Archive of Our Own ^beta

To Yuki, social media was like a broken bone: unnecessary and wholly painful to deal with.

Well, perhaps that was a bit dramatic. But Yuki was impressively dramatic in his youth, wasn’t he?

Always having to be apart, always having to be separate. Naturally, when he was younger Yuki entirely snubbed the idea of social media as it became far more wide spread to the point that he would end up rolling his eyes or simply tuning out of a conversation entirely should profiles and what some random person had said or whatever else would come up in conversation.

(Granted, it wasn’t like Yuki had actually been a part of those conversations since essentially no one talked to him, just how he liked it, but he would overhear things. Entirely against his will.)

The idea of putting himself and his life on the internet was abhorrent to him, the way that just being perceived was abhorrent to him. When Ban suggested uploading a few of their songs onto RabbiTube to gain traction they had argued so badly that they didn’t speak to each other for a week straight, during which Yuki stubbornly ignored how lonely and isolated he felt as a result of arguing with his literal only friend. In the end, they hadn’t because Ban simply decided that it wasn’t worth arguing with Yuki about, but that didn’t stop recordings of their performances from being uploaded, regrettably. 

Yuki hadn’t wanted to go through the trouble of trying to get the videos taken down, but had demanded that Ban do it, instead.

“Exposure is good for a band,” Ban had said, sounding vaguely amused and exasperated the way that he often did when he thought Yuki was being difficult but entertaining.

“We don’t need our songs circulating around the internet,” Yuki had his arms crossed and a frown on his face that he refused to admit outright was a legitimate pout.

Ban dropped his face into his hand and laughed, “Yuki, how do you think we’re going to go anywhere as a band without our music being circulated?”

“There are ways without social media.”

“With the way RabbiTube and Rabbiter have been taking off? I seriously doubt it. Just because you hate social media doesn’t mean that it’s evil, it just means you’re practically an old man. One that’s behind the times, even.”

Yuki had huffed and Ban had decidedly not reported the recordings of their concerts and over the years Yuki begrudgingly admitted, to himself alone, that there really wasn’t any way for an artist to take off without some component of social media involved. It was irritating the way that sand stuck in your shoe was, though, and Yuki didn’t care how snobbish or elderly it made him sound, and pointblank refused to make any accounts despite Ban’s continuous attempts to persuade him otherwise.

Ban had even offered to run his social media for him and had laughed again when Yuki complained about Ban acting like a manager for the millionth time.

Time demanded change and adaption, however, and Yuki eventually gave in.

Because of Momo, of course.

Because in the end Re:vale were a freshly debuting idol pair with Momo knowing conceptually what it was to put your face and life and whole art and being on display for millions of people to see but having never experienced it. And, by that point, Yuki had long since decided to devote his whole being into making Re:vale successful, because how could he not, when Momo was trying so hard?

How could he do anything less than everything he was capable of, when he wanted so badly to protect a kindhearted, gallant person? When he wanted so badly to make him smile?

When this was a way to find Ban, maybe.

What had finally, fully convinced him was simply: “It’s a way to make yourself more relatable,” Okarin had explained.

“To our fans?”

“Exactly. You’re showing them a dream, some form of ideal, but bridging the gap and making yourself somehow available to them make them feel closer to you.”

“And I… want that.”

Okarin had smiled, “If we want to take Re:vale as high as I feel it will go, then of course. What are idols without fans, after all?”

So Yuki relented half a year into Re:vale’s skyrocketing popularity and sat with Okarin to make sure that things were set up appropriately to represent Okazaki Productions, and decided that his first post would simply be: hello . Because, surely, an empty profile wasn’t relatable enough, but what else was there to say?

And the app he had reluctantly downloaded on his phone promptly crashed.

“Okarin, it isn’t working,” Yuki tapped on it again and when it refused to open frowned, because while he wasn’t especially social media savvy he didn’t think that he was that bad .

“Huh?” Okarin glanced over his shoulder, “Oh, your phone must not be able to handle the amount of notifications  you’re getting.”

“That’s not very well designed.”

Okarin’s head suddenly dropped and his shoulders were shaking and it, admittedly, took Yuki a moment to realize that he was laughing silently. “Well, I don’t think it was designed with getting floods of thousands of notifications all at once in mind.”

“Thousands?”

“Mhmm,” Okarin had hummed, pulling out his phone and showing Yuki the hello that he had posted, which had somehow amassed 9k likes and hundreds of comments within the, what, 3 minutes since he had posted it?

“Do people not have anything better to do…” Yuki said, reaching over and tapping on Okarin’s screen. “Oh, Momo said something.”

Yuki blinked and plucked Okarin’s phone from his hand, much to his manager’s bemusement and mild offense, if his face was anything to go by. Well, it wasn’t like Okarin wasn’t used to Yuki doing things unprompted, which was probably why he didn’t immediately swipe his phone back.

He was somewhat pleased to know that Okarin just accepted his oddities in stride, at this point.

“Yuki, why did you take my phone?”

“Momo,” was all Yuki said as he typed out a reply.

Okarin’s head tilted as he tried to process what that could possibly mean coming from Yuki. It took approximately 7 seconds from Yuki’s count. “Wait a second——” it seemed that Okarin had figured out Yuki’s thought process, though by the time he reached for his phone Yuki had posted the message.

And the app promptly crashed.

“Ah…” Okarin’s head dropped again and this time Yuki heard and practically felt the enormity of the sigh that he released, “Well, there goes my tracking of some other idol groups the next few hours.”

“Now I won’t be able to reply at all, I guess,” Yuki said, glancing back at his own phone where the app attempted to start, and promptly returned to his home screen again.

“Probably for the best,” Okarin adjusted his glasses with a rueful but amused smile on his face, “that’s enough fanservice for the internet today, I think.”

“Fanservice?”

“Yuki!” Momo said as the door to their green room opened, the room immediately filling with his effusive presence. He looked happy, smiling his pleased smile that he did when he was especially excited about something, like when they were able to afford good meat for dinner or when a concert had gone especially well, and Yuki felt the compulsion to smile, as well. “We broke the internet!”

“That’s possible?”

“Metaphorically,” Momo said easily, practically waltzing over to the couch and dropping on it, limbs sprawling and laughter dancing across his face. “Maybe a little literally, too, since you can’t even open the app on your phone right now.”

“And this is… a good thing.”

“It certainly proves your rising popularity, and may gain you more fans,” Okarin said as he went back over to his miniature workstation they had cobbled together for when they were waiting between engagements. “And it’ll boost you two for MOP.”

Yuki looked between Okarin and Momo, both of whom looked especially gratified with the way things panned out, like an excellent thing happened that day. Though, he supposed that boosting Re:vale’s popularity and potentially even putting them in the running for MOP, when they had been lingering solidly in the teens despite their exponentially increasing popularity with Yuki’s movie and television appearances and Momo’s variety show appearances, was a good thing, in the end.

And something about relatability. Or, perhaps, just availability to their fans, even if it was veiled and not genuine.

It all felt rather shallow, to Yuki, which he knew was hilarious coming from him. But, if it made Momo and Okarin this pleased, he supposed that he could occasionally use social media.

Extremely occasionally.

“Yuki, you should add a description to your profile!”

“Hm… yours is: Hello, I’m Momo of @Revale! With a kaomoji and a peach.”

“You don’t have to do anything too complicated, maybe a link to our Re:vale account?”

“We have a Re:vale account?”

Momo’s laugh always felt like it was filling some reservoir within himself that he hadn’t known was there, before. “Yuki, sometimes you’re so airheaded! It’s one of the two accounts Okarin followed for you.”

“Oh.”

(He set his profile to: Yuki of @Revale, partner of @remomo.

Momo had squeaked when he first saw it, and the next time Yuki had glanced at Momo’s profile looking for something it had changed to include @reyuki is my partner! )

Momo was acting a bit strangely. Not quite distracted but intermittently listless and, occasionally, he even looked a bit gloomy. But, never around Yuki. Yuki had only noticed to begin with because he still had his knack of appearing at Momo’s side suddenly without being noticed, and could catch Momo unaware at times.

He had taken to checking his phone more than usual, too, when they were walking between jobs or had a moment of rest in their hectic days.

The subtleties of socialization and social cues were lost on Yuki a great deal of the time, though he was certainly trying to learn as they waded their way through the idol industry and made connections and whatnot that Yuki found he, also, had to maintain, but when it came to Momo he was relatively confident in his ability to notice when something was wrong.

Except.

“Momo,” it occurred to Yuki that he was hovering, again, leaning into Momo’s space without thinking.

“Yuki?” Momo turned to look at him, turning off his phone screen quickly which ——— was somewhat abnormal, he had never done that so quickly when Yuki suddenly appeared in his space.

“Are you okay?”

“Of course!”

Yuki could only ever take people at their word, and Momo’s smile was as radiant as ever, sun-like and glimmering around the edges. Who was he to doubt exactly what Momo was telling him to his face? He didn’t think Momo would lie to him about feeling well, or having nothing wrong, so he would just have to accept that he had been wrong, this time.

But it kept happening .

Momo would be scrolling his phone determinedly in the evening while Yuki was making dinner, a furrow to his brow and a slight frown on his face, gnawing on his bottom lip all the while. Or he would suddenly look almost distressed when a minor mistake would happen in the middle of a concert, instead of laughing it off. Or he would become almost listless in the middle of a variety show, which was so subtle that Yuki highly doubted that anyone but himself would have noticed, to begin with.

For a while, he wondered if he was imagining things. Making problems where there were none —— Momo had said that he was fine, and who was Yuki to presume otherwise?

But it was too persistent to be coincidence or his imagination, surely.

“Can I borrow your phone?” Yuki said after tossing his to the side with a sigh, “Mine ran out of battery.”

“Did you forget to plug it in last night?” Momo said, looking slightly concerned while he handed his phone to Yuki, “I can go get a charger if you need one.”

“I’ll borrow one from Okarin,” Yuki said, typing in Momo’s password (it was his old jersey number and the year he had first seen Re:vale, Yuki had known that for ages) and keeping his face carefully neutral as Momo chirped okay and returned to watching the performers who were on stage currently.

Lying was permissible when circumstances demanded it, right?

Except, Yuki wasn’t quite sure what he was looking for. There seemed to be a pattern with Momo’s shifting moods and his phone, but Yuki wasn’t especially good with reasoning or piecing puzzles together. He was a composer and songwriter, not a detective. Instinct told him to look at Momo’s phone, though, and when he swiped on the screen to see the most recently viewed apps he tapped on Rabbiter.

Rabbiter, where Momo had searched Re:vale and there was the typical amount of people talking about them, praising them or expressing some form of excitement about an upcoming show and discussing their most recent television appearance. Yuki wasn’t in the habit of looking at social media as much as Momo —— for all that he had been convinced to make accounts that hardly meant that he looked at them more than absolutely necessary —— so everything seemed par for the course, even the posts that were criticizing them.

Yuki was no stranger to criticism. Even when it was only Ban who had been checking comments and forums for then he had known that some of their fans didn’t like his attitude or found him distasteful or annoying. It had never bothered him, truly. Yuki had never been one to care much about others opinions of him, and that especially included faceless strangers who had time to complain about him on the internet.

There were even some criticisms about him now, for all that he had made attempts to become more personable. No one could achieve universal popularity, after all.

(Other than Momo, in his opinion, but.)

Yuki didn’t talk enough. Yuki sometimes looked disinterested. Yuki thought too highly of himself. The music Yuki created was crap, actually (that could get on his nerves, at times, but.) Yuki’s hair looked stupid at the awkward length it was at. Stuff like that.

So nothing seemed out of place except —— a small string of posts that were complaining about Momo for utterly insane reasons. He was too talkative, too loud, he never let Yuki talk, his dancing wasn’t as refined, his singing wasn’t as good. It was all useless babbling, as far as Yuki was concerned, and didn’t warrant much more than a skim, but ——

But did Momo feel that way?

That gave him pause.

Momo was bright and effusive and sun-like and determined and so talented it took Yuki’s breath away, at times, but he was also sensitive and so earnest that it was a wonder that Momo had wholeheartedly decided to enter the idol industry, of all places.

Where everything you did was picked apart.

Where not everyone would love you.

Where people could tear you down so easily.

Where you could scroll social media endlessly and always, always find someone criticizing literally anyone for doing anything at all.

It hadn’t occurred to Yuki that Momo would scroll through strangers’ posts about them, much less that he would take any criticisms to heart, because Yuki didn’t care to. But, Momo surely cared far more about that kind of stuff; it was in his nature, wasn’t it?

Yuki supposed he had always been impressively dense. (“How are you even alive?” Ban would ask, laughing when Yuki would do something objectively strange, “It’s amazing you haven’t been murdered or somehow fell to your death.”) Maybe it should have been obvious from context clues alone why Momo occasionally seemed down or especially hard on himself when he would make a mistake. Or, slightly more than usual.

It was obvious, in hindsight.

Instinctively, Yuki wanted to say something like Don’t listen to strangers or People don’t know what they’re talking about or even Momo, you’re amazing —— placating words, for all that they were also heartfelt. They would sound awkward coming from him, he thought, or Momo would smile a bit, or maybe a lot, but not accept them as truth.

He was gradually starting to realize that Momo needed to be shown things, repeatedly, to be convinced of something that he was entirely convinced wasn’t true or couldn’t be applied to him. Whether it be Yuki’s appreciation of him or his own talent or the like ——

Or maybe he was convincing himself of that, because sometimes words would get tangled in Yuki’s throat or something would come out far harsher than he intended or he would just find himself utterly incapable of voicing his own feelings and thoughts. He felt that he was making progress, and had expressed his appreciation of Momo aloud to him several times by now, but…

Despite his attempts and motivation for change, Yuki was still that recalcitrant child who refused to speak to his peers inside.

And, perhaps, there were times when words alone weren’t enough.

“Momo,” Yuki said after searching something utterly random in his browser, “here.”

“Oh, thanks!” Momo grinned as he took his phone back and glanced at it, before practically barking out a laugh, “Cat cafés? Are you trying to tell me something, Yuki?”

“Let’s go to one,” Yuki picked up his phone and stood, “they look… cute.”

“Ah, it could be a great section for a variety show,” Momo tapped his chin thoughtfully.

“Mmm,” Yuki turned his phone away from Momo as it lit up. “Do you think Okarin is in the lounge or studio?”

“Studio, maybe?”

Yuki stepped out of their green room and into the empty hall. He could hear people talking around the corner in one direction and knew that a small lounge was in the other and made a beeline towards the quieter side, scrolling through his phone —— more sociable he may be by necessity, but who wanted to be trapped in needless conversations?

If words alone weren’t enough to reassure Momo that he was awe-inspiringly talented and that they had rebuilt Re:vale together and he was an essential part of it (Yuki didn’t think that anyone in all of the world could love Re:vale half as much as Momo did, not even himself or Ban) and without him there was no way that Re:vale would exist, anymore, then some form of action was required.

They said fight fire with fire, after all.

It was easy enough to find a video —— Yuki went through phases as frequently as the moon when it came to recording practices to reference back to and to actually visualize the stage and dances that they did to make sure things weren’t too large or small, and he had recorded Momo too, naturally. He chose a more recent rehearsal video, one that he had recorded while Momo was practicing on his own and Yuki had been resting and watching and had been quietly impressed, as he always was when it came to Momo.

(Really, he had come astoundingly far in such a small amount of time for someone who had said he would become an idol and had absolutely zero training in vocals or dance previously.)

Momo singing, his voice echoing in the room, and in movement and somehow always looking so energetic. His dancing wasn’t graceful like a classically trained ballet dancer, but it was forceful and impressive to watch, the way Yuki assumed it would be performed by someone who had been a soccer player for the vast majority of his life. Momo always looked like he had absolute control of his body, never looking clumsy or awkward, and Yuki thought that he was especially handsome, in the midst of dancing.

Well, Yuki always found Momo to be objectively handsome, but that was neither here nor there.

Perhaps it was crossing boundaries, posting a video of Momo without asking, but Yuki was nothing if not determined in his own way, and he never was able to control his impulses when they gripped him. How else would he ever got songwriting done?

He shortened the clip down to 50 seconds (it was approximately 2 minutes of recording, because near the end of it Momo started talking to him and he had forgotten to stop recording for a while longer), typed out the first thing that came to mind, and posted it.

Approximately 40 seconds later, after grabbing a drink from the vending machine, Rabbiter crashed on his phone.

Halfway back to their greenroom he realized that he hadn’t gotten a charger, and that would look suspicious, right? He ambled off to track down Okarin, who was talking to a producer and turned to Yuki the moment he came into his line of vision.

“Hello,” Yuki said, bowing politely to the producer who greeted him with a smile (sometimes it was still strange to be relatively likeable), “Okarin, may I borrow a charger?”

“You forgot to charge your phone?” Okarin raised an eyebrow as he started to go through his small bag that he always kept on him for emergencies that were split 50/50 between being Momo-centric and Yuki-centric. “Here, we may as well keep this in the green room just in case, huh?”

“Yuki-san, you’re trending on Rabbiter,” the producer whose name Yuki had entirely forgotten said, amusement clear on his face. “Ah, and there’s Momo-san.”

“What did you do?” Okarin’s eyebrows were both furrowed and practically sky high as he pulled out his phone.

“Posted a video.”

Okarin looked for a moment like he wanted to chastise Yuki for some reason, but then sighed and laughed, “Well, I suppose this is harmless enough.”

Yuki bowed goodbye and made his way back to their greenroom, glancing at his phone and trying to reopen the application a few times on the way, but it just refused to open after he had posted the video. He shrugged and pocketed his phone as he turned the corner to a familiar hallway and started as the door flew open, revealing Momo, who promptly crashed into him and shouted in surprise.

“Are we late for something?” Yuki tried to remember if they had anything scheduled in the next hour, but failed to recall anything that took place in the break that Okarin had worked into their schedule.

“No, no,” Momo said, immediately trying to sound reassuring, but there was a wide eyed almost wild look on his face that Yuki only ever saw when he was especially flustered. It had been happening less and less as they settled into their partnership and Momo seemed to get more accustomed with Yuki being, well. Yuki.

“Oh, bathroom?”

“Well, I kind of have had to go a bit for the past hour, but not —— wait, no! I was running out to look for you!”

“You found me.”

“Yuki,” Momo had that faint whine in his voice he got whenever Yuki had either done something especially gentlemanly or when he was being especially weird . “You——You posted a video of me!”

“Yes?”

“You posted a video of me practicing,” Momo shoved his phone forward and Yuki had to lean back slightly to avoid getting smacked in the face with it. “I didn’t even know you were recording!”

He squinted at the screen, even though he knew exactly what he was looking at.

It had 15k likes and a number of comments that Yuki glanced at and approved of immediately.

Yuki instinctively reached out to scroll down and glance through more comments, but Momo snatched the phone back before he could, “I thought your phone died,” there was a slightly accusatory tone to his voice, but he still sounded distinctly flustered and, Yuki didn’t think he was imagining it, thrilled.

“It did,” Yuki lied, holding up the phone charger, “I charged my phone for a bit and posted it.”

“But —— but why ?”

“Because it’s true, my partner is very talented,” Yuki shrugged loosely, “and I wanted to share it.”

Momo always got a slightly dazed and thoroughly surprised look on his face whenever Yuki would praise him or even insinuate that he was talented. On one hand, it was cute and reminiscent of when they had first met, but on the other hand Yuki hoped for a day when Momo wouldn’t look quite so surprised when he was praised. He would simply have to repeat himself until that day, and keep daying it after, as well.

“Have you been researching romance manga or something?” Momo clutched his phone to his chest. “This is honestly kind of embarrassing…” he laughed, sounding somewhat tremulous, but he had started smiling that sun-like grin that Yuki always wanted to see. “I was all sweaty too!”

“You can post a practice video of me.”

“Fair’s fair!” Momo said, bouncing in place, before pursing his lips as if in thought. “Hmm, do I want to share the mega handsome Yuki in the middle of practice though? That might just kill everyone… or my phone.”

It did, indeed, crash Momo’s phone.

Winning the newcomers award at Black or White in their debut year wasn’t exactly surprising to Yuki, but it was gratifying. He’d had full confidence in Re:vale as a unit as well as the fanbase that they had built over the past year and, quite frankly, there was no feasible universe that they would have lost in, as far as Yuki was concerned.

He had wanted to somehow give some of his confidence to Momo, who looked like he was approximately 5 seconds away from either vomiting or passing out just before they had taken the stage. Instinctively, Yuki had grabbed Momo’s hand and tugged gently, dragging Momo’s attention to him.

“I’m happy that I’m sharing this with you,” was what he had managed to say before they were being ushered on stage and Momo had to shake the softly surprised look on his face away just in time to stand in front of the crowd and small legion of cameras.

(It was both surprising and not, that Yuki genuinely meant it. Over the months that they had lived together and practiced together and struggled together and, occasionally, starved together Yuki had grown deeply attached to Momo —— he already had been rather attached to him, to the gallant and wonderful boy who had written them a heartfelt letter. Perhaps it was natural, that the attachment he had, that tie to his heart, would transform into an urgent need to protect that gallant and wonderful boy and to want so badly to see him happy. To receive his smiles.

He was truly happy, to have built this Re:vale with Momo.

But there was that guilt festering inside of him —— that bleeding affection and smarting love for Ban, who Yuki still hadn’t heard from, who he wanted so badly to see again. At least to say: look, what you wanted came true, all because of Momo.

He had wanted to share with with Ban, too.

But there was a, currently, small part of him, the part that held that reservoir that he hadn’t even known had existed before Momo that seemed to fill and threaten to overflow when Momo laughed his bright, genuine, ringing laugh, that couldn’t imagine anyone but Momo by his side. Not even Ban.)

Sometimes it was strange, to look at his life and see it split. Skewed. The Yuki he was currently was content, happy even, to be living this life and singing on this stage and dancing alongside Momo. The Yuki who had tried to change and started to change, all for Momo. The Yuki he had been not so long ago would be confused if not outright disgusted —— to be happy to be an idol, to know what it means to be willing to do anything and everything for a person you care for.

To crash into Momo at the same time that Momo crashed into him as Re:vale was announced as the triumphant winners over last year’s group. Momo was warm, almost feverish, in his arms and was calling out his happiness over their triumph, over this win that had practically been predestined because they were together. There were tears building in his eyes and an impossibly bright sparkle, too, as Momo clung onto his shoulders and spun them around with the momentum of their collision.

Yuki’s face was already aching with the force of his own hopelessly happy grin.

The crowd’s cheers of delight crescendoed as they embraced, reaching a fever point. Re:vale, Re:vale, Re:vale! Yuki, Momo, Yuki, Momo! The density of noise was so thick that it was all but a physical presence on stage with them, curling around them: as if their fans were embracing them too. As if they were sharing in their joy —— and Yuki supposed they were.

It was only because of the fans that they could stand on this stage, after all, let alone win .

Everything was a blur, after that. He could recall the smell of Momo’s peach body wash and the press of his body against his and the warmth of the lights and the cheers of the crowd and happiness so transcendent that he felt at once kilometeres outside of his body and as if he had never been more present in all of his life.

His heart was still racing as the door to their greenroom shut and they were left in relative silence, Okarin saying that he would be back for them soon, to please drink some water and eat something before they both passed out. Momo was practically shaking with adrenaline, the smile on his face still as radiant as it had been on stage.

Yuki’s face was going to be so sore tomorrow.

“We won!” it was as if a fermata had finally ended and the music had started all over again, Momo’s voice ringing in Yuki’s ears, practically his favorite melody. “We won!”

“As if there was every any doubt.”

“So cool…” Momo sighed, looking almost dreamily over at Yuki before bounding back over to him, energy practically pouring from him. Yuki thought that the sun was envious of Momo, at this point. “It’s no wonder we won, how could someone as handsome and talented as you not win?”

“We won because of you,” Yuki said, leaning towards Momo until there was mere inches between them again and his smile widened at the briefly surprised, wide eyed look that crossed Momo’s face, and the faint flush that was taking over the exertional reddening.

“You’ve become too charming,” Momo said, laughing. “Where did antisocial Yuki go?”

“He’s still here, he just changed,” for you , he thought. Because of you .

Momo was so handsome —— Yuki knew that most media and a great deal of his fans thought of Momo was cute , extremely so, and he was practically first in line to subscribe to the universal fact that Momo was cute, but Momo with his hair tousled and sweat beading along his hairline and the exhilaration of performing lighting him up somehow brighter from the inside out was so ——

Yuki swayed forward almost thoughtlessly and ——

The greenroom door swung open, “We’re trending on, well, everywhere !”

The pair of them turned towards Okarin in unison, “We did just win the newcomer’s award, so that makes sense,” Yuki said, head tilting.

“Still so exciting, we haven’t trended since the last time you released a new song!”

There was a blazing, ecstatic look in Okarin’s eyes. “No, you don’t understand —— Momo, check your phone.”

Momo leaned around Yuki and grabbed his phone from the table, and when he unlocked it his eyebrows practically flew upwards, “We’re trending higher than the overall winners!”

“Oh?” Yuki tilted himself to look down at Momo’s screen, their shoulders pressing together. They were, indeed, trending even higher than the overall winners of Black or White this year, which wasn’t exactly unheard of, but it wasn’t typical.

“Exactly!” Okarin clapped his hands together, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet, “You two did a wonderful job tonight, this can only mean amazing things for Re:vale’s second year. We’ll just have to make it even bigger!”

“Thank you,” the pair of them chorused together.

“Whoaaaa look at all of the posts of us hugging,” Momo laughed, scrolling down what seemed to be an infinite number of screenshots of them colliding into each other on stage. “There so many of them! Yuki, Yuki, let’s take a selfie! It’ll be a nice treat for our fans,” he looped their arms together.

“We should spoil them for their hard work.”

(Momo’s Rabbiter app promptly crashed. Again.)

THE RE:MARKABLE RISE OF RE:VALE

The small clip of them going to the cat cafe gained an impressive amount of traction to the point that the very president of Okazaki productions requested (meaning: demanded) that they make a whole video about it to post onto RabbiTube, even though they weren’t RabbiTubers whatsoever and the Re:vale account only had releases of their songs and some lyric videos on them.

They could hardly say no to a demand from the person who was the reason that they were employed to begin with.

The longer version of Re:vale’s visit to a cat cafe was an absolute hit, amassing millions of views within days and broadening their audience even wider and earning them more and more streams and higher sales and so many job offers that there was barely enough time to breathe in their schedule anymore.

“Keep breaking the internet, boys,” Okazaki had said with a dazzling smile on his face.

Momo and Yuki glanced at each other and nodded.

“You got it, president!”

“Of course.”

Yuki fell into the habit of confiscating Momo’s phone whenever he would be staring at it, scrolling, and looking especially down. They were the hallmark signs that he was doomscrolling again, or whatever people used to describe pessimistic and persistent browsing of the internet. He couldn’t stop brainless idiots from posting things online as much as he couldn’t force Momo to stop reading them , but he could at least literally take it away from Momo.

“Wh——Yuki, my phone!”

“Let’s get ice cream.”

“Right now?” Momo’s head tilted to the side, though he kept glancing at his phone in Yuki’s hand. “We have to be ready for a show in 45 minutes.”

“So we have 30 minutes to get ice cream.”

Momo blinked and then burst into laughter, “Yuki, are you being a rebel?”

“Yes, against social media,” Yuki said, taking Momo’s hand and dragging him out of their green room.

Momo was quiet for a few long moments as Yuki pulled them towards the elevator. “Ahh but you’ve always been a rebel against social media! It took Okarin and I combined to convince you to even make accounts to begin with.”

“I’ve always been told I’m consistent,” Yuki glanced over at Momo with a magnanimous smile as he reached over to tuck Momo’s phone firmly in his pocket.

“So dependable,” Momo stepped ont the elevator without complaint and Yuki released his hand accordingly. “Okarin might die if we get photographed outside getting ice cream when our schedule is so tight, you know.”

“That’s okay.”

Momo pressed his laughter into his hand, “We’re torturing our poor manager.”

“Only a bit,” Yuki shrugged and stepped out of the elevator, making a beeline towards the door because he really did want ice cream, now, honestly they didn’t actually have time for this. “Okarin will forgive us when we bring him vanilla ice cream.”

(They  weren’t late for their next filming, mind you. Just barely on time.)

(An interlude that will never see the fiery pits of the internet, ever:

Deciding to live apart was shockingly difficult. Yuki had become so accustomed to living with Momo as they worked tirelessly to keep rising higher and higher that when he realized that they were making more than enough money to live somewhere far better and to live separately he had been confused. He almost hadn’t believed it at all.

Maybe he never would have realized, if Okarin hadn’t pointed it out nearly 2 years into their Re:vale.

The dreams that he and Momo had talked about and the goals that they had striven for when they were so poor they hadn’t been entirely sure if they had enough money left for groceries the next week were well within reach. A home studio was even plausible, for Yuki.

And living apart was —— it seemed reasonable. Yuki had always prized his personal space and time alone, but that never quite applied to Momo. Being around Momo had become as natural as breathing, as singing, as composing music; it wasn’t as draining as interacting with other people.

Living alone would be better for them. Or Okarin seemed to think so, at least, and Momo was agreeable to it, though Yuki was fairly sure that Momo, too, had been stricken by the idea. Something about the way that his jaw set and his shoulders squared and his smile looked too tight around the edges, too much tension and not nearly enough ease.

At least, it would be better for them regarding the press who they had, somehow, hidden the location of their apartment from. Probably by virtue of how rundown the place was, Yuki supposed, but if they or fans were to catch wind that this was where they lived ——

It was dangerous.

And for them to be living together…

It was, objectively, safer for them to live apart in buildings that had legitimate security. Such a scenario would avoid unnecessary gossip (thought it was still prevalent , and though Yuki wasn’t aware of it arguments regarding them happened online daily) and circumvent the majority of dangerous situations that they could get into, including but not limited to stalkers.

Yuki just hadn’t expected the pang of sorrow that rang through him at the thought of living apart from Momo, even though they hadn’t been living together for all that long.

They packed their small, shabby apartment up together with a heavy air of melancholy around them for all that they discussed their plans for their new spaces. Plants and the beginnings of a small home studio for Yuki, a cool bedroom setup for Momo, actual mattresses, the works. They cleaned the kitchen together and Yuki practically collapsed laughing when Momo bemoaned the fact that, clearly, they could still use the frozen fish that had been left forgotten in the back of their ice box.

Yuki carefully hid the letter that he had kept from so long ago that had tied his unsuspecting heart to Momo irrevocably, and packed it away safely with the envelope it came in and his photobook of Ban.

In what felt like the final stanza they stood at the door that had become so familiar, shoulder to shoulder, and said goodbye to the stain and its spirit and the walls that had housed them for 2 years and the creaky floors and the shower that either ran too hot or too cold but never just right and the corner that they had shoved their futons into when it was freezing outside and the corner of the ceiling that, somehow, always had cobwebs despite their best efforts.

Momo sniffed, quietly. “Whoa, I shouldn’t be crying,” his laugh was watery and quiet, “this is just a sign that we’re succeeding and moving up, right?” He wiped his sleeve across his face, “This is a cause for celebration!”

Yuki pulled gently at Momo’s elbow and stepped close to him, “Yes, it is a cause for celebration,” Momo sniffed again, louder and Yuki brushed away one of his tears, “but it’s sad, too.”

He had been so happy, here. They had been so happy, here, in this place filled with their memories and laughter, even though it had never retained heat in the winter and was sweltering in the summer.

“I’ll,” Momo said, mouth twisting into a self-deprecating smile, “now I’ll have to start cooking for myself, instead of eating Yuki’s amazing food. I’m gonna starve! Or eat a lot of takeout…”

“I’ll still cook for you,” Yuki said, “I would never let you starve. Or accidentally poison yourself.”

This time, Momo’s laugh was less tearful. “My apartment is going to be so messy” he drew out the y , his nose wrinkling slightly, “I’m not half as neat as you.”

“You can learn how to clean weekly.”

“Never,” Momo grinned. “Just like I’ll never get to bathe with Yuki ever again,” he practically pouted, suddenly, but the tears had slowed.

“Ever?”

“Well, maybe not ever .”

“We’ll see each other every day,” which was true, considering the fact that their jobs literally depended on each other, but even if they hadn’t Yuki was sure that he would want to see Momo every day.

“See… I shouldn’t be crying at all.”

“Maybe,” Yuki couldn’t argue that crying wasn’t wholly warranted in this scenario but —— in the end, he didn’t want to leave this place, either.

So he leaned over in the cramped doorway of their tiny apartment where almost half of the light switches inexplicably didn’t work and the kitchen faucet leaked constantly and both of them didn’t fit in the tub despite their best efforts, considering both of them barely fit in front of the bathroom sink to begin with, and kissed him.

They’d live together again one day —— Yuki was sure of it.)

(Never mind the fact that they spent the night at each other’s apartments at least 3 times a week.)

Yuki posted a picture of his new plants to christen his apartment and it didn’t crash his app, or come close to it, but it seemed like the fans appreciated the glimpse into his own personal life.

Something about relatability, right?

He smiled when Momo posted a picture of their prints on the wall of his own new apartment lamenting how he should arrange them, and liked it.

“Should we post something specific for our second anniversary?” Momo’s legs were draped over the arm of the couch and there was a magazine open on his face from where he had dropped it a few minutes ago.

Yuki didn’t glance away from fixing his chipped nail polish, “Other than an anniversary concert picture?”

“Yeah, like,” Momo drew out the vowel as he thought, legs kicking briefly in the air, “like a picture of us doing something new, or a video! Our cat cafe video did well,” he hummed, still clearly thinking.

Two years seemed both miniscule in the grand scheme of things and impossibly massive. A whole two years since their debut, a bit more than that since the day that Yuki had knelt before a sobbing Momo on the floor of his apartment and said okay to his pleas that had been reverberating through his very bones; since Yuki had accepted Momo as a new partner to create music with.

It felt like an eternity. It felt like it had passed in the blink of an eye.

(And still no sign of Ban, not a hair nor word nor message, and while that wasn’t Yuki’s primary goal anymore and hadn’t been for some time, it was as disheartening as it was worrying. Momo was still looking, Yuki knew —— because Momo had sworn that he would help Yuki find Ban, and Momo kept his word almost too well —— and, surely, if Ban was still in Japan, he would have seen or heard of Re:vale, by now.

Maybe their next anniversary, Ban would come back and Yuki would be able to show him what he and Momo had built, what Momo had poured his whole self and being and life into creating out of nothing more or less than love.

Yuki had to find him, one day, but in the meantime:)

It was all thanks to Momo, really. Momo and their fans —— Yuki was good for little more than writing music, composing, and looking handsome with minimal effort, and without Momo and Okarin he wouldn’t be an idol, at all.

He would be his old self, trapped in the long halls of his childhood home, music playing through the speakers of empty rooms and endless shadows. Static and unable to move forwards or back, languishing away like a corpse, without even the benefit of being truly, physically dead.

Yuki could say that he was thankful, but that would be an understatement. There wasn’t a word or string of words immense enough to encompass this tangle in his heart that got caught up in his throat, this warmth that had suddenly taken residence deep inside him where there had been empty rooms, before, places where even Ban couldn’t reach.

And, in the end, what else could he offer Momo and their fans but music? The people who supported him most, who always seemed to be waiting with baited breath for another song, another single, another phrase with baited breath, and how could he have ever thought that people looking to him would inherently dampen their appreciation of his music?

(The answer was this: he hadn’t wanted to perceive himself , let alone allow others to do so in his stead —— he could only ever interact with people through the filter of Ban or with the armor of music and while Yuki was fairly sure that he would struggle to make any genuine connection with a person without the link of music for the rest of time, he could see the error in his thought process now, years removed.)

Yuki thought of Momo and miracles and he was only ever good at expressing himself through one medium alone, so the answer was simple: the melody that he had been building in his head for the past month, in preparation for their second anniversary.

“A glimpse at our new song?” Yuki felt rather coy, saying it this way, though he supposed that he was being purposefully coy.

Momo gasped loudly and pulled the magazine from his face, all but launching himself to sitting, “You finished it?! The song you mentioned in celebration of two years?” There was a wondrous, awe-struck look on Momo’s face, and Yuki could see the remnants of the gallant and wonderful boy who had shied away from Yuki and blushed bright red if he so much as looked at him for more than a few seconds lingering in that expression.

It had been a while, since Yuki had glimpsed him.

He didn’t bother to suppress the fond smile pulling at his mouth, “Last night.”

Meaning: a few hours ago.

“No wonder you were so hard to wake up this morning,” Momo did some kind of flip or spin or twist (or all of the above) as he leaned excitedly towards Yuki, though seemed to catch himself and frowned in concern at him. “You didn’t stay up too late, did you?”

“I slept,” Yuki said, which could mean quite literally anywhere between 1-12 hours of sleep coming from him, and it was up to Momo to decide how many Yuki meant. The answer was 1 hour, maybe , but he wasn’t going to willfully reveal that.

(Yuki dozing off when left idle for more than 2 minutes would confirm that for him, anyways.)

“Yuki,” Momo said, clearly interpreting him correctly.

“Here,” no, Yuki was not pointedly changing the subject to avoid worrying Momo any more than strictly necessary. Whatever would give you that idea?

Luckily, he knew exactly how to distract Momo, at least temporarily: he leaned forward and slid his headphones over Momo’s ears, pressing his index finger to Momo’s lips when he tried to protest get the conversation back on Yuki’s questionable sleep schedule, his most handsome, charming, and almost arrogant smile curling at his mouth.

And he pressed play.

Momo practically burst with excitement.

It was worth Okarin being somewhat mad at him to post a (very, very , thank you very much) short clip of the song demo.

On the day of their second anniversary, just before their concert, Yuki follow along easily as Momo pulled them into good lighting and posed their hands, with their matching rings and matching new polishes, just so to take a picture.

When they glanced at Momo’s phone in during costume change, it had reached 10k likes and quite the amount of comments, and Momo grinned toothily.

“Ahh, I knew our fans would appreciate that,” he said, yanking his shirt over his head. “The ones who couldn’t make it tonight deserve something nice, too.”

“They do like our rings,” Yuki said as he glanced briefly at the cut of Momo’s muscles, before returning to buttoning up his shirt. When they had gotten them near the end of their first year as Re:vale, Yuki had thought of it as symbol of how they had become intertwined, and he supposed that he should have foreseen it becoming the fixation of many, many of their fans.

The president had insisted that they could make merchandise out of the rings but ——

Yuki had put his foot down so firmly that even he was surprised.

“Yuki,” Momo half-chided, his own shirt only half buttoned as he reached over and batted Yuki’s hands away from his shirt. “We can’t break the internet twice in one day,” he said as he undid the buttons that Yuki had, thoughtlessly done up incorrectly.

There was glitter on Momo’s eyelashes.

Their eyes met and Momo started, as if surprised by their proximity, and the only thought in Yuki’s head was: Handsome .

“45 seconds!” someone shouted outside of their makeshift dressroom, and Momo squeaked and fumbled for his jacket as Yuki practically dove for his boots.

“Yuki,” he’d always liked the way that Momo said his name, ringing and even a bit adoring, “the idea of social media seems to have grown on you.”

“Like mold on damp drywall.”

A warm, carrying laugh, “No, Yuki couldn’t ever be something like mold —— hmm, but maybe then I could become drywall…”

“Being mold sounds agreeable, in that case.”

Momo dropped onto the couch beside Yuki, depositing a plate full of his favored cookies into his lap, careful to avoid disturbing the sheet music that Yuki had been frowning at for the better part of the day. “Let’s be mold and drywall, then.”

Yuki picked up one of the cookies and nibbled on it before glancing at Momo, “Social media has its uses.”

Their shoulders pressed together as Momo snagged a cookie from the plate for himself, too. “But you’d still rather live in the middle of nowhere totally disconnected from the rest of the world and never have to look at Rabbitter ever again,” Momo grinned as he bit the cookie easily in half.

“If we’re mold and drywall together, that solves all of my problems.”

“Except you won’t be able to make music.”

“But I’ll have Momo.”

(The post of a picture of their matching shoes for new costumes with the caption like mold and drywall ( ´ ▽ ` ).｡ｏ♡ was, mostly, met with objective confusion as to what the hell that caption meant in relation to the picture they had taken together.)

(It meant nothing, Momo just found the phrasing funny over a week and a half later, but their fans didn’t have to know that, did they?)

“Momo,” Yuki was barely half awake when he glanced at his phone and saw so, so many notifications, from Rabbitter and then from several private messages from other idols that seemed to be laughing or poking fun at him. Probably.

He couldn’t tell, it was too early in the morning.

“Yes, darling?” Momo poked his head into the bedroom and his hair was notably damp, like he had just gotten out of the shower, which was a thought that linger in Yuki’s mind before falling flat, because it was far too early for Yuki to be awake. And yet: here he was.

Yuki blinked blearily at him no less than ten times (during which Momo’s fond bemusement only seemed to increase, his head tilting and something softening in his expression) before he realized that his hair was tied up, which it definitely hadn’t been when he had fallen asleep. While actually falling asleep was somewhat fuzzy, Yuki had issues falling asleep with his hair tied for some reason. They hadn’t gotten nearly drunk enough last night that he would have been able to fall asleep if it had been tied back while he was conscious. “Why is my hair up?”

After a beat something mischievous lit his expression, which somehow softened his eyes more , though his smile had turned into something more like a smirk. “‘Cause I thought it was cute!”

“Cute…?” Yuki was too tired to cope with being awake, actually. So he gave into gravity.

“Yuki, don’t fall back asleep, we have to be at the studio in an hour!”

He grumbled into his pillow. Or maybe it was Momo’s pillow, it definitely smelled like peaches, but everything ended up smelling like peaches when Momo stayed over at his place. (Yuki liked it that way.) Waking up was such a chore that was only mildly improved by Momo’s physical presence being a slight motivator for him to get up and start his day properly.

He always had to wake up in stages. Or phases, and he supposed there wasn’t a better place to start than taking his hair down. He reached blindly up to pull at the tie keeping his hair up and paused when he brushed against something decidedly plastic. “Momo,” he said against the pillow, meaning it just came out as senseless noise, and he deigned to turn his head to the side with a gargantuan effort. “Is there a peach tie in my hair?”

“Maybe,” Momo was actually giggling , which was so cute that it made Yuki want to stay in bed for even longer and see if he could convince Momo to join him, even though the chances of getting him to agree after he had already taken a post-morning workout shower were, essentially, zero.

It was still tempting .

Regardless, Yuki didn’t mind whatsoever about the hair tie the way he hardly ever minded Momo simply existing as Momo around him (provided he was safe and not being too self-deprecating), and he had clearly put some effort into tying his hair back the only way that Yuki liked doing it. He even considered, while still fully laying in bed as Momo continued getting ready for the day. considered keeping it up. If only that wouldn’t trouble their stylists, who only ever wanted Yuki to put his hair up for specific appearances. For whatever reason.

Well, at least he had a good idea why his phone had practically exploded with more notifications than usual.

 Winning the MOP award that year wasn’t exactly surprising, given the fact that the engagement on what few posts Yuki put up and every one that Momo posted was impressively high —— and only got higher when they received their own show and fell naturally into a married couple act.

Yuki didn’t know about the great Re:vale debate of 20xx where, it seemed, all of their fans practically went to war against people who found their act and general demeanor to be off putting or even offensive, decrying them as using a gay relationship as a selling tactic and mere ploy, since he was as disconnected from social media as ever.

(And Momo made sure Yuki didn’t have a clue about it.)

Even if he had known he wouldn’t have cared, anyways. It wasn’t any of their business.

“We can afford to go to a stylist now, you know,” Yuki said as he ran his fingers through Momo’s hair, tousling it to make sure that the layers he had cut in were similar to whatever he had done the last time they had had a dye session. “It’s not even taken out of our paycheck.”

“Sure, but I like the way you dye my hair,” Momo leaned back, pressing against Yuki’s chest briefly and tipping his head back to grin at him upside down and Yuki couldn’t have not smiled if he tried, fondness threatening to overwhelm him. He leaned down and pressed a kiss against Momo’s forehead for good measure. Momo, despite everything, pinked slightly at his ears, before straightening again. “We should touch up your roots.”

Yuki glanced at himself in the mirror and tilted his head and, ah, yes. His grey-silver was showing again, and quite a bit of it at that —— they could generally get away with waiting several months between dyeing Yuki’s hair, since when there were only a few centimeters of his natural color it was practically indistinguishable from the white dye. “While you’re processing.”

“Okay,” Momo said, glimmering again before settling to let Yuki section his hair with clips..

He really had gotten better at this over the years. He supposed it was only natural that he had when he had been dyeing Momo’s hair almost every other month for 3 years —— they even had gloves and foils now and everything.

It had become something like a ritual that was easy to fall into. Sectioning and bleaching and toning, while Momo would play music or talk about his day or talk about anything and everything. Momo didn’t blush quite as hard as he used to when they would have to smoosh themselves into their tiny, cramped bathroom, but Yuki did enjoy brushing his fingers against the nape of Momo’s neck just to see him shiver intermittently, and to watch the smile on his face widen briefly, the look in his eyes somehow ——

He always ended face to face with Momo, foiling his bangs, stealing glances at his partner almost furtively, of all things, and speaking when prompted or when he felt it was necessary to. Sometimes Momo would loop his arms around Yuki’s waist, which would make it spectacularly difficult to see what he was doing, and other times Momo would set his hands on Yuki’s hips, thumbs pressing against the jut of his hip bones, tracing the sloping angle it made.

Tonight Momo decided on Yuki’s hips, and didn’t pause in his discussion about the soccer season as it stood and individual teams strengths and weaknesses and the rookies that had been scouted and their stats and other things that Yuki, quite frankly, didn’t understand. He had gone to a great deal of soccer games with Momo, always wanting to spoil him in one way or another, but try as he might and for as many times as Momo had tried to explain the sport to him, Yuki just didn’t understand it, in the end.

He was just happy to listen to Momo talk about something he loved.

Yuki placed the last foil and leaned over to start the timer before allowing Momo to pull at his hips and spin them around with a flourish, switching their spots.

(Well, he was always happy to let Momo manhandle him, after all.)

“They picked up Sakamoto, which is a double edged sword to me —— he’s a very strong power forward, but weak defensively and a bit inconsistent,” Momo continued without pausing, pulling on the gloves Yuki had left out for him and separating the piece of Yuki’s hair he had been dyeing for years, now.

He let his eyes slip closed, enjoying the motion of Momo brushing the bleach into his hair and smooth it carefully, hands gentle against his hair and skin. It didn’t take nearly as long to touch up Yuki’s hair as it did Momo’s, and it was always over far too soon, to him.

“Yuki, smile,” Momo said cajolingly some time later, and Yuki opened his eyes and smiled automatically as Momo took a picture with his chest pressed against Yuki’s back, their foils reflecting the lights of his bathroom. “So handsome even with foil in your hair,” Momo sighed, adoration clear in his voice as he starting typing something into his phone.

Yuki started another, much shorter, alarm on his phone to time his own processing and glanced perfunctorily at the alert that popped onto the top of his screen. And then tapped it and smiled.

“There’s still leftovers, right?” Momo said as he wandered out of the bathroom, foils crinkling with his movement.

“There should be,” Yuki set his phone on the counter and trailed after Momo —— like he always did, didn’t he?

“Hmmm do we still have ice cream, too?”

“I got more at the store earlier.”

“Oh, I see —— wait, this is my favorite brand.”

“It’s good ice cream.”

“Yuki… so gentlemanly, always thinking of me.”

“Mmm.”

A flash caught his eye. Not quite in the distance but not close enough to see the origin, particularly with the cars driving by on the busy Tokyo street. Honestly, being followed by the press was par for the course for both of them at this point, Re:vale was well on its way to becoming the top idol group in Japan, flying by nearly every other group from the very start and perfectly on track to becoming legends of this very industry, but that never made it any more pleasant.

Yuki still both loathed and loved beyond compare heavy blackout curtains.

They were in a public space, which typically meant that there was little they could do about it other than continue moving with hats pulled low over their eyes —— granted, they still stuck out even with those things. That’s what they got, for having especially recognizable hair, he supposed.

They were in a public space but —— but this was also their day off. The first day off they had managed to get together in months, because try though Okarin may to figure out the insanity of their schedules to give them as much relaxation time (together), with all of their bookings, concerts, prior engagements, and filmings, it was nearly impossible.

Which meant that Yuki wanted to enjoy his day off with Momo to the best of his ability and not have it dampened by being followed around all day long.

They were on a date, after all.

“—— the pop up should still be there, but they had mentioned on their Rabbitter account that they may have to close early but then didn’t give a new date,” Momo sighed morosely, “it’ll be a shame if it’s gone already, I know you were really looking —— Yuki?” it was amazing, how quickly Momo could shift gears at the drop of a hat.

It was something Yuki admired and loved about him.

That an action so simple and subtle as brushing their elbows together would pull Momo’s attention swiftly to him, because they were so well attuned to each other.

Yuki nodded towards where he had seen the flash, “We have guests.”

Momo sighed, “Aww, man. I know it was wishful thinking but I was hoping we could be left alone for today.”

“We still could be.”

“Do you wanna give them the slip?” Momo nudged Yuki’s side teasingly, “Last time we tried to do that you almost passed out from running so much.”

“I nearly died.”

“I tried to choose an easy, minimal obstacle and no incline route!”

“I know you did,” Yuki sighed at the memory of running after Momo, struggling the whole way through —— he really had thought he was going to die right then and there out of sheer exhaustion and physical exertion.

“Well, we can’t have you dying on our day off.”

“It would be regrettable…”

In the end, the press liked getting a story. Something to build a story out of, something to sensationalize, anything and everything that could possibly be used to either boost a celebrity or tear them down, one way or another. It was rather disgusting, as far as Yuki was concerned, but there were sacrifices to being idols and he had known that logically before agreeing to enter this world full time.

Thus, logic dictated that they would simply have to give the press something to talk about.

Yuki hooked his finger into Momo’s belt loop and tugged, not bothering to suppress an amused smile as Momo nearly stumbled, but compensated and continued walking as if nothing were wrong, their hips pressed together. It wasn’t like they had been walking especially far apart, but they had been keeping a generally respectable distance, the way that Okarin ever so kindly requested of them when they were out in public to avoid any unnecessary scandal.

Sorry, Okarin .

(Was Yuki ever really, truly sorry about the strange things that he did on impulse?

No, no he wasn’t.)

He looped his arm easily around Momo’s shoulders and pressed close to him as they side stepped a group of people in synch, and almost their whole sides were flush to each other, now. Honestly,  it was far too hot to be this close in the full heat of the late morning sun, but (for now) Yuki didn’t care much; he always wanted to be close to Momo, after all.

“Do you really want to try to drive them off by giving them what they want?” the bemusement was clear in Momo’s voice as he wrapped his arm around Yuki’s waist, and this time it was his pointer and middle fingers that hooked through Yuki’s belt loop, tugging teasingly.

“I’m simply giving them an honest impression of us,” Yuki said perfectly innocently, and Momo laughed.

“Okarin is going to kill us.”

“We’ll buy him a fruit basket.”

“At this rate we’ll have to buy him a whole private island with fruit trees!”

“That can be arranged in approximately 8 years.”

Momo’s laughter was brighter than the sun reflecting off of passing cars, and far more interesting than being followed by the press could ever be. And, given how their lives were, maybe it was too much to ask for a day where they could simply be together without intrusion from the outside world. That wouldn’t stop Yuki from wanting to only hear Momo’s carrying sun-bright and sun-warm laugh for the rest of time.

A wonderful melody.

“Ooo, look, that crepe place finally opened!”

“Let’s get one later.”

“With extra whipped cream.”

“Whatever you wish,” Yuki glanced over Momo’s head at where he thought he had seen the initial flash, and while he couldn’t see anything through the crowd he figured that this was their best chance at being left mostly alone for the rest of their day. He pulled gently on Momo’s shoulder, head tilting downwards as Momo looked up at him, their noses nearly brushing.

“Ah, it’s a shame those glasses cover up your beauty mark,” Momo sighed as a business person ran past them at breakneck pace.

“And you’ll have hat hair later,” Yuki couldn’t help but tease, the desire to kiss Momo a familiar warmth in his chest. It was always there, really, though at times it would become more insistent and somehow louder , demanding to be noticed and seen and heard the way a song does, but ——

There were lines and there were things that Yuki didn’t want the whole world to see, in the end.

Another flash caught his eye as someone else passed and he held Momo close, their hips bumping together as they turned a street corner, intent and content to carry on with their day.

“Do you think that was enough?” Momo said, though he didn’t release Yuki’s belt loop.

“Maybe,” Yuki said, decidedly keeping himself as close to Momo as he could possibly be.

“You’re right, we should keep going just in case. Who knows how much they need?”

“Until I die of heat exhaustion.”

Momo’s head tilted back against his arm, “Noooo, I can’t accept your death!”

“In that case…”

“Ugh,” Yuki tossed the fake gun to the side, careful to aim it to drop on one of the mats as opposed to the ground. He’d already been warned once.

Huge production music videos were fun and all, but how had they ended up here for NO DOUBT, exactly?

“I know you hate it,” Momo said, bounding closer to him and taking Yuki’s wrists in hand, toothy smile wide and a decidedly impish look in his eyes, eyebrows raised semi-suggestively, “but it suits you, you look like a major badass hottie.”

“With a gun ?” Yuki rolled his eyes.

“And in this suit, too! It’s a shame that we can’t post any pictures until the video drops…”

“I’m tired,” Yuki said, swaying towards Momo who, for his part, laughed and pulled on Yuki’s wrists as the staff bustled around them

“They’ve had you running around way more than they usually do,” Momo said agreeably as he led Yuki towards their trailer where there was, blessedly, air conditioning to alleviate his suffering. “You’ve been managing impressively well, you even learned some fighting moves for this!”

“I’m the picture of professionalism.”

Momo squeezed Yuki’s wrist as he turned so they were face to face, his back to the door of their trailer. “No one could ever doubt.”

“You get to show off your athleticism,” there was a stunt double for both of them, but Yuki’s had to be employed far more than Momo’s given the gap in their physical capabilities under strenuous things like running, jumping, fighting, and dancing. Honestly, he was looking forward to the second day of filming where they would be indoors the entire time. “Everyone is going to be suitably impressed.”

“Everyone knows I’m way more athletic than you,” Momo waved his hand, as if warding off Yuki’s appreciative words, “they’re going to be much more impressed with your part of the music video.”

Yuki could have sighed, but instead opted to give Momo a deliberate and thorough once over, gaze roaming from his face to his feet and back again, slowly . “Hmm… not with you dressed like that .”

“Yuki! Don’t say it like that!”

“Why not?”

“At least not here, I’ll die of sexiness overexposure…”

“Oh, we’re trending again.”

“We haven’t done anything but film today…”

“Looks like one of the staff took a picture and sent it to a fan account.”

“With a no film or picture policy and everything… I was so distracted I didn’t even notice.”

“This picture is nice but… a bit embarrassing.”

“Ah, it was when I was complimenting you. No wonder I didn’t notice.”

“Yuki’s eyes on me are so distracting…”

“I thought I was the airhead.”

Momo laughed and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth.

(Their team couldn't even be exasperated besides sighing for a moment at behind the scenes footage being released to the public. Was it troublesome? Certainly. Was it the end of the world? Harly.

Re:vale were infamous for somehow always, every time, without fail: leaking something.

Honestly, trying to lock things down harder just made it worse, which confused and amused Okarin deeply and, when it came to managing Orikasa Yukito and Sunohara Momose of all people, he had to pick his battles. Carefully.

At least it wasn't exactly their fault this time. Or, not completely.

"Subtlety is lost on you two," Okarin said with a sigh.

"Whaaaaaat?" Momo said, pressing his hand to his chest, eyes going wide, "Okarin, no!"

"We're masters at subtlety."

Okarin pinched the bridge of his nose, pushing his glasses up as a result, and laughed. Some would think that eventually they would have to worry about officially announcing that Re:vale were genuinely dating and grossly obsessed with each other, but Okarin had simply accepted that some things were uncontrollable.

It was up to the public to decide what they were, all on their own.)

“Wait,” Gaku said, eyebrows raised, “you guys don’t plan when you post certain things?”

“Nope,” Momo said as he twisted open another bottle of his peach-apple juice.  “Why would we?”

“There’s no… strategy? At all?”

“None,” Yuki said, and tilted his head, “other than anniversary things.”

“Not even what you’re posting?” Tenn’s eyebrows were raised.

“Nah, I just post whatever seems right to me.”

“I’m the same.”

“And it just… always happens to be each other.”

“Naturally,” Momo grinned, fangs on full display, “I have a super handsome partner to show off, after all!”

“Coincidental fanservice,” Gaku said under his breath, shaking his head as a smile started to pull at his mouth.

“Well, that’ll displease President Yaotome,” Tenn said, looking distinctly amused.

“He’s always displeased with us,” Yuki smiled his pleasantly charming smile that he knew perfectly well Yaotome hated, because it meant that he was about to cause some sort of trouble for him in a way that he couldn’t foresee.

“We haven’t angered him recently,” Momo dropped onto the couch beside Yuki, “why’s he gonna be mad this time?”

“He’s been trying to figure out for years how you two always manage to get so much interaction on your posts when there doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the pattern or content of your posts,” there was clear amusement in Gaku’s voice accompanied by what Yuki now saw was a distinct smirk, rather than a smile As if he was thoroughly pleased that he had received information that would piss off his dad.

“We told him we didn’t have a strategy,” Yuki said, thinking back to the meeting they had sometime in their 2nd year that had ended with intense amusement on both of their parts and frustration for Yaotome.

“Aww, he didn’t believe us!”

“I guess my sister did tell me that the infrequency of your posting always got her more excited for the next one,” Ryuu said, his head tilted in thought.

“Your sister is a fan?! Excellent!”

“We should sent her something.”

“Wh —— Hold on,” Ryuu laughed nervously, “she said that she’d change her bias to TRIGGER, if you send her Re:vale merchandise she’s going to turn on me!”

“Perfect,” Momo said, practically cheering.

“No wonder you guys are trending nearly every week,” Gaku shook his head, “even when you don’t post for ages.”

“It’s all a part of our charm,” Yuki flipped his hair over his shoulder with a smile as Momo posed, making a peace sign with his hand and winking.

“I’ll say,” Tenn said, shaking his head. “Your poor manager.”

“Momo.”

“Yes…”

“Yuki.”

“Yes?”

A loud, tired, exasperated sigh, “I really don’t want to have to approve everything you two post.”

“Then don’t.”

“But,” as if he hadn’t interrupted at all, “at this rate I just may have to.”

“In my defense,” Momo’s voice was fluttery and amused and maybe a bit abashed, “Yuki looked super handsome sleeping and I couldn’t help but take a picture and then I thought to myself: well it would be selfish to not share this with the world! So I posted it. I’ve posted pictures of Yuki sleeping before!”

“That’s your defense ?! Besides, this time he didn’t have a shirt on and it was obvious .”

“Well…”

“We only broke the internet a bit.”

Another deep sigh that sounded like it was being pulled from the very depths of Okarin’s soul, “Help me.”

(With nearly any other idol group it would be unthinkable and outright insane to simply let them have free reign of their own social media profiles. There was always a chance to misspeak or misstep or cause some sort of scandal by sheer chance alone, even doing something as innocuous as discussing their day or talking about a new series that they liked. There was a reason why a great deal of idols and celebrities had their managers or social media persons run their accounts, busy schedules aside.

The truth of it was that, in the end, it was far more of a financial benefit to just keep letting the pair of them do whatever they wanted with their social media. Within reason. The Team™ that oversaw Re:vale and their operations and calculated future projections and tracked public opinion for them with intense care could only come to the conclusion that whatever Re:vale wanted to do and whatever they wanted to post, it would essentially only ever boost them, and limiting them was a fruitless effort.

It was a perilous line to walk and something that could very well destroy Re:vale as quickly as they had risen, should something go wrong, but quite frankly ——

It was simply inconceivable.

The thing with Re:vale was that their posts, which could be spaced out by months or mere days at a time, were so not innocuous and practically always sensational that it worked perfectly in their favor with their fanbase, nearly every time. Why, you may ask?

The answer was simple: they only ever posted each other and, beyond the shadow of a doubt, only ever in a positive if not outright adoring light.

Pictures, typically, and almost never any posts regarding their own days independent of each other. It worked startlingly well for the image that they had forged early in their careers, to the point that The Team™ had to, begrudgingly, accept that no social media expert would ever be able to match the insane energy that they put out without even trying .

It was just enough to tantalize their audience while drawing more and more in while keeping them waiting with baited breath for more in hopes of relating to their favorite idols or, otherwise, seeing a glimpse at their day to day lives with each other. They were Re:vale, after all, well known for their married couple comedy act and for being shockingly close, even for groupmates, and for singing songs that could only be construed as romantic .

Also, the glances at each other and fleeting touches during concerts that almost never failed to go viral when a clip of it was posted online.

It helped that the mere concept of the pair of them being as tightly intertwined as they were was scandalous enough in and of itself, half-catering to hardcore fangirls (and boys) the whole way through, and just upsetting enough to rile up the conservative crowd to talk about them even more . Thus, the frequency and content of their social media posts being persistently and consistently adoring caused just the right amount of impropriety that it kept the conversation about Re:vale going and going and going .

Re:vale had built their brand around themselves so thoroughly and tightly and perfectly that there was no feasible way that it had been a genuine accident, except it (partially) had been.

It’s terribly difficult to manufacture genuine, heartaching, and absolute love, after all.

But easy enough to profit off of it, when it’s delivered to your doorstep.

And, to be quite frank, way too annoying to control: so what was the point of trying to do so?)

Honestly, Re:vale should be studied by social media experts.

(They will be, one day. Inevitably.)

Yuki was awoken by his second favorite way to be woken up: Momo’s fingers combing through his hair as gently as a lentando .

“Momo,” he mumbled half into his pillow, not bothering to open his eyes quite yet.

“Yuki,” he could hear the smile on Momo’s face and knew that it was the soft, adoring smile that pulled at his mouth whenever he was feeling especially lovey dovey. The one paired with the softening of his eyes and only served to make him so heart stoppingly lovely that Yuki could write a billion songs about him and still never run out of music to make.

He tilted his head and Momo laughed at the silent demand before acquiescing, kissing him so lovingly that Yuki thought that he may just overflow. Momo’s hair was soft and fluffy in his hands as he cradled the back of his head, and Yuki impatiently kicked the sheet that had gotten caught between their bodies to feel the warmth of his skin against his.

They kissed lazily for a stretch of time that Yuki wouldn’t have bothered keeping track of, even if he had been able to. Instead he traced his fingers down the defined lines of Momo’s back and tangled their legs together and luxuriated in the ability to simply lay here with Momo, absent of any sense of urgency or time limit.

“Good morning,” Yuki said some indeterminate amount of time later when they had ended up on their sides facing each other, their foreheads pressed together.

“Good morning,” Momo was smiling so hard that it looked like it physically hurt and Yuki loved him so, so terribly much —— a future without Momo was unthinkable.

Luckily, he would never have to consider it.

“What should we do today?” Momo spoke softly, as if he were sharing a secret. Or, perhaps, he simply wanted to keep this moment encapsulated forever, just like Yuki.

“Lay in bed,” Yuki said immediately.

Momo laughed as he cupped Yuki’s jaw, “We’re on vacation, we can’t just spend all day in bed.”

“It’s traditional to spend a great deal of your honeymoon in bed.”

“Yuki!”

He leaned over and kissed him again.

“See?”

“Yes, yes, I see,” Momo said against his mouth, a slight smirk on his face. “I want to go explore though, I heard there’s an old theater with amazing acoustics that even lets you play the piano set up on stage to your heart’s content.”

Yuki pursed his lips in thought, “I’m intrigued.”

Momo snickered and kissed his pursed lips, “Right, right?”

“Later, though. After lunch.”

“A whole morning in bed?!” another kiss and the rustle of their sheets. “Well, I can’t resist spoiling you at least a little bit.”

“I’m meant to be pampered.”

“Of course!”

And then, some time later: “Let’s post something later.”

“Oh, what?”

Yuki dropped a kiss to the lovely curve where Momo’s neck met his shoulder, “You’ll see.”

Worth it.

Social media was still like a broken bone, as far as Yuki was concerned —— an echochamber of things that were far more harmful than helpful, in the end. In an ideal world, he would simply never have to bother with it, but years removed from his misanthropic teenage and early adult years, he could admit that it certainly had its uses.

The infinite reach that it had. The connection that it offered to Re:vale’s fans, for all that Yuki barely said an actual word to them, he could appreciate the excitement and love that they felt for he and Yuki being displayed for all the world to see. The ability to reach out to others all the way across the world and to hear their thoughts on music and composition and be able to participate in that conversation, language barrier aside.

The ability that he had to show off Momo shamelessly, whenever the desire struck him.

And he supposed that he did enjoy “breaking the internet” nearly every other month.

( It didn’t hurt that it was the optimal way to mess with people, too.)

So, sure. Social media was alright, sometimes.