Dream Boy: First Quarter (2/4)
Nov. 1st, 2011 02:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maayacolabackupTitle: Dream Boy
Pairing: Kame/Jin
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Jin dreams of the moon, over and over and over again.
Jin’s first kiss happens on a drama set. He doesn’t count it.
His first real kiss happens when he’s twenty. He’s drunk at a club for the first time, and it’s different than being drunk at his parents' house when they’re out of town, giggling with Pi and playing video games at maximum volume while Pi hiccups and snorts and neither of them care what they look or sound like. Here, out, Jin feels like he does when he’s on stage; like he’s being watched and evaluated, and it’s mildly uncomfortable.
Takki keeps teasing him about not being able to hold his liquor, and it’s true. Jin’s swaying on his feet, and his head feels fuzzy. Everything feels sort of like it’s happening to someone else, really.
Jin doesn’t remember much, only that Takki is introducing him to this girl, and they’re dancing, and then she’s kissing him. It’s nice, Jin guesses. Her lips are soft and pliable, and she tastes like strawberry champagne and smells like expensive perfume. She’s soft in his arms, melting into him, all curves and sweetness.
When Jin recalls it, the next night, in fragments of images and smells and feelings, he thinks it was really nice.
Jin doesn’t know why, but strangely, when he touches himself, stroking quickly up and down his hard cock and muffling his gasps by biting his lip, the strawberry in his mind changes to honey, and the smell of perfume is suddenly lemon.
As Jin comes, thighs and abs tight like a bowstring as he spills over his hand, he imagines lean muscle instead of curves, and a mouth that takes instead of gives.
#
Kame is already downstairs when Jin stumbles down, wearing a fresh t-shirt and his favorite pair of plaid shorts.
Kame's hair is pulled back in a ponytail, scraggly pieces falling around his face as he turns two fried eggs in a skillet. Light from the kitchen window shines in on him, but it just highlights how pale he is.
"You're awake already?" Jin says, walking over to stand beside Kame at the stove. "I thought you'd sleep the day away after that flight. I know how rough it is."
"I don't need much sleep anymore," Kame says, and his voice is low. He looks up at Jin, and Jin just looks at him, the same way he always does when he thinks Kame is bullshitting. "Don't give me that look," he says, and it's a little whiny. It makes Jin think about when they were kids.
"You love sleep," Jin says. "No one here is going to tell you that you need to wake up. Certainly not me—I am sleep’s greatest advocate."
Kame brushes past him, grabbing the salt, and Kame's arm brushes against Jin's stomach. Jin steps back, quickly, and Kame looks at him fleetingly, flickering eyes examining Jin's face for a brief moment before he looks back down at the eggs, sprinkling a little salt on the tops of them. "Well, then let's just say I’ve gotten used to not getting sleep." Kame reaches out and turns off the stove. "Where are your plates?"
"Top shelf of the cabinet in front of you," Jin says, and Kame smiles at him with chagrin.
"You'll have to get them, then," Kame says wryly. "I'm not quite tall enough to reach."
Jin clears his throat and shifts so he's behind Kame, who's putting toast in Jin's toaster, and reaches up to the top cabinet. His chest presses against Kame's broad back, and Kame's muscles tense against him. Jin rapidly grabs the plates and steps back. "Sorry," Jin mumbles, and Kame arches a brow at him.
"A simple 'excuse me' would have sufficed," Kame says, as he takes the plates from Jin's hands, scooping the eggs onto plates and dropping a piece of toast onto each one. "Here."
"You're my guest," Jin says in response. "I should’ve made you breakfast."
They sit down at the kitchen table, across from each other, and Kame laughs. "I've barged in on you without calling, even though we haven't talked in, what? Three years?"
"Two years and six months," Jin says, and Kame pauses, looking at Jin, and damn if Jin doesn't want to blush, again. He hasn't felt this out of control of himself in years, but Kame's always had a way of making him come undone.
"Oh," Kame says.
"It's easy to remember," Jin explains. "That day, I mean."
"Is it?" Kame asks.
"You told me..." Jin sticks his fork into his egg, and he notices that Kame's grabbed chopsticks. "You told me 'Good luck with your new life.'"
The silence is heavy. The egg is a little too salty, and it could use some ketchup, but he knows tomatoes and everything associated with them are sort of Kame's arch nemesis, so he refrains, because he doesn't want to see Kame's face scrunch up this early in the morning.
Kame's tongue wets his lips. They're still dry, and still chapped. "The weather's nice, here. I've never been to Los Angeles before."
"We should go out," Jin offers, before he can stop himself. "I'll show you around."
"Don't you have, you know, work?"
Jin considers. He's got a meeting with his manager in two hours, and a photo shoot at three. "Yeah, I do." He takes a big bite of toast. "You wanna come? We'll do sightseeing afterwards."
Kame studies him, and Jin feels like he's under a microscope, and Kame is picking apart his intentions carefully, trying to figure out why Jin is being so...welcoming.
Jin wishes him luck, because Jin doesn't even have those answers for himself. All he knows is that Kame is here, and Jin feels like he has been put in the spin cycle of the wash, wet and soapy and dizzy.
"Jin, why are you..." Kame starts, and then he stops, before he scratches the side of his jaw and starts again. "I'd love to come, if it's okay."
Jin shoves the last bite of egg into his mouth. It's fine without ketchup, he thinks. "Cool," Jin says, and Kame gives him a smile that makes Jin think of the salty beach air in the middle of the night.
"Aren’t you going to ask?" Kame says, when Jin runs the water in the sink and starts cleaning up the dishes. "Why I'm here?"
It takes Jin a moment to respond. "You'll tell me when you're ready, won't you?" Jin asks, and Kame nods. "Then that's enough for me."
Kame's mouth stretches the tiniest bit, into this almost invisible smile. It's gorgeous in its subtlety. Jin loves that smile because it's a smile that Kame has always saved just for Jin.
#
The air is cool, and Jin is shivering. It's night, and there are no clouds. The sky is lit up with stars.
"It's cold," Kame says from behind him, and Jin turns around to look at the smaller boy, who stands in the door, looking out into the yard. He's wearing Jin's sweatshirt, and it makes Jin smile. "Why are you out here?"
"Looking at the stars," Jin says, and Kame looks up, taking in the magnificence above them. Kame's hair is ruffled from sleep, and the arms of Jin's sweatshirt are covering Kame's hands, and Jin feels warmer just looking at him, the chill of the night air forgotten. "Aren't they beautiful?"
"Yes," Kame replies, coming to stand next to Jin. "It makes me feel so small."
"You are small," Jin says, and Kame shoves him with a pointy elbow, making a displeased face at Jin that makes Jin feel like laughing.
"Whatever. You're just a few years ahead of me, is all," Kame says, voice cracking. "I'll catch up."
"In your dreams," Jin answers, shoving his hands into the pockets of his basketball shorts.
It's unusually cold for fall, Jin thinks, and as he looks over at his best friend, thin and tiny and wide eyed, he's glad Kame's wearing his sweatshirt.
"I'm going to be so big one day that you won't be able to tease me," Kame says. "I'm going to be tall, and famous, and respected."
"Big dreams you've got there, Kamenashi," Jin says, and he wraps an arm around Kame's shoulder, pulling him in. Kame is hot like fire against his side, and maybe Jin's been outside too long, after all. "But good ones, I guess."
"I want to be a star," Kame says. "Shining so bright that people want to look at me."
Kame is staring down now at the grass, which peeks up playfully between his toes and casts shadows on his bare feet. Jin can't see his face, because his hair, choppy and clumped, obscures his face in shadow.
"Me too," Jin says, and Kame looks up at him, a wry smile on his face.
"You're already so bright," Kame says, and then he swallows. Jin can feel the movement ripple through Kame's frame, still curved into Jin's own. Kame hair smells like lemon, and like the sweet heaviness of afternoon rain, and a little like hibiscus flowers after the first bloom. Jin thinks Kame himself might just smell like spring, even now, in the middle of the fall. Kame's like having spring all year round, Jin figures, and he can't think of anything brighter than that.
Jin exhales, and digs his fingers into Kame's shoulder, making Kame yelp and look up at him. Jin takes his other hand and points up, toward the sky, and Kame follows his finger. "Let's shine brighter together," Jin says, and then blushes, because it sounds silly and gay and like something the guy says to the girl in those television dramas his mom likes to watch.
But Kame's smile spreads across his whole face, and Jin can't really regret that. "Alright," Kame says. "But first, I'm going to be as tall as you."
"No, you're not," Jin says, laughing, as his arm drops from Kame's shoulder and he turns around. He stops at the door, and looks back at Kame, who is still standing in the grass where Jin left him, still a fourteen year old boy in a sixteen year old's sweatshirt, lit from behind by the light of the stars. Outlined like that, he looks like the moon. "But everyone will love you anyway."
Jin will love him anyway. That’s what best friends do.
Jin feels wide awake.
#
On the official Johnny's website, Kamenashi Kazuya's height is listed at 172cm, while Jin's is listed at 178.
It's only six centimeters. Two and a half inches by American measure.
Still, they're adults now, and Kame isn't going to grow anymore. It feels like the end of an era; Kame stops trying to catch him.
Jin wonders, sometimes, if he and Kame weren't always destined to be separated by some measure of distance. If maybe Kame was destined to stop chasing him.
#
Jin's manager looks surprised when Jin walks into the Starbucks with Kame in tow, but he quickly stands and holds out his hand to shake. "Ah, Jin, you brought a friend?"
Kame's head tilts to the side, and Jin realizes, belatedly, that Kame doesn't speak English. "Yes," Jin tells him. "This is Kamenashi."
"Nice to meet you," Kame says, speaking slowly and clearly, face impassive as the two shake hands.
"Kamena...From KAT-TUN?" His manager, David, says the first part like he's talking about a cat, and Jin delights in the way Kame's eyes crinkle at the corners.
"That would be the one," Jin says. He feels strangely nervous, now that they're in public together, even though he's not nearly as famous here as he is in Japan. Not nearly as important. Kamenashi isn't famous at all.
"Wow, when did you get here? Do you like LA? Are you staying with Jin?" David seems excited.
"He can't understand you," Jin says, as Kame's eyes get wider and wider and he leans against Jin in mild panic. "Calm down."
Jin's manager nods then, and looks back at Jin. "I thought you didn't keep in touch with your old band mates."
"He sort of...found me," Jin says, and Jin pushes back.
They all ride together to Jin's photo shoot, Kame silently looking out the window in the backseat of David's Toyota Camry as David tells Jin all about his activities for the next week. Jin sips slowly on his chocolate latte as he watches Kame in the rear view mirror.
Kame's eyes catch his in the mirror once, and there's something strange in them, vague and mysterious and hard to fathom, and then Kame's eyes shift back out to watching the world fly by.
At the photo shoot, Kame sits in the back on a fold-out metal chair and watches unobtrusively, but Jin still feels more jittery than he’s felt at a photo shoot in years, sweating and making silly mistakes. He can feel Kame’s eyes on him, and they’re heavier than any camera lens.
When it’s over, Kame follows Jin quietly back to the dressing room, leaning against the door way arms akimbo as Jin tends to his face with make-up remover. He’s staring, and Jin’s jittery all over again. “Where to now?” Kame asks, and Jin smiles timidly at him.
“Well, I was thinking we could drive down to downtown,” Jin says, and Kame smiles back.
“That would be nice,” Kame replies.
Jin changes quickly, and Kame flips through a magazine making sarcastic comments about the fashion style of American men into the silence, and Jin finds himself snorting at Kame’s comments, even though most of the time he doesn’t give even half of a fuck about fashion.
When Jin’s ready to go, Jin’s manager drops them back at Starbucks, where they pick up Jin’s truck.
The ride is uncomfortable, because Jin’s mind is racing, searching for something to say, but Kame looks so tired, resting his head against the window and watching the scenery race by. Jin doesn’t want to disturb him, and he doesn’t know what to talk about. It’s not that he doesn’t have a million things he wants to say, or a million things to ask about, but he doesn’t want to upset Kame, and he doesn’t know what’s okay and what’s off limits.
As they drive down the highway, Kame rolls down the window and leans out the window. His hair blows behind him, and he relaxes and smiles, and Jin wants to just stare at him, but he’s got to keep his eyes on the road. Still, his eyes keep shifting over for small peeks at the man beside him, whose eyes have closed, just enjoying the wind on his face.
Jin doesn’t know why he feels like a teenager on his first date, but he definitely does. His hands are holding on to the steering wheel too tight, and his throat is dry, and he wants to impress Kame for some reason, and he’d really thought he was over feeling like this.
When Jin pulls into the parking lot, he quickly unfastens his seatbelt and jumps out of the car, opening Kame’s door before his brain catches up with him and he realizes he’s being absolutely ridiculous.
“I’m perfectly capable of opening doors for myself,” Kame says, and he’s amused, and Jin feels stupid but Kame’s smiling at him, looking the least tense he’s looked since he’d shown up on Jin’s doorstep like a stray, so Jin supposes it’s worth it.
“Just because you can do something on your own doesn’t mean I can’t do it for you, sometimes,” Jin mumbles, swallowing quickly.
Kame rolls his eyes, but the grin stays fixed, and then Kame climbs out of the vehicle to look around curiously. “So this is downtown?”
“Yeah,” Jin says. “I thought we could walk around so you could see what the city looks like. It’s pretty at this time of day.”
“I’d like that,” Kame says.
Jin wants Kame to like LA. He doesn’t know why it matters to him so much, but he just… Jin loves LA so much, and loves…well, it’s important to him that Kame can see the beauty in it that Jin does, that’s all. Jin is tired of trying to understand himself anyway, and Kame being here, where Jin never expected him to be, makes it infinitely harder.
So Jin pushes it all aside, and shoves his hands into his pockets, instead. “Great, let’s go then.”
Jin’s parked his car in the lot at Union Station, and they just walk the streets, crossing Alameda Street and reaching Olvera Street. Kame’s eyes roam around, just taking in anything and everything.
Kame looks out of place here, Jin thinks, and he can’t pinpoint exactly why.
“So why here?” Kame asks, and Jin scratches his neck earnestly.
“Well, you like old stuff,” Jin says, and Kame raises an eyebrow. “Like Oda Nobunaga and samurai and history, or whatever.” Jin winces at how dumb he sounds, but he barrels on when Kame doesn’t stop him. “Los Angeles isn’t as old as, you know, Japan. But this street…it’s the oldest part of Downtown Los Angeles. There’s like a ton of historical buildings and stuff here. So I thought you might like it.”
Jin digs in his pocket and pulls out his iPhone as Kame stares at him.
“And I also downloaded some old guy talking about it in Japanese from the tourist association, so you wouldn’t have to rely on me translating or remembering stuff while we walked.” He offers Kame one of his earbuds, sticking the other in his ear, and Kame gingerly takes it from Jin’s hand.
“Why?”
“I thought you might like it,” Jin says. “And if you don’t, that’s okay, cause this whole street is a marketplace, and at least you can pick up souvenirs or something for your family, or the guys or whatever, if you wanted, or we could leave too, if you wanted to do that. Maybe this was stupid.” Jin knows he’s babbling, but Kame is just staring at him and it’s making him panic.
“Jin,” Kame says, and he gently rests his fingertips against Jin’s forearm. “It’s kind of perfect.”
“Really?” Jin says, sucking his lower lip into his mouth and biting down on it. “Or are you just saying that?”
“Really,” Kame says, and Jin offers Kame a tentative smile.
They walk down the street, listening to Jin’s recorded tour of the buildings, and it takes the better part of an hour, especially because Jin keeps pausing the audio in order to drag Kame over to stalls and make him look at handmade toys or scarves or jewelry, Kame laughing lightly and barely protesting as Jin pulls him away from archaic buildings made in the 1700s and toward festive lights and lively music. Kame doesn’t seem to mind, staying half a step behind Jin and perusing the contents of the stalls with more life than Jin’s seen in him yet.
He stops, and pulls a huge SLR camera out of his bag, snapping pictures of buildings and the street. He tries to take pictures of Jin, too, but Jin sneaks out of shots with apologetic grins, and Kame shrugs.
Kame buys a small golden beaded bracelet for his niece, delicate and bright, with coral detailing and elegant swivels. It looks so small and precious. Jin thinks it’s the perfect gift for a little girl, pausing barely a moment before he picks a similar looking one in turquoise for Lina.
Kame seems particularly taken with a plain silver necklace, a simple sterling silver circle pendant hanging from an even simpler chain. When Kame goes to the restroom, Jin buys that too, shoving the purchase into his pocket before Kame can see it, gut twisting up. He doesn’t know why he bought it, only that he thinks Kame should have it.
The sun is starting to set now. The harsh daylight fades to a soft orange, and against the city skyline, it’s wonderful. “Wow,” Kame says, and Jin turns away from the view to look at Kame. The rays of the setting sun reflect in his auburn hair, and it makes Kame seem to glow, red and gold and soft, and Jin almost forgets that Kame is worryingly thin and worn, and he can’t take his eyes away. Kame turns to look at him too, and his eyes widen at whatever he sees in Jin’s eyes. “What?”
“It’s a gorgeous sunset,” Jin says, because it is.
“I like your city, Jin,” Kame says, and Jin feels the joy start tingling in his chest before it flows out to fill his whole body.
#
Jin sees Kame standing out on the front porch, head thrown back and staring at the sky. “The stars look completely different here,” Kame says, as Jin closes the door behind him and stops next to Kame, shoulder to shoulder but with a hands width between them.
Jin looks up too. “Do they?”
“Yes,” Kame says, and then he wraps his arms around himself. “They really do.”
He retreats inside, and Jin is left alone to contemplate the difference.
#
Jin dreams of singing. He’s singing at the top of his lungs, and he can’t hear anyone or anything. He’s just singing all alone on an empty stage, surrounded by darkness, voice echoing against imaginary walls.
Suddenly there’s a second voice singing too, lower and more nasal, and it’s singing just as loud is Jin.
Jin immediately starts to harmonize—with that voice, it’s what he’s always done best.
He doesn’t need to see Kame to sing in harmony with him, but Kame’s eyes meet his from out in the darkness anyway, and they’re piercing and bright.
It’s been a long time since they’ve sung together, but it’s easy and effortless, like Jin is muscle and Kame is bone, Jin’s voice twining around Kame’s to build something greater than them both.
They just sing and sing and sing, until Jin can’t sing another note, and Kame is glowing now, soft white light like moonbeams shining in Jin’s eyes.
Jin wakes up in a cold sweat, and his throat aches like he’s been singing all night.
#
“What are you working on?” Kame says from behind him, and Jin jumps, dropping the crinkled sheet of notebook paper in his hands and falling over sideways on the sofa like someone lacking basic motor control. He looks up sheepishly at Kame, who’s laughing lightly at him.
“You scared me,” Jin says defensively, and Kame’s shoulders shake slightly as he stands with his hands on his hips behind Jin. He’s wearing this awful stripped shirt, and these huge oversized glasses that make him look like he’s about to discuss art theory or some underground band Jin’s never heard of, and the way one eyebrow is arched, Jin feels a little silly. “I’d gotten used to living alone.”
“What are you working on,” Kame asks again, after a moment of silence.
“Ah,” Jin says, picking up the pathetically crushed piece of paper from the floor and laying it on his lap, smoothing it out as Kame comes to sit next to him. Kame’s holding a gigantic book, with kanji Jin has never even seen written boldly across the cover.
Kame slides into the space next to Jin with ease, head leaning forward to examine Jin’s rushed handwriting. He’s not touching Jin, but Jin reacts as if he is, muscles tensing and breath catching at the other man’s proximity. Kame clicks his tongue at the list.
“So why do you keep crossing stuff out?”
“I’m not sure which of the songs from the Yellow Gold Tour to include,” Jin manages, looking back down at his list. “I can only have three or four of them, and I don’t know which ones resonate the most with people, you know? They’re all mine, so of course I love them all.”
Kame looks up at him, over the rim of his glasses, as his tongue peeks out to lick his lips. “You’re never indecisive about music,” Kame says. “This is weird.”
Jin bristles. “Well, it’s important,” Jin says. “Last time, it was all just old fans of mine at the concerts—people who knew me from Japan.” From KAT-TUN, Jin wants to say, but he guesses he doesn’t have to. Kame knows what he means. His eyes fall back down the battered paper. “Now it’s new people.”
“The Fifth Season,” Kame says, and Jin’s head whips up to stare at him. “It shows off your voice. It’s pretty.” Kame is assiduously not looking at Jin now, eyes fixed on Jin’s crumpled paper like it holds some important answer.
“I never released that as a single in Japan,” Jin says. “You listen to my music.”
A light flush crosses Kame’s face. It’s fleeting, and Jin supposes that Kame’s continued participation in Japanese variety television has made it easier to stifle embarrassment. “Just a little,” Kame mumbles, and he’s so cute, Jin thinks, and his stomach is doing tiny flips at the thought of Kame watching his concert, even after… “It’s not a big deal.”
“Kame,” Jin says, and his voice, to his dismay, is wobbling a little, so he presses his lips together to keep something gay from coming out.
“So anyway,” Kame says, standing up brusquely and brushing off his jeans uneasily. “You should definitely include that one.”
Then Kame disappears into the kitchen, and Jin hears the kitchen door that leads to the courtyard open and shut.
“Pull yourself together, Jin,” Jin mutters to himself. “It doesn’t mean he missed you.”
Still, he adds ‘The Fifth Season’ into the sixth slot, and smiles.
#
"Jin," Kame says, "What is your most important dream?"
"For us to make it," Jin says, and looks over at Kame, who is fiddling with his shoelaces. It's late, and the others are setting off firecrackers to celebrate the new year while Jin and Kame watch them from the top of the hill.
The sky is filled with smoke and sparks, and the air around them is filled with laughter. "Me too," Kame says, and he rests his head on Jin's shoulder. His hair, black and spiky, tangles with Jin's. He looking out on their friends, their group mates, and his lips are pulled into the gentlest of smiles.
Jin feels confused, because his heart is beating so fast and and he feels dizzy, like just being next to Kame is intoxicating; it feels like when Yuu’s mom serves them wine with dinner, and Jin’s head seems like it can float right off of his body. Like that, only better.
He doesn’t know what it means, but it makes him want Kame to be closer.
When they go to bed that night, all of them crammed into one room, futons side by side, so close their elbows touch, Jin's hand seeks out Kame's in the dark.
#
There’s a weariness in how Kame holds himself that keeps Jin from asking questions.
When Kame falls asleep in the armchair in Jin’s living room, and the lines in his face relax, brow unfurrowing and thin lips falling into a gentle pout, Jin thinks he looks painfully young, and it makes Jin feel painfully young too.
Kame shifts when Jin carefully tucks a blanket around him, grabbing the thick book Kame’s holding from his lax fingers, and Jin’s not sure if it’s his imagination, but he thinks Kame whispers his name.
#
The rising moon has hid the stars;
Her level rays, like golden bars,
Lie on the landscape green,
With shadows brown between.
--Endymion, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
#
“Oh my god,” Kame says, as he peeks his head into Jin’s room, eyes becoming round with what Jin thinks is dismay as he surveys the train wreck that is Jin’s room. “I’d almost forgotten you were a disaster zone.”
“Yeah,” Jin says, setting down his notebook on top of his tangled sheets. “I keep meaning to clean it up, but…” But there’s always something else to do, something more important that captures his attention. It’s not that he doesn’t care about the mess, it’s just that he cares more about other things, like writing song lyrics, or smoking cigarettes out in the yard with his feet in the swimming pool, leaning back at looking at the stars.
“If it was clean, it wouldn’t be you,” Kame says in response. “I thought you must have a housekeeper or something with the way the rest of the place looks.”
“Ahh, no, I’m just too busy to make a mess out of everywhere else,” Jin says, and Kame laughs.
“Anyway, I wondered if you wanted to get lunch. I know you have rehearsal this afternoon, so…”
“Okay,” Jin says. “Just give me a minute.” He shifts his guitar, which he’s got around his neck, and plays the bit of melody he’s just worked out again, thinking about the lyrics. He closes his eyes for focus, and then the bed dips in front of him.
Kame is lying on his back across the foot of Jin’s bed, hands resting on his stomach. “Sing it to me,” Kame says, and Jin does, fingers brushing across the strings and voice coming out just a little hoarse.
As Jin sings, he opens his eyes, and Kame’s staring at him, or staring through him, Jin’s not sure which. Kame rolls onto his side, and he looks so…so otherworldly, curled up on Jin’s bed and staring at Jin with tired eyes that look like they have all the answers.
It makes Jin want to put his guitar down and stretch out beside him, and ask Kame all his questions, and feel the tickle of Kame’s breath on his neck.
Instead, he just keeps singing, and the words come as if he’s already written them.
Everything in his room is out of place, Jin thinks. Clothes on the floor, dishes on tabletops and sheets ripped from the mattress from anxious nighttime tossing and turning. His chair is piled high with sweatshirts and worn-out sweats, and discarded lyrics can be found on crumpled sheets of paper everywhere Jin looks. But Kame…Kame, in his loose black t-shirt and artfully tattered jeans, dark against the white of Jin’s tangled sheets, looks like he’s exactly where he belongs.
#
Jin dreams of fog. In his dream, it’s tangible, and he can scoop up handfuls of it. It slips tremulously from his hands, bleeding through the spaces between his fingers and rejoining the rest of it filling the air.
Through the fog, he sees a figure facing away from him, broad shoulders leading to a narrow waist, and he walks toward it, until he can see every detail of the familiar back. He’s close enough to touch, but when tries to close his fingers, Kame turns to nothing, disappearing into the fog.
Overhead, the moon’s light is obscured.
#
Seven days isn't so long, in a person's life. One week. It's almost nothing, when you consider that there are three-hundred-and-sixty-five days in a year, and fifty-two weeks, and the average person lives to be seventy-eight years old.
Still, it only takes seven very short, inconsequential days for Jin to wonder if Kame can ever be someone that Jin can forget.
#
Jin fumbles for his cell phone, groping around blindly on his bedside table for it as it blares Nicky Minaj. "Hello?" Jin says groggily into the phone, voice feeling scratchy with sleep.
"Yo, Jin, wassup?" Yamapi says cheerfully from the other end of the line. Jin wonders if Yamapi is able to the feel the power of his glare from across 9000 kilometers of ocean.
"Fuck you so much," Jin says. "It's five in the morning, asshole."
"I haven't heard from you in a month, and that's all you have to say when I make time in my busy schedule to call you on the other side of the world?"
"My mom says you have a girlfriend now," Jin replies, sitting up on bed and leaning his back against the headboard. He takes his left hand and rubs at his eyes, trying to clear the sleep from them. "Why don't you call her instead?"
"Jin, I have a different girlfriend every two weeks. The fact that I have a girlfriend is not surprising news." Yamapi chuckles and Jin can hear him shuffling magazines around on his coffee table like he always does when he's on the phone. "And I talked to her already today. It's you I haven't talked to."
"Sorry, man," Jin says, and it's more a yawn than words. "I've just been so busy. I keep wanting to call, but then I get caught up in stuff and...yeah."
"Excuses, excuses," Yamapi says, and he's still laughing. "Are you awake enough to chat, or should I give this up as a lost cause?"
"No!" Jin says. He's really happy to hear from Pi, who's one of his best friends. He misses him, sometimes. "It's nice to hear your voice."
"Don't get mushy on me, Jin," Yamapi warns playfully. "You're missing all the gossip here in Japan."
"Gossip?"
"Yeah, KAT-TUN announced a hiatus yesterday, it was all over the entertainment news. Uproar, fangirls crying in the streets, old ladies in love with Taguchi sobbing at the news stands..."
"Seriously?" Jin asks, feeling more awake by the second.
"No one knows why either, although I ran into Massu this morning, and he said, on the down-low, that Nakamaru says Kamenashi's gone AWOL."
"Really?" Jin says faintly. His fingertips feel cold, so he snuggles deeper into the blankets. "That doesn't seem like him."
"Apparently, no warning or anything. Johnny's going apeshit about something, anyway, and Kamenashi’s just missing." Yamapi sighs. "Sometimes I want to go missing too. Like, I just need a break. I bet he's holed up at his older brother's house or something, playing with his niece and getting some shut-eye. He needs to."
"Um." Jin's not sure if he's supposed to say that he's one-hundred percent sure that that's not what Kame is doing. "Wow."
"Yeah, I don't know," Yamapi says. "It's got everyone in a tizzy, though. Massu said Nakamaru looked panicked." Yamapi clears his throat, and Jin feels his heart leap into his own. "I shouldn't be talking to you about Kamenashi. Sorry. I always forget."
"Why not?" Jin says. "I don’t remember that being a rule. You totally just made that rule up."
"You always get all weird and bristly about him. You’ve always been weird about him, and it just gets worse with age." Yamapi's moved to the kitchen, Jin can tell, and he hears the sound of the coffee grinder.
“I’m not weird about him,” Jin grumbles, and Yamapi snorts derisively.
“Okay, Jin, you’re not weird about Kamenashi.” His voice is flat, like he’s humoring Jin. "Anyway, what's been up in Los Angeles? Seeing anyone? Attracting trouble?"
Jin thinks about Kame, who's sleeping right now in his guest bedroom, with his tired red eyes and worrying lines around his mouth, too thin and too tattered to be a twenty-six year old man. Jin thinks about words caught sticky in the back of his mouth, lying heavy on his tongue, and sweaty palms and feeling eighteen all over again. He wonders if that’s ‘trouble’.
"Nothing much," Jin says, in an attempt to sound light and flippant, and definitely not like he's harboring a fugitive in his comfortable LA home.
"Wow, you are the worst liar in the whole world," Yamapi says in response, his voice caught between a snort and curiosity. "Like, I can't believe they let you act. In movies even. Do they pay you?"
"Shut the hell up," Jin says, slinking down in place. He can imagine Yamapi's eyebrows climbing his forehead in amusement.
"Spill," Yamapi says, and Jin sighs, closing his eyes and falling down onto his side, tangling himself up in his blankets as he curls into a ball. He's not sure what to say, so he just presses his face into the blanket, scrambling for words.
"Kame is here," Jin says, when Pi makes an impatient noise at Jin's silence.
"What?"
"Kame. He's here. In LA. More specifically, he’s in my guest bedroom."
Yamapi is silent for a moment. "Why there, though? Is he having some sort of, I don’t know, breakdown? I didn't think you'd even talked to him in years, Jin."
"Yeah. I mean, I haven’t." Jin's face is buried in his pillow now, and he's sure his voice comes out muffled. "And I don't know why he’s here."
"Don't know?" Yamapi's voice is high, now, and Jin wishes he was a better liar. "What do you mean you don't know? Did you ask?"
"Not really," Jin says softly, and then Yamapi snorts again.
"Jin." Yamapi sounds caught between amused and annoyed. "Kamenashi shows up at your house, after two or three years where you two haven't exchanged glances, let alone words, and you just open your house to him with no questions? You don’t even know why he stopped--"
"He's Kame," Jin interjects helplessly, like it explains everything. The way Yamapi quiets, maybe it does. "He's still Kame."
"This isn’t going to mess up your concert rehearsals, right?" Yamapi queries, and now his voice is calm. "I don’t trust your common sense when it comes to Kamenashi. You always act like an idiot.”
"It's fine," Jin says. "I don’t know what you’re talking about. I do not act like an idiot around Kame."
"If you say so," Yamapi says, sounding dubious. “I don’t know why, but you’ve always been weird about Kame, Jin. Really weird.”
"You can't tell anyone he’s here," Jin says quickly. "I don't know why he's here, but it's obviously the last place anyone will think to look." Jin hugs his pillow in between his arms tightly, like it's a teddy bear. "He doesn't want to be found." Jin worries at his lower lip. “He looks…” Jin searches for the word. “Weary.”
"Jin..."
"Promise me you won’t tell. Bro-code promise me."
"You can't use the bro-code at a time like this, Jin. People are worried about him. His family is worried. His friends are worried. Hell, I was a little worried, as much as I worry about things that aren’t sex and fried foods."
"I'll make him call his mom," Jin says. "I will. So his family can relax."
Yamapi takes a deep breath, and then lets it all out in whoosh. It's loud in Jin's ear. "Alright Jin," Yamapi says. "Just...I don’t know why, but I want to tell you to be careful, or something."
"It's not big deal," Jin replies, sucking his lower lip into his mouth.
Yamapi chuckles again, but this time it's dry, and a little sad. "You're the worst liar in the whole world."
"It'll be okay," Jin says again. Maybe he's reassuring himself.
#
"Jin, do you like Yamapi more than you like me?"
Kame's voice is uncertain, and Jin doesn't like it.
"Yamapi is my best friend," Jin says. "I can talk to him about anything and everything, and sometimes I don't even have to talk to him for him to get me. It's easy."
"Easier than with me?"
"Yeah," Jin says.
"Oh," Kame says, leaning away from Jin.
Jin's having none of it. His arm snakes out and pulls Kame in, until Kame topples into his lap, arms looping around Jin's waist for balance. "But."
"But?" Kame says, and Jin can feel Kame's lips move against his ribs, even through his shirt.
"I want more than things that are easy," Jin answers. "Because some of the things most worth having are things you have to work at."
"Okay," Kame says, but his voice is still wavering.
"It's like..." Jin isn't sure how to make the words come out. "The things you work for, the things you have to keep trying and trying at, the things you keep reaching for...those are the things you really, really want."
Kame's arms tighten around him, and Jin's fingers clutch at Kame's sweatshirt, the fleece soft in his desperate grip.
"So even if I don't always understand you immediately," Jin continues. "Even if sometimes we misunderstand each other because we're so different..." Jin swallows, and exhales, and when he breathes in again, he can almost taste the rain. "I want to keep you." Jin smiles, and looks down at Kame, who looks up at him. "And I'm willing to work at it."
"So you like me more than Yamapi?" Kame asks, with a cheeky grin. His eyes glow silvery in the evening light.
"I like you different," Jin says, and that's the first time he realizes that Kame makes his heart beat faster in his chest just by being close.
#
Jin realizes, somewhere along the line, that he doesn’t really know what’s been up in Kame’s life. Luckily, Jin doesn’t have to actually ask Kame, which would totally be awkward, because Kame is famous and a large number of Jin’s questions can be answered with a Goo search of Kame’s name.
Jin thinks Yamapi’s theory that Kame might seriously need a break holds some weight as he reads about all the different things Kame is doing these days—it seems impossible that Kame can do all of these things and sleep.
Jin feels really out of touch with Japanese pop culture as he reads, and he supposes it only makes sense, since Kame is threaded through all of it, somehow, and Jin’s been avoiding news about Kame like the plague for the past two and a half years because it made him ache in strange ways.
He downloads the first few episodes of Kame’s drama from last year when he sees tons of pictures of Kame and his co-star pop up on celebrity dating blogs. She’s tall, Jin thinks, maybe almost as tall as Jin himself, and the way Kame is smiling at her sits like a stone in Jin’s belly.
Kame’s been busy, Jin thinks. Working a lot. He’s smiling in all the pictures Jin sees of him, tired but smiling, and Jin supposes that’s part of the job, but it doesn’t look like false cheer. The smile reaches Kame’s eyes, Jin thinks. Kame doesn’t look miserable. Kame doesn’t look like a man on the verge of a breakdown.
Jin wonders why Kame is here. Jin wonders if Kame is okay.
#
“You’re acting weird,” Dom says, and Jin stops scribbling in his notebook to look up at him.
“Weird?”
“Not that you’re usually the most focused guy or anything, but you seem…I don’t know. Distracted.”
Jin feels distracted. He feels like all his old feelings, long bottled up and pushed to the back of his mind and the back of his heart, have fallen off the shelves, crashing down on Jin and burying him under their weight, pinning him down so he can’t think about anything else.
Jin’s expression must be telling. Jin’s not surprised. He gets told time and time again that he’s an open book. It’s why he wears sunglasses inside—it makes him feel like he can keep his thoughts to himself.
“I dunno man, you don’t have to tell me about it, or anything. I was just noticing.” Dom shakes his head, and stares at Jin searchingly.
Jin blinks at him, and Dom laughs.
“Don’t worry about it man. What are you working on?” Jin triumphantly turns his notebook around, and points at the page he’s been scribbling on for the past few minutes. Dom gives a low whistle. “Looks good, man.”
Jin’s decided on his set list, and the sixth song is Kame’s choice.
#
"Why are you smiling at me like that?" Jin asks, as he tightens his grip on his guitar.
"You look so serious," Kame says. "It's not like you to be focused like this. You're usually all over the place."
Kame's fumbling with the corsage on the breast of his jacket, square fingers exploring the textures of the leather rose, and tugging on it to make sure it's affixed perfectly to the lace. His lower lip is slick from his tongue constantly peeking out to wet it, and his shoulders are hunched forward like he's a little tired. Jin's eyes peruse the line of his neck, following helplessly down his back to admire the way Kame's low-slung jeans hand sublimely around his hips.
But it's his smile, slight and teasing and innocently amused, that draws Jin's gaze again and again, until he almost forgets he's holding a guitar.
"I can be focused," Jin says, and Kame laughs, taking the jacket off the hanger and pulling it over his broad shoulders.
The jacket is ridiculous, Jin thinks, with lace and feathers and all manner of patterned fabrics. Kame doesn't look ridiculous though. "Well, Mr. Focused, how do I look?"
"Like something worth focusing on," Jin replies, and Kame's smile grows a little wider.
Jin doesn’t allow himself to look at Kame on stage—to get too close, or to touch. If he does, he’ll forget the words.
#
“You should call your mom,” Jin says to Kame. “The only reason no one’s called the police yet is because you’re Kamenashi Kazuya, and because the media would know if they did, and Johnny doesn’t want any of that.”
Kame starts. “I’d rather not,” Kame says.
“Why not?” Jin asks, tapping his fingers against his thigh.
“Because then I’d have to explain why I’m here, and I don’t think she’ll understand,” Kame replies.
“Are you having a breakdown?” Jin asks.
“No,” Kame says. “I am absolutely not having a breakdown.” He looks amused at the thought, and Jin notices that the circles under his eyes are starting to disappear, but that strange look in his eyes remains.
“Fine,” Jin says, and then he scratches at his hair thoughtfully. “Then I still think you should call your mother and tell her you haven’t been kidnapped by a lunatic or murdered or something. Tell her you’re safe”
“Not sure I can tell her I’m safe,” Kame says. “Your room is probably emanating toxic air to the rest of the house.” Kame’s studying the wood of the table, dragging his fingertip along the grain.
“I’m not asking you why you’re here, or anything. Just… people are worried about you. If you had disappeared and I didn’t know if you were okay… well, I don’t know if I’d be able to sleep at night,” Jin adds quietly, and Kame purses his lips, eyelashes fluttering as he blinks at Jin.
“Okay,” Kame says. “Okay.”
“Are you going to…” Jin debates whether it’s okay to ask, before he just barrels ahead. “Aren’t you going to be in major trouble? I mean, with your radio show and your TV stuff, and all the things you’re doing all the time?”
“Probably,” Kame says, and he’s not looking at Jin. He’s looking out the window with a serious expression on his face. He wraps his hands, (and Jin has always loved Kame’s hands), around a mug of coffee, and Jin notices that his knuckles are white. “Ah. More like definitely.”
“Is that okay?”
“There’s something I wanted, no, needed to know,” Kame says, and his voice doesn’t invite questions, so Jin doesn’t ask. He just walks over to the coffee pot, and pours himself a cup. “Are you asking why I’m here?” Kame’s tone is a little sharp, not with anger, but with uncertainty, and Jin runs his tongue over his teeth. He wants a cigarette.
“No,” Jin says.
#
Waxing Gibbous
Pairing: Kame/Jin
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Jin dreams of the moon, over and over and over again.
Jin’s first kiss happens on a drama set. He doesn’t count it.
His first real kiss happens when he’s twenty. He’s drunk at a club for the first time, and it’s different than being drunk at his parents' house when they’re out of town, giggling with Pi and playing video games at maximum volume while Pi hiccups and snorts and neither of them care what they look or sound like. Here, out, Jin feels like he does when he’s on stage; like he’s being watched and evaluated, and it’s mildly uncomfortable.
Takki keeps teasing him about not being able to hold his liquor, and it’s true. Jin’s swaying on his feet, and his head feels fuzzy. Everything feels sort of like it’s happening to someone else, really.
Jin doesn’t remember much, only that Takki is introducing him to this girl, and they’re dancing, and then she’s kissing him. It’s nice, Jin guesses. Her lips are soft and pliable, and she tastes like strawberry champagne and smells like expensive perfume. She’s soft in his arms, melting into him, all curves and sweetness.
When Jin recalls it, the next night, in fragments of images and smells and feelings, he thinks it was really nice.
Jin doesn’t know why, but strangely, when he touches himself, stroking quickly up and down his hard cock and muffling his gasps by biting his lip, the strawberry in his mind changes to honey, and the smell of perfume is suddenly lemon.
As Jin comes, thighs and abs tight like a bowstring as he spills over his hand, he imagines lean muscle instead of curves, and a mouth that takes instead of gives.
#
Kame is already downstairs when Jin stumbles down, wearing a fresh t-shirt and his favorite pair of plaid shorts.
Kame's hair is pulled back in a ponytail, scraggly pieces falling around his face as he turns two fried eggs in a skillet. Light from the kitchen window shines in on him, but it just highlights how pale he is.
"You're awake already?" Jin says, walking over to stand beside Kame at the stove. "I thought you'd sleep the day away after that flight. I know how rough it is."
"I don't need much sleep anymore," Kame says, and his voice is low. He looks up at Jin, and Jin just looks at him, the same way he always does when he thinks Kame is bullshitting. "Don't give me that look," he says, and it's a little whiny. It makes Jin think about when they were kids.
"You love sleep," Jin says. "No one here is going to tell you that you need to wake up. Certainly not me—I am sleep’s greatest advocate."
Kame brushes past him, grabbing the salt, and Kame's arm brushes against Jin's stomach. Jin steps back, quickly, and Kame looks at him fleetingly, flickering eyes examining Jin's face for a brief moment before he looks back down at the eggs, sprinkling a little salt on the tops of them. "Well, then let's just say I’ve gotten used to not getting sleep." Kame reaches out and turns off the stove. "Where are your plates?"
"Top shelf of the cabinet in front of you," Jin says, and Kame smiles at him with chagrin.
"You'll have to get them, then," Kame says wryly. "I'm not quite tall enough to reach."
Jin clears his throat and shifts so he's behind Kame, who's putting toast in Jin's toaster, and reaches up to the top cabinet. His chest presses against Kame's broad back, and Kame's muscles tense against him. Jin rapidly grabs the plates and steps back. "Sorry," Jin mumbles, and Kame arches a brow at him.
"A simple 'excuse me' would have sufficed," Kame says, as he takes the plates from Jin's hands, scooping the eggs onto plates and dropping a piece of toast onto each one. "Here."
"You're my guest," Jin says in response. "I should’ve made you breakfast."
They sit down at the kitchen table, across from each other, and Kame laughs. "I've barged in on you without calling, even though we haven't talked in, what? Three years?"
"Two years and six months," Jin says, and Kame pauses, looking at Jin, and damn if Jin doesn't want to blush, again. He hasn't felt this out of control of himself in years, but Kame's always had a way of making him come undone.
"Oh," Kame says.
"It's easy to remember," Jin explains. "That day, I mean."
"Is it?" Kame asks.
"You told me..." Jin sticks his fork into his egg, and he notices that Kame's grabbed chopsticks. "You told me 'Good luck with your new life.'"
The silence is heavy. The egg is a little too salty, and it could use some ketchup, but he knows tomatoes and everything associated with them are sort of Kame's arch nemesis, so he refrains, because he doesn't want to see Kame's face scrunch up this early in the morning.
Kame's tongue wets his lips. They're still dry, and still chapped. "The weather's nice, here. I've never been to Los Angeles before."
"We should go out," Jin offers, before he can stop himself. "I'll show you around."
"Don't you have, you know, work?"
Jin considers. He's got a meeting with his manager in two hours, and a photo shoot at three. "Yeah, I do." He takes a big bite of toast. "You wanna come? We'll do sightseeing afterwards."
Kame studies him, and Jin feels like he's under a microscope, and Kame is picking apart his intentions carefully, trying to figure out why Jin is being so...welcoming.
Jin wishes him luck, because Jin doesn't even have those answers for himself. All he knows is that Kame is here, and Jin feels like he has been put in the spin cycle of the wash, wet and soapy and dizzy.
"Jin, why are you..." Kame starts, and then he stops, before he scratches the side of his jaw and starts again. "I'd love to come, if it's okay."
Jin shoves the last bite of egg into his mouth. It's fine without ketchup, he thinks. "Cool," Jin says, and Kame gives him a smile that makes Jin think of the salty beach air in the middle of the night.
"Aren’t you going to ask?" Kame says, when Jin runs the water in the sink and starts cleaning up the dishes. "Why I'm here?"
It takes Jin a moment to respond. "You'll tell me when you're ready, won't you?" Jin asks, and Kame nods. "Then that's enough for me."
Kame's mouth stretches the tiniest bit, into this almost invisible smile. It's gorgeous in its subtlety. Jin loves that smile because it's a smile that Kame has always saved just for Jin.
#
The air is cool, and Jin is shivering. It's night, and there are no clouds. The sky is lit up with stars.
"It's cold," Kame says from behind him, and Jin turns around to look at the smaller boy, who stands in the door, looking out into the yard. He's wearing Jin's sweatshirt, and it makes Jin smile. "Why are you out here?"
"Looking at the stars," Jin says, and Kame looks up, taking in the magnificence above them. Kame's hair is ruffled from sleep, and the arms of Jin's sweatshirt are covering Kame's hands, and Jin feels warmer just looking at him, the chill of the night air forgotten. "Aren't they beautiful?"
"Yes," Kame replies, coming to stand next to Jin. "It makes me feel so small."
"You are small," Jin says, and Kame shoves him with a pointy elbow, making a displeased face at Jin that makes Jin feel like laughing.
"Whatever. You're just a few years ahead of me, is all," Kame says, voice cracking. "I'll catch up."
"In your dreams," Jin answers, shoving his hands into the pockets of his basketball shorts.
It's unusually cold for fall, Jin thinks, and as he looks over at his best friend, thin and tiny and wide eyed, he's glad Kame's wearing his sweatshirt.
"I'm going to be so big one day that you won't be able to tease me," Kame says. "I'm going to be tall, and famous, and respected."
"Big dreams you've got there, Kamenashi," Jin says, and he wraps an arm around Kame's shoulder, pulling him in. Kame is hot like fire against his side, and maybe Jin's been outside too long, after all. "But good ones, I guess."
"I want to be a star," Kame says. "Shining so bright that people want to look at me."
Kame is staring down now at the grass, which peeks up playfully between his toes and casts shadows on his bare feet. Jin can't see his face, because his hair, choppy and clumped, obscures his face in shadow.
"Me too," Jin says, and Kame looks up at him, a wry smile on his face.
"You're already so bright," Kame says, and then he swallows. Jin can feel the movement ripple through Kame's frame, still curved into Jin's own. Kame hair smells like lemon, and like the sweet heaviness of afternoon rain, and a little like hibiscus flowers after the first bloom. Jin thinks Kame himself might just smell like spring, even now, in the middle of the fall. Kame's like having spring all year round, Jin figures, and he can't think of anything brighter than that.
Jin exhales, and digs his fingers into Kame's shoulder, making Kame yelp and look up at him. Jin takes his other hand and points up, toward the sky, and Kame follows his finger. "Let's shine brighter together," Jin says, and then blushes, because it sounds silly and gay and like something the guy says to the girl in those television dramas his mom likes to watch.
But Kame's smile spreads across his whole face, and Jin can't really regret that. "Alright," Kame says. "But first, I'm going to be as tall as you."
"No, you're not," Jin says, laughing, as his arm drops from Kame's shoulder and he turns around. He stops at the door, and looks back at Kame, who is still standing in the grass where Jin left him, still a fourteen year old boy in a sixteen year old's sweatshirt, lit from behind by the light of the stars. Outlined like that, he looks like the moon. "But everyone will love you anyway."
Jin will love him anyway. That’s what best friends do.
Jin feels wide awake.
#
On the official Johnny's website, Kamenashi Kazuya's height is listed at 172cm, while Jin's is listed at 178.
It's only six centimeters. Two and a half inches by American measure.
Still, they're adults now, and Kame isn't going to grow anymore. It feels like the end of an era; Kame stops trying to catch him.
Jin wonders, sometimes, if he and Kame weren't always destined to be separated by some measure of distance. If maybe Kame was destined to stop chasing him.
#
Jin's manager looks surprised when Jin walks into the Starbucks with Kame in tow, but he quickly stands and holds out his hand to shake. "Ah, Jin, you brought a friend?"
Kame's head tilts to the side, and Jin realizes, belatedly, that Kame doesn't speak English. "Yes," Jin tells him. "This is Kamenashi."
"Nice to meet you," Kame says, speaking slowly and clearly, face impassive as the two shake hands.
"Kamena...From KAT-TUN?" His manager, David, says the first part like he's talking about a cat, and Jin delights in the way Kame's eyes crinkle at the corners.
"That would be the one," Jin says. He feels strangely nervous, now that they're in public together, even though he's not nearly as famous here as he is in Japan. Not nearly as important. Kamenashi isn't famous at all.
"Wow, when did you get here? Do you like LA? Are you staying with Jin?" David seems excited.
"He can't understand you," Jin says, as Kame's eyes get wider and wider and he leans against Jin in mild panic. "Calm down."
Jin's manager nods then, and looks back at Jin. "I thought you didn't keep in touch with your old band mates."
"He sort of...found me," Jin says, and Jin pushes back.
They all ride together to Jin's photo shoot, Kame silently looking out the window in the backseat of David's Toyota Camry as David tells Jin all about his activities for the next week. Jin sips slowly on his chocolate latte as he watches Kame in the rear view mirror.
Kame's eyes catch his in the mirror once, and there's something strange in them, vague and mysterious and hard to fathom, and then Kame's eyes shift back out to watching the world fly by.
At the photo shoot, Kame sits in the back on a fold-out metal chair and watches unobtrusively, but Jin still feels more jittery than he’s felt at a photo shoot in years, sweating and making silly mistakes. He can feel Kame’s eyes on him, and they’re heavier than any camera lens.
When it’s over, Kame follows Jin quietly back to the dressing room, leaning against the door way arms akimbo as Jin tends to his face with make-up remover. He’s staring, and Jin’s jittery all over again. “Where to now?” Kame asks, and Jin smiles timidly at him.
“Well, I was thinking we could drive down to downtown,” Jin says, and Kame smiles back.
“That would be nice,” Kame replies.
Jin changes quickly, and Kame flips through a magazine making sarcastic comments about the fashion style of American men into the silence, and Jin finds himself snorting at Kame’s comments, even though most of the time he doesn’t give even half of a fuck about fashion.
When Jin’s ready to go, Jin’s manager drops them back at Starbucks, where they pick up Jin’s truck.
The ride is uncomfortable, because Jin’s mind is racing, searching for something to say, but Kame looks so tired, resting his head against the window and watching the scenery race by. Jin doesn’t want to disturb him, and he doesn’t know what to talk about. It’s not that he doesn’t have a million things he wants to say, or a million things to ask about, but he doesn’t want to upset Kame, and he doesn’t know what’s okay and what’s off limits.
As they drive down the highway, Kame rolls down the window and leans out the window. His hair blows behind him, and he relaxes and smiles, and Jin wants to just stare at him, but he’s got to keep his eyes on the road. Still, his eyes keep shifting over for small peeks at the man beside him, whose eyes have closed, just enjoying the wind on his face.
Jin doesn’t know why he feels like a teenager on his first date, but he definitely does. His hands are holding on to the steering wheel too tight, and his throat is dry, and he wants to impress Kame for some reason, and he’d really thought he was over feeling like this.
When Jin pulls into the parking lot, he quickly unfastens his seatbelt and jumps out of the car, opening Kame’s door before his brain catches up with him and he realizes he’s being absolutely ridiculous.
“I’m perfectly capable of opening doors for myself,” Kame says, and he’s amused, and Jin feels stupid but Kame’s smiling at him, looking the least tense he’s looked since he’d shown up on Jin’s doorstep like a stray, so Jin supposes it’s worth it.
“Just because you can do something on your own doesn’t mean I can’t do it for you, sometimes,” Jin mumbles, swallowing quickly.
Kame rolls his eyes, but the grin stays fixed, and then Kame climbs out of the vehicle to look around curiously. “So this is downtown?”
“Yeah,” Jin says. “I thought we could walk around so you could see what the city looks like. It’s pretty at this time of day.”
“I’d like that,” Kame says.
Jin wants Kame to like LA. He doesn’t know why it matters to him so much, but he just… Jin loves LA so much, and loves…well, it’s important to him that Kame can see the beauty in it that Jin does, that’s all. Jin is tired of trying to understand himself anyway, and Kame being here, where Jin never expected him to be, makes it infinitely harder.
So Jin pushes it all aside, and shoves his hands into his pockets, instead. “Great, let’s go then.”
Jin’s parked his car in the lot at Union Station, and they just walk the streets, crossing Alameda Street and reaching Olvera Street. Kame’s eyes roam around, just taking in anything and everything.
Kame looks out of place here, Jin thinks, and he can’t pinpoint exactly why.
“So why here?” Kame asks, and Jin scratches his neck earnestly.
“Well, you like old stuff,” Jin says, and Kame raises an eyebrow. “Like Oda Nobunaga and samurai and history, or whatever.” Jin winces at how dumb he sounds, but he barrels on when Kame doesn’t stop him. “Los Angeles isn’t as old as, you know, Japan. But this street…it’s the oldest part of Downtown Los Angeles. There’s like a ton of historical buildings and stuff here. So I thought you might like it.”
Jin digs in his pocket and pulls out his iPhone as Kame stares at him.
“And I also downloaded some old guy talking about it in Japanese from the tourist association, so you wouldn’t have to rely on me translating or remembering stuff while we walked.” He offers Kame one of his earbuds, sticking the other in his ear, and Kame gingerly takes it from Jin’s hand.
“Why?”
“I thought you might like it,” Jin says. “And if you don’t, that’s okay, cause this whole street is a marketplace, and at least you can pick up souvenirs or something for your family, or the guys or whatever, if you wanted, or we could leave too, if you wanted to do that. Maybe this was stupid.” Jin knows he’s babbling, but Kame is just staring at him and it’s making him panic.
“Jin,” Kame says, and he gently rests his fingertips against Jin’s forearm. “It’s kind of perfect.”
“Really?” Jin says, sucking his lower lip into his mouth and biting down on it. “Or are you just saying that?”
“Really,” Kame says, and Jin offers Kame a tentative smile.
They walk down the street, listening to Jin’s recorded tour of the buildings, and it takes the better part of an hour, especially because Jin keeps pausing the audio in order to drag Kame over to stalls and make him look at handmade toys or scarves or jewelry, Kame laughing lightly and barely protesting as Jin pulls him away from archaic buildings made in the 1700s and toward festive lights and lively music. Kame doesn’t seem to mind, staying half a step behind Jin and perusing the contents of the stalls with more life than Jin’s seen in him yet.
He stops, and pulls a huge SLR camera out of his bag, snapping pictures of buildings and the street. He tries to take pictures of Jin, too, but Jin sneaks out of shots with apologetic grins, and Kame shrugs.
Kame buys a small golden beaded bracelet for his niece, delicate and bright, with coral detailing and elegant swivels. It looks so small and precious. Jin thinks it’s the perfect gift for a little girl, pausing barely a moment before he picks a similar looking one in turquoise for Lina.
Kame seems particularly taken with a plain silver necklace, a simple sterling silver circle pendant hanging from an even simpler chain. When Kame goes to the restroom, Jin buys that too, shoving the purchase into his pocket before Kame can see it, gut twisting up. He doesn’t know why he bought it, only that he thinks Kame should have it.
The sun is starting to set now. The harsh daylight fades to a soft orange, and against the city skyline, it’s wonderful. “Wow,” Kame says, and Jin turns away from the view to look at Kame. The rays of the setting sun reflect in his auburn hair, and it makes Kame seem to glow, red and gold and soft, and Jin almost forgets that Kame is worryingly thin and worn, and he can’t take his eyes away. Kame turns to look at him too, and his eyes widen at whatever he sees in Jin’s eyes. “What?”
“It’s a gorgeous sunset,” Jin says, because it is.
“I like your city, Jin,” Kame says, and Jin feels the joy start tingling in his chest before it flows out to fill his whole body.
#
Jin sees Kame standing out on the front porch, head thrown back and staring at the sky. “The stars look completely different here,” Kame says, as Jin closes the door behind him and stops next to Kame, shoulder to shoulder but with a hands width between them.
Jin looks up too. “Do they?”
“Yes,” Kame says, and then he wraps his arms around himself. “They really do.”
He retreats inside, and Jin is left alone to contemplate the difference.
#
Jin dreams of singing. He’s singing at the top of his lungs, and he can’t hear anyone or anything. He’s just singing all alone on an empty stage, surrounded by darkness, voice echoing against imaginary walls.
Suddenly there’s a second voice singing too, lower and more nasal, and it’s singing just as loud is Jin.
Jin immediately starts to harmonize—with that voice, it’s what he’s always done best.
He doesn’t need to see Kame to sing in harmony with him, but Kame’s eyes meet his from out in the darkness anyway, and they’re piercing and bright.
It’s been a long time since they’ve sung together, but it’s easy and effortless, like Jin is muscle and Kame is bone, Jin’s voice twining around Kame’s to build something greater than them both.
They just sing and sing and sing, until Jin can’t sing another note, and Kame is glowing now, soft white light like moonbeams shining in Jin’s eyes.
Jin wakes up in a cold sweat, and his throat aches like he’s been singing all night.
#
“What are you working on?” Kame says from behind him, and Jin jumps, dropping the crinkled sheet of notebook paper in his hands and falling over sideways on the sofa like someone lacking basic motor control. He looks up sheepishly at Kame, who’s laughing lightly at him.
“You scared me,” Jin says defensively, and Kame’s shoulders shake slightly as he stands with his hands on his hips behind Jin. He’s wearing this awful stripped shirt, and these huge oversized glasses that make him look like he’s about to discuss art theory or some underground band Jin’s never heard of, and the way one eyebrow is arched, Jin feels a little silly. “I’d gotten used to living alone.”
“What are you working on,” Kame asks again, after a moment of silence.
“Ah,” Jin says, picking up the pathetically crushed piece of paper from the floor and laying it on his lap, smoothing it out as Kame comes to sit next to him. Kame’s holding a gigantic book, with kanji Jin has never even seen written boldly across the cover.
Kame slides into the space next to Jin with ease, head leaning forward to examine Jin’s rushed handwriting. He’s not touching Jin, but Jin reacts as if he is, muscles tensing and breath catching at the other man’s proximity. Kame clicks his tongue at the list.
“So why do you keep crossing stuff out?”
“I’m not sure which of the songs from the Yellow Gold Tour to include,” Jin manages, looking back down at his list. “I can only have three or four of them, and I don’t know which ones resonate the most with people, you know? They’re all mine, so of course I love them all.”
Kame looks up at him, over the rim of his glasses, as his tongue peeks out to lick his lips. “You’re never indecisive about music,” Kame says. “This is weird.”
Jin bristles. “Well, it’s important,” Jin says. “Last time, it was all just old fans of mine at the concerts—people who knew me from Japan.” From KAT-TUN, Jin wants to say, but he guesses he doesn’t have to. Kame knows what he means. His eyes fall back down the battered paper. “Now it’s new people.”
“The Fifth Season,” Kame says, and Jin’s head whips up to stare at him. “It shows off your voice. It’s pretty.” Kame is assiduously not looking at Jin now, eyes fixed on Jin’s crumpled paper like it holds some important answer.
“I never released that as a single in Japan,” Jin says. “You listen to my music.”
A light flush crosses Kame’s face. It’s fleeting, and Jin supposes that Kame’s continued participation in Japanese variety television has made it easier to stifle embarrassment. “Just a little,” Kame mumbles, and he’s so cute, Jin thinks, and his stomach is doing tiny flips at the thought of Kame watching his concert, even after… “It’s not a big deal.”
“Kame,” Jin says, and his voice, to his dismay, is wobbling a little, so he presses his lips together to keep something gay from coming out.
“So anyway,” Kame says, standing up brusquely and brushing off his jeans uneasily. “You should definitely include that one.”
Then Kame disappears into the kitchen, and Jin hears the kitchen door that leads to the courtyard open and shut.
“Pull yourself together, Jin,” Jin mutters to himself. “It doesn’t mean he missed you.”
Still, he adds ‘The Fifth Season’ into the sixth slot, and smiles.
#
"Jin," Kame says, "What is your most important dream?"
"For us to make it," Jin says, and looks over at Kame, who is fiddling with his shoelaces. It's late, and the others are setting off firecrackers to celebrate the new year while Jin and Kame watch them from the top of the hill.
The sky is filled with smoke and sparks, and the air around them is filled with laughter. "Me too," Kame says, and he rests his head on Jin's shoulder. His hair, black and spiky, tangles with Jin's. He looking out on their friends, their group mates, and his lips are pulled into the gentlest of smiles.
Jin feels confused, because his heart is beating so fast and and he feels dizzy, like just being next to Kame is intoxicating; it feels like when Yuu’s mom serves them wine with dinner, and Jin’s head seems like it can float right off of his body. Like that, only better.
He doesn’t know what it means, but it makes him want Kame to be closer.
When they go to bed that night, all of them crammed into one room, futons side by side, so close their elbows touch, Jin's hand seeks out Kame's in the dark.
#
There’s a weariness in how Kame holds himself that keeps Jin from asking questions.
When Kame falls asleep in the armchair in Jin’s living room, and the lines in his face relax, brow unfurrowing and thin lips falling into a gentle pout, Jin thinks he looks painfully young, and it makes Jin feel painfully young too.
Kame shifts when Jin carefully tucks a blanket around him, grabbing the thick book Kame’s holding from his lax fingers, and Jin’s not sure if it’s his imagination, but he thinks Kame whispers his name.
#
The rising moon has hid the stars;
Her level rays, like golden bars,
Lie on the landscape green,
With shadows brown between.
--Endymion, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
#
“Oh my god,” Kame says, as he peeks his head into Jin’s room, eyes becoming round with what Jin thinks is dismay as he surveys the train wreck that is Jin’s room. “I’d almost forgotten you were a disaster zone.”
“Yeah,” Jin says, setting down his notebook on top of his tangled sheets. “I keep meaning to clean it up, but…” But there’s always something else to do, something more important that captures his attention. It’s not that he doesn’t care about the mess, it’s just that he cares more about other things, like writing song lyrics, or smoking cigarettes out in the yard with his feet in the swimming pool, leaning back at looking at the stars.
“If it was clean, it wouldn’t be you,” Kame says in response. “I thought you must have a housekeeper or something with the way the rest of the place looks.”
“Ahh, no, I’m just too busy to make a mess out of everywhere else,” Jin says, and Kame laughs.
“Anyway, I wondered if you wanted to get lunch. I know you have rehearsal this afternoon, so…”
“Okay,” Jin says. “Just give me a minute.” He shifts his guitar, which he’s got around his neck, and plays the bit of melody he’s just worked out again, thinking about the lyrics. He closes his eyes for focus, and then the bed dips in front of him.
Kame is lying on his back across the foot of Jin’s bed, hands resting on his stomach. “Sing it to me,” Kame says, and Jin does, fingers brushing across the strings and voice coming out just a little hoarse.
As Jin sings, he opens his eyes, and Kame’s staring at him, or staring through him, Jin’s not sure which. Kame rolls onto his side, and he looks so…so otherworldly, curled up on Jin’s bed and staring at Jin with tired eyes that look like they have all the answers.
It makes Jin want to put his guitar down and stretch out beside him, and ask Kame all his questions, and feel the tickle of Kame’s breath on his neck.
Instead, he just keeps singing, and the words come as if he’s already written them.
Everything in his room is out of place, Jin thinks. Clothes on the floor, dishes on tabletops and sheets ripped from the mattress from anxious nighttime tossing and turning. His chair is piled high with sweatshirts and worn-out sweats, and discarded lyrics can be found on crumpled sheets of paper everywhere Jin looks. But Kame…Kame, in his loose black t-shirt and artfully tattered jeans, dark against the white of Jin’s tangled sheets, looks like he’s exactly where he belongs.
#
Jin dreams of fog. In his dream, it’s tangible, and he can scoop up handfuls of it. It slips tremulously from his hands, bleeding through the spaces between his fingers and rejoining the rest of it filling the air.
Through the fog, he sees a figure facing away from him, broad shoulders leading to a narrow waist, and he walks toward it, until he can see every detail of the familiar back. He’s close enough to touch, but when tries to close his fingers, Kame turns to nothing, disappearing into the fog.
Overhead, the moon’s light is obscured.
#
Seven days isn't so long, in a person's life. One week. It's almost nothing, when you consider that there are three-hundred-and-sixty-five days in a year, and fifty-two weeks, and the average person lives to be seventy-eight years old.
Still, it only takes seven very short, inconsequential days for Jin to wonder if Kame can ever be someone that Jin can forget.
#
Jin fumbles for his cell phone, groping around blindly on his bedside table for it as it blares Nicky Minaj. "Hello?" Jin says groggily into the phone, voice feeling scratchy with sleep.
"Yo, Jin, wassup?" Yamapi says cheerfully from the other end of the line. Jin wonders if Yamapi is able to the feel the power of his glare from across 9000 kilometers of ocean.
"Fuck you so much," Jin says. "It's five in the morning, asshole."
"I haven't heard from you in a month, and that's all you have to say when I make time in my busy schedule to call you on the other side of the world?"
"My mom says you have a girlfriend now," Jin replies, sitting up on bed and leaning his back against the headboard. He takes his left hand and rubs at his eyes, trying to clear the sleep from them. "Why don't you call her instead?"
"Jin, I have a different girlfriend every two weeks. The fact that I have a girlfriend is not surprising news." Yamapi chuckles and Jin can hear him shuffling magazines around on his coffee table like he always does when he's on the phone. "And I talked to her already today. It's you I haven't talked to."
"Sorry, man," Jin says, and it's more a yawn than words. "I've just been so busy. I keep wanting to call, but then I get caught up in stuff and...yeah."
"Excuses, excuses," Yamapi says, and he's still laughing. "Are you awake enough to chat, or should I give this up as a lost cause?"
"No!" Jin says. He's really happy to hear from Pi, who's one of his best friends. He misses him, sometimes. "It's nice to hear your voice."
"Don't get mushy on me, Jin," Yamapi warns playfully. "You're missing all the gossip here in Japan."
"Gossip?"
"Yeah, KAT-TUN announced a hiatus yesterday, it was all over the entertainment news. Uproar, fangirls crying in the streets, old ladies in love with Taguchi sobbing at the news stands..."
"Seriously?" Jin asks, feeling more awake by the second.
"No one knows why either, although I ran into Massu this morning, and he said, on the down-low, that Nakamaru says Kamenashi's gone AWOL."
"Really?" Jin says faintly. His fingertips feel cold, so he snuggles deeper into the blankets. "That doesn't seem like him."
"Apparently, no warning or anything. Johnny's going apeshit about something, anyway, and Kamenashi’s just missing." Yamapi sighs. "Sometimes I want to go missing too. Like, I just need a break. I bet he's holed up at his older brother's house or something, playing with his niece and getting some shut-eye. He needs to."
"Um." Jin's not sure if he's supposed to say that he's one-hundred percent sure that that's not what Kame is doing. "Wow."
"Yeah, I don't know," Yamapi says. "It's got everyone in a tizzy, though. Massu said Nakamaru looked panicked." Yamapi clears his throat, and Jin feels his heart leap into his own. "I shouldn't be talking to you about Kamenashi. Sorry. I always forget."
"Why not?" Jin says. "I don’t remember that being a rule. You totally just made that rule up."
"You always get all weird and bristly about him. You’ve always been weird about him, and it just gets worse with age." Yamapi's moved to the kitchen, Jin can tell, and he hears the sound of the coffee grinder.
“I’m not weird about him,” Jin grumbles, and Yamapi snorts derisively.
“Okay, Jin, you’re not weird about Kamenashi.” His voice is flat, like he’s humoring Jin. "Anyway, what's been up in Los Angeles? Seeing anyone? Attracting trouble?"
Jin thinks about Kame, who's sleeping right now in his guest bedroom, with his tired red eyes and worrying lines around his mouth, too thin and too tattered to be a twenty-six year old man. Jin thinks about words caught sticky in the back of his mouth, lying heavy on his tongue, and sweaty palms and feeling eighteen all over again. He wonders if that’s ‘trouble’.
"Nothing much," Jin says, in an attempt to sound light and flippant, and definitely not like he's harboring a fugitive in his comfortable LA home.
"Wow, you are the worst liar in the whole world," Yamapi says in response, his voice caught between a snort and curiosity. "Like, I can't believe they let you act. In movies even. Do they pay you?"
"Shut the hell up," Jin says, slinking down in place. He can imagine Yamapi's eyebrows climbing his forehead in amusement.
"Spill," Yamapi says, and Jin sighs, closing his eyes and falling down onto his side, tangling himself up in his blankets as he curls into a ball. He's not sure what to say, so he just presses his face into the blanket, scrambling for words.
"Kame is here," Jin says, when Pi makes an impatient noise at Jin's silence.
"What?"
"Kame. He's here. In LA. More specifically, he’s in my guest bedroom."
Yamapi is silent for a moment. "Why there, though? Is he having some sort of, I don’t know, breakdown? I didn't think you'd even talked to him in years, Jin."
"Yeah. I mean, I haven’t." Jin's face is buried in his pillow now, and he's sure his voice comes out muffled. "And I don't know why he’s here."
"Don't know?" Yamapi's voice is high, now, and Jin wishes he was a better liar. "What do you mean you don't know? Did you ask?"
"Not really," Jin says softly, and then Yamapi snorts again.
"Jin." Yamapi sounds caught between amused and annoyed. "Kamenashi shows up at your house, after two or three years where you two haven't exchanged glances, let alone words, and you just open your house to him with no questions? You don’t even know why he stopped--"
"He's Kame," Jin interjects helplessly, like it explains everything. The way Yamapi quiets, maybe it does. "He's still Kame."
"This isn’t going to mess up your concert rehearsals, right?" Yamapi queries, and now his voice is calm. "I don’t trust your common sense when it comes to Kamenashi. You always act like an idiot.”
"It's fine," Jin says. "I don’t know what you’re talking about. I do not act like an idiot around Kame."
"If you say so," Yamapi says, sounding dubious. “I don’t know why, but you’ve always been weird about Kame, Jin. Really weird.”
"You can't tell anyone he’s here," Jin says quickly. "I don't know why he's here, but it's obviously the last place anyone will think to look." Jin hugs his pillow in between his arms tightly, like it's a teddy bear. "He doesn't want to be found." Jin worries at his lower lip. “He looks…” Jin searches for the word. “Weary.”
"Jin..."
"Promise me you won’t tell. Bro-code promise me."
"You can't use the bro-code at a time like this, Jin. People are worried about him. His family is worried. His friends are worried. Hell, I was a little worried, as much as I worry about things that aren’t sex and fried foods."
"I'll make him call his mom," Jin says. "I will. So his family can relax."
Yamapi takes a deep breath, and then lets it all out in whoosh. It's loud in Jin's ear. "Alright Jin," Yamapi says. "Just...I don’t know why, but I want to tell you to be careful, or something."
"It's not big deal," Jin replies, sucking his lower lip into his mouth.
Yamapi chuckles again, but this time it's dry, and a little sad. "You're the worst liar in the whole world."
"It'll be okay," Jin says again. Maybe he's reassuring himself.
#
"Jin, do you like Yamapi more than you like me?"
Kame's voice is uncertain, and Jin doesn't like it.
"Yamapi is my best friend," Jin says. "I can talk to him about anything and everything, and sometimes I don't even have to talk to him for him to get me. It's easy."
"Easier than with me?"
"Yeah," Jin says.
"Oh," Kame says, leaning away from Jin.
Jin's having none of it. His arm snakes out and pulls Kame in, until Kame topples into his lap, arms looping around Jin's waist for balance. "But."
"But?" Kame says, and Jin can feel Kame's lips move against his ribs, even through his shirt.
"I want more than things that are easy," Jin answers. "Because some of the things most worth having are things you have to work at."
"Okay," Kame says, but his voice is still wavering.
"It's like..." Jin isn't sure how to make the words come out. "The things you work for, the things you have to keep trying and trying at, the things you keep reaching for...those are the things you really, really want."
Kame's arms tighten around him, and Jin's fingers clutch at Kame's sweatshirt, the fleece soft in his desperate grip.
"So even if I don't always understand you immediately," Jin continues. "Even if sometimes we misunderstand each other because we're so different..." Jin swallows, and exhales, and when he breathes in again, he can almost taste the rain. "I want to keep you." Jin smiles, and looks down at Kame, who looks up at him. "And I'm willing to work at it."
"So you like me more than Yamapi?" Kame asks, with a cheeky grin. His eyes glow silvery in the evening light.
"I like you different," Jin says, and that's the first time he realizes that Kame makes his heart beat faster in his chest just by being close.
#
Jin realizes, somewhere along the line, that he doesn’t really know what’s been up in Kame’s life. Luckily, Jin doesn’t have to actually ask Kame, which would totally be awkward, because Kame is famous and a large number of Jin’s questions can be answered with a Goo search of Kame’s name.
Jin thinks Yamapi’s theory that Kame might seriously need a break holds some weight as he reads about all the different things Kame is doing these days—it seems impossible that Kame can do all of these things and sleep.
Jin feels really out of touch with Japanese pop culture as he reads, and he supposes it only makes sense, since Kame is threaded through all of it, somehow, and Jin’s been avoiding news about Kame like the plague for the past two and a half years because it made him ache in strange ways.
He downloads the first few episodes of Kame’s drama from last year when he sees tons of pictures of Kame and his co-star pop up on celebrity dating blogs. She’s tall, Jin thinks, maybe almost as tall as Jin himself, and the way Kame is smiling at her sits like a stone in Jin’s belly.
Kame’s been busy, Jin thinks. Working a lot. He’s smiling in all the pictures Jin sees of him, tired but smiling, and Jin supposes that’s part of the job, but it doesn’t look like false cheer. The smile reaches Kame’s eyes, Jin thinks. Kame doesn’t look miserable. Kame doesn’t look like a man on the verge of a breakdown.
Jin wonders why Kame is here. Jin wonders if Kame is okay.
#
“You’re acting weird,” Dom says, and Jin stops scribbling in his notebook to look up at him.
“Weird?”
“Not that you’re usually the most focused guy or anything, but you seem…I don’t know. Distracted.”
Jin feels distracted. He feels like all his old feelings, long bottled up and pushed to the back of his mind and the back of his heart, have fallen off the shelves, crashing down on Jin and burying him under their weight, pinning him down so he can’t think about anything else.
Jin’s expression must be telling. Jin’s not surprised. He gets told time and time again that he’s an open book. It’s why he wears sunglasses inside—it makes him feel like he can keep his thoughts to himself.
“I dunno man, you don’t have to tell me about it, or anything. I was just noticing.” Dom shakes his head, and stares at Jin searchingly.
Jin blinks at him, and Dom laughs.
“Don’t worry about it man. What are you working on?” Jin triumphantly turns his notebook around, and points at the page he’s been scribbling on for the past few minutes. Dom gives a low whistle. “Looks good, man.”
Jin’s decided on his set list, and the sixth song is Kame’s choice.
#
"Why are you smiling at me like that?" Jin asks, as he tightens his grip on his guitar.
"You look so serious," Kame says. "It's not like you to be focused like this. You're usually all over the place."
Kame's fumbling with the corsage on the breast of his jacket, square fingers exploring the textures of the leather rose, and tugging on it to make sure it's affixed perfectly to the lace. His lower lip is slick from his tongue constantly peeking out to wet it, and his shoulders are hunched forward like he's a little tired. Jin's eyes peruse the line of his neck, following helplessly down his back to admire the way Kame's low-slung jeans hand sublimely around his hips.
But it's his smile, slight and teasing and innocently amused, that draws Jin's gaze again and again, until he almost forgets he's holding a guitar.
"I can be focused," Jin says, and Kame laughs, taking the jacket off the hanger and pulling it over his broad shoulders.
The jacket is ridiculous, Jin thinks, with lace and feathers and all manner of patterned fabrics. Kame doesn't look ridiculous though. "Well, Mr. Focused, how do I look?"
"Like something worth focusing on," Jin replies, and Kame's smile grows a little wider.
Jin doesn’t allow himself to look at Kame on stage—to get too close, or to touch. If he does, he’ll forget the words.
#
“You should call your mom,” Jin says to Kame. “The only reason no one’s called the police yet is because you’re Kamenashi Kazuya, and because the media would know if they did, and Johnny doesn’t want any of that.”
Kame starts. “I’d rather not,” Kame says.
“Why not?” Jin asks, tapping his fingers against his thigh.
“Because then I’d have to explain why I’m here, and I don’t think she’ll understand,” Kame replies.
“Are you having a breakdown?” Jin asks.
“No,” Kame says. “I am absolutely not having a breakdown.” He looks amused at the thought, and Jin notices that the circles under his eyes are starting to disappear, but that strange look in his eyes remains.
“Fine,” Jin says, and then he scratches at his hair thoughtfully. “Then I still think you should call your mother and tell her you haven’t been kidnapped by a lunatic or murdered or something. Tell her you’re safe”
“Not sure I can tell her I’m safe,” Kame says. “Your room is probably emanating toxic air to the rest of the house.” Kame’s studying the wood of the table, dragging his fingertip along the grain.
“I’m not asking you why you’re here, or anything. Just… people are worried about you. If you had disappeared and I didn’t know if you were okay… well, I don’t know if I’d be able to sleep at night,” Jin adds quietly, and Kame purses his lips, eyelashes fluttering as he blinks at Jin.
“Okay,” Kame says. “Okay.”
“Are you going to…” Jin debates whether it’s okay to ask, before he just barrels ahead. “Aren’t you going to be in major trouble? I mean, with your radio show and your TV stuff, and all the things you’re doing all the time?”
“Probably,” Kame says, and he’s not looking at Jin. He’s looking out the window with a serious expression on his face. He wraps his hands, (and Jin has always loved Kame’s hands), around a mug of coffee, and Jin notices that his knuckles are white. “Ah. More like definitely.”
“Is that okay?”
“There’s something I wanted, no, needed to know,” Kame says, and his voice doesn’t invite questions, so Jin doesn’t ask. He just walks over to the coffee pot, and pours himself a cup. “Are you asking why I’m here?” Kame’s tone is a little sharp, not with anger, but with uncertainty, and Jin runs his tongue over his teeth. He wants a cigarette.
“No,” Jin says.
#
Waxing Gibbous
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Dream Boy: First Quarter (2/4)
Date: 2011-11-01 11:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-26 06:14 pm (UTC)Or he knows the answer...
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Pikka
off to part 3