Rock and Romance
Warnings: A jump forward in time. Sorries, that's the only surefire way to cure writer's block. Anyway, it's mentioned in the text, so you probably won't be confused…
Archived: http:adultfan,nexcess,net/aff/story,php?no544173771 ; http:fiction,gurabiteshiyon,net/story,php?no722 ; http:www,fanfiction,net/s/2199767/1/
Chapter 5Shuichi threw his arms up into the air, allowing his bags to tumble to the ground, in a much-needed stretch. He let out a content sigh, his eyes slipping closed, as he twisted his body around, working out all the little kinks he had gathered from the short flight. With every pop of each joint, he could feel a relaxing sensation pouring around his body, as if he were being engulfed in the world's finest hot spring.
Only after he had successfully relieved every muscle in his body did he lean over to pick up his bags again. He gathered them up in his arms and looked about the apartment—nothing had changed in the two months he had been gone, except that it seemed Sakano had picked up a little. The couch was still bare, and everything else was still messy. Shuichi frowned to see the door to the bedroom was closed; he hated when Sakano shut it. But, then again, he knew Sakano liked it better closed, thinking that it gave him some sort of privacy, though Shuichi never quite understood that, since they shared that room anyway. Sakano was usually considerate and kept it open, just for him, so it was understandable that it was closed now, Shuichi decided, because he actually hadn't told Sakano that he was returning home.
"Sakano," Shuichi called, even though he knew it would be fruitless; it was only midday, about one or so, and Sakano always was at the studio at this time. Still, miracles did happen, as did nasty surprises. He only wanted to make sure.
As he was expecting, no one responded. Shuichi made his way towards the bedroom, stumbling over various pieces of junk on his way, and swung open the door. He took a deep breath, deciding that the air smelled a tad bit stale, and then tossed his bags inside, patting himself on his back for his excellent aim in landing them on the bed, imagining himself as a professional basketball player, like Michael Jordan or Yao, shooting hoops at a highly anticipated game. Landing bags on beds was amateur work; he was a master.
World Famous Shindou Shuichi. Basketball Pro Extraordinaire.
"What to do, what to do…?" Shuichi sang to himself, turning around and stumbling across the room to collapse onto the couch. He let out another sigh, though this one was more of boredom than anything.
Because of his tour, his next novel's deadline had been pushed back two months, which gave him a little break. He had secretly been hoping that his little vacation would cure the awful slump he had fallen in, but no such luck. His desire to write still had yet to come. Besides, he hadn't even started the novel yet, and beginnings were always the hardest.
Shuichi lay there motionlessly for a while, relaxing in the moment he had. He could hear nothing but the little battery face clock ticking away every second that he didn't move, and soon enough it became annoying. All the silence bothered him—he was a creature of noise. Whenever there was someone to talk to, he would be talking. Sometimes he would even talk to himself, if the situation were dire enough; however, this time did not apply. Shuichi sat up and flicked on the radio (which appeared to have been shoved halfway under the coffee table), inhaling the sound of music that filled the room.
The current singer's voice seemed slightly familiar, but Shuichi knew he had never heard the song before. Nonetheless, it was good, and Shuichi even found his feet tapping to the rhythm on their own accord. This was always his favorite way to waste time.
"And that was Sakuma Ryuichi with the song 'Rain Shine,' off his first solo album. We'll be continuing with the music soon, but first we've got some concert info for all you music heads out there," the DJ's voice started rapidly as soon as the last note of the song finished.
Shuichi smiled. Sakuma Ryuichi, that's right. They had only met once before, when Ryuichi worked with Sakano one time, but they had hit it off pretty quick, so to speak. Shuichi remembered thinking, at that time, that if he weren't with Sakano…
An exasperated laugh escaped his lips with this memory. I'm really awful, aren't I, he thought, shaking his head. How many times have I thought of dumping Sakano? I guess I really am unsatisfied with him.
This only served to bring about the memory of Eiri, something that he had actually managed to abandon while on vacation. Shuichi blinked his eyes and tried to shake his head clear, instead focusing his attention to the radio.
"Tonight, tonight, tonight! At the 'Rocket Pad,' we have for you lovely listeners the chance to win free tickets to Bad Luck's sold out show! Tickets for this show were completely gone within the first hour of ticket sales. I mean it; this is absolutely your last chance to get tickets if you don't already have them. Be the fourth caller…"
Shuichi felt his back go rigid, and suddenly he was sitting up straight on the couch. Bad Luck…
Shuichi frowned and picked up the phone, quickly dialing a number he knew by heart—he couldn't stop himself. He was back home, and all his old problems had to be dealt with sooner or later.
"Hello?" a voice answered on the other line, and Shuichi's will almost shattered just from the sound of it. Almost.
"I need you to do something for me," Shuichi cried urgently. "I need to get into the Bad Luck concert tonight. Please, Tohma?"
The crowd was going wild; it was the last song of their performance. Eiri could see security darting around, trying to keep the fans from rushing the stage, but he barely paid attention. He cut off his last note, listening as the music halted straight after him, and stood, eyeing the crowd silently, as if he were unsure of what to do, with the microphone still held up to his lips.
He breathed a sigh and blinked slowly, leaving his eyes half-lidded and earning himself a few high-pitched squeals from a few feminine faces. "I hope you enjoyed it," he said at last, his own voice reverberating around the building and echoing back to his own ears. It was loud, but the effect was hardly as deafening as the screams from the audience. The entire picture flooded his eyes—he could barely make out the glowing orange faces behind the glare of the stage lights, but the sheer number of them overwhelmed him. Playing at dingy clubs was one thing, but this was unthinkable. A few months ago, he never would have thought he'd be here, now, faced with hundreds of fans screaming over him with every scrap of voice they had. And just like that, his words escaped him. A few moments of silence passed, the audience fidgeting impatiently, before Hiro approached Eiri from behind and slipped the microphone from his hand.
"Hey guys," Hiro said with a smile into the microphone. "I'm sorry, I think Yuki here is just a little overjoyed with your presence." A dorky chuckle followed this, and Eiri turned to glare at him, hating to admit that it was true. Hiro shot him a playfully condescending smile, and then continued. "If you liked this performance, then come to our next concert at the 'Ruido.' I hope to see you there. Thanks, to all of you." With that, he drove his hands into the air, resembling the pose of a champion of a boxing match. This elicited the greatest cheer that they had heard all night, and they exited to the lovely sound.
"You were great," Hiro called once they were fully backstage, approaching the dressing rooms. "Really, both of you. It's fun working with you guys, you know that?" He grinned again as he pulled his guitar from his shoulder and ducked into his room. Eiri and Fujisaki remained standing outside, completely silent.
"He's cool," Fujisaki muttered, and then smiled, almost bitterly. "Hey, Eiri, I never got to tell you. You'll never guess who I ran into at NG today."
"Who?" Eiri asked, trying to sound uninterested.
"Aizawa Taki. Apparently he signed on at NG last month some time."
Eiri frowned hearing the name. He was still a little sore from Taki's betrayal, not to mention from his own demons that still compared his own voice to Taki's beautiful one. Of course Taki would get a spot with NG; he was talented.
"What did he say to you?"
"Well," Fujisaki said, narrowing his eyes as if he were trying to dig deep into his memory. "He looked about as surprised to see me there as I was to see him. He thought I was, like, an extra, like Hiro used to be, I guess. When I told him that I was the keyboardist for a band…with you as the lead singer, well, first he looked like he was about to faint. And then he flipped and stormed off in a huff. It was kind of disturbing, truthfully."
"Whatever," Eiri mumbled. "Who cares about a little competition? It makes victory that much sweeter."
"Right," Fujisaki said with a cute smile, nodding his head. He let out a short laugh, winked, and then turned and stepped into his dressing room.
Eiri paused a moment, thinking briefly about the former lead singer of Bad Luck and trying not to let it upset him, before he continued on. He rounded the corner towards his dressing room, reaching out to grasp the handle, when suddenly he felt as though a sack of bricks smacked him in the head. He fell against the wall, pressing his fingers to his temples, and slid to the ground, breathing heavily. The urge to vomit came over him, and he forced himself to keep breathing so that he wouldn't retch.
They say, the higher you fly, the harder you fall, right? Eiri thought underneath the onslaught of the sudden massive headache. I really was soaring.
Eiri clutched his head with one hand, placing the other on the ground, propping himself up and he straightened out his waist, and then leaned back against the wall, pulling his knees into his chest and using them to support his head. The throbbing was so heavy, his entire body shook, and his ears were ringing louder than all the fans' screams put together. This was close to being a migraine. Eiri bit his lower lip and tried desperately to clear his mind, but a soft white mist was rapidly spreading across the inside of his eyelids.
I'm going to die…"No you're not," Yuki said, biting into his apple.
"Yes I am!" Eiri cried, sinking deeper onto the hard wooden table that was currently supporting all of his weight. "My brain is going to pop…"
Yuki only laughed at this, taking another bite and setting his elbows onto the table across from the young blonde. "It's going to pop, huh?"
"It's a migraine. It hurts so bad! Why do I get these horrible migraines…? Yuki…"
"Grow up," Yuki replied coldly. "It's not a migraine. You've never had a migraine. Migraines knock you out."
"You don't call this being knocked out?" Eiri screamed, tears already surfacing in his eyes. This was the slow kind of pain, torture to be exact. It was a dull ringing that lasted forever, drove him insane. He couldn't stand it. It was the worst thing he ever felt.
"No. You're just whining." Yuki leaned back in his chair, draping his long arms over his skinny frame—he was still in his performance costume, which only served to show off his thin body. In fact, he looked thinner than usual…
Maybe it was the black eye shadow that made his eyes look sunken, and the powder that made him look especially pale. Yuki was naturally skinny… Eiri didn't know why he was noticing it so much tonight. Still, a worried frown etched itself onto his face as he scrutinized the older singer.
"See? You've already forgotten about it," Yuki said, grinning, though his smile did not reach his eyes. "It's no migraine."
"Yuki, are you…?"
"Come on, Eiri," he said, still wearing the smile. It seemed frighteningly ominous; there was a peculiar sorrow, almost regret, exuding from its sharp curve. "Let's go to bed."
The performer stood up, his frame rocking slightly, before turning and stumbling towards the bedroom. Eiri rose to his feet as well, watching carefully, and following obediently as always. As he watched the lanky form meld with the darkness of the room, he felt a certain terror well into his throat.
"I love you, Yuki!" he called, as if it were the only thing that could save him.
"Sakano, Sakano! Are you around here?"
Eiri cursed the interruption of the muffled voice and lifted his head to glare—upon finding his portion of the hallway empty, he allowed his head to fall back into its previous position. His headaches took longer to go away now; it was Kitazawa's magic that always chased them away before, but now…
"Sakano!"
He could tell now that the voice was coming from around the corner, probably somewhere in front of Hiro or Fujisaki's rooms. And what an annoying voice it was! Certainly nothing to help his headache get any better.
He listened to the footsteps of whoever it was—they were sporadic and bouncy, irregular in a lively sort of way. At least they gave him something to concentrate on other than his headache. They were coming closer to the corner, to his spot against the wall, but he didn't dare lift his head and exacerbate the ache, even when they rounded the corner and stopped short, right in front of him.
"A…are you okay?" the grating voice asked, a scratchy quality to the tone, hinting of nervousness.
"No. Go away," Eiri commanded flatly, sinking his head deeper between his knees. For some reason, his brain told him that
gravity would fix the hurt and drain his head of the pain as long as he succumbed to its force. Tilting his head at such an angle, at least, made the pain feel a little different, which was a start.
"Eiri…"
Ah… He had thought that voice sounded familiar. Last time he heard that name on those lips, it was being passionately cried out behind the not-so-private confines of a public bathroom stall.
"You really are stalking me, aren't you?" Eiri said, lifting his head and staring at the pink-haired author, pretended that his eyes didn't cloud with darkness from the movement and keeping them locked in place.
"I'm not… I told you—at the club that night, I just went with my boyfriend. I didn't know you'd be there."
Eiri laughed mockingly, setting his head back against the wall. "Surely you knew I'd be here, unless you're really clueless. You knew this was a Bad Luck concert, right?"
There was no response, and Eiri peeled open his eyes, looking at Shuichi standing there, blushing pink. The entire hall suddenly seemed strangely silent, with every noise muted. It must have been the headache.
"You don't look very good… Are you all right? Do you have a headache?"
Eiri's eyelids fell closed again, and he remained there like that, his arms draped across his knees and the wall supporting the whole of his upper body. The pain felt like it was almost settling at the bottom of his brain, like dust on the surface of a bookcase. One thing he needed now was alcohol—he had drunk sparingly for the past couple of months, since he had always been beat after the long days recording in the studios and ended up collapsing in bed the minute he got home. Luckily, he had managed to make enough money to buy his own apartment, and Fujisaki was no longer a hassle, but other than that, his life rather sucked.
Eiri's eyes instinctively snapped open when he felt a soft, cold touch on his right hand; he turned his focus on the brat kneeling beside him, holding his hand close to those red lips of his. The novelist's whole demeanor seemed oddly tense, and Eiri watched intently, expectantly, dreading and hoping at the same time to find out what was going on behind those darkened violet eyes.
When Shuichi gently bit the skin between his thumb and index finger, Eiri, much to his own surprise, only continued to watch. The kid's ministrations were odd, but enticing. His teeth softly raked across the skin, and then a strong, wet tongue followed, firmly moistening the flesh there. After a few seconds, Shuichi removed his mouth and began massaging with his hands in the very same place, rubbing and gliding his fingers expertly across the webbing there, for a few minutes. After he finished, he placed a feathery kiss on Eiri's thumb, as a gentleman would kiss a lady's hand, and then looked up expectantly.
"What the hell was that?" Eiri asked, finally donning his irritation once he was certain it was done.
"Is your headache gone?" Shuichi asked, wide-eyed.
Eiri blinked at him, realizing reluctantly that, in fact, it was. There was hardly a trace of it left—his head felt light once again.
"How…did you…?"
Shuichi smiled grandly, his face brightening up as if that had just made his day complete. "It's a trick I learned from my mom. You see, there's a pressure point between those two fingers; if you massage it like that, sometimes it makes headaches go away."
A tiny grin tugged at the corner of Eiri's mouth, and he fought it for all that he was worth. "You learned that from your mom?" The smile won, breaking free into an amused smirk.
"Uh," Shuichi blinked, crossing his big eyes and blushing. "Not…exactly like that." A sheepish smile formed on his lips, drawing Eiri's gaze with their sheer lusciousness. "I'm allowed to improvise sometimes…you know…"
"Me too…" Eiri mumbled, staring intently at the bright face. His lips parted on their own accord, and he ever so slowly leaned forward until their lips touched gently. "As…thanks…"
The kiss was soft, a ghost of a kiss, lacking the passion of their other kisses. They no longer seemed bent on tearing each other apart—rather, it was a polite kiss, a gentleman's kiss, not unlike Shuichi's kiss on his thumb, leaving in its wake disappointment and promises. The whole while, Eiri found himself thinking of his dialogue afterwards, preparing a speech in his head to recite to the boy. It won't work; that's all; I'm sorry; I can't… It was what he said every time, and what he meant every time, and yet it never lasted. Nonetheless, he would not allow himself another relationship, especially not with this particular brat, and resigned himself to the dirty work.
Thus, he was completely taken by surprise when all his plans suddenly became obsolete.
"Shu…ichi…?"
With the alien voice, Eiri felt the novelist's lips depart from his own rapidly, like a rabbit racing to its hole. He peeled open his eyes, gazing amusedly at Shuichi's deer-in-the-headlights expression before curiosity ensnared him, and he turned his attention to the newcomer who was, as chance would have it, Eiri's very own boss.
"Sa-Sakano! It's not what it looks like!" Shuichi cried, obviously acting purely on impulse and instinct. He jumped to his feet, tripping himself on the way up and nearly falling, and held his hands up like a criminal would for a policeman.
"Shui…Shindou-kun, I didn't know you had returned from your trip…" Sakano's hair looked messier than usual. He pushed his thick glasses to the bridge of his nose as he ran his fingers though the dark strands.
"Umm…"
"I guess…" The silence of his pause hung restlessly in the muted air, thick and hot. "Then…I'll be seeing you, Shindou-kun. Yuki-kun." He dipped his head awkwardly before wandering off in a blank, dazed sort of way, weaving a bit from side to side. He turned the corner, disappearing from sight, but Eiri waited until he was sure the producer was out of hearing range before he spoke.
"What the hell was that? You know Sakano?"
Shuichi remained as he was, his body tensely rigid, swaying back and forth slightly. His eyes were still open wide, shining with what looked to be unshed tears.
"Hey!"
"I said I went to the club with my boyfriend!" Shuichi cried, suddenly launching himself into motion, grabbing his own pink bangs and scrunching his face. His voice was screechy, hinting of hysteria. "If only I had never met you! If only you hadn't wandered into my neighborhood. You didn't belong there. You were just passing. You're a predator, Eiri!"
Eiri felt the blood rush to his face so fast that it clouded his eyes, as well as his better judgment, and he lunged. His arms swung around Shuichi's legs, breaking their lock and sending the novelist tumbling down on top of him.
"I'm a predator?" Eiri spat, shoving Shuichi off him and slamming the kid's body into the ground. "You're the one who wouldn't leave me alone! I couldn't get rid of you, try though I did, and so I just used you for the cheap fuck you're worth!"
"I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!" Shuichi screamed, shaking his head back and forth. His cheeks were violet, and tears streaked his already gross face. Eiri winced at the sight, as well as at the volume at which the brat was yelling. It would only be a matter of time before Hiro, Fujisaki, and every other staff member made their way back here to witness this.
"Shuichi!" Eiri whined after a few moments promised only Shuichi's relentlessness. "Stop!"
But Shuichi didn't stop; if anything, he just increased the ferocity of his tantrum. Eiri grabbed the boy's hands tightly just to keep them still. The paranoia of someone seeing this spectacle welled up in Eiri, and he used his fear as strength to drag the novelist into his dressing room.
And, like all things, only when Eiri was out of danger of being the subject of gossip did Shuichi's bawling recede.
"H-How could you?" Shuichi stuttered, choking on his own tears and burying his face in his hands. Eiri clenched his jaw and made his way to the dressing table, awkwardly sitting sideways on the chair placed next to it.
"What?"
"How could you do this to me? You're such a bastard. You're the scum of the Earth. You're one of those people that the newscasters talk about…one of those strangers that people condemn even though they don't know you."
Eiri felt the blood rising to his face again; his eyes narrowed instantly, and if his body weren't so tense, it would have been trembling with rage.
"Why are you so cruel? You're just toying with me."
"Who's toying with who?" Eiri asked, giving everything he had into controlling his voice and temper. "You're the one that's taken. You're disloyal."
"You're worse!" Shuichi cried, jumping to his feet and pointing an enraged finger at the blonde. "I bet you've been to jail before, haven't you? You're like, this bad, tough guy, and you go around victimizing people just to be able to laugh at them!"
All his efforts were in vain. Eiri felt his temper snap like a wishbone. "Who the hell do you think I am? How dare you?"
"How dare you?" Shuichi retorted, matching Eiri's rage. "This is all your fault! You've ruined my life! You're just a pompous bastard! I should have known. I thought you were cool, but instead you're cold! You're just dirt! I'll tell Seguchi, and he'll kick you back out onto the street where you belong!"
It was originally intended to be a gentle slap, but Eiri's control was limited, and it grew into a full-fledged punch, knocking Shuichi's jaw so hard that the novelist collapsed from the force of it and was sent toppling to the floor. His delicate hands immediately sheltered the reddened cheek, hiding beneath it both the damage and the tears. Eiri could hear the strained sobs, as if Shuichi were trying to hold them back, amplified by the cupped hands, but his fury was enormous and he dared not comfort the boy.
"Who's pompous?" Eiri hissed, spinning around on his heel and throwing himself back onto his chair, trying to force his anger to dispel.
This time, he was only greeted by the incessant gasps and sobs of the boy, crumpled and hunched on the cold floor. Eiri rolled his eyes, but it was only half-hearted. The boy couldn't see it, and Eiri wouldn't have done it otherwise.
"Look, I'm sorry I hit you," Eiri muttered reluctantly. After still no reply came, he sighed and turned his head, resting his forehead in his hand. He continued, trying to ignore the feeling that his words were falling on deaf ears, "I don't know what you thought you would get by coming here, anyway. It's your fault you're so upset because you can't let go."
After a bit of silence, unbroken even by sobs, Shuichi surprisingly answered. His voice no longer held venom or anger, but rather, just sadness. "You're right. I'm an idiot."
Eiri bit back his tongue, unsure of whether to agree with the brat or not. His lack of response, however, didn't seem to perturb Shuichi at all.
"I was so stupid to think that there was something with you. You're right. I don't know anything about love. I write about what I want love to be, but it's all just a delusion, isn't it? You're just a stranger I met in a park one day, nothing more, right? It was just a one-night stand. It would blossom into nothing, and I knew it."
"Your problem," Eiri interjected, once Shuichi fell into a pause, "is that you worry too much about love. It's not as important as you think it is."
"…Your problem," Shuichi replied, turning around with a bitter smile, unshed tears glittering in his eyes, "is that you contradict yourself. How much do you worry about love?"
Eiri narrowed his eyes and looked away, hoping Shuichi would do the same, but the kid merely continued to stare at him. Eiri, however, was not willing to give up and merely froze in his position, refusing to look back at the boy or to speak, placing the burden instead on Shuichi to break the silence. Grudgingly, Shuichi complied, though not with what Eiri would have wished.
"You have to let me live with you."
"What?" Eiri cried, breaking his stance and staring at Shuichi wide-eyed. "What the hell…?"
"It's Sakano's apartment. I don't have anywhere to live now!"
"Well, that's your fault for cheating on your boyfriend, isn't it?"
"It's your fault for tempting me!"
"You're the one who came to me in the first place!"
"You're the one who didn't push me away!"
"How is your lack of self-control my fault?"
"How is your tactlessness mine?"
The two, who had risen to their feet in rage, now fell back to their seats in a huff, Eiri to his chair and Shuichi to the floor.
"How do you argue with someone who has no logic?" Eiri muttered to himself, closing his eyes in frustration and running anxious fingers though his hair. He remained like that for a few moments before addressing Shuichi once again, "How do you expect to live together if we can't even get along just seeing each other like this?"
"It's because you keep pushing me away," Shuichi replied without any thought, as if he had pondered this long and hard previously. "If you would quit that, then I think we could get along. Please, Eiri, just until I find another apartment."
Eiri fell into a long bout of thought, looking deep in concentration with his brow furrowed and his eyes darting back and forth across his hand. Shuichi watched, fearful of interrupting, with his legs pulled up to his chest nervously. He gazed at the blonde in a sort of idolization, as the other pondered quietly.
"Fine," Eiri said at last, the hesitation written clearly in his voice, "but on certain conditions. First, you are to actually look for an apartment; second, you do not bother me at all; third, do not tell Sakano that you are living with me. Understood?"
Shuichi nodded eagerly with an excited squeal. He jumped to his feet and immediately began chattering mindlessly, but Eiri quickly tuned him out, falling back into his own thoughts. He knew he would regret this.
TBC
……………
Notes: Ahh, oops. That took me awhile, didn't it? Sorries, sorries. But, this chapter is extra long! Just for you! I hit a rut while writing this; you can probably tell. Sorry. I hope to pick up the pace again soon.
Thank you again for all that reviewed! You're so very encouraging! And, uh, yeah. That's it.
Also, I believe this is the last chapter I'm going to post at I'm sorry, no matter what I do, I cannot get it to upload there correctly (not to mention that site is really slow and I don't believe many people are reading it there). However, I will continue with it at and (see links above) if you want to keep reading it.