Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Fleeting Inspiration ❯ Home Again, Home Again, Dancing A Jig ( Chapter 15 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Fleeting Inspiration
by Anna Sartin

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Chapter 15: Home Again, Home Again Dancing a Jig

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When Eiri and Shuichi got home from the video store they found that Tatsuha and Ryuichi had already beaten them there. Eiri found them laying on their stomachs on the living room floor playing with... something... made out of cardboard. He took a closer look while Shuichi dragged in their luggage.

"The Daily Box" had been transformed into a miniature cardboard house. A door had been cut out at one side and windows had been drawn (some not quite at the correct angle) on the others. The whole box had been colored with Ryuichi's scribbling, although "The Daily Box" could still be read quite clearly on all four sides. The four flaps at the top had been cut to meet at a point and make a roof.

"What the hell is that?" Eiri asked.

"It's a house for Kumagoro!" Ryuichi said proudly. "Tatsuha helped me make it. Look!"

He motioned for them to look inside the house, where Kumagoro was sitting in a miniature-sized beach chair.

"It smells," the writer said disdainfully, crinkling his nose.

"That lady threw him in the garbage," Ryuichi said in a small voice. "It's not his fault..."

"I suggest you give him a bath before I throw him in the garbage," the blonde replied, without realizing that he had switched to addressing the older man's toy as him instead of it. He headed off to the kitchen to get a beer, ignoring the over-grown child's whining. Surprisingly his brother followed him instead of taking to opportunity to comfort the object of his affection.

"Had enough of him yet?" Eiri asked as they entered the kitchen.

"No!" Tatsuha answered quickly, appalled that his brother would even suggest such a thing. "I'm just worn out is all. Why didn't you take us home with you?"

"So you saw us, did you?"

"How could I not notice you throwing a book in the middle of the street and knocking a woman over?"

Eiri grunted in response.

"You could have waited for us!" Tatsuha said indignantly.

"Could have, but didn't," the blonde replied, opening the fridge in search of some much-needed alcoholic relief.

It was empty.

"WHERE THE HELL IS MY WUDBEISER?!!" Eiri shouted at the top of his lungs. The first two shelves of the refrigerator had been full when he left on vacation.

"I drank it," Tatsuha replied.

"ALL of it?"

"Yes. I was thirsty. You were gone for five days, Aniki."

Naturally the blonde had expected his brother to drink some of his beer while he was gone, but he hadn't expected to come home to an empty refrigerator. So he'd been gone one day longer than he'd planned; a man ought to be able to come home without finding some little twerp had polished off all his beer!

"Why the hell didn't you buy any more?"

"I'm underage, Aniki," Tatsuha reminded him.

"That never stopped you before!"

Tatsuha just shrugged. "I needed it. You wouldn't believe the week I've had."

"And just what's that supposed to mean?" his brother inquired.

Tatsuha looked at him pitifully, tears starting to form in his eyes. Eiri was disturbed by how much his brother's expression reminded him of Shuichi.

"I didn't get laid!!!" the younger Uesugi brother wailed. "I had exams every morning this week and Ryuichi-sama made me study the rest of the day!!!" He clung to his brother's shirt and cried. "He got so excited when I told him that I could move here if I passed my exams that he wouldn't let me do anything else!!!"

Eiri fought the urge to snicker as he pushed his brother away. "You actually had to work for a whole week. Your life is SO hard," he mocked unsympathetically. "Now where's my credit card?"

"But I barely got a chance to use it!" Tatsuha protested.

"Even better. Now hand it over."

Tatsuha grumbled and pulled it out of his pocket. He threw it at his brother, just as Eiri had done earlier that week. "My life sucks."

"Join the club."

. . .

In the living room Shuichi and Ryuichi were dancing around, tripping over each other and stepping on one another's feet as they tried to share the headphones of Shuichi's new Mp3 player. Eiri just shook his head and grabbed his coat.

"Yuki, where are you going???" Shuichi asked, surrendering the headphones to Ryuichi and running over to his boyfriend.

"To buy beer."

"Wait, I'll come with you!"

"No. Stay here and wait for them to deliver our mattress."

"Oh Yuki!!!" he squealed happily, grabbing his lover and dancing for joy.

"What the hell is your problem???" Eiri asked, annoyed. He tried to push Shuichi off but the little singer refused to let go.

"You said OUR mattress!"

"I slipped! Now get off me or I won't let you sleep on it!"

"Nuh uh!" Shuichi waved his finger in the older man's face. "You promised to NEVER make me sleep on the couch again!"

"Get off now or I'll make you sleep on the FLOOR!"

"Awww..." Shuichi slowly released him, feeling slightly betrayed by the threat. Eiri stalked out, slamming the door behind him.

Ryuichi continued to dance around, oblivious to what was going on around him. "Shuichi, you've GOT to show me where to get one of these things!" he laughed.

"So what happened to you guys?" Shuichi asked, when Tatsuha entered the room. The young monk pointed to his dancing boyfriend.

"He tripped over a box with a homeless woman inside it," Tatsuha explained. "She starting ranting like a lunatic and chased us down the street yelling something in English about God or something. She got a hold of Kumagoro and Ryuichi ran into a garbage can with another homeless person in it and he started yelling at us-"

"I thought it was a hut," Ryuichi interrupted, taking off the headphones.

"Huh?" Shuichi asked, confused.

"That garbage can," Ryuichi said, "I thought it was a miniature hut- like for a display, you know?- because there was a man in it."

"Anyway," Tatsuha continued. "She started waving a book in his face and he took it away from her, so she stole the trash can- really pissed the guy off, by the way- and rolled it down the middle of the street w-"

"With Kumagoro inside it!" Ryuichi yelled, interrupting him again.

Tatsuha nodded. "We could have just left then and let them kill each other but we had to get Kumagoro-chan back."

"I saw," Shuichi said, noticing suddenly that Yuki had left his keys sitting on a table. The irritable blonde would be back in a moment, grouchier than ever, when he realized he didn't have them to start the car. "So how did you guys finally get away? You were arguing with that bum when Yuki and I left."

"We all made up," Ryuichi smiled. "That lady came back and told us we shouldn't fight because it wasn't Christian."

Shuichi actually fell over. "She WHAT??? After all the trouble she caused she tells YOU not to fight???"

Ryuichi shrugged. "I told her we weren't Christian, so she gave us her bible to study. See?"

"Shuichi, where the hell are my keys?" Eiri asked, as he reentered the apartment.

Shuichi didn't- couldn't- say anything. He just stood there mutely, staring at the book Ryuichi was holding up.

Eiri looked too, and when his eyes fell upon it a scream erupted from his throat so loud that it echoed throughout the entire apartment community.

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~End chapter fifteen