Still Raining

Still Raining
Sequel to: On the Street of Dreams
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: There was one woman at the press conference that refused to leave well enough alone. Two years later, she’s back and causing trouble. She’s determined to prove that Aizawa isn’t the biological father of little Takanori. What if she’s right?
Chapter Summary:
Warning: angst, drama, romance, m-preg, language, m/m, hentai
Inserts: flashbacks from chapter 1
A/N: Thank you to UnratedCrimsonBlood, glostarz, secret hidden within me, Acherona, Selina for your reviews. This chapter is longer than the last two. Yeah! I could have gotten this chapter out earlier, but I had to baby-sit on Saturday and then Sundays I usually just veg out. But here it is! Enjoy!

+---+---+---+

(Last Time)

Except for a few who were working on additional research for their articles, everyone else had gone home for the night. Yet she remained. Nami Mataguchi twirled the pencil ambidextrously as she sat behind her desk in her office. Playing softly in the background was some Christian rock song that she could not remember the name of. Suddenly, she flung the yellow number two pencil down in frustration.

Dammit. This was ridiculous.

She ran her fingers through her short black locks. Leaning back, she laced her fingers together behind her head and glared through anger-clouded vision at the drop down ceiling.

Was he choosing to ignore her challenge? Again? Some would say that made him the better man. It was braver to walk away than to return the punch. It was more Christian-like to turn the other cheek. Yada. Yada. Yada. People could say whatever they liked, but she did not believe any of it. At least, not in this particular case. The fact that young Mr. Shindou continued to have “no comment” was in and of itself a comment. It was the answer she had been searching for this whole time. It meant she was right in her beliefs. She had to be. She had to give him cudos for sticking to his guns. The fact of the matter was that if she was wrong and he right, then he should not have any problem in proving it. Right? Seeing that he refused to give her and the public a sufficient answer meant that she was indeed right.

A grin slowly made its way onto her face.

Maybe she could use that. Rile him up a bit.

Dropping her hands, she reached for the phone. Her fingers danced over the keys.

“Thank you for calling TCN, The Christian Network. This is Kinu. How may I direct your call?”

+---+---+

Chapter 4: The Welcoming Home of the Estranged Husband

The Trinity Offices - Setagaya, Tokyo

“Are you sure about this?” the male voice over the line asked her for what seemed like the hundredth time that evening.

“Of course I am,” she snapped back. “Why wouldn’t I be? I‘m the one who called you.”

There was a heavy sigh. “Look, Nami…”

“Save it, Chishin,” Nami Mataguchi bit. She swirled her chair around to glare out the windows into the rapidly descending twilight.

“Don’t you think you’re taking this too far?”

“No. I do not.”

In his office at The Christian Network studios, Chishin Yamada reclined in his leather chair behind his desk and pinched the bridge of his nose. He could feel the beginnings of a looming headache. “Why do you care so much?”

“You know why,” Nami answered him.

“Humor me.”

“Fine.” She started counting. Her index finger on her free hand rose up. “You have a man who is known as Japan’s cold, stoic, heartless bachelor.”

“Accepted.”

“In the past, he’s avoided commitment like the plaque.” A second finger went up.

“Accepted.”

“Then we learn that he’s involved with someone.” A third finger. “And this was after saying in an interview for Book TV that he was convinced love didn’t really exist.”

“People change.”

“Yes, but this someone is not an ordinary someone. But a Neutral,” she sneered the word. She fisted her hand and brought it down onto the arm of the chair.

In his office on the opposite end of the city, Chishin rolled his eyes. “Yes. Yes. They’re disgusting and immoral and wicked and gross and should not be allowed to exist.”

Nami nodded in agreement. “Exactly.” Apparently, she did not hear the sarcasm in her old friend’s voice. “But it does not end there.”

“Of course not.”

“This Neutral was pregnant.”

“Imagine that.”

“The pièce de résistance comes when we learn this pregnant Neutral is no more than a boy. A minor.”

“So?”

Nami’s grip tightened around the phone. How could he play this off as nothing? Did he not understand the severity of what she was trying to tell him? “’So’? ‘So’?”

“Yeah. So. What. In Tokyo, you become of age at seventeen and since the two of them started dating a couple months before he became of age, it‘s not something the police would-”

“That’s not the point!”

“And what is?” he shot right back.

“He was still a minor! The famous Eiri Yuki was fucking a minor who he ended up impregnating.”

“There’s no proof of that.”

A slow grin crossed Nami‘s face. “Exactly.”

Chishin sighed again. “Not all people are ruled by their libidos”

“That may be so, but Shindou was pregnant. He and Yuki were dating.” She pounded the arm of the chair she was sitting in for emphasis.

“If ‘a’ equals ‘b’ and ‘b’ equals ‘c’ then ‘a’ must equal ‘c’, huh?” Who said you could not adequately relate the math you learned in school and real life?

“Precisely. It‘s simple logic.”

Chishin sighed. Talking to her was like trying to have a meaningful conversation with a brick wall. “No it‘s not. The biological father of Mr. Shindou‘s son is his ex-boyfriend.”

“So they claim.”

“And why would they lie?”

“To cover the truth.”

Of course it was. “The truth being what?” he asked aloud.

“That Eiri Yuki is the biological father.”

Chishin sighed. Yet again.

“You have to admit that it’s just a little too coincidental that Shindou’s so-called ex-boyfriend just happened to die in a tragic accident around the same time that it came out that he was not only pregnant but dating Mr. bestselling-romance-bachelor Eiri Yuki.”

“Not really.”

“What?!”

“However,” Chishin continued, “I will admit that it’s mighty suspicious, but it doesn’t mean anything. Something similar happened to my cousin several years back. It happens.”

“We aren’t talking about your cousin!”

“I know that! I’m just saying that it doesn‘t mean there‘s something underhanded going on.”

“Of course it does!”

Chishin was becoming tired of sighing, but he could not seem to help it when he was speaking with her. “…What‘s this really about?”

“I’m telling you what this is about!”

He had to wonder about that.

“Are you going to do it not?”

“I don’t know, Nami. Frankly, I don’t give a damn about this supposed truth.”

“Yeah, well that makes one of us.”

“Nami-”

“You aren’t the only religious affiliate, ya know,” she reminded him. “I can take my story elsewhere.”

Chishin stopped himself from sighing for what had to be the hundredth time in the past ten minutes. That headache that had only been looming on the sidelines was now threatening to split his head open. He was getting too old for this.

+---+---+

Koishikawa Park Tower – Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo

“What’s the point in having nine hundred stations if there’s crap all on?” Eiri grumbled as he flipped passed station after station after station. This was why he did not watch television. Much. Maybe when he was feeling particularly bored he might decide to see what kind of crap the kids were buying at the record stores these days. If there just happened to be a Bad Luck video on it was pure coincidental. Despite the fact that he might watch on average three hours of TV a week, here he was stuck paying eighty-six hundred yen a month for nearly nine hundred stations. And why?

“You just don’t want to watch any of that ‘crap all’,” Shuichi corrected as he meandered out of the kitchen and made his way slowly back to the living room.

Oh. That would be why; his lithe baka husband. “Exactly.”

Shuichi giggled lightly.

He finally settled on Anaconda with Ice Cube and Jennifer Lopez. “Why you convinced me to get the premium package, I’ll never know,” he griped even though he knew the answer. He lightly tossed the remote onto the coffee table.

“That’s easy.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yup!”

“And that would be…?”

“Because you love me,” Shuichi replied happily.

Eiri snorted as he tried desperately to ignore the heat warming his cheeks.

“Here.”

He took the proffered bottle of beer and took a swig from the open dew covered dark amber colored bottle.

Folding his legs beneath him, Shuichi settled onto the sofa besides his husband. Being careful not to spill any of his drink, he hooked his left arm through Eiri’s right arm and cuddled against the writer’s side. Using him as a pillow, he rested his head against Eiri’s shoulder.

Eiri eyed the Nesquik 60th anniversary cup that was filled with some sort of yellow liquid suspiciously.

Feeling the heated gaze trained on him, Shuichi said, “Lemonade,” before Eiri had a chance to even form the words to ask. He lifted his head and gazed up at his husband.

Eiri narrowed his eyes.

“Honest. Non-carbonated.”

It amazed Eiri that Shuichi knew such a big word, but he had no choice but to believe the pink haired singer. Seeing as he was the one who had stocked the refrigerator, he knew that no carbonated beverages were readily available under this roof. However, knowing Shuichi as well as he did, it would not surprise him if Shuichi somehow were able to sneak an illicit beverage into the condominium without him knowing it. “Baka.” It rather irritated him that Shuichi knew him so well, but he was proud at the same time.

Grinning, Shuichi giggled. He settled back against Eiri’s side, feeling content for the first time in a long time, and hugged his cup to his chest.

Eiri took another sip of his beer and tried to follow along with the movie that he had apparently caught mid-way through. It was something about a film crew who was trying to film some sort of documentary in what appeared to be the Amazon, but was now being stalked by an anaconda that was impossibly huge.

“I love you, you know,” Shuichi admitted unexpectedly after several seconds of blissful silence.

Eiri blinked at the admission. “What?”

“I love you.”

Eiri snorted, “You sure as hell better.” He turned back to the television just in time to watch a man being strangled to death by the giant anaconda.

Shuichi giggled. He tightened his hold on Eiri and snuggled as close as he could get despite his little baby bump. Eiri would not mind having his children resting in his arms, though. A look of absolute bliss on his face, he heaved a sigh full of content. His wide grin dwindled slowly into a soft smile, but the swell of emotion within him burned as brightly as ever. This was nice. He did not want to ever let go of this feeling.

When his pillow disappeared and the front of him grew suddenly cold, Shuichi pouted.

Growing bored of the movie, Eiri pulled out of Shuichi’s restraint-like grip, smirking at the small whine this action elicited from him. Maybe getting his baka to move back home was not going to be so difficult after all. He snatched Shuichi’s cup out of his hand. Leaning forward, he set both it and his beer on the table besides the remote control. Sitting back, he turned to face his pink-haired love and rested his hands on Shuichi’s belly. “How’re you feeling?”

A light blush coloring his cheeks, Shuichi lowered his head and said, “Pregnant.”

Eiri chuckled lightly. “Not giving you any trouble?”

Shuichi shook his head negatively. “Not yet, but it‘s still early.”

Eiri snorted. Unfortunately, that was all too true. The fun was yet to come. Yip. Ee. He could hardly wait. When Shuichi had been pregnant with little Takanori, he had very nearly gone insane. Talk about a roller coaster of emotions. It was tempting to wait until Shuichi went into labor to ask him to move back home so that he did not have to go through the rigorous side effects of his partner’s pregnancy, but not being able to hold Shuichi in his arms at night was a hundred times worse. “So, come up with any names?”

Shuichi shrugged. “A couple.”

“Like?”

“Kita if it’s a boy.”

Cute, but Eiri was not too sure about it as a choice for his son. It sounded somewhat pansy-ish. The last thing he wanted was to have a child of his go through life being teased and bullied because Shuichi could not be bothered to think up a good, strong name for their son. Seriously, did Shuichi want their child to grow up to become a weakling?

“And maybe Aina for a girl.”

Now that he could live with. “But how bout Sen if it‘s a boy?”

Shuichi muddled it over. “It’s…okay…I guess.” He had to admit that he liked the name he picked out better.

“It was my grandfather’s name.”

“Really?” This little tidbit of information did nothing to change his opinion about the name Eiri wanted for their son. It sounded like a girl’s name.

“Yes, really,” Eiri said with meaning. He knew exactly what was running through Shuichi’s mind.

Shuichi rolled his eyes. He still thought Sen sounded like a girl’s name.

“I was thinking of Kaya or Sayo for my daughter.”

Shuichi immediately latched onto the suggestions. “Oo! I like those,” he exclaimed, grinning broadly. “Hey, ya know, Mai’s thinking of Poema if she has a daughter?”

Eiri chocked. “What?! What the hell kind of name is that?”

“That’s what I said! She’s adamant though.”

“Is that like Koenma?” Eiri teased.

“Eiri,” Shuichi scolded. He slapped his husband playfully.

Eiri chuckled. He settled back next to his lover and ran his fingers through his golden mane. “Dear God. It’s like a hippie naming their kid Rainbow.”

“Hey, now there’s a name.”

Eiri narrowed his eyes at his husband. “You do you die.”

Shuichi grinned slyly. “What? You don’t like it?”

Eiri felt his eye twitch. He swore by all that was holy that if Shuichi did something as asinine as name their child “Rainbow” or “Sunshine” or “China Rose” or something he would file for divorce. A low growl trickled out of his mouth.

Shuichi giggled. Hooking his arm through Eiri’s, he laid his head back on Eiri’s shoulder. “She says ‘hi’ by the way.”

His mind still on the long list of idiotic names his husband could decide to choose for their children, he said, “Who?” in a distracted manner.

“Maiko.”

“When’d you talk to her?” It was nice that the two of them could finally start connecting. Because Shuichi had been ostracized by his father his whole life, he and his sister had not had much of a relationship. It was too bad that it took something like the events of the past two years to bring the siblings back together.

“We had lunch at that café across the street from NG. La Coix de something or other.”

Eiri chuckled. “La Noix de Coco?”

“Yeah! That’s it.”

“How is she?”

“Pregnant.”

Eiri rolled his eyes. “No kidding.”

Shuichi giggled, but the warm glow slowly dimmed until it vanished all together, leaving behind a heavy feeling of melancholy. Back when he was pregnant with Takanori, it had been so hard to tell his parents that he was going to have a baby, especially knowing how his father felt about him being a “freak of nature”, as he oh, so nicely put it. Part of him had been adamant that they would overlook their prejudices and be happy for him, maybe even excited. That had given him the courage to tell them that they were going to be grandparents. He had not expected kisses and hugs or tears of joy, but some support at least. Who would not want to have a newborn to spoil and coo over and then hand off when it was time for a changing? Yes, he had been sixteen years old, practically a baby himself. As a parent himself, he knew he would hit the roof if his child came up to him one day and admitted something like that to him. So of course, he had been prepared for a little yelling and a little screaming, but he never expected to be kicked out of his own house.

What’s more, he had not expected his parents’ reaction to do a complete one-eighty when his baby sister had to confess that she was pregnant at sixteen.

Why? Why did they welcome her with open arms and tears of joy and kisses and hugs when they had shown him such animosity? Was it because she had been practically raped by a guy she had had a crush on for years and that he had spread his legs willing? Or was it because she was a proper woman and he was nothing more than this thing stuck in between being a male and a female?

Eiri became worried when Shuichi remained silent for longer than he was accustomed to. “Baby? What’s wrong?”

A stray tear slid unchecked down Shuichi’s cheek. He shook his head.

Eiri did not like to see Shuichi like this. It had been two years, but the pain was still as raw as it was on that day when Shuichi’s father had literally tossed him out of the house. As much as he wished he could, Eiri knew he could do or say nothing to make the hurt go away. It will be with him, haunting him, for the rest of his days. “They’ll come around.” They had to. The alternative was too depressing.

Shuichi nodded, though he did not really believe that to be the case. More than anything, he wanted all of them to be this big happy family like the Waltons, but that was nothing more than a fantasy.

He swept at the tears that coursed down his face and settled back against Eiri.

Eiri laid his head against Shuichi’s where it was pillowed on his shoulder. A comfortable silence settled around them as they each settled back to watch the movie.

This was nice.

He reached out and rubbed a hand over Shuichi’s belly.

---

“Goddamnit Shuichi! She’s out to ruin you, you know that!”

Shuichi shrugged. It seems his nonchalant, laid-back attitude was annoying Eiri even more so than his noncompliance to Nami Mataguchi’s challenge. “She can try all she wants. I frankly don’t care. She can try to pick as many fights as she wants. Not my problem if she wants to come off looking like a five year old.”

“Shuichi…” Eiri sighed over the line.

Something inside Shuichi snapped. “What?! Then what the hell do you suggest Eiri?”

“Get the paternity test done.”

Shuichi did not have to think about it. He said, “No,” immediately.

“Why the hell not?”

“I don’t have anything to prove to that bitch.”
---

With a sigh, he leaned his head back against the back of the couch and stared up at the ceiling. He really screwed up hadn’t he? Shuichi did not want to give in to the demands of Nami Mataguchi. He understood the reasons behind Shuichi’s decisions, but he still thought it was foolish. She was not going to go away until she got what she wanted. Unfortunately, they could do nothing to stop her. They could not even sue her for slander.

If he had his way, he would get the paternity test done and it was not just to shut the religious extremist up either, though it would be an added benefit. No. He would get it done for Takanori. Shuichi may consider Eiri to be his son’s father and Eiri may think of Takanori as his son, but the harsh reality was that he was not little Takanori’s father and little Takanori was not his son; at least biologically speaking. Some day, Takanori may want to know who the man was who helped conceived him and he wanted to be able to give him an answer.

“Look, Shu…”

“Mm?”

When those large violet eyes turned towards him, he faltered. “Nothing.” He turned away to hide the rosy color his cheeks had taken on.

Shuichi cocked his head and studied the older man for a few seconds longer.

Eiri’s dark blonde hair was longer than he normally liked to keep it. His usual layered circle cut had grown out into long layers that brushed the collar of his open collared white button down shirt. It was parted down the middle to frame the face. It reminded him of his drummer Eri’s surfer boyfriend’s hair. He liked Eiri’s hair like this. It was pretty sexy. Though if Mika saw his hair this long she would force him to get it cut.

He took in the long black eyelashes that framed golden hazel eyes that stared out from a smooth, androgynous face, those angular cheeks, chiseled jaw, wide set shoulders and broad chest.

For the past half a year, he and little Takanori have lived apart from Eiri in a two bedroom, one bathroom apartment that he rented on the opposite side of Chiyoda from the condominium Tohma had purchased for him and Eiri when they decided to move here from Kyoto. It wasn‘t the two hundred square meters that this place was, but it served its purpose. He’d wanted to be close enough so that Eiri could visit their son whenever he chose to without having to inconvenience the author. At the same time, he’d needed their places to be far enough apart so that he could experience being his own man and having his own place without running next door to Eiri whenever he had a problem.

Moving out had been the hardest decision of his short, young life, but it was something that he’d needed to do. As excruciating as the choice may have been, if the opportunity arose, he would not take the chance to go back and stop himself from making it. He would not change his choice for anything in the world for one reason. He did not want to look back on his life fifty years from now and wonder, “what if”. He did not want to have any regrets on his deathbed like his grandfather had. However, he had to admit that as difficult as coming to this decision had been, it had been even harder to not recant the choice. It had taken all of his willpower to not call up Eiri and beg him to come and get them.

That first night alone, and every night after that, he had cried himself to sleep. Just that morning, six months after he and his son moved out, he put on a fresh pot of coffee (even though he did not even drink the stuff). Everybody knew he was a crybaby. He cried at least once a day and usually over something stupid. Now that he had his own place, he found himself bursting into tears in the most inopportune moments. For example, he had woken up after a restless night that first day and had inexplicably started sobbing when he stepped into the tatami room and did not spot an ashtray on the kotatsu. Though the apartment he rented was barely sixty square meters, without Eiri it seemed twice as large. Despite a toddler running around like a chicken with its head cut off, it was too quiet. The twin-sized bed he attempted to sleep in at night was too empty, too big for just him. When he reached out for his husband in the middle of the night only to discover that the other side of the bed was still made up, he would curl up and sob.

It was what he had wanted, but living a solitary life in that apartment, even with his son, was not turning out at all like he had imagined it would. He had never felt so alone in his entire life.

What helped him make it through those cold, lonely nights was knowing that he would be seeing Eiri.

When his gaze rose back up, he met Eiri’s smirking gaze. He blushed hotly in embarrassment at being caught ogling.

Eiri chuckled.

Shuichi peeked at eye through the curtain of hair that veiled his face. His blush deepened.

Eiri reached out and smoothed a lock of the choppy long layered cotton candy pink hair behind Shuichi’s ear. He wondered idly if it was alright for Shuichi to be coloring his hair now that he was pregnant. That was something he would have to look into.

“Eiri?” Shuichi questioned as Eiri began caressing his face.

“Stay,” Eiri found himself saying.

Tensing, Shuichi blinked. “What?” He wanted to make sure he was not reading more into what was there.

“Stay here. With me.”

Tears filled Shuichi’s eyes. “Oh, Eiri!”

Eiri brushed aside a stray tear with his thumb. “I don’t mean just for tonight.”

With a sob, Shuichi nodded.

Leaning forward, Eiri captured Shuichi lips with his own. “I love you, Shu-chan,” he whispered as he pulled away.

“Me too, Eiri,” Shuichi echoed with tears spilling down his face.

“Letting you go was the stupidest thing I ever did,” Eiri admitted. Shuichi may have needed the experience of being his own man, but with each day that passed and Shuichi’s side of the bed remained cold and empty, he had to fight the urge to drag his baka back home where he belonged.

Shuichi laughed through his tears.

Standing up, Eiri held out his hand.

Swiping at his tears, Shuichi slid his hand into Eiri’s and allowed him to pull him to his feet.

Lacing their fingers together, Eiri lead his husband to their bedroom. “Welcome home Shuichi Uesugi,” he whispered. He brought lips together just as the bedroom door shut behind them.

---TBC---

A/N: Isn’t the net great? You can find all different hairstyles for both men and women and hair colors and eye colors. Did you know people can naturally have violet eyes? I did not know that. Strange. I have green eyes, which is apparently the rarest eye color to have. Go figure. Anyway, I wanted to have a lemon, but I thought I would save it for the next one because several things happen at about the same time. So stay tuned. BTW. You can give me some suggestions on what Shuichi should have. Boy? Girl? Twins? And some names.