[Arashi] 17
Aug. 24th, 2013 03:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
neko_kirin3104Title: 17
Group/Pairing: Arashi/Ohmiya (Ohno/Nino)
Prompt: Proposal/The difficult road of love
Word Count: 3175
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Fluff/Angst + AU - Alternate Reality/Speculative
Summary: Sunsets have always been special moments for Ohno. His memories are filled with endless ones he shared with his beloved since Nino was 17.
Disclaimer: I own nobody. Purely fictional, of course. :3
Notes: written for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ohmiyawedding 2013.
Warning: character death
+52 years
If you only have a moment left with the one you love, how will you spend it?
A much younger version of himself will have said, “I’ll stay by his side until his final breath.”
“Hold his hand and whisper ‘I love you’ over and over until he can no longer hear me. Until he’s no longer here...”
Such obnoxious notions, really. Actions that only serve to make the one who’s left behind feel like he’s done something, everything he can to hold on to a forever that is no longer there—
—that has never been there...
Forever... is a lie.
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
His lover turns to him and smiles. “Us. How we got this far...”
Ohno reaches out to slip his hand through the younger man’s stubby fingers. “I don’t see why that matters now.”
“It does.” Nino shifts in the lounge chair, leaning his entire weight against Ohno, a curious frown forming on his face. “I wanna know how you got so old and gray. It feels like time has slipped out of my hands. Have you always been like this? Have I not been paying attention?”
Ohno laughs heartily, a boyish sound, a youthful melody contrasting pleasantly with his wrinkled face.
Nino’s frown only deepens. Infused with a pout, it makes Ohno’s heart tremble. He chokes back the rest of his chuckles, cups a hand to his lover’s chin and leans in for a kiss, awkwardly bumping noses and teeth along the way.
The contact feels warm and soft against his chapped lips, making his skin prickle, his insides flutter pleasantly like they did the first time—
“You hardly have hair, Ojii-chan,” Nino whispers, his breath dancing like sea breeze on Ohno’s face. He brushes a hand through the few strands of whites left on the old man’s head. “But you still kiss like a boy. Haven’t I taught you anything?”
And Ohno laughs again, freely and boisterously like he has never done before.
“You look different today,” Nino says, playfully pinching his cheek, soothing his laughter into a smile. “Did something happen?”
“You happened,” Ohno replies, catching his lover’s wrist and burying his lips into the young man’s palm, his eyes brimming with tears. “You happened, Nino...”
“Is this what old age does to people? Make them spurt cheesy lines like the common Romeo? Or is that Cassanova—?”
Ohno pulls Nino into a tight embrace, purposefully pressing the rambling boy’s face against his chest, chuckling a little at the muffled sounds of protest it generated.
“Oh~cha~n~!”
He loves this. The false show of annoyance, the weak-willed squirming that only serves as an excuse for Nino to nuzzle his sweet, flushed face on Ohno’s body.
He lives for this. The way their chortling delights will eventually harmonize, as he loosens his hold, allowing Nino to settle back in a comfortable mold in his arms.
But illusions... they have to end sometime—
“I can’t stay with you anymore.” There was not a hint of sadness in his voice.
Nino looks up and fixes him with a quiet, knowing gaze. “I know.”
The soothing silence that surrounds them, occasionally pierced by the afternoon breeze, dissolves his need to hold back his tears.
He cries. But neither grief nor regret touches his heart.
There is just Nino leaning an ear against it, whispering, “Is it time?”
“Yes.”
There is just Nino, placing a hand over it, as though counting down to the last beats, an old man’s final bid for life. His lover is sniffling, but is too proud to show his tears. “Well, then... I’m glad.”
Hearing this, Ohno closes his eyes and settles into the darkness, relaxes into the void, smiles through his final breath—
“Sweet dreams, Oh-chan...”
+43 years
The landscape never changes. It’s always the same patio, overlooking the ocean, with the sun halfway through its journey back into the horizon.
There’s always the lounge chair. There’s always him on it.
And there’s always Nino beside him...
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
His lover turns to him and grins, eyes glinting with mischief. “Us. And how you seem to grow new wrinkles everyday. Ah, there’s a new one here, see?”
Ohno barely evades the stubby finger aiming for his cheek.
“And another one here... And here... And here...”
He tilts his head this way and that, waves his hands in front of his face in an attempt to avoid and fend off the attacks. He is laughing heartily like he has never done before.
He finally traps both frisky wrists in his hands, and Nino starts laughing with him.
Then, the young man pauses, sighs and cups Ohno’s face in his hands.
“Why do you look so old, Oh-chan? Have you always been like this?” The whispered curiosity feels like sea breeze touching Ohno’s skin, stinging his eyes. Nino frowns even more, leaning in closer. “Have I not been paying attention?”
Ohno smiles and claims his lover’s lips for a kiss, dashing through the awkward bumps of slight hesitation. The connection feels warm and real and unmistakably Nino, deftly nibbling on his lower lip before pulling away.
It has always been like the first time: the rippling sensations during and the lingering buzz of affections after are as soothingly familiar as he remembers...
“You learned nothing, Ojii-chan.” Nino’s grimace looks exaggeratedly fake, playful. “Haven’t I taught you anything at all?”
Ohno’s boisterous laughter mingles with the passing breeze. He grabs his lover and squeezes him to his chest.
There’s the squirming, the muffled protests...
The silent, comfortable cuddling that follows—
“Stay with me, Oh-chan...”
All of his memories from this point have ended the same way.
Today, he hardly minds the conclusion.
+30 years
There’s something perfectly lovely about watching sunsets with the one you love. Warm bodies pressed together in the same lounge chair, in the same patio, overlooking the same vast ocean, waiting for the sun to sink into the same horizon.
Nothing much changes. The setting, the emotions, the general framework of events—
“What are you thinking about, Nino?” he asks his lover, warm and alive in his arms.
“Us.” Nino turns his face up, taking a second to stare at Ohno before breathing out an overdone gasp, his eyes widening in feigned surprise. “Oh boy, Ojii-chan! Your hairline is receding! What the hell!”
Ohno reaches out to tap a hand on the chortling boy’s forehead. It isn’t like this is the first time the younger man has said that in months.
He silently wonders how long this phase can last...
“Why are aging, Oh-chan?” Nino runs a hand through his hair, tenderly like the way he is looking into Ohno’s eyes; gently, like Nino’s whispered words grazing his face. “Or have you always been like this and I haven’t been paying attention?”
Ohno merely smiles at the uncertainty in his lover’s face, at the doubt lacing the boyish voice. His mind briefly slips back to when the truth first reared its ugly head, and how the mere thought of it had initially filled him with dread, before he got a chance to think about it and decided it didn’t matter.
It hardly matters that he’s going to grow old.
While Nino—this Nino will remain young. Forever stuck at seventeen in this realm.
“Does it bother you?”
Nino frowns, cups his own face in his small hand and hums in concentration, his eyes never straying from Ohno’s face.
Ohno flushes under his lover’s intense scrutiny. Already knowing the answer from the previous days he has had to re-live this moment, but still feeling a hint of anxiety at how things can change with the tiniest variation in his breath—
He almost misses Nino leaning in closer, capturing his lips in a kiss. The union feels warm, and alive, and wet. Telling him with every movement of tongue and every accidental bump of teeth that Nino accepts him. That his ageless lover will never have him any other way.
It’s always been like the first time—
Not much different from the last...
“What was that you were doing?” Nino scowls in feigned displeasure, pressing his hands on Ohno’s cheeks. “Haven’t I taught you anything, Ojii-chan?”
Ohno laughs through his duck lips, not making any attempt at all to free his face from the affectionate squeeze.
Instead, he reaches out and does the same to his lover.
“I bet I look so much better than you do,” Nino grumbles, a playful glint flashing in his eyes.
“Hell, no,” Ohno grumbles back, his squished lips straining into a smirk.
Their bantering fills the afternoon, mocking words and lilting voices merging with the breeze. Until they find themselves cuddling, pressing their bodies close, their hearts almost freezing as they bate their breaths for the final few minutes of their time together...
”Hold me, Oh-chan...”
Three decades have done nothing to lessen the pain he feels when Nino finally closes his eyes...
+21 years
The sun dipping into the horizon has always been a majestic sight. It is Nino’s favorite time of the day. Ohno would never have known such perfection exists if it weren’t for his lover.
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
Nino slinks an arm around his waist and sighs. “Us. And how I wish we can be like this forever...”
Ohno wraps his arms tighter around the younger man’s naked frame and buries his face into the tuft of unruly hair that smells of summer and lovemaking.
From the moment he took this man home with him all those years ago, it has been his one and only wish—
For them to stay like this. Forever.
Two decades have done nothing to change his mind.
“What a stupid thing to do, Oh-chan...” Nino mumbles, his warm breath dancing across Ohno’s chest. “What a stupid, stupid thing to do!”
Ohno smiles and closes his eyes. Loving the way the afternoon breeze touches his face. It feels warm, and real, and still pretty much like the last time—
The last day he ever spent with his beloved Pet—
The man he picked out of many to accompany him, serve him, pleasure him, for what was supposed to have been a single day—
A day he is now trying to stretch to eternity...
“I regret nothing, Nino,” Ohno brushes his fingers down the young man’s cheek, his heart constricting from the memories of their time together, but never truly breaking.
Nino looks up at him, eyes brimming with tears. “You could’ve gotten a worthier partner, you know. Not someone like me...”
Ohno knows what Nino means to say, and it flashes in his mind like a warning too late and too senseless now to be heeded.
“I regret nothing,” he repeats, savoring every word, knowing without a doubt that he means each one, even as tears begin running down his cheeks.
Nino reaches out and cradles his face in his small hands. “Why do you look so beautiful, Oh-chan?” he whispers, his breath frolicking pleasantly on Ohno’s face. “Have you always been like this? Have I not been paying attention?”
The years hadn’t been enough to curb his tears, his pain, the way his heart would bleed at this very moment. He sniffles. And Nino laughs through his own tears before pressing their lips together.
The kiss feels perfect. Real. Warm and intrusive just like he remembers...
They banter afterwards, their voices lilting in the wind. Both of them trying to put the inevitable out of their minds for even just a few minutes.
They cuddle when the truth finally begins sinking in.
”Don’t leave me, Oh-chan...”
“I won’t, Nino,” Ohno whispers, pressing the trembling body as close as possible to his side. “I never will.”
Time doesn’t heal. It only makes the pain worse—
Still, Ohno regrets nothing.
+10 years
If it had been up to him, he would’ve chosen a different memory. A happier one that didn’t have to end with him crying.
Except that this is the only memory he has ever had with Nino—
The same patio. The same ocean. The same sunset.
The same lounge chair with him and Nino on it, their skins still buzzing from the heat of their recent lovemaking.
For how else can they spend a perfectly warm summer, especially the last one they’ll ever get to share?
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
He has never learned to call his lover by his first name. Nino actually likes it better this way.
“Us. And how far we can go from here...”
It still feels weird hearing Nino’s voice sometimes, so real and youthful like the first and last time.
Though they’ve already done more than just talk...
Though he has been re-living this same memory for the past 10 years...
It’ll take time to get used to this, he’s been told. But once he gets the hang of things, he’ll be able to do so much more. Like alter little stuffs here and there. Give a little variety to their conversations—
“You’re a stupid man, Oh-chan! Why’d you have to do this to yourself?!”
Not that there is anything wrong with this memory echoing the most special moment of his life to the tee...
“I regret nothing, Nino.”
He won’t be able to change how it ends, though.
At least, no such case has ever been documented.
“You could’ve chosen someone better. Why me?”
The people who extracted this memory for him and infused it into the machine that ate up more than half of what he inherited from his father at 18, smirked at his decision and silently questioned his sanity.
He saw the mockery clearly displayed in everybody’s eyes. But he didn’t care.
Not even a decade, or two, or more, can change his mind—
“I regret nothing.”
He has always been a rebellious man. Distinctions between people never matter to him.
He does what his heart tells him to do. Every single time...
“Why do you look so perfect, Oh-chan?”
Even if it means he’ll be hurting himself every day for the rest of his life—
“Have you always been like this?”
Even it means he’ll have to endure the bittersweet sensations rippling through his nerves as the happiest and saddest day of his life unfold before his eyes—
“Have I not been paying attention?”
Even if it means he’ll have to watch life slip out of his lover’s eyes over and over again—
He regrets nothing.
At least, this way he gets to spend the time he never had with Nino. The few minutes he spends in this plain sustains him for the rest of the day.
Nino’s kiss feels as sweet and warm and loving as he remembers.
The bantering makes him laugh through his tears.
The cuddling is filled with wordless sniffles, uttered requests, and whispered promises.
“Don’t let me go, Oh-chan...”
“I won’t, Nino. You know I never will.”
Forever is a lie.
But it’s all he has to live for, and it’s all that matters to him now.
@17
Kazunari Ninomiya died at 17.
But not before Ohno made sure they would stay together forever.
Pets like Nino were never meant to last for more than a day.
They were made to please and never cling.
Fulfill the job they were brought up to do, then expire.
Satoshi Ohno was one of those flighty Elites that the Casa which owned Nino catered to.
People like him were more sensual than loving, preferred short flashes of raw sensations to heavy strings of emotions that obliged them to get tied down.
It wasn’t really that Nino was anything special that he managed to capture an Elite’s heart.
Ohno, at 19, was just of the right frame of mind, at just the perfect time, to be very receptive to affections that were freely and honestly given.
For Pets only ever had one chance to fall in love, and they sure did make the most of it until their time was up.
Nino found it easy enough to fall for Ohno, just as easy as Ohno did for him.
Ohno spoke openly. Nino listened attentively.
Ohno felt like the worst man on earth for betraying his father’s expectations.
Nino held him close and made him feel like nothing could bring him down.
Ohno believed he couldn’t possibly be happy with anyone. Ever.
Nino made love to him and changed his mind—
If you only had a moment left with the one you love, how would you spend it?
Ohno at 19 knew exactly what he wanted to do.
“Marry me.”
“Oh-chan... I can’t—Are you stupid?!”
He understood Nino’s reluctance, but he hardly really cared.
Of course, he knew it was a stupid thing to do.
A marriage between an Elite and a Pet who only had a few hours left to live was totally unheard of.
Who would willingly want to endure such a tragic bond for the rest of his life?
But it was the only way he could keep Nino close.
It was the only way he could ensure he would never forget that a man named Kazunari Ninomiya had once graced his life and gave him a hundred reasons to live when he no longer felt like living. To dream when he no longer felt like dreaming.
To wish for a Forever he never thought could exist—
They got married at noon the next day, and Nino spent the next hour crying like a little girl admiring the ring on his hand.
Nino died in the evening, in his arms, right after the sun vanished into the horizon. Exactly twenty-four hours from when Ohno bought him and took him home.
The grieving Elite held his lifeless lover close and cried for a while, then set out to do what had to be done.
The people at the Institute who extracted this memory from Nino’s mind, looked at him first with confusion, then amusement.
For only the oldest of people who had lost their marriage partners had ever come for this procedure.
No one as young as Ohno would ever want to get tied down to a single person, a single memory this early in his life.
But it hardly mattered. Ohno had the money. He had the papers to prove he and the Pet were indeed married, and thus should qualify without question.
Everybody could only smirk and silently question his sanity.
Ohno saw the mockery clearly displayed in their eyes. But he didn’t care.
Nothing else mattered.
The machine was ready for him the following day—
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
He used it without fail, in the morning and at night, for the rest of his days.
“Us. And how far we can go from here...”
It was a good married life—this much he could say—though only ever lived inside his head—
Satoshi Ohno died at 71, the machine called Forever whirring beside him, playing in an endless loop the memory that has sustained his life for many years.
Group/Pairing: Arashi/Ohmiya (Ohno/Nino)
Prompt: Proposal/The difficult road of love
Word Count: 3175
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Fluff/Angst + AU - Alternate Reality/Speculative
Summary: Sunsets have always been special moments for Ohno. His memories are filled with endless ones he shared with his beloved since Nino was 17.
Disclaimer: I own nobody. Purely fictional, of course. :3
Notes: written for
ohmiyawedding 2013.Warning: character death
+52 years
If you only have a moment left with the one you love, how will you spend it?
A much younger version of himself will have said, “I’ll stay by his side until his final breath.”
“Hold his hand and whisper ‘I love you’ over and over until he can no longer hear me. Until he’s no longer here...”
Such obnoxious notions, really. Actions that only serve to make the one who’s left behind feel like he’s done something, everything he can to hold on to a forever that is no longer there—
—that has never been there...
Forever... is a lie.
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
His lover turns to him and smiles. “Us. How we got this far...”
Ohno reaches out to slip his hand through the younger man’s stubby fingers. “I don’t see why that matters now.”
“It does.” Nino shifts in the lounge chair, leaning his entire weight against Ohno, a curious frown forming on his face. “I wanna know how you got so old and gray. It feels like time has slipped out of my hands. Have you always been like this? Have I not been paying attention?”
Ohno laughs heartily, a boyish sound, a youthful melody contrasting pleasantly with his wrinkled face.
Nino’s frown only deepens. Infused with a pout, it makes Ohno’s heart tremble. He chokes back the rest of his chuckles, cups a hand to his lover’s chin and leans in for a kiss, awkwardly bumping noses and teeth along the way.
The contact feels warm and soft against his chapped lips, making his skin prickle, his insides flutter pleasantly like they did the first time—
“You hardly have hair, Ojii-chan,” Nino whispers, his breath dancing like sea breeze on Ohno’s face. He brushes a hand through the few strands of whites left on the old man’s head. “But you still kiss like a boy. Haven’t I taught you anything?”
And Ohno laughs again, freely and boisterously like he has never done before.
“You look different today,” Nino says, playfully pinching his cheek, soothing his laughter into a smile. “Did something happen?”
“You happened,” Ohno replies, catching his lover’s wrist and burying his lips into the young man’s palm, his eyes brimming with tears. “You happened, Nino...”
“Is this what old age does to people? Make them spurt cheesy lines like the common Romeo? Or is that Cassanova—?”
Ohno pulls Nino into a tight embrace, purposefully pressing the rambling boy’s face against his chest, chuckling a little at the muffled sounds of protest it generated.
“Oh~cha~n~!”
He loves this. The false show of annoyance, the weak-willed squirming that only serves as an excuse for Nino to nuzzle his sweet, flushed face on Ohno’s body.
He lives for this. The way their chortling delights will eventually harmonize, as he loosens his hold, allowing Nino to settle back in a comfortable mold in his arms.
But illusions... they have to end sometime—
“I can’t stay with you anymore.” There was not a hint of sadness in his voice.
Nino looks up and fixes him with a quiet, knowing gaze. “I know.”
The soothing silence that surrounds them, occasionally pierced by the afternoon breeze, dissolves his need to hold back his tears.
He cries. But neither grief nor regret touches his heart.
There is just Nino leaning an ear against it, whispering, “Is it time?”
“Yes.”
There is just Nino, placing a hand over it, as though counting down to the last beats, an old man’s final bid for life. His lover is sniffling, but is too proud to show his tears. “Well, then... I’m glad.”
Hearing this, Ohno closes his eyes and settles into the darkness, relaxes into the void, smiles through his final breath—
“Sweet dreams, Oh-chan...”
+43 years
The landscape never changes. It’s always the same patio, overlooking the ocean, with the sun halfway through its journey back into the horizon.
There’s always the lounge chair. There’s always him on it.
And there’s always Nino beside him...
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
His lover turns to him and grins, eyes glinting with mischief. “Us. And how you seem to grow new wrinkles everyday. Ah, there’s a new one here, see?”
Ohno barely evades the stubby finger aiming for his cheek.
“And another one here... And here... And here...”
He tilts his head this way and that, waves his hands in front of his face in an attempt to avoid and fend off the attacks. He is laughing heartily like he has never done before.
He finally traps both frisky wrists in his hands, and Nino starts laughing with him.
Then, the young man pauses, sighs and cups Ohno’s face in his hands.
“Why do you look so old, Oh-chan? Have you always been like this?” The whispered curiosity feels like sea breeze touching Ohno’s skin, stinging his eyes. Nino frowns even more, leaning in closer. “Have I not been paying attention?”
Ohno smiles and claims his lover’s lips for a kiss, dashing through the awkward bumps of slight hesitation. The connection feels warm and real and unmistakably Nino, deftly nibbling on his lower lip before pulling away.
It has always been like the first time: the rippling sensations during and the lingering buzz of affections after are as soothingly familiar as he remembers...
“You learned nothing, Ojii-chan.” Nino’s grimace looks exaggeratedly fake, playful. “Haven’t I taught you anything at all?”
Ohno’s boisterous laughter mingles with the passing breeze. He grabs his lover and squeezes him to his chest.
There’s the squirming, the muffled protests...
The silent, comfortable cuddling that follows—
“Stay with me, Oh-chan...”
All of his memories from this point have ended the same way.
Today, he hardly minds the conclusion.
+30 years
There’s something perfectly lovely about watching sunsets with the one you love. Warm bodies pressed together in the same lounge chair, in the same patio, overlooking the same vast ocean, waiting for the sun to sink into the same horizon.
Nothing much changes. The setting, the emotions, the general framework of events—
“What are you thinking about, Nino?” he asks his lover, warm and alive in his arms.
“Us.” Nino turns his face up, taking a second to stare at Ohno before breathing out an overdone gasp, his eyes widening in feigned surprise. “Oh boy, Ojii-chan! Your hairline is receding! What the hell!”
Ohno reaches out to tap a hand on the chortling boy’s forehead. It isn’t like this is the first time the younger man has said that in months.
He silently wonders how long this phase can last...
“Why are aging, Oh-chan?” Nino runs a hand through his hair, tenderly like the way he is looking into Ohno’s eyes; gently, like Nino’s whispered words grazing his face. “Or have you always been like this and I haven’t been paying attention?”
Ohno merely smiles at the uncertainty in his lover’s face, at the doubt lacing the boyish voice. His mind briefly slips back to when the truth first reared its ugly head, and how the mere thought of it had initially filled him with dread, before he got a chance to think about it and decided it didn’t matter.
It hardly matters that he’s going to grow old.
While Nino—this Nino will remain young. Forever stuck at seventeen in this realm.
“Does it bother you?”
Nino frowns, cups his own face in his small hand and hums in concentration, his eyes never straying from Ohno’s face.
Ohno flushes under his lover’s intense scrutiny. Already knowing the answer from the previous days he has had to re-live this moment, but still feeling a hint of anxiety at how things can change with the tiniest variation in his breath—
He almost misses Nino leaning in closer, capturing his lips in a kiss. The union feels warm, and alive, and wet. Telling him with every movement of tongue and every accidental bump of teeth that Nino accepts him. That his ageless lover will never have him any other way.
It’s always been like the first time—
Not much different from the last...
“What was that you were doing?” Nino scowls in feigned displeasure, pressing his hands on Ohno’s cheeks. “Haven’t I taught you anything, Ojii-chan?”
Ohno laughs through his duck lips, not making any attempt at all to free his face from the affectionate squeeze.
Instead, he reaches out and does the same to his lover.
“I bet I look so much better than you do,” Nino grumbles, a playful glint flashing in his eyes.
“Hell, no,” Ohno grumbles back, his squished lips straining into a smirk.
Their bantering fills the afternoon, mocking words and lilting voices merging with the breeze. Until they find themselves cuddling, pressing their bodies close, their hearts almost freezing as they bate their breaths for the final few minutes of their time together...
”Hold me, Oh-chan...”
Three decades have done nothing to lessen the pain he feels when Nino finally closes his eyes...
+21 years
The sun dipping into the horizon has always been a majestic sight. It is Nino’s favorite time of the day. Ohno would never have known such perfection exists if it weren’t for his lover.
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
Nino slinks an arm around his waist and sighs. “Us. And how I wish we can be like this forever...”
Ohno wraps his arms tighter around the younger man’s naked frame and buries his face into the tuft of unruly hair that smells of summer and lovemaking.
From the moment he took this man home with him all those years ago, it has been his one and only wish—
For them to stay like this. Forever.
Two decades have done nothing to change his mind.
“What a stupid thing to do, Oh-chan...” Nino mumbles, his warm breath dancing across Ohno’s chest. “What a stupid, stupid thing to do!”
Ohno smiles and closes his eyes. Loving the way the afternoon breeze touches his face. It feels warm, and real, and still pretty much like the last time—
The last day he ever spent with his beloved Pet—
The man he picked out of many to accompany him, serve him, pleasure him, for what was supposed to have been a single day—
A day he is now trying to stretch to eternity...
“I regret nothing, Nino,” Ohno brushes his fingers down the young man’s cheek, his heart constricting from the memories of their time together, but never truly breaking.
Nino looks up at him, eyes brimming with tears. “You could’ve gotten a worthier partner, you know. Not someone like me...”
Ohno knows what Nino means to say, and it flashes in his mind like a warning too late and too senseless now to be heeded.
“I regret nothing,” he repeats, savoring every word, knowing without a doubt that he means each one, even as tears begin running down his cheeks.
Nino reaches out and cradles his face in his small hands. “Why do you look so beautiful, Oh-chan?” he whispers, his breath frolicking pleasantly on Ohno’s face. “Have you always been like this? Have I not been paying attention?”
The years hadn’t been enough to curb his tears, his pain, the way his heart would bleed at this very moment. He sniffles. And Nino laughs through his own tears before pressing their lips together.
The kiss feels perfect. Real. Warm and intrusive just like he remembers...
They banter afterwards, their voices lilting in the wind. Both of them trying to put the inevitable out of their minds for even just a few minutes.
They cuddle when the truth finally begins sinking in.
”Don’t leave me, Oh-chan...”
“I won’t, Nino,” Ohno whispers, pressing the trembling body as close as possible to his side. “I never will.”
Time doesn’t heal. It only makes the pain worse—
Still, Ohno regrets nothing.
+10 years
If it had been up to him, he would’ve chosen a different memory. A happier one that didn’t have to end with him crying.
Except that this is the only memory he has ever had with Nino—
The same patio. The same ocean. The same sunset.
The same lounge chair with him and Nino on it, their skins still buzzing from the heat of their recent lovemaking.
For how else can they spend a perfectly warm summer, especially the last one they’ll ever get to share?
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
He has never learned to call his lover by his first name. Nino actually likes it better this way.
“Us. And how far we can go from here...”
It still feels weird hearing Nino’s voice sometimes, so real and youthful like the first and last time.
Though they’ve already done more than just talk...
Though he has been re-living this same memory for the past 10 years...
It’ll take time to get used to this, he’s been told. But once he gets the hang of things, he’ll be able to do so much more. Like alter little stuffs here and there. Give a little variety to their conversations—
“You’re a stupid man, Oh-chan! Why’d you have to do this to yourself?!”
Not that there is anything wrong with this memory echoing the most special moment of his life to the tee...
“I regret nothing, Nino.”
He won’t be able to change how it ends, though.
At least, no such case has ever been documented.
“You could’ve chosen someone better. Why me?”
The people who extracted this memory for him and infused it into the machine that ate up more than half of what he inherited from his father at 18, smirked at his decision and silently questioned his sanity.
He saw the mockery clearly displayed in everybody’s eyes. But he didn’t care.
Not even a decade, or two, or more, can change his mind—
“I regret nothing.”
He has always been a rebellious man. Distinctions between people never matter to him.
He does what his heart tells him to do. Every single time...
“Why do you look so perfect, Oh-chan?”
Even if it means he’ll be hurting himself every day for the rest of his life—
“Have you always been like this?”
Even it means he’ll have to endure the bittersweet sensations rippling through his nerves as the happiest and saddest day of his life unfold before his eyes—
“Have I not been paying attention?”
Even if it means he’ll have to watch life slip out of his lover’s eyes over and over again—
He regrets nothing.
At least, this way he gets to spend the time he never had with Nino. The few minutes he spends in this plain sustains him for the rest of the day.
Nino’s kiss feels as sweet and warm and loving as he remembers.
The bantering makes him laugh through his tears.
The cuddling is filled with wordless sniffles, uttered requests, and whispered promises.
“Don’t let me go, Oh-chan...”
“I won’t, Nino. You know I never will.”
Forever is a lie.
But it’s all he has to live for, and it’s all that matters to him now.
@17
Kazunari Ninomiya died at 17.
But not before Ohno made sure they would stay together forever.
Pets like Nino were never meant to last for more than a day.
They were made to please and never cling.
Fulfill the job they were brought up to do, then expire.
Satoshi Ohno was one of those flighty Elites that the Casa which owned Nino catered to.
People like him were more sensual than loving, preferred short flashes of raw sensations to heavy strings of emotions that obliged them to get tied down.
It wasn’t really that Nino was anything special that he managed to capture an Elite’s heart.
Ohno, at 19, was just of the right frame of mind, at just the perfect time, to be very receptive to affections that were freely and honestly given.
For Pets only ever had one chance to fall in love, and they sure did make the most of it until their time was up.
Nino found it easy enough to fall for Ohno, just as easy as Ohno did for him.
Ohno spoke openly. Nino listened attentively.
Ohno felt like the worst man on earth for betraying his father’s expectations.
Nino held him close and made him feel like nothing could bring him down.
Ohno believed he couldn’t possibly be happy with anyone. Ever.
Nino made love to him and changed his mind—
If you only had a moment left with the one you love, how would you spend it?
Ohno at 19 knew exactly what he wanted to do.
“Marry me.”
“Oh-chan... I can’t—Are you stupid?!”
He understood Nino’s reluctance, but he hardly really cared.
Of course, he knew it was a stupid thing to do.
A marriage between an Elite and a Pet who only had a few hours left to live was totally unheard of.
Who would willingly want to endure such a tragic bond for the rest of his life?
But it was the only way he could keep Nino close.
It was the only way he could ensure he would never forget that a man named Kazunari Ninomiya had once graced his life and gave him a hundred reasons to live when he no longer felt like living. To dream when he no longer felt like dreaming.
To wish for a Forever he never thought could exist—
They got married at noon the next day, and Nino spent the next hour crying like a little girl admiring the ring on his hand.
Nino died in the evening, in his arms, right after the sun vanished into the horizon. Exactly twenty-four hours from when Ohno bought him and took him home.
The grieving Elite held his lifeless lover close and cried for a while, then set out to do what had to be done.
The people at the Institute who extracted this memory from Nino’s mind, looked at him first with confusion, then amusement.
For only the oldest of people who had lost their marriage partners had ever come for this procedure.
No one as young as Ohno would ever want to get tied down to a single person, a single memory this early in his life.
But it hardly mattered. Ohno had the money. He had the papers to prove he and the Pet were indeed married, and thus should qualify without question.
Everybody could only smirk and silently question his sanity.
Ohno saw the mockery clearly displayed in their eyes. But he didn’t care.
Nothing else mattered.
The machine was ready for him the following day—
“What are you thinking about, Nino?”
He used it without fail, in the morning and at night, for the rest of his days.
“Us. And how far we can go from here...”
It was a good married life—this much he could say—though only ever lived inside his head—
∞•∞•∞•∞•∞
Satoshi Ohno died at 71, the machine called Forever whirring beside him, playing in an endless loop the memory that has sustained his life for many years.
~1992*4##111~
