3 -
Yuki stared at the computer, debating in his mind whether to let Shuichi help like Mizuki wanted and have the novel fail, or to refuse and save it. That route, though, it would not get edited. He was stuck, and he knew it.
"Damn her!" Yuki said, glaring at the screen. He heard the front door slam shut, and the familiar voice yelling through the rooms.
"YUKI! I'm back!" He looked at the clock. Shuichi was at least four hours early! That must mean...
"If you skipped work, get back to it. I am not going to die so you can get here early without permission!" Yuki yelled, scowling.
"K said we could leave early! So I did!" Shuichi peeked into the office, beaming. "Sooo...can we start now?"
Yuki stared. He needed a plan, and fast. Looking thoughtfully at Shuichi, one formed in his mind. "Shu...I've written half this book, how about you write the other half?"
Shuichi stared a while, before his giant smile returned. "Ok! I can do that!"
Quickly pulling the file up, Yuki pointed out the characters and important parts. He let Shuichi take over the computer, before walking out and going into the kitchen. Fixing a quick snack, he sat at the table to eat it.
By letting Shuichi start where he left off meant if the second half was bad enough, Yuki could rewrite it easily. He groaned. The problem with that was, Mizuki would want it published the way it was! Yuki rubbed his eyes, and leaned back in his chair. That novel was going to be the death of him.
Shuichi giggled madly, and read what Yuki had wrote, before making a face. It was way too serious for his liking. What it needed was some adventure! All Yuki had wrote was about some girl that used to use black, but was being forced by her clan to keep to it even when she didn't want to, and the guy she meets who saves her from it. "How sad is that?" he said aloud, before twirling around in the chair, "Let's liven it up!"
He thought of some ideas, before typing anything. He wanted to make Yuki proud, and to show he could work well on something like the book. It couldn't be that hard: it was just like writing really long lyrical verses.
In the living room, Yuki turned at his seat on the couch and listened to the slow typing in the other room. He wondered whether Shuichi was just a slow typist, or if he was taking his time on it. Either way, the whole project was doomed to fail.
He rubbed his eyes, and shut the TV off. Yuki got up and quickly grabbed his coat and shoes, before going out. Fresh air would help to settle his nerves. Walking at a brisk pace, he took the long route to the park, not wanting to be bothered by anyone nearby.
People where running through the park, using the time they have in daylight to enjoy the sunshine. Yuki looked at the group of kids playing, narrowing his eyes. Two of them where arguing, trying to convince the other what type of music was better, Japanese or American. Rolling his eyes, he continued on.
Japanese was obviously better.
Yuki sat down on one of the numerous benches, and stretched his legs out. He still had some time to kill, and going back to wait out until Shuichi finished was not what he considered fun; quite contrary, it was very stressful. Tuning out the yells and shrieks coming from the children littered across the park, he concentrated on calming himself down.
Something hit Yuki in the back of the head, jerking him back. Turning to glare at who was behind him, the children yelped and ran to their parents. "Brats," he muttered, getting up and walking back the way he had came. Rubbing the sore spot on his head, he sighed. It would not be a good month.
"Yuuukkkkiiiii!" Shuichi jumped into the bed, smiling. Yuki growled in his sleep, rolling over and putting his pillow over his head. "Waaake uuup! I finished it!"
Snapping wide-awake, Yuki pushed the pillow off and stared at the pink haired singer. He had finished the novel already? It had barely been two weeks! "What?"
"I finished the book, Yuki-chan!" Shuichi repeated. Yuki sat up, and grabbed his cigarettes from the table along with his lighter. This was going to take some explaining.
"The deadline isn't for another two weeks. Did you edit it?" he asked, lighting up one of the cigarettes that had been stuck in his mouth. Shuichi looked confused. Sighing, Yuki rolled his eyes. "Did you proofread it?"
"..." The singer stared at Yuki, still with the same confused expression. "...Proofread it?"
"Edit it! Look for errors! Typos, those things!" Yuki rolled his eyes again. Shuichi was a total idiot. Shaking his head, Shuichi frowned. He hadn't known you needed to 'proofread'.
"No. Do I have to?"
Growling, Yuki nodded. "Brat, of course you do! People are going to be reading it, and if there are errors it'll make it harder to read!"
Going pale, Shuichi scampered off the bed and ran back to the office, slamming the door shut. Yuki took a long drag off his cigarette, glaring at the door for the bedroom, before finally getting up. "Baka."
He got showered and dressed, before going to the kitchen for breakfast. It looked like Shuichi had already made something, though it did look slightly burnt. Wincing, Yuki forced down his breakfast. Running the dishes under the water in the sink, he looked at the small pad of paper on the counter. In messy writing was 'CALL MIZUKI' in bright red.
Taking it, Yuki grabbed the phone and dialed in the number. It rang several times before the voice of his editor answered: "Hello, Mizuki here."
"What is so important that Shuichi had to write a note in big red letters to call you?" Yuki asked, using his free hand to stick another cigarette between his lips and light it. Mizuki was quiet for a moment, before giving him a reply.
"I called to find out how the novel is doing. Has he done anything with it yet?"
"He's only finished the damn thing." Yuki glared at the phone. "I made him go back and proofread it since the baka didn't know he had to."
Mizuki made a disapproving sound. "Even though he doesn't have to?"
"It'll teach him what writing really is." There was silence for a few minutes, before he sighed and hung up, sick of sitting on the phone. Yuki was about to go write his will - because surely he was going to die soon – when his lover once again pounced on him.
"I finished proofreading it!" Shuichi yelled, making Yuki wince. It had been right into his ear. Glaring at him, Yuki shoved Shuichi off and went to go look at what he hoped was at least a decent novel.
Shuichi ran into the office, holding the door open for Yuki to enter. He excitedly abandoned the door and did the same for the chair. Shaking his head, Yuki sat down and pulled the novel file up.
The heading he had put on only two months before greeted his eyes, along with the beginning of the novel. Yuki scrolled down to page 70 of 100, which was where he had let Shuichi take over. He glowered, staring at the overall number of pages. His novels normally had at least 150…
Reading over the last paragraph he wrote, he started on Shuichi's. Yuki's eyes bugged out, as his vision was attacked by the numerous mistakes and problems. It looks like Shuichi had been using smiley faces like ':D' and '' instead of making a sentence for it saying 'He smiled' or 'She frowned at…' Paragraphs where also near nonexistent. Each one was at most 3 small – extremely small – sentences in length. A lot of words where misspelled also, and the plot was lost after about three pages.
Gaping at the screen, Yuki then turned his look to Shuichi. The pink-haired 'novelist' beamed. "Did I do a good job?" Shuichi asked, looking slightly hopeful.
Worrying his lip, Yuki read back over some of the pages. It was a total disaster. He didn't want to lie, but he didn't want to be honest either. "Well…let's let Mizuki decide, shall we?" he said coolly.
Shuichi nodded, grabbing the phone. "Let's call her!"
"You call her. I need to print this novel up for her." In his mind, Yuki had not thought 'novel' but 'rubbish'. He clicked the Print button and let the pages start coming out, rubbing his eyes aggravatedly.
Mizuki looked at the pages, nodding approvingly as she read them over. She was nearly to Shuichi's part, when she looked up. "This is what you wrote?" she asked, looking between the two.
Yuki nodded. "Page 70 is when Shuichi started."
She flipped straight to page 70, before continuing to read. Yuki couldn't tell whether she thought it was good or bad by her expression. Closing the booklet, Mizuki smiled at them. "I'll get it edited and given back to you so it can be published."
His jaw near dropped. She was seriously going to let that thing be published? His face must have shown the disbelief, because Mizuki laughed. "It'll be fine. Thank you for the manuscript!" she said, getting up and bowing slightly, before leaving.
Shuichi smiled, visibly bouncing in his seat. "We are publishing a book together!"
Making a gesture with his hand, Yuki sighed. "Yay."
It took two months, but A Lover's Curse was edited, published, and being printed as they spoke. Yuki couldn't believe Mizuki would be all right with what Shuichi had written. A 1st grader could have done better! Frowning, he looked at the article in the newspaper about it. All it said was that 'famous romance novelist Eiri Yuki' has his newest novel being printed and shipped to bookstores around Japan, readying them for the debut of it to the public at the end of the week. It also stated that unlike his previous novels, this one had been a joint work done with the singer Shuichi Shindou, who had wrote half of the novel. The last sentence of the article caught Yuki's attention very quickly though: 'Will this new type of novel be a best seller or a total bust? We all are anxious to find out.'
Throwing it at Shuichi, Yuki got up to get a beer. The pink-headed man glanced over the article, eyes widening, before finally actually trying to read it. "We really did it Yuki! They are talking about it!" Shuichi said, jumping up and running at Yuki, grabbing hold of him and clinging.
"Great." Yuki picked up the novel from the counter, where he had thrown it before. He opened it to look at what exactly had been done with it, and cringed. Even after Mizuki's work on it, it was still a wreck. Most likely, the readers would not be happy with the piece. "This will be interesting to see what happens..."
They awaited the weekend, and it came all too soon. The TV stations announced that the book signing was going to start at 12 that day for A Lover's Curse, and that was also when they could purchase the novel. Both Shuichi and Yuki sat at the table in the store, several pens sitting on the table for the signing. The storekeeper kept rearranging the books, lecturing his clerks that they must be ready. Book signings where big events for the store.
Shuichi bit his lip, looking around excitedly. "I can't believe it! We are at a book signing!" he said, latching onto Yuki.
Scowling, Yuki shoved him off. People had started walking into the store already, even though there was still another thirty minutes until the books where released. "Baka, don't crawl on me in public!"
Waiting for Yuki to notice him, one of the clerks stood in front of the table. The novelist turned to stare at him. "What?"
"The boss wants to know if it would be alright with you to start the book signing early?" he asked. Yuki glared at Shuichi, who had been about to reply, before sighing and nodding. Rushing to tell the others, they did the final changes before making the announcement. People who had been waiting for the book swarmed to get it from the stack and bought it, getting in line for it to be signed by Yuki and Shuichi.
Shuichi seemed to love the new attention, while Yuki sullenly signed each book with his signature and passed it on the singer. It was already a long day, and they still had hours to go! Some of the readers peeked inside the book after it was signed, flipping through to see if it was the same as his previous novels. Every one of them did the same thing at the same point in the book: they would freeze and just stare at the page, before turning to look at them.
Yuki cringed, knowing it was doomed to fail for sure at that point. They hated it.
Mizuki called shortly after the debut of the novel, her voice excited. Yuki could not understand why; the fans must despise A Lover's Curse, so what was to be happy about? "We just got your first three reviews for your book!"
"And?" he dreaded hearing the harsh words of a literature critic. Shuichi looked up from his bowl, his curiosity showing.
"And they all said the same thing! It is one of the most unique novels they have ever seen! The fans though..." Mizuki replied.
"They hate it, don't they? No one is buying any more?" Yuki asked, frowning. Mizuki laughed.
"No, half of your fans like it, because of having Shuichi write it with you, which gives it an interesting touch. The other half hates it, because of the way it goes from your type of writing to his. They want only you to write them." Yuki shook his head, giving Shuichi a glowering look.
"I knew someone wouldn't like it." Shuichi frowned at him. "Can we pull it out and fix it some more maybe? Rewrite it?"
"Why not just leave it? At least for a while, maybe they'll come to like the idea of it. It is rather new for you," Mizuki said. Yuki ran a hand through his hair, leaning against the counter. "If it doesn't work out, then you can rework the whole thing."
Thank god, he thought, before replying, "We'll try that. Good bye Mizuki." He hung up.
"Is it doing that bad?" Shuichi asked, getting up. Yuki shook his head, and looked at him.
"The fans are torn between one half loving it and the other half hating it. Mizuki says to give it some time though, so..." Shuichi hugged Yuki, and then gave him an extremely excited kiss. "You are a total sap yet can't write a novel? What is wrong with you?!"
Shuichi grinned. "I never paid attention in school."
Yuki stared dully at him, before giving Shuichi a faint smile. "Figures."
Here it is! The last chapter! I finally got up off my freaking butt and posted it. -- Gomen, I forgot to then hadn't felt like it. I don't really like something about it, though it might be that Yuki is slightly OOC, if not balantly OOC. It might just be me though o.O So, hope it was an alright fanfiction!