![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedishampooTitle: Followers
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jedishampoo
Fandom: Wild Adapter
Rating: PG-13?
Summary: The pet joke was getting old; Tokito wants Kubota to know this. There are some things Tokito wants to know for himself, too. Sorta Tokito/Kubota.
Notes: Written for the![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
yuletide exchange. I just realized that I never did post this story in my journal! Probably because I found it really, really hard to write-- I had such mixed feelings about this story and WA6 and beyond and I was never sure that I felt the characters. I do want to thank inksheddings, my resident WA expert, for her beta and lots of encouragement. (And thanks to moshesque and athena8 for assistance and putting up with wibbling, hee!) Concrit would be most welcome. Here's the link on yuletide.
Followers
The pet joke was getting old, old, old. It had been old before Shouta had left to go to Hokkaido or wherever. It had gotten old the first time Tokito had heard people refer to him as “kitten,” “stray,” or whatever, when they thought he couldn’t hear them. For a while Tokito had even wondered if the whole animal thing was a reference to his deformed hand; then he’d realized that it was just another thing to do with Kubota’s past. The one he never talked about.
Still, old joke or not, Tokito was starting to feel like a dog, leading his master only as far as the master would allow, and master was going to rein him in, any second, with one of his offhand remarks like there’s food at home or something just as annoying. That was, if Tokito didn’t find something quickly--
He stood on the street corner, Kubo-chan standing silently behind, and looked, and looked, willing a restaurant to pop into view and say ‘I’m here, I’m just what you wanted!’ He willed the double-beep of the don’t walk sign to keep double-beeping, so he could pretend just a little longer that he knew what he was doing. Sakuragi-Cho was a huge station; surely, he thought, something had to be close by. Still, the side-streets mocked him with silence. It was nearly noon but still too early for anything to be open; everything interesting in these few blocks of Yokohama came to life at night. The ramen stand was covered, closed, silent. A Seven-Eleven reminded Tokito that it had great food, but there was nowhere to sit inside, it was grab-and-go-home like everything they did, every night.
This trip was about doing something different. Tokito had chosen to get off the train at Sakuragi-Cho because he’d never been there before. He could have turned left out of the station, led Kubota to the giant mall, there was plenty of food there-- but noooo, he’d had to go right. Just to show that he could handle the world, could find food.
He would show that he could take care of himself. Take care of Kubota, outside of their apartment, their space that was still sort of Kubota’s space. Show he was someone who could, and deserved to, know things.
Beep-beep, don’t walk, beep-beep, still don’t walk. Oh, hey, there was a man carrying out a food-price board-- no, it was the Breezbay hotel, one of those overpriced places for foreigners. Beep-beep, don’t walk yet, shit, he was going to look stupid-- wait, tucked away on that corner?
“There it is,” Tokito pointed, and glanced back at Kubota. Bong, bong, bong, walk, walk, walk-- he stepped off the curb like he’d only been waiting for the signal. “Coco Curry.”
Kubota pretended to glance at the store front, but Tokito knew he was weighing it. What was he weighing it for? It was a cheap curry joint. They didn’t have one near where they lived. Was it off-limits? There were so many things Tokito didn’t know but he was going to learn them, dammit.
“Mmmm, curry,” Kubo-chan said around his cigarette.
It was a tiny place with bright lights. It wasn’t very busy. They took an enclosed booth in the back so Kubota could smoke. Kubota slid into the booth first, with his back to the wall, with a view of the door through the narrow aisle between the row of booths, and Tokito noticed that. When Tokito slid in he bumped Kubo-chan’s leg with his knee, and he noticed that, too. It seemed that no matter how he tried to shift himself in the booth, they were bumping feet or legs. Kubota was the kind of person who, without even expending any visible effort, just sort of took over. Places and people.
Tokito had come too far, learned too much in the last year or so, to be taken over. It was undignified. He knew too much. Not enough.
“So, whose territory is this?” Tokito asked. He hoped he sounded as nonchalant as he’d wanted.
“Hmm,” Kubota said, and lit another smoke. “Izumo.”
A straight answer, without any extra information. Kubo-chan must be in a good mood.
Were there people from Izumo here? Would they recognize Kubota? Why hadn’t Tokito chosen to go left, to the mall? Tokito yanked a menu out of the wall-clip and flipped it open. He didn’t even pay attention to which page, or whether or not it was right-side-up. He wanted to think of another question to ask. He wanted--
“Holy shit,” he said, when his eyes finally focused on the plastic pages. “I’ve never seen so many kinds of curry!”
“The mushroom beef is good.”
Of course Kubota would have been here before. Tokito marveled at the multitude of choices. The waitress brought them some tea. She smiled at Kubo-chan. She smiled a huge smile. Girls did that to Kubo-chan all the time. Still, her smile was a lot huger than was necessary for any two regular old anonymous customers.
Maybe she knows him, Tokito thought. If they were in Izumo territory. This girl was a lot prettier than most curry-hut waitresses. Maybe she’d known him before--
“Mushroom beef, for him. With rice. Chicken pepper for me. I want potato salad,” Tokito told the smiling waitress. He snapped his menu shut and was happy to notice Kubo-chan doing the same. She pouted but bowed and said “yes, thank you,” and turned away to saunter off to give their order to the cooks. Tokito nudged Kubota’s leg with his shoe. It wasn’t a friendly nudge; it was a nudge that clearly said, move it. Tokito glared.
“Thanks,” Kubo-chan said from behind a veil of smoke. He might have been smiling. In fact, he really was. Tokito was one of the few people who could tell.
Tokito shifted his foot, ending the brief war of placement. “Yeah. Have you been here before?”
“Probably,” Kubota said, glancing around. “Or I had take-out from here. I can’t remember.”
“Liar,” Tokito said. He wondered if Kou-san would come across with any information, if Tokito asked. If Tokito showed Kou-san his hand, like Kou-san wanted. Trade for trade.
Nah, it wouldn’t be necessary. Tokito could work it out on his own. Kubo-chan lit another cigarette. Tokito played with the condiments. He was Mr. Cool.
“Let’s go all the way up to Ikebukuro,” he said, tapping a chopstick against the glass jar of gomashio. “I wanna see the manga stores up there. I wanna see if there’s anything new out.”
“We probably shouldn’t,” Kubota said.
“Why?”
“It’s too far. There’s something good on TV tonight.”
“Liar,” Tokito said again. “Whose territory is that?”
Kubota blew out a cloud of smoke. The waitress reappeared just then, with her grin and their food. Two plates of brown curry and rice, one tiny little bowl with a tiny, perfectly round scoop of pale orange something on it. Kubota said thanks, and Tokito glared at her again. When she finally took herself off, Tokito turned his glare on Kubota.
“Well?” Mr. Cool wasn’t so cool but he would not be denied!
“You like that stuff?” Kubota said, stubbing out his cigarette and pointing at Tokito’s potato salad.
“Maybe,” Tokito said.
Let Kubota wonder about something for once. Tokito dug in with his chopsticks, dragging a bite of the orange stuff to his mouth. It was tangy. Mayonnaise-y. He thought he liked it. He did, in fact. He couldn’t have said why he’d ordered it in the first place. It had sounded good.
“So whose is it?” he said again.
“Ahh, I don’t remember,” Kubota said, leaning back and stretching his legs, putting the goddamned things full-length on Tokito’s thigh.
“Bullshit!” Tokito broke. Shit, he totally broke. But he was totally over it. People were staring; but then, people were always staring. He kicked Kubota’s warm, pressing leg under the table. “I learn everything I know about you from other people!”
“Everything?”
“Yeah! Shit.” Kubota had that look, the one that said tons of shit that was meaningless on a surface level but did something to Tokito, so quiet and so intent, like that time he’d broken Kubo-chan’s arm, like it’d done when Kubo-chan had gotten out of jail. It said, yeah, you don’t learn everything about me from other people, because I’m different with everyone else and why does it matter? “Shit,” Tokito said again.
“What do you want to know?” Kubo-chan said, in a very quiet voice.
Tokito looked at his food. His heart did some weird nervous jumpy thing into his throat and he swallowed it back down. He could ask about Anna. He could ask about Izumo. He could find out exactly whose territory Ikebukuro was and why they couldn’t go there. He could ask about other people Kubota had liked.
But it was too late: Mr. Cool’s cover had been blown. Tokito realized that, unless he truly wanted to look like the stupidest person in the world, all he could do was what he’d always done-- wait. If he wanted the information, really wanted it, then he could get it in bits and pieces like always, from the source or elsewhere. And Kubo-chan understood Tokito’s predicament; Tokito could hear it in his voice, at that moment, the same way he’d seen it in his eyes just a few seconds ago. What else was there that he needed to know? If it was important, really important, then he should ask it.
Tokito took another bite of the yummy orange stuff. “What’s your favorite flavor of curry?”
“Hm,” Kubota said, maybe a laugh. “Right now I think it’s mushroom beef.”
“I knew you’d say that,” Tokito told him. “Fine.”
“Don’t you want to know what’s going to be on TV tonight?” Kubo-chan asked. “It’s an animal special. On that animal channel.”
“Y’know, that pet joke is getting really, really old,” Tokito said from around a mouthful of chicken-pepper curry.
“What are you talking about?” Kubo-chan asked, and Tokito thought that maybe there was another thing or two that Tokito knew that Kubo-chan didn’t. There was too much Tokito didn’t know about himself, even, but sometimes, keeping secrets felt good.
“Never mind.”
Kubo-chan shrugged and ate his mushroom beef curry. “This place was a good pick.”
“I know,” Tokito said. He’d proven something. He knew he’d won, somehow. And he also felt bad, in a way. One thing Tokito knew was that Kubo-chan wondered if Tokito would stay, or would go, would leave him. He wouldn’t. He should probably tell Kubo-chan that at some point.
It was fun to do something different now and then. Still, comfortable was good. Kubo-chan’s calf pressed against his was comfortable, like they were playing video games at home. Tokito supposed there was plenty of time for everything else; neither of them was going anywhere alone. Someone would always be following, no matter who was leading.
Author:
jedishampooFandom: Wild Adapter
Rating: PG-13?
Summary: The pet joke was getting old; Tokito wants Kubota to know this. There are some things Tokito wants to know for himself, too. Sorta Tokito/Kubota.
Notes: Written for the
yuletide exchange. I just realized that I never did post this story in my journal! Probably because I found it really, really hard to write-- I had such mixed feelings about this story and WA6 and beyond and I was never sure that I felt the characters. I do want to thank inksheddings, my resident WA expert, for her beta and lots of encouragement. (And thanks to moshesque and athena8 for assistance and putting up with wibbling, hee!) Concrit would be most welcome. Here's the link on yuletide.Followers
The pet joke was getting old, old, old. It had been old before Shouta had left to go to Hokkaido or wherever. It had gotten old the first time Tokito had heard people refer to him as “kitten,” “stray,” or whatever, when they thought he couldn’t hear them. For a while Tokito had even wondered if the whole animal thing was a reference to his deformed hand; then he’d realized that it was just another thing to do with Kubota’s past. The one he never talked about.
Still, old joke or not, Tokito was starting to feel like a dog, leading his master only as far as the master would allow, and master was going to rein him in, any second, with one of his offhand remarks like there’s food at home or something just as annoying. That was, if Tokito didn’t find something quickly--
He stood on the street corner, Kubo-chan standing silently behind, and looked, and looked, willing a restaurant to pop into view and say ‘I’m here, I’m just what you wanted!’ He willed the double-beep of the don’t walk sign to keep double-beeping, so he could pretend just a little longer that he knew what he was doing. Sakuragi-Cho was a huge station; surely, he thought, something had to be close by. Still, the side-streets mocked him with silence. It was nearly noon but still too early for anything to be open; everything interesting in these few blocks of Yokohama came to life at night. The ramen stand was covered, closed, silent. A Seven-Eleven reminded Tokito that it had great food, but there was nowhere to sit inside, it was grab-and-go-home like everything they did, every night.
This trip was about doing something different. Tokito had chosen to get off the train at Sakuragi-Cho because he’d never been there before. He could have turned left out of the station, led Kubota to the giant mall, there was plenty of food there-- but noooo, he’d had to go right. Just to show that he could handle the world, could find food.
He would show that he could take care of himself. Take care of Kubota, outside of their apartment, their space that was still sort of Kubota’s space. Show he was someone who could, and deserved to, know things.
Beep-beep, don’t walk, beep-beep, still don’t walk. Oh, hey, there was a man carrying out a food-price board-- no, it was the Breezbay hotel, one of those overpriced places for foreigners. Beep-beep, don’t walk yet, shit, he was going to look stupid-- wait, tucked away on that corner?
“There it is,” Tokito pointed, and glanced back at Kubota. Bong, bong, bong, walk, walk, walk-- he stepped off the curb like he’d only been waiting for the signal. “Coco Curry.”
Kubota pretended to glance at the store front, but Tokito knew he was weighing it. What was he weighing it for? It was a cheap curry joint. They didn’t have one near where they lived. Was it off-limits? There were so many things Tokito didn’t know but he was going to learn them, dammit.
“Mmmm, curry,” Kubo-chan said around his cigarette.
It was a tiny place with bright lights. It wasn’t very busy. They took an enclosed booth in the back so Kubota could smoke. Kubota slid into the booth first, with his back to the wall, with a view of the door through the narrow aisle between the row of booths, and Tokito noticed that. When Tokito slid in he bumped Kubo-chan’s leg with his knee, and he noticed that, too. It seemed that no matter how he tried to shift himself in the booth, they were bumping feet or legs. Kubota was the kind of person who, without even expending any visible effort, just sort of took over. Places and people.
Tokito had come too far, learned too much in the last year or so, to be taken over. It was undignified. He knew too much. Not enough.
“So, whose territory is this?” Tokito asked. He hoped he sounded as nonchalant as he’d wanted.
“Hmm,” Kubota said, and lit another smoke. “Izumo.”
A straight answer, without any extra information. Kubo-chan must be in a good mood.
Were there people from Izumo here? Would they recognize Kubota? Why hadn’t Tokito chosen to go left, to the mall? Tokito yanked a menu out of the wall-clip and flipped it open. He didn’t even pay attention to which page, or whether or not it was right-side-up. He wanted to think of another question to ask. He wanted--
“Holy shit,” he said, when his eyes finally focused on the plastic pages. “I’ve never seen so many kinds of curry!”
“The mushroom beef is good.”
Of course Kubota would have been here before. Tokito marveled at the multitude of choices. The waitress brought them some tea. She smiled at Kubo-chan. She smiled a huge smile. Girls did that to Kubo-chan all the time. Still, her smile was a lot huger than was necessary for any two regular old anonymous customers.
Maybe she knows him, Tokito thought. If they were in Izumo territory. This girl was a lot prettier than most curry-hut waitresses. Maybe she’d known him before--
“Mushroom beef, for him. With rice. Chicken pepper for me. I want potato salad,” Tokito told the smiling waitress. He snapped his menu shut and was happy to notice Kubo-chan doing the same. She pouted but bowed and said “yes, thank you,” and turned away to saunter off to give their order to the cooks. Tokito nudged Kubota’s leg with his shoe. It wasn’t a friendly nudge; it was a nudge that clearly said, move it. Tokito glared.
“Thanks,” Kubo-chan said from behind a veil of smoke. He might have been smiling. In fact, he really was. Tokito was one of the few people who could tell.
Tokito shifted his foot, ending the brief war of placement. “Yeah. Have you been here before?”
“Probably,” Kubota said, glancing around. “Or I had take-out from here. I can’t remember.”
“Liar,” Tokito said. He wondered if Kou-san would come across with any information, if Tokito asked. If Tokito showed Kou-san his hand, like Kou-san wanted. Trade for trade.
Nah, it wouldn’t be necessary. Tokito could work it out on his own. Kubo-chan lit another cigarette. Tokito played with the condiments. He was Mr. Cool.
“Let’s go all the way up to Ikebukuro,” he said, tapping a chopstick against the glass jar of gomashio. “I wanna see the manga stores up there. I wanna see if there’s anything new out.”
“We probably shouldn’t,” Kubota said.
“Why?”
“It’s too far. There’s something good on TV tonight.”
“Liar,” Tokito said again. “Whose territory is that?”
Kubota blew out a cloud of smoke. The waitress reappeared just then, with her grin and their food. Two plates of brown curry and rice, one tiny little bowl with a tiny, perfectly round scoop of pale orange something on it. Kubota said thanks, and Tokito glared at her again. When she finally took herself off, Tokito turned his glare on Kubota.
“Well?” Mr. Cool wasn’t so cool but he would not be denied!
“You like that stuff?” Kubota said, stubbing out his cigarette and pointing at Tokito’s potato salad.
“Maybe,” Tokito said.
Let Kubota wonder about something for once. Tokito dug in with his chopsticks, dragging a bite of the orange stuff to his mouth. It was tangy. Mayonnaise-y. He thought he liked it. He did, in fact. He couldn’t have said why he’d ordered it in the first place. It had sounded good.
“So whose is it?” he said again.
“Ahh, I don’t remember,” Kubota said, leaning back and stretching his legs, putting the goddamned things full-length on Tokito’s thigh.
“Bullshit!” Tokito broke. Shit, he totally broke. But he was totally over it. People were staring; but then, people were always staring. He kicked Kubota’s warm, pressing leg under the table. “I learn everything I know about you from other people!”
“Everything?”
“Yeah! Shit.” Kubota had that look, the one that said tons of shit that was meaningless on a surface level but did something to Tokito, so quiet and so intent, like that time he’d broken Kubo-chan’s arm, like it’d done when Kubo-chan had gotten out of jail. It said, yeah, you don’t learn everything about me from other people, because I’m different with everyone else and why does it matter? “Shit,” Tokito said again.
“What do you want to know?” Kubo-chan said, in a very quiet voice.
Tokito looked at his food. His heart did some weird nervous jumpy thing into his throat and he swallowed it back down. He could ask about Anna. He could ask about Izumo. He could find out exactly whose territory Ikebukuro was and why they couldn’t go there. He could ask about other people Kubota had liked.
But it was too late: Mr. Cool’s cover had been blown. Tokito realized that, unless he truly wanted to look like the stupidest person in the world, all he could do was what he’d always done-- wait. If he wanted the information, really wanted it, then he could get it in bits and pieces like always, from the source or elsewhere. And Kubo-chan understood Tokito’s predicament; Tokito could hear it in his voice, at that moment, the same way he’d seen it in his eyes just a few seconds ago. What else was there that he needed to know? If it was important, really important, then he should ask it.
Tokito took another bite of the yummy orange stuff. “What’s your favorite flavor of curry?”
“Hm,” Kubota said, maybe a laugh. “Right now I think it’s mushroom beef.”
“I knew you’d say that,” Tokito told him. “Fine.”
“Don’t you want to know what’s going to be on TV tonight?” Kubo-chan asked. “It’s an animal special. On that animal channel.”
“Y’know, that pet joke is getting really, really old,” Tokito said from around a mouthful of chicken-pepper curry.
“What are you talking about?” Kubo-chan asked, and Tokito thought that maybe there was another thing or two that Tokito knew that Kubo-chan didn’t. There was too much Tokito didn’t know about himself, even, but sometimes, keeping secrets felt good.
“Never mind.”
Kubo-chan shrugged and ate his mushroom beef curry. “This place was a good pick.”
“I know,” Tokito said. He’d proven something. He knew he’d won, somehow. And he also felt bad, in a way. One thing Tokito knew was that Kubo-chan wondered if Tokito would stay, or would go, would leave him. He wouldn’t. He should probably tell Kubo-chan that at some point.
It was fun to do something different now and then. Still, comfortable was good. Kubo-chan’s calf pressed against his was comfortable, like they were playing video games at home. Tokito supposed there was plenty of time for everything else; neither of them was going anywhere alone. Someone would always be following, no matter who was leading.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Cute
Date: 2009-02-08 07:03 pm (UTC);)
E
Re: Cute
Date: 2009-02-08 07:11 pm (UTC)Thank you for stopping by, heh. So don't tell me you've been reading the NC-l7 stuff, too...
:) K
Re: Cute
Date: 2009-02-08 07:14 pm (UTC)*LOL* Good afternoon ;)
E
no subject
Date: 2009-02-08 07:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-08 08:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-08 08:58 pm (UTC)The fucked-up-edness of the WA boys is quite different from that of the Saiyuki boys, so I can see having trouble getting into their heads. I enjoy WA fic and I know when the characterizations feel on or off, but there's no way I'd even want to attempt writing them. TOO MUCH FUCKED-UP.
no subject
Date: 2009-02-08 09:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-09 05:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-09 07:01 am (UTC)This is lovely! I don't know why you wibbled over it. ♥
no subject
Date: 2009-02-09 06:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-14 04:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-14 09:42 am (UTC)I appreciate you reading and your nice words!
no subject
Date: 2009-02-19 08:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-19 11:44 pm (UTC)Tokito has grown on me since the beginning, though.
Thank you! ::hugs::
no subject
Date: 2009-02-20 02:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-02-20 05:25 pm (UTC)