we're imagining car wrecks

and thousands upon thousands made an ocean

2009-12-15T18:24:12Z

;the Atlantic was born today and I'll tell you how
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;It will go on for months, and when Nino stops to think about it one day he will realise that he’s lost count.
;R
;Angst.
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.
;Note: Title is shamelessly stolen from Transatlanticism, by Death Cab for Cutie.

The first time they fuck, it will be by accident. They’ll be alone in the dressing room, the two of them, and Ohno will be cradling a paper cup of ocha in his hands while Nino will be making lewd jokes about the interviewer’s breasts. In the middle of a reference to an old Shukudai-kun episode with impromptu volleyball and pastel-coloured balloons, Nino will find himself on his back on the floor, his shirt hitched up to his armpits and Ohno’s tongue in his mouth.

Nothing will register in Nino’s mind for the next few minutes, except for strangely mundane details, such as how Ohno manages to pull Nino’s boxers off without having to remove his shoes, or how the tips of Ohno’s hair turn golden against the harsh light of the ceiling lamp as he hovers over him. Nino will wince and let himself cry out when Ohno pushes two fingers inside him, slick with spit and still warm from holding hot tea. Then it will be cock and teeth and skin and sweat, and Nino will grip the leg of the coffee table beside his right temple till his knuckles turn white and get carpet burn on the base of his spine.

Nino will not come but he won’t give a damn. He’ll lie on his back, panting, listening as Ohno dresses up and comes back with a towel from his duffel bag. Ohno will wipe Nino’s chest dry while Nino tries to count the number of cracks on the ceiling, even as Ohno tugs on his boxers and jeans for him and dabs at the sweat blooming on his upper lip.

“Are you okay?” Ohno will ask. “I’m sorry.”

Nino will think about the raw patch of skin on his back and the dull throbbing between his legs, and nod.

--

The second time they fuck, it will become a habit. Ohno will have him pressed up against the wall of the last toilet cubicle on the second floor of the Jimusho. The tiles will feel cool against Nino’s forehead, and this time both their jeans will be pooling around their ankles. When Nino starts to get loud Ohno will cover his mouth with his right hand; Nino will feel rather than hear the muffled moans between their skin, and when he smells cheap soap from the soap dispenser and himself on Ohno’s fingers, he will come on his stomach and all over the wall.

They will dress slowly, speaking to each other in soft tones with words that hardly go beyond “Is there anymore toilet paper?” and “I think I have soapsuds coming out of my ass.”

It will go on for months, and when Nino stops to think about it one day he will realise that he’s lost count. Ohno will have dated five different girls within the same period of time, and at the back of his head Nino will wonder whether they let him fuck them from behind. Nino will date only one girl, and break up with her six weeks after he finds out about her affair.

--

“I’m not gay.”

It will be out of his mouth before he thinks about it. They will be in Ohno’s bed and the lights will be turned off, so all Nino can see is the bobbing of Ohno’s Adam’s apple and the outline of his right knee as he plants his foot on the bed.

“I never said you were,” Ohno will reply softly, and that’ll be the last they talk about it.

--

In February, Nino will be offered the supporting role in a French independent art house film. The director will have spotted him from Letters from Iwo Jima, and have the script translated into Japanese and sent over. At the same time, Shinsuke Sato will call him up to audition for another multi-million dollar live-action film adaptation of another popular anime.

“Remember how successful Gantz was,” his manager will tell him.

Nino will finger his dog-eared copy of the French movie script, listening to the rising shrill of his manager’s voice, before asking her to confirm that his lines will only be in Japanese. The next day, he will start packing his bags, and turn down the audition quietly.

Sho will be the only one to see him off at the airport because the others will be busy, and also because they won’t want to attract too much attention. While he’s waiting for his turn to check in, Nino will let his head fall back to try and count the cracks on the ceiling but Narita International’s stainless steel structures are pretty much close to perfection. Sho will look at him bemusedly, and Nino will mumble something about how five years ago he’d told a magazine that he went to America to accomplish what he could and five years later he finds himself leaving for Paris to get away from what he can’t.

Nino will want to take it back right after because Sho will look worried and confused, eyebrows knitting together and hand reaching out to grab Nino’s wrist.

“I don’t understand,” he’ll say.

Nino will laugh and shrug him off. “The last thing you understood about life was the invisible hand. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”

“Adam Smith has nothing on you.”

On the plane, Nino will eat half a packet of peanuts and drink two cups of juice. When it’s nightfall he will fall asleep, and dream about the Eiffel Tower, freshly baked baguettes and playing Kaibun on Ohno’s skin in the dark.

--

Paris, Nino will think, is surreal. Everywhere he turns he will see these quaint, cluttered cafés, and there will always be more people sitting outside rather than inside them, despite the chilly weather. They will sit outside around tables made out of heartwood, cradling tiny cups of espressos; sometimes it’ll be pale blue porcelain and sometimes it’ll be chipped glass, but Nino will think it’s espresso because the cups are always small. And the chairs are always, always, facing the street.

Sometimes when they’re on location, Nino will look at them – those people with their tiny cups and mismatched saucers, facing the street instead of each other. He will wonder if they’re on the outside looking in, or if he’s on the inside looking out.

--

His co-star will be called Ida, and she will be short and sweet, like her name. Nino will suppose that she should be considered pretty, because even though she’s not well known people on the streets always give her a second look, but he will not see anything special about her except for how she always has stray eyelashes on her cheeks. In between takes, she will teach Nino how to flirt in French and Nino will teach her how to curse in Japanese.

One day, Aiba will call him while he’s in hair and make-up. He will press his phone close to his ear and listen to the Japanese syllables tumble over each other in waves as Aiba tells him about drama filming, how he got into trouble for buying a kitten for his niece’s birthday and Jun’s perfect double catch on the latest VS. Halfway through their conversation Aiba will insist that Nino let him speak to Ida, after Nino lets slip that she can understand English.

Nino will like Ida as she takes the phone despite how he shakes his head frantically. He will lean a bit closer to her, and between bits of incoherent English punctuated with the occasional “Sugoi!” he will be able to make out Aiba's “Please take care of our Nino-chan,” and “I am Japanese idol.” When Aiba starts singing “Arashi, Arashi, for dream,” just to get his point across, Ida will laugh, revealing the dimple on her right cheek and the gap between her two front teeth, and Nino will like her even more.

--

On his day off, Nino will wake up at ten in the morning and wonder around the shops near his hotel. He’ll find a gift shop nearby and buy a beret for Aiba and a snow globe holding a model of the Arc de Triomphe for Sho. Before lunch he’ll remember that he needs soap. After going into several pharmacies and two upscale boutiques, the kind which sell organic herb-infused bath crystals, Nino will finally come to the conclusion that yes, Japan is indeed the only country capable of producing soap-scented soap, and get the bath crystals for Jun.

Nino will spend the rest of the day roaming around the Centre Pompidou and the Louvre, and unknowingly pick out books on clay and modern art. He will end up buying magnets with artworks printed on them, and tell himself that they’re for anyone he happens to forget, just in case.

--

On the last day of filming, Nino will head out with some of the crewmembers for dinner. They will go to a restaurant with a four-tier chandelier hanging from the ceiling and paintings of several breeds of dogs playing poker on the walls. Between the goose foie gras terrine and the lobster bisque, Ida will laugh at something he’d said, and Nino will stare at her right dimple and the gap between her two front teeth and think that he could possibly like her more than he does right then, or love her, even. After dinner Ida will invite Nino over to her house for coffee but he will decline, using his early flight as an excuse. She will look disappointed but Nino will pretend not to notice, and smile politely after she kisses him on the cheek.

Nino will go to bar and pick up a nameless, faceless redhead clad in a bustier dress and black fishnets and fuck her twice in the sleaziest hotel he can find. He will leave when it’s barely dawn, with nothing more than smudged lipstick on the underside of his wrist and the memory of her hands, pale and freckled, curled against the bedspread on the spot where his chest was just moments before.

He will flag a taxi standing on cobblestone sidewalk with his shoelaces still undone. Inside the taxi, Queen’s Greatest Hits will be playing on the stereo and when Nino breathes in deeply he will smell scented candles and worn leather stale with cigarette smoke. After telling the taxi driver the name of the hotel he’s staying in, he will call Ohno.

“Nino?” is all Ohno will say.

Nino will wind down the window as Ohno’s tiny voice floats down the line, crackly with static. As the taxi stops at a red light Nino will see a couple of drunkards stumbling around the back of an alley, high on tequila and debauchery.

When the taxi starts moving again, the sound of vomit hitting the asphalt will fade away, along with the clicking of chopsticks against bento sets on the other side of the line. Ohno will have walked away from whomever he’s having lunch with and into an empty stairwell, eight hours and six thousand miles away, waiting patiently.

“Yeah,” Nino will breathe.

After that none of them will say a word, and Freddie Mercury will croon ‘Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy’ in the empty spaces between them.

--

Nino’s manager will drop him off at the entrance of his apartment building, and watch as Nino collects his mail from the security guard on duty and disappear into the elevator before driving away.

The first thing Nino will see as the elevator doors slide open is Ohno squatting beside his apartment door, baseball cap pulled low over his head and both elbows resting on his knees. When the wheels of his suitcase get caught on his way out of the elevator Ohno will look up and smile lazily. Nino will let both of them in and lock the door, and Ohno will hardly bat an eyelid.

Nino will leave his suitcase and duffel bags in the hallway and strip off his jacket and socks as he makes his way into the bedroom.

“By the way,” he will yawn, pulling his t-shirt over his head. “I didn’t buy you anything.”

Ohno will laugh and tell him it’s okay, before stripping down to his boxers and joining Nino on the bed. After that, Nino will stop trying. He will fold himself against Ohno’s body, fingertips seeking out familiar angles and nooks, and grow helplessly hard in his boxers. They will come grinding against each other and stay like that, everything hot and sticky in their boxers and Ohno’s finger still lying in the cleft of Nino’s ass.

Somewhere between the edges of consciousness and dreams, Nino will wish Ohno never said sorry the first time. He will want to crawl into the hollow above Ohno’s hipbone and stay there for the night, because Ohno is a fucking marathon, and Nino is tired of running.

We are stuck, you and I, Nino will want to tell him. Stuck between a fuck you and an apology, not knowing where to go or what to do or even, perhaps, who they are, only that this is how they’ll let themselves burn and that somewhere along the way, God, they should have known.

there's a safety issue

2009-11-25T17:03:55Z

;between planets and sweethearts
;One-shot
;Gen, with slight Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;Nino was here
;PG
;Starts as crack and ends as something else.
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.

Nino disappears on a Saturday morning.

His manager leaves him no less than nineteen missed calls on his cellphone and three increasingly angry-sounding voicemails on his answering machine. After listening to Hi, this is Nino. Don’t bother leaving a message. I never check these. for the fourth time, she flips her cellphone shut with an ominous click. Then she flips it open again, and dials Ohno’s number.

Ohno lets himself into Nino’s apartment not with the key Nino had given him (because he’d misplaced it somewhere in his parents’ house) but with the spare key under the potted plant with the Doraemon sticker. He toes off his shoes and pads around the apartment in mismatched socks, peeping first into the bedroom, the bathroom and the kitchen. The bed is already made, grey checkered sheets folded neatly over two white pillows, and a pair of over-washed boxers hangs over the heater. The bathroom looks the same as always; the shelf above the sink is uncluttered, save for a tub of Gatsby Moving Rubber with the Takuya Kimura label still attached and a cup holding a tube of toothpaste and two toothbrushes, one for Nino and the other for Ohno (is his the orange one with the white stripe or the blue one with the transparent handle?) for when he stays over.

Ohno shuffles into the kitchen. The refrigerator is still running, and so is the coffee machine. He pours himself some coffee and peers into the fridge. There are four eggs, a Tupperware full of onigiri (courtesy of Mother Ninomiya, he thinks) and a bottle of Calpis that’s half full.

Then Ohno hears a shrill, mechanic tinkling and reaches for his cellphone before remembering that he had left it on silent mode. He turns around and notices, for the first time, the DS that’s sitting on the kitchen counter, next to a mug of coffee with steam still rising off the surface. He leans over the contraption and sees that Chrono Trigger is still on, at level 59, and the game is not paused. Ohno holds the DS in his hands for a while, tracing the well-worn buttons and the tiny scratch at the edge of the screen from when Aiba had borrowed it for “an experiment”. Then he takes out his cellphone and calls Sho.

“Morning, Captain!”

“Nino’s missing.”

--

The media goes crazy.

Ohno sees Nino’s face on every magazine cover and every television programme and hears his name every hour on the radio. Everyday, Sho steps into their dressing room with a bundle of newspapers tucked under his arm and holding a tray of coffee in the other and Jun heads straight for the newspapers instead of the coffee like he used to and Ohno reads the newspaper from cover to cover without checking the fishing column or the sports section.

He keeps seeing headlines like Arashi: Now A Four-Man Band? and Ninomiya Kazunari is MIA and he’d throw his head back and laugh, if only he knew whether he’d stop.

--

It happens when the four of them are stuck in some interview, and the interviewers have been going on and on about their latest single when it’s clear that what they really want to talk about is Nino and they are all so drained and exhausted and if they could just be left alone for just one minute perhaps they could look as though they’re enjoying their jobs again.

When one of the interviewers begins her question with “So, about Ninomiya…” for the third time in the past hour, Sho interjects her mid-question, uncharacteristically rude with his News Zero face, and says, “Nino’s in Albania, teaching the otters to lap dance before Aiba gets there to host his new variety show, fuck you very much.”

Fifteen minutes, two angry interviewers and one baffled crew later, the ten-second clip gets tossed onto the cutting room floor.

Twenty minutes later, the clip gets uploaded on YouTube.

Twenty-three minutes later, ‘Sakurai Sho Tells All’ receives its eight hundred and thirty-five thousand, two hundred and seventeenth hit and approximately two thousand six hundred five-star ratings.

The eight hundred and thirty-five thousand, two hundred and eighteenth hit opens up a new window that says This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Fuji Television Network, Inc.

(Somewhere between the fifth and the sixth hundred thousandth hit the video had been ripped and made available for download in both FLV and MP4 format.)

--

Management flies into the biggest uproar in nearly a decade. Sho spends most of his day with his arms plastered to his sides and his upper body bending at a ninety-degree angle, apologising to his shoes.

When Sho’s finally allowed to retire to the dressing room, back aching and shoulders more slumped than usual, Ohno tries to be a leader, in the best way he knows how, sitting beside him on the couch and putting Sho’s head on his shoulder. Sho folds pliantly, just as Aiba squeezes in on his other side and Jun sits on the floor by their feet. If they hear their managers yelling in the room next door, they don’t say a word.

Talks of disbanding begin the next week, and Ohno turns up for work not knowing whether he’ll spend the day singing or holding a press conference announcing the end of Arashi.

On Friday, Ohno rushes past the boardroom and skids to a stop when he hears about a dozen voices whispering in hushed tones inside. Words like “brilliant gimmick” and “media attention” jump out at him, but he’s already twenty minutes late for hair and make-up and his new stylist is a modern-day Nazi with a pair of tweezers, so he shakes his head, and makes a mad dash for the elevators. His manager finds him later, wincing as yet another stray eyebrow is plucked and tells him, with barely suppressed glee, that their thirty-first single has topped the Oricon charts for the week (even beating out Mr. Children!) and viewership for Shukudai-kun has increased (by twofold!).

Within the next few days, Jun gets an offer for a new movie, Sho receives two drama scripts and Ohno gets the lead role in a play he didn’t even know he had auditioned for. Aiba gets a new variety show investigating the lives and natural habitats of semi-aquatic mammals that will premiere in Albania for the first week. Arashi stays.

--

One day, Ohno gets bored of memorising his lines in the dressing room and wanders to the notice board hanging on the wall above the couch and checks on their schedule for the week. He feel tired after reading about their third consecutive photo shoot on Tuesday, and ends up covering the entire notice board with several blank music sheets he finds lying around. Then he gets a pen and writes 1. Teaching otters in Albania to lap dance on the top left-hand corner of the board.

Like all the things done out of boredom in his life, it escalates into something Ohno never planned for it to be.

--

2. Challenging the locals in Bora Bora to see how many piña coladas they can down in one sitting

--

~~3. Working as a stripper in a cabaret in Ginza wearing a French maid costume!~~
*Nobody is to let Masaki near the board

--

4. Black hole

--

It has become their inside joke, of sorts. They can give any reason they want whenever they’re asked The Question, and just to make sure that they don’t give the same reason twice, there’s a small tick against the ones they have already used (and maybe a cross against some of those they haven’t used but are contributed by Aiba).

Ohno’s personal favourite is no. 19, which he uses on an episode of Utaban because with one less member, he’s been told to do more talking and less pissing-Nakai-off.

“Nino’s on the moon,” he says.

It is probably one of their more ridiculous reasons, even more so than the one they last gave (34. Trying to straighten The Leaning Tower of Pisa) or the one Jun had given Popolo (61. Abducted by aliens *see: The X-Files), but Ohno remembers their previous Odoroki episodes, and how Nino had wanted to go for the Zero Gravity experiments instead of the Leave-It-Be experiments where he had to “watch fucking tomatoes grow in fucking star-shaped moulds,” and it gives him a bit of satisfaction to imagine Nino laughing as he cracks an egg in outer space.

For the next issue of Wink Up, Ohno just sends in one entry.

To Kazu (Ninomiya Kazunari)
I hope you get what you want, and dream dreams bigger than the moon.

When it gets published, Jun buys two copies. He cuts out Ohno’s section and pins it on the board along with a part of the cover page, the part that's just above the barcode and beside one of Hey! Say! JUMP’s right kneecap. Everytime Ohno passes the board for the rest of the day, he pauses, and stares at the glossy square of blue and red.

--

On one of the rare occasions where Ohno is the earliest to report to work, he dumps his bag on the couch and contemplates writing down reason no. 130 when he sees the words Nino was here, scribbled messily at the corner between no. 23 and the margin of the paper.

Ohno can’t remember what happens for the next fifteen minutes, except for running to the bathroom, then over to hair and make-up (you’re early, Ohno-san!), then to the boardroom before finally going back to the dressing room, breathless and feeling more adrenaline pumping in his system than he had for months, and seeing the three of them sitting on the couch, and Aiba with the guiltiest expression on his face.

Aiba doesn’t stop apologising and Ohno has to grip him hard by his elbows and smile and tell him that it’s stupid, but it’s okay. He starts apologising again five minutes later and this time Ohno doesn’t try stopping him, because it makes one of them feel better and Ohno tries to be a leader, in the best way he knows how.

For the recording of Shukudai-kun that day, an AD manages to find the old cardboard cutout of Nino which they had lugged around when he was in L.A. and asks Ohno if he wants to bring it out again. Ohno says thank you, but no, because this is real life and Nino’s not in L.A. and let’s be realistic, Nino’s never going to be on the fucking moon. The AD carries the cutout under his arm and shuffles away with his head down while someone comes over to powder Ohno’s nose, and nothing tastes good for the next hour.

--

They don’t erase Aiba’s tiny fuck up, and although Ohno never admits it, he likes it there, sitting quietly in the corner. Sometimes, when it’s way too early in the morning or if he’s left to rot for three whole hours before his turn for the shoot, he looks at the words and says them in his head again and again and again till they are no longer words (and therefore not a lie). Ohno’s not delusional, but sometimes, just sometimes, he lets himself squint, and the words almost resemble a familiar uphill scrawl.

--

Ohno wakes up one day and realises that he cannot remember how Nino looks like in the mornings.

On the way to work, he hugs his bag to his chest and thinks, the tip of his tongue peeking out of his mouth. By the time he reaches the dressing room he manages to come up with the cowlick that always stands up at the back of his head and the pillow creases imprinted on his cheek and Ohno supposes it’s enough, but he feels full and hollow at the same time, and wonders how that could be.

So Ohno goes to the board and writes Miss you in tiny, neat handwriting under Nino was here, and leaves it at that.

missed the last train home

2009-11-21T13:15:59Z

It's things like this that restore my faith in humanity.

it's full of charts and facts and figures and instructions for dancing

2009-11-14T10:48:55Z

;5 Ways Arashi Never Met
;One-shot
;Gen, with very slight Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari and Aiba Masaki/Sakurai Sho
;Exactly what the title says.
;PG
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.
;Note: A spur-of-the-moment thing. So I apologise if there're any errors. .___.

1. Arashi never met in a combini.
Nino doesn’t mean to be rude, but seriously. Purple nail polish?

“You’re not ringing up my purchases,” says the man. Nino thinks he looks a tad ticked off.

“Are you one of those? Those sensitive new age types?” Nino asks, perfectly aware of how obnoxious he’s being. “Take it from me. If you wanna do it, you should do it all the way. Might I interest you in those over there, yes, the ones in heart-shaped bottles. They come in neon, gloss –” Said man glares at him. “– and pastel.”

Another customer walks in, carrying a small golden retriever in one arm and holding up his other hand with his palm facing up. Nino leans over the counter and sees that he’s actually holding a ladybug.

He waves at Nino and the disgruntled SNAG, vigorous enough so that the puppy looks like it’s vibrating, before heading towards the condiments.

“Anyway, I don’t care,” says the SNAG, leaning on the magazine rack. “You either give me my things, or I’ll just wait here till you close shop.”

Nino tips off an imaginary hat. “I’m open twenty-four seven.”

“That sounds wrong on so many levels.”

“Oi, you at the back,” Nino hollers. “Are you lost or what? Are you trying to steal something?”

“No,” says the man crouched at the refrigerators. He finally selects an egg mayo sandwich and shuffles to pay.

“That’ll be three hundred yen,” Nino tells him, ignoring the dirty look the SNAG is giving him.

As Nino counts his change, Dazed and Confused looks at the cash register in nothing short of awe. “I’ve always wanted to work in a combini,” he tells Nino.

Nino spends the next five minutes ringing up the cash register, just to see his face light up.

As Animal Farm comes back with a packet of mustard seeds and disposable underwear, a man enters the store, and stares wide-eyed at his puppy.

“NO PETS ALLOWED IN THE STORE,” he bellows, pointing at a sign on the wall that even Nino hadn’t noticed.

Animal Farm pouts, but agrees, and goes out to deposit his ladybug on the pavement before making his way in again.

The Public Service Announcement can’t close his mouth for a good twelve seconds, then he finally turns and asks the SNAG nicely if he could please move, he’d like a copy of The Economist.

2. Arashi never met in third period economics.
Sho thinks he is beginning to dislike his classmates.

Not that they’re nasty to him, or anything. On the contrary, they’re all rather nice. Ohno, who sits beside him, likes to doodle absently on his table sometimes. And that guy, Matsumoto, collected Sho’s notes for him that time he had a cold. Even if he did look at Sho like it’s his fault for being sick.

It’s just that, well, they’re disruptive. And honestly, even with Sho sitting right at the front and braving the occasional spray of spittle, he cannot. Concentrate.

Ninomiya, who sits behind him, has also recently developed a fetish for answering the sensei in French.

“Ninomiya, what are the policies used for correcting negative externalities?”

“Oui?”

“Ninomiya, what are the benefits for state provision of merit goods?”

“Oui?”

“Ninomiya, what is the ‘incentive problem’?”

“Oui?”

As Sho takes down notes, Ninomiya pelts Ohno at the back of his head with a crushed paper ball. Ohno bends down to retrieve the paper ball, unfazed, and smooths the paper to reveal a messily scribbled je t’aime, oh oui, je t’aime. Ohno tears off the edge of his feint ruled exercise paper and draws a perfect ♥ before folding it up neatly and placing it on Ninomiya’s table. Sho turns just in time to see him beam at the paper and Matsumoto wrinkle his nose in distaste, before going back to reading GQ under the table.

“Sensei?” Aiba pipes from Sho’s right. “I’ve got a question, about Kaori-chan.”

“This is economics, Aiba.”

Sho covers his ears, because he does not want to know why Aiba Masaki, of all people, has something to ask about the class whore.

“Yes, but it’s just, if it’s technically impossible to exclude any of us from enjoying the benefits of Kaori-chan, and if each time one of us has her without having to reduce the chances of others having her, does that mean she’s a public good, too?”

Sho doesn’t know what horrifies him more: the fact that Ohno actually tries to pay attention, or that Aiba is honestly curious.

3. Arashi never met in cyberspace.
ilovegame: you suck
keio_sho: what i do not
ilovegame: you totally sucj
ilovegame: you wouldve shot yourself if it allowed u to
keio_sho: D:
ma-chan: he just means that ur a boob
ma-chan: noob
J: Can we stop this meaningless conversation and continue?
ilovegame: okok
ma-chan: its ok kieo-chan, i will help you <3
keio_sho: okay (:
keio_sho: thats not my name
ma-chan: who’s dat new person
ohnose: t
ohnose: testing
ma-chan: hi!1
ohnose: oh so this is AIM?
keio_sho: o.o
keio_sho: this is CS
ohnose: are they the same?
keio_sho: it means counter-strike
ilovegame: omfg
J: Oh my fucking god.

4. Arashi never met in jail.
Aiba’s never been in a jail cell before, so all in all, this new experience is actually pretty cool.

There’re four other people with him, and even though they don’t look very friendly, Aiba tries to make friends. Because what else is there to do? If they’re going to be locked up in the same cell for an indeterminable number of hours, they should at least shake hands and say hi.

He turns and smiles at the harmless-looking bloke beside him and asks what he’s in for, like how they always do on TV.

“I was fishing, and apparently I’d crossed some restricted border that I’m not authorised to.” He frowns. “I didn’t realise that I’d sailed that far.”

“I accidentally spilled liquid nitrogen on a police car.”

“That’s pretty neat.”

“Aiba.”

“Ohno.”

Aiba beams. He turns to the other man hunched up beside him, inky black hair falling into his eyes. “How ‘bout you?”

The man looks at him through his bangs. “I killed someone.”

One of the two men opposite him gives a tiny squeak, and the other one rolls his eyes.

“Nino’s just joking,” Ohno kindly informs Aiba. “He told me he robbed a bank.”

Aiba relaxes a bit, but he’s not ruling out the possibility.

“That’s Sho, and that’s Jun,” Ohno continues, gesturing at the two opposite them. “I think they’re just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Now that the icebreakers are over, Aiba thinks it’s time for proper conversation. “How long are you guys gonna be in here?”

“Not much longer,” Nino says quietly. Aiba looks at him, and he’s tapping his chin in concentration, eyes flitting to the small window at the corner of the cell and a rusty hook near the bars. “I’m ditching this joint.”

“Oh, do you mind breaking me out, too?” Ohno bends forward so that Aiba’s head isn’t blocking his view of Nino. “Then I wouldn’t have to trouble my mother to come bail me out.”

“We’re all breaking out. I can’t do it alone.”

Jun, who’s not looking disinterested for the first time since Aiba stepped foot in the cell, leans forward. “What are you planning?”

Nino leans forward as well, and whispers conspiratorially into his ear. When he’s done, Jun sits back with an almost sadistic grin on his face.

“I want in on the plan!” Aiba says, bouncing up and down. He hasn’t been this excited since the incident with the liquid nitrogen two hours ago.

“You’re going to need a distraction,” Jun says.

Nino continues to tap his chin for a few moments without saying a word. Then he turns his gaze on Sho, and smirks. Slowly.

5. Arashi never met in the end.
It’s only 5 a.m. in the morning, but the train station is already bustling with people.

Ohno heads towards the vending machine and nearly pokes the man queuing up in front of him with his fishing rod. He’s glad he didn’t, because the man is wearing a ring that's large enough to cause permanent damage and he buys piping hot black coffee. Definitely not a morning person.

Instead, Ohno buys two bottles of Pocari Sweat, and ends up hitting the person behind him as he turns with his fishing rod balanced against his shoulder. The man doesn’t mind though, and laughs it off so that Ohno can see the laugh lines at the corner of his eyes.

It’s 5.15 by the time Ohno gets to the Yamanote line. As he’s on the escalator, a man in a suit carrying a briefcase brushes past him, Blackberry plastered to his ear and talking about inflation rates and national income. Ohno’s glad he’s not a working stiff.

The train has already arrived, but Ohno takes his time walking to the end of the station because he usually likes sitting in the last carriage. He’s about a few steps away from the last entrance when the doors slide close. Ohno peeks in through the glass and sees a relatively empty carriage. There’s even an empty seat next to a man with a baseball cap tapping away on a DS. The man looks up, and their eyes meet for a second, but then the train starts to move and all Ohno sees is the wall on the opposite side of the line.

It’s okay, though. He still has time, he thinks, as he finds a bench. Ohno sits, and waits.

there's a chance that we might fall apart before too long

2009-11-05T08:57:58Z

;sometimes I think of us, and how we used to be
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;A drunken phone call, and a resolution.
;PG
;Tiny specks of angst.
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.
;Note: My brain has got the dumb, and my muse is cranky and took one look at my hiatus and said, "Fuck this shit." The result? STREAMS OF CONSCIOUSNESS PASSED OFF AS FIC. *facepalm* I apologise for the ambiguity of it all.

“Hello?”

“Ohno?”

“Yeah?”

Nino grunts, and gropes around blindly for the lamp on his nightstand.

“What do you mean ‘yeah?’” he snaps, rubbing sleep out of his eyes as he turns on the lamp and bathes the room in a soft glow. “You’re the one who called!”

“Oh, yes,” Ohno amends, as if he forgot.

Nino’s feet get tangled in the sheets as he tumbles out of bed and he stubs his toe against the corner of his dresser and curses, a muted “fuck”, less because he’s in pain and more because he’s becoming Aiba. He ignores Ohno’s confused “What?” and limps into the living room, dragging a pillow along with him.

“Nino?”

“What?”

“Do you remember what I said? The last time?”

Nino falls on the couch, thinks of a drunken phone call that he laughed off, and says, “No.”

“I meant it, though.”

“Are you out drinking?” he asks instead, worrying the callus on his thumb between his teeth.

“Yes,” Ohno replies, just a tad slurred. “I mean, I was. With Maru.”

“Please tell me he’s driving you home.”

“It’s nearby. I’m walking.”

Nino can hear random chatter from other people along the streets and the distant honking of a car. “Don’t get run over.”

Ohno laughs.

“Nino. I lo–”

“Stop it. Just stop, okay?”

Ohno sighs. “You never let me say it. It’s okay if I say it on national television, it’s okay if it’s in print and it’s okay when you tell them what I said. But when it’s just you listening, you tell me to shut up.”

He pauses, so all Nino can hear is the sound of traffic in the background.

“That’s fucked, okay?” Ohno’s tiny voice floats back down the line. “That’s fucked, and you don’t get to do that anymore.”

Nino stands up and starts pacing around, the edge of his thumb now sore and red. “Yes, I do, because it’s happened before and the last time we were this close to getting fucked over –”

“I know, Nino, I was there," Ohno snaps, and Nino thinks he’s probably not as drunk as he thought.

He swears under his breath. It’s past three in the morning and all Nino wants is a cigarette and a bed with someone else in it, but he doesn’t think he can handle that right now. He manages to find his cigarettes but there’s no lighter nearby, so he lets one cigarette dangle between his lips and sits on the dining table.

Nino sighs, and takes out the cigarette. “I’m sorry.” He swings his feet back and forth like a little boy and stares at the pillow in his lap.

“Doesn’t matter,” Ohno says after a while, even though Nino knows it does.

The sound of traffic has died down; he listens to slow, steady footsteps as Ohno makes his way home. Nino presses his face into the pillow, and he can still smell Ohno from the night before.

“By the way, you left your socks here the other day,” he adds. “And I had to wash them for you.”

“The grey ones?” Ohno asks.

“No,” Nino replies, going to the dryer and pulling out a sock. “It’s like the colour of the eggplant croquette Sho tried to make that one time.”

“Before or after the fire?”

“Before the fire. But after Jun and the ketchup bottle.”

“Ah,” Ohno says, and Nino knows he’s nodding without having to see him. “I thought I’d lost those.”

“Lucky you.”

“Yeah,” he says, followed by the sound of a door opening and closing, and shuffling of feet. “I lucked out.”

“You home already?”

“Mmhmmm.”

Nino closes his eyes, and imagines Ohno padding quietly up the stairs hoping not to wake his parents up, stripping off his jacket and t-shirt once he reaches his room.

“Remind me to bring your socks for you tomorrow,” Nino says, just for the sake of it, because between the two of them Ohno always forgets, and Nino can take care of things himself anyway.

“I could go get them from you now,” Ohno says. His voice is light, but there’s something lying underneath, like whispered promises and hope.

“Is it too late?” Ohno asks when Nino doesn’t reply. “It’s too late, isn’t it, Nino.”

It’s not a question anymore, and Nino wonders when it ever was.

“Don’t be stupid,” he says. “It’s too early. It’s almost four.”

Ohno gives a small chuckle, and even though Nino tries to ignore it he knows that part of it is out of relief. He folds the socks and makes his way back to bed.

“I told you last year that on my seventeenth birthday I wished I was a girl,” he says, when he’s between the sheets.

“But you said not anymore.”

“Yeah, not anymore.”

“What about it?”

“I don’t think you got what the confession was.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying, I remember what you said. That last time.”

It’s quiet for a moment, and Nino thinks Ohno must’ve stopped whatever he’s doing because Nino stopped breathing two seconds ago.

“Good. M’wanted you to know that.”

Nino doesn’t say anything after that, and neither does Ohno. He shifts his phone to his left ear and moves into a more comfortable position, lying on his stomach with the blankets pulled up to his chin. They listen to each other breathe for a while, and there’s a moment of crunched gravel as a car drives pass outside and the hum of a heater, but Nino can’t tell whether it’s coming from where Ohno is or where he is. He wonders absently how much his phone bill is going to cost him this month.

When he’s almost convinced that Ohno has fallen asleep, Ohno pipes, “Think I’m going to sleep now.”

“Okay,” Nino says, switching off the lamp and plunging the room in darkness. “Don’t be late for work tomorrow. Today.”

“Try.”

“Yes, please do.”

“G’night.”

“See you.”

“I’m glad.”

give me some teeth

2009-10-22T17:36:18Z

FIC HIATUS.
Till the 3rd of December, because exams are suckin' the life outta me.

I kiss you on the brain in the shadow of the train

2009-10-15T18:17:57Z

;A Coming Together in Five Parts (or, Ohno learns that life changes but the whole world can be contained in an orange.)
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;Ohno could be sixty and his ideal date would still be to go to a deserted island with Ninomiya Kazunari.
;PG
;Heartwarming moments disguised as crack. Anyway, chaos ensues.
;A tad AU, in that Ohno and Nino first met in preschool.
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.
;Props to misaki7chan, who translated this into Russian. Very cool. :3

1.
If Ohno were anyone else, he’d probably feel offended at how this kid has no qualms whatsoever about using his sempai’s bright yellow wax crayon, which he had sharpened into a perfect tip the night before. But, as it is, Ohno possesses a ridiculous amount of patience and a reaction time that’s probably fifteen minutes slower than the average human being’s, even for someone at the tender age of five.

So that’s why when Ninomiya-kun takes his crayon (without permission, no less), Ohno does nothing but look on with mild interest at the short, stubby fingers dragging the crayon across clean paper. By the time fifteen minutes have passed, Ohno is looking at Ninomiya-kun like he’s something fascinating on the Discovery Channel, because, surely, no preschooler can draw a giraffe with such detail and technique.

“I like your giraffe,” he says.

Ninomiya-kun looks up at him, with steely eyes and mouth set in a straight line.

“It’s the Tokyo Tower.”

“Oh.”

Going back to shading the Tokyo Tower bright yellow, Ninomiya-kun glares at him, and keeps his crayon for the rest of the day.

--

Ninomiya-kun submits his drawing, and calls it The Talest Billding in the World. He gets a C for good effort.

Ohno puts Dog aside (“A! Well done!”) and peeks over Ninomiya-kun’s shoulder at his drawing. He can’t help pouting because it was such a brilliant piece of work, and it would have scored an A if only Ninomiya-kun had named it “Giraffe” like he told him to.

His bottom lip starts to wobble at this travesty of justice.

Ninomiya-kun, on the other hand, grins proudly at his drawing, and turns to Ohno with an impatient tsk.

“What is wrong with you?” he asks. He reaches into his bag for an orange and thrusts it at Ohno. “Chubby Cheeks. Hey, Chubs. Here. Take this.”

Ohno looks at it with wide eyes.

“An obaa-san in my neighbourhood sells them on the street.”

“Thank you,” Ohno says, taking the orange and giving Ninomiya-kun a watery smile.

In the meantime, Sasaki-sensei starts distributing afternoon tea, and wonders why Ohno is crying when Ninomiya is the one with a C.

--

Before they break for summer vacation, Sasaki-sensei gathers all the students for a group photograph. Ohno winds up standing next to Ninomiya-kun, whose hands nearly poke Ohno’s left eyeball when he makes two peace signs and raises them into the air.

“Oh-chan,” Ninomiya-kun whines. “Don’t be such a poop.”

He reaches over for Ohno’s hand and starts arranging his fingers to form a peace sign before holding all their hands up and grinning widely at the camera.

To be fair, nobody had ever called Ohno “Oh-chan” before (and it’s a considerable upgrade from “Chubs”), and Ninomiya-kun can seem, well, cute, even though he always ignores his brand new Faber-Castells in favour of Ohno’s rapidly depleting set of wax crayons.

It almost makes him feel bad for playing connect-the-dots on Ninomiya-kun’s face with the sensei’s black marker during naptime.

2.
When Ohno graduated from preschool and left Ninomiya behind, when Ninomiya announced that he was going to leave the jimusho with Sakurai-kun and become a director (“I promise to cast you as the retarded kid who picks his nose.”) and when they met up again in Hawaii, he gave Ninomiya an orange.

He thinks it must be something symbolic, because Ninomiya did give him an orange as a truce back when they were drawing on each other’s faces. Or one of them, at least.

So just before their first concert, when each of them is dressed in transparent latex of a monstrosity and white shorts, he goes up to Ninomiya and gives him an orange.

He takes the orange, like he always does, and says, “I really dislike oranges.”

Ohno splutters. “But you always buy them from that obaa-san.”

Ninomiya rolls his eyes. “That’s because it makes her happy, not me, Ohno-kun. Gee-zus.”

He turns to talk to Matsujun, so Ohno makes his way over to Sho-kun, who’s covering his nipples in the corner.

3.
The stylist that jumped Nino in the greenroom once only to get shoved away roughly with a “NANDA-YO?” loud enough to have alerted security dresses Nino for the recording of Shukudai-kun. She puts him in shorts that end above his knees and socks that cover his ankles so that Nino looks all of twelve years old. Then she dumps him unceremoniously into a chair and slicks his hair into one pointed bunch at the front and another at the back of his head with an amount of wax that would take him five showers to scrub off.

Nino stands scowling in the corner of hair and make-up, but feels marginally better when Ohno joins him with a sun burnt nose and splotches of rouge on each cheek from his make-up artist’s attempt to give him a healthier complexion, wearing a bright red pullover.

Aiba walks by a while later in jeans and a t-shirt with cool graphics, his hair curling gently over his forehead. He does a double take when he sees the both of them.

“You two look like Astro Boy and Anpanman!”

“Fuck off.”

4.
Ohno’s obsession with clay seems to have taken on a whole new level when he turns up for work the next day and finds that he cannot get rid of the remnants of clay on his skin and under his fingernails.

“You look like you’ve been unearthed by an archeologist,” Aiba breathes.

“You’re not using him for A no Arashi so don’t even think about it,” Nino cuts in.

In a valiant attempt to save Ohno from incurring hair and make-up’s wrath (Nino knows), he yells for Jun’s help (“Yo, that motherfucker in the corner with the Sally Hanson’s and glittery pink, get your ass over here.”) and licks the pad of his thumb before wiping furiously at a smear of clay across Ohno’s cheek.

“You’re getting skinnier,” Nino remarks, pressing his finger into Ohno’s cheek. “Let’s go eat ramen later. I’ll even let you treat me.”

Ohno nods, and wants to tell Nino to keep it down before the others hear, but suddenly Jun is there with acetone and cotton pads and yelling, with evil satisfaction, “Riida is taking Nino out for ramen without us!”

Aiba pops in at the opportune moment, clutching his chest in mock devastation. “How will I live?”

Ohno grimaces, and shrugs apologetically. He can’t help it if he only has enough love for Nino.

He ends up taking everyone for ramen, and pays for six bowls instead of five because the rest of them forced an extra helping on him. Nino grins rather spectacularly as Ohno chews his way around a huge mouthful of ramen.

(“Missed you, Chubs.”)

5.
Ohno’s parents announced their divorce over shabu-shabu on Thursday evening.

Thinking back, Ohno never did ask for the reason for their divorce. Instead, he had asked whether they would have to live apart, to which his mother replied, “Your otosan will be moving into the garage, which he can help to clear up while he’s at it,” and scooped a generous serving of beef into Ohno’s bowl whilst doing so.

Now, as he helps his father pack his books and collection of stamps in cardboard boxes, Ohno asks why.

“Your mother bought juice with pulp. Again.”

Ohno pauses in the doorway. “That’s it?”

His father turns to him with a serious look. “Thirty years, Satoshi. Thirty years of marriage. That amounts to about seven hundred and twenty cartons of juice with pulp. A man can only take so much, son.”

He heaves a box of books and socks and walks past Ohno. “Chop chop! We don’t have all day, you know.”

--

The best person to call in such situations out of the four of them is, of course, Sho.

But Ohno had misplaced his cell phone, so he turns up at Sho’s apartment at 9 p.m., armed with bags of Chinese takeout.

“Riida!” Sho exclaims, smiling in surprise. “What’s up?”

“My parents are currently in a mid-life crisis, and I need to consult an expert to help me with this predicament.”

“Who told you to memorise that?”

“Matsujun.”

Sho shrugs sheepishly. “Ohno-san. I have to do a recording of News Zero tomorrow. There are still three different newspapers and TIME left to read.”

“Oh, it’s okay, then,” Ohno nods and pats Sho’s shoulder, narrowly avoiding jabbing him in the ribs with the pair of wooden chopsticks poking out of a bag. “Maybe I can try Aiba-kun.”

“He’s preparing for A no Arashi.”

“What’s he planning to do?”

Sho’s right eye twitches. “An experiment to find out whether pink flamingos can stand on one leg throughout a half-hour bus journey.”

“Nino should be home, no?”

--

They spread out enough food to cover the expanse of Nino’s dining table.

“No offence, Ohno-kun, but your parents aren’t divorced so much as they are sleeping in different rooms on the same plot of land.”

Nino takes out an old deck of cards from the kitchen drawer and takes out two cards as coasters for their C1000s. Ohno gets the King of Spades and he gets the Joker. Nino frowns. Ohno lets him swap.

“He did come over for dinner for the past two nights,” Ohno says. “But maybe it’s because we had yakiniku.”

“Itadakimasu.”

They eat in silence for a while, and Ohno mumbles how stupid it was to get divorced over fucking juice.

“It was actually over the pulp, if you want to get technical about it,” Nino pipes. He pauses, and examines a piece of orange chicken. “Maybe they stopped loving each other.”

Ohno looks at Nino.

“But they say true love lasts a lifetime.”

“They lied, Oh-chan,” Nino says, handing him the spring rolls.

Ohno ignores the grease-soaked carton in front of him. “Was that what your okasan told you?” he asks curiously.

“Okasan just says never love someone more than they love you. Why aren’t you eating the spring rolls?”

It’s a puzzling concept to grasp, especially for a man whose mother never gave him advise that went beyond “If it’s important they’ll call back.” and “When life gives you lemons, save them for sashimi.”

It’s also puzzling because Ohno likes permanence. It’s comforting, like how fresh sheets of paper and old jukeboxes and warm sake in February are comforting. He thinks of managers that come and go and married couples that sleep in different rooms and how the five of them used to have really bad teeth and not give a shit and for once Ohno wants something that’s constant.

--

Ohno could be sixty and his ideal date would still be to go to a deserted island with Ninomiya Kazunari.

--

“Go out with me.”

“Eh?”

Not the most eloquent answer, no, but Ohno is beyond caring.

“Go out with me,” he repeats.

Nino stares at him with owlish eyes, and winces when a mechanical voice booms “K.O.” in his hands. He sighs, and puts his DS away.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m saving lemons for sashimi.”

“Fuck, you’re high.”

Ohno laughs. “Kazu. Kazu.” He kneels in front of Nino, and it’s like having his crayons stolen all over again.

“We could go to Ginza,” Ohno says. “I will buy you truffle soba and you can wear those shoes with the pointed tips.”

Nino covers his face with his hands and mutters something that sounds suspiciously like “Baka,” and Ohno smiles because Nino just said Yes, I’d like that.

It’s not exactly a deserted island, but it’s okay. Ohno’s happy with okay.

--

On his way to Nino’s apartment two days later, Ohno stops by the frail old lady sitting on a bench by the park.

When Nino opens the door, wearing the shoes with the pointed tips, he takes in all ten million of the oranges Ohno’s carrying (“There’re only fifty-four oranges, seriously.”) with remarkable composure.

“I bought all that she had left, so she went home.”

Nino laughs, and tells him this is even better than flowers.

end.

what comes is better than what came before

2009-09-28T16:33:10Z

;439
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari (slight Ohno Satoshi/Matsumoto Jun)
;In which Ohno paints, and nothing and everything happens.
;R
;I don't even know what genre this belongs in.
;One cookie to Johnny Kitagawa.

“Draw me.”

“Okay.”

Ohno manages to find scrap paper from the centerfold of a magazine and coloured felt-tip pens in the dressing room. He’s slightly tired, adrenaline leaving him with each exhalation of breath, but Ohno knows that some things are meant to be more than just mental pictures.

Jun is still flushed, aglow with a sheen of sweat and beaming rosy pink at Ohno. His hair is curling in wet tendrils against his forehead and he’s still smiling, so that when Ohno squints all he sees is eyebrows, creamy skin and teeth.

Ohno thinks Jun is quite beautiful.

Felt-tip pens are hard to work with, and he doesn’t like how the paper gets splotchy with ink when he lingers there too long, but Ohno manages to sketch Jun into infinity within that moment, unabashed grin and all.

“It’s really good,” Jun says, when Ohno hands it to him.

Ohno shrugs. It’s not his best one of Jun, but he has a feeling that it will end up being framed, like the one Ohno did of him back in the jimusho.

“So, how much?”

“It’s okay.”

Fifteen minutes later Ohno is getting a blowjob in the third bathroom stall from the left, his glittery costume pooling around his ankles. He comes with a soft groan into Jun’s mouth.

“MY EARS, MY EARS!”

Jun stands up, wipes the corner of his mouth and, pining Ohno with a sultry gaze, tells Sho to piss off.

When Ohno looks up, he can see Aiba’s hand waving a Super Soaker menacingly from the first stall, aiming the nozzle in his direction. He ends up missing and wets Sho’s clean boxers instead. Jun laughs, and Sho laments on how this would not have happened if, for fuck’s sake, the two of them had waited till they got back to the hotel.

The last stall is quiet.

It’s nearly midnight by the time they reach the hotel. Ohno lets himself into his room and eats umeboshi onigiri from the bento they were all given for supper. He contemplates going out into the balcony, but his fingers feel frozen when they touch the glass window, so he sits down on the floor instead, and tells himself to count to a thousand. He’s out the door before he hits five hundred.

Ohno’s toes dig grooves into the plush carpet along the corridor, and he repeats the room number to himself in his head. It’s something he tries to do now, ever since that time in Osaka when he almost went into Aiba’s room by mistake. Ohno knows he’s got the correct room when he can see light peeking out from under the door.

He presses the doorbell once, and before he can blink he’s being pulled in and pushed against and his arms are full of freshly shampooed hair and warm male skin.

“Hello,” he says to Nino, who’s currently busy nuzzling into his neck.

“Mmmm.”

Ohno smiles, and lets his hands roam across Nino’s bare back.

“You’re early.”

“Yeah.”

Nino hums happily and bites Ohno’s ear.

Splaying his hands on the base of Nino’s spine, Ohno starts walking him slowly backwards.

“Jun blew me today,” Ohno says, as if Nino doesn’t already know. Nino doesn’t pause in his ministrations, but Ohno feels his eyelashes fluttering faster against the nape of his neck. “Then I jerked him off.”

He’s not sure if Nino wants to hear it, and he knows that he doesn’t have to say a single thing, but Ohno tells Nino everytime he fucks Jun, everytime Jun sucks him off. He still doesn’t know why. Nino pulls himself away, finally, and doesn’t look at Ohno as he turns and walks towards the bed.

“The thing about being a kept secret, Ohno-kun,” Nino throws over his shoulder with a smirk, “is that nothing really makes you feel betrayed anymore.”

He slides his boxers down his narrow hips and sits on the foot of the bed, tilting his head to the side and giving Ohno a small smile.

“Come here.”

Their hotel is in the snazzy part of Shinjuku. Spectrums filter through the window, drenching Nino in shades of skyscraper and mirrored flakes. Ohno dips his finger into the cornflower pooling in Nino’s bellybutton and draws around in spirals, aqua fading into seafoam green.

Jun might be Ohno’s favourite subject but Nino is his favourite canvas.

“Hurry, hurry. Please,” Nino whispers. He pulls frantically at Ohno’s belt and arches his hips upwards. Ohno bites back a groan, reaches down for Nino’s wrists and pins them together over his head.

“No,” he says, and Nino growls in frustration. “No. You’re not. You’re more than that and you know it. So don’t… don’t talk like that.”

Nino’s still panting, but he looks at Ohno with fond exasperation. “You’re a tad slow today, aren’t you?”

He smiles into Nino’s collarbone.

Then his pants and his boxers are finally off, and when he pushes into Nino he hears a sharp intake of breath.

“I’m sorry.” His voice is rough and jagged against Nino’s ear.

They push and pull, Nino is nipping at Ohno’s wrist and Ohno is marking Nino’s jaw and it feels like a game. Only – it’s not.

“I don’t blame you,” Nino says. “I don’t blame you.”

It’s softer, this time, and it feels like petals covering Ohno’s ears.

He thinks he’s going to lose it any moment now, so he tries not to think of Nino and his pink lips and fuck, yes, harder and focuses instead on the blushing spot behind Nino’s ear and how maybe some things are better left as mental pictures, because Ohno doesn’t want to share this with anybody.

Ohno moves faster, grips Nino’s hips tighter and pushes bruises beneath his skin.

Then

“Satoshi.”

Ohno thinks this is what free falling must feel like.

They collapse in a tangle of limbs and murmurs, hair plastered to their foreheads with sweat. When he looks down he sees Nino flushed all over, and Ohno would like to claim credit for painting him in streetlamp and red billboard, but that’s all Nino.

“Stay.”

“Okay.”

Ohno likes it when he has Ninomiya Kazunari warm and sleepy in bed, muted and psychedelic under his fingertips.

{end.}

elliot perlman, your niece's speech night

2009-09-20T14:44:59Z

I sit by the wall in a police caravan, a good night's work for someone. My feet, our feet, are sore and we have only travelled one day in our new school shoes. But we have travelled that same day over and over and over, only without ever noticing it. We fill our day, our one repeated day, with distractions, clothes, cars, orgasms, a job. A job in Atherton, for me. You will sleep and live the day again and again. But remember the cool dry grass. That's what I had to tell you.

I drew a line for you

2009-09-16T14:24:55Z

;so if you have a minute why don't we
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;Two, three, maybe ten years further down the road, I’ll wake up in the morning and make coffee.
;PG
;If you squint, and tilt your head a bit, you might be able to spot some semblance of angst.
;It's called JE for a reason.
;Note: I wrote this in 10 minutes while I was supposed to be studying for my preliminary exams. o.o *garbles*

When all this is over, it’ll be without much fanfare. Sure, the fans will be devastated, but they’ll have grown up, and so will we.

Jun will be the most upset amongst all of us, but I’ll be the one who steals a scarf, a shoelace, a ring with a skull and some fishing string. I’ll put them all in an old Nike shoebox, beside a bottle of coloured sand from Hawaii.

We’ll try to meet up once a month. It'll work well for awhile, but we’ll be busy, things will crop up and Sho will be delivering a special report in Minato. So we’ll change it to a yearly reunion.

The first year, we’ll come together in a burst of noise and colour. Aiba will buy us tie-dyed t-shirts from Mumbai with elephant prints on them. They happen to come in blue, green, purple, yellow and red, he’ll say.

The second year, you’ll come as a personal invitation, ducking your head bashfully with a ring around your finger. There’ll be more noise and colour. I will say congratulations and be happy for you, both before and after we break out the beer and only start hating myself after.

The next year, I’ll be stuck in some recording studio in Chiyoda.

You'll stop coming after the fourth year, and I'll turn up every year after that.

You’ll forget my birthdays occasionally, but there’ll be a card in your mailbox on the twenty-sixth of November every year. You’ll feel guilty, so even when it’s in the middle of January or February or March I will find bubblewrapped clay figurines in a FedEx box outside my door. Sometimes, there’ll be two figures dressed in red and blue feathers and plastic goggles. I will arrange them all on my coffee table one afternoon and keep them the next day under my bed, next to an old shoebox.

Two, three, maybe ten years further down the road, I’ll wake up in the morning and make coffee. There’ll be a woman sleeping beside my warm spot on the bed. Or maybe a man. If it’s a busy day, I’ll drink two cups of black coffee. If it’s not, I’ll probably make waffles with cold butter, three scampering children shrieking as they run around my knees.

I will change and drive to work. The deck of cards stays at home. Work will probably consist of writing songs, signing copyrights, looking through royalties. There won’t be singing and dancing. Maybe I won’t even be in Tokyo. Maybe I’ll be on a set in Santa Monica, or behind a camera in Berlin. And like it.

I’ll go home late in the night, on days when I don’t feel like staying back at work. There’ll be leftover dinner in the fridge, maybe with a note on heating directions. I’ll put it in the microwave and watch a disc of warm light spin round and round, and think of perhaps taking a vacation, or really going back home.

Then maybe when I’m brushing cherry blossoms out of my hair, eating really good udon, or perhaps wincing as I watch an orange sunrise, I’ll look to my left, out of habit, and still be surprised that you’re not there.

{end.}

sew your fortunes on a string

2009-09-04T08:06:07Z

Arashi fic!

;Standstill
;One-shot
;Ohno Satoshi/Ninomiya Kazunari
;5 drabbles in which Ohmiya stop being.
;PG - light R
;Angsty angsty.
;A complete work of fiction, yo.

{one.}
In retrospect, Ohno thinks he should have seen it coming.

It started three weeks and two days ago (Ohno remembers because it’s one of those days Nino greets him verbally). He flounced in with a “Hey, Ohno-san,” and headed straight to hair and make-up. Ohno waved at his retreating back.

The next time, they’re all in the dressing room. Nino was trying to level up on Dragon Quest but halfway through his DS blanked out. He tried shaking the thing to no avail, and ended up slapping it instead.

“Yo, Nino,” Sho called out from the other side of the room, arm hanging on Ohno’s shoulder. “Ohno’s ass is just here.”

Nino looked up with a non-committal “Hmmm?” and went back to hitting his DS.

A week later they were at rehearsal. Ohno looked to his left and right for Nino, but he was standing over on the other side of the studio. So he waited patiently, because sooner or later gravity or whatever it was would do its job. But ten minutes passed and Nino was still over at the other end, practicing his steps with a small frown on his face.

Ohno made his way over, and stood close enough so that his arm touched Nino’s side. Nino looked up, startled, and spared him a grin. Then he stepped to his right, and Ohno stopped feeling warm cotton.

They are filming an episode of Arashi no Shukudai-kun when Ohno finally figures it out. He moves to sit with his legs further apart and Nino crosses his, and Ohno is left waiting for a hand that never comes.

The day Ohno realises Nino has stopped touching him, the couch never seemed so big.

{two.}
Out of courtesy, they ask him whether he wants a bachelor party tonight. They wait until Nino is out of the room before they do.

Ohno shakes his head no, thank you, but he’s got to work this evening. Aiba shrugs carelessly although he knows that Ohno has the rest of the day off. The other two don’t say a word.

At seven in the evening, he turns up on Nino’s doorstep. Nino has sweatpants hanging on his hips and dark circles under his eyes. Ohno wonders whether they’ll end up fucking or if he’ll make Nino cry.

In the end, they fuck on the floor of Nino’s bathroom in the dark, because Ohno knows that’s where Nino hides when he’s scared. The last time he found Nino there, he was sitting on the floor next to the bathtub, hugging his knees to his chest and rocking back and forth, holding a cream-coloured card so that all Ohno could read was ‘You have been invited to attend the wedding of Ohno Satoshi & ‘.

Nino has his legs on Ohno’s shoulders and his face buried in his neck. Ohno’s tugging on Nino’s hair, biting on his lips till they are raw and swollen, dragging his teeth along his collar bone and he doesn’t think he’s ever fucked Nino this hard before.

It feels like he’s tearing Nino apart in every way possible, but Ohno knows only one is causing the dampness on his shoulder.

{three.}
They get called into the office just as they are about to leave the building.

Hello, yes, yes, sit down.

It’s not as though they hadn’t seen it coming.

Coffee? Tea?

They just didn’t think it would be so soon.

Well, then, let me just cut to the chase.

Nino wipes his palms on his jeans.

The thing is, from what we have observed lately, you two have been acting a bit too… intimately, I should say. In concerts, public appearances, on TV. You get what I mean.

He feels a certain weight on his chest, and it makes it hard to breathe.

The board and I have discussed this, and we feel that it is best if you two could stop this behaviour.

And there it goes.

I don’t mean for it to stop it completely, you know, I mean the fans completely adore it. Hell, it’s fanservice, and it’s entertaining. Just make sure it’s pretend, and that the fans know that that’s all it is. Don’t let it become real, you underst-

“But it is real.” It’s the first time Ohno’s spoken that evening. Nino wants to smile, but he’s too busy trying not to scream.

That’s not important. We have a policy here. There are rules to be followed.

Something’s about to change, and they both know it.

So that’s that. You do understand, don’t you? We can’t let this get out.

Why not?

You have no idea what it will do to the band.

Nothing will happen–

If it does, well, who knows?

We wouldn’t know until we at least try–

Arashi would probably go bust.

Then they realise that at the end of the day, it’s not just about the two of them,

And we can’t have that now,

not anymore.

can we?

The next day, they stop holding hands in public.

{four.}
Nino used to believe in magic.

His mother took him to a David Copperfield show when he was ten. He can’t remember much about it, except that the entire show was punctuated with his gasps of awe and his mother’s hushed “Close your mouth, Kazunari, or else flies will go in.” He also remembers being particularly amazed when the magician made a pretty lady appear out of thin air.

At twelve, Nino tried to make his father appear.

It didn’t work, and Nino felt bad about it for ages, especially since his mother and sister were upset almost all the time. He felt like he was letting them down or something. But then Nino grew up, and realised that they didn’t need his father to get by anyway.

At eighteen, Nino tried to make Noriko appear.

She didn’t come back, so the next couple of days were spent moping around and making up for all the teenage angst he never got the chance to express during puberty. It wasn’t too bad, though. Aiba was twice as loud to make up for his lack of noise, Sho kept bringing him hot chocolate and Jun was not as mean.

Plus, he had Ohno, so that was okay.

At twenty-five, Nino tries to make one Ohno Satoshi appear.

Because where there used to be paint and DS games and clay, there’s now long stretches of silence spent staring at the clock and leaving voicemails that go “Are you going to finish fishing anytime soon?”, wondering whether someone in particular will arrive at work early or stay with him after, so that there’ll be paint and DS games and clay, again.

There isn’t.

Nino used to believe in magic, but now he’s not so sure.

{five.}
Nino breaks it to Ohno over coffee one morning.

“We should stop,” he says.

Ohno continues stirring his coffee for a few seconds, as though he hadn’t heard him. Then, blinking slowly, he looks up at Nino.

“Why?”

Nino pulls on the sleeves of his sweater so that they almost cover his fingertips.

“I’m dating someone.”

He imagines a sudden standstill, a suspension in time, where everyone else in the café is moving in slow motion and that dull buzz he’s hearing is just incessant chatter in the background, not blood roaring through his ears.

“Oh,” Ohno replies, and goes back to stirring his coffee.

Nino feels a childish urge to whimper and throw a tantrum, or to reach across the table. He burns his tongue by drinking too-hot coffee and sits on his hands instead.

Ohno looks up a second time, and stares at a spot below Nino’s left shoulder. He coughs, scratches the tip of his nose.

“Why?” he asks again. He has a tiny frown on his face.

Nino wonders if Ohno feels as lost as he looks.

“You’ve been enough for me for ten years,” Ohno pauses. “I thought – I mean,” Licks his lip, and looks Nino in the eye. “Aren’t I enough for you, too?”

Yes, you are, Nino thinks. You’re too much, and that’s the problem.

{end.}

That's how it is on this bitch of an earth

2009-01-11T13:12:47Z

Yet ANOTHER Gale/Randy RPS.

Gosh.

For some reason, I find it much easier to write Gale/Randy fic instead of actual QAF fic, which was what I actually set out to do in the first place. Whenever I start I end up deleting everything, scared that I'd butcher the whole QAFverse. But I WILL write QAF fic, God damn it, the minute I finish watching season 5.

;Here
;one-shot
;Gale/Randy
;In which Randy poses an interesting question.
;A light R, I'd say.
;And of course nothing like that, whatsoever, had happened.

They're driving in Gale’s truck, the light rain falling down against the soft glow of the streetlights looking like the parade of glitter always fluttering down on the set of Babylon.

“Do you like me because I’m effeminate?” Randy asks out of the blue.

Gale takes his eyes off the road and looks at him with mild amusement. Randy looks back at him, his eyes bright with curiousity and lips quirked in a small smile.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” he replies, and reaches over to tangle his right hand in Randy’s short, spiky hair. “You’re not pretty enough.”

Randy laughs and smacks his hand away, attempting to force down the patch of hair on the back of his head that’s now hopelessly standing up haywire. After a moment, he gives up and settles for running his hand haphazardly through his hair one last time, and only succeeds in making it even messier.

“It’s just that, sometimes I feel as though you find it easier for us to be together because you can pretend that I’m a girl.”

Caught completely off guard, Gale whips his head back and looks at Randy as if he’d grown an extra head.

“I’ve never thought of you as a woman.” He pauses, and blinks. “What the fuck brought all this about, anyway?”

Randy shrugs, unaware of the nonplussed look Gale shot at him. “Well, since I’m the only man you want to fuck, the only man you like, the fact that we’re partners, and also the fact that a person’s sexuality is usually decided by the time he or she is fourteen, it is highly unlikely that you suddenly decided to become gay – only for me, I might add – when I came into the picture.”

For a few minutes, the only sounds in the truck are the steady beats of the windshield wiper moving up and down and the quiet sounds of Iron and Wine coming from the old stereo.

Gale looks ahead, not really seeing the road, and pulls up near the pier at 17th street around the corner.

This time, it is Randy who turns to look at him with a surprised look. Gale decides to ignore him for the moment, because he needs to think, and when he’s thinking he needs to do it with his full attention. And a cigarette. He rolls down the window on his side of the truck and lights up a cigarette, offering Randy one, before throwing the box somewhere to the back of the truck when he shook his head.

He inhales deeply, and looks out at the sea. Yes, he’d been straight for most of his life so far, and he’d been quite happily so. Gale never considered himself a ladies’ man, although for some strange reason women seem to like him. Girls gushed over him in junior high, flocked to him in art school, and Jenny Parmer from the theatre class down the hall even confessed to the entire cohort that she wanted to have his babies. When he went out to work, women were as attracted to him, perhaps even more so. They’d jumped on his bones in the coat room more times than he can remember, and he’d never been turned down when he asked them out on dates.

And in comes Randy. And Gale thinks, well. He’s fucked.

Randy, who looks like a fragile waif who’s never been introduced to outdoor sports or the sun but can knock back ten tequila shots without getting shitfaced, who’s passionate about theatre and music and everything he loves and doesn’t need protection from anyone, not even Gale.

“I think you’re beautiful.” Gale says finally.

Randy lets out a laugh, and looks sweetly baffled at Gale. “You said I wasn’t pretty enough, but you think I’m beautiful.” He sighs, a long-suffering look of tenderness, and Gale knows he understands.

That night, Gale takes Randy home and fucks him face to face, and when Randy’s ass starts to clench erratically around him and his breathing gets heavier, Gale pulls hard on his hair and forces Randy to look up at him as he comes, and wraps his hand around Randy’s dick firmly and says without words that he never has to pretend anything when he’s with him.

End.

Inspired by the SoGayTV episode with Randy. Does anyone else find the way he said "Sure. I am an effeminate gay guy.", like it was the most natural thing in the world, incredibly adorable? OkayIshallendmyRandyfangirl!squeerightnow.

These words are yours for the taking

2008-12-19T17:38:06Z

Yes, as they say, RPS is evil.

But I am completely owned by the Gale/Randy.

;Flight
;one-shot
;Gale/Randy
;Done to death, I know, but here's my contribution to the onslaught of Randy-visits-Gale-in-hospital fics.
;Nothing explicit, just a fair bit of cursing.
;And of course nothing like that, whatsoever, had happened.

Surprisingly, Randy is the last one of the gang to come and visit him.

“Hey,” he breathes, standing in the doorway of his hospital room and tugging at his left sideburn.

Gale smiles at him and crosses his arms. “Hey yourself, you son of a bitch.”

Randy laughs, flushing, and shuffles into the room awkwardly. Well, as awkwardly as he can anyway. Gale has always thought that the kid moved as gracefully as a fucking ballerina.

“So,” Gale begins as Randy perches himself precariously on the side of the bed. “What the fuck took you so long?”

Randy smooths a wrinkle on the sheets before looking up at Gale with a sheepish and slightly mischevious grin. “I went to see the new Bond film.”

“Ah. So you got distracted by Daniel Craig’s ass and forgot all about your ex-costar lying in the hospital.”

“There was this drink, in the movie,” Randy continues, as if he hadn’t heard him. “It has like, four measures of gin, one measure of vodka, half a measure of whiskey, a spec of black tea from Beijing, a pinch of salt, Jamaican rum, Fernet Branca, white wine, red wine, flakes of orange crust, a drop of ninety-proof alcohol, six grams of chocolate, white sugar, brown sugar, a drop of organic non-fat milk power, Viagra, tonic and a slice of lemon crust in it.”

Of course Gale is not surprised if Randy had gotten all the ingredients spot on. He has a knack for remembering the strangest things. Especially when he’s worried about something and not paying the slightest bit of attention to what he’s supposed to be listening to. He just soaks it up like a sponge, and it all comes spilling out afterward.

Gale thinks it’s quite a handy skill, but he knows Randy is completely annoyed by it. He used to tug on Gale’s t-shirt and bite on his thumbnail, frowning. “Where the hell did I hear that? I can’t fucking remember!”

“Sounds lethal.” Gale pipes.

“Mmhmmm. It is.”

“You didn’t.”

“Oh, yes, I did.”

“Hate to break it to you Randy, but you don’t have the strongest constitution on the planet. I’d say absinthe is the limit.”

Gale receives a hard jab to his ribs, followed by an unapologetic look from Randy.

“Fuck you.”

“No cussing in front of the patient.”

Randy snorts. “But I got completely sloshed, needless to say. The bartender wasn’t very amused.”

“And I wasn’t there to drag your sorry ass back home.” Gale pats the back of his hand in mock sympathy, but keeps it there.

“You haven’t been there to drag my sorry ass home for quite a while.”

Gale doesn’t know what to say to that, and the two of them sit quietly for a minute, the silence not awkward, never awkward. He looks down at the smaller, paler hand in his grasp, and the veins and knuckles still feel as familiar as they did three years ago.

“I was afraid that I’d lose it.”

Gale waits.

“Hal called me first. I flew down here as soon as I could. Didn’t even bother checking into a hotel, just dragged my duffel bag here.” He inhales and lets out a shuddering breath. “I was walking in, and suddenly there was a bunch of nurses pushing this bloody man on a stretcher, and I knew it wasn’t you ‘cause they already told me you were out of danger, but I saw your face, on that guy, and I just. Freaked.”

He pulls out his hand from under Gale’s and begins tugging on his sideburn again.

“And I know it’s completely fucked and I’m an asshole for doing it, but I just couldn’t see you then, just fucking couldn’t. So I left and I didn’t know where to go and the first place I saw was this cinema around the corner so I just bought a ticket and sat there for two and a half hours.”

Randy pauses and swallows, and Gale thinks with horror for a moment that he’s about to cry before he ploughs on.

“When it ended, I went to the airport and flew home. Fucked, I know. I flew back here two days ago. The first day back I wanted to come see you, but I nearly had an asthma attack in the hotel lobby. So I didn’t. I went to the bar and decided to fuel my courage with that vile concoction. But I got sloshed and only managed to crawl out the toilet this morning. So here I am.”

Gale blinks slowly. “No wonder you look a bit peaky.”

“Fuck you,” Randy says again, more weakly this time.

Gale chuckles and bites his lower lip. “You know that that is completely fucked, right?”

Randy hangs his head and sniffs, and Gale sees the familiar wrinkle of his nose and feels something very much like affection for the guy, more than he has felt for anyone, really.

“But you’re here now. So it’s okay.”

Randy slides his hand back under Gale’s.

“I don’t like seeing you hurt,” he says, sounding almost like a petulant three year-old, but Gale finds that he doesn’t need to know his reasons for not coming earlier.

The night nurse with the big hair who always seems to be standing with her arms akimbo steps into the room and booms “Visiting hours were over twenty minutes ago.” Gale notes with amusement that Randy’s currently thinking of it as VISITING HOURS WERE OVER TWENTY MINUTES AGO because he always sees what people say as words in his fucked up head and he knows that when someone says something really loudly he imagines the words to be in capital letters. Gale also knows that the average person thinks about two thousand thoughts to themselves a day, and that Randy thinks about double that amount and that he also sees his own thoughts spelt out in words, and most of the time in italics. He wonders when was the last time he had the chance to see the words in Randy’s head as Randy saw them, and realises how much he’s missed it.

As the nurse stalks away, Randy turns to him with a tiny smirk on his face, and Gale knows that Randy knows that he’s seeing the words in Randy’s head again. He forgot that they’re able to read each other’s minds as well. Gale kind of misses that, too.

“I’ll come back tomorrow,” Randy announces as he slings his messenger bag over his shoulder.

Gale raises his eyebrows.

“I will, I promise. God I’m not gonna freak out again. If you can give me that look, then surely nothing has changed.” He pauses, and giggles. “And I’ll come back the day after that, and the day after, and the day after and the day after.”

“How fucking long do you think I’m gonna be staying here? I’m ditching this joint tomorrow.”

Randy gives him one of those playful grins again, the one Gale has come to be wary of and at the same time it’s what he sees every time he turns his head and feels sunshine on his skin.

“Who says I’m coming back to the hospital?”

With that, he leaves, playful grin still in place, and Gale knows he’s not imagining it when he sees I’m coming back to you, you fucker at the back of Randy’s head.

End.

Three cold fingers on my elbow

2008-11-04T09:26:18Z

I wrote this fic last year, and posted it somewhere on the boards. And now I've decided to post it on eljay.

Yeah.

Anyway.

Title: Three Cold Fingers On My Elbow
Author: Me.
Pairing: PoynterJones
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: I owe nothing 'cept for the plot.
Warning(s): Slash

Oh, and just a warning, all my fics are un-beta'd. I don't even know what a beta is.

*cue horrified gasps from fandom*

His hands were abnormally large. They looked completely out of proportion compared to the rest of his wiry body, so wide that they resembled frying pans, far too clumsy. And when he shook my hand for the first time, his completely enveloped mine.

“So welcome to McFly, mate.” said Danny, reaching out to shake my hand.

There goes my hand.

Then he grinned widely, all gums and teeth, green eyes twinkling brightly.

And there goes my head.

But that wasn’t what I found most strange about him, no. Loads of people had large hands. I could randomly select ten people off the streets of England and wouldn’t be surprised if five out of ten of them had trash can lid sized-hands.

It was the fact that they were cold. Not just cold, in fact. They were downright freezing. Even in the room where it was warm and toasty, his hands felt as though they had been stuck in a freezer for the past hour.

His hands weren’t the only part of his body that’s clumsy. All of him was clumsy.

We were heading out the door, down to some fancy room where they had champagne to celebrate the forming of our band.

“Champagne? Ain’t that a bit too much?” he had asked. “Guinness will do fine.”

The sentence ended with a jolt, because the toe of his sneakers got caught on the doorjamb and he stumbled forward. He broke his fall by flinging his hands out to hold on to something and stabalise himself. One hand caught the doorframe, which did the trick, while another landed lightly on my right arm.

Just three of his fingers. His forefinger, middle finger, and ring finger. Always these particular ones. Gently on my elbow. Like three tiny globes of ice.

He finally managed to untangle himself, and heaved a sigh of relief. He then threw me an apologetic smile(even his apologetic smile was happy, chirpy, as if all was right in the world, only with a hint of sheepishness) and unclamped his hand off the doorframe and continued walking.

I remember feeling puzzled as to why he still kept his fingers on my elbow. I could distinctly feel each cold finger, and was very much aware of the patch of goosebumps on the suddenly hyper sensitive area of skin on my right elbow. I looked down nonchalantly, and realised that his fingers were in fact not touching me, but safely tucked into his left pocket. I looked up at him disbelievingly to see him with his mouth arranged in an O shape, whistling(once again, as if all was right in the world), then back at my elbow, where a small patch of goosebumps was clearly visible.

My elbow remained cold for the rest of the day.

. . .

The Wonderland Tour.

My summary, of the Wonderland Tour, was Danny’s sudden development of epic interest in his nipples.

We had just arrived at a new venue to a crowd of screaming teenage girls thrusting out CDs and posters for us to sign through the bars of a huge iron gate. I chuckled as I good-naturedly signed yet another poster that’s shoved under my nose.

Suddenly, the shrieks and screams coming from my right got two octaves higher and I briefly wondered whether Harry had just let one rip before I swiveled my head to the source of all the commotion. Apparently, it wasn’t Harry.

Danny had his jumper pulled all the way up to his shoulders, revealing his bare chest, and was quite happily fingering his nipples, much to the delight of the crowd of girls standing in front of him.

I was suddenly thankful that I was wearing baggy jeans.

Tugging on the neckline of my shirt, I turn back to the girl in front of me.

“Sorry, what’s your name again?”

The girl giggled and said her name. I signed on her CD messily and handed it back to her. Then I felt it.

“Hey Doug,” whispered Danny, suddenly right beside me, three fingers touching my elbow. Ignoring my suddenly cold elbow, I looked at him, and exhaled in relief when I saw his fully covered chest. He jerked his head at something in the crowd, laughing softly under his breath. I looked at the crowd and noticed a huge banner that was being raised by a bunch of girls. It was so huge that I didn’t even need to squint to see what was written on it.

PoynterJones is our OTP

I chuckled weakly. Of course. We were everybody’s OTP. How ironic.

Looking back at Danny, I raised an eyebrow. He saw my expression and giggled some more. Then he leaned dangerously close to my face. I tried to swallow discreetly.

“Shall we make them happy?” he breathed onto my face.

And with that, his three fingers pressed harder against my elbow and he brought his other hand up to my head, angling it so that it looked as though he was giving me a full blown kiss.

It was as if the entire place exploded. All the girls started shrieking like bloody banshees and I could see the PoynterJones is our OTP banner being waved even more violently. He laughed loudly and winked at me, moving away to sign more things, leaving me standing there with my right elbow cold and every other part of my body scorching hot. I cleared my throat and turned to face the group of girls in front of me, who looked as though we had just made all their dreams come true. I smiled weakly and accepted another CD sleeve.

I wasn’t past my third poster when the girls on my right started screaming wildly again. I turned to see Danny playing with his nipples. Cursing under my breath, I shoved the poster back somewhere into the crowd and grabbed another one randomly.

“Name?” I asked gruffly, like an impatient police officer who’d just caught someone driving past the speed limit.

The girl shrieked her name along with something else, but I didn’t pay attention, because all I could think about was that if the damn bastard didn’t stop fondling with his nipples I was going to have my way with him, right there, up against the hard, iron gate.

. . .

Riding the tube together was not the best idea.

In the time span of three minutes, we had knocked into three old women, balanced ourselves on the head of a particularly short seven year old, and stepped on the feet of at least five other passengers.

Most of it was Danny’s fault.

“Whoa,” he exclaimed, stumbling a bit as the train jostled, leaning into my side.

“You know what,” I said, pushing back against him in order to balance our weight. “You should never take any form of public transport ever again. You’re a danger hazard. To the public.”

He gave me a dirty look. “Well, Tom’s car is too small and my car is at the mechanic’s and as long as Harry keeps fartin’ in his I’m not sitting in it. Now that, mate, is a true danger hazard.”

I snorted.

He sighed dramatically and rested his left elbow on my right shoulder, letting his arm drop slightly so that his fingers-three of them, again-brushed against my right elbow. “If you can take it, tough guy, then why are you here?"

Pause.

“Same reason.”

He couldn’t tell that I was lying, because he punched his fist into the air triumphantly, throwing the both of us off balance, and sent me crashing into the train door.

“Fuck! Bleeding fuck! Motherfucker! Oh bleeding mother- “

“Shhhh!"

I bit my lip to stop myself from cursing everybody’s mother, ignoring the filthy look an old woman threw at me. I cradled my bruised elbow carefully while Danny whispered frantic apologies into my ear.

Daniel Alan David Jones was a danger hazard.

. . .

He threw the pen down and flexed his fingers.

“Fuck. I think they’re cramping up.”

I sniggered and looked down at the table, tracing the HMV logo with my pen as I waited for the next fan in line to come forward. My sniggers came to an abrupt stop as I felt three cold spots on my bruised elbow.

I noticed that recently, his fingers had gotten colder. My theory was that he stopped using his hair straighteners. The heat from the hair straighteners must have traveled to his hands through conduction, thus making them slightly warmer-although they still felt icy cold. And now that he stopped using them and decided to go “naturally afro”, his fingers didn’t get any more heat and therefore became even colder than I was used to.

Fucking bollocks.

But the cold felt nicer than usual on my bruised skin. I moved my elbow closer towards him without him knowing and sighed in satisfaction when the cold relieved some of my pain.

I looked at him.

“Does it still hurt?” he asked, prodding my right elbow gently.

I looked at him incredulously. “It’s now purple with dark blue splotches and a slightly green outline. Nope, it doesn’t hurt at all, Danny. It’s just peachy.”

He grimaced and apologized again. Then he removed his fingers and grabbed his pen. The cold began to fade away and the burning persisted on my elbow.

“Could you do that again?”

Danny raised his eyebrows at me questioningly.

“Your fingers are cold.” I explained, looking at the line of people casually. “It feels nice."

For a while, nothing happened. Then, as I was in the middle of signing my name, I felt him press three fingers onto my bruised elbow gently.

For the rest of the signing he giggled madly and wrote with his right hand.

. . .

I jumped and shouted as someone else poured more beer over my head.

All in all, my nineteenth birthday party was going along just fine. The guys held it in the ballroom of some hotel so that we could crash in the hotel rooms if we got too drunk, which we of course, would. There was an unlimited amount of alcohol available and everyone was going mental. Someone threw an arm over my shoulder.

“Happy birthday mate!” Danny shouted into my ear.

Laughing, he dragged me over to a table and handed me a bottle of Corona.

“Alright Doug, time to pull.”

I rolled my eyes and knocked back my Corona.

“How about that one? She wants you man. And she has amazing tits."

I looked over to her. True. She did have amazing tits. Not amazing enough to turn me straight, though.

“How about the other one, the blonde one? Or…” his voice trailed away.

I looked up at him to find him staring at the corner of the room with a dazed expression on his face. I followed his line of vision and my eyes landed on a redhead standing in the corner, chatting with a bunch of girls.

He liked her, I knew. He had for quite a while now. While I never said anything, I never encouraged him, either. I never thought anything of it, anyway. He didn’t have the courage to ask her out. But it just so happened that he managed to grow a pair that day. He turned to look at me with excited, thrilled eyes.

“Hey, I’m going to ask her out.”

He hopped off the bar stool he was sitting on and touched my elbow.

“Wish me luck.”

And he disappeared into the crowd.

Suddenly, turning nineteen didn’t feel all that good.

“Have you seen the way you look at him?” came a voice right beside me.

I started and turned to see Tom sitting on Danny’s stool.

“Huh? What?”

He laughed at my response and shrugged. “The way you look at Danny. I don’t know… It’s like you’re at peace with yourself.”

Well. Tom obviously sucked at this face reading thing because inside I was fighting a raging battle with my inner fucking demons. And I wasn’t exactly on the winning end.

Surrender?

Don’t surrender?

Like him?

Don’t like him?

It was all very fucked up.

Tom reached over and helped himself to my Corona.

“Ooh. I don’t think the redhead likes him.”

I looked up just in time to see the redhead storm angrily pass us.

Don’t surrender.

Don’t surrender.

Don’t surrender.

I stood up and followed her.

. . .

I found Danny sitting alone at an obscure table at the back, staring into his mug of beer as if he wanted to drown in it.

I stared at him.

“Come on. Get up.”

He seemed to sink further into the mug, so that when he spoke, it sounded like an echo.

“What for?”

I braced myself.

“We’re going to fix things.”

. . .

The hotel rooms had paper-thin walls. And Just My Luck(pardon the pun), I got stuck in the room next to Danny’s. I sighed again as I heard more moans coming from his room, coupled with a funny pounding sound with an increasing tempo.

I managed to salvage whatever Danny had screwed up between him and the redhead.

Seriously, the guys don’t give me enough credit. Tom just looked impressed while Harry gave me a strange, almost sympathetic look, which I chose to ignore.

It was the right thing to do, right? Putting aside one’s feelings for the happiness of another, all that crap. Frankly, I was damn well pleased with myself.

I didn’t surrender.

Of course I knew that it was only a temporary victory. That in the morning I’ll see him again and he’ll touch my elbow again and I’ll be gone. Again. Needless to say.

But it was still victory, nonetheless.

I closed my eyes and tried to block out the moans(which were progressing to screams).

So here I was, on my nineteenth birthday, sprawled out alone on a rock-hard couch while Danny fucked the redhead into oblivion in the next room; smiling instead of frowning, laughing instead of crying.

. . .

We’re meeting at Harry’s house for lunch. Surprisingly, I’m the earliest one there.

“We have to be at the recording studio by ten tomorrow, remember.” he reminds me as we fling ourselves onto his couch.

“Yes mom.”

“Insolent little brat.”

We both giggle unmanly for a few seconds.

“So how are you getting there? Driving?” he asks, after we’ve sobered up.

“I think I’m taking the tube.” I reply, picking a piece of lint off the armrest.

He sits up. “You ran over an old man again, didn’t you? Bloody hell. I’m giving you a lift.”

I snort. “Quit worrying your pretty bald head off. I did not run anybody over.” I clear my throat and do my best to mimic his posh accent. “I’ve just developed a liking for taking the tube.”

“Right,” Harry drawls. “Was this before or after you fell for Danny?”

I freeze and the piece of lint falls from my fingers.

We both watch as it floats gently to the ground, landing just beside my feet.

Harry smirks. “I thought so.” His face turns soft. “Tell him.”

I give him a dry smile. “He’s not gay, Harry. You know that."

“I can strap him to a chair and force him to watch Brokeback Mountain on repeat if you want."

I chuckle. “Thanks, but I think I’ll just shut up about it. I’m going out to the balcony for a smoke.”

And before Harry can protest, I stand up and stride out the glass door into the cold.

. . .

I let the unlit cigarette dangle from my lips as I take in a deep breath of cold air. It is kind of quiet outside. Nice. Peaceful. No danger hazards.

“Dougie?”

My face falls. So much for no danger hazards.

“Wha’ Bammy?”

“What?"

I pull the cigarette out of my mouth. “What Danny?”

“Why are you standing outside in the cold?”

“I like the cold.”

It reminds me of something.

“You little freak of nature. Come in! It’s freezing!”

“No. Go away.”

“Someone’s having a diva strop.”

I turn around to face him, finally, and ignore the sudden queasiness of my stomach. “Oi!” I say, lobbing the cigarette at his head. He catches it and laughs. I turn back and face out the balcony.

“Come on, Dougie! Or else I’m going in without you!”

Go, go, go.

“I’m warning you Doug.”

Anything to make this easier.

“That’s it!”

I hear the glass door close. I heave a sigh of relief.

Suddenly, a head of curly brown hair materializes beside me. I turn in disbelief to see Danny standing beside me, hands tucked deep into his pockets, shifting his weight from his right foot to his left foot and back.

“Bloody freezing.” he mumbles. “No idea why you like this. Brrr.”

I smirk.

“Well,” he exclaims. “Now you’ve got me standing outside in the cold with you, freezing my arse off. What do you have to say for yourself?”

I’m in love with you, asshole.

I shrug.

He chuckles and shakes his head. For a few moments, we just stand there, not talking, staring out into Harry’s lawn. I fill my lungs with more cold air, clearing my head.

Somehow, it’s just easier to breathe when Danny’s around.

Finally, he breaks the silence.

“Can we please go in now Dougie? I’m starving.”

No you’re not. At least, not the same way I’ve been, and I hope you never have to be.

I sigh. Turning around sharply, I head back for the door, taking him by surprise.

“Hey, Doug, wait up!”

He catches up with me and lays three fingers on my right elbow. And just when I thought I was already far too numb, too numb to feel any colder, my right elbow turns into a block of ice. I look down. He doesn’t remove his fingers.

I feel colder than I've ever been.

End.