*Pops up from behind a fortress wall*
Hey everyone! Wie Gehts? I'm learning German now!
*Ducks to avoid assorted projectiles flying her way*
*peeks out fearfully*
Sorry about the delay you guys... I have german classes from 2 to 6 on Sundays and I have college on all the other days, and my semester exams started and I had no time... I wrote bits and pieces of this in between studying for tests and whatnot, and my semesters just finished and I'm finally free so...
I'M REALLLLLLYYYYYY SORRY YOU GUYSSSSS
You're great and patient people and I keep doing this to you...
*gross sobbing*
Special thank to AcerbusEquinomin56, akin 'to38, GabZ and Hibisha for reviewing and OHMAGAWD I have 43 reviews now FORTY THREE *EXCITED SCREAMING*
THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU *MORE SCREAMING*
Now, on with the show!
This will be a bigger chapter, I think... Plus there will be some questionable humor and some heart-to-hearts which are supposed to add to character development... *mumbles some more trying to remember what else she was supposed to say* Oh yeah, there will be use of various lyrics, and I think everyone knows that I don't own any of them.
*disappears behind wall*
NOTE: I went through it and edited all the typos. I can't believe I didn't even notice there were so many... Agh.
When the Stars Cease to Shine
Chapter 11: Road Trip
After they'd come down from the adrenalin rush and were more than 150 kilometers away from Moscow, things became very... quiet. Tala was staring straight ahead as he kept going at 90 kmph, not even making small talk as he usually did. Kai considered it a little eerie, seeing the always animated Tala with his mouth shut for more than a few minutes at a time.
And he didn't really know what to say to make the silence go away, so he kept his mouth shut and pensively stared outside the window at the passing trees and the occasional gas station or building.
After fifteen more minutes of silence, there was a clicking sound and Kai looked back inside, only to see the redhead fiddling with the music system, searching for a particular song.
A few moments later, an ominous noise was heard, followed by the howling of dogs, and very familiar opening beats belted out of the cars' impressive speakers.
Tala was nodding his head and grinning like a maniac, practically dancing in his seat as he sang along with the King Of Pop.
"Its close to mi-idnight,
Something evil is lurking in the dark
Under the mo-on light,
You see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream, but terror takes the sound
Before you make it
You start to freeze, as horror looks you
Right between the eyes,
You're paralyzed" The red head turned to look at him with the same manic grin on his face, egging Kai to sing along with him.
Kai hesitated a bit before he gave in, and the both of them screamed at the top of their lungs, both of them nodding their heads with the beat as they giggled slightly, the tension that seemed to permeate the car only minutes before vanishing without a trace.
"'Cause this is THRILLER! Thriller night!
And no one's gonna save you from the
Beast about to strike
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller
Tonight!"
They sang along for a while, just for the heck of it, and besides, who didn't like to sing along to Thriller? The song was addictive.
After that song ended, Maroon 5's Moves like Jagger came on, and Kai silenced himself as he watched Tala thoroughly enjoy himself, singing along and moving his head to the beat to this song as well.
"Take by the tongue and I'll show you
Kiss me till you're drunk and I'll own you
With the Moves like Jagger
I got the moves like Jagger
I got the Mo-o-o-o-o-ves like Jagger"
Kai rolled his eyes and smiled when Tala looked at him and winked at the 'Kiss me till you're drunk' part.
The next song was also energetic, but in a different language, and Kai was surprised when Tala matched the singer word for word.
"Is that... What language is that? And is that Spanish in the middle?"
Tala turned and gave him a big smile. "Hindi. You like Bollywood?"
"I've never really seen any foreign movies, apart from English movies."
"Hm. You're missing out on quite a bit."
"Maybe."
"What's your favourite movie?"
"I've watched many movies, but I like very few. I love Life is Beautiful. And The Sound of Music, more recently I liked The Blind Side,"
" Amazing movie, that one. What's your favourite genre?"
"Art movies, documentaries, mostly old movies, and I quite like Charlie Chaplin. I watch whatever catches my fancy, but I'm not really one for action and mindless stunts. "
"But you like Pirates of the Carribean."
"Well, yeah. That's a nice series. Plus Johnny Depp was in it. What about you?"
"I like rom-coms. I don't like movies that are sad and depressing, and I hate sad or ambiguous endings. I like horror movies, but not the extremely disgusting ones, with slime and goop everywhere. But I watch just about everything, cause you never know if you'll like something unless you've tried it. I like Charlie Chaplin too." He smiled sideways at Kai before focusing his attention back on the road.
"What's your favourite movie?"
"Too many to list out." Tala gave him a sort-of-pained look. "Why aren't you asking about our destination? Aren't you curious?" He asked, reminding Kai of a child that had a secret who was bursting to spill it but didn't want to till someone asked.
"You said we were going to your sister's house in the country side, right?"
Tala beamed, relieved that he could finally talk about it. "Yeah. It's a great place, and it's near the woods, so we can go out exploring and stuff in the morning, maybe even see some hares, or foxes! My sister and her husband have a dairy farm, and they have a lot of animals, goats, cows, and sheep! It's really amazing, and it's a really peaceful place. I think you'll like it there."
Kai smiled. Yes, that did sound quite nice. And if it was secluded, there were lesser chances of getting found out and possibly reported...
He briefly wondered about what was going on in the mansion. No doubt his grandfather would have been informed about it right now. Hopefully Mr. Dickinson and the others wouldn't get caught, or fired. He really didn't want that.
4 hours had passed since they'd left Moscow, and it looked like they had to stop to refuel the car.
Tala looked at Kai, frowning a little. "There'll be people at the gas station."
The model nodded, before reaching over the back seat and grabbing his bag. He pulled out a black beanie and his lens case, before turning the rear view mirror to put his contacts in. The road was smooth, so he didn't have to worry about poking his eyes out. He put the hat on his head, pulling it so it covered all of his hair. He also pulled on a surgical face mask, and coughed a little.
"How do I look?"
Tala raised an eyebrow, amused. "With all that black and that mask? You look like a mugger."
"If I looked like a supermodel, I'd be defeating the point."
Tala chuckled lightly and left it at that.
Pretty soon the gas station came up, and Tala pulled in behind another car. There were no other cars there, and the lone serviceman was listening to the radio at full blast.
"... watari has been reported missing. Details of how he went missing are sketchy but al police checkpoints have been alerted to be on the look out for the heir. A reward has been announced for the safe return of Kai Hiwatari by his grandfather, Voltaire Hiwatari, who is distraught at his grandson's disappearance."
Kai's eyes widened a little and he slumped in his seat in a poor attempt to hide. Tala moved behind the other car, before he turned off the ignition and pulled out the key and walked to the petrol cap.
He tried to be as nonchalant as possible even when the serviceman looked into his car and eyed Kai suspiciously.
"My cousin is recovering from pneumonia." He said, putting on his best game face.
Kai, seemingly taking a hint, erupted in a series of the most believable, painful sounding coughs and even wheezed a little, before he slumped back in his seat like one of those old people having sudden heart attacks in soap operas. Tala bit the inside of his lower lip, trying desperately to not break into laughter.
The serviceman gave the boy an understanding look tinged with compassion before he turned back to Tala to receive his cash. "Take care. There are diseases everywhere now, not like the old days."
"Yeah, definitely." Tala gave the man a quick smile and hurried back to the driver's side, eager to get away and also a little eager to let out the mirth he'd been trying to keep in.
As soon as they got away, Kai revived and pulled off his beanie and surgical mask, as Tala threw his head back and laughed, thumping the steering wheel with his right fist. "Bloody hell, what was that? Melodramatic much? It looked like you were the 80 year old millionaire reacting to the news that your 30 year old wife slept with the 20 year old pool boy! What was up with THAT!" He resumed his laughing, although it was a little more subdued now.
Kai chuckled a little, only slightly put out that Tala was laughing at his expense. But he guessed that he had gone a little overboard there with the wheezing. He was supposed to be recovering from pneumonia, not dying of it.
"I guess I did get a bit carried away. But that was all kinds of fun. I saw you trying to bite back laughter. You looked constipated." Kai laughed back at Tala, doing an exaggerated imitation of Tala's stoic face.
"Oh, that reminds me. Have you seen the movie Constipation?"
Kai just looked at him. And looked at him. When Tala didn't seem to be offering any explanations, he ventured, "Um, no?"
"Yeah, well, that's because it isn't out yet!"
The right side of his face twitched, before he let out an undignified snort, falling back into his seat and huffing out disbelieving laughter. "That-" He made a little 'hah' sound "-was the... You know what, I don't even have words for it."
Tala was laughing too, before he turned to Kai again, eyes bright. "Wait, wait, here's another one-"
"No Tala, really, that's enough-"
"Knock knock."
Kai gave him an exasperated look, but responded anyway. "Who's there?"
"Who who." Tala grinned.
"Who Who who?"
"Hee hee hee!"
Kai's face was a the epitome of 'oh my god it is kind of funny but I can't laugh because it's sort of beneath my sense of humor' which when physically expressed was a look with his lips tucked between his teeth as he fought not to laugh at Tala's juvenile sense of humor, plus twitching in his right eye and the right side of his mouth.
Tala was laughing so hard at Kai's dismayed yet stunned face, the blunet trying to digest the fact that it was an absolutely dumb joke but it was sort of funny nonetheless.
"It's funny, just laugh already!" he cackled.
"It's not!"
"Maybe you don't have a sense of humor!"
Kai pursed his lips together to keep from saying anything else about the 'sense' part of Tala's sense of humor. "So where were we anyway before your mind blowing jokes?"
Tala stuck his tongue out at him, but responded anyway. "We were talking about your sick person act back at the fuel place."
"Oh yeah. I guess I did get a little carried away, didn't I?"
Tala laughed. "You did, but the old man seemed to believe it, so it's all okay. It was definitely very funny to an observer though."
"I know. My throat hurts now."
Tala laughed again. Kai marveled at how nice it sounded, how pleasant and comforting. He wanted to say so to the other man, but held back, not wanting to sound weird. Instead, he quipped, "So tell me, are you and your sister really close?"
"Yeah. Every since our parents died, we realized there isn't much else that's more important than family. Especially since I moved to the city, it seems like we've become closer. I call her at least once a week and we catch up. You'd think there would't be anything interesting in the country side, but she has her own share of amusing stories to tell, like what a cow did to an ox that tried to mount her, or how a duck scared their dog so bad he refused to come out of the house for two days straight! I talk to her sons too, real amazing pieces of work, those two. One's eight and the other's four, and they're both so cute! Bryan, that's the older one, he goes to elementary school, and he's the smartest little kid I've ever met! And Ian, he's adopted, and he's an absolute sweet heart, you'll see when you meet them. I'm sure you'll get along great!"
Kai looked mildly amazed at the amount of talking Tala had done without pausing to regroup, and all of it with a big smile too! He wondered how he'd get along with them. He'd never been around small children much, would they think he was a klutz and no fun at all? Anyone standing next to Tala would pale in comparison to the vibrant haired man, but he wanted to make a favorable impression on the man's family.
The thought had him confused. He normally didn't care about what others thought of him, but he found himself wanting to be liked by the people Tala held in such high regard.
"And my brother in law, don't even get me started on him. The man's huge! I mean, he's almost 6'6" and built like a tank, sometimes I look at him and wonder if he was a runaway military experiment or something, and the fact that he lives in the wild only adds to my suspicion that he doesn't want to be seen and reported and dragged back to whatever underground facility he was being experimented on at. But don't tell that to my sister, she'd make me go clean out the cow shed or worse. God knows she loves that man like crazy. The first time she bought him home I thought she was joking, and so did my mum! If dad had been there to see it he'd have thrown a bitch fit. 'No simple living farmer for my precious daughter!' he'd say in his gruff, angry voice, and then he'd stomp off and sit in the bathroom and read the newspaper till mum cajoled him out with promises to make caramel pudding for dessert. Weird man, my father. Anyways, when she brought Spencer home, me and mum were just staring at the guy. I mean, he was totally different from my sister, there was no way in hell that they even had anything in common, let alone like each other! But it turned out that both of them were really fond of animals and farm life, and that was that. She got married a year later, and bam, out came little Bryan and I'm an uncle at 18!"
Kai was trying and failing at hiding his amusement at Tala's monologue, complete with imitations of his father's voice and plenty of head bobbing and fist thumping, the most vicious which accompanied the 'out came little Bryan' part, by which point Kai was outright chortling and working on not choking on his own spit.
Tala looked over at Kai, pleased to see that his rambling had served its purpose and made the boy smile.
Recently, Tala had noticed a shift in his feelings toward the blunette, a shift he did't even register till it hit him right out of nowhere. It was during one of their phone conversations where they were both laughing over something mundane and not all that funny at all, that Tala had imagined him and Kai having a snowball fight and then making snow angels. The sheer non-X-ratedness of that visual was somewhat jarring to him.
Usually when he imagined them together, they were always doing something that involved a lot less clothes, and also one of them would be pressed against a horizontal or vertical surface.
There was also a lot of moaning. LOUD moaning.
But recently whenever he imagined them spending time together they were always doing other fun activities, like street shopping and baking and flying kites. He found himself thinking up new things to show to the blunette, new things to make him smile. He found himself wanting to show Kai things that he'd never seen, things that he'd missed out on for so long. He found himself wanting to cuddle the blunette up and make the loneliness disappear from his brilliant ruby eyes. He wanted to protect Kai from everything bad in the world, he wanted the blunette to be safe and happy and experiencing everything he deserved to. He wanted to make the blunette forget that he ever felt lost. He found himself actually falling in love with the intelligent, witty and sweet model, something that felt totally different from how he was feeling all those months ago when he first met the guy. The feeling felt like someone had pressed his chest full of cotton and made breathing difficult. But strangely the thought that he was in actual love made Tala feel content and secure and satisfied.
The way he saw it, love conquers all, so why bother trying to fight back? He was setting himself up for a big, big fall if Kai decided to refuse his feelings, but he was confident that he could win him over with time.
Kai was fiddling with the audio system, looking at all the songs Tala had and either nodding in approval or grimacing at his taste in music.
"Your nose looks really cute when it's all scrunched up like that, like a pug!" He crowed.
Kai glared at him, but there was no hiding the faint blush that rose on his cheeks. "Stop calling me cute."
"Aw, but why?"
"Just don't. It's weird."
"Whatever you say. But the truth still stands even if I don't point it out, little pug-face!"
Kai chose not to dignify that little jibe with a response, and Tala simply laughed lightly.
"How do you do it?"
Tala frowned on hearing the suddenly soft, subdued voice of the boy. "What do you mean? How I do what?"
Kai gave a small, wistful smile as he turned his face slightly to look at the passing darkness. "Being yourself, I guess. You say whatever you want to say, and you don't care how other people take it."
"Hey, I do care how other people take it, you know. I wouldn't want to hurt anyone by saying something insensitive or cutting. But I guess I do always say what I think..." Tala glanced sideways at the blunette's profile, willing him to look back. When it didn't happen, he ventured carefully, "Is this about the teasing? I won't do it anymore if you don't like it. I thought you didn't mind when I gave you nick-names."
"No, it isn't about that." Kai bent his head to look at his hands that were lying limply in his lap. "You're so open." He scratched the thumb of his left hand with the index finger of his right. "When you want to say something, you say it. Even when your opinion conflicts with the others, you say it anyway. You don't care if the other person accepts your point of view or not, but you make yourself heard." He linked his hands together, twiddling his thumbs. "I wish I could be like that."
Tala simply shut his mouth and waited for the blunette to ride out his train of thought.
"All my life," Kai sighed, letting his head fall back against the seat, the lights from the music system bathing his face in a dull blue glow, "All my life, I've been told what to do. How to speak, how to walk, how to eat, how to behave myself in public, how to always appear charming and well mannered and smiling despite how terrible you're actually feeling. I was the scion to the Hiwatari empire, and I was expected to act like that. My grandfather was always telling me to keep quiet and listen to what others were saying. I was never allowed to speak my mind, because my opinions were never worth anything, or because I would offend someone important to the family name. Even when I vehemently disagreed with whatever was being said, even if the other party was just wrong about something, I could never tell them so because I might end up upsetting them and causing a scene, and bring shame to the Hiwatari name.
I tried speaking up once, at a dinner, when some old man was talking about clearing up a forest in South America and putting up luxury villas, like it didn't matter that there would be millions of animals living there, like it didn't matter that they'd be driven to extinction if their habitats were destroyed. I told them they had no right to kill off a whole exotic world just because they had the money and wanted to show it off. My grandfather caned me that night when we got home."
Tala's entire frame froze at that, looking wide eyed at Kai when he spoke that last bit so calmly.
Kai turned to Tala, opening his eyes halfway from where they'd been closed completely as he mused out loud, a sardonic smile on his face. "Don't look so stricken, Tala. My grandfather was a very strict man. He rewarded me when I got good grades and brought fame to the family. He also punished me when he felt I had crossed the limits he'd set up for me. Rudely talking back to a business partner was a grave offense in his book, and he made sure I knew that and wouldn't ever do it again.
I tried to be myself, and I got punished. Eventually I got tired and just stopped trying, till I was nothing but a puppet that bent to my grandfather's every whim.
And all the time, when I think, 'I don't want to be a Hiwatari. I want to be me', I realise I've spent so long being someone else that I don't even remember who 'me' is anymore."
Tala felt his heart break for the younger boy. He knew Kai was sad and lonely, but he had no idea things were so bleak and desolate in the other's mind. He waited for Kai to continue, but when he didn't, he decided it was okay to speak up. "What bought this on, Kai?" he asked gently, not wanting to seem annoyed or judgmental.
Kai looked surprised, but he answered anyway. "Just that... A while ago, when you were laughing, you seemed so... Carefree. You tease me all the time, and you call things as you see them. If you want to say something, you say it, and worry about consequences later. You're sure of yourself. But whenever I want to say something, I always worry about how others interpret it, or react to it. Each time I want to say something to you, I worry if I might upset you, or that you might laugh at me, and I just want all the niggling in my mind to go away and just... Talk without worrying about stuff. I know what I just said doesn't have much connection with what I was talking about earlier, but it all seems interconnected."
Tala gave him a slight frown. He needed to say so much to reassure the blunette, but he wasn't sure how exactly to go about it. "What you just told me... I can't know exactly how it feels for you, but I can guess it. And I don't want to feel that way at all, even if it's just imaginary and for a few seconds. And you shouldn't have to feel that way either, and it physically hurts to think that you've had to experience that sort of emotional and mental strain for so long all by yourself. Ha, strain is an understatement.
Whatever you told me now, plus what you told me back then, on that day when we were going to have dinner, it all ties into your sense of self. You're confused because you feel like you're two different people, when in reality you don't have to be confused at all because you're ultimately both the same person. Kai Hiwatari the model and Kai Hiwatari the dork are two facets of a whole, both of them are just as real and constant as gravity and starlight. You can't see the stars during the day, or you can't exactly feel gravity, but that doesn't mean that they don't exist, right? It's just like that with you: just because your true self isn't in the spotlight and openly visible, doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.
And what all this about not being able to talk freely? As far as I've seen, you're spunky and witty and you always have a retort to everything I say. Sometimes I have noticed that you look like you want to say something but you hold yourself back. But let me just tell you that it's okay. If you want to say something, come out and say it. If you don't want to say something, that's fine too. I think it's nice of you to carefully consider your words before you speak. But if you feel like it's holding you back, then you don't have to do it.
I've told you this before, and I'll keep telling you this till it sticks: You need to stop over-thinking things. Stop calculating everything you experience. You say you feel like you don't even know who you are anymore, but I can clearly see who you are. You're the guy I met on a bridge, who stayed with me in my house one night, who I took to my favourite diner for a coffee and the guy who got so embarrassed when he did something inconsequential like forgetting to change the names on the movie premier invites.
You're the guy who can act like a dying pneumonia patient, the guy who likes singing along to Michael Jackson, who knows so much more about the world than a normal eighteen year old should know.
You're the guy millions of people all over the world adore, the guy who was brave enough to trust a stranger to help you out, the guy who has the love of a mansion full of people who are willing to help you out even if it means risking their jobs, the guy who's compassionate enough to worry about a rainforest to try to speak against cutting it down.
But most importantly, Kai, you're the guy who had the determination and the strength to stand up for yourself against your grandfather and get away from him. You might argue that the idea was mine, or that you couldn't have done it without the help from your staff, but that doesn't take away the fact that you were the one who actually pulled it off. And I know for a fact that you could have done it even without anyone's help, because that's who you are, Kai. It's in your blood. You're intelligent, adaptable, courageous, and kind. You're Kai Hiwatari. That's who you are. I can see you clearly, Kai, and the people around you can too. I think right now you're sad, and that's why you can't see it, but I'm positive that you will be able to as well. And when you do, I'll be right next to you, rolling my eyes at your theatrics and telling you, 'See, I told you so.' And that's a promise."
**********continues...
I hope all this makes sense. I started out writing with an outline in mind, and then suddenly Kai was rambling and Tala was rambling and everything got all ramble-y and gosh I don't even know anymore. I feel really insecure about this chapter.
It's the longest chapter so far: it's 5000+ words. And the author's note alone is almost 400 words. GOOD GOD.
NOTE: I didn't come up with the Constipation joke, I found it on tumblr quite a while ago. The knock knock joke is also not mine, though I'm not sure if I saw it on TV or if I read it in the newspaper. If you know the source, tell me and I will add it here. Please don't call me a thief or whatever. I always give credit where it's due.
I laughed like a loon at both the jokes, which says something about my sense of humor. Hopefully you laughed too?
Because it was asked in a review, here's the Bollywood ring-tone that Tala has for his general calls:
Dilliwaali Girlfriend (From the movie Yeh jawani Hai Deewani) (remove the spaces and you're good to go)
youtube.com/watch?v=bCMqDAzYLBE&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DbCMqDAzYLBE
The song Tala has assigned to Kai is 'Hero' by Enrique Iglesias (Because Tala is ridiculously sappy like that. And he keeps changing the ring-tone, but rest assured it'll always be something stupidly romantic like Umbrella by Rihanna or Halo by Beyonce or even You Give Love A Bad Name by Bon Jovi. Zero Gravity by David Archuleta will also be used rampantly, almost on a rotational basis)
The song they listen to in the car: Senorita (from the movie Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara)
youtube watch?v= YdVPHlpMpsw&fulldescription= 1&client=mv-google&guid=&gl = IN&hl=en-GB
Whew.
Take pity on this poor author and feed her reviews... Please?