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It's Christmas again, huh.
He can almost hear Mitsu in his head: quit pretending to be surprised, old man! Yamato grins, blowing on his hands. Imaginary Mitsu’s not wrong. It’d been impossible to forget with all of them. Riku had been humming Christmas songs since September, and they’d preordered the KFC all the way back in November. They’d organized a Secret Santa for the party this year again, as per tradition. Yamato had been meaning to find a day to do something for that, but he’d been booked up almost the entire season. Well, he didn’t mind. As long as he was making someone out there smile.
What have I become? Yamato laughs to himself lightly as he keeps walking, the winter streets brightened with fairy lights. Believing in things like smiles and hard work—his younger self would probably go into shock.
"—Whoa!" Busy shoppers jostle against him in his moment of weakness, shoving him forward into the shopping district. It’s a little weird that nobody stops to gasp at the leader of IDOLiSH7 among them; Yamato’s scarf can’t be that good a disguise. But still they push on, sweep-sweeping on their way with a efficiency that reminds him of Musashi. Yamato goes along. He trusts Musashi, and so he’ll trust them. Like him, everyone probably just wants to get home soon.
It still feels weird, Yamato thinks as he goes along the crowd. Actually wanting to go home, that is. Especially during Christmas. Christmas at the dorms were festive, lively, but it'd been so different at his mom's place. Chiba Shizuo was never around during the season; he used to brush Yamato off with some excuse about work and disappear into the night, off to another home, a family he didn't have to keep a secret. Yamato had always wondered why his mom seemed sadder around Christmas when he was a kid.
The crowd disperses, people heading this way and that into different directions. Yamato’s left smack in the middle of the shopping district, only a little ways ahead the street he’d been on.
Someone more poetic might have called it fate, to be left here when he’d been procrastinating on his Secret Santa gift. But as it is Yamato’s old and cynical, so he calls this a reminder from the universe to get his ass on it already.
“Fine, fine,” he says out loud to nobody in particular. It’s not a bad time to do it. The sun had barely begun to set, and he’d be a little late for dinner, but it’d work out fine.
Yamato: Manager, I'll be home a little later.
I have something I want to check out.
A reply pings back almost immediately, as expected of their diligent manager. If it were anyone else Yamato might have teased them for always being glued to their phone, but it's Tsumugi, so he doubts she was slacking off. He doubts she even knows what slacking off means, actually.
Tsumugi: Understood!
Could it be Christmas-related?
His cover already blown. (Not that he had one to begin with, come to think of it.) Yamato sighs in mock exasperation as he types a reply back, but he can't help the fond smile that spreads across his face.
Yamato: You'll just have to wait and see.
It's not a hard connection to make given it's a week before Christmas, but their manager really is too smart for all of them. Yamato's losing his mysterious charm.
Maybe it's just as well, because Yamato doesn't feel cool and mysterious wandering around the mall aimlessly. He feels like a bumbling old man. How did people even buy things for other people? It's Yamato's third year doing something like Secret Santa, and he still has no idea how to do it. He'd kind of—well, definitely fucked around with the gift exchange the first year and gave it some effort the second, but this year...Yamato's caused all of them enough trouble this year. He wants to do…better. And the least he can do for them is make sure they have a good Christmas.
Easier said than done, though. The mall seems like a multicolour whirlwind of Christmas sales and decorations, advertising everything from clothes (and underwear) to electronic appliances. Yamato had no idea where he was even going to start, much less what he was going to buy.
“Yamato-kun?” A familiar voice says from behind him, and Yamato freezes up. Last Christmas plays ominously in the background. Oh no. Fuck this. I don’t exist, I’m not h—
“Yamato-kun,” the voice says again, and Yamato gives up. Sure enough it's Yuki behind him, dressed down and Momo-less. Sadly. Momo would have made what was about to come a lot more bearable.
"I didn't expect to see you here,” Yuki continues when Yamato doesn’t say anything. It would sound normal coming from anyone else, except Yamato is pre-programmed to be suspicious of Yuki, so instead he narrows his eyes, already irritated.
"Why are you here,” he says, instead of an actual greeting. “Where’s Momo-san?”
“He's at a meeting nearby,” Yuki replies. “He told me to ‘go find something fun to do, Yuki~~!’ so here I am.”
“At a mall,” Yamato deadpans. The pinnacle of fun, truly. “Also, never pretend to be Momo-san again. It gives me chills.”
“It’s true that he does it best,” Yuki says almost sincerely. Yamato inwardly does a double take. “Well, that aside what are you doing here, Yamato-kun? Have you migrated from wasting away in your room to wasting away in the open?”
“None of your business,” Yamato returns snippily. "I'm gonna go do what I came here for, bye.” He moves away, except he finds himself shadowed. Why is he even surprised.
“Don’t follow me, what the hell!”
“You seem lonely,” Yuki says in return, coming even closer. “Surely you could use some company.”
"I really don't ,” Yamato sighs, but it comes out resigned. He's too tired to even fight it tonight. He lets Yuki fall into step next to him as silent permission, because even after everything it's still hard to communicate when he doesn't really want to. Baby steps, he supposes.
Or maybe it doesn't really matter, because the next thing Yuki does is ask "Where are we going,” businesslike. His presence is apparently set in stone for tonight.
"We're doing Secret Santa, so I have to get a present,” Yamato says. It's not really an answer, but it's not like Yamato has an actual place in mind.
“And who are you Santa for?” Yuki asks.
Ah. Yamato doesn't really want to answer. It was yet another intervention of fate, maybe. That after having shut him out, pushed him away and caused him a whole load of heartache, Yamato would have to be Mitsu's Santa, his bearer of joy. Maybe it was irony at its finest, but it only felt like a second chance.
Except the idea of telling any of this to Yuki, in any capacity, feels like shooting himself in the foot.
“...Take a guess,” Yamato says instead.
“From the look on your face, I assume it’s Mitsuki-kun?” Yuki says, and of course he gets it right on first try. Of course Yamato had to run into the one person who’d seen the full extent of the mess he’d been after the fight.
“Yeah,” Yamato says shortly.
“I assume you have no idea what you could gift him that would be appropriate to make up for all of the pain and trouble you’ve caused him in particular this year, and you’re in a dilemma as a result?”
“I knew letting you come along was a mistake,” Yamato fumes, his footsteps quickening out of habit. Out of years and years of I don't like this, I want to get away , instead of standing firm and toughing it out.
There's a sudden grip on his shoulder, an iron claw, and Yamato whirls around in surprise. "I don't think it has to be anything particularly grand,” Yuki says, releasing Yamato when he stops walking.
"But you don't have to think of something now ,” he continues when Yamato doesn't reply. Again. Was this going to be a thing the whole night. "You can think of something while we look for the rest.”
"The rest?" Yamato says, confused.
Yuki's eyes glitter, and Yamato starts to feel wary again.
“Aren’t you going to buy presents for the rest of your members?” the long-haired devil on Yamato’s shoulder says.
Usamimi Friends store
"I seriously think you're just doing this because you want to see my wallet emptied out,” Yamato says as the two of them enter the store. Everything's in pastel colours like some baby’s nursery. Yamato just walked in, but he already needs to die. Oh God, he's with Yuki too. What if he runs into a fan here, or the paparazzi. This is turning out to be a worse idea by the second. He needs to get what he needs and out, stat.
"You're the one who brought us here,” Yuki points out. He looks noncommittally at the shelves of plushies they're passing by, and back at Yamato. "I don't suppose we’re here for Mitsuki-kun?”
Yamato snorts. "No way. We're headed for the stationery section.”
That doesn't answer Yuki's unspoken question of who it was for, but he doesn't ask again. Yamato gets to spend the next few seconds in blessed, blessed silence until they reach the rows of pens, Yuki tapping on his phone. Yamato's eyes zoom in on the few Roppu-chans left. Jackpot.
"I thought Tamaki-kun preferred King Pudding,” Yuki says, raising his head and watching Yamato pick out one of each piece of Roppu-chan stationary. Mechanical pencil, eraser, notebook all go into the basket. “—Or could this be for Iori-kun?”
"I wonder,” Yamato says. It's not hard to figure out, but Yamato's not going to give it up if he can help it. Ichi would probably die of sheer embarrassment, and they need their little producer after all.
Yuki starts to say something, but Yamato shoves the basket at him instead. "Roppu-chan,” he instructs, pointing at the mascot on the notebook cover. “One of each thing. We're gonna get this year's Christmas keyholder, too.”
"I didn't think you were so familiar with the franchise,” Yuki says, a smirk starting over his face. Yamato realizes his fatal mistake.
"Just shut up and help me,” he snaps, ears beginning to burn.
King Pudding store
The bundle of merch they've gotten Ichi thankfully fits into Yamato's shoulder bag, so it's with shoulder-sagging relief he staggers out of the store, hands free of a trademark Usamimi Friends shopping bag. Yuki gives him a weird look.
"Where to next?” he asks.
Yamato pauses. Going for Mitsuki’s present sounded like the logical choice after buying his little brother presents, but Yamato still…has nothing.
“Let’s look at the mall directory, I guess,” Yamato says. Except they have to find that too, and honestly, Yamato’s already getting tired. He squints around the level they’re on for a directory, not noticing that Yuki had stopped a few steps behind.
Yamato turns around, half-questioning, mostly exasperated. “What, you see something?”
Yuki points to the store next to them. “Our next destination.”
The familiar logo of King Pudding looks out at them from above, and while Yamato’s a little peeved at Yuki acting like a know-it-all, Yuki’s also not wrong. The entire world knows King Pudding is Tama’s special interest, after all. Yamato would have ended up at here at some point tonight anyway; it’d just been a matter of time. But still he grumbles a petty “don’t go deciding things on your own,” even as he follows Yuki into the store.
The interior of the store is almost entirely pudding yellow and brown, and the colours alone remind Yamato of Tama, lightening his mood a little. It makes sense that even shopping for Tama would be straightforward. Yamato has always found the trait endearing, and it’s a comfort especially now, when he’s worrying about a gift he doesn’t know what to do about, followed by a senior he can’t seem to understand.
Yamato gathers an armful of King Puddings from the fridge and dumps them into the King Pudding-themed basket, hearing the dull thud of plastic on plastic as they tumble in. Tama would probably be happy enough with just that, but just pudding for a present doesn’t really feel like enough.
“Yamato-kun,” Yuki says, from somewhere near him. Why does he keep wandering away.
“What,” Yamato says, and follows Yuki’s gaze. “Oh my God.”
A display dummy wearing a King Pudding onesie stands proudly in the store, the top of the head brown like its signature syrup. Its crown is a hairclip this time, attached to the side of the hood. Goddamn, it’s cute, Yamato thinks as he reaches to touch one of the sleeves. It’s soft and fluffy, every bit the wearable comfort blanket. It’d be perfect for Tama, but.
“It’s way too small,” he muses, eyeing at the dummy. It only reaches up to his chest, clearly modelled for someone younger and smaller.
“Ask if there are other sizes,” Yuki says, and with that he finds a shop assistant nearby, who just about loses her mind at the Yuki of Re:vale standing in front of her. “Excuse me.”
“Y-Yes?!” the assistant says, straightening up.
“Does this onesie come in a size that would fit a six feet tall child?” Yuki asks, entirely straight-faced.
The silence that follows is deafening.
Yamato's just about to explain that's not a joke, they really do have a six-foot kid in mind, when finally the assistant exhales, and turns her heel. “Just a moment.” She disappears into the stockroom, and Yamato can’t help but feel like he’ll have to thank her a dozen times over by the time this is done.
It takes a good ten minutes, but finally she reappears with a bundle of fluffy yellow in her arms. Yamato catches her expression in a mix of annoyance and exhaustion before she schools it back into a customer service face, and Yamato winces. You’ve worked hard, thank you—!
She unrolls the fluff to show the two of them, and sure enough, when she pulls it up it seems just about as tall as Yamato, if not taller. (It’s kind of hard to tell, when she’s shorter than them.) He has no idea how she found it, or why people even made onesies six feet tall, but he’s sure as hell glad for it.
“I’ll take it, thanks,” Yamato tells her, and she lets him take it into his own arms.
“Thank you,” Yuki echoes.
“All in a day’s work,” she replies. She’d stopped stuttering as soon as she came back out. Retail really changes people, huh. “Although…who is it for, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“Tama,” Yamato says, forgetting to specify, because that’s what happens when you grow up in entertainment and just assume everyone knows your name.
“Tama?” she repeats, one finger to her chin. “Like…your kid or something?”
…She’s not really wrong. “...Yeah,” Yamato says. It's also been a while since he's felt like this much of a rookie name. Meanwhile, Yuki’s definitely snickering in the background. Yamato’s got a good mind to step on his foot.
“That sounds real cute,” she says with a grin. “I hope they like it.”
“Me too,” Yamato replies, feeling a part of his soul physically crumbling away as they head to the cashier.
Thrift shop
Since Yamato’s already accidentally going by number order, it just seems to make sense that Sou is the next person to get a gift. He genuinely means to walk into a normal CD store and get Sou like, an album or something, CD of Rootbank’s Greatest Hits, even if he has no idea what Sou does or doesn’t already own, but then. He sees it.
Just next to the King Pudding store is one of those tiny stores that sell everything, clocks to underwear to mugs. And just beyond the entrance, smack in the middle of the display, is the ugliest, stupidest, bootleg-as-fuck Douglas Rootbank mug Yamato has ever seen. It’s absolutely horrific. Yamato can’t not buy it.
Yuki follows Yamato’s awed gaze, and even Yuki’s mouth starts twitching. The two of them make their way closer. Yamato feels as though they had discovered a priceless artifact. They’re clearly about to change the world.
“The face is a true work of art,” Yuki says as they inspect it. The mug is in the shape of Rootbank’s head, his expression stretched mercilessly across the plastic so his sunglasses are wide ovals. Yamato discovers Rootbank’s eyes are only visible when he lifts the mug and stares directly into his face, and finds the void staring back at him.
Yamato puts the mug back down, shaken to his core. “It contains so much,” he whispers.
Yuki nods solemnly and touches the orange handle of the mug, shaped like Rootbank’s bun. “I understand.” The dark depths of the mug continue to stare back up at them ominously. Yamato can’t wait to see Sou drink out of his idol’s head every time he uses it.
“Shall we go to the cashier now?” Yuki asks, but Yamato pauses.
“Wait.” Something bright red and lettered sticks out from one of the shelves, and when Yamato pulls it out he snorts in delight. “Oh hell yeah. We’re getting this too.”
“For Sougo-kun again?” Yuki says, raising an eyebrow.
“No, no,” Yamato says, waving him off. He picks up the cursed Douglas Rootbank mug, the scrap of fabric in his other hand, and looks around for the cashier. “Let’s go pay now.”
Animate
Nagi is a lot easier to shop for, physically; Google Maps tells them there’s an Animate only two streets away. But emotionally? Imagine the toll.
"Let's get out of here in case someone recognizes us,” Yamato mutters. He wouldn't have minded being recognized at the King Pudding store, but in an Animate? Oniisan can only take so much. He only just manages to stuff the Cocona tea set into the King Pudding bag with the onesie, relieved. Thank God it fits. Now to get out—
"An autograph? Sure,” Yuki's voice says from a distance, in his idol voice, and Yamato's head snaps up. Not again, he thinks first, then on the heels of that—oh shit. Is this what it feels like to be a parent. Wait, Yamato doesn't want a kid like Yuki.
Yuki had wandered a little ways away next to the TV showing reruns of Cocona (somehow Yuki and magical girl anime was an incredibly cursed combo) and a young man stands in front of him, looking like he was going to piss himself from joy at any moment. "So we still have male fans,” Yuki says as he scribbles his signature on what looks like a crumpled Animate receipt. Yamato wonders if this evening can get any weirder. "Momo will be thrilled.”
The guy squeaks. “I’ve been a fan for so long!” He takes the receipt when Yuki hands it back to him, holding it reverently. Distantly, Yamato remembers Sou with his Rootbank autograph.
"I'm glad to hear that,” Yuki says, offering a little smile. Yamato thinks he can see the guy actually die inside. "Say, do you like IDOLiSH7?”
Never mind the guy, Yamato's going to fucking die instead. He shakes his head frantically at Yuki, but he ignores him in favour of the fan, who brightens even more. “I love them too! Mitsuki-san's always so inclusive of the different genders of their fans, and I love seeing Re:vale and IDOLiSH7 get along!”
Yuki nods, and beckons towards Yamato. “Yamato-kun, come greet your fan properly.”
The fan turns around, and Yamato swears he sees stars in the guy's eyes. "Yamato-san too...?! This really is the best day of my life...!”
Yamato's embarrassment doesn't seem to matter, all of sudden.
Tokusatsu store
"We probably set off a bunch of gossip being seen together in Animate,” Yamato says after they send the fan off, waving until they turn the corner. The poor guy had wound up crying because he'd been so overwhelmed, and cried harder when Yamato patted his head.
"Let the people say what they want to,” Yuki says. “What's important is the music.” He casts a glance at Yamato, and when he speaks again his voice seems different somehow, more serious. "So how does it feel, young master? To know you created something so precious it reduces people to tears?”
A repeat of their conversation that night, but this time Yamato feels like he can listen. “Ah...”
Yamato knew they had fans. It was what every cheering crowd, every sea of penlights, every sold-out concert meant. But to see someone in front of him sobbing their eyes out because Yamato was that…admired? Important? Precious a figure to them? It never stopped feeling like a shock. It didn’t feel like something he was worthy of. It felt like…
"Love,” Yamato says softly, before he can stop himself.
“Hm?” Yuki asks.
“No, nothing.” Love? Yamato knew their fans didn't know him outside of the screen. They saw Yamato the idol, the face he put on for shows. They didn’t really know him. That had what showbusiness had been for him. All lies, all appearances. You had people that would swindle and cheat to get where they wanted to be, and Yamato's ideals hadn't been much better either. But yet.
Yet what he did now, standing center stage, made people laugh and cry honestly and purely. It was more than what Yuki was asking; more than just his music. Yamato had lost track of all the comments he'd received asking him if he'd slept, if he'd eaten, if he was taking care of himself, a kind of warmth even in this cesspool of an industry. He had met the truest people he had ever known here, deep in the throbbing heart of the entertainment industry, in what should have been deceit and lies and nothing more. He had been at his worst, but he as a person, as himself, had still been welcomed back with open arms, with nothing but…love.
I've been loved more than I thought, all along, Yamato thinks, and feels his own eyes begin to sting.
The bell above the door hums sharply, and Yamato startles to see Yuki holding the handle. "You stopped here, so I assume it's our next destination,” Yuki says by way of explanation.
“I told you where we were going,” Yamato says roughly, trying to speak through the lump in his throat.
“I forgot,” Yuki returns matter-of-factly. Yamato gives up for the second time tonight.
The interior of the store is filled to the brim with figures, the TV here playing some action show. The special effects and yelling give Yamato whiplash after Cocona's sparkles, but that's what they're here for. Yuki gives Yamato another look.
“For Riku-kun?”
He’d gotten almost terrifyingly good at guessing over the course of one night. “He likes hero stuff,” Yamato says defensively. He’s not even sure why he is; maybe it’s because he’s the one who thought up toku when he complains about Animate being nerdy. “This is hero stuff.”
Yuki shrugs. “Go ahead then.”
The TV continues to play as Yamato pokes around the DVDs, wondering which series he should get. He’d never really been into toku all that much; he’d watched an episode or two as a kid, but it’d popped into his mind when he saw it on the same street as Animate.
“We’re heroes because we protect people’s smiles!” The TV blares. It’s a cheesy line, but something about it makes Yamato remember the starstruck look in the fan’s eyes, and how brightly Riku shines, and he pauses in his rifling.
“Is there any greater justice than moving people’s hearts?!”
“Excuse me,” Yamato says, heading towards the cashier. They look up at him from their phone. “Do you know the name of the show playing on the TV?”
The night air is fresh against their faces when they step out of the store, a shock after the indoor heating. Everything seems toned down a shade or two in the winter night, even with the city’s ever-present lights, and that's how Yamato knows it's late.
“We didn’t get Mitsu anything after all,” Yamato says wryly. Nothing good enough, anyway.
Yuki shrugs again. He’d gotten increasingly quieter towards the end of the night; and looking at him stifle a yawn, Yamato realizes Yuki must be tired. Maybe even terribly so.
“I still don’t think it needs to be anything grand,” Yuki says, wrapping his scarf more tightly around himself. “Just give him a present from the heart.”
“Easier said than done,” Yamato says. But it’s a bratty answer, especially when Yuki was genuinely trying to help. So he pauses, and swallows, a little ashamed. “...I’ll try to think of something. Thank you for everything tonight.” The words come out quietly, floating into the air so much like bubbles, and Yamato hopes they reach Yuki. It's a courtesy stock phrase he's said a million times before, but sincerity makes it harder to say.
"Unblock me if you really are grateful,” Yuki returns.
"I was stupid to think—ah, fuck it,” Yamato snaps, the King Pudding bag bumping against his leg as he turns to leave. Goddamnit. He shouldn't have bothered being honest. He should have known it’d turn out like this, taken as a joke. He’d said his pleasantries. He didn’t have anything else he owed this conversation.
“Yamato-kun,” Yuki says, just as Yamato starts to walk away.
Typical of him to inconvenience people whenever he likes, Yamato thinks, turning around again. But maybe that’s unfair, his mind says as his anger simmers down into a candle flame. Even if Yuki hadn’t reacted with equal sincerity as Yamato had hoped, he’d still spent his entire evening helping Yamato pick out presents for his members with literally nothing as compensation, with only a "you looked lonely” as a reason.
Yuki cared. It hits Yamato like a punch in the gut.
Yamato had always understood that, to some degree. Re:vale looked out for their juniors, and that included Yamato. But Yuki spent so much of his time teasing Yamato it was difficult to realize, to remember that he was the same person who had offered Yamato a place to stay at his lowest, and asked him what more he needed outside of heart-wrenching music like he was trying to explain a philosophy Yamato wasn’t sure he understood.
"Yeah?”
“You've come a long way.” Yuki says. “The young master I met all those years ago is still there, in bits and pieces, but you’ve very much become the Yamato-kun of yourself, away from the shadow of your father.” He smiles, an old kind of tired around the edges, and Yamato suddenly finds himself wondering about Yuki’s own demons. “I’m glad.”
The only person, apart from his mom, who’d seen him grow from the surly, angry schoolboy to who he was today.
“...Yeah,” Yamato says again. He smiles too. "Yeah. Me too.”
"Goodnight then, Yamato-kun.”
"Goodnight, Yuki-san.”
This time, when Yamato turns to go, he finds himself thinking that maybe this too, in its own way, was another kind of love.
Hey Mitsu. Merry Christmas.
Sorry your present isn't much. Think of it as something to put next to that "moderation” I gave you. I caused you a lot of trouble this year, but you still kept your trust in me, so...I wanted to return that to you. As much as I could. You taught me how to give it my all, and a lot of other things, and I really don’t know how I can ever repay you. Thank you.
I guess my present to you is...a promise. If you ever need company or want a shoulder to cry on instead of an empty bathroom, Onii-san’s always here for a drink, okay? My company’s expensive though, so if you keep this a secret between the two of us I’ll consider it advance payment.
P.S. The other package is the rest of your present lol. Hope you needed new underwear.