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Part Three
Mitsui sat up sleepily on his bed, blinking stupidly against the sunlight that was streaming in through the crack of the curtains as he watched Jin come in through the bedroom door that they shared with Fujima. " Who was that on the phone?" He demanded, not appreciating being woken up at the ungodly hour of one o'clock in the afternoon when he had been out all night 'working', if you could actually call what they did 'work'.
" Who else do you think it could be?" Fujima demanded as he heaved himself up to his feet. The way that he was rubbing his eyes with his balled up fist only served to enhance his childlike appearance. " Look at him. He only smiles like that whenever something is up with his ' wild monkey', to quote Hanamichi..."
" Ah, yes. That love sick fool..." Mitsui snickered as he also rose from the bed, not seeing any point in trying to get back to sleep. He might as well get ready for the day. He was almost never up before five o'clock in the afternoon so this was the perfect opportunity for him to catch up on all of those smutty daytime talk shows and soap operas that appealed so much to Hanamichi. " What was it this time? Did he pledge his undying love to you again? Serenade you over the phone with that God awful voice of his and atrocious guitar playing skills like the last time?"
" No. I asked him not to anymore after that one time...But that was sort of sweet..." Fujima rolled his eyes at the last part. Well, people said that love was blind. Why couldn't love also be deaf then? " He just asked me if I could go out with him tonight since it's my night off and all..."
" And what did you say?" Mitsui prompted, knowing full well what the answer had been but still wanting to hear Jin confirm it.
The ecstatic smile still on his face, Jin proceeded to smooth the sheets of his bed. God. This was so weird...Why was it that he could never stop smiling after talking to Nobu-kun? He was even worse when the two of them were together. On the rare occasions that they were, he either couldn't take his eyes off the energetic young man or was too busy laughing at his amusing antics to be able to make much of a conversationalist. " Yes. Was there ever any doubt?"
" Well, I'm glad that the love life of at least one of us is finally working out..." Fujima muttered, his face slightly averted from the two so that they wouldn't see the mixture of emotions on his face. Confusion, longing, shame. The satisfaction of knowing someone cared even a little for him. Koshino made him feel all these things. He was confused because though he knew he shouldn't even hope about anything developing between the two of them, his heart still insisted on it, still longed for the young man with the intense brown eyes. And even though he knew that Koshino never consciously tried to make him feel bad or anything, he couldn't help feeling a little bit ashamed of himself for not being able to do anything about his current situation, for not being able to find some more respectable profession than the one that he had now.
Mitsui exchanged concerned glances with Jin, whose smile had finally disappeared from his face after Fujima's comment. " Ne, Ken-chan. Your time will come...Don't worry about that! I'm sure sooner or later that Koshino of yours will-"
Fujima let out a soft, bitter laugh, interrupting Mitsui. " How can you say that, Mitsui? You heard him yourself last night, didn't you? ' I'm sorry, Kenji, but I don't go for that sort of thing'. What I am disgusts him."
" If it did, Kenji-kun, then I don't think that he would have helped you in the first place." Jin pointed out softly. Nobu-kun always made him so happy and Rukawa and Hanamichi had each other. It seemed so unfair to him that Kogure, Mitsui and Fujima didn't have anybody who could help to make everything much easier, as Kiyota did for him. " And I don't think he would maintain a friendship with you if you disgusted him."
" That's right, Ken-chan. And remember the thing that you always say..." laughingly, Mitsui and Jin recited Fujima's phrase together, " If somebody doesn't like the sort of things that I do, then they can just stuff it!"
Slowly, Fujima's lips pulled up into a little smile. " Is that the sort of thing that you plan on telling that Akira person the next time that you see him?"
" Akira?" Mitsui stared at him blankly.
" Aww, don't tell me that you've forgotten that guy!" Fujima exclaimed, hurling a pillow at Mitsui who caught it deftly. " You know, the handsome guy that was so keen on you yesterday! Koshino's friend!"
" Oh! You mean the guy that looked as though he'd stuck his finger in an electrical socket?"
" Porcupine head!" Jin put in as he finally recalled who Fujima was talking about. "Hanamichi couldn't stop laughing about that guy's hairstyle! I thought it was sort of cute..."
" Well, for the sake of ' Porcupine head', you better not let your Nobu-kun hear you saying that..." Mitsui advised him, grinning.
" Well?" Fujima demanded, eyebrow raised.
" Well, what?"
" What did you think of Akira?"
Mitsui shrugged noncommittally. " Cute enough. Seemed nice. Too damn, freakishly happy for his own good, though. I've never seen anybody smile as much as that guy did..."
" You got something against happy people, Mitsui?"
" Nah. I just think it's unnatural for someone to smile so much..."
" For us, maybe. But for people who have something to be happy about, like that Akira and our Jin-kun here, it's perfectly natural." Fujima corrected him.
" One more gloomy comment like that,
Fujima and I'll bash you." Mitsui declared, as he dashed out of the room
and into the bathroom so that he could be the first to use it and finish
up all the hot water like Fujima usually did.
" Hisa-kun? What are you doing up so early?"
Mitsui tore his gaze away from the T.V and watched with slightly worried eyes as Kogure shuffled into the room. It was pretty obvious from the way he walked that he was still very much in pain though it was nice to see that he was finally up and about, not like before when he couldn't even stand up. " Min-kun! What are you doing up? You should be resting! Boss gave you the week off, remember?"
" Believe me, I'm not planning on doing any work soon..." Kogure muttered as he lowered himself gingerly onto the couch beside the scarred face boy. " Where's Fujima and Jin?"
" The little domestics are shopping for groceries. I offered to do it for them, but no. Fujima insisted that I wouldn't know what brand of dishwashing liquid to buy or what type of cereal you liked or whatever. He's a little tyrant."
Kogure chuckled. " That's Fujima for you..."
" And if you don't like it, you can stuff it." Mitsui remarked with a wry grin.
There was a moment of silence as the two of them concentrated on what was going on in the T.V. Mitsui occasionally darted a few glances towards Kogure, still trying to ascertain the boy's well being. He still looked pretty messed up, what with the numerous bruises that marred his usually flawless face. " Tell me the truth, Min-kun. Are you okay? If not, I could always take you to the doctors or something. I know that you've given your money over to that bastard brother of yours already but the guys and I would be more than willing to chip in, you know..."
With a soft sigh, Kogure closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose nervously. "No, Hisa-kun. I'm not all right...I'm...I'm sick of all of this. And I just don't think I can do this anymore without going crazy. Especially not if..." the boy hesitated, not wanting to worry his friend unnecessarily. After all, it wasn't for sure yet. It would be better not to bring it up for the time being. There was nothing Mitsui or any of the others could do about it anyways.
" Not if what?" Mitsui demanded, a sense of foreboding overcoming him.
Well, Mitsui had asked and he really had to get this out of his system already. It would be good to have someone he could talk to and for as long as he could remember, Mitsui had been the one that he had always turned to whenever he needed to vent something out. "You know how sometimes, some customers arrange things with the boss so that he can be the only one to use a certain favorite?"
" Yeah. Fujima used to be an exclusive when he was sixteen, remember? And I was too for a few months. It's actually not so bad. At least you only have to deal with one person and you don't have to keep on wandering around the streets at night time."
" It wouldn't be too bad with another person, Mitsui. I agree. That would actually be preferable to the brothel or working the streets. But if it's just that Todaki that I'll be working for, then..." Kogure shuddered, recalling the beating that he had received only a couple of nights back. " I won't be able to take it...I know that I wont...God..." He buried his face in his hands in his despair.
" You mean that that bastard is going to try and arrange for your exclusivity?" Mitsui demanded, his eyes wide.
" He basically told me so the last night that I was with him..." Kogure squeezed his eyes tightly to try and keep the tears from falling from his eyes. " I...won't be able to take that, Hisa-kun. I know I won't. But I won't be able to do anything about it all. What the boss says goes."
Mitsui wished that there was some
way that he could reassure his friend, that he could tell Kogure that there
was some way for him to get out of it but he knew that this wasn't so.
He was right. What the boss says goes. That was a fact of life
for them.
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