Chapter 1: Perhaps the world's second worst crime is boredom. The first is being a bore.
"That red-head's really getting on my nerves."
Rin doesn't look up from playing Solitaire on his desktop. "You better not be talking about me."
Sousuke laughs. "I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about Minishiba over there."
"Isn't he in holding?"
"Not anymore, apparently."
Rin stops the game and looks up. A few desks over, Nitori is trying to work on compiling a case file while simultaneously having his ear talked off by Momotaro Mikoshiba. Catching Rin's eye, Nitori sends him a pleading glance as if to say, help me, I don't want to hear any more about stag beetles.
Rin sighs and stands. "Damn it, who let Momo out again?"
The boy turns. "Hi, Sergeant Matsuoka! My brother came to pay my bail so I'm technically not in custody anymore! Can I play with the puppy now?"
"Stop bothering Officer Nitori, Momo," Rin sighs, looking around for the older Mikoshiba brother. "And no, she is a fully trained police dog, not a toy, so you can't play with her."
"Not much of a police dog, she just lies on the floor and trips people up most of the time," calls Sousuke helpfully from his corner.
"If the peanut gallery could keep its thoughts to itself?" Rin replies tersely. "Mikoshiba, you should really start taking better care of your little brother."
Seijuro Mikoshiba, despite being all of six feet tall, fiery-haired, wild-eyed and well-muscled, shuffles his feet in embarrassment. "Yeah, sorry for all the trouble. What did he do this time?"
"He tried to shoplift a cupboard."
Seijuro whistles. "Momo, you lifted a whole cupboard?"
Rin shakes his head. "He didn't. It fell on him when he was halfway out the door. Shopkeeper waited a few hours before he called us, apparently. Thought it'd teach him a lesson."
"Yeah, if you're going to steal something, make sure it's not heavier than you!" Momo pitches in. He receives a slap on the head from his older brother as input.
"Dammit, Momo, how many times are you going to keep doing stupid shit? I don't want to keep having to bail your dumb ass out. The next time this happens I'm just going to leave you here to rot." He grabs his younger brother's collar and physically hauls him out the door, getting started on a long and probably slightly profane lecture about morals and if you're going to do something illegal at least try not to get caught.
Rin does, in fact, trip over the police dog on the way back to his desk, but his subordinates are polite enough to ignore it. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say that kidgets locked up on purpose."
"He does. The first time we called him in, he tried to stay an extra night."
"But why?" Rin says to nobody in particular. The police dog gets off the floor and shuffles over to put her head in his lap. "There's nothing pleasant about holding. He's got nice clothes. His home can't be that bad. What possible motivation could he have for getting arrested every week?"
"We could always interrogate him the next time we see him. You know, rough him up a little," Sousuke grins.
"He's nineteen, and half your size. Everyone's already scared of you, you don't need a police brutality charge on top of that."
"Aw, come on." His voice is petulant, although nobody but Rin would have dared point that out. "He could be up to something. And besides, I'm bored."
"You and I both know Momo has about the same tactical ability as a fruit salad. And not a very intelligent fruit salad, either. I'd be more afraid the dog was up to something."
"She might well be. Hell, I'd be planning to kick some ass if some dumbass decided to call me 'Snoop Dogg' for the rest of my life."
"Fuck off, it's a good name. Isn't that right, Snoopy?" Rin coos, scratching the German Shepherd behind the ear. "You won't listen to that guy, will you? He's just jealous because I wouldn't let him name you after a Pokemon."
"Houndoom is cool, okay?"
"It's not, and you're a huge nerd."
"Fuck you too. At least let me play with her a little."
"Not after you insulted her. If you're bored, how about you do your damned paperwork? You could stand to practice your kanji. Some Sergeant you are, you can barely write your own name."
"Hell, I ain't that bored. And Yamazaki can be hard to spell, okay?"
"I take it back, you have the intelligence of a fruit salad," Rin mutters.
Sousuke twirls a pen in his hand and turns to look out the window. Tokyo is pretty busy for this time of day, although anything would be busy in comparison to Iwatobi. Neither he nor Rin have been to their hometown in a few years, but the fast-paced lifestyle and higher crime rates make sure Sousuke is always kept on his toes. "Hey, do I really have to meet your boyfriend?" he asks.
"Haru's not my boyfriend, dipshit, he's my best friend. And yes, you do. I've already booked a nice place for us to eat at. He's bringing Makoto too, so you better look presentable. I don't wanna see any of that sloppy 'I just rolled out of bed' shit."
"I thought I was your best friend."
Rin rolls his eyes. "'Best friend' is a level, man, not a title. So I want one best friend to meet my other best friends. Sound reasonable?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Is he cute?"
"I guess, but I think he and Makoto might have something going on. I don't know, we never really talk about that kind of stuff."
"Fuck."
"Yeah, probably not."
Sousuke throws the pen at him. "Let's get some ramen after the shift, I don't feel like cooking tonight."
"Only if you're paying," Rin replies.
Sousuke doesn't argue. The two collapse into companionable silence until Officer Nitori squeaks from one corner of the office. There is a sound like a stack of papers falling to the floor followed by a brief scuffle. The office goes quiet again, and then Rin hears a loud wail. Sousuke starts snickering beside him, and Rin doesn't even bother looking up this time.
"Alright, you assholes, which one of you let Momo back in?"
Nagisa has, somehow, a weird ability to guess what Rei is going to order even before Rei can look at the menu.
This wouldn't be much of a bother, except that Nagisa also makes it a habit to order the exact same thing, only to make Rei change his order to something Nagisa would like. They're not allowed to exchange dishes, for reasons that Rei is still trying to figure out, so they end up spending their lunch break picking food off each other's plates. Rei has asked about this many times, but the answer he gets is generally non-committal, and so he gave up before the year was out.
He allows Nagisa to spear a strawberry out of the cake box in his hands and is rewarded with a tuna roll in return. "Mr Nanase is going to be here at 3 pm. He said he wanted to take a look at Takano's newer works."
Nagisa takes a second to reply, chewing thoughtfully on his strawberry with a splotch of whipped cream on the tip of his nose that he may only be leaving there just to piss Rei off. "Which one was Tanako again?"
"Takano. The young one, Nagisa, her work is absolutely beautiful. I've never seen futuristic scenes rendered in such loving detail, and her female characters are divine. Did you know she was represented by Murakami? In one of his movies, I think it was Kiki, I can't imagine what an honour it must have been for such a young artist…"
Eyes glazing over like the top of his cake, Nagisa lets the steady stream of babble wash over him. Rei is cute as hell, but Nagisa could do without the weird obsession with aesthetic pleasure. Still, he supposes, he can't complain, because Rei wouldn't be Rei without his quirks. He's a bit of a fruitcake, sure, but Nagisa likes fruitcake.
Besides, it's not like Nagisa's easy to deal with himself.
He pokes Rei hard on the forehead, just to see what he'll do. The monologue stops immediately.
Rei's blushing, which is cute, but he's also gone cross-eyed and catatonic, which may be a sign of an absence seizure. Nagisa quickly removes the offending digit, but not before rubbing at Rei's skin slightly so nobody will find his fingerprints there in case Rei actually does die.
"Are you still there?"
"…please don't do that again, Nagisa."
Nagisa sighs. He likes art well enough, and it's always nice looking at pretty paintings and trying to imagine what the artist must have been thinking while creating them. It had been lonely though, working in the gallery all by himself in big bad Tokyo, until Rei had walked in like a batty butterfly in glasses to take a look at the display. Nagisa had fluttered his eyelashes and made cute remarks and followed him around because not only was this stranger disgustingly good-looking, but he looked smart and had an appreciation for the finer things in life. Rei became a regular until Nagisa finally managed to wheedle him into coming to work at the gallery with him, at which point he discovered that Rei was a lot more dorky than he let on, and then he'd liked him even more.
Really, you'd think he'd have managed to score a date by now.
The bell above the door jingles, making the two jump. Nagisa shoves the sushi box under the counter and wipes the cream off his face as Rei stands, and calls out a greeting.
"Sorry for coming in so early. We were in the area, so we just thought we'd stop by."
Rei's face breaks into a smile, and Nagisa bounces on the balls of his feet. "Hello, Mr Tachibana, Mr Nanase! Please don't worry, you're always welcome here. Would you like to take a look at the pieces I told you about last week?"
Nanase Haruka, twenty-four years old and a respectable connoisseur of the artistic medium, flops into a chair and lets Makoto do the work for him. "I wanted a tuna melt for lunch, but the restaurant we went to didn't have any."
"That's a shame," says Nagisa good-naturedly. "Rei's still got some tuna sushi, if you want. You can have some of that."
Haruka considerers this and gracefully accepts the offer. Meanwhile, Makoto walks among the paintings with Rei by his side.
"This one's interesting," he says, selecting one of the larger ones. "Tell me, how was it made?"
Rei launches into a complicated explanation about oil paints and special brushes, which Makoto nods along to. Haruka listens with half an ear. He's interested in painting methods, but when it comes to actually choosing art, he usually lets Makoto decide. He has a good eye for commercial value, after all, while Haruka can only appreciate a painting for its artistry, rather than its appeal to an audience.
Makoto ends up buying two paintings, which sets them back a couple of hundred thousand yen. Rei sometimes wonders what the two of them do for a living, that they can afford to buy mid-range art every month at such a young age. He's polite enough not to ask, though, so he leaves it at that.
The pair leaves, and Rei and Nagisa wave them off cheerfully. The moment the door swings shut, Nagisa leans forward for a stage whisper.
"I bet they're both members of the yakuza."
Rei splutters. "That's absolutely ridiculous, Nagisa. They're such nice people, there's no way that they're criminals."
Nagisa laughs and leans against the counter, retrieving his abandoned shortcake. "Oh yeah? Where'd they get all that money from, then? Who can afford to buy so many paintings all the time?"
"Maybe they're agents, Nagisa. They could be buying the art for other people. Some people resell art and make money off it. If that's the case then I have to congratulate them for their good business sense, because it seems they're quite successful." He rummages around for his sushi, ignoring the co-worker sprawled over the counter and getting in the way.
"Don't be so boring, Rei-baby. I'm just saying, I find it a little suspicious, that's all."
"Please don't call me Rei-baby, I'm twenty-two years old and not a girl."
"Sorry, sweetie."
Rei sighs and lets it go. Nobody ever wins when it comes to the little blond antichrist.
The idea of the Tachibana-Nanase duo being up to illicit activities is intriguing, but Rei brushes it off as fiction. Nagisa does, after all, like to spin stories about total strangers, often turning it into a game to pass the time. Mr Tachibana's gentle smile makes it very difficult to imagine him breaking someone's ankles, and Mr Nanase seems too…vacant to be any sort of criminal mastermind. If either of them have ever done anything wrong, Rei thinks, it can't be worth much more than a parking ticket.
"Nagisa?"
"Yes?"
"Where are all my tuna rolls?"
Nagisa, mysteriously, remains silent for the rest of the day.
You know what? Even disregarding the sexuality of all the other boys (and how he is in this fic), I can't help but imagine Sousuke as that one straight friend who acts ambiguously gay. Like, he'd have a new girlfriend every two months, but he'd also casually suggest making out and then laugh when Rin splutters and punches his arm. He probably wouldn't actually date any of them, but he'd incessantly fish for compliments and of course butt-grabbing is a must ლ(́◉◞౪◟◉‵ლ).
Well, hate to sound pathetic, but it's time for me to grovel and plead that you leave a comment! It's very encouraging to see that people read what you write. I always reply, so please don't be shy to come talk to me!
...my results come out tomorrow. If I don't update ever again, I may have committed seppuku.
