Fic for J-chan: Breaking Point
Sep. 11th, 2005 07:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kageotogiI promised ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mortenavida a very long time ago that I would write a Gravitation fic for her starring Suguru and Tatsuha, and, at long last, I have. Well, sort of. It got a little out of hand, and it's not going to be a one-shot like I thought it would be. Anyway, this is the first chapter.
Summary: Tohma gets married. Suguru and Tatsuha bump into each other -- several times over.
[word count - 4,494]
It all began with a spilt drink.
Fujisaki Suguru was thirteen, shy, and frantically wishing he was anywhere but at his cousin Tohma's wedding. He had heard the Arctic was nice this time of year and so was the moon and he would gladly have been in either of those places, but not here, all alone and standing awkwardly in a reception hall while he tried to drink his coca-cola. He didn't know anyone here but his cousin, who was far to busy with his new wife and all of their guests to mind him. Suguru's parents had been called away at the last minute and had decided he would be fine all alone. They had been confident in Suguru's ability to handle the situation -- he was thirteen, after all, and very mature for his age. He would make friends easily and would be able to handle everything without a problem.
Their confidence couldn't possibly have been more misplaced. Suguru, despite his best inclinations, was a loner. While other kids his age went out with friends or played sports, Suguru kept his nose buried in books and scores of music. Despite being shy, Suguru was very attached to Tohma, a blond, twenty-something, and reasonably wealthy charmer. Tohma was a professional musician -- a keyboardist -- and Suguru followed in his footsteps every possible waking moment. He admired the man for his power and his connections and -- most of all -- his talent. That was the only reason he was at the wedding. Really.
Well, and because Suguru had wanted to see the woman who had stolen his cousin's love and attention away from him. He was heartbroken to discover that she was just as beautiful, talented, and charming as her new husband. Her darker hair and eyes complimented his lighter features and she could banter with him just as well as any of Tohma's friends or business associates. They were a perfect match.
Leaning against the wall for a moment to let a stream of people past, Suguru tilted his head forward to let his hair (which was dark, he mourned, and nothing like Tohma's blond locks or the carefully colored tea-hair the new wife sported) shadow his face as he watched the pair. He watched the new wife smile and graciously extend her hand to an elderly gentleman who had obviously had too much to drink. He watched them both laugh at something -- a joke? -- one of their guests had told them. He watched Tohma hold his new wife close to him. He watched all of this and hated them for being happy.
He loved Seguchi Tohma with everything his thirteen-year-old heart could muster. It wasn't anything but a love shared between family, between cousins or perhaps brothers, but it was a fierce love and he was furious that this woman -- Tohma's new wife -- was keeping Tohma from reciprocating it as he was supposed to do. Suguru knew, somewhere in his mind, that he was being unreasonable, but he couldn't help it. He both loved and hated with the unbridled passion of the young. (He'd read that phrase in a book, although he couldn't remember what sort of book he had been reading or why.) And right now, he was busy hating everyone in the new wife's entire family.
Suguru watched the couple for a moment longer and then scooted away from the wall, figuring he could hide out in the restroom until this wretched affair was over, but was stopped suddenly as someone bumped into him from behind. Suguru stumbled and his mostly-full glass of cola spilled everywhere -- but mostly on the boy who had crashed into him.
The apology reflex kicked in automatically.
"I'm sorry," Suguru said quickly. "I'll clean it up, don't worry!"
The crasher only laughed and shook his head. His dark eyes gleamed with obvious delight, which was a rather frightening effect, seeing as how he was well over a head taller than Suguru (who tried to pretend he wasn't suddenly grateful for the crowd of people. They could act like witnesses in a pinch, he supposed). The crasher needed a haircut; his hair -- darker than even Suguru's -- hung into his face.
"Don't worry about it," he said. His voice was jaunting and lilted a bit. "It was my fault, I guess. I ran into you, didn't I?"
"Um," Suguru answered brilliantly while his mind tried to supply a better answer. He replayed the past minute in his head and, in lieu of actually answering the question, hemmed and hawed for a few more moments.
"I did," the crasher decided in a voice that clearly said he wasn't interested in an argument. He sounded young, Suguru decided, but looked older. Fifteen, maybe?
"So I'm the sorry one!" the crasher continued with a grin that didn't seem at all apologetic. "C'mon, I'll get you a refill."
Suguru backpedaled so that his vocal chords could finally catch up to his brain.
"But your clothes..."
"I've got more," the crasher said dismissively. He apparently did not think walking around in cola-splashed clothing would be at all uncomfortable. "Anyway, I'm bored out of my skull. Want to go hide in a closet and see if anyone misses us?"
Suguru was taken slightly aback. "Of course I don't!" he cried indignantly. (No one would notice anyway, he added silently.)
The crasher shrugged. "Whatever. It was just an idea." He grabbed Suguru's wrist, the one that was attached to the hand still holding the recently emptied plastic cup, and started to pull him back toward the bar for a new drink. "So what do you want to do?"
"What?" Suguru made a miserable attempt at hiding his surprise. He didn't even know this guy, but the crasher was acting as though they were friendly. Perhaps, Suguru mused, the crasher was an idiot. It would explain something, at least.
"I asked what you wanted to do," the crasher said. His voice was patient. Weary, as though he had explained this twenty times already, but patient. "You're seriously the only other person here who even looks like they might be younger than twenty, I can't find Sakuma-san anywhere even though I was promised he'd be here, and I'm sick of adults. I've gotta deal with them all day as it is, you see. So unless you have a better idea, I'm hijacking you."
Suguru's voice failed him again and he worked his jaw aimlessly for a moment. The crasher looked at him expectantly and half-wondrously. He was probably trying to figure out if Suguru was half-goldfish.
"Uh," Suguru choked out at last. "Okay."
That was enough for the crasher. "Cool." The crasher changed course and headed toward the huge double doors that marked the exit, dragging Suguru along behind him. He talked as he went.
"So how old are you? I'm thirteen and you look about my age, but I look old for my age is what my brother says so maybe you look young for your age or something?" He didn't wait for an answer. "It feels weird being in a church," he said. "I live in a temple, you know. My dad's real pissed that the wedding was in a church -- that's why my brother gave Mika away. He thought it was funny. I guess it is. I've never been to a wedding before, 'specially not one at a church, so I don't really know, but Eiri -- that's my brother -- says this one was really fucked up. He's fucked up, if you wanna know the truth, so I wouldn't take his word for anything if I were you. He's not all bad, though. I guess."
As the crasher spoke, names slowly registered in Suguru's awe-struck mind. He pulled back on his wrist and the crasher's arm jerked back with the movement. The crasher dropped the wrist and half-turned around to see Suguru. He was walking in a side-step now, like a crab. Suguru's steps slowed and halted. When he noticed this, the crasher stopped, too.
"What is it?"
"You're the bride's brother?" Suguru asked.
The crasher hit himself on the forehead with the palm of one hand. "Oh, duh. Sorry." He gave a short, almost mocking bow. "I'm Uesugi Tatsuha. And to answer your question, yeah, I'm one of 'em." He grinned as he stood up a little bit straighter. "And you are?"
"Fujisaki Suguru," the boy answered carefully.
Tatsuha's smile faltered for just a moment. "Oh. You're Tohma's cousin."
The new washed-out quality of the smile did not go unnoticed by Suguru. "What's wrong with that?" he asked bitingly.
"The genes, I guess," Tatsuha answered. He didn't even bother to keep up appearances anymore. The smile disappeared and Tatsuha crossed his arms over his chest. "Seguchi Tohma is an ass."
Suguru rushed to his cousin's defense. "He is not!"
"He is," Tatsuha countered smoothly. "Which I guess means you are, too, by the simple law of association."
An outrage far greater than anything Suguru had ever before felt in all his thirteen years filled him from tip to toe. "I am not!" he screeched.
Tatsuha leaned in a little closer to Suguru and sniffed. "I can practically smell the assity radiating off you now," he said. His voice was tainted with mocking wonder. "Wow. I can't believe I didn't sense it before."
"How dare you!" Suguru cried, drawing back from Tatsuha. There was something very, very wrong with this boy. Not all of the lights were on upstairs or his gears were rusty or... or something, but this was not how normal people behaved. Suguru didn't claim to know much, but he at least knew that!
Tatsuha stuck out his tongue in a silent taunt. Hardly to Suguru's surprise, he didn't let the silence stand and he backed the insult with words. "You sound like you're just as prissy as your cousin."
Suguru started to respond, but Tatsuha turned on his heel and started to walk in the same direction in which he had been tugging Suguru. As he pushed open the double doors, Suguru quickly followed, intent on finishing the argument the other boy had instigated.
"We aren't finished!" Suguru protested. He blinked to get his eyes used to the sunlight and then glared at Tatsuha, who returned the look with one of his own.
"I'm bored with you," Tatsuha said dismissively. "No one in the Seguchi family is any fun at all."
Suguru suddenly wished he knew more about Tatsuha's family so that he could return the insult appropriately. He sputtered instead. "That's a terrible assumption!"
"So?"
When people questioned him later on why he had attacked Tatsuha like he did, Suguru wasn't sure how to answer them. Perhaps he had done it because of Tatsuha's cocky tone of voice or the insults he threw upon Suguru's extended family. Perhaps Suguru had simply kept his irritation and fury bottled up for far too long and Tatsuha had unleashed it at last. Perhaps Suguru simply lost his mind. Whatever the reason, Suguru lunged and he aimed for Tatsuha's face. The other teenager fought back admirably and, when people finally noticed them and rushed forward to pull them apart, it wasn't at all clear as to who suffered through the most damage. Tatsuha emerged with a bloody nose and a split lip; Suguru came away from the battle with a black eye and a few blossoming bruises on his arms and shoulders. His jaw was sore for days afterward.
Nonetheless, Suguru was smugly certain that it was worth it.
---
Suguru and Tatsuha didn't meet again for a full year after Tohma and Mika were married and, after a while, the memory of Tatsuha's audacity and attitude began to fade from Suguru's mind. His parents continued to flit from place to place, so Suguru spent the year moving back and forth between his parent's home and his cousin's estate. Mika -- Tohma's bride -- slowly ingratiated herself to Suguru until the teenager, now fourteen, decided she was tolerable and began to view her as a friend.
While Suguru stayed with his cousin, he often spent time in NG Studio, where Tohma worked. Nittle Grasper, the band for which Tohma had played keyboards, had broken up shortly after Tohma's marriage (when the lead singer, Sakuma Ryuichi, and his new manager went overseas to make a name for the singer as a single artist), and Tohma had made short time of using his money and connections to secure himself a lofty position in the company. It wasn't long after that before Tohma became president of the studio, renamed it NG after the band to which he had already devoted so much of his life, and made the company the cornerstone of the music industry. Musicians and bands flocked from all around the country to collect outside of NG, begging for sponsors, producers, or the chance to hit it big, and NG Studio graciously opened its doors to the truly talented and those with significant potential. Tohma spent the time not taken up by meetings and paperwork with the bands in the studios or in the concert halls or in rehearsal. He doubled as a scout and an advisor as well as filling his role as the boss, and Suguru admired him all the more for being able to pull off such a juggling act.
Tohma had noticed Suguru's interest in music years before and, once he became such an authority in the field, promised to find his younger cousin a position in NG as soon as Suguru developed his skill enough to be useful. It was a day Suguru lived for, so he continued to practice his music day in and day out. He used his time visiting NG to receive tips from those who had already made their way in the industry and, of course, practicing to become the maestro his cousin wished him to be.
Suguru sat in his cousin's office, play acting a Chopin against Tohma's desk, when Uesugi Tatsuha once again entered his life. He heard the door open behind him but paid it no attention as he was sure it was simply Tohma returning early from his meeting, and went on through a more difficult trill passage. He hummed softly, acting as his own accompaniment.
"Why are you fucking with the desk like that?"
The words didn't register at first and Suguru's fingers continued with a momentum of their own. Then, suddenly, they tripped and stumbled. Suguru's back went rigid and he slammed his palms against the desktop. He recognized that voice.
Tatsuha.
"What are you doing here?" Suguru asked snappishly.
Just as he did the year before, Tatsuha ignored Suguru's tone of voice. "Hanging out. What are you doing with the desk?"
"I was practicing," Suguru answered, already on the defense.
Tatsuha walked around the desk and plopped himself down into the black leather chair behind it -- Tohma's chair. Suguru half-expected the other teenager to prop his feet up on the desk and make the desk his own. He was almost surprised when Tatsuha simply leaned back in the chair, both feet planted firmly on the floor.
"Practicing what?" Tatsuha asked. He tilted his head to the side and cocked one dark eyebrow. "Anything good?"
Suguru huffed. "Chopin," he answered. He expected Tatsuha to give him a confused look at the composer's name or perhaps simply drop the subject altogether, but Tatsuha did neither.
"Oh," he said. "Piano." Tatsuha cracked his knuckles. "Shouldn't you, y'know, use a piano to practice on the piano?"
Suguru scowled. "Why are you here?"
"What?" Tatsuha asked, his voice dripping with feigned innocence. "I'm not allowed to visit my only sister's husband?"
"You don't even like him!" Suguru cried.
A grin flashed over Tatsuha's face but quickly passed, hidden by the feigned sincerity. "I'm wounded. You don't even know me very well and you're accusing me of a whole bunch of unspeakable things."
"You should get out of his chair."
Tatsuha shook his head. "I don't want to."
How was it, Suguru wondered, that Tatsuha could simply toe the line and bring Suguru to the far edge of fury just by speaking? Suguru leapt to his feet. His own chair fell back.
"Get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha ignored him and pulled a drawer open. He briefly examined the contents as Suguru stood before him, scowling and gaping by turn. "Did you know he organizes his pencils in the desk by length?" Tatsuha asked. "Tallest to shortest. Seriously."
"Get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha acknowledged the question this time. "Why?" he asked. His eyes gleamed just as they had on the day of Tohma's wedding, when he had first crashed into Suguru and instigated his juvenile attempt at kidnapping. "Are you afraid he'll come back in here and get mad at me if I'm sitting here?"
"No!" Suguru protested. "Just get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha had no right to sit in that chair. It was Tohma's chair, and that chair was a symbol of Tohma's achievements and power (or so Suguru had decided to believe months earlier, when Tohma had first bought the chair for his office). The chair was everything Suguru aspired to reach and everything he wanted to be. And now... and now that scum of humanity was despoiling that mark of high honor, that symbol, that goal, and it made Suguru's blood rush to his head.
"No," Tatsuha said at last. He leaned back a little more in the chair and put his feet on top of the desk.
It was, in a way, a repeat performance of what had happened at Tohma's wedding. The air exploded in what Suguru was sure must be an audible snap as Suguru nearly flew around the desk. He grabbed at Tatsuha's hair and shoulders and attempted to physically remove Tatsuha (who was much taller and heavier) out of the chair. Tatsuha warded him away with surprised jerks and slaps, but Suguru persisted. The feet Tatsuha had propped up on the desktop swept over the surface and a few papers and a container of pens fell off the desk. The papers drifted to the floor. The pens crashed there in little plastic outbursts. One of the pen caps came away and skittered under the desk. Suguru noticed all these things even as the chair Tatsuha had invaded tilted backward until both boys were caught off-balance and crashed downward. Both Tatsuha and the chair fell on Suguru and splayed across his legs. Suguru hit his head against a treacherous potted tree Tohma kept behind the desk. The plant gave Suguru a silent apology for the injury by toppling itself and landing none too gently against Tatsuha's shoulder.
The two teenagers, the chair, and the plant were still trying to recover from their fall when Tohma walked in, accompanied by a few people Suguru would later recognize as the business heads of a rival music company.
---
Once Tohma had recovered from the initial surprise of seeing his brother-in-law and his cousin tangled on the floor, he exiled Tatsuha and Suguru to the green room on the second floor. This was the less popular of the two green rooms, thanks to the air-conditioning and heating unit that blasted either one extreme or the other at random intervals and the vending machines which refused to work properly no matter how many coins were fed into them.
It had already been half an hour since their banishment. Suguru had, upon entering the room, taken a seat on the couch by the window and he had yet to move from that spot. Tatsuha had chosen a seat on the opposite side of the room, by the door, but hadn't stayed there for long; he flitted about the room almost anxiously, although he kept his distance from Suguru.
Suguru watched Tatsuha move around the room for a while but had long since shifted his gaze out the window. Since they were two stories up, there wasn't a great deal to see. A few trees. The beginning peaks of buildings. Suguru couldn't see any people or cars unless he sat up a little straighter and peered over the window ledge. It was almost...
"Do you have any change?"
"What?" Suguru quickly turned his head back toward Tatsuha, who was staring intently at the innards of one of the vending machines.
"Do you have any change? I'm a little short."
"Uh..."
Tatsuha looked over his shoulder at Suguru. "Is that a 'yes but I don't want to give it to you' or a 'no, you freak, and quit asking me questions' kind of answer?"
Suguru frowned. "It's an 'I'm not really sure' kind of answer." He twisted a little bit and began to root through his pockets. "Why?"
"I'm hungry. I forgot to eat something this morning before I left." Tatsuha turned to face Suguru and leaned back against the vending machine. He slid down; his knees nearly touched his ears before his rear hit the floor and Tatsuha stretched his legs out.
This morning? Suguru glanced at the clock hanging over the door. "But it's almost three o'clock!"
Tatsuha just shrugged. "I guess."
Suguru looked at the clock again and estimated the amount of time since Tatsuha's last meal. "Why didn't you eat?"
"Because I didn't think of it."
Suguru paused his search for coins. How could someone forget to eat? It wasn't something a person really had to think about, after all, and Suguru was pretty sure most people set up an actual schedule -- three meals a day, morning noon and night. He considered Tatsuha curiously. Maybe he had some sort of amnesia. Or maybe (Suguru guessed) he was just stupid.
The question, if not the speculations, must have been clear on Suguru's face, because Tatsuha sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I left Kyoto really early this morning and caught the train and came here," he admitted. "I didn't eat anything because it would have woken up my dad -- he sleeps like... I don't know. He's a light sleeper."
Suguru's search for spare change was quickly forgotten. He gaped at the other teenager. "You ran away from home?"
"Maybe." Tatsuha eyed him. "Why? Are you going to tell Seguchi on me so he can ship me back to my dad?"
The thought had crossed Suguru's mind, but he shook his head anyway. "Why did you run away?"
"Because my dad's a dictator," Tatsuha complained.
"Really?"
Tatsuha shrugged. "Sort of." He crossed his legs under him to sit in the lotus position. "Nah. My brother's sick. Eiri, you remember? You saw him at the wedding last year."
Suguru had actually seen Eiri-san several times since the wedding; the tall, nineteen-year-old blond was a friend of Tohma's and had recently moved to Tokyo. Tohma and Mika had put him up in the house for a few weeks while he searched for an apartment. He hadn't looked at all sick when Suguru had last seen him. "What does he have?"
"Eh?" Tatsuha frowned. "Oh. Nothing. When I say he's sick, what I mean is he's crazy. Which I guess isn't nothing, really, but... yeah."
"Oh." Suguru picked at a loose thread on the couch. What more was there to say? "So he's the reason why you ran away?"
Tatsuha shrugged. "I guess. Part of it." He ran a hand through his hair. "My brother is one of my best friends. Or, at least, he used to be before he started being a jerk. But my dad's mad he left and he won't let me talk to him. So I came here."
"What about your mother?" Suguru asked. "Does she know you're here?"
Tatsuha answered him only by snorting. Suguru was slightly taken aback. What was that supposed to mean? Was Tatsuha dismissing the question because his mother knew what was going on or because she didn't? Either way, did it matter? Suguru couldn't be sure, but he found himself less bothered by Tatsuha as he had been before. Tatsuha seemed to be less rude and obnoxious and self-absorbed and...
Tatsuha jerked his head and hit it against the vending machine pressed against his back. Suguru jumped upright again, startled.
"I, uh... I think I left my change in my jacket," Suguru said, remembering the question that had first started their conversation. "Downstairs."
Tatsuha shrugged. "S'okay. I'm about ready to get out of here anyway."
"But Tohma told us to stay here and wait until he --" Suguru cut himself off even as Tatsuha lifted a questioning eyebrow in his direction. Tatsuha didn't care what Tohma had told them to do. Why would he? For that matter, why should Suguru?
Tatsuha scrambled to his feet, a mess of limbs, and grinned. "I'm going. Want to come?"
"Sure," Suguru answered quickly, surprising even himself.
Tatsuha's grin widened. "Cool. Maybe you aren't so bad after all."
"Yeah." Suguru stood. "Where are we going? To see your brother?"
"Nah. Not yet. I don't know where in Tokyo he lives -- that's why I was in Seguchi's office." Tatsuha went up to the window and squinted at the ground below.
"So where are we going to go?" Suguru squinted, too, as he tried to figure out what Tatsuha was looking for.
Tatsuha spotted something and gestured toward it. "You in the mood for cheap pizza?"
---
The two teenagers did eventually get their pizza and Tatsuha eventually found his brother's apartment, but not before Tohma intercepted them in the hallway, chased them away from the doors, and scolded them for trying to go out unattended. Getting caught on their way to an adventure didn't bother the boys in the least; the prospect and the chase had done enough, and they declared an unspoken truce. The two chattered in confiding whispers over their pizza (just plain cheese, since Tatsuha had recently become a vegetarian in protest of his father and Suguru simply wasn't fond of vegetables) while Tohma tried to eavesdrop.
Tatsuha was put on a train back to Kyoto the next day, having spent the night with his brother, who praised him for taking such an initiative against their father, and the morning with his sister, who lectured at him for having been so irresponsible and running away from home. Tatsuha took each of the reactions in stride, passing Suguru (who had hung around with Tohma when Tatsuha had been dropped off at Eiri's and was among the first to answer the door when Tatsuha reappeared the next morning) a few grins when he thought he could get away with it. Tatsuha was obviously quite pleased with himself and Suguru had the feeling this was simply the beginning of his new friend's depravity.
Two years passed and, as the two teenagers kept in touch with short visits, speedy phone calls, and the occasional email, Suguru discovered he was right.
to be continued
On to Part Two!
mortenavida a very long time ago that I would write a Gravitation fic for her starring Suguru and Tatsuha, and, at long last, I have. Well, sort of. It got a little out of hand, and it's not going to be a one-shot like I thought it would be. Anyway, this is the first chapter.Summary: Tohma gets married. Suguru and Tatsuha bump into each other -- several times over.
It all began with a spilt drink.
Fujisaki Suguru was thirteen, shy, and frantically wishing he was anywhere but at his cousin Tohma's wedding. He had heard the Arctic was nice this time of year and so was the moon and he would gladly have been in either of those places, but not here, all alone and standing awkwardly in a reception hall while he tried to drink his coca-cola. He didn't know anyone here but his cousin, who was far to busy with his new wife and all of their guests to mind him. Suguru's parents had been called away at the last minute and had decided he would be fine all alone. They had been confident in Suguru's ability to handle the situation -- he was thirteen, after all, and very mature for his age. He would make friends easily and would be able to handle everything without a problem.
Their confidence couldn't possibly have been more misplaced. Suguru, despite his best inclinations, was a loner. While other kids his age went out with friends or played sports, Suguru kept his nose buried in books and scores of music. Despite being shy, Suguru was very attached to Tohma, a blond, twenty-something, and reasonably wealthy charmer. Tohma was a professional musician -- a keyboardist -- and Suguru followed in his footsteps every possible waking moment. He admired the man for his power and his connections and -- most of all -- his talent. That was the only reason he was at the wedding. Really.
Well, and because Suguru had wanted to see the woman who had stolen his cousin's love and attention away from him. He was heartbroken to discover that she was just as beautiful, talented, and charming as her new husband. Her darker hair and eyes complimented his lighter features and she could banter with him just as well as any of Tohma's friends or business associates. They were a perfect match.
Leaning against the wall for a moment to let a stream of people past, Suguru tilted his head forward to let his hair (which was dark, he mourned, and nothing like Tohma's blond locks or the carefully colored tea-hair the new wife sported) shadow his face as he watched the pair. He watched the new wife smile and graciously extend her hand to an elderly gentleman who had obviously had too much to drink. He watched them both laugh at something -- a joke? -- one of their guests had told them. He watched Tohma hold his new wife close to him. He watched all of this and hated them for being happy.
He loved Seguchi Tohma with everything his thirteen-year-old heart could muster. It wasn't anything but a love shared between family, between cousins or perhaps brothers, but it was a fierce love and he was furious that this woman -- Tohma's new wife -- was keeping Tohma from reciprocating it as he was supposed to do. Suguru knew, somewhere in his mind, that he was being unreasonable, but he couldn't help it. He both loved and hated with the unbridled passion of the young. (He'd read that phrase in a book, although he couldn't remember what sort of book he had been reading or why.) And right now, he was busy hating everyone in the new wife's entire family.
Suguru watched the couple for a moment longer and then scooted away from the wall, figuring he could hide out in the restroom until this wretched affair was over, but was stopped suddenly as someone bumped into him from behind. Suguru stumbled and his mostly-full glass of cola spilled everywhere -- but mostly on the boy who had crashed into him.
The apology reflex kicked in automatically.
"I'm sorry," Suguru said quickly. "I'll clean it up, don't worry!"
The crasher only laughed and shook his head. His dark eyes gleamed with obvious delight, which was a rather frightening effect, seeing as how he was well over a head taller than Suguru (who tried to pretend he wasn't suddenly grateful for the crowd of people. They could act like witnesses in a pinch, he supposed). The crasher needed a haircut; his hair -- darker than even Suguru's -- hung into his face.
"Don't worry about it," he said. His voice was jaunting and lilted a bit. "It was my fault, I guess. I ran into you, didn't I?"
"Um," Suguru answered brilliantly while his mind tried to supply a better answer. He replayed the past minute in his head and, in lieu of actually answering the question, hemmed and hawed for a few more moments.
"I did," the crasher decided in a voice that clearly said he wasn't interested in an argument. He sounded young, Suguru decided, but looked older. Fifteen, maybe?
"So I'm the sorry one!" the crasher continued with a grin that didn't seem at all apologetic. "C'mon, I'll get you a refill."
Suguru backpedaled so that his vocal chords could finally catch up to his brain.
"But your clothes..."
"I've got more," the crasher said dismissively. He apparently did not think walking around in cola-splashed clothing would be at all uncomfortable. "Anyway, I'm bored out of my skull. Want to go hide in a closet and see if anyone misses us?"
Suguru was taken slightly aback. "Of course I don't!" he cried indignantly. (No one would notice anyway, he added silently.)
The crasher shrugged. "Whatever. It was just an idea." He grabbed Suguru's wrist, the one that was attached to the hand still holding the recently emptied plastic cup, and started to pull him back toward the bar for a new drink. "So what do you want to do?"
"What?" Suguru made a miserable attempt at hiding his surprise. He didn't even know this guy, but the crasher was acting as though they were friendly. Perhaps, Suguru mused, the crasher was an idiot. It would explain something, at least.
"I asked what you wanted to do," the crasher said. His voice was patient. Weary, as though he had explained this twenty times already, but patient. "You're seriously the only other person here who even looks like they might be younger than twenty, I can't find Sakuma-san anywhere even though I was promised he'd be here, and I'm sick of adults. I've gotta deal with them all day as it is, you see. So unless you have a better idea, I'm hijacking you."
Suguru's voice failed him again and he worked his jaw aimlessly for a moment. The crasher looked at him expectantly and half-wondrously. He was probably trying to figure out if Suguru was half-goldfish.
"Uh," Suguru choked out at last. "Okay."
That was enough for the crasher. "Cool." The crasher changed course and headed toward the huge double doors that marked the exit, dragging Suguru along behind him. He talked as he went.
"So how old are you? I'm thirteen and you look about my age, but I look old for my age is what my brother says so maybe you look young for your age or something?" He didn't wait for an answer. "It feels weird being in a church," he said. "I live in a temple, you know. My dad's real pissed that the wedding was in a church -- that's why my brother gave Mika away. He thought it was funny. I guess it is. I've never been to a wedding before, 'specially not one at a church, so I don't really know, but Eiri -- that's my brother -- says this one was really fucked up. He's fucked up, if you wanna know the truth, so I wouldn't take his word for anything if I were you. He's not all bad, though. I guess."
As the crasher spoke, names slowly registered in Suguru's awe-struck mind. He pulled back on his wrist and the crasher's arm jerked back with the movement. The crasher dropped the wrist and half-turned around to see Suguru. He was walking in a side-step now, like a crab. Suguru's steps slowed and halted. When he noticed this, the crasher stopped, too.
"What is it?"
"You're the bride's brother?" Suguru asked.
The crasher hit himself on the forehead with the palm of one hand. "Oh, duh. Sorry." He gave a short, almost mocking bow. "I'm Uesugi Tatsuha. And to answer your question, yeah, I'm one of 'em." He grinned as he stood up a little bit straighter. "And you are?"
"Fujisaki Suguru," the boy answered carefully.
Tatsuha's smile faltered for just a moment. "Oh. You're Tohma's cousin."
The new washed-out quality of the smile did not go unnoticed by Suguru. "What's wrong with that?" he asked bitingly.
"The genes, I guess," Tatsuha answered. He didn't even bother to keep up appearances anymore. The smile disappeared and Tatsuha crossed his arms over his chest. "Seguchi Tohma is an ass."
Suguru rushed to his cousin's defense. "He is not!"
"He is," Tatsuha countered smoothly. "Which I guess means you are, too, by the simple law of association."
An outrage far greater than anything Suguru had ever before felt in all his thirteen years filled him from tip to toe. "I am not!" he screeched.
Tatsuha leaned in a little closer to Suguru and sniffed. "I can practically smell the assity radiating off you now," he said. His voice was tainted with mocking wonder. "Wow. I can't believe I didn't sense it before."
"How dare you!" Suguru cried, drawing back from Tatsuha. There was something very, very wrong with this boy. Not all of the lights were on upstairs or his gears were rusty or... or something, but this was not how normal people behaved. Suguru didn't claim to know much, but he at least knew that!
Tatsuha stuck out his tongue in a silent taunt. Hardly to Suguru's surprise, he didn't let the silence stand and he backed the insult with words. "You sound like you're just as prissy as your cousin."
Suguru started to respond, but Tatsuha turned on his heel and started to walk in the same direction in which he had been tugging Suguru. As he pushed open the double doors, Suguru quickly followed, intent on finishing the argument the other boy had instigated.
"We aren't finished!" Suguru protested. He blinked to get his eyes used to the sunlight and then glared at Tatsuha, who returned the look with one of his own.
"I'm bored with you," Tatsuha said dismissively. "No one in the Seguchi family is any fun at all."
Suguru suddenly wished he knew more about Tatsuha's family so that he could return the insult appropriately. He sputtered instead. "That's a terrible assumption!"
"So?"
When people questioned him later on why he had attacked Tatsuha like he did, Suguru wasn't sure how to answer them. Perhaps he had done it because of Tatsuha's cocky tone of voice or the insults he threw upon Suguru's extended family. Perhaps Suguru had simply kept his irritation and fury bottled up for far too long and Tatsuha had unleashed it at last. Perhaps Suguru simply lost his mind. Whatever the reason, Suguru lunged and he aimed for Tatsuha's face. The other teenager fought back admirably and, when people finally noticed them and rushed forward to pull them apart, it wasn't at all clear as to who suffered through the most damage. Tatsuha emerged with a bloody nose and a split lip; Suguru came away from the battle with a black eye and a few blossoming bruises on his arms and shoulders. His jaw was sore for days afterward.
Nonetheless, Suguru was smugly certain that it was worth it.
---
Suguru and Tatsuha didn't meet again for a full year after Tohma and Mika were married and, after a while, the memory of Tatsuha's audacity and attitude began to fade from Suguru's mind. His parents continued to flit from place to place, so Suguru spent the year moving back and forth between his parent's home and his cousin's estate. Mika -- Tohma's bride -- slowly ingratiated herself to Suguru until the teenager, now fourteen, decided she was tolerable and began to view her as a friend.
While Suguru stayed with his cousin, he often spent time in NG Studio, where Tohma worked. Nittle Grasper, the band for which Tohma had played keyboards, had broken up shortly after Tohma's marriage (when the lead singer, Sakuma Ryuichi, and his new manager went overseas to make a name for the singer as a single artist), and Tohma had made short time of using his money and connections to secure himself a lofty position in the company. It wasn't long after that before Tohma became president of the studio, renamed it NG after the band to which he had already devoted so much of his life, and made the company the cornerstone of the music industry. Musicians and bands flocked from all around the country to collect outside of NG, begging for sponsors, producers, or the chance to hit it big, and NG Studio graciously opened its doors to the truly talented and those with significant potential. Tohma spent the time not taken up by meetings and paperwork with the bands in the studios or in the concert halls or in rehearsal. He doubled as a scout and an advisor as well as filling his role as the boss, and Suguru admired him all the more for being able to pull off such a juggling act.
Tohma had noticed Suguru's interest in music years before and, once he became such an authority in the field, promised to find his younger cousin a position in NG as soon as Suguru developed his skill enough to be useful. It was a day Suguru lived for, so he continued to practice his music day in and day out. He used his time visiting NG to receive tips from those who had already made their way in the industry and, of course, practicing to become the maestro his cousin wished him to be.
Suguru sat in his cousin's office, play acting a Chopin against Tohma's desk, when Uesugi Tatsuha once again entered his life. He heard the door open behind him but paid it no attention as he was sure it was simply Tohma returning early from his meeting, and went on through a more difficult trill passage. He hummed softly, acting as his own accompaniment.
"Why are you fucking with the desk like that?"
The words didn't register at first and Suguru's fingers continued with a momentum of their own. Then, suddenly, they tripped and stumbled. Suguru's back went rigid and he slammed his palms against the desktop. He recognized that voice.
Tatsuha.
"What are you doing here?" Suguru asked snappishly.
Just as he did the year before, Tatsuha ignored Suguru's tone of voice. "Hanging out. What are you doing with the desk?"
"I was practicing," Suguru answered, already on the defense.
Tatsuha walked around the desk and plopped himself down into the black leather chair behind it -- Tohma's chair. Suguru half-expected the other teenager to prop his feet up on the desk and make the desk his own. He was almost surprised when Tatsuha simply leaned back in the chair, both feet planted firmly on the floor.
"Practicing what?" Tatsuha asked. He tilted his head to the side and cocked one dark eyebrow. "Anything good?"
Suguru huffed. "Chopin," he answered. He expected Tatsuha to give him a confused look at the composer's name or perhaps simply drop the subject altogether, but Tatsuha did neither.
"Oh," he said. "Piano." Tatsuha cracked his knuckles. "Shouldn't you, y'know, use a piano to practice on the piano?"
Suguru scowled. "Why are you here?"
"What?" Tatsuha asked, his voice dripping with feigned innocence. "I'm not allowed to visit my only sister's husband?"
"You don't even like him!" Suguru cried.
A grin flashed over Tatsuha's face but quickly passed, hidden by the feigned sincerity. "I'm wounded. You don't even know me very well and you're accusing me of a whole bunch of unspeakable things."
"You should get out of his chair."
Tatsuha shook his head. "I don't want to."
How was it, Suguru wondered, that Tatsuha could simply toe the line and bring Suguru to the far edge of fury just by speaking? Suguru leapt to his feet. His own chair fell back.
"Get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha ignored him and pulled a drawer open. He briefly examined the contents as Suguru stood before him, scowling and gaping by turn. "Did you know he organizes his pencils in the desk by length?" Tatsuha asked. "Tallest to shortest. Seriously."
"Get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha acknowledged the question this time. "Why?" he asked. His eyes gleamed just as they had on the day of Tohma's wedding, when he had first crashed into Suguru and instigated his juvenile attempt at kidnapping. "Are you afraid he'll come back in here and get mad at me if I'm sitting here?"
"No!" Suguru protested. "Just get out of his chair!"
Tatsuha had no right to sit in that chair. It was Tohma's chair, and that chair was a symbol of Tohma's achievements and power (or so Suguru had decided to believe months earlier, when Tohma had first bought the chair for his office). The chair was everything Suguru aspired to reach and everything he wanted to be. And now... and now that scum of humanity was despoiling that mark of high honor, that symbol, that goal, and it made Suguru's blood rush to his head.
"No," Tatsuha said at last. He leaned back a little more in the chair and put his feet on top of the desk.
It was, in a way, a repeat performance of what had happened at Tohma's wedding. The air exploded in what Suguru was sure must be an audible snap as Suguru nearly flew around the desk. He grabbed at Tatsuha's hair and shoulders and attempted to physically remove Tatsuha (who was much taller and heavier) out of the chair. Tatsuha warded him away with surprised jerks and slaps, but Suguru persisted. The feet Tatsuha had propped up on the desktop swept over the surface and a few papers and a container of pens fell off the desk. The papers drifted to the floor. The pens crashed there in little plastic outbursts. One of the pen caps came away and skittered under the desk. Suguru noticed all these things even as the chair Tatsuha had invaded tilted backward until both boys were caught off-balance and crashed downward. Both Tatsuha and the chair fell on Suguru and splayed across his legs. Suguru hit his head against a treacherous potted tree Tohma kept behind the desk. The plant gave Suguru a silent apology for the injury by toppling itself and landing none too gently against Tatsuha's shoulder.
The two teenagers, the chair, and the plant were still trying to recover from their fall when Tohma walked in, accompanied by a few people Suguru would later recognize as the business heads of a rival music company.
---
Once Tohma had recovered from the initial surprise of seeing his brother-in-law and his cousin tangled on the floor, he exiled Tatsuha and Suguru to the green room on the second floor. This was the less popular of the two green rooms, thanks to the air-conditioning and heating unit that blasted either one extreme or the other at random intervals and the vending machines which refused to work properly no matter how many coins were fed into them.
It had already been half an hour since their banishment. Suguru had, upon entering the room, taken a seat on the couch by the window and he had yet to move from that spot. Tatsuha had chosen a seat on the opposite side of the room, by the door, but hadn't stayed there for long; he flitted about the room almost anxiously, although he kept his distance from Suguru.
Suguru watched Tatsuha move around the room for a while but had long since shifted his gaze out the window. Since they were two stories up, there wasn't a great deal to see. A few trees. The beginning peaks of buildings. Suguru couldn't see any people or cars unless he sat up a little straighter and peered over the window ledge. It was almost...
"Do you have any change?"
"What?" Suguru quickly turned his head back toward Tatsuha, who was staring intently at the innards of one of the vending machines.
"Do you have any change? I'm a little short."
"Uh..."
Tatsuha looked over his shoulder at Suguru. "Is that a 'yes but I don't want to give it to you' or a 'no, you freak, and quit asking me questions' kind of answer?"
Suguru frowned. "It's an 'I'm not really sure' kind of answer." He twisted a little bit and began to root through his pockets. "Why?"
"I'm hungry. I forgot to eat something this morning before I left." Tatsuha turned to face Suguru and leaned back against the vending machine. He slid down; his knees nearly touched his ears before his rear hit the floor and Tatsuha stretched his legs out.
This morning? Suguru glanced at the clock hanging over the door. "But it's almost three o'clock!"
Tatsuha just shrugged. "I guess."
Suguru looked at the clock again and estimated the amount of time since Tatsuha's last meal. "Why didn't you eat?"
"Because I didn't think of it."
Suguru paused his search for coins. How could someone forget to eat? It wasn't something a person really had to think about, after all, and Suguru was pretty sure most people set up an actual schedule -- three meals a day, morning noon and night. He considered Tatsuha curiously. Maybe he had some sort of amnesia. Or maybe (Suguru guessed) he was just stupid.
The question, if not the speculations, must have been clear on Suguru's face, because Tatsuha sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I left Kyoto really early this morning and caught the train and came here," he admitted. "I didn't eat anything because it would have woken up my dad -- he sleeps like... I don't know. He's a light sleeper."
Suguru's search for spare change was quickly forgotten. He gaped at the other teenager. "You ran away from home?"
"Maybe." Tatsuha eyed him. "Why? Are you going to tell Seguchi on me so he can ship me back to my dad?"
The thought had crossed Suguru's mind, but he shook his head anyway. "Why did you run away?"
"Because my dad's a dictator," Tatsuha complained.
"Really?"
Tatsuha shrugged. "Sort of." He crossed his legs under him to sit in the lotus position. "Nah. My brother's sick. Eiri, you remember? You saw him at the wedding last year."
Suguru had actually seen Eiri-san several times since the wedding; the tall, nineteen-year-old blond was a friend of Tohma's and had recently moved to Tokyo. Tohma and Mika had put him up in the house for a few weeks while he searched for an apartment. He hadn't looked at all sick when Suguru had last seen him. "What does he have?"
"Eh?" Tatsuha frowned. "Oh. Nothing. When I say he's sick, what I mean is he's crazy. Which I guess isn't nothing, really, but... yeah."
"Oh." Suguru picked at a loose thread on the couch. What more was there to say? "So he's the reason why you ran away?"
Tatsuha shrugged. "I guess. Part of it." He ran a hand through his hair. "My brother is one of my best friends. Or, at least, he used to be before he started being a jerk. But my dad's mad he left and he won't let me talk to him. So I came here."
"What about your mother?" Suguru asked. "Does she know you're here?"
Tatsuha answered him only by snorting. Suguru was slightly taken aback. What was that supposed to mean? Was Tatsuha dismissing the question because his mother knew what was going on or because she didn't? Either way, did it matter? Suguru couldn't be sure, but he found himself less bothered by Tatsuha as he had been before. Tatsuha seemed to be less rude and obnoxious and self-absorbed and...
Tatsuha jerked his head and hit it against the vending machine pressed against his back. Suguru jumped upright again, startled.
"I, uh... I think I left my change in my jacket," Suguru said, remembering the question that had first started their conversation. "Downstairs."
Tatsuha shrugged. "S'okay. I'm about ready to get out of here anyway."
"But Tohma told us to stay here and wait until he --" Suguru cut himself off even as Tatsuha lifted a questioning eyebrow in his direction. Tatsuha didn't care what Tohma had told them to do. Why would he? For that matter, why should Suguru?
Tatsuha scrambled to his feet, a mess of limbs, and grinned. "I'm going. Want to come?"
"Sure," Suguru answered quickly, surprising even himself.
Tatsuha's grin widened. "Cool. Maybe you aren't so bad after all."
"Yeah." Suguru stood. "Where are we going? To see your brother?"
"Nah. Not yet. I don't know where in Tokyo he lives -- that's why I was in Seguchi's office." Tatsuha went up to the window and squinted at the ground below.
"So where are we going to go?" Suguru squinted, too, as he tried to figure out what Tatsuha was looking for.
Tatsuha spotted something and gestured toward it. "You in the mood for cheap pizza?"
---
The two teenagers did eventually get their pizza and Tatsuha eventually found his brother's apartment, but not before Tohma intercepted them in the hallway, chased them away from the doors, and scolded them for trying to go out unattended. Getting caught on their way to an adventure didn't bother the boys in the least; the prospect and the chase had done enough, and they declared an unspoken truce. The two chattered in confiding whispers over their pizza (just plain cheese, since Tatsuha had recently become a vegetarian in protest of his father and Suguru simply wasn't fond of vegetables) while Tohma tried to eavesdrop.
Tatsuha was put on a train back to Kyoto the next day, having spent the night with his brother, who praised him for taking such an initiative against their father, and the morning with his sister, who lectured at him for having been so irresponsible and running away from home. Tatsuha took each of the reactions in stride, passing Suguru (who had hung around with Tohma when Tatsuha had been dropped off at Eiri's and was among the first to answer the door when Tatsuha reappeared the next morning) a few grins when he thought he could get away with it. Tatsuha was obviously quite pleased with himself and Suguru had the feeling this was simply the beginning of his new friend's depravity.
Two years passed and, as the two teenagers kept in touch with short visits, speedy phone calls, and the occasional email, Suguru discovered he was right.
On to Part Two!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 03:22 am (UTC)...
you stopped on what I would consider a cliffhanger.
...
I will pout at you. Pout until part II is out. Maybe even pout until it is completed or you have molested me enough. I haven't decided yet.
...
I still love you, though.^^
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 12:24 pm (UTC)Heee. ^^ I've spent so much time writing this so far that I decided to be lazy for my Advanced Fiction class. I changed names and turned this chapter in (up to the "cheap pizza" line) to be workshopped. I probably should have waited to post it until after workshopping, but whatever. ^^
I'm glad you like it so far. ^____^
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 01:35 pm (UTC)And the thought of you turning in something that was originally Suguru and Tatsuha amuses me to no end. ^____^ Don't know why, but it just does.^^
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 04:25 pm (UTC):P I had to turn something in. ^_~
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 05:35 am (UTC)Want more! *wiggles brows*
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 12:25 pm (UTC)There will be more. Eventually. I promise.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-13 03:47 am (UTC)AND YAY ....more!
no subject
Date: 2005-09-13 03:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 12:26 pm (UTC)Heee. ^^ The half-goldfish line was also necessary. I swear. *grin* I couldn't help it. People who gape remind me of goldfish, so...
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 05:23 pm (UTC)chance?
...Tatsuha had been dropped off at Eddie's...
Her darker hair and eyes complimented his lighter features and she could banter with him just as well as any of Christopher's friends...
The end line...
Suguru discovered he was right-- about what? Tatsuha's future depravity? Or Suguru discovered Tatsuha was right-- about something? Since this line is in a new paragraph, I'm not sure if you meant to refer to the previous paragraph, or you're hearkening back to something earlier in the story. Please forgive me if I'm being dense.
Overall, I am interested in the story and I hope to see more of it.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-12 06:19 pm (UTC)Thanks for the interest. ^^ If all goes well, I'll eventually get around to finishing the second part. Hope it's still interesting then. ^^