Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Because of You ❯ chapter 28 ( Chapter 28 )

Because of You   Sequel to: This I Promise You   Written by: Chocho   Disclaimer: I do not own Gravitation or the characters from it.  I do not make any money from the writing of this story.   Summary: The only thing they have in common is their abhorrence for Shuichi.  Karin claims he murdered her brother.  Scott maintains that he is responsible for the death of his daughter.  Karin and Scott’s meeting may have been coincidental, but their plan to assassinate Shuichi is not.   Chapter summary:  In order to catch Karin, the police put a trap into motion.  While Shuichi sends Eiri out on an errand in the very earlier hours of the morning, Shuichi gets a phone call from Michael and some confessions are made.   Warning: Angst, drama, m-preg, language, m/m sexual content   Inserts:   A/N:  Sorry the last chapter was so short.  If you do not know who Riku is (shame on you), I have a little summery at the end.  And I also have an original fantasy story here on AFF called “A Bittersweet Reunion”.  Check it out!  Oh, hey!  Read this chapter carefully.  You will learn the gender and the names of the babies.     ***     Chapter 28     [“I want to have a crew on the Uesugi-Shindou household twenty-four-seven,” Detective Misawa was saying over the phone to his captain as he paced back and forth under the carport outside the hospital.  “I think it will be the only way to catch her.”   This woman was as slippery as a fish and as elusive as a ghost was.  She was unlike any other criminal he had ever come across.  Nothing about her made any sense.  The one thing they could count on was that she would show up at the Uesugi-Shindou household to hand deliver another photograph.   From what he was able to learn from both Uesugi-san and Seguchi-san, they had a state of the art security system on not only the house, but also Shindou-san’s recording studio and the grounds itself.  This means that if Rinjin had plans to do more than just evade the privacy of this family or play bumper cars, she would have to do it outside the compound.   Whether Rinjin Karin was watching them from down the street or sneaking up to their mailbox in the middle of the night, they needed to be there to catch her.   “…Great.  Thanks…Sure thing.”  Detective Misawa snapped the phone shut and slipped it into his coat pocket.  He turned towards his partner.  “He went for it,” he said grinning.   “Let’s just hope it works.”   “It will.”   “We’ll see.”   “All right.  You ready for this?”   Not really, Detective Shigeno thought but he nodded to the affirmative.  Neither Detective Misawa nor he actually liked this part of their job, but unfortunately, it was unavoidable if they wanted to gain the trust and cooperation of the public.  It was when the political aspect became more important than the investigation that Detective Shigeno drew the line.   Together they exited the hospital via the automatic sliding doors.  Crossing the lot, they headed towards the horde of various news agencies that seemed to have multiplied a hundred fold in the brief couple of hours since they had arrived at the hospital.   Detective Misawa took a deep breath and stepped up to the podium that sprouted microphones like mutations.  “Good afternoon.”    His voice instantly silenced the murmurings of the gathered reporters and photographers that seemed to have created a shantytown around the hospital in the hopes of catching something newsworthy that would help them to top their competitors.    “We’ll be making a short statement today.  Afterwards, we’ll take a couple questions.”  He glanced briefly over the statement that had been prepared for him earlier.  “Earlier today…”]     ***     One Month Later, January – Nara     It was nearing what was commonly known as “Dead Time” among some Paranormal Investigators.  The sparsely populated neighborhood just outside of Nara where the Uesugi-Shindou household resided was eerily quiet.  Other than the symphony of maracas echoing in the tranquility that stretched across the land, the only other sound came from the squawking of his radio that he had turned down when his watch began earlier that evening.  When Officer Shibasaki Hiroyuki pressed the button on the side of his watch, which made the face of it light up, he noticed that it was past time for his replacement to arrive.  He could not wait to get home to his wife.  They were expecting their first child any day now.   Officer Hiroyuki reached towards the console of his unmarked patrol car that was hidden deep within the shadows.  “213 to dispatch,” he called into his radio.   The static filled reply came over the radio.  “Go ahead 213.”   “No sign of target.”   “Copy 213.”   Officer Hiroyuki glanced in his rearview and side mirrors, but saw no sign of life.  All was still and quiet in the very earlier hours of the morning.  It was a perfect setting for a horror movie.  But that was what was beginning to worry him.  Where was Hideo?   Oda Hideo and he grew up together.  They even went through the Police Academy together and by a strange twist of events, somehow they both managed to end up at the Nara City Police Department.  Hideo was supposed to have replaced him as watchman over the Uesugi-Shindou compound half an hour ago.  He hoped everything was all right.  Thankfully, he was not the only officer on guard duty.  Lieutenant Katsuragi volunteered and was even now several yards down the street.  They had it so that the shift change did not happen at the same time.  That way, there was always someone at attention.  The Lieutenant was scheduled to go off duty in a couple of hours.  Officer Hiroyuki decided to give his replacement the benefit of the doubt and give him a little more time.  Even if Hideo was MIA, Officer Hiroyuki was not about to leave the Lieutenant holding the bag even though he would give anything to be with his pregnant wife right about now.    Where the hell was Hideo?     ~*~     At four o’clock in the morning, Shuichi suddenly found himself wide-awake and with an overwhelming craving.  Alternately licking and gnawing at his lips, he glanced over his shoulder.  Eiri was sound asleep with his back to him.  Shuichi smiled.  It was good to have Eiri besides him again.  His smile slipped.  Eiri looked so peaceful.  He hated to wake him.  He knew his husband needed the sleep, but he really, really, really wanted…   When he was pregnant with the twins, he really had not had any strange or bizarre cravings.  He had not wakened Eiri up in the middle of the night to make food runs.  He ate twice his body weight, at least, though.  It did not help that Eiri had had him on a strict diet.  Shuichi still has not forgiven Eiri for that.  With Kira, it was the same story.  Up until recently, it had been the same with this pregnancy.  Shuichi figured the change in his appetite in part had to do with the fact that there were three babies within him, growing and developing and the rest was due to stress because of his latest stalker.    He had only just allowed Eiri back into the bed for keeping quiet for so long about that.  Eiri had been sleeping on the couch in the Great Room with Riku for the past month as punishment.  He could have slept in his office, but had decided to keep Riku company instead.  It was a good thing they had cellphones.  And of course, Shuichi made sure that Eiri had the baby monitor with him.  There was no way he was going to lug his sorry pregnant ass to the nursery to go get Kira when the seven month old woke up at five o’clock in the morning.   Shuichi was unsure how he managed it, but somehow, Tohma managed to secure a hospital bed for Riku.  Because Riku was confined to bed for several months while his back healed, they felt it would be easier for him to be in the Great Room, which was the heart of the manor.  That way, he was not missing out on anything with the kitchen, dining room and downstairs bathroom being right there.    They had had a full house over Christmas.  Hiro, Fujisaki, Kazehaya, Shuichi’s parents, Maiko and her children had all crammed into the house.  How, Shuichi still did not know.  Ryuichi, Tatsuha, Mika and Tohma and their children had also stopped by.  And Eiri had taken full advantage of all the company.  They moved Riku’s bedroom from the second floor to the third floor and changed his old room into the nursery like Eiri and he had talked about, even though Eiri had always been against giving Riku so much privacy.  It was unavoidable, what with three new babies on the way, but that did not mean that Eiri had to like it.  Because Eiri remembered clearly what he had been like when he was Riku’s age.  So did Shuichi, which was why he pushed for giving Riku free reign over the top floor, which had been converted from attic space when they moved in years ago when the twins were toddlers.  Tohma bought and installed a chair lift for the staircase leading from the first floor to the second floor to make it easier for Shuichi to climb the stairs.  He also bought a second wheelchair, which was kept on the second floor.  Shuichi’s old wheelchair, the one Tohma purchased for him when Shuichi injured his back, was kept on the first floor.  Of course, Tohma did not stop there.  Much to Eiri’s chagrin, his brother-in-law also bought a fifty-inch flat screen television for Riku since his nephew was stuck in the Great Room, which did not have a television.  He also purchased a wheelchair for Riku, which made it easier to get Riku in and out of the house for his doctor appointments.  Even though the gifts were much appreciated, Eiri had had a serious talk with Tohma.  Eiri being Eiri, he claimed he could take care of his own family.  Of course, Tohma just smiled that smile of his and said, “Alright, Eiri,” which of course pissed off Eiri even more.   Flipping slowly and carefully onto his back and then turning onto his other side, Shuichi faced the long line of his husband’s bare back.  “Eiri,” he called softly.  He shook Eiri’s shoulder gently.  “Eiri?  I’m hungry.  Eiri,” he whined piteously when his husband continued to ignore him.  “Eiri, wake up!”   Startled awake, golden hazel eyes snapped open.  Eiri flipped onto his back and met wide violet eyes.  “What?  What is it?  What happened?” he demanded over a rate heart that had doubled.   “Uhm…”  Shuichi cast his gaze downward.  His jet-black locks swung forward over his face.  As he played with the edge of the comforter, he peered surreptitiously from time to time through the veil of bangs shielding his eyes at his husband who was staring down at him with alarm.  “Can you, uhm…”   Eiri sighed heavily and flopped back onto the bed.  He scrubbed his hands over his face.  “What is it this time?”   Shuichi continued to play with the folds of the blanket.  He lifted his gaze briefly before dropping it back down.  “I, uhm, I want ice cream,” he said in a soft voice.   Eiri dropped his hands to his sides and turned to face his partner.  “…You do realize what time it is.”   “Yeah,” Shuichi answered in a soft whisper.   “And that we have no ice cream in the house.”   “Yeah.”  His voice dropped even lower.   Eiri sighed in disgust.  This was becoming very old very fast.  This was one of many side effects of Shuichi’s pregnancy that he was beginning to despise.  He stared up at the ceiling hidden in deep shadows.  He wished he could just say no and go right back to sleep, but if he did that, Shuichi would be whining and crying and be just a difficult little bitch moaning about how Eiri did not love him or the babies developing within him…blah, blah, blah.  Eiri would get a splitting headache.  They would exchange a few not so pleasant niceties.  Shuichi would lock himself in the bathroom.  Eiri would feel so massively guilty for making the love of his life and the mother of his children so absolutely miserable that he would end up driving to the corner market and buying Shuichi his favorite ice cream, which he would use to lure the mother of his children out of the bathroom.  They would make up.  Shuichi would down the entire gallon of ice cream with a little help from Eiri.  And then they would live happily ever after.  But as much as the hot, steamy make up sex turned him on, the rest was a definite deal breaker.  So instead, Eiri thought it more prudent to just run up to the store now and bypass all that.  Besides, he might still get the kinky sex part.  Only it would be out of gratitude.    “Eiri?”   Eiri was snapped out of his thoughts by Shuichi’s worried voice calling out to him.  “Alright,” he sighed.  “Alright.”   A huge grin split Shuichi’s face.  “Thank you, Eiri!”   Eiri’s face twitched as he fought back his own smile.  That was how much Shuichi’s happiness affected him.  He cleared his throat.  “Yeah, yeah,” Eiri grumbled.    Shuichi giggled.  He may act like an airhead and an idiot, but he knew what he did to Eiri and he definitely played it up every chance he got.   Tossing aside the bedcovers, Eiri grabbed his cotton pajama pants that had been discarded earlier that night up off the floor and slipped them on.  Standing up, he turned around and kneeling on the mattress, leaned over and kissed Shuichi chastely on the lips.   “Love you,” Shuichi said as Eiri pulled back.   Eiri smiled.  “I know,” he whispered back.  His gaze traveled to Shuichi’s bulbous belly.  A surge of pride swelled up in him.  Those were his children in there.  It was hard to believe.  When he was sixteen, he never would have thought he would be at this point in his life.  Hell, when he first met Shuichi he never would have imagined his life would have turned out like this.  He raised his head and met Shuichi’s smiling eyes.  Bending over, he kissed his husband once, twice, three times.   “Go,” Shuichi giggled pushing Eiri away.  His eyes sparkled with amusement.  “Get me my ice cream.”   Eiri chuckled as he straightened.   “Besides,” Shuichi added as he watched Eiri’s tight ass cross the master bedroom.   “Hm?”   “Your face is all scratchy.”   Eiri halted right before the walk-in closet.  He glanced over his shoulder with golden eyes sparkling mischievously.  A devilish grin crossed his face.   Shuichi gulped uncertainly though things low in his body began twitching.   An all-knowing smile crossed Eiri’s face as he vanished into the walk-in closet.   Shuichi collapsed against the mattress.  Tugging at one of the pillows, he held it over his face to muffle any sounds he would make.  Then tossed it aside with a contented sigh.  Did it make him vain to admit that he loved his life?  Well, despite the psychotic bitch that was after him anyway.     ~*~     Yawning, Shuichi scrubbed his achy eyes as he rolled back onto his other side and tucked the body pillow back between his legs.  He fixed the blankets that had become twisted.    Now that he was in the last trimester of his pregnancy, Shuichi found he was becoming more and more tired.  It was not much of a surprise.  Having gone through two pregnancies before this, one of them with twins, he had been expecting it.  But this time it seemed to be worse than the other two times combined.  It might have something to do with there being three babies developing within him.  Everything seemed to be magnified thrice.  He was also finding it difficult to fall asleep at night again, something else he had anticipated.  When he did manage to fall asleep, it was not very restful.  Eiri tried giving him massages, but of course they did not help him relax.  They just riled him back up.  Shuichi knew damn well Eiri did it on purpose.  He was such a pervert.  Taking naps throughout the middle of the day seemed to make up for the restless nights, when he could get them in anyways.  Having four children-, one confined to bed with a broken back, another one only seven months old and two other ones that acted like Tasmanian devils- made it hard to actually sleep during the day.  It only worked when the twins were at school.  It did not matter where he slept, whether it be in Eiri and his bedroom, the couch in the living room or somewhere else or whether Eiri forbid the boys from bothering him.  Nothing seemed to work.  Sleeping on his side with a pillow, either between his knees or under his belly did help him fall asleep at night occasionally, but it did not always work.  He just could not wait to have his c-section and get these kids out of him.   Shuichi now saw his OB/GYN, Dr. Takanaga, almost every day now.  Typically, the norm this late in a pregnancy was a weekly visit to the doctor, but seeing as Shuichi was who he was, Dr. Takanaga wanted to see him every day.  Sometimes, it was every other day.  She also came to the house.  It was much safer, for a variety of reasons.  And it seemed as if every time they saw her, she changed his due date.  At first, she was saying it would be at the beginning of April.  Now she was saying sometime in March.  They were aiming for the week of March 23.  He would be thirty-five weeks along then, but Shuichi was not holding his breath.  He knew how multiple births went.  The more fetuses developing within an expectant mother, the earlier the due date typically.  Because he was pregnant with triplets, Dr. Takanaga wanted to wait as long as possible so that they had enough time to develop.  In the end though, it did not matter what Dr. Takanaga or he wanted, prayed or hoped for.  Yosuke, Shinta and Yukiko had the final say.   Feeling suddenly the heavy weight of sleep pressing over him, Shuichi yawned again and let his lids drift closed.  It seemed like only seconds later when he was jerked away by a strange buzzing.  Prying open heavy lidded eyes, Shuichi flitted his tired gaze around the room until his cellphone came within view.  The screen was lit up and the phone itself, being on vibrate, was dancing across the nightstand.  Propping himself up on his elbow, he reached over to his bedside table and grabbed his phone.  A familiar name brought a wide grin to his face.  Flopping back onto the bed, Shuichi grinned widely.  The last vestiges of sleep vanished instantly as he answered the phone.   “Michael!”   “Hey, Shu,” greeted his long time friend.  “What’s going on?  I didn’t wake you, did I?”   “Not at all!  No!”   “I completely forgot the time difference,” Michael said sheepishly.   Shuichi laughed.  “I was up.”   “Oh?”   “I sent Eiri to the store.”   Michael laughed.  “What was it this time?”   “Ice cream.”   “Mmm.  Sounds good.”   “I know!  Doesn’t it?”   “What kind you gonna get?”   “Don’t know.  Told Eiri to call me when he got to the store.  Something chocolate-y and nutty and marshmallow-y.”   “…Hm…There’s…Roc ky Road.  I don’t know if they have that in Japan.  Do they?”   “Rocky Road?”  Sounded familiar.   “Yeah.  You had it when we toured through North America once.  It’s chocolate ice cream with nuts, marshmallows and chocolate pieces.  One of my favorites.”   Shuichi was beginning to drool.  “Oo!”  His free hand flew to his belly.   “Shu?” came Michael’s worried voice over the line.   “I think you made the babies hungry,” Shuichi chuckled lightly.  “They’re beginning to grow restless.”   “Sorry,” the ex-bassist chuckled.  Then his tone turned serious.  “I heard about Riku,” Michael confessed.   Shuichi sighed.  “Yeah.”   “How’s he doing?  He broke his back?”   “Actually,” Shuichi said as he sat up and began piling the pillows up behind him, “it was a compression fracture.”   “Now, was that what you had?”   “Nnn…Not really.  I had bruising and fluid build up.”   “Ah, okay.”   “And of course, the nerves were damaged.”   “And you’re going in for surgery this summer to fix them?”   “Yeah.”  Shuichi stifled a yawn.   “Tired?”   “Yeah, but I still want that ice cream.”   Michael laughed lightly.  “So, Riku will be alright?”   Shuichi nodded.  “He should make a full recovery.”   “Good!”   “He goes to see the doctor tomorrow, so…Actually, he’s doing better than the doctors thought.”   “Really?”   “Yeah.  They’re surprised.”   “I’m glad he’s going to be okay.”   “Yeah.  Me, too.”   “So, what’s he gonna do about school?  Didn’t the semester start the other day?  This was supposed to be his last semester, right?”   “We sat down and had a talk about that once Riku was released from the hospital last month.”   “He’d have to take off, right?  Until he’s healed?”   Shuichi scratched the back of his head.  “Yeah,” he sighed.  “He’s pretty bummed about that, but he did not have any other choice.  So, he is going to make it up this summer.  That way, he will still be able to start Graduate school this fall in Kyoto.”   “That’s good.  Hey, at least he’ll be around when his brothers and sister are born, huh?”   Shuichi instantly brightened.  “Yeah, that’s right!  We will definitely need all the help we can get.  I am trying to get Eiri to agree to hire a nanny, or something, but so far, he is against it.  I tried telling him that most celebrities have one, but…”   “Maybe you can get your parents to move out to Nara.”   “You know, I never thought about that.  My dad did retire last spring and they are always complaining about how little they get to see the boys.”   “There ya go.”    “And our neighbors just put their house up for sale.”   “Really.”  He wondered if it was just coincidence or had something to do with Shuichi’s newest stalker.  Michael did not like to bring it up, but…  “What about Kane and Keitaro?  How are they holding up?”   Shuichi sighed heavily and shook his head.  “Nightmares.”   “Oh, no,” Michael groaned.   Shuichi felt tears welling in his eyes.  Sadness overwhelmed him, but underneath the grief of being forced to watch his boys suffer was a rising anger that has been simmering for the past month.  How dare this chick!  Who did she think she was?  How dare she go after his children?  Whatever problem she had with him was between her and him.  She was going to pay for messing with his boys.  “We have all of them, Riku too, seeing a psychiatrist and it seems to work for the most part, but…”   “…Well, they went through a traumatic experience.”   Shuichi nodded with a heavy head and a heavier heart.  He knew more than anyone what a traumatic experience could do to a person, but he could not comprehend how it must be for the boys being as young as they were.  Thinking about his boys’ suffering brought back painful memories of his own harrowing experience.  It had been nearly twenty years since then, but it was still as fresh as the day it happened.  Shuichi gave a violent shudder and pushed it to the back of his mind.  Mulling over his past made him remember his autobiography that he was supposed to be working on.  He had not touched it since he received that phone call from his mother back in August in the middle of the night about his grandfather’s passing.  And honestly, he was not even sure if or when he would ever finish it.  Though Shuichi did not like to leave things unfinished, he knew Eiri would not mind that in the least if his book never got finished.   “Hey,” came Michael’s suddenly chipper voice through the leaden silence that had enveloped the two friends.  There was a sly edge to his voice.  “Did you get the Christmas presents I sent you guys?”   Thankful for the sudden change in subjects, Shuichi arched his cramped back over the mound of pillows and ran his free hand through his hair.  A wide toothy grin spread across his face.  “Yeah!  They were so cute,” he cooed.   A couple days before Christmas, they received a rather large package in the mail from Michael that contained presents for all of them.  Since this passed summer, Kane’s personality has undergone a drastic change.  Once a little on the girlie side, for which Eiri blamed Shuichi, Kane has developed a sudden passion for baseball and soccer (or “football” for those outside of the US and Canada).  He was no longer interested in Dora the Explorer, Diego or SpongeBob SquarePants, or any of those other shows that are for “babies”.  He has finally become what Eiri called, “a little man”.  Eiri himself gathered up all of Kane’s nightgowns out of the trash where Kane had tossed them and had a nice bonfire out in the backyard.  Shuichi had mourned their loss.  Hearing about his nephews sudden sports fascination, Michael sent Kane some sports equipment for Christmas.  Since it still took a threat to get Kane to clean up his half of the bedroom, now instead of toys it was all of his baseball and soccer equipment all over the place.  Shuichi wondered if having his hair lopped off had anything to do with his sudden personality change.  Keitaro was still the same, though.  He was just a little bookworm so Michael sent him some books, which Keitaro finished reading within a week of receiving them.  Riku just got money, which he was fine with.  For the triplets, Michael gave them a whole bunch of little booties, bibs, pacifiers and the like.   “The kids loved their presents.”   “That’s good.  I’m glad, but what about you and Eiri?”   Shuichi’s mind went blank.  “Me and Eiri what?” he asked.   “How did you and Eiri like your present?”   Knowing instantly what Michael was referring to, Shuichi’s face turned lobster red.  “You know…”   “What?” Michael asked.  His dark eyes sparkled in amusement.   “You got me into serious trouble.”   Michael chuckled.   “Well,” Shuichi pouted, “I didn’t know what you’d gotten us, so I…uhm…”   Michael just laughed.   “Don’t laugh!” Shuichi whined.  “I had to tell the boys that it was a special rolling pin.”   Michael laughed harder.   “But then they wanted to use it to make cookies…”   That sent Michael in hysterics.  “Oh, God!  I just pissed my pants!”     ~*~     On Christmas morning, after all the presents had been torn into leaving the sitting room buried beneath countless layers of wrapping paper, bows, ribbon and tissue paper, a horn had sounded from outside.  Their security detail had instantly been on alert.  Tohma, Mika, that brainless idiot Sakuma and Eiri’s perverted brother were scheduled to come over later that day, but nobody was expecting anyone else, especially so earlier in the day.  On guard, Satoshi and Sanami, who had been on duty, checked it out.  They came back a few minutes later to inform Eiri that he was needed outside.  Not sure what to expect, Eiri had been on his guard when he stepped out of the house.    To say he had been dumbfounded would be an understatement.  There sitting in his driveway was a cobalt blue vintage 1969 Ferrari 365 GTS.  It was the exact car he had been drooling over several months back when he saw the commercial for an antique car show during some movie Shuichi and he had been watching.   “Merry Christmas, Eiri,” Shuichi had said as he rolled up behind him in his wheelchair.   The two-seater Ferrari 365 GTS was one of only twenty ever produced.  It was a combination of the rear body from the 275 GTS and the 500 super fast front.  It had a Columbo V-12 engine.  The guy living in Minnesota that Shuichi had purchased the Ferrari from had completely remodeled the car.  One of the improvements he made was to install power windows for the old hand cranked ones and updated the AC.  The interior had been completely reupholstered in black leather and the exterior was freshly painted a dark cobalt blue.  The Ferrari still retained the original factory hard top.  With a twin double exhaust 4390cc SOHC engine, the Ferrari 365 GTS went from zero to sixty in five-point-nine seconds and reached top speeds of 175 MPH (281.6 km/h).  The 60-degree vee-type V-engine ran on twelve cylinders and had three hundred twenty horses under the vented hood.  It ran on gas-petrol and the transmission was manual, but it was a rear wheel drive vehicle and everything Eiri thought it would be.    That night after everybody had gone to bed, Shuichi had allowed Eiri the opportunity to properly thank him before kicking his sorry ass to his office couch, which was where Eiri slept until their guests left and then he went back to the couch in the sitting room.  Until last night that was.   And as Eiri sat behind the wheel of his Ferrari, with Blade besides him in the passenger seat- Marcus and Kaoru were at the house with Shuichi and the boys- his gaze kept flitting to the rear view mirror every few seconds.  A frown creased his forehead.  Maybe it was just his paranoia.  “Hey.”   “I see it.”  Blade’s deep bass voice echoed within Eiri’s chest.   “Since we turned off our street.”   “Could be a cop,” Blade suggested, though he did not sound too convincing.   “…Maybe.”  But Eiri doubted it.   “You think it’s that crazy chick?”   “…Don’t know.”  He hoped not.     ~*~     “You finished?” Shuichi demanded feeling put out as Michael continued laughing hysterically at his angst.  Michael would not find the whole incident so amusing if he were in Shuichi’s shoes.  Kane and Keitaro still bring up the “French Rolling Pin”.  Damn Michael!   Laughing, Michael said, “…Yeah…”  He cleared his throat and wiped the tears from his eyes.  “Okay.  Sorry.”   Shuichi did not believe him.    “I heard…”  Michael’s voice drifted off into a chuckle that he tried to cover with a couch.  “…I heard,” he tried again, “that you agreed to appear on Desert Star’s album?”   “Sorta,” Shuichi confessed.  “They wanted me to make a guest appearance on a remake of, uhm, Brooke Hogan’s song?”   Michael made a noise over the line that made it clear that he knew exactly what song Shuichi was speaking about.  “God.  My oldest used to play that song on endless repeat.”   Michael Kagawa-Montgomery was a Japanese-American with black eyes and blond hair just a tad lighter than Eiri.  He appeared as Japanese as the next person did except for his hair.  It was the only indication that he was not pure Japanese.  He had been an exchange student at Tokyo University when he joined Bad Luck with Shuichi’s twin cousins Kai and Kei Shiro.  The three became members of Bad Luck after Claude “K” Winchester resigned as their manager.  K used to be Sakuma Ryuichi’s manager, but decided to manage Bad Luck after watching them open for ASK at Zepp Tokyo.  K wanted to do for Bad Luck what he did for Sakuma Ryuichi.  And that was exactly what he did.  But after nearly a decade with them, K decided there was no more he could do for Bad Luck and decided his services would be better appreciated with what had been a fledgling band at the time, a rock band that called themselves Ninku.  They won a contest put on by a national radio program to be the opening act for Bad Luck at one of their concerts.  The crowd loved them as had K, who has been their manager ever since.  Ninku has since gone on to be one of the greatest rock bands ever.  But when K left, that left Bad Luck in a bind.  So, Tohma offered Fujisaki the manager position, which he gladly accepted.  Unfortunately, he could not run the band and be in the band at the same time.  While he still helped to produce their songs, and played with the band every once in a while, he had been forced to retire from actual performing, which left a huge hole in the band.  Not long after, Kei and Kai overheard Shuichi’s plight at a family reunion and offered their services.  They had had a band of their own along with Michael.  After a successful audition, the three joined Bad Luck as its newest members.  They were fortunate enough that the legions of Bad Luck fans welcomed them warmly.  A year after joining, Michael married his college sweetheart, Anzu, and had three beautiful children, two daughters and a son ages thirteen, ten and seven respectively.  Unfortunately, Michael and Anzu’s marriage has been a little on the rocky side for some time now.  And from what Shuichi learned from his cousins’ at their grandfather’s funeral, they were now separated.    A frown drew Shuichi’s brows together and tilted the corners of his mouth downwards.  He wondered if there was something behind this late night phone call other then a simple call to say, “Hi”.  It was strange for Michael to “forget” the time difference.  Michael had lived in Japan from the time he was in Middle School to about the time Bad Luck disbanded seven years ago.  Essentially, Michael spent most of his life in Japan.  So, for him not to realize that it was four o’clock in the morning here in Nara, Japan, something must have happened.  The only other time Shuichi could think of that Michael had been so confused about the time difference had been last spring when Anzu had a miscarriage.   Michael’s voice drew Shuichi out of his thought.  “You going to do it?”   It took several seconds for Shuichi to remember what it was they were supposed to be talking about.  “…I started,” Shuichi admitted in a distracted manner.  “But with everything that has been going on…”   “Right.  Right.”   Shuichi sighed.  “I think Ryu’s going to do it instead.”   “Sakuma Ryuichi?”   “Yeah.”   “I didn’t think he knew how to rap.”   Shuichi shrugged.  “Mm.  I’m sure he’ll think of something.”   “Yeah.  Yeah, you’re right.  This is Sakuma Ryuichi after all.”   “So instead,” Shuichi said over a yawn, “we’re going to be working on a song called ‘Bird’ that I’ve been working on.”   “Cool,” Michael exclaimed.   “Actually…”  Shuichi was a little unsure how to say this or how Michael would take it.  The only person who knew that he has been thinking about this for some time now was Eiri and of course, he supported Shuichi no matter what he decided to do.  What with him being confined to bed, Shuichi had so much time on his hands.  “…The song won’t be on…their album.”   There was silence.   “…Michael?”   “What do you mean?”   This time it was Shuichi who was unsure what to say.  “…I…I was thinking of putting, of putting out a…solo CD.”  It was a whisper by the end.   “What?  That’s great, Shuichi!”   Shuichi was floored.  “You mean, you aren’t mad?”   “Why would I be?”   “I don’t know.  I just thought-”   “Shuichi,” Michael scolded.  “If this is what you want, then I’m going to be behind you one hundred percent.”   A smile flashed the gloom from his face.  “Thanks, Michael,” he sighed.  He had been afraid that the guys would be angry with him for wanting to do this on his own.  He knew that people were eager for something knew from Bad Luck.   “But…”   “…But what?” Shuichi asked suspiciously.   “You gotta let me help produce your album.”   Shuichi snorted and then started chuckling.  Michael really was something else.  But that got Shuichi into thinking.  If Michael wanted to help produce his album, that meant that Michael would have to move back to Japan and with his marriage as it was, was that really a good idea?  “It would be an honor, Michael, but what about Anzu?  Do you really think that she’d want to upset-?”   “Actually, Shuichi,” Michael interrupted, “she packed up the kids and moved back in with her parents.”  His voice was so low that Shuichi had to strain his ears in order to hear him.   Shuichi was stunned into silence.  “…But…don’t her folks live in Hiroshima?”   “They used to.  They moved to Nagasaki some time ago to be near their son who lives there with his wife.”   “…But…”  That made no sense.  “Michael what’s going on?  I thought the two of you were just separated?  Why would she do something like that?  What about her job?  Besides, it’s in the middle of the school year.  I mean-?”   “Because…”   “Because what?” Shuichi demanded.   “…I was served today.”   Shuichi’s mind went blank.  “Huh?” he asked deadpanned.   “Served.  I was served Shuichi.”   “Served what?”   Michael sighed heavily and fingered his hair with his free hand.  “Anzu wants a divorce.”   As what he said slowly sunk in, Shuichi’s eyes steadily grew wider.  “Oh, my God.  Michael!  Why?  I, I, I thought, I thought the two of you were going for marriage counseling?”   “I don’t know,” Michael said.  His voice was strained.  “I moved into an apartment when we separated and I thought things were going well in counseling, but…today at work…”  His voice cracked and he could not say anymore.   “Oh, Michael, I’m so sorry.”  Tears welled up in Shuichi’s eyes.   “…Me, too.”  Michael cleared his throat.  “But, unfortunately…these things happen.”     ***TBC***   A/N:  I already mentioned this once before, but in case you are not aware of it, Riku Kitazawa is Yuki Kitazawa’s son (just in case his family name was not clue enough).  He is from Gravitation EX (sequel to Gravitation).  But if all you know Gravitation from is the anime, then of course, there is a lot you are missing, especially Riku, the fact that Eiri has gone temporarily blind and that Shuichi “cheated” on Eiri with Ryuichi.  In my story, Eiri and Shuichi adopted Riku.  In “This I Promise You” he was spending time in NYC with his aunt Yoshiki (Yuki Kitazawa’s little brother who has become a transgender- in the process of changing from a male into a female.  In Gravitation EX vol. 1, she gets Shuichi and Eiri to watch Riku while she goes in for surgery to become full female).  I am not sure how old Riku is in Gravitation EX vol. 1, but I made him five.  Get it?           So!  Did you catch it?  Know the gender and names of the babies?  Watcha think?                 Oh, hey.  Did you hear about those three US soldiers whom allegedly gang-raped some fourteen year old in Okinawa?  Disgusting perverts should be ashamed of themselves!  I hope they get what they deserve.