maayacolabackup (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
maayacolabackup) wrote2012-05-08 04:43 am
maayacolabackup) wrote2012-05-08 04:43 am
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Flip the Script (Ryo/Kame, PG-13) [4/4]
*
Ryo and Kame have never had a relationship for the cameras.
Ryo likes that in a world where his friendships are public knowledge, exploited for fanservice, or exaggerated to promote this or that, Ryo can still have some connections to people that aren’t up for scrutiny.
Kame likes it too, because he doesn’t talk about Ryo in interviews, and saves his warmest, most sincere smiles for when no one else is around at all.
*
Koyama is sitting next to him. The meeting hasn’t started yet, because Yamapi is caught in traffic and Kato is late- Ryo remembers hearing that he’s working on something, a book, and he’s got a meeting with a publisher today.
Massu and Tegoshi are bickering in the corner, as usual, with Tegoshi smiling smugly and Massu looking a bit like he wants to rearrange Tegoshi’s face. Some things, Ryo thinks, never change.
“Do you know what this meeting is about?” Koyama asks, and Ryo shrugs uncomfortably, because he does.
And some things do change, even if Ryo feels a bit melancholy facing that truth.
“We’d better wait for everyone to get here,” Ryo says, and Koyama peers at him closely.
“You do know,” he says, and he looks worried. Koyama always wants to take care of everyone. It’s one of his best qualities.
He’ll be a good leader. Maybe a little better than Yamapi, who has, for a while, had one foot out the door. Yamapi’s dreams aren’t NEWS, like Koyama’s are. They’ve all always known that.
“Yeah,” Ryo says, and he doesn’t know what he can say now that will soften the blow later.
His phone buzzes. Kamenashi. We all have to make tough choices, the message says. No emoticons.
It’s… exactly what Ryo needs. He sighs, and smiles a little at his phone. Maybe he owes Kamenashi a drink, at that bar they both like.
“You look soft,” Koyama says.
“What?” Ryo asks, and Koyama looks down at his binder, where he’s organizing things for what looks like a news segment.
“Just now,” Koyama says. “You looked so gentle.”
“Oh,” Ryo says, and then he swallows. “I can be gentle, sometimes.” He nudges Koyama with arm, and Koyama smiles. “I’m not always good at showing it, but I care, okay?”
“Okay,” Koyama says, and Ryo hopes he still believes him later.
*
Kamenashi Speaks!
Kazuya Kamenashi, actor and music idol under the popular label, Johnny’s Entertainment, will be sitting down for an interview next week with special correspondent Sachiko Tanaka to discuss the latest scandal sweeping the nation. Please tune in next week to see what he has to say regarding the rumors about his lifestyle, right here on NTV.
*
“You look like you went to sleep and someone stole your kidneys,” Ryo says when he answers the door, and Kame’s face smoothes from the strange, pained expression he is wearing while standing at his doorstep.
“Ah, Ryo, I didn’t know whether you’d be here or not!” Kame says, and Ryo raises both eyebrows. The false smile drops immediately from his face. “Ahh, sorry. It’s habit.”
“Don’t waste my time with interviewer-voices,” Ryo says, and Kame narrows his eyes at him. “And this is my apartment.”
“You’re right,” he says. “I’m just… On edge.” His hair is a mess. “You look dressed up.”
“What’s happened now?” Ryo asks, even as he’s buttoning up his shirt. “And why do you never call before you show up at my door?”
“I keep hoping I’ll catch you naked,” Kame says teasingly, and Ryo blushes a terrible red and he hates it.
“Oh good,” Ryo says. “That’s not even remotely alarming or predatory.”
“I keep being afraid you’ll say no,” Kame admits. “That you won’t want me to come.”
“Don’t be stupider than usual,” Ryo mumbles back, and when he peeks up at him through his eyelashes, Kame is smiling at him soppily in a way that makes Ryo’s stomach feel like it’s filled with butterflies. “Of course you can come.” He hopes his voice sounds gruff and not choked up. “If I’m home. Which, you know, I might not be sometimes.”
“I’ve been lucky so far,” Kame says with a shrug, and Ryo awkwardly shifts his weight.
“I’m making coffee,” he says. “I have an interview in a few hours and I need to be awake for it. Do you want some?”
“Sure,” Kame says, and he slips out of his shoes and follows Ryo into the kitchen.
“So what’s wrong with your face?” Ryo asks, as he takes two mugs down from the cabinet. He’s distinctly aware of how close Kame is standing; if he wanted to, Ryo could reach out and grab him. Or hit him. He can feel Kame’s warmth radiating off him in waves.
“Wow,” Kame says. “I don’t know where to start.” He jokingly lifts his hand up to touch his nose, and Ryo grunts.
“Not like that,” Ryo says. “The sad look.”
“Oh,” Kame says, and he looks down at the tile of Ryo’s kitchen, which Ryo had scrubbed only two days ago, so Kame shouldn’t be looking at it with so much consternation. “My family wants me to come over for dinner. Before the interview.”
And yeah, Ryo’s heard about the interview. He’s not entirely sure what Kame’s going to say, or even if he’ll watch it live. But yeah. He’s heard about it.
“Is it the first time you’re going to see them since…?”
“Yes,” Kame says. “I’ve been avoiding it, saying I’m busier than I am and dodging all sorts of attempts to bring me home, but… I’ll probably have to come out of the closet.”
“Were you in the closet?” Ryo asks, as he pours the coffee. He adds creamer to both of them, but Kame doesn’t let him add sugar. “I mean, I know you spend a lot of time in there, but I thought that was so you could pick out your outfits.”
“I think…” Kame says, and he takes the coffee from Ryo’s offering hand, holding it up to his face and inhaling. The circles under his eyes look dark, and his skin looks so smooth, and it makes Ryo’s heart twist. “I think they knew, but now they have to acknowledge it,” Kame continues. “And that will be hard.”
“So dinner,” Ryo says, and he takes a big sip of his coffee. It burns going down, because it’s too hot, but at least it wakes Ryo up. He sets his mug down on the counter, and starts tucking his shirt into his pants. “That will be unbelievably awkward.”
“Didn’t we already decide that we’re the awkward ones? That means most things we do will be unbelievably awkward,” Kame says, as Ryo straightens his shirt so that the buttons are lined up with the fastening of his pants.
“You’re not awkward anymore,” Ryo informs him. “Just me.”
“Okay,” Kame says. “If you say so.”
“You’re better at… people,” Ryo says, and he fumbles with the top button of his shirt.
“Let me,” Kame says, and he reaches up with his square, thick hands, and easily buttons it, his fingertips brushing across the skin at Ryo’s throat and sending a trill down Ryo’s back. Ryo swallows, and Kame’s hands draw back, slowly. Or maybe everything’s just moving in slow motion for Ryo.
Kame is close, chest almost pressed against Ryo’s, and his breath smells like coffee and his hair smells like chocolate, and Ryo can’t breathe at all. The counter is digging into his butt, where he’s pressed against it, and he feels so very nervous. “You got it,” Ryo croaks. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” Kame says, and he steps back, and there is air. Ryo inhales a lungful of it, and fumbles for his coffee even as Kame calmly retrieves his own from the kitchen table. Ryo can see his hands shake just a little, and he wonders if… “So yes. Dinner.”
The coffee is cooling off, which means Ryo can drink it faster. He needs the caffeine, because clearly he’s too sleepy and his defenses are low. “Okay,” Ryo says. “Do you…” he starts to say, but then he’s watching Kame, who drinks his coffee like he’s selling it, tongue darting out to lick the residue of his lips in a way that makes Ryo feel… weird.
“Do I what?” Kame asks, leaning slightly against the kitchen table and looking at Ryo directly.
“Do you want me to go with you?” Ryo blurts out, and Kame looks surprised by his offer.
“You would do that?” Kame asks, and he sounds a bit disbelieving. “But you don’t even know…”
“I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t mean it,” Ryo mumbles, and now it’s Ryo who is studying the kitchen tile like it has all the answers. “I’ll go with you. Moral support. I’m not entirely sure two awkward people are better than one, and I’m rude and foul-mouthed, so maybe I wouldn’t exactly help your case, but-”
“I really should go alone,” Kame says. “But… It would mean a lot. If you came.”
“Okay,” Ryo says, and Kame’s smile makes Ryo think it’s all worth it. “And Kame?”
“Yes?” Kame says, and he tilts his head to the side curiously.
“Your nose,” Ryo says. “I like it.”
“Why?” Kame asks, and Ryo’s hands are suddenly interesting.
“It’s not perfect,” Ryo says. “But less than perfect… It’s good, sometimes. You know?”
“There’s something wrong with your brain,” Kame says, but he looks happy, and that’s enough.
*
“You’re spending a lot of time with Kame,” Yamapi says, as he sips his frappuccino.
“Why are you drinking a lady-drink?” Ryo replies, taking a sip of his own, manly coffee. “You look like an American socialite.”
“I like whipped cream,” Yamapi says, and he suggestively raises his eyebrows.
“That’s why you have a sex tape,” Ryo says. “And also why I like Kame better than you.”
“Kame likes cosmos and wears lipstick,” Yamapi says. “Your logic is flawed.”
“Kame is not my bro,” Ryo says. “I have a different set of rules with him.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Yamapi says. “You’re just cranky.”
“And you’re not going to have those famous abs if you keep drinking things like that,” Ryo says, and Yamapi frowns.
“There’re only a thousand calories in this,” Yamapi whines. “That’s less than a third of my daily intake.
“In a single beverage,” Ryo says, and Yamapi looks at him unimpressed over the top of his Prada sunglasses.
“Stop avoiding the subject, Ryo-chan,” Yamapi says. “You’ve been spending a lot of time with Kame. Even Matsumoto has noticed. He says you don’t even make fun of his crocodile shoes anymore.”
“That’s because Jin has a pair of them now too, so it doesn’t feel special,” Ryo says. “Oh, I should tell him that his shoes are on their way out of fashion because Jin got them and then watch the cat-fight.”
“You’re broken,” Yamapi says, and Ryo snorts.
“You’re one to talk,” Ryo retorts, and then he crosses his arms. “I’m allowed to hang out with whomever I want.”
“Is it just hanging out?” Yamapi asks. “Because… well, I know you’re not exactly straight as an arrow, either.”
It was once, at a bar. Ryo had been drunk, and Ryo had liked the way his hair fell into his eyes, and the way he’d smiled, confident and sure. Ryo’d liked the way he wasn’t expected to lead, because Ryo’s terrible at that.
It was only once, but Yamapi had been there, and Ryo remembers it all.
“It’s just hanging out,” Ryo says. “That’s all.”
“Okay,” Yamapi says, and he takes a large, healthy slurp of his frappe. “If you say so.” He shakes his hair, and then seems to remember he’d cut it shorter again. “But…”
“But what?” Ryo snaps, and then covers his embarrassment with a sip of his own drink.
“You could do worse,” Yamapi says, and Ryo bristles.
“You say that like Kame isn’t the best-“ Ryo stops himself, but Yamapi is laughing at him.
“Cute,” he says, and he flicks Ryo in the forehead. “Really cute.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
*
Kame’s parents are nice. Of course they are, Ryo thinks, because what else would Kame’s parents be, but nice, and Ryo likes them immediately, just like he likes Kame. Kame’s brothers are nice too, with the same short hands and firm grips that Kame’s got, and the family resemblance leaves Ryo spinning.
Somehow, amidst all the talk with Koji about Eito and being from Kansai (“-I can hear it, a bit, in the way you talk! How fun!”) he loses Kame, and when he finds him again, Kame’s entire body has relaxed, and he’s got an armful of nephew and a huge grin for Ryo.
“It went okay, I take it?” Ryo asks, and Kame shrugs.
“I suppose I’m lucky they already have grandkids and it doesn’t fall to me,” Kame says.
“I suppose,” Ryo says, and he likes the way Kame looks, standing there with his nephew on his hip and his face pleased and soft. “Worried all week for nothing, didn’t you?”
“Didn’t even need the reinforcements,” Kame says. “But glad I had them, just in case.”
Dinner is rowdy, with lots of noise from lots of boys, and Kame’s niece isn’t one to be overshadowed, laughing just as loud and involving herself in every conversation Kame’s a part of, demanding his continuous attention.
Ryo’s never seen Kame do anything so openly, so loosely. He eats, and doesn’t seem to mind if he drops a noodle on the table, and he laughs, and keeps dropping his chopsticks, and slams his hands on the table when jokes are too funny.
Ryo wonders what Kame would have been like, without his career. If he’d be like this, all glowing and alive.
But then Ryo remembers Kame looks alive on stage too; just as effervescent and bright in front of thousands of fans, making raunchy jokes and flashing his tongue, and thinks Kame is Kame, no matter what.
After dinner, Kame helps his mother with the dishes, and afterwards, and Kame’s niece snags Ryo’s hand and leads him outside to the front porch, where she shoves him down on the steps and sits next to him.
“You really are a Kamenashi, aren’t you?” Ryo says, and she smiles at him in a way that reminds Ryo of the open way Kame used to smile, a long time ago.
It’s warm outside, despite the slight evening chill. Summer is finally settling upon Tokyo in earnest, and Ryo dreads the coming of the mosquitoes more than most things.
They sit outside in companionship, for a few minutes, both of them enjoying a bit of silence in contrast to the noise inside.
“Is it always like this?” Ryo asks her, and the little girl nods her head.
“Always,” she says, and she tugs at one of her pigtails. “We’re a loud family.”
“I’ll bet,” Ryo says. His own family is loud, and it’s made Ryo quieter. Still, the boisterous gathering reminds Ryo of home, with his own brothers. “Must be fun.”
“Are you Uncle Kazuya’s boyfriend?” Kame’s niece asks, and the question feels like it’s come out of nowhere, and Ryo sputters.
“What?” he asks, and Kame’s niece smiles at him knowingly.
“You kept watching Uncle Kazu through dinner. I thought you must be his boyfriend.”
“Ah, no, I’m not,” Ryo says, and he closes his eyes. Behind them is Kame, a bit of soy sauce at the corner of his mouth, fending off his oldest brother’s attempts to tousle his hair. Ryo thinks about the way Kame glows, when he’s genuinely happy like that, and it makes his chest feel tight, and he thinks, maybe, he wouldn’t mind so much if the answer to that question was yes.
“Oh,” she says, and Ryo tries to gather air but it’s difficult. “That’s strange,” she says, and Ryo opens his eyes to see her looking in through the front window confusedly.
“Why?” Ryo asks, and he turns his head. Kame’s in the window, smiling out at both of them. When he sees Ryo looking, he wiggles his fingers in a semi-greeting and Ryo flushes.
“Because during dinner, he kept staring at you too.”
“Oh,” Ryo says, and she disappears inside, leaving Ryo alone on the porch to smoke a cigarette.
When they’re driving home, Kame behind the wheel and Ryo watching out the passenger side window, there’s a calming silence, the kind Ryo has no urge to fill.
“Want to come back to my place for a drink?” Kame asks, and Ryo looks over at him. Kame looks peaceful, eyes in front of him, carefully watching the traffic even though it’s quite late and the roads are empty. “Or should I drop you at home?”
“Yeah,” Ryo says, and he sits up straight in his seat. The material of his pants, a soft tweed, sticks to his sweaty palms. “A drink would be nice.”
Kame’s apartment is as clean as always, and Ryo leaves his socks inside his shoes at the door, shuffling in behind Kame in bare feet. The wood is smooth beneath his toes, and Kame looks over his shoulder and smiles.
“Poison of choice?” Kame asks lightly, but there’s a thick tension in the air, like he and Kame are standing opposite each other on a tightrope and the drop below is farther than either of them can see.
“No poison, thanks,” Ryo says. “I’ll take whiskey.” He scratches at his hair, probably sending it into hopeless disarray. “I always thought you might be out to kill me, Kamenashi.” Ryo takes a step closer, edging along the wire. He stops in front of Kame, not sure what he’s doing. Kame’s face is free of make-up, and there’s a faint sheen of sweat at his temples from the humidity outside.
Kame laughs, and Ryo is so close he can feel the movement of Kame’s shoulders. “I think you’re out to kill me,” Kame says, and he shoves lightly at Ryo’s shoulder, and his hand is trembling. Ryo takes the opportunity to step around past Kame and into the kitchen.
“I’ll get some ice,” Ryo says, and when he goes into the freezer, Ryo notices his own hands are trembling too. “How many cubes?”
“Three,” Kame says. “One for the past, one for the present, and one for the future.”
“Who taught you that?” Ryo says, when he comes back into the living room to see Kame holding two fairly aged bottles of whiskey.
“Takki,” Kame says. “I think he got it from a movie, or something, but back in the day, his word was law.”
“King of the Juniors,” Ryo agrees. And the wire is shaking under his feet, shivering under his and Kame’s weight.
Now Kame steps closer to him. “Let me pour you a drink,” Kame says, and as the brown liquid sloshes into his glass, Ryo studies Kame’s face. It’s closed to him, but at the same time, Ryo can see the same confusion and… something else, in the tiny lines around Kame’s eyes and in the downward turn of his lips. He can see it in the way Kame quivers when Ryo’s fingers brush his to take the glass, and in the way Kame’s breath catches in the same moment Ryo’s does.
Ryo doesn’t know the lines, right now. He only knows that Kame is close enough to touch, and Ryo wants to touch him. Ryo feels crazy, and impulsive, and Kame was right, it is exhilarating to stand on this precipice and know you’re leaping into the unknown- to know that you’re risking it all for something you know in your heart is right.
It’s an Akanishi revolution, Ryo thinks. He’s not sure he can embrace it as a lifestyle, but right now, Ryo’s stupid enough to try it just this once.
“I’m sorry,” Ryo says, and Kame looks up at him. His eyelashes are thin, Ryo thinks, but they still perfectly frame his eyes. Kame’s eyes are alert, and searching Ryo’s.
“Sorry for what?” Kame asks, and Ryo’s nose brushes Kame’s perfectly imperfect crooked one.
“Your floor,” Ryo says. “And this glass.” He drops it, and he doesn’t think it shatters, but he’s not really paying attention. Instead, he’s putting his hands on Kame’s strong, wide shoulders, and Kame’s mouth parts in surprise.
Kame’s lips are as soft as they look, Ryo thinks. Pliant and soft and they taste like the cake they ate at Kame’s parents’ house, and like strawberry lip gloss, and it figures that Kamenashi tastes like strawberries, Ryo thinks.
At first, Kame doesn’t respond, but suddenly he wraps his left hand around Ryo’s back to draw him closer, sucking Ryo’s lower lip into his mouth, and Ryo gasps, and moans at the way Kame feels like a livewire in his arms. The bottle of whiskey in Kame’s other hand hits Ryo’s thigh, and Ryo wants to laugh because he has the worst timing ever and this is so awkward, but hell, they’re awkward, and Kame is too intoxicating for him to spare the breath.
“Kame,” Ryo whispers, and Kame seeks entrance to his mouth. Ryo grants it, and Kame’s tongue curls about his own, tasting him slowly and carefully, and Ryo hopes he doesn’t taste like the cigarette he smoked on the front porch, and also that there’s not stir-fry left between his teeth, or tomatoes, or something awful like that.
Kame shudders, and Ryo lets his hands slide around Kame’s neck, and Kame presses closer, until they’re chest to chest and Ryo can feel Kame’s sympathetic heartbeat, pounding and hammering as fast as Ryo’s own.
“Kame,” Ryo says again, when they part for air, and then before Ryo can get his bearings, Kame is gone, and Ryo is clutching nothing but air.
“What… what are we doing?” Kame asks, and his lips are swollen, and his voice cracks in a way that breaks Ryo’s heart along with it, because Kame… he doesn’t look happy. He looks scared, and upset, and maybe Ryo’s plunged them both into that nothing that had been lying in wait beneath the tightrope. “What… why did you kiss me?” Kame asks, and Ryo thinks the answer to that is obvious.
“Because…” Ryo starts, and of course the words don’t come, because Ryo needs them, and Kame needs them, and all Ryo’s got is a seemingly endless moment filled with desperate silence. “Because you’re. I’m.”
“This is bad,” Kame says. “This doesn’t benefit anyone.”
Ryo wants to protest that it benefits them, and that Kame had kissed Ryo back, and that Kame doesn’t need to look so terrified, because it’s only Ryo.
“No,” Ryo says, but Kame isn’t listening. Kame just sits on the couch and buries his face in his hands, and Ryo steps in a sticky puddle of spilled whiskey and hopes it wasn’t too expensive, and that it comes out of the imported rug under the coffee table.
“A mistake,” Kame whispers, and oh, Ryo thinks, that hurts, because Ryo’s not really thinking it’s a mistake at all. He’s mostly thinking that he’d like to do it again, because Ryo’s never loved strawberries before, but he can see himself getting attached to the flavor.
“Do you want me to leave?” Ryo asks, and Kame doesn’t respond, just curls up more into himself and Ryo doesn’t know what to say.
Ryo never knows what to say.
So Ryo leaves. He catches a cab, and the whole way home, all he can think about is that somehow, he’s messed everything up.
He doesn’t want to lose Kame. More than anything, he doesn’t want that.
*
“You don’t have to pretend you’re in a drama, to say the right words, do you?” Ryo’s covers are cool under his back. It’s early evening, and he should really be asleep, because he’s got an early schedule tomorrow. But Ryo can’t sleep. He hasn’t slept well in two days.
Asami laughs, before she sighs. “Oh Ryo,” she says. “Neither do you.”
“I searched for them, and I couldn’t find them,” Ryo says, and he must sound pitiful because Asami makes a cooing noise at him across the phone.
“Ryo, when you act, how do you access those emotions? How do you cry, like that?”
“I think about how the character must be feeling. What must be running through his head.”
“How must Ryo Nishikido be feeling? What must be running through his head right now?”
“Love,” Ryo says, and maybe that’s all he’d ever needed to say to Kame in the first place.
*
“Have you ever been in love?” Kamenashi asks, and Ryo looks at him like he’s crazy.
“No,” Ryo says. “I’m too busy to fall in love.” Ryo buffs his fingernails on his jacket. “I’ve got two groups and I’m constantly touring.”
“Yes,” Kame says. “But what’s that got to do with falling in love?”
“Who am I going to fall in love with?” Ryo asks.
“You go home with girls all the time,” Kamenashi says. “Jin tells stories of your conquests at rehearsal.”
“Jin is dumb,” Ryo says. “And going home with someone doesn’t mean you’re in love.”
“But I mean, you’re meeting people,” Kamenashi insists. “Surely at least one of them is worth falling in love with?”
“Love takes time,” Ryo says. “I’d like to think you fall in love over years, and then one day, you wake up, and you realize: Hey, I’m in love.” He looks up and Kamenashi is staring at him raptly. “Or something.” Ryo can feel the dull red creeping up his neck, and he tries to suppress it. “Go away.”
“You forgot I was here and you said something really cool,” Kamenashi says, and Ryo can’t fight the blush.
“Why are you asking lame questions like that, anyway, Kamenashi? Don’t you have a boring drama to film?”
“Just thinking,” Kamenashi says. “About things we give up to do this job.”
“Yeah?” Ryo says. “You ever regret it?”
“Rarely,” Kamenashi says. “Because whenever I think about it, I realize…”
“What?” Ryo says, turning completely toward Kamenashi.
“I’d give up a lot for this job.”
“Including love?” Ryo asks, and Kamenashi closes his eyes.
“Especially love,” Kamenashi says, and Ryo thinks Kamenashi looks a little like he’s got the weight of the world on his shoulders.
*
On Saturday, Kame’s interview airs.
Ryo plans not to watch it. He really does. He even unplugs his television, because Ryo’s willpower is shit, and he knows it, and he figures that will stem the temptation.
It doesn’t, and about six minutes before Kame is going to be on TV, Ryo plugs his television back in and turns to the correct channel. He sits in the middle of his couch, with a fluffy blanket wrapped around him, even though it’s the peak of summer, and he’s got a beer by his side as he braces himself.
He gets a text from Yamapi about one minute before the start. Watching?!?! it says, and Ryo types back a quick yes as the screen switches to the special report music.
“Do you have anything to say with regards to the accusations that you’re gay?” the reporter, Sachiko, asks, and Kame smiles at her, in that distant way that he saves for situations where he can’t frown. Ryo wants to give him a hug.
“Accusations?” Kame says lightly. “Is it a crime?” The way he phrases it is soft, like a sword hidden in a swath of silk. Ryo shakes his head at Kame’s skill. “Do you mean ‘speculation’?”
The interviewer blushes, because she’s been reprimanded but Kame is still smiling at her gently, not looking like he’s correcting her at all. “Yes, of course,” she says, and Kame soothingly leans forward toward her.
“Hmm,” Kame says. “The thing is, I’m an idol. I sell an image. And it is an image. We all sell images. We don’t sell ourselves; not really.” He leans back now, and she leans forward to follow him.
Kame’s so good at this game, Ryo thinks.
The interviewer, Sachiko Tanaka, is caught in Kame’s spell. So is Ryo, so he can empathize.
“And to be honest,” Kame says. “Because I’m selling an image, one that includes being a fantasy boyfriend, I don’t want to confirm or deny anything.” Kame clears his throat. “Candidly, though, I’ll tell you that I don’t think it should matter. Because regardless of the answer, I’ll give the same amount of myself to this job. Which is… everything.”
“Your fans love you,” Sachiko says. “They just want an answer.”
“Then my answer is ‘maybe’,” Kame says. “Being an idol is about giving, and I’ll keep doing that until there’s nothing left, whether I like men or women. But liking men isn’t something to be ashamed of, and I won’t treat it like it is.”
“I see,” she says, and she retreats from Kame’s parry. “Being an idol is giving?”
“Yes,” Kame says. “It’s also a search for perfection.” Kame narrows his eyes a bit. “We expect ourselves to be perfect, and so do our fans.” Kame laughs. “It’s a bitter pill to swallow, when you realize that you aren’t. I think that’s something anyone can identify with.”
“Yes,” Sachiko Tanaka says. “The ultimate reality check.”
“A friend told me that less than perfect is okay, too. That less than perfect is good. I hope viewers out there remember that,” Kame says.
“I hope they will too,” Sachiko Tanaka says, and then it’s easy.
Kame, Ryo thinks, is such a pro. The interviewer is looking at him enraptured, and he doesn’t break eye contact, drawing her in the way he always does. She’s on his side. She loves him.
Everyone loves him, even when they don’t know anything about him.
Ryo knows a lot about him, though, so Ryo can see the way his hands are stiffly clutching at his thighs, and the way there’s the slightest furrow in his brow.
Kame is nervous. Nervous and scared, like he was on his couch with his head buried in his hands as Ryo searched and searched for the right words to say.
Later, when they’ve talked about KAT-TUN’s new single and Nakamaru’s new drama, and Kame’s single-handedly won back over every housewife in Tokyo, Kame closes the interview with a smile that seems closer to real than it’s been for the whole hour.
”Do you think Kamenashi gives lessons?” Ohkura asks, at the end of it all, calling while Ryo is still staring at his screen remembering the way Kame had looked, in his perfect suit with his perfect hair, making the painful admission that he isn’t perfect.
“Why? Need some?” Ryo asks, and he waits barely a second for a response.
“I was thinking for Akanishi,” Ohkura says. “Kame could probably make him look like a thoughtful crusader for idol equality and the power of love.”
“Probably,” Ryo replies, and he wishes, more than anything, that Kame were sitting next to him now, so Ryo could make a fool of himself until Kame’s face didn’t look like it looked on TV anymore.
Ryo wishes he knew the next time Kame would be on his couch, in general, too.
“Are you okay?” Ohkura says. “I’ve been eating the whole time we’ve been on the phone and you haven’t called me fat once. I’m worried.”
“I’m fine,” Ryo mumbles, but he isn’t fine, at all.
*
Ryo looks at Kamenashi, and suddenly he looks all grown up.
“It’s still me,” Kamenashi says. “Why are you looking at me like I’m a stranger?”
“I haven’t seen you in a while,” Ryo says. “You look different.”
“Must be the eyebrows,” Kamenashi says, and Jin snorts and elbows him, and Kamenashi squawks, and there, underneath the polish and the shine is the boy Ryo has always wanted to know.
“Must be,” Jin says, and Tanaka looks at them both with fondness as Yamapi appears next to him.
“No, it’s something else,” Ryo says, and he doesn’t mean to say it aloud, but suddenly everyone looks at him. Ryo, at 23, is just as shy as he was at 16, and he hates the way everyone’s waiting now. “Never mind, it’s nothing,” he demurs, and then conversation is moving forward.
“What was that all about, with Kame?” Yamapi asks later, and Ryo doesn’t respond because he doesn’t want to say that somehow, Kamenashi’s kind of strangely beautiful in Ryo’s eyes.
*
I got Going back, Kame texts him on Tuesday. The teams all signed a petition. That they wanted me back.
I told you, Ryo writes back. You’ve got friends.
I do, Kame writes, and without the emoticons, Ryo feels a little bereft.
Congratulations, he texts, finally, after thinking for ten minutes, and Kame doesn’t respond to that.
Ryo misses him. He misses his weird little laugh and the taste of Kame’s cooking and he’d almost bought a fucking wok and Kame is gone, and Ryo misses him.
He almost texts it, but it’s like he’s back to square one, and he looks at the ceiling instead. “I miss you, Kamenashi,” he says upward, and the ceiling isn’t Kamenashi, and it isn’t going to answer.
*
“You look sad,” Uchi says. He’s casually eating an ice cream cone. It’s mixed chocolate and vanilla, and Ryo is tempted but if Yamapi ever finds out, he’s toast, so he manages to restrain the urge to get his own.
“I’m no good at people,” Ryo replies, stretched out on the grass. “I’m lost.”
“What do you usually do when you’re lost?” Uchi says, rising up so he’s resting on his elbows. It’s a bright summer day, and faint threads of NEWS’ latest single are audible over the sounds of children playing. Uchi is licking the ice cream that’s melted off his knuckles, and he looks six.
Ryo is getting advice from a six year old.
“Write it all down so I don’t have to talk about it,” Ryo says, and Uchi laughs.
“So do that?” he says. “Really, it’s not like it’ll hurt anyone if you scribble things in that little yellow notebook of yours. “
“Maybe I will,” Ryo says, and as he stares up into a mostly cloudless sky, the words start coming to him, bit by bit. “Thanks,” he says.
“What are best friends for?” Uchi replies, and then he cruelly drops his ice cream on Ryo’s face.
“You suck,” Ryo says, and he licks some of the ice cream off his face and resigns himself to the miserable sticky feeling.
“And Ryo-chan?” Uchi says, even as he wipes some of the dessert off of Ryo’s eyes so Ryo can look up at him. “Don’t give up.”
“On what?” Ryo asks, but he knows the answer, and determination is nice to feel, he thinks. Much nicer than defeat. Ryo wants to get this right.
*
Ryo opens to a fresh page in his notebook.
He starts to write.
It’s like a script, he thinks, only the character he’s writing for is himself, and this is a love song he can’t sing to millions of people and hope that at least one understands his feelings.
Ryo has to be brave, and Ryo has to find the words, good ones. Perfect ones.
He hopes that for Kame, he can.
*
Ryo’s never been good at expressing himself. He’s lucky if he makes it through a single day without sticking his foot so far into his mouth his toes find his lower intestines.
And now he’s got to convince a man who has probably sworn off love in the name of professionalism and monk-like self-denial that Ryo is in love with him. Even worse, Ryo’s got to figure out if Kame can even love him back.
Ryo calls Kame, just once. Kame doesn’t answer, and when Ryo gets Kame’s voicemail, all he manages is a soft, stupid-sounding “Kame…” before he feels humiliated and hangs up.
He doesn’t call back, because he doesn’t know if Kame wants to hear from him. Ryo feels like he’s trapped between what he wants and what he knows how to take.
The abyss hadn’t seemed so scary before he dropped into it, but now Ryo feels more adrift that he’s ever felt before.
He guesses Kame was a person Ryo felt safe around, and like he could let his guard down, and now he feels exposed and vulnerable.
It kind of sucks.
He sends Subaru some lyrics via email, and Subaru sends him back a weird, gloomy looking emoticon and a message that says these describe my soul, and that’s how he knows he’s gone off the deep end into emo.
Jin seems to have a sixth sense for when Ryo is miserable, because he keeps texting Ryo inane updates about Meisa making him take off his sunglasses in the house, and they make Ryo laugh, at least in the moment.
Love is horrible, Jin writes back, when Ryo sends him a picture he snatched from ‘Goo’ image-search of a whip, and Ryo can’t help but agree.
It’s not until Friday that Ryo is surprised, again, by the ringing of his doorbell.
“Why do I even have a phone?” Ryo says, when he opens the door to find Kame standing there in a suit, a thick layer of foundation on his face and his hands in his pockets as he looks sheepishly up at Ryo through mascara coated lashes. “I guess I should be glad I’m not naked.”
Ryo regrets the joke as soon as he says it, because the last time they’d been together, he’d kissed Kame, and Kame had regretted it. “One day I’ll get lucky,” Kame jokes, but it falls flat into the space between them.
Ryo moves aside, wordlessly welcoming Kame into his home. Kame comes in and squats down in the foyer to carefully take off his designer leather shoes.
“You’re wearing a suit,” Ryo says, just to say something.
“Going,” Kame says, and he can’t hide the satisfaction in his voice. That’s okay, because Ryo’s glad to hear it.
“Ah,” Ryo says, and Kame stands up and steps into the hall, and meets Ryo’s gaze.
They just look at each other, for a few moments, and Ryo realizes, all over again, that Kame makes his heart beat faster just by being.
Kame’s lapel is twisted, and Ryo reaches out to straighten it; it’s not because he cares, but because he knows Kame cares. The material is soft beneath his fingertips. Kame’s lips press into a thin line as Ryo unfolds the crease and presses it down straight. Kame shudders under the flat of his hand, and Ryo’s palm lingers there, enjoying the heat of Kame’s chest and the silk of his jacket.
Everything about Kame is smooth.
“You wanted to talk to me?” Kame prompts, and Ryo withdraws, arm falling casually to his side as they both stand there. Ryo breaks the moment by scratching his neck anxiously.
“I didn’t say that,” Ryo replies, averting his eyes. His notebook sits on the table, filled with half-formed thought and ideas that are everything Ryo wants to say, but maybe not quite how he wants to say it.
“You didn’t,” Kame says. “But I know you.”
“Do you?” Ryo asks, and Kame’s lips curl up at the edges.
“Yeah,” Kame says. “Because even when you don’t say anything, something about you is so honest.”
Ryo takes a deep breath. “I might have wanted to say something.”
“Really?” Kame says, and now when Ryo looks at him, he looks a little hopeful. “You haven’t given up on me quite yet?” Ryo watches Kame’s mouth form the words, pretty and slick and shiny, and Ryo wants to kiss him. He wants to lean forward and steal the breath from Kame’s lungs and…
“Why would I?” Ryo says, and then he walks more fully into the living room from the hall. Kame follows.
“Because I freaked out over a kiss. Because I got so wrapped up in what was expected of me that I didn’t really think about your feelings. Because I’m a little bit crazy and I show up at your house without calling and wear lipstick on my days off.”
“I already know you’re crazy,” Ryo says. “You’ve always been crazy.” Ryo grabs his guitar and puts the strap over his head. “Nothing new there.”
“Your guitar?” Kame asks, furrowing his brow. “What do you need that for?”
“I have something to say,” Ryo says. “I already told you that.”
“But the guitar… Are you about to sing?” Kame looks incredulous.
“No,” Ryo says defensively. “But it’s easier to talk if I-“
“Okay,” Kame says, and Ryo picks up his notebook.
The guitar is heavy in his lap. “You know I can be terrible with words,” Ryo says. “Well, I wanted to make sure I got it right. So I wrote it down. And I thought it out. And no matter how much I erased and erased, and rewrote things, I couldn’t. So I’m going to. Just. Listen to all of it, okay?”
“Yes,” Kame says, and he licks his lips.
Ryo looks down at his notebook. The words are blurry, because Ryo is nervous. Ryo is nervous and awkward and painfully incapable at all these things, but Kame, Ryo knows, is patient.
“I liked you,” Ryo reads. “I always liked you. I liked your stupid eyebrows and your stupid weird face, and the stupid way you laughed. I liked the way you squeaked when your voice cracked, and the way you ordered everyone around, and the way you alphabetized everyone’s nametags at meetings because it made you upset to see them out of order. I liked the way you always had something nice to say. I liked the way you were so enthusiastic about everything. It made it more fun. I liked the way you put up with me even when I was mean.”
Ryo coughs, because there’s a tickle in his throat. Kame doesn’t move, just swallows, and shuts his eyes. Ryo watches him for a second, just enjoying the way Kame breathes, nostrils slightly flared and forehead wrinkled just a bit with concentration. Kame’s trembling, a little, but so is Ryo.
“And it’s been years, and your voice has changed, and your eyebrows aren’t bushy. You don’t order people around anymore- instead you just insinuate that it should be done, and people want to do it. You only alphabetize the things in your own house now, even though the chaos of my CD shelf makes you twitch.” Ryo peeks at Kame again, and Kame smiles, and Ryo quickly barrels on.
“You’re all grown up now, and you’re still-“ Ryo’s mouth fumbles over the words, and his hands are shaking, and he’s erased so many times here that the words are almost illegible. “I still like you. I more than like you. I like your stupid nose and your gay lip gloss and the way you make people feel nice when they talk to you. I like the way it feels, when you spend time with me, like I’ve earned something special, because I have, because you’re special. I like the way you still put up with me, because I’m still mean.”
Ryo, despite the fact that he thinks he might die of stress and embarrassment and sheer awkward, feels kind of free, too.
“I don’t know the perfect words to say,” Ryo reads, and Kame is laughing now, and Ryo thinks that’s a good sign. “But I think you’re better than most people, and that’s why I kissed you. Because you’re Kame. And Kame is someone I care about. Love.” The last few words are shakily scrawled, and Ryo can barely read these either, and his tongue feels like it’s made of lead.
But Kame is taking the notebook out of his hands, and setting it down on the table. “Someone I trust very much once told me that less than perfect is okay,” Kame says, and Ryo bites down on his lower lip, studying Kame’s face. “Suddenly, I’m starting to see what he must have meant.”
“Yeah?” Ryo asks, and Kame smiles.
“Yes,” Kame says, and then he’s lacing his fingers with Ryo’s, and his knee hits the guitar, and they both wince. “Are you going to need to hold that every time we have a serious conversation?”
Kame seems amused at the idea, and maybe he’s okay with a Ryo that’s a little bit broken. “Maybe,” Ryo says. “I’m hoping this whole ‘baring your heart’ thing gets easier with practice.”
“Who says you get to practice?” Kame drawls, and Ryo tightens his hold on Kame’s hand, Kame’s square fingers fitting so nicely between his own. “I just don’t know if we’re compatible. Your apartment is a mess.”
Ryo looks around, at the stacked cups on the coffee table, and the magazines he still hasn’t picked up from the floor. He looks at the pile of t-shirts that badly need laundering behind his sofa. Then he looks back at Kame. “You’re just OCD,” Ryo grumbles, and Kame raises an impeccably groomed brow. “But I feel like we can compromise.”
“You make me nervous,” Kame says. “Like I’m not quite in control of my own emotions. I’m not used to feeling that way.”
“You make me want to tie your shoelaces together, sometimes,” Ryo counters. “Just to see if you’ll fall out of step and trip. I think we can both deal.”
“I wouldn’t,” Kame replies. “Fall out of step, I mean. I always check to make sure my laces are perfectly straight on my shoes before I start walking.”
“So we’re perfect for each other, then,” Ryo says, and there’s something stubborn in his voice, and he knows it, but he’s not going to let go of Kame’s hand.
“Not perfect,” Kame says. “But that’s okay, right?”
And Kame is asking about a lot of things, all wrapped up in one question that Ryo definitely knows the answer to. He smiles.
“I never loved strawberries,” Ryo says. “Your lip gloss tastes like strawberries.”
“What, is it too gay?” Kame asks, but he’s laughing, because he speaks Ryo, after all.
“No,” Ryo says. “I’m developing a taste for them. I can be surprisingly open-minded.”
“Really, now,” Kame says, and then, he leans forward, pausing right in front of Ryo’s lips. “I think I’ll add that to my list of things I like about you.”
“Yeah?” Ryo says, and this time, Ryo can’t see Kame’s grin but he can feel it against his own lips, beneath a layer of sheer gloss that’s sticky and soft. “There’s a list?”
“Yes,” Kame says, and then he laughs again, low in his throat, in a way that makes Ryo’s heart quake in his chest. “Maybe I should write it down.”
*
“You have a hickey on your neck,” Yoko says. “Have you been frolicking with vampires?”
Ryo flushes, all the way down to his toes. “I guess you could say that,” he mumbles, and remembers the way Kame’s lips had latched onto his neck, and the way Kame had guided him down to the bed and…
“Oh my god,” Yoko says, and it’s loud enough that Ohkura looks up from his instant ramen to focus on them both. “You-“
“Shut up, shut up, shut up,” Ryo says. “It’s none of your business, so you shouldn’t even be thinking-“
“You totally hooked up with Kame,” Yoko says obnoxiously, and Ohkura cackles around a mouthful of noodles.
“It’s not hooking up!” Ryo blurts out, and then he slaps both hands over his mouth.
“Oh my god,” Yoko says. “Oh my god, yes.”
“What the hell is wrong with you,” Ryo says. “Why are you so invested in this?”
“I totally get to make up a namesquish,” Yoko says triumphantly, and Ryo gives up.
You win some, you lose some, he thinks, and Ryo’s been winning a lot lately, anyway.
“I’m texting Kitayama,” Ohkura says, and Ryo gives him the finger.
“So half-hearted,” Yoko says. He seems delighted. “Love has changed you.”
“I hate your face,” Ryo says, and life, Ryo realizes, is pretty good.
*
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I just spent my afternoon reading it (instead of working, ehm...) because I couldn't wait to know how it was going to end. It seems almost real, both in settings than in characters, I think you may have guessed right some things. I may have a huge soft spot for Ryo, but I totally lack interest in Kame; so that you manage to make me feel both of them is quite amazing.
This is going straight in my favourites.
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Thanks for the comment! <3
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Thanks for sharing! (And thank you for writing, I really love your style)
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Thank you for reading; Glad you liked!
Love, Maia
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Less than perfect is okay, too. Less than perfect is good.
I think that sums up how I feel about this fic. To me, it's kind of perfect in an imperfect sort of way?
I hope I'm not offending you by saying that. Orz.
If I did offend you, please feel free to delete this comment and pretend you never read it.
Thank you for sharing this epic fic!
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As far as characterization goes, you're not being weird! Because they're real people who put on personas for us, sometimes we pick and choose what elements we buy and which ones we don't, you know? And we might not all agree on what parts are real or fake, and the great thing is that we'll NEVER know. In this instance, I chose to focus on the part of Ryo that's more shy... and I'm taking the words straight out of Ryo's mouth! If you dig around, Ryo's said he thinks Kame is really, really good at being an idol (he also puts Pi on that same pedestal). Not much about Kame as a person, though D: As much as I wish we knew more, I'm sort of glad we don't :D because it means it's more likely that the interactions they DO have aren't made up as 'fanservice' :3 So this is just my interpretation, and there's no law that you have to always agree ;) That's your prerogative!
Thanks for reading and commenting ;) Glad you found things to like ^_^
Love,
Maia
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Anyway, I'm glad that you didn't take any offence! I really like that you chose to focus on the part of Ryo that's more shy. I mean, as much as I enjoy reading fics where he has the "Sexy Osaka Man" persona, it gets a tad bit repetitive after a while and it makes him two dimensional, so it's great that you went about a different route. :)
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Just beautiful work, need to memory this.
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I totally enjoyed the moments between Ryo and Kame, the way you alternated between present and past... it made everything so realistic <3
And honestly, Ryo was so CUTE!!! *________* and sfskjghjsl, Kame... ahh, they're perfect to write about <3
“You’re both so awkward. Kame dealt with it by becoming super social, and you dealt with it by becoming super silent. But you’re both really, really awkward people.”
:)) my favorite description of them up till now in RyoKame stories XDD
It was a wonderful reading and I don't regret not going to sleep until I finished this lol
I'm going to have some nice dreams now <3<3<3
Thanks~~
sorry for typos/grammar mistakes I'm half seeing what I'm writing >/////< haha