for he was a beautiful fiction
Rating: General Audiences Fandom: ヒプノシスマイク | Hypnosis Mic (Albums) Relationship: Arisugawa Dice/Yumeno Gentaro Characters: Arisugawa Dice, Yumeno Gentaro Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Storytelling, Rakugo, Dreamscapes Word Count: 10181 Summary:
If I win, you’ll tell me our story.
That gave the boy pause, midway through cutting the cards, though maybe he should have known that Dice would ask for the last thing anyone might have expected.
Ours?
Yeah, silly! Like, one with the two of us in it.
In which two boys walk in dreams, and come to life.
We tell ourselves stories in order to live.
— Joan Didion
The bolts of cloth in the tailor’s shop come in more colors than Shibuya-ku at night. For all he’s been visiting this shop since he was a boy, Gentaro’s not above still finding some wonder in it all, admiring the twist and loop of gold and silver embroidery through midnight-blue brocade, the drape of red silk crepe around a dressform.
Today the tailor himself is out on another appointment, so it’s his son who’s brought Gentaro’s new clothes from the backroom, and stands now examining the new hakama, the crested haori, hands measuring out the width of Gentaro’s shoulders to ascertain that everything fits as it should. He hums as he works, but his eyes are sharp enough to thread a needle unaided, so of course he sees when Gentaro’s gaze wanders.
“That dark green there with the gold leaves. That would look so pretty on you, bring out your eyes and all.” His sigh is so exaggerated Gentaro has no trouble at all imagining him on a stage. “It’s a shame you never want anything but black.”
“You save even my poor taste all the time, Ramuda.”
The truth is Gentaro likes black. He likes the elegant understatement, but moreover he likes the way his body disappears into it—what is a storyteller, after all, if not an expert in the art of vanishing? But the secrets of Gentaro’s trade aren’t Ramuda’s concern; he hums, probably half in concession and half in derision, and folds himself down onto the floor to sit at Gentaro’s feet. The little plastic case he produces from his back pocket is full of sewing pins, their heads bright pink and yellow and aquamarine.
“That I definitely do. You could make it up to me with a story, Yumeno-sensei.”
The sound of the name raises a chill along his spine and makes all the hairs on the back of his neck stand, but Gentaro is nothing if not a consummate performer. “Yumeno-sensei is my master.”
Ramuda beams up at him, as if to say, Ah, but for how much longer? “They say you’ve been writing your own stories. That you’ll debut one next week when you inherit the name.” His fingers twist and fold the hakama at the hem, and he slides one of his pins into place where the last few inches need to be taken in. “But nobody knows what it’s about, because you’ve been keeping it a secret even from your closest friends.”
“That’s certainly news to me. I wasn’t aware I had friends.”
“That’s cold.” Ramuda laughs, secures another pin. “Aren’t we friends?”
It’s a joke they’ve shared since the days of their apprenticeship, to call themselves two birds of the same twisted feather. Ramuda loves to tease and mock, to say what he means aslant until the very act of conversing with him feels like work—and Gentaro, when he isn’t being put through this work himself, thinks he can appreciate that. It’s almost a shame, really, that he wasn’t born to the theater. But perhaps, seen from a different angle, perhaps it’s also a relief.
“One little story, Yumeno-sensei. Even if it’s not the one you’re keeping closest to your heart, that’s fine with me.”
Watching his own face in the mirror, just as he’s practiced, Gentaro smiles back.
“I never could refuse you anything.”
Continue on AO3.
