Across A Bridge of Magpies (Akame, R) [3/4]

[maayacolabackup]

-

Kame is really, really tired. He knows he can't be, right now, because there's a lot to film, and most of it is very emotional, with close angle camera shots and lots of interaction between Kame and two of the women who play backstabbing interlopers. It's an important subplot, and even if it wasn't, Kame wants to bring his A game to every scene of this movie, because it deserves his best.

Still, he's a little cranky, and fussy, and Jin looks hungover, which makes him angry.

"Have you been drinking again?" Kame says nastily. "Did they get your picture for ‘Friday’?" He regrets it as soon as he says it, and winces. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't take my mood out on you," Kame apologizes.

"You shouldn't," Jin agrees. "But it's such a relief to see you in a bad mood I'll forgive you this time."

"That's a terrible thing to say," Kame mutters, and Jin looks at him surprised.

"Oh, not that you being upset is good, but it is, for me." Jin scratches his head, and takes off his sunglasses, and maybe he's not hungover at all. "I'm putting my foot in my mouth, sorry. I was up late recording for my new album last night, so my mouth is going faster than my brain."

"That's not hard to do," Kame grunts, and Jin raises an eyebrow. "Go faster than your brain, I mean."

Jin laughs, and Kame is still put out. "Okay, okay, what I'm trying to say is, you have lots of emotions all the time, but they're all fake. I never know if you're laughing for real, or if you're laughing because you're supposed to be." Jin puts both hands in his pockets, and shrugs. "But today, I'm pretty sure you just feel rotten. And I'm sorry, but it's a relief that you still feel things at all." Jin gives him the side-eye. "I wondered, for a while, if you'd managed to bury it all somewhere deep inside you where no one could find it."

Kame just gapes at Jin, who chuckles with embarrassment. "Sorry, didn't mean to give a speech, or anything."

The director calls for Jin, who walks over to him. The two bend their heads over a heavily marked sheet of paper, and strands of long black hair fall into Jin's face and he blows them away, laughing and joking with the director.

Seeing easygoing Jin again feels like déjà-vu, and Kame wonders what has changed.

Later, Jin leaves Kame a small square of his favorite chocolate, and a little note on his dressing room table in his trailer. 'Feel better soon, Baseball,' the note says, and there's a little picture of a sun with sunglasses scribbled next to the words. Jin has terrible handwriting, and the kanji might be wrong.

It makes Kame smile, tentatively.

-

When Kame is starring in Yuuki, he feels sick all the time. He throws up after every meal, because food seems to sit sour in his stomach, and he loses a ton of weight. He can't help it-- being sick all day for filming makes it easy to be sick at night. Kame has a hard time separating.

Jin frets over him but tries not to hover, but Kame feels optimistic. Maybe it's because Yuuki Sanda is so strong that Kame feels strong just pretending to be him.

Kame doesn't try and explain to Jin how he becomes characters, because Jin doesn't ask. Just holds Kame closer to him by the shoulders, and tries to keep him warm, and holds his hair back while he throws up into the toilet.

-

Jin is covered in sweat when Kame finds him. "Oh My God, Kame, it was awful," Jin says, when he sees Kame.

"I've been looking everywhere for you," Kame tells him. "I wanted to go over this scene before we hit film." Kame self-consciously scratches his neck when Jin pulls off his sweat-soaked shirt to reveal his toned stomach. "What was awful?"

"I've been in the burning sun for the past seven hours, rehearsing the massive battle scene we're filming Friday," Jin moans, and he turns around and he is a bit burned, on the back of his neck. "It's not even summer anymore." He flops down on the couch, his plaid shorts contrasting horrifically with the tan sofa in the lounge, and groans into the cushion, which he's mashed his face into melodramatically. "Everything hurts."

Kame sighs, and on instinct he goes and squeezes onto the edge of the couch, sitting sideways and pressing the flats of his palms into Jin's shoulders. "You forgot to put sunscreen on your neck again. Don't you remember that time in Osaka?"

"Shut up, my hair covered it." Jin moans again, but this time from pleasure. "Kame, you are still the best at this," Jin says, as Kame begins a gentle massage of Jin's tense shoulders.

"It's not about aesthetics, Jin!" Kame says, but there's no heat in his voice. "You'll get skin damage, or skin cancer, or something."

"Don't harp, Kame," Jin replies, and there's no heat in his voice either.

It's a comfortable afternoon.

-
*
Jin kisses Honoko, or is it Kame? like Honoko is water and he hasn't drunk for days. His lips flutter softly against Honoko's at first, but soon, he is pulling Honoko so tight against him that it hurts, and Honoko can do nothing but open under the assault of Jin's desperate tongue and the unforgiving crush of parched lips.

Jin tastes of sake and adrenaline, and of battle and blood, too. Honoko knows Jin has survived yet another skirmish today, that he has made it back alive to circle around the outskirts of Honoko's world like a steady satellite.

"Come home with me," Jin whispers to Honoko, and Honoko knows it's wrong but he can't say no.

They share their second kiss in the dark shadows of a Gion alley as the early rays of morning light sink into the horizon, turning the sky the same flushed pink as Jin's bruised and swollen mouth. Jin doesn't let Honoko go even once, and his hands are shaking uncontrollably. Honoko doesn't know how to help him except that he should kiss him back, and Honoko is just as desperate as Jin to reassure himself that the clumsy man, not a warrior by any stretch of the imagination, has made it back to him alive.

Honoko doesn't believe in love. Love is like dreams: it serves as a place to hide from the harsh realities of the world. When Honoko wakes tomorrow, he'll be beaten for staying out too late, and then he'll sleep fitfully until he has to awaken and return to his hell of smoke and sake, and Jin will still go out and risk his life for a cause he barely believes in, and take lives it kills a part of him inside to take, still a fragile artist stuffed into the role of samurai by the hands of rigid tradition. Honoko will still be stuck waiting in teahouses, telling jokes and playing instruments, while his betraying eyes scan the comings and goings on the street outside, looking for any trace of Jin, praying that he's survived.

But as Jin's tongue wraps around his, licking at every corner of his mouth and making Honoko feel like he's going to unravel in Jin's arms, Honoko thinks that just for now, just for tonight, he can let this be love.

Jin's eager lips kiss every part of Honoko's face, before descending to his neck, nibbling and licking as the soft skin there. It draws a gasp from Honoko, whose hands clutch at Jin's shoulder as his knees threaten to buckle. "Jin," he murmurs, but no, he should be saying 'Takamori,' and Jin's eyes are hazy when they meet Kame-- Honoko's. "Tomorrow..."

"Until then," Jin says, licking a stripe across Honoko's collarbone that adds to the increasing burn in Honoko's lower belly. "Until then, let's just be."

He tugs at Honoko's yukata, pulling it down and baring his shoulder. He presses his lips to the exposed skin, before he continues to tug. The yukata falls down Honoko's arms, and pools at his waist. Jin's eyes devour his upper body, before he runs his calloused warm hands down Honoko's muscular arms. "You're beautiful, like this," Jin says.

Honoko feels beautiful. He comes undone in Jin's arms, hot touches and burning open-mouthed kisses leaving him panting and aching until everything spirals into oblivion.

*

Kame wakes up in a sweat, hair plastered to his neck and hands fisted in his sheets.

He can still feel the tingling trails of fire, where Jin trailed his fingertips across Kame's skin, and he feels feverish with want even though here, in his apartment, he's alone.

Kame's always been exceptionally good at getting into character, and it always consumes him like this.

He feels strangely alive, though.

-

Kame is filming alone today, which is good, because he keeps seeing flashes of his dream whenever he blinks or closes his eyes.

When Jin shows up on set in the afternoon, sunburnt and flush, Kame can't stop himself from reaching out and touching Jin's face. As soon as he feels his fingertips make contact, he draws back.

Jin looks anxious, and his eyes are searching. Kame doesn't have any answers. Neither does Honoko.

Jin doesn't seem to mind, and his fingers brush across Kame's kimono, straightening the fabric, and then Kame is called back to the scene.

The performance is better the second time, when he can feel Jin's eyes on him. Kame finds is easier to long for him, for Honoko to long for him, when there's the image of his questioning eyes seared into Kame's mind.

-

“It’s raining,” Jin says, and Kame shrugs. “Lucky me! No battle training today!” Then he rests his chin on his folded arms, looking out the window. “Still, it’s sad.”

“Why?” Kame asks, staring at Jin contemplatively. Jin’s hair falls softly around his face, and his eyes are unfocused.

“Today is Tanabata. Don’t you feel bad for Orihime and Hikoboshi? The magpies will never come outside today.” Jin sighs, and his shorter hair in the front blows up with the force of his expelled breath.

"Well, Hikoboshi needs to watch his herd, and Orihime needs to weave her cloth. It's not as if they don't have anything," Kame says, and Jin looks at him sadly.

"They don't have each other, though," Jin says, and his eyes are soft and distant. "It's awful lonely, to be in love with someone you can't touch."

Kame has stopped feeling bad about it, because it’s the seventh year in a row.

-

The TV is playing in the dressing room where Kame and Tatsuya are having their hair done. The stylist is using huge rollers for who knows what reason, so Kame figures he and Tatsuya will have matching poodle perms or something awful like that. It doesn't matter, Kame figures, because it's just hair.

He hears Jin's name and shifts his gaze up to the TV. Sure enough, it's Jin, being interviewed in English. There are subtitles, and Jin looks confident and comfortable talking with the interviewer, a pretty brunette with big brown eyes. "So, Jin," she says, and Kame winces at the familiarity. He can never get used to the way people's names are thrown about without permission in Western culture. "Do you have a girlfriend? America wants to know."

Jin laughs, and shakes his long mane back behind his shoulders. He can't cut it now, because unlike Kame, he's using his real hair for the film. It's longer than Kame has ever seen it, but somehow it suits him. "Jin looks like a girl," Tatsuya says, and Kame glares mildly at him. Tatsuya shrugs in some nonchalant manner that he regularly passes off as an apology.

"No," Jin says. "I'm not really interested in one, to be honest."

"Aww," the interview says, feigning a pout and flirting outrageously. "That's too bad. Girl's hearts are breaking across the country."

"You're exaggerating," Jin says, and he looks a little genuinely embarrassed. Kame feels relieved, for some reason, that Jin still gets embarrassed over stuff like this, just like he used to.

"Then my next question is: Have you ever been in love?"

Now Jin smiles a strange secretive smile, and winks at the interviewer. "Only once," Jin says, and Kame finds himself inexplicably leaning forward to listen more carefully. "It was a one-sided love."

The interviewer is leaning forward too. Kame can see right down her shirt, but Jin isn't even looking. "Did you ever tell?"

"No," Jin says, and now his smile looks a little sad. "I knew it wasn't meant to be, because of the showbiz thing, you know? This person really valued things I would have thrown away for them."

"That's too bad," the interviewer says. "The lucky girl is probably shaking her head at the--" the TV shuts off, and Tatsuya rolls his eyes, the control lightly held in his right hand.

"What an unmitigated sap," Tatsuya says, looking uncomfortable. "Jin's one of those disgusting romantic types, no doubt." Tatsuya looks like the mere idea of it makes him want to skip lunch and spend the time punching puppies.

Kame wants to turn the TV back on, and keep watching the play of different emotions in Jin's eyes.

The sparkle is familiar. Jin is probably beautiful in love, Kame thinks, because even when he and Kame were best friends, Jin glowed with emotion.

But the control stays in Tatsuya's hand, and Kame closes his eyes.

-

"Please?" Jin says, resting his head on Kame's shoulder and looking at him teasingly. "I really want to eat cake."

"It's not your birthday, Jin," Kame says, but he can feel himself giving in. "It's late fall."

"You didn't celebrate my birthday with me," Jin says.

"You weren't talking to me," Kame says, already fingering his wallet. Jin hears his victory, the jingling of car keys, and cheers. He scrambles to lace up his big yellow sneakers.

"You know how sad it is that you still wear the same sneakers you wore when you were twenty?" Kame says, and Jin looks unrepentant about his fashion delinquency.

"It just means they were worth all the money I spent on them, then, doesn't?" he retorts, and then he lifts a judgmental eyebrow. "If all of us bought new jeans every week at outrageous prices, then you wouldn't be as special, right?"

"You're a hobo," Kame tells Jin flatly, and Jin shrugs, his large sweater barely moving because it doesn't even touch Jin's skin. "It's shameful, given your career."

"Whatever, I don't care that much about clothes," Jin replies. "What I care about...is cake. Can we eat cake?"

"Yes, we can eat cake," Kame says.

They go to this little place in Harajuku, about a four-meter walk from the station. It's between two weird Gothic Lolita clothing shops, and no one who shops in Harajuku is really going to be a big Johnny fan, so it feels safe. When they were younger, they would take the train there on the way home, even though it was drastically out of the way, and it always made them late to arrive home. It was their secret, that place, and it always made Kame feel closer to Jin knowing that it was their cake shop.

"I never told anyone about this place," Jin tells him, like he can read Kame's mind. "I haven't been here in a while."

"I haven't been here since..." Jin will know, so Kame doesn't finish the sentence. He doesn't eat sweets that often anymore anyway, because they make him round-faced, and then he gets bad press in the papers and online and his manager gets angry.

"Cake's the same, still," Jin quietly says.

Jin gets icing all over his face somehow, and Kame has this inexplicable urge to reach across the table and wipe it off with his thumb, so he does.

Jin freezes, staring at him with a half chewed bite of cake in his mouth. He looks cute. Kame brings his thumb to his mouth, and licks the icing off, Jin's eyes trailing his thumb with a strange expression on his face. The icing is sweet. "It's good cake," Kame says, and Jin gulps.

"It always has been." Jin's voice is faint. "Remember?"

"Yeah," Kame answers, and he can't get the sweet taste out of his mouth, no matter how many times he swallows. The lemon icing lingers on his tongue, even hours later.

-

Jin's brother buys him a stuffed turtle for his birthday.

Reio looks shocked when Jin throws the turtle back in his face, running upstairs and locking himself in his room. Kame puts an arm around him as he tries not to sniffle. "I don't get it," Reio says. "Jin really likes turtles."

"Does he?" Kame asks, and Reio nods.

"He's got three or four of them, already. Maybe he thinks I'm trying to tease him about toys?"

Kame nods safely. "I'm sure that's it," Kame tells him, then stands up. "I'm going to go investigate the matter."

Reio grins, and so does Jin's mother. "Good luck, Kame. Jin's a handful when he's in a rage."

"I know," Kame says, with a smile. "But he's still just Jin."

Kame sits outside the door with his back against it, not bothering to try and get Jin to let him in. "You made Reio cry," Kame says just loud enough for Jin to hear. "He was just trying to be nice. He's only eleven, Jin."

"I know," Jin mumbles, and Kame hears him rest his own back against the door, so it's like they're resting against each other. "It's just embarrassing because you're here."

"Because I'm here?" Kame says, before he realizes. Turtles. Jin collects Kame.

"I just want you around all the time. But things are too busy for that," Jin says, and Kame can barely hear him through the door.

"I'm glad you want me around so much," Kame says, and it's true. He feels all choked up that Jin's happy to have him around; that he's not just putting up with him. "I want you around all the time too."

Jin opens the door, and Kame crawls into the room, and sits next to Jin, leaning against the wall. "I think there's something wrong with me," Jin tells Kame.

"What?" Kame asks, and Jin leans his head on Kame's shoulder, and rests his head in Kame's neck.

"Pi keeps talking about girls, and sex." Jin looks torn, and confused. "But I..."

"What?" Kame asks again. He doesn't see how that means there's something wrong with Jin, really.

"But I want..." He looks at Kame, and suddenly he's insanely close. Kame can feel the tickle of Jin’s breath on his cheeks, and in his eyelashes. It feels… Then Jin seems to gather himself, and pull away. "I don't want to talk about it, after all," Jin says after a minute, as Kame starts to stroke his hair. "Some other time," he adds, and Kame doesn't think there's anything wrong with Jin.

Jin is pretty close to Kame's own vision of perfect.

-

From Tsukuba's peak
Falling waters have become
Mina's still, full flow:
So my love has grown to be
Like the river's quiet deeps.

-- Emperor Yozei, 13

-

"Kame!" Yamashita says, and Kame looks over to see him jogging lightly over to where Kame is waiting for the elevator. "Off to rehearsal? Heard you guys have a new single."

"Yamashita," Kame says, and Yamashita frowns. "We actually ARE getting our new single today," Kame informs him.

"God, you act like we're strangers," Yamashita says. "Call me Yamapi like everyone else, you weirdo. Or Akira." He grins then. "We've been friends for a while now, you know?"

Kame smiles at him, for real now. "I know," he says. "It's just hard for me to switch back and forth."

"You're such a nutcase," Yamashita...Yamapi says. "How's working with Jin? He's never home...always on set, or hanging out watching you film. How'd you guys manage to become friends again?"

Kame shrugs. "I don't know," he answers, and Yamapi grins as the elevator opens. They both walk in, and Yamashita presses six and Kame presses nine.

"Well, it's nice to see Jin doing something that's not sitting around watching American MTV and stuffing his face with pizza. Mostly he just moped around the house writing music and refusing to go on dates with hot chicks. I almost feel guilty about the amount of sex I have. Almost."

Kame laughs, because Yamashita is a total airhead, and he can see why Jin likes him, because Yamashita is easy and uncomplicated. He teases, but not too much, and his every emotion is apparent on his face in private, despite the fact that he's got these soulless eyes in public. Kame thinks it might be because Yamashita doesn't know how much of his personality to show anymore, so he doesn't show any at all.

"It's hard for me to imagine Jin doing nothing," Kame admits, and Yamapi looks at him strangely. "He's always out partying, it seems."

"Really?" Yamapi says, and then he scratches his head. "Jin only goes out partying to distract himself, I think. I don't know. Jin's more complicated than he used to be."

Kame doesn't think that's true, but Yamashita would know better than him. "Jin's always been complicated," Kame says, and Yamashita grins again. He's got really ugly teeth, Kame thinks, but a really wonderful smile.

"Maybe for you," Yamashita says. "For me, it's always been video games and a six pack. And occasionally listening to whining about how the media takes everything he says wrong."

The elevator dings, and Yamashita steps out. "Nice seeing you Shuuuuuuji!" Yamashita says, and Kame smiles at him, waving goodbye. He likes Yamashita.


-

Kame remembers when he hated Yamashita, when Yamashita had yelled at Jin and told him to stop picking his 'boyfriend' over hanging out with him, and he and Yamashita had brawled like idiots in the park. Jin hadn't talked to either of them for days. Kame hadn't understood.

"How can you let him talk about you like that?" Kame asks, and Jin shrugs.

"I don't care if other people think that about me, about us," Jin replies, not really looking at Kame.

"I care," Kame says. "It's really bad for our careers if people think that way about us for real. It's okay if it's fan service, but it can't be real, or we're in trouble."

Jin frowns. "Not everything is about our career," Jin says, and Kame glares at him.

"I didn't give up everything so I could lose the one thing I've gotten on something that isn't even true."

Jin's face steels, and then he roughly jams his fingers into his hair and pulls. "You're right," he says. "It's not true. I'm sorry, Kame, I'll try and better understand your feelings."

"Thanks," Kame says, and then he leans toward Jin to bump their shoulders together. But Jin leans away, and offers him a weak smile.

Jin starts hanging out with Yamashita a lot more after that. It is a long while before Kame forgives Yamashita for stealing Jin away.

-

Jin is pouting at Kame. He looks like he used to look when Kame got all serious about rehearsal and Jin was more interested in getting lunch. It makes Kame feel like a balloon, floating up into the sky. "No Jin, I am not skipping rehearsal with KAT-TUN to go to an arcade with you."

Jin increases the strength of his pout, making these big doe eyes that call to mind an anime character, or Bambi.

Kame laughs at him, freely, and Jin's face lights up at the sound.

Kame reaches out, and grabs a tendril of Jin's hair, curling it around his fingers. "I love your smile," Kame tells him. "I missed it."

Jin is looking at Kame with this strange expression, somewhere between fear and joy. It's fierce, that look, and it makes Kame shiver, for some reason. "Kame," Jin says quietly. "I'm sorry."

Jin's fingers wrap around Kame's wrist, and it feels just like Kame remembers it, even though Jin's fingers are longer and the skin is more rough. "Okay," he says, and Jin's always had this impossibly perfect smile, one that makes the whole room feel like the sun is shining only on them. Kame feels trapped in its radiance, just like he always does, and it hurts but it feels so good. Kame feels so warm, so whole, when Jin is like this, so close to him and so happy to be there.

It's like all these years, Kame's been in a dark cave, and finally, he's been let back out into the light of day.

Kame tells Tatsuya that he feels sick, and then calls his manager to tell him the same story. They don't go to an arcade, because Kame might get caught in his lie by the paparazzi. Instead they go to Jin and Yamapi's apartment, and play video games until Jin falls asleep on Kame's shoulder, arms touching hands pressed back to back against each other. Kame wants to lace them together, and he's not sure what that means, because there are no cameras rolling, and he shouldn't be feeling like that at all.

Jin always makes him want things, like nothing else ever has. He wanted nothing more, when they first met, than he wanted to be Jin's friend.

Jin stirs in his sleep, and nuzzles Kame's abdomen. It tickles. "Kame," he whispers, and Kame doesn't know if Jin's asleep or awake. "Have you ever wanted something you couldn't have?" Kame can barely make out the words, but when he deciphers them, he licks his lips with self-consciousness.

Kame shivers and remembers how he used to pray for Jin to look at him again, even just once, after he unexpectedly disappeared from Kame's life. How Jin was there but it felt like he wasn't. "Have you?"

"Yeah," Jin mumbles, and Kame can feel Jin's lips against his thigh, through his jeans. It tickles. "I have."

Later, when Jin wakes up, they eat Kame's leftover ice-cream from the convenience store that's in the fridge, and Kame goes home around one in the morning, because he's got to be at work at six thirty. Jin sleepily shows him to the door, and his eyes are so affectionate and open Kame that feels sixteen, and he wishes he could just go to sleep in Jin's bed like they used to.

They never get around to talking about Jin's question again, so Kame doesn't know if Jin remembers asking him at all.

Kame isn't sure how he would have answered.

-

Nakamaru is good for Kame, as a friend. He has Yamashita and Ryo, and despite clashing personalities, he gets along with all the other guys in KAT-TUN, and considers them friends, even prickly Tatsuya who's always scoffing and never means it. He's got artist friends, who all smoke and talk about modern art, and he's got grungy friends who he almost never sees anymore because there's no time, that like to get him drunk and tease him about being a perfectly manicured idol. He's got other Johnnys too, especially Ohno, who always makes time to message him, and see how he's doing.

But Nakamaru likes the quiet, and Kame doesn't ever feel like he has to entertain him or be on around him. Kame can just be, with Maru. It's like that with Jin, too, only Jin has always made him jittery too, with this unidentifiable excitement that wells up in his gut and makes him want.

"You okay?" Nakamaru says, and when Kame nods, he puts a calm hand on his arm and smiles. "Okay, just checking."

Sometimes Kame wants to tell Nakamaru how confused he is, how much he's loosing control lately, with Jin. But it feels selfish, and Kame should be able to deal with it on his own.

They all have a part to play, and Kame has to hold up his end of the bargain.

-

Kame breaks up with his first girlfriend when he is 21 years old.

Kame experiences his first heartbreak long before that, when Jin suddenly stops answering all his calls.

-

Honoko feels restless and alone in the mornings, when no one else is awake. After a night out entertaining, it's always hard to sleep.

Or is Kame, who feels restless?

Either way, behind his eyelids, he always finds Jin.

-

Kame doesn't know what makes Jin want ice-cream in mid autumn, but he follows along dutifully anyway, just to soak up Jin's presence.

It's not cold at all, Kame thinks, but that might just be Jin's natural warmth.

Jin's using all these big, wild hand gestures to tell some story about how he and Yamashita had caught Tegoshi in a compromising position with a busty costume assistant, and he's making all these horrified faces because he hates Tegoshi even though Yamashita adores him, and Kame just feels...whole.

It's weird, how Kame thought everything was fine before, but now it's so much better. The world is so much brighter, Kame thinks. He hasn't seen such vivid colors in ages. The air hasn't tasted so fresh, either.

"Kame, you're not even listening," Jin says, huffing.

"Yes I am."

"What did I just say?" Jin's teasing him, mischievous look on his face.

"You're really special to me," Kame says to Jin without conscious thought, and Jin looks at him, and looks some more, and there's something Kame doesn't understand written in his gaze.

"That's not what I just said." A nervous chuckle. "You're special to me too," Jin says. "You...always have been."

Later, Kame wonders if it was him or Honoko that said that to Jin, and if it really matters anymore.

-

"Hiko," Jin says, and Honoko can barely hear him over the pouring rain. Jin's hair is sticking to his face. And to his neck, and drops of water cling to his eyelashes and drip down his skin. His face is too open, and too exposed. "Hiko, I can't do this anymore."

"Do what, Takamori?" Honoko asks, but he knows the answer already, before the words ever even leave his lips.

"Pretend it's not here," Jin yells, cutting through the rain and the wind straight to Honoko's heart. "Pretend that you're not special to me. Pretend you're not my friend."

"What else can you do?" Honoko says, letting his voice rise to be heard above the downpour. "What else can I do? You know it has to be this way."

"Does it?" Jin questions bitterly. "Why? Why does everything have to be so...unfair?"

"Life is unfair," Honoko replies, something like despair creeping into his voice. "Haven't you noticed that yet?"

Jin swallows, and Honoko can see his Adams apple quivering, crystalline drops of water sliding down the smooth, beautiful column of Jin's neck. "I know..." Jin starts, but then his jaw clenches. "I know that there's a lot of things standing between us," Jin says. "But I'm really tired of society denying me everything I've ever wanted. Aren't you tired of that too?"

Jin reaches out to touch him, and Honoko knows it's wrong, knows he should say no or step away. But when Jin reaches out and puts his arms around Honoko, gathering him close in an armful of wet silk, all Honoko can do is breathe in the scent of camellia flowers on the evening air, and relish the sticky contact of Jin's wet cheek against his own. Jin's soft sigh in his ear makes him shiver, and Honoko doesn't know what else to do but gather up the fabric of Jin's gi in his own hands and clutch him closer.

"Yes," Honoko whispers, and Jin stills to listen. "I'm tired of that."

Jin presses his lips to Honoko's neck, softly, in a gentle kiss, and Honoko feels his heart skip a beat.

They stand there for a long time, alone, in the pouring rain. It feels as though the world is standing still, and Honoko wonders if it's only like this, under the crying skies, that he and Jin can pretend they are part of the same world.

"But this, Takamori, isn't a dream. This is reality." Honoko pulls back, and it's so much colder than it was only moments ago. "Real life is much harsher than stolen moments in the dark."

"Kazuya,"Jin says, his voice thin and barely audible.

Honoko turns around, and walks back into the teahouse.

-

Kame's neck tingles from Jin's lips. The cameras won't have caught it, that tiny kiss, but Kame feels like they should have, because it was perfect. Jin's instincts have been perfect.

He's not sure if Jin actually said his real name, or if he only imagined it.

They film the scene two more times, but Jin doesn't kiss his neck again.

Jin is shivering. His lips are parted, and his hair is plastered to his face from the freezing cold water. The navy of his hakama is almost black, and so are Jin's eyes, which are looking at Kame so intently he feels like Jin can see through him all the way to the other side.

Kame is shivering too, but it's not because of the cold.

The director will probably choose the first take in editing.

-

Kame and Junno go out with one of their managers, and he presses fruity drink after fruity drink into their hands.

Kame tries to protest, but it's impossible.

Where r u? He texts to Jin, the screen blurring before his eyes.

I'm at home. Comes quickly in response.

My home? Kame texts, and Jin responds even faster.

R u drunk?!

Not my fault! Kame types back.

Jin writes haha back, and then stops responding to messages.

But when Kame gets home, Jin is standing outside of his door, waiting.

"No fun to be drunk alone," Jin says, and Kame grins.

-

The first time Kame gets drunk, it's on accident, and it's Jin's fault.

Jin feels so guilty the next morning, as Kame throws up, that he buys Kame lunch for three days.

Kame thinks he must have made a real ass of himself, because Jin keeps smiling guiltily every time he looks at him.

He asks Koki about it, but Koki give him a weird look. "All you did was cuddle with Jin like you were his pet or something. You guys are gross," Koki says, and Kame lets Jin buy him lunch for the fourth day in a row.

-

The day has long since turned to evening, and Kame can feel his shoulders falling forward with exhaustion. Jin sits next to him, arms inside his t-shirt like a little kid because his jacket's too far away to retrieve. A cigarette hangs from his mouth as he expertly puffs on it, and Jin is looking up at the night sky. "The stars are so bright."

"Yeah," Kame says, but he's not looking at the sky at all, because he's looking at Jin. "They are."

Jin's hair is pulled away from his face with a headband, and his features look sharp with only the dim light of the trailer headlights to see by. His skin looks dewy though, and bright, as if he was one of the stars himself. "I'm really happy," Jin says, turning to look at Kame, his eyes soft. "That I got to work with you on this."

"Me too," Kame replies, meeting Jin's gaze and feeling inexplicably anxious. "It's been really..." Wo derful, healing, enlightening, thrilling. Kame can think of hundreds of words, but none of them seem quite right. "Really..."

"I think so too," Jin says, like he knows exactly how Kame feels right now, knows how hard it is to pick just the right word. "I used to dream about this. Both of us being famous together."

"I did too." Those dreams wrapped around him like a vice, then, choking him and making him work harder and harder, until he let go of Jin's hand and couldn't manage to find it again.

"Really?" Jin asks, sucking his lower lip into his mouth. "I always thought you wanted to leave me behind."

"I was just trying to keep up," Kame breathes, turning from Jin to look up at the stars for himself. They aren't nearly as bright as Jin. "I was just trying to catch you."

Jin laughs. "I wouldn't have left you for anything back then, Kame. It seemed like you didn't want me."

"Back then," Kame says, shutting his eyes as a gust of wind blows across them both, and makes Jin shiver next to him. "Back then, I wanted to be your friend more than anything."

Jin leans closer. "I wanted..." he starts, but then he sneezes, and it startles a laugh out of Kame, who unzips his jacket and slides it down his shoulders.

"Here, stupid," Kame says, a smile playing with the corner of his lips. "You always get cold, and you always forget your jacket."

"Thanks," Jin says, slipping into the jacket, his face tinged with chagrin. His wrists stick out of the sleeves, because the arms of the jacket are too short, and it stretches tightly across Jin's shoulders.

"Better?" Kame asks, and then another burst of wind chills them both.

"Much," Jin says, before he scoots closer to Kame and drops an arm around his shoulder. "So you won't be cold," Jin softly whispers, and it makes the hairs on the back of Kame's neck stand up.

"Okay," Kame says, because this feels like now but it also feels like then, and Jin has always made Kame feel warm.

-

The Milky Way looks so wide, lately, when Kame looks up at the night sky, and Kame feels kind of lonely.

There's the faint shadow of something across the way, and maybe it's a person, but it could just be Kame's imagination.

-

Kame has already appeared on a show in the morning with KAT-TUN, and he's tired already. But the moment he's in costume, all except for his wig, the exhaustion evaporates like moisture in the sun.

Jin peeks his head into Kame's dressing room, his smile bright and infectious. Kame doesn't smile though, because Honoko doesn't smile, and Kame is Honoko from the moment the first layer of his kimono is slipped over his broad shoulders, turning them androgynous and narrow. "Kame, you're here!"

Kame's heart flutters in his chest, tentatively, a chick about to fly for the first time, because Jin is inescapably beautiful. "Yeah, I got here about thirty minutes ago. I wanted to go over the script again before we film."

Jin is already in costume too. He'd been filming all morning, most likely. Jin looks comfortable in his costume, probably because it's his second period film in three years, and Kame forgets, when he rests his hand comfortably on the hilt of his katana, that he's not really a samurai. "You take acting really seriously, huh, Kame?" Jin says, and he leans in too close. Jin is always too close lately, even when he's across the room, and it makes Kame tremble.

Kame picks up the scent of pine, fresh in Jin's hair. Jin always smells like pine, to Kame. He absently licks his lips, and something changes in Jin's eyes.

"Hey Kame," Jin softly murmurs. "I..."

Kame shifts, and looks up at Jin from under his darkened lashes. "You smell like pine trees," Kame says.

There's a sudden moment of tension as Jin looks at him wonderingly, like Kame is amazing or awe-inspiring, the way Jin used to look at him when they were kids and Kame got the choreography right on the first try, or when Kame chose him first for team challenges. Jin traces the black kohl on Kame's brows lightly with his thumb, careful not to smear it, and then he breathes in. "I really love you," he exhales, his voice incredulous and searching and scared all at once.

Kame is caught off guard, because it feels so natural and true, like the cameras are still rolling. Like this is a missing scene from their movie, because the timing is so perfect.

But there are no cameras, just Jin, anxious, trembling, terrified Jin, who drags Kame into his arms tightly, hugging him, Kame's ear pressed against Jin's heartbeat because he's still sitting down.

Kame doesn't want to pull away. Jin's arms are comforting, and the feeling of Jin's lips pressing into his temple is indescribable, like fire and ice at the same time, or like the way Kame feels at first snowfall, like everything is clean and white and untarnished in the world. Like the way Kame felt years ago, Jin warm above him and the snow cold beneath him.

It's confusing. It makes him ache, it makes him want to reach out and...

But then Jin's wakazashi gets caught on Kame's obi, Honoko's obi, and Kame can't figure out which one of those two people he is right now. That makes him pull away, pushing Jin away from him swiftly, and scoot back. He feels hot, so hot, and a little like there isn't any air in the room. "Jin, no."

Jin looks confused, his face red and big brown eyes wide and shining with all sorts of things Kame can't begin to fathom. "You don't... Was I wrong?" Jin's face is falling into something that might be misery.

"This," Kame says. "I can't do this."

"Why not?" Jin replies, running a quivering hand through his hair. "I'm special to you, right? I've always been special to you. And you...you've always been special to me too. Why can't I be what you want?" Jin's voice catches. "What do you want, Kame?"

"What I want," Kame whispers. He knows exactly what Honoko wants. He wants to pull Jin as close as he can and never let go. He wants to kiss Jin, and feel the heat of Jin through all the layers of silk and cotton and linen, because Jin is so warm, like a glimpse of summer in the middle of winter. But this is Jin, not Honoko's samurai, and Kame can't make sense of his own desires right now.

Kame knows what he doesn't want. He doesn't want Jin to look at him like he is right now, like Kame has ripped his heart out of his chest and is holding it in the palm of his hand, squeezing way too tight. Like all of his happiness hinges on Kame knowing what to do, on Kame not throwing his heart on the ground.

"Do you really not know what you want? Kame, this can't have been all in my imagination, this thing between us... I'm not that creative." Jin's hands are clenched now, and he looks a little panicked. "Kame, what do you want?"

Kame doesn't say anything at all. It feels like a waterfall in his head, or maybe like a hurricane.

"What do you want?" Jin asks again, raising his voice slightly, and Kame can't breathe at all. "Kame, what do you want?"

"I don't know!" Kame yells, because he doesn't have any idea. "This isn't me. These aren't my feelings. We're just caught up in the characters, Jin. Caught up in what's between Takamori and Honoko. This isn't real, none of it's real!" he remembers when they were kids, when he felt confused just like this, and it hurts and Kame isn't allowed to want, to need, and he shoves it all down as deep as he can because the only reason he's thinking about is because of Honoko.

Jin is staring at him, stricken. "Kame, what...?"

"These things I feel for you, no matter how much I...they aren't my feelings," Kame says, and then he swallows. The silk of his kimono shifts as he moves. "They're Honoko's feelings, and I'm just getting confused. It's not real, none of it's real. Don't you see Jin? We're getting too deep into the roles and--"

"Kame," Jin says quietly, refusing to look at Kame at all as he speaks. "I don't get my real feelings confused with my characters’ feelings. They're two distinct things for me. And I'm not... Have I ever been that good at pretending to feel something? The way I feel about you... that's just me. Just Jin. Who really...really cares for you. Really... loves..." Jin chokes on his words, and maybe a sob. "Loves you. Has for a long time, really. Loves you so much he had to stay away so it wouldn't hurt so much."

Kame closes his eyes so he doesn't have to see Jin shrinking into himself. "I'm sorry, Jin. I'm so sorry. But it's just how I act, my method. I become the character, and..."

"I get it," Jin says, his voice cracking. "It's not real for you. You can stop, now." Kame looks at Jin, again, and Jin is staring at the floor.

"Jin," Kame says helplessly, and it feels like he's crumbling, and Jin looks like he's crumbling too. "Jin, I..."

"Stop!" Jin snaps, and then he winces. He turns around and tugs his hair free, and it falls like a black curtain around his face, hiding it from view. "It's enough, Kame. It's enough already."

Jin retreats from Kame's dressing room, and Kame is left sitting limply on his chair until one of the assistants comes in to help him put on his wig. Later, hours later, when he's back in his own clothes, Kame can still hear the sound of rustling silk in his ears. But barely, because his other thoughts are too loud.

-

In the mountain depths,
Treading through the crimson leaves,
The wandering stag calls.
When I hear the lonely cry,
Sad--how sad!--the autumn is.

-- Sarumaru, 5

-

Now that Kame finally has the whole picture, somehow he's even more jumbled up inside.

The idea that Jin has been secretly... something towards him for so long sits like lead in his stomach. He guesses he can see it now, in the soft touches and the wide-eyed blushing. He guesses, if he looks back, everything will fall into place with this one extra piece of knowledge.

The thing is, for Kame, Jin's always been this slightly homophobic playboy, who jerks when you do even the most mild fan service unless he initiates it or it's planned. Kame thinks this makes sense now, if Jin is really attracted to men and it's not just pretending for him. It's not like Johnny's idols can actually be gay. The whole point is that they're potential boyfriends for all Japanese girls, and they can't be so completely unavailable.

Kame's never thought about his own sexuality. He's only been in a couple of relationships, and they've been with older, domineering women who knew exactly what they wanted, which is good because Kame never had to think about what he wanted, what he wants. They were beautiful and willing to be in-charge, and Kame didn't have to think at all. It was just like with his job. Become the character, play the part, on to the next assignment.

Kame knows the world thinks he's kinda gay, probably, but the truth is he's never thought about it. For him, wanting someone sexually or emotionally has always been something he's afraid of, because it's too close to hoping, too close to dreaming. Kyoko had been aggressive, and Kame had been vulnerable, then, feeling so abandoned by Jin that he had clung to her affection, without contemplating what it meant.

Kame wants to ask Jin how he knows. How he knows what he feels for Kame isn't part of the whole "pretend to be gay with each other" Johnny's package, or the result of playing these two characters who flirt with the line between friendship and romance.

But Jin, Kame realizes, has always known himself. Jin always knows what he wants. Kame admires that about Jin-- that he can reach out, with both arms, even when he's terrified.

Kame just shoves everything down as deep as he can, and pulls his baseball cap lower over his forehead.

-

"They got the Brave Samurai," Honoko hears one day, and he can feel bile rising in his throat. “He committed honorable suicide.”

He doesn't believe it until he sees the government flier. Honoko sees the wet parchment nailed to a lantern post, torn at the edges and the ink smudged. He reaches out a hand to trace the characters with a fingertip, but suddenly the letters start swimming in front of his eyes.

He wonders when it started to rain. But no one is opening an umbrella, so maybe Honoko is just crying.

-

When they film the scene where Honoko comes to grips with Takamori being dead, Kame finds it surprisingly simple to cry. He releases these fierce, wracking sobs that make his whole body quake, and when the director yells “cut” everyone is looking at him like he's done something awesome. Jin is studying him, face unreadable, and his hands are knotted into his hakama, the knuckles white.

Kame wipes his face on the wet washcloth one of the assistants hands him, and when he looks back up, Jin is gone.
Part Four