reassuringly. He doesn’t mean anything bad with this. He can’t help his heart. Natsu’s just… still going to take a while to worm his way fully in. It’s not going so badly.
The drive is mostly silent, but it’s not a heavy one. It’s somehow good like this. Moments like these let him regain his confidence in comparison to the moments when Hiroto can’t help but mutter some absurd nonsense about ‘the other one’ doing this or that better or the accusations of just screwing him over and not loving him like the others do. It’s still sometimes a bit difficult to fully comprehend that Hiroto really isn’t insane.
He demands a kiss before he lets Hiroto hop off the vehicle. It’s sweet and brief, with a little more initiative from himself, but he’ll deal. Hiroto ruffles his hair as he heads off. Natsu studies his back profile as he makes his way towards the house, blindly but smoothly. He’s used to this.
“Jerk,” Natsu mumbles to himself grumpily as he digs out his guitar and musical notebook from the backseat, lights himself a cigarette and starts killing boredom. He’ll probably have quite a few hours to waste. His own fault for insisting on staying.
It’s good to be composing again. His tunes have been turning soft, vulnerable and melodic lately. It’s probably because of the love bug he’s managed to get bitten by. The car slowly fills with the strong smell of the smoke, but it’s pleasant and familiar. It’s good to have something to calm him down in a strange and new situation.
He plays his guitar absently and scribbles down notes to the little booklet when he comes up with something he quite likes. Time feels slow when he’s just forced to sit here like this and he’s constantly distracted, but it’s not so bad. He’ll deal. He understands that this has to be done. He just doesn’t like the fact that Hiroto still clearly harbours some kind of feelings for his ex-wife.
Speaking of the ex-wife, there’s a knock on the window that startles him. He puts out his cigarette to the ashtray between the benches and rolls the window down, heart pounding painfully in his chest. The situation is absurd - why is Tsukioka Nao standing beside his car when she’s supposed to be spending time with Hiroto indoors?
“Um,” Natsu mumbles stupidly. “Hello.”
“Hello,” the woman greets him politely and bows her head a little. “I couldn’t help noticing you. You drove Hiroto here, didn’t you?” she enquires and Natsu tries to nod a bit evasively. He never really expected to have to deal with this situation. He kind of feels like the first impression she’s getting of him isn’t going to be the best, but at least she’s smiling a bit now. “Would you like to come inside? I can offer you some tea. It looks like Mika isn’t going to let him go anytime soon. You don’t have to,” she decides to clarify with a hint of a grin. “I just thought I’d offer.”
“…Can I?” Natsu mumbles, feeling a bit taken aback. “I won’t be a bother?”
“I’m sure Mika would like to see some of her father’s friends as well,” she nods. “Some old friends come by every now and then but that’s it, really. Besides, I have something I’d like to discuss with Hiroto,” she sighs. “It’d be… good to keep her distracted.”
“I can come,” Natsu agrees right away. He hops out of the car with his guitar and glances at the case on the backseat uneasily. “Can I take this with me?” he asks. “It’s a bit expensive to just leave it lying around.”
“Sure, no problem,” Nao nods. She slams the car door shut and Natsu locks it before taking a look at the family house which is quite different in comparison to Hiroto’s tiny and minimalistic apartment. She leads him inside and instructs him to leave his shoes in the foyer. He obeys and feels nervous as he glances around uneasily. He wonders if Hiroto used to live in this house.
When Natsu catches a glimpse of Hiroto on the couch with Mika on his lap, blabbering away about school and whatnot, he finally understands the odd yearning and possessiveness. He wants to be a part of this. It’s ridiculous, beginning to want a family past the age of forty, but some people get hit by the family bug a little late, he assumes. Hiroto wasn’t late.
“Thank you for having me,” he mumbles humbly and Hiroto’s head snaps in his direction. Nao has hurried towards the kitchen so Natsu makes his way to the couch, sitting down beside the pair.
“Is that a guitar? Can you play?!” Mika exclaims excitedly while pointing a finger at him.
“I sure can,” Natsu assures her with a smile.
Hiroto is quiet, recovering from the shock. “Nao invited me in,” Natsu explains. “She wants to talk to you,” he continues more softly and sees the muscles on the man’s face strain a little. “I’ll be here. I can look after her,” he offers gently. Hiroto nods absently and gets up with the girl in his arms before setting her on his feet, kneeling down to ask for a peck and ruffling her hair.
“I’ll be right back,” Hiroto promises to both of them. “Natsu is very good with the guitar,” he tells Mika with an adorable baby-voice and points at the man. “I’m sure he can play you some song you like.”
“Yay!” she squeals and climbs back on the couch. Her eyes are shiny and full of naivety which is admirable given her family’s condition. Natsu watches worriedly as Hiroto heads towards the kitchen.
He doesn’t hear from the two of them for a while. Instead, he sits on the couch with an adorable little girl on his lap and plays parts of children’s songs and a few of his own pieces to the curious girl who looks far more interested in the guitar than in himself. He has an inkling feeling what is taking so long in the kitchen. It’s about time.
When Hiroto will come back, he’ll be here. He’ll take him home, let him cry against his chest and support him when he finally really has to move on.
It’s not only an ending. It’s a beginning as well, and he’s determined to make it as beautiful as he can, given the conditions. They’ll pull through. There’s always a tomorrow waiting for them right around the corner.