Burdens of a Depressive Mind
Fire Angel

Disclaimer: I'll admit here that I do not own Gackt, Hyde, nor any other J-Rocker mentioned in this story, nor do I claim to know them. Their lives and actions are not mine, however, in this story I've taken them and twisted them to do my own free will. Therefore - their actions here, whilst based on things they've said in interviews and such, are not necessarily true. This is not gospel. It's fiction. Take it or leave it. ^^

Chapter 2

They say that life goes on and I guess, to a certain extent, this is true. Although in my case, pieces of my life moved on while others lingered viciously and painfully within my past, haunting me as I went through the day-to-day activities of life for a twenty-eight year old (or, more correctly, the day-to-day activities of life for Gackt).

I woke in the early hours of the morning. I trained. I thought of Hyde and subsequently wound up both jerking myself off and crying my eyes out (“Dammit, why the fuck are you married?!?!”). I forced myself to eat breakfast and then retched it up only thirty seconds later as I thought of my days with Malice, my near-relationship with Mana, and the deep feelings I’d had for my long-deceased friend Kami. I fed my gorgeous dog Bell (who wasn’t quite the drama queen that Runa-chan had been – thank God – although she was getting damn close), and then curled up on the couch with tears streaming down my face for a reason I couldn’t even pinpoint anymore.

Meanwhile I was churning songs out for the public, making as much use of my admittedly-bad English as I could possibly stomach (I rewrote ‘12-gatsu no Love Song’ in English and it took me at least a week… but I haven’t told that to anyone yet, my public confession is that it took about a day), and raking in cash from CD sales, CM appearances, random naked spots in magazines (often featuring other members of GacktJOB who were often also naked, or alternatively, naked females who were young enough to make me look like a freaking paedophile), and making a general ass of myself in public.

Life, frankly, sucked dick (merely theoretical dick, unfortunately).

My evenings were wasted on dutiful yet somewhat fun group outings with my boys and at times I found myself amused with the fact that my neighbouring Kazuke Road inhabitants still found me strange and still had a hard time getting used to the strange schedule of my vampiric nightlife. A vampiric nightlife which, admittedly, sucked, but was a nightlife just the same. Those nights I spent with my friends were the only times in life I ever felt like the old Gackt.

It was with these thoughts in mind that I sat down at my computer one night and poured out the tragic story of Kei, a lonely man-cum-vampire who wants nothing more than a friend, when in fact, one by one, all his friends desert him and leave him utterly alone. So far, it wasn’t much of an idea at all, just a basic scenario with a few ideas tacked on here and there.

But it was a good scenario, I thought.

I typed furiously, ignoring Bell’s whining at my feet (“Gacchan you haven’t walked me in three whole days, and also, I’m hungry Gacchan”), and ignoring the phone when it rang, especially when my answering machine picked up and revealed it to be an equally-whiny You (“Gacchan where are you, we’re waiting Gacchan”), and even more so when the next call turned out to be Mana (“Gacchan I know it’s been a while but I love you and I still miss you Gacchan, Gacchan I want to talk to you, where are you Gacchan?”). Instead of answering their pleas, I engulfed myself with and then locked myself into the world of my story, not even aware that tears were streaming down my face and flooding my lap as I plotted out the miserable, somewhat true story surrounding vampire Kei and his best friend Sho.

Time passed. Minutes felt like seconds. The next time I became aware of the phone’s noisy ringing as it ripped me away from the fictional Taiwanese city I’d fashioned for my characters, I was surprised to find Bell sleeping noisily next to my chair and slivers of sunlight breaking in through my arrow slit windows. I’d been sitting up all night! (A closer look at the computer told me I had thirty pages of size twelve font, which further amazed me, especially when it suddenly repaginated and re-told me that I actually had thirty-three pages of size twelve font.)

Standing, I stepped carefully over Bell and drifted over to where the portable phone was lying, forgotten, on my bed, answering it with a hugely yawned, “Moshi moshi… Gakuto doesu.”

“Gakkun, ohayou gozaimasu… Shinji desu.”

“Oh! Shinji-kun! Oyahou! Genki?” I asked politely, trotting back over to my computer and tripping over Bell on the way. (She woke with a start, snapped at me, ignoring my profuse, albeit silent apologies, wandered over to the foot of my bed and curled up with a content snore. Lazy thing.)

“Mmm… genki yo. I didn’t wake you, did I?”

“Wha? Oh, no, no, I’ve been up all night. You didn’t wake me.” Sitting, I flicked my eyes over the document and replaced my ‘???’ marks denoting the undecided name of Sho’s older brother with the name ‘Shinji’.

“Up all night?!” the real Shinji demanded shrilly. I couldn’t help but grin – sometimes my friend really did act like an older brother. He worried about me far too much, almost as if I were 17 and in need of love and support all over again. “Gakkun, what’s wrong with you?”

“I’m writing a novel. I want to make it into a movie.”

“A novel? And a movie?” he asked incredulously. “Christ, is there anything you don’t do?”

I found myself laughing, answering him, “Well I don’t date, I don’t smell bad, and apparently I don’t know how to be subtle, either.”

My friend chuckled. “Still not dating? You need a girlfriend.” No, I need Hyde. “I’ll tell you what, I’m having a small dinner party next week for my birthday. Why don’t you come? I’ve got a couple of female friends who are young, single and good looking. Just your type, Gackt.”

“Oh, I don’t know, Shinji-kun, I’m happily single you know.”

He laughed. “It’s okay, ne. I’m not actually asking you because I think you need a girl – although it’s true a girl might help the situation – I’m really asking you because, well, it’s my birthday and I want my closest friends to be near me when I break down in tears.”

“Shinji-kun, why are you going to cry on your birthday?”

“Because I’ll be forty-two. I’m old, Gakkun, it’s a horrid thought.”

“Aw, you’re not old. I still love you.”

Shinji snickered. “That’s what I was afraid of.

“So, what’s your story about?”

“Huh?” I asked stupidly, before blushing and following up quickly with, “Oh. It’s about a lonely vampire whose name is Kei, and the friends he makes and loses during the years of his long, sad life… That’s all I can tell you though. My story is shrouded in mystery – for now.”

“Gackt, I’m your best friend. If you can’t tell me, who can you tell?”

Laughing, I defended myself, “It’s not finished yet. If you’re lucky, I’ll tell you once I know how the whole story goes – from beginning to end. Or maybe,” I added cheerfully, “you’ll just have to wait and see it in the cinemas.”

“Ambitious, aren’t we,” he teased gently, believing in my desire but not my ability to see the project through. “And just who is going to be your leading actor?”

I shook my head. I’d been asking myself the same question over and over again the night before. Every word that came from Kei’s mouth seemed real to me, but I had no image in my head of how he looked, of how he really felt towards the other characters. “I don’t know,” I said in frustration. “I can’t see Kei. It’s annoying because I can’t finish this story until I know him. Sho – I know him, Sho is me. He acts like me and he talks like me and… he’s me. But Kei… I don’t know who he is. Shinji-kun, how do I find him?” (Even now, I was turning to my once-mentor for advice. It was sort of embarrassing.)

I could almost hear Shinji’s smile. “Gakkun, you created Kei. He belongs to you, he’s in your head and only you can find him. So just set yourself aside some time and do just that. Deconstruct your head until you find him hiding there.”

“You make it sound like he’s playing a game with me.”

Shinji chuckled. “He could well be.”

“Thanks, Shinji-kun.”

“No problem. I take it you’ll be coming then, next week?”

“Of course. How could I miss the opportunity to laugh at you when you break down in tears,” I teased. “I’ve been waiting for this moment forever, Shinji.”

“Well, I’ll see you then. Good luck in finding Kei.”

“Bai bai.”

I hung up and looked at Bell, who was staring at me accusatorily, the way a wife would if her husband had been avoiding her for the last three days. I stared back, hoping to scare her off. But she just sniffed delicately and tapped her forepaw on the tiled black floor of my room.

With a defeated sigh, I threw up my hands. “All right, all right! I’ll get you some food, okay?”

Bell’s gaze didn’t leave mine. She sniffed again. She kept tapping.

“Yes, yes, it’ll be a feast fit for a king. Just stop staring, you demanding creature. Jesus,” I muttered as I stormed into the kitchen, “sometimes you’re as bad as Runa-chan was.”

A loud bark sounded from my bedroom, the equivalent to said wife yelling “I HEARD THAT, BASTARD!” at her husband.

Damned dog.

As I reluctantly cooked up a huge breakfast for Bell, I wondered amazedly how, inevitably, I had eventually become my bitch’s bitch.

That afternoon I sat down and thought about Kei, tried to find him in the fucked-up maze of my mind, and found myself failing miserably. First I was interrupted by a knock on the door from You…

You: “Gacchan, you didn’t call back last night.”

Me: “Sorry, You, I was unavoidably busy. Did you guys have fun?”

You: “Yeah, but we missed you. Me most. After all, I was looking forward to seeing your new jacket.”

Me: *amused* “…Or rather, me with lack of jacket. Right?”

You: *pause* *blush* “Umm…”

Me: *pause* “Well I’ll tell you what. Come back in three hours and I’ll let you see lack of said jacket, alright? I’ll even tell you what I was doing last night. But I’m a little busy right now.”

You: *hurriedly* “But of course Gacchan, I’ll let you be. See you in three hours!”

After ridding myself of my friend, and, it seemed, soon-to-be sex buddy (but that was okay because I was seriously turning into chaste virgin goddess Athene – minus the virgin part – and not enjoying it), I turned and sat down at my desk again, only to be interrupted once more, this time by a phone call from Mana…

Mana: “Gacchan, you didn’t call back last night, Gacchan.”

Me: “Sorry. I was unavoidably busy.”

*awkward silence*

Mana: “Gacchan, I miss you.”

Me: “I know. Sucks doesn’t it.”

Mana: “?!”

Me: “Look, Mana. I stopped seeing you for a reason.”

Mana: *snakily* “Because you’re an asshole who was only ever interested in pretty-boy Haido, right?”

Me: “No, because you’re a jealous, possessive bint and I got tired of fending off your constant attempts to give me a headjob.”

Mana: *whining* “But you said that one time that it was…”

*loss of temper on my part*

Me: “Yeah, it was, but only because I was thinking about someone I couldn’t have, and at least having you was a better comparison to having no one!”

Mana: “!…… Gacchan…”

Me: “I’m sorry Mana, but I’ve got to go. You know how it is: stuff to see, people to do.”

Mana: “People?! Like who?!”

Me: “Like people you don’t know.”

Mana: “…”

Me: *coldly* “Bye now.”

I hung up and then, feeling bad, immediately called him back and apologised for being such a jerk, but maintained that “I think it’s best we keep our separation intact, at least for now”. After dealing with a few tears on his part and several declarations of undying love, I hung up the phone and sat in a meditative stance on my bedroom floor with a paper and pencil at hand, ready to create in my mind – and consequently, on paper – the image of Kei.

With my eyes closed, I poked around my mind, thinking of what I already knew about Kei – old in age but eternally young-bodied and equally beautiful, knowledgeable, shy, softly-spoken, depressed – and sketched him carefully out on the piece of paper, feeling more than seeing the soft pout that creased his features when he talked to Sho, who adored and respected him, the reluctant smile that found its way to his perfect lips every now and then, the way his eyebrows tweaked to subtly reveal his emotion, and somewhere, in the back of my mind, hearing his light, sad voice, chatting away and laughing at something Sakura had said.

Sakura?

My eyes snapped open at the sound of that familiar, and yet all-too-distant laugh, and when I looked down at my paper, seeing those soulful eyes staring out at me, captured almost perfectly by my now-shaking hand, I clenched my pencil so hard that I snapped it in half, and promptly burst into tears.

All along, the image of Kei was… Hyde.

When You showed up later on, smelling of mint and rosewater, I’m informed that he wound up kicking the door down to come find me because I neglected to answer it. He found me dead drunk, crying heartbrokenly, and attempting to hang myself from the bathroom fan with one of my favourite S&M whips. When he gently pried the leather thong away from me, I lashed out and tried to stab him with the convenient knife I’d placed on the sink just in case the hanging idea didn’t work.

In the end, he put good use to the random sadomasochistic items I had lying around my room, using my silver handcuffs to chain my hands behind my back and prevent me from doing anything stupid that could possibly have resulted in injury or death to either one of us. (It has always surprised me how resourceful You is, even at the worst of times, even when given the most ridiculous items to work with.) Then he held me tightly as I sobbed into his arms about my fucked-up head, my never-to-be-fulfilled obsession with Hyde, my sucky movie script and my terrible increase in weight.

(The last two, by the way, were in hindsight totally not true, however at the time I was drunk and depressed and looking for anything to whine about.)

“No one loves me, You,” I whispered once my tears had subsided. Biting my lip, I glanced up at him and added, “How could anyone ever love me? I’m fat and rude and just generally a bastard to everyone. And my novel… my story is the worst.”

“I do.”

My drunk brain was still stuck on my movie script comment which didn’t entirely gel with You’s tender response. I shook my head, saying loudly, “E? Nani iite no?”

“I love you, Gacchan.”

Oh, I realised surprisedly, that’s what he meant.

“Y-you do?”

You nodded, his brown eyes flicking momentarily away from mine, and then back as they filled with tears. “You know how much it hurts me to see you so depressed about Hyde-sama all the time, and so angry at Mana… when… you know… I’m here, ne. If you need someone, Gacchan, I’m here. I… I know you don’t feel the same, but that’s… that’s okay. Ii yo. I’m here anyhow…

“I’m sorry,” he whispered suddenly, “I just thought I should tell you…… it’s… it’s only fair, after all. I’m sorry…”

“You-chan, I’m drunk,” I informed him in surprising sobriety. “I won’t remember this tomorrow, ne.”

“I know,” he murmured, reaching up and wiping away the tears spilling from the corners of his brown eyes. “That’s why I wanted to…”

You cut himself off as he leaned across and covered my mouth with his, bringing his hand gently up to my cheek and stroking away my tears with a brush of his thumb as his jaw worked with surprising gentleness against mine. He wasn’t as forceful as Mana had been that one time, nor as submissive as I imagined Hyde would be when kissed by another man (preferably me but most likely Tetsu or Sakura, or perhaps both at once), but that was okay, it was somewhere in between and sat well with my distressed self (at least, that’s what I remember). His hands fluttered slightly, nervously, and shifted from my face down to my shoulders so he could push me backwards until I was lying on the cushions, my arms still pinned painfully behind my back. Then he shifted his kissing attentions down to my neck.

But he stopped soon after, pulling himself away and biting his lower lip coyly as he tenderly helped me back to a sitting position, trying to ignore the fact that his pants were visibly tighter than they had been minutes before.

“Sorry, Gacchan,” he managed, “I didn’t stop to think.” I could see pain in his brown eyes, and felt bad for him. Didn’t I know how he felt.

I smiled tiredly. “That’s okay, You-chan. That’s okay.”

Later, he held me softly by the shoulders as I vomited into the toire, and soothed me after as I cried more, aware of how painful and self-destroying my obsession with Hyde was becoming. I think I fell asleep like that.

In the morning, when I awoke, he was gone.

You and I never had sex. He said he didn’t want to; that being able to kiss and hold me was enough for him. And I was personally comfortable with the way things were, anyway. Apart from my encounter with Mana, a few drunken flings with various women from various bars, and several thousand self servicings, I had been painfully chaste from the day I first saw Hyde.

It was funny, but in a twisted way, You-chan seemed to understand. He as much as told me so one afternoon while he lay with me on my lavish bed, spooned around and under me and planting soft kisses on the back of my neck as his fingers toyed absently across my waist, dipping lower every now and then for a tease, a brief pleasuring. I had murmured to him at one point during our morning together that he seemed focused only on making sure I was comfortable, that I was feeling pleasure through what he was doing, that I was happy, that I was okay and wasn’t crying again like I seemed to every time we were together. At the time he’d just looked at me silently.

But now, with his lips on my neck he whispered suddenly, “I told you once before Gacchan. I love you. That’s why I don’t mind if you spend all day crying, and why I care only about your comfort and your pleasure. This isn’t about me, it’s about you, Gacchan, you.”

My eyes wet with sudden emotion, I twisted to look at him, smiling slightly as his leg immediately found a place between mine, and as his hands slid around to my front, toying instead with my chest and the cross hung around my neck. “I’m sorry, You-chan,” I said softly, looking down. “I’m sorry I can’t…”

“Listen,” he told me gently, placing a finger across my lips, “just listen. If you had Hyde-sama here right now, what would you be doing, Gacchan? Would you be demanding he fall to his knees and give you the world’s best deep-throated headjob ever, or would you be cherishing him and caring only about the pleasure you could give him?”

My throat quickly went dry, and my face blanched at the mere thought of me thrusting my way inside Hyde’s mouth, going deeper and deeper until he almost choked, the feel of his tongue on my skin as he explored me…

But…

You-chan was right. Once the kinky, hormone-driven thoughts were out of the way, I realised that, given one night with my crush-cum-idol, I would gladly spend that night un-pleasured and fully erected if I knew that he, at least, would walk away, after an eternity of powerful orgasms, feeling perfectly fulfilled.

It’s true. It’s sad. But I would.

I admitted this to You, who smiled sweetly and then kissed me. And I realised then – You felt that way about me. He only cared about making me feel the way that I wanted Hyde to feel under my touch. It shocked me a little, and scared me a little also, to know that someone loved me that much. But it touched me deeply too, and with a contented sigh I wrapped my arms back around You and kissed him back, feeling my whole body start to respond to him all over again.

If, I learned that day, you can’t have the one you love, and the one who loves you is willing to forget that you don’t love them in return, then you’re very lucky to have someone to cling to.

The story ‘Moon’ progressed slowly over the next week. Now that I knew who Kei really was it was harder for me to write than ever, as I felt Hyde’s mannerisms, Hyde’s way fall into and become this character that I’d fashioned. Kei was Hyde, just like Sho was me. (For a little while, I considered messing with the original idea and writing in a hardcore sex scene just to get my rocks off, then decided firmly against it because, well, what were my chances of getting Hyde to play Kei when this thing went movie, anyway?)

Then again, I realised – if I couldn’t have Hyde in the lead role, did I want the movie to go ahead? No, no I did not. But that would be giving in. I’d just have to find someone like Hyde.

Someone like Hyde?

My afternoons invariably ended with my tears.

The day after my bedroom-realisation regarding You, Hyde managed to take up two hours of my time in a television special that I swear was made only to show a) how generous he was (ie. the huge basket of gifts he bought and brought for the interviewer) b) his ‘new’ collection of songs (A.K.A. lounge jazz-y ensembles of the songs from ‘ROENTGEN’) and c) his excellent English skills used in some of his songs (fucking bastard).

Even so, they were a difficult two hours.

Hyde had hardly appeared on TV since the most recent single with Laruku, which I personally deemed a publicity stunt because it was entirely in English, for a movie soundtrack, and also produced during a long ‘cool period’ for the boys: it was released more than a year after their previous single, and also, they hadn’t released anything since (if you ignore the whole ‘Clicked Singles’ idea which really, if you think about it, was just a money-grabber).

It was almost as if, for a while, he’d simply ceased to exist, except of course inside my overly-horny memories.

And then, all of a sudden, on a seemingly-innocent Saturday morning, he thoroughly disturbed me in all my song writing peace, and within the first few bars of ‘Angel’s tale’ alone, moved me from a forcedly-calm young man to a crying, screaming puddle of self-gloom mixed with spent semen. By the end of ‘Shallow sleep’ I was even worse and was once again contemplating suicide, hating myself for becoming such an obsessive freak over someone I’d met for a practically nonexistent two minutes in my excruciatingly long life. And he probably didn’t even remember me, after all he’d been tipsy and hanging out with Sakura, and we all know what the rumours were about Hyde and Sakura now, don’t we?

Such biting sarcasm plus those bitter thoughts equalled me fumbling for a kitchen knife and using it expertly so it danced on my upper thighs – somewhere no one save You would see, and to You such wounds could easily be explained away, after all he had a few himself – watching for a few minutes as the blood trickled down my legs before carefully dabbing it all away with a cloth. In all the passing years I’d perfected the art: I knew just how deep to cut in order to give myself a slight, albeit needed, anaesthetic. (Sad, I know. Plain fucking sad. Just like the rest of my fucking life.)

After watching the closing credits for the show I rewound my tape and put myself through the torture all over again, only this time You was there, with and for me, and when ‘Shallow sleep’ ended, instead of cutting myself, I let him shower me with healing kisses until I fell asleep in his sympathetic, loving arms.

Selfish bastard I am.

As the end of the week neared, I found myself terribly and constantly depressed, and for a while I even contemplated feigning an illness so I wouldn’t have to drag my miserable carcass to Shinji’s birthday party. After all, apart from laughing at my friend’s pitiful ‘Oh no, I’m getting older’-type tears, there’d be nothing to do apart from eat (and I was getting fatter already, which I was not happy with), chat to boring people with a fake smile plastered on my face (oh what fun), and later, get plastered full stop (could be fun but would later equal a hangover, which I didn’t want). It took me a few hours of reasoning with my stubborn self to eventually convince me to go.

In the end, I was glad I took that time out of my otherwise busy night. Shinji’s party turned out to be an extremely interesting affair indeed.

On the night in question, I showed myself, as asked, at Shinji’s chosen restaurant at seven p.m., bringing along, as asked, a friend in the form of You. The two of us stayed in the car for a whole twenty minutes, sprawled in the backseat as my insecurity veins violently bashed and killed the confidence ones, his lips welded to mine in his display of comfort: a flaming, desperate kiss plus a random grope here and there.

Eventually, I pulled myself away from him, resting my head back on the seat and looking up into his wide brown eyes (yes, I was bottom). He pouted a little, moving as if to kiss me again, but I held him back, whispering, “You-chan… we should go in.”

He frowned. “Must we? I was having fun.”

“Me too,” I admitted with a slight grin, flicking my tongue out to tease his fingertips as they trailed lightly around my lips. “However. Shinji-kun will kill me if I choose to make out with a friend in the car park rather than go in and wish him a happy birthday.”

He frowned deeper, more serious now. “Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

I sighed and shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. I’m just being stupid as usual. For some reason I have this terrible feeling…” Shaking my head, I broke off. He’d heard it a million times before. I always accepted invites to parties and then had crazy anxiety attacks before actually going in; terrified of being recognised for the freak I am as opposed to merely Gackt, collagen-inflated Pop God. My low self-esteem always chose the worst of times to kick up a fuss.

Damn self-esteem issues.

Not that I particularly minded them at that point in time: in the end You and I wasted another ten minutes as he nicely aired my Magnum (that was good fun, I don’t think I know anyone who can give as good a blowjob as You – actually I can think of one other… but that’s beside the point now), and then headed inside to face Shinji’s other friends, most of whom didn’t even glance up when we sauntered in. (Thank God, crisis averted and all.)

Shinji, however, came racing over, calling, “Yo, Gakkun, you’re late!!”

I shrugged in the nonchalant boredom way I’d legally patented a few years before (actually I hadn’t, but I may as well have, I’d become known for it anyway). “Panic attack,” I explained in a tone anyone else bar Shinji or You would take as a light-hearted joke.

My friend nodded understandingly. We finished exchanging pleasantries and introductions (“You-chan… Shinji: best friend. Shinji-kun… You: band mate and fuck buddy.”), I gave Shinji his present, and then, after placing glasses of wine in our hands, he whisked You and me off to meet his other friends, most of whom sat with husbands, wives, sisters, brothers or cousins.

Only one of Shinji’s friends was sitting alone, separated from everyone else with his longish, bleach-blonde hair falling over his face and shielding it from our view. When it was his turn in the circle to be introduced, Shinji made towards him, then hesitated and changed his mind, instead saying to us in a low voice, “That’s Hyde. I think we should maybe just leave him alone… he seemed kinda depressed when he arrived earlier.”

My heart stopped for about seven different reasons:

…Hyde was there?

…Hyde was within perfect glomping range?

…Shinji knew Hyde?

…I hadn’t known that Shinji knew Hyde?

…Hyde was… alone?

…Hyde was depressed?

…I hadn’t recognised Hyde straight away?

I could feel You’s eyes scanning my face, judging my reaction, which, I’m proud to say, was a very calm one (well, it was on the outside, anyway). I glanced over at Hyde-sama and then back to Shinji. “Laruku no Hyde?” I asked, feigning naught but mere curiosity.

“Yeah. You know who he is?”

I shrugged a little. “Only because Közi hated L’Arc~en~ciel for beating us to fame and fortune. Otherwise I don’t really follow them.”

“I know them,” You piped up from behind me. He sounded annoyed to my ears, probably because he knew I was lying to my best friend. (Well, it was an awkward situation, dammit, Hyde was Shinji’s friend too, after all!) “I have a friend who has a crush on Hyde-san, actually.”

“Do you really?” I asked coolly, turning to look at You, sending him furious messages with my eyes: Shut the fuck up already, asshole. “You never told me.”

“That’s because you never asked,” he replied equally coldly, eyes glinting: You fucking liar. That’s your fucking best friend you’re talking to.

The cold war between You and I lasted until Shinji had ushered us to a table (approximately) 2.547 metres away from Hyde-sama’s and rushed off to get a ‘cute waiter and/or waitress’ for us.

Then, we rounded on each other at the exact same moment.

“Why the fuck did you do that?”     “Why did you lie to Shinji-san?”

I blushed as Hyde shot a curious glance over in our direction, a slight smirk on his handsome face. Great, just fucking great. Every time I met with him in public, I was in the middle of a domestic with my fuck-buddy-of-the-moment. He probably thought I was some kind of freak who couldn’t make proper friends or something.

“Do you have to speak so loud?” I muttered angrily to You, averting my face from Hyde’s steady gaze. “It’s embarrassing.”

He rolled his eyes and snarled (albeit at a quieter volume, which I was grateful for), “I can’t believe you just lied to Shinji. That’s so fucking childish, Gackt.”

“Childish? It’s being smart, You. Any truths told could’ve ended in major embarrassment all around.” Changing the subject, I added, “But what about you? Trying to embarrass me, were you?”

“Trying to get you to tell the truth, more like. Regardless of what you say, it’s still childish for you to avoid…”

“I don’t fucking care, You, all right? What I care about is the fact that you fucking did it. It was so fucking rude.”

(Looking back on the moment, I don’t think either of us really gave much thought to how stupid the argument had become. All I cared about was the fact that You had attempted to make a public ass of me, and all he cared about was the fact that he was trying to make an ass of me because I was lying to a friend and he thought that dishonourable.)

He shook his head. “Do we have to do this here?” he muttered. “It’s so stupid and we’re making idiots of ourselves.”

“It wouldn’t have happened if you’d just kept your fucking mouth shut.”

“Well it happened,” he snarled, glaring at me, “so let’s just fucking grow up and forget about it for now, right? We don’t want to be fighting all through your best friend’s birthday dinner, do we?”

I shook my head sullenly, and he instantly started raving off on some tangent that didn’t really interest me but was designed, I think, to move my attention elsewhere.

Oddly enough, he succeeded, although probably not quite in the way he’d hoped to. After our orders had been taken, I found myself staring at Hyde’s bowed blonde head as he toyed with his food and uttered curses under his breath, You’s words going in one ear and straight out the other.

I guess we painted a funny picture…

Hyde: “Stupid fucking bitch, just wait until I fucking get home one day with someone half your age hanging from my sleeve… then you’ll be sorry, then you’ll wish you hadn’t snobbed me so much in the last few years…” *grumble* *violent stab at food with chopstick*

You: “Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah…” *smile*

Me: *ignoring You* *drooling over Hyde*

I guess this series of events continued for the next ten, twenty minutes or so, but You put an end to it just as our meals arrived, standing from his chair and putting a gentle hand on my shoulder.

“Gacchan,” he said gently as I started from my stupor, hurriedly pushing my chair further under the table so the tent forming on my lap wasn’t so visible, “I think it’s time I was leaving.”

“A-ano?” I stumbled, quickly rising to my feet and nearly knocking the table over, snatching his coat away as he tried to take it. “Leaving? Why?” Don’t leave me alone here. I won’t cope. I’ll attack Hyde. I’ll get arrested for something involving the words ‘indecent exposure’, ‘random glomping fit’, ‘attempted rape’, and ‘unbelievably big penis’.

“Just play along for a moment,” he hissed. “At least until we’re outside.” Then, louder, he offered, “Oh, did I forget to tell you…? Gomen ne… I have an appointment with my sister’s doctor… she’s been very sick as you know… tonight hopefully the doctor can say what is wrong.”

“Sou da…?” I muttered in response. Then, with as much gallantry as I could muster, I helped You into his jacket and then accompanied him outside, stopping briefly on the way so he could offer lied farewells (You, after all, doesn’t even have a sister!), apologies, and good wishes to my best friend.

The instant the door was closed behind us, however, all signs of nobility disappeared. I grabbed You by his collar and yanked him up close to me. “Just what the fuck are you playing at?”

Smiling, my friend gently disengaged himself from my furious grasp. “Gacchan,” he asked, “exactly how much did you hear before? Of what I said?”

“Ummm………” I could feel colour and heat rising quickly in my cheeks as I was forced to truthfully admit, “………nothing.”

You nodded thoughtfully. “I thought so. You were staring at Hyde, weren’t you?”

“……Y-yes…”

“I noticed. And… I also noticed, Gacchan…… he’s alone tonight. So… I thought… if you are alone too…… oh, I don’t know…

“Look, maybe I’m just being stupid and overly hopeful… but I’m sick of you being sad. You have a chance to sit with him and get to know him… you could even ask him to be in your movie, if you wanted… That’s why I’m leaving, Gacchan, because you deserve this chance. And with me sitting next to you, it wasn’t going to happen. So… for tonight… goodbye.” His piece said, You leaned into me and planted a tender, chaste kiss on my lips, before turning and walking into the night.

Suddenly, it occurred fully to me what had just happened: You had sacrificed his happiness (A.K.A. our status as fuck buddies) so I could have my chance at mine (A.K.A. Hyde). I stood, gobsmacked, for several seconds, letting this sink in. After all, if it were me, in his position, and I stood between Hyde and a married man he was after… would I be willing to step aside and let my love move in the for the kill on his love? Even if his love wasn’t a guaranteed one? Even if?

No – I wouldn’t. (So I’m a selfish bastard. So shoot me.)

“You-chan!” I called, feeling tears well in my eyes as I ran and flung myself at his surprised form. Holding tightly onto him, I murmured, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry for what I said before! You were right. I’ll call Shinji tomorrow and tell him the truth, I promise. Oh God, You-chan, I don’t deserve you at all… I’m so lucky. Thankyou! And… I’m sorry!”

My friend peeled himself away from my clinging body a little, smiling sadly at me. “Please don’t apologise,” he whispered. “You need never apologise to me, Gacchan. I forgave you straight away, you know.”

“Y-you did?”

He nodded. “Yeah. So there’s no need to apologise. But as for the thanks…” You shook his head mock-gravely and pointed firmly at the restaurant, “…the only thanks needed is for you to get your ass in there and get Hyde’s dick planted firmly inside it.”

“…Oh.” I felt colour sneaking up my cheeks. “Okay. I’ll do so.”

You winked and slithered into the dark night. And I returned to Shinji’s birthday party…

And Hyde.