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Walking away from Ichiban again, Nanba held his breath and waited for the catharsis that he’d promised himself would come when he made up his mind to say goodbye. His declarations were a bitter film clinging to his tongue like awful booze, and he choked down his rising emotions as he put distance between himself and the fires of the homeless camp. It was just like Ichiban to make it into a see you later. It was a promise he’d had no intention of making when he’d showed up, but with Ichiban, Nanba found himself doing and saying reckless things as if they were the only natural conclusion. Now was the time to break away from all of it- he couldn’t keep risking his life when he had his brother to think about. Everything he’d done had been for him, selfless and honourable, and what a complete load of horseshit that was.
He should feel relieved. He mostly just felt heavy, dragging himself on the instinctual path back to the bar district before correcting his course towards the apartment block in Koreatown that’d been under his nose the whole time.
Being given his own keycard and the elevator code had felt the tiniest bit anticlimactic in the moment, given what he’d endured to find Shoichi, but Nanba was grateful for it now as he made his way unimpeded to the suite on the top floor. The plain white numbers on the door glared down at him as he raised one clenched fist and knocked, a blunted sound that still felt intrusive in the midnight silence.
“Sorry,” he started as soon as the door swung open, pausing to try to breathe through the lump forming again in his throat at the way his brother’s face fell at the sight of him. He dropped his gaze down to the toes of his filthy gumboots as he continued roughly. “Sorry, I didn’t want to come back so soon but-”
He should’ve really seen it coming, but it still nearly knocked him off his balance when Shoichi’s arms (always stronger than him, even when they were young) wrapped around his back and yanked him a full step forwards into the doorway, colliding with his stocky frame.
“Yu, none of that.” Shoichi mumbled, obscured against the shoulder of Nanba's jacket, and he took those precious few seconds to unsubtly wipe at his eyes before Shoichi took a step back, one hand clapped on his shoulder as he looked Nanba over. "C'mon, none of that. What do you need?"
"Can I just sleep on the floor for tonight?"
“Idiot, we own a futon." Shoichi dropped his arm, talking backwards as he padded towards a closet tucked into the corner beside a neat set of shoes. "If you’re here you may as well shower-”
“You’re not the first person to say that.”
“-wash your face; shave if you want to, top drawer. I’ll get everything set up for ya.”
Laying in a borrowed set of his brother’s clothes with his still-damp hair soaking into his pillow, Nanba absently listened to the almost imperceptible hum of the washing machine tumbling his jacket. (An in-suite washer and dryer- Shoichi really had been living the good life.) Granted, it still stung a bit to be inside the gilded cage that’d held his brother hostage for the better part of a year, no matter how much he’d made it into a home.
If this were a normal night, Nanba figured, he would be sprawled out on one of the spare futons at Survive, with Ichiban rolling around and kicking at his legs as he slept.
"Hey, bro.”
“Huh?” A slice of light from the hallway interrupted Nanba’s thoughts as the shadowy figure of Shoichi shuffled into the living room. He felt more than he saw the younger Nanba brother carefully step over and sink down to sit cross-legged beside him. He raised both arms over his head in a stretch before flopping down to land on his back with a soft thump.
"Been a while, huh? Kinda like those sleepovers we would do when we were kids." He turned his head to face Nanba, who scoffed.
“I know you’re not choosing to sleep on the floor beside a homeless bum when your lovely fiancée is down the hall.”
Shoichi exhaled deeply, folding his arms behind his head as a makeshift pillow. The ambient noise of the apartment punctuated the stretch of silence until he spoke again, audibly more strained than before. “What happened, Yu?”
"Ah," he said lamely, chewing on his lip as he stalled.
He’d gotten a lot more than he’d bargained for since coming to Ijincho; his brother being back in one piece was just part of it. But peeling back a single layer of the corruption and violence revealed an even more rotten, complex depth, one he was currently standing on the precipice of and staring down. He wasn’t an ex-gangster with a dog in this fucked-up political race, but then again; neither were Saeko or Adachi, and they’d stayed behind easily. Why was it so hard for him?
“We’re all basically in the same boat here, right?”
“Look, it’s fine. I’ve heard enough. I-”
Why the hell did he say that?
“I told Ichiban I was leaving.” He confessed as he stuffed the recent memory down. The sour taste coming back to his mouth was worse mingling with the mouthwash he’d all but chugged in an attempt to feel clean.
“And where are you planning on going?”
“I don’t know.” Nanba answered honestly. “Anywhere but this damn city.” The melodramatic proclamation fell flat as Shoichi considered it.
“What about your friends?”
“They’re not- I mean-” Nanba sat up abruptly, dragging his hands over his face and hearing Shoichi shuffle up to a seated position after him, alert and unrelenting in his pursuit. “It’s better that we’re not.”
“You finally made some friends, and now you don’t want them?”
“Shut up. You were always a social chameleon, what would you know.” He could barely make out the shape of Shoichi in the dark and trying to discern his features without his glasses was an exercise in futility, so Nanba glared in his general direction. If he had to take a guess, his brother merely shrugged and rested his chin on a propped-up fist.
“You seemed really happy when you told me about them, that’s all. I still can’t believe you saved that Ichiban guy’s life with fishing line, by the way.”
Despite himself, Nanba felt his guard drop at the mention of their first meeting. “It’s not like I expected him to survive. I told you I hid him back in the garbage afterwards, right?”
“Hah! No, you sure didn’t.”
If he hadn’t been in the camp that night, god forbid, if Ichiban had died, he would’ve probably never lived long enough to find Shoichi. Nanba owed Ichiban for more than he could have ever tried to express, and what had he done? Kept him in the dark, used him, fought against him just to have someone other than himself to blame for his sloppy plans falling apart, and left him high and dry the second he finally got what he’d come for- admittedly, in a very roundabout way.
“Just, trust me, okay? He’s better off now. I was just dragging him down.”
"Alright, how do I say this.” Shoichi started and then paused, leaving Nanba to sullenly wait for the other shoe to drop. "Are you sure you're not running away?"
It was his damned journalistic tendencies that got him in trouble in the first place, and as much as he’d missed him Nanba bitterly wished, just for a moment, that he’d found a nice piece of cardboard to cozy up under for the night instead. He dragged his hands down his face, exhaling harshly into his palms. “Great, is that just what everyone thinks of me?”
“Yu, that’s not it.”
As much as he was tempted to throw his brother’s accommodation back in his face and storm out onto the streets, the gesture would be ruined in the time it took to dig his damp laundry out of the wash. So, being stuck in his conflicting feelings, Nanba did the mature thing and pulled his blanket up to his ears, rolling over onto his side and pretending not to feel Shoichi's disappointed stare boring holes through his back. The silent stand-off hung heavy, until Nanba heard the shuffling of Shoichi dragging himself to his feet and his voice came from above.
"Sleep on it. You can stay as long as you need."