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Interlude ~ The Airing of Longstanding Grievances

Summary:

The personnel of the Nakamachi Circus experience some upheaval behind the scenes.

Notes:

We know nothing about Naota's mother, so I'm making a total stab in the dark that she's an ex-wife; she could easily be dead. Presumably they were married at some point, given that the series deals in Masaru's arc with the stigma against out-of-wedlock births.

Work Text:

"There's this movie playing in town," Masaru offered one light summer evening shortly after the dishes were washed. "About these good robots fighting these evil ones. I found a flyer in town the other day, it's called Morphotrons 5000: This Time It's Impersonal. And I know we don't have a  iot of money, but it's cheaper today, and the place is kind of old, and..."

"Spit it out, kid," Nakamachi said. Politeness was one thing, but dithering was another.

 

"I thought maybe we could all go together," Masaru said earnestly. "I've never been to a movie with... you know, company."

"Naturally I will accompany you, young master," Shirogane said immediately. "It's far too dangerous for you to go alone. Besides," she added. "There are good robots as well in this movie, are there not? I believe I would like to see these good giant robots."

"I'll come too," Nori broke in, Hiro and Naota chiming in in near-unison.

"If you're all is, then I think I will as well," Liese put in. "This will be the first movie I have seen since I came to Japan."

The group turned inquiringly to the table in the center of the truck.

"Oh, no," Virma said. "Me at the movies? Think of my reputation."

"Absolutely not," Mitsuushi said from the other side of the table.

Nakamachi shook his head. "You kids'll have to enjoy it for me. Robots blowing each other up sounds like a bad headache waiting to happen."

"You know, I think I'll go after all," Virma announced. She had a strange expression on her face. "Play chaperone for the kiddies, take in the local color. I so rarely get the chance in my line of work."

Nakamachi tried to follow her line of sight. It was kind of hard, what with the sunglasses.

"Think the boys'll be trouble?"

"Oh, no. Nothing I can't handle. We'll have fun there, so you two be sure to have fun here." Again, the odd look.

Then again, most of her looks were odd. He gave up trying to figure it out.

For what it was worth, he wasn't anticipating having all that much fun. Mitsuushi had been more or less tolerable for about a week after they took him in, but the honeymoon was over, so to speak, and recently he'd been grouchier than ever. At least his beef was understandable this time, but it still didn't make him any easier to deal with. If they made movies a little quieter these days he'd join the others just to get away from the guy. But at 53, something called Morphotrons 5000 sounded well out of his comfort zone. And so, about ten minutes later, he was left sitting at the table with Mitsuushi, who was only slightly more inside that comfort zone. Familiar, if nothing else.

The nothing else part was the problem. Mitsuushi wasn't complaining, at least, but there was a deadly silence behind the newspaper that he clearly wasn't even reading, and in the normally lively space of the Nakamachi Circus's traveling truck, it was enough to cause any performer physical pain. 

Nakamachi racked his brain for conversation, came up with nothing, and found himself contemplating his other options.

First things first, he wasn't making up some excuse to sneak off. He was a grown man, this was his property, and the whole damn circus happened to be his in the first place. That left just one choice. Not his first one, but hell, if it was in the name of keeping the guy from pissing and moaning around the place the whole time...

He retreated to the corner where everybody's personal items were piled up; then, after a few minutes digging, he pulled out a mostly-full bottle of wine.

"Hey—now that we've got the young folks out of the way, what do you say we kick back a little."

Mitsuushi looked at him for about two seconds and then retreated behind a headline about crop futures.

"I've got this saved up. Overseas stuff, y'know."

Mitsuushi rattled the newspaper pointedly.

"I mean, you like expensive crap, right? This is sorta... not that I really remember how much I spent, but it's old, at least." He waited. "You know that newspaper is a month old?"

Mitsuushi set the newspaper down with the air of someone surrendering to a great injustice, not bothering to fold it. "Fine. We'll drink."

Nakamachi made sure to fill the glasses up good and high. He was gonna need every drop. "Good idea with the paper, we can just use it like a coaster."

Mitsuushi ignored the attempt at an olive branch. "And what are we drinking to, exactly?"

"Well... to family."

"To family," Mitsuushi echoed doubtfully.

"You know, our little... whatever we have going on, here."

"Our family. Right."

He was pretty sure Mitsuushi's toast extended about as far as Me, Myself, And My Big Meat-Headed Son With All The Ugly Shirts, but the glasses weren't getting any fuller.

As it turned out, the guy wasn't one of your fun drunks.

"You are," Mitsuushi slurred, "unfairly, disgushtingly successful." He held up a hand and started to count shakily. Index finger. "Beautiful wife."

"True."

Middle. "Who never left you."

"True," he said, a little quieter.

Ring. "Still in shape!"

Nakamachi checked to see if the pot belly had shrunk since that morning. "Well..."

Pinky. "Five children!"

"I don't know if I'd say five."

"Well," Mitsuushi added, "five adopted children."

"Run that by me one more time if you're looking for a punch in the face." Why was he willingly spending his spare time with this guy again?

"And a truck!" Mitsuushi went on, as if he hadn't been interrupted at all, extending his thumb and splaying all five fingers accusingly.

"You might be setting the bar a little low there."

"I don't have a truck," Mitsuushi pointed out with all the wounded dignity of a man three sheets to the wind.

"Just sayin', I'm not exactly on top of the world at the moment."

"I don't even have a circus anymore! After 20 years, reduced to assistant ringmaster in another man's circus...!"

Nakamachi got the sense, not for the first time, that he was playing a bit part in someone else's center-ring monologue. He leaned his head back, downed another glass, and decided not to mention that this was the first he'd heard of any assistant ringmaster business.

"Well, none of that's my fault, is it? You're the one who asked to join up in the first place!"

"Anyway!" Mitsuushi slammed his—fortunately empty—glass down onto the table. "The point is you always win! You always come out on top! And you cheat!"

Dammit, he'd never totally understood this guy. "In what way have I ever cheated you?"

"Like that time you sucked me off backstage! Right before my act!"

It took a moment to register before Nakamachi choked on his drink. "The time I what?!"

"Don't pretend you don't remember," Mitsuushi huffed. "My legs were shaky for the whole routine and I looked like an idiot."

"Uh..."

"I mean, it was a dirty trick! Even if I... if I maybe begged for it a little bit, and—"

"Mitsuushi," he said, trying to wipe his mouth on his sleeve, "I promise I don't remember doing that at all. To anyone. Ever."

"Well, you did!"

"When did I do that?"

"It—well, it was in..." He held his hands up and started to count again. "In... nineteen... seventy-...sometime..."

"You sure you aren't thinking about that sword swallower who—"

Mitsuushi was getting redder and redder, either from the drinking or from anger, or from...

It was probably from the drinking.

"You can't dodge the issue I'm bringing up j-jus-...jus' because that was maybe a dream, or, or something."

He shook his head emphatically. "The point is, you cheat, and don't you think you—you've won or anything just because you have a job, and because I used to jerk off after your routine, and because you have your circus. And your truck!"

Christ, was he really buzzed enough that the truck thing was now the most logical part of any of this?

"Look," he tried. "Mitsuushi. You're giving me a headache. You and this booze are giving me a headache and one or the other of you is gonna

have to explain what you're so mad about. First of all—" He paused and tried to gather his thoughts. "First. First... of all. Why're you so fiss... fix-a-ted on the truck?"

"It's a symbol!"

"Of what?"

"Of you! Winning! Like you always do, eventually!"

Mitsuushi grabbed his arm and slid another few inches closer on his knees, and he realized they were next to each other, somehow; they'd been slowly edging towards each other for a while now. Both of them? Just one?

"Winning at—at what, for God's sake? Who said we were fighting?"

But Mitsuushi was off again on his favorite subject. "I had a whole, successful, world-class circus," he went on, "and you had nothing, and now you're ahead again, somehow!"

He was really leaning in now, rising up on his knees and Nakamachi leaned backwards a bit, only half listening. In the old days he would have just pushed him away, but they weren't exactly on the same physical level now and it didn't feel right to push an old man. Even if he was an old man too.

Although, if Mitsuushi brought the damn truck up again he just might go ahead and push.

But Mitsuushi didn't bring the truck up. He'd gone pretty quiet, actually, because Nakamachi was about at the limit of how far he could lean back and their faces were uncomfortably close all of a sudden. He was flushed and sulking and his mouth opened and closed silently a couple of times. "I—I mean," he managed, "you're... You're not..." He trailed off again.

"Would you let go of my arm?" was all the response Nakamachi could think of. His grip was starting to get painful.

Mitsuushi did let go. He pulled his head back too and gulped, Adam's apple bobbing visibly, and then his hand darted back again, running sort of awkwardly up Nakamachi's arm to the bicep. And honestly, Nakamachi had had enough; the grip on his arm was far from the only painful thing about this position. "Look," he started.

He didn't go on because talking suddenly got very difficult. Something was on his mouth, and something was around his neck, and after a few seconds of careful thought he discovered Mitsuushi was kissing him. The first thing he did was lift himself back upright, which was surprisingly easy, because Mitsuushi gave way immediately, letting himself be lifted up with a groan as their bodies settled together. The second thing he did was try to make sense of the past few minutes, kissing back a little halfheartedly as he did so.

In retrospect, he realized through a faint mist of alcohol, he had maybe let a few warning signs slip by unnoticed.

The third thing he did was notice that Mitsuushi had a hard-on. Kind of an impressive one for a drunk man in his early fifties. Also kind of awkward.

He detached himself with a little difficulty.

"Okay. Uh." He fished for something to say. "First of all..."

Mitsuushi leaped backwards about five feet, still in the kneeling position. Again, kind of impressive. "I slipped and fell," he said, triumphantly.

"Right. Let me know if you're planning to fall anywhere else on me, will you?"

"Shut up! I don't want to kiss you! Now or ever! Nobody would! Your mustache feels weird!"

"My mustache feels weird?"

"What I never understood was how you got married at all, with that revolting carpet on your face."

"Obviously my wife liked it more than yours liked your attempt." It was a low blow, but he wasn't the one who'd started aiming low.

Mitsuushi flopped heavily onto his back. "Why don't you just bend me over and finish me off now."

"Would you quit talking like I'm about to kill you?"

"Just bend me over the table," Mitsuushi repeated, sprawling one arm dramatically across said table. "Finish me off."

"I'm not gonna fuck you on the table."

It wasn't like he was looking at Mitsuushi's crotch, but he was pretty sure there was a visible twitch. It wasn't exactly easy to miss with him lying down like that.

"I mean, we eat off that," he added. It didn't seem to make the situation any less awkward.

There was a pause. "On the floor, then." So they were negotiating, suddenly.

But. Well. He wasn't turned off, exactly. It was hard not to be flattered by that kind of visible excitement. The personality attached to it was definitely pretty questionable, but... it had been a while. He shifted his weight a little and found that maybe he wasn't entirely incapable.

"Maybe I will."

Nakamachi must've been drunker than he thought, because his belt gave him a lot more trouble than usual. By the time he got it off Mitsuushi was on all fours, pants around his ankles.

"You might wanna get those off all the way. Fold 'em or something."

"I don't care!" Mitsuushi snapped. "Hurry up!"

Just for that he took his sweet time with his shoes. He set them down carefully to one side of the belt, then shifted the right one until they were perfectly parallel.

"I'm not going to wait here forever, you know."

He almost considered having second thoughts. But, annoyed as he was, his dick was still hard, so he reached for his pants. As he pulled them down he noticed that Mitsuushi had stopped whining. Instead he was just staring. He glanced away quickly when he saw Nakamachi looking back, but a second later his eyes wandered back again.

Now that didn't feel half bad. He looked back down to the job at hand. Let Mitsuushi look all he wanted.

His pants came off a lot faster than the belt. He folded them quickly and relatively neatly, then turned to face the problem at hand. He was vaguely aware that you needed lube, or something, for this, with another guy. With nothing on hand he paused for a second, at a loss. Then—

"Holdjer legs together."

He slipped his cock in between the other man's thighs, the head sliding between his balls before coming to rest about halfway up the shaft. There was a surprising amount of heat considering he wasn't actually inside him.

"What the hell is that?"

"You expecting me to just ram it in?" No answer. "Y'know, you've got a bad habit of assuming the worst about people."

"You could at least try," Mitsuushi muttered.

"You want me up your ass that bad?"

"Obviously I do!"

"Look," Nakamachi growled. "I"m telling you, this'll work just as good. Sorry if it's not straight out of your fantasies, but..."

"You don't know anything about my fantasies!"

He didn't quite know what to say to that. "Well, apparently not," he finally muttered.

"Anyway," Mitsuushi said quickly. "Now what?"

"I guess we're about to find out."

He let his weight rest tentatively on Mitsuushi's back, half expecting to be dropped to the ground. When it didn't happen, he brought his right arm down to jerk himself off. The tip of his cock was rubbing against Mitsuushi's balls, and as he cupped his own balls for a second it was easy to settle back into his old  solo routine from younger days. A little (a lot) more sag than there used to be, but the old blood could still run hot if there was a need.

The precum was starting now, fully erect with the foreskin pulled back, and that gave him an idea. Mitsuushi's thighs were about as dry as you'd expect from a man of his age—of their age, he had to remind himself—but the slight lubrication was enough to make thrusting a little easier.

After a few minutes he was feeling a lot younger. Pretty damn vital, in fact. It had been a while since he'd had this. The only problem was that his partner's mood didn't seem to have improved any.

"If you wanna contribute anything," he muttered, "feel free."

Mitsuushi grumbled into the tatami.

"I'm gonna stop if you're not liking this."

"I said..." Mitsuushi raised himself up on his elbows with a little effort. "I said—you... don't have to stop, if you don't want to—"

Nakamachi sighed. "Can you just, for once, tell me what you actually want?"

"I'm trying!" Mitsuushi snapped. "I—I don't want you to stop!"

"All right, then." He settled back into the rhythm. "You know, you..." He racked his brain for the right words. What the hell did women like to hear at a time like this? "You, um... feel pretty good."

"Oh, God," Mitsuushi whimpered. "Don't say—oh, God. Nakamachi, please...!" His hips gave a shiver—damn, that really did feel good. "If you keep acting like that, I'm gonna... lose again..."

Please, not that again. "Okay, you can shut up now."

"You shut up."

"You—dammit, never mind."

Mitsuushi was panting pretty hard by now. "Grab me," he managed.

Nakamachi was doing pretty well just from the friction, so he complied.

"Not there—I mean grab me, I want... Mm. Unh—" He trailed off, struggling for words. "I wanna... feel your arms."

Well, hell, why not. He got him in a bearhug from behind pretty easily. Mitsuushi bucked up into him, back shivering against his chest, and came with a gasp. His whole body went slack, and his thighs squeezed together painfully, then loosened.

"Hey," Nakamachi began. "You're done already? We barely—" He blinked dizzily. He felt his cock, smarting from that squeeze, throb desperately against nothing. Mitsuushi groaned happily underneath him. "Ohh, shit," he gasped.

After that there didn't seem to be much point staying in position. He flopped over on his side, and a moment later Mitsuushi joined him on the floor.

"See, when you just ask for what you want..."

"Too embarrassing," Mitsuushi muttered, eyes half closed.

He was lost again. "Why? 'Cause we're both men? You got some hangup about that? Y'know, these days—"

"Because it's you!" Mitsuushi snapped, eyes wide open and glaring. "How am I supposed to ever come out on top if I'm begging you to fuck me and kiss me and—and hold me while I come..."

"You really like making problems for yourself, huh?"

"You asked me to be serious, Nakamachi! Well, I'm being serious! You always play innocent, but I never asked you to be so big and strong and hot, and—and everyone used to see how hard I was after our routine, they all knew I had to sneak away afterwards to jerk off like a teenager. But you—you never said a word!"

"You've got jizz on your chin," Nakamachi offered. It didn't make a big hit. "Look," he tried again, "I'm sorry about your feelings or whatever, but this isn't a competition, y'know. It never was. You just decided—where are you going?"

"I'm just going to go curl up in the corner and die."

"Oh, come on!" Honestly, he was about fed up. "You're talking about the old days? How am I supposed to respond to that? I was—not paying attention to you. I was practically married already. You know that."

"Right," Mitsuushi sniffed. "Your fairytale romance."

"Is this your idea of pillow talk? Do you have any idea how the whole afterglow thing works?"

"Go ahead and enlighten me!"

He pounced.

Mitsuushi was actually, surprisingly, pretty amenable to the whole cuddling thing. After a few minutes he was maybe about 70% mush. And maybe it was the afterglow talking, or even the booze, but he was a hell of a lot more tolerable like that too. So... what the hell. Might as well devote a few minutes to really making him melt.


He woke up with a crick in his neck, Mitsuushi drooling on his shoulder, and his sons gaping at him from about a meter away, eyes wide with horror.

A moment later the murmur of conversation became audible as the girls and Masaru rounded the side of the truck, only to die abruptly as they turned to follow Hiro and Nori's gaze. For a few seconds they just goggled. Then Naota came bounding up, a few paces behind the rest, nearly bowling over Shirogane, who despite the situation had the presence of mind to sidestep him nimbly. As he caught sight of them Naota too stopped in his tracks.

"Papa!" He was the first to break the stunned silence. Nakamachi winced in anticipation. "No one told me we had booze!" There was genuine hurt in his voice.

Mitsuushi had apparently come to life at some point, because at that he roused himself and sat up. "Naota," he said, very decisively, "shut up." With that, he rolled back over, seeming to feel his duty had been discharged.

"You could have mentioned it," Naota muttered, but he did so quietly.

"That's your issue here?!" Nori demanded.

"Yeah," said Hiro. "I mean, are you even gonna mention... that! Whatever that is!"

"Oh," Naota said. "Well, Papa's always finding someone new." Leaving the rest of them to digest that, he scrambled up into the truck, making a beeline for the glasses left on the table.

"Oh, dear," Liese said suddenly, breaking the silence again. "That's—er, I'm afraid that's right where I... sleep..." She trailed off miserably.

"They'll clean it up!" Virma said brightly. "In fact, I'm sure they'd be just delighted to let you sleep in the cab tonight while they really scrub the tatami out. Won't you, ringmaster?"

"Yeah, we'll..." Nakamachi cleared his throat. "You go ahead and do that, Liese. All of you can, uh... well, we'll get things cleaned up and settled here."

That seemed like it should've taken care of the most awkward part, but the boys were still taking it rough.

"Oh, god—Pops, we're not brothers with him now, are we?" Hiro jabbed a finger at Naota, who was holding the bottle up to the light and squinting intently.

Naota's jaw dropped, along with the bottle. With his left hand, he caught the bottle, if not his jaw, halfway to the floor. Nakamachi wondered idly if the boy'd ever practiced a juggling act. (Picking pockets seemed more likely.)

"Hey—that's right! Papa, you never brought home one with kids before! I can't adjust to this! I'm too old to adapt!"

"See?!" Hiro demanded. "No one wants this!"

"Looks to me like someone wanted it an awful lot," Virma said.

"Virma-san, please!"

"Liese-chan, I'm surprised you caught that. I didn't think you were so worldly."

"I mean," Liese said, her ears turning bright red nonetheless, "this is a family matter! We shouldn't be butting in. In fact, we should really just..."

"Liese, dear, what on earth is the point of being in the circus if you're not going to join in on the act?"

"I have never been in any circus with an act like that," Shirogane said firmly.

"Oh, really?" said Virma. "I thought you Europeans were more permissive about such things."

Shirogane refused to take the bait. "I was referring to the personal lives of the actors. Private entanglements are not something to be witnessed by the audience. We leave those backstage. And, in any case, we are performers—not an audience." She took Masaru by the shoulders. "Come along, young master. Tonight is fine weather to sleep under the stars. Let us be sure to roll out the tarp before we put our blankets down."

"Um," Masaru said. "Yeah, that sounds like a good idea."

"Yes," said Liese, clearly pleased to be able to escape. "Let us do that."

"Honestly," Virma called after them, "none of you are any fun!"

The frown on Naota's face was still expanding. "Wait a second. If you're living with him, does this mean he gets half our stuff?"

"You don't have any stuff, dumbass! All the stuff is ours!"

"I'm not giving up anything," Nori insisted. "I'll fight you for it."

"We'll both fight you," said Hiro. "You climb up first, bro, I'll follow you."

"You climb up first."

"Hold it just a second," Naota interrupted. "As the new oldest brother..." A very unpleasant grin spread across his face.

"Oh, God, no," Nori groaned.

"You two can call me big brother from now on."

"Pops!" His sons had fallen back into that annoying habit of wailing for his help like a pair of baby birds. Granted, the Mitsuushi duo were doing their best impersonation of a cowbird and its overfed youngster on the hunt for a new nest, but Nakamachi was well past his egg-sitting days and it was high time the boys learned to use their own wings. If only long enough for him to sleep off this headache.

"For my first act," Naota announced, "I declare the back of the truck off-limits for anyone whose name happens to start with Nakamachi."

"The hell you do."

"Sleeping on the ground builds character. Ask anyone. And you two need all the character you can get."

"So you're ready to make this two against one, that what you're saying?"

Naota retreated a few steps but held firm. "I'm the one with the hardest job here. I have to learn how to harden my heart, how to be the kind of big brother who can teach his dear stupid jackass baby brothers how to live like real me—"

"No one is brothers with anyone!" Nakamachi roared. "Except you two," he added to Hiro and Nori. "You're still brothers. Now, look," he went on. "This, here, this is not... anything. It's not a wedding, it's not an engagement, it's just a little backstage... entanglement, like Shirogane says. Nothing's about to change around here.  So if you'd all calm down, clear out, and give me a chance to get my pants on, that'd be great. And then we can all get on with our lives."

He waited. The dismay on his sons' faces—and the pout on Naota's at being reprimanded—didn't fade.

"In other words: this is none of your business, kids, so get the hell out!"

The boys sulked off. Naota seemed to think he'd managed to pocket the bottle subtly, and Nakamachi didn't care enough to correct him. He turned to Mitsuushi.

"You planning to wake up any time soon?"

"No."

"Well, great. I'll clean up, then. Don't bother helping or anything."

Wrapping the blanket awkwardly around his waist, he retrieved his pants from where he'd tossed them a few feet away. He turned back just in time to see Virma jab Mitsuushi in the small of the back with her folded sunglasses.

"I got us lost on the way back. I hope you used the time well."

"Yeah," Mitsuushi said, a little dreamily. "Actually—" He sat bolt upright. "Get out!"

"Oh, so 'kids' includes me?" She darted back with a wolfish grin. "I guess at your age it would, wouldn't it? Got it! I'll keep them out of your hair for a while longer. Remember, we're not too far away, so try not to stargaze too loudly—oh, assistant ringmaster, you'll never replace my act with that kind of aim." She made her exit.

"Have you seen my left shoe?"

"I threw it at Virma."

Nakamachi threw his hands into the air. "All right, thanks for that. That really puts the capper on the evening."

"It's not like you need to walk anywhere," Mitsuushi grumbled into his own elbow.

Had he heard that right?

"What is that, an invitation?"

"If you want." He sat back up, bristling at his own words. "Not that you need one! It's your truck! You can sleep where you want."

Nakamachi's knees were still reminding him that he'd overdone it earlier; a nap hadn't been enough to fix that or the fact that he was still a little drunk. But unlike the idiot in front of him, he wasn't fool enough to tell himself that was the only reason he felt like curling back up and getting in a little more cuddling.

After, of course, he was done cleaning up.