Sorry for the wait! OTL lj was on the fritz, I got a virus, and then made a stupid password-related mistake that I'd rather not explain for the sake of the last trickles of pride that still remain within me.
Sometimes Masaomi looked back on his actions and thought, "Was that really me? Was I really that crazy?" He would wonder how one person could hurl him into such an unfamiliar state of desperate anticipation, so much that he would sprint to the park just to meet them.
But here he was, ignoring the often-suffocated voice of reason in his head and dodging teenage girls on the sidewalks as he darted off towards the park. The annoyed exclamations and curses that followed in his wake did little to slow him down – after all, Mikado had asked him on a date!
(Okay, study session, but they were both going to be alone together talking and having a great time, which was practically the same thing.)
(And no, Masaomi didn't have a penchant for wishful thinking.)
(Really.)
"Mikado-kun!" Masaomi shouted the moment he spotted the boy in question sitting on a familiar bench. He waved his arm in a large swooping motion as he began to run forward. Somehow, Mikado looked even better in the morning light.
"Ohayo, Kida-kun. Shirt…" Kida looked down, only to see that in his haste to leave the apartment quickly after Mikado's call he'd pulled on his t-shirt backwards.
"Oh…whoops!" Masaomi pulled his arms from the holes and switched the shirt around, so that now the writing was on the front.
"What is on shirt?" Mikado pointed to the word 'BIG' printed on the cotton, right above the silhouette of a rooster.
"Er…" Masaomi hummed awkwardly as Mikado squinted.
"Big…bird?"
"Yeah! Totally. Big bird. Ahahaha…" he laughed lamely then said, "It doesn't matter. What are we learning today?"
"Ah! Japan culture. Come," Mikado said, leading them towards the train station. This explains the phone call, Masaomi thought back to Mikado's request not to bring anything. He sounded so cute and flustered on the phone, ahhh!
"So where are we going? A shrine or something?" Masaomi mused over the idea of visiting a spiritual place when he had only been to his parents' bible study once, where the kids just watched episodes of VeggieTales in the basement with cheese and crackers while the adults had wine upstairs as they went through bible passages. Masaomi started a fight with one of the other boys right away for saying he was a poopy head, and was henceforth banned from the community church. Oh well. They would've kicked him out eventually anyways a few years later.
"Iie. Watashi-tachi wa, manga-ya ni iku sa rete imasu," the boy replied as he checked both ways and stepped into the street.
"Er...something about a manga shop?" Masaomi replied. "Wait – my culture lesson is going to a manga store?" He was starting to doubt Mikado's credibility. Of course, Masaomi held the utmost adoration and respect for the smaller boy, but he had to be a little suspicious about how a manga store could tell him more about Japan than a trip to a museum.
"Hai." Masaomi halted for a moment just as Mikado was about to step off the curb. That split second of hesitancy was enough to motivate Mikado's small, warm hand to grasp his and pull him forward. The blonde's thought process moved in slow motion for a moment when he realized that these fingers wrapped around his belonged to the boy he'd fallen in love with. Masaomi wouldn't have blamed a mind reader if they thought he was mentally challenged, since all he could think was Ohmygoshthat'sMikado'.
It was with a dumbfounded expression that Masaomi was pulled down the remainder of the streets by the smaller boy who was too focussed on taking the right turns to worry about the way the taller boy's brain was frying in his skull and dripping onto his shirt.
The brain cell loss only continued when Mikado pulled him into the manga-store-which-was-totally-not-a-store-but-actually-a-monstrous-Transformer-posing-as-a-store.
It was several floors of brightly-coloured manga volumes stuffed onto ceiling-high bookcases, walls with advertisements and posters plastered to them, some using up several feet. Toys and collectibles were scattered across various shelves, ranging from DVDs to canned bread to action figures to suggestive pillows. Each floor was dedicated to a different type of product. Music from anime soundtracks played overhead. Most people milled around in everyday clothes, but some were clad in strange outfits that could only be classified as cosplay.
"I…whut?" Any normal person would be awestruck and a little bit horrified at the sight before them, but Mikado only smiled at Masaomi's flabbergasted reaction.
"Manga. Big in Japan culture." No kidding, Masaomi thought. This store could house all the McDonald's in New York.
"So…do you read this stuff?" Masaomi asked as he picked up the nearest volume of Bleach (Who reads stories about laundry?) and flipped through without really looking, preferring instead to listen eagerly for the object of his affection's answer.
"Ano…" Mikado made a half/half gesture with his hand, unsure of the correct term in English.
"Sometimes," Masaomi answered his silent question, filing with pride at the thankful smile sent his way.
"Mikado-kun!" The pair turned at the sound of a woman's voice, seeing a lady wearing a black dress and hat walking towards them.
"Konnichiwa! Ogenki desu ka?" She asked as she reached the two of them.
"Genki desu." He turned to Masaomi. "This is Erika-san."
"Ehhh?" The woman suddenly gasped, then said something very quickly that Masaomi couldn't understand. He wished he did – whatever she told him made Mikado blush a bright crimson.
"I-Iie, Erika-san! Wareware wa tada no tomodachidesu!" The woman seemingly ignored the boy's protests, leaning in to leer at the two of them with an expression that was often found on the faces of sexual predators or intense perverts (though the terms weren't mutually exclusive).
"Watashi wa Kida Masaomi desu. Konnichiwa," Masaomi introduced himself politely, though the spark in her eyes didn't do anything to calm his suspicions of her.
"Ah! Watashi wa Karisawa Erika desu. Nihongo o hanashimasu ka?" Okay, so her name is Erika Karisawa. But…what is she asking? Masaomi did what he had been doing ever since he arrived in Japan and was faced with this situation: smiled and nodded.
"Ah! Kare wa nihongo o hanasu koto wa arimasen," Mikado said quickly, which made Erika laugh.
"Kare o ikashite, hai?" Erika teased.
"I-Iie, Erika-san!" Masaomi wished he could've understood why Mikado's face lit up as red as Rudolph's nose. Not for the first time, Masaomi felt like the only person who wasn't in on the big inside joke called life.
"Nani ga okite iru no?" Another voice chipped in, this time belonging to a man with light brown-blonde hair and a wide grin. Masaomi had to glance down at the manga in his hands to one of the white-haired characters, who seemed to match this guy to a T, then shuddered.
Mikado handled repeating all the introductions while Masaomi watched an otaku dressed in an orange jumpsuit and wig walk up the stairs with the curiosity usually associated with newborns or puppies.
"Kida-kun, sushi?" Mikado asked the distracted teen, who whipped around instantly at the sound of his soft voice.
With a vigorous nod, he found himself sitting in a van moments later, cramped up beside Mikado (not that he was complaining). He leaned in to take a sniff of Mikado when the van took a particularly sharp turn (vanilla and teenage BO), then righted himself as he was introduced to the fellow passengers.
Two men sat in the front, identified as Togusa and Kadota by Mikado in English. Kadota, the one in the bandana, turned back at the mention of English in the stale air.
"Where are you from?" He said in a heavily-accented lilt, but the perfect grammar was more than Mikado could say for himself.
"Uh…New York, USA."
"That's far away. Why did you decide to move here?"
Masaomi shrugged nonchalantly. "My dad got a job here. The usual."
The conversation trailed off there as they pulled into the back lot of Russia Sushi. Erika and Walker's constant manga talk that created the soundtrack for the van gang was interrupted by Simon's deep, distinctive voice saying, "Shizuo! Back again! Sushi good, yes?"
Walking up to them was a blonde man, tall and wearing weirdly formal clothes. He took out his cigarette for a moment to say, "Oi."
"Konnichiwa, Shizuo-san," Erika chirped.
"Kida-kun, he is Heiwajima Shizuo," Mikado introduced, then did the same for Shizuo in quick Japanese.
What followed was a short conversation between the adults of the group, Mikado smiling happily as he watched the proceedings while Masaomi tried to adjust to the odd feeling of not being in the center of attention anymore.
It probably sounded pitiful, but Masaomi enjoyed being the popular guy. He strived daily to be well-liked among his acquaintances, even as his own family drifted steadily away. Now that he wasn't in his element, only rarely being able to slip on his humorous persona, he felt an emotion akin to when he was little and got lost in the woods behind his house.
Masaomi let out a sigh as he tipped his head back to look at the sky, squinting at the direct sunlight and stupidly tuning out Shizuo's outraged roar of, 'IZAAAAAAYAAAA!" He didn't notice the vending machine flying overhead until it blocked out the sun, making Masaomi jump and trail it with eyes on its journey to smash down into the cratered sidewalk. Any people nearby fled with screams of terror, save the van gang and a few brave or foolish souls. Out from the rubble leapt a widely-smirking man, ruby eyes flashing as he skipped nearer, treating Shizuo's outrage like a joke.
"…Izaya?" Masaomi asked out loud in his confusion. The man in question's grin only grew as he walked lithely over, laying his hand on the younger boy's shoulder.
"Masaomi! Funny seeing you here. I see you've made some new friends!" Izaya gave a friendly wave paired with a cheeky smile to the group behind him.
"Anata wa kare o shitte imasu ka?" Shizuo growled loudly at Masaomi, who could only reply with a questioning look as Izaya laughed.
"Hai, Shizu-chan~! Masaomi and I are best friends," Izaya cackled, enjoying Shizuo's frustration at his misunderstanding of English.
Shizuo let out a roar, choosing combat over argument and sending any birds in the vicinity away into the air. Masaomi watched in undisguised awe as Shizuo tore a stop sign from the ground, leaving a cracked gouge in the concrete. It only vaguely occurred to Masaomi that he should probably move out of the way when he saw Shizuo pull back his arm to hurl the ragged pole at him and Izaya.
It was only when the pole was yards away and Izaya had leapt to the side that Masaomi's adrenaline kicked in and he jumped up into the air with a grimace, the pole continuing its flight below his feet to skid across the street, leaving a long gash in the asphalt.
"Wha…What the hell?" Masaomi landed and looked up at the insane blonde man, who already had another two sign posts in each hand.
The sound of creaking metal and Izaya's delighted laughter filled the air as Shizuo threw all four posts at once, motivating Masaomi to duck and slide out of the way. He caught sight of Izaya dashing around the corner with a malevolent beam on his face, and Masaomi, convinced that Shizuo had some sort of crazy homicidal plan for the both of them, followed.
More angry roars followed them as they ran, Masaomi too preoccupied with taking glances back and running to demand an explanation from Izaya, who was calmly darting through the streets, civilians parting the way for what was clearly a regular occurrence in Ikebukuro. Suddenly, the murderous blonde skidded around the corner, shouting what were probably Japanese expletives into the air as he launched a mailbox at them. Izaya and Masaomi both jumped away at the same time, gracefully landing in tandem a few yards from the dust cloud of destruction.
"Ah, Masaomi! You're quite adept in parkour as well, I can see," Izaya grinned, thrilled at the prospect of unveiling more interesting points of this American boy.
"Yeah, whatever," Masaomi grunted, using his hand to help push himself over the roof of a parked car as he continued running, twisting to look back at Shizuo just as he picked up a much larger stoplight post and swung it like a baseball bat, forcing Masaomi to scrabble up a streetlight and use it to spring himself onto the rooftop of the nearest building, a squat convenience store that Izaya leapt on as well through the aid of the door's overhang.
Masaomi paused to catch his breath, propping himself on his knees as he Shizuo searched for something else to throw below. People took this as a cue to run away, none-too-eager to be the next object to be tossed in Shizuo's blind rage. He took off to the next street over to grab something, and Masaomi fell to his bottom with a large sigh as he gasped in air like a drowning man. Izaya sat calmly beside him, letting his legs hang over the edge of the roof as he watched the younger boy.
"What," gasp, "the hell," wheeze, "is going on?"
"Shizu-chan is always like that," Izaya grinned. "Isn't it fun?"
"Fun?" Masaomi's breath began to regain its normal pace. "How is he that freakin' strong?"
Izaya leaned back on his hands, looking up at the cerulean sky and answering, "Who knows?"
Scowling at Izaya's unhelpful answer, Masaomi was about to reply with a scathing remark when the blonde Heracles of Ikebukuro appeared from around the corner with a newly-destroyed vending machine carried above his head.
"Ah! There he is," Izaya chuckled as he rose to his feet. He looked over to Masaomi. "Don't worry about running. He's chasing me, after all."
"Wait, what?" Izaya gave Masaomi a happy-go-lucky salute before leaping away quickly across more rooftops, soon out of sight even as the sounds of their brawl rang out for blocks.
"What a jerk. He couldn't tell me all of that before I put in all that effort?" Masaomi frowned, though the quick beating of his heart and excitement running through his veins said otherwise. He'd forgotten the exhilaration of leaping from such high heights and thinking on his feet for the purpose of self-preservation.
Stop that, Masaomi knocked the tempting thoughts from his head. You've had enough trouble to last a lifetime.
Trouble, of course, was the reason he'd learned parkour in the first place.
"Kida-kun!" Masaomi looked down at the mention of his name. Waving up at him from the sidewalk was Mikado, the van gang nowhere to be seen. His eyebrows were slanted in worry as he shouted out his friend's name again.
Masaomi smiled at his friend's fear for him. Somewhere far away, there sound of a building crumpling. Standing and shaking out his limbs, Masaomi gripped the lip of the roof and hopped down onto the edge of the overhang, then dropped down softly in front of Mikado. He wasn't usually one to brag about his skills, since the roots of his parkour training weren't particularly pleasant and he didn't enjoy recalling them.
"Waaaah! Kida-kun is very good!" Mikado looked up at his friend in awe, and Masaomi couldn't help but up the bravado with a smug grin and some blasé gestures.
"Oh, it was nothing! It's easy for me!" Masaomi winced as he remembered the beginner scratches and broken bones.
"Gomen nasai, Kida-kun. Sore wa yoso-gaideatta." Mikado bowed quickly, causing a smile to spread across Masaomi's face like hot butter on a strawberry scone.
"No problem. Are we still eating sushi?"
Mikado shook his head. "Iie. Friends watch Shizuo-san and Izaya-san."
"I guess it's really fun to watch."
An uninterested shrug. "No. Fight often."
"Wow…what did Izaya ever do to be treated like that?"
Mikado shook his head to show he didn't know. Then, "Kida-kun, you Izaya-san friend?"
"No! He speaks English really well. We met at the store yesterday." Masaomi shrugged. "He's crazy, but he's kinda the only person I can fully talk to, I guess."
Mikado frowned at his friend's words, then clenched his fists in determination that Masaomi could only watch with the rapid inflation of the 'Mikado Cute-O-Meter'. He was quickly encroaching on the territory of 'Can't-Handle-The-Adorable-Brain-Will-Explode!'
"I help Kida-kun! Try hard! Ganbaritai!"
Masaomi smiled at the resolve in Mikado's eyes.
"Ganbatte."
Watashi-tachi wa, manga-ya ni iku sa rete imasu. We are going to a manga shop.
Wareware wa tada no tomodachidesu! We are just friends!
Nihongo o hanashimasu ka? Do you speak Japanese?
Kare wa nihongo o hanasu koto wa arimasen. He does not speak Japanese.
Kare o ikashite, hai? Taking advantage of him, yes?
Nani ga okite iru no? What are you talking about?
Anata wa kare o shitte imasu ka? Do you know him?
Sore wa yoso-gaideatta. It was unexpected.
Ganbaritai, Ganbatte. I want to do my best, Do your best.
I'm working on having this fic rely on translations by having the gist explained in the following dialogue, but for things like Erika's conversation with Mikado there's no way around it T.T
I would like to thank all of you for your kind words, and especially those with constructive criticism! It's really nice how so many of you are aiding me in my Google Translate Japanese XD
So I've planned the basic plot (though I go into chapters at first with no idea of what I'll write, since I only plan pivotal moments, festivals, etc.) and I've realized that this story is gonna be pretty loooong. I hope you're all in for the long haul!
Enjoyed? Review! \(^w^)/