Chapter Text
Ch. 1: KAJ vs sauna
As KAJ are taking a sauna, they have one imperative question to answer: is it gay to look?
It was another exciting and grueling day on stage. After their gig, KAJ, with a pack of Karhu beer in hand, trudged into their custom-made sauna on wheels that they carted with them wherever they toured.
They had a rare full Sunday off tomorrow, so tonight they allowed themselves to relax to the fullest extent.
Jakob, Axel, and Kevin sat next to another on a wooden bench, buck naked, sipping from their beer cans and saying nary a thing and making no sound except when Kevin dipped a wooden ladle into a bucket and tossed the contents onto the sizzling and sputtering stones.
It was karar i arbeit for 12 hours today. They were glad for the opportunity.
Axel certainly was, at least. He woke up with a mild strain in his shoulder that he never felt before, and by the time their last song and dance number was over, it grew palpable enough to give him …a hyper-awareness of his condition.
Jakob looked towards Axel, who was rotating his shoulder, with a knowing look.
“Jå,” Axel grunted. “So many more pine trees than I remember these days.”
“We’re only thirty two,” Jakob said, reading between the lines.
Axel grunted again and smirked. Easy for Jakob to say. Not only did Jakob look a decade younger than him, but he never once complained of any dance or vocal-related ailment — not in front of his band members at least.
“You still got your mum’s camphor oil?”
Jakob nodded. He smiled in contentedness as he leaned his weary head against the sauna-soaked wood beam — whether he was on stage, being an impromptu therapist to someone, or his fiancé was in the middle of giving birth, he was always smiling.
“You kids are too young to be yapping about these things ,” Kevin chimed him, stretching his long legs onto the opposite bench. “Besides, if anyone should be worried, it should be me.”
“And why’s that?” Jakob asked.
“Well, my older genes aside, it’s because taller guys can get a collapsed lung. I’m a ticking time bomb. It’s called, um …”
“…primary spontaneous pneumothorax,” Axel promptly finished.
“We need to cut you another check for being the tour nurse,” Kevin said in joking admiration.
Jakob mimed a phone call. “‘Mr. International here, what’s your emergency?’ ‘Doctor, my son fainted.’ ‘Oh really? In that case, I recommend you shove some peppermint and eucalyptus essential oils up one nostril.’”
Everyone’s laughs bounced off the hollow tight-packed sauna interior.
“Or blueberry soup on the face,” Jakob added as an afterthought.*
“Kevin,” Axel pointed out, noting Kevin’s red sweaty face, “Go out and get us some birch branches.”
“Soon,” he grumbled. He was concentrated on beating his last indoor sauna session.
“So, who invented this rule that to be a real man you need to be unwrapped in the sauna?” Jakob said, turning to Axel. “Like, you know — towel-less.”
“My god,” Axel said. “I never thought about it.”
“Why not?”
“I never had reason to.”
“Do we have to think about it, though?” Kevin spoke up in bemusement.
“Well!” Jakob clasped his hands behind his head and leaned back, glancing both ways to his camaraderie. “Let’s say you’re in a sauna in a group, all men. And one of them has a towel wrapped around himself. The rest will then ask him, always ask him, ‘Emilll, aren’t you a man? Are you insecure? Are you actually gay or something?’”
“It depends. Why does Emil want to wrap?” Axel responded.
“See? It could be that he’s …from Kärklax. Or maybe he has warts.”
“Or maybe he just decided to wrap,” Axel said.
“That’s my point! What if a man just does it for any given reason! And still, he’s pelted with these questions and, ‘why aren’t you being a real man?’”
“Wait — but what if I accidentally stare at another’s …you know…is that gay or manly? Or both?”
“See — see, Axel! You have to not wrap. BUT! You can’t stare too long! Or better, don’t even stare at all.”
“What if I look?”
“Well then, don’t try to look.”
“What if I ‘accidentally’ look?”
“Then that means you’re gay.”
“It’s gay to just look?”
“Yeah.”
“But then by your logic it should be gay to not look!” Axel protested.
“I know! All these rules!” Jakob clapped his hands and laughed.
“So. Axel,” Jakob whispered. “Tell me. Did you ever peek?”
“I could ask you the same thing, Jakob,” Axel said tersely, straightening himself to meet Jakob’s fully serious gaze.
“I can see your eyes flitting about.”
“It’s called OCD, Jakob.”
“How do you know?”
“You know what they say about men who talk about their masculinity a little too much, Schakob…”
“O-ho! Are you calling me gay?!”
“I didn’t come up with that, you did.”
They looked at each other, neither daring to break eye contact…only for them to give in and collapse on each other in laughter.
“Jakob,” Axel wheezed, “you don’t have to sauna with Big Kev if his makes you feel …insecure to yours .” Axel flashed a cheeky smile, that underhanded type of smile that he reserved for when he made a particular point.
“Hey, hey! Don’t bring me into this!” Kevin protested from his corner.
Jakob and Axel roared with laughter, slapping each other on the backs like wasted Finns on May Day.
“There’s a reason he’s called Big Kev!” Jakob wheezed while Kevin cut in with, “Have you kids seriously peaked?” while fighting an amused smile curling the corners of his lips.
“Hey, are we drunk?” Jakob eventually piped up.
“Duh.”
“Yeah, but I think we’re very drunk.”
“Explain.”
“Well, for one, I don’t think this is water…” Jakob peered so deeply into the bucket he almost dunked his head into it.
“Gimme it.” Axel snatched the bucket and sniffed the rim. He frowned. “More Karhu? How did it get here, helvete !”
“What?!”
The very thought of getting drunk on beer vapor made the Axel and Jakob erupt in childish giggles.
If this was Jakob’s idea of a troll gag and play dumb, well, Axel wasn’t going to pry. Jakob was too good at denialism.
If this was payback from one of their backup dancers … well, Axel had it coming to them since he forgot to pay his dues to Pelle in a card game last week.
Either way, he did discreetly tuck the bucket out of sight from Jakob in case he decided to chug the rest of its contents inside.
And with more laughter, they both staggered out of the sauna, arms wrapped around each other and not even bothering to wrap a towel around their waists.
Let the world know of the freed plights of dongle-di and dongle-doo, they thought in their drunken, sauna-soaked minds.
“Hey, we should make song about this!” Jakob called out in the freezing air.
“We already kinda did, dumbass!”
“Oh, yeah!” More merry hollers rang out into the night.
Kevin was passed out cold across the sauna floor since a long time ago, butt up and long legs splayed out.
No one was the wiser that night.
* KAJ loving the Emil series by Astrid Lindgren is now headcanon