Kin no Shuichi

Kin no Shuichi
Written by: Chochowilliams
Disclaimer: I do not own Gravitation or the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.
Summary: Shuichi and Eiri are working things out after a mistake on both of their parts nearly ended their five-year relationship. But what about Bad Luck? What does the future hold for them?
Chapter Summary: The rift between Bad Luck grows wider with the addition of an ultimatum
Warning: M/M, romance, angst, OOC-ness, language, Shuichi/Eiri, implied Eiri/oc, implied Shuichi/oc
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A/N: Thank you to ferler, sun‘s and stars, fahaar, lilgurlanima, Acherona for your reviews. I always look forward to hearing from you guys. As I said, in honor of my birthday, this week I am giving you all a gift of three new chapters. Yay! So here is the second new chapter. Enjoy!

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Chapter 26: Take the Egg and Shave It

“You know…!”

It did little to ignore the hotheaded keyboardist.

“In real life, Shindou-san would never be able to get away with this.”

Hiro sighed. He had a headache. “This is real life, Fujisaki.”

Suguru Fujisaki barked out a dry laugh.

With another sigh, Hiro folded his arms along the top of his new galaxy white Ibanez RG1527M Prestige 7-string electric guitar and watched as Suguru paced angrily from one end of the rehearsal studio to the other. Like at that tennis tournament Ayaka had dragged him to not too long ago, he was beginning to become dizzy watching him go back and forth. If Suguru kept it up for much longer, he would wear a path in the floor. Of course, the cost to replace the floor would come out of their paychecks. Just what they needed. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Most handlers would never allow someone in Shindou-san’s position to get away with as much as Shindou-san has been allowed to get away with.”

“Yeah, well,” Hiro said as he straightened, “most handlers don’t have to put up with Yuki-san.”

True enough. It did not help that said partner to their fearless leader was the brother-in-law to their boss. He, Suguru Fujisaki, may be Tohma Seguchi’s cousin, but Eiri Yuki outranked him. Most of the time, he corrected himself silently with a smile. His smug expression slipped. A scowl replaced it. “I can’t believe Mr. K and Sakano-san are allowing this farce to continue.”

Hiro sighed from the stool as he returned to doing his warm up exercises. “Not like they have much of a choice.”

“Of course they do,” Suguru barked. “All Mr. K has to do is take that magnum of his that he seems to be in love with and-”

Hiro scoffed. “You can’t expect Mr. K to do something like that.”

“Oh? Why not?”

“Look, Fujisaki-”

“He’s done it before,” Suguru reminded him.

“Yes,” Hiro conceded, “but Shuichi didn’t nearly overdose before.”

“His own fault!”

He had to give Suguru that.

“Does he even care about this band anymore?”

Hiro was beginning to suspect that Suguru complained so much because he was in love with the sound of his own voice.

Nevertheless, he could not blame the keyboardist for voicing such doubts. Sometimes it was hard to tell whether Shuichi was still supporting the band that they had created together back in middle school. He had even confronted his singer not too long ago about the very real doubts that all of Japan seemed to have.

“How can you ask something like that? You of all people should know that Bad Luck is my life!”

Hiro had no doubts that what his best friend told him so adamantly was the truth, but he still questioned its validity. He had to. Music was in Shuichi’s blood. It was in his soul, part of his very being. At least it used to be. First came the music, but then love, marriage and the baby carriage filed in one after another after that. They took up so much room in Shuichi’s heart that the band had been pushed to the sidelines. It was hard to compete with the new loves in Shuichi’s life.

“You don’t have to compete!”

That’s what Shuichi claimed, but it was hard not to, especially when there was a call in the middle of a recording session from Eiri Yuki saying that Shuichi had to come home now because Sayo had thrown up all over herself. You could not very well in good conscience tell Shuichi that he could not leave early to see to his sick daughter even though this was the first time in weeks that Bad Luck had actually sat down to work on an album that was long overdue. Family came first before anything. They all understood that. Hiro did not have a problem with that.

“I mean, it’s been a month! A month!”

“And we have two more to go until he can come back to work,” Hiro reminded the other man calmly.

“Exactly!”

Hiro sighed, but otherwise said nothing.

The problem was the million and one side projects that seemed to be competing with Bad Luck for Shuichi’s attention. His friend had tried to do too much at once and it cost him; it cost them all. So, no, he could not blame Suguru for his constant questioning of their friend’s loyalty. However, it was becoming increasingly annoying being forced to listen to him bitch and moan on a daily basis.

“We’re supposed to be putting together an album! One which is three years behind schedule!”

Here we go again, Hiro sighed. He wished K were here right about now. This was one time when he would not mind a bullet to the head.

“And instead of being here in the recording studio, he’s gallivanting around town producing a clothing line based around the prostitute clothes he wears on stage, some smelly assed cologne, recording songs for some stupid assed movie, acting in said stupid assed movie that I’m sure will be a big flop and then lending his voice to some anime that proves that the creators have no sense of originality!”

Hiro sighed. Same old. Same old. He knew he should keep his mouth shut, but he just had to add, “And let not forget that he got married to Yuki-san and had daughter.”

“Yeah. Yeah! That’s right! That, too.”

Everything about Shuichi just seemed to piss Suguru off. How they had managed to remain a band for as long as they had was something that he would never be able to understand.

“Oh! And now he’s posing for…for…Playgirl!”

“Blaze.”

“Whatever!” Suguru glared vehemently at Hiro. “Do you have any idea what that does for the reputation of a band like ours? We’re a pop band, Hiro. Pop. Band. We are not that type of band!”

A weird sense of déjà vu washed over Hiro. Those were almost the same exact words he had tossed at Shuichi when he confronted him about Blaze.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing? Posing nude on the cover of this trashy porn magazine?! You have any idea what this‘s going to do to Bad Luck? To our reputation?”

Shuichi had just smiled sadly at him from the other side of the open door. “I knew you’d say something like that.”

“Then why the hell-?!”

“I didn’t have any other choice.”

“What the hell kind of excuse is that? ‘No other choice’? I’d think you’d be a little more creative than that!”

Shuichi had shaken his head with that sad smile still on his face. “It’s not an excuse.”

“Yeah, I know,” Hiro agreed with the younger man. “I’m with you on that, but it’s not like he’s the first to pull something like this. Besides, you seem to be the only one making such a big deal out of it. You heard K. He said-”

“I know what he said,” Suguru snapped.

“Then you know he was right.”

Whether the American was right or not was not the issue here. “You of all people should know that not all press is good press! This could every easily have blown up in our faces and you know that!”

Hiro winced at the blow. The last time their manager tried to use a controversial issue that had surrounded the band, it had nearly cost them everything.

“And you dare sit there and tell me I’m wrong!”

“No, you’re right. You are right, but Fujisaki,” Hiro continued, raising his voice over that of his outspoken keyboardist, “it didn’t. Besides, I explained about all that.”

---

Shuichi emerged from the master closet with a white envelope clutched in his hand. “Here,” he said holding the envelope out towards Hiro. His violet gaze locked onto the tatami floor at his feet. He did not have the courage to look his friend in the eye.

“What’s this?” Hiro asked, taking it from Shuichi’s trembling grasp. He turned the envelope over. Both sides were blank, but he did notice that the crease between the envelope itself and its flap was well worn. “What does this have to do-?”

“Just…open it,” was all Shuichi said in that same sad tone before he stepped around Hiro, circled the bed and vanished out the bedroom door.

Confused, Hiro lifted the flap of the envelope and pulled out a glossy sheet of photo paper. When he flipped it over, his eyebrows flew into his long reddish-brown hair. “What the hell?!”

+---+---+

He stepped out of the short hall that led to the master bedroom suite into the dining room with a hundred thousand questions on his mind. He found Shuichi sitting at the head of the table with his back to him. The singer was staring out the wall of floor to ceiling windows at the Tokyo landscape.

“Eiri…”

Hiro paused.

“…He’s the one who chose what photo was going to be on the cover.”

With as protective as Eiri was, it amazed him that the writer even allowed Shuichi to be on the cover of something like Blaze. There had been no problem with that interview Shuichi agreed to a few years back, but this was a horse of another color. “Yuki-san?” To say he was surprised would be an understatement.

Shuichi made a noise of agreement.

“But-?”

“Actually,” Shuichi continued in that same sad tone, “Yoshi took that photo years ago as a favor.”

“A…favor?”

“It’s the less…provocative one we took.”

Gulping, Hiro felt his face grow warm. Dear God.

“They were for Eiri. For his birthday.” With that, Shuichi fell silent once again.

Hiro drew his brows together in confusion. “…But…why? Shu, what’s-?”

“I didn’t have any other choice,” Shuichi whispered.

Hiro gazed down at the photograph in his hand.

---

“He can explain until he’s blue in the face and I still wouldn’t give a rat’s ass! It‘s his own damn fault for allowing himself to get blackmailed into being naked on the cover of a freaking porn magazine! A whore by any other name is still a slut!”

Hiro‘s hand stilled around his guitar. “…That was uncalled for.”

“I don’t think so.”

“…Sug-”

“No! I’ve had it with his crap! He either pulls his shit together or-”

“-Or what?” Hiro inquired. His voice had fallen to a dangerous tone and his eyes narrowed into slits.

Not fazed in the least by the over-protectiveness of their lead singer‘s best friend, Suguru turned towards Hiro. He crossed the studio until the two of them were standing nose to nose. “Or Bad Luck will soon be in need of a new lead singer,” he hissed.

---

“…You…slept with Yoshio?” He could not keep the disgust out of his voice.

A tear slipped down Shuichi’s cheek. “…Yes,” he confirmed. His voice was barely above a whisper.

Son of a bitch. He knew it. When Shuichi brought that bastard into the studio that day a couple years back, he had known that that man was going to bring them all nothing but trouble. He knew just by looking at him that that man could not be trusted. Damn it all to hell and back. He so did not like it when he was right. “Why the hell would you-”

“I don’t know.”

“-do something so ridiculously asinine?” Hiro demanded to know.

“I don’t know,” Shuichi sobbed louder. Another tear rolled down his cheek. “I was drunk and upset and…I just…I don’t…”

A horrific thought crossed Hiro’s mind. His face paled. He almost did not want to ask. “…Did he…?”

Shuichi said nothing, but a third tear followed closely by a forth dripped down his face.

Hiro clenched his free hand into a fist. He swore that if ever saw that bastard Yoshio Nakamura again, he would personally kill the son of a bitch.

---

It seemed to take twice as long as normal for his brain to process what he heard. Slowly, he started to understand that the syllables formed words and that the words were creating sentences that were supposed to express thoughts and emotions. Then it hit him like a slap upside the head. Wide eyed, Hiro jumped up from the stool. His hasty movement caused the stool to topple over backwards. It slammed hard into the floor with a loud clatter. His guitar dangled from his hand. Anger coursed through him, anger and shock that Suguru would even suggest such a thing. “You can’t mean that,” he breathed.

“I can,” Suguru bit back.

Hiro swallowed the bile that filled his mouth. He was not even aware of when he started trembling, but having noticed it, he could not seem to stop it. “Seguchi-san wouldn‘t-”

“My cousin is the one who suggested the idea.”

Hiro paled.

“Back to Zero is to be released by the end of the summer. No. Matter. What.”

Lightheaded, Hiro tumbled to the floor. This could not be happening. Why did it seem as if everything was crashing down around them all at once? He could understand the impatience their boss had with them, but…

…Wait a minute!

“End of summer?”

“That‘s what I was told.”

Hiro felt nauseous. “But…Shu…he won’t…he doesn’t return until…”

Suguru crossed his arms over his chest. “Exactly.”

They say when it rains it pours.

---TBC---

Preview: “Whipped”

A/N: Well, holy chicken shit. I think the end of Bad Luck is upon us.