Picspam, a reminder, and a terrible AU ahead!

[ciircee]

Reminder for those of us involved in things over at je_fqfest. We've got, like, a month. *weeps* IMMA WRITE PORN LIKE A MO-FO, OKAY? I will totally finish BEFORE the deadline!

Picspam!

First up: Massive couch failure.

Nobody fails at couches quite like Ohmiya.

Next: Nino hugs a girl boy.

WHY DO I LOVE THIS SO MUCH THAT I TOOK FOUR CAPS OF A SIX-SECOND HUG? Why do I not care what the answer to that question might be?

Sakurai Sho has grabby hands.


I APPROVE, SHO!

They approve of Sho, too!

I just KNOW this ended with a shirtless, pantsless Sho. ;___; The magazines don't love us more than they fear Johnny.

But speaking of love!


Jun loves Aiba!

And he's very sublte about this!

Very!

T-this series maybe got Aki in trouble at work. From now on I will warn her of pictures in the comments.

And I won't say 'butt grab'.

Or call this a 'butt grope'.

I won't indicate that Ohno is doing a post-grope butt check.

And I will refrain from posting pictures of Jun's post-grope pants situation.

PS. Dear to Oh-chan:

You are a handy arm-rest. Love, Me.

Remind me to talk about how Aiba touched Ohno's knee on MS, okay?


That aside...um. Ahahahaha. Apparently when I thought I posted this to sei_shoku's Bi-weekly Theme Work: AU post I...totally didn't. Either I was sicker than I thought or I just failed to notice the fact that LJ was being very robust at the time.

THIS is the one that I was going to trash because when I am sick I write emotive, angsty crap. And then I thought 'ah, I can just bury it over at the end of the post!' except for the fact that the theme is over and it's twelve pages in Word. That would be a LOT of comments to leave. orz

So, here, have some untitledTitle-by-the-lovely-ysabet-who-totally-DOES-need-to-get-into-this-fandom OT3 crap stuff that everybody else seems to like.


Architecture

The worst summer of Sho's life starts out with Nino playing the guitar.

---

"Don't you have to work?" Sho bitches as he reaches the door to the apartment he shares with Nino and Ohno. It's a cheap place with one bedroom and paper-thin walls and he can hear the guitar all the way down the hall.

"Not tonight; tonight I am all yours," Nino calls back.

Satoshi is stepping into Nino's heavy construction-job boots at the door and Sho nearly knocks him over coming in. "I asked him to stay home," he says quietly. Ohno Satoshi does most everything quietly; he's a calm, peaceful person. Sho often thinks that without Ohno he and Nino probably would have been kicked out of the apartment by now. Well, kicked out for something other than not being able to make the rent.

Making the rent really does require all three of them to go to all of their jobs, especially if they want to eat, too. It's a cheap place but only in comparison to other places in the city; mostly it's just crappy and run-down. "Satoshi," Sho says and because they've been together so long Ohno knows what he's getting at with just that word.

He leans close, keeping his voice low. "He's running a fever. A really high one."

"Really?" Sho asks, startled. Sho's known Nino since high school and while Nino might be slender and a little delicate he's never really had issues with illness before. Two fevers in two weeks is a bit strange. "Again?"

Ohno bites his lip. "Still, I think." He blinks and then squats down to tie the laces of the boots. "I'm taking his job tonight."

"You already had two jobs today," Sho says. Sho is in charge of their schedules; they've got a whiteboard where Sho outlines the whole week in chores and jobs and other things. He knows for a fact that Ohno's been awake and working since six and that Nino's night job, the construction, will keep him up for another eight. If everything goes well, Ohno might get two hours of sleep before his next job beckons. "Satoshi."

"It's the only way he'd stay home," Ohno sighs, standing up again. "It's only a half-shift, since he called in late. Just until they can find somebody else. We looked over the books and we can still make it all right with the loss of hours."

Sho doesn't really know where they'd be without Ohno. He kisses him softly. "I'll pack you a lunch," he says quietly.

"We don't need you to poison him," Nino says. Now that Sho is listening, he can hear the raspy, tired quality of it that is just under the cheerfully sardonic tone. "I made him something," he says, holding a bento box out to him.

Taking it carefully, Ohno holds it between himself and Nino as he kisses Nino's forehead gently and then his eyes. "Go to sleep," he says softly. "Tomorrow you have the combini and the coffee shop."

"Mm," Nino hums. "I know. Easy day."

Sho notices how slowly Nino is blinking and can't help setting his lips to Nino's forehead once Ohno is out of the way. It's not so much a kiss as it is a simple method to gauge Nino's fever but when he feels the scorching heat it turns into a kiss meant to soothe. "Easy day tomorrow," Sho repeats.

"You smell like kid vomit," Nino tells him.

"Well, that's because one of the kids vomited on me," Sho tells him, rubbing his hand over Nino's shoulder.

Nino shrugs out from under his hand. "Since when did you wear your news suit to the daycare?"

"I'd already changed when I picked her up. She was crying," he defends himself as Nino pulls a face. "Satoshi, could you have left a crying child?"

Satoshi grins at him. "Yeah, but I'm not Sho-chan," he says and ducks out the door before Sho can throw his briefcase at him.

Sho sets the briefcase down and nudges it so that it's pressed against the wall, out of the way, and tugs off his tie. "Come shower with me?" he suggest to Nino. When Nino leers at him he rolls his eyes, mildly reassured. "It's supposed to get humid and that'll make it feel even hotter. We can try and head it off at the pass."

Nino wraps his arms around himself and wanders toward the kitchen. "I'm not that bothered by it yet," he says. "I'll reheat your dinner while you shower. Oh-chan made chahan."

As he showers, Sho thinks about the kids at the daycare, the work in the news room, how long he can let Satoshi sleep in the morning, and dinner (which he can already smell). It's only when he gets out that he thinks of Nino's fever again. Nino is already tucked into their bed (which is more like a nest of pillows and futons) and asleep. Nino is their little night owl, their morning sleeper. The only times Sho has known Nino to get in bed before midnight is when he's definitely not intending to sleep.

He eats quickly, rinses his dishes before he stacks them beside the sink, repacks his briefcase with a clean suit and snaps off the light before he slides in behind Nino, spooning himself around him. Nino burns in his arms, rolls over to snuggle his face against his chest. Sho shifts until he's on his back, Nino in his arms and half over him. There's a bit of streetlight and moonlight slanting in through the gap in the curtains and it's stretched across Nino's sleeping face in shades of silver and orange. Sho brushes his hair away from his forehead, already shining with sweat, and holds Nino closer. Nino is the cause and reason for Sho living this life; he can never hold him close enough.

---

He meets Nino his second year of high school. They're not in the same school—Sho goes to Keio schools and Nino attends one of the best 'cheap' schools in the area. They meet on the subway, crammed into a corner practically on top of each other. One of the boys from Nino's school is taunting him. Nino is insulting the boy but it's so quick and clever that the other boy doesn't seem to even realize.

Sho grins at Nino. "You want to come over to my place and hang out?" he asks without thinking.

Nino looks startled but Sho can't tell if it's because of the offer or because of his answer, a sweet and easy "Sure!"

Everything after that is just as sweet and easy, just as quick and clever and unthinking. Nino sleeps over at his place. He sleeps over at Nino's. They curl up together in the same futon and talk and talk and talk, touching all along their bodies.

Sho's mother makes pointed comments about spending good money on his bed and the guest bed. Sho laughs and agrees. "But Nino's a cuddle-bug," he adds with another laugh.

Looking back, he wonders how much he knew then: what his mother suspected, what she was trying to say, what he knew of himself, what he understood subconsciously. One night, under the covers of the guest futon, he kisses Nino, touches him, makes him come. The door opens while Nino is returning the favor and Sho feels him go still in shock. Sho keeps moving, keeps his mouth against Nino's and the door closes again.

He talks to his parents only on his birthday and they tell him that if he'll forget all of this, if he will tell his sister and brother that it was a horrible mistake, they will take him back. In texts, in e-mails, in brief and furtive meetings, Sho tells his brother and his sister that he loves them, misses them, that Nino misses them, that Ohno wants to meet them someday. He tells them that he's proud of them, that he himself is working hard, that he is happy, is glad that they're happy too even if they can't all be together.

Sho tells his parents that he will talk to them next year.

---

When Sho wakes up, when he finally hears the apartment door open again, the moonlight has gone and the streetlights are faintl; the blue of the sky is beginning to overpower the black. He disentangles himself from Nino and gets out of bed with minimal stirring of the blankets.

Ohno is taking his shoes off, every movement heavy and slow with fatigue.

"Satoshi, you worked the whole shift," Sho accuses softly.

"Is Nino any better?" Ohno asks, ignoring him.

Sho looks back to where he came from. He can still feel the unnatural warmth. "No," he answers, still in a whisper.

Ohno finally gets the boots off and stands, leaning against the wall. "Then if he needs to stay home again he can without worrying."

"Goodness! Heaven forbid he might have to get his game manuals from the library!" Sho mutters, slapping one hand dramatically (and quietly) to his forehead.

He gets a smile for it. "Sho-chan won't have to worry either," Ohno says softly.

Sho almost hates the way that Ohno can make him melt as easily as Nino does. He reaches out and curves his hand over the back of Ohno's neck, runs it up to cup the back of his head as he pulls him close. "Get some sleep. I'll set the alarm for you. Just don't dawdle, all right?"

"Mm," Ohno nods. His forehead is still pressed to Sho's as he fights a yawn and says, "Shower."

"Don't bother," Sho says, kissing Ohno's cheek. "Nino didn't and he's been sweating all night. He can cast no stones."

"Nino will hurl insults until he can find a rock," Ohno mumbles sleepily, his eyes already drifting closed.

Sho laughs a little and leads Ohno to the bed, helping him strip down to just his undershorts and get under the blankets. He watches as Ohno and Nino find each other even in sleep, coming together naturally. He kisses Ohno's shoulder and then Nino's. "I'll take care of breakfast," he promises. Ohno breathes out something that might have been an attempt at sound.

He buys milk buns at the little bakery down the street, getting fresh ones even though the day old ones are cheaper. Nino's sick, Ohno's worked hard, and milk buns are cheap anyway. He leaves them on the table with a note to Ohno to 'seriously, hurry up' and grabs his briefcase, goes to work.

---

Nino stays feverish and unnaturally sleepy and quiet over the next few days. He also goes back to work.

"Look," he sighs when Sho spends part of the morning trying to take his afternoon shift at the café, "it's a fever. I've worked through them before. So have you. And so has Satoshi."

Which is entirely true. It's uncomfortable but necessary and every shift they work instead of taking off is one shift that they CAN afford to take off later, if they need to.

"If I don't go, then what? This isn't like the combini job where you just stand behind the counter and stop twee little girls from stealing pocky. I have to go to this one," Nino goes on. Some of their jobs—Ohno's at the bakery, Nino's at the combini—help keep expenses down and so even if the official job holder is too ill to work, one of them will pick it up. Nino's job at the coffee shop is good for tips and caffeine but it's not chimp-simple like, say, the construction gig or handing out quarters at the arcade (which was Nino's job before Ohno took it because Nino was close to getting fired for playing games at work).

Sometimes Sho thinks about how their lives would be easier if they weren't chasing their dreams. If Ohno didn't do his art, just clerked the art supply shop and didn't have to keep buying supplies to keep creating new pieces to show around, if Nino didn't write music and spend nights at hole-in-the-wall bars and clubs trying to make it heard and getting almost nothing in return, if he himself quit trying to anchor the news outside of the ward they lived in and just settled in as the station weatherman or as a full-time teacher at the preschool, quit buying three newspapers every day and replacing worn out business wear—if they could just do those things, the struggle wouldn't be so bad. Nino wouldn't have to work through an illness that was clearly wearing him thin and ragged.

It could be so much easier if only Sho didn't care more about their dreams than he did his own.

"All right," he sighs. He puts his hands on Nino's shoulders and frowns when Nino wriggles away.

"You're going to mother hen at me and I know it," Nino says, smiling weakly.

"I'm going to do your tie since I'm the only one out of the three of us who can tie a bowtie," Sho tells him. Nino's smile flickers stronger and he lifts his chin obediently. When Sho is done, Nino kisses him. It is one of Sho's very most favorite types of Nino-kisses, the sort where Nino opens up and lets Sho pour everything into him, the sort where Nino drinks it all in, all the feelings Sho has for him. Sho loves the feeling of filling Nino up with all the soft, sweet things he feels for him. He never says it, not even to Ohno, but there are times when Nino seems a little empty, hollow, like he's rattling around inside of himself and Sho wants to crawl inside Nino's skin with him and cushion him against everything. That's what these kisses are meant for, truly.

This doesn't mean that Sho isn't getting inappropriately hard beneath his teaching smock. Each second of each kiss is getting him harder. It's been a while since Nino has been up for anything. He drags his mouth away with a groan. "Go to work. Both of us. I'll see you after I do the news."

"Mm," Nino agrees. "Tie my shoes for me."


Sho's day is busy and long and tiring but he's got a fine undercurrent of excitement, expectation, running through everything and he uses that to push through all the long and tiring moments. He can't wait to get home.

Except when he gets home, Ohno is outside the apartment door. "He's pissed off," Ohno says, jerking a thumb at the door. "He keeps screwing up."

He'd heard the sour notes of a guitar as he'd come up the stairs but he hadn't thought to connect them with home. "Is he—?"

"Don't even think about touching him," Ohno sighs, raking a hand through his hair. "It just makes him even madder. And he won't hear of putting down the guitar, so don't try that, either."

"Shit," Sho sighs.

Ohno gives him a tiny smile. "I know. I'm leaving him to you."

"What? Why? What did I do to you?" Sho demands.

It makes Ohno smile. "I got a call earlier. There's a gallery that's hosting an open exhibit by local artists. I'm bringing a few pieces over to show them. Hopefully they'll be interested enough to host one or two."

"You'll knock their socks off," Sho promises, hugging him briefly. A particularly mangled note from the guitar ends it. "Go get famous. I'll deal with Nino." He waves Ohno down the hall before opening the apartment door and calling, "Nino?"

The guitar makes a harsh sound. "Is he gone?" Nino asks, sounding sullen.

Sho drops his chin to his chest in a moment of resignation and then kicks out of his shoes and heads for the sound of Nino's voice. "Yes, Satoshi left. I don't know wha—" he stops abruptly. Nino is sitting on the floor and the guitar is in his lap but he doesn't look nearly as angry as he sounded. He looks small and scared. "What's wrong?"

Nino sets the guitar aside, talking as he puts it in its case. "I'm not mad because I'm messing up and I'm not messing up because I'm mad." He looks up, his eyes huge and dark and still glassy from his constant fever. He holds out a hand and Sho moves automatically to take it. Nino shies back with a hiss.

"Nino?"

"That's all the higher I can lift it and I can't move my fingers anymore," Nino says calmly, letting Sho take his hand gently, gently, as gently as Sho can manage. "We can't tell Oh-chan."

---

Sho meets Ohno Satoshi in the park and mainly because Nino is obsessed with him. Sho is busy with the summer term at university and Nino has taken to spending the between-jobs times at the park near campus, singing beneath the shade trees. Sho can't always join him but Nino charms people easily and so he's never lacking for company.

It does very little to mitigate the guilt Sho feels at leaving him alone so much, especially since they've just moved out of Nino's mom's apartment and into their own. He's actually relieved when all of Nino's reports of what Sho has missed begin to feature 'Oh-chan' prominently. 'Oh-chan' is an artist and sometimes he does caricatures, Nino tells him. He and the other man set up shop side-by-side and end up getting a bit of a crowd and making a fair amount of pocket change. They go for ramen together and Nino gets treated more often than not since there's an actual charge for the caricatures.

As the summer passes, he does get a little worried. He and Nino sort of fell in to their relationship and they never talked about any of it but Sho can not imagine life without Nino in it somewhere close to him. "Come over and watch me sing," he invites one day and Sho skips class to go. He watches Nino from a distance at first, noting the small crowd that's gathered. The people waiting for caricatures often drop change in Nino's guitar case (Sho can tell it's change by the way Nino smiles up at them, quick and bright; Nino loves the sound of money) . Nino and the blond man beside him chat during the songs when Nino isn't singing and sometimes Nino is shown the drawings before the customers.

He can tell when Nino sees him because there is a special smile that only he gets from Nino. He's a little more surprised by the smile he gets from the other guy when Nino (apparently) points him out. Ohno Satoshi has a sweet, shy smile that twinkles up into a grin that scrunches his nose and crinkles the corners of his eyes. He's got a round face with baby-fat cheeks and Sho sort of wants to squish them.

"Oh-chan," Nino says, sounding like he's laughing and he IS, Sho knows he is because Nino finds it hilarious when Sho stares at cute little kids. "Oh-chan, this is Sho-chan. Sho, this is Ohno Satoshi."

"It's nice to meet you," Sho tells him.

This is the start. After this moment Sho is just as hooked by Satoshi as Nino. He can't always skip class to watch them at the park and so he finds himself inviting Ohno along on the few outings he and Nino manage to take together. Nino takes to inviting Ohno over to their apartment. Sho quits being busy with summer term and becomes busy with the fall term, then spring.

There are still times when Sho wonders if he's going to come home one day to find Nino and Ohno kissing but this little worry is actually rather pointless because it is Sho who kisses Ohno first. Ohno is making chahan and Sho is watching over his shoulder. "Smells good," he says. He absentmindedly kisses his neck, the way he often does with Nino.

For a moment there is absolute stillness. He's frozen with his lips just centimeters away from the warm, sweet skin of Ohno's nape. Ohno is as still as stone, the rice sizzling beneath his un-stirring hands. Nino is silent and watchful at the entrance to the kitchen. Nobody says a word. Sho's heart is racing out of control until Nino moves, joins him at Ohno's side, and kisses the place where Ohno's neck meets his shoulder, shown off by the wide and shapeless collar of his shirt. "That does smell good," Nino says.

The rice is a bit burnt and they tease Ohno about it all through dinner.

Ohno begins to spend even more time with them, some of it spent in cautious kisses, and when he doesn't come, he sends funny texts to Nino's phone. When he comes back, he tells them stories about playing Wii bowling tournaments with his family.

There is a period of several months—long and frightening—where they don't see Ohno at all and the phone remains silent. The rain falls and stops. Tanabata passes and Obon comes. With the Bonodori, Ohno returns to them. He's thinner, quieter, his usual spacey gentleness replaced with a deep sorrow. "Home is gone," he says softly into Sho's shoulder. "They're gone."

"We're here," Nino says, his voice muffled against Ohno's skin. "You're here."

It takes only an hour for Ohno to move in completely that night. Mornings begin with the scent of incense. Sho begins to call home to warn Nino if there are catastrophic accidents that are going to be featured on the news, or if there is a particularly horrible crime to be reported. The very first time Sho gets sick he and Nino take turns holding Ohno through the marble-eyed shakes that wrack him at odd moments and they endure the too-tight embraces that come on the heels of those shakes.

They don't find out what happened to Ohno's family and Ohno never says. He gains weight again, smiles more, and one day smacks Sho on the head for coughing in his face. It matters more than knowing.

---

As much as they want to, they actually can't hide this from Ohno. It takes all night for Sho to find an emergency room that isn't too full that they're forced to turn them away and it's nearly noon by the time they have a diagnosis and a plan of treatment. He has to piggyback Nino from the bust stop to the apartment.

Ohno is sprawled out on the kitchen floor, painting. There are a number of brushes scattered around him but he's switched to using his fingers. Even from across the room, tucking Nino in amongst the blankets, Sho can see that the painting is dark and hollow. "Satoshi," he says quietly as he pushes Nino's hair away from his forehead.

"I called," Ohno tells him, without looking up. "I called three times before Nino answered. He said you were yelling at the nurse to 'find him some fucking aspirin'."

Sho thinks about that moment. He'd yell at that nurse again right now if it'd help. There is a laundry list of things wrong with Nino. Exhaustion. Dehydration. The infection in his arm. The build up of fluid from the infection. The pain in his joints, the fever, the shots he'll have to have, the pills he'll have to take. Things are going to get worse before they get better. Worse, Sho thinks. "He's going to be fine; it's just an infection."

"All right," Ohno says and he finally looks up.

The next thing Sho knows is that he and Ohno are on the floor together, tearing at each other's clothes and kissing furiously. Both of them are supposed to be getting ready for work and one of them should be making lunch while the other lays out Nino's medicine and makes sure there's a glass of water nearby, maybe even something simple for dinner that won't trouble Nino much. Instead they're rolling over Ohno's canvas and paint cups and brushes and clinging to each other.

"I think we broke your painting," Sho says later, breathing heavily, feeling sticky all over and tired and bruised but a little bit better.

"I'll make it in to a sculpture," Ohno promises quietly.

---

Things get worse.

Ohno and Sho take as many of Nino's shifts as they can manage but neither of them can hold down three jobs a day every day. They have to have time to sleep. Two hours a night won't cut it if they can't take a day here or there to catch up.

Nino sleeps all the sleep that they're missing. He is unnaturally pale beneath the unnatural flush of the fever. The antibiotics make him miserable. They're meant to be taken with food but Nino never eats very much and he eats even less when he's sick. Eating makes Nino tired. Sho coaxes soup down him with promises and bribes. Ohno uses silence and an unwavering, pleading stare. What little they get in to him doesn't do much to soften the ravages of the medicine and nearly as often as not the medicine and the food come back up together and they have to repeat the process.

The household is in shambles. Nino did most of the cleaning work. Sho and Ohno tend not to notice the little things and they have the same mess-tolerance level. Normally Nino would have snapped and gone on a cleaning binge the day there were no clean dishes left. And he certainly wouldn't have made it past the first day of no clean clothing. The most housework that Sho does is changing the sheets, airing out one futon at a time so that Nino always has a clean bed to sleep in. Nino sleeps and doesn't notice.

Because when Nino isn't sleeping or having food or a bath forced on him, he's working.

"Give me the needle, Sho," Nino says harshly.

Sho doesn't want to. "Nino, you can miss this shift. They know you're not well," he tries. They need the money to make the rent but it seems so much more important that Nino actually rest. He doesn't want to give Nino the shot that will numb his arm and let Nino function through another shift, using up his strength to get another tip instead of getting well.

Ohno takes the needle from Sho's hand and kisses Nino's bare shoulder. "Kazu," he says quietly as he jabs the needle in. He catches Nino's clenched fist in his hand after he throws the needle across the room and cradles him close. Sho goes to take care of the needle while Ohno pets Nino and strokes him, calming both of them again. He goes to take a shower.

"We can't keep doing this," Sho says wearily as Ohno joins him.

"We can't give up," Ohno replies simply, scrubbing Sho's back for him.

Nino comes in before Sho can do more than smile at Ohno gratefully. He leans into them and shivers in the warm fall of water. "I miss sex," he says.

Sho laughs.

---

They were not so much sex-crazed as they were Nino-starved. Though it's late and they're tired, he and Ohno can't quit touching Nino, looking at the dull shine of Nino's eyes in the darkness as they kiss him, fondle him, moan into his skin and tell him what they miss, what they want, what they need.

Nino only responds in whispery breaths and heavy, slow movements.

His mouth, his skin, everything has a bitter, medicinal taste lurking under it. When he finally comes, when Sho finally manages to make him hard enough to do so, there is an almost metallic taste to it. The rich, earthy flavor of Nino's satisfaction is rancid-sour and Sho ends up spitting it into his discarded t-shirt, nearly gagging as Ohno rubs his back in gentle circles.

When he looks up, he wonders if Nino slept through the whole thing. The dried tear tracks on his cheeks could have meant anything.

They don't do it again. They limit themselves to letting Nino watch as they take each other beside him, kissing him when they can't hold back anymore.

---

Things are bad for so long that Sho forgets what it's like when things are normal, how good things can be.

It's probably why he panics.

"Satoshi! Something's wrong with Nino!" he barely manages to keep his voice down and avoid waking Nino.

Ohno is at his side instantly, his eyes wide and alert. "Sho?" he asks.

Sho presses his wrist to Nino's forehead, moves it to the back of his neck. "He's cold," he says, hearing the way his voice is strangling in his throat. "Satoshi, he's cold." He's already mentally listing what could be causing this: a reaction to all the antibiotics, liver failure from all the tylenol, septic shock…

Apparently, Ohno isn't concerned. Ohno is laughing. "His fever is gone," he says and it takes Sho a minute to understand what he's said and what that means.

When he does, he laughs too, loud and long and relieved. Nino tells them crossly to shut the hell up, glaring at them through clear, sleepy eyes.

---

Things get better.

Years in the future, looking back, Sho will think that it was a good year, a turning point year. The year he got made anchor for the midnight news, the year Ohno sold his painting-turned-sculpture, the year one of Nino's songs got picked up by the opening act for the opening act of a mostly popular band. They gain a little ground against the rent and the grocery bill, they get a little more rest, they relax a little more even as they keep working hard.

"Do you remember that summer you got so sick?" Sho asks one day as they pack up their apartment.

"Mm," says Nino around the piece of packing tape he's holding with his teeth. He finally gets it unstuck from itself and seals the box he's working on. "You were a total mother-hen about it."

Ohno punches Nino in the shoulder, the one that used to get the shots, and picks up his box. "You were useless," he says as he goes out the door, dodging the empty tape roll that Nino throws at him.

They can hear him laughing all the way down the hall.

Sho opens another carton and begins to fill it. "I didn't think you were ever going to get better. That day in the park—that was when I finally thought that it was okay again."

---

The worst summer of Sho's life ends with the sound of Nino's guitar in the hot summer park, his voice as bright as the sun.

Comments

[still-ciircee.livejournal.com]

I blame Zel for a lot of things!

I wanted to trash this (I actually did--several times) because it felt really over-blown and super-angsty to me. It still does but, again, I lived with it in my head so I'm not exactly objective. All I see are the mistakes, really. So it's really great to know that other people like it and that I'm not just flailing and the keyboard and failing.

[ayumwu.livejournal.com]

XD Zel is the one to blame for everything.

Awww, well it made sense to me. You should have more confidence in yourself. :D